With President Joe Biden’s nomination of Ketanji Brown Jackson to the US Supreme Court, the usual suspects are weighing in with the usual rhetoric about the candidate. In nominating Jackson, who is black, Biden declared:
Democracy is held as the apotheosis of governance, the pinnacle of societal organization that replaced a long succession of failed predecessors (monarchy, oligarchies, dictatorships, etc). Its sine qua non is the peaceful exercise of power and authority. But that peaceful guise is an illusion. Those who submit to the majority’s wishes do so not out of a noble love for democracy, but rather out of fear of its enforcement. Democracy, after you strip away all the slogans and grade-school platitudes, is a proxy for violence.
Since independence in 1947, the Indian subcontinent has remained bound to its ancient caste system, which can generally be understood in this descending order, albeit with significant variations and subcastes depending on region:
The Russian regime’s invasion of Ukraine has shocked and horrified the world, in no small part because it is the first war of this scale in Europe since the end of the Second World War and also because it is the first large-scale war to be fought with contemporary and high-tech armaments. The situation is changing rapidly, but the amount of devastation, death, and suffering this war has inflicted is already immense and will only grow larger as the war continues.
The financial woes of the giant real estate developer Evergrande, which carries an estimated debt of $300 billion, have rekindled global fears that China’s property bubble is about to burst. Such predictions have occurred repeatedly in the past, in particular since 2010, and have been fueled by the rapid rise of property prices, construction volumes, and real estate debt.
“Critical race theory is the tip of a one hundred years long spear designed to gore the side of the Western civilisation,” said James Lindsay in a recent workshop on the topic of critical race theory (CRT).
Economic sanctions serve as a powerful foreign policy tool for the US government. But could this ultimately backfire on the US?
Over the last several years, many countries have made a concerted effort to limit dependence on the US dollar. The economic warfare waged against Russia reveals exactly why.
The US hit Russia with a round of economic sanctions after Russian President Vladimir Putin recognized two breakaway republics in Ukraine and announced he would send troops into those regions. President Biden announced additional sanctions after Russia invaded Ukraine.
In recent years, the financial sector has become a key target of progressive activists seeking to implement their agenda. Activists have used a variety of methods to persuade and pressure financial institutions to do their bidding.
Whenever the signs of an economic weakness emerge, most economic and political commentators declare that the government should increase spending in order to prevent the economy falling into a recession. Economic activity, in this view, consists of a circular flow of money, with one individual’s spending becoming part of the income of another individual. Spending equals income, hence more spending will mean higher incomes.
With the Russian invasion of Ukraine in full force, it seems that while the Ukranians are putting up a fight, longer-term resistance is futile. Russia has already recognized the independence of the embattled eastern states of Donetsk and Luhansk. Donetsk and Luhansk will become Russian puppet states or be absorbed into Russia itself. Ukraine will spend the money of its taxpayers and the blood of its young men fighting a useless war.
