Hurts So Good: When Exactly Are Falling Prices Bad?
While falling prices may strike the layman as cause for celebration, economists believe that it can kick off a nasty, and often inescapable, negative cycle, which many believe leads inevitably to a prolonged recession, or even a depression. However, these same economists acknowledge that falling energy prices may offer a stimulus, equivalent to an enormous “tax cut,” particularly for lower and middle income consumers for whom energy costs represent a major portion of disposable income. They suggest that the money consumers and businesses no longer spend on gasoline and heating oil could be spent on other goods and services thereby creating demand in other areas of the economy. Even Fed Chair Janet Yellen, a staunch advocate of the economic benefits of rising consumer prices, has extolled the benefits of falling oil prices.
Trust Reputation, Beware of Regulation
For most of history, our ancestors lived in clans with other family members, or in small villages. Everyone pretty much knew who was trustworthy. People behaved better because they wanted good relationships with family members and neighbors. It’s one reason that today we trust friends and family more than strangers.
Only recently have humans interacted with lots of people. Today, “50 percent of the population lives in cities,” points out entrepreneur Julien Smith. “We’re surrounded by strangers, and you end up with these systems in place that progressively get built (to determine:) ‘should I trust this person?'”
Thomas Sowell’s Basic Economics
“Whether one is a conservative or a radical, a protectionist or a free trader, a cosmopolitan or a nationalist, a churchman or a heathen, it is useful to know the causes and consequences of economic phenomena.” That quotation, from Nobel laureate George J. Stigler, is how Dr. Thomas Sowell begins the fifth edition of “Basic Economics.” It’s a book that explains complex economic phenomena in a way that many economists cannot. And, I might add, it provides an understanding of some economic phenomena that might prove elusive to a Ph.D. economist.
Early Presidential Prospects
With 2015 just getting under way, the buzz of
political activity makes it seem almost as if we are already in the
midst of the 2016 presidential campaign.Among the Democrats, Hillary Clinton is honing her message to appeal to the mindset of the left wing of her party, whose support she will need in her second attempt to get the nomination as the Democrats’ presidential candidate in 2016.
Paris: City of Darkness
Had the French government adopted a consistent policy of protecting the freedom of speech, nothing like today’s attack on the satirical magazine, Charlie Hebdo, would ever have occurred. Muslims and Islam would not be so visible in France had the government also put out the unwelcome mat to Muslim “refugees,” as most European and American governments have. With the Muslim “refugees” and “asylum seekers” came Islam, on one hand, the cruddiest “religion” on the face of the earth, and, on the other, a totalitarian system of slavery and submission, applicable to Muslims and infidels alike.
Boom Goes The Dynamite: The Crashing Price Of Oil Is Going To Rip The Global Economy To Shreds
If you were waiting for a “black swan event” to come along and devastate the global economy, you don’t have to wait any longer. As I write this, the price of U.S. oil is sitting at $45.76 a barrel. It has fallen by more than 60 dollars a barrel since June. There is only one other time in history when we have seen anything like this happen before. That was in 2008, just prior to the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. But following the financial crisis of 2008, the price of oil rebounded fairly rapidly. As you will see below, there are very strong reasons to believe that it will not happen this time. And the longer the price of oil stays this low, the worse our problems are going to get. At a price of less than $50 a barrel, it is just a matter of time before we see a huge wave of energy company bankruptcies, massive job losses, a junk bond crash followed by a stock market crash, and a crisis in commodity derivatives unlike anything that we have ever seen before. So let’s hope that a very unlikely miracle happens and the price of oil rebounds substantially in the months ahead. Because if not, the price of oil is going to absolutely rip the global economy to shreds.
89 Tips That Will Help You Prepare For The Coming Economic Depression
By Michael Snyder
What do we need to do in order to prepare for the coming economic collapse? Are there practical steps that we can take right now that will help us and our families survive the economic depression that is approaching? As the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, I get asked these kinds of questions a lot. Once people become convinced that an economic collapse is coming, they want to know what they should do. And so in this article I am going to share some key pieces of advice from some of the top experts in the entire country. If you are not convinced that economic disaster is on the way, this article might not be for you. Instead, I would encourage you to go to my website where you will find more than 1,200 articles that set out the case for the coming economic collapse in excruciating detail. For those of you that are interested in getting prepared, I apologize in advance for the outline format of this article. To examine each of these points in detail would take an entire book. In fact, I am the co-author of a book that will soon be published that discusses many of these things in great depth. But you don’t have to wait for a book to get prepared. Mostly, it comes down to common sense. In this article, I share 89 common sense tips that will help you get prepared for the coming economic depression. Hopefully a lot of people will find these to be very helpful.
This first set of tips are 11 things that I strongly encourage my readers to do…
What In The World Just Happened In Switzerland?
Central banks lie. That is what they do. Not too long ago, the Swiss National Bank promised that it would defend the euro/Swiss franc currency peg with the “utmost determination”. But on Thursday, the central bank shocked the financial world by abruptly abandoning it. More than three years ago, the Swiss National Bank announced that it would not allow the Swiss franc to fall below 1.20 to the euro, and it has spent a mountain of money defending that peg. But now that it looks like the EU is going to launch a very robust quantitative easing program, the Swiss National Bank has thrown in the towel. It was simply going to cost way too much to continue to defend the currency floor. So now there is panic all over Europe. On Thursday, the Swiss franc rose a staggering 30 percent against the euro, and the Swiss stock market plunged by 10 percent. And all over the world, investors, hedge funds and central banks either lost or made gigantic piles of money as currency rates shifted at an unprecedented rate. It is going to take months to really measure the damage that has been done. Meanwhile, the euro is in greater danger than ever. The euro has been declining for months, and now the number one buyer of euros (the Swiss National Bank) has been removed from the equation. As things in Europe continue to get even worse, expect the euro to go to all-time record lows. In addition, it is important to remember that the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s began when Thailand abandoned its currency peg. With this move by Switzerland set off a European financial crisis?
27 Facts That Show How The Middle Class Has Fared Under 6 Years Of Barack Obama
By Michael Snyder
During his State of the Union speech on Tuesday evening, Barack Obama is going to promise to make life better for middle class families. Of course he has also promised to do this during all of his other State of the Union addresses, but apparently he still believes that there are people out there that are buying what he is selling. Each January, he gets up there and tells us how the economy is “turning around” and to believe that much brighter days are right around the corner. And yet things just continue to get even worse for the middle class. The numbers that you are about to see will not be included in Obama’s State of the Union speech. They don’t fit the “narrative” that Obama is trying to sell to the American people. But all of these statistics are accurate. They paint a picture of a middle class that is dying. Yes, the decline of the U.S. middle class is a phenomenon that has been playing out for decades. But without a doubt, our troubles have accelerated during the Obama years. When it comes to economics, he is completely and utterly clueless, and the policies that he has implemented are eating away at the foundations of our economy like a cancer. The following are 27 facts that show how the middle class has fared under 6 years of Barack Obama…
Swiss Shocker Triggers Gigantic Losses For Banks, Hedge Funds And Currency Traders
By Michael Snyder
The absolutely stunning decision by the Swiss National Bank to decouple from the euro
has triggered billions of dollars worth of losses all over the globe.
Citigroup and Deutsche Bank both say that their losses were somewhere in
the neighborhood of 150 million dollars, a major hedge fund that had
830 million dollars in assets at the end of December has been forced to
shut down, and several major global currency trading firms have
announced that they are now insolvent. And these are just the losses
that we know about so far. It will be many months before the full scope
of the financial devastation caused by the Swiss National Bank is fully
revealed. But of course the same thing could be said about the crash
in the price of oil that we have witnessed in recent weeks. These two
“black swan events” have set financial dominoes in motion all over the
globe. At this point we can only guess how bad the financial
devastation will ultimately be.Government Control Freaks Finding New Ways to Run Your Life
Control freaks want to run your life. They call themselves “public servants.”
But whether student council president, environmental bureaucrat or member of Congress, most believe they know how to run your life better than you do.
I admit I was once guilty of this kind of thinking. As a young consumer reporter, I researched what doctors said was bad for us and what products might harm us. Then I demanded that the state pass rules to protect us from those things.
Big Government Santa Creates Welfare Dependency
It’s the season for giving.
That doesn’t mean it’s the season for government.
Government creates loyalty in the minds of citizens by pretending to be Santa Claus, doling out gifts and favors. Politicians claim they help those unfortunates who aren’t helped by coldhearted capitalism.
The truth is, government gets in the way of charity, making it harder for people to help others and for the poor to help themselves. It also gets in the way of commerce, which is what really makes people better off.
Face Facts: Islam is Not a Religion of Peace for Everyone
“Let’s be honest here. Islam has a problem.”
Those are key sentences in an incredibly hard-hitting speech that Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal will give in London on Monday. It is the toughest speech I have read on the whole issue of Islamic radicalism and its destructive, murdering, barbarous ways that are upsetting the entire world.
Bush vs Clinton 2016 Makes Many Voters Hopping Mad
Charlie Cook, a veteran inside-the-beltway political analyst, recently wrote of a focus group discussing the 2016 presidential election. He observed that the conversation among 12 Colorado voters “would be jarring to anyone who assumed that the nominations of Bush and Clinton are inevitable.” Cook added that, “When half a dozen voters in a conversation say they would back a law that would ban any Bush or Clinton from running, it makes you sit up and take notice.”
Illegal Aliens Attack Paper for Calling Them “Illegals”
I stand with the Santa Barbara News-Press. How about you?The newspaper is under fire for refusing to kowtow to left-wing word police and militant propagandists who demand unfettered illegal immigration. Last week, in the wake of angry protests against the publication, vandals threw paint bombs and spray-painted graffiti on its offices.
So, what exactly is the News-Press’ unforgivable crime? Calling illegal aliens “illegals” in a headline for a story about illegal aliens descending on California DMVs. A new law went into effect last Friday allowing illegal aliens to obtain driver’s licenses without proof of lawful residence. The article featured interviews with ecstatic illegal aliens, including one who has been in the country illegally for “22 years.”
What Makes ISIS Tick?
According to the New York Times, Maj. Gen. Michael K. Nagata, the commander
of American Special Operations forces in the Middle East, is trying to figure
out why the brutal Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) is such a dynamic
force in Iraq and Syria, but has been flummoxed. The general’s band of graybeards
couldn’t seem to figure out what appeals to young radical Islamists who are
migrating to ISIS’s war in those two countries from around the world. The aim
is to learn about the appeal of the group to counter it with American counter-propaganda.
Is Another Eurozone Crisis at Hand?
If you have any spare cash laying around and need of a vacation, Chevy Chase
would probably recommend that you go to Europe. The euro currency has dipped
to a nine-year low against the dollar. That is good for tourists going to Europe,
but is not good for European economic prospects in the long term. Why?
Terror in Europe
The January 7 massacre at the offices of Charlie Hebdo magazine and
the subsequent hostage standoff at a kosher supermarket – resulting in the death
of 15 civilians, two police, and three terrorists – were much smaller in scope
than the September 11, 2001 attacks in the US. Yet they have had almost the
same impact, throwing not only France but much of Western Europe into turmoil
and raising questions about Muslim immigration, foreign policy and government
(in)competence.
The Sick Man of Europe
The Paris terrorist attacks
are an alarming symptom of sickness: a matrix of cultural, economic,
and political diseases that, taken together, spell Europe’s doom. Can we
diagnose the illness, and, perhaps, prescribe a cure?
An examination of the European body politic is the first order of business: how healthy is this creature? For diseases don’t break out in a vacuum: they erupt because the organism’s immune system is somehow compromised. The air is filled with pathogens galore, but most have no effect because they are fought off by the body’s natural defenses. Yet here the germs have overwhelmed these, and the result is that the body is at war with itself. A civil war, in other words, in which society turns on itself and tears itself apart.
An examination of the European body politic is the first order of business: how healthy is this creature? For diseases don’t break out in a vacuum: they erupt because the organism’s immune system is somehow compromised. The air is filled with pathogens galore, but most have no effect because they are fought off by the body’s natural defenses. Yet here the germs have overwhelmed these, and the result is that the body is at war with itself. A civil war, in other words, in which society turns on itself and tears itself apart.
The Uses of Charlie Hebdo
Six months ago, 20-year-old Christopher
Lee Cornell, an American convert to Islam living with his parents in Green
Township, Ohio, attracted the attention of the FBI. We don’t know the reason
for their initial interest, although it’s likely Cornell’s vocal adherence to
Muslim religious beliefs had much to do with it. In any case, he was put under
surveillance and, at some point, an FBI informant seeking leniency for crimes
he had committed got in touch with Cornell at the Bureau’s request. This was
the genesis of the "terrorist plot" to bomb the Capitol in Washington
the feds are trumpeting as a triumph that demonstrates both their competence
and the alleged danger the "Islamic State" poses to Americans on American
soil.
The bonfire that lit up Iguala’s darkest night
Reconstructing the events surrounding the capture and death of 43 Mexican students
A student’s desk at the Escuela Normal de Ayotzinapa. / SAÚL RUIZ
The night of September 26, 23-year-old Ernesto Guerrero saw the mouth of a Colt AR-15 pointing at him.
– Go or I kill you.
He didn’t know it at the time, but the officer was saving
him from certain death. It was nothing to do with chance or pity, but
plain logistics. As Ernesto would remember weeks later, municipal police
officers had dozens of student teachers from the Escuela Rural Normal
de Ayotzinapa lying face down on the asphalt and were taking them away
in trucks. The vehicles were so full that Iguala police asked officers
from the nearby town of Cocula for help and when Ernesto, armed with
courage, approached to ask about the fate of his friends, they no longer
had time or space for one more. They pointed the rifle at him and
warned him to go away. “I saw my schoolmates disappear down the avenue,”
he remembers. That was the last time he knew anything about them.
That day, Ernesto and two busloads of almost 100 student
teachers had arrived in Iguala from Ayotzinapa. The radical and
rebellious students were going to collect funds for their activities, as
they had on other occasions. This meant panhandling on the city’s main
roads, entering a few business establishments and even cutting off a
street.
Mexican drug gangs kidnapping bus passengers to turn them into hitmen
Criminal organizations in Tamaulipas state are growing their ranks through forced recruitment
Jan MartÃnez Ahrens
Mexico City
A soldier at a checkpoint in San Fernando, Tamaulipas. / REUTERS
The cattle-raising towns of Estación-Manuel and Aldama lie
37.5 kilometers apart. The trip by car takes an average 27 minutes. It
is a short if somewhat torturous ride, but the new bus lines, which
feature internet and bathroom facilities, make it comfortable enough –
that’s unless you doze off and get woken up by a group of hooded men
offering a ticket to hell.
Ayotzinapa, the cradle of Mexico’s rebel teachers
The town’s students, like those killed in Iguala, have a history of fighting for social causes
Juan Diego Quesada
Ayotzinapa
A demonstration for the missing students in Guerrero. / AP
To attend the teacher training college in Ayotzinapa,
students need to pass an exam and agree to an evaluation of their
family’s finances. Bernardo Flores is the son of a farmer. His file
notes two family assets: an adobe home with a zinc roof and an old mare.
Flores fulfilled the low-income requirements and showed the will to
become a teacher in one of the rural communities scattered in the
mountains. He became an exemplary student. “El Cochi” – as he is known –
has been missing for 12 days. On September 26, he and 42 other students
were kidnapped by Iguala’s municipal police, a security force controlled by organized crime.
The school is located on a country road, three hours from
Mexico City. Most students are from farming families that grow corn and
beans. They study and sleep in shared rooms. Decisions about internal
rules and regulations are taken by assemblies where members vote by a
show of hands and the revolutionary rhetoric is strong. Messages on the
walls of the hallways champion the struggle of workers and farmers. “The
cradle of social conscience,” one poster at the entrance says. Poverty,
violence and political corruption in the southeastern Mexican state of
Guerrero create the ideal breeding ground for generations of idealistic
youths who reject the status quo.
Tension rises in Guerrero more than 100 days after Iguala tragedy
Parents of missing trainee teachers clash with Mexican army at demonstration
Paula Chouza
Mexico City
Protestors set a truck on fire in Chilpancingo, Guerrero on Monday, January 12. / JESUS GUERRERO (AFP)
Demonstrators protested in a dozen Mexican cities on Monday
to pressure authorities to continue the search for 43 missing trainee
teachers who disappeared on September 26, 2014 after clashing with
municipal police in Iguala, Guerrero.
In November, the Enrique Peña Nieto administration claimed the students’ bodies were burnt at a dump site
located around 30 kilometers from where they were abducted. Authorities
identified one of the students, Alexander Mora, among the remains found
at the waste yard. But family members still harbor doubts over the way
the case is being handled, and the tension continues to rise more than
100 days after the disappearances.
Argentina leader accused of cover-up over 1994 Jewish center bombing
Prosecutor says Fernández de Kirchner conspired to hide Iran’s involvement in case
Francisco Peregil
Buenos Aires
Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and her foreign minister, Héctor Timerman, attend a Mercosur summit in Mendoza in 2012. / ENRIQUE MARCARIAN (REUTERS)
A prosecutor investigating the fatal 1994 car bombing of a Jewish
center in Buenos Aires has accused Argentinean President Cristina
Fernández de Kirchner and some members of her government of conspiring
to cover up Iran’s involvement.
Alberto Nisman, who has been investigating the attack at the Israeli-Argentina Mutual Association (AMIA), which left 85 people dead and dozens injured, demanded that Fernández Kirchner and government officials testify about their roles in reaching an agreement in 2013 with Iran regarding the inquiry.
Alberto Nisman, who has been investigating the attack at the Israeli-Argentina Mutual Association (AMIA), which left 85 people dead and dozens injured, demanded that Fernández Kirchner and government officials testify about their roles in reaching an agreement in 2013 with Iran regarding the inquiry.
Prosecutor investigating Argentinean president found dead
Latin America
Nisman had accused Fernández de Kirchner of cover-up over 1994 Jewish center bombing
Francisco Peregil
Buenos Aires
The body of prosecutor Alberto Nisman is carried out of his apartment on Sunday. / reuters
The Argentinean special prosecutor who last week formally accused
President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner of taking part in a cover-up
to derail the investigation into the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community
center was found dead at his home on Sunday.
Authorities found the body of 51-year-old Alberto Nisman in his apartment in the Puerto Madero district of Buenos Aires just a day before he was scheduled to appear in Congress to explain the charges he recommended should be brought against the president and government officials.
Authorities found the body of 51-year-old Alberto Nisman in his apartment in the Puerto Madero district of Buenos Aires just a day before he was scheduled to appear in Congress to explain the charges he recommended should be brought against the president and government officials.
Sunday, January 18, 2015
Rancher’s Terrifying Discovery Suggests 9-11 Is About To Happen Again
Mike Vickers, pictured above, owns a 1,000 acre ranch in Texas. He claims that at least 30 illegal immigrants cross his ranch each day as they illegally make their way into the U.S. He often finds things they leave behind, sometimes intentionally, and sometimes not so intentionally.
Last summer, Vickers discovered something quite frightening that had been accidentally dropped by an illegal immigrant; an Urdu dictionary.
What is an Urdu dictionary?
Urdu is the language spoken in Pakistan and in parts of Afghanistan and India. It is believed by many that radical Islamic extremists have been crossing the border from Mexico, into the U.S., and preparing for something catastrophic. But Vickers’ finding is merely fact. So if you want to continue to believe Hussein Obama that Islam is a ‘beautiful religion of peace,’ stick your head back in the sand now, and whatever you do, do not watch the video below, because it contains the truth.
Read more at http://patriotnewswire.com/2015/01/video-ranchers-terrifying-discovery-suggests-9-11-happen/
Obama Busted in What May Be the Crime of the Century… Impeach Him NOW
Obama Busted in What May Be the Crime of the Century… Impeach Him NOW
BREAKING: The CIA’s own report shows that the White House itself had direct involvement in the agency’s spying on the United States Senate.
This is far worse than Watergate … this act of subversion demands immediate impeachment and jail time for any and all involved.
And some of those involved would appear to be among President Barack Obama’s inner circle of most trusted advisers, making it an open question as to how much the president himself knew about this unconstitutional exercise of power by the CIA.
Saturday, January 17, 2015
Lamenting Liberty Lost
Unless we have a radical change, we will continue our march toward the federal destruction of the presumption of liberty.
A British author, residing in the United States for the past 30
years, created a small firestorm earlier this week with his candid
observations that modern-day Americans have been duped by the
government into accepting a European-style march toward socialism
because we fail to appreciate the rich legacy of personal liberty
that is everyone's birthright and is expressly articulated in the
Declaration of Independence and guaranteed by the U.S.
Constitution.
French Government Shows Stunning Hypocrisy on Free Speech
Arrests for speech at a march in support of free speech? Mais oui!
The photos of 40 of the world's government leaders marching
arm-in-arm along a Paris boulevard on Sunday with the president of
the United States not among them was a provocative image that has
fomented much debate. The march was, of course, in direct response
to the murderous attacks on workers at the French
satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo by a pair of brothers
named Kouachi, and on shoppers at a Paris kosher supermarket by
one of the brothers' comrades.
American Sniper and Blackhat
Bradley Cooper commandeers Clint Eastwood’s powerful war movie, Chris Hemsworth withers in Michael Mann’s cyber-crime misfire.
Warner BrosWhatever
Clint Eastwood’s exact politics may be—kind of libertarian? sort of
conservative?—his new movie, American Sniper, waves
no flags for America’s involvement in the Iraq War. In recounting
the true story of Navy SEAL Chris Kyle, said to be the deadliest
sniper in U.S. military history, Eastwood marshals deep feelings
about the moral and physical destruction of war, and flashing anger
toward the higher-ups who guide young warriors to their doom.
He doesn’t flinch from showing us the full ugliness of
combat—American forces violently invading an Iraqi home, a
vicious jihadi taking a power drill to a helpless civiliian—but
this is in no way an old-school Hollywood war movie. Eastwood never
exults in the brutal action, and throughout the film we can feel
his disgust.The Congress That Cried Wolf
It's time for lawmakers to stop abusing the emergency-spending loophole.
The newly dominant GOP swept into Washington after November
muttering promises about fiscal discipline. But the last time
Republicans controlled Congress, they utterly failed to rein in
their profligate ways. Their favorite trick: passing large
supplemental spending bills and labeling routine funding as
"emergency."
In theory, supplemental appropriations—and emergency-designated funds in particular—are intended to provide necessary infusions of cash on matters so unforeseen that they couldn't have been expected to make it into this year's budget and so urgent that they cannot wait for next year's. The Budget Enforcement Act, passed in 1990 to facilitate deficit reduction, gave emergency-designated funding special exemptions from budget restraints.
In theory, supplemental appropriations—and emergency-designated funds in particular—are intended to provide necessary infusions of cash on matters so unforeseen that they couldn't have been expected to make it into this year's budget and so urgent that they cannot wait for next year's. The Budget Enforcement Act, passed in 1990 to facilitate deficit reduction, gave emergency-designated funding special exemptions from budget restraints.
Obama's 2014 State of the Union Scorecard
The president didn't get much of his wish list last year and he'll get even less this time. That's a good thing.
On Tuesday night, January 21, President Barack Obama will deliver his seventh State of the Union address (SOTU). He will offer a laundry list of initiatives that will be familiar to anyone who watched any of his previous speeches.
If you plan on watching, here's a piece of advice from someone who gets paid to pay attention to politicians: Don't bother.
When control in Washington is divided between parties, the president generally doesn't get his wish list fulfilled. That's usually a good thing, by the way.
Last year's SOTU is illustrative (full text here). Here's a roundup what the president proposed last year and what has actually happened.
Inside Stalin's Head
A biography offers fresh insights on one of history's bloodiest dictators.
We all think we know Stalin. He
was the brutal and vengeful dictator of the Soviet Union from the
late 1920s until 1953, when, mercifully, he died before he could do
any more damage. He was the instigator of forced industrialization
and collectivization, taking his country down a dead-end path to
modernity from which its heirs are still trying to recover. As the
valued ally of Great Britain and the United States during World War
II, he was responsible for his country's great victory over Nazism,
which cost, sometimes senselessly, the lives of 27 million Soviet
citizens. He was the primary author of the Cold War, instigating
such crises as the Berlin Blockade and the Korean conflict. Stalin
killed millions of people-party rivals, army officers, "kulaks"
(supposedly rich peasants), ex-tsarist bureaucrats and nobles,
nationalities, "asocials" (alleged prostitutes, petty thieves,
gamblers, the chronically homeless and unemployed, etc.), and
innumerable "counterrevolutionaries." He used the famine of the
early 1930s to commit genocide against the Ukrainians. He deported
and murdered hundreds of thousands of Soviet Poles, Germans,
Koreans, Chechens-Ingush, Crimean Tatars, Kalmyks-the list goes on
and on.Ted Cruz: Loose Cannon or Libertarian Reformer?
The Texas senator might be just crazy enough to win the GOP presidential nomination.
Credit: Gage SkidmoreAs they used to say in the old westerns, it was quiet out there-too quiet. So no one was really surprised when Ted Cruz announced to The Washington Post the weekend before the November election that his brief flirtation with civilized behavior was nearing its end.
For months, the Texas senator had abandoned his "the guy with dynamite strapped to his chest" persona, as one Republican political strategist describes it, to be a team player, crisscrossing the country to campaign for GOP candidates. No filibusters on the Senate floor to hold the federal budget hostage to the repeal of Obamacare; no fundraising letters on behalf of Tea Party insurgents seeking to knock off what Cruz likes to call "squishy" Republican incumbents.
When It Comes to Racial Strife, Forget the Facts
Some of us, who are old enough to remember the old television police series “Dragnet,” may remember Sgt. Joe Friday saying, “Just the facts, ma’am.” But that would be completely out of place today. Facts are becoming obsolete, as recent events have demonstrated.
What matters today is how well you can concoct a story that fits people’s preconceptions and arouses their emotions.
Politicians like New York mayor Bill de Blasio, professional demagogues like Al Sharpton and innumerable irresponsible people in the media have shown that they have great talent in promoting a lynch mob atmosphere toward the police.
Ben Carson: Americans Would Benefit from Israeli-style Optimism
Like many other Americans, I have always had a desire to travel to Israel and visit firsthand the many historical sites of spiritual significance. I was recently afforded the opportunity to fulfill that desire and was not disappointed.
In addition to being greatly inspired, I spoke with numerous Israeli citizens from a variety of backgrounds. One overwhelming theme in those conversations was the feeling of abandonment by the United States government. Some of the more diplomatic individuals said they felt sidelined by a U.S. government that had more important issues to deal with. Of course, they had not forgotten the times that our military and financial aid saved them from utter defeat at the hands of their numerous local enemies.
Republicans Have the Edge for the White House in 2016
With a simple Facebook post, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush became the first person to express interest in the 2016 Republican presidential nomination. He’ll have plenty of company in the near future, as nearly two dozen others have unofficially expressed similar interests. To say the race is wide open is an understatement.
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