US Couple Charged Passing Nuclear Secrets, Couple Denies

Article first published as US Couple Charged Passing Nuclear Secrets, Couple Denies on Technorati.

A US couple is charged with trying passing information of US nuclear secrets to a fake Venezuelan agent. Venezuela has no actual role in this fake espionage. The team is of a husband and his wife. Argentina born Mr. Pedro Mascheroni and his wife were contractors at Los Alamos National Laboratory, a centre for US nuclear research.

Mr. Mascheroni of age 75 worked as a nuclear physicist at the laboratory from 1979 and 1988. He was removed from his job after criticizing a US nuclear funding priorities. He was denied funding for his project of developing a laser technology. Mrs. Mascheroni worked as a technical writer and editor from 1981 to 2010.

Both Accused

The couple is said to have access to nuclear secrets, including design and manufacture of nuclear weapons. Mr. Mascheroni is accused of meeting an FBI agent, posing as a Venezuelan intelligence operative two years ago and saying, he would help Venezuela develop a nuclear bomb. He was also accused of telling the agent he would help the Latin American country produce nuclear energy.

Mrs. Mascheroni is accused of helping her husband prepare a document containing the nuclear secrets. The document was then handed to the FBI agent posing as a Venezuelan secret service. The justice department warned the US’ people of wrongdoing of this kind.

The Fall and Rise of Major Economies’ Interest Rates

Article first published as The Fall and Rise of Major Economies’ Interest Rates on Blogcritics.

The world financial crisis, the worst since the great depression of 1930s, forced major economies of the world reduce their central banks’ interest rates to their least level possible. This was done to overcome “the credit crunch” that erupted as a byproduct of the financial crisis. Credit crunch was also a result of the bankers ceasing their lending to one another, due to mistrust developed out of lack of transparency over the exposure of each bank to the toxic sub-prime mortgage loans.

As the banks, investment as well as commercial, stopped releasing their funds for lending, the central banks stepped in to see that the required funds are available to market. This prompts people believing that the banks are in dearth of funds, which is not true. If market players stall their activities, the theories of free market economy would become useless. Ironically the people (or consumers in market language), on whose purchasing capacity and spending activity the markets depend upon, had no role in this entire fiasco except paying taxes and losing jobs.

Interest Rates

The central banks exercise their control mainly on four rates. They are Bank Rate (or discount rate), repo rate (repurchasing rate), reverse repo rate and CRR (cash reserve ratio). A bank rate is the interest rate that is charged by a country’s central bank (federal bank in some countries) on loans and advances

Indo-Pak Express Recommended for Highest Pakistan Civil Award

Article first published as Indo-Pak Express Recommended for Highest Pakistan Civil Award on Technorati.

Here is a laudable gesture from Pakistan government to its archrival and neighboring India. The Governor of Punjab state of Pakistan Salmaan Taseer has recommended the runner doubles team in the recently concluded US open tennis to be honored with the highest Pakistan civil award.

Amid raised tensions, this is really a welcoming proposal from a Pakistan State Government.

The people of India administered Kashmir have been on warpath against Indian Army stationing in the state and against AFSPA (Armed Forces’ Special Powers Act). More than hundred people were killed in police firing. The Indian Government is widely criticized for failing to deal with people properly.

Pakistan has rejected the aid offered by India to Pakistan flood victims, the move also condemned by the US. While appealing the world to contributions, rejecting aid from the neighboring country is truly an insult to India.

Reserve Bank of India Beats Forecast on Rate Hike

(Article first published as Reserve Bank of India Beats Forecast on Rate Hike on Technorati.)

The Governor of Reserve Bank of India, Duvvuri Subba Rao could not allow himself lagging behind the trend of beating forecast by growth numbers of India. At the quarterly review meeting on Sept 16, 2010, the RBI raised interest rates more aggressively than expected. The RBI lifted repo rate, at which it lends to banks and other financial intermediaries, by 25 basis points to 6 percent. It also lifted reverse repo rate, at which RBI absorbs the cash from the system, by 50 basis points to 5 percent.

Inflation concerns

The deference between the repo rate and reverse repo rate is decreased from 1.25 percent to 1 percent, signalling that the central bank is committed to control the high rate of inflation. "Inflation remains the dominant concern in macroeconomic management," the central bank said in a statement released to reporters. “Monetary Policy Review: September 2010,” almost confirmed that the inflation rates have reached their peak, but cautioned it is likely to remain at unacceptably high levels for some months.

Several factors prompted the central bank to rein in the inflation, which is still nearer to the double-digit figure. Almost double the forecast growth (13.8 percent) of Industrial output in July 2010; rocket speed rise of the share markets; and robust annualized growth rate of GDP (8.8 percent) for the quarter ending with June 2010 necessitated controlling the money supply in the system.

Big Firm Bonuses Back to pre-Crisis Level

Article first published as Big Firm Bonuses Back to pre-Crisis Level on Technorati.

Bonuses to executive directors are back to pre-crisis level in the U.K. Though pace of increases is slowed, the levels of payment have reached almost pre-crisis level. A business advisory firm Deloitte conducted a survey to find the developments occurred in pays and bonuses after the crisis. The survey revealed that pay increases for the executives might be history for now. The BBC News quoted Stephen Cahill of Deloitte as saying, “Last year we saw a very large number of companies freezing executive salaries, but at the time it was difficult to predict whether this was a one-off. Now it appears that the years of executive salaries increasing at rates far in excess of inflation and the increase in average earnings are, at least for the moment, well and truly over.”

Toppers at Top

The survey found that the average bonuses for executive directors of FTSE 100 companies were equal to 100% of their basic salary for the year. It said the top 30 companies increased the bonuses to their executives by 140%. Coming to mid-sized FTSE 250 companies, one in Seven paid no bonus to their bosses. For the present year also the difference between the trends of bonuses in FTSE 100 and FTSE 250 companies are expected to continue. While for the bosses of FTSE 100 companies, the bonuses are expected to be greater than the last year in the present year; they would be lower for FTSE 250 companies.

Bonus vs. Austerity

While European Countries are burdened with high levels of debts and deficits and their governments are already on the path of aggressive austerity measures and spending cuts, trade unions or giving warning signals that the workers’ pay

Ohio’s Outsourcing Ban - A Tip of Iceberg of US’ Protectionism

Article first published as Ohio’s Outsourcing Ban is the Tip of the US Protectionism Iceberg on Blogcritics.

H-1B Visa fee hike and the ban imposed on outsourcing by Ohio State are the latest of the US protectionist measures unveiling once again the protectionist policies of the US Government. The U.S. teaches the entire world to fallow the ‘Free Market Economy principles.’ It does so even at G7 meetings to the so called ‘most developed countries’ of the world. They started GATT negotiations asking the world nations ‘to accept or reject’ the agreement, as if there was no other alternative. They’ve ultimately established WTO, completed Uruguay Round and urging to complete ‘Doha Round’ trade negotiations for further Liberalization, Privatization and Globalization (LPG).

Not New

While GATT negotiations of Uruguay Round were on, the US televisions transmitted a news item that showed an Indian garment catching fire instantly to tell the viewers, not to buy Indian garments as there was imminent danger of getting caught by fire easily. This was done in the 2^nd half of the 90s’ decade and the US garment producers were alleged to be behind transmitting the news item. Similarly, high tariff on Chinese tyres in the name of anti-dumping duties is one such case. This is nothing but a covert protectionism. The US stipulates strictures to the third world countries through IMF and World Bank loans, like reducing or abolishing subsidies to their agricultural sector, selling every service –Hospitals’ user charges, water charges by metering the consumption even by farmers and so on- to the people. The US aka its companies want people of all countries buying its agricultural products and inputs. Every country in the world should buy the America produced grains, wheat, burgers, pizzas and what not?

Larger Background

Actually, the matured capitalist economies like the US, the EU and Japan are increasingly facing crisis after crisis that are becoming more and more difficult to recover from. Japan’s painful and decade long recession from 90s into 21^st Century and the present deflation & dead-slow growth, the dotcom bubble’s burst at the beginning of the millennium, the

China Intensifies Drive to Relocate Industries to the Central and Western Inlands

Article first published as China Intensifies Drive to Relocate Industries to the Central and Western Inlands on Blogcritics.

The China has been campaigning for more than a decade to “develop the west,” as part of a stated aim to develop the inland region of the Western China. Ever since the China adopted market friendly economy since 1978, the rapid industrialization has been mainly concentrated in southern coastal provinces like Shenzhen, Guangdong and Zhejiang. As a result of rapid urbanization and industrialization, people from western provinces migrated to the coastal provinces in search of job opportunities, thus, providing cheap labor to the factories in the coastal region. The cheap labor thus available majorly due to migration helped the southern region attracting billions of dollars of FDIs.

This was actually a result of the policy preached by the then supreme leader of China Communist Party, Deng-Xiao-Ping. He advocated to “allow first some people to become rich, who would latter provide resources to make the rest of the country rich.” This made southern provinces more crowded and prices of properties, like housing and land, have shot up beyond the reach of even rich middle classes. The western and Northern provinces of the China have been deprived of industries, jobs and related developments due to concentration of industrial activities in southern and eastern coastal provinces.

Inland Relocation of Industries

The worst economic crisis, since the great depression of 1930s, has pushed the Chinese government to drive aggressively for agglomeration of industries towards central and western provinces. The Chinese version of the cabinet, the state council namely “Central People's Government,” the highest executive organ of State power has issued directives stressing the importance of relocating industries to the central and western inland provinces to keep manufacturing competitive and encourage job growth closer to the homes of China’s vast rural population. "The

Martin Luther King. Jr.’s Famous Speech “I Have a Dream…” -Video

 

Source: You Tube, via website Republic-of-Dave

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Global Leadership at the Cost of Sweat and Blood

Article first published as Global Leadership at the Cost of Sweat and Blood on Blogcritics.

In a rare confession, the US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton expressed fear that the US is on the brink of losing global leadership. She sees the US’ national debt posing enormous threat to the national security of the US as a result of losing global leadership. The US’ two unpaid wars and tax cuts have to properly be dealt with Ms. Clinton opined. “…it is fair to say that we fought two wars without paying for them, and we had tax cuts that were not paid for either. And that has been a very deadly combination to fiscal sanity and responsibility," Clinton said in her speech given at Council on Foreign Relations, a research institute on foreign relations based in Washington.

Who Pays?

If the US government didn’t have to pay the two aggressive wars that devastated two countries; left many dead, widowed, orphaned; threw a country into sectarian violence, chaos and leaderless (people shouldn’t have their own leaders with back-bone for their countries but leaders that agree to serve the interests of the American bosses of MNCs, TNCs, cartels, syndicates and so on) then who could have been forced to pay and who is going to pay? Aren’t Clinton’s concerns for debt and deficit of the US, directed at calling those helped create financial chaos at home, for paying at least now to stop the US from losing global leadership? It seems answer is ‘no’. If the US wants to recover itself from quagmire of financial crises (not only of 2007, but a series of crises that occurred during post-cold-war period) developed at home, none has any problem. It can employ its own people; produce goods, trade and sell them; earn what it deserves. But how is it justified when it wages wars of aggression so as to bring its debt ridden economy back on track?

Two Big Stimuli

In her comments Ms. Clinton forgot that apart from two unpaid aggressive wars and sops of tax cuts, two enormous and magnanimous stimulus packages were paid to those who brought the world financial system down to the earth along with millions of families’ health and wealth. They have also contributed to the huge debt that she was talking about. She

India’s Government Paper Proposes Weakening FDI Rules

Article first published as India’s Government Paper Proposes Weakening FDI Rules on Technorati.

The Commerce and Industry Ministry on Friday, released proposals for discussion on whether to abolish foreign investment caps imposed on the companies invested in joint ventures in India prior to the year 2005. The discussion paper released is said to be a part of series of papers released by the ministry as a measure to attract more FDIs. Such papers also inform foreign investors how the Government of India is changing over time the policies and priorities.

Before 2005, there was a rule for the companies who tied up with Indian partners in joint ventures to seek approval from the federal government before bidding for expansion outside the tie-up. The problem is that the policy was reviewed in 2005 after which the rule exempted the companies that invested after 2005 from seeking approval for further expansion of their own. This is clearly observed as discrimination between the companies entered India before and after 2005.

Vedanta’s Acquisition Bid

Maybe the recent bid by Vedanta Resources to acquire Cairn India, a subsidiary of the U.K. based Cairn, prompted the ministry to release the discussion paper. It is a common practice in India that when the government intends a policy review, it would first release discussion papers to identify the opposition so that it can calm them properly. Cairn India has a tie-up with ONGC, a public sector oil exploration company, in its biggest oil well in Rajasthan State. Cairn India holds 70% stake and ONGC the rest in it.

India focused Vedanta Resources made a highest bid for Cairn India of $9.6 billion and sought the government’s approval which is still pending. When the matter came to light there were huge expectations that the ONGC might