Mike Norman Economics

Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev was given a host of assurances that the NATO alliance would not expand past what was then the East German border in 1990 according to new declassified documents. Russian leaders often complain that the NATO extended an invitation to Hungary, Poland and what was then Czechoslovakia to joint the alliance in 1997 at the Madrid Summit in contravention of assurances offered to the Soviet Union before its 1991 collapse. The alliance has dismissed the notion that...

Richard Wolff describes how libertarians have got it wrong when they believe that capitalism will free people from tyranny. Capitalism replaced feudalism which did free people from the rentier lords but the new capitalist class have now enslaved people instead. [embedded content]

Cliff Asness is a ball-less fucking moron.After getting into a little Twitter spat with this guy (who called me a "whack job"), the same guy who thought QE was going to cause hyperinflation and then goes on to trash MMT, he posts this weeny little tweet. Asked and answered. Learn to read. And I called you whack job over your ISIS comments. Besides whack job you’re also pretty stupid and a very slimy debater. What a pathetic creature. You’re muted now, shout into the void. I’ll block you...

Jeff Bezos is the world's richest man and earns 1.6 million dollars per hour while his company, Amazon, takes half of all the internet sales in the US.  Jeff Bezos owns a major newspaper, his companies now deliver groceries, and since Amazon have closed down many local bookstores, like Barnes and Noble, they are now opening their own bookshops. Jeff Bezos also has a contract with the CIA, but perhaps it's the CIA that works for him?Mark Blyth says that the large internet companies need to be...

Absolutely superb lecture by Mark Blyth about why people are turning to populism. His answer to get people back to the center (but not neoliberalism, which is finished, he says -. Free College education . Subsidized Childcare .Single payer Healthcare .Corporate Reform of 'Shareholder Value' Culture .Breaking Up Digital Monopolies This is European style social democracy in the old fashioned sense, i.e, not neoliberalism.Mark Blyth explains what went wrong in the 1970's where inflation shot...

A key purpose of demand-led growth theory is to extend the ‘principle of effective demand’ to contexts in which productive capacity is best considered variable rather than fixed. The central idea is that, over any time frame, it is demand that determines output, and demand-led variations in income that adjust planned leakages to planned injections. Once it is acknowledged that capacity is variable, it becomes clear that the adjustment of output to demand, and planned leakages to planned...

In the 1960s, a brilliant young filmmaker, Peter Watkins, made “The War Game” for the BBC. Watkins reconstructed the aftermath of a nuclear attack on London. “The War Game” was banned. “The effect of this film,” said the BBC, “has been judged to be too horrifying for the medium of broadcasting.” The then-chairman of the BBC’s Board of Governors was Lord Normanbrook, who had been Secretary to the Cabinet. He wrote to his successor in the Cabinet, Sir Burke Trend: “The War Game is not...

It’s routine for world leaders to speak to one another, not when it involves Putin and Trump. Western media bash them both, instead of urging improved bilateral relations. A brief White House statement said both leaders discussed “working together to resolve the very dangerous situation in North Korea.” “President Trump thanked President Putin for acknowledging America’s strong economic performance in his annual press conference.” Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said they “spoke out in...

Deep state plot outed.Consortium News The Scary Void Inside Russia-gate Stephen F. Cohen The Foundering Russia-gate ‘Scandal’ Robert Parry Protecting the Shaky Russia-gate Narrative Robert Parry Russia-gate’s Litany of Corrections Robert Parry Sucking Liberals into a New Cold War William Blum Russia-gate’s Reach into Journalism Dennis J. Bernstein Sic Semper TyrannisFake News, Sedition and Public Apathy Your Trump Dossier Cheat Sheet Publius TacitusIrrussianalityThe latest...

Muslims may lose Mecca and other holy sites if the US decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israeli capital isn’t reversed, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has warned“If we lose Jerusalem then we won’t be able to protect Medina. If we lose Medina – we will lose Mecca and Kaaba,”Erdogan said in a speech at an award ceremony in Istanbul.  Erdogan has been one of the most vocal critics of President Trump’s controversial decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. The...