Author Archives: Yves Smith

Rentier Capitalism and Class Warfare in Kazakhstan

Blame Kazakhstan ‘free’ market reforms that benefit the rich and powerful at the expense of the working class for recent protests.

Unredacted Antitrust Complaint Shows Google’s Ad Business Even Scummier than Many Imagined

Even more ugly details about Google misbehavior in the online ad market.

Eurasia’s Ring of Fire

A theory of empire, based on aspirations for control of Eurasia.

Links 1/15/2022

Wrong Way CalPERS: Dumping $6 Billion of Private Equity After Struggling to Put Money to Work and Then Increasing Target

CalPERS is trying to do something more obviously nonsensical than usual.

Is Geneva 2022 Munich 1938 Without Chamberlain’s Piece Of Paper? How To Read the US Paper to Russia For Peace For Our Time

Why the US is looking at best mighty unserious in its talks with Russia.

Our Rolling Civil War

The institutional left has abandoned leadership of a nascent civil war to the institutional right.

More on the Morbidity Risk of Omicron: “Like a Chess Grandmaster Playing Against Schoolboys”

A lot of the misunderstanding of Omicron is actively cultivated.

More Covid Delusion: Thermography for Health Endangers Patient Health via Eschewing Masks in Favor of Ozone

A shaggy dog story on how Thermography for Health endangers patients also illustrates the “ozone protection” con/self delusion.

Links 1/8/2022

Fateful Collision: NATO’s Drive to the East Versus Russia’s Sphere of Influence

How using the military alliance NATO for Euroepean-loyality-building ends has made it more and more of a threat to Russia.

The ‘China Shock’ of Trade in the 2000s Reverberates in US Politics and Economics

Belatedly learning from how trade losses to China damaged communities to determine how to shore them up.