We thought we’d plumbed the depths of political sleaze and voter rip-offs in California, but it turns out things there are even worse than we thought. Take a look at this story that comes from the Voice of San Diego: Last year the Poway Unified School District made a deal: It borrowed $105 million from […]

By Roger BerkowitzConspiracies are everywhere. From the President’s birthplace to U.S. involvement in 9/11, conspiracy theorists rule the airwaves. It is easy to mock those who purvey false certainties, but that should not stop us from taking them seriously. When people feel threatened and uneasy, in times of spiritual homelessness and economic dislocation, there is […]

Most of us outside the bubble think that the mainstream media is pretty pro-Obama. We remember all those comparisons to Lincoln and FDR in the heady early days of the administration.But apparently that’s not how it looks from the Oval Office; the president thinks he’s not getting a fair shot from the press. The New […]

A new Gallup poll confirms what we already suspected at Via Meadia: despite incessant insinuations in the MSM that life among the Latter Day Saints could be anything other than a hell on earth, Mormon Utah is the most pleasant state in the union to live in. More than half a million Americans were asked […]

Gu Kailai, wife of the purged Bo Xilai, is expected to go on trial on Thursday for the murder of British businessman and family fixer Neil Heywood. Bo was the former party secretary (effectively the mayor) of Chongqing, where Heywood was found poisoned in a hotel room last November.The scandal has shaken the Communist Party […]

ECB chief Mario Draghi’s last-minute euro rescue plan lies in shambles and Italian PM Mario Monti warns of the “psychological dissolution of Europe.” Now the Economist is reporting that Greece is far behind on its committments to international investors and may not implement all of the promised reforms for years, or even decades: Greece has performed badly on many measures. […]

After 16 Egyptian security officers were killed Sunday at a border checkpoint, the Muslim Brotherhood didn’t hesitate to point its finger at Israel. From the BBC: A statement on the Muslim Brotherhood’s website said the incident “can be attributed to the Mossad”.It said Israel had carried out the attack in an attempt to undermine the government […]

The European Central Bank is about to lose another one of its shaky potential rescue ladders. The Long-Term Refinancing Operation (LTRO), Europe’s  equivalent of the American TARP, appears to hemorrhaging money as European banks run out of quality items to pawn to the ECB.The Financial Times reports: Last month, for example, Ray Dalio, head of Bridgewater Capital, […]

Not content with being a thorn in the side of China’s suspicious neighbors in Vietnam and the Philippines, Chinese fishermen are starting to annoy China’s close friends as well, Reuters reports: Sri Lanka’s navy said on Monday it was still holding 37 Chinese fishermen to appear in court on charges of fishing within its waters, contradicting […]

Standard Chartered’s Group Executive Director, according to reports, when confronted about his bank’s Iran dealings, said: “You [expletive] Americans. Who are you to tell us, the rest of the world, that we’re not going to deal with Iranians.”More on the story: New York State’s financial watchdog has accused Standard Chartered of hiding $250bn of transactions with the Iranian […]