Iraq

• GOP debate winners and losers (Hill)
• European Stocks Rise as Dollar Weakens; Metals Decline on China (BBG)
• Global shares shrug off mixed China data, copper teeters near six-year low (Reuters)
• Fed's Evans: Looking forward to time when Fed can raise rates (Reuters)
• Alibaba’s Global Ambitions Face Counterfeit Challenge (WSJ)
• China Rebalancing Takes Hold as Output Slows, Retail Jumps (BBG)

There is “a barbarous relic” in our global monetary system. It is the U.S. dollar: the worthless, monetary relic of an empire in decline.

According to the U.S. State Government 2013-2015 Foreign Assistance report, an estimated $5.9 billion was spent on foreign military funding alone in fiscal year 2014.  This is equivalent to 17% of the estimated $35 billion spent on total global aid discussed in our previous article. U.S. foreign military aid to countries ranged from $200,000 to $3.1 billion. Of the top 10 recipients, two countries received 75% of the $5.9 billion.

Empires, like adolescents, think they’ll live forever. In geopolitics, as in biology, expiration dates are never visible. When death comes, it’s always a shock. "At the beginning of the great unraveling, in 2015, I was still a young man. Like everyone else, I didn’t see this coming. Today, in 2050, fewer and fewer people can recall what it was like to live among those leviathans... Thirty-five years and endless catastrophes later on a poorer, bleaker, less hospitable planet, it’s clear that we just weren’t paying sufficient attention. Had we been listening, we would have heard the termites. There, in the basement of our common home, they were eating the very foundations out from under us. Suddenly, before we knew quite what was happening, all that was solid had melted into air."

First the good news: with a cold winter about to slam Europe where thousand of refugees make their way north every day, and where many of these migrants have been scrambling to find any form of lodging ahead of the first snow, Finland has decided to generously provide much needed housing facilities.

The bad news: said facilities are empty shipping containers and tents. Neither has heating.

"It’s going to take years. Air power is extremely important. It can do a lot but it can't do everything. Ultimately it cannot occupy territory and very importantly it cannot govern territory." 

JS Kim Issues Critical Warning About Newly Introduced Global Banking "Gold Programs". Could Bankers Be Duping Us into Yet Another One of Their Reverse Alchemy Schemes?

Hmmmm ...

• Global Stocks Slip Lower (WSJ)
• Dollar sits pretty, bond yields rise as Fed bets firm (Reuters)
• Takeover Loans Have Few Takers on Wall Street (WSJ)
• Chinese Buyers Seek Dollar Assets as Promise of Yuan Gains Fades (BBG)
• Banking Giants Learn Cost of Preventing Another Lehman Moment (BBG)
• Eurozone Finance Ministers Won’t Release $2.15 billion Loan to Greece (WSJ)

"Most disturbing, Moscow's nuclear sabre-rattling raises questions about Putin's commitment to strategic stability."

Forget anything you might read about “brutal dictators” that need to go or the importance of “democracy” to the region. That's dumbed-down pablum for the masses and has literally nothing to do with the motivations of the (clinically insane) external power brokers actually driving the events on the ground and crafting the narrative that is faithfully scribed and re-told by the media. In fact, disturbingly often, the scribed narrative is exactly opposite of the truth.

The US military-intelligence complex is engaged in systematic preparations for World War III. As far as the Pentagon is concerned, a military conflict with China and/or Russia is inevitable, and this prospect has become the driving force of its tactical and strategic planning. Three congressional hearings Tuesday demonstrated this reality. Contrary to the media portrayal of Washington as deeply divided between parties with intransigently opposed political outlooks, there was bipartisan agreement on this most fundamental of issues, the preparation of a new imperialist world war.

"I am thinking that you are going to see something out of Congress, because we, as Americans, are embarrassed by this – this is an embarrassing situation. Obama is embarrassed, the State Department sounded quite embarrassed when they briefed Congress. I think we are looking at somebody taking some action."