Image by Thomas Hawk via FlickrWhy Microsoft treats us as only a consumer market ?Mobilink has launched Windows 7 Phone in Pakistan. Mobilink is extremely proud to mention that this is second launch in the world, after US
Microsoft though deciding to reap the benefit from sales of its Windows Mobile to the world’s 6th Largest population, decided to keep its developers away from reaping the benefit of developing for it. Pakistani Developers and firms are unable to register and submit applications for Windows Marketplace. While , all these foreign companies are making huge profits and sending back to their native countries as income . The country that is proud to be second in the launch : cannot get access to application store markets for profit.
UFone also Launches Mobile Banking (sort of)
China Is Waking Up to an Inflation Nightmare
When inflation gets so bad that food and energy costs spiral out of control, civil unrest becomes a risk. The authorities in China have always put civil unrest fears at the top of the list, given the rigid nature of the authoritarian political system.
Western democracies are more flexible — when people get upset, they can “throw the bums out” even as the political institutions endure.
In China, though, the party leaders are the institution. What’s more, in the face of rapid economic growth, the longevity of an authoritarian political structure such as China’s is an open question. (As China grows more prosperous, Chinese citizens will hunger for more rights and freedoms.)
So China is now in a place where inflation must be tackled, if only to head off the risk of civil unrest. But raising interest rates — normally the obvious and clear step — is problematic as an inflation-fighting method because of China’s mercantilist export system.
Chang Jian, a Barclays economist in Hong Kong: “The procrastination in raising interest rates will further increase the risk of asset bubbles and worsen the inflation situation.”
Yup. And that’s pretty much the modus operandi of governments everywhere. Decisions that look attractive in the short run are taken at the expense of nasty costs in the long run.
Municipal Bond Market Crash 2011: Are Dozens Of State And Local Governments About To Default On Their Debts?
The Economic Collapse Blog
By Michael T. Snyder
In the United States, it is not just the federal government that has a horrific debt problem. Today, state and local governments across America are collectively deeper in debt than they ever have been before. In fact, state and local government debt is now sitting at an all-time high of 22 percent of U.S. GDP. Once upon a time, municipal bonds (used to fund such things as roads, sewer systems and government buildings) were viewed as incredibly safe investments. They were considered to have virtually no risk. But now all of that has changed. Many analysts are now openly speaking of the possibility of a municipal bond market crash in 2011. The truth is that dozens upon dozens of city and county governments are teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. Even the debt of some of our biggest state governments, such as Illinois and California, is essentially considered to be “junk” at this point. There are literally hundreds of governmental financial implosions happening in slow motion from coast to coast, and up to this point not a lot of people in the mainstream media have been talking about it.
Fortunately, a recent report on 60 Minutes has brought these issues to light.
In the piece, one of the people that 60 Minutes interviewed was Meredith Whitney – one of the most respected financial analysts in the United States. According to Whitney, the municipal bond crisis that we are facing is a massive threat to our financial system….
“It has tentacles as wide as anything I’ve seen. I think next to housing this is the single most important issue in the United States and certainly the largest threat to the U.S. economy.”Unlike the federal government, state and local governments cannot just ask the Federal Reserve to print up endless amounts of cash. If state and local governments want to spend more than they bring in, they must borrow it from investors.
If the municipal bond market crashes, and investors around the world are no longer willing to hand over gigantic sacks of cash to state and local governments in the United States, then the game is over. Either state and local governments will have to raise taxes or they will have to start spending within their means.
Most Americans have no idea what this would mean. For decade after decade, state and local governments throughout the nation have been living way, way, way above their means. If the debt cycle gets cut off, it is going to mean that many local communities around the nation will start degenerating into rotting hellholes nearly overnight.
Gains in Kandahar Came with More Brutal U.S. Tactics
The Barack Obama administration’s claim of “progress” in its war strategy is based on the military seizure of three rural districts outside Kandahar City in October.
But those tactical gains have come at the price of further exacerbating the basic U.S. strategic weakness in Afghanistan – the antagonism toward the foreign presence shared throughout the Pashtun south.The most prominent of those tactics was a large-scale demolition of homes that has left widespread bitterness among the civilians who had remained in their villages when the U.S.-NATO offensive was launched, as well as those who had fled before the offensive.
The unprecedented home demolition policy and other harsh tactics used in the offensive suggest that Gen. Petraeus has abandoned the pretense that he will ever win over the population in those Taliban strongholds.
The New York Times first reported the large-scale demolition of houses in a Nov. 16 story that said U.S. troops in Arghandab, Zhari and Panjwaii districts had been using armoured bulldozers, high explosives, missiles and airstrikes in “routinely destroying almost every unoccupied home or unused farm building in areas where they are operating”.
Neither U.S. nor Afghan officials have offered any estimate of the actual number of homes destroyed, but a spokesman for the provincial governor told the Times that the number of houses demolished was “huge”.
The house demolitions in Kandahar have apparently affected many thousands of people. The demolitions “have made a whole lot of people very angry, because they will be cold and hungry in the coming months”, said a U.S. source who asked not to be identified.
But the U.S.-NATO command is evidently unconcerned about that anger. Chandrasekaran quoted a “senior official” as asserting that, by forcing people to go to the district governor’s office to submit their claims for damaged property, “in effect you’re connecting the government to the people.”
Both Liberals and Conservatives Hate Corporate Socialism (Where the Federal Government Favors Giant Corporations at the Expense of the Little Guy)
Conservatives hate big unfettered government and liberals hate big unchecked corporations, so both hate legislation which encourages the federal government to reward big corporations at the expense of small businesses.
As an example, both liberals and conservatives are angry that the feds are propping up the giant banks - while letting small banks fail by the hundreds - even though that is horrible for the economy and Main Street.Many liberals and conservatives look at the government's approach to the financial crisis as socialism for the rich and free market capitalism for the little guy.Americans are angry that the federal government under both Bush and Obama have handed giant defense contractors like Blackwater and Halliburton no-bid contracts. They are mad that - instead of cracking down on BP - the government has acted like BP's p.r. spokesman-in-chief and sugar daddy.
They are peeved that companies like Monsanto are able to sell genetically modified foods without any disclosure, and that small farmers are getting sued when Monsanto crops drift onto their fields.
They are mad that Obama promised "change" - i.e. standing up to Wall Street and the other powers-that-be - but is just delivering more of the same.
They are furious that there is no separation between government and a handful of favored giant corporations. In other words, Americans are angry that we've gone from capitalism to oligarchy.
So if both liberals and conservatives hate something, it doesn't necessarily mean it's a compromise. It may mean that they feel disenfranchised from a government that is of the powerful and for the powerful.
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