With a worldwide box office of more than a half-billion dollars, The Purge franchise has become one of the top horror franchises in film history, with many reviewers wowed by the concept of the series and differentiating on the execution. With five films and a TV show (and another film possibly in the works), the series seems unstoppable. The franchise's main concept taps into underlying tensions throughout America. The vast differences between the films are largely due to the ever-changing casts, including actors, writers, and directors, so that each film has its own unique commentary, sometimes getting right at the nerve of social issues that seem to be best discussed in fictional worlds' metaphors and parables. Acclaimed film and television critics and horror scholars such as Dale Bailey, Jason V. Brock, Chesya Burke, Lisa Morton, Katherine A. Troyer, and Kevin J. Wetmore give a wide range of analyses of just what The Purge films are saying about modern-day America and the world. Essays in the collection examine politics, violence, Trump, Freud, class issues, feminism, race, and more.
The Financial Crisis Inquiry Report, published by the U.S. Government and the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission in early 2011, is the official government report on the United States financial collapse and the review of major financial institutions that bankrupted and failed, or would have without help from the government. The commission and the report were implemented after Congress passed an act in 2009 to review and prevent fraudulent activity. The report details, among other things, the periods before, during, and after the crisis, what led up to it, and analyses of subprime mortgage lending, credit expansion and banking policies, the collapse of companies like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and the federal bailouts of Lehman and AIG. It also discusses the aftermath of the fallout and our current state. This report should be of interest to anyone concerned about the financial situation in the U.S. and around the world.THE FINANCIAL CRISIS INQUIRY COMMISSION is an independent, bi-partisan, government-appointed panel of 10 people that was created to "examine the causes, domestic and global, of the current financial and economic crisis in the United States." It was established as part of the Fraud Enforcement and Recovery Act of 2009. The commission consisted of private citizens with expertise in economics and finance, banking, housing, market regulation, and consumer protection. They examined and reported on "the collapse of major financial institutions that failed or would have failed if not for exceptional assistance from the government."News Dissector DANNY SCHECHTER is a journalist, blogger and filmmaker. He has been reporting on economic crises since the 1980's when he was with ABC News. His film In Debt We Trust warned of the economic meltdown in 2006. He has since written three books on the subject including Plunder: Investigating Our Economic Calamity (Cosimo Books, 2008), and The Crime Of Our Time: Why Wall Street Is Not Too Big to Jail (Disinfo Books, 2011), a companion to his latest film Plunder The Crime Of Our Time. He can be reached online at www.newsdissector.com.
Witnesses: Thomas Bennett, Bankruptcy Judge, U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the N. Dist. of AL; Jacqueline Cox, Bankruptcy Judge, U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the N. Dist. of IL; Joseph Mason, Drexel Univ.; Nettie McGee, Chicago, IL; Mark Scarberry, Pepperdine School of Law, and Amer. Bankruptcy Inst.; Henry Sommer, Nat. Assoc. of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys; Mark Zandi, Moody¿s. Submissions for the Record: Amer. Bankers Assoc.; Financial Serv. Roundtable; Thomas Bennett, Bankruptcy Judge; Erwin Chemerinsky, Duke Univ.; Consumer, and civil rights advocate; Consumer Fed. of Amer.; Consumer Mortgage Coalition; Jacqueline Cox, Bankruptcy Judge; Leadership Conf. on Civil Rights. Illus.
Ray Dalio, the legendary investor and #1 New York Times bestselling author of Principles—whose books have sold more than five million copies worldwide—shares his unique template for how debt crises work and principles for dealing with them well. This template allowed his firm, Bridgewater Associates, to anticipate 2008’s events and navigate them well while others struggled badly. As he explained in his #1 New York Times bestseller Principles, Ray Dalio believes that most everything happens over and over again through time so that by studying patterns one can understand the cause-effect relationships behind events and develop principles for dealing with them well. In this three-part research series, he does just that for big debt crises and shares his template in the hopes of reducing the chances of big debt crises happening and helping them be better managed in the future. The template comes in three parts: 1. The Archetypal Big Debt Cycle (which explains the template) 2. Three Detailed Cases (which examines in depth the 2008 financial crisis, the 1930s Great Depression, and the 1920s inflationary depression of Germany’s Weimar Republic) 3. Compendium of 48 Cases (which is a compendium of charts and brief descriptions of the worst debt crises of the last 100 years) Whether you’re an investor, a policy maker, or are simply interested in debt, this unconventional perspective from one of the few people who navigated the crisis successfully, Principles for Navigating Big Debt Crises will help you understand the economy and markets in revealing new ways.