America

Submitted by Louis Rouanet via The Mises Institute,

It seems fashionable nowadays to compare Donald Trump to Marine Le Pen or the Trump movement to the French National Front. The idea behind this comparison is to suggest that the French far right might very well win the coming presidential elections in May 2017 and create a French “Trump surprise.” But, as when it came to comparisons between Brexit and Trump, comparisons between Trump and Le Pen tend to be hyped.

Last week, TAC held its annual foreign policy conference. Pretty much everyone there had expected to be talking about what President Hillary Clinton is going to do wrong; instead, the room was heady with possibility.

Last week, when looking at the divergence between Donald Trump's proposed fiscal plan to "make America great again" on the back of an unprecedented fiscal stimulus boost which is expected to add $5.3 trillion to the debt over the next decade...

... and the deleveraging fiscal plan espoused by House Republicans...

... we pointed out something disturbing: the two plans were roughly $12 trillion apart over a cumulative ten year period, a difference equal to more than one-quarter of total federal outlays.

Submitted by Patrick Buchanan via Buchanan.org,

Speaking in Greece on his valedictory trip to Europe as president, Barack Obama struck a familiar theme:

“(W)e are going to have to guard against a rise in a crude form of nationalism, or ethnic identity, or tribalism that is built around an ‘us’ and a ‘them’ …

 

“(T)he future of humanity and the future of the world is going to be defined by what we have in common, as opposed to those things that separate us and ultimately lead us into conflict.”

Submitted by Charles Hugh-SMith via OfTwoMinds blog,

In this war of the rising and fading elites, there is no common ground or incentive to compromise.

Historian Michael Grant identified profound political disunity in the ruling elite as a key cause of the dissolution of the Roman Empire. Grant described this dynamic in his excellent account The Fall of the Roman Empire.