Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Monday that Sweden can forget about membership in the 30-member North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Erdogan is demanding that Sweden cooperate with Turkey in repressing Kurdish activist expatriates in Sweden, all of whom he views as terrorists. He also says he is furious about the […]
Israel’s Netanyahu Crumbles before Supreme Court demand he Fire Corrupt Minister, as AG considers Banning Netanyahu Too
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) Carrie Keller-Lynn at The Times of Israel reports that at Sunday’s Cabinet meeting, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu was forced to fire his minister of health and the Interior, Aryeh Makhlouf Deri, who heads up the ultra-right-wing Shas Party. The move was forced on Netanyahu by Israel’s Supreme Court, which holds Deri […]
Is Israel becoming a Middle East Dictatorship under Netanyahu? 110,000 Rally against Gov’t
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Some 110,000 Israelis protested Saturday night at two big rallies in Tel Aviv. So reports Al Jazeera. The larger of the two was attended by opposition politicians Yair Lapid and Benny Gantz. Lapid told Israeli radio, “We will defend the nation and democracy. We will not surrender before we reach […]
Nearly 20% of New Vehicles in California Last Year were Zero-Emission, as Peak Oil nears
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) The office of California Governor Gavin Newsom has announced that nearly 1 in 5 of new vehicles purchased in that state in 2022 were zero emission (ZEVs). Nationwide, nearly 6 percent of new vehicle registrations were electric. This statistic of 18.8% ZEVs did not represent business as usual for California. The […]
In 2023, Biden may have to Choose between Sanctions against Russia’s Ukraine War and Maximum Pressure on Iran
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Does President Joe Biden have a choice of winning his struggle with Russia’s Vladimir Putin, or continuing “maximum pressure” sanctions against Iran? The problem is that if he continues to pursue both, he may end up handing Russia more resources to prosecute its campaign in Ukraine.
Israel Plunged into Constitutional Crisis as Supreme Court Orders Corrupt Netanyahu Cabinet Minister to Step Down and He Refuses
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Israel has entered a profound constitutional crisis, after the country’s Supreme Court insisted that Shas Party leader Aryeh Makhlouf Deri, a Moroccan-Israeli, not be seated as a cabinet minister in the just-formed government of Binyamin Netanyahu because he committed crimes involving moral turpitude. Dubai-based al-Arabiyyah reports that Deri and Netanyahu […]
EU, IEA: Next 10 Years will See Greatest Industrial Transformation of our Times
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Six million workers are employed globally in the $217 billion green energy industry today. But in only 8 years, they will more than double to 14 million. Half of those jobs would be connected to “electric vehicles, solar PV, wind and heat pumps.” And the size of the industry will […]
Billionaires Gobbled up 2/3s of New Wealth at $2.7 bn/ day, as 800 million go to bed Hungry: Oxfam
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Oxfam , the British charity, has released a new report finding that the global problem of wealth inequality is growing ever more threatening. Of all the new wealth the entire human race has produced in the past two years, the richest 1% gobbled up 66% of it. The less-rich 99% […]
J. Edgar Hoover was the QAnon of his Era, and Martin Luther King Jr. was the Victim of his Dirty Tricks
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Ours is an age beset by conspiracy theories, with the fascist QAnon cult at the center of much public lunacy. These completely implausible ideas, apparently taken seriously by millions of people, have been enabled by the internet, by social media, and by the rise of a new, militant billionaire class […]