balirand

Ex-Deloitte, Ziff Brothers Alum | Advisor: Geo-Politics, Economics, & Cyberwar Policy | MA Int'l Affairs, KCL | CFA | CPA.

[balirand @trivcap]

And the US does so with never a thought to consequences, blow-back.

[Ben Norton @BenjaminNorton]

The US empire is waging a neocolonial assault all across Latin America.

The US blatantly meddled in Colombia's election. Trump and Marco Rubio backed the far-right, multimillionaire candidate Abelardo de la Espriella (a defender of fascist paramilitaries), and there are serious irregularities in the results.

Colombia's current left-wing President Gustavo Petro has been very pro-Palestine and pro-China. He cut relations with the genocidal Israeli regime and joined China's Belt and Road Initiative.

De la Espriella vows to form a close alliance with the US and Israel, and minimize relations with China. Just a few weeks before the elections, he was in Florida, meeting with far-right US politicians who are close allies of Trump and Rubio.

The same thing is happening across the continent. The US carried out a blatant electoral coup in Honduras, to put a drug cartel-linked, pro-US, pro-Israel, anti-China puppet in power.

The US is currently trying to steal the election in Peru, to put the daughter of the fascist former dictator in power.

The US empire already has far-right puppets in power in Argentina, Chile, and Ecuador. The leader of Chile is the Pinochet-defending son of a Nazi war criminal. The dictator of Ecuador is the son of the country's richest billionaire oligarch.

Brazil is the next target of the US empire's neocolonial assault, in this year's election.

This is the colonial Monroe Doctrine in the neo-fascist era.

[Relearning Economics @RelearningEcon]

"It is not a correct deduction from the Principles of Economics that enlightened self-interest always operates in the public interest. Nor is it true that self-interest generally is enlightened."

-John Maynard Keynes

[Darren Quinn | Modern Money Economist/Educator @AusMMT]

WHAT IS THE NATIONAL DEBT?
The "national debt" is a scary-sounding term that is deeply misunderstood.
It is simply a record of all the dollars the government has spent into the economy that have not yet been taxed back. It is the net money supply.
It is our asset.
https://t.co/c8iqwcfppq #MMT #ECON

[Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur oPt @FranceskAlbs]

The man who accused me of ''witchcraft'' - after every other attack had failed - continues to champion institutional narcissism.

Yet the message for him is clear: Enough with the bullying. Not every UN senior official accepts to be intimidated into silence.

[William Thomson @Williamgallus]

4000-word article in @heraldscotland on #MMT in Scotland. It's great to see some unbiased reporting! NB a lot of people doing a lot of good work here.

[DD Geopolitics @DD_Geopolitics]

🇺🇸🇮🇷 TRUMP HAS ALREADY VIOLATED SECTION 1 OF THE MoU!

Trump just threatened to "hit Iran very hard again" over Lebanon, a direct breach of Section 1 of the Islamabad MoU, which binds both sides to refrain from the threat or use of force against each other.

[Jostein Hauge @haugejostein]

The Iranian football team is only allowed to arrive in the US 24 hours before their matches and required to leave shortly after — despite all their matches being played in the US.

Imagine if this had happened to a North American or European team. There would be outrage. But in this situation, FIFA simply shrugs.

FIFA is a pathetic excuse for an international football organisation.

[Countercurrents.org @Countercurrents]

Human Origins Destroys Core Fascist Mythology
by Yann Perreau

https://t.co/i8cp0HXm8w

New research in archaeology, anthropology, genetics and evolutionary science is challenging long-standing myths that have been used to justify fascist and authoritarian ideologies. In this article, Yann Perreau examines how evidence of migration, cooperation and cultural exchange undermines notions of racial purity, fixed identities and inevitable hierarchy. Drawing on the work of Georges Bataille and contemporary scholars, the article argues that deep human history reveals a story of shared creation and adaptation rather than domination. It suggests that humanity’s greatest strength has been its capacity for cooperation and collective life.

[Yachad UK @YachadUK]

1/ Dozens of high ranking officials in Israel, including former security chiefs & ex-PMs have called on Netanyahu to act against Jewish terror in the West Bank.

They point out extent of violence against Palestinians is being downplayed & no action taken.

https://t.co/6cMgIoFpkd

[Relearning Economics @RelearningEcon]

Everyone remembers the crash of 1929. Far fewer people ask what made the 1920s boom possible in the first place.

The standard story focuses on stock market speculation. Some Austrians blame the Federal Reserve for holding interest rates too low. There is some truth in both observations, but neither gets to the heart of what was happening.

What really matters is debt. During the 1920s, private debt grew much faster than the economy itself. Businesses borrowed to expand production. Investors borrowed to buy stocks. Banks were happy to lend because rising asset prices made everything look safe.

The important thing to understand is that banks do not lend out existing money in the way most textbooks describe. When a bank makes a loan, it creates a deposit. New debt creates new purchasing power.

As debt rose, spending rose with it. Rising spending boosted profits. Rising profits encouraged investment. Rising investment supported employment and incomes. The boom seemed to justify itself.

People looked at the prosperity of the Roaring Twenties and assumed it reflected a fundamentally healthy economy. In reality, an increasing share of economic activity was being supported by an ever-growing pile of private debt.

That works for a while. The trouble begins when debt stops growing quickly enough. An economy that has become accustomed to large injections of new credit each year can run into serious trouble when those injections slow down. Spending weakens. Asset prices come under pressure. Businesses pull back investment plans. Borrowers become more cautious. What looked stable suddenly starts moving in reverse.

By the late 1920s, stock prices had become increasingly disconnected from the underlying economy. Investors were borrowing heavily to chase rising prices, while the banking system continued expanding credit to support the boom.

When that process finally broke, the result was not just a stock market crash. It was a collapse in debt-financed demand.

Irving Fisher eventually came to understand this after losing much of his own fortune. He called it debt deflation. As borrowers tried to reduce debt, spending fell. Falling spending reduced incomes. Lower incomes made debts harder to repay. The economy entered a vicious cycle.

From this perspective, the Great Depression was not simply the result of bad monetary policy, nor was it proof that markets are inherently self-correcting. It was the consequence of an economy that had become increasingly dependent on rising private debt to sustain growth.

The crash was dramatic, but the real story had been building for years on bank balance sheets long before the headlines arrived.

[balirand @trivcap]

How is this different than in the West aside from western media being corporate owned?

[The Economist @TheEconomist]

The job of Chinese state-media journalists is often to create “positive energy” with their stories so as to flatter the government. That encourages unethical practices https://t.co/yplZ3qf0BF

[Dina D. Pomeranz 🟣 @DinaPomeranz]

Israel's national security minister, Itamar Ben Gvir: "All of Lebanon must burn"

[The Better India @thebetterindia]

He had no idea he was sick.

A routine AI-powered health screening at a village camp detected TB before symptoms appeared. Now, a portable health kit is helping frontline workers screen for 20+ health conditions across rural India.

Read more. #HealthcareInnovation #RuralHealthcare #PublicHealth #HealthTech #HealthcareForAll

[Rural Healthcare India, Early Disease Detection, Healthcare Innovation, ASHA Workers Empowerment, Preventive Healthcare Solutions]

https://t.co/YlpnkzKOkh

[Hal Singer @halsinger]

Really excellent letter to the editors of @TheEconomist by Paul Crider of Liberal Currents

[Mehdi Hasan @mehdirhasan]

They were killed while invading a foreign country. They were killed while occupying foreign soil.

Stop with the gaslighting!

[Kenneth Roth @KenRoth]

Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert says Israel Is conducting a systematic campaign of ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity in the occupied West Bank. https://t.co/LBq6Y6pQOn

[✨⋰Ẍ⋱ 🇸🇾شركسية✨ @savienog]

This is Damascus, the capital of my country.

Israel bombed it less than a year ago, despite the fact that not a single shot had been fired at Israel from Syria for over 60 years.

This had nothing to do with Iran, Hezbollah, or Hamas. It was part of Israel’s efforts to interfere in the country’s internal affairs and keep it divided and weak.

So when Israelis claim that Israel does not attack those who do not attack it, Damascus proves otherwise.

[Omar El-Ayat @oelayat]

“All of Lebanon must burn”

Free Press writer: I’d gently push back on the idea that this is extreme

[Isabella M Weber @IsabellaMWeber]

Almost five years ago I was declared an “unreal economist” for proposing that the return of inflation had something to do with a sharp rise in profit margins.

This was the beginning of a tireless research effort. @EvanWasner and I wrote a paper explaining how emergencies coordinate corporate price hikes causing sellers’ inflation. Our work has been discussed widely and cited by central banks, the IMF and OECD.

Now, Evan just became Dr Wasner with a brilliant dissertation on inflation, critical inputs and inequality.

Could not be prouder of my first ever PhD student graduating! Onwards! 🍾🍾🍾🍾

[Mark Ames @MarkAmesExiled]

There's a real disconnect between all the "Ukraine turning the tide" pr in the West, vs the reality on the ground. Kostyantynivka is a larger city than Pokrovsk, and more strategic as the gateway to the Donbas's final fortress city-agglomeration.
https://t.co/xbE2eE03DF