Mike Norman Economics

Greece will be in a “non-functional condition” until 2020, predicts the advisor to the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Yiğit Bulut, who characterizes the Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras as a “tool of the imperialists”. Speaking on the state television programme “Deep Analysis” he gave the example of Greece to show the consequences of imperialism for global political developments.”They sold off everything. The banks have passed into the hands of the Germans. They have been left with...

Good summary of the witch hunting to date. While he doesn't use the McGovern "soft coup" to characterize what is happening, he implies it. It's really about Trump rather than Russia. The US deep state has always had it in for Russia and won't rest until the US controls it, this is really aimed at neutralizing the president and continuing the effort to remove him from power. Perhaps you saw "news" reports last week calling William Binney, formerly the NSA's technical director for world...

A cursory glance at the World’s leading tax havens illustrates the hypocrisy of politicians getting wound up about the revelations in the recently released Paradise Papers and the Panama Papers before them. Many of the havens are within the direct legislative jurisdiction of nations such as the US (which is itself a tax haven) and the UK, for example. And we should not forget that Luxembourg, Switzerland are key European homes of tax avoidance. Remember that the current President of the...

This is live. I've been watching this for 20 minutes now expecting it to end soon but it hasn't. I don't know how long it will last but it's very interesting. Charles Ortel is onto Hilary. [embedded content]

New interview: What is Steve Keens take on MMT and how does his theories differ? He agrees with most of what MMT says and he then goes to describe how the Chinese government runs a MMT type economy by making its own money and spending it on projects like the One Belt Road Initiative - The New Silk Road - creating full employment. At 23 minutes he describes where he differs from MMT (there is also a bit at 1.30 minutes). He says he differs from MMT in how he sees the role of private banks in...

Qatar’s former prime minister has spoken out about how his country worked with Saudi Arabia and Turkey under the direction of the Obama Administration to funnel arms and money to jihadists in Syria. The explosive interview is a “public admission to collusion and coordination between four countries to destabilise an independent state, [including] possible support for Nusra/al-Qaeda,” by former Prime Minister Hamad bin Jassim bin Jaber al-Thani. Al-Thani oversaw operations against Syria...

I liked this. Very simple and very nicely put together. [embedded content] A nation’s currency is a wonderful, powerful thing. Learn how countries like the U.S.—which issue their own sovereign currency—can afford to use that currency to serve their citizens. Get inspired about our untapped potential, and learn to be less worried about the so-called "national debt"! Learn more about modern money theory (MMT): www.modernmoneybasics.com

German news. Will the US and UK new report it? Fort RussREVEALED: 2,500 German neo-nazi mercernaries fought in Ukraine conflictDer Spiegel Translated by J Flores

I think there are two separate issues here that depend on intent. "P-hacking" likely implies intent, and that is not necessarily a factor in all cases, and it may well not be in many if not most cases. In some cases there may be intent to persuade by playing loose, or even to deceive. I recall that How to Lie with Statistics was required reading in the Stat 101 course I took over fifty years ago. But this is not the only issue. As Richard Feynman famously observed, science is about...

I keep reading about how Iran has greatly increased its influence in the Middle East, but did it do it by winning wars or using its intelligence to install favorable regimes in other counties? No, it's been just sitting back and watching this to happen because the US and its allies have brought it on themselves .Behind only North Korea, Iran is the country the Trump administration vilifies most. The White House endorses Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s injunction that “We must all...