Scoundrels looking out for other scoundrels- Russia tries to block report on Iran nukes

Plus this-

Since the beginning of the last decade, Iran has played Western diplomats for fools with Russian assistance. Every effort to reach out to Tehran, including the Bush administration’s try at outsourcing diplomacy via France and Germany and Barack Obama’s celebrated and disastrous “engagement” policy has been a failure, though not from lack of Western effort. The Iranians, with Russia standing by as their helpful partner, have become experts at stringing along American and European envoys with proposals about stopping their nuclear plans or rendering it harmless. But every time even one of these largely symbolic measures gets close to fruition, the ayatollahs back away.

Note that this is very much against the media narrative of West itching to bomb Iran. If fools were to vanish from the media offices and the universities, only janitors would be left. And they very likely would do a better job.

OWS protester -Power of greed makes you work long hours.

Or maybe it's the work ethic thing, dude. Not something that most OWS protesters would be caught dead with.

OWS Zombies

Sauvik Chakraverti takes on the thankless task of explaining to the editors of a top mainstream newspaper that REFORM means LIBERTY or else it is not a reform at all.

Good luck with that.

This Diwali, Stop Hesitating and Donate, says Shefali Anand.

Yes, please do
Support LIBERTY NEWS CENTRAL. We are among the very few genuine liberty lovers in the this vast land ruled by collectivists, brain washed by leftist academics and informed by a generally clueless media.

Donate via Paypal

As our not so catchy but direct slogan says-
Even 10 dollars will do - we are not finicky!

Plus this from Ms. Anand's article-

Recent studies have shown that we give away a much smaller percentage of our wealth than our counterparts in Western countries

Yet for decades we have been fed on the notion that the culture of the West is a callous one, indifferent to compassion. Like much else peddled by the academic-intellectual-media axis of evil, pure poppycock!

Have gun, must shoot, will kill -the welfare state mentality

Bjorn Lomborg : Government shouldn't be picking Solyndras

The lesson from the federal government's failed backing of Solyndra is not that the United States should abandon energy innovation. It is that the government should not try to pick industry winners in the race to replace fossil fuels with an alternative.

Solyndra is the now-bankrupt solar-panel manufacturer that received a $535 million federal loan guarantee in 2009..

-- snip --

But the danger is when politicians and bureaucrats attempt to predict which technologies will be winners and back them to build an industry.

The danger is to the taxpayers not to the politicians and bureaucrats who retire away with their loot on generous pensions, lucrative lecture tours, ceremonial titles and presidentships of corporate and NGO entities.

Plus what is the point of having power if not to exercise it, whatever may be the harm done?  Have gun, must shoot, will kill -that is the welfare state mentality.

China jails former officials for leaking data

The two men leaked data on gross domestic product, consumer prices and money supply to securities industry employees between June 2009 and January 2011, an official with China's top prosecutorial body told a news conference on Monday.

-- snip --

"The leaking of national macroeconomic data harms economic operations, prevents fair market competition and affects government credibility, thereby causing heavy losses to the interests of the country, society and individuals," said Li Zhongcheng, deputy director general of the Procuratorial Department of Dereliction of Duty and Infringement on Citizen's Rights, which polices misconduct among bureaucrats.

(emphasis mine)

While transparency is worshiped in West, such basic data as "gross domestic product, consumer prices and money supply" are national secrets. For chrissake!!

It's almost as if the ruling Chinese communists take their economy to be a weapon of war.

TROUBLED REVOLUTIONS
Moderate Islamist Party Set to Win Tunisian Vote

Tunisia's moderate Islamist Nahda Party appears set for a decisive victory in the country's elections for a constituent assembly

-- snip --

If official results, which may be released as early as Tuesday, support those results, it would be a substantially better showing for the Islamists than many predicted. The center-left Tekatil Party and a party lead by a leading human-rights activist, the Congress Party for the Republic, looked set to come in second and third. The party most predicted to place second, the staunchly secular Progressive Democratic Party and Nahda's most outspoken critics, did far worse than expected.

So is it good news that they are moderate or bad news that they are Islamist? Hasn't the history of Islamic parties been that the moderates eventually get swept aside into the dustbin of history?

Plus can there really be a moderate Islamist party?

Questions, questions ....

We were wrong! Obama is not about class envy and warfare-

The president and his advisers are correct when they say his policies are not class warfare — that would imply that one class is prioritized over another. Looking at the results of his policies, everyone loses, regardless of whether they are rich or poor.

Heh!

Is this the height of irony or what? Mexico is complaining about illegal immigrants to US returning back to Mexico!

After Arizona passed a mandatory E-Verify law in 2007, lots of illegal aliens left the state and headed back across the border. Mexican officials were outraged at the burdens imposed on them by these immigrants

-- snip --

Rafael Fernandez de Castro, head of the International Relations studies at the Monterrey Technological Institute, told the conference that about 200,000 Mexicans per year are returning to their country, and that Mexican schools are facing a new problem: tens of thousands of Mexican children are coming back each year with little or no Spanish.

As a famous blogger is wont to say, heh!

Is this alright or is it as crazy as it sounds to me -

The Indian government expects a fiscal deficit (you know, the difference between the amount it burns and the loot it hauls in) to be Rs 412,817 crore ( I crore = 10 million). It is going to borrow Rs 470,000 crore this fiscal year, up 53,000 crore from last estimate! That sounds like a lot of money either way.

I'm not an economist. Far from it. But I became interested in this science(?) when I learnt that so much our blood, sweat and tears went into paying off the parasitic, blood sucking state. I'm still stumbling my way around the labyrinthine and tortuous jargon blocked alleyways of Economics.

So somebody tell me - why can't these professional bugs politicos live within their our means? Why do they have to spend like a senseless drunk and borrow like no tomorrow? Is this 'normal' economics? Or is it as mad as hatter?


Update-

The Economic Times-

India's widening fiscal deficit has triggered fresh worries about the possibility of a ratings downgrade of the nation by a leading ratings agency.

 Though no ratings agency has officially hinted at this outcome yet, the market is rife with speculation that India is vulnerable to a ratings downgrade amid the slowdown in the economy.

 A section of the market feels such a move could happen if the RBI raises policy rates on Tuesday for the thirteenth time since February 2010.

 Economists see fiscal deficit widening up to 5.6% of GDP in the current fiscal against government's target of 4.6%.

 Average yields on government bonds have firmed up further of late on worries about higher borrowing and rising policy rates. A ratings downgrade could trigger the next bout of correction in stocks, brokers said.

So it is mad as hatter then? 

Best of comments-

No one disputes the importance of inflation control. If the government has failed in fiscal control, should ordinary people be punished for it. Housing loan EMI has become unbearable. In addtion to increased prices for all consumer items from cooking gas to vegetables, we have to pay high EMIs. Should we sell our houses, repay the loans and shift to some unauthorised slum! There is a saying in my language'if you lose in the market, go and blame your mother for it'. Should government's failure be blamed on people.

By S.K.Nair at this article on the inability of the government or the RBI (Reserve Bank of India) to control rampant inflation and on the impending interest rate hikes.

All Utopian schemes come to a bad end-

The single currency is close to collapse

But not before they have made many lives miserable.

Good news-
Cult of Global Warming Is Losing Influence

Also-

On Oct. 22, 1844, thousand of Millerites, having sold all their possessions, climbed to the top of hills in Upstate New York to await the return of Jesus and the end of the world. They suffered "the great disappointment" when it didn't happen.

I suspect when everyone learns that Global Warming is not the bugbear it is made out to be, there will be many disappointed souls in the environmental movement. They want disaster to happen to, you know, teach a lesson to mankind.

Americans are dying for these people ? -

  Hamid Karzai has said if the United States and Pakistan ever went to war, Afghanistan would back Islamabad

Wow! It's as if they deserve Taliban.

TROUBLED REVOLUTIONS
Happy days are here again in Libya-

.... the chairman of the National Transitional Council and de facto president, announced that Libyan laws would have Sharia as their “basic source.” Just to get the ball rolling, he immediately lifted one law from Gaddafi’s era that he said was in conflict with Sharia — the law banning polygamy.

Don't get me wrong. As a libertarian I'm all for polygamy - but in a non-discriminatory way, for women as well as men. Let anyone have four wives or ten husbands or a hundred if one so chooses. It's about happiness and freedom and, as they said in Kung Fu Panda 2, inner peace, not social oppression.

The fate of India has been to be ruled by economic idiots

Growth equals inflation -RBI (Reserve Bank of India) and the government continue to play this false narrative of  economic growth causing inflation.

Despite the recent spate of concerns about moderating growth, the Reserve Bank of India came out with guns blazing against inflation. The higher than expected 50 basis points hike caught the pundits and markets wrong footed.

-- snip --

The bank is not overly concerned about growth moderating. It says that it will “manage the risk of growth falling significantly below trend.”

Even when they have a clue-

The bank also noted the possibility that commodity prices may still go up because of abundant liquidity even if demand is subdued.

they are clueless.

These eminent experts do 'know' that prices go up even if demand goes down due to "abundant liquidity". And yet they continue to act as if that knowing did not really register in the important areas of their cerebral cortex. How did the liquidity become abundant - did it just drop from the skies? They have no idea that they collectively (politicians, state economists, planners, state bankers) are the cause of general stress now felt by the common man.


 Henry Hazlitt had something to say about it (What You Should Know About Inflation) in 1960-

Yet the plain truth is that our political leaders have brought on inflation by their own money and fiscal policies. They are promising to fight with their right hand the conditions brought on with their left.

Inflation, always and everywhere, is primarily caused by an increase in the supply of money and credit.

This is so important that it is worth repeating and highlighting-

Inflation, always and everywhere, is primarily caused by an increase in the supply of money and credit.

I strongly recommend reading all of it. Pdf of Hazlitt's book is here.
His book came out over 50 years ago! How the things have not changed. False narratives and bad ideas are like zombies - nothing seems to kill them.


The Indian government has been peddling this hogwash of 'Growth equals inflation' to shirk blame for the high inflation spreading misery for the last few years but I'm afraid these people really do believe it. After all, India's Prime Minister is a lifelong government and academic economist as is his cabal of economic advisers. Amartya Sen and Keynes are their models not Milton Friedman or Von Mises. Times change, data changes -but the musty and stifling bureaucratic mindset of state economists and their colleagues tenured in the universities is a constant.

Just as the fate of Russia has been to be ruled by strongmen, the fate of India has been to be ruled by economic idiots.

Liberal columnist Michael Tomasky asks -

Is (Herman)Cain not that bright?

He gets a response in the comments(by hound)-

on Cains brightness
- bachelors degrees in mathematics, masters in computer Science
- he was actually a rocket scientist, he computed missile trajectories for the Navy
- VP of Data systems for Pillsbury
this was before he was 35
after 35
- in 3 years he toook 400 of Burger Kings poorest performing restuarants and transformed them into the best performing in the nation
- in 14 months he transformed Godfathers from near bankruptcy to a prefit making chain
- Chairman of the Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank.

those are only some of his achievements, compare that to Barrack Obama's

Mr Tomasky is berating Cain on the fact he is not a professional politician as Obama is. To me that is a big plus, not a negative.

Yes, what exactly are Obama's achievements? Apart from writing successful books - about himself!

A better question is -
Are Tomasky and the hordes of other Obamabots in the media bright?

And am I bright to pose such a question when the answer is obvious?
As stupid as asking if Barkha Dutt is bright.

There is a predictable dreariness about Obama - his championing of one bad, already failed idea after another:

Increased infrastructure spending has significant support in Washington these days. President Obama wants a new federal infrastructure bank, and some members of both parties want to pass big highway and air-traffic-control funding bills.

-- snip --

Their histories show that the federal government shouldn’t be in the infrastructure business. Rather, state governments and the private sector are best equipped to provide it.

-- snip --

Some of the highest-profile failures include the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927. That disaster dramatically proved the shortcomings of the Corps’ approach to flood control, which it had stubbornly defended despite outside criticism. Hurricane Katrina in 2005 was like a dreadful repeat. The flooding was in large part a man-made disaster stemming from poor engineering by the Corps and misdirected funding by Congress.

(emphasis mine)

Wait that can't be!  Katrina was unleashed by the evil Bush to hurt black people!

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan would rather see turks die than to have them rescued by Israelis -

"Over 1,000 persons are feared dead in the aftermath of a quake that measured 7.2 on the Richter scale. With workers battling to save those trapped in collapsed buildings in towns and cities near the Iranian border, it’s more than likely that Israel’s experienced rescue teams — which participated in previous earthquake relief efforts in Turkey — would be of value to the effort. But according to Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak, the government of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has told the Israelis they are not wanted. Erdoğan would apparently prefer to see his compatriots die rather than to allow Jews to help them."

Too often Jew hatred is cloaked in 'protest' against Israel's policies. When will this racism end? And why are the world elites, uber-sensitive about Western racism, blind to it if not actually supportive?

Top news

Top News is going to be a running section here. This shall be about that which is highlighted at the top of this page but in more detail than is possible there.

The first Top News is about the continuing "Green" energy fail. Why the scary quotes around green? When something kills and creates general misery, the scary quotes are the least of the opprobrium it deserves.

Green taxes now killing more Brits per year than car crashes

Patrick Michaels on the fool's rush for the "Green" energy-

Our friends in the U.K. and Europe are especially green.  Just hop off the plane in London and pick up the papers.  Global warming is everywhere, and, for decades, the religion’s been that carbon dioxide reductions are fine, virtuous, and they’re going to make everyone rich. I have a social security system I would like to sell them.

------- snip ---------

At the same time, consumers got an extra bill to support wind farms that, because of the inconstancy of the wind, operate at 25% of their capacity (figure from the British Wind Energy Association) or 8% (according to E.on, a large operator of UK wind farms).

Guess what?  Electricity prices have gone through the roof.  The average U.K. household bill is a tad under $200 per month, and so the thermostat goes down.  It’s pretty chilly there for much of the year, and a cold house has consequences.  A study just came out today on the health costs of what they call “fuel poverty”, commissioned by the Energy and Climate Change Secretary (don’t we need one of  those?), Chris Huhne.  Bottom line:   the chill from green taxes is now killing more Brits per year than car crashes.

London has suddenly awoken to the costs of indiscriminate greenness and is proposing to reduce the solar subsidies and — this is big — now threatens the multibillion dollar subsidies for its massive (and massively ugly) wind power scam.

(emphasis mine)


Do read the whole thing.


And speaking of car crashes, Sauvik Chakraverti points out the State failure on road accidents in his usual mild way (Fuck The Indian Police, And Fuck Chidambaram, Too - For Gross Dereliction Of Duty)
-

It's official! A report by the highways ministry has said that 1,60,000 people are killed on our roads every year, and more than 5,00,000 are injured, most of them seriously. A Times of India news report adds that a Member of the Planning Commission, BK Chaturvedi, estimated that road accidents cost India 1 lakh crore rupees annually - that is, 1,000,000,000,000 rupees.
------- snip ---------

Chidambaram (India's Home Minister), to me, seems to be a "house-trained" Police Minister, a puppet in the hands of his officials, all of whom are deeply involved in political skullduggery. The man is effeminate - and thoroughly incompetent. He - and the entire police top brass - need to be taken to task over the FACT that some 1000 people per day are killed or permanently disabled on our fucked-up roads.

(emphasis mine)



Green and State fail go hand in hand, in fact hand in glove.

We were wrong! Obama is not about class envy and warfare-

The president and his advisers are correct when they say his policies are not class warfare — that would imply that one class is prioritized over another. Looking at the results of his policies, everyone loses, regardless of whether they are rich or poor.

Heh!