America needs an ineffective president. That's much better than an effective president that's going to go to war with Russia, that's going to push for the Trans-Pacific Partnership, that's going to protect Wall Street, and that's going to oppose neoliberal austerity. I would much rather have an ineffective president than someone who's going to do these bad things that I fear is going to come from Hillary and the Democratic Party.

The biggest industrial sector next to real estate is oil, gas and other mineral resources. They don't report any taxable income, because if you depict yourself as earning a profit, you have to pay a tax on it. So, it's all about what accountants choose to declare as profit.

I think something like three-quarters of American currency is held abroad, by drug dealers, by tax evaders, Russians and Chinese. Other people think that they want to protect themselves against their own currency going down. When you have 75% of the currency and even more of the high-denomination $100 bills held abroad, you wonder whether these are people we really want to pay. If you get rid of the $100 bills, its foreign holders will be the main losers.

Needless to say, banks and bondholders do not want to promote any arguments explaining the limits to how much can be paid without pushing economies into depression.

Most of the European leaders look at themselves as having to follow the United States, because if the US opposes them, there will be a regime change.

Paying debt service to banks leaves less income to buy goods and services.

The problem is indeed that one party's debt finds its counterpart in some other party's savings. Not paying debts therefore involves annulling some other party's financial claims on the debtor.