Politics

Several hours after President Trump officially signed the new Russian sanctions into law - despite his reservations and his statement that while he favors "tough measures to punish and deter aggressive and destabilizing behavior by Iran, North Korea, and Russia, this legislation is significantly flawed" - Russia responded when moments ago Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said on his FaceBook page that any hopes of improving Russian relations with the new US administration are dead, that the Trump administration demonstrated complete impotence by transferring executive power to

Authored by Raul Ilargi Meijer via The Automatic Earth blog,

The western world is mired in a mile-deep political crisis and nary a soul seems to notice, or rather: everyone just sees their own little preferred echochamber tidbits of it. Which is not a good thing, because that crisis is bound to trigger other bigger crises that are much more damaging. And I’m sorry to say it, but Donald Trump is not your main problem. Not even close.

While the world's eyes are focused on Syria, Russia, Ukraine, and North Korea; there is another - much more tense - fight between two nuclear powers that is getting far too little attention. The world's two most populous nations, China and India, have been engaged in a border dispute for decades but in recent months it has flared once again with a Chinese Ministry of Defense official now warning explicitly that Indian troops must leave the contested Doklam area if they do not want war.

Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk.com,

Australia’s Black Economy Taskforce has come up with a list of 35 “consumer-focused” proposals to crack down on cash. The taskforce blames consumers for holding cash and for not getting receipts.

Michael Andrew, the head of the taskforce, proposes nanochips in $50 and $100 notes so the government knows where the cash is, and suggests that cash should expire after a designated period of time. 

Three weeks ago, when the WSJ ran an infomercial of the "down to earth" Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg as just the guy next door in "Mark Zuckerberg Hits the Road to Meet Regular Folks" as part of Zuckerberg's tour of the country...

... the obvious question immediately emerged: is Zuck's publicity stunt preparation for a presidential run?