Submitted by Bill O'Grady via Confluence Investment Management,
One of the key elements of global hegemony is the ability of a nation to project power. Ideally, this means a potential hegemon needs local security. In other words, a nation that faces significant proximate threats will struggle to project power globally. As a general rule, it’s easier to attack via land compared to the sea.
Submitted by Tim Price via SovereignMan.com,
On March 30, 1999, the Wall Street Journal’s front page headline blasted the good news across the world:
“Dow Industrials Top 10,000”
The day before, the all-important US stock index, the Dow Jones Industrial Average, closed above 10,000 for the first time in history.
It was a major milestone, and investors cheered.
As Caterpillar's stock continues to soar, its operations continue to decline.
Submitted by Adam Taggart via PeakProsperity.com,
James Howard Kunstler returns to the podcast this week, observing that despite the baton being handed to a new American president, the massive predicaments we face as a society remain the same. And it seems the incoming administration is just as in denial of them as the old.
Shortly after Donald Trump made good on one of his core campaign promises on Monday morning by signing an executive order formally withdrawing the U.S. from the Trans-Pacific Partnership free-trade deal, Trump told labor union leaders that he would renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement "at the appropriate time."
The remarks came at the start of a meeting at the White House with leaders of construction, carpenters, plumbers and sheet metal unions, during which Trump pledged to stop trade deals that harmed American workers.