Showing posts with label Economics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Economics. Show all posts
Sunday, February 3, 2013
A BIG shout out to Iceland! The FBI Gets Ejected & Banned from Iceland
Iceland refused to cooperate with an FBI investigation into WikiLeaks two years ago so the FBI just... dropped... in... without informing the Icelandic government to snoop around about WikiLeaks and it’s founder Julian Assange.
Buy-Bye guys. Next time try NOT TO create an international incident with our ostensible allies Hunh?
Iceland didn’t spread their legs for the banks when their economy failed either, and Iceland was one of the first to recover their economic footing after the global market disturbances a few years back
Saturday, April 7, 2012
The Decline & Fall Of American Civilization Illustrated - Civilian Employment-Population Ratio (EMRATIO)
[Click the image for perspective & current chart from the St. Louis Fed]
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
A Barren Place: California Bookstore Replaced By Police Substation
Wednesday May 11 2011
In the wake of the closing of Borders Bookshop the SCPD has increased their overt pressure on the musicians and craftsmen native to, and traveling through Santa Cruz California.
These itinerant craftspeople have been known to purvey their wares within the boundaries of the city's arcane laws regarding sales, vending, noise ordinances with no known or stated standards, trespassing laws that encompass half the available sidewalk space as is the case in front of Borders Books, and the police are on scene this morning to specifically show the citizens of Santa Cruz how welcome they are, and to prove-by-their-presence that generally, hanging out and enjoying the day on Pacific avenue, a PUBLIC STREET, is a significant enough event to warrant(sic) 'observation'.
Pacific Avenue, in the intervening years since the Loma Prieta earthquake of 1989, has become an ugly blight... A failed corporate business-inhabited 'Shopping Mall', with the only revenue producing businesses apparently being the bars frequented on weekends by UCSC students, wherein Santa Cruz increases it's bloated police budget, but NOT it's city treasury, enforcing laws related to a host of universally problematic alcohol related crimes.
This is RazerRaygun saying "Take It Easy... But TAKE IT!
This news report has been cross-posted to Santa Cruz IndyMedia
Saturday, January 1, 2011
Global "Weather" Forecast For 2011 From Russian TV: Expect Stormy "Weather" And Potential "Lightning Strikes" In The United States
We Americans are exceptional... we're too 'stupidified' to revolt. Motivated by the hunger for 'stuff' and fearing anything that might upset the 'applecart' that supplies it, even if it's untenable for the long term and future of our children (and THEIR children) or outright murderous of people who happen to be in places 'needing to be bombed' in the American 'national interest'.
Also, we might miss "The Young And The Restless" while we're in the streets waiting for someone else to do our 'revolting' for us.
We will be continually kept psychologically off-balance and blinded by an ongoing savage blanket blitz advertising campaign hammering on us that we 'need' all that 'stuff', using the same technique, fear, that they sell us wars... on nations, and self-created 'terrorists' who in reality are typically rogue CIA agents like Osama bin-Laden and the mythical a-Qaeda, translated into English as "the database", which it was... They were the people on the CIA and Pentagon's database and payroll as allies in their war on Russia in Afghanistan.
Expect no civil rights, expunged one-by-one in the name of those wars based solely on lies... Just like the advertising of the "shiny... shiny..."
Expect no audience participation... (Snicker into cuff) ...because
The Revolution WILL NOT be televised.
Saturday, October 23, 2010
The Dispossessed WILL Inherit... "How (not to) to Organize a Community" - Dimitry Orlov
"...You see, upon close examination the English word “community” turns out to be all but meaningless..." [In Full]
"...suppose that our two communities are in an English-speaking country, which is likely to be afflicted with the irrational belief that the free market can solve all problems on its own, even problems with the availability of critical supplies such as oil. Just as one would expect, the invisible hand of the market fails to make itself visible,"How (not to) to Organize a Community
Dimitry Orlov
Saturday, October 23, 2010
Resource Clock Courtesy of Poodwaddle
[Pop out a larger version]
In the midst of all this organizational activity neighbors get a chance to meet, perhaps for the first time, and discover a commonality of interests that leads them to form acquaintances and perhaps even friendships.
As neighbors get to know each other, they start looking out for each other, improving safety and reducing crime.
As the community becomes more tight-knit, it changes in atmosphere and appearance, becoming more fashionable and desirable, attracting better-educated and more prosperous residents while pricing out the undesirable element. News of these vast improvements spreads far and wide, and the community becomes a tourist mecca, complete with food festivals, swank boutiques and pricy bric-à-brac shops and restaurants.
The undesirable element is forced to decamp to a less desirable neighborhood nearby. There, it has no choice but to suffer with high levels of crime, but is typically afraid to ask the police for help, having learned from experience that the police are more likely to harass them then to help them, to arrest them for minor offenses and to round them up and deport them if they happen to be illegal immigrants. They also learn to be careful around members of local gangs and drug dealers.
Since official jobs in the neighborhood are scarce, they seek informal, cash-based employment, contributing to an underground economy. Seeking safety in numbers, they self-organize along racial and ethnic lines, and, to promote their common interests, form ethnic mafias that strive to dominate one or more forms of illegal or semi-legal activity.
Growing up in a dangerous, violent environment, their children become tough at a young age, and, those that survive, develop excellent situational awareness that allows them to steer clear of dangerous situations and to know when to resort to violence.
When the fossil fuel-based national economy shuts down due to the increasingly well understood local ramifications of the global phenomenon of Peak Oil, both of these communities are harmed, but to different extents and in different ways.
Other countries may continue to function for another decade or even longer: these are the countries that have enough oil of their own, as well as those that were far-sighted enough to enter into long-term barter agreements with the few remaining oil producers that still have a surplus of oil for export.
But suppose that our two communities are in an English-speaking country, which is likely to be afflicted with the irrational belief that the free market can solve all problems on its own, even problems with the availability of critical supplies such as oil. Just as one would expect, the invisible hand of the market fails to make itself visible, but it is plain to see that fuel is no longer delivered to either of these communities, although in the second one some fuel is likely to still be available on the black market, at prices that very few people can afford.
Sooner or later, due to lack of supplies and maintenance at every level, electricity shuts off, water pumping stations cease to function, sewage backs up making bathrooms unusable, garbage trucks no longer collect the garbage, which piles up, breading rats, flies and cockroaches.
As sanitary conditions deteriorate, diseases such as cholera, dysentery and typhoid reappear and spread. The medical system requires fuel for the ambulances and running water, electricity and oil-based pharmaceuticals and disposable supplies for the hospitals and clinics to operate.
When these are no longer available, the surviving residents are left to care for each other as best they can and, when they fail, to bury their own dead. Along with the other municipal and government services, police departments cease to function. Particularly important installations are guarded by soldiers or by private security, while the population is left to fend for itself.
The effect on the two communities is markedly different... In Full @ ClubOrlov
Monday, June 28, 2010
Some Notes, From The Distance, On The the G20 'Summit' And The Concurrent "Toronto Troubles"
($1 Billion G20 Brutality - Canada's Shame @ The Livable Blog is)"Probably the best summation of the G8 I have read so far. A good cohesive write up. Needs to be read on the site where the materials and little clips are linked in."
This is what was achieved for that ONE BILLION DOLLARS in security:
The G20 Summit sets a 5 year withdrawal from Afghanistan as one of it's goals, and a number of other policies have been agreed on including deficit reductions. Guess WHY most of the industrialized nations HAVE deficits that need cutting?
Clue: It's due to persecuting a war...
Need another clue? The country we are persecuting that war on starts with the letter "A". [source]
It was interesting to read a Facebook entry from someone in the Toronto suburbs (Kitchner)on a friend's page in regard to the G20 conference and concurrent demonstrations:
"Wow.. watching channel 24, and now they are randomly arresting ppl the reporter seen a young couple five feet from him get tackled to the ground for no reason!! and taken in."
In another incident The Real News Network's Jesse Freeston, a member of the credentialed media was attacked after a deaf man was arrested for "Not Following Orders" and his equipment smashed when he asked the officer if his orders included attacking the press:
This after headlines like: G20/G8 Toronto arrest total tops 500 after night of riots...
CBC News - Toronto - G20 police raid activists' homes
Four people have been charged after G20 police raided two homes in Toronto, and there are reports activists from Montreal were arrested later at a third house...
Twits like this: _GirlsAction RT @q_e_d: RT @andrewbrett: Video Peaceful protesters sing O Canada, then police charge at them. http://bit.ly/c8YIkU #g20report #g20 #cdnpoli #cdnleft
and succinctly to the point... What to Expect at G20: Lots and Lots of Cops
Toronto, Canada - If you want to see more police officers than you’ve probably ever seen in your life, come to Toronto this weekend.
There were side issues such a the rape of large portions of Canada's land for Oil Sands, and the fact that The NGOs and E-NGOs 'have a seat' at the conference...
...after the E-NGOs sold out the Canadian Native's (First Nation) forests.
NGOs join Presidents behind the G20 Fence
Canada's non-profit industrial complex shows its face in the run up to the G20
Constantly updated reports were provided by the Toronto Media Coop HERE and at it's home page where there are links to still more information and images, such as g20.this.org, People-powered coverage of the June 2010 G8 & G20 summit.
Photo on the right from their site:
Yes, there are a number of reasons for rage against the Machine
But regarding the 'rioting'...
As much as I despise random violence... I believe absolutely in "No justice no peace"
I said the same thing about the WTO demos in Seattle, and I said it when New York and so many other cities in the U.S. had the Vietnam war come home to roost.
Here's a posting Da' Buffalo did a while back on the subject of world trade and economic organizations:
An excruciatingly detailed look at how these cretins-with-suits-and-government 'credentials' destroy economies.
The WTO, World Bank, and IMF - Destroying African (or insert your third world country's name here) AgricultureMultiply that pressure on the Third World and Agricultural nations by (G)20... Then feel the rage of the rest of the (Non-industrialized) world.
"U.S. Agriculture Secretary John Block put it at the start of the Uruguay Round of trade negotiations in 1986, “the idea that developing countries should feed themselves is an anachronism from a bygone era. They could better ensure their food security by relying on U.S. agricultural products, which are available, in most cases at lower cost." [link above]
Not to mention how the E-NGOs sold out the Canadian "First Nations" and Canada's primordial forests?
They were at the G20 too.
The natives 'outside the wire', and the E-NGOs 'inside the wire'
Rage!
But it comes down to this...
There's a long standing rule among "those that's doin'" about property destruction.
It's message has to be INSTANTLY recognizable!
Reverend Billy recently "building mountains' in JP Morgan/Chase banks to protest mountaintop removal mining in West Virginia for example (It Worked! They 'divested'), or dumping soot in power company lobbies as some New Yorkers fed up with Con Edison's coal burning in the 60s did, are a couple of examples that come to mind.
If what's happening appears senseless, then MY senses say "Provocateurs at work", and indeed, it's quite easy to infiltrate so-called 'black blocs'.
Case in point from the streets of Toronto:
Groups of undercover police were repeatedly identified by protesters at marches occurring between Monday and Wednesday. Some were reportedly wearing black baseball caps, bandanas with marijuana leaf-designs on them, and patches with Che Guevara on them. When asked by journalists if they were police, none denied it. [Source]Black Blocs are too loosely affiliated to be secure or have reliable goals and leadership.
Some history... New York... Abbie Hoffman's hard core friends, UAW/MF-ESSO
Also known as Up Against The Wall Motherfuckers
The real deal...
They don't come along every day, and truth be told, someone who's angry enough to be taunted to commit an action that would run counter to a common goal with a larger community (and FWIW, this "Street Gang With Analysis", the UAW/MF, was fairy god mother to a community of so many spaced out hippies who needed help, with the ESSO (East Side Service Organization) free store, free meals, medical aid, and so much more available on a daily basis), or for that matter any discernible goal past just pure anger venting as observed by the general public, IS NOT IN ANY WAY AN ANARCHIST...
"Nihilist" would be the more appropriate term, and they simply do the work of "Useful Idiots" for whomever seeks to disrupt their community's safety and well being. In other words, they witlessly work for "The Man".
Labels:
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Canada,
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Economics,
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G8,
Indigenous People,
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Mass Demonstrations,
New World Order,
NGOs,
Oil Sands,
Police Riot,
Provocateurs,
Riot,
Toronto,
UAW/MF
Sunday, May 23, 2010
'Grudge Post' Files: Greenpeace Sold Out Canada's Forests And "Nature Conservancy" Has A 'Posse' Of Corporate Names Too
About Greenpeace's sellout
(and they haven't floated a boat for years either, content with lobbying congress 'for the Whales'):
So a new management deal has been signed for Canada’s Boreal Forest. It’s being hailed as the largest forest deal in the history of the world. You can see the map above: orange will be ‘protected’, gray areas will not. The fragmentation seems to indicate a lack of wildlife migration corridors. Sounds pretty fishy already. Check out this article especially, and this one, and this from the NYT business blog.
21 timber and paper companies, the State and 9 NGOs are on board, including Greenpeace, which is publicly declaring this deal as a major victory. But many questions remain unanswered, like these from DTE.
And as usual, despite their having been here for at least thousands of years, no one consulted the Natives. Mad props to the VMC for breaking this.
“It’s a massive tomb, uh, tome that we’ve put together,” misspoke Richard Brooks from Greenpeace at the press conference on Tuesday morning. Only a twelve page abridged version of the agreement has been made public. The full agreement was leaked to the Vancouver Media Co-op on May 19. According to Brooks, it will now be presented to various levels of government.
“The Canadian Boreal Forest Agreement is essentially another huge jump away from democracy, towards corporate control of the lands of Canada, as well as the corporatization of what is left of a once defiant environmental movement,” said Macdonald Stainsby, coordinator of OilSandsTruth.org.
“I hardly think that this in any way represents an end to the conflict between the true proponants of the war over the boreal forest, which of course are corporations and First Nations,” he said. “What this means is that First Nations no longer have the support of these mainstream environmental groups... [In Full, With Linkage]
But this is a story about The "Nature Conservancy" and THEIR friends, along with a list of "Environmental NGOs" that aren't... "Environmental" that is.
Nature Conservancy's Corporate Posse:
It is a disgrace to ecosystems everywhere and the next seven generations that they pimp nature dot org as their official website. A quick look-see into the world of TNC and comprehension dawns. Their corporate partners in environmental crime and shame:Also see this Washington Post article: Nature Conservancy faces potential backlash from ties with BP
3M Company
Alliant Energy
Altria Group
American Electric Power
Bank of America
Barrick Gold Corporation
The Boeing Company
BP
Cargill
Caterpillar Inc.
Chevron
The Coca-Cola Company
Delta Air Lines
The Dow Chemical Company
Duke Energy Corporation
Eastman Kodak Company
Ecolab Inc.
ExxonMobil Corporation
MeadWestvaco Corporation
Monsanto Company
Nestlé Waters North America
PG&E Corporation
Plum Creek Timber Company
SC Johnson & Son, Inc.
Temple-Inland
Weyerhaeuser Company
Xerox Corporation
Scratching your temple?
Read "This. Is. Serious." Environmentalism is Dead
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Untenable Lifestyle Alert! US military warns oil output may dip causing massive shortages by 2015 - Guardian UK
"The actual report can be found here (PDF) but the peak oil assertions are buried fairly deep inside (see p.29), and certainly not underlined in the summary... so we have a fairly schizophrenic approach here, with peak oil acknowledged but downplayed... (for the 2005 view on peak oil by the US Army, see also this report (PDF))
It looks like someone found the nuggets deep in the report, and fed them to friends in the media. Interesting times..."
(Say Buh-Bye To All That "Stuff")
The Wicks Review on UK energy policy published last summer effectively dismissed fears but Lord Hunt, the British energy minister, met concerned industrialists two weeks ago in a sign that it is rapidly changing its mind on the seriousness of the issue.Further...
...there are signs that the US Department of Energy might also be changing its stance on peak oil. In a recent interview with French newspaper, Le Monde, Glen Sweetnam, main oil adviser to the Obama administration, admitted that "a chance exists that we may experience a decline" of world liquid fuels production between 2011 and 2015 if the investment was not forthcoming.
("...the answer to the issue of knowing when, where and in which quantities additional sources of oil should be put on-stream remains widely “unidentified” in the eyes of the most prominent official analyst on energy inside the Obama administration.")
In Other Words:Say goodbye to a culture based on 'plastic crap' folks. The last few drops of 'black blood' will be used to power the Pentagon's military machine defending us from a world of enemies we've created for ourselves, NOT to run your car on your last long drive down to the store for a sixxer and some cigs. Did you ever think otherwise?
Even the food we eat is grown in an artificial environment based on petroleum derived fertilizers, and the pills you take to stay calm... petroleum-based production facilities and ingredients... poised to be unavailable as American society collapses.
Terry Macalister
guardian.co.uk
Sunday 11 April 2010 18.47 BST
• Shortfall could reach 10m barrels a day, report says
• Cost of crude oil is predicted to top $100 a barrel
The US military has warned that surplus oil production capacity could disappear within two years and there could be serious shortages by 2015 with a significant economic and political impact.
The energy crisis outlined in a Joint Operating Environment report from the US Joint Forces Command, comes as the price of petrol in Britain reaches record levels and the cost of crude is predicted to soon top $100 a barrel.
"By 2012, surplus oil production capacity could entirely disappear, and as early as 2015, the shortfall in output could reach nearly 10 million barrels per day," says the report, which has a foreword by a senior commander, General James N Mattis.
It adds: "While it is difficult to predict precisely what economic, political, and strategic effects such a shortfall might produce, it surely would reduce the prospects for growth in both the developing and developed worlds. Such an economic slowdown would exacerbate other unresolved tensions, push fragile and failing states further down the path toward collapse, and perhaps have serious economic impact on both China and India.
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Anarchists Versus Teabaggers - "Of Tea-Parties and Patriots: Liberty for Who?"
From The IAS Blog
(The following article was written and directed towards members of the "Liberty Movement," participants in the Tea Parties and Town Hall meeting protests. It was originally intended to be handed out at Colorado gun shows, where anarchists have done counter-recruitment against the Minutemen.)Of Tea-Parties and Patriots:
Liberty for who?
by Dave Strano
As town hall meetings on health care become the targets for disruptive protest and a growing “pro-liberty” movement gains traction and headlines, a full analysis of the situations we are facing as white working class people and an analysis of the strategies of the new “pro-liberty” movement is necessary.
I am authoring this piece as a white working class male that comes from a military family background, and identifies to some extent as being a libertarian. This description of myself is important as it helps color the perspective I am writing from, as any differences in my background, race, or socio-economic status would ultimately change the entire nature of this essay.
This piece is also mainly directed at white working class people that are active within this new movement. The reasons for this are many, as will become obvious as this piece progresses.
On race…
The Liberty Movement resembles the broader Libertarian Movement in a myriad of ways. One of these ways is in racial composition. To be plain and up front, the U.S. Right is mostly comprised of white people. These giant Tea Parties, our demonstrations and meetings are seas of white faces, with small sprinklings of nonwhite faces.
Whiteness is defined in many different ways by many different people. To many, Jews are not white. Up until the mid 1900’s, white skinned people of Irish and Italian descent were not considered white. Some folks still think this way.
I identify, for the benefit of this essay, a white person as any person with pale skin pigmentation that would commonly pass as white in this society. We don’t need to break this down any further. We know whether we’re white or not.
Most whites immediately become defensive when the word race is even brought up. We don’t want to admit we think in these terms. We don’t want to admit that race has anything to do with our lives or what’s going on in this country. We’d rather pretend it doesn’t exist and not talk about it.
We can act like Ostriches all we want. It doesn’t change that our movement is nearly completely white. Let’s admit that, understand that, and move on to understanding what that means for us.
On class…
When people bring up the term “class”, many white working people start to snicker. The calls of “leftist” or “socialist” or “pinko” come to the lips of many at the mere indication that someone may be conscious of class in America. Despite this tendency, especially within the ranks of poor and working whites, most white working people naturally view the world in terms of class, whether they’d admit it or not.
Our realities are shaped by where we stand socially, economically, and politically. The vast majority of whites, like people of all other races, live in precarious social, political, and economic realities. We live paycheck to paycheck. We live off over-extended credit. We live in debt. We don’t own much, if at all, in real estate. We live in stressful situations, where if one part of the chain breaks, we lose everything. Our very existence is one of insecurity and economic disaster.
Most people in the middle and upper classes of white society try to stifle this talk amongst us in the working or lower classes. Political, social, and church leaders try to erase the class line. But for those of us going home at night to trailers, slumlord owned apartments, or dilapidated houses, we tend to not forget the large suburban homes and mansions that these leaders sleep in.
Class exists. Just like race, we can’t make it go away by ignoring it. But why would we even want to ignore it? Our situation as working whites boils down directly to the idea of class.
Our class interests…
I start with the idea that most white working class people want similar things. We, as most people do, want security, freedom, prosperity, comfort, and safety. We don’t want to have to worry about where our next meal is coming from, how we’re going to be able to afford school supplies for our children, or whether or not we will fall victims to a “terrorist” attack. We don’t want to constantly fear losing our jobs or living the rest of our lives in precarious economic situations.
We now live in a country with a huge division between rich and poor. We live with a failed economy. We live in a nearly failed state. The government of the United States has systemically become a monstrous giant of bureaucrats and neo-tyrants. The whole government, every single politician, is part of this corrupt system.
Back home, in our communities, both rural and urban, we are losing our jobs. We are watching our sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, dying in deserts and mountains halfway across the world. Our police forces are growing larger, just as our prison populations. We, as working people, are losing everything.
But, there may still be hope for us...
Click to read the guidelines and the rest of the article
Labels:
American Society,
Anarchism,
Anarchist,
Class,
Class War,
Despotism,
Economics,
Militarism,
Tea Party,
Teabagger
Thursday, March 25, 2010
"Bullets from the Drug War" - Dimitry Orlov (kollapsnik @ ClubOrlov) On America's Border Drug War
Bullets from the Drug Warby kollapsnik (Dmitry Olov)
[One-year update: I posted this a year ago. Right now, the Secretary of State, the Head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and other American top brass are in Mexico City trying to spin this. Let's see if any of what I said a year ago needs to be revisited.]
* The US has lost the "War on Drugs"
* The losing side is usually not the one to decide when a fight is over or how it ends
* Unlike other recent defeats, this lost war is a defeat followed by an invasion
* Mexico is the natural staging area for the invasion (inconvenient though it is for the Mexicans)
* New franchises are being set up to service the North American drug market (which is the biggest in the world)
* The CIA has to eat, and all they know how to do competently is run guns and drugs and control thugs; they get a seat at the table
* The narcs have to eat too, and all they are trained to do is deal (with) drugs; they get a seat at the table too
* As the federales grow weak in the US and Mexico, the battle lines will advance north of the border, leaving Mexico a quiet and largely intact backwater
* This is an inter-US conflict, because Americans are the most avid consumers, sellers, and prosecutors of drugs
* Life in the USA gives everyone a pain that is for many people simply not survivable without drugs: either alcohol, pharmaceuticals or illegal drugs
* Illegal drugs are far more cost-effective than either pharma or alcohol — government-licensed industries which are either excessively lucrative or taxed heavily
* As Americans give up hope, they will need to self-medicate in ever-larger numbers
* They will be far more able financially to afford illegal drugs than either pharma or alcohol.
* Illegal drugs (and moonshine) are two very large post-collapse enrepreneurial opportunities within the USA [Post-Soviet Lessons for a Post-American Century, Orlov 2005]
* This is no longer a war against drugs; it is now a contest between alternative drug distribution systems
* One alternative is a centralized, paramilitary organization run by CIA remnants, former military, and former police
* Another alternative is ethnic mafias, which will diversify into many other kinds of trade.
* The third, nautrally most cost-effective alternative will be provided by informal, local distribution networks based on barter, which will be all that is left once the dust settles
* The downside of all this is that it will be hard to find anyone sober enough to operate a light switch
* The upside to that is that the national electrical grid goes away, so there will be very little demand for competent light switch operators
[source]
Visit Dimitry @ ClubOrlov, and if you haven't, be sure to check his (2006) presentation "Closing the 'Collapse Gap': the USSR was better prepared for collapse than the US" at energybulletin.net and a recent update: "Collapse Gap Revisited"
Labels:
CIA,
ClubOrlov,
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Drug Wars,
Economics,
Mexico,
Narcotics,
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