Kerby Anderson
While most Americans were focused on the election, the BRICS nations had a conference in Russia that we should not ignore. In case you are wondering, BRICS is an acronym for some of the world’s leading emerging market economies. BRICS stands for Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa.
At the conference, there were 9 members and 13 new “partner nations” who were accepted. That means that the GDP of the BRICS nations is now greater than the GDP of the G7 nations. The population of the BRICS nations is more than 3 billion.
Some pundits have wondered if a BRICS currency would threaten the status of the dollar. Until recently, the assumption has been that would be unlikely since the diversity of the various foreign economies. They wouldn’t likely settle on one currency.
But Matthew Sigel (Head of Digital Assets Research, VanEck) reminds us that three of the new members are now mining bitcoin with government resources. He explained that there is an urgency in the BRICS nations to find some way to circumvent the irresponsible US fiscal policy. Russia’s Sovereign Wealth Fund is going to invest in a regional initiative to build bitcoin mining and to build AI infrastructure throughout the BRICS nations with the goal of being able to settle global trade in bitcoin.
Sigel predicts that when President Putin dies, some of these countries may reintegrate into the world’s financial system. He says these BRICS countries will be trading with bitcoin and then wonders what the US will be doing at that time.
The US dollar has been the world’s primary reserve currency for over 60 years. Now, these countries are pursuing a policy of de-dollarization that will reduce the use of dollars in world trade and financial transactions. Congress and the incoming president need to take note.

Penna Dexter
Election day was almost upon us — the editorial endorsing Kamala Harris had already been written — when William Lewis, CEO and Publisher of The Washington Post announced the paper would not be endorsing a presidential candidate, ending a 50-year tradition of doing so.
Immediately after the announcement, The Post began bleeding subscribers — 250,000 of them within four days. Several staff members resigned in protest. Longtime opinion writer Ruth Marcus titled her column, “The Post, the wrong choice at the worst possible time.”
Owner Jeff Bezos wrote his own column explaining that The Post can no longer ignore polling that reveals falling public trust in journalists and the media. “What presidential endorsements do,” he wrote, “is create a perception of bias.” He said, “Ending them is a principled decision.” Other newspapers — The LA Times and USA Today – took the same action citing awareness of their own “lack of credibility.”
The Washington Post is not profitable and is becoming less so. Subscribers are turning to smaller, independent news outlets and social media. But, to do good investigative reporting, a news organization needs a large infrastructure. Covering the U.S. government takes a huge staff. The Post has these things. But, Mr. Bezos wrote, his paper and The New York Times “talk only to a certain elite” and increasingly “only to ourselves.” It would be good to have a centrist DC-based paper. If The Washington Post took serious steps away from its role as purveyor of leftist propaganda, it would be better for all of us.
Mr. Bezos also reportedly told The Post’s management it needs to hire more conservative columnists. Radio host Erick Erickson suggested that, if Mr. Bezos is serious about creating a balance, the paper should also add conservative editors and reporters “to break the leftwing worldview infused into the news product they produce.”
It would take deep structural and ideological shifts for The Washington Post to shed its reputation for extreme bias.