In 2011, then-Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, dubbed “Big Sis” by Matt Drudge, unleashed a “See Something, Say Something” campaign to encourage Americans to report “suspicious” activity to the Federal government.
Now it is official: Dilma Rousseff is no longer Brazil’s president. After almost two years of waiting, the country’s senate approved her impeachment. I will try to make here a brief summary of what happened, and write down some of my expectations for Brazil’s near political future.
The details of Brazilian law and Rousseff’s trial can get somewhat complicated, but the basics are that she spent public money she was legally not supposed to, most likely with electoral purposes.
Robert E. Lucas Jr. won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1995 for one of the most celebrated contributions in modern macroeconomics: the Lucas Critique.
The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve system launched a new Facebook page last week, and UPI reports that the Fed’s posts on the new page were not met with universal approval:
The page has gained more than 13,000 likes but has been flooded with critical and sarcastic comments, starting from its very first post.
Apple Inc., the US corporate parent of dozens of foreign legal entities, has been hit with a $14.6 billion tax bill by a commission of the European Union. At the heart of the commission’s complaint is an alleged antitrust violation rather than a tax dispute per se: Apple is accused of negotiating a sweetheart arrangement with Ireland, in exchange for creating thousands of new jobs there.
The decision of several major insurance companies to cut their losses and withdraw from the Obamacare exchanges, combined with the failure of 70 percent of Obamacare’s health insurance “co-ops,” will leave one in six Obamacare enrollees with only one health insurance option. If Obamacare continues on its current track, most of America may resemble Pinal County, Arizona, where no one can obtain private health insurance. Those lucky enough to obtain insurance will face ever-increasing premiums and a declining choice of providers.
Most Americans have heard the common refrain: The US spends almost nothing at all on social benefits compared to other Western welfare states. And even worse, what little the US does spend on social benefits is mostly in the form of non-cash benefits such as food stamps. By spending so little on social benefits, and by cutting back on cash benefits, the poor suffer not only deprivations, but indignity as well.
