Berto Jongman: Shadow Banking & Tax Loopholes – With Comment by Robert Steele on Integrity & Automated Transaction Payment Tax

Beyond Regulators’ Grasp How Shadow Banks Rule the World By Martin Hesse and Anne Seith Spiegel, 11/14/2012 Beyond the banking world, a parallel universe of shadow banks has grown in the form of hedge funds and money market funds. They’re outside the reach of conventional financial regulation, prompting authorities to plan introducing new rules to …

Owl: Both Parties Died on 7 November 2012 — The Angry White Guy GOP *and* the Well-Intentioned Liberal Left — Gone, Gone, Gone

None of my liberal friends who I sent this article have responded or commented on it. Perhaps they cannot be bothered, since they are rejoicing at Obama’s win? Or could it be that Professor James Petras, who wrote it, and an outstanding scholar with many books and articles to his name, is puncturing their illusions …

Yoda: Pirate Leader Understanding of Why US Invaded Iraq – Over the End of the Dollar as Global Reserve Currency

Good, reality is. Rick is the founder of the first Pirate Party and is a political evangelist, traveling around Europe and the world to talk and write about ideas of a sensible information policy. He has a tech entrepreneur background and loves whisky. While the US invasion of Iraq about a decade ago was based …

Chuck Spinney – Cogent Analysis pf Arab Spring Seven Key Challenges Not Available from CIA or Department of State – Plus Personal Appeal for Contributions to Keep CounterPunch Going

Jeffrey St Claire, the editor at Counterpunch has given me permission to distribute the attached essay, “The Arab Spring at the Crossroads,” by  Esam Al-Amin.  It was published in the subscription edition of Counterpunch and is not available at the CP website.  Al-Amin, who I do not know, has written a very informative summary of …

Michel Bauwens: The Third Wave: Peer-to-Peer Immaterial Expansion

Peer to peer and the feudal transition Executive Summary: First Wave: Extensive Development (Expansion across Space using Slaves) Second Wave: Intensive Development (Material Development Upgrading Slaves to Serfs) Third Wave:  P2P Development (Immaterial Developments Upgrading Serfs to Seers) 10 September 2012 In this thought capsule, inspired by the reading of the very stimulating book Deep …