The United States is the world's biggest pest. It doesn't matter where you live or what you do, the US will find some excuse to poke its nose in your business and make your life miserable. That's why the US has so many enemies, because its the world's biggest budinski. The people in Washington just can't stand the idea that someone, somewhere might be having a normal, happy life without getting bombed to death in drone attack or shunted off to some black site where the CIA can rip out their fingernails or beat them black and blue. That's what this whole global war on terror-thing is all about. It's about sticking your big fat nose in other people's business 24-7. Some people just get a kick out of that. Why? Because they're obnoxious people, that's why. Like the drunk who shows up at your dinner party and slops red wine all over the rug. That's the US in a nutshell, a first-rate pain-in-the-ass.

Everyone knows this is true, even the flag wavers. They know we shouldn't be in Afghanistan or Iraq or Somalia or Yemen or wherever. We just go to be annoying, because that's who we are, The Irritating States of America.

I get tired of leftist writers droning on and on about the Empire-this and the Superpower-that. It's all baloney, and it misses the point. In fact, it dignifies US behavior as though it was all part of some grand plan. It's not. There is no plan. The plan is to hector people until they can't stand it anymore. That's not really a plan at all. It's just being a pest. It's like the brat who keeps kicking the back of your seat when your flying across country or the wasp that shows up at the company picnic. Are you going to tell me the wasp has a plan? No. The wasp has no plan and neither does the US. The US is just doing what it does best; making a first class nuisance of itself.

SHUTDOWN - blared the Washington Post headline. None of the powers-that-be could stop a small faction of Republicans in the House of Representatives from shutting down many federal government operations starting on October 1.

Suddenly the powerful Business Roundtable and U.S. Chamber of Commerce are powerless, along with two hundred corporate trade associations, who see Uncle Sam as their big customer. Suddenly, the Republican dominated National Governors Association, together with Mitt Romney, the Party's presidential nominee in 2013, are powerless. Also powerless so far are the allegedly sovereign people, who want uninterrupted safety inspections, enforcement of labor and environmental laws, children's nutrition and educational programs (like Head Start), student loan processing, veterans benefits, detection of epidemics, access to national parks, and inspections of nuclear power plants.

All of the above want the federal government to stay open. Most of them do not want to see 800,000 federal workers (out of two million) furloughed. It doesn't matter to House Republicans. About thirty-five to forty obscure, foot-stomping Republicans have scared the easily frightened House Speaker, John Boehner, and his curled-lip deputy, Rep. Eric Cantor, into doing what no foreign enemy since the British burned Washington in 1812 has been able to do. This cohort, representing the most cruel, ignorant, narcissistic Republicans in the Party's history, has closed down much of the national government.

As clocks at the Pentagon approached midnight late Monday evening and inched America towards a government shutdown, the United States Department of Defense spent $5.5 billion dollars on an arsenal of items ordered at the last minute by Uncle Sam.

Foreign Policy reported on Tuesday that the Defense Department awarded 94 contracts totaling over $5.5 billion a day earlier, ensuring the mightiest military on Earth would stay significantly well-stocked throughout an indefinite shutdown that has sent hundreds of thousands of federal workers home without pay and polarized lawmakers in Washington.

Comparatively, Foreign Policy's John Reed noted that on September 3 - the first workday of the month - the Pentagon published news of only 14 contracts: practically one-seventh of what was signed off on as Monday's midnight deadline seemed increasingly more likely to come and go without a compromise.

The shutdown, now in its third day with no end in sight, is costing the US an estimated $300 million in lost economic output each day, according to research firm IHS Inc.

But as hundreds of thousands of federal employees remain furloughed and national parks and programs stay shuttered indefinitely, the Pentagon does not seem to have much to worry about.

"This goes to show that even when the federal government is shut down and the military has temporarily lost half its civilian workforce, the Pentagon can spend money like almost no one else," Reed wrote.

What is freedom really?

Is it the ability to do whatever you like without regard for anyone but yourself?

Some people think so. But more often than not there will eventually come the time of the great hang-over, when that ultimate freedom that had been sought after so diligently has somehow lost its meaning.

"Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing."

The interim Egyptian government approved a draft law Wednesday which makes disrespecting the flag and not standing during the national anthem offenses punishable by prison time and a fine.

The Egyptian website Ahram Online reports that the measure states that "ridiculing the Egyptian flag and not standing in respect when the national anthem is played in public is a crime punishable by a maximum of six months imprisonment and/or five thousand pounds fine (about $726)."

In recent days, supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood and more hardline Salafi groups have confronted their secular opponents over which songs are played to start the school day.

Those who support the military have been playing pro-army songs in schools, a move that has irritated Muslim Brotherhood members. This as army supporters accuse Muslim Brotherhood school administrators of failing to play Egypt's national anthem in their schools and instead playing pro-Brotherhood tunes, reports Ahram.

The leader of Greece's Golden Dawn party was taken to a high-security prison Thursday pending his trial on criminal charges, as part of a major government crackdown on the neo-Nazi group.

Nikos Michaloliakos is the first Greek party leader to be put behind bars in at least three decades.

He was transferred to the Korydallos prison in west Athens on Thursday afternoon, hours after being charged with running a criminal organisation.

The 56-year-old faces at least 10 years in jail if convicted. No trial date has been set yet.

The leader of Greece's Golden Dawn party, widely viewed as Europe's most violent political force, appeared in court on Saturday night on charges of heading a criminal gang after police mounted an unprecedented crackdown on the neo-fascist party, arresting Nikos Michaloliakos and other key members of his organisation.

After a police operation in which anti-terrorism officers stormed the homes of Golden Dawn politicians across Athens, Michaloliakos and five of his MPs were seized. Fifteen other senior party activists, including a female police officer, were taken into custody accused of fomenting violence as members of a criminal organisation. Reading from a nine-page charge sheet, a public prosecutor accused the far-rightists of murder, extortion and money laundering.

The crackdown was hailed as "a historic day for Greece and Europe" by the public order minister, Nikos Dendias, who oversaw the operation, known only to three security officials before it was launched a little after dawn. "Golden Dawn tried to test the endurance of democracy," he said in a televised address, insisting that the inquiry into the party's illegal activities would continue apace. "Today it got an answer from state justice."

Israeli forces have attacked a Palestinian village north of the Jordan Valley for the fourth time since September, leaving some 100 residents without shelter, Press TV reports.

Israeli bulldozers backed by military jeeps entered the village of Makhool in the early hours of Thursday morning and evacuated the residents before destroying the village.

The Israeli soldiers further seized two tents and confiscated all materials that had been provided to them by European Humanitarian aid agencies.

"The army attacked us while we were sleeping and forced us to leave our tents before they destroyed everything. When they finished, they collected all the plastic and burned them before confiscating the iron structures," said a village resident.

"Every time we build anything, a tent or barracks, they demolish them. Even the presence of diplomats makes no difference," he added.

American lawmakers have colluded with Wall Street executives to build an economy that no longer works in the best interest of, or even needs, the majority of the American public, according to RT financial host Max Keiser.

RT: There's a lot of hype and some would say overreaction around all of this but the tell-tale sign is the markets. They haven't reacted negatively. Is there really a crisis here?

Max Keiser: I think we should take the words of Warren Buffet to heart. He basically described the Federal Reserve Bank and the American economy as one giant hedge fund. And he is absolutely correct. The way that Wall Street, Washington, and these large funds approach America is as a trade that is backed by $120,000 or $130,000 of debt and that debt gets traded around every day. And the whole initiative here is to buy hedge funds and try to squeak out profits, and they don't really care who they hurt in the process. Remember America is run by what I call financial jihadists who are basically suicide bankers. Warren Buffett, of course, is one of these suicide bankers and America, from the outside of course, looks like they're trying to commit financial suicide. But that's what a financial jihadist does, or a suicide banker. They blow themselves up for their cause and in this case it's market fundamentalism, a belief in the profit - not the prophet.

RT: But other tell-tale signs of the economy improving are there, Max. Are we to believe the economic indicators which suggest the US economy is on the up?

David Buckner, the founder and CEO of Bottom Line Training and Consulting, an adjunct professor at Columbia University, and the author of Permission to Think, explained on the Glenn Beck Program Wednesday why America hasn't yet seen hyperinflation - but why it could be just around the corner.

Buckner said that in discussing hyperinflation, people often refer to the Weimar Republic, Zimbabwe, and Bolivia, but say "it could never happen here" because a "certain kind of layering has to occur" that America hasn't seen.

That layering, he said, or the "recipe" for hyperinflation, is:

1) Economic Implosion

2) Collapse in tax revenues

3) Raise taxes

4) Lenders unwilling

5) Austerity or print

Beck seemed shocked by the list, saying all five have occurred.