On January 23rd 2017, on his first day on the job, US President Donald Trump issued an executive order pulling the USA out of the TPP. That was the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a 12-nation free trade block that former President Obama had worked to get passed for years. In this podcast, the Professor outlines the TPP-tanking process, who liked it and who hated it, the potential impacts to major world players, and ideological free-trade fallout due to this now-defunct deal. TPP party on!
Keywords: TPP, free trade, USA, Trump, Pacific, China, ISDS, RCEP, Asia, Japan
Rio de Impeachment! It has happened! The current President of Brazil Dilma Rousseff is going to be impeached! The Professor made this impeachment podcast for you before the final vote was even tallied, but it has since come to pass, and what was passed was the start of the full-on impeachment of Brazil’s first female President, which will leave the country in political turmoil just before they host the summer Olympics this year! This political turmoil adds to the economic turmoil, the corruption turmoil, and the overall angst turmoil that is seeing South America’s largest country and economy falling apart! The Professor explains why, and looks at the broader meaning of this for Latin America!
Hundreds of thousands of Brazilian peeps took to the streets to protest against the government of President Dilma Rousseff last weekend…some calling for her to resign, others calling for a military coup to overthrow her! What, what what is that all about? The Professor explains the situation, and why it is actually an awesome sign of democracy in action, in this bodacious Brazilian society!
Keywords: Brazil, democracy, economy, corruption, car wash, PT, Workers Party, Petrobas, leftist, Latin America, protests, junta, Sao Paulo
Let’s get rude with the crude! What’s up with dropping oil prices world wide? Like the Titanic, they are going down my friends, and that has titanic geopolitical consequences for a whole lot of countries. The Professor points out the winners (USA! USA! USA!) and losers (sorry Russia!) of the precipitous petroleum plunge!
Keywords: oil, petroleum, OPEC, frack, fracking, USA, Russia, Saudi Arabia, supply, demand, China, Japan, EU, India, Iran, Iraq, Venezuela, Qatar , Libya, the United Arab Emirates, Algeria, Nigeria, Angola, North Dakota
What is up with the 43? The 43 kidnapped (and likely assassinated) students sparked a nation-wide protest in Mexico, a protest now spilling into the USA…and is symptomatic of a huge drug problem that ain’t going away. Get the Professor lowdown on this specific current event, and its role in the overall nasty narco-story of the North American continent. And dig these other vintage podcasts that refer to the Mexican War on Drugs in more detail:
Cool Calderon Bags a Barbie Part 1 at plaidavenger.com/plaidcasts/cool-calderon-bags-a-barbie-part-1/
and
Cool Calderon Bags a Barbie Part 2 at plaidavenger.com/plaidcasts/cool-calderon-bags-a-barbie-part-2/
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