Some troubling observations from the last leader of the USSR, first posted in Time.
The world today is overwhelmed with problems. Policymakers seem to be confused and at a loss.
But no problem is more urgent today than the militarization of politics and the new arms race. Stopping and reversing this ruinous race must be our top priority.
The current situation is too dangerous.
Lifting of Sanctions Could Be Costly To Russia
Paul Craig Roberts
Tweets on social media say Trump is about to lift the sanctions placed on Russia by the Obama regime. Being a showman, Trump would want to make this announcement himself, not have it made for him by someone outside his administration. Nevertheless, the social media tweets are a good guess.
Reports are that Trump and Putin will speak tomorrow. The conversation cannot avoid the issue of sanctions.
Submitted by Patrick Buchanan via Buchanan.org,
“Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,” wrote poet Robert Frost in the opening line of “Mending Walls.”
And on the American left there is something like revulsion at the idea of the “beautiful wall” President Trump intends to build along the 1,900-mile border between the U.S. and Mexico.
The opposition’s arguments are usually rooted in economics or practicality. The wall is unnecessary. It will not stop people from coming illegally. It costs too much.
The final UMichigan consumer confidence print is in, and it was even higher, printing at 98.5, up from 98.2 in December, and above the 98.1 consensus estimate. This was the highest print since January 2014, or as the survey emphatically notes, "consumers expressed a higher level of confidence January than any other time in the last dozen years."
The reason for this ongoing surge in US consumer confidence, once again, continues to be Trump:
While so far Trump's trade focus was fallen mostly on Nafta countries, and to a lesser extent China, one country that is taking precautionary steps is the one which recently suffered a major loss when Trump signed an executive order to exit the TPP, effectively killing the trade deal: Japan. The TPP, which took years to negotiate among 12 countries, has often been described as being, at its core, a deal between the United States and Japan, the world's largest and third-largest economies respectively.