I have come to the conclusion that capitalism is successful primarily because it can impose the majority of the costs associated with its economic activities on outside parties and on the environment. In other words, capitalists make profits because their…
We are often told that the invasion and occupation of Iraq and the war in Syria are disastrous failures of Western foreign policy. This article, however, argues that the architects of these wars were, and are, well aware of the…
Economists and tax experts push back against White House reported plan to slash corporate rate by 60 percent. With reports that President Donald Trump wants to slash the corporate tax rate by 60 percent and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin claiming…
Submitted by: ButtCracker — What I believe to be the true significance of the mix-up over the wanderings of the USS Carl Vinson has been entirely missed, even by the alternative media. I think it provides an intriguing insight into…
In the midst of complaining about the Islamist threat to Israel and the world, Bibi Netanyahu conveniently forgets that his own country enjoys a tacit alliance with ISIS in Syria. It is an alliance of convenience to be sure and one that’s not…
Submitted by: ButtCracker — You could hear the deep sadness in the preacher’s voice as he named “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today — my own government.” With those words, Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. launched a scathing indictment of…
Originally published: April 29, 2013: — In mid-March, the Wall Street Journal carried a long discussion of the origins of the Bretton Woods system, the international financial framework that governed the Western world for decades after World War II. A…
It is widely known that the U.S.-led NATO intervention to topple Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi in 2011 resulted in a power vacuum that has allowed terror groups like ISIS to gain a foothold in the country. Despite the destructive consequences of…
Submitted by: ButtCracker — The real Donald Trump has been exposed. The man who promised a sensible and non-interventionist Middle Eastern policy and a reset with Moscow has now reneged on both pledges. His nitwit United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley…
As Yemen’s population has teetered on the brink of mass starvation in recent months, the United States has played a crucial role in enabling the Saudi strategy responsible for that potential humanitarian catastrophe. Both the Obama and Trump administrations have…
President Trump’s missile attack on Syria – without waiting for an investigation of Syria’s alleged role in a poison-gas attack – has dashed hopes that he might take U.S. foreign policy in a less warlike direction. My days of hoping for…
Increasingly, under the mantra of liquidity, trading activity on Wall Street that would have resulted in criminal charges in another era is yawned at by regulators. The week that Donald Trump shocked markets around the globe by getting himself elected…
Submitted by: ButtCracker — Protecting internet privacy should be a bipartisan issue, right? After all, Americans seem united in their dislike of the phone and cable behemoths that dominate internet service in the US. More importantly, the principle of protecting…
The right to protest is fundamental to American democracy. The country was born, after all, out of decades of civil disobedience by people angry about taxation without representation. (In Washington, FWIW, we are still angry.) But according to United Nations…
Although many details are still hazy because of secrecy – and further befogged by politics – it appears House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes was informed last week about invasive electronic surveillance of senior U.S. government officials and, in turn,…
Security measures are often exercises in futility. Resembling placebos, they are the reassurance authorities make as acts of intrusive inconvenience. Queues are increased at airports in the vain hope that an elusive gel carrier will be nabbed before the next…
The S&P 500 Index and CBOE Volatility Index have historically moved in opposite directions about 80 percent of the time, but that’s changed recently… As Bloomberg reports, both gauges are heading for declines this month, after the two rose in…
Doris Portillo keeps the door to her father’s old room closed to avoid remembering the last few months of his life. It’s a small room, barely large enough for a bed, a small bureau, and a television, all of which…
The Trump kleptocrats are political arsonists. They are carting cans of gasoline into government agencies and Congress to burn down any structure or program that promotes the common good and impedes corporate profit. They ineptly have set themselves on fire…
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova described it this way weeks after US-led terror-bombing and Iraqi ground operations began last October – long before the worst horrors ongoing now. US-orchestrated operations are being conducted under “conditions of absolute information blockade,” Zakharova explained.…
