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If you're looking for a good laugh this week, you probably can't do better than Tuesday's White House press conference. Reporters asked spokesman Josh Earnest about the confirmation of two Obama-appointed ambassadors whose confirmation was only possible because Democrats manipulated Senate rules earlier this year to make it easier to approve executive-branch nominees. By the narrowest of margins, two people completely unqualified to represent U.S. interests abroad were confirmed to serve in relatively important countries they know nothing about. Colleen Bell, the new U.S. ambassador to Hungary, is a former soap opera producer who couldn't name a single strategic interest...

White House spokesman Josh Earnest was unable to provide a cogent explanation for why Colleen Bell, a former soap opera producer, just became the U.S. ambassador to Hungary: "Josh, I wanted to ask you about something else that happened today in the Senate," said ABC's Jon Karl in today's White House press briefing. "You had some of your ambassadors confirmed after a long, long process. One of those is Colleen Bell, confirmed as ambassador to Hungary. If you can remind me, what are Colleen Bell's qualifications for ambassador? Was it that she was a soap opera producer, is it that...

Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s Speech at the 25th Bálványos Summer Free University and Student Camp July 30, 2014 9:24 AM26 July 2014, Tusnádfürdő (Băile Tuşnad), Romania Good afternoon, everyone! Greetings to all of you!When we last saw each other a year ago, I began my speech by saying that we are attending the last gathering here in Tusnádfürdő before the upcoming general elections in Hungary. Now, I can tell you that we are attending the first gathering here in Tusnádfürdő following the elections in Hungary, and I can tell you all the good news that we were victorious at those...

On Monday, 28 Russian military planes including TU-95 and TU-22 strategic bombers were intercepted over the Baltic Sea near Latvia's border. On Tuesday, a Russian plane violated Estonia's airspace. Poland's defense minister later accused Putin of launching "unprecedented activity" around the Baltic Sea. Gen. Philip Breedlove, NATO's Supreme Allied Commander Europe, said the recent Russian flights were "of a different nature than we've seen in a while." The warplanes were intercepted by NATO in international airspace. "For the past 19 years, we have been trying to treat Russia as a partner, trying to bring the nations of Europe back together...

This week, oil fell through the price floor of $60 a barrel and gas at my local filling station was $2.26 a gallon. That’s great news for commuters and almost every business, but wonderfully bad news for our ugliest enemies. If oil prices remain low through next year, the effect on rogue governments, from the Russian Federation to Venezuela, will go from damaging to devastating. But Western economies (and China’s) stand to benefit, with cheap oil possibly tickling Europe’s snoozing markets awake. Even most underdeveloped states will get a welcome break.

VIENNA (AP) — A Russian loan to France's National Front. Invitations to Moscow for leaders of Austria's Freedom Party. Praise for Vladimir Putin from the head of Britain's anti-European Union party. As the diplomatic chill over Ukraine deepens, the Kremlin seems keener than ever to enlist Europe's far-right parties in its campaign for influence in the West, seeking new relationships based largely on shared concern over the growing clout of the EU. Russia fears that the EU and NATO could spread to countries it considers part of its sphere of influence. And it has repeatedly served notice that it will...

Staunton, December 13 – Four Russian analysts suggest that the six causes they identify as being behind the collapse of the USSR are again to varying degrees present in Russia today, but what is perhaps more interesting than the causes they do identify is the one that they don’t: the ways in which the six they do helped power a seventh: nationalism Russian and non-Russian. In a 4400-word article in “Russky Reporter” this week, Vladimir Bazhanov, Andrey Veselov, Dmitry Karpets and Aleksandr Pototsky consider to what extent the six causes they say led to the demise of the USSR are...

Putin has become shockingly effective at influencing European politics through a host of far-right parties. The following chart from the Center for Eurasian Strategic Intelligence (CESI) shows Russia's growing influence within six different European Union countries. The parties, located in the UK, France, Germany, Greece, Bulgaria, and Hungary, are increasingly popular—and staunchly against giving more power to the EU. Each of the parties has also fostered a closer relationship with Russia, and has protested against sanctions on Moscow following its annexation of Ukraine.

Stockholm (AFP) - With an assertive Russia next door, Sweden has started to beef up its military after a decade of downsizing, but a credible deterrent may take years to achieve, analysts warn. In one of Sweden's most dramatic steps since the end of the Cold War, it has brought back the option of using reservists to boost its military force, making no attempt to hide the fact that the main motivation behind the move is Russia. Defence Minister Peter Hultqvist went on TV this week to argue the move was necessary against the backdrop of Russia's rearmament and its...

Moscow (AFP) - Russia's defence ministry on Sunday denied a report by Swedish military that a Russian military plane nearly collided this week with a passenger plane over Sweden. Russia's defence ministry did not deny that its plane was in the area at the time of the incident on Friday, but said that it was at a safe distance of more than 70 kilometres (43 miles) from the flight path of the passenger jet. The incident happened amid growing concern in the Baltic region over signs of more assertive Russian behaviour, including Russian planes skirting or violating the national airspace...

It's not clear what's happened,probably another meteorite explodes, Sverdlovsk region,Russia Read more at http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=bf3_1416311834#dyTzQBMp3dP5Gcue.99

While both the Ukrainian and Russian governments continue to point fingers at one another for the MH17 crash, former Congressman Ron Paul (R-TX) urged caution Friday against jumping to any conclusions about where blame lies. Some American pundits accuse Vladimir Putin of having “blood on his hands” since the missile that took down the Malaysia Airlines flight may have been a Russian weapon given to pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine. Speaking with Newsmax TV’s John Bachman earlier today, Paul said “Putin is a little bit smarter than that. I don’t think he would ever come close to participating in an act...

MOSCOW (AP) — A furniture store has taken over a Moscow cinema, allowing theatergoers to enjoy what more closely resembles an enormous slumber party than an afternoon at the movies. This week the Swedish furniture giant IKEA replaced a movie theater's seats with beds in its Russian "Awake Love" campaign. The switchover took place in the Moscow suburb of Khimki, not far from a branch of the store beloved by many Russians. The campaign, which lasts until Dec. 14, is modeled after a similar event in 2010 at a Paris music hall.

So while nobody knows the future we still need to know what to expect from the week's two big headlines, even though our view can easily (and will probably) be muddied w/ other factors.  So we deal with an unknown future by checking the historical record for clues on at what the news means to our future investment returns.  What oil bargains do:  namely, what's it doing to the economy and to investments; here's what tanking oil's done in the past (ya gotta LOVE the fed's data site) and how real oil prices (2014$ per barrel) track real GDP-- [click...

House Resolution 758 officially calls upon President Obama “to provide the Government of Ukraine with lethal and non-lethal defense articles, services, and training required to effectively defend its territory and sovereignty.” The Ukraine Support Act of 2014 does not use the phrase “lethal aid,” but it does give authorization to Obama to “provide defense articles, defense services, and training to the Government of Ukraine for the purpose of countering offensive weapons and reestablishing the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine, including anti-tank and anti-armor weapons, crew weapons and ammunition, counter-artillery radars to identify and target artillery batteries, fire control, range...

The international price of oil has dropped by more than 40 percent in the past six months. To put it lightly, this presents a major challenge to oil-exporting nations. Many analysts agree that, of all oil rich countries, Venezuela is the most vulnerable. A combination of persistent fiscal deficits, out-of-control inflation, and plunging public support for President Nicolás Maduro threatens to make the nation of 30 million ungovernable. What can Maduro do to survive? In order to answer this question, we must differentiate between what Maduro can do, and what he most likely will (or, rather, will not) do.

Washington (AFP) - The US Congress unanimously approved fresh economic sanctions against Russia and lethal weapons for Kiev, defying President Barack Obama and hardening American lawmakers' response to a Kremlin-backed insurgency in Ukraine. Identical texts of the Ukraine Freedom Support Act passed both the Senate and House of Representatives on Thursday, but because of a technical issue it returned to the Senate where it passed by unanimous consent moments before the chamber adjourned late Saturday night. It is now up to Obama to either sign or veto the measure. The White House said Thursday it was "looking at it."

Via Mediaite, an easy lay-up here for a guy who (a) warned the world about Saddam’s WMD threat more than once as president, (b) cautiously declined to take a firm position against the war at the time, and (c) is of course married to someone who cast a vote in the Senate to invade.But never mind that. This is an interesting counterfactual: What would have happened to Iraq during the Arab Spring and Syrian uprising if Saddam had endured? Clinton implicitly assumes that ISIS advancing on Baghdad is the worst possible outcome of the past 10 years, which is...

Companies linked to Russian billionaire Arkady Rotenberg and Gennady Timchenko, both close allies of Russian President Vladimir Putin, were given contracts worth 309 billion roubles (£3.6 billion, $8.1 billion) since western sanctions were imposed on the men in March, according to a Bloomberg report. The deals included a 228-billion- rouble project to build a bridge to Crimea from the Russian mainland as well as a large chunk of the 770-billion-rouble Power of Siberia gas pipeline.

Karen Dawisha's new book Putin's Kleptocracy: Who Owns Russia shows how Russian president Vladimir Putin has enabled his cronies to become enormously wealthy under his kleptocratic rule. Copyright © 2014 NPR. For personal, noncommercial use only. See Terms of Use. For other uses, prior permission required. ARUN RATH, HOST: Karen Dawisha, professor of political science at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, spent the last five years investigating how Russia's president, Vladimir Putin, came to control so much of that country's wealth. Her new book is "Putin's Kleptocracy: Who Owns Russia?" Karen Dawisha, welcome to the program. KAREN DAWISHA: Thanks for...