Charles Rangel’s Fall
Another of the House mighty has fallen. Charles Rangel (D), 40-year veteran Congressman from Harlem and the senior member of the New York state congressional delegation, was convicted today...
About: Charles Scaliger
Posts by Charles Scaliger
TARP Bailout Payback: “Drop in the Bucket”
Over the recent clamor of approval for the outcome of the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), which Beltway insiders are proclaiming a success because of the high rate of...
Behind the Mortgage Foreclosure Crisis
The foreclosure crisis continues to threaten the U.S. banking sector with more headaches, admitted Sheila Bair, head of the FDIC, on October 25. According to a Reuters report, the...
The Mortgage Foreclosure Crisis
Let us be blunt: The mortgage foreclosure crisis, which first burst into full public view with Bank of America’s suspension of all foreclosures only a few days ago, has...
Tim Hawkins: Man Behind “The Government Can”
In this era of potty-mouthed comedians, good clean humor that isn’t cloying is hard to come by. The Red Skeltons and Victor Borges of yesterday would have trouble getting...
IMF Outlook for Global Economy Gloomy
There is little growth on the horizon for the global economy, and a significant likelihood of further trouble, believes the International Monetary Fund. ...
New Contract With America to be Unveiled
History is about to repeat itself, if the activity of House Republicans is any indication. ...
9/11 Terror Attacks & Their Effect on America
Nine years ago today, 19 hijackers commandeered four civilian jetliners in American airspace and perpetrated the worst act of terrorism in American history. None of us who witnessed those...
Chinese Cyber Warfare Advance in Quantum Teleportation
There’s a new arms race heating up, one that involves not nuclear weapons or satellite-guided bombs but communications. In May of this year, Chinese engineers achieved a significant technological...
Obama Against Extending Bush Tax Cuts
Despite the wave of popular anger over the ongoing recession (no, it hasn’t ended, as just about everybody outside the Beltway has figured out by now) and the enormous...
Argentina’s Economic Tragedy: Lesson for U.S.
For a peek at where debt-ridden America may be headed, look no further than modern-day Argentina. ...
Obama’s New Stimulus Target: Infrastructure
If it is true, as Albert Einstein is alleged to have said, that insanity consists of doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results, then...
Bernanke: More Fed Stimuli if Economy Slumps
After more than two years of intervention in the economy by the Federal Reserve, the economy is showing signs of sliding back into recession. This, of course, is precisely...
Does Language Shape Our Thoughts?
The linguistic relativity principle is back in vogue, according to linguist Guy Deutscher of the University of Manchester, writing for the New York Times. This principle, often known informally...
True Federal Debt $202 Trillion, Kotlikoff Says
Think you’re scared enough about the economy, the ballooning deficit, and the prospect of ruinous tax rates and runaway inflation to pay for astronomical government debts? If you haven’t...
Is Our National Debt Nothing to Worry About?
A national debt is nothing to worry about, because “we owe it to ourselves” —so runs one of the more popular sophisms of Keynesian economics. ...
Cutting Taxes Is Again in Vogue
Cutting taxes is again in vogue in a Washington, D.C., increasingly dismayed by the utter inability of the massive Obama stimulus package to jolt the economy back...
Financial Overhaul Law Boon to Financial Overlords
A triumphant and triumphalist President Obama signed the financial overhaul bill into law July 21, promising as he did that “the American people will never be asked again to...
Financial Reform Bill: Bureaucratic Absolutism
Czarist Russia is looking better and better. Once a byword for bureaucratic absolutism, the apparatchiks of pre-revolutionary St. Petersburg and their endless rule-making seem positively enlightened beside some of...
Small Banks Struggle Despite Bailout Funds
The Treasury Department’s Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) is wreaking havoc on hundreds of small banks that took bailout money, according to a new report issued by the Congressional...