“It’s not a crisis that will be resolved by one group of countries taking action. It’s going to be hopefully resolved by all countries, all regions, all categories of countries actually taking action.”-Christine Lagarde, IMF Managing Director
The director of the International Monetary Fund made that comment in a U.S. State Department conference on December […] Continue Reading…
“41% of foreign exchange reserves in Russia are euro-denominated, so EU member states and Russia all are interested in the security of it.”-Dmitry Medvedev, President of Russia
Turns out that Russia has a big stake in European countries getting back on the economic track.
On December 15, Russia’s current President said his country will work to […] Continue Reading…
“Consumers are going to pay more because we’re going to have less beef. Fewer cows, calves, less beef production and increasing [demand for] exports.”-David Anderson, Texas AgriLife Extension Service
Texas is officially suffering its worst drought ever! The decline in cows just more proof.
Texas is now seeing the biggest drop in cattle since the U.S. […] Continue Reading…
“We’ve issued a closure order so the entire mine is shut down. We will conduct a thorough investigation and we will not allow it to reopen until we are sure it is safe.”-Amy Louviere, U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration
On December 14, another rock burst struck the unlucky Lucky Friday silver mine in northern […] Continue Reading…
“Hopefully, we can work with the Russians who, for the first time, at least are recognizing that this is a matter that needs to go to the Security Council. It is just that we have differences in how they are approaching it, but we hope to be able to work with them.”-Hillary Clinton, U.S. […] Continue Reading…
According to corporate research firm Global Market Insight (GMI), Corporate America’s CEOs got big raises in 2010, even though many companies did not perform well!
The CEOs of the top 500 companies got as much as a 36.5% increase in pay. The next 3,000 U.S. corporations gave their CEOs a pay raise averaging 27%! Researchers […] Continue Reading…
“I hope you believe America is part of the battlefield.”-Lindsey Graham, U.S. Senator from South Carolina
In a confusing back and forth between the House and Senate, on December 15 the Senate passed the latest version of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012, allowing the indefinite detention and torture of U.S. citizens. […] Continue Reading…
“It is not possible to stop Iran’s nuclear weapons program without targeting its nuclear program as a whole, because there is no safe dividing line between those activities and facilities that are purely peaceful and those which are military related.”-Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, U.S. Representative for Florida
By using that argument then any country can justify destroying […] Continue Reading…
On December 14, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the Iran Threat Reduction Act of 2011. It passed with an overwhelming majority; 410 for, 11 against and 12 abstaining.
The U.S. Senate is now debating their version.
Basically HR 1905 continues the same old sanctions, but with some interesting exemptions and additions:
(1) the procurement of certain […] Continue Reading…
The final version of the National Defense Authorization Act for 2012, known in the House as HR 1540, was voted on twice. The first time it failed to pass!
According to CSPAN records the act was first voted on at 18:33 hours, local Washington DC time, then again at 18:50 hours.
The first time it failed […] Continue Reading…