Russia ramps up arms to Syria, warns Israel of “catastrophic” price for interfering

Russia has doubled the number of arms ships heading for Syria’s Tartous from the Black Sea through the Bosporus, DEBKAfile’s military sources report. The acceleration of Russian arms traffic to Syria has been noted in the last fortnight. The vessels are loaded with containers holding military hardware. It is believed that they contain quantities of advanced S-300 air defense missiles bound for Bashar Assad’s army and short-range Pantsir-S1 systems capable of intercepting UAVs and cruise missiles. The consignments also include large quantities of automatic 30mm cannons and radar equipment.

Why the California water crisis will lead to a housing collapse, municipal bankruptcies and a mass exodus of climate refugees

(NaturalNews) The only proof you need that many Californians are still living in a water fairy tale is the fact that California real estate prices haven’t yet collapsed. Even as the California Governor has declared a state of emergency — and emergency water rationing is under way — there are still people purchasing commercial and residential real estate in precisely the areas that will be hardest hit by that rationing.

What is the value of a home or business that has no functioning connection to a water system? Essentially ZERO.

How many California homes and businesses are headed for a zero-water future? Many millions.

Russian analyst urges nuclear attack on Yellowstone National Park and San Andreas fault line

A Russian geopolitical analyst says the best way to attack the United States is to detonate nuclear weapons to trigger a supervolcano at Yellowstone National Park or along the San Andreas fault line on California’s coast.

The president of the Academy of Geopolitical Problems based in Moscow, Konstantin Sivkov said in an article for a Russian trade newspaper on Wednesday, VPK News, that Russia needed to increase its military weapons and strategies against the “West” which was “moving to the borders or Russia”. 

‘Germany Has Been the Winner in the Globalization Process’

SPIEGEL: What advice would you give Merkel and her counterparts? Should they tear the euro zone apart?

Rogoff: No, certainly not. We are talking about bending not breaking, with one or more periphery countries allowed to leave temporarily in order to enjoy greater flexibility. There is currently no simple solution for this unparalleled crisis. The big mistakes were made in the 1990s.

SPIEGEL: Does that mean the whole idea of the euro was a mistake?

Rogoff: No, a common currency for countries like Germany and France was a reasonable risk, given the political dividends. But it was a grave mistake to bring all the south European states into the euro zone purely for reasons of political union. Most of them were not ready for it economically.

SPIEGEL: That may well be, but the fact is that now they are part of the monetary union, and that can’t simply be unravelled.

Rogoff: Which is why there is only one alternative: Either the euro completely collapses — with all the catastrophic consequences that would entail — or the core members of the currency union manage to turn the euro zone into a genuine political union.

SPIEGEL: Europe has recently agreed on a fiscal compact committing all members to better budgetary discipline. Is that a step in the right direction?

Rogoff: Yes, but it will by no means suffice. All this treaty does is give the markets the temporary illusion that the problems have been solved for now. It has achieved nothing more than that.

SPIEGEL: What is needed instead?

Rogoff: What the monetary union needs more than anything is a central government, including a a finance minister, with significant tax and spending authority. The individual countries should also stop insisting on national control of banking regulation. That is a matter that should be dealt with exclusively at European level.

SPIEGEL: Do you honestly believe that the countries in the euro zone can bring themselves to hand over that much more power to Brussels?

Rogoff: The terrible thing is that few countries in Europe seem genuinely prepared for that. Those politicians who know what is needed keep quiet, fearing opposition from the voters. But the pressure of this crisis will create a momentum whose scope and impact we cannot yet imagine. At the end of the day, the United States of Europe may well come about a lot quicker than many would have thought.

Full article: ‘Germany Has Been the Winner in the Globalization Process’ (Spiegel Online)

Economic Freedom and the Leftward Drift

Of course, the United States is yet a free country (mostly free, according to the Heritage Foundation); though it cannot be denied that we are “on the road” to serfdom, slowly but surely. Social spending is going to grow because people are going to avail themselves of the government’s “bounty.” Instead of the law of supply and demand, there will be a law of increasing demand for government programs and government money. Already many Americans prefer dependency and entitlement to economic freedom; and this preference will have catastrophic consequences for the country – and may spell the end of liberty.

To quote from Kim Holmes and Mathew Spalding’s Why Does Economic Freedom Matter, “America’s founders knew that liberty is about more than just securing political freedoms. True liberty requires economic freedom – the ability to profit from our own ideas and labor, to work, produce, consume, own, trade, and invest according to our own choices.”

Full article: Economic Freedom and the Leftward Drift (JR Nyquist)