American Ruling Class

John Kerry’s Tender Sensibilities

"In response to Bashir Assad’s crossing of a 'red line' by allegedly using chemical weapons against his own people, Secretary of State John Kerry cites his own fatherly feelings as justification for the all-but-inevitable looming US military intervention in Syria. 'As a father, I can’t get the image out of my head, of a father who held up his dead child, wailing …' Hopefully CNN will try extra hard to sanitize the war footage from Syria once the bombing starts, now that we know how badly dead Syrian kids upset Kerry. Because there are a lot more dead Syrian kids on the way. This is the same John Kerry who served in Vietnam, and who backed two attacks on Iraq and one on Afghanistan, is it not?" Continue reading →

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Dec. 20, 1983: Rumsfeld shakes hands with Saddam Hussein

"15 months after the massacre in Du'jail for which Saddam was eventually hanged in 2006, Reagan's Special Envoy to the Middle East, Donald Rumsfeld is in Iraq is shaking Saddam Hussein's hand and pledging our support in his war against Iran." Continue reading →

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British PM concedes vote on military action should await UN report

"David Cameron was forced to delay plans for immediate military strikes on Syria last night after being warned he faced losing a Commons vote. MPs will vote tonight on a hastily prepared motion which still supports the principle of military action. However, it will not now be carried out until ‘every effort’ has been made to secure a UN agreement, and even then, direct British involvement would require a second Commons vote. The decision to wait for a second vote is a humiliating setback for Mr Cameron who had privately promised Barack Obama that Britain would stand shoulder to shoulder with the United States." Continue reading →

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The Empire’s Next Effort to Extract Your Wealth

"Since before the tech bust, we’ve been suggesting that while Americans 'think' they’re getting richer… they’re actually heading in the other direction. They’re getting poorer. This proposition has been easier for folks to entertain since housing busted and the financial crisis reversed the “wealth effect” in 2008. With that in mind, let’s take a look at the logic of the American Empire and what you can expect in the year(s) ahead." Continue reading →

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Citizen Obama’s Middle-Class Vacation in Martha’s Vineyard

"Seventy hotel rooms had been booked for the president’s secret police (not counting those for the whores). Somber men could be seen everywhere with earpieces and bulging jackets. People on the island generally yielded before them on the sidewalk, out of deference for what they understand are their own bodyguards. 'It’s good to be in Massachusetts again,' the president confided when climbing down from a MV-22 Osprey, a military helicopter-airplane hybrid. 'With its tough gun laws, the state of Massachusetts illustrates how common-sense controls can reduce crimes and create a safe gun-free zone for middle-class families like mine.'" Continue reading →

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Students and parents boycott Chicago schools to protest new city budget

"WBBM-TV reported that the march was also held to call attention to the city’s planned school budget of $5.58 billion, which includes a cut of about $68 million from classroom services that opponents argue targets schools in communities of color. According to WGN-TV, the protest, part of a group of demonstrations in 25 cities around the country against school budget cuts, was quickly criticized by Mayor Rahm Emanuel. 'I do not think it’s appropriate to advocate that children stay out of school,' he said at a press conference on Tuesday. 'You wanna make a statement? Go to the courtroom. Don’t take it to the classroom.'" Continue reading →

Continue ReadingStudents and parents boycott Chicago schools to protest new city budget

Warren Buffett’s bubble cash-out strategy revealed in 38-year-old letter

"A recently released 1975 letter offers new insight into how early Buffett was to grasp both the difficulties of pension fund management and the inability of Wall Street to provide adequate solutions. Perhaps even more valuable is the way the letter throws light on Buffett's approach to value investing. Buffett tries to act not like a typical fund manager but like a company owner thinking about buying another company. The crucial ingredients: patience, to get a good purchase price; courage, to stick with your investment if the business is doing well but the market doesn't agree; and a willingness to sell into a bubble when, as so often happens, one comes along." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingWarren Buffett’s bubble cash-out strategy revealed in 38-year-old letter

Fed’s Janet Yellen: Debt Free Multi-Millionaire

"Federal Reserve vice-chair, Janet Yellen, who is widely believed to be under consideration to be nominated by President Obama to succeed Ben Bernanke as Fed chair, is a debt free, multi-millionaire. The total does not include the pensions the couple earned at the University of California, Berkeley, where both worked as professors, nor Ms. Yellen’s pension from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, where she was president from 2004 to 2010, nor the home they own near campus. The disclosure forms do not include the salary earned by Mr. Akerlof as a senior resident scholar at the International Monetary Fund." Continue reading →

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I was a liberal mole at Fox News

"Each show had one person — be they anchor or producer or whoever — who was directly accountable to the Second Floor. That was the brilliance of the company’s power structure. One misconception that outsiders always had about the channel is that we’d sit around all morning planning how to distort the news that day. But there was never any centralized control like that. No 'marching orders,' as it were. Instead, it was more a decentralized, entrepreneurial approach. Each show was an autonomous unit. Each showrunner — who had not risen to their position by being stupid — knew exactly what was expected of them, knew what topics and guests would be acceptable." Continue reading →

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Bill Kristol’s Empire of Death

"What do Bill Kristol's enterprises all have in common? They traffic in murder and mayhem worldwide. They provide well-paid sinecures to 'intellectuals' to argue the case for a permanent revolution to be fought by the US to the benefit of the military industrial complex. They are heavily subsidized by the mega-wealthy who have an international agenda that does not necessarily reflect US interests. They are oblivious to public opinion in the US and are impervious to market forces. Though purporting to advocate the spread of democracy worldwide, they are disdainful of majority opinion in the US, preferring to adhere to the Straussian view that the non-elites must be lied to continuously." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingBill Kristol’s Empire of Death