Archive - Apr 2015

"Greece is drawing up drastic plans to nationalise the country's banking system and introduce a parallel currency to pay bills unless the eurozone takes steps to defuse the simmering crisis and soften its demands," The Telegraph reports, contradicting officials' "categorical" denial that the country faces a cash crunch and possible default as early as April 9. Will the curtain finally fall on the long-running tragicomedy that is the Greco-Euro standoff? 

In recent weeks, there has been a lot of concern that an upcoming eight week military exercise on U.S. soil known as “Jade Helm” is actually a dress rehearsal for the imposition of martial law in this country. As our world becomes increasingly unstable, and as our society rapidly decays from within, many believe that it is only a matter of time before the executive branch will have sufficient excuse to use the extensive martial law powers that it has been accumulating since 9/11. When that day arrives, what will our nation look like? What would actually happen if martial law was declared in America?

The Obama administration has "screwed up" on its way to deal with the China-proposed Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and "should not have done in this way," former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said on Tuesday.

"I think $8,900 is a fair price. But if you want to pay more, then that's fine too......... My goodness! Dec corn got slaughtered yesterday...... down another 20 cents after the Planting Intentions report....... Let's make it $8,500 and everyone goes home a winner!"

In the case of the U.S., which thanks to its pool of capital, political and military power, enjoys the exorbitant privilege of having the world's reserve currency, an expansive Fed will not even necessarily "throw seniors under the bus", as one of Bernanke's critics once mentioned, suggesting that monetary expansion erodes life savings of senior citizens. A lot of the monetary expansion results in investment bubbles all over the planet. Some even have "credited" Bernanke with triggering the Arab "Spring", as food prices in the Middle East rose from mid-2010 to an unsustainable level after quantitative easing was re-started. It looks like Bernanke, or at least the institution he presided, is more powerful than he seems to think.

In America’s fraudulent oligarch economy in which corruption and theft have become the preferred means to earn money, it’s no surprise doctors feel a need to participate. “Mr. Rorie was recruiting homeless people, prosecutors said, ...after hours of unnecessary tests and fake diagnoses, the homeless people would be sent off with sneakers - selected from stacks of shoeboxes in the clinics’ basements... "We can use the same patients like guinea pigs for anything we want,” Mr. Vainer was recorded saying in a government wiretap." Do no harm indeed.

"Approximately 10 percent of ozone pollution in California’s San Joaquin Valley is estimated to be coming from outside of the state’s borders, particularly from Asia," a study by UC Davis notes, as evidence mounts that China may be "exporting" its abundant supply of smog.

Russia possesses tremendous opportunity for growth and with no lack of suitors – east or west – Putin is in no hurry to pander to the US or EU hardliners.

Friends, enemies, frenemies, anemones, or nemeses?

Before you think about holding out for a taxpayer government-sponsored bailout on your student loans, you may want to check the laws in your state because as it turns out, you may end up losing your driver’s license or worse, your barber’s license.

A new National Geographic documentary looks at illegal drug use in America. "It seems Vermonters are buying and selling much more than maple syrup and dairy products..."

The truth will set her free?

We are at an important juncture as a global society: either we immediately prioritize a new trajectory focused on creating a positive, functional future or -- by continuing the consumptive, extractive, exploitative status quo -- we will default into a nasty nightmare. What will determine which future path we take is our collective narrative. It's the story we tell ourselves -- who we are, what we value.

Back in early 2007, just as the first cracks of the bursting housing and credit bubble were becoming visible, one of the primary harbingers of impending doom was banks slowly but surely yanking availability (aka dry powder) under secured revolving credit facilities to companies across America. This, in effect, was the first snowflake in what would ultimately become the lack of liquidity avalanche that swept away AIG and unleashed the biggest bailout of capitalism in history. Back then, analysts had a pet name for banks calling CFOs and telling them "so sorry, but your secured credit availability has been cut by 50%, 75% or worse" - revolver raids. Well, the infamous revolver raids are back.