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  The best indicator of a chess player's form is his ability to sense the climax of the game –Boris Spassky, World Chess Champion, 1969-1972You've likely heard that the German central bank announced it will begin withdrawing part of its massive gold holdings from the United States as well as all its holdings from France. By 2020, Bundesbank says it wants half its gold reserves stored in its own vault in Germany.Why would it want to physically move the metal from New York? It's not as if US vaults are not secure, and since Germany already owns the gold, does...

BILL GROSS: Investment Banks Have Morphed Markets With 'Ponzi Finance' — And Time Is Almost Up Matthew BoeslerJanuary 31, 2013, 9:52 AMBill Gross, the PIMCO fund manager known as the "Bond King," is out with his February investment letter, titled "Credit Supernova!" This month, Gross tackles the relationship between credit expansion and real growth. He channels the late economist Hyman Minsky, saying the economy is now in Minsky's "Ponzi finance" phase, "when additional credit would be required just to cover increasingly burdensome interest payments, with accelerating inflation the end result." Gross writes that new credit is providing diminishing returns: "Each...

United States Rep. Rosa DeLauro wants to offer tax incentives for people who agree to turn in their assault weapons, as a way of getting the weapons off the streets. DeLauro said the SAFER Streets Act is designed to prevent guns from falling into the hands of violent criminals, getting dangerous assault weapons off the streets and to improve the state's mental health system so it properly helps those in need. The act will give gun owners a $2,000 tax credit when they turn their weapons in. According to experts, AR-15s usually cost about $1,000. At the news conference Thursday...

Boy, I sure am. If there’s one thing the GOP needs now, it’s another senator who’s famously soft on immigration. Imagine these words ringing off the walls in the Senate chamber: “[A]ny Latino who votes for a Republican or a Democrat who opposes rational immigration reform is an Uncle Tom.” He’ll make a fine third in the McCain/Graham alliance. “I mention this only briefly, fasten your seatbelt,” Rivera said on his radio show. “I mentioned this only briefly to my wife … but I am and I’ve been in touch with some people in the Republican Party in New Jersey....

That’s one small step for tolerance, but one giant leap for states’ rights. The modified policy would, in effect, kick the can down the road to local sponsors, who could continue the abominable policy of deeming gay teenagers too “immoral” to participate in Boy Scout activities. There is no similar step forward for atheists. This modified policy would still require local groups to discriminate against atheists, apparently because the Boy Scout Oath implies that an atheist can’t be “morally straight” unless he can do his “duty to God.” Using this twisted logic, a number of courageous and honest atheists have...

The attacks, which began in mid-September, coincided with a Times investigation into how the relatives and family of Premier Wen Jiabao built a fortune worth over $2 billion. The report, which was posted online Oct. 25, embarrassed the Communist Party leadership, coming ahead of a fraught transition to new leaders and exposing deep-seated favoritism at a time when many Chinese are upset about a wealth gap. Over the months of cyber-incursions, the hackers eventually lifted the computer passwords of all Times employees and used them to get into the personal computers of 53 employees. The report said none of the...

Aggressive TV ads and racial politics take center stage in the race to replace Jesse Jackson Junior in the 2nd Congressional District. "I don't have enough words to say thank you. All I can say is I'll give you my whole heart and soul," State Sen. Toi Hutchison said Wednesday as a group of African-American ministers prayed that the other black candidates- Robin Kelly, Alderman Anthony Beale and State Senator Napoleon Harris  would remove themselves from the ballot. They believe by having one black candidate, it would be easier for an African-American to win on February 26. "

W.H. blames Congress for record deportations By DONOVAN SLACK | 1/31/13 2:15 PM EST White House domestic policy chief Cecilia Muñoz on Thursday blamed Congress for the record number of deportations carried out by the Obama administration. Jose Antonio Vargas, an undocumented immigrant, asked Muñoz during a Google+ Hangout how President Obama feels about deporting 1.5 million illegal immigrants since taking office. "The government’s job is to do what Congress tells it to do," Muñoz replied. "Congress, under the immigration laws that we've got now, Congress requires us to remove people who are removable and gives DHS, frankly, a whole...

A starving man in North Korea has been executed after murdering his two children for food, reports from inside the secretive state claim. A 'hidden famine' in the farming provinces of North and South Hwanghae is believed to have killed up to 10,000 people and there are fears that incidents of cannibalism have risen. The grim story is just one to emerge as residents battle starvation after a drought hit farms and shortages were compounded by party officials confiscating food. Undercover reporters from Asia Press told the Sunday Times that one man dug up his grandchild's corpse and ate it....

Considered a cancer-surviving “badass on a bike,” it turns out Lance Armstrong is just a badass — and a fraud. Armstrong's admission that he doped his way to seven Tour de France titles even prompted CBS News CEO Jeffrey Fager to Think Again about his network's role in the “Miracle Man's” narrative. “We helped create the myth,” he acknowledged, because “we wanted to believe this absolutely inspirational story. But we were duped.” Unearned moral superiority and blazing self-righteousness hastened Armstrong's rise as he slandered and sued whistle-blowers into submission. “I was a bully in the sense that I tried to...

Senator Jim Inhofe cited a blog post by conservative Washington Post blogger Jennifer Rubin during the confirmation hearing for Secretary of Defense nominee Chuck Hagel on Thursday, setting in motion a public argument on Twitter. Inhofe, who called Rubin a reporter, cited a blog post of her's about Hagel. Shortly thereafter, Post reporter Rajiv Chandrasekaran took issue with Rubin's work on Twitter, saying that Rubin "is NOT a WaPo reporter."

Last month, when the Republican Governor of South Carolina named GOP U.S. Representative Tim Scott to the U.S. Senate, the “first African American U.S. Senator from the South since Blanche Bruce of Mississippi in 1881” according to The State newspaper, thus becoming the only black -- Democrat or Republican -- in the Senate, ABC’s World News didn’t mention it. Fast-forward to Wednesday night, and ABC anchor Diane Sawyer suddenly found it newsworthy that the Democratic Governor of Massachusetts appointed an African-American to replace new Secretary of State John Kerry, trumpeting: “Look closely at this picture. That is William ‘Mo’ Cowan...

Arlington County issued a media statement today reporting that an investigation of election offense violations against Patrick Moran, the son of U.S. Rep. Jim Moran, has been concluded and no charges will be brought. A criminal investigation was initiated by the Arlington County Police Department in October 2012 after a video was released allegedly depicting Patrick Moran, former Director of Field Operations for the Jim Moran for Congress campaign organization, assisting another to vote illegally. According to the media statement, Patrick Moran and the Jim Moran for Congress campaign “provided full cooperation throughout the investigation,” whereas “despite repeated attempts to...

Women may be ready for combat, but Republicans aren’t. When the Obama administration announced that it would allow women into combat units, prominent Republicans were quick to say that they supported the policy — generally without any reservations or hints that there might be reasons for concern. A party that fought for decades against allowing open homosexuals to serve in the military is now thoughtlessly accepting a much more problematic change in military-personnel policy.They are doing so on naïve assumptions. The first is that physical standards will not change, and only those few women who meet ones developed for...

Earlier this month, Geraldo Rivera asked a caller: "How could you not trust your own government?" Putting aside big and little episodes of untrustworthy government in the history of this country like the Trail of Tears, the internment of Americans of Japanese descent, Kent State, Waco, Fast and Furious, and the Benghazi Coverup, Rivera implies the burden of proof lies with the skeptical citizen when it comes to trust. But his question only diverts our attention. The issue isn't the relative peace in the body politic at this instant. The question Geraldo asks really goes to the heart of the...

A House committee this morning endorsed Sen. Bryan King's (R) bill to allow guns in church, if the churches approve, which means final action is close at hand. Gov. Mike Beebe (D) says he'll sign it.

A few years ago, Alaska’s proposed “Bridge to Nowhere” became a national symbol of wasteful government spending on little-needed projects. Now Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) has pushed through his own version of this embarrassment, a $1.4 billion highway outside Hampton Roads that qualifies as a “Road for Nobody.” McDonnell has perplexed people across the state by his insistence on adding a tolled, four-lane highway parallel to U.S. 460. It will stretch for 55 miles from Petersburg, a Richmond suburb, southeast to Suffolk. The deal signed in December to build the road is especially insulting to traffic-jammed Northern Virginia, where...

Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) confronted former Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel with a clip from his 2009 interview with Al Jazeera during today's Defense Secretary confirmation hearing. The Secretary of Defense nominee can be heard agreeing with a caller's assertion that the United States is the "world's bully."

Distraught by his poor performance in front of the Senate Armed Services Committee, liberals viciously turned on secretary of defense nominee Chuck Hagel on social media. hagel’s making biden look rhetorically sure-footed — Peter Beinart (@PeterBeinart) January 31, 2013 this hearing is beginning to remind me of the 1st Obama-Romney debate — Peter Beinart (@PeterBeinart) January 31, 2013 This Hagel hearing is a disaster. — Andrew Kaczynski (@BuzzFeedAndrew) January 31, 2013

The White House on Thursday warned Syria not to transfer weapons to Hizbullah, as tensions mounted following reported Israeli raids on a military research center and a weapons convoy. "Syria should not further destabilize the region by transferring weaponry to Hizbullah," said Ben Rhodes, a US deputy national security advisor. Syria on Thursday warned that it reserves the right to retaliate to what it says was an Israeli air strike on a military research center..., as it lodged a complaint with the United Nations. The Syrian foreign ministry said Israel "and the states that protect it at the UN Security...