Once again, Donald Trump is trying to dig himself out of a hole by lying and doing a spectacularly bad job of it. After threatening an ill-advised trade war against China and then actually going through with it without consulting anyone because he was having a bad day, the stock ...read more

The only thing worse than an enemy laughing at you is for them to dismiss you as irrelevant. And that's exactly how China currently views the United States with Donald Trump at the helm. In an unusual and unusually scathing op-ed, Yan Xuetong, one of China's leading ...read more

One of the things you learn about politics over the years is that when the going gets tough politically, leaders kick off wars to boost their poll numbers and distract the public from their domestic failures. Generally speaking, the weaker the target, the better. Margaret ...read more

It’s finally happening. On Tuesday it was announced that the first bilateral meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump will take place on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Germany. Just a partial list of topics that need attention include ...read more

Continuing his nonstop string of international gaffes based on blind ignorance, Donald Trump managed to deeply offend yet another one of our allies while making the world laugh even harder at us than it already was: Donald Trump has been accused of “shocking ignorance” after ...read more

While the Trump's threats against North Korea are making Fox News giddy with the prospect of another Big American War, the real world ramifications are decidedly less glamorous. One of the major reasons why rather than approach the situation carefully and intelligently, Trump is ...read more

Last Friday, I penned an article asking whether Donald Trump was about to kick off World War III. I wrote it in response to his out of the blue aggression against North Korea, and the shocking lack of foresight he is showing by attempting to interfere in a region he clearly ...read more

The people behind the Doomsday Clock must seriously be considering upgrading the clock to a digital version so they can start measuring in milliseconds. That's assuming they don't all drink themselves into a coma to get away from the horror that is Donald Trump's foreign policy: ...read more

There's a women's soccer tournament coming up in Dallas, Texas, and one of the teams expecting to take part is from Tibet. But, due to reasons that aren't totally clear, they have been denied visas. According to The Guardian, the 15 members of the Tibet women's soccer team who ...read more

In the middle of Donald Trump's ongoing meltdown, Steve Bannon still had time to instruct Trump to have Defense Secretary Jim Mattis reduce the United States to a sleazy extortion racket: BRUSSELS — Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, echoing his boss in Washington, warned on ...read more

The American Prospect's "Blustering Toward Armageddon" is a disturbing examination of how Donald Trump's arrogance and apelike need for dominance will spell disaster for global stability: Call it belligerent deterrence: If only we build intimidating military capabilities ...read more

Oh how the times are achangin'. A new poll from YouGov shows a stunning rise in warm, fuzzy feelings for Russian dictator Vladimir Putin among previously hardcore Commie-hatin' real 'Murikans: Just a little context here. Back in 2009, Fox News and AM Hate Radio turned Obama's ...read more

According to the Washington Post, Donald has been planning to call Taiwan since before winning the election. Allegedly even before winning the nomination. Assuming this is true and not his lackeys running cover for their master's diplomatic faux pas, a more disturbing image ...read more

Sometimes, a rant needs to happen. Especially when we are far too close to a man leading our country that repeatedly sides with dictators over our own leaders. Keith Olbermann delivers that needed rant in his latest piece and he has some choice words for Trump.  Trump's love of ...read more

Given we're heading into the Republican presidential debate this Thursday and Donald Trump is the leading candidate in the field, the media is pretty much obligated to cover him whether we like it or not. Regardless of his idiocy, Trump is the man to beat so both Republicans and ...read more

If you're on Twitter this afternoon and you happen to be following the venerable news service United Press International, or UPI, you probably think the world is coming to an end. Behold. There go your weekend plans. According to various reports that are actually ...read more

It came as no surprise to see the kneejerk Republican response to President Obama's decision to open relations with Cuba after more than half-a-century of isolation and sanctions. Clearly, 54 years isn't quite enough time for this ridiculous policy to work, and if you ever ...read more

While most of our collective American-red blood is currently boiling because of our old nemesis Russia and the relatively new dictator on the block, Kim Jong Un, there's a sleeping giant on the interweb, and Michelle Obama is preparing for the digital world to shake when it ...read more

How bad is North Korea? According to a new United Nations report, it's really, really, really bad.  Reports the Guardian: North Korea's leadership is committing systematic and appalling human rights abuses against its own citizens on a scale unparalleled in the modern world, ...read more

It's the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, so you shouldn't be at work reading this. If you are, your boss is an a$$hole. Either way, here's some interesting bits from the world wide web for ya: 1. Top-Secret Document Reveals NSA Spied On Porn Habits As Part Of Plan To Discredit ...read more

While the image of 22 year old Chinese man Xiaolian might be disturbing to some, it is a testament to the power of modern science to do good that the young man has a chance at having a normal life after his nose got infected and badly damaged after a car accident. Doctors in ...read more

Never let it be said that the human species isn't diverse, particularly when it comes to intelligence. From the Huff Post: A man in China's southeastern Guangdong province admitted himself to a local hospital after he reportedly got a live eel stuck inside him. According to ...read more

The Daily Banter Headline Grab (from the AP): As public evidence mounts that the Chinese military is responsible for stealing massive amounts of U.S. government data and corporate trade secrets, the Obama administration is eyeing fines and other trade actions it may take ...read more

In order to whip up a good bit of Red fear in America, politicians and pundits like to proclaim loudly that China 'owns America'. While China does hold a good portion of US debt, it isn't the Communist behemoth that 'owns America', it's actually still Japan. Writes Daniel Gross ...read more

Ezra Klein compares and contrasts the key points in Obama and Romney's jobs plan: In his news conference, Romney emphasized four ideas in his plan: expanding domestic energy production, working out trade agreements with Latin America, cracking down on China and cutting the ...read more

From Information Week: Google warns that government attempts to remove online information are increasing and that some of the governments making censorship requests are Western democracies. U.S. authorities, for example, made 6,192 requests seeking the removal of information ...read more

Investors counting on China to repeat its huge 2008-09 stimulus to backstop global economic growth are failing to recognize Beijing's limited scope to deliver another major spending surge. The 4 trillion yuan ($628 billion) stimulus package launched to counter the post-Lehman ...read more

By Lawrence S. Wittner: On April 17, as millions of Americans were filing their income tax returns, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) released its latest study of world military spending. In case Americans were wondering where most of their tax money — ...read more

An independent investigation has found "significant issues" among working practices at Chinese plants making Apple iPhones and iPads. The US Fair Labor Association (FLA) was asked by Apple to investigate working conditions at Foxconn after reports of long hours and poor safety. ...read more

It is entirely normal to mythologize people after they are gone - prominent and effective leaders are often cannonized in the media, their virtues given priority in accounts of their lives and their flaws relegated to background noise. Steve Jobs, a truly visionary figure who ...read more