Independent Alternative-News Aggregation
Source: Zerohedge.com
Bangladesh has been rocked by weeks of social unrest as thousands of university students protest against inequality, poverty, and the lack of job security in the South Asian country. The unrest worsened this week, forcing the government to shut down the nation’s internet service to prevent further student organizing and unrest.
Source: Unz.com
NIMA ROSTAMI ALKHORSHID: Michael, let’s get started with the SCO summit. And right after that, we’re having the NATO summit. It seems that NATO is fighting on behalf of the United States to try to preserve the U.S. unipolar hegemony over Eurasia and the Global South, isn’t it?
MICHAEL HUDSON: Well, for the last few months, we’ve been discussing how the United States and its allied Western neoliberal economies have driven the non-Western world, the global majority, into protecting themselves and breaking away. And they’ve been developing a whole array of how they’re going to go about splitting.
Continue reading “World Shaking Up! Epic Political & Economic Earthquakes – Michael Hudson 7/15/24”
Source: Alt-Market.us
Yeah, it’s happening. The last half of 2024 is shaping up to be one of the most politically insane in a century and the sparks are already flying. The biggest moment of absurdity so far might be the first presidential debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden, in which it was made abundantly clear for all the world to see that Biden is on the fast track to crazy town. We’ve been saying for four years that the guy is gone, a dementia case propped up and protected by the DNC and the media. Now, it’s undeniable:
There’s a vegetable sitting in the Oval Office and the nation is in a panic.
Source: DiailyReconing.com
Everyday Americans and investors in particular are confronted with “narratives” daily. Many include hidden agendas that are politically, ideologically or financially driven.
The key for investors is to see the narrative for what it is, avoid the mass psychosis, position yourself for reality and succeed in the end.
Following are four reigning narratives.
In each case, I sketch these narratives (and what the media wants you to believe), then contrast that sketch with reality supported by hard data.
Continue reading “Four Unbelievable Narratives – James Rickards 7/8/24”
Source: ChildrensHealthDefense.org
Ultra-processed food producers are key actors in a complex global network of influence groups where they exert disproportionate power on global food policy and nutrition policy, according to a new paper in Agriculture and Human Values.
Source: Wirepoints.org
Wirepoints recently warned in a Chicago Sun-Times oped that Chicago’s pension mess was going to get worse. As Chicago’s latest annual financial report shows, that’s just what happened.
Source: ArmstrongEconomics.com
The globalist cabal needs to control the food supply in order to control the masses. The World Economic Forum proposed ending gardening in general. Every nation is watching their farmland bought in bulk, with places like America seeing land taken away through eminent domain laws. The UK imposed a tax on chickens simply to prevent people from having the ability to source their own food. Now, Denmark is implementing a tax for cow ownership.
Continue reading “The War On Farming Continues: Denmark To Tax Cattle – Martin Armstrong 7/3/24”
Source: Mises.org
[The following is a condensation of Garet Garrett’s pamphlet The Rise of Empire, published in 1952, and included in his collection The People’s Pottage (Caldwell, ID: Caxton Printers, 1953).]
We have crossed the boundary that lies between Republic and Empire. If you ask when, the answer is that you cannot make a single stroke between day and night; the precise moment does not matter. There was no painted sign to say: “You now are entering Imperium.” Yet it was a very old road and the voice of history was saying: “Whether you know it or not, the act of crossing may be irreversible.”
That a Republic may vanish is an elementary schoolbook fact.
Continue reading “The American Empire – Garet Garrett via Mises Institute 6/23/24”
Source: CrisisMagazine.com
As my eyes endure another Pride Month, I’m struck by the scope of a movement that barely two election cycles ago was opposed by the majority of Americans. At least once a year, our entire society is covered in more glitter and rainbows than a 7-year-old girl’s birthday party. Recent pushback notwithstanding, Pride is everywhere—in our stores, our schools, our billboards, our churches, and even our crosswalks. It’s treated as a decidedly settled topic. Opposition to the LGBTQ+ agenda is incredibly unpopular and not tolerated in our institutions.
Continue reading “Pride Month 2024: How Did We Get Here? – Adam Lucas 6/21/24”
Source: TheLastAmericanVagabond.com
Recent viral reports claim the United States and Saudi Arabia have ended their long-standing petrodollar agreement. Are these claims based in fact? And what do recent agreements between the Saudi Kingdom and China mean for the U.S. dollar?
Continue reading “The Petro Dollar, China, and CBDC’s – Derrick Broze 6/21/24”
Source: karlof1.substack.com
Veteran War Correspondent Marat Khairullen’s insights have been shared here before. I read this at his Telegram yesterday morning and knew it was a scoop but that the other events demanded to be covered first and were. Now a very interesting thing occurred between yesterday and today—yesterday I had no issues with my inbuilt translation software doing its work, and I kept the tab with it open continually in the event I’d have time to make it into an article before I retired; however, today that one section of his Telegram would not automatically translate although everything else did: Why is a very good question. Now, his report was also aired in an audio format on the 13th at this URL. As you’ll see, I was able to translate the entire 11,000+ words.
Continue reading “Marat Khairullen: The African Front – Karl Sanchez 6/15/24”
Source: Mises.org
On May 14, Alexey Pertsev, one of the lead developers of Tornado Cash (TC), was found guilty of money laundering by a Dutch court and sentenced to sixty-four months in prison. TC is a privacy-preserving protocol developed for the Ethereum blockchain: it allows users to deposit funds in a TC pool and withdraw them to a different address, thus making it impossible for external observers to track financial activity. TC is completely noncustodial, meaning that users are in control of their own money at every step of the process. In other words, developers do not have any technical means to control how individuals interact with the TC smart contracts.
Source: Mises.org
According to a new report from the federal government’s Bureau of Labor Statistics on Friday, the US economy added 272,000 jobs during May while the unemployment rate rose slightly to 4.0 percent. As has been repeatedly the case over the past year, the latest monthly job-growth number was described as a “blowout” or “hot” number by major media outlets like CNN. As is typical in the good-news-is-bad-news view on Wall Street, the Dow fell on Friday out of fear that the “strong” jobs report would impel the Federal Reserve to put off interest-rate cuts further into the future.
Source: TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com
To those at the bottom of America’s economic pyramid, it feels like the economy has already collapsed. When you can’t afford to put a roof over your head and you barely have enough food to eat, nothing else really matters. During the Great Depression of the 1930s, millions of homeless Americans created large shantytowns known as “Hoovervilles” all over America. Unfortunately, we are witnessing the same thing today. Our homeless population is rapidly exploding, and those that have nowhere to live are creating shelters for themselves out of wood, cardboard boxes, tents, tarps, construction materials and whatever else they can find. In some cases, very large shantytown communities are being established, and they are primarily populated by our young adults…
Source: ZeroHedge.com
General Dynamics’ new 155-millimeter artillery shell factory in Mesquite, Texas, is set to produce 30,000 shells per month, according to a New York Times report. This will provide crucial support to the Ukrainian Armed Forces on the first and second lines and bring the US Army closer to its 100,000 shell target goal by 2025. However, this goal remains far behind Russia’s current 155mm shell production capacity of 250,000 rounds per month.
Source: Mises.org
The Link between Economic Calculation and Human Personality
Economists and historians have clearly shown that the destruction of the value and function of money by hyperinflation makes economic calculation impossible and leads to economic and social disintegration and widespread poverty. What is not so clearly understood, even by many economists, is that during periods of rapid inflation, the inability to economically calculate undermines the very nature of property and causes a withering of the human personality, which is intimately connected with property ownership. By eliminating the means of appraising and rationally allocating one’s property, hyperinflation eliminates the very basis of independent human existence and personality under a system of social cooperation. The inevitable result is the dissolution of the society of voluntary contract and its replacement by a hegemonic order in which property and personality are collectivized.
Source: ZeroHedge.com
Back in March, when reading the mammoth, 1050-page bill that was meant to avert government shutdown, but was yet another pork filled free-for-all bonanza authorizing $1.7 trillion in in discretionary spending, we stumbled upon something that was truly shocking: after Biden singlehandedly drained half of the US strategic petroleum reserve to avoid obliteration for Democrats in the 2022 midterm elections, Congress has snuck in a provision that would sell off and shutter the Northeast Gasoline Supply Reserve, a move that while perhaps keeps gas prices lower for a day or two, would also leave the entire continental northeast defenseless to any true environmental catastrophe or shock. We were so dismayed by the inclusion of this particular text, we wondered if it hadn’t been put there solely for the benefit of America’s enemies…
Source: LifeSiteNews.com
Addressing a Vatican-hosted climate change conference, Pope Francis called for a “new global financial charter” by 2025 that would be centered on climate change and “ecological debt.”
Source: Antiwar.com
On May 8, 2024, as Israel escalated its brutal assault on Rafah, President Biden announced that he had “paused” a delivery of 1,700 500-pound and 1,800 2,000-pound bombs, and threatened to withhold more shipments if Israel went ahead with its full-scale invasion of Rafah.
The move elicited an outcry from Israeli officials (National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir tweeted “Hamas loves Biden”), as well as Republicans, staunch anti-Palestinian Democrats and pro-Israel donors. Republicans immediately prepared a bill entitled the Israel Security Assistance Support Act to prohibit the administration from withholding military aid to Israel.
Many people have been asking the U.S. to halt weapons to Israel for seven months, and of course Biden’s move comes too late for 35,000 Palestinians who have been killed in Gaza, mainly by American weapons.
Source: Mondoweiss.net
The move comes days after a State Department report that documents likely international humanitarian violations by Israel.
Congressional aides say that the Biden administration will send Israel another $1 billion in weapons and ammunition. The package includes roughly $700 million for tank ammunition, $500 million for tactical vehicles, and $60 million in mortar rounds.
The move comes amid rising tensions over a potential military invasion of Rafah, a town in Southern Gaza.
Continue reading “Biden is Sending Israel Another $1 Billion in Weapons – Michael Arria 5/15/24”
Source: TheFP.com
While the border crisis has become a major liability for President Biden, threatening his reelection chances, it’s become a huge boon to a group of nonprofits getting rich off government contracts.
Continue reading “Nonprofits are Making Billions off the Border Crisis – Madeleine Rowley 5/12/24”
Source: WallStreetOnParade.com
On Friday, the Federal Reserve released its semiannual Supervision and Regulation Report on banks. Commercial real estate loans at banks – particularly on office properties – continued to rank high on the Fed’s list of concerns. The Fed included the chart above showing that delinquency rates on office property loans held by the banks had skyrocketed from just over 1 percent at the end of 2022 to over 8 percent as of December 31, 2023. (The red text and arrow have been added by Wall Street On Parade.)
Source: Mises.org
On April 24, two lead developers of Samourai Wallet (SW), the most-advanced privacy-centric wallet in the bitcoin ecosystem, were arrested and charged with money laundering and money transmitters offenses by order of the United States Department of Justice (DOJ). This is just the latest assault of an escalating war waged by US regulators on financial privacy and freedom.
Source; WallStreetOnParade.com
Last Wednesday, JPMorgan Chase, the publicly-traded parent of the largest federally-insured bank in the United States as well as a five-count felon, revealed in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission that on top of the $348 million it paid out in March to two of its banking regulators for sketchy trading violations involving “billions” of trades on 30 global trading venues, it “expects to enter into a resolution with a third U.S. regulator that will require the Firm to, among other things, pay a civil penalty of $100 million….” (See “Trading Venues Investigations” on page 168 of the SEC filing at this link.) JPMorgan Chase did not name this third regulator but Bloomberg News reported that it is the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
Source: WallStreetOnParade.com
The pro-Palestinian protestors on college and university campuses across the U.S. have opened a pandora’s box for the Wall Street megabanks that underwrite billions of dollars in Israel bonds – including $8 billion in March of this year – at a time when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s conduct of the war in Gaza has come under broad condemnation.
U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who is Jewish, described Netanyahu’s war operation as follows on the April 28 edition of CNN’s State of the Union:
“Right now, what Netanyahu’s right-wing, extremist and racist government is doing is unprecedented in the modern history of warfare. They have killed in the last six-and-a-half months 33,000 Palestinians, wounded 77,000, two-thirds of whom are women and children.