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Opinion The scientific community celebrated April 14 as World Quantum Day to raise awareness of quantum science’s impact across diverse fields The world of science is on the cusp of a transformative era driven by the burgeoning field of quantum technology. Quantum science is founded on several key principles that underpin the behaviour of particles and systems at the quantum scale. The term “quantum scale” refers to the realm of physics that deals with phenomena occurring at very small scales, typically at the level of atoms, subatomic particles and fundamental particles. It encompasses the principles of quantum mechanics, which govern...

There are no other constitutional rights in substance without freedom to transact Being meaning to write this for 6 months, but the Canadian response to the trucker protests is illustrating this so vividly, that today is the day. I assume we are in agreement that constitutional democracies are a good form of government or, at least, a better form of government than the other methods we have found to-date. This means that I am taking for granted the following assumptions. - People have fundamental rights to speech, assembly, religion and so on - People are innocent until proven guilty -...

Something stunning took place earlier this week, and it quietly snuck by, unnoticed by anyone as the "all important" FOMC meeting was looming. That something could have been taken straight out of the playbook of either Cyprus, or Greece, or the USSR "evil empire", or all three. This is how the WSJ explained it: The U.S. Justice Department’s criminal head said banks may need to go beyond filing suspicious activity reports when they encounter a risky customer.

The story line is that our government leaves no soldier behind and if this is to be believed, one has to ask, why did we leave behind the team at Benghazi? Is the qualifier that if combat is necessary, we’d leave our folks behind? Can the leftists praising the Bergdahl transaction, in their new found interest in the welfare of our military, explain why this “rescue” was necessary but the guys in Benghazi weren’t worthy? Or is it simply a matter of, “what difference, at this point, does it make”? Incidentally, with this Administration, the outing of the CIA Chief...

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is looking to create a "Google Earth" of every financial transaction of every American, Sen. Mike Enzi (R-WY) warned today in a Senate speech opposing confirmation of Richard Cordray as CFPB director. "This bill (creating the CFPB) was supposed to be about regulating Wall Street. Instead, it's creating a Google Earth on every financial transaction.

BRUSSELS - The much vaunted EU financial transaction tax (FTT) is set to be hard-wired into the EU budget, with most of its revenue going directly to the EU. A paper prepared by EU Council President Herman Van Rompuy and sent to European capitals ahead of next week's EU budget summit, where leaders aim to agree a mandate on the budget framework for 2014-2020, would deduct FTT revenues from national contributions to the annual EU pot. Van Rompuy put forward his ideas after private talks with EU countries' budget sherpas over the past 10 days. (Snip) Under Van Rompuy's plan,...

Speaker Nancy Pelosi gave her strongest endorsement yet of a global financial transaction fee Thursday after raising the issue directly with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner in a conversation this week. Geithner was widely seen as opposing such a levy when it was proposed by Gordon Brown, the British prime minister, at a meeting of G-20 finance ministers last month in Scotland. But after their phone conversation Wednesday, Pelosi told colleagues that the secretary indicated he was more open to some such fee than had been reported. Pelosi didn’t reveal her conversation with Geithner at her weekly press conference Thursday, but...

The M&A market is found relevant in lots of countries including Russia. The other day the informational agency Bloomberg published its traditional annual market research across the globe. A bit earlier, in the middle of November, the third annual national forum Mergers and Acquisitions of Russia took place. The research results determined the rating of the most civilized transactions at the M&A market. Western M&A markets got used to mergers prevailing over acquisitions, but as for the Russian part, here acquisitions form the major share of dealings. No wonder that record high rates of transactions’ number ($3.1tr in the world...

President Bush approved a deal to allow a company from Dubai, the country that was forced to withdraw from the Portgate deal, to take over American plants that make parts for jets and tanks for the United States. Dubai is part of the United Arab Emirates, a country that continues to pay money to the families of homicide bombers and to the Hamas terrorist group. It appears to have been protecting Osama bin Laden in the late 1990s for some period of time. America was unable to bomb Osama's hideout because he was meeting with officials of the government of...

WASHINGTON, Feb. 27, 2006 – A United Arab Emirates-owned firm that's slated to take over shipping terminal operations at six major U.S. ports requested an extended U.S. government review of the transaction, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States announced in a news release yesterday. The committee "welcomed the announcement by Dubai Ports World that it will submit for review its proposed acquisition of control of U.S. port terminal operations," the release stated. Headed by the U.S. Treasury Department, CFIUS inspects sales of firms that could affect national security. The review, which the White House accepted, will include...

AUTOMATED PAYMENT TRANSACTION (APT) TAX Taxation technology for the 21st century Dr. Edgar L. Feige, Professor Emeritus of Economics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the originator of the APT Tax concept, has just produced new estimates suggesting that a broad-based transaction tax as low as six tenths of one percent could replace the entire Federal and State 2005 budget revenue requirements of the United States of America. The APT concept is elegant in its simplicity - potentially replacing the entire federal and state tax system - including income, corporate profits, excise and estate taxes - in favor of a...