South Carolina

• WSJ urges Fed to blow uberest of all bubbles: Memo to Fed: Let the Economy Overheat (WSJ)
• Gunman at large after killing nine at black South Carolina church (Reuters)
• Nine Dead in Charleston Shooting Labeled a 'Hate Crime' (BBG)
• Hong Kong Votes Down Beijing-Backed Election Plan (WSJ)
• Greece Has Already Cost Investors $897 Billion This Year (BBG)
• Merkel Maintains Tough Stance on Greece as Deadline Looms (WSJ)
• Small U.S. frackers face extinction amid drilling drought (Reuters)
• Brian Williams to Stay at NBC, but Lester Holt Will Be Anchor (WSJ)

The first step in any 12-step imperial-overstretch recovery program would involve accepting the fact that American power is limited and global rule an impossible fantasy. Accepted as well would have to be this obvious reality: like it or not, the U.S. shares the planet with a coterie of other major powers -- none as strong as we are, but none so weak as to be intimidated by the threat of U.S. military intervention. Having absorbed a more realistic assessment of American power, Washington would then have to focus on how exactly to cohabit with such powers -- Russia, China, and Iran among them -- and manage its differences with them without igniting yet more disastrous regional firestorms.  But for any of this to happen, American policymakers would first have to abandon the pretense that the United States remains the sole global superpower -- and that may be too bitter a pill for the present American psyche (and for the political aspirations of certain Republican candidates) to swallow. From such denialism, it’s already clear, will only come further ill-conceived military adventures abroad and, sooner or later, under far grimmer circumstances, an American reckoning with reality.

It took a paltry $1.15 million in bribes to get everyone in the Senate on the same page. And the biggest shocker: with a total of $195,550 in "donations", or more than double the second largest donor UPS, was none other than Goldman Sachs.

The “inconsequential” war certainly and drastically changed America, of that there is no doubt. Whether for the good, or bad, you’ll have to decide for yourself. On the positive side, the war did cement American independence. It proved that to defeat America on its home ground, a very, very large army, and a great commitment to prolonged and bloody war, was going to be needed. On the negative side; the war left the country with constitutional revisionism, centralized power, protectionism, mercantilism, expansionism, blind patriotism, and militarism. That decentralist small-government thingy conceived by the Founding Fathers didn’t last very long, did it? One must wonder “War, what is it good for? Was it all worth it?”

History has not been kind to major trade blunders. Just as the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930 sparked a global trade war that may well have put the “great” in the Great Depression, Congressional enactment of enforceable currency rules today could spark retaliatory actions that might devastate the free flow of trade that a sluggish global economy desperately needs.

While Obama unleashes his "folks" phrasing to appeal to middle-America, it appears Hillary Clinton has a different approach in her effort to reach "everyday Americans" - speak in tongues. As The Hill reports, Clinton - who grew up in Chicago - spoke with a Southern accent during a swing through South Carolina yesterday. What is even more disturbing is the fact that it is not the first time she has faked her accent as Bloomberg exposes various versions of American English employed by Clinton, going back to her early years as first lady of Arkansas and first lady of the United States.

Are you ready for rioting, looting and mindless violence in major U.S. cities all summer long?  According to a brand new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, 96 percent of all Americans believe that there will be more civil unrest in America this summer.  That leaves only 4 percent of people that believe that everything will be just fine.  In this day and age, it is virtually impossible to get 96 percent of Americans to agree on anything.  So the fact that just about everyone agrees that we are going to see more civil unrest should really tell you something.

Seven years ago, the U.S. Army War College issued a report calling on the military to be prepared should they need to put down civil unrest within the country. Summarizing the report, investigative journalist Chris Hedges declared, “The military must be prepared, the document warned, for a ‘violent, strategic dislocation inside the United States,’ which could be provoked by ‘unforeseen economic collapse,’ ‘purposeful domestic resistance,’ ‘pervasive public health emergencies’ or ‘loss of functioning political and legal order.’ The ‘widespread civil violence,’ the document said, ‘would force the defense establishment to reorient priorities in extremis to defend basic domestic order and human security.’” At what point will all of the government’s carefully drawn plans for dealing with civil unrest, “homegrown” terrorism and targeting pre-crime become a unified blueprint for locking down the nation?

The lines have been drawn in many police departments: it’s us vs. them. Trust in many departments has been utterly shattered within some communities because the police hold themselves to a different standard than they do the populace.  But the recent cases of police brutality are simply a symptom of a much larger problem. Society in the US is breaking down, civility has been lost, and the country is rapidly becoming uncivilized. This extends within and across all of the most important institutions.

Texas Department of Public Safety trooper Abraham Martinez doesn't take kindly to motorcyclists who run stop signs, which is why when Steven Gaydos ignored a red octagon and led Martinez on a high speed chase, he ended up getting shot in the thigh before suffering the wrath of the trooper's flying jumpkick.

"I've said it before, and I'll say it again: In a situation with the police, it's not immediately about who is right or wrong, it's about staying alive,” a former Alabama state trooper says, in an open letter to African Americans across the country.

California is an interesting place.  Probably something like California never existed before.  A barren state with no substantial natural resources, with cities constructed mostly directly over major fault lines, no water, the highest per capita immigrant population of any US state, and of course, also the state with the highest population per capita of lawyers.  "Land of fruits and nuts."  or "La La Land" according to the LA Times:

The American justice system is broken. Completely and totally broken... "The Justice Department and FBI have formally acknowledged that nearly every examiner in an elite FBI forensic unit gave flawed testimony in almost all trials in which they offered evidence against criminal defendants over more than a two-decade period before 2000."

Understanding Jackson’s Bank War is critical to our future. He was absolutely correct insofar as following the Jeffersonian view that a National Debt would not be a Blessing as Hamilton proclaimed, but the servitude of the people that would ultimately consume all liberty.

On the heels of the South Carolina “confrontation” which led to the shooting death of Walter Scott, we get a new video out of Tulsa in which one Eric Courtney Harris — who apparently sold an illegal firearm to undercover agents and who CNN compassionately describes as a “possibly PCP-addled felon” — is “accidentally” shot by a 73-old reserve deputy who apparently could not distinguish between his Taser and his glock.