Today’s News 7th July 2021

  • EU Proposes To Exempt Private Jets, Cargo From Jet Fuel Tax
    EU Proposes To Exempt Private Jets, Cargo From Jet Fuel Tax

    And so the oligarch and ruling class hypocrisy comes full circle…

    According to Argus Media, the European Commission – that murder of career bureaucrats – has proposed exempting private jets and cargo flights, two of the most polluting forms of transportation, from the planned EU jet fuel tax. A draft indicates that the tax would be phased-in for passenger flights, including ones that carry cargo.

    The draft, which the commission will on 14 July present with its proposed revisions to the bloc’s 2003 energy-taxation directive, indicates there could be an exemption from taxation for energy products and electricity used for intra-EU air navigation of cargo-only flights. It proposes allowing EU states to only tax such flights either domestically or by virtue of bilateral or multilateral agreements with other member states.

    The commission is worried that taxing fuel for cargo-only flights would adversely affect EU carriers, Argus reports adding that third-country carriers, also with a significant share of the intra-EU cargo market, have to be exempted from taxation due to aviation services agreements, the commission argues.

    Meanwhile, private jets will enjoy an exemption through classification of “business aviation” as the use of aircraft by firms for carriage of passengers or goods as an “aid to the conduct of their business”, if generally considered not for public hire. It gets better: a further exemption is given for “pleasure” flights whereby an aircraft is used for “personal or recreational” purposes not associated with a business or professional use.

    Non-governmental organization Transport & Environment (T&E) called the proposal “generally good”.

    “The downside, though, is the commission is considering exempting cargo carriers that are often US-run,” said its aviation director Andrew Murphy, who noted “multiple” solutions for taxing jet fuel used by cargo carriers that “tend to use older, dirtier aircraft”.

    Hilariously, none other than Murphy recently co-authored a report indicating that private-jet CO2 emissions in Europe rose by 31% between 2005 and 2019, with flights to popular destinations up markedly during summer holiday seasons. He has argued for a fuel tax for this “leisure-driven” private jet sector.

    But, naturally, the very rich people who use private jets, pulled just enough strings within Europe’s bureaucracy to avoid paying the tax.

    Of course, in a world of fake concerns about climate change and ESG poseurs galore, there needed to be some excuse for this glaring exemption, and sure enough Airlines for Europe (A4E) came up with on, saying that it feared setting minimum tax rates for intra-EU flights could lead to distortion of competition. The industry association, which counts 16 airline groups as members including Ryanair, Air France/KLM, Lufthansa, IAG, easyJet and Cargolux, indicated that the commission’s proposal could lead to aircraft deliberately carrying excess fuel bought outside the EU specifically to avoid the bloc’s jet fuel tax.

    So it’s best to just do away with the tax altogether.

    The draft may change before 14 July, and does not contain the all-important annexes with tax rates. To enter into force it must be approved by all 27 EU member states, and it may change markedly over the coming months. A commission proposal made in April 2011 to update EU energy taxation rules failed after finance ministers could not agree by unanimity in 2014.

    The commission wants to align energy taxation with EU climate goals, meaning that taxes should be based on the net calorific value of the energy products and electricity and that minimum levels of taxation across the EU would be set out according to environmental performance and expressed in €/GJ. These minimum levels should be aligned annually on the basis of the EU’s harmonised index of consumer prices, excluding energy and unprocessed food.

    Next week, the commission will propose changes to the EU’s emissions trading system (ETS). A draft of these did not detail how aviation will be treated, but no free allocations are envisaged for maritime, road transport and buildings sectors. Officials will also present the commission’s mandate for sustainable aviation fuels (SAF), whereby all firms could be expected to fill up with blended jet fuels at EU airports.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 07/07/2021 – 02:45

  • UK Government Launches Multi-Front Attack On Freedom Of Expression Under Guise Of National Security
    UK Government Launches Multi-Front Attack On Freedom Of Expression Under Guise Of National Security

    Authored by Patrick Cockburn via Counterpunch.org,

    Matt Hancock’s bungling effort to conceal his affair with Gina Coladangelo may give hope to some that all government attempts to keep information from the public will be equally futile.

    Unfortunately, the government has launched a carefully targeted multi-front offensive to hide its activities more effectively. Among measures being considered or already under way are a reformed Official Secrets Act that will conflate investigative journalism and whistleblowing with espionage. On another front, the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) is being crippled by rejecting requests and under-resourcing. At an individual level, ministers and senior officials escape scrutiny by using encrypted messaging services that can make conversations disappear from the record.

    Hancock himself was apparently so concerned over the contents of his emails that he used a private email account. Any enquiry into the test and trace debacle or the mass deaths in care homes may find it difficult to discover with whom the former health secretary was in contact.

    In the last year, the rejection of requests for information from central government under the FOIA have soared to 50 per cent compared to 15 per cent when it was first introduced.

    “The importance of FOIA is that it is a symbol of transparency which is why politicians hate it so much,” says Ben Worthy, a senior lecturer at Birkbeck specialising in transparency and freedom of information.

    He says that governments do not dare to abolish the act, but they can defang it by across-the-board rejections, deliberately long delays or simple non-compliance.

    Most threatening of all to the public knowing what the government is doing are proposed changes in the Official Secrets Act which would treat journalists, whistleblowers and leakers as if they were spies. A little-noticed 67-page consultative paper issued in May by the Home Office and titled Legislation to Counter State Threats (Hostile State Activity)says anybody revealing information that the government chooses to label as a state secret would be liable for prosecution. The papers defines espionage particularly broadly as “the covert process of obtaining sensitive confidential information that is not normally publicly available”.

    Critics say the proposed legislation would leave journalists and others facing the threat of 14 years in prison for publishing whatever the government may say is damaging to national security. The burden of proof for a successful prosecution would be reduced and juries would not necessarily be told why some disclosure poses such a serious threat.

    In Priti Patel’s introduction to the document, the home secretary portrays Britain as beset by enemies at home and abroad who pose a mounting danger to the nation. Her declared purpose is “to empower the whole national security community to counter the insidious threat we face today”.

    Supposing all these proposals are implemented then Britain will be well on the way to joining those countries where the disclosure of any information damaging to the government is punishable. Offences range from revealing war crimes to disclosing trivial failures. The Indian government would like to silence anybody revealing the true death toll in the Covid-19 epidemic; Turkey has jailed journalists for writing that it had supplied weapons to al-Qaeda-type organisations; the Egyptian government once stopped an academic from publishing a paper showing that more Egyptian farmers were going blind because of the spread of a waterborne parasite.

    Britain does not have the same tradition of authoritarian censorship, but freedom of expression here is more fragile than it looks for two reasons. The Johnson administration has been more moderate than many nativist populist governments that have taken power around the world over the last decade. But it shares with them a strategy of systematic threat-inflation, frequently modelled on the agenda of the Republican Party in the US. In the paper cited above, Patel speaks of the necessity of introducing voter IDs and combating foreign powers interfering in British elections.

    A second feature of British culture makes the country particularly open to the belief that somewhere in the heart of government lie informational crown jewels, well-guarded secrets so important that their disclosure would pose an existential threat to us all. Such a myth is central to the plot of thousands of spy novels and films. But in my experience as a journalist few such earth-shaking secrets exist and what many people think of as a secret is either trivial or can be deduced by any reasonably well-informed person.

    The disclosures by Dominic Cummings, recently in the top ranks of government as Boris Johnson’s chief of staff, are a good example of what might be termed “the fallacy of the state secret”. For more than seven hours he testified to a parliamentary committee about the inner workings and personal likes and dislikes within the Johnson government. He made damaging allegations about Hancock, Johnson, inadequate preparations for the Covid-19 pandemic, the failure to protect care homes and shambolic mistakes in calling the second lockdown.

    Yet none of these revelations were “secrets” in any sense of the word since the facts about these disastrous decisions and decision-makers had long been obvious. What made Cummings’s testimony so fascinating was that it provided eye-witness confirmation of what most people already knew.

    Much the same is true of the Wikileaks publication of hundreds of thousands of classified US diplomatic and military cables in 2010 for which Julian Assange is currently incarcerated in Belmarsh high security prison in London. Despite the best effort of the US government to prove the opposite, these supposed “secrets” revealed little that was not known previously, deeply embarrassing though it was for the US government to see proof that its helicopters were machine-gunning civilians in the streets of Baghdad.

    To try to maintain the classic spy movie narrative that secrets betrayed means that there is blood on the hands of the betrayers, the US army set up a task force to try to find a US agent who had died because of the Wikileaks revelations. But after long researches the team of 120 counterintelligence officers failed to find a single person, among the thousands of American agents and secret sources in Afghanistan and Iraq, who could be shown to have died because of the revelations.

    The real reason why governments fight so hard to maintain their monopoly control over information is not to keep security secrets vital to the nation, but to use or leak that information themselves.

    They know that it is one of the key levers of their power and will persecute and punish anybody who tries to take it from them.

    As Ben Worthy puts it, the struggle, which people imagine is about keeping secrets, is really about who discloses them and is consequently “a battle to control the news agenda”.

    *  *  *

    Patrick Cockburn is the author of War in the Age of Trump (Verso).

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 07/07/2021 – 02:00

  • Pressed For Answers On Syria Cover-Up, OPCW Chief Offers New Lies And Excuses
    Pressed For Answers On Syria Cover-Up, OPCW Chief Offers New Lies And Excuses

    Authored by Aaron Maté via TheGrayZone.com,

    Facing growing outcry, OPCW Director General Fernando Arias went before the UN and told new falsehoods about his organization’s Syria cover-up scandal – along with more disingenuous excuses to avoid addressing it.

    Part 1 of 2…

    In the two years since the censorship of a Syria chemical weapons investigation was exposed, the head of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), Fernando Arias, has vigorously resisted accountability.

    Arias has refused to investigate or explain the extensive manipulation of the OPCW’s probe of an alleged April 2018 chlorine attack in Douma. Rather than answer calls to meet with the veteran inspectors who protested the deception, Arias has disparaged them. The OPCW Director General (DG) has even resorted to feigning ignorance about the scandal, recently claiming that “I don’t know why” the organization’s final report on Douma “was contested.”

    Facing growing pressure to address the cover-up – most prominently in a “Statement of Concern” from 28 notable signatories, including five former senior OPCW officials – Arias came before the United Nations Security Council on June 3rd to answer questions in open session for the first time.

    In a nod to the public outcry, Arias backtracked from a previous statement that the Douma controversy could not be revisited. But while appearing to suggest that the investigation could be reopened, Arias offered more falsehoods about the scandal, and new disingenuous excuses to avoid addressing it.

    This two-part report summarizes Arias’ latest evasions and distortions, which include the following:

    • Rejecting proposals for resolving the Douma controvery, Arias invoked restrictions that do not appear to exist. Arias falsely claimed that the OPCW’s Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) has “no authority” to examine the suppressed Douma evidence. Arias also claimed that he personally has “no authority whatsoever to reopen this investigation,” even though the OPCW’s regulations contain no such limits.

    • To discredit the vast quantity of work that was done for the investigation’s original report, which found no evidence of a chlorine attack, Arias falsely stated that the “bulk” of analysis was conducted after its chief author was no longer involved. To advance this falsehood, Arias cited a fabricated figure.

    • Arias tacitly retracted a previous false claim that no state has challenged the Douma report’s conclusions. But instead of acknowledging that prior falsehood, he replaced it with a new one.

    • Arias did not answer direct questions about the documented scientific fraud in the Douma probe, and how he plans to address it. The DG ignored a question from the Russian delegation about why the Final Report omitted the conclusions of NATO member state toxicologists who ruled out chlorine gas as the cause of death. And for the third time, Arias did not respond to a question asking whether he will agree to meet with the dissenting inspectors.

    • A recent BBC podcast interviewed a purported OPCW source who discussed sensitive information and criticized the Douma whistleblowers, as well as the organization’s first Director General, José Bustani. Arias offered an absurd excuse to avoid launching an investigation, stating that he would only probe the breach of confidentiality if the BBC’s source “is identified.”

    • Arias continued to deceptively minimize the role of the key dissenting inspector, Dr. Brendan Whelan. Arias downplayed the fact that Whelan was the scientific coordinator and chief author of the team’s original report, and falsely claimed that he was only involved “in a limited capacity.”

    • Arias also continued to falsely downplay the role of the second known whistleblower, Ian Henderson. Arias’ latest distortions about Whelan and Henderson are addressed in the second part of this report.

    Arias’ UN appearance was the latest chapter in a saga that has upended the world’s chemical weapons watchdog. In April 2018, the US, UK and France bombed Syria after accusing its government of committing a chemical attack in Douma. In March 2019, the OPCW released a final report that aligned with the US narrative that Syria was guilty of dropping chlorine gas cylinders on a pair of apartment buildings, including one where dozens of dead bodies were filmed. But an extraordinary trove of leaks soon exposed that the OPCW had published a whitewash.

    Internal OPCW documents showed that the inspectors who investigated the Douma incident had found no evidence of a chemical weapons attack. The files also revealed gross inconsistencies in the prevailing narrative that chlorine was the cause of death. These findings, if released, would have reinforced strong indications that extremist insurgents who controlled Douma had staged the incident, just as Syrian forces were set to retake control. But the Douma evidence was concealed in a multi-stage cover-up.

    Unknown senior OPCW officials were caught trying to doctor the team’s original report to falsely suggest evidence of a chemical attack. A delegation of US officials also visited the Hague and, in a highly irregular move, tried to convince the team that chlorine gas was used by the Syrian government. The bulk of the original team who deployed in Douma was sidelined, replaced by officials who, for the most part, had not even set foot in Syria. The result was a deceptive final report that erased the key findings of the censored original.

    Although the OPCW leaks first surfaced in May 2019, Arias did not face direct questioning about the controversy until December of last year, when he came before the United Nations Security Council. However, Arias refused to answer in open session, and reportedly gave vague, non-substantive answers in private.

    The Director General’s decision to return to the UN to answer questions in open session followed growing public pressure, led by former senior UN official Hans von Sponeck, as well as Bustani, the former OPCW chief. Arias’ reliance on falsehoods and hollow excuses offered the most stark display yet that his handling of the Douma cover-up cannot be defended in good faith.

    OPCW chief falsely claims “no authority whatsoever” to address Douma cover-up

    Just weeks before his UN appearance, Arias told the European Parliament on April 14th that when it comes to the OPCW’s Douma scandal, “the matter is closed.”

    But when he came before the UN Security Council on June 3rd, Arias changed his tune. Rather than personally closing the door on revisiting the probe, Arias now claimed that he does not have the authority to re-open it. Arias did so by citing OPCW rules and restrictions that do not appear to exist.

    Arias’ fallacious excuse came in response to a new proposal to break the impasse. In April, the Berlin Group 21 – established by former UN assistant secretary general Hans von Sponeck, former OPCW chief Jose Bustani and Richard Falk, an eminent Princeton Law Professor – put forward a way to address the dispute over the Douma report. They urged Arias to allow the OPCW’s own Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) — a subsidiary body made up of 25 independent scientific and technical experts who serve in their personal capacities — to assess the claims of the dissenting inspectors.

    “The SAB possesses the necessary scientific and technical expertise,” the Berlin Group 21 statement said.  “[We] believe that leaving the scientific debate to the scientists, who best understand the issues at hand, would provide a more objective and rational approach to begin resolving this unfortunate and highly damaging controversy that surrounds the OPCW and indirectly endangers global security by eroding confidence in future findings relevant to alleged uses of chemical weapons.”

    At the UN Security Council, Arias rejected this proposal, claiming that his hands are tied by the OPCW’s own regulations:

     The goal of the Scientific Advisory Board is written, in the terms of reference, is to enable the Director-General to render specialized advice in connection with very sophisticated, very complicated matters and issues related to chemicals and chemical weapons.  Which means that the SAB has no role to assess the findings of the FFM.  The FFM is entrusted to investigate and activate an investigation to produce a report.  And this report—I sign the report, I don’t touch it—it goes directly to the policymaking organs, in this case the Executive Council.  Which means that the SAB has no authority to reassess the investigation of the FFM or to assess any opinion of the inspectors produced on a personal basis.

    In claiming that the SAB “has no authority to reassess” the Douma FFM’s findings, Arias is invoking a restriction that does not exist.

    In citing the SAB’s terms of reference (ToR), Arias failed to mention that it – along with the Chemical Weapons Convention — explicitly allows for the establishment of a temporary working group of scientific experts to provide recommendations on “specific issues” – exactly as the Berlin Group 21 proposed. Paragraph 9 of the SAB’s ToR states:

    In consultation with members of the [Scientific Advisory] Board, the Director-General may establish temporary working groups of scientific experts to provide recommendations within a specific time-frame on specific issues, in accordance with Article VIII, paragraph 45 of the [Chemical Weapons] Convention.

     Contrary to Arias’ claim, there is nothing preventing him from convening a working group of scientific experts to review the particularly “specific issue” that is the Douma investigation – arguably the most internally contested specific issue in the OPCW’s history. Yet Arias is claiming that he is somehow hindered by regulations that, in reality, explicitly grant him the authority to do exactly what he now claims he cannot.

    In stating this excuse, Arias also dismissed the work of the dissenting inspectors as having been “produced on a personal basis”, and therefore not subject to reevaluation. Yet there was nothing “personal” about the Brendan Whelan authored-original report, completed in June 2018 and reviewed and sanctioned by other inspectors, including the team leader. What remains unknown is who exactly were the senior OPCW officials who personally doctored its contents – a question that Arias has refused to investigate.

    Arias also offered another hollow excuse. The OPCW chief claimed that he can no longer revisit the Douma investigation because it is no longer “in the hands” of his office, but instead the policy-making organizations of the OPCW. According to Arias, that power now lies in the hands of the Executive Council, (the rotating group of 41 member states who govern the OPCW), and the full Conference of State Parties (all OPCW member states):

     I have to say that the report of the FFM directed to Douma is in the hands of the Executive Council and the Conference.  The Director-General has no authority whatsoever to reopen this investigation that concluded and was reported to the Executive Council, and through the Executive Council to the Conference.  The matter is in the hands of the policymaking organs and not of the Director-General.  The Executive Council was already seized of the matter in March 2019.

     This is the first time that the Director General has claimed that the report is out of his control, and instead “in the hands” of a higher body. In introducing this escape-hatch, Arias is now giving the appearance that in principle he no longer objects to a reopening of the investigation. In reality, he is skirting responsibility for that decision by passing it to executive bodies that have blocked any efforts to discuss the cover-up right from the start. Upon the release of the Douma final report in March 2019, the Executive Council immediately voted down a proposal to hear from all of the experts who worked on the Douma case. The US delegation lobbied to block the vote by reportedly arguing that such a hearing would be akin to “Stalinist trials.”

    Contrary to Arias’ assertions, the Chemical Weapons Convention does not support his claim that once a final report is issued, it becomes “in the hands of the Executive Council and Conference.” The relevant passage of the CWC simply states that the “Director General shall promptly transmit the preliminary and final reports to the Executive Council and to all States Parties.” (Part XI of the Verification Annex to the CWC, Investigations of Alleged Uses of Chemical Weapons, Section D [Reports], paragraph 23.)

    There is nothing to suggest here that the Executive Council – or the State Parties — becomes the custodian of these reports, or that the Technical Secretariat (TS), which the Director General oversees, somehow loses control over them.

    This is indeed borne out by past practice. It is common for the TS to make amendments to final reports and issue them without the Executive Council’s permission. Such amendments, which are issued as official TS “Addendums” to published reports, can be minor technical or typographic corrections, but also major substantive additions.

    This practice includes a previous OPCW investigation in Syria. After publishing a final report on alleged chemical attacks by insurgents in Syria in December 2015 (S/1318/2015/Rev.1), Syrian authorities invited the OPCW to return in order to collect further evidence that the report claimed was lacking. The FFM team paid a second visit to Syria one month later and published an Addendum to the final report — with details of its additional deployment — in February 2016. (S/1318/2015/Rev.1/Add.1).

    The Addendum contains no mention of the Executive Council, and there is no record of any EC vote to authorize it. The opening paragraph reads:

     This addendum provides information further to “The Report of the OPCW Fact-Finding Mission in Syria Regarding the Incidents Described in Communications from the Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs and Expatriates and Head of the National Authority of the Syrian Arab Republic” (S/1318/2015/Rev.1, dated 17 December 2015’).

     In the case of Douma, no one is even proposing that the OPCW return to Syria, as it did after issuing that final report of December 2015. The OPCW is simply being asked to hear from the Douma probe’s own inspectors, and address their complaints, including the doctoring of the mission’s original reportArias is passing the buck to a concocted higher authority in order to avoid exercising his own.

    Disparaging whistleblowers, OPCW chief cites a fabricated figure

    In one of his few attempts to make a substantive claim in defense of the Douma investigation, OPCW Director General Ferando Arias has repeatedly asserted that “most of the analytical work took place” in the last six or seven months, when the dissenting inspectors were no longer part of the Douma Fact-Finding Mission (FFM). Because of this, Arias has claimed that the whistleblowers “had manifestly incomplete information on the Douma investigation,” rendering their protests “egregious.”

    At the UN Security Council, Arias doubled down on this argument by adducing, for the first time, a purported figure to substantiate it. According to Arias, 70 samples were analyzed by the OPCW in the last six months of the investigation, when the dissenting inspectors were no longer involved. Arias made this claim twice:

    The FFM, after Inspector B departed, worked for more than six months, during which the bulk of the results of the investigation was got by the team.  For instance, out of the more than 100 samples, around more than 70 results were brought in those last six months of the investigation.

     Of course, the bulk of the investigations related to Douma came after I arrived to the Organisation after July 2018.  Of the more than 100 samples, more than 70 good samples were analyzed after the summer of 2018.  The bulk of the investigation, the bulk of information, the bulk of analysis, of all the information that had been gathered came after the two inspectors left.” 

    Arias’ claim that “more than 70” samples “were analyzed after the summer of 2018” in the “last six months of the investigation” is a demonstrable falsehood. Unless the OPCW somehow failed to report dozens of analyzed samples until now, the claim of 70 samples is a fabricated figure. In reality, the final report on Douma shows that just 44 samples were analyzed throughout the entire probe. And just 13 of those samples were analyzed after the issuing of the interim report — i.e., after the dissenting inspectors were out of the picture.

    With just 44 samples analyzed for the entire probe, and just 13 new samples analyzed in the final six months, this means that 70% of the Douma investigation’s total sample analysis was in fact conducted in its first month.

    Completely inverting that reality, Arias has now produced a phony figure that paints a false picture of the work conducted in the six months after the dissenting inspectors were sidelined.

    According to the Final Report, 70% of the total chemical samples analyzed were analyzed in the probe’s first month. Just 13 samples were analyzed in the last seven months, undermining OPCW DG Arias’ new claim that 70 samples were analyzed in that period. (Excerpt of Aaron Maté’s UN presentation, April 16 2021)

    By claiming that the “bulk of the investigation” was conducted after the whistleblowers were no longer involved, Arias is also erasing other critical areas of work conducted in the first two months and included in the suppressed original report.

    As I recently detailed in a UN presentation, a comparison between the interim report of July 2018 and the final report of March 2019 shows that the vast majority of the investigation was already done in the first two months in multiple key areas: 100% of the research of the scientific literature; 87% of the total interviews had been conducted and analyzed; a meeting with four NATO toxicologists had been convened, and 98.5% of the metadata analysis of media files from Douma was undertaken. In addition, a complete epidemiological study was reported in the original report, much of which was expunged from the final report.

    This means that, contrary to Arias’ claim, the bulk of the work was in fact carried out in the probe’s first two months.

    Retracting one falsehood, Arias replaces it with another

    At the European Parliament in April, Arias falsely claimed that no state party has challenged any of the Douma report’s conclusions, and that Russia even “agrees” with them:

    The conclusions of the report, paradoxically, have never been disputed by a state party. Even the Russian delegation agrees with the conclusions.

    Arias’ implausible contention was that, despite the heated two-year public dispute over the Douma investigation, no member state has challenged it. Yet Syria and Russia have vigorously challenged the report’s findings, within the OPCW itself and in a series of UN Security Council debates.

    As The Grayzone has previously reported, this phony talking point was first put forward by the NATO-tied website Bellingcat last year. Bellingcat produced excerpts of a letter that it claimed was sent by Arias in June 2019 to Dr. Brendan Whelan, the key dissenting inspector. This letter, Bellingcat declared, “reveals that at a diplomatic level behind closed doors, the Russian and Syrian governments have both agreed with the conclusions of the OPCW report.”

    But The Grayzone then revealed that not only was this claim ludicrous, but based on a “letter” that was never actually sent. The Grayzone obtained and published Arias’ actual letter to Whelan, which contained none of Bellingcat’s text.

    In a sign that he has now recognized the fallacy of the Bellingcat-promoted talking point, Arias tacitly walked it back in his June 3rd UN appearance. But instead of acknowledging his previous error, he replaced it with a new one. Arias now claimed:

    None of the 193 Member States of the OPCW have challenged the findings of the FFM that chlorine was found on the scene of the attack, in Douma.

     To support his claim about chlorine found at the scene, Arias cited a note verbal (diplomatic correspondence) from Russia:

    I have here in front of me a note verbal of the Russian Embassy, dated the 26th of April 2019, note #759 that includes an attachment.  Its a Russian Federation paper, based on the conclusions of the report of the FFM in Douma.  And this note required me to disseminate this report. This note, or report attached to the note by the Russian Embassy in The Hague said, Conclusion.  The Russian Federation does not challenge the findings contained in the FFM report regarding the possible presence of molecular chlorine in the cylinders, etc.”  This is on the web page from the Organisation.

     Arias’ own source undermines his claim. Whereas Arias told the UN that no state has “challenged the findings of the FFM that chlorine was found on the scene,” his evidence for that statement – a Russian note verbal – simply states that Russia “does not challenge” that there was a “possible presence of molecular chlorine in the cylinders.”

    The Russian correspondence goes on to explain why it explicitly does challenge the final report’s conclusion that chlorine was likely used as a chemical weapon. Responding to Arias at the UN, Russian Ambassador Vasily Nebenzya read the relevant passage in full:

    The Russian Federation does not challenge the findings contained in the FFM report regarding the possible presence of molecular chlorine on the cylinders.  However, the parameters, characteristics and exterior of the cylinders, as well as the data obtained from the locations of those incidents, are not consistent with the argument that they were dropped from an aircraft. The existing facts more likely indicate that there is a high probability that both cylinders were placed at Locations 2 and 4 manually rather than dropped from an aircraft. Apparently the factual material contained in the report does not allow us to draw a conclusion as to the use of a toxic chemical as a weapon. On that basis, the Russian Federation insists on the version that there was false evidence and on the staged character of the incident in Douma.

    Therefore, the only contention that Russia did not challenge is that of a “possible” presence of molecular chlorine in the cylinders found in Douma. That is for obvious reasons.

    No one has argued that there was no possibility of a chlorine presence. There were, after all, two chlorine cylinders found at the scene, so traces of chlorine could be expected. In reality, the OPCW did not even report any finding of chlorine gas on the cylinder. They found chloride, a breakdown product of chlorine gas but also a very common substance in the environment, and in household products like table salt and other chloride salts. Chloride theoretically could have been dispersed around the cylinders.

    Other possible evidence of chlorine gas use came from very low traces of various chlorine-containing organic compounds (CLOCs) found at the scene — most, if not all, of which can be present in the environment. Because the OPCW failed to test background samples – an oversight or deliberate omission that Whelan later described as scientifically indefensible – it could not determine if these trace quantities of CLOCs found at the scene pointed to chlorine gas use, or if they came from benign sources.

    When challenged at the UN on his misrepresentation of the Russian note verbal, Arias did not offer a rebuttal. He instead tersely stated: “The Russian note verbale is published and that is what they have to say.”

    Arias’ willingness to deceive the UN on the details of the Douma probe and the OPCW’s own capacity to address it also extends to his portrayal of the whistleblowers, as we will explain in detail in the second part of this report.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 23:40

  • CDC Insists Benefits Of mRNA Vaccines Still "Clearly Outweigh" Risks Of Dangerous Side Effects
    CDC Insists Benefits Of mRNA Vaccines Still “Clearly Outweigh” Risks Of Dangerous Side Effects

    With a new round of data out of Israel seemingly confirming what we have been reporting for weeks now, fresh questions are emerging about the efficacy of the mRNA vaccines (those produced by Pfizer and Moderna) and whether they’re truly 90%+ effective, as advertised.

    As the number of confirmed COVID cases topped 184MM, the Israeli health ministry shared preliminary data appearing to confirm that these vaccines are less effective at preventing infection via the Delta variant. Although the data must still be peer reviewed, the Israelis went so far as to proclaim that the true efficacy number is closer to 64%. To be sure, the vaccines continue to mostly prevent severe infection and death (though they’re only 93% effective at this, less than the 100% number initially touted by their corporate parents).

    Now, with President Joe Biden publicly addressing the administration’s ongoing effort to combat COVID as case numbers continue to creep higher in the US, the CDC has chimed in – right on cue – to remind the world that the benefits of everybody taking the vaccine still far outweigh the risks posed by the rare (but sometimes deadly) side effects that have now also been documented.

    As we reported, the FDA now recognizes that the rare heart inflammation seen in some patients, including members of the military, have been linked to mRNA vaccines. So, with criticism and skepticism directed at the US-made vaccines mounting, the CDC on Tuesday tried its hand at a little damage control.

    Per Bloomberg:

    The benefits of messenger RNA Covid-19 vaccines clearly outweigh the risks despite heart complications seen in a relatively small number of mostly young men, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Roughly 1,200 cases of myocarditis, or inflammation of the heart wall, were reported in people who received mRNA vaccines, the CDC said in its Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report on Tuesday. But with about 296 million doses of mRNA vaccines having been administered as of June 11, the benefit is clear in all populations, including adolescents and young adults, the researchers reported.

    For the Biden Administration, the stakes have never been higher. COVID cases are rising, and many are blaming Southern and western states with lower vaccination rates as a potential vulnerability that could ignite another wave of COVID.

    Meanwhile, in the UK, PM Boris Johnson just confirmed that he plans to relax the last remaining COVID restrictions in England on July 19. But already, public health advisers and other “experts” are pressuring him to reconsider.

    And in the US, the daily case numbers have started to creep higher, while the pace of vaccinations has slowed dramatically. Still, just under 70% of American adults have received at least one dose.

    While the Biden Administration has already given employers the green light to pressure employees to get vaccinated, and will undoubtedly continue to do whatever it can to pressure more adults to accept the vaccine, Dr. Scott Gottlieb points out that most Americans will eventually acquire immunity either through natural infection, or the vaccine.

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    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 23:20

  • Dershowitz Predicts Charges Against Trump Org's CFO Will Be Tossed
    Dershowitz Predicts Charges Against Trump Org’s CFO Will Be Tossed

    Authored by Tom Ozimek via The Epoch Times,

    Harvard Law professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz says he believes federal tax fraud charges filed in New York City against The Trump Organization’s longtime finance chief will end up being dismissed.

    “You can’t get a city district attorney indicting somebody for failing to pay federal income taxes when the IRS hasn’t even gone after him,” Dershowitz said in a July 3 interview with Newsmax.

    “One of the charges, a major charge, is grand larceny against the United States government.

    “That shows the extent to which they are prepared to stretch existing law and the Constitution to give them authority over federal taxes. It’s absurd.

    Allen Weisselberg, Trump Organization CFO, leaves Manhattan Criminal Court after his arraignment in State Supreme Court in Lower Manhattan on July 1, 2021. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)

    On July 1, The Trump Organization and its chief financial officer, Allen Weisselberg, were charged in what New York prosecutors called a “sweeping and audacious” tax fraud scheme in which Trump’s company and Weisselberg allegedly cheated the state and city out of taxes by conspiring to pay senior executives off the books by way of fringe benefits, such as apartment rent and car payments.

    Prosecutor Carey Dunne said in court that the alleged scheme was “orchestrated by the most senior executives” at the firm and got “secret pay raises at the expense of state and federal taxpayers.”

    Weisselberg and attorneys for The Trump Organization have pleaded not guilty.

    Ahead of the unsealing of the criminal indictment on July 1, The Trump Organization criticized Manhattan prosecutors for what they claimed was a partisan criminal investigation designed to hurt Trump politically. In a July 1 statement, The Trump Organization said the probe “is not justice; this is politics.”

    Dunne pushed back on the claim, saying that “politics has no role in the jury chamber, and I can assure you it had no role here.”

    Alan Futerfas, a member of The Trump Organization’s defense team, disagreed.

    “I believe the political forces driving today’s events are just that. It’s political, politically driven, notwithstanding the statements by my colleague at the DA’s office in court today,” Futerfas said.

    Weisselberg himself has been accused of defrauding the federal government—along with New York state and New York City—of more than $1 million in unpaid taxes and tax refunds for which he was ineligible.

    The most serious charge against Weisselberg, grand larceny, carries a sentence of between 5 and 15 years behind bars.

    Attorney Alan Dershowitz, then member of President Donald Trump’s legal team, speaks to the press in the Senate Reception Room during the Senate impeachment trial at the Capitol in Washington on Jan. 29, 2020. (Mario Tama/Getty Images)

    Dershowitz told Newsmax he believes the charges against Weisselberg, who has intimate knowledge of The Trump Organization’s financial dealings, are a pressure tactic to get him to testify against Trump’s company.

    “If he doesn’t turn, they will sentence him to prison, probably will not be a long prison term. Generally for crimes like this relating to a relatively small amount of taxes, there’s either no prison time or a small amount in prison time,” Dershowitz told the outlet.

    “That’s the goal, to try to get people like him to testify against the higher-ups,” Dershowitz said.

    “The ultimate goal here obviously, is Donald Trump. And the question is, will they get people to turn on him?”

    This comes as Trump has been discussing a possible comeback run for president in 2024.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 23:00

  • Japan's No.2 Says US & Japan "Must Defend Taiwan Together" 
    Japan’s No.2 Says US & Japan “Must Defend Taiwan Together” 

    Washington appears to be successfully wooing Japan to its side after urging a more united ‘standing up’ against China when it comes to Taiwan and other contested sovereignty issues in the South China Sea. 

    Japanese Deputy Prime Minister Taro Aso on Monday made some surprising statements, saying that any future Chinese invasion of Taiwan would likely be interpreted in Tokyo as a “threat to Japan’s survival” – allowing the government to deploy its Self-Defense Forces for collective self-defense.

    Taro Aso, Japan’s deputy prime minister, Getty Images

    While not necessarily a new policy given recent updates to Japan’s post-World War II constitution allow the country to deploy armed forces only in instances it’s under attack,  Aso’s choosing to specifically invoke the hotly contested Taiwan issue alongside an expressed willingness to defend the island with the United States will be taken as especially bellicose and brazen in Beijing. 

    “If a major incident happened [in Taiwan], it would not be strange at all if it touches on a situation threatening survival,” Aso said. “If that is the case, Japan and the US must defend Taiwan together.” The number two highest Japanese official further noted “the situation over Taiwan is becoming extremely intense” – especially following a Xi speech days ago wherein he vowed to enforce Chinese sovereignty over the island. 

    At the moment Japan is actually locked in its own direct standoff with China over the uninhabited Senkaku Islands, recently giving its coast guard looser rules of engagement in dealing with Chinese fishing vessels, believed used of China to attempt a quiet de facto takeover of the disputed territory.

    Recall that in the very first phone call early this year between Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and Japan’s Defense Minister, the Biden administration had reaffirmed a previously agreed upon US commitment to defending Japanese sovereignty over the Senkakus.

    Meanwhile as was revealed last week…

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    “Secretary Austin further affirmed that the Senkaku Islands are covered by Article V of the US-Japan Security Treaty, and that the United States remains opposed to any unilateral attempts to change the status quo in the East China Sea,” the late January call readout had stated. 

    Later in April Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and President Biden issued a joint statement that urged “peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait” – however at that time it’s likely the American side had pressed for more specific and assertive language.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 22:40

  • Weimar Los Angeles: "You Can't Go Home Again"
    Weimar Los Angeles: “You Can’t Go Home Again”

    Authored by Roger Simon, op-ed via The Epoch Times,

    When I saw video online of Antifa attacking demonstrators in front of the Wi Spa in Los Angeles’ Koreatown, I realized why, in the immortal words of Thomas Wolfe, “You Can’t Go Home Again.”

    But unlike Wolfe, who, in his famous novel, was loath to return to his native Asheville, North Carolina, I am in the south, resistant to returning to California where I lived most of my adult life.

    It was the homeless coming down in the morning from Mulholland Drive on the way to free food and not-so-free drugs, making even walking the dog a perilous activity, that had initially propelled our family out—at least in part.

    But things have apparently only gotten worse since, considering what transpired at the Wi Spa. That was a place I knew because, in the eighties and nineties and into the first few years of this century, I had become an occasional habitué of LA’s Korean spas, excellent places to relax in the hot water, although I can only recall patronizing Wi once.

    Nothing happened there then remotely similar to what occurred the other day—a man walking buck naked into the women’s only side, declaring his “gender identity” female, while not bothering to hide the contrary evidence in front of the assembled biological women and their children.

    Later, a black woman expressed her justifiable anger at this display before management only to be herself confronted by a particularly obnoxious “woke” individual defending the right of the gender dysphoric to freak out kids. (This is also on video at the link, if you haven’t seen it.)

    The next chapter had defenders of traditional human privacy (aka “normals” as my friend Kurt Schlichter calls them) protesting in front of the spa when they are confronted by the violent Antifa psychos who are apparently immune to any kind of serious prosecution by the district attorneys of Los Angeles, Portland and Seattle or, for that matter, our Department of Justice.

    What are we to make of this other than it is all too predictable by now?

    America, in its blue states at least, and they are doing their best to spread the poison elsewhere, has turned us into a land of the “woke” where near-total conformity rules the day, the populace terrified to speak up against the real intention behind this basic Marxist behavior—the destruction of the family as we know it.

    When you look at the silent faces standing in the lobby of the Wi Spa while the “woke” spokesman pontificates, you see this fear and all you can say is “Welcome to Weimar Los Angeles.”

    Indeed, the direction of our republic is eerily similar to that of Weimar, Germany, in everything from social mores to inflation.

    One of the more interesting books that gives a sense of what it was like then is—doubly apropos since we are in the middle of Wimbledon—“A Terrible Splendor” about the epochal 1937 Davis Cup duel between America’s Don Budge and Germany’s Baron von Cramm—a handsome gay man who was under the thumb of the Gestapo at that time for his proclivities so that he would win against the Yankee.

    Meanwhile, license prevailed for others in 1930s Berlin beyond anything we would even conceive of today.

    What the self-described “progressives” of LA and elsewhere have to learn is this is not about whether you are pro or anti gay. There are plenty of gays on the right these days. Or how you feel about the transgendered. Personally, I’m live and let live.

    It is about something much more basic we all learned in school when school really was school and not a Cultureal Revolution indoctrination camp. I’m going to put it in caps, lest it be forgotten:

    RESPECT THE RIGHTS OF OTHERS!

    Disrespecting others is what Antifa, BLM and virtually everyone else on the left is doing now at a level unknown since the Weimar Republic.

    We all know how that ended.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 22:20

  • Texas AG: Biden Administration 'On The Side Of Cartels' When It Comes To Southern Border
    Texas AG: Biden Administration ‘On The Side Of Cartels’ When It Comes To Southern Border

    President Biden’s southern border crisis is growing increasingly grave by the week. A flood of migrants continues to pour into the country as the president, earlier this year, reversed many of his predecessor’s immigration policies, including having asylum seekers remain in Mexico instead of in the U.S. and ending border wall construction.

    Speaking first hand about the border crisis, because frankly, the mainstream media continues to ignore the issue, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton recently appeared on the Sara Carter Show podcast to discuss immigration. 

    “Not only are we fighting illegal immigration and the cartels,” Paxton said, “but we’re fighting the Biden administration.” Instead of lending a hand to the Lone Star state, “They’re on the side of the cartels literally helping them to transport human beings into our state.”

    As a result, the attorney general admits he’s afraid of his own federal government. “Look, I’ve never been more afraid of our own government than I am right now. I’ve never been more afraid of law enforcement,” Paxton told Carter. “These are people that we expect to hold to a very high standard, whether it’s whether it’s you know, the FBI or the CIA, these national federal organizations have become very political.”

    Every passing day, the Biden administration continues to mishandle the border crisis. The reversal in former President Trump’s policies has resulted in a massive surge in migrants, including unaccompanied minors, which has overwhelmed capacity at immigration facilities. 

    Paxton’s only solution to combat the administration is through a barrage of lawsuits:

    “We are definitely in the fight with the Biden administration. We have 11 lawsuits right now, that’s in the first six months of his administration,” he said. “They matter because we have to fight, we have to hold them accountable for violating federal law, for not following the President’s constitutional duty.”

    With the administration’s unwillingness to secure the border, South Dakota is sending their National Guard members to defend Texans from border chaos. 

    On Tuesday,  Fox News’ Bill Melugin snaped images of at least 100 migrants in La Joya, Texas, who just crossed the border. 

    He said this is the “largest single group of migrants I’ve ever seen is currently being apprehended here in La Joya, TX. At least 100+ and more still coming down the road. Many children coughing, some moms breastfeeding. Some I talked to are from Nicaragua, Honduras, & Guatemala.” 

    One of Melugin’s images shows the +100 group of migrants lined up alongside U.S. Customs and Border Protection trucks. Agents appeared to be interviewing the migrants. There was no word on what agents were discussing. 

    Here are other images of the large group. 

    On Monday, former Acting Director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Ron Vitiello told “Fox & Friends First” that the “root cause of the chaos” at the southern border is Biden’s quick reversal of former President Trump’s immigration policies. 

    Listen to the entire interview or skip to the 32-minute mark where Carter and Paxton talk about the border crisis. 

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 22:00

  • Fake Chips Flood China Market, Fill Overseas Supply Chains
    Fake Chips Flood China Market, Fill Overseas Supply Chains

    Authored by Winnie Han via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Counterfeit products have been circulated in China’s electronics market for a long time. However, as the global chip shortage intensifies, a large amount of refurbished, substandard fake chips are flood the market, exposing major deficiencies in China’s quality control standards.

    A chip the size of a coin, used in central processing units and a graphic processing units developed by the US-headquartered Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) is displayed during a press conference held in Taipei on May 24, 2011. (Sam Yeh/AFP via Getty Images)

    China Economic Observer reported a chip agent revealed that to meet the growing demand, suppliers were no longer keeping their counterfeiting practices secret. Instead, they are openly creating separate production lines to expedite the sales of counterfeit or refurbished chips. Furthermore, businesses are no longer offering the shoddy products at half price. Many are being sold at full market value.

    The agent identified two types of counterfeit chips. The first involves recycling used chips from e-waste by removing the logo and cleaning them for resale with new packaging. The second involves packaging the substandard chips from the regular production line and selling them as good products.

    Not surprisingly, customers were often dissatisfied with the product’s performance, reliability, and durability. However, the deficiencies were not immediately evident until after the chips were used over time or under extreme conditions. At which point, it would be the customers or manufacturer of the final products who suffer a loss, while the fake chip providers often avoid troubles, according to the chip agent.

    Small and Medium-sized Enterprises Are Most Affected

    China has long relied on imported chips. Small and medium-sized enterprises are unable to directly order from overseas manufacturers due to the small quantities, and can only purchase through third-party distributors. Thus, small and medium-sized enterprises in China have become the largest buyers of fake chips, and also the largest group of victims.

    For example, a small company once designed a simple data acquisition card. The debugging stage always showed abnormal results. It raised concerns about the design. But through the help of a chip disassembly company that compared it with an authentic chip purchased through proper channels, they found that the problem stemmed from the chip being fake.

    Some of the Fake Chips Flowed Overseas

    The commercial district of Huaqiangbei in Shenzhen, Guangdong, is well known for its counterfeit chip dealers. It has become the largest distribution center for integrated circuit products in Asia. While most of the chips produced there stay in China, many are believed to be filling overseas supply chains, especially through the exporting of Chinese electronic products. It prompts legal liability concerns that rarely get resolved.

    Zhu Yicong, a senior equity partner at Yingke (Shenzhen) Law Firm, told Chinese state media that legal actions are rarely taken against China’s questionable chip manufacturers. This is despite how China’s laws consider it illegal to offer “substandard”  or counterfeit products. But because the term “substandard” is ambiguous, independent examiners may be needed to prove the chips being sold are not genuine and reliable.

    Another reason is that some buyers, due to supply shortages or cost-cutting, take a tacit attitude towards illegal chips, and deliberately mix the genuine chips with the fake ones, which encouraged the formation of a counterfeit industrial chain. Unfortunately, the end-users and consumers have to bear all the risks.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 21:40

  • Iran: Major Electricity Blackouts During Hot Summer Lead To Growing Anti-Regime Protests
    Iran: Major Electricity Blackouts During Hot Summer Lead To Growing Anti-Regime Protests

    Widespread power outages in Iran which have continued this week have plunged entire cities into darkness and is fueling growing anti-government protests less than a month before hardline judiciary cleric Ebrahim Raisi enters office as president. Frequent power cuts have also high neighboring Iraq, given it’s currently reliant for much of its electrical supply on Iran’s infrastructure. 

    Multiple social media videos have spread across the internet which show Iranians chanting “death to the dictator” and other anti-Ayatollah slogans, though the footage can’t be verified. 

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    Iranians have over the past months come to expect such disruptions, but starting late Saturday unusually long power outages impacted large swathes of Tehran and nearby Karaj, among others. 

    The weekend Tehran outage had been unannounced (after for months the country has implemented scheduled power cuts over a severe supply shortage and rising demand), and sparked widespread anger. It went from 11pm Saturday night through early the next morning in the middle of a hot summer.

    Iran hawks in the West are seizing upon the protests in an attempt to argue against restoring the JCPOA nuclear deal

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    The regional news source Iran International explained that the country’s power consumption this summer “has topped 60,000 megawatts per day, a more than ten percent increase compared with last year, while electricity generation has remained the same at 50,000-56,000 megawatts.” And further the report notes:

    As electricity remains subsidized and cheap, there is no incentive for people to limit its use. It also makes Iran a magnate for cryptocurrency mining by huge computer farms that are consume perhaps up to ten percent of electricity supplies in the country.

    In recent months authorities have vowed to disrupt all illegal crypto mining, despite it once being a key way for the country to offset the severe US sanctions blow under the past Trump administration. 

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    The hotter temperatures and growing broad-level frustration has resulted in rare acts of self-criticism by the government, starting with speaker of the parliament Mohammad Qalibaf, who began this week with a written statement acknowledging thefrequent power outages throughout the country and disruption of people’s lives and businesses require planning and management.

    “If the increase in consumption and excess demand is not compensated in the short term for any reason, at least stick to the announced blackout schedule so that people can plan for problems,” he continued in unusually blunt recognition of the crisis.

    And this was followed Tuesday with an unprecedented apology from outgoing president Hassan Rouhani:

    In a government meeting broadcast live on state TV, Rouhani acknowledged that chronic power outages over the past week have caused Iranians “plenty of pain” and expressed contrition in an unusually personal speech.

    “My apologies to dear people who have faced these problems and pain,” he said.

    Some Iranian towns are actually experiencing water supply cut offs to boot, given in some places it relies on power to pipe supply.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 21:20

  • US Forces Are Under Constant Rain Of Fire In Both Syria And Iraq
    US Forces Are Under Constant Rain Of Fire In Both Syria And Iraq

    By SouthFront.org,

    The United States seems to have stepped in a wasp’s nest after their most recent strikes on ‘resistance’ positions along the Syrian-Iraqi border. The US strike took place on June 27th. The response from the resistance came on the very next day.

    The largest American base in Syria – at the al-Omar Oil Field came under fire by at least 8 rockets, which resulted in no casualties but significant material damage. Exactly a week later, reports surfaced of another rocket attack on al-Omar, this time the rumors were first spread by a US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) spokesman.

    The reports of an attack were subsequently denied by both the US and the SDF. Other reports, however, said the blasts were caused as a result of “training” activity taking place among foreign forces there.

    Alongside all of this, US convoys in Iraq are subject to daily IED attacks, with the most recent one taking place on July 5th, in the Baghdad governorate.

    There is no single area of focus for these attacks, as they happen all across Iraq’s provinces.

    In the very early hours of July 6th, another attack took place in Iraq – this time in Baghdad’s “Green Zone” which hosts various important buildings, such as the US Embassy. The Union 3 US base is located there, and C-RAM air defense systems were activated in response to a suicide drone attack on the compound. In the middle of the night air raid sirens sounded and then the air defenses were activated and began hunting for the UAV, successfully downing it judging by footage that’s available online.

    A more successful attack was aimed at al-Asad Air Base, also located in Iraq.

    On July 5th, at least three rockets landed on the base, not causing any casualties and undisclosed material damage. Ain al-Asad has been the frequent target of rocket attacks attributed to Iran-backed Shiite militias operating both in Iraq and Syria. The base was also targeted by Iranian ballistic missiles in January of 2020, after the US killed Qasem Soleimani in Baghdad with an air attack. Soleimani was Tehran’s top Middle East operator.

    The United States accuses Iranian-backed militia groups of launching regular rocket attacks against its troops in Iraq. The American punitive air strikes on bases operated by these militias along the Syrian-Iraqi border come in response to these “violations”. The Hashed-al-Shaabi, an Iraqi paramilitary alliance that includes several Iranian proxies and has become the main power broker in Baghdad, said the raids killed four of its fighters in the Qaim region near the border with Syria.

    As such, it is likely that the response against Washington’s forces is far from over.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 21:00

  • As Pandemic Restrictions In India Ease, The Price Of Gold Swings From A Discount To A Premium
    As Pandemic Restrictions In India Ease, The Price Of Gold Swings From A Discount To A Premium

    The price of gold has swung to a premium in India, one of the countries that helps drive the most demand for the precious metal. It marks the first time in more than two months it has sold for a premium, according to a new report from Reuters featured on Mining.com. 

    The demand comes after pandemic restrictions in the country were slightly relaxed over the last 60 days. This has catalyzed a bump higher in retail demand, as people make purchases for weddings, the report says. 

    Local gold futures on Friday of last week traded at about 47,400 rupees per 10 grams of gold and dealers were charging a premium of up to $3 per ounce this week compared to last week’s discount of $12. 

    One dealer based in Mumbai said: “There is slight improvement in demand from jewellers as some of them think prices could rise above $1,800 and want to stock up.”

    Meanwhile premiums in China – another major driver of gold demand – narrowed to between $3 and $4 per ounce versus between $3 and $6 per ounce last week. The report also notes that a growth in shipments from Switzerland in April and May was due to local prices trading at a premium, rather than an improvement in demand. 

    In Hong Kong, premiums were at $1 versus $0.70-$1 an ounce in the week prior. In Japan, demand was quiet, with premiums at $0.50 per ounce. 

    Vincent Tie, sales manager at Singapore dealer, Silver Bullion, concluded: “Investors’ demand for gold has marginally increased since May as they are back in the market buying the dip, seeing current prices as a good opportunity.”

     

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 20:40

  • Why Is NASA Working So Hard To Learn How To Defend The Earth From Giant Asteroids?
    Why Is NASA Working So Hard To Learn How To Defend The Earth From Giant Asteroids?

    Authored by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse blog,

    Did you know that NASA is going to send a spacecraft on a suicide mission in an attempt to change the trajectory of a massive space rock?  The good news is that the space rock that NASA will be crashing this spacecraft into is not on a collision course with Earth.  It is only a test.  But why has NASA suddenly become so concerned with figuring out how to defend the Earth from giant asteroids?  Could it be possible that there is something heading toward Earth in the future that they haven’t told us about yet?

    According to NASA, there are more than 26,000 asteroids that pass near Earth, and more than 2,000 of them are classified as “potentially dangerous” asteroids.

    Most of those “potentially dangerous” asteroids aren’t that large, but 158 of them do have a diameter of more than one kilometer.

    If one of those monsters were to hit us, it would be a disaster of cataclysmic proportions.

    Of course there are countless other space rocks that our scientists have not discovered yet, and those probably represent the greatest threat.  Because if you don’t see a threat coming, you can’t get prepared for it in advance.

    These days, NASA officials have become quite preoccupied by the threat that giant space rocks potentially pose, and we are being told that “scientists are at work on a plan to avoid the destruction of Earth by an errant asteroid”.  The following comes from an article that was just published by the Boston Globe

    NASA and a cadre of the world’s leading engineers and space scientists are at work on a plan to avoid the destruction of Earth by an errant asteroid like the one 65 million years ago that wiped out the dinosaurs, created a cloud of dust so impenetrable that it blocked out the sun, and plunged the planet into a prolonged winter that sent half of all plant life into extinction.

    Personally, I think that this is something that NASA should definitely be focusing on, because the threat is very real.

    Most people don’t realize this, but our planet is actually being pelted by space debris on a constant basis at this point.  In fact, NASA says that we are being hit by very small objects “every day”

    Every day, Earth is bombarded by tons of dust and sand-sized particles from the solar system. Meteoroids burn up as they enter the Earth’s atmosphere causing little or no damage. They are easy to spot, streaking across the night sky in brilliant, short-lived bursts of light. Of more concern are the asteroids that pass by Earth unnoticed; they are difficult to detect and track as observers depend on reflected sunlight to spot them.

    Thankfully, the vast majority of the objects that we encounter are too small to do any damage.

    But it is just a matter of time before a really big space rock comes along.

    NASA officials like to give the impression that they have a really good idea of what is going on up there, but the truth is that our ability to detect large space rocks is still quite limited.  In May, a “potentially hazardous” asteroid that came close to Earth was only discovered about a week before it arrived

    The reason why 2021 KT1 is news is that NASA estimates that it’s between 492 feet/150 meters and 1,082 feet/330 meters in diameter. It wasn’t observed until late in May 2021 just a week before its closest pass.

    And late last year a fairly large asteroid was not discovered until it had already buzzed dangerously close to our planet

    Wow. A low-flying space rock set a record last Friday (appropriately, the 13th), when 2020 VT4 passed just under 400 kilometers (250 miles) over the Southern Pacific.

    The asteroid was spotted by the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) survey at the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii in the early morning hours of Saturday, November 14th, just 15 hours after approach. This is not uncommon for fast-movers, especially asteroids that are coming at the Earth from our sunward blind-spot, like 2020 VT4.

    So if a major threat is headed our way, we may or may not see it coming in advance.

    If we do have advance warning that a huge asteroid is coming, obviously we would want to try to do something about it.  With such a scenario in mind, NASA will soon be crashing the DART spacecraft into a giant space rock called Dimorphos

    Developed by a team of scientists from the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory and NASA’s Planetary Defense Coordination Office, DART is an unmanned, remotely controlled astronomical suicide mission designed to nudge an asteroid that is half a mile in diameter out of its orbit. Doomsayers take note: This is only a test. The asteroid in question, Didymos — Greek for “twin,” and so named because it was discovered to be paired with its own small moon — is not actually on a collision course with Earth.

    Sometime between Thanksgiving week (perhaps as soon as the evening of Nov. 23) and February 2022, the team behind DART will launch it from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. The spacecraft will, if all goes according to plan, travel 6.8 million miles to reach and collide with Didymos’s moonlet, Dimorphos, which is 525 feet in diameter.

    Is NASA testing out technology that they plan to use on another giant space rock at a later date?

    Some have suggested that an asteroid known as Apophis could hit us on April 13th, 2029

    On April 13, 2029 (which happens to be Friday the 13th), something unsettling will happen.

    A decent-sized asteroid, the 1,100-foot-wide Apophis, will pass so close to Earth it’ll be visible in the sky from certain places. Crucially, the giant rock will not strike our humble planet. But it will pass closer than 20,000 miles from the surface, which is closer than where some of the United States’ most prized weather satellites orbit.

    But NASA insists that Apophis will not hit us “for at least a century”

    After its discovery in 2004, asteroid 99942 Apophis had been identified as one of the most hazardous asteroids that could impact Earth. But that impact assessment changed as astronomers tracked Apophis and its orbit became better determined.

    Now, the results from a new radar observation campaign combined with precise orbit analysis have helped astronomers conclude that there is no risk of Apophis impacting our planet for at least a century.

    Estimated to be about 1,100 feet (340 meters) across, Apophis quickly gained notoriety as an asteroid that could pose a serious threat to Earth when astronomers predicted that it would come uncomfortably close in 2029. Thanks to additional observations of the near-Earth object (NEO), the risk of an impact in 2029 was later ruled out, as was the potential impact risk posed by another close approach in 2036.

    The orbit of Apophis is now very well known by astronomers all over the globe.  To me, all of the giant space rocks that are floating around up there that we don’t know about represent a much greater threat.

    Unfortunately, the number of large space rocks going by our planet has been steadily increasing, and I believe that there is a good chance that we could see an asteroid impact long before 2029 ever rolls around.

    If NASA officials know about such a threat, for now they aren’t admitting that to the public.

    But they are admitting that they are trying to figure out how to deflect a very large asteroid, and that should definitely be getting our attention.

    *  *  *

    Michael’s new book entitled “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 20:20

  • Eric Adams Wins New York Democratic Primary After Mail-In Ballots Tallied
    Eric Adams Wins New York Democratic Primary After Mail-In Ballots Tallied

    Former NYPD police captain Eric Adams has officially won the New York City Democratic mayoral primary despite a vote-counting ‘discrepancy’ last week which – had it not been caught – would have likely resulted in former sanitation commissioner Kathryn Garcia clinching the win.

    The Associated Press called the race for Adams shortly after the most recent batch of results were released in New York’s ranked-choice primary on Tuesday afternoon, setting him up as the overwhelming favorite to win the general election in November, according to The Hill.

    Adams, a former police captain who entered primary voting as the frontrunner, bested a crowded field of Democrats, including former New York City Sanitation Commissioner Kathryn Garcia, former presidential candidate Andrew Yang and civil rights lawyer Maya Wiley. -The Hill

    Adams will face Guardian Angels founder Curtis Sliwa, who sailed to an easy win over restaurateur Fernando Mateo in last month’s Republican mayoral primary, receiving 68.9% of the Republican vote.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 20:05

  • Pelosi's Husband Bought Amazon Calls Before Pentagon JEDI Shakeup Sent Shares Soaring
    Pelosi’s Husband Bought Amazon Calls Before Pentagon JEDI Shakeup Sent Shares Soaring

    House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) disclosed from her ivory tower late last week that her investor husband, Paul Pelosi, made several now-profitable trades in various securities.

    For starters, Pelosi bought Amazon calls on May 21 when it closed at $3,259.05. Fast forward six weeks and great news for Amazon after the Pentagon pulled the rug out from Microsoft’s $10 billion JEDI cloud computing deal (opening the door for Bezos), and the trade is looking great.

    That’s not all;

    Paul Pelosi on May 21 spent up to $250,000 on 50 Apple calls that have a strike price of $100 and that expire on June 17, 2022. He also bought 20 Amazon calls, costing up to $1 million, that have a strike price of $3,000 and that also expire on June 17, 2022. 

    On June 18, Paul Pelosi, exercised his Alphabet call options giving him the right to buy 4,000 shares at a price of $1,200 apiece, or $4.8 million. The Alphabet call options were originally purchased on Feb. 27, 2020. 

    The transactions were disclosed in a filing on Friday, July 2. –Fox Business

    According to Fox Business, “The speaker has no involvement or prior knowledge of these transactions,” adding “The speaker does not own any stock.”

    The Pelosis have at least one ardent defender in former Rep. Jill Long Thompson (D-IN), who insists that even though Paul is married to the House Speaker, it’s unlikely that he would “have any information that someone else wouldn’t,” adding “Members of Congress make it clear what their positions are on these issues and the fact that they’re working on a piece of legislation that would be public information.”

    On June 11, the House Judiciary Committee advanced several bills with bipartisan support which would limit the powers of FAANG companies. The bills, which passed through committee by slim margins, have yet to be voted on by the House.

    This is not the first time that investments made by Paul Pelosi have been made in close proximity to happenings in Congress. 

    Paul Pelosi in March exercised $1.95 million worth of Microsoft call options less than two weeks before the tech stalwart secured a $22 billion contract to supply U.S. Army combat troops with augmented reality headsets. 

    In January, he purchased up to $1 million of Tesla calls before the Biden administration delivered its plans to provide incentives to promote the shift away from traditional automobiles and toward electric vehicles. –Fox Business

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    Meanwhile, Congressional Democrats are going after Redditors who’ve banded together to squeeze meme stocks.

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    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 20:00

  • Critical Race Theory Should Be Banned, And A Black Parent Explains Why
    Critical Race Theory Should Be Banned, And A Black Parent Explains Why

    Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk.com,

    The best case ever against critical race theory is in the following video, sure to go viral.

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    Partial Transcript – Emphasis Mine

    I’ve got two children her in the school district. It’s very apparent here by all the parents who have spoken, that this board and the school district is failing. More importantly, about Critical Race Theory, this theory was never meant to be brought into grade schools, high schools at all. 

    It’s actually taught in the collegiate atmosphere, more importantly, the legal portion of the collegiate atmosphere to see different laws through the lens of race from an ethics and ethical standpoint, not for grade schools and high schools.

    The problem in bringing it up at the high school and grade school level is we do not have the educators to properly teach the kids. 

    Instead, educators use it as their own agenda, to indoctrinate the kids to hate each other. And whether you believe that or not, the reality is that is what’s happening. 

    Critical Race Theory is teaching us that white people are bad. That’s not true. That would teach my daughter that her mother is evil.

    You have an educator within your staff that has pulled my daughter aside and said ‘You’re a minority. So you know better than to engage in certain things.’ [Audience gasps, wow, whoa, etc.]

    When I brought this to the school’s attention, nothing happened to that educator. Instead, my daughter was brought in, and she was ridiculed. [Again audience gasps].

     So my question is now, with Critical Race Theory being brought in, what is your criteria to educate the educators? And who are you to educate my children, or any of our children on life issues? That’s our job.

    Your job is to teach them math and science. Our job is to teach them about life. 

    I believe racial issues and tensions across the US are nowhere near what they used to be decades ago. Do we have a long way to go? Sure. Do we have individuals who need to be taught? Absolutely. 

    But people here do not look at me as a black man. They look at me as a man coming in front of you, addressing an issue that we all are passionate about. [applause!] 

    End Transcript

    That video is not an isolated event. You can find dozens of articles.

    Furious Mother Slams School Board 

    Mother Demolishes School Board Forcing Critical Race Theory

    To Promote Equality, California Proposes a Ban on Advanced Math Classes

    Please note To Promote Equality, California Proposes a Ban on Advanced Math Classes

    Adversity scores are the Latest in Dumbing Down of US Education.

    Bill Maher on Critical Race Theory

    Even the Left has serious issues. 

    In a must see video, comedian Bill Maher blast wokes who have no sense of massive progress on many liberal and Libertarian fronts.

    To play the video and for a partial transcript as well, please see The Woke Liberals Have a Bad Case of Progressophobia

    Backlash Coming

    This should have a major impact in the midterm elections, and I believe it will if Republican can put aside infighting.

    CRT is not (or at least should not) be a Left vs Right issue. Instead, it is a right vs wrong issue. 

    School boards, typically liberal progressives, are on the very wrong side of this debate.

    “Your job is to teach them math and science. Our job is to teach them about life!”

    Indeed. And a huge majority of the public would agree. Unfortunately, grade school kids are caught in the crossfire of Woke indoctrination and a Woke debate and that belongs in a collegiate law class.

    *  *  *

    Like these reports? I hope so, and if you do, please Subscribe to MishTalk Email Alerts.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 19:40

  • The Peak Is In For Global Manufacturing PMI
    The Peak Is In For Global Manufacturing PMI

    Two months ago, a forward-looking Wall Street responded to the Bank of America Fund Manager Survey for the month of May, and concluded that the peak of the post-covid expansion was now behind us, whether looking at growth expectations…

    … profit margins expectations (46% to 26%)…

    … capex spending plans (54% to 51%)…

    … and inflation (93% to 83%).

    Of course, these “forward-looking” expectations needed some hard data validation which they got today when the latest data confirmed that the Global Manufacturing PMI has now peaked.

    As DB’s Frances Yared writes, the Global Manufacturing PMI was running ahead of leading indicators (key exporters such as Taiwan, Chile and South Korea). Well, the latter indicators had been consistent with the Global PMI Manufacturing at 54 rather than the 56 observed at the peak last month. But the reversal is finally here, and the latest Global PMI print declined by 0.5pt in July and, based on the aforementioned leading indicators, should decline another 1.5 points.

    The good news: as Yared notes, a PMI at 54 would still be very high from a historical perspective and leading indicators are so far stable. “Thus, the decline from the peak should be seen as a correction from an overshoot rather than a trend at this stage.”

    The bad news: today’s peak PMI data definitively confirms that we are now “mid-cycle” as Morgan Stanley’s Michael Wilson has been warning for months.

    For those wondering what that means for market, we republish some of our observations from our May 12 article looking at just this question:

    Just days after Morgan Stanley said that it “rather than getting excited about the reopening, we are getting more concerned” pointing to the infamously volatile mid-cycle transition, when the the peak rate of change reverses and execution risk jumps as visualized by the following chart showing headline Manufacturing Purchasing Managers Index and Prices Paid component…

    … BofA has jumped on board the mid-cycle bandwagon, and in a note from the bank’s chief quant, Savita Subramanian, she writes that the bank’s regime Indicator rose to highs seen only once before in the last 30+ years: in Feb. 2004, after which Mid-Cycle continued for four more months.

    Does this mean that the end-cycle – which is quickly followed by recession – is imminent?

    According to the BofA quant, “historically Mid-Cycle has lasted for 12 months, but today we are just four months in. Thus, the current phase could extend at least through summer and potentially beyond.”

    What does this mean for investing? Mid-Cycle is usually accompanied by rising interest rates and capex: thus valuation metrics which account for the firm value to incorporate more expensive debt, and profitability that reflects capex are important. P/E and Price to Book are less effective, but EV/EBITDA has outperformed the index 75% of the time in this phase (and today EV/EBITDA positioning is close to a record underweight.) Additionally, “quality value” tends to outperform “deep value” in this phase. And if we have reached peak stimulus, quality should outperform from here to the detriment of other factors.

    Picking up on this, Leuthold Group’s Jim Paulsen, who has analyzed bull cycles of the past 40 years, notes that while every bull market is different, “the pattern they follow is usually the same: a strong run at the start of the cycle, a period of hesitancy that lasts a year or more, then the resumption of the advance”, or a crash, of course, assuming no Fed bailouts. While we don’t know what the endgame is, we agree with Bloomberg that are now “at the pause stage of the current cycle right now.”

    In any case, describing the Mid-Cycle, or as he calls it the Revaluation phase, Paulson notes that’s when corporate performance continues to improve but valuations get stretched and the pressure of rising yields intensifies. That’s when stocks go nowhere for a year at best or decline by low-double digits at worst. And sure enough, as Bloomberg notes, the checklist of signals that led to prior swoon periods is here: rising valuations that have almost doubled from a trough, improving corporate performance and yields.

    Some examples:

    • In 1982, the stock market posted a sharp rally as profits and bond yields continued to decline. A 15% correction into mid-1984 followed, leaving the S&P 500 essentially flat for that year. The next year, earnings started to recover and bond yields went up.
    • In 1992, earnings and yields declined heading into the 1994 mid-cycle, when the S&P fell by nearly 10% in early 1994 and stayed flat until 1995.
    • A similar pattern occurred in 2004, when the S&P 500’s multiple declined from 22 times earnings in late 2003, to less than 17 times by late 2004.
    • After an initial recovery in the spring of 2009, the S&P 500 stumbled as stocks underwent a 15% correction in the second quarter of 2010.

    Finally, how did economically-sensitive sectors fare during the revaluation period? As Bloomberg notes, small-cap stocks gained in three out of four pause stages, adding on average 5.6%, after falling more than 7% during a pause period between the spring of 1983 and summer of 1984. Cyclicals gained in two out of four instances — in 2004 and 2010, when they posted a modest advance that exceeded the broader peers.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 19:20

  • A "Great Listener And Collaborator": Stalinist Professor Under Fire For Praising Genocidal Soviet Leader
    A “Great Listener And Collaborator”: Stalinist Professor Under Fire For Praising Genocidal Soviet Leader

    Authored by Jonathan Turley,

    Asatar Bair, an assistant professor of economics at Riverside City College, is under fire this week for his praise of one of the most blood-soaked, tyrannical figures in history: Joseph Stalin.  Bair is a self-described Marxist but most communists draw a line well clear of Stalin who was responsible for killing millions. As will come as little surprise to many on this blog, I strongly support Bair’s right to espouse his Stalinist views even though I find them utterly absurd and offensive.

    In tweets, Bair expressed his support for Stalin as “a very successful revolutionary, a great contributor to Marxist theory” and “one of the great leaders of the 20th [Century].”  He added Stalin was also a “great listener and collaborator during discussions.”

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    He may also have been a great dancer . . . in between sending millions to their deaths, murdering opponents, and destroying any semblance of freedom. Yet, Bair also heaped praise in tweets for the Chinese Communist Party.

    His Stalinist support is due to what he sees as tremendous improvements of health care for citizens.

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    Yet, Bair ignores the millions who were killed. The Stalin health care plan was a bit more lethal for them. Certainly Leon Trotsky found Stalin’s ice-axe remedies less than optimal. He also ignores that there were improvements throughout the industrial world after World War II and that such changes could have occurred without Stalin. Indeed, Stalin is blamed for a series of moronic plans that devastated the Soviet agriculture and economy due to his one-man rule.

    Putting aside the millions who were killed or sent to Siberia, consider just the Soviet famine of 1932-33 which killed many millions, including an estimate of 7.5 million in the Ukrainian population alone. Stalin ordered the eradication of the wealthy peasant or “Kulak” class. It wiped out agricultural production. The life expectancies of the millions who died was hardly a victory for the working class or a model of public health policy.  He has been accused of mass murder and genocide.

    Stalin was also responsible for leaving his country vulnerable to the German invasion after he conspired with Hitler as an ally against other countries. Stalin’s purges included wiping out the officer corp, leaving the Soviet Army without sufficient leadership and experience. When Hitler betrayed him, the Soviet Army effectively collapsed in disarray. Tens of millions were killed by the end of the war.

    Stalin relished murder on a grand scale. He famously stated “The death of one man is a tragedy. The death of millions is a statistic.” His health care plan was summed up in his declaration that “death is the solution to all problems. No man – no problem.”

    Nevertheless, Riverside college district’s Chancellor Wolde-Ab Isaac told Fox News that while Bair’s “statements and ideas may be unpopular or even controversial, his right to express himself is constitutionally protected.” That is absolutely correct.

    My only concern, again, is the consistency of universities in protecting controversial speakers on the left as opposed to those on the right. I have defended faculty who have made similarly disturbing comments denouncing policecalling for Republicans to suffer,  strangling police officerscelebrating the death of conservativescalling for the killing of Trump supporters, supporting the murder of conservative protesters and other outrageous statements. These comments were not protested as creating an “unsafe environment” and were largely ignored by universities. However, professors and students are routinely investigated, suspended, and sanctioned for countervailing views.

    As we have previously discussed (with an Oregon professor and a Rutgers professor), there remains an uncertain line in what language is protected for teachers in their private lives. The efforts to fire professors who voice dissenting views on various issues including an effort to oust a leading economist from the University of Chicago as well as a leading linguistics professor at Harvard and a literature professor at Penn. Sites like Lawyers, Guns, and Money feature writers like Colorado Law Professor Paul Campus who call for the firing of those with opposing views (including myself).  Such campaigns have targeted teachers and students who contest the evidence of systemic racism in the use of lethal force by police or offer other opposing views in current debates over the pandemic, reparations, electoral fraud, or other issues.

    A conservative North Carolina professor  faced calls for termination over controversial tweets and was pushed to retire. Dr. Mike Adams, a professor of sociology and criminology, had long been a lightning rod of controversy. In 2014, we discussed his prevailing in a lawsuit that alleged discrimination due to his conservative views.  He was then targeted again after an inflammatory tweet calling North Carolina a “slave state.”  That led to his being pressured to resign with a settlement. He then committed suicide. We are approaching the one year anniversary of his death.

    Riverside College should be praised for its support of free speech for Bair. He is part of a diversity of opinion that should be cherished on college campuses. While Stalin was a tyrant to killed those with opposing views, we value such freedoms.

    The question is whether such tolerance would be shown those on the other end of the political spectrum.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 19:00

  • The Central Banks New Mandate: Social Justice, Race, Gender Issues, Climate Change And Inequality
    The Central Banks New Mandate: Social Justice, Race, Gender Issues, Climate Change And Inequality

    One upon a time, when central bank “independence” first materialized – even though as we have noted in the past central banks are anything but independent (see “Who Owns The World’s Central Banks“)…

    Source: Based on de Kock (1965), Rossouw (2018) and information from central banks websites

    … their mandate was to control inflation and generally this was their absolute priority.

    However, as DB’s Jim Reid writes today, recent years have seen central banks increasingly enter the debate on numerous other topics including fiscal policy, social justice, race, gender issues, climate change and inequality.

    Enter Reid’s “chart of the day”, which shows a snapshot of this in terms of mentions of inequality over time in speeches from developed market central bank officials.

    As Reid says, while “these are all admirable and crucial topics to discuss and could help make the world a better place” it does however show “how central bank power and influence has changed and also how they seem to be giving governments cover to spend on these issues.”

    He also adds that this is one of the reasons an increasingly vocal minority of the DB Research staff thinks inflation is more likely going forward (see DB’s thoughts on why Inflation Is About To Explode “Leaving Global Economies Sitting On A Time Bomb“). As Reid concludes, governments want to spend more to deal with the issues above and central banks seem increasingly comfortable to support them in that aim. As a result, co-ordinated monetary and fiscal policy is more likely going forward. It’s also time to ask just who elected these “independent” central bankers, and demand independence from their ideological bias.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 18:40

Digest powered by RSS Digest

Today’s News 6th July 2021

  • Suez Canal Deal Reached, Ever Given To Be Freed Wednesday
    Suez Canal Deal Reached, Ever Given To Be Freed Wednesday

    The owners and insurers of the massive container ship, Ever Given, which blocked the Suez Canal in late March and closed the world’s most important shipping lane for almost a week, settled Sunday with Egyptian authorities, allowing the vessel to exit the canal later this week, according to AP News

    The Suez Canal Authority (SCA) will allow Ever Given and its crew to set sail on Wednesday after settling compensation disputes. Since late March, owners and insurers of the vessel and SCA officials have been bickering over settlement figures for canal disruptions. 

    Last month, an “agreement in principle” between the vessel’s owners and SCA was announced, but it now appears finalized. 

    Readers may recall the 1,312 feet long mega-ship was traversing the southern part of the canal when high winds diverted it off course and become stuck, blocking all vessel traffic in the shipping lane for six days. After the vessel was dislodged, SCA demanded nearly $1 billion from the ship’s Japanese owners for lost revenue and the cost of salvaging it. But the amount was later publicly lowered to $550 million.

    “We are pleased to announce that… good progress has been made and a formal solution agreed,” said Faz Peermohamed, a member of the London-based Stann Marine law firm, which represents owner Shoei Kisen and its insurers.

    “Preparations for the release of the vessel will be made and an event marking the agreement will be held at the Authority’s headquarters in Ismailia in due course,” Peermohamed said.

    There were no details about settlement figures. The signing of the settlement contract would be held on Wednesday at a ceremony as the vessel departs from Great Bitter Lake, a large saltwater lake in Egypt that is part of the Suez Canal.

    The entire ordeal lasted more than three months and appears to be finally over. Ever Given and its crews are lucky because some maritime disputes can be locked up in courts for years, stranding crews and precious cargo. 

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 02:45

  • The Taliban Are Unstoppable In Their Momentum
    The Taliban Are Unstoppable In Their Momentum

    By SouthFront,

    The Taliban seem unstoppable all over Afghanistan, as their gains are followed by even more gains.

    In recent days, the Taliban’s march through northern Afghanistan gained momentum with the capture of several districts from fleeing Afghan forces. More than 300 Afghan military personnel crossed from Afghanistan’s Badakhshan province as Taliban fighters advanced towards the border. The Afghan soldiers escaped to neighboring Tajikistan, saving their lives from the enemy.

    On July 4th, the Taliban was on the verge of taking Faizabad, the provincial capital of the Badakhshan province.

    Senior local officials have already taken a flight and escaped to Kabul.

    Following the fall of dozens of districts of the Badakhshan province, Afghan commandos of special operation forces were deployed to the strategic city. The gains in northeastern Badakhshan province in recent days have mostly come to the insurgent movement without a fight.

    The areas under Taliban control in the north are increasingly strategic, running along Afghanistan’s border with central Asian states. Last month the religious movement took control of Imam Sahib, a town in the Kunduz province opposite Uzbekistan and gained control of a key trade route.

    Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid confirmed the fall of the districts and said most were captured without a fight. The Taliban in previous surrenders have shown video of Afghan soldiers taking transportation money and returning to their homes. From those who didn’t return, many have joined the Taliban ranks as deserters from the Afghani army.

    The Taliban reportedly captured the city of Farah, another provincial capital, and the largest city of the Farah Province in western Afghanistan. Footage of the city showed dozens of Afghani army soldiers, many of which were killed.

    Hundreds are being killed on each side every day, with reports coming in from scores of Taliban being killed by Afghan security forces, and still the Taliban are the ones coming in on top and capturing even more areas. A significant impetus to the Taliban was the fact that the US abandoned its key position – the Bagram air base – and has turned it over to the Afghanistan Army.

    Initially, the Taliban spokesman said that everything had been either been taken by the Americans or destroyed, but it seems that U.S. forces have left behind radar and navigation systems as well as hundreds of vehicles.

    On July 3, the Afghan Civil Aviation Authority revealed that the U.S. military left behind Radar and Very-Small-Aperture Terminal (VSAT) systems at the air base. The systems, which were deactivated by U.S. troops before withdrawal, were successfully reactivated by Afghan engineers.

    Seeing as how there’s significant equipment there, the Taliban may change their decision not to attempt to capture the base, and in exchange turn their gaze towards it, as it would be a great boon to their operations.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 02:00

  • Victor Davis Hanson: The Genesis Of Our American Collective Meltdown
    Victor Davis Hanson: The Genesis Of Our American Collective Meltdown

    Authored by Victor Davis Hanson via AmGreatness.com,

    This Fourth of July holiday we might pause for a moment from our festivities to ask how we collectively lost our minds over the last 15 months—and are we yet regaining any semblance of our sanity? 

    A pandemic caused by the leak of a Chinese-engineered virus and its coverup was cause enough for nationwide madness. But the spread of COVID–19 was followed by a nationalized and often politicized “flatten-the-curve” quarantine that soon ensured a stir-crazy nation. Tens of millions saw no people, and heard nothing human other than what was fed to them through television and computers. No wonder they grew paranoid, conspiratorial, and angry, and soon forgot the therapeutic nature of personal interaction and the shared humanity of being in the physical presence of others.

    Our first self-induced recession came next and lasted over a year, destroying all the hard work of the prior three years. Next ensued the death of George Floyd and a subsequent 120 days of rioting, looting, and arson. The immediate costs were $2 billion in damage, over 25 deaths, 14,000 arrests, and a Lord of the Flies anarchy with no-go zones in our major cities. A McCarthyite frenzy followed, as remote-controlled America hunted down the supposed “racists” among us—while career agendas, personal grudges, and ideological hatred fueled the cancel culture.

    All this was antecedent to our first election in which Election Day voting was incidental, not essential, to the outcome. This was also our first presidential campaign in which the incumbent was stricken by a pandemic virus. And his opponent, due to his age and infirmity, simply reverted to the 19th century style of staying home and outsourcing the electioneering to the Democratic-media complex. Biden’s basement became the equivalent of the “front-porch” of homebound candidates of a century and more ago. 

    The derangement was then capped off, first, by a buffoonish riot at the Capitol followed by a Reichstag-fire style militarization of Washington, D.C., in a “never let a crisis go to waste” psychodrama. Then came a novel second and unprecedented presidential impeachment, without a special prosecutor, witnesses, or cross examinations. It was based on the myth of a deadly “armed insurrection” fueled by President Trump, which purportedly led to the murder of a police officer. Later most of the writs of the House impeachment were proven fantasies, from the idea of “armed” and “well-organized” to “murderous” revolutionaries. The only mysteries were the identity of the unnamed officer who fatally shot an unarmed female protester and military veteran, and why the government has still not released thousands of hours of video detailing the riot. 

    That impeachment charade was followed by a trial in the Senate—without the chief justice presiding—of a president, who was no longer in office. 

    The finale was the promise of a “moderate” good ol’ Joe Biden from Scranton—the supposed correction to Trump. In reality, Biden’s first 150 days proved, as the cynics predicted, that he was mere cover and conveyance for the implementation of the most radical agenda since the 1930s.

    So we can cut America some slack when we ponder why the entire country is now descending into a collective madness, given the amount of propaganda and media distortion pumped out during the quarantine, and since. 

    The Chaos of Daily Living

    Within the space of about 6 months in 2021, the costs of the essentials of life have skyrocketed—food, gasoline, housing, appliances, cars and trucks, and building materials. Non-ending streams of stimulus money, huge deficits, and pent-up demand so far have ensured that Americans would pay such spiking prices. And soon radical inflation may trigger 1970s stagflation and then recession, as the “why-go-to-work?” checks and consumer zeal finally cease, but the government printing machine keeps going. What good is free government money if spiraling prices eat away the entitlement? 

    California is the worst run of our states. But it is also always a helpful bellwether of where we are descending. The state has plenty of oil and natural gas. There are still remnants of a once thriving nuclear and hydroelectric industry. But power outages are now commonplace—to the point that, like Third-Worlders, we merely shrug when the lights go out as if it were a green way of reducing carbon emissions.  

    Forty million people driving on roads and highways intended for 20 million people—27 percent of them not born in America—becomes a “Road-Warrior”-like wildness intended to discourage the kind of driving to which we became accustomed in the 20th century. Any trip over 200 miles cannot be calibrated by traditional “arrival times.” Ad hoc repairs on ancient roads paralyzes traffic not already slowed by accidents. Speeding and traffic violations are commonplace. Either the population ignores or does not know the law, or a paranoid law enforcement is reluctant to enforce the laws, or there are simply too few patrol cars responsible for too many drivers.  

    Gas can range from $4.00 to over $5.00 a gallon; $100 fill-ups are common. To go to a California Home Depot or Lowes store is to be amazed at grades of plywood priced at nearly $90 a sheet. 

    Californians are leaving in droves, but housing costs are still soaring. Californians love nice houses. But those who have them don’t like to allow anyone to build new ones for others. 

    A horrendous drought has dried up reservoirs and dropped the water tables of most aquifers. Privately, Californians know that it was madness not to build reservoirs, all cancelled over 30 years ago, or to allow the California Water Project’s infrastructure to decay, or to continue to allow scarce fresh water to flow into the sea, or not to invest in new technologies of underground water savings and storage.  

    But they also know that as long as the Bay Area’s activists have sufficient supplies of water (from their own early 20th century, far-seeing politicians who created the huge Hetch Hetchy transference and won first-dibs allotments from the subsequent California Water Project), they will continue to push green agendas, the disastrous consequences of which the elite avoid, given their own wealth and power.  

    High-speed rail is a tragic joke. It is inert and unfinished. The ostentatious half-built overpasses stand like modern graffiti-stained versions of Stonehenge. Its only ostensible purpose seems to have been a green plan to siphon money from road repair and expansion. 

    Mention San Francisco to a Californian, and the same, monotonous warnings arise: don’t go there! And if you must, don’t park there—since smashing into a car and stealing its contents are viewed as understandable redistribution rather than criminal acts. Others advise to check constantly the soles of your shoes: human and animal excrement is ubiquitous as the city’s sanitation regresses to something resembling Old Cairo or medieval London.  

    I drive often to the central Sierra. For the last 4 years the talk there was “Why don’t they do something about the millions of trees that have died from drought and bug infestation?” The locals now say of the incinerated forests “Why don’t they do something about the millions of those charred black trees?” Such sincere questions assume people matter more than ideology. They don’t.  

    In a state where defecation on the sidewalks apparently hurts no one, drought and fires consuming a forest are also OK—as long as it is likewise deemed a function of nature. In California, logging an acre of timber is insurrectionary; 400,000 acres going up in smoke is “stuff happens.”

    Policies and Politicians 

    The truth is that the necessities of life—safety, affordability of the essentials, transportation, power, and fuel—are now iffy. If 15 years ago, Americans more or less saw each other as fellow citizens rather than as members of rival tribes, now they are resegregating into Dark Age bands. In place of oral bards and mythic sagas, we have dry and racist “critical race theory.” 

    There is no media credibility left after assuring us for years that the Steele dossier was the gold standard, that Robert Mueller’s dream team would prove “collusion,” that Donald Trump sicced the federal police on demonstrators for a cheap photo-op stunt, that Hunter Biden’s laptop was Russian disinformation, and that only conspiracists could make a looney connection between COVID-19’s ground zero origins in Wuhan and a nearby level 4 virology lab, with ties to the Chinese military. 

    The current chaos of everyday life of course follows from national policy and politics. The streets are on a reverse trajectory into the 1970s, since crime is redefined as either tolerable collateral damage, “equity,” or a collective indictment of society rather than one of individual culpability. When mayors claim that burning a police precinct is a mere loss of “brick and mortar,” or taking over downtown Seattle is just part of a “summer of love,” or when the architect of the “1619 Project” claims looting is not violence, then crime is no longer crime. 

    The Left says it has not defunded the police because there are still police to be seen. But progressives have done something far more insidious: America has destroyed police deterrence by a year of anti-police venom, by prosecutors selectively and asymmetrically exempting the arrested, and by prompting police retirements, resignations or simple slowdowns. There is now in the minds of all big-city cops a constant cost-to-benefit calculation: going into the inner city has become a lose/lose/lose/lose/lose proposition in which a 911 call from the danger zone can get an officer killed, injured, fired, suspended, imprisoned, or rendered a fool, as the successfully arrested are summarily let go.  

    The country has gone mad with debt. Both parties are responsible for the massive spending. The Republican defense is that Democrats would spend even more—and, if they are lavishing entitlements to buy votes, why shouldn’t we

    The Left’s excuse is not just the old idea of redistribution, but a new revolutionary myth that money and debt are really irrelevant constructs. A novel economic pseudoscience has revised or discarded the oppressive idea of having to pay back what was borrowed.  

    Traditionalists and conservatives always assumed that the military, the intelligence and investigatory agencies, and the prosecutorial industry were at least above politics, defenders of traditional and constitutional norms, and completely professional in their service.  

    No longer. There is now a new military-industrial-intelligence-legal complex. Its hierarchy is politically weaponized, and amply renumerated. The careers of John Brennan, James Clapper, James Comey, Andrew McCabe, General Mark Milley and a score of retired 4-stars officers, Robert Mueller and his dream team, and the Department of Justice are characteristically determined and calibrated by politics rather than competence.  

    The usual consequences follow: half the country no longer trusts its once esteemed FBI, CIA, or military. And when these agencies veer from their assigned tasks, it is no wonder that they miss impending signs of terrorism in Boston, Fort Hood, and San Bernardino, had little clue that the “JVs” of ISIS were expanding in Iraq, and never really informed the American people about the costs, the benefits, the stakes and the likely future of the two-decade Afghan war. In the 1960s the Left sought to tarnish the reputation of what they saw as hated government institutions and failed; in the 2020s, the Left diminished the reputation of what they now saw as useful and malleable institutions and succeeded. 

    America does not quite know what will follow from the first months of the Biden Administration. Already, it has managed to destroy the idea of a border, with an anticipated 2 million entering the country illegally over a 12 month period. It demolished the idea of the police and prosecutorial deterrence curbing crime. It is ending the trajectory of America’s natural gas and oil renaissance that enriched the country, and freed it from Middle East entanglements. And it killed off the notion that government should seek to ensure that race is not how we collectively define the content of our individual characters.  

    Abroad 

    Meanwhile, our enemies and rivals—China, Iran, and Russia especially—are giddy at what America has become. The American Left, they believe, has done a much better job of denying Chinese culpability for a Chinese-engineered virus than had the Chinese communist media. 

    When billionaires, such as Michael Bloomberg, see China as essentially democratic (“The communist party wants to stay in power in China, and they listen to the public . . . Xi Jinping is not a dictator.”), when Charles Munger applauds their clampdown on outspoken capitalists like Jack Ma (“I don’t want the, all of the Chinese system, but I certainly would like to have the financial part of it in my own country, . .  . Communists did the right thing. They just called in Jack Ma and say, ‘You aren’t gonna do it, sonny.’””), and when Bill Gates believes that in the midst of the pandemic, a lying China had done “a lot of things right in the beginning,” we can conclude America’s richest are placing their bets on a Chinese-Communist controlled 21st century, and will adjust accordingly.

    Our adversaries can’t quite believe their good fortune. Had they thought up ways to divide and impoverish America, to see its cities burned, and looted, to weaken its economy and currency, to erode the unity of its once feared military, and to entrench the most effective critics of America in America—not in Beijing, Moscow, Pyongyang, or Tehran, but in corporate boardrooms, campuses, newsrooms, Hollywood, Wall Street and the Pentagon—they could not have improved on what has happened in 2020-21, the era of our collective meltdown.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 07/06/2021 – 00:00

  • Two Taikonauts Complete First Spacewalk Outside Chinese Station
    Two Taikonauts Complete First Spacewalk Outside Chinese Station

    On America’s Independence Day, the Chinese were busy in low Earth orbit conducting their first spacewalk outside a new space station

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    According to a China Manned Space Engineering Office statement, two astronauts (taikonauts) on Sunday made the first spacewalk outside the country’s new space station core module Tianhe or Heavenly Harmony. 

    Chinese astronauts Liu Boming and Tang Hongbo successfully opened the exit door of the space station core module Tianhe at 8:11 a.m. (Beijing Time) on July 4, 2021. As of 11:02 a.m., donning new-generation homemade EMU (extravehicular mobility unit) spacesuits Feitian, meaning flying to space, astronauts Liu Boming and Tang Hongbo have successfully exiting the module from the Tianhe core module, and also completed the installation of foot limiter and extravehicular workbench on the robotic arm. Follow up, with the support of the robotic arm, they will cooperate with each other to carry out the assembly of relevant equipment outside the space station. 

    China’s space agency plans another 11 launches through the end of 2022 to complete the new 70-ton station. This comes as the International Space Station (ISS) celebrated its 20 years in operation with an end of lifespan by 2030. Already, the space station has shown signs of wear and tear amid a series of malfunctions, including air leaks

    In early April, Russia said it would pull out of the ISS in 2025 and build a space station by 2030 if President Vladimir Putin provides funding. If not, Russia could soon find itself working with the Chinese in space.

    President Xi Jinping has touted China’s space dream as he was recently cited by state media as saying space is the path to “national rejuvenation.” 

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 23:15

  • One For The History Books: A New Control Regime In Oil
    One For The History Books: A New Control Regime In Oil

    By Larry McDonald, author of The Bear Traps Report

    You have to give pause when you think that the only news in markets that mattered today is OPEC+ and what the next move is by them. We live in a world with growing demand, shrinking supply. ESG matters, climate change, inflation, Iran, etc, mean nothing today in the global crude market.  All people want to know is what OPEC+ is going to do next. So clearly IT is an important issue for the market before we tackle anything else.

    The sticking point in the talks – the UAE (United Arab Emirates) want a higher baseline after large-scale CAPEX investments in recent years’ production capacity and wants to boost production by 700mbd. On the other hand, the Saudis do not want to offend the Russians and other players by adjusting the UAE baseline.

    • *BRENT CRUDE SURPASSES $77 PER BARREL FOR FIRST TIME SINCE 2018 – Bloomberg

    Gasoline, Summer Driving Season

    After the U.S. handed far more control over the price of oil to the Saudis and Russians, consumers are paying the price. The White House wants this problem fixed by the time the 2022 midterm elections come around. Brent now up close to 116% since the eve of the 2020 U.S. Presidential election.

    We are told OPEC+ is proud their “control of price” regime is back. A mere year ago, it was hard to grasp that they had any control after a 10-year hiatus as the dictator of pricing. We feel they canceled today’s planned meetíng just to save the pain of having to create more anxiety in the market when they say they could not land on a solution. Frankly, the solution likely lies behind closed doors with a few parties and not the whole group. That is likely what is happening. But there are a bunch of people out there that say they have ‘inside contacts’ that likely know or think they know.

    “The deal we see is, no extension past April 2022, gives time for UAE to argue for a higher baseline, both are sides committed, Larry, there is a low probability of a destructive breakdown with a large boost in production, not happening.”

    – CIO in Canada, in our live Bear Traps, chat on the Bloomberg terminal.

    The market hanging on the outcome of the weekend along with the meteoric rise of Saudi control of the market over the last year. All should be seen as a sign that they (OPEC+) don’t want to blow this opportunity. The March 2020 testosterone show inflicted a lot of pain on all sides, those scars are still healing. Oil price risk is to the upside. The likely UAE deal is a kick of the can to April 2022. The world is watching them again for signs of control or lack of it. OPEC lost control for 10 years when the Shale drilling spewed new non-OPEC supply into the market in ’09 and they don’t want to lose control like that again.

    We are in a period of strong demand and weak supply. The UAE weekend proposal says no extension past April 2022, OPEC + wanted the extension for all of 2022. In recent months, years, the Saudis have worked many other members into contained quotas, baselines.

    A total breakdown is highly unlikely, “the oil market globally is in a sweet spot, there is too much money on the line for all the players. Demand globally is strong, we are looking at a deficit of 2.3 to 2.5mbd in June, the highest since last year coming out of covid” – CIO of a large energy fund in Canada.

    If OPEC can’t make that perfect scenario work then it is sending a signal of significant weakness to the market, then volatility to pricing will be back. That means derivatives players will start controlling the price and we could see dramatic whipsaws in prices as we did in the last decade prior to COVID rebalancing the market. While Saudi is in control, you won’t see the shorts show up. They have warned the speculators to stay away or be hurt. They listened for the most part but would show up again if this cartel were to start showing significant cracks. We just don’t think that OPEC+ is that unwise to let all of their great efforts go to waste over this quota issue. Demand surge is real, summer driving. Overall market dynamics best in decades, the risk to oil prices is to the upside.

    “All the emergency spare capacity is outside the USA now Larry.” – Portfolio Manager in the U.S. Midwest.

    Spare capacity globally is mostly inside core OPEC, the ESG overdose has crushed US shale investments (see “Why One Bank Thinks ESG Could Trigger Hyperinflation“)

    “There is too much money in the hands of core OPEC, two years ago this was NOT the case with shale cranking”CIO, Macro Fund in NYC.

    Further to that, there is an agreement that all parties are saying they are obligated to work with until Apr ’22. Even UAE says they are not trying to be a thorn or break up the cartel or even the agreement. So I think we can assume this agreement will be honored and we have relative stability until then. That is a lifetime in this market lately. Iran’s new supply risk is out in November in terms of getting oil to mkt, current shale new rigs coming online are not sufficient to impact prices near term.

    “Watch RIG equity as CAPEX investment start to come in, Q3. Very tight global market through year-end. One producer needs to produce 2.3mbd to get the mkt into a surplus, that is a high bar, not in anyone´s interest.” – CIO Energy Fund in Canada.

    US shale is not a threat as it is very high-cost production and requires higher prices or contango in the curve to see incremental supply enter the system. Also, the ESG (backfire) narrative still weighs heavy on their ability to grow. In this cycle, companies are being forced to return capital to shareholders, there is far less cowboy up speculation, drilling. Frankly, this ‘noise’ around OPEC+ stability only shakes the ground under the US producer to remember how quickly prices could collapse again.

    “It is time to think of the oil curve CL1 (front-month futures contract) is priced at $75.16 vs. CL36 (36 months out futures contract) down at $57.95. As you can see above the spread above is eye-opening looking back from 2005 to 2021. “Larry, the one-year backwardation roll is 11%, just wow” says a veteran oil trader in our live chat.

    “Spikes in oil prices have triggered economic slowdowns historically. Remember, oil isn’t a forward-looking product. It is a ‘demand is here now’ product.. The curve shows it, CL36 at 2y highs vs. CL1 at 7y highs speaks volumes. WTI is saying this is a short-term supply and demand imbalance, Otherwise, PBR would be at $50/sh, its closer to $12.” – Veteran energy sector portfolio manager in Brazil.

    Inventories are dropping and global demand is on the rise via economic re-opening, a massive increase in driving and massive unprecedented infrastructure spending around the world. We have yet to see the impact of global travel amongst countries via airlines which will add almost 3 mil b\d of demand. We don’t see any increase in OPEC+ production being considered as a threat to the current price. In this status quo market, we need more of their supply or we are going to see higher oil prices. The current situation is a very unique opportunity for OPEC to cash in. Non-OPEC – Ex USA production spare capacity around the world in decline.

    “We see strong demand (India, Europe) with real supply risk, it is not in OPEC´s interest to blow this opportunity.” CIO London. Oil has a shot at $90 to $100 in, next 6 months.

    We do not believe that a price-destructive “non-deal” is in the cards at this time. This is the strongest period OPEC+ has had in the market in decades and they don’t want to give that all up.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 22:30

  • Google, Facebook & Twitter Threaten To Pull Services In Hong Kong Over "Vague" Doxxing Law
    Google, Facebook & Twitter Threaten To Pull Services In Hong Kong Over “Vague” Doxxing Law

    The big three internet and social media companies Facebook, Twitter and Google have warned the Hong Kong government that they could quit the city altogether if new controversial data protection laws ostensibly to “combat doxxing” are pushed through. The Silicon Valley giants reportedly made their stance known “privately” according to reporting in The Wall Street Journal Monday.

    Without doubt the new proposed legal amendments to existing data protection laws are closely related to the pro-China crackdown which has for many months utterly stifled the kind of large-scale pro-independence protests which defined much of 2019. Facebook, Twitter and Google’s anger over the possible beefed-up law centers on the part that would make them liable for revealing individuals’ private information online. Also in the cross-hairs is Amazon.

    Google China office in Beijing, via AFP.

    Doxxing was widely viewed as a favored tactic of young anti-China activists, which reportedly targeted pro-mainland HK officials and entities while sometimes violent protests raged in the streets. The amendments were first proposed in May by Hong Kong’s Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Bureau and would also impose steep penalties on individuals caught doxxing, including up to five years in prison and a fine of up to 1 million Hong Kong dollars (or over $120,000). 

    The US companies are also alarmed at how vague the definition of doxxing might be defined by HK authorities at a moment the ‘national security law’ continues to be used as a broad, blunt instrument for pursuing activists and dissidents. At this point, a number of the most prominent protest leaders are either in jail or in exile, with Joshua Wong, Agnes Chow and Jimmy Lai currently serving prison sentences related to things like the “anti-mask” law and unauthorized assembly.

    The tech giants worry their own local employees and system administrators would inevitably be subject to criminal charges based merely on the actions of random individual users, including what might be viewed in the West as political free speech, but which Hong Kong and its Beijing backers would view as banned speech. Google’s Hong Kong Web site is considered to be much less censored when compared to mainland China’s filters designed to prevent access to government-critical information and sources.

    The previously undisclosed June 25 letter from an industry group through which Facebook, Twitter, and Google raised their alarm said bluntly that

    “The only way to avoid these sanctions for technology companies would be to refrain from investing and offering the services in Hong Kong…”

    The letter calls the proposed penalties “completely disproportionate and unnecessary response” that will cast a broad enough legal net that will no doubt punish “innocent acts of sharing information online,” according to select quotes unveiled for the first time in WSJ.

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    Though it remains to be seen whether they would go through with this ‘nuclear option’ – as Google and Facebook have elsewhere threatened to – for example in Australia for very different reasons (related to advertising revenue and new government efforts to ensure greater reward for local news sources).

    The city’ some 7.5 million population doesn’t make it a huge user-base compared to much of the rest of the US companies’ global presence; however, it’s unthinkable to many that such a central international financial hub could be without Google or Twitter, for example. It would also certainly negatively impact any future protests movements or activists’ ability to rapidly share information, as the law will also extend to Telegram, or any alternative platforms. 

    Paul Haswell of Hong Kong-based law firm Pinsent Masons summarized the slippery slope scenario easily foreseeable if the law goes into effect: “A broad reading of the rules could suggest that even an unflattering photo of a person taken in public, or of a police officer’s face on the basis that this would constitute personal data, could run afoul of the proposed amendments if posted with malice or an intention to cause harm, he said,” according to WSJ.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 21:45

  • Billionaire Investor Charlie Munger Says US Should Learn From China's Authoritarianism
    Billionaire Investor Charlie Munger Says US Should Learn From China’s Authoritarianism

    Authored by Frank Fang via The Epoch Times,

    U.S. billionaire investor Charlie Munger, vice chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, praised China’s communist regime for its silencing of Alibaba founder Jack Ma.

    “Communists did the right thing,” said Munger on what the Chinese regime did to Ma, in an interview with CNBC on June 29.

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    Munger, a longtime business partner of Warren Buffett, said the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) “just called in Jack Ma” and told him “you aren’t gonna do it, sonny,” pointing out that the Chinese tech billionaire was looking to “wade into banking” and “just do whatever he pleased.”

    “I don’t want the, all of the Chinese system, but I certainly would like to have the financial part of it in my own country,” Munger said.

    Ma had publicly criticized China’s financial industry in October last year, when he said that Chinese banks had a “pawnshop mentality” and added that the Chinese finance sector “basically doesn’t have a system.” After making the remarks, Ma disappeared, before making his first public appearance in January.

    Meanwhile, the Chinese regime launched an antitrust probe against Alibaba in December last year, before slapping a fine of $2.8 billion on it in April for anti-competitive tactics. In response to the fine, Alibaba issued a statement saying the company was “full of gratitude and respect” since it “would not have achieved our growth without sound government regulation and service.”

    Alibaba’s affiliate Ant Group has also been targeted. In April, Chinese regulators demanded the fintech group undergo a restructuring overhaul, five months after the company’s $37 billion initial public offering (IPO) in Shanghai and Hong Kong was suspended.

    Munger also criticized the U.S. free-market economy.

    He explained,

    “Our own wonderful free enterprise economy is letting all these crazy people go to this gross excess,” meanwhile the Chinese regime “step[s] in preemptively to stop speculation.”

    Additionally, Munger praised China’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, saying that as a totalitarian state, the Chinese regime could “simply shut down the country for six weeks.”

    “That turned out to be exactly the right thing to do. And they didn’t allow any contact,” Munger said.

    The Chinese regime took draconian measures to stop the spread of the CCP virus, the pathogen that causes the disease, after concealing the outbreak the outbreak by silencing whistleblower doctors. These measures included sealing off residents’ doors and forcing people to take unproven COVID-19 drugs.

    In January, Human Rights Watch called out these draconian measures, urging the Chinese regime to stop its campaign against people seeking redress for abuses linked to the outbreak.

    “The Chinese government’s narrative that it has won the COVID-19 ‘war’ is conditioned on silencing those who speak out about failings in the government’s pandemic response and abuses committed under the pretext of stopping the spread of the virus,” said Wang Yaqiu, China researcher at Human Rights Watch, in a statement.

    Some Chinese citizens have filed lawsuits against government officials in Wuhan, the epicenter of the CCP virus outbreak last year, over their handling of the outbreak.

    Munger has been open about his admiration for the Chinese regime in recent months. During a shareholders meeting in May, he praised the Chinese communist leaders for how they allowed “businesses to flourish” and that there were now “a bunch of billionaires” in China.

    In February, he told the annual meeting of the Los Angeles-based Daily Journal Corp., where he serves as chairman, that “the strongest companies in the world are not in America. I think Chinese companies are stronger than ours and are growing faster.”

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 21:00

  • Ethereum 2.0 Will Supercharge Staking Industry By Tens Of Billions, JPMorgan Estimates
    Ethereum 2.0 Will Supercharge Staking Industry By Tens Of Billions, JPMorgan Estimates

    It’s hardly a secret that the Wall Street/central bank establishment is not a fan of energy-intensive proof of work (PoW) crypto tokens in general and bitcoin in particular. Even Elon Musk infamously U-turned in his support for bitcoin after he – gasp – discovered that electricity electricity is involved in the creation of cryptocurrencies (coincidentally, right around the time China made it abundantly clear that for the digital yuan to flourish and for Tesla cars to keep selling in China, Musk would have to turn his back on the largest cryptocurrency).

    But what about far more energy efficient proof-of-stake (PoS) tokens such as Cardano, Polkadot, Tezos, Polygon, and – soon – Ethereum 2.0?  Here things get a little confusing because unlike the rest of the crypto space which is almost universally loathed by Wall Street analysts, when it comes to the PoS subspace, the sellside appears to have developed a bit of a soft spot.

    Take JPMorgan analyst Ken Worthingon and Samantha Trent who in a lengthy primer on staking, meant to identify where the biggest growth opportunities are in the crypto space (for companies like Coinbase which they cover), they not only disagree with the most famous crypto skeptic of all, their own boss Jamie Dimon, who 4 years ago said he would fire anyone caught trading bitcoin, but by extrapolating current growth trends in the PoS space, conclude that as bitcoin and ethereum increase in popularity, staking – the process of pledging one’s cryptos to pocket interest –  will gain traction as a source of revenue for institutional and retail investors alike, and that once ethereum merge happens into ethereum 2.0, JPM estimates that staking, which is currently a $9bn business for the crypto economy, “will grow to $20bn following the  Ethereum merge, and could get to $40bn by 2025 should proof-of-stake grow to the dominant protocol” (at which point the duo expects Coinbase to get a $500mn staking revenue run rate).

    A quick aside for novices: currently the bitcoin and ethereum blockchains use an energy-demanding process called proof-of-work to ensure all transactions on the network are valid and that the network’s distributed record is accurate. It is this Proof of Work process that is the basis for all criticism that bitcoin and various other cryptos, are energy inefficient as they require brute force “mining” to maintain the system.

    However, in order to create a more scalable and energy-efficient system, blockchain development teams, including the decentralized finance movement, ethereum (which Goldman recently called the “Amazon of Information” in a lengthy report in which it panned bitcoin as a “one trick pony” and praised ethereum as the next big thing in crypto), are switching from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake, where investors lock-up their funds on the blockchain in exchange for rewards.

    While we have discussed it at length previously, staking is an essential part of maintaining the integrity of the cryptocurrency ecosystem for proof-of-stake tokens. In order to record cryptocurrency transactions, the blockchain needs to be updated and validated. Two protocols are used for this validation, proof-of-work (the current dominant blockchain validating protocol, used by Bitcoin and currently by Ethereum) and proof-of-stake (the emerging and faster growing protocol that is the core of staking.) Both the PoS and PoW protocols incentivize blockchain validation by issuing (generally in-kind) rewards, with Bitcoin miners rewarded in Bitcoin and Ethereum 2.0 minters rewarded in Ethereum 2.0, for example.

    A selection of the largest PoS tokens is shown below.

    Staking cryptocurrencies like SOL or BNB earn yields ranging from 4% to as high as 15.9% annually, according to data from staked. The Winklevoss crypto exchange Gemini currently advertises to  investors the chance to earn annual yields up to 7.4% by holding on to their stablecoin.

    The report also says that as the volatility of cryptocurrencies declines, the ability to earn a positive real return will be an important factor in helping the market become more mainstream. That’s why, JPM projects that the number of tokens utilizing the proof-of-stake protocolwill continue to grow faster than the number of tokens using the proof-of-work protocol. Here, the greater the number of PoS tokens, the greater the market cap associated with PoS, the greater the investment income opportunity for token holders in the staking process and for companies that facilitate staking.

    The JPM analysts also echo what we said over a month ago, namely that in their view, “the PoS protocol is becoming increasingly popular and is benefiting from concerns about the energy consumption and resource utilization for tokens using the PoW protocol. When combined with a proof-of-stake system that better aligns token holders and their blockchain validation together with enhanced security, we see new tokens increasingly adopting the PoS protocol, driving the staking opportunity higher over time.”

    This is important for companies that JPM’s analysts cover such as Coinbase, because the analysts predict that staking will become a growing source of income for cryptocurrency intermediaries like Coinbase, especially after Ethereum 2.0 which is scheduled to be complete in 2022. JPMorgan estimates that staking presents a $200 million revenue opportunity for Coinbase in 2022, up from $10.4 million in 2020.

    As for the demand side, as cryptos mature and volatility declines, a key driver of investor interest will be yield PoS tokens generate:

    Individuals or institutions are incentivized to stake their cryptocurrencies to earn passive income rewarded in-kind from the network. Nominal yields can be high from staking and are contingent both on the design of the token as well as the participation rates in the staking pools. While not the main draw for individual or corporate participants in the cryptomarkets at this time in our opinion, yield earned through staking can mitigate the opportunity cost of owning cryptocurrencies versus other investments in other asset classes such as US dollars, US Treasuries, or money market funds in which investments generate some positive nominal yield. In fact, in the current zero rate environment, we see the yields as an incentive to invest.

    In other words, while most focus on the explosive capital appreciation (and depreciation) qualities of cryptos where bitcoin went from $30K to $60K and then back again to 30% just this year alone, a growing area of interest for less aggressive investors will be the yield they can generate on their various crypto tokens and stablecoins.

    To be sure, this transformation from PoW to PoS will take a while, and will require the successful conversion of the PoW Ethereum 1.0 into PoS Ethereum 2.0. Meanwhhle, as shown in the chart below, the cryptocurrency market remains dominated by proof-of-work, which accounts for roughly 70% of the cryptocurrency market capitalization. This is largely driven by the two largest tokens, Bitcoin and Ethereum, which are both (currently) proof-of-work, although it is critical to note that Ethereum is due to migrate to proof-of-stake protocol in the coming months (Ethereum 2.0 was originally supposed to launch in January 2020, and is now expected to enter its final launch phase in 2022.).

    Of course, there are risks, and the potential ability to earn consistent positive yield through staking cryptocurrencies is dependent on market volatility. For example, ethereum competitor Solana lets investors take the native SOL cryptocurrency, currently valued at $32.76, and earn SOL rewards. If the value of the SOL token were to tank, there would be no real gains. This is true of any staking cryptocurrency.

    That said, JPM is confident that as the crypto market matures and volatility decreases, staking will likely become a more reliable source of revenue (much more in the full JPM report).

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 20:15

  • US Army Directs Commands To Prep For Mandatory COVID Shots For Troops; Report
    US Army Directs Commands To Prep For Mandatory COVID Shots For Troops; Report

    Authored by Steve Watson via Summit News,

    The US Army is preparing to enforce mandatory coronavirus vaccinations for service members from the beginning of September, according to an Army Times report.

    The report published Saturday notes “The Army has directed commands to prepare to administer mandatory COVID-19 vaccines as early as Sept. 1, pending full Food and Drug Administration licensure.”

    “The directive came from an execute order sent to the force by Department of the Army Headquarters,” the report adds.

    An update to a purported leaked military directive says that “Commands will be prepared to provide a backbrief on servicemember vaccination status and way ahead for completion once the vaccine is mandated.”

    Both the Army and the DoD have denied that there are plans for mandatory vaccinations.

    Army spokesperson Maj. Jackie Wren staled that “As a matter of policy we do not comment on leaked documents. The vaccine continues to be voluntary.”

    “If we are directed by DoD to change our posture, we are prepared to do so,” Wren added.

    The military is experiencing vaccine hesitancy, just as in the greater population. This is sure to continue, with new research linking heart issues and chest pains in soldiers to mRNA vaccines.

    The latest study, published in JAMA’s Cardiology Journal on Tuesday, showed that 23 male soldiers (including 22 who were deemed “previously health”) between the ages of 20 and 51 presented “acute onset of marked chest pain” within four days of receiving their second dose. Patients who sought care for chest pain in the military health-care system following COVID-19 vaccination and were subsequently diagnosed with clinical myocarditis were included in the case study.

    In the UK, soldiers have been warned that if they decline the vaccine they will face ‘punishment and re-education’.

    *  *  *

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    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 19:30

  • Staggering Numbers Of Shootings, Deaths In Chicago & NYC Over Bloody July 4th Weekend 
    Staggering Numbers Of Shootings, Deaths In Chicago & NYC Over Bloody July 4th Weekend 

    Every July 4th weekend police in Chicago brace for an uptick in violence – even more than is usual when typical weekends average about 40 shootings – and this holiday weekend was no different, easily registering as the deadliest and most violent this year given the total death count. New York City has also been witnessing a steady uptick in seemingly random shootings and violence, including brazen acts committed in broad daylight in heavily trafficked areas, such as the recent Times Square wounding of a US Marine. 

    On Monday the Chicago Sun-Times has tallied 92 people shot over the long July 4th weekend, with 16 killed. The Sun-Times database shows the numbers killed to be a weekend high for all of 2021 so far.

    File image: AP/ABC

    Among the 92 shooting incidents, 76 were considered serious enough to receive hospital treatment, including six children and teenagers, according to Chicago police. 

    It was a particularly devastating weekend in terms of horrific headlines involving child deaths and woundings – with the Sun-Times listing the following

    Like with other weekend spikes in violence, local media and even woefully understaffed police often struggle to gain an accurate tally of shooting incidents amid the rapidly incoming emergency notifications. 

    Fox News wrote earlier that “Reports on the total number of incidents ranged wildly from 37 to 88, but the fact remains that dozens of people were shot, with at least five children among the victims.”

    The youngest victim in Chicago was a 6-year old girl who survived what likely was a random act targeting someone else in a group which had been standing on a sidewalk

    The youngest victim was a 6-year-old girl who was shot while standing in a group on a sidewalk at around 1 a.m. Monday, WGN 9 reported

    A gray SUV pulled up and someone opened fire on the group, hitting a 43-year-old woman twice in the back as well as the little girl. Both are expected to recover. 

    New York City also saw a noticeable spike in violence over the holiday weekend, with by Monday morning NYPD data showing 26 total shot since Friday midnight. Later in the day that total rose to at least 30 as more detailed reports came in on the prior two days.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    And then there’s this surreal story which suggests increasingly lawless streets where criminals strike with impunity often in broad daylight and in crowded places:

    A 23-year old woman was slashed in the chest and hand in Times Square early Friday morning when a stranger lashed out after she ignored his catcalls, police said. 

    The woman, whose name was not released, was visiting Manhattan from Michigan and leaving ‘Restaurant Row’ in Midtown, around West 46th Street and Eighth Avenue, around 4.30am with a friend when the man began shouting crude remarks, according to the New York Daily News.

    Her friend told the stranger to leave her alone, but he grew enraged and followed them before approaching the woman from behind a slicing her across the chest and hand with an unknown sharp object, police said.

    Police were not able to apprehend the man described in public alerts as a “dark-skinned man in black clothing” after he fled the scene. Surveillance footage was subsequently released as NYPD continue seeking the public’s help.

    Police appear to have few answers or done little in terms of practical solutions or prevention…

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    All the latest incidents which at times sent tourists running for their lives in central places like Times Square “mark the latest in a bloody summer as violent crime continues to spike in the Big Apple, jumping by a quarter over the past year, according to police data,” The Daily Mail wrote of recent incidents. “Shootings in New York City have surged by 43 percent in the past year, while murders are up 12 percent.”

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 18:45

  • 'Wikipedia Is More One-Sided Than Ever' Writes Disaffected Co-Founder Larry Sanger
    ‘Wikipedia Is More One-Sided Than Ever’ Writes Disaffected Co-Founder Larry Sanger

    Authored by WikiPedia co-founder Larry Sanger via larrysanger.org,

    “All encyclopedic content on Wikipedia,” declares a policy page, “must be written from a neutral point of view (NPOV).” This is essential policy, believe it or not. Maybe that will be hard to believe, if you have read many Wikipedia articles on controversial topics lately. But it is true: neutrality is the second of the “Five Pillars” policies that define Wikipedia’s approach to the craft of encyclopedia-writing. Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales made a statement that Wikipedia now regards as definitive. “Doing The Right Thing takes many forms,” he wrote, “but perhaps most central is the preservation of our shared vision for the NPOV and for a culture of thoughtful diplomatic honesty.”

    Some animals are more equal than others.

    Yes, Wikipedia is very earnest about its neutrality.

    But what does “neutral” mean? This is easy to misunderstand; many people think it means the same as “objective.” But neutrality is not the same as objectivity. If an encyclopedia is neutral about political, scientific, and religious controversies—the issues that define the ongoing culture war—then you will find competing sides represented carefully and respectfully, even if one side is “objectively” wrong. From a truly neutral article, you would learn why, on a whole variety of issues, conservatives believe one thing, while progressives believe another thing. And then you would be able to make up your own mind.

    Is that what Wikipedia offers? As we will see, the answer is No.

    Like Switzerland. Sort of.

    What Is “Neutrality,” Anyway?

    “Now wait a second,” I can already hear some people saying. “I reject this distinction between objectivity and neutrality. Neutrality does not mean giving equal weight to all opinions. Neutrality means approaching issues without emotion, following standards of logic and science. The neutral approach seeks hard facts and assembles hard-won truths for a critical audience.”

    That might be a fine thing, but I am afraid that is not what “neutrality” means, certainly not according to Wikipedia. Logic, science, and factuality are admirable, but the words summing up those ideals are “objectivity” and “rationality.” Neutrality is something else. Wikipedia is supposed to be like Switzerland, proverbially speaking: not casting any side as the enemy, and certainly not taking pot-shots at one side. And this is roughly how Wikipedia still officially characterizes neutrality: “Wikipedia aims to describe disputes, but not engage in them.”

    Jimmy Wales is right. We did originally adopt the neutrality policy to foster “a culture of thoughtful diplomatic honesty.” In other words, the way to keep the peace among a radically diverse set of contributors is not to declare winners and losers. But that is only one reason we adopted the policy. There was another key reason: as I have explained, no one has a right to make up your mind for you, especially in an open, global project. That does violence to our basic autonomy and, if the project ever became very large and important, it would place an enormous amount of power in the hands of a ideological cabal. And on Wikipedia, There is no cabal (ask them; they’ll tell you). Such ideological control would turn Wikipedia into an engine of propaganda. The neutrality policy was supposed to prevent that.

    There is a crucial difference between propaganda and information that supports individual deliberation. The difference is neutrality.

    So does Wikipedia meet its own ideals of neutrality? Let’s find out. I already explored this question by looking for (and easily finding) bias in articles on important topics. In the present article, I take another approach: we can list a few big political issues, briefly summarize the warring views on them, and then look and see whether these views are presented neutrally, in a way that allows the reader to make up his own mind. Does that sound fair? I think it does. And does Wikipedia take such an approach?

    I propose to look and see. Which issues in the last year or so have caused the most acrimonious dispute? We can look at the main battlefronts of the culture war: politics, science, and religion. I will spend most of my time on politics.

    In U.S. politics, four of the biggest political issues would include:

    • Trump’s impeachments
    • Biden’s scandals
    • The Antifa and BLM riots
    • Alleged election irregularities

    The impeachment managers.

    Trump’s Impeachments

    Democrats and (most) Republicans were sharply divided on the question of whether Trump’s impeachments had any merit. The Democratic view was that Trump abused his office by encouraging the president of Ukraine to investigate his opponent, Biden. Later, he egged on the January 6 invasion of the Capitol building. The Republican view was that Trump’s call with the Ukrainian president was wholly innocent, that he had committed no “high crime or misdemeanor,” and that Biden was in fact guilty of dirty shenanigans in Ukraine. As to the January 6 invasion, his remarks did not cause it. Of course, there is much, much more to be said on all sides. Now, a neutral Wikipedia would not come down clearly on either side, and would fully lay out the Democratic and the Republican cases fairly and fully. Is that what we see on Wikipedia?

    No. As of this writing (and this caveat goes for all of the following), there was a section of the Donald Trump article about the first impeachment (2019-20). That section had absolutely no information about the Republican side in the House impeachment proceedings; only the Democratic side is presented. As to the Senate trial, here is the total extent of Wikipedia’s remarks about the Trump (i.e., majority Republican) position: “Trump’s lawyers did not deny the facts as presented in the charges but said Trump had not broken any laws or obstructed Congress. They argued that the impeachment was ‘constitutionally and legally invalid’ because Trump was not charged with a crime and that abuse of power is not an impeachable offense.” That is all; two transparently biased sentences. Among other things, the article omits the essential point that Trump’s lawyers also denied that there was any abuse of power in the first place.

    There is, of course, much more information to be found about the Republican case in the (very long) article, “First impeachment trial of Donald Trump“; but, and I suppose you will just have to take my word for this, the relevant section is extremely biased, for example, dismissing various what it calls “conspiracy theories.”

    As to the second impeachment trial (that of January, 2021), in the Donald Trump article, no information is offered on either side about the arguments for impeachment, either in the House or the Senate proceedings. Certainly there is nothing remotely representing the perspective of Trump and his defenders. Again, there is a much longer article, “Second impeachment of Donald Trump,” with a “Background” section that essentially lays out the Democratic case against Trump. No Trump rebuttal is given at all. The rest of the article is also extremely biased; there is a long section of opinions whether Trump should have been impeached. The “Opposition” section (i.e., listing people opposed to impeachment) skips entirely over all House Republican opposition, and presents only Senate opposition.

    This is hardly fair, neutral treatment on events that deeply divided the American people. Wikipedia took the Democrats’ side against Trump, period. The articles are so biased, in fact, that it is fair to call them “propaganda.”

    Hunter looks on as Joe speaks.

    The Biden Family Ukraine Scandal

    President Biden faced, and has so far easily escaped, two potentially devastating scandals that were unleashed in the 2020 election. One concerned Ukraine and the other concerned the shady business dealings Hunter and his father allegedly had with a company controlled by the Chinese government. The issue dividing Republicans and Democrats here, obviously, was: Was there any evidence of wrongdoing? Not all national-level Republicans thought the scandals were worth talking about, but some certainly did; and a lot of the rank-and-file did. The Democrats, meanwhile, essentially circled the wagons and refused to report on or discuss the issues involved. When they did, they typically issued blanket denials and dismissals.

    A neutral handling of the many confusing accusations would not imply that Biden was guilty of anything. But it also would not clear him of all charges. Rather, it would present enough detail about the accusations and the purported evidence for them, leaving nothing important out; then it would explain in some detail how Biden was defended by Democrats and his allies. That much is the least that one would expect to find in a neutral treatment of the scandals. Is that what we see in Wikipedia?

    Not at all. We can look at some relevant articles, first about the Ukraine scandal. In the “Campaign” section of the Wikipedia article on Biden, there are two paragraphs explaining the allegations (footnotes and links have been removed from this quotation):

    In September 2019, it was reported that Trump had pressured Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate alleged wrongdoing by Biden and his son Hunter Biden. Despite the allegations, as of September 2019, no evidence has been produced of any wrongdoing by the Bidens. The media widely interpreted this pressure to investigate the Bidens as trying to hurt Biden’s chances of winning the presidency, resulting in a political scandal and Trump’s impeachment by the House of Representatives.

    Beginning in 2019, Trump and his allies falsely accused Biden of getting the Ukrainian prosecutor general Viktor Shokin fired because he was supposedly pursuing an investigation into Burisma Holdings, which employed Hunter Biden. Biden was accused of withholding $1 billion in aid from Ukraine in this effort. In 2015, Biden pressured the Ukrainian parliament to remove Shokin because the United States, the European Union and other international organizations considered Shokin corrupt and ineffective, and in particular because Shokin was not assertively investigating Burisma. The withholding of the $1 billion in aid was part of this official policy.

    This is, of course, an obviously one-sided whitewash which takes Biden’s side throughout. In these dismissive paragraphs, one cannot fully make sense of what the case against Biden was even supposed to be; Biden’s withholding of aid is mentioned, but the context and explanation essential to the case are omitted.

    Anyone passingly familiar with the story knows there is much more to it. There is nothing here about the fact that Ukrainian natural gas company Burisma paid Joe Biden’s son Hunter approximately $600,000 per annum from 2014 to 2019 to serve on the Board of Directors, never mind that he had no industry experience but only a connection to his father, the Vice President of the United States. Wikipedia even has the temerity to make the claim that “Trump and his allies falsely accused Biden of getting the Ukrainian prosecutor general Viktor Shokin fired, because he was supposedly pursuing an investigation into Burisma Holdings, which employed Hunter Biden.” While it was in dispute why Biden sought Shokin’s ouster, it is perfectly true that he did so. The statement, in fact, was one Joe Biden specifically made himself—with braggadocio and to laughter—in an infamous video of an interview before the Council on Foreign Relations. The video, of course, is not so much as mentioned by Wikipedia. Nor is there any discussion of Hunter Biden’s infamous laptop and the damning evidence it contained.

    Wikipedia does have a whole article titled—indeed, its bias showing right in the title—”Biden-Ukraine conspiracy theory.” It begins, “The Biden–Ukraine conspiracy theory [bold in original] is a series of unevidenced claims centered on the false allegation that while Joe Biden was vice president of the United States, he engaged in corrupt activities relating to the employment of his son Hunter Biden by the Ukrainian gas company Burisma.” There are, of course, a great many people who believe the claims are not “false” and no mere “conspiracy theory.” Their point of view is not presented but dismissed out of hand. The article goes downhill from there, serving essentially as a hit piece on Trump, Rudy Giuliani, and the New York Post, with very few actual details about what the allegations even were. More details can be found in a section of the Hunter Biden article—which is something—but even this reads as a blatantly biased brief written by the Biden family’s own lawyers.

    The family in China.

    The Biden Family Chinese Deals

    At this point, Wikipedia’s defenders might well fall back on their notion that only “reliable sources” are permitted, and, gee, no reliable sources thought much of the above-mentioned video or laptop. “But,” you might well observe, “it was big news for a time. And Wikipedia thought there were no reliable sources at all? Why not?” The reason is that the sources that provide mainstream coverage of conservative points of view, including Fox News, The New York Post, and the (U.K.) Daily Mail—as well as pretty much all of newer conservative news media sources, which are the only outlets doing any reporting on many important stories—have all been added to a list of sources “deprecated” for their coverage of political news. This is not a joke and not an exaggeration. Republican-favoring sources, even quite mainstream ones, simply may not be used on Wikipedia, not even to explain a Republican viewpoint. (I will discuss this more in the last section below.)

    The Biden China scandal is similar and is treated similarly in Wikipedia. Here, Hunter was a director of a joint venture between an American company, Rosemont Seneca, where Hunter was a partner, and Bohai Capital, a Chinese government-controlled investment firm. The joint venture was called BHR. According to the explosive testimony of Tony Bobulinski, the Bidens’ top executive for handling certain deals in China, Hunter arranged for Jonathan Li, CEO of Bohai Capital, to “shake hands” with his father, and Joe Biden was, according to Bobulinski, directly involved in the deals.

    In addition to the Bobulinksi interview, a great deal of supporting evidence comes from the same Hunter Biden laptop mentioned above, such as an email indicating that brothers Hunter and Jim Biden, along with “the big guy”—Bobulinski identified him as Joe Biden—would each be assigned equity shares in a business venture with Chinese energy giant CEFC.

    Can any of this information on the China Biden scandal be found—even in a twisted, biased form—in the Wikipedia article on Joe Biden? Nope. As of this writing, that article contains not a single word about the China deals, Rosemont Seneca, Tony Bobulinksi, the laptop, or the CEFC. But surely information can be found elsewhere on Wikipedia about these matters? Well, yes, there is a little. Most of it is again in the article on Hunter Biden, written in a way to make Hunter look as good as possible, the hapless victim of Trump’s “false charges” (those precise, dismissive words are actually used).

    Again, there is much more to the story, but the point is that the Biden scandals deeply divide the American people. An ideologically neutral resource would explain both sides fully and fairly, leaving the reader to make up his own mind. Is that what Wikipedia does? No. Wikipedia is clearly aligned with one side. You might maintain that it is the only legitimate side; but then, that is what many ideologues say of their own side. What you cannot seriously maintain is that Wikipedia’s treatment of the Biden scandals is neutral. It is grossly biased.

    Not one of the peaceful 93%.

    The Antifa/BLM riots

    Next I propose to look at some articles on the 2020 Antifa and BLM riots. There could not be a starker cultural divide in the American body politic than in the reaction to these riots. The rioting was sparked particularly following the May 26, 2020 death (or, as most people think, killing) of George Floyd. National Democrats generally supported the rioters; portrayed them as “mostly peaceful” activists against fascism and racism, even contributing money to their defense; took seriously the notion that we should “defund the police” or backed similar police “reform” proposals; and stubbornly minimized the months of bloodshed, danger, and destruction the riots caused. Republicans made no secret of their hatred of the riots, if they had no objection to peaceful protests; their contempt for the violent rioters; their sympathy for the afflicted neighborhoods; and their wonder and disbelief at the very suggestion that we should “defund the police.” They also pushed back, somewhat, against the notion that the United States was so woefully racist that the country must make dramatic changes to, e.g., policing practices or anti-white indoctrination at schools. Both sides generally agreed that real examples of police brutality needed to be dealt with more severely and that society, more than ever, had no place for real racism.

    A neutral treatment would, of course, give broad factual coverage of such things as where the rioting took place, how many people were arrested, and numbers of injuries and deaths attributable to the rioting. The main Wikipedia article actually seems to do a good job there, as far as I can tell. But in addition, the reaction to the riots on both sides would be fully and fairly canvassed. Varying theories of the causes of the riots would be offered; Democratic theories would dwell, of course, on police brutality and racist attitudes and groups, while Republican theories, acknowledging that to some degree, would also discuss deliberate left-wing organization and dispute the extent of the problems exemplified by the George Floyd case.

    Wikipedia’s coverage is, unsurprisingly, very extensive. There is a long summary article, “George Floyd protests,” as well as a “List of George Floyd protests in the United States,” and a long article titled, “2020-2021 United States racial unrest.” The concern that conservatives have is not with any protest, but with political violence in the form of rioting. So let us focus on the last article. The article does helpfully have useful statistics. While labeled “unrest,” there is a “Casualties” section in the article’s infobox, saying there were “At least 25” deaths, injuries to 2000+ law enforcement offers and to “an unknown number of civilians,” and $1–2 billion in property damage. Indeed, after pointing out that 93% of the protests were “peaceful and nondestructive,” the bottom line was that, owing to that pesky remaining 7%, the riots were “the civil disorder event with the highest recorded damage in United States history.” So far, so good: the article in those respects states facts that all sides would want presented.

    As one gets farther into the article, however, the bias becomes much more pronounced. “A wave of monument removals”—an odd way to describe the deliberate, illegal destruction of public sculpture—”and name changes has taken place throughout the world, especially in the United States.” But what about the reaction to the riots? It was a “cultural reckoning,” we are told. “Public opinion of racism and discrimination quickly shifted in the wake of the protests, with significantly increased support of the Black Lives Matter movement and acknowledgement of institutional racism.” It is true that there was an increased of support for BLM early on. But support quickly dropped as the organization became associated with destructive violence in black neighborhoods, agitation against police funding, and radical communist views. Even by September of 2020, support had dropped 12% from 67% to 55%, in a Pew poll. The latter point can be found further down in the article, but is not mentioned in the more important article introduction, which says simply that BLM enjoyed “significantly increased support.” Also, BLM support later continued to drop to pre-riot levels. Even the New York Times, hardly a conservative mouthpiece, puzzlingly observes, “The data…contradicts the idea that the country underwent a racial reckoning.”

    The rest of the article—which, I confess, I did not read entirely, as it is very long—looks like a lovingly detailed Establishment brief about the causes and events of the 2020 riots. As to the causes, one key claim is: “Black people, who account for less than 13% of the American population, are killed by police at a disproportionate rate, being killed at more than twice the rate of white people.” While this is no doubt true, a relevant fact, often cited by Republicans, is omitted: black men are much more likely to commit crimes that might bring a call to the police. Hence, as one study put it, “We find no evidence of anti-Black or anti-Hispanic disparities across shootings, and White officers are not more likely to shoot minority civilians than non-White officers.” Such information, which appears inconsistent with Democratic viewpoints on racial injustice of police, does not seem to be found in the article.

    Finally, there is a “Social impact” section. This is focused entirely on broader social and political changes that were supposedly caused by a reaction to the riots (and protests). In this section, and indeed all throughout the article, there is complete silence about the Republican criticism of the riots and of Democratic politicians who supported the violence or pretended that it was not happening; of the conservative backlash against Antifa and BLM; and of resistance to the social fallout such as the “Defund the Police” campaigns and some police “reform” proposals that would make policing much more difficult. There is absolutely no mention of conservative and Republican claims that the riots were deliberately and even centrally organized by left-wing organizations. Criticism of Black Lives Matter cannot be found in the article in any form, despite looming large in the Republican reaction to the riots.

    Their opinions are worthless and need no mention, says Wikipedia.

    The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election

    Then of course there is the disputed 2020 U.S. presidential election. This was controversial not only across party lines, it was a wrenching fight within the Republican Party, with Establishment Republicans and centrists—who never liked Trump much in the first place—facing down Trump and his noisy rank-and-file supporters. Irregularities with massive amounts of mail-in ballots, failure to permit observers, and much more, caused massive uproar from Republicans. It came down to January 6, when Congress was going to vote on whether to accept the Electoral College vote count. As the Wikipedia article on the “Attempts to overturn the 2020 United States presidential election” has it, some 140 House Republicans and 11 Senate Republicans were prepared to lodge objections. Then, of course, the infamous invasion of the Capitol building happened—just in time to make such objections even more politically costly for representatives holding shaky seats.

    The above-linked article was bound to be another propaganda piece. And so it is—shot through and through with egregious bias. Here is how it begins:

    After the 2020 United States presidential election in which Joe Biden prevailed, then-incumbent Donald Trump, as well as his campaign and his proxies, pursued an aggressive and unprecedented effort to deny and overturn the election. The attempts to overturn the election were described as an attempted coup d’état and an implementation of “the big lie.” Trump and his allies promoted numerous false claims that the election was stolen from Trump through an international communist conspiracy, rigged voting machines, and electoral fraud.

    Further down, we have another gem:

    Stop the Steal [bold in original] is a far-right and conservative campaign and protest movement in the United States promoting the conspiracy theory that falsely posits that widespread electoral fraud occurred during the 2020 presidential election to deny incumbent President Donald Trump victory over former vice president Joe Biden.

    I will not go into more details; you can imagine. There are actually several articles related to irregularities in the 2020 election and its aftermath. In addition to the one discussed above, there is also Republican reactions to Donald Trump’s claims of 2020 election fraud, which states, “Trump falsely claimed to have won the election, and made many false and unsubstantiated claims of election fraud.” Of course, the very title here is a good example of Saul Alinsky’s Rule 11: “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, polarize it.” In other words, the backlash against the 2020 election was not a broad Republican movement, but only one hated and discredited man’s outrageous and illegal attempt to overturn the election.

    Obviously, I could go on and talk about the January 6 Capitol invasion: what really happened? In “2021 United States Capitol Attack,” you will learn that the Capitol “was stormed during a riot and violent attack against the U.S. Congress,” by “a mob of supporters of President Donald Trump” who “attempted to overturn his defeat in the 2020 presidential election.” Never mind that several details here are in dispute. Many Republicans believe a number of leftists and FBI agents were among those who invaded the Capitol building. In any event, precisely what happened is not clear to those of us who have watched hours of video footage of the invasion. I watched with increasing horror and had questions even as it happened.

    Republicans are naturally of differing views on Trump’s speech on the day of January 6—some think it was justified, others concede it was irresponsible—but they generally agree that he cannot be blamed for the attack. Such nuanced points of view so unpopular with Wikipedia are, unsurprisingly, not presented in the article at all. Instead, it tells a story that, by omitting key details, makes it sound as if the invasion was a spontaneous uprising of crazy MAGA people that Trump deliberately whipped up into a treasonous rage. Perhaps that is precisely what happened; but a neutral article on the topic would sketch alternate narratives as well, present all the relevant information from which various people build their cases, and leave the reader to make up his own mind about what actually happened.

    I hardly need add that Wikipedia is firmly aligned with one political party, and its articles on the 2020 election read like party propaganda.

    Rumble

    Other Recent Issues in the Culture War

    This article is already long enough and I have made my point, but it will be interesting to dip briefly into other culture war topics, drawn from science and religion, that were in the news in the last year.

    In science, even more than global warming (or climate change), there has been significant controversy over Covid-19 and the official measures to combat it. You will not be surprised to learn that Wikipedia debunks everything the Establishment debunks, all conveniently collected into a single article on “COVID-19 misinformation.” Alongside silly things almost no one would take seriously, you can learn that it is “misinformation” to suggest a “Wuhan lab origin” of the virus. You will also be relieved to know that “masks do actually work.”

    Another article assures us, “Several researchers, from modelling and demonstrated examples, have concluded that lockdowns are effective at reducing the spread of, and deaths caused by, COVID-19.” Of course, there is no mention of any other research. What about the Covid-19 vaccines: are they effective? Safe? In the COVID-19 vaccine article, the introductory section mentions “demonstrated efficacy as high as 95%,” but nothing about side effects; further down in the article, a very short paragraph in a “Misinformation” section informs us that claims about such side effects are “overblown.” And that is it. You read that right: in an article about the experimental Covid-19 vaccines, the only thing Wikipedia has to say about their side-effects is that concern about them is overblown. Needless to say, you will not find anything in the way of information from the many skeptical physicians and medical researchers, who must not exist.

    Let us be clear on something here. You might support Wikipedia’s approach to Covid-19; but you cannot maintain that it is neutral. A neutral approach would acknowledge and fairly represent alternative views on the origin of the virus, the efficacy of masks, the effectiveness and defensibility of lockdowns, and the effectiveness and safety of the Covid-19 vaccines. You might maintain that the articles are better without such an approach; but then what you are saying is that you prefer the articles’ Establishment bias to a neutral approach that would let the reader decide.

    In religion, recently, a few different issues have divided conservatives from the more liberal Establishment, represented by mainline denominations and most (but not all) seminaries. One is this: Is Christianity in decline in the West—or just liberal denominations and churches? Wikipedia’s “Decline of Christianity in the Western world” article begins, “The decline of Christianity in the Western world is an ongoing trend. Developed countries with modern, secular educational facilities in the post-World War II era have shifted towards post-Christian, secular, globalized, multicultural and multifaith societies.” But, the article correctly notes, a similar decline is not happening in Latin America and Africa, and even recently, “71% of Western Europeans identified themselves as Christian, according to a 2018 study by the Pew Research Center.”

    In the section about the United States, the focus is (unsurprisingly) on mainline denominations, despite the fact that they are now among the smaller denominations; even as of ten years ago, taken together, the mainline Protestant denominations had fewer than half the adherents of evangelical and conservative Protestant denominations.” Only at the very end of the article do we learn that “‘intense religion’ including evangelicalism has persisted.” You will not learn, in this article, the name of the single largest Protestant denomination: the Southern Baptist Convention, with 16.2 million members. (The information can be found in the “Southern Baptist Convention” article.) You will also not learn that in an important segment, conservative church membership is actually growing: among others, nondenominational churches were booming as of 2014, and actually outnumbered even the Southern Baptists.

    Basically, to hear Wikipedia tell it, Christianity is in decline, because mainline denominations are in decline, and the conservative denominations and churches are barely worth caring about. And I can just hear the response: “Well, yeah. Sounds about right.” But if you agree with the Wikipedia article’s approach, that does not mean it is neutral; the point is that it is clearly biased.

    Among the hot-button topics in church politics is one that appears to be causing a schism in the United Methodist Church: same-sex marriage. The relevant article is “Blessing of same-sex unions in Christian churches.” The article has a section with five bullet points offering “Theological views of those who support same-sex unions and/or marriages,” but there is no parallel section—or any information at all, believe it or not—about the theology of those who believe same-sex marriage is unbiblical. Some major denominations that strictly forbid same-sex marriage, like the Southern Baptists, are simply not mentioned in the article.

    Banning Fox News as a source is just good sense, says Wikipedia.

    Conclusion

    These contentious issues are exactly where we should expect to see fair treatment of “alternative” views on Wikipedia. But we do not.

    This is hardly news, but it bears repeating. Wikipedia openly repudiates neutrality, and therefore it is shamelessly hypocritical in how it continues to pay lip service to its “neutral point of view” policy. Wikipedia’s editors embrace their biases sometimes so fervently that their articles emerge more as propaganda than as reference material.

    “But wait,” you say. “Come on. Fine, they’re hypocritical, but dodgy claims to neutrality are just marketing. Why should we care about actual neutrality? For journalists, it is totally passé. Sure, most of them don’t actually want you to make up your own mind on important issues. So? Of course they want experts to declare what is known, and then you should learn that—a lot of times that’s the whole point of ‘journalism.’ And here’s another thing. Wikipedia strongly prefers mainstream secondary sources. When it comes to the culture war, the educated classes, the readers of those mainstream sources, naturally skew liberal. Wikipedia just represents that mainstream view. And that’s reasonable; it is not a fault with Wikipedia. Live with it. It’s the new reality. How do you respond?”

    First, I refuse to accept such excuses for the bully tactics of propagandists. Second, it’s also false that Wikipedia just represents the mainstream. Wikipedia does not just mirror the biases found in the mainstream news media, because some of it is conservative or contrarian. A lot of mainstream news stories are broken only in Fox News, the Daily Mail, and the New York Post—all of which are banned from use as sources by Wikipedia. Beyond that, many mainstream sources of conservative, libertarian, or contrarian opinion are banned from Wikipedia as well, including Quillette, The Federalist, and the Daily Caller. Those might be contrarian or conservative, but they are hardly “radical”; they are still mainstream. So, how on earth can such viewpoints ever be given an airing on Wikipedia? Answer: often, they cannot, not if there are no “reliable sources” available to report about them.

    In short, and with few exceptions, only globalist, progressive mainstream sources—and sources friendly to globalist progressivism—are permitted.

    It is true that Wikipedia permits a few sources, such as Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, Daily Telegraph, and Weekly Standard, which are more often tolerant of conservative viewpoints, but these are (or have become) as often centrist as conservative, and they are generally careful never to leave the current Overton Window of progressive thought. They are the “loyal opposition” of the progressive media hegemony.

    Why has Wikipedia systematically purged conservative mainstream media sources? Is it because such sources have become intolerably irresponsible and partisan? That’s what Wikipedians will tell you. As they put it, it is because they do not want what they dismiss as “misinformation,” “conspiracy theories,” etc., to get any hearing. In saying so, they (and similarly biased institutions) are plainly claiming exclusive control over what is thinkable. They want to set the boundaries of the debate, and they want to tell you how to think about it. A good illustration of just how radical Wikipedia’s source-banning policies have become can be seen in their treatment of Newsweek magazine, which is now marked as “no consensus” (i.e., avoid and use with caution), because ownership passed in 2013 to IBT Media, the publisher of the centrist, sometimes conservative-leaning, International Business Times, which is itself deemed “unreliable.”

    For these reasons, it is not too far to say that Wikipedia, like many other deeply biased institutions of our brave new digital world, has made itself into a kind of thought police that has de facto shackled conservative viewpoints with which they disagree. Democracy cannot thrive under such conditions: I maintain that Wikipedia has become an opponent of vigorous democracy. Democracy requires that voters be given the full range of views on controversial issues, so that they can make up their minds for themselves. If society’s main information sources march in ideological lockstep, they make a mockery of democracy. Then the wealthy and powerful need only gain control of the few approved organs of acceptable thought; then they will be able to manipulate and ultimately control all important political dialogue.

    Wrecking intellectual autonomy, to make the world safe for the socialist utopia.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 18:00

  • "The Alternative Sucks" – Matthew McConaughey Explains Why America Is Awesome
    “The Alternative Sucks” – Matthew McConaughey Explains Why America Is Awesome

    Superstar actor and recent additional to the plethora of podcasters, Matthew McConaughey released his “Happy Birthday America” and they are anything but the usual virtue-signaling Kow-towing we have come to expect from the celebrati.

    His thoughts were summarized will in the following sentence…

    “We’re all in this together… as the UNITED states of America… If you don’t purchase that, move on, go somewhere else!”

    Watch the full clip below:

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    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 17:25

  • Morgan Stanley: Here's Why The Market Rally Is About To Take A Break
    Morgan Stanley: Here’s Why The Market Rally Is About To Take A Break

    By Michael Wilson of Morgan Stanley

    It’s Getting Hot

    When the COVID lockdowns first hit, the primary risk facing companies centered on how to survive the sharpest economic downturn in 90 years. On reflection, what companies were able to accomplish over the past year with most of the labor force working from home is an economic miracle. In aggregate, the US economy surpassed its pre-COVID peak last quarter, just nine months after the trough of the recession. Profits returned to peak levels even faster, with many companies feeling no effects of the recession at all. In fact, essential businesses and technology enablers achieved an acceleration in pre-COVID sales trends, accompanied by record profitability as labor and other costs fell precipitously.

    Now, with the economic recovery from COVID in full bloom, companies and investors are facing different questions:

    1. First, how will consumers spend their money? Will their purchases of the items they bought last year remain elevated or will we see a wallet share shift toward the experiences they were unable to enjoy? Perhaps there’s enough pent-up savings to support both? In our view, as the stimulus checks and supplemental unemployment benefits run out later this summer, consumers will be forced to make choices. That likely means a rotation toward services and away from goods, which have been over-consumed.
    2. Second, higher costs are returning as businesses deal with supply chain shortages. Most investors are aware of the spike in certain materials like lumber, copper and semiconductors. However, they also view such increases as temporary, or transitory, as the Fed calls them. They believe materials prices will eventually simmer down as supply adjusts, the normal pattern for commodity markets historically.

    We’re not quite as confident in that view, but we do believe some commodity prices will subside where supply can adjust in a timely fashion.

    On the other hand, we think the risk is growing that rising labor costs are more structural. First, the pandemic lockdown has curtailed the labor supply in ways that may not be easily fixed. Many workers have moved on to new occupations, which means that labor shortages may be more persistent than normal. This is especially true of the hospitality, travel and leisure industries, where demand is now surging the most. Second, generous supplemental unemployment benefits and stimulus checks have given many the means to delay their return to the labor force or enroll in higher education or training to pursue a more attractive career. Third, thanks to the extraordinary rise in asset prices, including homes, some older workers are choosing to retire earlier than planned. All these factors suggest that there is less slack in the labor force than usual at this stage of the recovery. In fact, aggregate payrolls are already well above pre-COVID levels even though total payrolls are still well below (Exhibit 1). That suggests higher labor costs for businesses as we fully reopen and lower profitability.

    A powerful political shift toward fostering social equality is also under way, increasing pressure on companies to pay higher wages. This trend began in 2015 with the push for an increase in the minimum wage. Since then, minimum wages in many states are up as much as 50% or more. At the federal level, ever greater increases have been proposed. Nevertheless, when adjusted for inflation, real minimum wages are still down almost 40% from their highs in the late 1960s. This suggests there’s a long way to go before policy-makers are satisfied.

    Finally, globalization and the outsourcing of manufacturing and labor costs have been on a one-way track for the past 25 years. In addition to increasing political pressure to reverse course, the pandemic has exposed the outsourcing model as vulnerable when supply is less than fluid, leading many companies to rethink and reshore, which could mean higher costs.

    The bottom line is that the US economy is booming, but this is now a known known and asset markets reflect it. What isn’t so clear anymore is at what price this growth will accrue. Higher costs mean lower profits, another reason why the overall equity market has been narrowing. It also supports our view that equity markets are likely to take a break this summer as things heat up.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 16:47

  • Black Dems & NPR Trashed The Declaration Of Independence Yesterday
    Black Dems & NPR Trashed The Declaration Of Independence Yesterday

    Authored by Thomas Lifson via AmericanThinker.com,

    Our founding document, The Declaration of Independence, changed the world by establishing that human rights come from God, not courtesy of a ruler, and that justice requires governments operate with the consent of the governed. That the nation built upon the principles flourished and became the leader of the free world changed the rest of the world. Without the Declaration, there would be no such thing as the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights and no social democracies in former kingdoms of Europe, much less the expectation even in dictatorships that sham elections must take place.

    But because some of the states that declared their independence permitted slavery, and because eighteenth century society had different customs and linguistic conventions than now, a growing chorus of progressives condemns the document on its anniversary day.

    Three Black Democrats serving in the House of Representatives ignored the free Blacks in the North when they spoke out against the Declaration yesterday:

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    They also ignore the fact that the language of the Declaration served as justification for the abolitionist movement that ended up electing a Republican president and Congress that ended slavery during a bloody civil war fought to end slavery, that was defended by Democrats.

    Even worse than these radical politicians whose political careers are founded on hatred and resentment is National Public Radio, the taxpayer-funded entity that has become a propaganda organ of the left.  Penny Starr reports for Breitbart:

    Taxpayer-funded National Public Radio (NPR) reluctantly repeated its tradition of staff reading the Declaration of Independence, this year framing its report to point out the “flaws” and racist elements of one of the most cherished U.S. documents. (snip)

    NPR included remarks from author David Treuer, who is Ojibwe from Leech Lake Reservation.

    “But a deeper look at history also shows that one of the reasons why the colonists wanted to rise up against the British — and wage the Revolutionary War — was over the question of who would try to colonize Native lands west of the colonies,” Treuer told Morning Edition.

    It boiled down to power and money, Treuer argued. 

    “The crown wanted that money for themselves,” he said. “The colonists, understandably, would have preferred to have it for themselves. So the whole revolution was in large part fought over who got to take our stuff.”

    “One of the reasons”? Maybe a few people thought about control of the rest of North America, but the Declaration makes no such mention, nor was the question of colonizing other lands much of an issue in the discontent leading up to the American Revolution. Besides, Spain and France controlled a lot of the land that eventually became the United States. The most charitable description I can make of Treuer’s argument is to describe it as thinly-justified.

    Then there is the question of the “stolen” land, a continuing libel of the United States. The universal condition of the globe is that land is ruled by sovereigns that gained control of it by conquest. That is as true of the native tribes that controlled land in North America in 1776 as it is of Alsace-Lorraine, whose sovereign authority has changed and then changed back, in the last couple of centuries.

    The Ojibwe Tribe from which Mr. Treuer alleges land was “stolen”:

    …migrated from the east along the Great Lakes, pushed by newly arrived Europeans and other tribes.

    With the help of guns acquired in the fur trade, they pushed the Dakota south and west in the 18th century and replaced them in the north woods.

    Mr. Treuer’s tribe owns the Leech Lake Reservation because they “stole” the land from the Dakotas.  Using guns!

    Had American settlers not “stolen” the land from Native Americans, they would be living in the Neolithic conditions that predated the arrival of the Americans, complete with life spans of roughly four decades, partly fueled by starvation, curable diseases, and of course, strife with other tribes not constrained by notions of just war or human rights that also arrived with settlers that followed the Declaration as their founding document.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 15:40

  • Multiple Rockets Hit Iraq's Largest US Base In Apparent Revenge Attack
    Multiple Rockets Hit Iraq’s Largest US Base In Apparent Revenge Attack

    A fresh rocket attack was unleased Monday on the largest military base where US troops are hosted in Iraq. Ain Al Assad airbase in western Iraq’s Anbar province was hit by at least three rockets, the American coalition has confirmed.

    An official US coalition statement said that “At approx. 2:45 PM local time, Ain Al-Assad Air Base was attacked by three rockets. The rockets landed on the base perimeter.” It indicated no injuries and that damage is being assessed.

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    Though the perpetrators of this new attack are as yet unknown, it will likely be seen as part of broader revenge attacks for the June 27 series of US airstrikes on Iran-backed militia groups along the Iraq-Syria border, which killed and wounded multiple fighters as well as reports of civilians. 

    Immediately after the US military action, which was the second of Biden’s presidency, a coalition of pro-Iranian Iraqi militias vowed revenge in a statement issued immediately afterward, which saidWe will avenge the blood of our righteous martyrs against the perpetrators of this heinous crime and with God’s help we will make the enemy taste the bitterness of revenge,” they said.

    The Iraqi Army issued a blistering statement condemning the “blatant and unacceptable violation of Iraqi sovereignty and national security.”

    Such airstrikes began growing commonplace during the last year of the Trump administration amid growing tit-for-tat attacks between Iranian-backed Iraqi militias.

    Now it looks to continue under Biden, creating greater pressure in terms of the growing Iraqi demands for foreign troops to finally exit the country.

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    During 2020 the series of attacks nearly sucked Iran and the US into direct war, especially following the January assassination of Gen. Qassem Soleimani. 

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 15:05

  • Leftists Blame Capitalism, Global Warming For Mexican State-Owned Oil Company's Gulf Fire
    Leftists Blame Capitalism, Global Warming For Mexican State-Owned Oil Company’s Gulf Fire

    Authored by Monica Showalter via AmericanThinker.com,

    To get a whiff of just how unserious the left is, take a look at the leftist knee-jerk reaction to a recent oil fire in the Gulf of Mexico:

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    These tweets are stupidities because while the boiling gas fire at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico is spectacular, it hasn’t a single thing to do with either capitalism or global warming. 

    It’s the result of an accident from a poorly maintained pipeline owned by Pemex, the state oil company of Mexico.

    That’s a 100% government-owned entity that was created in 1938 based on uncompensated expropriation from private-sector energy companies.

    State energy enterprises are never capitalist, they are socialist state entities.

    Mexico’s is worse than most of them – even Venezuela’s state oil company has some private ownership. Mexico’s, though is a full socialist state creature with zero accountability to shareholders.

    It calls to mind that it’s not capitalism, nor global warming that’s causing these accidents, but the hard fact that socialist state energy enterprises have an amazing environmental record.

    In Venezuela, we see state oil company pollution on an untold scale, with this sort of thing going on:

    While the collapse of Venezuela’s oil industry and what was once the richest economy in South America are well documented, there is little coverage of the immense environmental damage being caused by the decay of its energy infrastructure.

    The autocratic Maduro regime is determined to squeeze whatever oil and gasoline production it can generate from Venezuela’s crumbling oilfields, corroded refineries and rusting pipelines. The situation is so dire that oil spills are a regular event in the near-failed state, especially since Washington ratcheted up sanctions, preventing Caracas from obtaining the capital required to conduct critical maintenance and overhauls. Under Maduro’s leadership Venezuela’s government, including national oil company PDVSA, has ceased collecting and releasing data, making it near-impossible for international observers to ascertain what is occurring in the country. PDVSA data (Spanish) from 2016, before the national oil company stopped releasing operational information, showed that oil spills had multiplied fourfold since 1999. This was a worrying portent of what was to come because the worst of the decline for Venezuela’s oil industry did not start until 2018 as progressively stricter U.S. sanctions were imposed.

    Aside from PDVSA ceasing to publicly report operational data, Caracas regularly attempts to ignore or even cover up oil spills. That makes it extremely difficult for neighboring countries and the international community to discern just how much environmental damage is occurring.

    Notice the cover-ups, easy to do in a socialist state when the state controls the press.

    In Ecuador, we’ve got another state oil company situation that’s just about as bad:

    Chevron has never conducted oil production operations in Ecuador. Its subsidiary Texaco Petroleum Co. (TexPet) did operate in Ecuador, mostly in minority partnership with Ecuador’s state oil company, Petroecuador, which owned 62.5 percent. TexPet left Ecuador in 1992, and at that time it fully remediated its share of environmental impacts arising from oil production. The $40 million remediation operation was certified by all agencies of the Ecuadorian government responsible for oversight, and TexPet received a complete release from Ecuador’s national, provincial and municipal governments. Chevron acquired TexPet in 2001.

    For more than two decades, Petroecuador has been the sole owner of the operations TexPet left behind, and the state oil company has greatly expanded them. Petroecuador has been slow to remediate its majority share of pre-1992 impacts and has amassed a poor environmental record since that time. All remaining environmental conditions in the region are the sole legal responsibility of Petroecuador, and in December 2011, Petroecuador announced a $70 million remediation program that would address the balance of the necessary clean-up.

    A phony lawsuit pinning Chevron for blame for the Ecuadorean state oil company’s oil pollution in the Amazon fell apart after Chevron spent hundreds of millions to get the truth out. That has not just left Ecuador with state environmental pollution, it’s poisoned the environment for future foreign investment. Lucky Ecuador, and since that happened, the ChiComs have rolled in. In December 2018, I wrote:

    If there was ever an example for nations worldwide of What Not To Do, take a look at what socialist Ecuador has done to itself in dumping the U.S. and turning to align its interests to China. The New York Times has a superb (albeit stomach-churning) report about how Ecuador sold itself out as a vassal of China, getting for itself a junk dam that is already collapsing, and turning over 80% of its oil production to the communist behemoth in order to pay its massive, massive debts from it. That, in exchange for scrapping its military ties to the U.S. and skipping out on its tab with western banks.

    All that state capitalism, and pollution, too, yet somehow the West with its capitalism and rule of law, plus existing environmental standards that don’t exist in the socialist state-owned third world, is now to blame.

    Similar cases of socialist state oil company mismanagement and the horrible consequences of it abound in Russia, China, Nigeria, Iran, the list is pretty amazing.

    Now we have this Mexican case, and Mexico’s state oil company, Pemex, to its credit, has said it has since got the fire out.  

    If anything, this fire amounts to an argument against state oil companies and the inevitable results of their activity, where profit is not the foremost concern, profit is not a thing, and making shareholders happy is not an issue. These state enterprises just serve as a cash cow for socialist governments that have so impoverished their people they’ve lost their tax base.

    Now, if there’s any argument at all about global warming in this, it’s that countries like Mexico and China need to be held to the same standards as every other nation signed on to the Paris accord. That of course, is not happening, so this garbage goes on, useful to the left for pointing fingers at capitalism and global warming and, in reality, the West

    That brings us back to these leftists with their dishonest narratives about capitalism and global warming.

    Two of the idiots who posted those statements are leftist politicians who have a big thirst for attaining more power, for the state, and for themselves.

    And now before any facts are in, they’re assuming the voters are idiots, too, and will buy hook, line, and sinker the notion that capitalism and global warming are to blame for the Gulf fire.

    According to these tweets, it doesn’t seem to be working. Voters seem to be onto them and their ignorant, cynical game. Twitchy has curated some choice tweets educating these charlatans about the nature of the beast, too.

    It just goes to show that they’ll use a condemnation of capitalism, or a claim to global warming, to blame anything, no matter what disaster went down, on the West. It’s like a knee reflex.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 14:30

  • Search And Rescue Continues Following Demolition Of Surfside Condo Building
    Search And Rescue Continues Following Demolition Of Surfside Condo Building

    Update (Monday 1410 ET): Rescuers began searching for survivors of the Champlain Towers South condo in Surfside, FLA., after the remaining structure was demolished late Sunday night. 

    Three bodies were recovered Monday after search efforts resumed, bringing the death toll to 27. There are still 118 people unaccounted for since part of the condo collapsed on June 24.

    The demolition was planned and ahead of the approaching storm, Elsa. 

    With the threat of Else looming, local and state officials, along with rescue crews, were worried about the safety of the building and made the decision last night to demo the remaining structure. 

    “It appears as though the approaching storm may have been a blessing in disguise for us in that it initiated the demolition discussion,” Surfside Mayor Charles Burkett said Sunday night.

    “We want to make sure that we control which way the building falls and not a hurricane, so all of this together I think ended up being a good thing,” Burkett said. 

    Miami-Dade County mayor, Daniella Levine Cava, told NBC Monday, “We understand that families realize the fact that time has gone by, they realize that the chances are growing all dimmer.” 

    Rescue crews could be seen combing through debris Monday alongside cranes to lift concrete and steel. 

    * * * 

    Update (Monday 0616 ET): Around 2230 ET Sunday, the remaining portion of the Champlain Towers South condo building in Surfside, FLA., was demolished ahead of Tropical Storm Elsa’s arrival late Monday night into Tuesday. 

    Video: Champlain South Demo 

    Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava told CNN during a Sunday night press conference that once the area is safe, search and rescue teams will resume. 

    As of Sunday, the death toll sits at 24, according to the mayor. At least 191 people have been accounted for, but 121 remain missing. 

    * * * 

    Ten days after the condo building in Surfside, FLA. collapsed, search-and-rescue efforts have been suspended as officials prepare to demo the rest of the building ahead of Tropical Storm Elsa

    According to AP News, Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava halted search-and-rescue efforts around 1600 ET Saturday as demolition crews were preparing to demolish the portion of Champlain Towers South still standing. 

    “Search and rescue does have to pause while the demolition preparation is underway,” Cava said at a news conference. “Preparation includes actions like drilling into columns in the unsafe structure.”

    “It has been determined by our engineers and our fire department in constant communication with the demolition team as the process is underway, that we need to put a temporary pause,” she said. 

    “We will begin the search and rescue once again on any sections of the pile that are safe to access as soon as we are cleared,” she added.

    Plans for demolition of the upright portion of Champlain South were accelerated in the last 48 hours as weather models forecast Tropical Storm Elsa could impact South Florida early next week. 

    Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said, “We have a building here in Surfside that is tottering, it is structurally unsound. If the building is taken down this will protect our search and rescue teams.”

    “If the building is taken down, this will protect our search and rescue teams, because we don’t know when it could fall over,” DeSantis said. “And, of course, with these gusts, potentially that would create a really severe hazard.”

    Cava also declared a local state of emergency as Elsa moved west-northwest at 14 mph with maximum sustained winds of 65 mph. The storm’s center is about 85 mph east of Kingston, Jamaica. 

    There remains a lot of uncertainty about the storm’s trajectory after it tracks across central and western Cuba on Monday, then moves near the west coast of Florida on Tuesday and Wednesday. 

    Local and state officials are taking no chances and are set to demolish the remaining portion of the condo building before the storm hits. 

    As of Sunday, the death toll sits at 24, according to the mayor. At least 191 people have been accounted for, but 121 remain missing. 

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 14:10

  • Evacuations Ordered After Thai Plastic Factory Explodes
    Evacuations Ordered After Thai Plastic Factory Explodes

    A massive explosion has rocked a chemical plant in the suburbs of Bangkok early Monday. Authorities have evacuated the surrounding area for fear the thick column of black smoke is highly toxic and secondary explosions may occur. 

    In the early hours of Monday, an unexplained explosion occurred at the Ming Dih Chemical factory located on the capital’s outskirts. The factory produces expanded polystyrene plastic material consisting of small hollow spherical balls that are expanded when molded. The lightweight cellular plastic material is then molded into packaging and storage products to ship goods worldwide. 

    According to the company’s website, its products are mainly used to safely pack televisions, computers, electric tools, household and kitchen appliances, automobile accessories, among other things, in boxes for transport overseas. 

    AP News reports the fire broke out around 0300 local time, with an explosion so large that it blew out windows of surrounding homes and sent debris flying across the area. The blast was reportedly heard miles away. The fire was brought under control by mid-morning, but it ravaged the factory in a stunning inferno for hours. 

    The explosion was captured on a nearby security camera. 

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    Here’s another view of the initial blast. 

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    A better view of the blast via CCTV camera. 

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    The inferno from a firefighter’s perspective. 

    Thick black plumes of smoke were seen from miles away. 

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    Helicopters were called in to dump fire retardant onto the blaze as the fire was too hot for firefighters on the ground to fight. 

    There are still isolated fires and plumes of black smoke visible from the factory. Another concern is that three large chemical tanks may explode. 

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    The blast injured 62 people, including 12 firefighters, and at least one person has been confirmed dead. 

    Compound the loss of this factory in the already stretched global supply chains as exporters in the country who use this company to export their products overseas may have to source styrofoam packing material elsewhere.  

    In the last few days, we should remind readers that an oil refinery in Romania caught fire, a Mexican state-owned PEMEX offshore rig experienced a massive underwater pipeline fire, and a powerful explosion was observed in the Azerbaijani region of the Caspian Sea, known for offshore gas production. 

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 14:00

  • Justice Or Just Desserts? Trump, Cosby, & Georgia Cases Show Rising Cost Of Political Litigation
    Justice Or Just Desserts? Trump, Cosby, & Georgia Cases Show Rising Cost Of Political Litigation

    Authored by Jonathan Turley,

    Below is my column in the Hill on a series of cases that appear propelled by political rather than legal considerations. 

    The costs to the legal system, the public, or victims in such cases are often overlooked but they are considerable.

    Here is the column:

    “It’s not about politics.” New York prosecutor Carey Dunne’s words were repeated like a mantra after this week’s indictment of the Trump Organization and its financial chief, Allen Weisselberg. The problem is that it is manifestly untrue.

    In fairness to Dunne, he is prosecuting a case given to him by his superiors. Nor is he alone in pursuing a case driven more by political than legal considerations. From the prosecution of Bill Cosby to a federal lawsuit against Georgia, courts are dealing with cases where government lawyers repeat the same implausible claims with the same unconvincing results. The political gains from these cases ignore the real costs borne by others.

    The Weisselberg indictment

    Dunne’s statement was made after Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. and New York Attorney General Letitia James paraded triumphantly in front of hundreds of cameras with a handcuffed Weisselberg in their wake. The excitement — if not euphoria — expressed by many in the media was barely containable.

    Weisselberg is charged with failing to pay taxes on executive perks, including cars, apartments and holiday gift accounts; prosecutors added up every possible perk and came up with roughly $1.7 million in taxable benefits. There is no question that such tax violations can be charged criminally; however, if they prosecuted all untaxed executive perks, half of Manhattan would be frog-marched to the hoosegow. That does not make Weisselberg a Mother Teresa figure, but neither does it make him John Gotti.

    More importantly, it does not make him Donald Trump.

    The piling-on of charges clearly is intended to coerce Weisselberg to flip on Trump. However, prosecutors are not investigating anything involving Trump’s election or presidency. Instead, they are investigating another common practice in business — whether Trump undervalued assets for taxes while overvaluing assets for securing loans.

    It simply does not matter what the eventual charges are, however. James pledged to get Trump or his associates on any charge, and she found someone to charge. It is the name on the caption — not the name of the crime — that matters in a prosecutorial trophy kill. (James previously targeted the National Rifle Association.) Politicians like James who run for office by promising to bag political opponents, or their associates, do so at great cost to our legal system and to the concept of blind justice.

    The Cosby ruling

    In Pennsylvania, another prosecutor insisted that politics had nothing to do with a case. Kevin Steele, the Montgomery County district attorney who convicted comedian Bill Cosby in 2018, remained defiant after the Pennsylvania Supreme Court overturned Cosby’s sexual assault conviction on Wednesday.

    In Cosby v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the court found that Cosby was trapped by a “bait-and-switch” after a prior prosecutor assured that he would not be prosecuted if he testified in four civil depositions. Cosby proceeded to incriminate himself and admitted giving drugs to women who alleged sexual assaults. Steele later dismissed that agreement, introduced the incriminating statements, and then called five women to testify about their own uncharged alleged rapes. Those gross errors were allowed by Judge Steven T. O’Neill (who the defense sought to force off the case for bias). O’Neill refused to accept the prior agreement and mocked the notion that “The rabbit is in the hat and you want me at this point to assume: ‘Hey, the promise was made, judge. Accept that.’”

    The state’s justices had no problem “seeing the rabbit in the hat,” nor did many of us who criticized the trial. However, it was hugely popular to disregard Cosby’s legal rights in the first major trial of the #MeToo period, given the magnitude of the accusations against him.

    DA Steele is unapologetic and insists he was trying to show that “no one is above the law — including those who are rich, famous and powerful.” What he missed is that the rule of law should particularly apply to prosecutors who enforce it — and the costs of violating it are borne not just by Cosby but by his alleged victims, who lost any chance for a fair trial and a formal adjudication. The public will pay, too, not just the millions spent on the case but possible damages if Cosby sues for malicious prosecution based on the prosecutor’s public aggrandizing.

    The Georgia lawsuit

    Last week, the Biden administration surprised many observers by filing a civil rights action against the state of Georgia over its recent election reforms. The lawsuit was less surprising than its timing: It was filed just days before the release of Brnovich v. Democratic National Committee, an Arizona case in which the U.S. Supreme Court interpreted the very statutory provision (Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act) being used as the basis in the Georgia challenge.

    The Biden administration has made opposition to Georgia’s law into a rallying cry for its stalled legislative efforts to federalize state election laws. The problem is that President Biden has been long on rhetoric and short on facts in denouncing the law as “Jim Crow on steroids.” The Washington Post awarded him four “Pinocchios” for his characterization of the law, including the false claim that it reduces the hours for voting; the law actually does the opposite. Likewise, Biden falsely claimed Georgia’s law prevents voters in line at polling places from getting water. Georgia was responding to complaints that campaigns circumvent rules barring politicking around polling places by giving food and drinks to voters in line; the law allows “self-service water from an unattended receptacle.” On these and other provisions, Georgia’s law has considerable overlap with provisions in other states.

    In its 6-3 decision upholding Arizona’s election rules, including a bar on vote “harvesting,” the Supreme Court rejected presumptions of racial discrimination due to partisan objectives. Justice Samuel Alito declared “partisan motives are not the same as racial motives.” The ruling builds on earlier cases limiting the reach and meaning of the Voting Rights Act. The new Georgia challenge takes a considerable risk of magnifying these losses in court.

    The legal cost of this ill-considered move could be immense. Important questions are being raised about the impact of some laws on minority votes. Yet the attack on Georgia’s law is a poor choice, despite Biden going “all in” on the narrative, because it locks the administration into proving a weak case. While the court declined to issue a sweeping new standard for all Section 2 voting rights cases, this case could open the door for precisely that type of ruling. The Biden administration — which has lost a remarkably high number of legal cases in its first year — is likely to lose this one, too, before the next presidential election.

    Politically motivated cases like these impose costs that are rarely paid by those who bring them. The more a prosecutor feels it necessary to repeat that “It’s not about politics,” the more likely a case is entirely political.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 07/05/2021 – 13:30

Digest powered by RSS Digest

Today’s News 5th July 2021

  • Escobar: The Long & Winding Multipolar Road
    Escobar: The Long & Winding Multipolar Road

    Authored by Pepe Escobar via The Asia Times,

    The West’s “rules-based order” invokes rulers’ authority; Russia-China say it’s time to return to law-based order…

    We do live in extraordinary times.

    On the day of the 100th anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), President Xi Jinping, in Tiananmen square, amid all the pomp and circumstance, delivered a stark geopolitical message:

    The Chinese people will never allow foreign forces to intimidate, oppress or subjugate them. Anyone who tries to do this will find themselves on a collision course with a large steel wall forged by more than 1.4 billion Chinese.

    I have offered a concise version of the modern Chinese miracle – which has nothing to do with divine intervention, but “searching truth from facts” (copyright Deng Xiaoping), inspired by a solid cultural and historical tradition.

    The “large steel wall” evoked by Xi now permeates a dynamic “moderately prosperous society” – a goal achieved by the CCP on the eve of the centennial. Lifting over 800 million people out of poverty is a historical first – in every aspect.

    As in all things China, the past informs the future. This is all about xiaokang – which may be loosely translated as “moderately prosperous society”.

    The concept first appeared no less than 2,500 years ago, in the classic Shijing (“The Book of Poetry”). The Little Helmsman Deng, with his historical eagle eye, revived it in 1979, right at the start of the “opening up” economic reforms.

    Now compare the breakthrough celebrated in Tiananmen – which will be interpreted all across the Global South as evidence of the success of a Chinese model for economic development – with footage being circulated of the Taliban riding captured T-55 tanks across impoverished villages in northern Afghanistan.

    History Repeating: this is something I saw with my own eyes over twenty years ago.

    The Taliban now control nearly the same amount of Afghan territory they did immediately before 9/11. They control the border with Tajikistan and are closing in on the border with Uzbekistan.

    Exactly twenty years ago I was deep into yet another epic journey across Karachi, Peshawar, the Pakistan tribal areas, Tajikistan and finally the Panjshir valley, where I interviewed Commander Masoud – who told me the Taliban at the time were controlling 85% of Afghanistan.

    Three weeks later Masoud was assassinated by an al-Qaeda-linked commando disguised as “journalists” – two days before 9/11. The empire – at the height of the unipolar moment – went into Forever Wars on overdrive, while China – and Russia – went deep into consolidating their emergence, geopolitically and geoeconomically.

    We are now living the consequences of these opposed strategies.

    That strategic partnership

    President Putin has just spent three hours and fifty minutes answering non-pre-screened questions, live, from Russian citizens during his annual ‘Direct Line’ session. The notion that Western “leaders” of the Biden, BoJo, Merkel and Macron kind would be able to handle something even remotely similar, non-scripted, is laughable.

    The key takeaway: Putin stressed US elites understand that the world is changing but still want to preserve their dominant position. He illustrated it with the recent British caper in Crimea straight out of a Monty Python fail, a “complex provocation” that was in fact Anglo-American: a NATO aircraft had previously conducted a reconnaissance flight. Putin: “It was obvious that the destroyer entered [Crimean waters] pursuing military goals.”

    Earlier this week Putin and Xi held a videoconference. One of the key items was quite significant: the extension of the China-Russia Treaty of Good Neighborliness and Friendly Cooperation, originally signed 20 years ago.

    A key provision: “When a situation arises in which one of the contracting parties deems that…it is confronted with the threat of aggression, the contracting parties shall immediately hold contacts and consultations in order to eliminate such threats.”

    This treaty is at the heart of what is now officially described – by Moscow and Beijing – as a “comprehensive strategic partnership of coordination for a new era”. Such a broad definition is warranted because this is a complex multi-level partnership, not an “alliance”, designed as a counterbalance and viable alternative to hegemony and unilateralism.

    A graphic example is provided by the progressive interpolation of two trade/development strategies, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and the Eurasia Economic Union (EAEU), which Putin and Xi again discussed, in connection with the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), which was founded only three months before 9/11.

    It’s no wonder that one of the highlights in Beijing this week were trade talks between the Chinese and four Central Asia “stans” – all of them SCO members.

    “Law” and “rule”

    The defining multipolarity road map has been sketched in an essay by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov that deserves careful examination.

    Lavrov surveys the results of the recent G7, NATO and US-EU summits prior to Putin-Biden in Geneva:

    These meetings were carefully prepared in a way that leaves no doubt that the West wanted to send a clear message: it stands united like never before and will do what it believes to be right in international affairs, while forcing others, primarily Russia and China, to follow its lead. The documents adopted at the Cornwall and Brussels summits cemented the rules-based world order concept as a counterweight to the universal principles of international law with the UN Charter as its primary source. In doing so, the West deliberately shies away from spelling out the rules it purports to follow, just as it refrains from explaining why they are needed.

    As he dismisses how Russia and China have been labeled as “authoritarian powers” (or “illiberal”, according to the favorite New York-Paris-London mantra), Lavrov smashes Western hypocrisy:

    While proclaiming the ‘right’ to interfere in the domestic affairs of other countries for the sake of promoting democracy as it understands it, the West instantly loses all interest when we raise the prospect of making international relations more democratic, including renouncing arrogant behavior and committing to abide by the universally recognized tenets of international law instead of ‘rules’.

    That provides Lavrov with an opening for a linguistic analysis of “law” and “rule”:

    In Russian, the words “law” and “rule” share a single root. To us, a rule that is genuine and just is inseparable from the law. This is not the case for Western languages. For instance, in English, the words “law” and “rule” do not share any resemblance. See the difference? “Rule” is not so much about the law, in the sense of generally accepted laws, as it is about the decisions taken by the one who rules or governs. It is also worth noting that “rule” shares a single root with “ruler,” with the latter’s meanings including the commonplace device for measuring and drawing straight lines. It can be inferred that through its concept of “rules” the West seeks to align everyone around its vision or apply the same yardstick to everybody, so that everyone falls into a single file.

    In a nutshell: the road to multipolarity will not follow “ultimatums”. The G20, where the BRICS are represented, is a “natural platform” for “mutually accepted agreements”. Russia for its part is driving a Greater Eurasia Partnership. And a “polycentric world order” implies the necessary reform of the UN Security Council, “strengthening it with Asian, African and Latin American countries”.

    Will the Unilateral Masters ply this road? Over their dead bodies: after all, Russia and China are “existential threats”. Hence our collective angst, spectators under the volcano.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 23:50

  • South China Port Congestion Worsens As Traffic Jam Of Container Ships Builds
    South China Port Congestion Worsens As Traffic Jam Of Container Ships Builds

    We have previewed for months that port congestion in southern China could be a more severe problem than the shutdown of the Suez Canal in March. Port congestion at Yantian International Container Terminal, a deepwater port in Shenzhen, Guangdong, is operating at 40% capacity and is seeing vessel delays of more than 16 days, significantly impacting exports to the US. 

    Just outside of Yantian is the Outer Pearl River Delta (OPRD) Area, where the number of container vessels is waiting to access ports on the mainland has hit multi-year highs. 

    At the end of June, 75 container ships were moored in OPRD, surpassing levels from early February of around 35 and about 50 in February 2020. These vessels are waiting for berths to open up at ports. 

    The congestion has surpassed March’s Suez Canal blockage in terms of container disruption with median wait times around 18 days, according to data from project44.

    “From port handling in Yantian alone, the sheer number of containers (not vessels) impacted now exceed the number of containers impacted in Suez,” Lars Jensen, CEO of advisory Vespucci Maritime, said in a post on LinkedIn. 

    Jensen warned: “Add to this ripples such as problems in recent weeks getting new empty containers into South China. Then you will have a pile of cargo in backlog coming out of Yantian once everything re-opens given rise to a surge on the destination side with some timelag. You will have a pile of reefer cargo already on vessels inbound for Yantian but which is now being discharged in other ports increasing the risk that other ports will run out of reefer plugs (as we also saw in early 2020).”

    Meanwhile, international container shipping rates have hit never before seen levels amid a historic global scramble to secure goods and inventory…

    Congestion and soaring shipping costs are more bad news for Walmart, Target, Amazon.com, and top retailers who are now placing holiday orders for Chinese-made merchandise weeks earlier this year, as a global shipping backlog threatens to leave many gift buyers empty-handed this Christmas shopping season.

    The latest shipping data out of China suggest port congestion continues to worsen as supply chain woes are expected through the second half of this year. 

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 23:15

  • The Bay Area Has Become An Absolute Paradise For Violent Criminals
    The Bay Area Has Become An Absolute Paradise For Violent Criminals

    Authored by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse blog,

    Over the past couple of decades, northern California has prospered more than any other area in the country.  In fact, the two wealthiest metropolitan areas in the entire nation are located in northern California

    But even though the region is absolutely swimming in cash, crime is completely and totally out of control and violent criminals are having a field day.  We have never seen the sort of crime wave in the Bay Area that we are seeing now, and it seems to be getting worse with each passing month.

    Let me give you an example of what I am talking about.  According to the local CBS affiliate, the number of car break-ins has risen “by more than 700 percent in some parts of the city”

    Car break-ins have skyrocketed in San Francisco, increasing by more than 700 percent in some parts of the city. With more people visiting after county and state restrictions were lifted, thieves are taking advantage of tourists by breaking into rental cars.

    “Sucky end to our vacation but what can we do,” said Kaitlin Lore, visiting from New Jersey.

    The politicians running the city don’t like to admit this, but San Francisco is dealing with an absolutely massive epidemic of street drug abuse.

    The addicts that endlessly wander the streets are constantly looking for more drug money, and they have discovered that tourists are easy targets.

    So I would not recommend making San Francisco your next vacation destination.

    But of course tourists are not the only ones being hit.  In fact, a news crew was just robbed at gunpoint right in the middle of a television interview

    The attack took place outside City Hall on Monday just hours after the police chief blasted his city’s decision to defund its police department by $18.5 million despite a 90 percent increase in murders.

    The NBC Bay Area news crew was interviewing Guillermo Cespedes at around 3 pm when two armed men tried to take their camera, the Oakland Police Department said.

    It boggles my mind that Oakland politicians would want to slash 18.5 million dollars from the police budget in this environment.

    Shootings are up 70 percent in Oakland and murders are up 90 percent, and so the answer is to radically reduce police funding?

    Are they nuts?

    This is the same sort of thinking that caused California politicians to make all theft below $950 a misdemeanor.  As a result, thieves have learned that they can engage in wild shoplifting sprees as long as they keep the value of goods stolen in each store to under $950…

    A steady increase in shoplifting at big chains like Walgreens and CVS prompted a recent hearing before the Board of Supervisors, with some city leaders expressing shock after hearing how bad things are. One executive said thieves would hit several stores in a day, keeping each theft below the $950 threshold, but stealing more than $30,000 of goods overall. City leaders promised to explore the idea of “aggregating” such crimes for prosecution.

    “Like other retailers,” said a statement from Safeway, “we’ve seen a dramatic increase in shoplifting incidents and losses from shoplifting since California sentencing laws changed in 2014 to make all theft below $950 a misdemeanor when it was previously a wobbler, either a felony or a misdemeanor based on prosecutorial discretion. Enterprising thieves have figured out there are few consequences to shoplifting if they keep the value of their crimes below $950.”

    The shoplifting in San Francisco has gotten so bad that it has started to make headlines all over the globe.

    Politicians will give a lot of speeches about the problem, but don’t expect any real solutions any time soon.

    Meanwhile, homelessness is another crisis that just continues to grow in the Bay Area.

    Even though the region is swimming in more cash than ever before, the number of people camping out in the streets has just kept on climbing.

    At this point, many local residents have had enough.  Just check out the results of one recent survey

    The SF Chamber of Commerce released results Thursday from their annual CityBeat Poll, which asks San Francisco voters a range of questions about the state of the city and their perceptions of it.

    This year’s poll, like last year’s, found 70% city residents saying that quality of life in the city has declined. 80% of residents polled said that addressing homelessness needs to be a high priority for the city, and 88% said that the problem had gotten worse in the past few years.

    Some of the homeless have been herded into a large encampment run by the city, but that has turned out to be a rather expensive proposition.

    In fact, it is being reported that each tent in that homeless encampment is costing the city “$60,000 per year”

    Today in “liberals making wonderful capital allocation decisions with your tax dollar news”…

    It turns out “solving” the homelessness problem that has (along with sky high taxes) been plaguing San Francisco, driving residents out of the city (and state), is a costly endeavor.

    In fact, a homeless encampment run by San Francisco costs the city $60,000 per year, per tent, the NY Post reported this week.

    To put that in perspective, putting each one of those homeless individuals into a $5,000 apartment for 12 months would also cost $60,000 a year.

    If things are this bad in San Francisco now, how bad will they get when economic conditions really start going downhill?

    And if such an incredibly prosperous city cannot solve the problems that I have discussed in this article, how will other less prosperous cities fare as the fabric of our society continues to steadily deteriorate?

    Understandably, a large number of San Francisco residents have chosen to leave the city for good in recent months, and of those that remain 40 percent say that they intend to move out of the city permanently within the next few years.

    If I was living in San Francisco right now, I would definitely be planning to relocate as well.

    But the truth is that the entire country is on the exact same path that San Francisco has gone down.

    So what are you going to do when the conditions that we are currently witnessing in San Francisco seem like they are virtually everywhere?

    As California goes, so goes the nation.

    All around us we can see evidence of America’s decline, and the clock is ticking.

    *  *  *

    Michael’s new book entitled “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 22:40

  • Chicago Restaurants Blame COVID For $100 Minimum Per Person Just To Get A Table
    Chicago Restaurants Blame COVID For $100 Minimum Per Person Just To Get A Table

    This is insanity, driving local public outrage and vows to avoid these establishments: high-end restaurants in Chicago are still blaming COVID social distancing polices for a strictly enforced policy of a $100 minimum for each person to dine.

    “A Chicago man was outraged when he was faced with a minimum payment to eat at a restaurant, and he thinks the rule should go away now that the city is opening back up,” a local CBS affiliate reports. But the rule isn’t going away, many restaurants say while claiming the continued requirement is toward ensuring operations are in line with COVID-related health and distancing measures.

    Via Chicago Eater

    One man interviewed in the report, Howard Tolsky, booked a dinner online for a well-known downtown steak restaurant and was required to pay a minimum of $300 for three total people just to ensure a table there

    “I figured, well, we’re not going to spend $300,” Tolsky said. “We might spend $250. But I don’t want to spend $300 dollars on a meal that costs $250.” He went elsewhere on that basis, telling CBS-2 that “Now is the time for them to attract customers and not detract them.”

    The restaurant itself echoed the policies of a number of other Chicago dining establishments, saying in response to the report:

    “Like many in our industry, we had to make some updates to our policies. The $100 per person minimum will remain in effect to provide the ability to be successful as a steakhouse designed for the full sit-down experience and support our restaurant’s operations and staff.”

    The restaurants say that with the past year of severely restricted numbers on diners they were allowed to seat, last-minute cancelled reservations were especially brutal, causing them to also implement unusual requirements like non-refundable deposits on reserving a table

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    And on top of all this, “Chicago restaurants said of the reservation issues and minimum wage hike, we can expect to see prices rise in the next months or weeks,” the report notes

    Americans are by and large returning to restaurants and entertainment venues in record numbers during this “post-pandemic lockdowns” summer, providing a badly needed revenue boost for an service sector that barely survived. 

    But in Chicago and elsewhere, a family of five for example might think twice going to “$100 minimum” establishments, considering it would be a whopping $500 minimum just to get in and eat.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 22:05

  • The "Deprogramming" Begins: Public Defender Representing January 6th Defendants "Re-Educates" Them
    The “Deprogramming” Begins: Public Defender Representing January 6th Defendants “Re-Educates” Them

    Authored by Daisy Luther via The Organic Prepper blog,

    Remember the potential re-education of Trump supporters that everyone said was a conspiracy theory? Welp, it turns out (as I said in this article where I “blew someone’s comment on social media out of proportion,”) it’s a fact. So far on a small scale. But having Americans re-educated politically in any way smacks of communism. Particularly problematic is that it’s been done on the taxpayer’s dime.

    Defendants in the Jan. 6th Capitol case are being deprogrammed by their own lawyer.

    A public defender named H. Heather Shaner, we’re assured by Ryan J. Reilly of the Huffington Post, has no option but to defend the January 6 “attackers” because “who can’t afford their own attorneys, as guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution and as laid out in the Criminal Justice Act.”

    But she’s also taking the opportunity to re-educate her clients, so they aren’t racist anymore.

    “Reading books and then watching these shows is like a revelation,” Shaner told HuffPost. “I think that education is a very powerful tool … So I gave them book lists and shows that they should watch.”

    Shaner said her clients had poor educations and knew very little about the country. Her two female clients took to the task with zeal, Shaner said and got library cards for the first time in their lives.

    “Both my women are like, ‘I never learned this in school. Why don’t I know about this?’” Shaner said. (A couple of the male clients weren’t quite as eager students, she said. “The men are very much like ‘Oh, I’ll get to it.’” But she said some of her male clients have been doing some self-education.) (source)

    S0, if I understand this correctly, those poor dumb hick women just needed someone to help them see the error of their ways and introduce them to the joy of the public library, but the men refused to be womansplained to?

    And how was this case race-related? It was purely political.

    Shaner represents six of more than 500 Capitol defendants: Anna Morgan-Lloyd, Annie Howell, Jack Jesse Griffith (aka Juan Bibiano), Israel Tutrow, and Landon Kenneth Copeland.

    What’s on the reading/movie list?

    Shaner’s re-education program points out many of the worst moments in history (not just American history) to convince these white folks they have been racist. The program suggests the Capitol protest (even though it was based on what many believe to be a fixed election) happened due to their inherent racism.

    Different political views? Get ready to face persecution.

    While one of the books mentioned was not set in the United States, most will agree the rest showcase some low points in American history. However, when combined and forced upon a client by an attorney to “reform” them, it seems to be the beginning of another low point in America – the persecution of those guilty of having a different political opinion.

    It assumes all Trump supports are actively racist and therefore need to be shown the error of their ways.

    While Huffington Post cheers the actions of Shaner, not everyone agrees that the indoctrination of clients the government pays one to defend is an acceptable course of action.

    Note: It would be as challenging to contest American Greatness as unbiased as it would be Huffington Post. So let me be clear when I say both of these sources have their own political agendas. But here, we like to take a look at both sides of the issue.

    Let’s take a look at the other side of this.

    Small newspapers across the country widely picked up an article written by Julie Kelly for the website American Greatness. Kelly wrote a powerful argument about the danger of Shaner’s actions. Here are a couple of excerpts:

    Shaner’s legal captives are learning the hard way what the government will do when one resists their commands to comply. Not only have their personal lives been shattered, finances depleted, and reputations destroyed by an abusive Justice Department investigation, Shaner’s clients must be indoctrinated with leftist propaganda about America’s alleged systemic racism.

    The purge of the populist mindset is underway, courtesy of the fetid Beltway judicial system and the Joe Biden regime. Judges routinely lecture January 6 defendants about the wrongthink of a “stolen election” while prosecutors openly mock their political beliefs, including homeschooling and gun ownership

    …On the face of it, there’s nothing wrong with watching or reading any of Shaner’s “booklist.” What is very wrong is a taxpayer-paid attorney—one who is supposed to fight the government’s charges related to January 6, not play along with its phony depiction that “white supremacists” attacked the Capitol—using her authority to reprogram the political views of people she is supposed to be defending. The presumption of racist beliefs is automatic. (source)

    You support who? You must be racist.

    Anyone who supported Trump – no – let me rephrase that – anyone who did not emphatically denounce Trump – was deemed “crazy” and “racist.” By the very nature of their political beliefs, conservatives are looked down upon by tech giants, the mainstream media, and our government. And, this has been the case ever since Trump announced his run for the presidency.

    Thinking outside the far leftist box is akin to treason, and people who do so are now being treated like traitors in a country that was founded on freedom of thought.

    Politically correct prosecution?

    Kelly cites Joshua Rothstein, the assistant U.S. attorney handling one of Shaner’s cases, who said, “We don’t prosecute people based on their beliefs.”

    But we all know that’s not really true…

    Meanwhile, approximately 800 people breached the Capitol, and 500 are facing federal charges. Doesn’t that seem a bit skewed?

    More woke, less white…?

    Look at the ever-increasing lists of things we’re not supposed to say because someone, somewhere, might take offense. Businesses like Coca-Cola and Disney are re-educating their employees to be more “woke” and “less white.”

    Disney is pushing critical race theory on employees through a new plan called “Reimagine Tomorrow.” The program urges workers to recognize their “white privilege” in a battery of training modules on topics such as “systemic racism” and “white fragility,” according to internal documents obtained by City-Journal’s Christopher Rufo.

    Staffers are told to reject “equality” for “equity.” They must “reflect” on America’s “racist infrastructure” and “think carefully about whether or not [their] wealth” is derived from racism, according to the documents. (source)

    If we’re fighting against each other, we can’t stand up beside each other.

    That, of course, is the goal. It’s “othering” at its finest, and it sets us up for civil war or the quiet disappearance of conservative views. 

    People have been put in a difficult place. Speak up, and you’re likely to lose your job. Disagree, and you’re deemed a heinous racist, homophobic, or some other flavor of bigot. That’s what cancel culture is all about – silencing anyone who dissents with the threat of social and financial destruction. The deprogramming of Trump supporters and the re-education of white people to believe we owe penance to every person of other races is dangerously divisive. 

    I’m not a huge government supporter, preferring instead to govern myself. However, our government was designed to have checks and balances to keep the pendulum from swinging too far to one side. Currently, that system is being overridden, and re-education is just the start.

    *  *  *

    Daisy Luther is author of Be Ready for Anything and The Prepper’s Book of Lists

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 21:30

  • Model S Plaid Caught Fire "While Driver Was At The Wheel", Local Fire Chief Says
    Model S Plaid Caught Fire “While Driver Was At The Wheel”, Local Fire Chief Says

    Over the last 48 hours, we have been documenting the story of an allegedly spontaneously combusting Tesla Model S Plaid that became engulfed in flames in a Philadelphia suburb last week.

    Now, according to Charles McGarvey, chief fire officer for the Lower Merion Township Fire Department, it has been revealed that the driver was at the wheel when the vehicle went up in flames, according to CNBC

    We also learned from the new report that it took two crews of firefighters “just over 3 hours” to deal with the fire. Firefighters took the 2021 Tesla Model S Plaid to a complex to safely store it overnight after the fire, the fire chief said. The owner is going to have the vehicle investigated independently and McGarvey’s team has been in touch with Tesla, and will be releasing more information via public records soon, he said. 

    The NHTSA also commented for the first time, telling CNBC it was “aware of the Tesla vehicle fire in Pennsylvania and is in touch with relevant agencies and the manufacturer to gather more information about the incident”. 

    “If data or investigations show a defect or an inherent risk to safety exists, NHTSA will take action as appropriate to protect the public,” a NHTSA spokesperson told CNBC. 

    Earlier this weekend the owner of the vehicle’s lawyer spoke out, claiming the vehicle “burst into flames while the owner was driving” it. The driver of the vehicle has been identified as an “executive entrepreneur” who is being represented by Mark Geragos, of Geragos & Geragos.

    Geragos said that the driver wasn’t initially able to get out of the vehicle because its “electronic door system failed”, requiring the driver to push and use force to open the door.

    He said the car moved for 35 to 40 feet before “turning into a fireball”. He called it a “harrowing and horrifying experience”.

    “This is a brand new model… We are doing an investigation. We are calling for the S Plaid to be grounded, not to be on the road until we get to the bottom of this,” Geragos said. 

    separate source reported that the Tesla belonged to a top executive at one of Tesla’s biggest investors. The driver was identified in that report as Bart Smith, also called the “Crypto King” by CNBC, who works as the head of the digital asset group at trading firm Susquehanna International.

    Susquehanna owned about $1.1 billion worth of Tesla shares as of March 31, the report noted. 

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 20:55

  • "Happy Birthday America"
    “Happy Birthday America”

    Authored by Eric Utter via AmericanThinker.com,

    The U.S. Capitol building has been an iconic symbol of democracy for well over two hundred years, much like the U.S. itself.  It remained so through the Civil War, World Wars I and II, and too many lesser crises to count, all while remaining largely accessible to the citizens whose interests those who work there are supposed to represent.  However, this Independence Day finds the Capitol off-limits to all but a select few.  Our elite overseers can’t be expected to open themselves up to a possible “insurrection,” can they?  Sad.

    The tragic events of the past year and a half, and our “representatives'” reaction to them, as well as our own response, have left me wondering what the Founders and other astute political observers might say to us now if they had the chance.  

    Then I realized they would say pretty much what they said back then.  Here are some of the most profound, universal — and yet timely — words of wisdom ever uttered with regard to societies, governments, and freedom:

    “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” —Benjamin Franklin.  COVID-19?

    “Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech.” —Benjamin Franklin.  

    Sound familiar?  I wonder what Franklin’s preferred pronouns were.

    “For true patriots to be silent, is dangerous.” —Samuel Adams.

    “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.” —Thomas Jefferson.

    “But a constitution of government once changed from freedom can never be restored.  Liberty, once lost, is lost forever.” —John Adams.  

    We might want to take this one to heart.

    “When the people fear the government there is tyranny, when the government fears the people there is liberty.” —John Basil Barnhill.  

    One of the great truisms of all time.  

    “My definition of a free society is a society where it is safe to be unpopular.” —Adlai Stevenson.  

    Stevenson was a Democrat.  He would’ve been summarily canceled today.

    “Certainly one of the chief guarantees of freedom under any government, no matter how popular and respected, is the right of citizens to keep and bear arms.” —Hubert H. Humphrey.  

    Trigger warning!  Humphrey was a Democrat!

    “When plunder has become a way of life for a group of people living together in society, they create for themselves in the course of time a legal system that authorizes it, and a moral code that glorifies it.” —Frédéric Bastiat. 

    We are seeing this now with our elites on Wall Street, in Big Tech, and in government.  So sad.  

    “The urge to save humanity is almost always a false face for the urge to rule it.” —H.L. Mencken. 

     The most accurate description of leftists ever stated, in my humble opinion.  No truer words have ever been spoken.

    “I hope we once again have reminded people that man is not free unless government is limited.  There’s a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: as government expands, liberty contracts.” —Ronald Reagan.  

    Absolute and irrefutable.

    “Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves.” —Abraham Lincoln.

    “We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth.” —Abraham Lincoln.

    The last quote is from Lincoln’s message to Congress on December 1, 1861.  It is just as true today.  We are once again at a tipping point, an existential moment.

    And I leave you with another quote, this one from Toby Keith’s new song, “Happy Birthday America”:

    “Seems like everyone’s pissin’ on the red, white, and blue.  Happy birthday America, whatever’s left of you.”

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 20:20

  • OPEC On Verge Of Collapse After Saudis, UAE Refuse To Budge
    OPEC On Verge Of Collapse After Saudis, UAE Refuse To Budge

    Is the world about to go through another 2014 Thanksgiving massacre when OPEC collapsed sending the price of oil crashing and unleashing a brief if catastrophic wave of destruction across the US shale sector?

    That’s what commodity traders are wondering this long weekend when just two days after the UAE refused to fall inline with the rest of OPEC+, late on Sunday, in a Bloomberg TV interview, Saudi Prince Abdulaziz said that “we have to extend,” referring to the deal agreed upon by all but the UAE on Friday, according to which oil production would be increased by 400kbd over the next few months, while also extending the broader production quota agreement until the end of 2022 for the sake of stability: “the extension puts lots people in their comfort zone” said the Saudi, adding that Abu Dhabi was isolated within the OPEC+ alliance.

    “It’s the whole group versus one country, which is sad to me but this is the reality”, the Saudi summarized the potentially explosive situation, which has seen Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates crank up the tension in their OPEC standoff which as Bloomberg summarizes, has left the global economy guessing how much oil it will get next month.

    The bitter clash between the Saudis and UAE has forced OPEC+ to halt talks twice already, with the next meeting scheduled for Monday, putting markets in limbo as oil continues its inflationary surge above $75 a barrel. With the cartel discussing its production policy not only for the rest of the year, but also into 2022, the solution to the standoff will shape the market and industry into next year.

    While traditionally the oil cartel has been shy of publicity, keeping its spats behind close doors, on Sunday the fight between the two key producers broke into public view with both countries, which typically keep their grievances within the walls of the royal palaces, airing their differences on television, with Riyadh insisting on its plan, backed by other OPEC+ members including Russia, that the group should both increase production over the next few months, while also extending the broader agreement reached in the aftermath of the oil price collapse of 2020 until the end of 2022 to avoid a production glut.

    Just hours earlier, the Emirati energy minister, Suhail al-Mazrouei, again rejected the Saudi-proposed deal extension, supporting only a short-term increase and demanding better terms for itself for 2022.

    “The UAE is for an unconditional increase of production, which the market requires,” Al-Mazrouei told Bloomberg Television earlier on Sunday. Yet the decision to extend the deal until the end of 2022 is “unnecessary to take now.”

    What happens next is binary: while on one hand, Abu Dhabi is forcing OPEC into a difficult position: accept its requests, or risk unraveling the cartel without an output agreement in place, which would squeeze an already tight market, sending crude prices sharply higher. But only briefly because as Bloomberg notes, a more dramatic scenario is also in play – a repeat of Thanksgiving 2014 – when OPEC risks breaking down entirely, risking a free-for-all that would crash prices in a repeat of the crisis last year. Back then, it was a disagreement between Saudi Arabia and Russia that triggered a punishing price war, which according to some sparked the March 2020 liquidation panic, not the covid shutdown panic.

    Speaking to Bloomberg, Prince Abdulaziz said that without the extension of the agreement there’s a fallback deal in place  under which oil output doesn’t increase in August and the rest of the year, potentially risking an inflationary oil price spike. Asked if they could hike production without the UAE on board, Prince Abdulaziz said: “We cannot.” Which, of course, is false: should OPEC collapse it will be every oil exporter for themselves, and after a brief price spike oil will crater once again.

    According to Bloomberg, OPEC+ nations, oil traders and consultants have been stunned by the severity and duration of the fight, and the apparent lack of communication between the two. Prince Abdulaziz said he had not spoken to his counterpart in Abu Dhabi since Friday — even as he insisted he remained his friend. “I haven’t heard from my friend Suhail,” he said, adding he was ready to talk. “If he calls me, why not?” Asked if more senior officials had been in touch, he declined to comment.

    At the center of the dispute is a word key to OPEC+ output agreements: baselines. Each country measures its production cuts or increases against a baseline. The higher that number, the more a country will be allowed to pump. The UAE – a relatively minor oil producer – says its current level, set at about 3.2 million barrels a day in April 2020, is too low, and says it should be 3.8 million when the deal is extended into 2022.

    That, however, is a non-starter to Saudi Arabia and Russia, which have rejected re-calculating the output target for the UAE, fearing that conceding to one member would prompt everyone else in OPEC+ to ask for the same treatment, unraveling the deal that took several weeks of negotiations, and the the help of U.S. President Donald Trump as broker, with the ultimate outcome being another glut of supply.

    Prince Abdulaziz suggested that Abu Dhabi was cherry picking its new output target, and it would set a bad precedent. “What kind of compromise you can get if you say my production is 3.8 and this is going to be my base,” he said.

    For its part, Abu Dhabi – which in April 2020 accepted its current baseline – said it doesn’t want the straitjacket to stay on for even longer, arguing that it has spent heavily to expand production capacity, attracting foreign companies too.

    Meanwhile, as OPEC+ bickers, a potential wildcard is the flood of even more oil supply: Iran is expecting to return to the oil market as soon as it reaches a nuclear deal with Biden, boosting global supply by several millions barrels of oil.

    And so, markets remain on edge ahead of the next OPEC+ virtual meeting scheduled for Monday at 3 p.m. Vienna time, although Prince Abdulaziz suggested it wasn’t set in stone. He wouldn’t comment on the chances of finding a consensus, saying he would work hard to seek one. “Tomorrow is another day.”

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 20:02

  • Watch: Powerful Explosion Rocks Azerbaijan's Umid Gas Field In Caspian Sea
    Watch: Powerful Explosion Rocks Azerbaijan’s Umid Gas Field In Caspian Sea

    Moscow-based news website Gazeta reports a powerful explosion has been observed in the Azerbaijani region of the Caspian Sea, known for offshore gas production.  

    A powerful explosion took place in the Azerbaijani sector of the Caspian Sea. At the moment, there is no official information about the incident. According to local media, the explosion allegedly took place at the Umid gas field. – Gazeta

    The incident occurred at 2130 local time, with multiple videos show a large explosion.

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    A photo from Russian news agency TASS shows a dramatic picture of the fireball. 

    A security analyst in Yerevan, Armenia, Neil Hauer, tweeted: “Massive explosion off the coast of Azerbaijan in the Caspian Sea. Reportedly occurred in the Umid gas field, Azerbaijan’s second-largest.”

    Aurora Intel said the video from “Umid Gas Platform shows the platform itself is safe and the explosion is off in the sea in her vicinity.” 

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    They suggested it may be a tanker that exploded, but it’s only speculation at the moment. 

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    In the last few days, we should remind readers that an oil refinery in Romania caught fire and a Mexican state-owned PEMEX offshore rig experienced a massive underwater pipeline fire. 

    *This story is developing, and questions swirl at what caused the massive explosion.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 19:45

  • Target To Close Stores Early In San Francisco Due To Chronic Shoplifting
    Target To Close Stores Early In San Francisco Due To Chronic Shoplifting

    Authored by AllahPundit via Hot Air,

    Normal store hours are 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. They’re cutting back to 6 p.m. because, the company claims, “for more than a month, we’ve been experiencing a significant and alarming rise in theft and security incidents at our San Francisco stores.”

    Only a month? Walgreens has closed 17 stores in San Francisco since 2016 because it didn’t pay to keep them open with so many locals taking the five-finger discount. Target’s new policy raises the ominous possibility that the problem is getting worse, which would make sense. With the pandemic all but over in the highly vaccinated Bay Area, more thieves may be out and about lately.

    Read this post for background on San Francisco’s problem with shockingly brazen shoplifting.

    A state law that passed several years ago made it a misdemeanor to steal less than $950 worth of goods, a wrist-slap that’s encouraged repeat offenders. Go figure that three California cities (San Fran, L.A., and Sacramento) are among the top 10 in the United States for organized retail crime. Not all of the theft is organized, of course — sometimes it’s random homeless people or addicts acting alone — but a surprising amount is being driven by rings selling the stolen merchandise on the black market.

    And so the cost of doing business in the Bay keeps rising, and not just for Target:

    Target has now acknowledged that San Francisco is the only city in America where they have decided to close some stores early because of the escalating retail crime

    Target isn’t the only store in San Francisco to make changes because of the continuous shoplifting. After 10 p.m. the 7-Eleven on Drumm St. in the Financial District only does business through a metal door. But first you have to ring the bell to let them know you’re outside.

    “This window was installed like two to three months ago because it was not safe. Sometimes they would break that glass of the door,” explained Manager Bobby Singh.

    That’s from KGO, which also reports that San Francisco PD has exactly one officer assigned to the organized crime “task force.”

    Shoplifting isn’t the only form of theft that locals need to contend with:

    SFPD’s Central Station reported auto burglaries skyrocketed 753% in May compared to the same time last year during lockdowns and they’re still up 75% compared to the same period in 2019

    “They don’t even care. They tell us what the hell are you going to do,” said [a] tourism operator who did not wish his business to be identified.

    One family who did not wish to be identified showed KPIX 5 pictures they took as they witnessed thieves in action just before pulling into a parking lot on Embarcadero and Bay Street.

    Visit beautiful San Francisco and take in the sights: The Golden Gate Bridge, Fisherman’s Wharf, and random derelicts doing smash-and-grabs on parked cars in broad daylight. According to a survey conducted by the local chamber of commerce, 70 percent of city residents say their quality of life is down over the past few years and 44 percent say they’re likely to move within the next few.

    Mention this subject on social media and progressives will come out of the woodwork to try to convince you that it’s fine or that it’s … not actually happening. At least, not as rampantly as the media hype would have you believe. Crime data compiled by the local PD suggests shoplifting is down since 2019 — but is that because it’s happening less or because some stores aren’t bothering to report it anymore due to inaction by the police and D.A.?

    While shoplifting incidents haven’t surged this year or last, the rate of shoplifting incidents ending in citations or arrests did go down — a continuation of a decline that goes back at least as far as January 2018, the earliest month included in SFPD’s detailed incident data.

    The San Francisco Police Department did not return a request for comment on the shoplifting data, and why citations and arrest rates are declining. However, in a recent Board of Supervisors meeting, police officers said that shoplifters are getting more brazen, and that shoplifting incidents are likely underreported.

    If the shoplifting wave is a figment of our collective febrile imagination, what’s the theory for why Walgreens bugged out of the city and Target is now scaling back hours? If that’s due to economic factors rather than crime — sky-high rents, difficulty hiring — we’d expect many more local businesses besides convenience stores to be reacting similarly. Are they?

    It’s possible, I suppose, that the sort of brazen theft customers have repeatedly witnessed in San Francisco convenience stores tells us nothing about how common shoplifting is in the city. San Fran might not have an unusual number of thieves, just an unusually bold cohort of them. But that would defy common sense. A culture in which theft can happen with so much impunity that perpetrators are willing to commit the crime in front of security guards, while bystanders record them on smartphones, is a culture in which we’d expect to see a high rate of shoplifting. If the deterrent to larceny is weak, there’ll be more larceny. Yet lefties assure us that it’s just not so.

    Here’s local news reporting on the new Target policy.

     

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 19:10

  • Here Are The Best And Worst Performing Assets Of The First Half
    Here Are The Best And Worst Performing Assets Of The First Half

    As we enter the second half of the year, a quick look at asset returns in June, Q2 and the first half shows that it has been a stellar performance across most financial markets, with 33 of the 38 non-currency assets tracked by Deutsche Bank moving higher over the last three months in local currency terms.

    Having been left for dead in much of 2020, it should come as no surprise that the star performer in both H1 and Q2 was oil, with WTI up +51.4% and +24.2% respectively. Even in June it was up +10.8%. On the other end, Gold (-6.8% YTD) saw its worst month in June (-7.2%) since November 2016 with the Federal Reserve’s hawkish shift allaying concerns about inflation that had been very supportive for the precious metal. Silver (-6.8%) lost ground too, but the losses weren’t just confined to precious metals, with the industrial metal of copper (-8.1%) experiencing its worst monthly decline since March 2020 when the initial pandemic selloff took place, amid a Chinese crackdown on commodity prices, but it was still up +7.5% in Q2 and +22.1% YTD keeping it near the top of the pile.

    Meanwhile, a favorite of many traders in 2021, DB’s Jim Reid notes that the reopening trade stumbled in Q2 and especially in June with the delta variant spreading. This is best highlighted in more micro numbers with the Euro Stoxx Travel & Leisure index -8.4% in Q2 on a total returns basis, bringing to an end a run of 4 successive quarterly gains as it recovered after the pandemic. Meanwhile in the US, the S&P 500 airlines index is down -11.4% over Q2 and -11.6% in June, similarly ending a run of 4 quarterly advances.

    Despite the June swoon in reflation stocks, equities overall had another decent month for the most part that saw them cement their YTD gains, with the S&P 500 (+2.3%) and the STOXX 600 (+1.5%) both rising on a total returns basis in June, leaving their gains for the quarter at +8.5% and +6.8% respectively.

    To round things off, after climbing 82.7bps in Q1, 10yr USTs rallied -27.2bps in Q2. Where this goes in Q3 is probably one of the most important variables going forward as it will tell us a lot about inflation, growth, delta, the Fed and more generally about the funding glue that holds financial markets together.

    Last but not least, and sadly not on the Deutsche Bank graph, Bitcoin continued to deflate as it fell for a 3rd consecutive month with another -5.7% decline, and was down -41.3% in Q2 meaning it is now ‘only’ +19.3% YTD having been +123.7% at its intraday peak on April 14.

    In terms of other currencies, the main story for June was the dollar’s +2.9% gain after the Fed meeting saw the median dot bring forward the first hike into 2023, which (in the reverse image of gold) is the currency’s best month since November 2016. However, for the quarter as a whole the dollar remains -0.9% lower. EM currencies also saw some pretty sizeable moves, with the Brazilian real strengthening +13.4% over Q2 against the US Dollar, whereas the Turkish Lira fell another -2.5% in June as part of its 5th consecutive monthly decline.

    The sovereign bonds in the DB sample all remained in negative territory on a YTD basis, though Q2 saw a more divergent performance as Treasuries (+1.9%) and gilts (+1.8%) recovered, whereas their European counterparts including bunds (-0.4%) and BTPs (-0.8%) lost ground. Separately in credit, HY has continued to outperform on a YTD basis.

    And here is the performance charted for the month of June in local currency and in USD…

    … Q2…

    … and YTD.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 18:35

  • The New State Of Play Post Biden/Putin
    The New State Of Play Post Biden/Putin

    Authored by Tom Luongo via Gold, Goats, ‘n Guns blog,

    Sometimes the significance of events doesn’t hit you until far after the event took place. One of the hardest parts of this job is knowing when not to write about a subject and let it sink in for a bit rather than burp out the first thing that comes to mind. It also helps to spend that time considering what others say on the subject.

    The Saker’s thoughtful post on the outcome of the Biden/Putin summit is worth your time.  He rightly points out that the main outcome was a signal from Biden’s team, and handlers, that the hyper-aggressive war against Russia going on since 2013 is now over.

    … what Biden did and said was quite clearly very deliberate and prepared. This is not the case of a senile President losing his focus and just spewing (defeatist) nonsense. Therefore, we must conclude that there are also those in the current US (real) power configuration who decided that Biden must follow a new, different, course or, at the very least, change rhetoric. I don’t know who/what this segment of the US power configuration is, but I submit that something has happened which forced at least a part of the US ruling class to decide that Obama’s war on Russia had failed and that a different approach was needed. At least that is the optimistic view.

    I have some ideas about who actually ordered this shift in tone which has become readily apparent in the weeks since the meeting. More on that in a bit.

    This summit was the signal of the major shift in policy.  Kissinger is no longer the driving force intellectually for U.S. foreign policy.  Divide and conquer hasn’t worked.

    As Alex Mercouris brought up in my talk with him recently, the likely main offer made on Biden’s behalf by Jake Sullivan to his Russian counterpart, was to cut Russia in on the infrastructure deals in Africa if Russia would loosen ties to China. China is the new pivot for U.S. foreign policy.

    If that offer was made then it was a calculated move to tell Putin that the U.S. was unserious about changing the dynamic between them.  I think there was a lot more said than just this. But Putin didn’t say it directly to Biden. This summit was a ceasefire in the war against Russia, a typical move to retrench and rethink options after a major defeat. That defeat was not ginnng up a war in the Donbass.  The two events are intimately connected.

    In fact, that show of force and ultimatum by Putin to NATO (and more specifically The Davos Crowd) in Ukraine is what catalyzed this summit in the first place. Between that and the collapse of the COVID-19 narrative were all the excuse needed to publicly pivot U.S. aggression from Russia to China.

    This was a major summit, with hundreds of people on both sides, as The Saker points out, that took months to put together. My initial reaction to it was that nothing substantive had changed. A ceasefire with Russia isn’t an end to the war with her so, what changed exactly.

    That’s why I took some time to think things through.

    In order to understand my broader point I’m about to make you have to see things from Davos’ point of view and their goals. I took the time to work through this in Part I of a recent podcast series I did to lay the background out (listen to it here).

    Most importantly, keep in mind that Davos isn’t a monolithic organization under complete control of puppet master WEF Chair Klaus Schwab. It is, at best, a loose coalition of interested parties all looking for their piece of the globalist pie. And it only hangs together for as long as Schwab et.al. win and continue doing so.

    Davos sees the best path now for them to complete their Great Reset agenda comes from placing the U.S. and China on an irrevocable path to war. Making a temporary peace with Russia is part of that plan. It’s also a major defeat for Davos.

    Russia has refused to fight the war Obama’s started and MI-6 ran during the Trump Interregnum on Davos’ behalf. It played the long game of freezing the conflict in Ukraine while allowing the political attrition to take its toll on everyone involved. It also allowed Russia the time necessary to complete its strategic theater dominance in Eastern Europe now having hypersonic missiles capable of neutralizing any thought of NATO air superiority.

    Culturally, Russians understand how to deal with this type of European aggression.  The Russian people have pride in themselves but are not nationalistic, i.e. they are not subsumed by cultural hubris the same way both China and Europeans/Americans are. This is a critical difference in understanding why events have played out as they have.

    European/American ethnic hubris is nothing new. However, anyone who doubts my read on the Chinese in this respect, I only have to remind you of how easy it was to blow up Japanese/Chinese relations in 2012 over the Senkaku islands, which led to vandalism against Toyota and Honda dealerships… over nearly worthless rocks.

    So, by this calculus, now that Ukraine refused to show up for the war Davos threw, war with Russia is off the table for the time being and the pivot to China commences.  You have to force an existential crisis on Russia to get them to fight and failing that there is no point in pursuing it directly.  Putin made the point very clearly that any aggression in the Donbass would be an act of war which would not end at the contact line in Gorlovka.

    Their response would target the real enemy, NATO. And this is why both nothing changed and everything changed with this summit.

    Davos is still going to run their script of destroying the U.S. and China by pitting them against each other while trying to pull off the full-blown remaking of Europe into a technocratic supranational police state. On that last part, they are more than 80% of the way there.

    But, at the same time, the only reason for the European Union’s existence as it has been sold to Europeans is to prevent any further devastating wars fought on European soil. If Putin threatened a wider war with NATO he assured them Russia would this time win, then the whole rationale for the EU vaporizes like the first F-16 or logistics center hit by a Kinzhsal missile.

    Rock meet hard place, Herr Schwab. For once someone else presented you with a no-win scenario.

    So, in order to insure that Russia remains placated and happy to reopen somewhat normal relations with the EU, Biden was sent to Geneva to craft a face-saving summit and co-sign a simple statement committing to reopening arms control talks, coordinating on terrorism and not nuking Europe.

    Part II of my podcast series went over in detail the whys and hows of the summit in much more detail.

    The two exceptionalist-minded empires, the U.S. and China, make for much easier adversaries to spark into conflict because of the intense need for both sides not to lose face. For the U.S. as the global ‘hegemon’ losing face is a clear loss of potency. When you rule the hierarchy through dominance and fear, any moment of weakness is deadly.

    It’s why Putin’s intervention in Syria, the freezing of the Donbass and reunifying with Crimea were so significant. They were a series of events which blew holes in the perception of U.S. potency. And since then it has been one brush fire after another which has not panned out.

    As The Saker rightly points out in his article, Biden took a big hit with the Davos-controlled media for not “standing up to Putin.” And it was significant that that they even entertained that calculus no less made the diplomatic overtures. It’s why I feel my analysis of the situation is right. Only a real, credible military threat by Putin could have forced the outcome we saw at Geneva.

    That said, weakening Biden and the U.S. only to sets the stage for when he or (more importantly) his Republican/mid-term successor has to confront China for real.

    Now that I’ve laid that out, did anyone miss the Fed’s surprise hawkish statements released the same day as the Biden/Putin summit?  

    Did anyone not notice the extreme reaction to the supposed nothingburger statements from the FOMC?  

    All the Fed did was move a couple of dots on the rate forecast ‘dot-plot’ and bump IOER and RRP up by 5 basis points.

    And yet the Euro crashed into the end of Q2 and opened Q3 still crashing.  And yet the Yen was thrashed. And yet, everyday more people jump on the bandwagon highlighting the huge run up in the Fed’s Reverse Repo Facility. Since that announcement what was a record amount of reverse repos at around $450 billion has more than doubled to just under a trillion.

    Since the Fed no longer reports Excess Reserves of the banking system we have no idea how much has flowed into those either. In short, a measly 5 basis points drained at least half a trillion in dollar liquidity in less than two weeks.

    And too many people can’t make the connection.

    The dollar spiked to a significant bullish monthly reversal in June. The Fed followed up Powell’s statement with Bullard’s to ensure the technical reversal in the minds of currency and bond traders.  

    And the question is why?

    Just before the meeting I told my Patrons I thought at some point the Fed would have to come in and defend the U.S. dollar. Biden’s consistent trashing the dollar for Davos simply couldn’t stand forever.

    I’ve written in the past about what Davos’ Great Reset plans are for the commercial banks, to scapegoat them for the next crisis and throw them to the angry Millennials they’ve taught to hate all things not-Marxist and be pilloried on the altar of egalitarian envy. And honestly, it’s not like these fucking people deserve anything less for what they’ve done to the world.

    But at the same time, they still have allies and cards to play. And that means the Fed may align with Davos on some issues but not all of them. And I think it’s clear to everyone now that this is the plan and that plan is not workable.

    The Fed is now ready, I think, to go to war with Davos over the future of money and they aren’t ready to hand over the keys to the candy store to a bunch of European commies, at least while also cutting Wall St. out completely of the New World Order.

    Part III of the podcast series goes over the Fed’s moves and how it ties into what comes next.

    The plan is pretty obvious at this point: hand over the keys to capital formation to the central banks and destroy all risk assessment. Commercial banks aren’t needed.  Only socially acceptable projects going forward will get funded. This is what Christine Lagarde wants with her new all-European Green Stock Exchange she introduced at Ankara last week.

    But what’s clear to me now is that Davos went for the boob too fast on Prom Night at the Eschaton.  It’s too much, too soon and the acceleration is exposing its flanks.  Why would China and the U.S. go to war over COVID-19 and trade issues when they are being manipulated into it by a bunch of feckless Eurocrats with delusions of adequacy.

    Why not turn on them first, at a minimum, wipe them out with a wave of your hand, i.e. 5 basis point rise in RRP, and remind everyone where the real power in the markets lies.

    It’s hard to ignore what’s happened during the week of June 16th both geopolitically and monetarily.  There are no coincidences here.  If Powell hadn’t blown up the markets that week then I would be writing a different take on the Putin/Biden summit today.

    But he did so I am.

    So many people mischaracterize the Fed’s policies.  They miss the global significance of what they do by hyper-focusing on bad and misleading U.S. economic data. But the dollar is the global reserve currency, a point Martin Armstrong makes every single day, and that means Fed policy is made in the context of global capital shifts and politics.

    Most analyst myopia comes from their training. They’ve trained a particular skillset and because of that miss the bigger picture. They get lost in the miasma of low-quality, conflicting and purposefully confusing domestic data and miss the bull rampaging through the political china shop.

    What’s lacking, for example, in The Saker’s analysis of Geneva is looking at it, for the most part, from a monolithic Russia v. U.S. perspective, while ignoring the bigger picture of who is vying for control over the monetary system. This isn’t a rebuke, it simply isn’t his top priority.

    But it is a rebuke of those trained in these areas to know better.

    Geopolitics stems from control over the flow of capital, not the other way around.  So, when you see big changes on both fronts from one major player like the U.S. it means something. The U.S. changed it’s stance on Russia while also course correcting monetary policy and throwing markets into a tizzy on the same freaking day!  

    That’s why you have to do the multi-variant analysis of ALL the players, not just the two dominant ones and analyze all of their motivations. This was a story so big I took two hours of podcasts to scratch the surface of it.

    The bottom line is this: I maintain that Powell isn’t the same kind of globalist other Fed chairs have been, like Yellen and Bernanke. His private equity background marks him with a different mindset and set of priorities than his predecessors. That means he may be more willing to buck Davos when the time is right.

    That understanding along with Davos’ needle-scratch mistakes has a lot of powerful people questioning the plan. It can easily explain why the cracks are beginning to widen as to who should actually be in charge after this is all done.

    The real war now isn’t between the Empire and Zone B.  Or the Commies vs. the Conservatives.  It’s Davos against itself and we are now, unfortunately, caught in the middle between these factions.

    All hierarchies built on force are meta-stable.  Up until recently Davos maintained its control because it competently managed all of the players, moving pieces where they needed them.  Now, they’ve made fatal errors — COVID, Trump, Brexit, NS2, Russia’s intransigence, the JCPOA, Syria, Ukraine, — and from where I sit it looks like the various factions are going all Knives Out on each other, quickly.

    And as Daniel Craig said so eloquently in that movie, “I do suspect… foul play.”

    I don’t doubt for a second Powell would crash the global economy in 2021 to protect Wall St. and back China down.  I also don’t think he was given the green light to do so by Biden. I think he was told to fire a warning shot by, for lack of a better term, Wall St.

    If Davos listens to that in the same way the Brits listened to Russia’s warning shots at the HMS Defender in Crimean waters recently than the expect a full salvo at Jackson Hole. Can anyone say 25 basis points?  

    Biden and Obama have been told to pull back and refocus on China by Davos, but those behind Powell are setting them up for a massive backlash for the mid-terms.  

    The smartest thing for Xi Jinping to do during all of this is nothing. If he is truly interested in carving up the world and not replacing the U.S. with a Chinese hegemony then these next few months of turmoil in the West will prove that.

    Given his recent actions and statements, however, the likelihood of that is slim.

    The more things change…well, you know the rest.

    *  *  *

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    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 18:00

  • "Activist Athlete" Gwen Berry Made Rape Jokes And Mocked White People, Mexicans And Asians In Old Tweets
    “Activist Athlete” Gwen Berry Made Rape Jokes And Mocked White People, Mexicans And Asians In Old Tweets

    Once again, the liberal strategy of mining someone’s Twitter from years prior to find “un-woke” statements to implicate them, cancel them and ruin their future has come back to bite the SJW crowd in the back. 

    Gwen Berry, most recently known as a self-proclaimed “activist athlete” because she turned her back to the national anthem and U.S. flag at U.S. Olympic Team trials for the hammer throw looks as though she may not have always been so concerned with virtue signaling as she is now.

    According to new Tweets unearthed by the NY Post, Berry made disparaging remarks about Asians, Mexicans and white people.

    “Mexicans just don’t care about ppl,” she wrote in a Tweet in November 2012.

    In another Tweet from 2011, she wrote: “This lil white boy being bad as hell!! I would smack his ass then stomp him!! Smh #whitepplKids hella disrespectful.”

    “Just saw this gurl wearing heels with white socks!! What the Hell..#chineseppl always try to start new trends..smh..ggguuurrrllll,” she also wrote in 2011. 

    She also made a joke about rape in 2012, Tweeting: “I’m about to rape my lunch. [Shout out] to all the females that’s gon get drunk, get recked by 4 dudes, then cry rape this weekend.” 

    The posts came before her Olympic career, the Post article notes, and when she was in her 20’s. However, we all know that such items would not have been – and have not been – off limits for a “woke” SJW that will use any excuse to cancel someone that doesn’t surrender to their ideologies. 

    But for some reason, we feel like Berry will be overlooked and won’t get the same treatment. Recall, even the White House came out and defended Berry’s actions last week, with WH press secretary Psaki stating, on behalf of President Biden: “He would also say, of course, that part of that pride in our country means recognizing there are moments where we as a country haven’t lived up to our highest ideals, and it means respecting the right of people granted to them in the Constitution to peacefully protest.

     

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 17:25

  • Stockman: No, We Weren't All Born Yesterday
    Stockman: No, We Weren’t All Born Yesterday

    Authored by David Stockman via Contra Corner blog,

    According to the mainstream narrative, we were all born yesterday. There is no such thing as context, history or critical analysis – just cherry-picked short-term data-deltas, which are held to be either awesome or at least much improved from last time.

    That’s why we predictably got this headline from the Wall Street Journal with reference to today’s June employment release, which allegedly showed “employers added 850,000 jobs last month”: Stocks Tick Higher With Strong Jobs Report

    Well, no, it wasn’t and they (employers) didn’t.

    In fact, total hours worked in June actually declined from the May level, and, far more importantly, were still down 4.4% from the pre-Covid peak in February 2020.

    When expressed in total hours, there is absolutely nothing “strong” at all about the numbers. To wit, at the end of Q2 2021 total hours employed in the nonfarm economy were still down 8 billion hours from the Q4 2019 level.

    That’s right. Eight billion worker hours are MIA, yet the lazy shills at the WSJ, Bloomberg, Reuters et. al. keep pumping out bilge about an awesome economic rebound!

    Actually, what has never been noted notwithstanding the fact that it sits there in plain sight on the BLS website is that Dr. Fauci and his economy wreckers dug a far deeper hole in the main street labor market last spring than the narrative led you to believe. At the pre-Covid peak in Q4 2019, the nonfarm economy utilized 257.2 billion labor hours at an annualized rate, but that plunged by nearly -12% to just 227.6 billion hours in Q2 2020.

    So doing, Fauci & Co wiped out all of the aggregate nonfarm labor hours gain since Q4 2011. That is to say, it obliterated the awesome gains that had been contained in 102 monthly Jobs Friday reports in the interim. And now, after $4 trillion of freshly printed fiat cash and $6 trillion of stimmies and other bailouts and free stuff only 73% of the state-imposed shrinkage of hours worked has been recovered as of June 2021.

    Indeed, the not-at-all awesome June jobs report was even more squirrely than usual. Our memory may fail, but we are quite sure that back in the day, June was the time when school let out. The city kids all got to got to go to the beach, and we farm kids got to pick the berries, cherries, sweetcorn, cucumbers, peaches and tomatoes, as they took their turn in rotation.

    Perhaps, no longer. The BLS claims that state, local and private educational institutions went on a hiring binge during June, bringing on a total of 269,000 new teachers to superintend presumably empty classrooms!

    Moreover, when you add in the 192,000 bartenders and waiters who were rehired in June, that adds up to 461,000 jobs or 54% of the ballyhooed 850,000 gain during the month.

    Meanwhile, when it comes to the high pay, high productivity jobs in construction, manufacturing, mining and energy, not so much. Those sectors accounted for 23.338 million jobs in May and reported an increase of, well, 20k jobs in June. That’s a 0.0008 gain, if you have your HP 12c set to four decimal places.

    More importantly, the 20.358 million goods producing jobs reported for June were still down by 780,000 from the pre-Covid peak in February 2020; and, on the more appropriate and accurate hour-based measurement, employment in the goodsproducing sector truly remains mired in the dumps.

    Thus, the index of aggregate hours worked for June (black line) was down by -6.4% from its 2019 interim high, and off by -21.1% from its turn of the century level, -23.1% from its all-time peak in March 1979 and down by -4.8% from the level first attained in, well, May 1947!

    You can’t make this up. Employment in the goods-producing sector of the US economy has been dying on the vine for a half century. And even as these jobs paid a living wage of $56,000 per annum in the month of June, the purchasing power of those paychecks was no higher than January 1979 on an inflation-adjusted basis (purple line).

    In summary, after real wages in the goods-producing sector doubled between 1947 and 1979, what has followed is one-half century of real wage stagnation, coupled with a 23% shrinkage of hours worked. That alone should ixnay the “strong” and “blow out” descriptions that have been used hundreds of times in the interim to describe the Jobs Friday reports.

    Real Weekly Earnings Versus Aggregate Weekly Hours, Good-Producing Sector, 1947-2021

    Then again, there is truly no mystery as to where the Fed’s endless injections of fiat credit have come out in the wash. For three decades, the nation’s central bank has been primarily inflating financial asset prices on Wall Street, not jobs, incomes and prosperity on main street. And that’s especially been the case since the pre-crisis peak in Q4 2007, when today’s $8.1 trillion Fed balance sheet stood at just $800 billion.

    For want of doubt, you only need to ponder the message of the chart below in order to ascertain what an 8X increase in the Fed’s balance sheet has actually generated. Since Q4 2007, cumulative gains have been as follows:

    • Nonfarm Labor Hours (red line): +4.3%;

    • Nonfarm Output (black line): +24.8%;

    • Nominal GDP (blue line): +50%;

    • NASDAQ 100 (purple line): +600%

    Q.E.D.

    Do these knuckleheads have the slightest idea that this is their true handiwork?

    Really, is there any more proof needed that all of their lunatic money-pumping never actually leaves the canyons of Wall Street?

    Cumulative Gains Since Q4 2007: Stocks Versus Main Street

    So we perforce return to the central topic. Namely, that the Fed’s MOAAR inflation mantra is one of the most perversely idiotic and inequitable public policies ever imposed by an arm of the state.

    In fact, hitting the “averaged over time” 2.00% inflation goal remains the only reason for the Fed’s $120 billion per month of what amounts to financial fraud. After all, with employers from coast-to-coast scrambling to find workers, continued money-pumping is surely not needed to further the so-called “full-employment” goal. For crying out loud, private employers are already on it.

    Then again, would it be too much trouble for these power-intoxicated, groupthinkinebriated dolts to examine exactly what their pro-inflation policies have actually produced? And we mean over an extensive period of time where the cumulative impact can be clearly observed?

    Well, here’s an inflation-targeting stopper if there ever was one. During the approximate half century since real hourly rates peaked in 1972, the average American worker has been on the mother-of-all-treadmills:

    Change From 1972 Through 2020:

    • Nominal hourly wages: +533%;

    • Real hourly earnings: +2.2%

    It doesn’t get any more dramatic than that. Even the proverbial squirrel in the cage would have gotten the bends after that 50-year journey to nowhere.

    50-Year Trend: Nominal Versus Inflation-Adjusted Hourly Earnings

    As is evident in the chart above, the Fed made a cataclysmic mistake in the 1990s and thereafter. Due to the high inflation of the 1970s and to a lesser extent through the 1980s, nominal hourly wage had tripled between 1972 and 1995, when Mr. Deng’s shiny new export factories were cranking up with ultra-cheap labor drained out of China’s endless rice paddies and peasant villages.

    And, thank you, all that 200% gain in nominal wages had not done domestic workers one damn bit of good. In 1995, real hourly wages (purple line) were actually 18% below the level that had obtained in 1972, when Fed Chairman Arthur Burns, to his everlasting shame, grabbed his ankles upon Nixon’s presentation of what amounted to an election year bar of soap.

    Nixon got his temporarily booming economy and landslide election victory, of course, but that had also set up the hard hats, Nixon labor Dems and forgotten middle class like sitting ducks vis a vis the new Chinese (and Mexican et. al.) export factories. By the mid1990s the dollar wage gap was now enormous—so what was needed was deflation of domestic prices, wages and costs, not more of the same.

    As it happened, under Greenspan’s phony “disinflation” policies and then Bernanke’s formal inflation-targeting regime thereafter, the domestic price level was inflated by another 70% or 2.14% per annum between 1995 and 2020. What that meant was fully two-thirds of the gain in average hourly wages during that period was eaten-up by domestic inflation when the order of the day should have been wringing out some of the staggering 240% increase in the domestic price level that had occurred between 1972 and 1995.

    Yes, inflation-adjusted hourly wage rates (purple line above) did manage to crawl back to their 1972 starting point by 2020, but at the expense of another doubling of nominal wage rates. That is to say, the Fed’s idiotic pro-inflation policies drove the wage gap between domestic factories and the new low wage export economies dramatically wider. In all, average dollar wages in the US were 533% higher by 2020 than they had been when Nixon destroyed the gold-backed dollar in 1971-1972.

    Needless to say, when the average domestic wage rate went from $3.90 per hour in 1972 to $24.68 per hour in 2020 at absolutely no purchasing power benefit to workers, it left corporate executives with no choice except to outsource and off-shore to the maximum feasible extent. And that set in motion the hollowing out of America’s industrial economy.

    The chart below is surely the smoking gun implicit in the Fed’s Faustian bargain. That is, it got its fetishistic 2.00% inflation and showered the household sector with cheap debt to augment living standards that would have otherwise diminished owing to the export of good jobs.

    As a result, real consumption spending (PCE) for goods rose by 87% or 3.0% per annum between Q1 2002 and Q1 2021. Yet during the same 19 year period, the industrial production index for manufacturing rose by only 9% or barely 0.41% per year.

    Needless to say, we are not talking here about some marginal item that is better produced abroad where some venue has comparative advantage as Adam Smith originally saw it. To the contrary, this is the entire goods economy and for all practical purposes the growth in consumption of goods during this century to date has been supplied by imports.

    It is no wonder, therefore, that the burned out zones of the rust belt voted for “high tariff man” Trump. Twice.

    Real PCE For Durables Versus Manufactured Goods Output, Q1 2002-Q1

    2021 In throwing good-producing workers under the China/import bus, the powers that be urged them to make up the difference by buying stock. Wall Street had plenty of rapidly inflating shares on offer, and the Donald could not stop telling workers to check their 401ks.

    But here’s the thing. To ride the drastically inflated stock market higher, you had to have material savings to invest, and growing wages to allocate to investment rather than current consumption.

    Alas, American workers had neither. When Greenspan was nominated to head the Fed in July 1987, the average wage was $9.12 per hour and the NASDAQ 100 index stood at 196. That is, it took about 22 hours of work to buy the index.

    At the close of June 2021, the average hourly wage– as we learned this AM—was $25.68 per hour, while the NASDAQ 100 had taken flight to another financial planet, posting at 14,554. That is, it now took 566 hours of work to buy the index or 26X more than when Greenspan inaugurated wealth effects monetary policy.

    To paraphrase a famous black panther slogan of the 1960s, trickle-down might have been televised on CNBC, but it most definitely did not happen.

    Number Of Worker Hours to buy the NASDAQ-100, 1987-2021

    What happened, of course, is them’s that had, got.

    Our friend Tim Knight, who publishes at the must read Slope of Hope, captured the moral of this story about as well as can be said, while his accompanying chart truly does tell you all you need to know.

    Well, if you weren’t born yesterday.

    The economy, the capital markets, and wealth distribution have become more grotesquely-distorted, perverted, and warped than at any other time in human history. I have written about this endlessly and prefer to simply point you to this page where I’ve stacked up countless charts to make the point about the maldistribution of wealth.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 16:50

  • Watch: Video Captures "Unintentional Discharge" Of Fireworks On Maryland Beach
    Watch: Video Captures “Unintentional Discharge” Of Fireworks On Maryland Beach

    A stunning video has surfaced on social media showing an explosion of fireworks on a Maryland beach Sunday morning. Beachgoers ran for their lives when a premature detonation of fireworks occurred around 1100ET. 

    Ocean City Fire Department said the “unintentional discharge” occurred when employees of a fireworks company were handling fireworks for tonight’s Downtown fireworks event. 

    During the unintentional discharge, employees of the fireworks company received minor injuries and refused transport to the hospital by Ocean City Paramedics. No beach or boardwalk patrons were injured.

    “Our Fire Marshals are on the scene and will investigate the cause of the unintentional discharge,” said Ocean City Fire Chief Richie Bowers. “Prior to the fireworks being off loaded from the vehicle, Fire Marshals secure a safe zone around the fireworks and put other safety protocols in place. It is this very zone and safety protocols that kept anyone else from being injured,” he concluded. – Ocean City Fire Department said in a statement. 

    The video captured by one beachgoer shows the dramatic explosion that appears to briefly transform the beach, packed with thousands of tourists, into a warzone. 

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    After the “unintentional discharge,” Ocean City Fire Marshals have “canceled all firework shows” in the beach town, located down the street from President Biden’s vacation home in Rehoboth Beach, Deleware. 

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 16:15

  • CHS On July 4th: Sorry, America, You Lost Me
    CHS On July 4th: Sorry, America, You Lost Me

    Authored by Charles Hugh Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,

    Star Wars 24 plus the novelized version, amusement park ride, podcast, action figure and OnlyFans pages, anyone?

    I happened to be in a Big Box Emporium, buying two bags of whole wheat flour, when a strange revelation struck me: almost nothing in this giant emporium was made in the USA. Apologists will quickly point out that the two bags of whole wheat flour were “made in the USA,” and note the US-made items in the food, liquor and beverage aisles; but wander out of these aisles and tell me how many of the hundreds of items are made in the USA (not assembled of foreign components, but made entirely in the USA). The answer is very few.

    I suppose this fact is unremarkable to the majority of Americans, but my reaction was, sorry, America, you lost me: how is this not insane to depend on sweatshops thousands of miles away to make virtually everything on the shelves and warehouses of the U.S.?

    It’s as if a war was declared on manufacturing in America and we lost–or simply surrendered.

    If you want to buy a bulldozer or electric vehicle, you can Buy American, and if you buy an iPhone, the firmware is conjured in Cupertino (the phone is assembled in China of components sourced globally). But below a certain price point and outside the snacks, magazines and beer aisles, U.S.-made good are “special order” if they’re available at all.

    Is this because the foreign made stuff is so high quality? No, it’s virtually all garbage quality. A war was declared on quality, and America lost. Virtually nothing on the shelves of America’s Big Box Emporiums and fulfillment warehouses is durable; it’s either designed to fail (planned obsolescence) or it’s so poorly made that it breaks, fades, rips, tears, delaminates or fails, and is dutifully hauled to the landfill as part of the entire Landfill Economy. (Forget trying to repair it; it’s been designed to be impossible to repair, and all the components are junk, too.)

    If stuff breaks or fails in short order, it isn’t cheap, no matter what the price says. It’s expensive because it must be constantly replaced. A war was declared on value, and America lost. Sorry, America, you lost me. How is the transition from quality and value to junk not a complete disaster for the nation?

    So what is the business of America? Marketing. Everything boils down to marketing in America. Everything is a channel to collect consumer data that can be monetized (no, you can’t monetize your own data; that’s not how it works) or a channel to upsell anyone ensnared in the value chain.

    You may naively think an iPhone is a device for phone calls and texts. Silly you! It’s nothing but a channel to upsell you Apple services. The “settings” on my old SE still have a nag notice because “setting up” your iPhone means signing up for Apple TV, Apple Music, Apple Pay, Apple Skim and Apple Scam.

    My Mom-in-law is in her 90s and like many in her age group, she enjoys watching TV. She lives with us and so we handle the cable TV subscription for her. She asked us to get the commercial-free English-language network from Japan, NHK, and of course this is only available in a package of rubbish channels.

    Since I have a basketball hoop for my fitness amusement and have long been a roundball fan, I clicked to the NBA channel listed. It was nothing but a series of moronic adverts. I tried again later, nothing but moronic adverts. I gave up on the third try, because it dawned on me that apparently this channel doesn’t actually televise any actual basketball, it only promises to do so at some later date; and in the meantime, here is an endless stream of moronic adverts.

    Sorry, America, you lost me. Marketing and upselling is not prosperity or success, it’s ruination.

    The list of channels that are nothing but data mining, marketing and upselling is endless in America. Every subscription service is nothing more than a channel to upsell you on “Premium services.”

    Social media: nothing but data mining, marketing and upselling.

    Internet Search: nothing but data mining, marketing and upselling.

    Media, telecommunications, banking, etc.: nothing but data mining, marketing and upselling. Look at the most profitable and highest valuation corporations in America, and their sole business model and reason to exist is data mining, marketing and upselling.

    The Healthcare Borg is also nothing but data mining, marketing and upselling. If you want to get a look indicating profound suspicion of your motives and beliefs, tell your healthcare provider, “I’m over 65 and don’t take any meds.” Within the Borg, such a statement can only mean 1) you haven’t yet signed up for Medicare/Medicaid, and we need to get you in the gravy-train pronto; 2) you’re some kind of nutcase who refuses medications, or 3) you’re a dangerous subversive who should be reported to Facebook as a potential extremist.

    The Healthcare Borg’s marketing has reached extremes of absurdity. Practitioners are under extreme pressure from Corporate HQ to bill you for something on a regular basis, and so I received increasingly frantic phone calls and emails demanding I set up a telemarketing, oops, I mean telemedicine confab with my PCP (primary care physician–the Borg loves acronyms as much as the Pentagon).

    I halfway expected to be accosted on the street by thugs informing me to make a telemedicine appointment or “we’re gonna have to break something.” Sorry, America, you lost me. When healthcare stopped being about nurturing health, especially via basic preventative measures, and became a profit center and marketing channel, the well-being of the nation spiraled into the sewer.

    While I foolishly waited for a basketball game to appear on the NBA channel–how naive of me!–I clicked through a few movie channels. The offerings were the most recent batch of the super-hero genre. As a huge fan of action films, I had hopes these might reverse my disinterest in the genre. Nope. The movies were not bad, they were simply… uninteresting and derivative.

    Sorry, America, you lost me. Everything that’s a derivative of something that was creative and fresh decades ago is uninteresting, and virtually everything is a derivative. America is subjected to a remake of a remake of a remake, with a switch of media being the supposed creative magic.

    Star Wars 24 plus the novelized version, amusement park ride, podcast, action figure and OnlyFans pages, anyone?

    America’s cultural obsession with super-heroes made me wonder, in a dangerously subversive fashion, what this means beneath the superficiality of reaping reliable profits. Does it now require super-human powers to survive the onslaught of exploitation, profiteering, overwork and exposure to fanatical marketing, data mining and upselling that is life in the USA?

    Or does this cultural obsession reflect our fear that we’re so far gone down the road of worshiping billionaires blowing billions on space tourism that only super-heroes can save us?

    Sorry, America, you lost me. Many readers will write all this off as the sour rantings of some out-of-it geezer. But ask yourself: what if everything said here is correct, but nobody dares talk about it because that might make it real?

    *  *  *

    If you found value in this content, please join me in seeking solutions by becoming a $1/month patron of my work via patreon.com.

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    Read excerpts of the book for free (PDF).

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    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 15:40

  • Biden Insists "We're Not Sure" Russians Behind Ransomware Attack On 200 US Companies
    Biden Insists “We’re Not Sure” Russians Behind Ransomware Attack On 200 US Companies

    “We’re not sure if it’s the Russians,” President Biden said Friday in response to the latest allegations that a ‘Russian-linked hacker group’ targeted some 200 US companies in a massive ransomware attack. But he’s vaguely promising a “response” if Kremlin links can be found.

    This latest major incident unveiled at the end of this past week is being described as akin to “SolarWinds with ransomware,” which paralyzed the networks of the US companies. Wired explains the inevitability that the “the two dominant cybersecurity threats of the day— supply chain attacks and ransomware—would combine to wreak havoc.” It’s also being called “colossal” in scope and appears to involve blackmail payment demands just as in prior major breaches.

    Wired writes further of the aftermath as details continue to fall into place, “That’s precisely what happened Friday afternoon, as the notorious REvil criminal group successfully encrypted the files of hundreds of businesses in one swoop, apparently thanks to compromised IT management software. And that’s only the very beginning.”

    Via Reuters: Joe Biden departs Air Force One as he arrives in Traverse City, Michigan, on Saturday.

    The hack targeted the Florida-based software management firm Kaseya, which said Friday afternoon it was the “victim of a sophisticated cyberattack” which caused it to immediately alert all of its clients to shut down their impacted servers. The US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) quickly said it’s launching an investigation the same day, “taking action to understand and address the supply-chain ransomware attack against Kaseya,” according to its statement.

    Soon after disembarking Air Force One, Biden appeared a bit confused but also bluntly insisted there’s no certainty it was the Russians: “First of all, we’re not sure who it is for certain, number one,” he said while being peppered with reporters’ questions over the then developing incident:

    “I’ll be in better shape to talk to you about it—hang on a second,” the president said as he reached into his pocket to pull out a note card.

    “I’ll tell you what they sent me, OK?” the president continued. “First of all, we’re not sure who it is for certain, number one.”

    “And the fact is that I directed the intelligence community to give me a deep dive on what’s happened, and I’ll know better tomorrow. And if it is, either with the knowledge of and/or a consequence of Russia, then I told Putin we will respond,” Biden said.

    Here’s his awkward interaction with reporters inside a store during a Michigan stop…

    Based on his quickly referencing the initial intelligence he was sent, the president seemed to clearly confirm that US agencies have reached no conclusions on Russian involvement as yet, despite a slew of media reports hastily pointing in that direction, as is usual.

    Biden reiterated this position when asked about phoning President Putin over the new breach:

    Asked if has spoken with Russian President Vladimir Putin about the hack, Biden said he has not.

    “I haven’t called because we’re not certain. And the initial thinking was it was not the Russian government, but we’re not sure yet,” Biden said.

    He had said he “got a brief as I was on the plane and that’s why I was late”. The FBI is also said to be involved in probing the large-scale cyberattack which is being called by cyber security specialists a “colossal and devastating supply chain attack.” 

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    According to multiple reports that emerged over the weekend, the hacking collective REvil is demanding that victim companies pay $45,000 in the cryptocurrency Monero to gain back access to their systems, warning that the payment will double each week they fail to pay up.

    Despite Biden denying anything conclusive pointing to Russia being behind it, US mainstream media will undoubtedly hype a “Kremlin attack” through Sunday into Monday, which will in turn likely put more pressure on the administration to more aggressively put blame on Russian intelligence and in turn “take action” – evidence or not – likely in the form of more sanctions. The president has so far ordered a top level investigation into the ransomware attack.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 15:05

  • Trump Promises To Restore Free Speech In America
    Trump Promises To Restore Free Speech In America

    Authored by Melanie Sun via The Epoch Times,

    Former President Donald Trump warned at his third “Save America” rally on Saturday night that Americans no longer have free speech, describing a powerful system “for media and online censorship” that only presents the Democratic Party’s view of politics, including that Trump is attacking democracy by discussing potential election fraud.

    “We have a truly sick election system, it’s got to be changed,” the 45th president told thousands of supporters gathered in Robarts Arena in Sarasota, Florida.

    “Remember this, I am not the one trying to undermine American democracy,” he said in response to the legacy media and Democrat claims.

    “I am the one trying to save American democracy.”

    Democrats and Republicans have exchanged barbs since the chaotic 2020 election, which Trump maintains he will not concede, awaiting the results of a complete audit for Arizona’s Maricopa County that has been run independent of the secretary of state’s office. Additional audits are expected to follow in other jurisdictions.

    “We can’t let them take away our free speech so we can[‘t] talk about corrupt elections. Otherwise you’ll have … that’s communism. That’s what they do in these communist countries, you have no voice,” Trump warned.

    Communist and socialist states like Cuba and Venezuela remain embroiled in repeating cycles of contested elections, with their populations split between recognizing two heads of state, and both sides of politics accusing the other of election fraud.

    “Democrats used COVID to cheat. They illegally changed the rules in key states. They stole the votes,” Trump continued.

    “They abolished signature verification requirements, created a powerful system for media and the online censorship of their opponents, and did everything possible to facilitate fraud just like you would do in a third world country. That’s what happened with this election.”

    Trump gave special mention to the Right Side Broadcasting Network (RSBN), which was suspended by YouTube from live-streaming to their channel for a week just hours ahead of the rally. RSBN has carried feeds of Trump’s public appearances since July 2015. Following the suspension, the company migrated to the video platform Rumble to stream Trump’s speech.

    The former president also mentioned how left-wing billionaires had allegedly funded unsecured drop boxes in the 2020 election. He named Facebook as an example, referring to reports that Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, partly funded a nonprofit that irregularly distributed $350 million to nearly 2,500 election officials in 48 states and the District of Columbia, which could have helped increased voter turnout for Democrats.

    People listen to former U.S. President Donald Trump during a rally in Sarasota, Florida, on July 3, 2021. (Eva Marie Uzcategui/Getty Images)

    Trump, true to the stated mission of his “Save America” campaign office, said he will continue working to help secure support for “Republicans or MAGA” in the upcoming 2022 elections, with the goal of retaking the House and the Senate.

    But in order to do so, the 75-year-old said that actions are needed to restore trust and transparency for all Americans in the nation’s election systems.

    “We got them by surprise in 2016. And then they work for four years to make sure it didn’t happen again,” Trump said of the Democrats, accusing them of election fraud.

    He again questioned President Joe Biden’s vote count, saying that he found it hard to believe that Biden got more votes from black people than President Barack Obama. Trump said that, like many other things including the Wuhan virus lab leak theory and his border policies, he believes his claims about a “rigged election” will be proven right.

    “I wonder what I will be proved right about next. Perhaps it will be the election, perhaps,” he said.

    Trump said that Republicans around the nation are uniting around efforts to secure future elections, by progressing legislation to demand voter ID, universal signature signature verification, citizenship confirmation, chain of custody integrity controls, and updated voter rolls.

    “That’s before the elections, not after the elections,” Trump added, amid his criticism of Democrat actions passed ahead of the 2020 election to expand voter access that he said in effect reduced voter security in the name of needing to allow people to vote from home during the pandemic.

    He said that Republicans “will restore the right to free speech in America again, which we don’t have.”

    Hundreds of Trump’s supporters had lined up for the event overnight, with a large crowd staying until past 8 p.m. for Trump’s speech despite a thunderstorm ahead of Tropical Storm Elsa.

    Trump remarked that if American voters had faith in the integrity of the 2020 election, he wouldn’t have so many people still attending his rallies.

    “If we lost the election … I wouldn’t have a crowd that goes beyond what the eye can see, that stays in a thunderstorm,” he said of the crowd.

    He then joked that some of the women in attendance were “a mess” from the pouring rain, adding “but the truth is, you look more beautiful now than you did when you went to the beauty parlor … You’re real, it’s great.”

    People wait for former President Donald Trump to speak at a rally in Sarasota, Florida, on July 3, 2021. (Eva Marie Uzcategui/Getty Images)

    He also dismissed legal efforts launched by New York prosecutors to bring charges against his company, the Trump Organization, and its chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg over “fringe benefits.”

    “It’s really called prosecutorial misconduct. It’s a terrible, terrible thing,” Trump said of the legal efforts, contrasting them against cases of murder and human trafficking that he said were not pursued to the full extent by prosecutors. Weisselberg has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

    Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis did not join Trump at the rally after both decided the state leader would remain in South Florida to oversee recovery efforts for the condominium collapse at Surfside and preparations for Elsa, according to state GOP Chairman Sen. Joe Gruters, local media reported.

    Trump’s speech was followed by a fireworks display in celebration of Independence Day, when “56 brave patriots at Philadelphia proudly declared our independence and boldly proclaimed the eternal truth that we are all made equal by the almighty hand of our creator,” Trump said.

    “With the spirit of July 4, 1776 stirring in our souls … We will make our elections free and safe again, we will make America powerful again, we will make America wealthy again, we will make America strong again, we will make America proud again, we will make America safe again, and we will make America great again,” he said in his closing remarks.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 14:30

  • US Rolls Back More Sanctions On Iranians With Vienna Talks Still Stalled
    US Rolls Back More Sanctions On Iranians With Vienna Talks Still Stalled

    After last month quietly dropping sanctions on multiple Iranian entities amid ongoing nuclear negotiations in Vienna, the US Treasury Department on Friday announced the removal of sanctions against three more Iranian officials who have now had their access to their US assets restored.

    However, like prior moves toward sanctions relief, the Biden administration is claiming this has nothing to do with Vienna nuclear talks, which have appeared stalled over the past weeks, given lack of any monumental breakthroughs and with both sides threatening to cut things off as neither side wants things to drag on indefinitely.

    AFP/Getty Images

    According to Axios, “Treasury officials said Behzad Ferdows, Mehrzad Ferdows and Mohammad Reza Dezfulian should not be sanctioned but that the roll back had nothing to do with ongoing indirect talks on reviving the 2015 nuclear deal.”

    “Their assets had been blocked under Executive Order 13382, which focuses on proliferators of weapons of mass destruction and their supporters,” the report noted. 

    An unnamed Treasury official had sought to assure Reuters: “These delistings do not reflect any change in U.S. government sanctions policy towards Iran. They have nothing to do with ongoing JCPOA negotiations in Vienna.”

    The attorney representing the three Iranians had argued the US had “insufficient basis” for their initial designation, and thus he said “there was a dismissal of the claims” based on the legal flimsiness of the case.

    Meanwhile, a feeling of distrust seems to continue to pervade the atmosphere in Vienna, given that days ago the Iranian side said it is requiring a “guarantee” that the US doesn’t unilaterally leave the JCPOA deal again, as President Trump did in May 2018, after which unprecedented numbers of sanctions were slapped on Tehran.

    The talks have gone on for three months and six rounds. Both sides have strongly signaled they wish to see a finalized restored deal before Iran’s new president, hardline cleric Ebrahim Raisi takes office.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/04/2021 – 14:05

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Today’s News 4th July 2021

  • Why Isn't The US Preparing For EMP War Like The Rest Of The World?
    Why Isn’t The US Preparing For EMP War Like The Rest Of The World?

    Authored by Jeff Thompson via The Organic Prepper blog,

    You’re likely already familiar with the 2009 EMP Commission Report. It was this report that raised the issue of EMP-preparedness for the American public. It’s notorious stating that just one year after an EMP attack, 90% of the American population would be dead, caused alarm throughout multiple sectors of society.

    Books began to be written on the subject. Sales of Tedd Koppel’s Lights Out, Forstchen’s One Second After, and Crawford’s Lights Out quickly reached blockbuster levels. And while I believe that these books (and that report) brought the issue of an electromagnetic pulse to light for Americans, I don’t believe it showed Americans just how real of a threat it is.

    To truly understand just how very real of a risk this is, I believe all we have to do is look at the battle plans of some of the nations that hate America most.

    Let’s start with Russia

    **Non-Contact Warfare was the name of Russian General Vladimir Slipchenko’s military textbook. Within this text, he explains how EMPs are the greatest revolution in military affairs in history. According to Slipchenko, the possession of an EMP renders an enemy’s armies, navies, and air forces completely obsolete, and it’s hard to argue with him there.

    If you can’t get your missile defense systems online, if your tanks won’t run, if your planes have all just fallen out of the sky, you’re kind of screwed, aren’t you?

    The flagship journal of the Russian General Staff, Military Thought, further echoes this concept. An article within the journal titled “Weak Points of the US Concept of Network-Centric Warfare” specifically points out the use of an EMP as a possible means of defeating the US.

    Aside from the concern that comes from foreign military journals, specifically hatching battle plans against your country, Russia now possesses what is known as a “Super-EMP.” A weapon of drastically increased pulse amplitude capable of disabling spacecraft, radar sites, ICBMs, energy supply systems, military command systems, and economies as well.

    And to top things off, it’s designed as a first-strike weapon—just food for thought. As of 2017, the US had no Super EMPs (that the public was aware of).

    What About China? 

    Things are no different here. EMP capabilities, theory, and defenses seem to be going relatively fast here, just like Russia.

    In the PLA textbook The Third World War – Total Information Warfare, author Shen Weiguang notes the importance of developing China’s EMP defenses to neutralize and check the US if needed.

    Other Chinese military journal articles specifically state that the US “is more vulnerable than any other country in the world” to EMP attacks. I believe that this singling out of Americans should cause eyebrows to be raised.

    Iran

    In Iran, not only are EMP attacks fully endorsed but battle plans for their use are being drawn up as well. Military textbook Passive Defense – published in 2010 – echoes Russian General Slipchenko’s ideas on EM. **Former Director of the CIA, James Woolsey, points out that “Tehran’s military is planning to be able to make a nuclear EMP attack…”

    Woolsey goes on to say, “Passive Defense and other Iranian military writings are well aware that nuclear EMP attack is the most efficient way of killing people, through secondary effects, over the long run. The rationale appears to be that people starve to death, not because of EMP, but because they live in materialistic societies dependent upon modern technology.”

    Another Iranian military journal, in an article titled “Electronics to Determine Fate of Future Wars,” notes that the key to defeating the United States is through an EMP attack. The article goes on to say, “if the world’s industrial countries fail to devise effective ways to defend themselves against dangerous electronic assaults, then they will disintegrate within a few years….American soldiers would not be able to find food to eat nor would they be able to fire a single shot.”

    Whether this is a veiled threat or not is up for you to decide

    What I will expressly state is that Iran is gearing up for the capability of doing such. **We know that they’ve reportedly attempted to purchase radiofrequency weapons from Russia, that the Iranian news agency MEHR reported Iran is protecting itself against EMP attack. Ambassador Henry Cooper, former Director of the Strategic Defense Initiative, has also warned that some Iranian satellite launches appear to be practice for such an attack against the US.

    Our next nation on this list seems to have taken things just a bit further, though.

    North Korea

    What did you expect? Of course, they would make this list!

    **On April 9, 2013, North Korea’s KMS-3 satellite orbited the US at the perfect trajectory to evade US early warning radars and National Missile Defenses. And all while at the ideal altitude and location to launch an EMP field over the continental US.

    **On April 16, 2013, they did it again – this time orbiting the satellite over the DC-NYC corridor. If an EMP had been activated, we would have lost the entire Eastern Grid, where 75% of US electricity comes from. On that very same day, unknown parties used Ak-47s to attack the Metcalf transformer substation that services Silicon Valley as well. 

    Coincidence?

    In July of 2013, a North Korean freighter was found in the Panama Canal after passing through the Gulf of Mexico with SA-2 missiles mounted on their launchers hidden under bags of sugar. While the missiles weren’t armed at the time, they were of the type that could very easily have been used to execute an anonymous EMP attack via offshore freighter.

    At a House hearing October 12, 2017, experts warned members of Congress that a North Korean EMP attack could kill 90% of Americans within one year, calling it an “existential threat.”

    Source ]

    What about in the states? 

    While electric power lobbyists are fighting against EMP protection of the US grid in Washington, it seems like the rest of the world is doing the opposite. This doesn’t seem to make much sense from a self-preservation standpoint, does it?

    However, it’s not all bad news.

    Whether you like him or not – Donald Trump seems to have been the first president in years to have done anything to better prepare the USA against an EMP attack.

    On October 13, 2016, Trump signed Executive Order 13744 – Coordinating Efforts to Prepare the Nation for Space Weather Events. While this was most certainly not directed towards EMP preparedness, the fact of the matter is that space weather and EMP preparedness often overlap.

    A few short years later, on March 26, 2019, Trump signed Executive Order 13865 – Coordinating National Resilience to Electromagnetic Pulses. It was here that EMP-preparedness seemed to become a priority of the US military. Shortly after this EO was given, the Department of Homeland Security began investigated research-proven techniques to better protect critical American infrastructure against EMP attack. (Likely the most significant step that the US government has taken to date to defend itself against an EMP.)

    Final thoughts

    So while the US has taken some steps to better research what we can do to protect ourselves against EMP, it doesn’t appear as if we’re anywhere near as ready as many other nations worldwide are – particularly those who would love to see America fall.

    What conclusions can we draw from such? I’ll leave that up to you to decide, but just know, for the moment, it looks as if we’re showing up to a fight empty-handed.

    Daisy wrote a piece, How to Make a Faraday Cage in 4 Easy Steps, you may find useful. There is information on what a faraday cage is for and why you may need one.

    *  *  *

    All of the above information is readily available by reading EMP expert Dr. Pry’s 2017 Report to the Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) Attack. It’s a more extended file, but it’s in the public domain, and you can easily access it HERE. I believe it’s well worth the read. For those seeking more references to the subject, you can find that HERE.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 23:30

  • Long Waves: Visualizing The History Of Innovation Cycles
    Long Waves: Visualizing The History Of Innovation Cycles

    Creative destruction plays a key role in entrepreneurship and economic development.

    Coined by economist Joseph Schumpeter in 1942, the theory of “creative destruction” suggests that business cycles operate under long waves of innovation. Specifically, Visual Capitalist’s Dorothy Neufeld points out that as markets are disrupted, key clusters of industries have outsized effects on the economy.

    Take the railway industry, for example. At the turn of the 19th century, railways completely reshaped urban demographics and trade. Similarly, the internet disrupted entire industries—from media to retail.

    The above infographic shows how innovation cycles have impacted economies since 1785, and what’s next for the future.

    Innovation Cycles: The Six Waves

    From the first wave of textiles and water power in the industrial revolution, to the internet in the 1990s, here are the six waves of innovation and their key breakthroughs.

    Source: Edelsen Institute, Detlef Reis

    During the first wave of the Industrial Revolution, water power was instrumental in manufacturing paper, textiles, and iron goods. Unlike the mills of the past, full-sized dams fed turbines through complex belt systems. Advances in textiles brought the first factory, and cities expanded around them.

    With the second wave, between about 1845 and 1900, came significant rail, steam, and steel advancements. The rail industry alone affected countless industries, from iron and oil to steel and copper. In turn, great railway monopolies were formed.

    The emergence of electricity powering light and telephone communication through the third wave dominated the first half of the 1900s. Henry Ford introduced the Model T, and the assembly line transformed the auto industry. Automobiles became closely linked with the expansion of the American metropolis. Later, in the fourth wave, aviation revolutionized travel.

    After the internet emerged by the early 1990s, barriers to information were upended. New media changed political discourse, news cycles, and communication in the fifth wave. The internet ushered in a new frontier of globalization, a borderless landscape of digital information flows.

    Market Power

    To the economist Schumpeter, technological innovations boosted economic growth and improved living standards.

    However, these disruptors can also have a tendency to lead to monopolies. Especially during a cycle’s upswing, the strongest players realize wide margins, establish moats, and fend off rivals. Typically, these cycles begin when the innovations become of general use.

    Of course, this can be seen today—never has the world been so closely connected. Information is more centralized than it has ever been, with Big Tech dominating global search traffic, social networks, and advertising.

    Like the Big Tech behemoths of today, the rail industry had the power to control prices and push out competitors during the 19th century. At the peak, listed shares of rail companies on the New York Stock Exchange made up 60% of total stock market capitalization.

    Waves of Change

    As cycle longevity continues to shorten, the fifth wave may have a few years left under its belt.

    The sixth wave, marked by artificial intelligence and digitization across information of things (IoT), robotics, and drones, will likely paint an entirely new picture. Namely, the automation of systems, predictive analytics, and data processing could make an impact. In turn, physical goods and services will likely be digitized. The time to complete tasks could shift from hours to even seconds.

    At the same time, clean tech could come to the forefront. At the heart of each technological innovation is solving complex problems, and climate concerns are becoming increasingly pressing. Lower costs in solar PV and wind are also predicating efficiency advantages.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 23:00

  • Why COVID Is Like AIDS
    Why COVID Is Like AIDS

    Authored by Alex Berenson via Unreported Truths (emphasis ours),

    In 1981, doctors in New York and Los Angeles saw healthy young men sicken and die within months, their immune systems apparently destroyed.

    The deaths set off a frantic search for the culprit. By 1983 virologists had identified a novel pathogen they would call Human Immunodeficiency Virus.

    Over the next decade, scientists learned much more about HIV, which early on had a fatality rate close to 100 percent, worse even than Ebola or smallpox. Ultimately they tamed it – perhaps the greatest success for scientific and medical research in the late 20th century.

    But the political story of AIDS is much trickier. Scientists realized quickly that gay men and intravenous drug users were at far higher risk of contracting HIV than the general public. But they feared people might not support funding for AIDS research – and stigmatize those groups further – if they explained that reality openly.

    So they didn’t.

    As Smithsonian Magazine reported in 2013:

    “Federally-funded campaigns sought to address a large number of people from all backgrounds–male, female, homosexual or heterosexual. The America Responds to AIDS campaign, created by the CDC, ran from 1987 to 1996 and became a central part of the “everyone is at risk” message…”

    The deception probably increased the public’s willingness to fund research. But it came with serious side effects. Smithsonian went on to explain:

    “Some AIDS organizations, especially those providing service to communities at the highest risk for contracting HIV, saw the campaign as diverting money and attention away from the communities that needed it the most.”

    It also caused needless fear in people at vanishingly low risk, especially heterosexual women.

    Perhaps most important, it was fundamentally untrue.

    That fact should matter to anyone who believes truth – even unpleasant truth – ought to drive public policy decisions.

    Which brings us to COVID.

    SARS-COV-2 isn’t even in the same time zone as HIV as a killer. But it is like HIV in one crucial way. It plays favorites.

    After a year, most of us know that the elderly are at much higher risk from coronavirus (though even well-informed people may not be aware HOW much higher the risk is).

    But what public health authorities have gone out of their way to obscure is how much obesity – especially severe obesity – drives the risk of the coronavirus in younger people.

    In April, British researchers published a definitive paper on the subject in The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology, a peer-reviewed journal. The researchers examined the medical records of almost 7 million people in England to look at the link between obesity and severe outcomes from Covid, including hospitalization and death.

    The topline findings show only a moderate link between extra weight and Covid risk. But when the researchers looked more closely, they found that’s because in older people, being overweight does NOT drive excess risk.

    So the researchers divided the patients into four age ranges: 20-39, 40-59, 60-79, and over 80. They found that in the two younger groups – including adults up to age 60 – being obese was associated with nearly ALL the risk that Covid would lead to intensive care or death. The findings held even after they adjusted for many different potential confounding factors, like smoking, non-weight-related illnesses, and wealth.

    The excess risk was extremely high even for people who weren’t morbidly obese – defined as a body-mass index of 40 or more. A person between 40 and 60 with a BMI of 35 – someone who is 230 pounds and 5’8” – had about five times the risk of dying of Covid of a person of normal weight. For younger adults, the excess risk was even higher, and for morbidly obese people even higher still.

    In contrast, people of normal weight under 40 are at essentially no risk of death from Covid. The researchers found their rate to be under 1 in 10,000 per year. Even in the 40 to 59 age range, normal-weight adults had an annual risk well under 1 in 1,000.

    The researchers did not include those stunning findings in the main body of the paper, only its appendix. Still, they were clear in their discussion about the overall results:

    “Our findings from this large population-based cohort emphasise that excess weight is associated with substantially increased risks of severe COVID-19 outcomes, and one of the most important modifiable risk factors identified to date.

    In fact, the findings suggest that for people under 60, weight loss would be the single best way to reduce the risk of Covid – probably even more than a vaccine (and with no side effects).

    But of course you haven’t heard about this paper.

    No one has. The public health establishment has decided that an honest discussion of who is really at risk from Covid might smack of victim-blaming – just as it did a generation ago with HIV.

    This time, though, we haven’t just frightened a bunch of people at essentially no risk. Our viral lockdown theater has been far more destructive, for kids who have lost a year of school and everyone else. In one final irony, lockdown-related weight gain may have actually worsened the risks last year.

    It’s long past time to tell the truth.

    Subscribe to Alex’s substack here.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 22:30

  • NYC Suburban Housing Boom Slows As "Inventory Ran Out" 
    NYC Suburban Housing Boom Slows As “Inventory Ran Out” 

    City-dwellers have been fueling a housing boom across several New York City suburbs for at least a year. But, new housing data suggests surging home prices, fierce bidding wars, and low inventory have caused fatigue among buyers. 

    “Losing your fifth bidding war on a property is discouraging,” said Jonathan Miller, president of appraiser Miller Samuel Inc. “Part of this is consumers being fatigued with the process, and having other options in life these days, like vacations and travel.”

    Low mortgage rates (thanks Powell) and remote-working lifestyles sparked a surge in demand for spacious homes with backyards across NYC’s suburbs. Over the last year, home sales in Greenwich, Westchester, and Long Island have been on fire since the pandemic and social unrest across the metro but have slowed in June. 

    Bloomberg, who first cited the Miller Samuel and Douglas Elliman Real Estate report, said Long Island contracts to purchase single-family homes were up 14% in June from a year earlier. However, that’s down from May and April, when deals jumped 160% versus the same periods a year ago. 

    Source: Bloomberg 

    In Westchester County, sales were up 20% in June compared with the same month last year, though the annual sales rate has been fizzling out since May after soaring 81%. In Greenwich, Connecticut, June’s 50% jump in sales was the smallest yearly increase dating back to last July. 

    “You know what happened? We ran out of inventory,” said Scott Durkin, president of Douglas Elliman, who was referring to the latest drop in listings for single-family homes that fell 45% in Westchester, and 3% in Long Island, and 11% in Greenwich last month. 

    The suburban buying frenzy may not be over, but certainly, low inventory is slowing down sales. The question now is how long will the surge in demand last as urban exiles continue hunting for homes in rural areas, or perhaps they may broaden their search to other rural communities further from the Big Apple. 

    Here are other places where Manhattanites have fled over the past year. 

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 22:00

  • Former Police Officer Recounts Witnessing "Industrialized" Organ Harvesting In China
    Former Police Officer Recounts Witnessing “Industrialized” Organ Harvesting In China

    Authored by Eva Fu via The Epoch Times,

    At the sound of gunshots, prisoners fell lifeless to the ground. Their bodies, still warm, were carried to a nearby white van where two white-clad doctors awaited. Behind closed doors, they were cut open, the organs carved out for sale on the transplant market.

    The grisly scene, which sounds more like the plot of a horror movie, took place in China more than 20 years ago at the direction of state authorities. It was witnessed by Bob (pseudonym), then a police officer who provided security at the execution sites where death-row prisoners were executed.

    “The harvesting of death-row prisoners’ organs was an open secret,” Bob, a former public security officer from central China’s Zhengzhou City who is now based in the United States, told The Epoch Times in an interview.

    Bob described being an unwitting participant in an “industrialized” supply chain that converted living humans into products for sale in the organ trade. The players in this macabre industry include the judicial system, police, prisons, doctors, and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials who issue the directive.

    Doctors carry fresh organs for transplant at a hospital in Henan Province, China, on Aug. 16, 2012. (Screenshot via Sohu.com)

    The former officer used a pseudonym in sharing his experience to protect his safety. The Epoch Times has verified his police ID and other personal information.

    His account from the mid-1990s sheds light on one stage in the disturbing evolution of the CCP’s long-running practice of harvesting organs from non-consenting donors. While Bob witnessed organ extraction from prisoners who were already dead, in the following years the regime would go on to implement—and deploy on a mass scale—a practice far more sinister: harvesting organs from live prisoners of conscience, particularly Falun Gong practitioners.

    The Execution

    Bob joined the police force in 1996 and worked as a civilian police officer. From time to time, he assisted in maintaining order at a court where executions are confirmed and various execution sites in the city. Later, in 1999, as a result of an online post critical of the authorities, Bob himself was put in detention for more than a year. Inside, he was able to observe the handling of death-row prisoners,, and thus piece together the process from conviction to execution to organ harvesting.

    After being sentenced to death, an inmate would be slapped in hand and ankle cuffs, the latter weighing up to 33 pounds to prevent a possible escape. One or two other prisoners would keep them on watch at all times. A blood test—a step to identify possible donors—and a check up on their mental and physical health would also run during this time at a dedicated medical room in the detention center.

    “As far as I know, no one told the death-row prisoners their organs would be extracted,” Bob said.

    Executions typically occurred ahead of major holidays, he said.

    Death-row prisoners would have to attend a public hearing at a higher court, where a judge would confirm or overturn the death sentence assigned by the original court.

    Those destined for execution—ranging from a handful to more than a dozen each time—were then marched out of the courthouse to a procession of 20 to 30 vehicles waiting outside, according to Bob. The convoy also transferred local officials assigned to witness the executions. They included the vice director from the local public security bureau, the judge, and other personnel who handled the cases.

    All the cars had red cloth or paper taped over the windows and carried a numerical marking.

    The prisoners determined to be suitable to have their organs extracted (as a result of the tests) would get injected with a drug said to relieve their pain. Its actual goal, though, was to prevent blood to coagulate after brain death and damage the organs, Bob said.

    Those slated for organ harvesting were typically young, healthy men, usually in their 20s and 30s without a history of major illness, according to Bob.

    At the execution site, prisoners were arranged in a line to be shot in the back of the head.

    The closest convict would stand roughly three to five meters (3.3 to 5.5 yards) away from Bob.

    Adherents of the spiritual practice Falun Gong act out a scene of stealing human organs to sell during a demonstration in Taipei on July 20, 2014, against China’s persecution of the group. (Mandy Cheng/AFP via Getty Images)

    The White Van

    After the shootings, an on-site medical examiner would check the bodies to confirm death. After this, a black plastic bag would be used to cover the prisoners’ heads. The bodies slated for organ extraction were then rushed to a white van waiting nearby. The van’s rear door was usually kept shut, and its window curtains were pulled down to keep out prying eyes.

    Bob once caught a glimpse inside when the rear door chanced to be open. He saw an operating bed and two doctors donning a white gown, masks, and gloves. Plastic wrapping covered the ground in case of blood spills. The doctors swiftly closed the doors after realizing someone was watching.

    No one but the doctors would know what happened afterward. When the bodies came out, they were in a black cadaver bag and sent directly for cremation.

    The dead convicts were lumped together and burned in one kiln. As a result, it was impossible to distinguish which ashes belonged to who, Bob said. “They simply grabbed some from the heap, and gave it to each family.”

    The families were none the wiser.

    “The great majority of these death row prisoners’ families would have no idea their relative’s organs were extracted when they collected the ashes,” Bob said.

    With rare exceptions, those inmates had no chance to see or talk with their relatives during their last moments. Nor could the family see the bodies after their loved ones’ death.

    “All the family got was a box of ashes.”

    A woman adjusts banners in support of the Falun Gong spiritual movement, a group banned in mainland China, in Tung Chung, an area popular with tourists from the mainland, in Hong Kong on April 25, 2019. (Anthony Wallace/AFP via Getty Images)

    A Well-Oiled Machine

    The process was quick—because fresh organs must be promptly transported to the hospital for surgery—and meticulous planning was key for it to run smoothly, Bob said.

    “To them, it’s plenty clear which organ of a certain prisoner [they were going to harvest],” he said.

    “It was very explicit which [prisoner’s body] would be placed on the van … the people on the van knew exactly which organs to take because everything was arranged beforehand.”

    From this, Bob surmised that these practices had been running for a long time before he started the job.

    “The workflow, the adeptness they showed, and the closeness in their cooperation could not have happened in just one or two years,” he said. Even the price of the harvested organs was known beforehand, Bob added.

    China performed its first human organ transplant in 1960. Since the country did not have an official organ donation system until 2015, most of the organs for transplant came from executed prisoners, the regime has claimed. But from the 2000s, the domestic transplant industry saw a sudden boom and the number of executed prisoners simply couldn’t account for the number of transplants taking place.

    Chinese hospitals, seeking to entice organ transplant tourists from abroad, promised organ transplants in a matter of weeks or even days—unheard of in developed countries with established organ transplant systems where wait times could stretch on for years.

    The surge in transplants coincided with the onset of the CCP’s persecution of Falun Gong, a meditation discipline whose 70 million to 100 million adherents have faced arrests, torture, and jail over the past two decades.

    Falun Gong practitioners hold a candlelight vigil in front of the Chinese Consulate in Los Angeles for those who have died due to the Chinese regime’s persecution, on Oct. 15, 2015. (The Epoch Times)

    Over the years, evidence mounted pointing to a sprawling system of live organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience orchestrated by the CCP. In 2019, an independent people’s tribunal concluded that the regime, for years, was killing prisoners “on a significant scale” to supply its transplant market, and was continuing the practice. The main victims, the tribunal found, were imprisoned Falun Gong practitioners.

    The regime said it banned the use of executed prisoners’ organs in 2015, claiming it would exclusively source from organs from voluntary donors under the organ donation system set up the same year. But still, official organ donation figures cannot explain the high number of transplants conducted, the tribunal concluded.

    The Machine Keeps Running

    Bob’s account aligns with those of multiple other eyewitnesses who took part in the opaque organ transplant business in China around the same period.

    George Zheng, a former Chinese medical intern, recalled assisting in an organ removal operation in the 1990s alongside two nurses and three military doctors, in a mountainous area near an army prison close to Dalian, a city in northeastern China.

    The patient, a young man, was unresponsive but his body was still warm. The doctors had removed two kidneys from the man and then instructed Zheng to extract his eyes.

    “At that moment, his eyelids moved and he looked at me,” he told The Epoch Times in 2015.

    “There was sheer terror in his eyes … My mind went blank and my whole body began to shake.”

    The memories of those two eyes haunted Zheng for years.

    George Zheng, now living in Toronto, recounts how he witnessed live organ harvesting in Shenyang Province, China, in the 1990s. (Yi Ling/The Epoch Times)

    In 1995, ethnic Uyghur doctor Enver Tohti from the far west Xinjiang region similarly helped two chief surgeons to extract the liver and two kidneys from a live prisoner who had just been shot in the chest.

    “There was bleeding. He was still alive. But I didn’t feel guilty. In fact, I didn’t feel anything but like a full-programmed robot doing its task,” he told a July 2017 panel.

    “I thought I was carrying out my duty to eliminate … the enemy of the state.”

    The surgeons later told him to remember that “nothing happened.”

    A seemingly on-demand organ transplant trade appears to be continuing in recent years in hospitals in Zhengzhou, where Bob once worked, based on investigations by the World Organization to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong (WOIPFG), a U.S.-based nonprofit.

    One nurse from the First Affiliated Hospital of Zhengzhou University told the WOIPFG in 2019 that their hospital ranked among the country’s top five in terms of kidney transplantation and did around 400 surgeries the previous year.

    “We haven’t stopped since the Chinese New Year and haven’t taken any days off,” she told undercover WOIPFG investigators posing as prospective organ transplantees, adding that they had a kidney match that day.

    Another doctor from the hospital, during a phone call in 2017, told undercover investigators they did most of the liver transplant surgeries overnight as soon as they arrived.

    If you don’t utilize these times and only do them during the daytime, how can you possibly do so many surgeries? How can you outcompete the other folks?” he said.

    The organ transplant abuse Bob witnessed had sickened him and went against his values, which helped him make up his mind to quit less than three years into the job, he said.

    Despite having long left the police force, Bob saw no reason that the forced organ transplant industry would stop running.

    “Driven by the huge profits, there’s no place for the so-called human rights and humanitarian concerns,” he said.

    Bob’s hope is for the Chinese population to free themselves from the Chinese regime’s authoritarian rule and find freedom in democratic countries.

    By a twist of fate, the city committee secretary who ordered his detention ended up in jail himself for taking bribes. He later died in prison serving a life sentence.

    “No one is safe under the CCP rule,” he said. “What happens to someone else may very well happen to you tomorrow.”

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 21:30

  • "Huge Economic Boost" – New West Virginian Law Makes Gun And Ammo Purchases Tax-Free
    “Huge Economic Boost” – New West Virginian Law Makes Gun And Ammo Purchases Tax-Free

    West Virginian lawmakers have eliminated the sales tax on all small firearms and ammunition and are also offering weapon manufacturers tax credits in hopes of sparking an economic boom, according to local news WOWK

    “If you are going to buy that $2,000 riffle, it’s going to be $120 cheaper here in West Virginia than compared to our neighboring states,” said Delegate Gary Howell, (R) District 56.

    The law was passed in House Bill 2499, which went into effect on July 1. Customers can purchase handguns, shotguns, rifles, and whatever their heart desires (chambered up to .50 caliber) without sales tax. 

    The state hopes to get in on the action of record gun sales and millions of first-time gun owners sparked by the virus pandemic and social unrest of 2020. With millions of new guns owners, parts and ammo will be needed, and West Virginia plans to capitalize on that.  

    WOWK’s Audra Laskey calls the new law a “huge economic boost” for the state. 

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    “It’s definitely going to spike gun sales for the foreseeable future. Then after that, I think it will steadily increase in terms of your mid and high-range arms. So, I think over the long term that it will defiantly be a boost in business,” said Taylor Collins, gun and ammo salesman for Bridgeport.

    The law also promotes tax credits to gun and ammo manufacturers: 

    “If they do a $1 million piece of equipment, we will tax it as if it’s a $50,000 piece of equipment. That’s to encourage investment in the state,” said Delegate Howell.

    Already, one bullet manufacturer, Ranger Scientific, recently announced it would be building an ammo plant in the state because of the new law. The new plant will provide 400 jobs to residents in Montgomery. 

    “It makes West Virginia the single best place to locate arms or ammunition manufacturing plant,” said Delegate Howell.

    If you build it, they will come – and it appears the tax law could spark an exodus of gun manufacturers from other states to West Virginia.

    According to Noah Davis of sanctuarycounties.com, West Virginia is a huge Second Amendment state sanctuary state. 

    The Biden administration is losing the war on guns as more than 61% of American counties are now Second Amendment sanctuaries

    West Virginia could see a considerable boost in ammo sales as prices have come down, and no sales tax will make the cost per round even cheaper.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 21:00

  • How China Became The Big Winner Of The COVID Era
    How China Became The Big Winner Of The COVID Era

    By Greg Miller, of FreightWaves,

    When news first broke of the COVID lockdown in Wuhan, the initial prediction was: The virus will cripple the economy of China, which is the engine of global trade, and that will be terrible for the shipping business.

    Eighteen months and 3.9 million deaths later, the pandemic has had the opposite effect. Ships are full and, ironically, the country where the outbreak began has seen the biggest and broadest economic upside.

    Chinese exports are now much higher than they were before the outbreak, courtesy of pandemic-induced changes in consumer behavior and COVID-driven fiscal stimulus from the world’s governments. 

    The only major economy to grow in 2020 was China’s. GDP growth continued in Q1 2021. Business is at an all-time high for Chinese liner operators, shipyards and container-equipment factories.

    U.S. demand for Chinese exports is increasingly urgent as sales continue to offset inventory rebuilds. Trade has revved up in the opposite direction, as well: China is buying more American soybeans, crude oil, propane and natural gas.

    Pandemic boosts Chinese trade

    Nerijus Poskus, vice president of global ocean at Flexport, recently told American Shipper, “Back in 2020, if you’d asked 100 economists what would happen when COVID first hit China, all of them would have probably said that economies will go down, consumption will go down and prices for shipping will fall. Well, all of them would have been wrong.”

    Very wrong: China’s export value in January-May averaged $247.5 billion per month, up 29% from January-May 2019, pre-COVID, according to the country’s customs data.

    As more goods are going out, supporting container-shipping demand, more raw materials and commodities are coming in, employing tankers, bulkers and gas carriers. China’s import value averaged $206.8 billion per month in January-May, up 25% from the same period in 2019.

    Turning trade into even more business

    When demand for ocean transport surges, so too does demand for shipbuilding, container manufacturing and global liner operations. The U.S. has virtually no presence in these sectors. China is the world leader in the first two and a major force in the third.

    As of Jan. 1, 2020, pre-COVID, Chinese shipyards had commercial orders totaling 29.8 million compensated gross tons (CGT), according to U.K.-based valuation and data provider VesselsValue. At that point, China — which was already the world’s largest shipbuilding nation — accounted for 38.7% of the global orderbook.

    The Chinese yards’ orderbook was 26.9 million CGT as of Thursday, according to VesselsValue. While that is down from pre-COVID (orders dropped worldwide in Q1-Q3 2020 and partially rebounded thereafter), China’s share of the global orderbook is now 40.5%, even higher than it was before the pandemic.

    China’s dominance is far more extreme in container-equipment manufacturing. Over 96% of all the world’s dry containers and 100% of reefer containers are manufactured in China. Factories produced 2.66 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) of containers in the first five months of this year, according to data from U.K.-based consultancy Drewry.

    “I would be surprised if the 5-million-TEU mark is not exceeded in 2021,” commented John Fossey, Drewry’s head of container equipment and leasing research. The previous record was 4.42 million TEUs in 2018. If 5 million TEUs were produced this year, it would represent a 61% increase compared to last year and a 77% increase versus 2019.

    In the liner sector, China’s COSCO Group is the world’s fourth-largest container player, with a fleet capacity of 3 million TEUs, according to Alphaliner. Like all ocean carriers, COSCO is reaping historic profits from COVID-era consumer demand. The shipping division of COSCO posted a profit of $2.7 billion for Q1 2021, more than it earned in all of last year.

    China is now the world’s second-largest shipowning nation, behind Japan, according to VesselsValue. During the pandemic, China passed Greece to move up from third to second place.

    Containerized imports from China

    The ships at anchor waiting to unload at California ports highlight the strength of demand for Chinese goods. 

    The value of America’s goods imports from China averaged $37.7 billion per month in January-April, up 8% from the same period in 2019, pre-COVID.

    To gauge U.S. importer exposure to China, American Shipper analyzed Census Bureau data on five categories of imports from China transported by container: computers and electronic products, electrical equipment and appliances, furniture and fixtures, apparel and accessories, and miscellaneous manufactured commodities.

    The combined value of imports in these categories rose 10% in January-April versus the same period in 2019. The computer/electronics segment — the largest of the five categories by value — was up 10%, electrical equipment 17% and miscellaneous manufactured commodities 40%. Furniture was down 11% and apparel was down 29%.

    (Chart: American Shipper based on data from U.S. Census Bureau)

    Despite all the talk of supply chain diversification over the years, American sourcing remains very China-centric. In January-April, China’s average share of total U.S. import value of furniture was 37%, computers 35%, electrical equipment 33%, miscellaneous manufactured goods 33% and apparel 22%. 

    (Chart: American Shipper based on data from U.S. Census Bureau)

    U.S. importers reliant on Chinese sourcing face a new headache. The recent COVID outbreak hitting operations in the Chinese port of Yantian and surrounding ports in June will have a major impact on trade flows going forward. Yantian and surrounding ports handle about one-quarter of China’s containerized exports to America. 

    Ocean carrier Maersk told customers that “both the extended duration of the disruption and the sheer number of sailings that had to omit calling Yantian” mean that it will take “weeks if not months to recover.”

    “What should not be understated is the sheer magnitude of the task ahead as peak season volumes continue to ramp up,” warned Maersk.

    US commodity exports to China recover

    Amid the trade turmoil initiated by the Trump administration, China retaliated by curtailing purchases of American agricultural goods and energy commodities such as propane, liquefied natural gas (LNG) and crude oil. 

    The good news is that China is buying more American exports again. 

    Soybeans — China’s most important role as a buyer is in the soybean market. U.S. soybean exports to China collapsed in 2018 due to trade politics and the African Swine Flu’s impact on China’s pig population (soybeans are used to feed pigs).

    Data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture shows that Chinese buying recovered by 2020, when 54% of U.S. soybean exports went to China. Total U.S. exports jumped to a record 64.1 million metric tons last year. Chinese buying continues this year, with the country taking 47% of Q1 2021 U.S. export volumes. 

    (Chart: American Shipper based on data from U.S. Census Bureau)

    U.S. soybean exports to China have recently helped propel rates for dry bulk ships in the Panamax class (bulkers with capacity of 65,000-90,000 deadweight tons) to decade highs.

    Propane — In the tanker markets, China is an important destination for American propane. The propane is transported aboard large 84,000-cubic-meter liquefied petroleum gas tankers and is used by China for residential consumption and as a feedstock for plastics manufacturing.

    U.S. propane sales to China evaporated in 2019 during trade hostilities. But in full-year 2020 and Q1 2021, China came back to the market, taking 10% of U.S. seaborne propane exports, according to Energy Information Administration (EIA) data. 

    Seaborne exports approximated by excluding exports to Canada and Mexico due to land-based transport to those countries (Chart: American Shipper based on data from EIA)

    LNG — China overtook Japan last year to become the world’s largest importer of LNG. China stopped buying U.S. LNG in 2019 amid trade tensions, but accounted for 9% of America’s LNG exports last year. In Q1 2021, 8% of U.S. exports went to China, according to EIA data. 

    (Chart: American Shipper based on data from EIA)

    Crude oil — Chinese imports from America play a key role in demand for ships called very large crude carriers (VLCCs, tankers that carry 2 million barrels of oil). VLCC demand is measured in ton-miles: volume multiplied by distance. The sailing distance from the U.S. Gulf to China is more than double the distance from the Middle East to China. Thus, the more China imports from the U.S. instead of from the Middle East, the better for VLCC rates.

    China accounted for just 5% of U.S. export volume deliveries in 2019, at the height of the trade war. Its share bounced back to 17% in 2020 and 13% in Q1 2021, according to EIA data.

    Seaborne exports approximated by excluding exports to Canada due to land-based transport to those countries (Chart: American Shipper based on data from EIA)

    Trade balance no better than pre-trade war

    Overall, U.S. goods exports to China averaged $11.6 billion per month in January-April, up 38% from the same period in 2019. 

    The U.S.-China goods trade balance (exports minus imports) averaged minus $26.1 billion in the first four months of this year — slightly better than in January-April 2019, pre-COVID, due to the higher U.S. exports.

    (Chart: American Shipper based on data from U.S. Census Bureau)

    As for the effectiveness of the Trump administration’s tariffs, which have not been reversed by President Joe Biden, the average goods trade balance was minus $25.5 billion in January-April 2016, before Donald Trump’s election. 

    In the same period this year, the balance was 2% higher, in favor of Chinese exports to America.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 20:30

  • Exxon Lobbyist Caught On Film Saying Company-Backed Carbon Tax "Unlikely To Happen"
    Exxon Lobbyist Caught On Film Saying Company-Backed Carbon Tax “Unlikely To Happen”

    It’s almost as if the entire ESG push has been one giant case of virtue signaling… 

    Along those lines, Exxon has been forced to apologize this week after one of its lobbyists was caught on camera saying that a carbon tax the company has been pushing for years is “unlikely to happen”, according to Bloomberg.

    The lobbyist was caught on video saying: “Nobody is going to propose a tax on all Americans. And the cynical side of me says, ‘Yeah we kind of know that.’ But it gives us a talking point. We can say well what is ExxonMobil for? Well we’re for a carbon tax.”

    Exxon CEO Darren Woods came out and said the company was “deeply apologetic” about the comments after a Greenpeace investigator caught lobbyist Keith McCoy making the comments.

    Woods said this week: “Comments made by the individuals in no way represent the company’s position on a variety of issues, including climate policy and our firm commitment that carbon pricing is important to addressing climate change.”

    Woods continued: “We condemn the statements and are deeply apologetic for them, including comments regarding interactions with elected officials.”

    “They are entirely inconsistent with the way we expect our people to conduct themselves. We were shocked by these interviews and stand by our commitments to working on finding solutions to climate change,” he concluded.

    McCoy is also seen in the footage suggesting that Exxon had “joined shadow groups to work against some of the early efforts” of climate change. “There’s nothing illgeal about that,” he says on film. 

    While Bloomberg wasn’t able to reach McCoy, a statement on his LinkedIn read: “I am deeply embarrassed by my comments and that I allowed myself to fall for Greenpeace’s deception. My statements clearly do not represent ExxonMobil’s positions on important public policy issues.”

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 20:00

  • Biden's Bloated White House Payroll Is Most Expensive In American History
    Biden’s Bloated White House Payroll Is Most Expensive In American History

    By Adam Andrzejewski, of OpenTheBooks.com,

    If the White House payroll is a leading indicator of the president’s commitment to expand government then taxpayers have a reason for concern. Projected four-year costs of Biden’s White House payroll could top $200 million. For comparison, inflation adjusted, the Trump administration spent $164.3 million (2017-2020) and the Obama administration spent $188.5 million (2009-2012).

    On July 1st, the Biden administration released the annual Report to Congress on White House Office Personnel. President Biden hired czars, expensive “fellows,” “assistants,” and spent on a much larger First Lady (FLOTUS) staff.

    The payroll report included the name, status, salary and position title of all 567 White House employees costing taxpayers $49.6 million. (Search Biden’s White House payroll and Trump’s four years posted at OpenTheBooks.com.)

    Since January, the Biden administration has quickly staffed up. Here are some key findings from our auditors at OpenTheBooks.com:

    • There are 190 more employees on White House staff under Biden than under Trump (377) and 80 more than under Obama (487) at this point in their respective presidencies.
    • $9.6 million increase in payroll spending vs. the Trump FY2017 payroll. In 2017, the Trump White House spent $40 million for 377 employees, while the Biden payroll amounts to $49.6 million for 567 employees. All spending amounts are inflation adjusted.
    • Hires include 320 female staffers ($28.9 million salaries) vs. 240 male staffers ($20.8 million salaries). In terms of top staffers — Special Assistants — there are 53 female ($6.3 million salaries) vs. 37 males ($4.4 million).
    • Currently, there are 12 staffers dedicated – at least in part – to Dr. Jill Biden vs. five staffers who served Melania Trump in her first year (FY2017).
    • Counts of the “Assistants to the President” – the most trusted advisors to the president – are the same (22) in for the Biden administration and the Trump and Obama administrations. This year, these advisors make $180,000.
    • This year’s list of key advisors includes names such as Ron Klain (Chief of Staff), Susan Rice (Domestic Policy Council), Jennifer Psaki (Press Secretary), and Kate Bedingfield (Communications Director), Mike Donilon (Senior Advisor), and Steve Ricchetti (Counselor).
    • In the Trump first-year, Steven Bannon, Kellyanne Conway, Omarosa Manigault, Reince Priebus, Sean Spicer and 17 others made salaries of $179,700. In Obama’s first-year, David Axelrod, Rahm Emanuel and twenty others held the title with top pay of $172,000.
    • The most highly compensated White House Biden staffer? The top paid is Molly Groom ($185,656), Policy Advisor For Immigration, a crisis issue for the administration. The second highest paid is Elizabeth Hone ($183,164), Senior Policy Advisor For Broadband. The administration proposed $100 billion in government ownership of broadband.

    In Trump’s administration (2017), Mark House, Senior Policy Advisor, had a salary of $187,500. In Obama’s Administration (2009), David Marcozzi earned $193,000 “on detail” from Health and Human Services.

    FLOTUS Staff

    Dr. Jill Biden has 12 staffers including press, communication, and advance trip directors; media coordinators and schedulers. There are senior advisors, and even a couple of social secretaries. Five of the employees also serve the president in some capacity.

    In 2009, former First Lady Michelle Obama faced criticism for her twenty-four assistants, advisors, aides, and social secretaries. Laura Bush had a staff of eighteen. In 2017, Melania Trump, in her first year, had a staff of five employees.

    These 12 White House employees serving First Lady Dr. Jill Biden (five also serve the president in some capacity) cost taxpayers $1.35 million and include:

    • Julissa Reynoso Pantaleon, Chief of Staff to the First Lady and White House Gender Policy co-chair ($180,000);
    • Elizabeth Alexander, Director of Communications for the First Lady ($155,000);
    • Carlos Elizondo, Social Secretary ($155,000) and Deputy Social Secretary, Liz Hart ($80,000)
    • Press Secretary, Michael LaRosa, $100,000

    Special Initiative Czars

    Starting in 2009, President Obama came under fire for hiring special initiative czars. From 2017-2020, we found no evidence of “czars” on Trump’s payroll. 

    However, Biden has czar(ed) up – naming at least 21 czars to date, with plans to fill 55 positions. These include:  National Climate Advisor Regina McCarthy ($180,000) and a Special Envoy for Climate, John Kerry – who is listed in press accounts, but doesn’t appear in the payroll data. Others include Jeff Zients ($36,000), the COVID-19 czar.

    Critics at Politico have already questioned, “How many czars does the Biden administration need?”

    White House Leadership Development Fellows

    Starting in 2015, President Obama instituted a new fellowship – a White House Leadership Development program with an initial class of sixteen. During the Trump years, the program was dormant.

    On June 4th, Biden appointed 22 members to the fellowship program. None of these appear in the payroll disclosure.

    Like most presidents, Joe Biden doesn’t donate his salary. Donald Trump was the first since John F. Kennedy to donate his pre-tax quarterly salary to government agencies.

    Following tradition, Dr. Jill Biden isn’t paid as First Lady. However, she is the 1st First Lady to maintain an outside income – her government salary as a community college professor at Northern Virginia Community College.

    Although the White House personnel budget is an infinitesimal part of the $4+ trillion federal budget, it could be a leading indicator of Biden’s commitment to expand the size, scope, and power of the federal government.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 19:30

  • How Has The Flood Of Information Changed Wall Street Since 1990
    How Has The Flood Of Information Changed Wall Street Since 1990

    In a world where Wall Street admits that it increasingly gets its most precious commodity – information – from social networks such as Twitter, Reddit and Facebook…

    … it got us thinking about the changing nature of information flow in finance and how it may be impacting markets.

    Conveniently, in a recent note from DataTrek’s Nick Colas, the former SAC portfolio manager takes a big picture look at just this topic, writing that when he started covering stocks in 1991 back at Credit Suisse, there was no Internet, no smartphones, no “Big Data”, no quarterly earnings conference calls, and no real regulation around how companies disseminated potentially market-moving information. All those things exist today, and according to Colas, the fact that the world’s financial decision-makers are flooded with instant (and constant) information may well explain part of why US stocks trade at such premiums to prior cycles. But, as Colas also notes, more information can also make investors overconfident.

    Below we excerpt from the DataTrek founder’s latest note about the changing nature of information as it relates to the investment process over the last 30 years.

    Too Much Information, by Nicholas Colas

    We’ll start in late 1991 when these words first came out of a CFO’s mouth: “We should do a conference call after the quarter.” The speaker was Jerry York, then Chrysler’s chief financial officer. The company had just done a “save the firm” equity issuance to fund production of the then-new Grand Cherokee.

    He felt that the institutional buyers of that deal should hear directly from the management team right after Q4 earnings were made public. They had taken a big risk buying Chrysler, which at the time was essentially insolvent. Keeping the lines of communication open with this group of investors was important. After all, the company might need to tap them again if the US economy didn’t continue to rebound.

    I was at that first call, which was a hybrid in-person/teleconference held at the old Sky Club on top of what was then the Pan Am building in New York City. Some big investors in the deal traveled to New York to attend, and others dialed in. It did what Jerry wanted. Investors got to ask their questions directly and also hear management’s take on the business.

    As effective as that form of shareholder communications was, quarterly earnings conference calls only slowly caught on through the 1990s. For many years, analysts more commonly waited for earnings reports to come through on PR Newswire. We would then print those out on a dot matrix printer and call the company’s CFO or investor relations person. We’d then wait for a call back and ask our questions about the numbers. Sometimes it would be the same day, sometimes the next. And if the company didn’t like you, that return call would simply never come.

    Other differences between 1991 and now, as far as the investment process goes:

    • No Internet back then, at least as far as its utility to Wall Street. No Google, no Wikipedia, no “Big Data”.
    • No smartphones. If you were on the road and wanted a price quote or the latest news, you called your trading desk.
    • No email – analysts’ reports were printed and mailed/messengered to clients.
    • No Fed press conferences after FOMC meetings. Only Fed Chair Alan Greenspan spoke on policy, and infrequently at that.
    • No regulations requiring analysts to share their views with all clients at once.
    • No regulations requiring that companies disseminate market-moving information broadly. Most just used their favorite Wall Street analysts to update investors on earnings guidance.

    I think about all these differences every time I look at a 1990 – present history of the CBOE VIX Index. Has more, and more-widely available, information made US stocks less volatile? In theory, it should. Volatility is, first and foremost, a function of how much relevant fundamental information is embedded in stock prices.

    Here’s that VIX history back to 1990, which shows that the period from 2012 to 2019 did see generally lower volatility than the prior 2 economic up cycles. There were other forces at work, certainly … A long expansion makes for more predictable corporate earnings, which should make for lower equity price volatility. But seeing a VIX that reliably traded below 19 (its long run average) for the better part of a decade is still notable. The truly “different” thing about this period versus the previous ones is the change in the quantity and speed of information flow.

    What’s also striking about that chart is that volatility shocks (which always bring lower asset prices) still routinely occur despite the much greater amount of information available to markets and investors. Chalk that up to human nature. Prospect Theory says humans “feel/fear” loss about twice as much as equivalent gains. That asymmetry explains the old trader’s saying that “the market takes the stairs up, but the elevator down” when an unexpected event occurs.

    Now, what does all this mean for current US equity market dynamics? Three thoughts:

    1. Everything else equal, more complete information about company/macro fundamentals should make for higher equity valuations now relative to prior cycles. It’s hard to prove statistically that this is the case, but it makes intuitive sense to me.
    2. More information now should also allow markets to reset more quickly after a shock than prior cycles. Imagine if we’d had the Pandemic Recession in pre-Internet 1990 instead of 2020. Would investors have as much confidence in a global economic recovery if they couldn’t see it forming through data from Google Trends, smartphone-enabled mobility tracking, and other 21st century sources of data? I doubt it.
    3. Greater levels of available information can, however, lead to investor overconfidence.

    We’ll close out with a cautionary tale about “too much information” that relates to that last point:

    • Back in the 1970s, US researchers ran a study with 8 professional horse racing handicappers as their subjects.
    • They had the subjects list all the horse-specific datapoints they found most useful in predicting the outcome of a race, ranked from most to least important.
    • The handicappers received their top 10 data choices for the horses in an upcoming race and were asked to predict the winners.
    • For the next race, they saw their top 20 choices and made predictions based on that now-larger base of information.
    • Finally, they got their top 40 choices for relevant predictive data and forecast the outcome of the last race.

    The surprising finding: while the handicappers’ confidence about their predictions increased with larger amounts of information, their accuracy in picking winners did not.

    The lesson, profoundly relevant to investing: use the wealth of information available in a 21st century world with caution. More is not always better.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 18:30

  • The Super Rich Are Back Partying In The Hamptons This Summer
    The Super Rich Are Back Partying In The Hamptons This Summer

    After a very brief break in 2020 due to Covid, it looks at though it is back to fun in the sun, ritzy gatherings and massive parties by the super rich in the Hamptons this summer.

    The elites of the Hamptons – people like Mike Novogratz, Larry Gagosian and Kathy Rayner – are all back to hosting their normal gatherings this summer as life returns back to somewhat of a post-Covid normal, according to Bloomberg.

    And with the super rich comes super rich topics of discussion. At Novogratz’s recent Sunday gospel brunch, Goldman Sachs’s Ashok Varadhan said he was reaching academic papers on cryptocurrency while music executive Jason Flom spoke to Novogratz about his podcast and his new 1959 Corvette.

    And it looks like the summer is just getting started. Joey Wolffer, of the Sagaponack winery family, commented: “I haven’t been out to a party in a year-and-a-half, and I had events five nights in a row last week. I came home one night and my kids had epic meltdowns. We didn’t ease into this at all.”

    Steve Israel, former New York Democratic Congressman, noted that political fundraising was also helping people get together: “Ordinarily it would be quieter in an off-year, but political fundraising is coming back with a vengeance.”

    He said most Democrats in the Hamptons this summer aren’t complaining about President Biden’s tax increases: “Virtually all of them believe that wealth inequity is a major economic problem that has to be addressed. They also realize that if wealth inequality continues, at some point there will be pitchforks at the hedgerows.”

    All that means is they’re literally OK with throwing money at the problem of people wanting to riot to make it go away – it just happens to be called paying more in taxes, in this case.

    Regardless, there is some preparation being made for the increases. Leonard Ackerman, an East Hampton lawyer, said: “The most anxiety right now is over Biden’s tax plan, because if you’re not going to have a stepped-up basis, people who have homes here and sell them, upon someone passing, they’re going to get whacked twice, first on capital gains doubled, and on estate taxes. A substantial amount of equity built up over the years is going to get wiped out. So there’s potential for a lot of older homes to come on the market.”

    Up in the air is how many people partying in the Hamptons this summer will wind up back in NYC. One couple at Novogratz’s brunch said they pulled their kids out of private school and put them into public school in Amagansett, which they love. Another family matriarch said she was stayin in the Hamptons year-round while her husband commuted to the city for school with the kids. 

    On the agenda for the rest of the summer are numerous benefits, including one that will be held on Kathy Rayner’s estate. Guests can take in her carefully prepared gardens while sipping on home-made margaritas and home-grown strawberries. 

    Andrea Grover, the head of Guild Hall, concluded: “Having that cocktail party at her house was the top. She’s the consummate hostess who really attends to every detail of a party. The napkins were linen embroidered with elephants and golden thread.”

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 18:00

  • Pentagon Rolls Out New Embassy-Based Military Command For Afghanistan
    Pentagon Rolls Out New Embassy-Based Military Command For Afghanistan

    Authored by Dave DeCamp via AntiWar.com,

    On Friday, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin has approved a new military command structure that will be based out of the US embassy in Kabul, which will oversee Afghanistan operations after most US combat troops leave the country.

    The new embassy-based military office, dubbed Forces Afghanistan-Forward, will be headed by Navy Rear Admiral Peter Vasely. The US has tried to portray its plans to keep troops at its embassy in Kabul as only for security purposes. But Pentagon spokesman John Kirby described what sort of operations the new office will oversee, which goes beyond guarding the embassy.

    Via Tampa Bay Times

    “That presence will remain focused on four things over the course of the coming period. One, protecting our diplomatic presence in the country. Two, supporting security requirements at Hamid Karzai International Airport. Three, continued advice and assistance to Afghan National Defense and Security Forces as appropriate. And four, supporting our counterterrorism efforts,” Kirby said.

    Kirby said the embassy office would be supported by another Afghanistan office that will be established in Qatar. Under the plan, the authority to bomb Afghanistan will be transferred from the top US commander in the country, Gen. Scott Miller, to Gen. Frank McKenzie, the head of US Central Command. Airstrikes in Afghanistan will be carried out by warplanes based outside of the country, mostly in the Gulf region, what the Pentagon has dubbed “over the horizon capability.”

    Although nothing has been confirmed, reports say the US plans to leave 650 troops at the embassy. The US embassy in Kabul is a sprawling 36-acre compound and has the room to host thousands of people. That means besides troops, there could also be CIA or civilian contractors that don’t need to have a declared presence.

    The US might also leave some troops to help Turkey control the Hamid Karzai International Airport, which is also in Kabul. The US sees control of the airport as key to its post-withdrawal plans, and Washington and Ankara are working out an agreement that would keep the approximately 500 Turkish troops at the airport that are currently guarding it.

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    Recent media reports said the bulk of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan would be completed by July 4th. But both the Pentagon and the White House said on Friday the drawdown would probably be done by the end of August.

    We currently expect it to be completed by the end of August. So, as you know, the president decided to withdraw remaining US troops from Afghanistan and finally end the US war there after 20 years,” White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki told reporters on Friday.

    While Psaki said President Biden wants to remove all “remaining troops,” it’s clear based on the fact that Austin approved a new military command for Afghanistan that troops will stay. The plan will fuel more violence since the Taliban will view it as a clear violation of the Doha agreement that called for all foreign forces to leave Afghanistan.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 17:30

  • Amazon Uses Artificial Intelligence To Terminate Delivery Drivers 
    Amazon Uses Artificial Intelligence To Terminate Delivery Drivers 

    Bloomberg report details how artificial intelligence systems employed by Amazon have hired and fired contract drivers. 

    Called “Flex,” Amazon uses AI to determine how many drivers are needed for deliveries. The app, installed on drivers’ smartphones, measures whether they delivered packages on time and followed customers’ special requests. 

    If a driver misses the mark, they are subjected to an automatic firing. 

    That’s exactly what happened to Stephen Normandin, 63, an Army veteran who Flex recently fired. He said algorithms tracked his every move as he delivered packages around the Phoenix Metropolitan Area. 

    Photographer: Courtney Pedroza/Bloomberg

    Normandin said Amazon unfairly punished him for things way beyond his control – such as locked apartment complexes. He said every job he’s “given 110%,” but the algorithm failed to see external factors that may affect deliveries. 

    “This really upset me because we’re talking about my reputation. They say I didn’t do the job when I know damn well I did,” he said. 

    At the world’s largest e-commerce retailer, algorithms are the boss, hiring and firing and monitoring hundreds of thousands of workers with hardly any human oversight. 

    Flex began operations in 2015 as a way for Amazon to get its packages out the same day to regional customers. Here’s more from Bloomberg: 

    But the moment they sign on, Flex drivers discover algorithms are monitoring their every move. Did they get to the delivery station when they said they would? Did they complete their route in the prescribed window? Did they leave a package in full view of porch pirates instead of hidden behind a planter as requested? Amazon algorithms scan the gusher of incoming data for performance patterns and decide which drivers get more routes and which are deactivated. Human feedback is rare. Drivers occasionally receive automated emails, but mostly they’re left to obsess about their ratings, which include four categories: Fantastic, Great, Fair, or At Risk. -Bloomberg 

    Bloomberg interviewed 15 Flex drivers who allege a robot wrongfully terminated them. They say there’s no way to dispute their firing as Flex is entirely automated. One can appeal through arbitration, but that costs $200. Amazon knows delegating human resource work to machines is cheaper and more efficient. 

    But many of these drivers say the algorithms don’t factor in real-world problems for failing to deliver a package on time, such as traffic, locked buildings, vehicle troubles, among other things. An Amazon spokesperson told Bloomberg:

    “We have invested heavily in technology and resources to provide drivers visibility into their standing and eligibility to continue delivering and investigate all driver appeals.”

    Being hired and fired by AI is the new dystopic reality the working-poor must face. Amazon has a huge PR problem in treating their workers, mostly exposed during the virus pandemic. Sooner or later, Amazon will run out of workers as its high churn rate has alarmed executives. 

    But don’t worry, automated delivery vans and warehouses are coming and will eventually displace humans working for the company. later on this decade. 

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 17:00

  • "Too Much Advocacy For Violent Offenders": Chicago's Police Chief Shifts Blame On Crime Wave
    “Too Much Advocacy For Violent Offenders”: Chicago’s Police Chief Shifts Blame On Crime Wave

    Authored by Cara Ding via The Epoch Times,

    As Chicago aldermen took turns questioning Police Superintendent David Brown about an alarming crime wave on Friday, Brown said police officers had done their utmost and that the blame should be directed at the court system which had sent too many violent offenders back on the street.

    About 20 aldermen requested the special city council meeting with Brown following two violent weekends that saw 24 people killed and 114 injured in Chicago. The day before the meeting, a 1-month-old baby and a 9-year-old girl were both shot in the head; another 8-year-old girl was shot in the arm.

    “This is happening because there is too much advocacy for violent offenders and too little consequences for their behaviors in the courts,” Brown told the aldermen at the meeting.

    Brown highlighted the growing number of violent suspects sent back into the community before trials by Cook County judges on the electronic monitoring system, a GPS-style tracking device attached on suspects’ ankles for monitoring whereabouts.

    He cited a Chicago Tribune analysis which found over 90 suspects charged with murder were out on electronic monitoring by mid-May; whereas four years ago, that number was about 30. And about 570 suspects charged with aggravated unlawful use of a weapon were out on electronic monitoring by the same time; four years ago, that number was about 180. In total, violent suspects on electronic monitoring have bloomed from hundreds to thousands this year.

    According to Brown, some of these suspects soon committed violent crimes again, including murder. Last month, Dominique Johnson, while out on electronic monitoring, killed his girlfriend and then committed suicide on the South Side of Chicago. In March, Dakari Davis, while out on electronic monitoring, shot at a 45-year-old man twice in an attempted carjacking.

    Alderman Byron Lopez repudiated Brown’s reasoning, citing Loyola University research that suggests pretrial releases have not significantly increased crime following a 2017 Cook County felony bail reform.

    The research collects data up until late 2019 and does not account for the pandemic period when courts drastically increased jail releases.

    “I would ask those researchers to move over to the South and West Side of Chicago and come back with their conclusions. Just one night,” Brown said. South and West Side bear the brunt of shootings in the city.

    “When you say ‘a few people’ recommitted crimes [while out on electronic monitoring], to the victims, that’s everything,” Brown said. “‘A few people’ are problematic in our neighborhood. ‘A few people’ committed a murder-suicide this month. ‘A few people’ stabbed someone to death this month. That ‘few people,’ for the victims, is everything.”

    The special council meeting took place right before the Fourth of July weekend, traditionally one of the most violent weekends for Chicago. Last year, 17 were killed and 63 others were injured over the weekend.

    Chicago Police Department (CPD) Chief of Patrol Brian McDermott also briefed aldermen on the deployment plans for the Fourth of July weekend and the rest of summer. He said the CPD will be laser-focused on the fifteen most violent neighborhoods on the South and West Side of Chicago. CPD will also work with other governmental agencies and community organizations to collectively combat the crime.

    As of July 2, 364 people were murdered and 1,654 injured this year in Chicago, largely due to gunshots. This year’s record almost matches that of 2020, the pandemic year that saw sharp increases in shootings in the city.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 16:30

  • Strong Demand For RVs Expected To Roll Into 2022 
    Strong Demand For RVs Expected To Roll Into 2022 

    Months after we discussed the “unprecedented demand” for Recreational Vehicles, which we said was on pace for a blowout 2021, RV sales continue to soar to record highs. Over the past year, many Americans have rediscovered national parks, small towns, and rural communities that are RV friendly instead of traveling on planes to resort towns packed with people. The virus pandemic fundamentally changed how Americans travel, and the RV lifestyle is one of the hottest trends this year that will likely roll into 2022. 

    “The key driver here appears to be a more diverse demographic and an influx of first-time buyers seeking safe, socially-distanced and family-oriented activities, with the RV lifestyle checking all the boxes. While this has prompted investor concerns regarding the sustainability of this demand as consumers return to their pre-pandemic lifestyles, we believe the expansion of this addressable market for RVs is a long-term positive for the industry,” analysts from financial firm Raymond James wrote in a note to clients. 

    “As such, our base case is that the industry will see stabilization in 2022, with retail flat to down modestly, followed by a resumption of slow and steady demand closer to the longer-term average beginning in 2023,” the note added. 

    According to the RV Industry Association’s May 2021 survey of manufacturers, a total of 49,241 RVs were shipped to dealers, which was the best May wholesale shipment on record. 

    May 2021 shipments jumped 75.9% compared to the 27,999 units shipped during May 2020. 

    The RV boom is likely to remain through this year into next. More Americans than ever are rediscovering national parks and rural communities, and the joy of being with their families in a safe and controlled environment. 

    Demographically, demand for RVs is coming from baby boomers and millennials, which may be another reason why demand will stay elevated. 

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 16:00

  • Canadian Government To Extend "Pride Month" To The Whole Summer
    Canadian Government To Extend “Pride Month” To The Whole Summer

    Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Summit News,

    The Canadian government has announced this it is expanding ‘Pride Month’ for the entire summer and calling it ‘Pride Season’.

    Yes, really.

    A post on the official government ‘Canadian heritage’ website reveals the change, meaning that LGBT events and narratives will be promoted every year from June until the end of September.

    “In Canada, local Pride events span over the course of several months,” states the website.

    “Pride Season is a unifying term that refers to the period between June and September when LGBTQ2 communities and allies come together at different times throughout the summer to spotlight the resilience, talent, and contributions of LGBTQ2 communities in many Canadian cities.”

    Since gay rights have already been achieved in every major western country on the planet, critics (including gay conservatives) are becoming increasingly skeptical over the true agenda behind ‘Pride Month’.

    It appears to have been completely hijacked by a combination of woke corporations pushing LGBT rhetoric for free advertising and demented fringe activists who are at war with language and biological sexuality.

    Concerns over the increasing degeneracy of gay pride marches and children being exposed to sexualized performances and behavior have intensified in recent years.

    Biological men who identify as ‘transgender’ have also exploited mainstream acceptance of the movement to force their way into female spaces.

    As we highlighted this week, the problems caused by that were again evident when a biological male claiming to be transgender entered the female area of Wi Spa in Los Angeles and flashed his genitals to women and little girls.

    Apparently, the Canadian government is perfectly happy with these developments and wants to expand them over an entire season.

    *  *  *

    Brand new merch now available! Get it at https://www.pjwshop.com/

    In the age of mass Silicon Valley censorship It is crucial that we stay in touch. I need you to sign up for my free newsletter here. Support my sponsor – Turbo Force – a supercharged boost of clean energy without the comedown. Also, I urgently need your financial support here.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 15:30

  • How Media Consumption Evolved Throughout COVID-19
    How Media Consumption Evolved Throughout COVID-19

    Media consumption spiked in the early days of the COVID-19 outbreak as Americans actively sought information and entertainment while at home. Whether this changed over the course of 2020 remains unclear, however.

    To dive deeper into the issue, this infographic from the Knight Foundation explores each generation’s shifts in media consumption habits as the pandemic wore on.

    Further below, Visual Capitalist’s Marcus Lu examines which media sources Americans deemed to be the most trustworthy, and why consumption habits may have changed for good.

    Changes in American Media Consumption, by Generation

    The data in this infographic comes from two surveys conducted by Global Web Index (GWI). The first was completed in April 2020 (N=2,337) and asked participants a series of questions regarding media consumption during COVID-19.

    To see how consumption had changed by the end of the year, the Knight Foundation commissioned GWI to complete a follow-up survey in December 2020 (N=2,014). The following tables provide a summary of the results.

    Gen Z

    Unsurprisingly, a significant percentage of Gen Z reported an increase in digital media consumption in April 2020 in comparison to pre-pandemic habits. This bump was driven by higher use of online videos, video games, and online TV/streaming films such as Netflix.

    By December 2020, these media categories became even more popular with this cohort.

    The popularity of traditional outlets like broadcast TV and radio declined from their April 2020 highs, though they are still up relative to pre-pandemic levels for Gen Z survey respondents.

    Millennials

    Results from the December 2020 survey show that Millennials trimmed their media consumption from earlier in the year. This was most apparent in news outlets (online and physical press), which saw double digit declines in popularity relative to April.

    Books and podcasts were the only two categories to capture more interest from Millennials over the time period. It’s also worth noting that the percentage of respondents who said “none” for media consumption rose to 20.3%, up significantly from 9.1% in April.

    Possible factors for the increase in “none” responses include easing government restrictions and a return to more normal work schedules.

    Gen X

    The media consumption habits of Gen X developed similarly to Millennials over the year.

    Broadcast TV and online press saw the largest declines over the time period, while once again, podcasts and books were the only two categories to capture more interest relative to April. The percentage of respondents reporting “none” rose to 28.9%—a slightly higher share than that of Millennials.

    Boomers

    Media consumption trends among Baby Boomers were mixed, with some categories increasing and others decreasing since April. Broadcast TV saw the biggest decline in usage of all media types, but remained the most popular category for this cohort.

    Boomers also had the largest share of “none” respondents in both studies (23.0% in April and 31.0% in December).

    Where do Americans Go For Trustworthy News?

    To learn more about American media consumption—particularly when it came to staying updated on the pandemic—survey respondents were asked to confirm which of the following sources they found trustworthy.

    The deviations between each generation don’t appear to be too drastic, but there are some key takeaways from this data.

    For starters, Gen Z appears to be more skeptical of mainstream news channels like CNN, with only 28.9% believing them to be trustworthy. This contrasts the most with Gen X, which saw 40.1% of its respondents give news channels the thumbs up.

    This story is flipped when we turn to the World Health Organization (WHO). Gen Z demonstrated the highest levels of trust in information published by WHO, at 50.3% of respondents. Only 39.0% of Gen X could say the same.

    By far the least trustworthy source was foreign governments’ websites. This category had the lowest average approval rating across the four generations, and scored especially poor with Boomers.

    The Lasting Effects of the Pandemic

    Habits that were picked up during 2020 are likely to linger, even as life finally returns to normal. To find out what’s changed, respondents were asked which categories of media they expected to continue consuming in elevated amounts.

    The chart below shows each generation’s top three responses.

    Note that the top three for both Gen Z and Millennials are all digital and online categories (video games can be played offline, but the majority of popular titles are online). This contrasts with the preferences of Gen X and Boomers, who appear to be sticking with more traditional outlets in broadcast TV and books.

    With consumption habits of younger and older Americans moving in opposite directions, advertisers and media companies will likely need a clear understanding of their target audiences in order to be successful.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 15:00

  • Celebrating Independence Day With Illegal Fireworks
    Celebrating Independence Day With Illegal Fireworks

    Authored by Ryan McMaken via The Libertarian Institute & Mises.org,

    It’s almost Independence Day, and for many Coloradans, that means a trip to Wyoming to buy illegal fireworks. That is, it’s time to buy fireworks that are illegal in Colorado, but legal in Wyoming.

    In fact, this fact so well known to everyone that Wyoming officials don’t even try to hide the fact. This can be seen in the fact that fireworks stores selling these illegal fireworks are a mere two-minute drive from the border and among the first structures one will encounter driving north on I-25 from northern Colorado. There, in the middle of the prairie, between Cheyenne and the Colorado border, there is little to see other than an RV park and some enormous fireworks shops.

    And what do Coloradans do with these fireworks after buying them?

    The local Fox affiliate reports:

    Much of what shoppers find at the Wyoming stores are illegal in Colorado, but that does not dissuade Coloradans from making the drive north to spend money.

    Recently, across the Denver metro, there have been nightly illegal fireworks shows.

    This is true every year, but the use of illegal fireworks may be even more widespread this year after last year’s experience…

    On July 4 of 2020, every fireworks show in metro Denver—and probably also statewide—had been cancelled. The result of this was something that officials probably did not anticipate. With no official fireworks shows to attend, Coloradans apparently decided to hold their own private, illegal fireworks shows in droves. When the sun went down that day, the night sky across the city was lit up like never before by countless airborne—and therefore illegal—fireworks set off by locals who were going to have a fireworks show one way or another.

    The police—who were already on the edge of being reviled thanks to their enforcement of stay-at-home orders and business closures earlier that year—appeared to be unenthusiastic about enforcing the fireworks ban.

    Nor are the police in the business of prosecuting Coloradans who import illegal fireworks into Colorado. There aren’t any cops waiting on the Colorado side of the border to seize contraband. Possession of Wyoming-style illegal fireworks is generally legal in most jurisdictions.

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    But this isn’t just a Colorado-Wyoming issue. Apparently, in spite of severe wildfire danger throughout the West, many Americans aren’t on board with fireworks bans.

    Local officials aren’t unaware. As the AP reported this week,

    Several Utah cities are banning people from setting off their own fireworks this year during the record drought, but many Republicans are against a statewide prohibition. GOP Salt Lake County Councilwoman Aimee Winder Newton supports restrictions but thinks this year is a bad time for a blanket ban.

    “We’re just coming out of this pandemic where people already felt like government was restricting them in so many ways,” she said. “When you issue bans arbitrarily, we could have a situation where people who weren’t going to light fireworks purposely go and buy fireworks to just send a message to government.”

    There’s a similar mood in other states as well.

    “It’s not just Colorado,” said Ben Laws, manager of Pyro City. “We see people from Nebraska, we see people from Montana, we see people from all over coming to buy.”

    Clearly, the presence of Wyoming and its liberal fireworks laws is a bit of a fly in the ointment for neighboring officials looking to stamp out the use of private fireworks.

    Thanks to America’s relatively decentralized legal and regulatory regime—in some cases such as fireworks—enforcing local bans becomes a whole lot more difficult. As is the case with marijuana—or abortions or, in the past, legal divorces—the legality of something in some states often effectively makes that something a bit less illegal in all the other states.

    So why not ban the possession of fireworks and then arrest locals when they try to cross back over with their banned fireworks? After all, other states have taken this approach with marijuana and Colorado. Law enforcement officials in Nebraska, for instance, have long been on alert for “suspicious” vehicles that have recently crossed over from Colorado. It is illegal to even possess marijuana in most states surrounding Colorado.

    Well, making the possession of fireworks illegal is apparently easier said than done. As Councilwoman Newton in Utah noted, her constituents don’t appear to be in the mood for more bans on activities that many Americans would have considered to be perfectly legal, normal, and moral a year or two ago. In some ways, covid has encouraged lawlessness, because many Americans figured out that the connection between law and morality is a tenuous connection indeed. The proliferation of illegal fireworks may be just another side effect of the covid panic.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 14:35

  • "A Horrifying Experience": Lawyer For Driver Of Model S Plaid That Spontaneously Combusted Speaks Out
    “A Horrifying Experience”: Lawyer For Driver Of Model S Plaid That Spontaneously Combusted Speaks Out

    Days ago we wrote about how a Tesla Model S Plaid in the suburbs of Philadelphia was witnessed to be rolling down a street, engulfed in flames, before exploding. At the time, the cause of the accident and the well-being of the driver were both unknown. 

    Today, the owner of the vehicle’s lawyer is speaking out, claiming the vehicle “burst into flames while the owner was driving” it, according to a new report by Reuters

    The driver of the vehicle has been identified as an “executive entrepreneur” who is being represented by Mark Geragos, of Geragos & Geragos.

    Geragos said that the driver wasn’t initially able to get out of the vehicle because its “electronic door system failed”, requiring the driver to push and use force to open the door.

    He said the car moved for 35 to 40 feet before “turning into a fireball”. He called it a “harrowing and horrifying experience”.

    “This is a brand new model… We are doing an investigation. We are calling for the S Plaid to be grounded, not to be on the road until we get to the bottom of this,” Geragos said. 

    A separate source reported that the Tesla belonged to a top executive at one of Tesla’s biggest investors. The driver was identified in that report as Bart Smith, also called the “Crypto King” by CNBC, who works as the head of the digital asset group at trading firm Susquehanna International.

    Susquehanna owned about $1.1 billion worth of Tesla shares as of March 31, the report noted. 

    Recall, last week we pointed out pro-Tesla blog electrek’s coverage of the incident, where they noted that the vehicle had caught fire under what it called “strange circumstances”. 

    The incident took place in Haverford, Pennsylvania and the the Gladwyne fire department responded to the scene. They released the following statement during the middle of the week last week: 

    “Gladwyne Firefighters responding to the 100 block of Rose Lane last night just before 9pm to assist Station 25 (Merion Fire Company of Ardmore) with a vehicle fire. While enroute to the call Chief 25 was advised that the reports were that a Tesla was on fire and it was well involved in fire. Engine 24 with a crew of 7 arrived on scene simultaneously with Engine 25. Due to prior training classes on Tesla Vehicle Fire emergencies, Engine 24 laid a 5 inch supply line into the scene so that we could keep a continual water stream on the fire to extinguish the fire and cool the batteries down to ensure complete extinguishment. Engine 24 and Engine 25 both deployed hand lines to extinguish the fire, each maintained a dedicated water source and continued to cool the vehicle down for almost 90 minutes.”

    Photographs released by the fire department showed firefighters attempting to put out the blaze, and – as we have seen in many cases of Tesla fires – the charred remains of the vehicle that once was. 

    Attempting to offer up some form of analysis, electrek noted at the time that the “exact circumstances of how the vehicle caught on fire are still unknown”.

    But the post also claimed that a witness from Narberth Ambulance, who was working as an EMT in the area and who was on the scene, said that “the call came in from one of the residents of the neighborhood who saw it rolling down the road on fire before exploding in front of their house.”

    The blog post then turned on the spin, theorizing a number of potential causes for the fire except for negligence on the behalf of Tesla.

    “In this case, the most interesting thing is that the vehicle affected appears to be a brand new Model S Plaid, which is equipped with a new battery pack from Tesla,” electrek editor Fred Lambert wrote, possible unaware of the argument he’s tacitly making. 

    He concluded by stating the blog would wait for more information before drawing conclusions, and then suggests that “even arson” may have played a role in the fire.

    We’re sure Mr. Geragos will help you find the narrative going forward, Fred. Tesla has yet to comment further, according to Reuters. 

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 07/03/2021 – 14:14

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Today’s News 3rd July 2021

  • Police To Target Americans For Their Ideological Beliefs And Behaviors
    Police To Target Americans For Their Ideological Beliefs And Behaviors

    Via Mass Private I,

    Much has been written about President Joe Biden’s new Domestic Terror law, but nothing I have seen until now shows just how horrifying it is.

    To say that the White House uses the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) like political puppets to push their own agenda would be an understatement. The New Yorker chronicled four DHS secretaries who were forced to resign by October 2019, and a fifth who resigned this January.

    So when I heard about DHS counterterrorism chief John Cohen having a hard time containing his enthusiasm over Biden’s new domestic terrorism law in a GW Program on Extremism webinar I knew it couldn’t be good.

    Ricardo Vazquez Garcia, from Homeland Security Today describes what happened.

    Garcia does a great job of framing the Feds justification for creating a new War On Terror by targeting American citizens.

    “A lot of progress was made by the U.S. government in dealing with the threat posed by foreign terrorist organizations and in particular dealing with the way those organizations operated, the way they recruited individuals, the way they communicated, the way they developed plans, the way they saw to introduce operatives into the domestic environment, the way they sought to recruit people here domestically,” Cohen said. “I think it is safe to say that the U.S. created quite a robust counterterrorism capability. The challenge is the threat we face today is significantly different than the one we faced after Sept. 11,” DHS counterterrorism chief John Cohen said.

    As America closes in on the 11th anniversary of 9/11, the Feds want the public to believe that unknown terrorist organizations are recruiting your neighbor[s] to become a domestic extremist. But it is not just any neighbor, this time it is far-right “extremists” or White supremacists and Trump supporters who they want to recruit.

    For years DHS officials have warned Americans of the dangers that lurk just outside their front doors or worse in the far-flung Middle East where extremists are plotting to bomb us, shoot us, or poison our water systems. The only difference to the terrorists that await Americans is that now they are allegedly targeting a person’s ideological beliefs.

    According to Cohen, “the most significant terrorist threat facing the U.S. today comes from individuals or lone offenders, and small groups of individuals who based on an ideological belief system, primarily an ideological belief system they self-connect with online activity, but they’ll go out and commit an act of violence on behalf of that belief or a combination of ideological beliefs, or a combination of ideological beliefs and personal grievances.”

    What does this mean for Americans?

    It means that the Feds can target individuals for expressing anti-government sentiments.

    “In many respects, this is a much more individualized threat, and what I mean by that is if you look at the lethal attacks that have occurred in the U.S. over the last several years, they have been conducted by individuals who spend incredible amounts of time online viewing extremist content, content about past violent attacks, they tend to be individuals who have shared behavioral health or environmental characteristics,” Cohen said.

    Targeting people for their ideological beliefs is horrifying in and of itself. Biden’s new domestic terror law will also give law enforcement the right to target people based on their behaviors.

    “What we mean by that, yes, the motive and ideological beliefs are important as part of the analytic process, but the threat tends to come from individuals who have a very superficial understanding of the ideological belief system they use as the validation for an act of violence, but they do have shared behavioral characteristics,” Cohen said.

    If any of this is beginning to sound like China, one only need look at Hong Kong to see the similarities. Speaking out in print against an authoritative regime is an arrestable offense, demonstrating against police brutality is an arrestable offense and so on.

    As a recent Brietbart article pointed out, there is no “official Pentagon definition of extremism.” So how can our government give more powers to law enforcement to surveil and arrest suspected “domestic extremists”?

    Mike Berry, the general counsel for First Liberty Institute, said he asked the Counter-Extremism Working Group (CEWG) how it intended to define “extremism” and the answer he got was something to the effect of: “We’re still working on that, we’ll probably take the existing definition and expand it.” Berry said that response was “problematic.”

    When an organization that backed President Trump warns people about Biden’s new domestic terror law, it is time for all of us to take notice.

    Berry warned, “I just don’t know how you can reconcile the Constitution with trying to criminalize someone’s thoughts and beliefs.” And that is the crux of the problem.

    When DHS counterterrorism chief Cohen goes on record saying, “There have been several cases where individuals have not met the threshold for domestic terror yet they eventually go out and commit an act of violence”, they are admitting that this is another scam that the mass media is only too happy to perpetuate.

    When the Feds and the mass media started asking Americans to “enhance domestic terrorism reporting” by reporting family members and co-workers, you know law enforcement has become a mirror image of other authoritarian regimes.

    “Our goal is to enhance domestic terrorism analysis and improve information sharing throughout law enforcement at the federal, state, local, Tribal, and territorial level, and where appropriate with private sector partners.”

    “This involves creating contexts in which those who are family members or friends or co-workers know that there are pathways and avenues to raise concerns and seek help for those who they have perceived to be radicalizing and potentially radicalizing towards violence,” the White House official said.

    Imagine if I used the same logic that the Feds and law enforcement use. It could go something like this:

    One day, I looked outside my window and saw my neighbor talking to a Black man and then I saw them talking to someone who appeared to be a Muslim but I couldn’t see the person’s face because it was covered with a hijab. Then I saw my neighbor putting anti-government and Black Lives Matter signs in their front yard; they even put up a Pride flag. The next day, my neighbor knocked on my front door asking me to sign a police reform petition. Little did I know that my wife and kids had already signed the petition.

    The next day when I went to work, I overheard my co-workers saying that they planned to march in a Black Lives Matter protest and asked me to sign a police brutality petition.

    So when I got off work I immediately called DHS’s new, “Be On The Lookout For Domestic Terrorists” hotline and filed  reports on my neighbors, my family and co-workers, I even called my local police department and filed reports with the local Fusion Center. I did this to protect my Homeland, because you never really know about a person’s ideological beliefs and behaviors. (FYI, there is no domestic terrorism hotline, yet.)

    When did freedom of expression become a tool for law enforcement to identify family members, friends, neighbors and co-workers as potential extremists?

    Giving law enforcement more powers to target people based on made-up or junk science and unsound definitions of domestic terrorism has all the earmarks of an ever-expanding police state that began 11 years ago.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 23:40

  • Putin's 'City-Killer': Russia Launches World's Largest Nuclear-Armed Submarine 
    Putin’s ‘City-Killer’: Russia Launches World’s Largest Nuclear-Armed Submarine 

    It’s being popularly dubbed “Putin’s city-killer” – and is also being widely acknowledged as the largest submarine in the world to be built for 30 years: Russian Navy’s ‘Special Mission’ K-329 Belgorod has been put to see for the first time within the past days, undergoing sea trials. 

    Estimated at 178 meters (584 feet) long and about 15 meters (49 feet) across, it’s twice the size of the UK Royal Navy’s largest submarines, but more impressively is equipped with AI-guided nuclear tipped underwater drones which according to one prominent Western source are capable of hitting coastal targets lying 6,000 miles away.

    Belgorod, via Defence View

    The Belgorod has been known about and teased by the Kremlin for years, but is now being hailed in Russian media as a “game changer”. 

    One military expert with the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), Dr. Sidharth Kaushal, explained to The Mail on Sunday:

    “The Belgorod is large enough to act as a mother ship for a unique set of smaller vessels which have deep-diving capabilities and the ability to tamper with undersea infrastructure. 

    It’s well equipped for sabotage and clandestine operations. Its Poseidon nuclear torpedoes could also be a very effective means of attacking an aircraft carrier in wartime – one against which at present no defense exists.”

    It was designed with the advanced Poiseidon torpedoes in mind as part of Russia’s broader nuclear deterrence arsenal.

    Here’s more on why the gigantic Belgorod poses a major challenge for US and other Western attempts to classify and thus understand the vessel from a separate naval analysis source:

    Belgorod it’s intended purpose presents Western analysts with an enigma. She will combine two seemingly contradictory roles. The first is as a host submarine (read ‘mothership’) for deep diving nuclear powered midget submarines. These are capable of working on cables and other objects on the sea floor. The concern in NATO is that these could include the undersea internet cables connecting Western countries. This is termed a ‘special mission’ in navy parlance (which is full of euphemisms for covert activities).

    The second role is one of nuclear strike and deterrence. For this she will be armed with six ‘2м39′ Poseidon torpedoes. These are a whole new category of weapon not fielded by any another navy. They have been described as ‘Intercontinental Nuclear-Powered Nuclear-Armed Autonomous Torpedoes’.

    Each of these AI-driven torpedoes are themselves over 20 meters long, and at least according to Russian military claims have a practically unlimited range in terms of what they could reach across entire oceans.

    The timing of the submarine’s sea trial launch days ago is also a “propaganda victory” of sorts given last week’s dangerous Black Sea warning shots incident off Crimea involving Russia chasing away from its waters the UK’s HMS Defender. 

    British defense officials within days after the incident expressed “surprise” at how rapidly things escalated, given it seems they didn’t expected Russia to that quickly initiate live fire warnings.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 23:20

  • Georgia Secretary Of State Seeking Election Takeover Of Fulton County: "Enough Is Enough"
    Georgia Secretary Of State Seeking Election Takeover Of Fulton County: “Enough Is Enough”

    Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times,

    Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger is pursuing the taking over of Fulton County’s elections operations, claiming that the Atlanta-area county has habitually failed to count votes.

    “I think people are saying enough is enough,” Raffensperger said during a Just the News podcast on June 30.

    “I’m tired of it, but so is everyone else who lives in the other 158 counties [in Georgia].”

    Raffensperger, a Republican who has been frequently criticized by former President Donald Trump after the 2020 election, stated that he will invoke Georgia’s recent election integrity law that allows Georgia’s Elections Board to take over elections operations in localities that have issues with counting ballots.

    The law, SB 202, was approved by the Georgia state Legislature and signed into law earlier this year. The Department of Justice announced last week that it will file a civil rights lawsuit against the measure.

    Raffensperger was asked during the podcast about whether he would recommend that the Elections Board take over Fulton County by using the law.

    “Yes is the answer to your question,” he said.

    “With SB 202, habitually failing counties can—actually the state election board can come in and replace the election director and really take over the governance of that.”

    Raffensperger also noted that he sought the ouster of a top Fulton County elections official, but the county declined to do so.

    During the podcast interview, Raffensperger cited a report released by elections monitor Carter Jones in June that detailed alleged irregularities at a Fulton County vote-counting center in November 2020.

    “What [Jones] said was it’s all this mismanagement,” he said, noting that county “mismanagement” and “dysfunction” erodes the public’s trust in the election system and “really lends itself to conspiracy theories.”

    “So it needs to be fixed. It’s our largest county.”

    Representatives from Fulton County didn’t respond to a request for comment by press time.

    His announcement comes in the midst of an investigation into Fulton County election forms regarding ballots’ chain of custody that allegedly went missing.

    Amid claims that Fulton County can’t “produce all ballot drop box transfer documents,” Raffensperger said in a June 14 statement that his office is investigating the matter.

    Other counties that have failed to follow the state’s rules and regulations regarding drop boxes are also being reviewed, he said.

    A spokesperson for Fulton County at the time appeared to dismiss the reports, telling The Epoch Times that officials “followed procedures for the collection of absentee ballots from Fulton County drop boxes.”

    “We maintain a large quantity of documents and researching our files from last year to produce the ballot transfer forms. We have been in communication with the secretary of state’s office to update them of our progress on this matter.”

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 23:00

  • Fentanyl Seizures At Southern US Border Spike 4000%
    Fentanyl Seizures At Southern US Border Spike 4000%

    President Biden’s border crisis has morphed into a drug crisis as Mexican cartels have taken over parts of the southern border. These criminal gangs are pumping record amounts of fentanyl across the border and contributing to a spike in drug overdose deaths.  

    According to NBC News, US Border Patrol agents seized 4000% more fentanyl this year than in 2018. Biden’s relaxed immigration policies have allowed cartels and illegal aliens to overrun parts of the border. Agents have so far seized 41 pounds of fentanyl in 2021, compared with nine pounds in all of 2020, two pounds in 2019, and one pound in 2018.

    NBC’s data is primarily focused on seizures between land port of entries, such as in the open desert. 

    “For the first time, we’re starting to see these tactics where fentanyl is being smuggled between ports of entry,” Chief Border Patrol Agent Gloria Chavez said. “Cartels are very creative. They find ways to intimidate migrants and find ways to illegally have them transport that narcotic into the United States.”

    Forty-one pounds doesn’t seem like a lot of drugs, but keep in mind the powerful narcotic is 80-100 times stronger than morphine, and just one kilogram, or about 2.2 pounds, can potentially kill 500,000 people. Do the math, and the seizure so far this year is strong enough to kill approximately 9.3 million Americans. 

    Drug Enforcement Administration agents tell NBC that fentanyl has become the drug of choice for cartels to smuggle into the US because it’s easy to transport and very profitable. 

    At land ports, fentanyl and meth seizures are also up 719% and 781%, respectively. Cartels are flooding the deadly drug at every possible opening on the southern border, and Biden’s broken border policies make it possible. 

    A shocking 90,722 overdose deaths were reported in the US through November 2020. If the trajectory continues, overdoses this year could surpass last year’s figures. The virus pandemic intensified the drug crisis (read: here & here) as millions of people lost their jobs and the economy plunged into a recession. Still, millions are without jobs and are spiraling down a deep hole of drugs and alcohol. On top of this all, Biden’s failed border policies to undo former President Trump’s strict border security had made the drug and immigration crisis many times worse. 

    Tragically, this dangerous situation playing out at the southern border was very predictable. Republicans may use Biden’s failed border policies against Democrats for the 2022 midterms and 2024 presidential elections. 

    This week, a billionaire Republican and South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem were able to fund a future deployment of the state’s National Guard to the border as Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has frequently fought the Biden administration about their lousy job protecting Americans from cartels and illegal aliens. 

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 22:40

  • Pennsylvania Democrats To Propose Bullet Tax And Encoded Rounds To Track Ammo Owners
    Pennsylvania Democrats To Propose Bullet Tax And Encoded Rounds To Track Ammo Owners

    Authored by Beth Brelie via The Epoch Times,

    A 5 cent per bullet tax will be proposed in Pennsylvania as part of legislation to be brought forth by two state House Democrats, Rep. Manny Guzman and Rep. Stephen Kinsey.

    The tax would fund a state police database of ammunition sold in Pennsylvania.

    The planned legislation would require ammunition manufacturers to encode ammunition provided for retail sale in Pennsylvania, and to provide ammunition serial numbers to the Pennsylvania State Police for the ammunition database. The plan was revealed in a joint memo to the state legislature by Guzman and Kinsey.

    “Since 2015, only 21% of the nearly 8,500 shootings that Philadelphia has endured have resulted in an arrest or conviction,” the memo said.

    “Far too often, all that is left for the police to find is a victim and a bullet. By making the bullet a more useable piece of evidence, independent from the associated firearm, we can give our law enforcement officers the tools that they need to solve more of these heinous crimes.”

    “By maintaining a record of purchases of ammunition,” the memo continues,

    “our law enforcement officers will be able to easily trace the ownership of any ammunition involved in a crime. This proposal is a much more reliable method of forensic tracing than current systems like ballistic fingerprinting, since determination of a bullet’s code does not require any special skills or equipment, and it serves as an objective identifier.”

    “It is time for us to keep track of these lethal weapons and ensure that we have the tools necessary to convict individuals who use their firearms for unlawful purposes,” the memo said.

    The plan would impose a 5 cent per round tax. Ammunition owners could file for a tax credit of one-half of a percent (0.5 percent) of the gross amount of the tax paid.

    That is, a 50 cent tax return for every $100 spent in bullet taxes. A purchase of 2,000 rounds would cost $100 in tax.

    Gun Owners of America-Pennsylvania Director Val Finnell says the plan amounts to registration and taxation of a constitutional right, to own ammunition.

    “If you register your ammo, that’s a prelude to confiscation, just like firearms registration would be,” Finnell said, noting that if a bill to ban certain ammunition is passed, an ammunition database would show law enforcement who has ammunition to confiscate.

    “This is the agenda of Philadelphia Democrats: registration and confiscation,” Finnell said. “They say ‘we just want common-sense gun laws to help police’ but criminals are going to obtain guns anyway. The only ones it affects are law-abiding citizens.”

    Finnell predicts the bill will not move in the Republican-led General Assembly.

    Republican state Rep. Matthew Dowling, chair of the Pennsylvania House Second Amendment Caucus, says lawmakers shouldn’t be weighing down state police with managing an ammunition database that should not exist.

    “Not only is this onerous for state police who should be using resources in other ways, it’s a violation of privacy standards,” Dowling said.

    “This is on top of the fact that we have a massive shortage of ammo. Law-abiding citizens are having a hard time trying to get their hands on ammo. This will only make it more difficult for them.”

    It is unclear how such a law would address unmarked ammunition from other states or the ammunition already owned by Pennsylvanians.

    Neither Guzman nor Kinsey responded to calls and emails requesting comment.

    Although Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf’s mask mandate and other COVID-19-related restrictions have ended, Kinsey’s Philadelphia constituent office had a recording explaining the office is closed “out of an abundance of caution” due to the risk of COVID-19. Kinsey did have staff in his Harrisburg capitol building office.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 22:20

  • Canadian Asset Manager Charged With $3.6 Million Scheme Frontrunning His Firm's Trades
    Canadian Asset Manager Charged With $3.6 Million Scheme Frontrunning His Firm’s Trades

    A Canadian trader named Sean Wygovsky was charged with insider trading by a federal court in New York on Friday. Wygovsky is alleged to have reaped $3.6 million by stealing confidential information to front-run his firm’s trades. 

    The firm wasn’t identified by the government or by Bloomberg, who reported the charges on Friday.

    Using the accounts of close relatives and family, he attempted to conceal his activity. The relatives and family then kicked back “at least hundreds of thousands of dollars” in illegal trading profits, the government alleges.

    In an official DOJ release, Manhattan U.S. Attorney Audrey Strauss said: “As alleged, Sean Wygovsky illegally exploited his access to his employer firm’s yet-to-be-executed trade orders to make numerous trades in anticipation of the bump or dip the firm’s buying or selling would cause.  To conceal the scheme, Wygovsky allegedly made his front running trades through brokerage accounts of certain of his relatives.  As alleged, Wygovsky made or directed over 700 timely transactions that netted him more than $3.6 million in illegal profits.  Now Sean Wygovsky is in custody and facing serious criminal charges.”

    FBI Assistant Director William F. Sweeney Jr. said: “Over the course of several years, as alleged, Wygovsky made hundreds of short-term trades based on inside information that ultimately reaped more than $3 million in profits. Schemes like the one alleged here grossly affect the integrity of our financial markets and remain a top priority for our financial fraud investigative teams.”

    Wygovsky was arrested in Austin, Texas and is expected to appear in federal court in Texas later on Friday. 

    In addition to facing criminal charges, he is also facing a civil suit by the Securities and Exchange Commission based on similar allegations. 

    He was employed by his firm since 2013 and has been charged with securities fraud and wire fraud, both of which carry a maximum of 20 years in prison, if a conviction is reached. The Employer Firm is an asset management firm based in Toronto, Canada, with at least approximately $19 billion in assets under management, the DOJ said in its press release. 

    Traders on FinTwit pointed out that his LinkedIn appears to show he was employed at Polar Asset Management Partners:

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

     

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 22:00

  • Supreme Court Declines To Hear Appeal From Florist Who Refused Service Over Same-Sex Wedding
    Supreme Court Declines To Hear Appeal From Florist Who Refused Service Over Same-Sex Wedding

    Authored by Jack Philips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    The Supreme Court on Friday declined to hear an appeal over a florist’s refusal to offer service for a wedding of a same-sex couple, allowing a state court’s ruling that the shop engaged in unlawful discrimination.

    The court ruled 6-3 in declining to take it up. At least four justices need to vote in favor of granting a petition to authorize a review of a case. Justices Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, and Clarence Thomas voted in favor (pdf) of taking the case.

    The Supreme Court didn’t provide an explanation for its denial to hear the case, stating, in part: “The petition for a writ of certiorari is denied.”

    In June, the Washington state Supreme Court issued a ruling against the florist, Barronelle Stutzman, who refused to create a floral arrangement for Robert Ingersoll’s same-sex wedding in 2013.

    The state court had “branded Barronelle a ‘discriminator’ and ordered her to attend, facilitate, and create custom floral art celebrating all marriages or none,” Kristen Waggoner, an attorney for Stutzman, had written to the justices.

    Stutzman had argued that her floral arrangements were effectively speech that is protected under the First Amendment.

    “Like all artists, Barronelle speaks through her custom creations,” Waggoner wrote to the high court and argued that  the floral arrangements as “multimedia works incorporating flowers.”

    The Epoch Times has contacted Barronelle’s lawyers for comment following the Supreme Court’s refusal to take the case.

    However, lawyers for Ingersoll and Curt Freed, who filed the lawsuit, claimed that Stutzman violated anti-discrimination laws for refusing to make the floral arrangement for the wedding. The attorneys further stipulated that Stutzman is essentially trying to seek a “floral art” exemption to anti-discrimination laws.

    The notion of a First Amendment right to discriminate has been rejected as often as it has been raised,” wrote Ria Tabacco Mar, a lawyer who represented the plaintiffs, to the Supreme Court.

    Several weeks ago, the court issued a unanimous ruling that sided with a Catholic adoption agency in Philadelphia that says religious beliefs prevent it from working with same-sex foster parents.

    “It is plain that the City’s actions have burdened CSS’s [Catholic Social Services’] religious exercise by putting it to the choice of curtailing its mission or approving relationships inconsistent with its beliefs,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in that ruling. The agency, he added, “seeks only an accommodation that will allow it to continue serving the children of Philadelphia in a manner consistent with its religious beliefs; it does not seek to impose those beliefs on anyone else.”

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 21:40

  • Apple Warns iPhone Can "Interfere" With Cardiac Devices 
    Apple Warns iPhone Can “Interfere” With Cardiac Devices 

    Apple has released a long list of products it says should be kept away from implanted pacemakers and defibrillators because it may “interfere” with the medical devices. 

    “Many consumer-electronic devices contain magnets or components and radios that emit electromagnetic fields,” Apple said, adding that “to avoid any potential interactions with these types of medical devices, keep your Apple product a safe distance away from your medical device (more than 6 inches / 15 cm apart or more than 12 inches / 30 cm apart if wirelessly charging).” 

    Apple doesn’t explain what could happen when its products come in close contact with pacemakers and defibrillators. Still, one could assume the worst circumstance could be the deactivation of a medical device and may result in death. 

    “If you suspect that your Apple product is interfering with your medical device, stop using your Apple product and consult your physician and your medical-device manufacturer,” the company warned. 

    Here are the products Apple wants to keep away from your medical devices: 

    AirPods and charging cases

    • AirPods and Charging Case
    • AirPods and Wireless Charging Case 
    • AirPods Pro and Wireless Charging Case
    • AirPods Max and Smart Case

    Apple Watch and accessories

    • Apple Watch
    • Apple Watch bands with magnets
    • Apple Watch magnetic charging accessories

    HomePod

    • HomePod 
    • HomePod mini

    iPad and accessories

    • iPad
    • iPad mini
    • iPad Air
    • iPad Pro
    • iPad Smart Covers and Smart Folios
    • iPad Smart Keyboard and Smart Keyboard Folio
    • Magic Keyboard for iPad

    iPhone and MagSafe accessories

    • iPhone 12 models
    • MagSafe accessories

    Mac and accessories

    • Mac mini
    • Mac Pro
    • MacBook Air
    • MacBook Pro
    • iMac
    • Apple Pro Display XDR

    Beats

    • Beats Flex
    • Beats X
    • PowerBeats Pro
    • UrBeats3

    Perhaps Apple’s warning comes as a new analysis in the American Heart Association Journal warns that certain Apple iPhones can cause significant issues with cardiac implantable electronic devices. 

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 21:20

  • Facebook Now Sending Messages To Some Users Asking About Potentially ‘Extremist’ Friends
    Facebook Now Sending Messages To Some Users Asking About Potentially ‘Extremist’ Friends

    Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Some Facebook users have recently reported being sent warning messages from the social media giant relating to “extremists” or “extremist content.”

    Are you concerned that someone you know is becoming an extremist?” one message reads.

    “We care about preventing extremism on Facebook. Others in your situation have received confidential support.”

    A giant digital sign is seen at Facebook’s corporate headquarters campus in Menlo Park, California, on October 23, 2019. (JOSH EDELSON/AFP via Getty Images)

    The message also provides a button to “Get Support,” which leads to another Facebook page about extremism.

    Redstate editor Kira Davis, who said was sent a screenshot of the message from a friend, wrote: “Hey has anyone had this message pop up on their FB? My friend (who is not an ideologue but hosts lots of competing chatter) got this message twice. He’s very disturbed.”

    And others reported getting a warning that they may have been “exposed to harmful extremist content recently.” The message then states that “violent groups try to manipulate your anger and disappointment,” similarly offering a “Get Support” option.

    Facebook randomly sent me this notice about extremism when I clicked over to the app. Pretty weird. … The Get Support button just goes to a short article asking people not to be hateful,” another user on Twitter wrote.

    A Facebook spokesperson confirmed to The Epoch Times on July 1 that the company is currently running the warnings as a test to some users.

    “This test is part of our larger work to assess ways to provide resources and support to people on Facebook who may have engaged with or were exposed to extremist content, or may know someone who is at risk. We are partnering with NGOs and academic experts in this space and hope to have more to share in the future,” the spokesperson said, without elaborating.

    The messages come after lawmakers have repeatedly targeted and pressured CEOs of big tech firms such as Facebook, Twitter, Google, and Microsoft, essentially accusing them of allowing “extremism,” misinformation, and cyberbullying on their platforms. Such social media companies have faced criticism from Republicans who have accused them of censoring conservative voices and limiting the reach—or outright blocking—content that portrays Democrat political figures in a negative light.

    Conservatives, including former President Donald Trump, have argued for the revocation of Section 230 of the federal Communications Decency Act, which serves as a liability shield for online publishers. However, the movement to rein in Big Tech was dealt a blow earlier this week when a federal judge tossed a Federal Trade Commission lawsuit against Facebook that had accused the firm of engaging in anti-competitive practices.

    These warning messages, however, are sure to trigger even more negative feedback against Facebook and its CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, over fears that the company is attempting to stifle free speech. On Twitter, as screenshots of the warning messages were being shared en masse on July 1, many users expressed concern over the direction Facebook is taking.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.jshttps://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 21:00

  • Reality Check: Professor Pens Letter Explaining Natural Resource Drain Crated By "Net Zero Emission" Targets
    Reality Check: Professor Pens Letter Explaining Natural Resource Drain Crated By “Net Zero Emission” Targets

    While the idea of implementing net zero emissions by certain deadlines has sounded great for the companies, countries and states that have set targets, the reality of making it happen is slightly more difficult.

    That’s what the U.K. is finding out after Natural History Museum Head of Earth Sciences Prof Richard Herrington penned a letter to the Committee on Climate Change on the vast amount of natural resources that will be necessary to make the conversion. The letter was delivered to Baroness Brown, who chairs the Adaption Sub-Committee of the Committee on Climate Change.

    In addition to noting that the U.K. would need a 20% increase in UK-generated electricity, the release also notes that “to meet UK electric car targets for 2050 we would need to produce just under two times the current total annual world cobalt production, nearly the entire world production of neodymium, three quarters the world’s lithium production and at least half of the world’s copper production.”

    The letter reads:

    The urgent need to cut CO2 emissions to secure the future of our planet is clear, but there are huge implications for our natural resources not only to produce green technologies like electric cars but keep them charged.

    Over the next few decades, global supply of raw materials must drastically change to accommodate not just the UK’s transformation to a low carbon economy, but the whole world’s. Our role as scientists is to provide the evidence for how best to move towards a zero-carbon economy – society needs to understand that there is a raw material cost of going green and that both new research and investment is urgently needed for us to evaluate new ways to source these. This may include potentially considering sources much closer to where the metals are to be used.”

    It then points out obvious challenges in meeting the needs of converting all cars and vans to electric vehicles, especially as it relates to cobalt:

    To replace all UK-based vehicles today with electric vehicles (not including the LGV and HGV fleets), assuming they use the most resource-frugal next-generation NMC 811 batteries, would take 207,900 tonnes cobalt, 264,600 tonnes of lithium carbonate (LCE), at least 7,200 tonnes of neodymium and dysprosium, in addition to 2,362,500 tonnes copperThis represents, just under two times the total annual world cobalt production, nearly the entire world production of neodymium, three quarters the world’s lithium production and at least half of the world’s copper production during 2018. Even ensuring the annual supply of electric vehicles only, from 2035 as pledged, will require the UK to annually import the equivalent of the entire annual cobalt needs of European industry.

    The drain on resources would be felt globally, and not just in the U.K., the letter continues:

    If this analysis is extrapolated to the currently projected estimate of two billion cars worldwide, based on 2018 figures, annual production would have to increase for neodymium and dysprosium by 70%, copper output would need to more than double and cobalt output would need to increase at least three and a half times for the entire period from now until 2050 to satisfy the demand.

    Finally, it points out the rising energy cost of metal production (almost 4 times the total annual UK electrical output) and additional challenges of using “green energy” to provide the electricity for EVs:

    Energy cost of metal production: This choice of vehicle comes with an energy cost too.  Energy costs for cobalt production are estimated at 7000-8000 kWh for every tonne of metal produced and for copper 9000 kWh/t.  The rare-earth energy costs are at least 3350 kWh/t, so for the target of all 31.5 million cars that requires 22.5 TWh of power to produce the new metals for the UK fleet, amounting to 6% of the UK’s current annual electrical usage.  Extrapolated to 2 billion cars worldwide, the energy demand for extracting and processing the metals is almost 4 times the total annual UK electrical output

    Challenges of using ‘green energy’ to power electric cars: If wind farms are chosen to generate the power for the projected two billion cars at UK average usage, this requires the equivalent of a further years’ worth of total global copper supply and 10 years’ worth of global neodymium and dysprosium production to build the windfarms.

    Solar power is also problematic – it is also resource hungry; all the photovoltaic systems currently on the market are reliant on one or more raw materials classed as “critical” or “near critical” by the EU and/ or US Department of Energy (high purity silicon, indium, tellurium, gallium) because of their natural scarcity or their recovery as minor-by-products of other commodities. With a capacity factor of only ~10%, the UK would require ~72GW of photovoltaic input to fuel the EV fleet; over five times the current installed capacity. If CdTe-type photovoltaic power is used, that would consume over thirty years of current annual tellurium supply.

    The letter makes it clear that there are several “inconvenient truths” associated with the reality of all of the “clean energy” virtue signaling that has been taking place. The letter follows last month when we published an article reporting that EVs may offer a negligible difference from ICE vehicles in CO2 emissions. It was the topic of a blog post by natural resource investors Goehring & Rozencwajg (G&R), a “fundamental research firm focused exclusively on contrarian natural resource investments with a team with over 30 years of dedicated resource experience.”

    The firm, established in 2015, posted a blog entry entitled “Exploring Lithium-ion Electric Vehicles’ Carbon Footprint”, where they called into question a former ICE vs. EV comparison performed by the Wall Street Journal and, while citing work performed by Jefferies, argue that there could literally be “no reduction in CO2 output” in some EV vs. ICE comparisons. 

    Their analysis “details the tremendous amount of energy (and by extension CO2) needed to manufacture a lithium-ion battery.” Because a typical EV is on average 50% heavier than a similar internal combustion engine, the analysis notes that the “embedded carbon” in an EV (i.e., when it rolls off the lot) is therefore 20–50% more than an internal combustion engine.

     

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 20:40

  • New Emails Raise Fresh Allegations Of Influence Peddling By Hunter Biden, Contradict President Biden
    New Emails Raise Fresh Allegations Of Influence Peddling By Hunter Biden, Contradict President Biden

    Authored by Jonathan Turley,

    We have previously discussed the concerted and often embarrassing blackout in the media on stories involving Hunter Biden’s influence peddling during his father’s tenure as Vice President. That includes the burying of the laptop story and the growing contradictions over his father’s denial of any knowledge or involvement in his shady business dealings. Even recent reports that Hunter may have paid prostitutes with his father’s account were blacked out by mainstream media which exhaustively pursued any story related to the Trump children and their dealings and life styles. Now, however, there is a major allegation that Hunter used access to his father to seal previously unknown deals with Mexican businessmen, including Carlos Slim. 

    A picture shows Hunter with the businessmen in the Vice President residence with his father.

    As in the past, Americans interested in such stories have had to rely on the foreign press or a couple domestic sites for such information.

    The new emails include references to the use of Air Force II by Hunter Biden to pursue the deals — a similar pattern revealed with regard to the China dealings. The emails detail a number of visits to Mexico, including a February 2016 flight on Air Force II with his father.  On the plane was his business partner Jeff Cooper, who ran Illinois-based SimmonsCooper.  That is one of the largest asbestos litigation firms in the country and Hunter was given 3 percent of Cooper’s venture capital firm Eudora Global, according to emails. President Biden’s brother (who featured in past controversial deals) was also reportedly involved in some of these efforts.

    These dealings continued into 2018 as Hunter pushed for deals with Slim. One text message from July 24, 2018 reads “Spoke to my dad about ‘Slim ask” and Cooper responds  “Oh that sounds SO F’ING GOOD.”

    It obviously does not sound quite so good if you are a reporter who has been repeatedly assured by President Biden that he had no knowledge or involvement in any dealings with Hunter. That was previously refuted by various sources. Hunter himself contradicted his father’s repeated denial. Then there are the emails referring to the “Big Guy”, which witnesses say was Joe Biden. Then there is Tony Bobulinski who stated that he personally met with Joe Biden to discuss Hunter’s business dealings. Bobulinski is repeatedly praised by Hunter Biden in the emails and identified as the person in control of transactions for “the family.” He has directly contradicted Joe Biden’s denial of any knowledge or involvement in his son’s dubious dealings.

    The new emails contain additional information directly contradicting President Biden. In addition to earlier pictures from golf trips and references to his involvement or knowledge, new material refers to a notable dinner arranged in Washington, D.C.

    Hunter arranged for then Vice President Biden to have dinner on April 16, 2015 with his Ukrainian, Russian and Kazakhstani business associates. They appropriately chose a private room at Café Milano, a Georgetown restaurant that brags that it is “Where the world’s most powerful people go.”  After the dinner, Hunter received an email from Vadym Pozharskyi, an executive with the Ukrainian energy company Burisma, to thank him for introducing him to his father: “Dear Hunter, thank you for inviting me to DC and giving an opportunity to meet your father and spent [sic] some time together. It’s realty [sic] an honor and pleasure.”

    It is clear that Hunter Biden was selling access and influence. It appears that Joe Biden was aware of that effort. That is very serious.  If these emails are false, this is a major story. If they are true, this is a major scandal.  Presumably, however, this story will result in another run to the nearest ice cream shop for breathless coverage on the current frozen delights of the President.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 20:20

  • Understaffed Restaurants Resort To Serverless Ordering 
    Understaffed Restaurants Resort To Serverless Ordering 

    There are signs that technology is starting to become mainstream in restaurants chains across the country. The introduction of automation has made the experience for guests more pleasurable while more streamlined for employees. 

    WSJ reports casual-dining chains, such as Cracker Barrel Old Country Store Inc., Applebee’s International, Inc., among others, are quickly adopting technology for payments that allow contactless ordering and paying. 

    Cracker Barrel’s patrons can order their meals through an app on their smartphone and even pay for the entire meal. As explained by the president of Cracker Barrel, the good news is that amid labor shortages, automation allows understaffed wait staff to handle volumes adequately. 

    “The more we can move volume to things like that, it takes the pressure off the labor in the stores,” said Sandra B. Cochran, Cracker Barrel’s president and chief executive. “Staffing has become challenging at Cracker Barrel, which has classified the personnel situation at 10% of its restaurants as “critical,” she said.

    The automated ordering system frees up the server who once had to write the order on a pad then transfer it to a self-serve kiosk machine. Ordering and paying through an app allows the company to increase profit and margins and speeds up the ordering process. Servers can focus on other tasks while the app handles ordering and payment. 

    There has been some discussion about using tabletop technology versus traditional ordering through a server, said John Glass, a managing director and equity analyst covering restaurants at Morgan Stanley. “If face-to-face interaction is important to your brand, and you suddenly took it away, you’ve removed a layer of the brand differentiation,” he said.

    But in a new world where technology is pouring into restaurants amid aims for a contactless environment, the move could also prove beneficial for the customer. Ordering from their phones means that a server won’t screw up dishes, substitutions, and the amount of food that someone wants. 

    Deepthi Prakash, global director of product and marketing TBWA\Worldwide, an Omnicom Group Inc. advertising agency, said the casual-dining app means “more and the tables turn over faster, because they can get their orders and they can get their bills sooner.” This is also a big plus for restaurants that face labor shortages. 

    Technology is creeping into every corner of the restaurant industry. Back-end systems are also being overhauled to make managers lives less chaotic. 

    Applebee’s is another restaurant that has invested in front-end technology at its eateries. It has given servers in around 500 of its 1,705 restaurants hand-held tablets for processing orders instead of entering them into a central computer system. 

    “Bottom line—the servers love these tablets because it makes their job easier and allows them to make more money,” John Cywinski, president of the grill and bar chain, said. 

    There’s no turning back as automation technology investments will only increase in a contactless world as the evolution here will be the introduction of robotics that will replace human wait staff

    For those unfamiliar with why restaurant operators are turning to automation – it has to due with soaring labor and food costs, the need for better efficiency, and the standardization of operations to reduce errors. 

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 20:00

  • Navy Unit Forced To Take Part In Mandatory 'Diversity Hike' Waving LGBT Flags
    Navy Unit Forced To Take Part In Mandatory ‘Diversity Hike’ Waving LGBT Flags

    Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Summit News,

    Active duty members of the Navy in San Diego were forced to take part in a mandatory ‘diversity hike’ during which they flew LGBT flags while American flags were nowhere to be seen.

    “A woman whose husband is active duty Navy sent me this. His command held a “diversity hike” in honor of Pride Month. Attendance was mandatory. They hiked while waving a rainbow American flag,” tweeted Matt Walsh.

    As Chris Menahan explains, the event was promoted by the Construction Battalion Maintenance Unit 303, which celebrated “Pride Month” with a “Pride Hike” at Sunset Cliff last week.

    The servicemembers were made to carry a version of the LGBT flag which incorporates the stars and stripes, although no actual American flag was flown.

    A photo from the hike shows one of the men turning away from the camera, perhaps in protest at being forced to be involved.

    “It appears as though in April male sailors in the same unit had to hold up these humiliating signs telling one another not to commit rape,” writes Menahan.

    Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently appeared before a House Armed Services Committee where he faced accusations that the U.S. military was going “woke”.

    While attempting to deny the claim, Milley actually did everything to confirm it was true while also insisting he wanted to understand “white rage,” a concept invented by left-wing extremists as part of Critical Race Theory to denigrate white people.

     

    As we highlighted last week, Nellis Air Force base responded to controversy about a drag queen show hosted by the base by saying the performance was “essential to the morale, cohesion, and readiness of the military.”

    Attempts by the woke cult to subvert the military began under the Obama administration, during which in some instances cadets were made to take part in an event called Walk a Mile in Her Shoes, which sought to raise awareness for sexual assault victims by having men wearing Army Combat Uniforms parade around in red high heels.

    But no, of course the military isn’t going woke, who would be stupid enough to even suggest that?

    Meanwhile, China and Russia continue to laugh hysterically while training their soldiers to engage in elite combat.

    *  *  *

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    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 19:40

  • US Suffers Explosion In Urgent Mental-Health Cases As COVID Recedes
    US Suffers Explosion In Urgent Mental-Health Cases As COVID Recedes

    The latest indication that the COVID-19 pandemic (and the heavy-handed lockdowns imposed in the US and elsewhere) is leading to a relatively quiet, but still severe, mental health crisis appeared in Monday’s Wall Street Journal via a report about the surge in urgent mental-health-related cases clogging up emergency rooms and psychiatric hospitals around the country.

    And as the US increasingly moves to reopen, the whiff of newfound freedom is apparently pushing more people over the edge.

    WSJ begins its story at Pittsburgh’s largest psychiatric hospital, where one doctor working the overnight shift has seen the average number of daily  cases double to nearly two dozen from nearly a dozen.

    “It seems like everyone has been holding their breath for a year, and now, it’s just a total explosion of everything, both in terms of high volume but also the severity of cases,” Dr. Sparks said. “You see a lot more people who were, pre-pandemic, kind of overwhelmed and stressed, and now they have full-on anxiety disorders or depression.”

    The wave of mental-health cases has “grown into a tsunami”, flooding an already overtaxed health-care system. Emergency departments say they are being overwhelmed by patients who either deferred care, or simply couldn’t access it, during the pandemic, or whose symptoms were exacerbated or aggravated by the lockdowns.

    Some doctors fear this is only the beginning, and that the full impact of the pandemic on mental health won’t be ascertainable for years. Here’s a breakdown of some of the other key information from the WSJ story:

    • Children have been hit particularly hard. School closures have led to serious mental-health issues going unnoticed because teachers and school psychologists are a primary source of referrals. Even before the pandemic, the country faced a shortage of mental-health professionals serving juveniles: the American Academy of Pediatrics last year estimated the need for child psychiatrists at 47/100K people, roughly 4x the number in practice. Emergency-room visits for mental-health crises among 12- to 17-year-olds increased 31% between 2019 and 2020 according to the CDC. At the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, pediatric-outpatient volume surged 30% in the first four months of 2021 compared with the year earlier. “We have more kids waiting for care than we ever have before,” said Abigail Schlesinger, the hospital’s chief of child and adolescent psychiatry. “We’re in the mental-health emergency phase of this pandemic.”
    • Suicides have risen among minors. Emergency-room visits for suspected suicide among kids 12-17 rose 22% last summer compared with the previous year, and 39% this past winter compared with the previous winter.
    • More mental-health crises are ending up in emergency rooms in part because outpatient facilities, including private psychiatrists’ offices, therapy practices and crisis centers, are simply overwhelmed. “For us, it’s definitely a lot of people who either had pre-existing conditions or have neglected to address their new onset of emotional imbalance,” said Damir Huremovic, a psychiatrist at North Shore University Hospital on Long Island. “Many developed anxiety or insomnia, and they tried to see a provider but no one was taking new patients, and then things sort of just snowballed.”
    • Crisis hotlines are bumping. Overall volume at Resolve, a crisis hotline serving an impoverished slice of Pittsburgh, saw rates of calls between January and April surge 27% compared with the year-earlier period. For the past six months, Resolve has been handling hundreds of phone calls a day, with as many as 50 of them serious enough to require a home visit by trained clinicians. That’s 2x to 3x the level from two years ago. “Isolation is the overarching theme,” said Jeff McFadden, a phone crisis clinician at the center who says the volume of calls is the highest he has seen in his 13 years at Resolve. “It’s everything from ‘I’m lonely’ or ‘my girlfriend broke up with me,’ to ‘I’ve got a gun right next to me, give me a reason to live’…There’s this perfect storm where people feel trapped in their own houses and alone. We’re seeing it more and more.”
    • Delays in finding care are also a problem. “Clinics that used to be able to get people in within a couple of days, it now takes a couple of weeks or months,” one doctor said. The past year has “broken all the paradigms” for how to treat mental-health cases in the community.

    Increasingly, the doctors and nurses who care for patients seeking urgent care for psychiatric issues are feeling job-related stressors like burnout intensify. “You can only take so much when you’re sleep-deprived, exhausted, and juggling other people’s problems like balls on fire for so many nights in a row,” one doctor said.

    And another an epidemic of health-care workers taking leave or quitting due to burnout is the last time the health-care system needs.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 19:20

  • Judge Orders Minneapolis To Hire More Police Officers Amid Crime Surge
    Judge Orders Minneapolis To Hire More Police Officers Amid Crime Surge

    Authored by Isabel Van Brugen via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    A judge on July 1 ruled in favor of a group that filed a lawsuit demanding more police officers be brought into the city, after city council members and activist groups advocated to replace the police department following the death of George Floyd.

    Minneapolis Police Deputy Chief Art Knight speaks with people in Minneapolis, Minn., on June 16, 2020. (Stephen Maturen/Getty Images)

    Hennepin County District Judge Jamie Anderson issued a writ of mandamus (pdf) ordering the city to hire more police officers, specifically that Minneapolis should have at least 730 officers or .0017 of the 2020 census population, whichever is higher, by the end of June 2022.

    An unprecedented number of officers quit or went on extended medical leave after Floyd’s death and the unrest that followed, which included the burning of a police precinct. With new recruit classes, the city anticipates it will have 674 officers available at the end of the year, with another 28 in the hiring process, the Star Tribune reported.

    Floyd died May 25 last year after being restrained by former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin. Floyd’s death sparked widespread riots and protests. Chauvin was sentenced on June 25 to 22 1/2 years in prison for second-degree murder.

    The death of Floyd triggered left-wing demonstrations, riots, and violence across the country as well as calls to “defund the police,” which some critics have said has led to a significant rise in crime across major U.S. metropolitan areas in recent months. Minneapolis was particularly hit hard by weeks of riots, arson attacks, looting, and violence in the wake of Floyd’s death, causing tens of millions of dollars in damage.

    Amid calls to dismantle the department, some residents have begged the city to hire more officers, citing longer response times and an increase in violent crime.

    “Minneapolis is in a crisis,” the eight plaintiffs linked to the conservative Upper Midwest Law Center wrote in their lawsuit, noting the recent spike in violent crime in the city, FOX 9 reported.

    In his decision, the judge wrote that the eight plaintiffs, all Minneapolis residents, were able to show that the lack of officers in the city is linked to the surge in crime and has caused personal injuries.

    “This is a huge victory for the Petitioners and all residents of Minneapolis, especially those in the most diverse neighborhoods feeling the brunt of rising crime rates,” Doug Seaton, president of the Upper Midwest Law Center, said in a statement in response to the decision.

    We applaud the Court’s decision and look forward to swift action by the City Council and Mayor to fund the police and ensure the safety of all Minneapolitans.”

    The Associated Press contributed to this report.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 19:00

  • Dramatic Footage Shows Underwater Fireballs Erupting From Offshore Platform Gas Leak
    Dramatic Footage Shows Underwater Fireballs Erupting From Offshore Platform Gas Leak

    Mexico’s state-owned oil company, Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex), said Friday an underwater pipeline connecting an offshore platform at the Ku Maloob Zaap oil development experienced a fracture, shooting flames out of the water. 

    The video of the incident is absolutely stunning and resembles almost a lava pit, but that’s just flames boiling to the surface in the Gulf waters. 

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    Pemex dispatched multiple support vessels that were able to pump water over the flames. It took about five hours for the oil company to contain the gas leak, reportedly 150 meters from the drilling platform. 

    Ku-Maloob-Zaap is the most productive oil field in Mexico, accounting for 40% of its 1.68 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude production. Sources told Reuters, the development was producing 726,000 bpd at the time of the incident. 

    The source also shared an incident report of what may have caused the fire:

    “The turbomachinery of Ku Maloob Zaap’s active production facilities were affected by an electrical storm and heavy rains,” the report said.

    While the support vessels were spraying water on the roiling balls of flame erupting underwater, nitrogen was ultimately used to contain the pipeline leak. 

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 18:35

  • San Jose To Tax Law-Abiding Gun Owners For The Actions Of Criminals
    San Jose To Tax Law-Abiding Gun Owners For The Actions Of Criminals

    Via BattleSwarmblog.com,

    The Democratic Party’s war against the second amendment opens a new front thanks to the San Jose City Council’s decision to tax law-abiding gun owners for the actions of criminals:

    Gun owners in San Jose, California, will soon face a yearly tax and be required to carry additional insurance after their city council voted unanimously Tuesday evening to impose the new measures.

    The forthcoming fee for gun ownership in the city has not yet been determined, but officials said that anyone found to be in noncompliance will have their weapons confiscated.

    The city council’s aim is to try to recoup the cost of responding to gun incidents such as shootings and deaths. According to the Pacific Council on Research and Evaluation, which studied the issue and sent a representative to testify before the panel, gun-related incidents cost the city roughly $63 million every year in the way of paying for police officers, medics and other expenses, The San Francisco Chronicle reported.

    Chief Justice John Marshall said that the power to tax is the power to destroy, and here the attempt is to destroy lawful gun ownership by imposing collective guilt on the law-abiding for the actions of the criminal and turning law-abiding gun owners into criminals for refusing to comply with an unconstitutional, punitive tax.

    The endgame, as always, complete civilian gun confiscation.

    Next up: A tax on sober drivers to pay for the actions of drunk ones.

    Meanwhile, in other California war against guns news, various challenges to various California gun law are pending an en-banc hearing on Duncan v Bonta. (Previously.)

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 18:20

  • Human Rights Groups Are Quitting YouTube Over Its Pro-China Censorship
    Human Rights Groups Are Quitting YouTube Over Its Pro-China Censorship

    In yet another glaring example of Google willingly doing China’s bidding, YouTube this month agreed to take down multiple videos posted by a well-known China-related human rights organization

    As Reuters recently reported, YouTube initially tried to pressure the group called Atajurt Kazakh Human Rights to censor its content in several videos documenting disappeared Uyghur citizens in China’s Xinjiang province, which YouTube interpreted as a violation of its anti-harassment policy given personally identifiable information was present.

    Despite the group’s videos essentially including detailed news reporting, the Google-owned platform said it had too many strikes against it related to people featured showing their IDs. The organization was asked to blur the IDs

    The IDs were shown on the videos to verify that interviewees were indeed relatives of those believed to be missing inside Xinjiang’s vast ‘reeducation camp’ prisons. Instead of continuing to allow the videos to garner millions of views, spotlighting the ongoing crackdown against the Chinese Muslim minorities, YouTube instead “disappeared” the videos. The controversy began within the past years as follows:

    Atajurt Kazakh Human Rights’ channel has published nearly 11,000 videos on YouTube totaling over 120 million views since 2017, thousands of which feature people speaking to camera about relatives they say have disappeared without a trace in China’s Xinjiang region, where UN experts and rights groups estimate over a million people have been detained in recent years.

    On June 15, the channel was blocked for violating YouTube’s guidelines, according to a screenshot seen by Reuters, after twelve of its videos had been reported for breaching its ‘cyberbullying and harassment’ policy.

    While a number of videos have been reportedly restored on appeal, Atajurt Kazakh was alarmed enough over the crackdown to announce it would move its content to a less restrictive blockchain-based platform.

    YouTube later defended the move, describing that its harassment policy “clearly prohibits content revealing someone’s personally identifiable information, including their government identification or phone numbers.” It claimed to further be enforcing policies “equally for everyone”.

    Meanwhile in related news…

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    Following the media attention, YouTube began restoring the videos while saying it would further evaluate its current policies. Reuters documented that the social media platform still urged the human rights group to comply, noting that “YouTube asked Atajurt to blur the IDs.”

    However, it remains that “Atajurt is hesitant to comply, the channel’s administrator said, concerned that doing so would jeopardize the trustworthiness of the videos.” So far close to 1,000 videos have been moved to the blockchain-driven alternative side Odysee, in a move which other rights and journalism organization may soon follow.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 18:00

  • Virus Z: A Thought Experiment
    Virus Z: A Thought Experiment

    Authored by Charles Hugh Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,

    What’s striking about our thought experiment is how little reliable data we have about the transmissibility of our hypothetical Virus Z and the long-term consequences of its mutations.

    Let’s run a thought experiment on a hypothetical virus we’ll call Virus Z, a run-of-the-mill respiratory variety not much different from other viruses which are 1) very small; 2) mutate rapidly and 3) infect human cells and modify the cellular machinery to produce more viral particles.

    Like other viruses, Virus Z continually improves the odds of future replication via the natural selection of any mutations which improve its replication capabilities. Since viruses need host cells to replicate, the key advantages selected through mutation are evading hosts’ immune responses to invading viruses.

    As in all organisms in which advantageous mutations arise and eventually spread throughout the organism’s genetic instructions, the natural selection of mutations in viruses is not teleological, meaning there is no set goal to the evolutionary process other than whatever is advantageous in a particular setting.

    To use a football analogy, the viral mutations don’t have a goal of advancing 10 yards to get a first down and continue down the field to score a touchdown. Any mutation which helps the virus evade getting tackled by the host immune system is conserved, as the viruses which get tackled and gobbled up by the immune system are no longer replicating, while the virus which evades the immune system continues replicating. Whatever mutations that enable it to evade getting tackled are conserved in the genetic coding of all future viruses.

    In our thought experiment, Virus Z is a novel respiratory virus, i.e. it spreads via particles of moisture exhaled by human hosts, so most human hosts don’t have a natural immunity to it because their body’s immune system has never encountered it before. As a result, many people exposed to Virus Z become ill as the virus triggers an immune response (inflammation, fever, congestion) which disrupts various processes (oxygen uptake, digestion, etc.)

    Like many other pathogens, Virus Z leads to the death of some infected people with compromised or weakened immune systems. In our thought experiment, Virus Z leads to the hospitalization of a percentage of infected people and the death of around 2% of all people who contract the illness.

    This is not an exceptional rate in human history, and like many other pathogens, Virus Z tends to sicken the old and frail who have less robust immune systems.

    But nonetheless, 2% is not zero, and so bioscience develops a vaccine to Virus Z which successfully reduces the severity of the illness and this naturally lowers the rate of those dying from the viral illness.

    The vaccine is tested for one goal: does it reduce the severity of the illness or not? As a result of this goal and the testing protocol, it’s unknown if the virus can remain at low levels in vaccinated individuals and be transmissible to others.

    In other words, it’s unknown if some vaccinated individuals might be contagious even though they exhibit no symptoms of illness.

    Just as flu shots are not 100% effective against all strains of influenza, it turns out the Virus Z vaccine is highly effective in reducing the odds of contracting the virus and the severity of any subsequent illness, but it doesn’t reduce the transmissibility to zero or the number of those who become ill despite being vaccinated to zero.

    Since it’s not practical to constantly test every vaccinated individual, the number of vaccinated individuals who still harbor low levels of virus while being symptom-free (i.e. asymptomatic) is unknown. A vaccinated individual might be virus-free but then be reinfected by exposure to a new variant that survives the immune onslaught but does not generate symptoms.

    So in this pool of X number of vaccinated individuals, the virus continues to mutate, with those mutations which help the virus evade the vaccine-enhanced immune system of the host being the mutations which are conserved, as the viruses which get tackled by the immune system no longer replicate while those with the helpful mutation continue replicating.

    The viruses which evade the immune system tacklers are also selected for improved transmissibility, meaning those with limited transmissibility don’t infect other hosts while those with improved transmissibility (i.e. are more contagious) spread with relative ease to other hosts, both unvaccinated and vaccinated, as the vaccine suppresses transmissibility but doesn’t reduce it to zero.

    Since the goal of the vaccine program was to reduce the number of those becoming severely ill and requiring hospitalization, the system only counts individuals who become ill enough to require hospitalization: those hospitalized are tabulated in two fields, unvaccinated or vaccinated.

    As expected, the majority of those hospitalized with severe illness are unvaccinated, as the vaccine effectively reduced the number of people who develop severe cases after contracting the disease.

    What the vaccine doesn’t do is reduce the number of vaccinated people who contract the disease to zero, nor does it reduce the transmissibility of vaccinated carriers of the virus to zero.

    This means some unknown percentage (unknown because it’s not practical to routinely test tens of millions of people) of vaccinated individuals become carriers of the virus. Some unknown percentage will contract the illness but not severely enough to require hospitalization, so they won’t be counted by the system. A relative few will require hospitalization, and will be counted as “breakthrough cases,” i.e. vaccinated individuals who contracted the virus, became ill and required hospitalization.

    But because the system doesn’t count vaccinated people who become ill and stay at home, the number of officially tallied “breakthrough cases” is an undercount of the total number.

    Since relatively few vaccinated individuals who are ill at home will drag themselves to a testing facility to confirm they have Virus Z, the total number of vaccinated individuals who are carriers (i.e. are contagious) and who became ill enough to stay home is also unknown.

    Like many other viruses, Virus Z triggers long-term debilitating symptoms in a percentage of those who become ill, and some percentage of these long-term effects occur in individuals whose illness was relatively mild. Since it’s it’s not practical to routinely test tens of millions of vaccinated individuals, the number who contracted the illness and are experiencing long-term debilitating symptoms is unknown.

    What we do know via careful contract tracing is that one vaccinated individual transmitted the virus to 20 other people, both unvaccinated and vaccinated, in one encounter in an enclosed space, and this variant is genetically distinct from the initial Virus Z.

    This is worrisome, as the transmissibility of a virus is more dangerous than than the mortality rate of those infected. If a virus with low transmissibility causes the death of 5% of those who contract the illness, and it sickens 1,000 people, then 50 of those stricken will die. A highly transmissible virus with a mortality rate of 2% may appear less dangerous, but if it sickens 100,000 people and 2% die, that’s 2,000 people who lost their lives.

    Since the virus has been mutating in X number of vaccinated individuals at a rate of mutation typical of viruses (i.e. a high rate), a small but significant number of these millions of mutations help the mutated virus evade the host immune system and whatever advantages were conferred by the vaccine.

    Within this pool of mutations which evaded the immune system tacklers, those mutations which also enhance transmissibility spread rapidly to other human hosts, both unvaccinated and vaccinated, depending on the relative effectiveness of the vaccination in each individual, the relative robustness of their immune system and a variety of other complex factors such as partial natural immunity, exposure to previous variants of Virus Z and so on.

    Within this pool of mutations that enhance transmissibility, some percentage will enhance transmissibility to younger, healthier individuals who were less susceptible to the initial Virus Z.

    What’s striking about our thought experiment is how little reliable data we have about the transmissibility of our hypothetical Virus Z and the long-term consequences of its mutations. What’s striking is the number of important data fields which are unknown, only haphazardly collected, or in which data is so incomplete that it is misleading.

    Science cannot advance if data is unavailable, unreliable or so selectively gathered that it’s misleading. What’s striking about our thought experiment is how little is reliably known about Virus Z’s transmissibility, virulence or long-term effects.

    *  *  *

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    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 17:40

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Today’s News 2nd July 2021

  • Iraqi PM Goes To NATO HQ To Angrily Denounce Biden's Airstrikes
    Iraqi PM Goes To NATO HQ To Angrily Denounce Biden’s Airstrikes

    A high level Iraqi delegation led by Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi, as well as Iraq’s defense and foreign ministers, made a somewhat unusual visit to NATO headquarters in Brussels, Belgium on Wednesday to discuss the Western military alliance’s continued president inside Iraq.

    Prime Minister al-Kadhimi personally conveyed his anger over the violation of Iraq’s sovereignty for Sunday night’s US airstrikes along the Syrian border, which killed several Iraqi militia members in what Washington dubbed actions against “Iran-backed” groups which had been targeting US troops by drone strikes. “He urged the coalition not to use Iraq to take on neighboring Syria and Iran,” according to Newsweek.

    Via AFP

    Further he stressed the “importance of Iraq not being an arena for settling conflicts, or a springboard for aggression against any of its neighbors,” in reference to the Pentagon’s tit-for-tat running conflict with Iraqi pro-Iranian militias – a conflict which grew especially tense following the January 2020 assassination of the IRGC’s Qassem Soleimani and Iraq Popular Mobilization Unit (PMU) chief Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis (founder of Kataib Hezbollah).

    The US had dubbed the series of Sunday night strikes a “message” to Iran while Biden had personally defended the military action – the second such of his presidency – as within his right to authorize under Article 2 of the Constitution, despite a number of Congressional leaders pushing back on this claim. The Iraqis themselves also no doubt see Biden’s supposed “right” to attack anywhere he pleases very differently.

    Baghdad had issued its first comprehensive and official rebuke of the strikes on Monday following an emergency session of Iraq’s National Security Council, which called the US strikes “a flagrant violation of Iraqi sovereignty, which is rejected by all international laws and covenants.”

    While at NATO headquarters this week, the Iraqi PM’s delegation further discussed the withdrawal of remaining US forces – of which there are now said to be some 2,500 troops.

    But as US forces slowly continue to exit, NATO is currently said to be boosting its troop presence to provide security cover also amid exit logistics – from 500 to about 5,000.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 02:45

  • Record Numbers Of Migrants Cross English Channel In Small Boats
    Record Numbers Of Migrants Cross English Channel In Small Boats

    Authored by Simon Veazey via The Epoch Times,

    Record numbers of people are running the gauntlet of the English Channel in small boats and rubber dinghies, with nearly 6,000 breaking immigration law to reach the UK in the last six months.

    The uptick comes despite Home Secretary Priti Patel’s vows to make crossing what is one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes “unviable” for the smugglers and immigrants.

    According to the PA news agency, which has tracked and analysed crossings for the last 18 months, more than 5,900 people have succeeded in reaching the UK aboard small boats so far in 2021.

    A total of 8,417 made the journey in the whole of 2020—four times the number for 2019.

    In 2018, just 299 people made the crossing, according to Home Office figures.

    A Home Office spokesperson said, “These crossings are completely unacceptable and we have redoubled efforts with French authorities by increasing beach patrols, intelligence sharing, and investment in surveillance as we enter the summer months.

    “As a result we have now seen over 5,000 people prevented by the French from making the dangerous crossing so far this year.

    “As organised criminal gangs adapt their approach, so will we. But to truly close this lethal route we must fix the broken system through our New Plan for Immigration, which will be firm on those who abuse the system and fair on those in genuine need of protection.”

    Some charities have criticised the Government over the figures.

    Tim Naor Hilton, chief executive of Refugee Action, said: “The Government’s obsession with trying to build Fortress Britain has created a people smuggler’s dream.”

    “And their planned refugee Bill looks set to be an unworkable, unlawful and expensive disaster that will do nothing to stop refugees risking their lives on the Channel.”

    Several people have died attempting the busy 21-mile crossing in recent years.

    In October, a Kurdish-Iranian family including small children died when their migrant boat sank off the French coast.

    Channel crossings make up only a small proportion of illegal immigration to the UK. The vast majority of illegal immigrants in the UK are those who have overstayed visas, failed to receive asylum, or have obtained visas illegally.

    The latest figures on channel crossings come amid reports that the home office may introduce controversial legislation to enable asylum seekers to be sent to process centres abroad.

    There is little precise information on levels of what might be categorized as illegal migration into the UK, not least because the definition of “illegal” migration is also hard to pin down and is subject to different interpretations and uses.

    A report by the London School of Economics in 2007 (pdf) estimated the number of “irregular” migrants was 533,000—a little under one percent of the population.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 07/02/2021 – 02:00

  • America, Leader Of The Free World? How To Forget US Interference In Foreign Elections
    America, Leader Of The Free World? How To Forget US Interference In Foreign Elections

    Authored by Philip Giraldi via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

    After only five months in office, President Joe Biden has already become notorious for his verbal gaffes and mis-spokes, so much so that an admittedly Republican-partisan physician has suggested that he be tested to determine his cognitive abilities.

    That said, however, there is one June 16th tweet that he is responsible for that is quite straightforward that outdoes everything else for sheer mendacity. It appeared shortly after the summit meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin and was apparently intended to be rhetorical, at least insofar as Biden understands the term. It went:

    “How would it be if the United States were viewed by the rest of the world as interfering with the elections directly of other countries and everybody knew it? What would it be like if we engaged in activities that he engaged in? It diminishes the standing of a country.”

    There have been various estimates of just exactly how many elections the United States has interfered in since the Second World War, the numbers usually falling somewhere between 80 and 100, but that does not take into account the frequent interventions of various kinds that took place largely in Latin America between the Spanish-American War and 1946. One recalls how the most decorated Marine in the history of the Corps Major General Smedley Butler declared that “War is a racket” in 1935. He confessed to having “…helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested.”

    And there have been since 1900 other regime change and interventionist actions, both using military force and also brought about by corrupting local politicians with money and other inducements. And don’t forget the American trained death squads active in Latin America. Some would also include in the list the possibly as many as 50 Central Intelligence Agency and Special Ops political assassinations that have been documented, though admittedly sometimes based on thin evidence.

    That Joe Biden, who has been at a reasonably high level in the federal government for over forty years, including as Vice President for eight years and now President should appear to be ignorant of what his own government has done and quite plausibly continues to do is astonishing. After all, Biden was VP when Victoria Nuland worked for the Obama Administration as the driving force behind efforts in 2013-2014 to destabilize the Ukrainian government of President Viktor Yanukovych. Yanukovych, an admittedly corrupt autocrat, nevertheless became Prime Minister after a free election. Nuland, who is the Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs at the State Department, provided open support to the Maidan Square demonstrators opposed to Yanukovych’s government, to include media friendly appearances passing out cookies on the square accompanied by Senator John McCain to encourage the protesters.

    A Dick Cheney and Hillary Clinton protégé who is married to leading neocon Robert Kagan, Nuland openly sought regime change for Ukraine by brazenly supporting government opponents in spite of the fact that Washington and Kiev had ostensibly friendly relations. As Biden’s tweet even recognized in a backhanded way, it is hard to imagine that any U.S. administration would tolerate a similar attempt by a foreign nation to interfere in U.S. domestic politics, particularly if it were backed by a $5 billion budget, but Washington has long believed in a global double standard for evaluating its own behavior. Biden clearly is part of that and also clearly does not understand what he is doing or saying.

    Nuland is most famous for her foul language when referring to the potential European role in managing the unrest that she and the National Endowment for Democracy had helped create. The Obama and Biden Administration’s replacement of the government in Kiev was the prelude to a sharp break and escalating conflict with Moscow over Russia’s attempts to protect its own interests in Ukraine, most particularly in Crimea. That point of conflict has continued to this day, with a U.S. warships in the Black Sea engaging in exercises with the Ukrainian navy.

    Biden was also with the Obamas when they chose to destabilize and destroy Libya. Nor should Russia itself be forgotten. Boris Yeltsin was re-elected president of Russia in 1996 after the Clinton Administration pumped billions of dollars into his campaign, enabling him to win a close oligarch-backed victory that had been paid for and managed by Washington. Joe Biden was a Senator at the time.

    And then there is Iran, where democratically elected Mohammed Mossadeq was deposed by the CIA in 1953 and replaced by the Shah. The Shah was replaced by the Islamic Republic in turn in 1979 and the poisoned relationship between Washington and Tehran has constituted a tit-for-tat quasi-cold war ever since, marked by assassinations and sabotage.

    And who can forget Chile where Salvador Allende was removed by the CIA in 1973 and replaced by Augusto Pinochet? Or Cuba and the Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961 where the CIA failed to bring about regime change in Havana? Can it be that Joe Biden cannot recall any of those “interventions,” which were heavily covered in the international media at the time?

    And to make up the numbers, Joe can possibly consider the multiple “interferences in elections,” which is more precisely what he was referring to. As a CIA officer stationed in Europe and the Middle East in and 1970s through the early 1990s, I can assure him that I personally know about nearly continuous interference in elections in places like France, Spain, Portugal and Italy, all of which had prominent communist parties, some of which were on the verge of government entry. Bags of money went to conservative parties, politicians were bribed and journalists bought. In fact, during that time period I would dare to say there was hardly an election that the United States did not somehow get involved in.

    Does it still go on? The U.S. has been seeking regime change in Syria since 2004 and is currently occupying part of the country. And of course, Russia is on the receiving end of a delegitimization process through a controlled western media that is seeking to get rid of Putin by exploiting a CIA and western intelligence funded opposition. China has no real opposition or open elections, nor can its regime plausibly be changed, but it is constantly being challenged by depicting it and its behavior in the most negative fashion possible.

    Joe Biden really should read up on the history of American political and military interventions, regime changes and electoral interference worldwide. He just might learn something. The most important point might, however, elude him. All of the intervention and all of the deaths have turned out badly both for the U.S. and for the people and countries being targeted. Biden has taken a bold step to withdraw U.S. forces from Afghanistan, though it now appears that that decision might be in part reversed. Much better to complete the process and also do the same thing in places like Iraq, Somalia and Syria. The whole world will be a better place for it.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 23:40

  • Mapping Global Happiness Levels In 2021
    Mapping Global Happiness Levels In 2021

    “Are you happy?” is a deceptively complex question to both ask and answer.

    It’s generally understood that having enough money to cover your needs and wants can help you live a relatively happy, comfortable life – and recent research shows this relationship may increase linearly as income levels grow, as well.

    However, as Visual Capitalist’s Iman Ghosh details below, there’s much more to it than that. Happiness levels depend not just on financial security, but also broader perceptions of one’s social support, personal freedom, and more.

    This series of map pulls data from the World Happiness Report to uncover the average scores of 149 countries between 2018-2020, and which ones emerged the happiest or unhappiest. We also look at the most and least improved countries in every region.

    How is Happiness Measured?

    First, let’s look at the factors used to calculate world happiness levels. Some clear indicators are health and wealth, both metrics that have been steadily on the rise worldwide. The report takes these into account, weighting GDP per capita and life expectancy at birth into the scores.

    The report also looks at more intangible aspects, collecting survey responses around:

    • Social support

    • Freedom to make life choices

    • Generosity

    • Perceptions of government/ business corruption

    • Positive or negative affects (Recent experience of emotions)

    This year, there was a natural focus on the negative affect measure of the COVID-19 pandemic on happiness levels, such as exacerbating mental health risks. In addition, such measurements varied depending on each country’s response to the crisis.

    Looking Closely at Regional Happiness Levels

    Worldwide happiness comes in at an average score of 5.5, a marginal improvement since our previous coverage of this report in 2019. Let’s dive into regional outlooks for happiness levels.

    North America

    Current Mood: Happy (6.1)

    Canada retains its spot as the happiest country in North America, although its overall global ranking has dropped over the years. In 2019, it was ranked in ninth place globally, dropping to 11th in the 2020 edition, and declining further to 14th place in this year’s report.

    Haiti continues to fare poorly as the unhappiest in the region, with an average annual GDP growth of only 1.3% over 20 years. Its weak economy and political instability have been worsened by the pandemic—setting back efforts to reduce poverty and widening inequality.

    South America

    Current Mood: Content (5.9)

    With the largest middle class in the Americas—60% of its population—and a miniscule 0.1% extreme poverty rate, Uruguay is the happiest South American country. The nation has also achieved equitable access to basic services, from education to electricity.

    The trio of Colombia, Ecuador, and Venezuela are experiencing different stages of progress in happiness levels, but their relationship is very much interdependent.

    Venezuela and Ecuador face similar economic challenges and sharp declines in oil prices. Venezuela is additionally acutely affected by socio-political unrest, triggering a mass exodus of citizens to Ecuador and Colombia alike. The silver lining is that the influx of highly-educated Venezuelan migrants may provide a 2% boost to Ecuador’s GDP.

    Colombia, the most improved country, has halved its poverty rate in the last decade. In addition, it has welcomed almost 2 million Venezuelan migrants as of Dec 2020—and plans to provide them up to 10 years of protective status.

    Europe

    Current Mood: Happy (6.4)

    Finland remains at the top of the leaderboard as the world’s happiest country. This year’s ranking was also influenced by high levels of trust in the way the COVID-19 pandemic was handled.

    Meanwhile, the shock of the COVID-19 crisis is expected to be short-lived in Croatia, which is the most improved country. This is partly due to its steady pre-pandemic economic gains, although risks remain.

    In the unhappiest country of Ukraine, conflicts continue to cause stress on its politics, security, and economy. In particular, government corruption remains a big public issue.

    Middle East and Central Asia

    Current Mood: It’s Complicated (5.3)

    Saudi Arabia is the most improved country in the region, as it continues to reduce its oil dependence, diversify its economy, and bolster its public services. It has also been making some progress towards gender equality.

    The tourism and hospitality industries contribute nearly 20% of Jordan’s GDP—and COVID-19 has caused a prolonged economic decline in the country along with the headwinds of these industries.

    Although Afghanistan has seen improvements in access to basic services and its agricultural economy, challenges remain with prolonged conflict and violence. A post-pandemic recovery in the world’s unhappiest country might take several years.

    East Asia and Oceania

    Current Mood: Neutral (5.5)

    Both New Zealand and Taiwan saw a successful COVID-19 response and recovery boosting their positions in the global happiness rankings. In fact, New Zealand was the only non-European country to make it into the top 10 on the global happiness list.

    Note: As the report only covers 149 countries, “Oceania” only refers to Australia and New Zealand in this instance.

    Although India remains the unhappiest country in the region, it also showed the most improvement overall, possibly due to its increased access to basic services. Notably though, the pandemic caused a sharp economic contraction in real GDP by 23.9% year-over-year in Q1’2021.

    Africa

    Current Mood: Unhappy (4.5)

    In July 2020, the island nation of Mauritius joined Seychelles to become the second high-income country in Africa, helping cement its status as the happiest in the region.

    Zambia, the most improved African country, has one of the world’s youngest populations by median age—which presents long-term opportunities for labor force participation.

    On the flip side, agriculturally-reliant Benin struggles with high poverty, with close to 40% of the population living below $1.90 per day.

    Zimbabwe, the unhappiest country, has been through not just natural disasters but financial disasters too. It experienced hyperinflation of 786% in May 2020, accompanied by an equally sharp rise in food prices.

    Although each country has been uniquely impacted by the pandemic, it’s clear that on the whole, happiness levels take into account so much more. How will future rankings look like in a post-pandemic world?

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 23:20

  • California Begs For More Electricity As Shift To Renewable Power Leaves State In The Dark
    California Begs For More Electricity As Shift To Renewable Power Leaves State In The Dark

    Maybe it’s time to admit that the whole “green” energy push is one big farce

    Six months after a historic failure in the Texas power grid which collapsed when various “renewable” sources of electricity failed concurrently and dragged down the entire network, California – that liberal utopia powered by renewable power and/or unicorn flatulence – realizes it is about to get Enroned, and has made an urgent request for additional power supplies to avoid blackouts this summer, an extraordinary step after suffering from rolling outages less than a year ago.

    State energy officials asked the California Independent System Operator, which runs most of the grid, to contract for additional power capacity for July and August on concern it won’t be able to meet demand during the evening when solar production fades, according to a joint statement Thursday from grid, utility and energy agencies. They didn’t say how much more power is needed but one can guess it will be a lot.

    Of course, there was a convenient scapegoat on which to blame the collective lack of competence: global warming.

    “California is using all available tools to increase electricity reliability this summer,” the heads of the California Energy Commission, California Public Utilities Commission, and grid operator said citing “unprecedented climate change-driven heat events, which are occurring throughout the West in combination with drought conditions that reduce hydroelectric capacity.”

    Right, it’s always someone else’s fault that you could not properly budget even a few months in advance after keeping millions of people in the dark last year when California again blamed… global warming. But if you know there is global warming, and you suffer one nightmare summer in the dark because of it, can’t you extrapolate at least a year into the future?

    In California, the answer is no.

    Their statement underscores California’s challenges in the coming months as it begins summer already parched by drought that’s leaving hydroelectric reservoirs at historic lows. The state narrowly avoided rolling power outages recently as extreme heat came early this year, and with few new generation sources on the immediate horizon supplies tighten when hot weather hits.

    California has taken a number of steps including adding battery storage (which some may recall was a complete disaster last summer) to prevent blackouts such as those in August, when demand overwhelmed the grid. However, the state has grown concerned that that the increases aren’t enough, according to the letter.

    Procuring additional capacity “is taken out of an abundance of caution to ensure electric reliability and preserve the public health and safety of all Californians,” the officials said. Their letter also cited delayed availability for some thermal power plants and said some resources expected to be running during the hottest months have now been delayed.

    Supply challenges are mounting less than a year after a heat wave forced the state’s first rolling outages in two decades, and meeting demand is likely to be even harder this year because long-range forecasts call for above-average temperatures through September.

    What is remarkable is that even Bloomberg, which has been on a crusade to crush non-green sources of power, admits that California’s problem is the state’s aggressive push to cut carbon emissions by shifting to renewable energy.

    Many gas-burning plants have closed, which means electricity supplies tighten at sunset as the production from solar generation fades around sundown (good thing there are no vampires or zombies in Cali, yet). What’s more, big batteries being built to store solar power during the day and resupply the grid in the evening won’t be available by August and September, the state’s hottest months.

    In short, it’s time to admit that California’s “green” push has been a complete disaster, and is about to leave millions of people in the dark during hot, sweaty days, leading to countless deaths.

    Of course, since we are talking about the socialist paradise, this will never happen, and instead locals have even more brilliant ideas like for example paying people not to use electricity.

    “The short-term strategy needs to be centered around incentivizing demand reductions instead of increasing supply,” said Abe Stanway, co-founder of Amperon Holdings Inc., which provides analysis to utilities and power traders. “The best way to reduce uncertainty around demand resources is to simply pay consumers more to use less during peak events.”

    Because while electricity may not grow on trees in California but at least money still does.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 22:57

  • NBC News Crew Held At Gunpoint During Interview With Oakland Violence Prevention Chief
    NBC News Crew Held At Gunpoint During Interview With Oakland Violence Prevention Chief

    A News crew in Oakland, California was held at gunpoint midway through an interview with Oakland’s head of violence prevention, Guillermo Cespedes, after the city’s Democratic leaders decided to divert $18 million away from police amid a spike in violent crime.

    Oakland, California’s Department of Violence Prevention Chief Guillermo Cespedes was being interviewed by NBC affiliate KNTV when the crew was held at gunpoint.

    The incident took place Monday afternoon on the steps of Oakland City Hall – hours after Oakland Police Chief LeRonne Armstrong decried the reallocated $18 million – as NBC affiliate KNTV was interviewing Cespedes. As the East Bay Times‘ George Kelly reports:

    Just after 6 p.m., police said in a statement that two suspects approached a cameraperson filming during an interview at 3:09 p.m. before trying to take the camera at gunpoint.

    After a scuffle ensued, “the armed security officer pulled his firearm out, and directed the suspects to leave. The suspects immediately left the area without the camera,” and were still outstanding, police said.

    Officers, including a police spokesperson, responded to the scene during an investigation. There were no injuries, police said.

    “Please be advised that the suspects are still outstanding,” police said. “We encourage everyone to be vigilant of their surroundings and report all crimes. Please stay safe.”

    In a statement, an Oakland city spokesperson confirmed that Department of Violence Prevention Chief Guillermo Cespedes was the person being interviewed outside City Hall.

    The $18 million diverted from the city’s proposed $674 million police budget will be reallocated to the city’s relatively new Department of Violence Prevention, headed by Cespedes – who joined in 2020. Diverting the funds was the idea of Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf.

    According to SFGate, the Department, formed in 2017, has a focus on “community-led intervention strategies” to prevent violent crime, somehow. “Oakland has seen 65 homicides so far this year; there were a total of 74 in 2019 and 102 in 2020,” per the report.

    Believe it or not, news crews are regularly held at gunpoint in California.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 22:40

  • Fauci: "There Are Now Two Americas, The Vaccinated & The Unvaccinated"
    Fauci: “There Are Now Two Americas, The Vaccinated & The Unvaccinated”

    Authored by Steve Watson via Summit News,

    America’s favourite Chinese lab funding coronavirus doomonger doctor Anthony Fauci announced Tuesday that there are now two Americas, a vaccinated America and an unvaccinated America.

    In an appearance on Dom Lemon’s CNN panic hour, Fauci declared that “When you have such a low level of vaccination super-imposed upon a variant that has a high degree of efficiency of spread, what you are going to see among under-vaccinated regions, states, cities or counties you’re going to see these individual types of blips. It’s almost like it’s going to be two Americas.”

    “You’re going to have areas where vaccination rate is high, where more than 70% of the population received at least one dose,” he continued, adding “When you compare that to areas where you may have 35% of the people vaccinated, you clearly have a high risk of seeing these spikes in those selected areas.”

    Inevitably, Fauci concluded “The thing that’s so frustrating about this, Don, is that this is entirely avoidable, entirely preventable.”

    “If you are vaccinated, you diminish dramatically your risk of getting infected and even more dramatically your risk of getting seriously ill. If you are not vaccinated, you are at considerable risk,” Fauci once again repeated.

    Watch:

    Fauci is completely ignoring the science on natural immunity again.

    As Senator Rand Paul noted earlier this week, there is a boat load of misinformation on the matter coming from a government that is indiscriminately pushing vaccinations:

    *  *  *

    Brand new merch now available! Get it at https://www.pjwshop.com/

    In the age of mass Silicon Valley censorship It is crucial that we stay in touch. We need you to sign up for our free newsletter here. Support our sponsor – Turbo Force – a supercharged boost of clean energy without the comedown. Also, we urgently need your financial support here.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 22:22

  • Joint Chiefs Chairman Ignores Evidence Showing Critical Race Theory Harms Unit Cohesion
    Joint Chiefs Chairman Ignores Evidence Showing Critical Race Theory Harms Unit Cohesion

    Authored by John Rossomando via The Epoch Times,

    Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Mark Milley dismissed concerns about neo-Marxist critical race theory. He feigned outrage at accusations the military was becoming “woke.” His cavalier response showed that at best he’s ignorant, and at worst he doesn’t care.

    Critical race theory stems from a school of thought among post-Russian Revolution Marxist intellectuals who were disturbed by the fact communist revolution didn’t sweep Europe as Marx predicted. Orthodox Marxists deny that critical race theory is Marxist because it derives from a revisionist strain of thought. The revisionists reimagined Marxist theory to focus on who has power in society and who doesn’t instead of the class struggle between the working class and the capitalists found in Karl Marx’s writings.

    Critical race theory’s reliance on Marxist dualism of the oppressor versus the oppressed intends to produce strife and chaos.

    Unsurprisingly, a 2012 Harvard Business Review article noted, “Diversity training doesn’t extinguish prejudice. It promotes it.”

    Other social-science research finds that diversity training is ineffective at reaching positive outcomes.

    Milley clearly never read these reports.

    “I’ve read Mao Tse Tung. I’ve read Karl Marx. I’ve read Lenin. That doesn’t make me a communist,” Milley said.

    “So what is wrong with understanding, having some situational understanding about the country for which we are here to defend?”

    Milley acknowledged critical race theory’s roots in critical legal studies at Harvard University back in the 1980s. It bears the strong influence of neo-Marxist theorist Frantz Fanon and Communist Party USA member W.E.B. DuBois, winner of the Lenin Peace Prize from the Soviet Union.

    “And I personally find it offensive that we are accusing the United States military, our general officers, our commissioned, non-commissioned officers of being, quote, woke or something else, because we’re studying some theories that are out there. That was started at Harvard Law School years ago,” Milley continued.

    He claimed that he wanted to understand the “White Rage” behind the assault on the Capitol on Jan. 6. The general’s liberal-sounding rhetoric masks the real problem. The concept of “White Rage,” developed by Emory University professor Carol Anderson, is an aspect of critical race theory itself.

    Anderson promotes black powerlessness and blames whites for every contemporary problem of black America. She insinuates that questioning the critical race theorists’ dogmas itself is racist in her book “White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide.”

    “The trigger for white rage, inevitably, is black advancement,” Anderson theorizes, thus setting up a strawman argument that suggests that all white Americans oppose prosperity for blacks and that it threatens them.

    Her book cherry-picks points about white Americans following the Civil War. It avoids discussion of how people such as General and later President Ulysses S. Grant and the U.S. Army fought to protect freed blacks from racist violence. She also glosses over how Republicans tried to protect black civil rights from racist oppression immediately following the Civil War (pdf), focusing instead on President Andrew Johnson’s racism. Doing so is needed to portray America as totally evil. Such omissions show that Anderson’s “White Rage” is propaganda, not scholarship.

    Are Grant’s exploits on behalf of black Americans discussed, or the role of the U.S. military during Reconstruction protecting black lives (pdf) talked about in the Defense Department’s seminars?

    Milley’s discussion of his having read Mao, Marx, and Lenin was a red herring about the question at hand.

    Namely, are U.S. servicemembers being indoctrinated in ideas developed by contemporary acolytes of Karl Marx? Marxist thought is particularly destructive because it’s predicated on dialectical thinking that promotes conflict to bring about a new society.

    Milley’s dismissal set up a strawman argument because critical race theory is not a dispassionate examination of the history of slavery, Jim Crow, or even the problems black Americans currently face in American society. And by all reports, this critical race theory is being taught as fact rather than as a dispassionate assessment of the sectarian opinions of neo-Marxist scholars without presenting contrary ideas for debate. They aim to discredit the United States, its Constitution, and the same institutions that members of the military swear an oath to protect.

    “What Gen. Milley was responding to was an exchange that I had had during my time of question-and-answer with Secretary Austin, where I raised the point of a series of courses and seminars that’s being taught at West Point, which was brought to my attention by very upset and disturbed cadets, their families, soldiers,” Rep. Michael Waltz (R-Fla.) told Hugh Hewitt on his podcast on June 24.

    “One of the seminars, Hugh, was titled, ‘Dealing With Your Whiteness and White Rage,’ which apparently over 100 cadets attended; ‘Critical Race Theory: An Introduction’—the textbook is part of the curriculum.”

    This was one of several incidents that have appeared since Joe Biden became president.

    Members of Congress have repeatedly raised questions about the Navy’s recommendation of neo-Marxist ideologue Ibram X. Kendi’s book “How to Be an Antiracist,” which seeks to remedy past discrimination against blacks with “future discrimination” against whites. Kendi blames capitalism for the lack of an equality of outcome among black Americans. Kendi’s thesis falls apart after you look at how Afro-Cubans live in communist Cuba compared with Cubans of Spanish descent, the former suffering discrimination despite living under socialism.

    Like Anderson, Kendi cherry-picks his information and gets facts, such as data about black poverty in the Reagan era and other topics that are more nuanced than he claims, wrong.

    American capitalism has spawned more innovations and technological achievements than any in the preceding millennia of human history, including the technology that you’re reading this article on. Poor Americans of all colors have a higher standard of living here than they do in any socialist country, including China.

    Adm. Michael Gilday similarly defended critical race theory and Kendi’s disinformation.

    “Sir, initially you mentioned critical race theory: I’m not a theorist; I’m the Chief of Naval Operations,” Gilday told Congress.

    “What I can tell you is, factually, based on a substantial amount of time talking to sailors in the fleet, there’s racism in the Navy, just like there’s racism in our country. And the way we’re going to get after it is to be honest about it, not to sweep it under the rug, and to talk about it—and that’s what we’re doing. And that’s one of the reasons that book is on the list.”

    Winning wars requires unit cohesion and a common mission. It seems that Gen. Milley, Adm. Gilday, and the Pentagon’s civilian leadership are determined to compromise unit cohesion at the time when threats from Russia and China are increasing and that cohesion is needed the most. If they examined the social science, they would realize their activities only cause harm.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 22:20

  • June Payrolls Preview: Hot But Not Too Hot
    June Payrolls Preview: Hot But Not Too Hot

    Labor market reading going into tomorrow’s Nonfarm Payrolls have been predominantly strong in June, but not all; as Newsquawk writes in its payrolls preview, ADP’s report was strong, but the whisper number was even higher. Challenger layoffs was an exceedingly solid print at the lowest figure since June 2000 with the report crediting record job openings and high job seeker confidence. Consumer Confidence continues to facilitate the potentially impressive NFP print, as it rose to the highest post-pandemic level, while the difference between jobs “plentiful” and jobs “hard to get” rose too. However, the jobless claims figure was poor and surprisingly rose, which may weigh, but the total number on unemployment benefits fell below 15mln for the first time since April ’20.

    At the same time, business surveys, such as the ISM Manufacturing survey, painted a reasonably poorer picture with the headline figure falling alongside the employment sub-component dipping into contractionary territory, where panelists noted it remains difficult to fill vacant positions. Some of the former factors point to improving conditions and growing confidence amid the re-opening picture. However, slack still remains in the economy illustrated by the participation and unemployment rate still way off pre-COVID levels and record job openings.

    Looking at high-frequency data on the labor market shows a mixed picture for the May and June survey weeks. While two of the six measures tracked by Goldman declined outright (Dallas Fed survey, Google mobility), there were strong gains in the two datasets that explicitly track employee scheduling (Homebase, ADP). These two indicators may more effectively track inflections in reopening categories like restaurants, hotels, and other services.

    On this, and while the Fed continues to state unemployment has a long way to go, it is not unanimous. For instance, Quarles does not think we need to see labor force participation return to pre-COVID levels due to baby boomer retirements, although several members have said they are looking to return to the pre-COVID employment landscape.

    Therefore, as Newsquawk summarizes, a decent print is only likely to amplify the hawkish calls at the Fed amid progress on “substantial further progress”, sustaining expectations for a tapering announcement into year-end.

    With that in mind this is what consensus expects from tomorrow’s payroll report:

    • Non-farm Payrolls (exp. 7110k, prev. 559k);
    • Private Payrolls (exp. 615k, prev. 492k);
    • Manufacturing Payrolls (exp. 28k, prev. 23k);
    • Government Payrolls (prev. 67k);
    • Unemployment Rate (exp. 5.7%, prev. 5.8%);
    • Participation Rate (prev. 61.6%);
    • U6 Underemployment (prev. 10.2%);
    • EPOP (prev. 58.0%, vs 61.1% in Feb 2020);
    • Average Earnings M/M (exp. 0.4%, prev. 0.5%);
    • Average Earnings Y/Y (exp. 3.7%, prev. 2.0%);
    • Average Workweek Hours (exp. 34.9hrs, prev. 34.9hrs)

    Guesses by bank, from high to low:

    • Citi 860K
    • BofA 800K
    • Daiwa 800K
    • JPM 800K
    • Jefferies 800K
    • NatWest 800K
    • TD 800K
    • GS 750K
    • WF 750K
    • SocGen 730K
    • Nomura 720K
    • UBS 711K
    • CS 700K
    • DB 700K
    • Mizuho 700K
    • Scotia 700K
    • Amherst 690K
    • HSBC 675K
    • Barx 625K
    • BNP 625K
    • MS 620K
    • RBC 570K
    • BMO 550K

    Some more details from Newsquawk

    ADP PAYROLLS: Ahead of Friday’s jobs report, the ADP’s gauge of payrolls showed 692k jobs being added to the US economy in June, above the forecasted 600k, but below May’s figure which was revised lower to 886k from 978k. Pantheon Macroeconomics hoped for a greater increase, based on the Homebase employment data, suggesting the signal for Friday’s NFP release is unclear. Pantheon highlights the ADP’s measure was short of the official payroll data for most of the pandemic, but it suddenly overshot in April and May, adding that the change was likely due to ADP’s model overstating the strength of macroeconomic variables (retail sales and jobless claims) while ignoring the labor supply shortfall. As such, payrolls growth has not kept pace with demand due to the participation rate remaining lower. Looking ahead, PM writes, “if the new pattern continues for June, Friday’s print will only be about 200K, but that would be wildly at odds with the clear message from the Homebase data suggesting that increasing labor supply allowed payrolls growth to jump to about 1mln”, an expectation Pantheon is sticking with, but believes the breadth of Friday’s plausible outcomes is exceedingly broad.

    JOBLESS CLAIMS: The initial jobless claims data released for the period that usually coincides with the BLS Employment Situation report showed a surprise rise to 412k from 375k, against the expected fall to 359k. Continued Claims followed suit and also surprised on the upside, rising to 3.518mln from 3.517mln (revised up from 3.499mln), against the expected fall to 3.43mln. The rise in initial claims marked the first increase in more than a month, although the gains were primarily seen in California, Pennsylvania, and Kentucky. The good news from the report was that the total number of people on unemployment benefits fell below 15mln for the first time since April 2020. However, looking at the headline prints, it does not bode so well for the June BLS data.

    BUSINESS SURVEYS: The ISM Manufacturing PMI fell to 60.6 (prev. 61.2), below the expected 61.0. The survey gave a fairly negative insight into the labour market, highlighted by the Employment sub-component falling to 49.9 from 50.9, into contractionary territory after six straight months of expansion, with panellists continuing to note significant difficulties in attracting and retaining labor at their companies’ and suppliers’ facilities. Alongside this, panellists reported difficulties in filling open positions, continuing to limit manufacturing-growth potential. Looking at services, heading into this month’s payrolls the ISM Services data has yet to be released, and as such the IHS Markit Services May PMI data can be used as a proxy. The Markit data stated there was a further sharp rise in employment which can be derived down to the greater business requirements. However, despite that, the rate of job creation reduced as firms reported difficulties filling vacancies as they could not find suitable candidates. Nonetheless, jobs creation still remained sharp and outpaced the long-run series average.

    CHALLENGER LAYOFFS: Challenger reported that job cut announcements fell from 24,586 in May to 20,746 in June, the lowest monthly total since June 2000, and -88% Y/Y. Challenger stated that so far this year, employers announced plans to cut 212,661 jobs, the lowest January-June total since 1995, and down 87% from the 1,585,047 jobs eliminated through the same period last year. The report noted they are seeing a rubber band snap back, and companies are holding on tight to their workers during a time of record job openings and very high job seeker confidence. Also, they have not seen job cuts this low since the Dot-Com boom. However, Challenger adds, the majority of cuts were attributed to Restructuring (10,876), while 2,950 were from plant and store closings. Nonetheless, a low challenger layoffs reading
    bodes well for a  strong NFP print.

    SLACK: Fed officials are looking past the headline unemployment rate to try and gauge the levels of slack that remain; accordingly, the U6 Underemployment metric, Participation Rate, as well as the Employment-to-Population ratio have gained in importance. Last month, U6 was 10.2% (vs 7.0% in February 2020), Participation at 61.6% (vs 63.3% in February 2020), and the Employment-Population Ratio at 58.0% (vs 61.1% in February 2020), all three indicating there is still a long way to go, and recovering the lost ground is not going to happen in the immediate short-term. Moreover, Fed officials continue to state that unemployment has a long way to go, although it is not unanimous, as Quarles noted he does not think we need to see labor force participation return to pre-COVID levels due to baby boomer retirements.

    SENTIMENT: Consumer Confidence rose to the highest figure since February last year which indicates confidence has recuperated a large part of the COVID hit. Moreover, the view of the labor market has also drastically improved, as the “jobs hard to get” index fell to just below the pre-COVID level. Further signalling the positive outlook, the difference between jobs “plentiful” and jobs “hard to get” rose. Nonetheless, the future remains highly uncertain, as the level of people expecting business conditions to worsen has stopped falling. As such, the positive consumer confidence may filter through into a solid NFP figure.

    SEASONAL ADJUSTMENT:  Recall that April and May disappointed in no small part due to seasonal adjustments that mistook a highly unusual reopening for a regular expansion. In June the seasonal adjustment is still negative (-200k), but less than in May (-400k) and April (- 800k). But In July the US economy normally lays off 1,000k workers meaning that if the reopening economy continues to add about 1mn jobs monthly (seasonally unadjusted) Nonfarm payrolls could be around +2mn on a seasonally adjusted basis. Clearly that implies a rapidly improving labor market, inflation, much higher interest rates and wider credit spreads.

    Arguing for a better-than-expected report:

    • Reopening. The further decline in infection rates and looser restrictions on businesses and mask usage has supported job growth in virus-sensitive industries. For example, restaurant seatings on OpenTable rebounded to 90% of their 2019 levels during the June survey week, compared to 83% in the May survey week.

    • Seasonality. In April and May, reopening effects likely overlapped with normal seasonal hiring patterns, resulting in less-impressive job gains on a seasonally-adjusted basis.1 The June seasonal hurdle is sequentially easier in June however: the BLS adjustment factors generally assume 200k-400k of net hiring in June (mom nsa), compared to +414k in May 2021 and +823k in April 2021.Additionally, the end of the school year should result in fewer than normal education layoffs, given the 1.1mn staffers still not working because of pandemic.
    • Labor supply constraints. We also expect less of a drag from labor supply constraints in tomorrow’s report, due to the arrival of the youth summer labor force and the wind-down of federal unemployment top-ups in some states. As shown inthe left panel of Exhibit 2, 1.8mn 16-24-year-olds join the labor force in a typical June as the school year ends. This may have boosted overall payroll growth if a higher proportion successfully found jobs due to strong demand for labor in lower-skilled occupations. For example, if net hiring occurs at the 2019 pace (82% of the nsa change), we estimate it would boost headline job growth by approximately +325k relative to a typical June (66%).

    • The right panel indicates that state-level changes to unemployment insurance availability and generosity are also boosting labor supply. Benefits were curtailed in half of US states (representing 29% of the outstanding job losses since the start of the pandemic) in June and early July. Encouragingly, continuing claims declined more quickly in these states (by roughly 200k relative to the trend in all other states).
    • ADP. Private sector employment in the ADP report increased by 692k in June, above consensus expectations for a 600k gain. Additionally, the large reported gain in leisure and hospitality jobs (+332k) is consistent with our view that labor supply constraints eased sequentially.
    • Job availability. The Conference Board labor differential—the difference between the percent of respondents saying jobs are plentiful and those saying jobs are hard to get—surged to +43.5 in June (from +36.9 in May) and is now at its highest level since 2000.

    Arguing for a weaker-than-expected report:

    • Employer surveys. The employment component of our manufacturing survey tracker was unchanged (-at 58.4), while the employment component of our services survey tracker decreased (-1.6pt to 54.9), but both remain around early-2019 levels.Encouragingly, the employment component of the GSAI increased substantially (+7.3pt to 68.4).
    • Job cuts. Announced layoffs reported by Challenger, Gray & Christmas rose by 18%nin June after declining by 33% in May. Layoffs were at the lowest level since 1993.

    Neutral/mixed factors:

    • Big Data. High-frequency data on the labor market were mixed between the May and June survey weeks. While two of the six measures Goldman tracks declined outright (Dallas Fed survey, Google mobility), there were strong gains in the two datasets that explicitly track employee scheduling (Homebase, ADP). These two indicators may more effectively track inflections in reopening categories like restaurants, hotels, and other services.

    • Jobless claims. Initial jobless claims declined during the June payroll month, averaging 396k per week vs. 505k in May. Across all employee programs including emergency benefits, continuing claims remained roughly unchanged between the payroll survey weeks.

    FWIW, Goldman estimates nonfarm payrolls rose 750k in June (above the 711k consensus) after rising 559k in May and 278k in April. Labor demand remains very strong due to the reopening and the stimulus, and the arrival of the youth summer labor force and the wind-down of federal unemployment top-ups in some states eased the labor supply constraints that held down job growth in May and April. GS thinks pPrivate payrolls rose 675k, above consensus of +620k.

    Goldman also estimates a two-tenths drop in the unemployment rate to 5.6% (in line with consensus of 5.6%), reflecting a strong household employment gain but a further rise in the participation rate. Goldman sees scope for the household measure to outperform relative to headline payrolls, as the former should better reflect the impact of reopening establishments. At the same time, in addition to a vaccine- and reopening-driven rise in labor force participation, the easing of labor supply constraints discussed earlier may have also boosted it as well. This would absorb some of the impact of strong job growth from the perspective of the jobless rate. Goldman also will pay close attention to the number of unemployed workers on temporary layoff, which spiked to a record-high 18.1mn last April but fell to 1.8mn in the May 2021 report. The smaller number of workers left on temporary layoff reduces the scope for the rapid pace of gains seen last summer, but it remains a positive factor relative to the pre-coronavirus pace of job gains.

    Finally, Goldman estimates a 0.4% rise in average hourly earnings (above consensus of +0.3%), reflecting continued labor shortages partially offset by negative calendar effects. Coupled with last spring’s waning composition effects, this would result in a further rise in the year-on-year rate from +2.0% to +3.8% (consensus is +3.6%). Wage growth continues to be resilient in the wake of the crisis, reflecting strong labor demand per unemployed worker and pandemic-related delays in job searches. Wages for lower-paid workers have risen sharply in recent months amidst widespread reports of worker shortages, and this imbalance led to further wage hikes in June as well.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 21:59

  • "Offensive Content" Next? Comcast Suspends User's Internet Service For Downloading Copyrighted Material
    “Offensive Content” Next? Comcast Suspends User’s Internet Service For Downloading Copyrighted Material

    Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Summit News,

    After Comcast suspended a user’s Internet access for downloading copyrighted material, some people are asking whether in the near future similar punishments could be inflicted for accessing ‘offensive content’.

    A Comcast Xfinity subscriber was informed that his Internet service had been suspended for 8 hours due to downloading torrents and that it wouldn’t be restored until he contacted the company.

    “This alert is to let you know that this month, we again received notifications of alleged copyright infringement associated with your Xfinity account. That means your Internet service may have been used repeatedly to copy or share a movie, show, song, game, or other content without any required permission,” said the email to the customer.

    The user was told that further violations would result in another 12 hour suspension and that, “Further notifications may result in your Xfinity Internet account being suspended again or terminated.”

    ISP Cox also previously handed out a 6 month suspension against a user after receiving multiple complaints.

    “Such terminations have the potential to disrupt everything from distance learning to telework and telemedicine,” reports Torrent Freak.

    Indeed, now that things like grocery shopping, banking, housing, government services and other basic life necessities are mainly conducted online (exclusively in some cases), cutting off someone’s Internet access isn’t far removed from cutting off their power or water supply.

    And if major ISPs are willing to bow to the entertainment industry by metering out such draconian punishments, what’s to say they won’t do the same when pressured by governments or woke mobs?

    “If Comcast is cutting people’s internet off for civil copyright infractions, whose to say they won’t start cutting people off for “hate speech” next?” asks Chris Menahan.

    “The same measures the US government used to seize the domains of torrent sites a decade ago are now being used to seize Middle East news websites the Biden regime doesn’t fancy.”

    He is referring to the Iranian news website Press TV and similar sites, which Attorney General Merrick Garland announced last month had been seized by the FBI.

    This all underscores the fact that Internet access should be treated as a utility and protected by law.

    *  *  *

    Brand new merch now available! Get it at https://www.pjwshop.com/

    In the age of mass Silicon Valley censorship It is crucial that we stay in touch. I need you to sign up for my free newsletter here. Support my sponsor – Turbo Force – a supercharged boost of clean energy without the comedown. Also, I urgently need your financial support here.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 21:40

  • New Video Shows Surfside Condo's Parking Garage Crumbled Before Collapse
    New Video Shows Surfside Condo’s Parking Garage Crumbled Before Collapse

    Video recorded moments before the Champlain Tower South collapse last Thursday shows concrete crumbling and water pouring out of an underground parking garage ceiling. 

    The footage, shot by Adriana Sarmiento and Roberto Castillero, two tourists staying in a nearby hotel, initially heard a loud bang minutes before the 12-story condominium building collapsed. They grabbed their smartphones and headed to the parking garage.

    They found water pouring out of the ceiling and concrete breaking apart inside the build’s underground parking garage. This is yet another clue that structural deficiencies may have played a part in the collapse, outlined in a prior engineering field report

    Adriana Sarmiento told ABC News they went to investigate the loud bang. She captured video around 0118 ET Thursday, minutes before the collapse. 

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    Here’s more video. 

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    Sarmiento said she tried to warn residents who were on their balconies about the danger. But it was too late to evacuate the building as the next thing the couple saw was “dust, and then, glass, rock, and then I started running for my life,” Castillero said. 

    It took the couple a few minutes for them to realize what happened, but after they came to their senses, a massive pile of rubble and debris was the only thing left of the tower. 

    “I said, ‘Where are the people on the balcony?’ ” Castillero said. “I did not realize that the balcony was not there.”

    Sarmiento said that night haunts her mind. 

    “For me, it’s been very difficult thinking of everyone who lived there,” she said.

    As of Wednesday evening, the death toll climbed to 18 with 145 people unaccounted for, according to local Surfside officials. 

    President Joe Biden and Jill Biden plan to travel to the condo site in Surfside, Florida, to offer their condolences to families as the number of deaths is expected to soar. 

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 21:28

  • Russia Now Requires Foreign Social Media Companies To Open In-Country Offices
    Russia Now Requires Foreign Social Media Companies To Open In-Country Offices

    In the continuing saga and standoff between US tech giants and the Russian state, the Kremlin just took a bold, creative step in its long-running efforts to reign in foreign “propagandistic” attempts to both censor official Russian sources and at the same time promote “obscene” content, as its officials have long complained.

    Russian President Putin on Thursday signed a law that seeks to force major social media companies to open offices on Russian soil if they continue to want their platforms unrestricted inside Russia. 

    Via EPA/TASS

    “A foreign entity, carrying out activities on the internet in Russia, is obliged to create a branch, open an office or establish a Russian legal entity,” the new law reads, according to Reuters.

    More details of the law were reported in Reuters as follows:

    Alexander Khinshtein, the head of the information policy and IT committee at the State Duma, Russia’s lower house of parliament, said the law applied to internet giants with a daily audience in Russia of at least 500,000 people.

    The firms must register a personal account on the website of Roskomnadzor, Russia’s state communications regulator, he wrote on his Telegram channel. Companies that violate the legislation could face penalties such as advertising bans.

    This in effect targets at least 20 US-based and other international companies, including Facebook, Google, Twitter, Telegram YouTube, and TikTok – many of which already have multi-million dollar fines against them inside Russia based on allegations they promote and elevate “banned” anti-government activity, including recent pro-Navalny protests dubbed by the state “illegal gatherings”.

    Putin on Wednesday actually addressed the immense power of Silicon Valley during his annual “call-in” telethon which allows citizens to ask questions of the Russian leader directly:

    “We tell them ‘you are distributing child pornography, instructions on how to make Molotov cocktails and suicide, you must remove that’,” Putin said.

    Last Spring the country began throttling Twitter speeds for some of these very issues and lack of compliance to Russian law.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    While the threat of outright banning some platforms remains, many of the big platforms are so popular among Russians that it’s not believed leaders could pull it off politically, given the massive domestic backlash that would ensue. Putin this week emphasized that there’s currently no plans to ban social media companies, however, he stressed “they must comply with our laws” and remain available to state authorities “to enable dialogue”. 

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 21:20

  • China Building Over 100 New ICBM Silos According To New Satellite Data
    China Building Over 100 New ICBM Silos According To New Satellite Data

    Commercial satellite imagery obtained by the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies suggest that China is building over 100 new silos for intercontinental ballistic missiles in a desert close to the northwestern city of Yumen, which – if true, could signal a ‘major expansion of Beijing’s nuclear capabilities,’ according to the Washington Post.

    The Monterey, California-based James Martin Center says the images reveal that work is now underway at ‘scores of sites across a grid covering hundreds of square miles’ of arid terrain in the country’s Gansu province. At least 119 nearly identical construction sites which contain features seen at existing launch facilities for China’s nuclear arsenal have been observed.

    The sites are spaced approximately two miles apart, and many are concealed by large, dome-like coverings – a practice WaPo says has been observed during construction at known missile silos. Where the dome is not in place, crews can be seen excavating a circular-shaped pit in the desert floor.

    The acquisition of more than 100 new missile silos, if completed, would represent a historic shift for China, a country that is believed to possess a relatively modest stockpile of 250 to 350 nuclear weapons. The actual number of new missiles intended for those silos is unknown but could be much smaller. China has deployed decoy silos in the past.

    During the Cold War, the United States developed a plan to move its ICBMs across a matrix of silos in a kind of nuclear shell game, to ensure that Soviet war planners could never know exactly where the missiles were at any given time.

    The construction boom suggests a major effort to bolster the credibility of China’s nuclear deterrent, said researcher Jeffrey Lewis, an expert on China’s nuclear arsenal and part of a team that analyzed the suspicious sites, first spotted by colleague Decker Eveleth as he scoured photos taken by commercial satellites over northwestern China. Lewis described the scale of the building spree as “incredible.” -WaPo

    “If the silos under construction at other sites across China are added to the count, the total comes to about 145 silos under construction,” said Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies, part of the Middlebury Institute of International Studies. “We believe China is expanding its nuclear forces in part to maintain a deterrent that can survive a U.S. first strike in sufficient numbers to defeat U.S. missile defenses.

    A commercial satellite photo taken Monday over northwestern China shows what experts say is a construction site for a new silo for a nuclear-tipped ICBM. The construction site is hidden under a 230-foot cover, a common concealment practice observed at other Chinese missile sites. (Planet/Center for Nonproliferation Studies)

    Lewis believes the silos will likely house a Chinese ICBM known as the DF-41, which is capable of carrying multiple warheads and has a reach of at least 9,300 miles, close enough to reach US mainland.

    Is a cold war on the menu?

    WaPo’s logical conclusion from this – which, as they dutifully note ‘follows recent warnings by Pentagon officials about rapid advances in China’s nuclear capability,’ is that a cold war is on the horizon – if not already here.

    According to Lewis, the silo construction is part of an effort by Beijing to expand their deterrence strategy, as they continue to grow their arsenal in what appears to be an abandonment of their “limited deterrence” doctrine which prioritizes a robust, lean nuclear arsenal that maximizes China’s ability to retaliate against adversaries if attacked.

    In recent years, however, Chinese officials have complained that their country’s nuclear deterrent is losing credibility because of nuclear modernization programs proposed or already underway in Russia and the United States. Beijing has resisted calls to join new arms-control talks because of fears that new limits would forever enshrine its status as a second-rate nuclear power compared with Washington and Moscow.

    The discovery follows recent warnings by Pentagon officials about rapid advances in China’s nuclear capability. Adm. Charles Richard, who commands U.S. nuclear forces, said at a congressional hearing in April that a “breathtaking expansion” was underway in China, including an expanding arsenal of ICBMs and new mobile missile launchers that can be easily hidden from satellites. In addition, the Chinese navy has introduced new nuclear-weapons-capable submarines to its growing fleet. -WaPo

    Neither China’s Foreign Ministry nor the US Department of Defense commented on the satellite images, however Pentagon spokesman John Supple noted that previous Pentagon reports and analysts have raised concerns over China’s silos.

    “Defense Department leaders have testified and publicly spoken about China’s growing nuclear capabilities, which we expect to double or more over the next decade,” he said.

    According to Lewis,We’re stumbling into an arms race that is largely driven by U.S. investments and missile defense.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 21:00

  • Japanese Government Officially Recommends 4-Day Work Week
    Japanese Government Officially Recommends 4-Day Work Week

    While the Covid scourge is gradually fading away from the collective consciousness one day at a time, its consequences have forever changed the work landscape for many companies, and  more and more institutions – and also nations – are starting to experiment with a four day work week. 

    Three months ago we reported that Awin CEO Adam Ross, who recently allowed workers at his company to leave early on Fridays, told Bloomberg that “we firmly believe that happy, engaged, and well-balanced employees produce much better work. They find ways to work smarter, and they’re just as productive.”

    It’s not just Awin. It’s a trend that is growing much larger around the globe. For example, according to ZipRecruiter, postings that have mentioned a four day work week have tripled over the last three years, to 62 per 10,000 postings. Major companies like Unilever are even experimenting with the four day work week.

    Not surprisingly, the nation that discovered Siesta made an aggressive push into the 4-day workweek when Spain’s ruling socialists launched a nationwide test of a 4-day work week in April, and now even Japan is getting on the bandwagon because as part of the government’s initiative to improve the nation’s “work-life (im)balance”, Japan’s famously hard-working salarymen officially are encouraged to reduce the amount of time they spend in the office environment.

    The recently unveiled annual economic policy guidelines include new recommendations that companies permit their staff to opt to work four days a week instead of the typical five.

    As DW reports, the coronavirus pandemic has already brought huge changes to the way that Japanese corporations — many of which are still highly rigid and traditional — go about their business. Political leaders now hope to convince management that flexible working hours, remote working, growing interconnectedness and a host of other developments can be beneficial if they remain in place even after the end of the health crisis.

    There are regular stories about workers either falling ill due to excessive overtime or taking their own lives due to stress

    Of course, in a nation that for the past 30 years has been crippled by lack of wage growth – and hence why 30 years of QE has failed to boost benign inflation – cutting labor supply by 20% would do miracles for higher wages but we digress. After all, nobody would ever admit the real reason behind the push for a 4-day work week, so instead let’s follow the official narrative.

    The government said in the outline of its campaign that, with a four-day working week, companies would be able to retain capable and experienced staff who might otherwise have to leave if they are trying to raise a family or take care of elderly relatives. As if taking care of one’ family emerged as an urgent need only in the aftermath of covid.

    According to the government, a four-day workweek would also encourage more people to gain additional educational qualifications or even take on side jobs in addition to their regular employment, according to the government.

    Most importantly, and finally we get to the truth which has zero considerations for anyone’s weelbeing, authorities hope that an extra day off every week would encourage people to go out and spend, thereby boosting the economy. It is also anticipated that young people will have more time to meet, marry and have children, going some way to solving the worsening problem of a falling birth rate, an increasingly older national demographic and a contracting population.

    “The government is really very keen for this change in attitude to take root at Japanese companies,” Martin Schulz, chief policy economist for Fujitsu Ltd.’s Global Market Intelligence Unit, told DW.

    Recent Japanese administrations have sought a number of ways to overcome a sluggish national economy, but everything has failed as fiscal policy has run its course and the central bank is limited in the tools that it still has at its disposal. That makes reforms to the lifestyles and working styles of millions of Japanese its next approach, he said.

    “During the pandemic, companies have shifted to new ways of operating and they are seeing a gradual increase in productivity,” Schulz said. “Companies are having their employees work from home or remotely, at satellite offices or at their customers’ locations, which can be far more convenient and productive for many.”

    Fujitsu has seized the opportunity, Schulz pointed out, with the company cutting the office space at its Tokyo headquarters by fully 50% as it shifts further to remote working: “In the future, there will be some people in my department in the office but it will be rare for all of us to be there together and that space is mostly now for face-to-face meetings that cannot be done remotely,” he said.

    Of course, there are drawbacks to the government’s hail mary plans to boost output by limiting labor, however, with Japan already experiencing a labor shortage brought on by fewer young people joining the workforce. Equally, there is concern that management will be reluctant to do away with some of the attitudes towards business that have served Japan Inc. so well for generations — even if there is clear evidence that traditional approaches are less effective than they were in the past.

    Employees, on the other hand, find the idea of a shorter working week appealing, but they do worry about reduced wages and accusations that they are not fully committed to their company.

    Take Junko Shigeno who is just completing her degree in business studies and languages and had several job offers at major corporations, but instead opted for a smaller information technology company that is a longer commute from her home because she felt the “philosophy” of the firm suited her better.

    “I did a lot of research about the companies that offered me a full-time position and made sure that I spoke to four or five present employees at each place,” she said. “I was shocked when one of the women whom I asked about the work-life balance just broke down in tears.”

    One of the biggest issues for young people today is unpaid overtime, known as “service overtime.” The company that Shigeno will be joining has promised that she will never have to do more than 15 hours of overtime a month. One of the other companies that interviewed her said she should anticipate around 60 hours every month.

    As DW notes, there are regular stories in the Japanese media about young staff either falling ill due to excessive overtime or taking their own lives due to stress. Known as “karoshi,” or death by overwork, inquiries often determine that workers cracked after putting in more than 100 hours of service overtime for months on end.

    “That’s not for me,” Shigeno said. “I am looking forward to working and learning new skills, but I also want to have my own time, to see my family and friends and to keep up my hobbies. That is very important to me and that is why I chose this company.”

    For Schulz, the key lies in increasing productivity.

    “Over the last year, employees have shown that they do not physically need to be in an office five days a week and until late at night to remain productive,” he said, implying that most workers are somehow more productive at home.

    “The biggest risk right now is that some companies will slip back into the old way of doing things and insist on all their staff coming into the office all day, every day again,” he added. “For the companies that do not make that mistake, the outcome is win-win.”

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 20:40

  • The Tyranny Of The Minority Is Just As Dangerous As The Tyranny Of The Majority
    The Tyranny Of The Minority Is Just As Dangerous As The Tyranny Of The Majority

    Authored by Michael Rectenwald via The Mises Institute,

    In a previous installment, I pointed out that in On Liberty, John Stuart Mill advocated for minority opinion to be specially “encouraged and countenanced,” and thus that Mill was not an absolute free market thinker where opinion is concerned. Mill suggested that minority opinion should not only be tolerated but requires special encouragement in order to gain a fair hearing. Such special encouragement would amount to the subsidization of opinion, most likely by the state. Thus, Mill did not argue for a free and fair “marketplace of ideas.”

    It should be noted here that “the marketplace of ideas” is not only an analogy, where commodities are to markets what ideas are to the public square. The public square is also market in its own right, and not only metaphorically associated with the market. The expression “the marketplace of ideas” somewhat obscures rather than clarifying the situation of opinion.

    Further, I argued that Mill’s advocacy for special treatment of minority opinion does not solve the problem of “social tyranny,” which Mill suggested is “more formidable than many kinds of political oppression.” Rather, when minority opinion is foisted on the majority through special sanctions or subsidies, “social tyranny” is actually increased rather than diminished. To the extent that a majority is unwillingly subjected to minority opinion, the majority is tyrannized.

    This argument begs the question: What about the opinion of minorities? After all, the mere mention of minority opinion invokes minorities themselves. Don’t the opinions of minorities require special encouragement, special sanctions, especially when said opinions have to do with fair and equal treatment of minorities themselves? Doesn’t a free market in opinion, or an unfettered marketplace of ideas, drown out or otherwise suppress the opinions of minorities? Wouldn’t a free market in opinion thus serve to perpetuate discrimination, lack of recognition, or unfair treatment? Isn’t the state required to rectify the situation through special subsidies for opinion?

    Leaving the nonremunerated voicing of opinion aside—that is, opinion expressed casually or even in public demonstrations—the question becomes whether in the actual marketplace of ideas, state subsidies are necessary for the opinions of minorities to get a fair hearing.

    The question implies that state actors are specially qualified or motivated to subsidize minority opinion in order to rectify the unfair treatment of minorities—that the state is the most qualified entity for intervening in opinion to favor minorities. But it is easily demonstrated that the market provides more incentives to advocate for the fair treatment of minorities than does the state. Markets encourage legal equality among buyers and sellers. The state, meanwhile, has no monopoly on equal treatment—to say the least. Quite to the contrary, states have more incentives to discriminate against particular groups, as state prerogatives often depend on discrimination. Consider the treatment of the Japanese and Germans in America during World War II, or the treatment of Middle Easterners after 9/11. (Notice how discrimination against Middle Easterners morphed into the consternation about “Islamophobia” when the prerogatives of the state shifted from “the war on terror” under George W. Bush to the incorporation of Islamic immigrants into the electorate under Barack Obama.)

    Thus, we should be quite skeptical when states impose the opinion of minorities on the majority through special programs in schools and elsewhere. Such programs likely involve “positive discrimination” against particular groups, consistent with state objectives.

    In fact, discrimination is precisely what is involved in the teaching of critical race theory in schools, the military, the intelligence agencies, and in other government agencies today. Critical race theory is a minority opinion that even most blacks do not agree with. It is being foisted on the majority to establish discrimination against “whites,” in order to destroy a political contingent deemed inimical to the Democratic Party–run state. It is a means for marginalizing oppositional elements and driving others into the voting ranks of the Democratic Party by means of ideology. The state imposition of minority opinion does not serve minorities.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 20:20

  • Ohio Dems Disgrace Themselves Trying To Keep Biological Males Competing In Girls' Sports
    Ohio Dems Disgrace Themselves Trying To Keep Biological Males Competing In Girls’ Sports

    Authored by Thomas Lifson via AmericanThinker.com,

    Democrats have surrendered to their lunatic left faction on defunding the police and transgenderism. It has begun to sink in that as crime explodes in big cities, weakening the police will cost them dearly in votes. So much so that Jen Psaki, with a straight face, claimed the other day that it is Republicans who are defunding the police by voting against the massive COVID bailout bill that contained not one word about policing, but which did hand cash to local governments.

    But on transgenderism, the party of science™ remains wedded to the fantasy the merely wishing it to be so can alter one’s sex, so biological teen males should be allowed into girls’ bathrooms and locker rooms, or to compete in school sports all the way to the Olympics. (Interestingly, I have seen no signs of forcing biological males into the WNBA or onto the US Soccer Team where Megan Rapinoe grumbles about lower pay.

    Such polling as exists shows strong majorities of Americans disagree with transgender sports participation. Gallup reports that 62% of Americans want people to play on the teams of their biological sex, with 34% supporting “gender identity” as the factor in choosing which competition an athlete should join. That’s not quite two-to-one, but it is close. And this is after several years’ worth of pervasive media and activist propaganda pushing transgenderism.

    That political reality means nothing to fanatics who are driven by hate. And that’s how to understand what unfolded on the floor of the Ohio state house of representatives legislative chamber Tuesday, when Rep. Jena Powell introduced legislation banning biological males from competing in girls’ sports.  A number of Dems pounded on their desks and yelled in an attempt to disrupt the bill’s introduction.

    Two tweets show different views of the state senate as the bill was introduced:

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    Rep. Michael Skindell attempts to disrupt the proceedings

    Twitter video screengrab (cropped)

    It didn’t work: An amendment to protect women’s sports in the Ohio House succeeded with a 54-40 vote

    Joshua Arnold of the Family Research Council describes the disgrace on the state capitol:

    As State Rep. Powell began, “across our country, female athletes are currently losing scholarships, opportunities, medals, and training opportunities,” Democrats began banging on desks. One man repeatedly screamed, “point of order.” Powell courageously pushed through to offer the amendment despite Democrats’ rude interjections. The amendment succeeded in a 54-40 vote, and the Ohio House voted 57-36 to pass Senate Bill 187 through to the Senate.

    “In the two and a half years that I’ve been in the legislature, that was probably one of the worst outcries that we’ve seen. It’s very rare to have something like that on the Ohio House floor,” Powell said. “I can’t speak for the Democrats, but I know many of the Republicans thought it was completely out of turn.”

    Since pre-colonial times, deliberative bodies like the Ohio House have followed basic procedures that ensure everyone gets a turn to speak.

    “When the Democrats speak and we disagree with them, we allow them to speak, and then you have the ability to do rebuttal on the floor. Instead, he had a childish outburst and continued doing so until the speaker cut him off,” said Powell.

    Powell surmised “the Left gets frustrated” and so they “speak out in ways that are very inappropriate.” Even where they are dominant, it seems the Left gets frustrated by the mere fact that their opponents have freedom of speech. That’s why, through controlling definitions, censoring speech platforms, and cancelling individuals, the Left is trying to vigorously curtail conservatives’ freedom of speech.

    I think bullying and trying to force people to accept their sisters, daughters and female friends competing with biological males will backfire. It’s an ugly tactic in support of insanity. Feminist female athletes see their own status threatened, and they are for the most part creatures of the left. The whole transgenderism craze has been a top-down phenomenon, with institutions dominated by the left – corporations, schools and universities, and the media – pushing it. They may bully many people into silence, but so long as voting is private and if the vote counters are honest (I know, I know), this commitment to madness will hurt Democrats. Blinded by the lack of critical feedback due to their institutional dominance, they will persist in their folly.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 20:00

  • Urban Farmers Believe They Have Key To Solve Violent Crime 
    Urban Farmers Believe They Have Key To Solve Violent Crime 

    While the Biden administration is on a crusade to ban guns as they say firearms are the culprit to the upswing in violence across major metro areas, there’s one neighborhood in St. Louis, Missouri, which has one of the highest homicides rates in the country, is experimenting with “urban farming” as a way to lessen food insecurity that may result in less crime. 

    According to St. Louis Public Radio (STLPR), Tyrean Lewis, founder of Heru Urban Farming, is planting vegetable gardens in neighborhoods where children don’t have enough healthy food to eat. 

    Lewis is also a health teacher who has seen it all. Some of his students have been locked up for petty crimes, while others have been jailed for shootings. He constantly hears gunshots around his home, and on average, his neighborhood records 3 to 4 homicides yearly. 

    “I mean, that’s normal to some people and unfortunately to me,” he said.

    Researchers say a host of factors contribute to a city’s gun violence problem — what they define as deficits in social determinants of health such as income, housing, healthy living environments and quality education.

    And food insecurity.

    Lacking a complex nutritional diet can harm brain development in childhood, according to public health experts. That can cause later problems dealing with peers, handling authority and responding to situations of extreme stress.

    The problems facing areas that experience gun violence are many, Lewis acknowledges, but he has also seen the impact that food can have.

    “I’ve seen the difference in kids when they get a meal and when they don’t get a meal, how they behave and how they focus in school,” he said. “So I truly believe that’s all connected.”

    Nearly 70% of the city’s 271 homicides last year occurred in low income census tracts without access to a grocery store or supermarket for at least half a mile, according to a Kansas City Star analysis of federal data and police reports.

    Fifty-two of the killings occurred in just eight census tracts on the north side of the city with no grocery store for a mile.

    St. Louis leads the state in gun violence and for most of the past decade ranked No. 1 for food insecurity — the lack of reliable access to healthy food. –STLPR

    Lewis’ Heru Urban Farming is helping to build a “grassroots ecosystem of Black urban growers, farmers markets, entrepreneurs and community leaders,” said STLPR. In recent years, urban farming has sprouted across St. Louis, allowing folks to access fresh produce. 

    His mission is to rebuild communities from the bottom up and allow them to become “self-sustaining” with an abundance of healthy food. 

    People are now tilling and planting on vacant lots, backyards, and school gardens across the metro area as they find ways to rebuild their communities after Democrats and offshoring jobs to China have wrecked local economies over multiple decades. 

    St. Louis is not the only city with high rates of homicides where urban agriculture programs are springing up. Urban gardens have been spotted across Baltimore City with goals to increase food access, reduce vacant blight, and create new opportunities for education and employment.

    Instead of eating junk from corner stores and gas stations, perhaps healthy food is a novel plan to restore inner-city communities by first decreasing food scarcity and, second, allowing access to more nutrient-rich foods that increase brain development. 

    Though small plots of land in urban areas might not feed an entire neighborhood – and perhaps public/private investments in indoor vertical farming should be made for these communities. 

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 20:00

  • Robinhood Insiders Plan To Dump Stock On The First Day Of Trading
    Robinhood Insiders Plan To Dump Stock On The First Day Of Trading

    The Coinbase IPO Direct Listing day was memorable because not only did it top tick the price of bitcoin in 2021, but it also marked the peak price the crypto exchange in its brief public life.

    The reason behind the subsequent collapse: relentless, aggressive selling by insiders which because the public offering was a direct listing and not a traditional IPO was allowed.

    It now appears that Robinhood’s stock price – once it breaks for trading – will follow the same fate. We know this because in addition to the other remarkable disclosures in the company’s S1 filing profiled previously – like Robinhood paying former SEC head Daniel Gallagher $30 million for working as Robinhood’s chief legal officer…

    … the insiders behind the Robinhood listing will have some early chances to trim their positions. That’s good news for them, but the unusual strategy is similar to the one that helped push Coupang Inc. below its initial public offering price for the first time.

    According to Bloomberg, HOOD employees and directors will be able to sell a portion of their holdings as soon as the first day of trading, according to the IPO prospectus that was unveiled on Thursday. That, as Bloomberg’s Drew Singer notes, is quite a departure from the six-month lockup periods that accompany most listings.

    While it’s not unheard of to set lockup expirations earlier than for the typical IPO, Robinhood’s plan looks particularly liberal. Unlike Coupang, Robinhood’s lockup expirations begin to trigger with the first day of trading.

    Besides the first day, opportunities for insiders to sell shares include the stock’s 91st day of trading as well as a lockup expiration linked to its first earnings report. The approach resembles Coupang’s, which fell below its IPO price less than two months after going public with a plan to let some insiders start selling within a week of the debut.

    Whose brilliant idea was it to structure the IPO in such a way as to do away with lockups entirely? Why Goldman of course. Coupang’s IPO was led by Goldman Sachs, the same bank at the top of Robinhood’s syndicate.

    Not that Goldman will be impacted: the bank will collect its customary 4-5% fee, Robinhood’s insiders will immediately liquify a substantial portion of their newfound fortunes, and the only losers will be those investors who naively think that the offering is meant to make them rich.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 19:39

  • Could Cosby Sue For Wrongful Conviction?
    Could Cosby Sue For Wrongful Conviction?

    Authored by Jonathan Turley,

    Bill Cosby is a free man after the Pennsylvania Supreme Court overturned the conviction that sent him to jail roughly three years ago to serve 3-10 years for sexual assault.  The opinion (below) correctly found that the trial judge and prosecutors denied Cosby a fair trial and due process in 2018. The question now is whether Cosby might seek damages for his conviction and incarceration.

    In their 79-page opinion, the judges found that a “non-prosecution agreement” reached with Cosby should have barred the prosecution. In the earlier agreement, the prosecutor, Bruce Castor Jr., agreed not to charge Cosby in return for his civil deposition.  He proceeded to incriminate himself in what the Court said was a bait-and-switch.  The later prosecutor then just ignored the nonprosecution agreement. The trial was also undermined by the decision of the trial court to allow women to testify as witnesses on uncharged alleged crimes against Cosby.

    It is clear that, absent the agreement, Cosby would never have agreed to the four depositions.  Free of the threat of prosecution, Cosby incriminated himself. Dolores Troiani., counsel for Andrea Constand, asked “When you got the Quaaludes, was it in your mind that you were going to use these Quaaludes for young women that you wanted to have sex with?” Cosby replied, “Yes.” That and other statements were used at his criminal trial.

    Kevin Steele, the Montgomery County district attorney who convicted Cosby, issued a statement that was embarrassing in its evasion of responsibility. He dismissed the ruling as “a procedural issue that is irrelevant to the facts of the crime.” Obviously, it was quite relevant because Steele proved a crime by unconstitutional means. Yet, Steele seems entirely unwilling to acknowledge his errors and declared that

    “My hope is that this decision will not dampen the reporting of sexual assaults by victims. Prosecutors in my office will continue to follow the evidence wherever and to whomever it leads. We still believe that no one is above the law — including those who are rich, famous and powerful.”

    The statement is breathtaking. Of course it could undermine such reports since Steele engineered an unconstitutional verdict that led to Cosby prevailing. Moreover, Steele is right, “no one is above the law” including prosecutors who are not allowed to pursue convictions at any cost in popular high-profile cases.

    Judge Steven T. O’Neill (who the defense sought to force off the case for bias) also has much to answer for in this wrongful conviction. O’Neill at trial seemed hellbent to try the case. He virtually mocked the defense arguments on the nonprosecution agreement: O’Neill, rejected that claim, saying, “There’s no other witness to the promise. The rabbit is in the hat and you want me at this point to assume: ‘Hey, the promise was made, judge. Accept that.’”

    The victims should be most upset with the prosecutors and the judge. Any chance to prosecute Cosby was lost in a trial that discarded the most basic requirements of due process. The case shows how the gravitational pull of high-profile cases can grotesquely distort trials. The court yielded to prosecutorial demands that were facially unconstitutional. For the prosecution and the judge, the trial was popular with many. However, the ultimate result was the denial of these victims of a defensible verdict and the denial of this defendant of due process.

    One question is whether Cosby could now sue for not just the prosecution but the incarceration in light of the ruling of the Supreme Court. Roughly 30 states and the District of Columbia have statutes allowing for recovery for wrongful convictions and imprisonment. Pennsylvania is not one of them (which is quite surprising).

    However, recently Gov. Tom Wolf included in his budget plan a proposal for Pennsylvania to pay people who were wrongly convicted $50,000 for each year that they were held behind bars.  Cosby would qualify under such a program.

    A federal case in North Carolina recently resulted in $75 million in damages for two wrongly convicted men but that award was in the federal system.  The men were sent to death row.

    Pennsylvania man is currently suing in federal court for wrongful conviction.

    Likewise, there have been Pennsylvania cases that have resulted in settlements. One man reached a settlement with the city of Philadelphia for wrongful conviction worth $9.8 million.  Another man reached a settlement for $6.25 million.

    As the first major prosecution in the “MeToo” period, a settlement does not seem likely for Cosby.

    So Cosby could sue but would have to do so in a state that does not have a wrongful conviction provision.  It must be done under common law, which is challenging.  Under common law, Cosby could sued for malicious prosecution. The elements of that tort are (1) the individual was prosecuted without probable cause by law enforcement officers, (2) the prosecution occurred with malice, or recklessness to the lack of probable cause, and (3) the prosecution ultimately terminated in favor of the accused.

    Pennsylvania cases for malicious prosecution are based on the Restatement (Second) of Torts. Section 653 of the Restatement provides:

    A private person who initiates or procures the institution of criminal proceedings against another who is not guilty of the offense charged is subject to liability for malicious prosecution if (a) he initiates or procures the proceedings without probable cause and primarily for a purpose other than that of bringing an offender to justice, and (b) the proceedings have terminated in favor of the accused.

    Cosby would likely qualify in states with formal compensation systems. He could also make a plausible case for malicious prosecution.  Indeed, his lawsuit could present Gov. Wolf with a political dilemma.  Cosby has cognizable claims for wrongful conviction and malicious prosecution. However, he is not exactly a popular cause for many in Pennsylvania.  Roughly 50 women accused him and Cosby admitted to giving drugs to his alleged victims before sexual acts. Bill Cosby is the ultimate example that you do not have to be entirely innocent to be wrongly convicted.

    Here is the opinion: Cosby v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 19:20

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Today’s News 1st July 2021

  • Google Mistakenly Uses Photo Of Swiss Engineer On Wikipedia Entry For Notorious Bulgarian Rapist
    Google Mistakenly Uses Photo Of Swiss Engineer On Wikipedia Entry For Notorious Bulgarian Rapist

    Today in “Skynet rewrites history” news, a Google algorithm has been responsible for mixing up an engineer based in Switzerland with a notorious serial killer online. 

    The mix up happened when algorithms mistakenly took a photograph of engineer Hristo Georgiev and placed it into a Wikipedia entry for Hristo Georgiev, who is described by the same entry as “a Bulgarian rapist and serial killer who murdered five people, mainly women, between 1974 and 1980”. 

    The software engineer seemed to take the news in stride.

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    He even wrote a blog post called “Google turned me into a serial killer”. 

    “As I was scrolling through my inbox today, I stumbled upon an e-mail from a former colleague of mine who wanted to inform me that a Google search of my name yields a picture of me linked to a Wikipedia article about a serial killer who happens to have the same name as mine,” he wrote. 

    “I quickly popped out my browser, opened Google and typed in my name. And indeed, my photo appeared over a description of a Bulgarian serial killer,” his blog says. “My first reaction was that somebody was trying to pull off some sort of an elaborate prank on me, but after opening the Wikipedia article itself, it turned out that there’s no photo of me there whatsoever.”

    Georgiev concluded:

    “It turns out that Google’s knowledge graph algorithm somehow falsely associated my photo with the Wikipedia article about the serial killer. Which is also surprisingly strange because my name isn’t special or unique at all; there are literally hundreds of other people with my name, and despite of all that, my personal photo ended up being associated with a serial killer. I can’t really explain to myself how this happened, but it’s weird.”

    Several days later, the engineer reported the that problem had been fixed.

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    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 02:45

  • German Mayor Responds To Islamist Terror Attack By Expressing Concern About Refugees
    German Mayor Responds To Islamist Terror Attack By Expressing Concern About Refugees

    Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Summit News,

    After a Somali refugee went on a stabbing rampage that left three women dead, the Mayor of Würzburg reacted by writing an open letter expressing concern about the stigmatization of refugees and migrants.

    Yes, really.

    Videos from the scene of the attack showed members of the public confronting the 24-year-old killer, who was later found to have radical Islamist propaganda on the premises of his home.

    The suspect, who arrived in Germany in 2015 as a refugee, also reportedly told staff at a local hospital that his attack had been a ‘contribution to jihad’.

    On Monday, Joachim Herrmann, Bavaria’s Interior Minister, said the incident had all the hallmarks of an Islamist terror attack.

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    While Mayor Christian Schuchardt expressed grief over the deaths of the victims, the main focus of his open letter was to complain that the attack could be used to stereotype other migrants and refugees.

    “But I also cried for our city last night. Because of this short circuit, this equating is so obvious. Refugees, immigrants, violent criminals, religious warriors and terrorists – massacres,” he said in his letter.

    “However, the crimes of individuals can never be traced back to population groups, religions or nationalities. We Germans were not condemned in general after the Second World War either. Nor does this now apply to Somalis or refugees in general. This pigeonholing must come to an end,” Schuchardt added.

    “And at the same time, there will be no end to it. This is my moral demand, my wish for the society that I know cannot be fulfilled. Because how would you feel as a foreigner in our city today?” the letter asked.

    In reality, refugees have been responsible for numerous terror attacks throughout Europe over the past six years since Angela Merkel’s disastrous decision to open the borders to them.

    The terrorist who beheaded a woman and killed two others near a church in Nice, France last October was revealed to be a Tunisian boat migrant.

    The Chechen teen who beheaded school teacher Samuel Paty in the same month had been granted a 10-year residency in France as a refugee the previous March.

    The majority of the Paris massacre terrorists also exploited the refugee wave to enter Europe.

    The three terrorists who went on a knife rampage in Lyon back in April last year were also Sudanese refugees.

    The Manchester Arena suicide bomber Salmen Abedi was also rescued from Libya as a refugee by the British Royal Navy after the fall of Colonel Gadaffi.

    These are just a few of the many examples.

    *  *  *

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    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 07/01/2021 – 02:00

  • Decisions That Would Cause U.S. To Lose World War III
    Decisions That Would Cause U.S. To Lose World War III

    Authored by David Pyne via RealClear History,

    This month marked the 80th anniversary of Nazi Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union which took place on June 22, 1941. Hitler’s witting or unwitting pre-emptive attack against the Red Army, which were massed on the borders of eastern Germany, western Poland, Hungary, and Romania poised for their own invasion, enabled the Germans to capture or destroy tens of thousands of Soviet tanks and aircraft. Some authors who have examined Soviet archives have suggested the offensive was scheduled to take place a mere two and a half weeks after Hitler’s attack.

    Despite the fact that the Soviet Union had joined with Nazi Germany in invading Poland and starting World War II as co-aggressors, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill responded to the German invasion of its former Soviet ally by pledging their unqualified support for the Soviet war effort no matter what the consequences of their unqualified political and military support might be. U.S. and U.K government war propagandists went to work to deceive their citizens into believing that the world’s greatest mass murderer, Soviet dictator Josef Stalin, was, in fact, a gallant ally of democracy and freedom in the fight against Nazi Germany.

    In the four years that followed, the U.S. and Britain sent 15,000 combat aircraft and nearly 23,000 tanks and armored fighting vehicles to the Soviet Union along with even more massive quantities of strategic materials. Without these, Stalin stated he could not have produced the tanks, aircraft, and other heavy weapons needed to defeat Nazi Germany. This Allied military-industrial aid put the wartime needs of U.S. and U.K. forces as well as their own citizens behind Stalin’s needs and requisitions while also providing the Soviets with atomic bomb making plans and materials according to the new book “Stalin’s War-A New History of World War II”. This critical U.S. assistance to the Soviet atomic bomb program likely enabled the Soviets to explode their first atomic and hydrogen bombs several years earlier than they otherwise would have. 

    Lend-Lease allowed Soviets to triumph

    This massive U.S.-U.K. military aid provided the Red Army with the ability to engage in mobile counteroffensives, which succeeded many times in encircling German forces, that it otherwise would have largely lacked. The 430,000 US trucks and jeeps provided under Lend-Lease constituted the bulk of Soviet motorized capabilities of the Red Army and enabled the Red Army to overrun half of Europe and much of Asia while annexing parts or all of nine countries and conquering half a dozen more during and after the war.  

    While a reasonable argument could have been made for providing the Soviets with some military aid to help them halt the German advance in the east, by 1943, the rationale for this enormous U.S.-U.K. military-industrial assistance had largely evaporated. This is due to the fact that, after the Battle of Kursk, the German Army was never again able to mount an offensive in the east and began a rapid retreat culminating in the Soviet capture of the German capital of Berlin less than two years later along with the eastern half of Europe. 

    After the fall of Nazi Germany, the Soviet Blitzkrieg continued in the Far East in what later came to be known as Operation “August Storm” as the USSR entered the war against Imperial Japan exactly one week before it surrendered, claiming Manchuria, northern Japan and North Korea in a rapid armored advance that lasted scarcely more than two weeks. Inexplicably, the U.S. continued its Lend-Lease military-industrial assistance program to the Soviets including about sixty U.S. warships and dozens of amphibious landing ships until September 1945 — a month after Imperial Japan had surrendered. 

    U.S., U.K., helped create Iron Curtain

    Shortly after the war, Winston Churchill feigned surprise when he announced in his famous speech at Fulton, Mo. in March 1946 that an “Iron Curtain” now divided Europe and claimed that he alone had foreseen this unfortunate event. His claim was questionable given that he and FDR had authored the Yalta Agreement and previous agreements which had ceded virtually all of eastern Europe and much of Central Europe to the Soviets, thereby creating the Iron Curtain, leading to the Cold War between the Western and Soviet blocs that lasted half a century. Of course, for any educated observer of international affairs and world history at the time, the end result of the U.S.-U.K. decision to provide massive military-industrial aid to the Soviet Union was clear from the onset.  

    When the war began, the Soviet Union was the largest and most heavily armed nation in the world by far — more than 33 times larger than Nazi Germany at its greatest extent — and it spanned two continents. The decision of the U.S. and U.K. to ally themselves with the Soviet Union along with the enormous amount of direct military and military industrial aid they provided the Soviets ensured that the Soviet Union, not the Western Powers, would be the dominant power in postwar Europe. 

    Rather than merely liberating it from Nazi control and rebuilding postwar Germany as an ally of freedom against totalitarian aggression, at the Yalta Conference, the Big Three — FDR, Churchill, and Stalin decided to destroy and dismember Germany into six pieces and starve millions of its citizens as part of their implementation of the Soviet-inspired Morgenthau Plan. This decision proved to have devastating consequences for U.S. national security, let alone the hundreds of millions of captive peoples enslaved in the newly expanded Communist bloc. 

    Following Germany’s defeat, General George S. Patton was very upset with the Truman-Eisenhower continuation of FDR’s appeasement policy of the Soviet Union and their decision to unjustly hold 70 million Germans collectively responsible for the crimes of Hitler and top Nazi leaders. He resolved to resign his commission and go on a speaking tour of the United States to urge a patriotic call to support a policy designed to confront, contain and, possibly even roll back, Soviet tyrannical control of Central and Eastern Europe. Tragically, Patton was assassinated in a joint OSS-NKVD conspiracy mere days before he was able to do so, depriving the free world of one of its most visionary leaders.  

    European balance of power tilted

    One of the main results of the war was that the balance of power in Europe was destroyed and the Soviet Union became the new hegemon of continental Europe and, for a time following the Communist takeover of mainland China, Asia as well. Visionary anti-Communist statesmen such as former President Herbert Hoover, predicted this tragic and apocalyptic outcome if the Western Powers chose to ally with the Soviet Union. The U.S. and U.K. could have won the war against Nazi Germany and liberated Europe without their Unholy Alliance with what President Ronald Reagan later rightly termed “an evil empire”, let alone without providing massive military aid to it. It would have been far better for the U.S. to have simply signed a non-aggression pact with the Soviet Union and raced them to see which of the two countries could liberate the Nazi-occupied countries first. That way, the U.S. and U.K. would not have been complicit in the many horrific Soviet war crimes including the mass murderers of millions of people who dared resist the Soviet Communist onslaught helping to extinguish the flames of freedom from nearly a dozen nations in Eastern Europe, which yearned to be liberated from their enslavement by tyrannical dictators. 

    During the Pacific war, the Chinese National Revolutionary Army, led by Chiang Kai Shek, fought gallantly against the Japanese. By tying down nearly 80 percent of Japan’s Army divisions in China enabled the U.S. to engage in a Pacific island-hopping campaign that defeated Japan in three and a half years. They were able to accomplish this great feat despite being provided with only about 1 percent of the military assistance that the U.S. had given to the Soviet Union. 

    In 1946, the year after World War II ended, America’s Chinese Nationalist allies seemed on the verge of defeating Mao’s Soviet-backed Red Army and winning the Chinese Civil War. Then, General George C. Marshall, who had been sent by President Truman to lead U.S. foreign policy with regards to China, decided to cut off all military and logistical support to Chinese Nationalist forces, depriving them of the fuel and ammunition they needed to prevent China from being taken over by murderous Communist forces.

    In the end communism prevailed

    In response to this unprecedented gift by the Truman Administration to Stalin and CCP leader Mao Zedong, the U.S. Congress voted to approve $1 billion in military aid to help the Nationalists avert total defeat. Sadly, President Truman and Secretary Marshall ordered the U.S. Pacific Fleet to dump all of the tanks, aircraft and other U.S. weapons that Congress had been earmarked for the Nationalist freedom fighters into the Pacific Ocean rather than allow them to fall into Chinese Nationalist hands. In the meantime, Stalin had, since August 1945, been arming and equipping Mao’s Red Army forces with the latest tanks and other weapons in the Manchurian sanctuary we granted to him to help Mao Communize all of mainland China. When Mao proclaimed victory in the Chinese Civil War on Oct. 1, 1949, the only surprising thing about it is that it took them so long to finalize their victory.

    While claiming to be fighting a war for democracy against totalitarian tyranny, U.S. leaders  enabled the Soviet and Chinese Communists to double the amount of territory under their control from 16 percent to 30 percent of the world’s landmass. Thanks to FDR and Truman, the number of people enslaved by godless Communism increased by nearly 430 percent from 170 million in 1939 to 730 million a mere decade later — 30 percent of the world’s people. Communist tyrants have since mass murdered nearly a billion people including forced abortions and infanticide — lives that otherwise might have been spared. 

    Did U.S. really “win” cold war?

    While the U.S. supposedly “won” the Cold War when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, World War II’s tragic aftermath has continued as Russia signed a military alliance agreement with Communist China two decades ago in July 2001, forming the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, which Russian President Putin has rightly called “a reborn version of the Warsaw Pact”.  If Roosevelt and Truman had not chosen to prolong the Second World War unnecessarily for seven months after the issuance of the MacArthur Memorandum in January 1945 which documented five separate Japanese surrender attempts, Stalin would not have been able to conquer Manchuria, enabling him to provide a safe haven to Communist Chinese forces. 

    Had Truman not cut off all U.S. military support to Chinese Nationalist forces from 1946-49, Communist China and North Korea (with whom we remain technically in a state of war due to the fact no peace treaty ending the Korean War was ever signed) would not exist today. China and Korea would be united and free, having fought as allies in our Cold (and sometimes ‘hot’) War against the Soviet Union and its Communist vassal state allies.  Meanwhile, had the U.S. not provided such vast amounts of military industrial assistance to the Soviet Union helping them conquer or annex vast territories during and after the war, Russia might be considerably weaker today and might pose a significantly lower nuclear threat. 

    Certainly, the decision of U.S. leaders from President George H.W. Bush to Barack Obama to unilaterally disarm America of over 94 percent of its Cold War-era nuclear arsenal, while leaving its citizens largely defenseless against the existential threats of nuclear missile and Electro-Magnetic Pulse (EMP) attack in the face of a massive nuclear buildup by our Sino-Russian alliance enemies, bodes ill for America’s future prospects. However, if the U.S. ends up fighting another major war against Russia and its Communist Chinese and North Korean allies in the near future, and goes down to defeat, an outcome which is more likely than not, future generations of Americans may recall that it was the decisions of two U.S. presidents — Roosevelt and Truman — over 75 years ago, that sowed the seeds of America’s demise and helped ensure we would lose the war for our very national existence.

    *  *  *

    David T. Pyne, Esq. is a former U.S. Army combat arms and H.Q. staff officer with a M.A. in National Security Studies from Georgetown University. He currently serves as Deputy Director of National Operations for the EMP Caucus on National and Homeland Security and as a Vice President of the Association of the United States Army’s Utah Chapter.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 23:40

  • New Video Shows Boston Dynamics' Robo-Dog Dancing To A Whole New Beat 
    New Video Shows Boston Dynamics’ Robo-Dog Dancing To A Whole New Beat 

    It comes as no surprise that after South Korean firm Hyundai finalized its acquisition of Boston Dynamics earlier this month, the internet’s favorite dancing four-legged robot, Spot, danced to a song by South Korean boy band BTS. 

    The South Korean automotive giant now owns a controlling interest in the Massachusetts-based robotics company, previously belonging to SoftBank.

    Last year, Hyundai and BTS partnered in a music video called “I’m On It” that featured an IONIQ, a new EV lineup brand of Hyundai. So it comes as no surprise that Hyundai would use BTS to pump up their new Spot robot in a video released Tuesday. 

    Seven Spot robo-dogs can be seen dancing to the BTS song. 

    Another video shows a couple of members of BTS dancing alongside Spot. 

    Eric Whitman, a Boston Dynamics roboticist who had a role in the music video, said, “There were a lot of challenges around getting the vision of our choreographer, who’s used to dealing with human dancers, into our software.” 

    Whitman said, “Everything had to be worked out in advance and scripted precisely. Robots have the advantage over humans in that they’re very repeatable: Once you get it right, it stays right. But they have the disadvantage that you have to tell them every little detail. They don’t improvise at all.”

    Whitman said it had taken years to evolve Spot’s behavior and movements, such as reliable walking and climbing. 

    “When we do these projects we always have two goals,” he said. “One is to use the video as motivation to improve the product. The secondary goal is to have fun making the video.”

    Under South Korean ownership, we wonder what new tasks Hyundai will program Spot to do in the future. 

    Meanwhile, China has released a robo-dog of their own

    So the question remains: Will these robots end up in a war? 

    To answer that, a top French military academy has already trained with Spot. 

    So the answer could likely be yes. 

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 23:20

  • CJ Hopkins Exposes "The War On Reality"
    CJ Hopkins Exposes “The War On Reality”

    Authored (somewhat satirically) by CJ Hopkins via The Consent Factory,

    So, the War on Reality is going splendidly. Societies all across the world have been split into opposing, irreconcilable realities. Neighbors, friends, and even family members are bitterly divided into two hostile camps, each regarding the other as paranoid psychotics, delusional fanatics, dangerous idiots, and, in any event, as mortal enemies.

    In the UK, Germany, and many other countries, and in numerous states throughout the US, a “state of emergency” remains in effect. An apocalyptic virus is on the loose.

    Mutant variants are spreading like wildfire. Most of society is still shut down or subject to emergency health restrictions. People are still walking around in public with plastic face shields and medical-looking masks. The police are showing up at people’s homes to arrest them for “illegally gathering outdoors.” Any deviation from official reality is being censored by the Internet corporations. Constitutional rights are still suspended. Entire populations are being coerced into being injected with experimental “vaccines.” Pseudo-medical segregation systems are being brought online. And so on … you’re familiar with the details.

    Meanwhile, in Sweden, and a few other countries, and in various other states throughout the US, there is no apocalyptic pandemic.

    People are just going about their lives as normal. OK, sure, there is a nasty virus going around, so people are taking common sense precautions, as people typically do for any nasty virus, but there is no “state of emergency” in effect, and no reason to radically transform society into a paranoid, pathologized-totalitarian dystopia.

    This state of affairs, in which two contradictory, mutually-exclusive realities exist, is … well, it’s impossible, and so it cannot continue. Either there exists a devastating global pandemic that justifies a global “state of emergency,” the suspension of constitutional rights, and the other totalitarian “emergency measures” we have been subjected to since March of 2020 or there isn’t. It really is as simple as that.

    Except that it isn’t as simple as that. It is easy to forget, given the last 16 months, that people have been bitterly divided, and inhabiting mutually-exclusive realities, and regarding people who don’t conform to their realities as enemies for the last five years. I’m not talking about political disagreements, or even socio-cultural differences. I’m talking about contradictory realities. Things that actually happened, or didn’t happen. Things that exist, or do not exist.

    I’m not going rehash the whole War on Populism — I covered it extensively at the time — but that’s when the current global-capitalist War on Reality was officially launched. It wasn’t just the usual lies and propaganda. It was a full-scale ideological assault. By the end of it, people actually believed that (a) Donald Trump was a Russian agent, (b) that he was literally Hitler, and so was going to stage some sort of “coup,” declare himself American Führer, and launch the “Trumpian-White-Supremacist Fourth Reich,” and (c) that he had actually attempted this by sending a few hundred unarmed protesters — violent domestic extremist grandmothersfather-and-son kill squads, and bison hat loonies — to “storm the Capitol” and overthrow the government during the so-called “January 6 Insurrection.”

    So, when GloboCap rolled out the “New Normal” reality, they weren’t exactly starting from scratch.

    Millions of people — not just Americans, because the War on Populism was a global campaign — were already living in a new reality in which facts no longer mattered at all, where things that never happened officially happened, and other things that obviously happened never happened, not officially, or were “far-right extremist conspiracy theories,” “fake news,” or “disinformation,” or whatever, despite the fact that people knew that they weren’t.

    But the goal of GloboCap’s War on Reality isn’t simply to deceive the masses and divide them into opposing camps. Rulers have been deceiving the masses and dividing them into opposing camps since the dawn of human civilization. This time, it’s a bit more complicated than that.

    OK, bear with me now, because this gets kind of heady.

    The War on Reality is not an attempt to replace reality with a fake reality. Or it is that, but that is only one part of it. Its real goal is to render reality arbitrary, to strip it of its epistemological authority, to turn it into a “floating signifier,” a word that has no objective referent, which, of course, technically, it already is. You cannot take a picture of reality. It is a concept. It is not a physical object that exists somewhere in time and space.

    But let’s leave that last point for a later discussion. This is not the time to get lost in semiotics. For most people, for most practical purposes, reality is … well, reality. It’s objective. Material. It actually exists. It exists independent of our beliefs. It isn’t just an arbitrary, empty signifier that doesn’t actually refer to anything, but which we use, strategically, to assert authority, or to impose ideology on society. If that were the case, there would be no reality. Nothing would be true, everything would be permitted … which is a bunch of postmodern Marxist nonsense.

    But just imagine, for a moment, if that were the case … if what determined reality was actually just a question of power rather than facts. Imagine that reality was just a concept that we used to mark the current limits of our knowledge and ideological beliefs. Our doctors — oncologists and virologists, for example, but they could be any kind of doctors or scientists — would be not all that different from medieval alchemists, who totally believed in their reality at the time, as did the patients they were treating, but which we know now was not reality at all, because our reality is the real reality. I mean, it’s not as if people, five hundred years from now, are going to look back at our medical practices and scientific knowledge, and laugh, like we do at those medieval alchemists, right?

    Sorry, I got a little off track there. I was trying to explain the ultimate purpose of this global-capitalist War on Reality, and I wandered off into an ontological swamp, which isn’t going to get us anywhere. So, let’s get back to imagining reality, not as what we all know it is (i.e., an actual, material thing that exists), but as a construct people use to validate certain officially-sanctioned beliefs and perceptions and invalidate other beliefs and perceptions, more or less like a system of morals, except instead of dividing things into to “good” and “evil,” it divides things into “real” and “fake.”

    Now imagine that you were an immensely powerful, globally hegemonic ideological system, and you wanted to impose your ideology on as much of the entire world as possible, but you didn’t have an ideology per se, or any actual values at all, because exchange value was your only real value, and so your mission was to erase all ideologies, and values, and truths, and belief systems, and so on, and transform everything and everyone in existence into de facto commodities that you could manipulate any way you wanted, because they had no inherent value whatsoever, because their only real value was assigned by the market.

    How would you go about doing that, erasing all existing values, religious, cultural, and social values, and rendering everything a valueless commodity?

    Well, you wouldn’t want to destroy reality completely, because people wouldn’t stand for that. They would freak right out. Things would get ugly. So, instead, you might want to go the other way, and generate a lot of contradictory realities, not just contradictory ideologies, but actual mutually-exclusive realities, which could not possibly simultaneously exist … which would still freak people out pretty badly.

    Naturally, there would be one official reality that you would force everyone to rigidly conform to at any given moment in time, but you would change the official reality frequently, and force everyone to conform to the new one (and pretend that they’d never conformed to the old one), and then, once they had settled into that one, you would change the official reality again, until people’s brains just shut down completely, and they gave up trying to make sense of anything, and just tried to figure out what you wanted them to believe on any given day.

    If you repeated that process long enough, eventually, nothing would mean anything anymore, because everything could potentially mean anything … at which point, you could basically tell people anything you wanted and they would go along with it, because what the hell difference would it make? A narcissistic billionaire ass-clown could be a Russian agent and literally Hitler. A half-assed riot could be an “insurrection.” Children could be born “systemically racist.” Men could menstruate. But wait … it’s gets better.

    You could stage an apocalyptic global pandemic that only happened in certain countries, or in certain parts of certain countries, and that more or less mirrored natural mortality, and that didn’t drastically increase historical death rates, but was nonetheless totally apocalyptic.

    Perfectly healthy people could become “medical cases.” You could count anyone who died of anything as having died of your apocalyptic virus. You could tell people in no uncertain terms that medical-looking masks will not protect them from viruses, and then turn around and tell them that they will, and then, later, publicly admit you were lying in order to manipulate them, and then deny you ever said that, and tell them to wear masks.

    You could experimentally “vaccinate” millions of people whose risk of becoming seriously ill or dying from your apocalyptic virus was minuscule or non-existent, and kill tens or hundreds of thousands in the process, and the people whose brains you had methodically broken would thank you for murdering their friends and neighbors, and then rush out to their local discount drugstore to experimentally “vaccinate” their own kids and post pictures of it on the Internet.

    At that point, you wouldn’t really have to worry about “populist uprisings,” or “terrorism,” or any other type of insurgent activity, because the vast majority of the global population would be scramble-headed automatons who were totally incapable of independent thought, and who had no idea what was real and what wasn’t, so just repeated whatever new script you fed them like customer-service representatives on Haldol.

    It doesn’t get much better than that for globally hegemonic ideological systems!

    OK, sorry, I think I got lost there again. I’m not sure what I was trying to say. I’ve been a little foggy lately. I’m not sleeping so well. It’s probably Long Covid. Or maybe it’s just that time of month. Whatever. It’s not like it matters anyway. Still, I think I’ll go down to my former local bookshop and get myself tested.

    Have a nice day in … you know, reality!

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 23:00

  • 5,000 Burgers Per Day: World's First Mega Lab-Grown Meat Factory Opens 
    5,000 Burgers Per Day: World’s First Mega Lab-Grown Meat Factory Opens 

    The World Economic Forum’s (WEF) The Great Reset plan includes a complete transformation of the global food and agricultural industries and the dieting of humans. The architects behind this plan are preparing for a meatless society with the introduction of cell-based, slaughter-free meat. 

    Before this decade is over, we’re all going to be eating some form of slaughter-free meat, including chicken, pork and lamb, and beef. The point of all this is to generate fewer greenhouse emissions at cattle farms, use less land for farming, and reduce the use of freshwater and grains for the traditional process of growing livestock. 

    The aim is for a sustainable future, and already we’ve noted a few companies producing cell-based, slaughter-free meat. However, these facilities are operating at limited output as it is costly to produce fake meat. 

    That’s where Future Meat Technologies of Israel comes into play with their brand new facility able to pump out 500 kilograms (1,102 pounds) of cultured meat products per day, or the equivalence about 5,000 hamburgers per day. 

    “This facility opening marks a huge step in Future Meat Technologies’ path to market, serving as a critical enabler to bring our products to shelves by 2022,” said Rom Kshuk, CEO of Future Meat Technologies. “Having a running industrial line accelerates key processes such as regulation and product development.”

    Kshuk said the facility produces cultured chicken, pork, and lamb products, and beef production will be coming online soon.

    Here’s the company’s production facility located in Rehovot, Israel.

    The company’s platform enables fast production cycles—about 20 times shorter than traditional farming.

    Yaakov Nahmias, the company’s founder and chief scientific officer, said, “our goal is to make cultured meat affordable for everyone, while ensuring we produce delicious food that is both healthy and sustainable, helping to secure the future of coming generations.” 

    It seems as Nahmias’ roadmap for commercializing lab-grown meat plays into the “great reset” plan orchestrated by WEF. 

    So we don’t confuse readers, cultured meat products are different from plant-based imitation meat companies, such as Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat. 

    Future Meat Technologies could end up on US store shelves in 2022, pending regulatory approval. The company is also examining several locations for future plants in the States. 

    So there you have it, one part of the great reset by global elites is to transform the food industry and ensure that everyone eats fake meat by the end of this decade to save the planet from cow burps

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 22:40

  • Conrad Black: A Tsunami Of Crises About To Swamp Biden Administration
    Conrad Black: A Tsunami Of Crises About To Swamp Biden Administration

    Opinion authored by Conrad Black via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    The Biden-Harris administration is now in an extended levitation of credibility. Except for Donald Trump, who entered office in the midst of a public relations terror campaign against him and had no trace of a political honeymoon, all incoming presidents arrive with a favoring wind of bipartisan goodwill behind them.

    A group of Venezuelans wait to be picked up by Border Patrol after illegally crossing the Rio Grande from Mexico into Del Rio, Texas, on June 3, 2021. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)

    Especially as President Biden came into office promising a quieter and more genteel atmosphere and has largely done that, it is not surprising that his general popularity has been sustained at somewhat above 50 percent these first five months. But for a long time the Democrats have not had any war-cry except “We’re not Trump” and “That is racism.”

    In service to that credo, from Inauguration Day they have taken the position that they would do the reverse of anything Trump did: outright reaction unsupported by any analysis. Nothing else is conceivable as an explanation for their southern border policy.

    As Vice President Harris checked the box by going to El Paso, 800 miles away from the more agitated areas of illegal southern entry last week, she repeated the mantra that this administration inherited a mess. The polls are unanimous in indicating that the public realizes they did not inherit a mess; they inherited the almost complete end of illegal immigration and they squandered it instantly and jubilantly by effectively inviting the world to enter while having the hapless Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas repeat like a Disney World self-propelled puppet “The border is closed.”

    Television viewers can switch channels from that almost daily pronunciamento to see illegal immigrants swarming across by land and through water. Illegal immigration is now running at the rate of two million a year, which is an unsustainable level of entry of almost entirely unskilled people who will severely strain the social and educational and public security services of the southern border states.

    It is a crisis closing in upon a disaster, and the public can already see it approaching. All that can be said for the vice president’s visit to El Paso, where she was welcomed by the gushy local Democratic congresswoman to the “21st Century Ellis Island,” (where people arrived legally and some were rejected), is that it was nothing like as great a fiasco as her visit to Mexico and Guatemala three weeks ago.

    There she conspicuously failed to excite the enthusiasm of the American public to deluge more billions of dollars into those improvident areas in order to tackle “the sources of the problem”—the ancient liberal death wish of turning America’s pockets inside out to fight poverty in poor foreign countries by enriching their avaricious politicians.

    Inflation

    The tsunami of crises that are about to break over this administration do not stop at the southern border. It is no longer possible to disguise that inflation is stoking up. Awareness of this has been clouded and deferred because the composition of the index does not necessarily reflect the needs of average families.

    If the figures are broken out and averaged in traditional ways, the current rate of inflation appears to be something like eight or 9 percent and it will continue to remain high while the Sanders wing of the Democratic Party, which was solely responsible for the so-called Biden-Sanders Unity Program, is sticking to its guns.

    It demands and may force trillions more dollars to be thrown out of the windows of the Treasury and the Federal Reserve in an instant and artificial expansion of the money supply. The president’s latest wheeze for trying to satisfy Sanders while making a gesture to advocates of sane fiscal policy was his professed agreement on a bipartisan infrastructure bill, which almost everyone agrees is needed and is a good thing, followed a couple of hours later by the assertion that it would not be approved if not accompanied by a much larger “virtual infrastructure” measure.

    The Republicans who had agreed the bipartisan measure rose in revolt and the president, as is his custom, (and as is made plausible by his frequently turgid inarticulation), announced that he had been misunderstood. For the first time he is under some pressure to work himself out of one of the jams that he has blundered into, instead of just shrugging it off and relying on the docile media to ignore it.

    If he retains any of his old Senate bargaining skill, he may be able to come through it with his credibility intact. But he is trying to govern from a high wire, a very hazardous procedure for so unsteady a leader.

    Crime

    Even more urgent than the surging immigration and imminent inflation crises is the entirely predictable and much predicted crime wave. Violent crime is up everywhere and especially in Democratic-governed cities that cravenly bowed to the outrageous demands in the “peaceful protests” of last summer that injured 2000 police personnel, killed approximately 50 people, and caused over $2 billion of property damage.

    The rioters, almost none of whom would have been Republican voters, demanded that the police be defunded and “reimagined” and this was done in many cities, generating violent crime increases of from 25 to 150 percent.

    All Biden’s nonsense about shooting to hit people in the leg and enlisting social workers and psychologists to go out on 911 calls is vanishing in the vast cauldron of skyrocketing violent crime. Many formerly feasible neighborhoods are terrorized by gangs and conditions are undoubtedly aggravated by sluggish work from police forces that are tired of being the scapegoats for racist urban terrorists. The ranks of American urban police are thinning rapidly as the people in blue can easily find less hazardous and more highly appreciated work.

    The president’s address on crime on June 23 took refuge in the usual Democratic arguments about gun control. No doubt the gun laws can be better enforced, but the counter-argument that in such lawless conditions, the existence of firearms in most American homes is a factor of deterrence of crime and not an incitement to it.

    Chicago has tough gun laws but its worst areas are shooting galleries where the arrest rates are so low that it is obvious that the police are either compromised by their association with violent gangs or confining themselves to the perimeters of the most crime-ridden areas and have abandoned the core of those areas to the Darwinian masters of them, (and these desperate conditions are certainly not confined to Chicago).

    The president was correct in his plan to give greater assistance to criminals returning to civilian life and to prison reform in general, but that will work better with nonviolent people who are generally chronically over-sentenced, and who are much less likely to be repeat offenders than their violence-prone fellow inmates.

    Possible Fixes

    This is a problem that disconcerts and frightens scores of millions of Americans. When the administration comes to its collective senses, it can go back to the Trump methods of protecting the southern border while giving their policy a name that connotes reform.

    Biden can also stop being intimidated by Sanders and (Congresswoman) Ocasio Cortez and be assured of a large number of the reasonable majority with any serious gesture of fiscal restraint, at least up until the midterm elections. It might not be too late to damp down the psychology of inflation.

    But there is no quick fix to violent crime. It will soon be impossible to hide from the necessity to intervene directly to finance the recruitment and proper training of at least 100,000 more police personnel.

    The methods for reducing violent urban crime in the United States are now well known and were demonstrated by the mayoral regime of Rudolph Giuliani in New York (1993–2001), and there is no alternative but to return to them and the federal government can incentivize that.

    The embarrassment to the Democrats in such a course will be as nothing to the embarrassment they will receive at the polls next year if they do not take serious anti-crime measures.

    Conrad Black has been one of Canada’s most prominent financiers for 40 years, and was one of the leading newspaper publishers in the world. He’s the author of authoritative biographies of Franklin D. Roosevelt and Richard Nixon, and, most recently, “Donald J. Trump: A President Like No Other,” which has been republished in updated form. You can hear more of Conrad’s thoughts on his podcast “Scholars & Sense” alongside his co-hosts Bill Bennett and Victor Davis Hanson at ScholarsAndSense.buzzsprout.com.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 22:20

  • Billionaire Funds South Dakota National Guard Deployment To U.S-Mexico Border
    Billionaire Funds South Dakota National Guard Deployment To U.S-Mexico Border

    South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem tweeted Monday that she’s sending 50 of her state’s National Guard troops to the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas and will be paid for by a private donation, according to Axios

    Noem said, “I’m officially announcing up to 50 National Guard troops to Texas to help secure our border.” She said President Biden has forgotten that a secured border is critical to maintaining a sovereign nation. “We shouldn’t be making our own communities vulnerable by sending police to fix Biden’s border crisis.” 

    The funding for the troop deployment is coming from a “Tennessee billionaire and high-dollar Republicans,” Axios said. 

    Noem spokesperson Ian Fury told Axios the funds are coming from a foundation run by billionaire Willis Johnson. There was no word on the size of the donation or the exact mission the troops would be conducting. 

    Johnson has spent millions of dollars to bankroll several political campaigns, including former President Trump’s reelection campaign. 

    The eventual deployment of the troops, funded by republicans, could optically tarnish Biden’s image when it comes to border security because his administration has been chipping away at law and order on the border

    Other Republicans, such as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, announced they would send state law enforcement units to Texas to secure the border to clean up Biden’s disastrous border policies that have resulted in absolute chaos. 

    Texas Gov. Abbott has frequently fought with the Biden administration on border issues. 

    America is a melting pot of cultures. The most sustainable way to blend the world’s people is through a fair and orderly immigration system—something the Biden administration has failed to do. 

    The chaos on the southern border is terrible optics for Biden as Republicans swarm in with law enforcement and privately funded troops to fix the mess. Certainly, the border will be a huge debate issue in the next presidential election cycle. 

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 22:00

  • Biden Sends Federal Motor Fuels Tax Packing, Washington Insider Says
    Biden Sends Federal Motor Fuels Tax Packing, Washington Insider Says

    By Mark Solomon of FreightWaves,

    President Joe Biden has thrust a dagger into the heart of the federal motor fuels tax and, with it, the trust fund that’s long been dedicated to paying for highway projects.

    So says Randy Mullett, a multi-decade veteran of the inside-the-beltway transportation wars and head of a Virginia-based consultancy. Biden’s staunch opposition to an increase in the federal fuels tax — which hasn’t been raised since 1993 — sends a clear message to Congress that the Highway Trust Fund, which for decades has used fuel tax proceeds to funnel money to states for road infrastructure projects, has reached the end of its useful life, Mullett said. The Trust Fund was created in 1956 to fund the interstate highway system and other road projects.

    “The days of a dedicated highway trust fund are finished,” Mullett said Tuesday afternoon during a virtual session at the SMC3 annual summer meeting.

    House Democrats had been tinkering with the idea of raising the fuel tax by indexing it to inflation, Mullett said. Biden’s pronouncement quashed those efforts, he said. From now on, every infrastructure project will compete with other federal spending initiatives for the same pot of money, a prospect no one in the transport ecosystem relishes, Mullett said.

    Bereft of federal money, states will be pressured to continue hiking their fuel taxes, Mullett said. Over the past three decades, states have repeatedly raised fuel taxes and related fees to pay for necessary infrastructure improvements.

    Perhaps the oldest unresolved issue in official Washington has been how to pay for infrastructure improvements absent any increases in the federal fuels tax. The tax has sat at 22.4 cents per gallon on diesel and 18.4 cents per gallon on gasoline since President Bill Clinton’s first year in office. Groups including shippers, carriers and the 3 million-strong U.S. Chamber of Commerce have repeatedly endorsed measures to raise fuel taxes. However, the Obama administration consistently rejected it as a regressive tax, a position that Biden, who served as Obama’s vice president, has adopted. The Trump administration talked early on about supporting a fuel tax hike, but nothing ever materialized.

    Adding to the cost squeeze is the administration’s refusal to support taxes or user fees on the use of electric-powered vehicles (EV), which currently escape levies because they don’t require fossil fuels. Though still a distinct minority of the nation’s truck and auto fleets, EVs will become much more commonplace on American roads over the next 20 years. Hardly anyone disputes the need to capture EV activity and tax their use. The question is how it will be done.

    The urgency behind the “how-do-we-pay-for-this” question has reached a crescendo, with the administration and a bipartisan group of senators agreeing to an eight-year, $1.2 trillion infrastructure package, and with the House and Senate dueling over how to reauthorize the 2015 FAST Act, the last federal transport-spending bill. It is expected that the legislation, if a version gets enacted, will cost an additional $500 billion to $600 billion depending on its duration.

    With costs running far ahead of revenues due to years of inaction at the federal level, the trust fund regularly runs out of money and requires periodic capital transfers from the general treasury to meet its commitments. The House’s reauthorization bill, which is set to be voted on by the full chamber later this week, contains $148 billion in transfers over the next five years. The Senate is still putting together its version.

    It is unclear whether the administration-backed initiative and the reauthorization legislation will be consolidated or will move forward on different tracks. Either way, there is more infrastructure funding on the table than at any time in recent history.

    Panelists at the session said transport and business interests need to be on guard for any form of revenue-raising coming out of both branches. The Biden administration has proposed hiking the corporate income tax rate to 28% from 21% to pay for infrastructure programs, a move that would be a “huge hit” on retailers, said Jonathan Gold, vice president of supply chain and customs policy at the National Retail Federation (NRF), the world’s largest retail industry trade group. 

    There has also been bipartisan talk of a bill-of-lading tax, which would have a direct and enormous impact on all of logistics. Mullett said the broad strokes of the measure are “ill-defined” and that it’s unlikely to go anywhere. However, anything is possible when the executive and legislative branches are “scrambling for dollars,” he said.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 21:40

  • Welcome To The "Post-COVID Luxury Spending Boom"
    Welcome To The “Post-COVID Luxury Spending Boom”

    Now that the Covid panic is starting to subside, the “boom” is beginning. Especially in the luxury goods market.

    The surge in spending is indicative of the tailwind that loosening lockdowns, combined with trillions of dollars in stimulus, has created. 

    One person experiencing the spending binge firsthand is travel agent Dottie Williford, who told The Washington Post that the company’s luxury offerings are being sold out first: “People don’t usually spend $20,000 to go to the Bahamas, but my clients are. The first things to sell out were the top category on the ship.”

    As a result, businesses are going to start catering further to the wealthy, the report notes. This is due to the fact that the wealthiest Americans will be the driving force behind a lot of the recovery in retail spending. 

    As of now, “nearly 40 percent of overall consumer spending comes from the top fifth of earners — households that earn at least $120,000 a year,” WaPo notes. The bottom 20% of households account for just 9% of spending – and that gap is set to widen. The wealthiest 10% of Americans added more than $8 trillion to their net worth in 2020, despite the entire economy essentially shutting down and most of the country being in lockdown.

    Raj Chetty, a professor of economics at Harvard University, said: “Higher-income folks are accumulating a lot of savings. They will spend more going forward and that will further create an incentive for companies to cater to higher-income folks even more.”

    High income consumer spending is now 11% higher than pre-covid levels and consumer spending could grow at the fastest pace since 1946, the report notes. As a result, names like J.Crew and Uniqlo are specifically raising their price points heading into the new season, the report notes. Names like Gucci and Louis Vuitton are also raising prices. 

    Kayla Marci, a market analyst at retail-data firm EDITED, said: “Prices are rising. We’re also seeing these mass markets aligning their prices with luxury or expanding the offering of high-end products.”

    The hospitality and travel indsutry is also feeling robust demand. Lindblad Expeditions, a cruise line that normally offers 35 day Antarctic cruises for $50,000 each, said it may expand into a “diverse high end travel aggregate” heading into 2021. 

    Its CEO, Sven Lindblad, said in April: “We are well-prepared to start up again. We have excellent financial reserves, a couple of new companies under our umbrella and a marketing machine that is vastly strengthened for growth.”

    Similarly, Oceania Cruises’ 2023 world cruise, which is called “Around the World in 180 Days,” and costs between $46,000 and $160,000 per guest, sold out in a single day.

    CEO Frank Del Rio said: “We believe this achievement, along with multiple booking records we have announced in recent months, demonstrates the pent-up demand that exists from our mature and affluent cruisers even for long and exotic voyages once the severe impact of the pandemic subsides.”

    Robertico Croes, director of the Dick Pope Sr. Institute for Tourism Studies at the University of Central Florida, echoed the bullish sentiments for the industy: “The post pandemic will see a very strong movement toward the most affluent in terms of product development and services, and so on, compared to those who don’t have the affluence needed to engage in travel. Travel is inherently a luxury item.”

    Additionally, live entertainment spending is up 60% this year, amusement park trips and recreation are up 54% this year and membership clubs are up 45% this year. Those three fastest growing categories are usually dominated by high income Americans. 

    Demand for second homes has also “more than doubled” during the pandemic and was up a scorching 178% in April and 48% in May. 

    If the post-Great Recession spending data is any indicator, the economic recovery could only be getting started:

    In the five years after spending by the top 20 percent hit bottom during that recession, their share of all spending on care services such as day care, preschool and eldercare jumped 9 percentage points to 56 percent of overall spending in that area. The story was similar in education spending, such as college and private schools, as their share jumped 5 percentage points to 54 percent overall.

    Discretionary spending by the top 20 percent on fun purchases like pets, toys and hobbies rose 3.4 percentage points to 38.5 percent of that overall category. In another category that includes hotels and vacation homes, where the top 20 percent were already dominant, they gained even more ground, reaching 59 percent of spending overall.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 21:20

  • Incremental Outrageousness Is Killing America
    Incremental Outrageousness Is Killing America

    Authored by Bruce Abramson via RealClearPolitics.com,

    Critical race theory has exploded into public consciousness. Millions of American parents are just coming to realize that our schools have become woke indoctrination centers preaching divisiveness, bigotry, discrimination, and disdain for American history. Most of them are wondering how we got here.

    The answer is simple: Slowly. Incrementally. One step after another, over the course of decades. It’s hardly just K-12 education. An incentive system of “incremental outrageousness” has taken every aspect of American culture dangerously far from reality into the orgy of radical leftist hatred known as progressivism.

    How did it happen without anyone noticing?

    Turns out, we’ve reached the endgame of a strategy the radical left put in play in the 1960s: the long march through the institutions. The onslaught began in higher education—an institution particularly well suited for a takeover because it functions without external market signals. Success in academia hinges entirely on peer approval. Faculty members make all decisions concerning the hiring, firing, and promotion of junior colleagues, curriculum design, publication in prestigious journals, the appropriate paths for research, and the availability of public and private research funding.

    The surest way to succeed as an academic is thus to flatter the senior folks charged with making decisions about your career. The best way to do that (within the bounds of legality and propriety) is to “build upon” their work—that is, by taking it one step further in the recommended direction. Senior academics select the direction. Junior academics bolster the prestige of their seniors whenever they make a new “scientific discovery” along the designated path. In one fell swoop these junior academics show how important past work has been and tie their own egos, prestige, and careers to those of their seniors.

    This process calcifies conventional wisdom while divorcing each new “discovery” from everything other than the step that immediately preceded it. Each small step in the approved direction represents a small step away from the reality that originally grounded it.

    Incremental outrageousness. Consider, for example, the well-grounded observation that it might be worthwhile to study history from the perspective of the peasants and/or the conquered rather than of royalty and/or the victorious.  Fast-forward a few decades and many incremental steps. Now, perspective implies sympathy; those who study the oppressed are compassionate, while those who study the oppressors are cruel. Fast-forward a few more decades. Critical theory reduces all human interactions into conflicts between oppressors and oppressed.

    Finally, fast-forward to present. Today, “science has proved” that the nuclear family is a tool of oppression—hence the opposition of Black Lives Matter and its ideological allies—and that the biggest problem facing America is a white supremacism so pervasive that it can boast exactly zero organizations of any size or influence.

    How did science prove such things? One day at a time, building incrementally upon the scientific frontier of the day before.

    Outrageous? Absolutely. But the path from a grounded, reasonable observation to a hateful fantasy capable of undermining the republic was so methodical, so incremental, and so organic that few noticed it happening. Millions of individuals, over the course of decades, responded rationally to the incentives they faced. Prestigious “experts” told them what they had to do, say and join to succeed. Most young people arriving on campus or beginning work in the prestige professions complied; those who did not had short, unhappy experiences and limited career success.

    Meanwhile, decent, colorblind, patriotic Americans trusted our nation’s institutions to police themselves. That trust was badly misplaced. The radical left hollowed out our institutions and took them over—first academia, then the media, then the civil service, K-12 education, the professional organizations, Silicon Valley, and Wall Street. In 2021, even corporate America is more interested in being woke than in maximizing profits.

    Social media was the final blow. Social media made incremental outrageousness the dominant incentive system driving American society. Viral posts invariably move one step beyond yesterday’s outrage—familiar enough to seem plausible, but still pushing forward in the approved direction. The conventional wisdom dominating American culture is dangerously divorced from reality.

    The organic nature of incremental outrageousness is responsible for today’s “social progressives”: The folks committed to progressivism despite having no understanding of progressive ideology. The folks who provide cover and support for anti-American radicals despite believing quite deeply that they’re supporting traditional American concepts of democracy, freedom, and equality. The folks we need to wake up if we’re to secure the support necessary to sustain the American republic.

    Those of us committed to that republic must undertake a program of strategic education and commitment. Tools and techniques for waking them and changing their incentives are available and teachable. By all appearances, however, very few of our leaders or our fighters have mastered them. That’s going to have to change—soon—if we have any hope of restoring America.

    No one said it was going to be easy.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 21:00

  • Baltimore City Police Set To Seize Twice As Many "Ghost Guns"
    Baltimore City Police Set To Seize Twice As Many “Ghost Guns”

    Months ago, we told readers “ghost guns,” which are untraceable to the federal government and can either be made from 80% percent lower kits or 3D printers were popping up all across Baltimore City. Now the number of ghost guns the Baltimore City Police Department (BCPD) expects to seize this year is set to be more than double what it was last year. 

    Baltimore police are on track to seize at least twice as many privately manufactured firearms — often called “ghost guns” — as they did in 2020, Sheree Briscoe, the city’s deputy police commissioner, said Tuesday.

    At a virtual conversation moderated by the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Prevention and Policy, Briscoe said the department has seen an increase in its recovery of privately manufactured firearms in the last few years.

    The department recovered 29 ghost guns in 2019; 126 in 2020; and 83 from January to mid-May this year.

    “We’re on pace to surpass last year’s numbers and potentially come in between 250 to 300 privately made firearms that will make their way to the streets of Baltimore in the hands of various age groups [and] communities,” she said.

    According to Briscoe, 15 ghost gun seizures were “directly linked” to homicide or shooting investigations in 2020.

    “…To some that may not be a large percentage, but any percentage that’s attributed to a gun that is not legally registered, legally manufactured with serial numbers, is a challenge because then you run the difficulty of trying to find out where did that come from, who may ever possess that gun,” said Briscoe. – Maryland Matters

    With more than 300 homicides for six consecutive years, 2021 murders are estimated to be over 300.

    BCPD Commissioner Michael Harrison has blamed the rise in violent crime on several issues, including an officer shortage. 

    Last year, liberal city officials defunded BCPD, but as violent crime soared, newly elected Mayor Brandon Scott reversed their measure to increase funding.

    The situation in the metro area is so severe that Governor Larry Hogan had a recent meeting with Mayor Scott and Police Commissioner Michael Harrison. The governor said the meeting was “productive” but attributed the lack of consequences for petty crime to the surge in violence. 

    “When crime’s being committed right in front of police officers, when the state’s attorney refuses to prosecute half the crimes, we’re not going to fix the problem, regardless of how many meetings we’re going to have,” Hogan said, referring to Baltimore City State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby halting the prosecution of minor traffic violations, prostitution, drug possession, and other minor offenses during the virus pandemic. In March, Mosby held a press conference to declare that rough policing doesn’t prevent more violent crimes. Months later, her policing strategies have failed. 

    Last Wednesday, Mayor Scott sat down with President Biden at a roundtable discussion on gun violence. The mayor and Biden discussed new efforts to address violent crime. 

    “Today’s conversation with Mayor Scott of Baltimore, for example, echoed what we know to be the case and hear from mayors all across the country. Mayors have the power to help shape and enforce the laws in their cities, but they can’t control the laws in neighboring cities and states even though the gun legally bought there often ends up in their streets. Mayor Scott says that 80% of the guns in Baltimore were acquired outside the city. There’s nothing he can do about that, so we have to act,” Biden said.

    The president has been an advocate for banning ghost guns and crushing the NRA. 

    When someone can create an entire 3D-printed ghost gun at their home for under $350, including the cost of the printer, it seems Biden’s ambitions for more gun control could be a losing battle. 

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 20:40

  • George Orwell's 1984 Has Become A Blueprint For Our Dystopian Reality
    George Orwell’s 1984 Has Become A Blueprint For Our Dystopian Reality

    Authored by John W. Whitehead & Nisha Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,

    “If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face – for ever.”

    George Orwell, 1984

    Tread cautiously: the fiction of George Orwell (Jun. 25, 1903-Jan. 21, 1950) has become an operation manual for the omnipresent, modern-day surveillance state.

    It’s been more than 70 years since Orwell—dying, beset by fever and bloody coughing fits, and driven to warn against the rise of a society in which rampant abuse of power and mass manipulation are the norm—depicted the ominous rise of ubiquitous technology, fascism and totalitarianism in 1984.

    Who could have predicted that so many years after Orwell typed the final words to his dystopian novel, “He loved Big Brother,” we would come to love Big Brother.

    “To the future or to the past, to a time when thought is free, when men are different from one another and do not live alone— to a time when truth exists and what is done cannot be undone: From the age of uniformity, from the age of solitude, from the age of Big Brother, from the age of doublethink — greetings!”—George Orwell

    1984 portrays a global society of total control in which people are not allowed to have thoughts that in any way disagree with the corporate state. There is no personal freedom, and advanced technology has become the driving force behind a surveillance-driven society. Snitches and cameras are everywhere. People are subject to the Thought Police, who deal with anyone guilty of thought crimes. The government, or “Party,” is headed by Big Brother who appears on posters everywhere with the words: “Big Brother is watching you.”

    We have arrived, way ahead of schedule, into the dystopian future dreamed up by not only Orwell but also such fiction writers as Aldous Huxley, Margaret Atwood and Philip K. Dick.

    “If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.”―George Orwell

    Much like Orwell’s Big Brother in 1984, the government and its corporate spies now watch our every move. Much like Huxley’s A Brave New World, we are churning out a society of watchers who “have their liberties taken away from them, but … rather enjoy it, because they [are] distracted from any desire to rebel by propaganda or brainwashing.” Much like Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, the populace is now taught to “know their place and their duties, to understand that they have no real rights but will be protected up to a point if they conform, and to think so poorly of themselves that they will accept their assigned fate and not rebel or run away.”

    And in keeping with Philip K. Dick’s darkly prophetic vision of a dystopian police state—which became the basis for Steven Spielberg’s futuristic thriller Minority Report—we are now trapped in a world in which the government is all-seeing, all-knowing and all-powerful, and if you dare to step out of line, dark-clad police SWAT teams and pre-crime units will crack a few skulls to bring the populace under control.

    What once seemed futuristic no longer occupies the realm of science fiction.

    Incredibly, as the various nascent technologies employed and shared by the government and corporations alike—facial recognition, iris scanners, massive databases, behavior prediction software, and so on—are incorporated into a complex, interwoven cyber network aimed at tracking our movements, predicting our thoughts and controlling our behavior, the dystopian visions of past writers is fast becoming our reality.

    Our world is characterized by widespread surveillance, behavior prediction technologies, data mining, fusion centers, driverless cars, voice-controlled homes, facial recognition systems, cybugs and drones, and predictive policing (pre-crime) aimed at capturing would-be criminals before they can do any damage.

    Surveillance cameras are everywhere. Government agents listen in on our telephone calls and read our emails. Political correctness—a philosophy that discourages diversity—has become a guiding principle of modern society.

    “People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.”―George Orwell

    The courts have shredded the Fourth Amendment’s protections against unreasonable searches and seizures. In fact, SWAT teams battering down doors without search warrants and FBI agents acting as a secret police that investigate dissenting citizens are common occurrences in contemporary America. And bodily privacy and integrity have been utterly eviscerated by a prevailing view that Americans have no rights over what happens to their bodies during an encounter with government officials, who are allowed to search, seize, strip, scan, spy on, probe, pat down, taser, and arrest any individual at any time and for the slightest provocation.

    “The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.”―George Orwell, Animal Farm

    We are increasingly ruled by multi-corporations wedded to the police state.

    What many fail to realize is that the government is not operating alone. It cannot. The government requires an accomplice. Thus, the increasingly complex security needs of the massive federal government, especially in the areas of defense, surveillance and data management, have been met within the corporate sector, which has shown itself to be a powerful ally that both depends on and feeds the growth of governmental overreach.

    In fact, Big Tech wedded to Big Government has become Big Brother, and we are now ruled by the Corporate Elite whose tentacles have spread worldwide. The government now has at its disposal technological arsenals so sophisticated and invasive as to render any constitutional protections null and void. Spearheaded by the NSA, which has shown itself to care little to nothing for constitutional limits or privacy, the “security/industrial complex”—a marriage of government, military and corporate interests aimed at keeping Americans under constant surveillance—has come to dominate the government and our lives.

    Money, power, control. There is no shortage of motives fueling the convergence of mega-corporations and government. But who is paying the price? The American people, of course.

    Orwell understood what many Americans are still struggling to come to terms with: that there is no such thing as a government organized for the good of the people. Even the best intentions among those in government inevitably give way to the desire to maintain power and control over the citizenry at all costs.

    “The further a society drifts from truth the more it will hate those who speak it.” ― George Orwell

    Even our ability to speak and think freely is being regulated.

    In totalitarian regimes—a.k.a. police states—where conformity and compliance are enforced at the end of a loaded gun, the government dictates what words can and cannot be used. In countries where the police state hides behind a benevolent mask and disguises itself as tolerance, the citizens censor themselves, policing their words and thoughts to conform to the dictates of the mass mind.

    Dystopian literature shows what happens when the populace is transformed into mindless automatons.

    In Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, reading is banned and books are burned in order to suppress dissenting ideas, while televised entertainment is used to anesthetize the populace and render them easily pacified, distracted and controlled.

    In Huxley’s Brave New World, serious literature, scientific thinking and experimentation are banned as subversive, while critical thinking is discouraged through the use of conditioning, social taboos and inferior education. Likewise, expressions of individuality, independence and morality are viewed as vulgar and abnormal.

    In my debut novel The Erik Blair Diaries, the dystopian future that George Orwell predicted for 1984 has finally arrived, 100 years late and ten times as brutal. In this post-apocalyptic world where everyone marches to the beat of the same drummer and words like “freedom” are taboo, Erik Blair—Orwell’s descendant and unwitting heir to his legacy—isn’t volunteering to be anyone’s hero. Unfortunately, life doesn’t always go according to plan. To save all that he loves, Orwell will have to travel between his future self and the past.

    And in Orwell’s 1984, Big Brother does away with all undesirable and unnecessary words and meanings, even going so far as to routinely rewrite history and punish “thoughtcrimes.” Orwell’s Big Brother relies on Newspeak to eliminate undesirable words, strip such words as remained of unorthodox meanings and make independent, non-government-approved thought altogether unnecessary.

    Where we stand now is at the juncture of OldSpeak (where words have meanings, and ideas can be dangerous) and Newspeak (where only that which is “safe” and “accepted” by the majority is permitted). The power elite has made their intentions clear: they will pursue and prosecute any and all words, thoughts and expressions that challenge their authority.

    This is the final link in the police state chain.

    “Until they became conscious they will never rebel, and until after they have rebelled they cannot become conscious.”—George Orwell

    Having been reduced to a cowering citizenry—mute in the face of elected officials who refuse to represent us, helpless in the face of police brutality, powerless in the face of militarized tactics and technology that treat us like enemy combatants on a battlefield, and naked in the face of government surveillance that sees and hears all—we have nowhere left to go.

    We have, so to speak, gone from being a nation where privacy is king to one where nothing is safe from the prying eyes of government.

    “Big Brother is Watching You.”―George Orwell

    Wherever you go and whatever you do, you are now being watched, especially if you leave behind an electronic footprint. When you use your cell phone, you leave a record of when the call was placed, who you called, how long it lasted and even where you were at the time. When you use your ATM card, you leave a record of where and when you used the card. There is even a video camera at most locations equipped with facial recognition software. When you use a cell phone or drive a car enabled with GPS, you can be tracked by satellite. Such information is shared with government agents, including local police. And all of this once-private information about your consumer habits, your whereabouts and your activities is now being fed to the government.

    The government has nearly inexhaustible resources when it comes to tracking our movements, from electronic wiretapping devices, traffic cameras and biometrics to radio-frequency identification cards, satellites and Internet surveillance.

    In such a climate, everyone is a suspect. And you’re guilty until you can prove yourself innocent. To underscore this shift in how the government now views its citizens, the FBI uses its wide-ranging authority to investigate individuals or groups, regardless of whether they are suspected of criminal activity. 

    “Nothing was your own except the few cubic centimetres inside your skull.” ― George Orwell

    Here’s what a lot of people fail to understand, however: it’s not just what you say or do that is being monitored, but how you think that is being tracked and targeted. We’ve already seen this play out on the state and federal level with hate crime legislation that cracks down on so-called “hateful” thoughts and expression, encourages self-censoring and reduces free debate on various subject matter. 

    Say hello to the new Thought Police.

    Total Internet surveillance by the Corporate State, as omnipresent as God, is used by the government to predict and, more importantly, control the populace, and it’s not as far-fetched as you might think. For example, the NSA has been working on an artificial intelligence system designed to anticipate your every move. Aquaint (the acronym stands for Advanced QUestion Answering for INTelligence) has been designed to detect patterns and predict behavior.

    No information is sacred or spared.

    Everything from cell phone recordings and logs, to emails, to text messages, to personal information posted on social networking sites, to credit card statements, to library circulation records, to credit card histories, etc., is collected by the NSA and shared freely with its agents in crime: the CIA, FBI and DHS.

    What we are witnessing, in the so-called name of security and efficiency, is the creation of a new class system comprised of the watched (average Americans such as you and me) and the watchers (government bureaucrats, technicians and private corporations).

    Clearly, the age of privacy in America is at an end.

    So where does that leave us?

    We now find ourselves in the unenviable position of being monitored, managed and controlled by our technology, which answers not to us but to our government and corporate rulers. This is the fact-is-stranger-than-fiction lesson that is being pounded into us on a daily basis.

    It won’t be long before we find ourselves looking back on the past with longing, back to an age where we could speak to whom we wanted, buy what we wanted, think what we wanted without those thoughts, words and activities being tracked, processed and stored by corporate giants such as Google, sold to government agencies such as the NSA and CIA, and used against us by militarized police with their army of futuristic technologies.

    To be an individual today, to not conform, to have even a shred of privacy, and to live beyond the reach of the government’s roaming eyes and technological spies, one must not only be a rebel but rebel.

    Even when you rebel and take your stand, there is rarely a happy ending awaiting you. You are rendered an outlaw. Just look at what happened to Julian Assange.

    So how do you survive in the American surveillance state?

    We’re running out of options.

    Whether you’re dealing with fact or fiction, as I make clear in Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in my new novel The Erik Blair Diaries, we’ll soon have to choose between self-indulgence (the bread-and-circus distractions offered up by the news media, politicians, sports conglomerates, entertainment industry, etc.) and self-preservation in the form of renewed vigilance about threats to our freedoms and active engagement in self-governance.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 20:20

  • Charges Filed Against Trump Org And CFO Alan Weisselberg
    Charges Filed Against Trump Org And CFO Alan Weisselberg

    Update (1900ET): A Manhattan grand jury has filed the anticipated indictments against Trump Org and longtime CFO, Alan Weisselberg, who will reportedly turn himself in tomorrow, according to the Washington Post. The indictments containing the specific charges will be unsealed on Thursday afternoon, however people familiar with the case say the charges are related to allegations of unpaid taxes on benefits enjoyed by Trump Organization executives.

    Not exactly money laundering for Russian mobsters, as the Rachel Maddows of the world have been hinting at for over four years.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    According to the Post, dual investigations appear to have been set in motion by former Trump attorney Michael Cohen, who turned on the former President in 2018 after pleading guilty to making hush-money payments to two women who claimed to have had sex with Trump over a decade before the 2016 US election.

    Vance’s office opened an investigation in 2018, responding to Cohen’s charges that Trump had directed the illegal payoffs. But Vance’s probe broadened beyond those allegations to encompass years of business transactions. Vance examined tax breaks Trump got on an estate in suburban New York, loans Trump took out on his Chicago tower, and statements Trump made to New York tax authorities about the value of his Manhattan towers, according to previous court filings.

    The investigation became bogged down for much of Trump’s term, however, because of a long legal fight over his tax returns. Vance had sought them from Trump’s accountants in 2019, but Trump sued to stop him, saying that — as president — he was immune from investigation by any state-level prosecutor. -WaPo

    And of course, timing is everything – as the lawsuit, which we suspect could have been filed months, or even years ago, will now play out right as Trump gears up to support Republicans through the 2022 midterms.

    *  *  *

    The Trump Organization and its CFO, Allen Weisselberg, is expected to be charged on Thursday with tax-related crimes, according to the Wall Street Journal, citing people familiar with the matter. Trump himself is not expected to be charged, as we noted earlier this week.

    Allen Weisselberg, behind former President Donald Trump and Donald Trump Jr. in 2017, is chief financial officer of the Trump Organization.
    Photo: Evan Vucci/Associated Press

    The action by the Manhattan district attorney’s office would mark the first criminal charges against the former US president’s company since prosecutors began investigating three years ago. Weisselberg reportedly refused prosecutors’ attempts to get him to cooperate against Trump, according to the report.

    The defendants are expected to appear in court Thursday afternoon.

    The Trump Organization and Mr. Weisselberg are expected to face charges related to allegedly evading taxes on fringe benefits, the people said. For months, the Manhattan district attorney’s office and New York state attorney general’s office have been investigating whether Mr. Weisselberg and other employees illegally avoided paying taxes on perks—such as cars, apartments and private-school tuition—that they received from the Trump Organization. -WSJ

    According to the report, if prosecutors can show the Trump Organization and its executives systematically avoided paying taxes, more serious charges could follow.

    Trump has denied wrongdoing and insists that the case – led by Democrats – is politically motivated, and that the case covers “things that are standard practice throughout the U.S. business community, and in no way a crime.”

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 20:05

  • Restaurants Have No Choice But To Raise Menu Prices Amid Inflationary Pressures 
    Restaurants Have No Choice But To Raise Menu Prices Amid Inflationary Pressures 

    All vaxxed up (or maybe some have the COVID antibodies), many Americans are ditching their on-demand food delivery apps this summer and are supporting local restaurants with an in-dining experience but have been sticker shocked by the rise of menu prices. 

    Restaurants, big and small, are passing along the increasing costs of basic commodities and labor. For instance, the cost of vegetable oils, cereals, dairy, meat, and sugar has been erupting since the beginning of the pandemic. Compound this with labor costs, along with the cost of everything soaring, and restaurants already suffering from a lost year in 2020, are raising menu prices at a much faster pace than historical rates, according to Bloomberg

    Increasing menu costs are displayed in government data showing inflation rising at its fastest clip since 2009. 

    Source: Bloomberg

    The Labor Department said this month that consumer prices in May rose .6%, pushing the annual inflation rate to 5% over the last 12 months. Other government data reveals wholesale costs for various meats jumped 20% since the start of the year. Also, producer prices for processed poultry in May soared to a record high. 

    According to more government data, restaurant food prices rose 4% in May than a year ago, with limited-service meals up 6.1%. Full-service 4.1% over the last 12 months, the biggest jump since late 2008. 

    Bloomberg spoke with Tampa, Florida, restaurateur Andrew Koumi, who increased menu items by 2% to 4%. He operates a six-location chain called Green Market Cafe and attempts to keep food and paper costs below 35% of his menu prices. His computer keeps warning him that certain items, like chicken, have doubled in the last six months. 

    Koumi isn’t worried about passing along costs to consumers because “everyone” in the industry is “doing it.” He said some restaurants are “drastically” raising menu prices.”

    “Could it go up more? It’s scary. I’m hoping that it levels,” he added

    Restaraunt chain Chipotle raised its menu price by 4% due to increasing labor costs and food prices. Another chain, Cracker Barrel Old Country Store Inc., raised its menu prices by 3% amid persistent increases in wage and commodity expenses. 

    So far, consumer confidence remained steady in June amid warnings that inflation could sour their mood.

    The great debate today is if inflation is “transitory,” and the latest report via BofA’s Michael Hartnett concludes US inflation to remain elevated for two to four years. So much for the “transitory” narrative stuffed down our throats by the monetary wonks at the Federal Reserve. 

    Get used to paying higher prices… Or just eat at home. 

    … or perhaps some restraunts will keep prices steady but decrease the size of the meal, something known as “shrinkflation.” 

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 20:00

  • Half A Million Illegals Crossed Since Harris Named Border "Czar"
    Half A Million Illegals Crossed Since Harris Named Border “Czar”

    Authored by Steve Watson via Summit News,

    According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection figures, around 500,000 illegal immigrants have crossed the southern border since Kamala Harris was named border ‘czar’.

    The Washington Free Beacon reported the findings, noting that only three months has passed since Harris took on the responsibility, and that the half a million figure is just those that have been apprehended.

    The CBP says around 180,000 immigrants are being caught per month. In April agents arrested 178,854 illegal immigrants, the highest monthly figure for 21 years. That figure was then surpassed in May as agents apprehended 180,034 illegals.

    By the time June’s figures are reported in the coming days, the combined number is expected to be over half a million, more than the entire population of Miami, Florida or Cleveland, Ohio.

    Harris only bothered to visit the border when President Trump announced he was making a trip. Even then Harris visited El Paso, some 1000 miles away from where the crisis is taking place.

    Previous to this, Harris lied and claimed she had been to the border, telling NBC’s Lester Holt “This whole thing about the border. We’ve been to the border. We’ve been to the border.”

    When Holt pushed back and said she had not, Harris snapped “I—and I haven’t been to Europe. And I mean, I don’t—I don’t understand the point that you’re making,” then again laughed maniacally:

    On Tuesday, Republican Senator Ron Johnson argued that Harris’ trip to El Paso was designed to distract the media and keep them away from the real crisis hit areas of the border.

    “They took her to a point in the border where she wouldn’t see the crisis and so the press wouldn’t report on the crisis,” Johnson said.

    The Senator added, “You just simply can’t understand what this administration is doing. We literally are apprehending now about 6,000 people per day. That’s I mean, that’s a large caravan every day being processed, some of them being returned, others are being dispersed. But this crisis is not going away. It’s just under everybody’s radar because the press isn’t covering it.”

    Watch:

    https://video.foxnews.com/v/embed.js?id=6261537044001&w=466&h=263Watch the latest video at foxnews.com

    *  *  *

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    In the age of mass Silicon Valley censorship It is crucial that we stay in touch. We need you to sign up for our free newsletter here. Support our sponsor – Turbo Force – a supercharged boost of clean energy without the comedown. Also, we urgently need your financial support here.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 19:40

  • Kamala Harris Staffers Are Leaking — And Her Office Is A 'Dysfunctional' Mess
    Kamala Harris Staffers Are Leaking — And Her Office Is A ‘Dysfunctional’ Mess

    Vice President Kamala Harris’ office is a toxic, ‘abusive’ environment where “people are thrown under the bus from the very top,’ according to 22 current and former staffers, administration officials and associates of Harris and President Biden.

    In a Politico exposé reminiscent of a Feb. 2019 New York Times in which over fifty current and former staffers decried her dysfunctional campaign (h/t @mattdizwhitlock), Harris and her Chief of Staff, Tina Flournoy, are slammed for running an office with “low morale, porous lines of communication and diminished trust among aides and senior officials.”

    Vice President Kamala Harris, Chief of Staff Tina Flournoy

    It all starts at the top,” said one administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity (as they all did).

    “People are thrown under the bus from the very top, there are short fuses and it’s an abusive environment,” said another person with direct knowledge of Harris’ office. “It’s not a healthy environment and people often feel mistreated. It’s not a place where people feel supported but a place where people feel treated like shit.”

    As Politico notes, “The dysfunction in the VP’s ranks threatens to complicate the White House’s carefully crafted image as a place staffed by a close-knit group of professionals working in concert to advance the president’s agenda. It’s pronounced enough that members of the president’s own team have taken notice and are concerned about the way Harris’ staffers are treated.”

    Harris spokeswoman Symone Sanders – a racist who mocked a white Trump supporter after he was beaten by a group of black men – and was passed over for Biden’s press secretary, pushed back against the nearly two-dozen accounts of dysfunction, saying Flournoy has an “open door policy,” and that “Black women like me would not have the opportunity to work in politics without Tina.”

    Symone Sanders

    Sanders called the anonymous sources “cowards.”

    “We are not making rainbows and bunnies all day. What I hear is that people have hard jobs and I’m like ‘welcome to the club,'” Sanders continued. “We have created a culture where people, if there is anything anyone would like to raise, there are avenues for them to do so. Whoever has something they would like to raise, they should raise it directly.”

    Harris and Flournoy’s defenders are pulling the race card – saying that “Black women in particular—are subjected to standards that men often don’t have to clear. A tough and demanding office environment may be seen as a virtue for one and a sign of disorder and lack of leadership acumen for another.”

    Staffers looking for an exit.

    According to the report, some of Harris’ aides are looking for other employment opportunities, while others have left already. In recent days, two top advance staffers, Karly Satkowiak and Gabrielle DeFranceschi, left the ‘dysfunctional’ office. And while Harris’ team said the departures were ‘long-planned’, two people familiar with the departures call bullshit.

    For DeFranceschi, the deputy director of advance, the departure came down to a “difference in opinion on how things should run,” according to another person familiar with the matter, who said that Harris’ office is run “very different” from the Obama operation, where DeFranceschi previously worked. “If you have an opinion about how things should run and it’s not listened to, that can be frustrating.”

    DeFranceschi did not respond to a request for comment.

    A third Harris aide who worked on her digital team, Rajan Kaur, left the staff after opting not to relocate to Washington from Brooklyn.

    Anita Dunn, a senior adviser to the president, defended Flournoy as well as the decision to keep news of the border trip contained among a small group of people, saying Harris’ office didn’t want it to leak or “turn it into a spectacle.”

    It was closely held and there may be people whose feelings were a little hurt on her staff that they weren’t brought into the discussion,” Dunn said. “But any suggestion that it was mishandled or kept a secret from people who needed to know about the arrangements or needed to know about it is absolutely not true.”

    Asked if she was aware of the complaints about the VP’s office, Dunn replied that it was “not anywhere near what you are describing.” -Politico

    Flournoy, a veteran of the Clinton White House and Al Gore’s 2000 campaign, is part of an ‘informal group of Black women who’ve worked together for decades in Democratic politics, which includes Donna Brazile, Minyon Moore, Leah Daughtry and Yolanda Caraway,’ according to the report.

    “Look, [Tina’s] strong, she’s intelligent, she’s driven, and she expects strong, intelligent, driven people around her,” said Daughtry, adding “But some people may find strong, driven, smart people intimidating, but I think that’s more projection than reality because that’s just not Tina’s intent or style. And nothing in her experience would lead you to think that she’s an intimidating person.”

    So the staffers are the problem? Hilarious.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    Politico paints a different picture – having developed a reputation for being Kamala’s gatekeeper, often refusing to delegate while second-guessing others in Harris’ office.

    Apparently, she did the same thing as Bill Clinton’s post-presidential chief of staff.

    “People who Clinton knew for decades all of a sudden couldn’t get through to him because Tina choked off contact,” one of the people said. “Because Clinton didn’t use email,” just his blackberry, “she was able to keep many FOBs [friends of Bill] out.”

    Morale is “rough,” and in many ways ‘similar to the failed presidential campaign and her Senate office,’ according to a former Senate aide who speaks with Harris’ staffers.

    Read the rest of the report here.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 19:20

  • Majority Of Voters Reject Teaching Children That America Is "Structurally Racist": Harvard Poll
    Majority Of Voters Reject Teaching Children That America Is “Structurally Racist”: Harvard Poll

    Authored by GQ Pan via The Epoch Times,

    About two-thirds of Americans believe that children should not be taught in school the claim that the United States is a “structurally racist” nation dominated by white supremacy, a new poll revealed.

    The findings were published last week as part of an online survey (pdf) conducted by the Center for American Political Studies at Harvard University and The Harris Poll between June 15 and 17, among 2,006 registered voters. The survey asked participants whether they “believe that kids in elementary school should be taught that America is structurally racist and is dominated by white supremacy.”

    In response, 61 percent of participants answered children “should not be taught this,” while the remaining 39 percent said children “should be taught that America is structurally racist.”

    When it came to another question regarding the teaching of the First Amendment in schools, an overwhelming 81 percent of participants said elementary school students should learn about the First Amendment and the importance of free speech, compared to 19 percent who said they should not.

    The results of the survey echoed those of an online poll conducted by Economist and YouGov poll between June 13 and 15, among 1,500 adult U.S. citizens. Participants were asked if they had “a good idea of what critical race theory (CRT) is,” to which 54 percent responded “yes,” 23 percent said “no,” and 23 percent said they are “not sure.”

    Those who said they knew about CRT were then asked whether they have a “favorable or unfavorable” opinion of it. Of these participants, 58 percent said they at least have a “somewhat unfavorable” view of CRT, while 38 percent say they are in favor of the Marxism-rooted ideology, which deems the foundations of the American system to be inherently and irredeemably racist.

    The idea that racism remains deeply embedded in America has been popularized over the past years by left-wing activists, politicians, media publications, and the New York Times’s 1619 Project.

    The Pulitzer Prize-winning project consists of a collection of essays that argue, among many other controversial claims, that the primary reason for the American Revolution was to preserve slavery and that slavery was the source of American economic growth in the 19th century.

    A K-12 curriculum based on the 1619 Project, developed by Pulitzer Center, has made its way into many public school districts across the nation, including Chicago, Illinois; Buffalo, New York; and Newark, New Jersey.

    A new rule proposed in April by the Education Department also prioritizes funding U.S. history and civics programs that incorporate the 1619 Project and the works of prominent CRT advocate Ibram X. Kendi.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 19:00

  • Four Cali Residents Convicted Of Using $1.8 Million In PPP Funds For Luxury Homes, Gold Coins And Jewelry
    Four Cali Residents Convicted Of Using $1.8 Million In PPP Funds For Luxury Homes, Gold Coins And Jewelry

    While hundreds of billions of dollars in PPP money has (and will continue to go) unchecked as a result of arguably the government’s most wasteful and poorly planned cash grab for citizens, the dragnet has managed to pull in a couple of offenders. 

    The latest of which were four California residents that were convicted by a Federal Jury on June 25 for “scheming to submit fraudulent loan applications seeking millions of dollars in Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) and Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL) COVID-19 relief funds,” according to a DOJ press release.

    Richard Ayvazyan, his wife Marietta Terabelian and brother Artur Ayvazyan, all based out of Encino, were each found guilty of one count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud and wire fraud, 11 counts of wire fraud, eight counts of bank fraud, and one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering, the release says. Additionally, Vahe Dadyan of Glendale was found guilty of one count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud and wire fraud, six counts of wire fraud, three counts of bank fraud, one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering, and one count of money laundering.

    As a result they must forfeit “bank accounts, jewelry, watches, gold coins, three residential properties, and approximately $450,000 in cash”.

    The evidence at the trial showed that the defendants used fake, stolen or synthetic identities to submit fraudulent applications. After obtaining more than $1.8 million in relief funds, the group used the cash as “down payments on luxury homes in Tarzana, Glendale, and Palm Desert” and for “gold coins, diamonds, jewelry, luxury watches, fine imported furnishings, designer handbags, clothing, and a Harley-Davidson motorcycle”.

    As part of changing their identities, the group “submitted false and fictitious documents to lenders and the Small Business Administration (SBA), including fake identity documents, tax documents, and payroll records.”

    The charges were being brought by the COVID-19 Fraud Enforcement Task Force, whose job is to “marshal the resources of the Department of Justice in partnership with agencies across government to enhance efforts to combat and prevent pandemic-related fraud.” 

    If this example is any indication, the Fraud Enforcement Task Force should have enough work ahead of them to be busy for the next several decades. The full DOJ release can be found here.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 18:40

Digest powered by RSS Digest

Today’s News 30th June 2021

  • CO2 Emissions For Vehicles In EU, Iceland And Norway Fall Most In Ten Years
    CO2 Emissions For Vehicles In EU, Iceland And Norway Fall Most In Ten Years

    The average total emissions for new passenger vehicles registered in the EU, Iceland, Norway and the U.K. fell the steepest in ten years in 2020, according to new data provided by the European Environment Agency.

    Total emissions decreased by 14.5g of CO2/km during the year, Bloomberg reported Tuesday.

    The decline was attributed mostly to a “surge” in the share of plug-in hybrid and fully EV vehicle registrations, which tripled to 11% from 3.5% in 2019. The agency says that despite electric cars rising in prominence, that only “limited” progress was made in electrifying vans. 

    This followed data out in 2019 which showed that car emissions had increased for the third consecutive year. In 2019, average emissions of new passenger cars registered in the European Union, Iceland, Norway and the United Kingdom (UK) were 122.3 g CO2/km, according to the European Environmental Agency

    The agency said that according to its provisional data, average emissions of new passenger cars registered in 2020 were 107.8 grams of CO2/km.

    Recall, we wrote back in early June that one firm, natural resource investors Goehring & Rozencwajg (G&R), a “fundamental research firm focused exclusively on contrarian natural resource investments with a team with over 30 years of dedicated resource experience,” was making the argument that EVs only offered a negligible CO2 different from ICE vehicles. 

    The firm, established in 2015, posted a blog entry entitled “Exploring Lithium-ion Electric Vehicles’ Carbon Footprint” last month, where they called into question a former ICE vs. EV comparison performed by the Wall Street Journal and, while citing work performed by Jefferies, argued that there could literally be “no reduction in CO2 output” in some EV vs. ICE comparisons. 

    The argument could be moot, however, as most auto manufacturers – like Audi, for instance, have already committed to phasing out all ICE vehicles in coming years.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 02:45

  • Escobar: A Sea Painted NATO Black
    Escobar: A Sea Painted NATO Black

    Authored by Pepe Escobar via The Asia Times,

    US seeks to revamp post-WWI concept of Baltic-Black Sea Intermarium as a Cold War 2.0 iron wall against Russia…

    Welcome to the latest NATO show: Sea Breeze starts today and goes all the way to July 23. The co-hosts are the US Sixth Fleet and the Ukrainian Navy. The main protagonist is Standing NATO Maritime Group 2.

    The show, in NATOspeak, is just an innocent display of “strenghtening deterrence and defense”. NATO spin tells us the exercise is “growing in popularity” and now features more than 30 nations “from six continents” deploying 5,000 troops, 32 ships, 40 aircraft and “18 special operations and dive teams”. All committed to implement and improve that magical NATO concept: “interoperability”.

    Now let’s clear the fog and get to the heart of the matter. NATO is projecting the impression that it’s taking over selected stretches of the Black Sea in the name of “peace”. NATO’s supreme articles of faith, reiterated in its latest summit, are “Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea” and “support for Ukraine sovereignty”.

    So for NATO, Russia is an enemy of “peace”. Everything else is hybrid war fog.

    NATO not only “does not and will not recognize Russia’s illegal and illegitimate annexation of Crimea” but also denounces its “temporary occupation”. This script, redacted in Washington, is recited by Kiev and virtually the whole EU.

    NATO bills itself as committed to “transatlantic unity”. Geography tells us the Black Sea has not been annexed to the Atlantic. But that’s no impediment for NATO’s goodwill – which the record shows turned Libya, in northern Africa, into a wasteland run by militias. As for the intersection of Central and South Asia, NATO’s collective behind was unceremoniously kicked by a bunch of ragged Pashtuns with counterfeit Kalashnikovs.

    Meet the Bucharest 9

    The White House defines its NATO eastern flank allies as the Bucharest 9.

    The Bucharest 9 includes the members of the Visegrad Four (Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia); the Baltic trio (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania); and two Black Sea neighbors (Bulgaria and Romania). No Ukraine – at least not yet.

    When the White House refers to “strengthening transatlantic relations”, this means above all “closer cooperation with our nine Allies in Central Europe and the Baltic and Black Sea regions on the full range of challenges.” Translation: “full range of challenges” means Russia.

    So welcome to the return, in style, of the Intermarium – as in “between the seas”, mostly the Baltic and Black, with the Adriatic as a side show.

    After WWI, the drive for what would possibly become a geopolitical entente included the three Baltics, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, Belarus and Ukraine. That concoction was made in Poland.

    Now, under the hegemon and its NATO weaponized arm, a revamped Baltic-Black Sea intermarium is being pushed as the new Cold War 2.0 Iron Wall against Russia. That’s why the definitive incorporation of Ukraine to NATO is so important for Washington – as it would solidify the intermarium for good.

    Double O Seven does Monty Python

    The prequel to Sea Breeze took place last week, via a farcical Britannia Rules The Waves stunt enacted like a Monty Python sketch – yet with potentially explosive overtones.

    Imagine waiting at a bus stop somewhere in Kent and finding a soggy blob – nearly 50 pages – of secret documents in a trash bin detailing Ministry of Defense elaborations on the explicitly provocative deployment of the Defender destroyer off Sebastopol, in the Crimean coast.

    Even a BBC journalist embedded with the destroyer smashed the official London spin that this was a mere “innocent passage”. Moreover, the Defender weapons were fully loaded – as it advanced two nautical miles inside Russian waters. Moscow released a video documenting the stunt.

    It gets better. The soggy blob found in Kent revealed not only discussions about the possible Russian reaction to the “innocent passage”, but also digressions about the Brits, “encouraged” by the Americans, leaving commandos behind in Afghanistan after the troop pull out next 9/11.

    That would qualify as extra evidence that the Anglo-American-NATO combo will not really “leave” Afghanistan.

    A vague “member of the public” contacted the BBC when he innocently found the geopolitically radioactive materials. No one knows whether this was a leak, a trap or a silly mistake. If the “member of the public” were a true whistleblower he would have gone the Wikileaks way, not BBC.

    The “innocent passage” happened only hours after London signed a deal with Kiev for the “enhancement of Ukrainian naval capabilities”.

    On the Russian reaction front, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova summed it all up: “London has demonstrated yet another provocative action followed by a bunch of lies to cover it up. 007 agents are not what they used to be.”

    Meanwhile, in the Mediterranean front, which NATO considers its Mare Nostrum, two Russian Mig-31k fighters – capable of carrying Khinzal hypersonic missiles – were redeployed last week to Syria. The Khinzal range encompasses the whole Mediterranean, west as well as east.

    Across the Global South, NATO promoting “global peace” in the port of Odessa, in the Black Sea, is bound to evoke shades of Libya cum Afghanistan. Austin Powers, self-billed Agent Double Oh! Behave! would perfectly fit in the Kent trash bin “secret documents” caper. “Oh. Behave!” totally applies to Sea Breeze. Otherwise, the opportunity might arise to say hello to Mr. Kinzhal.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 02:00

  • What The Pentagon Papers 50th Anniversary Means
    What The Pentagon Papers 50th Anniversary Means

    Authored by Peter van Buren via WeMeantWell.com,

    It was a humid June on the east coast 50 years ago when the New York Times began publishing the Pentagon Papers. The anniversary is worth marking, for reasons sweeping and grand, and for reasons deeply personal.

    In 1971 Daniel Ellsberg leaked the Pentagon Papers, a secret U.S. government history of the Vietnam War, to the Times. No one had ever published such classified documents before, and reporters feared prosecution under the Espionage Act. A federal court ordered the Times to cease publication after an initial flurry of excerpts were printed, the first time in U.S. history a federal judge had invoked prior restraint and shattered the 1A.

    In a legal battle too important to have been written first as a novel, the NYT fought back. The Supreme Court on June 30, 1971 handed down a victory for the First Amendment in New York Times Company v. United States, and the Times won the Pulitzer Prize. The Papers helped convince Americans the Vietnam War was wrong, their government could not be trusted, and The People informed by a free press could still have a say in things.

    This 50 year anniversary rightfully marks all that.

    Today, journalists expect a Pulitzer for a snarky tweet that mocks Trump. In our current shameful state where the MSM serves as an organ of the Deep State, the anniversary of the Papers also serves as a reminder to millennials OnlyFansing as journalists that there were once people in their jobs who valued truth and righteousness. Perhaps this may inspire some MSM propagandist to realize he might still run with lions instead of slinking home to feed his cats.

    The 50th anniversary of the Papers is also a chance to remember how fragile the victory in 1971 was. The Supreme Court left the door open for prosecution of journalists who publish classified documents by focusing narrowly on prohibiting the government from prior restraint. Politics and public opinion, not law, have kept the feds exercising discretion in not prosecuting the press, a delicate dance around an 800-pound gorilla loose in the halls of democracy. The government, particularly under Obama, has meanwhile aggressively used the Espionage Act to prosecute whistleblowers who leak to those same journalists.

    There is also a very personal side to this anniversary.

    When my book, We Meant Well, turned me into a State Department whistleblower and set off a wall of the bad brown falling on me, Pentagon Papers leaker Daniel Ellsberg sent me two of his books, unannounced, in the mail.

    He wrote a personal message inside each one, explaining to me what I was doing was hard, scary, and above all, a duty. It changed me and my understanding of what was happening to me. I wasn’t arguing procedure with the State Department and grubbing for my pension, I was defending the First Amendment itself. I wrote Dan a thank you note. Here’s some of it.

    Thank you for sending me copies of your books, and thank you even more for writing “with admiration for your truth telling” inside the cover flap of one. I am humbled, because I waited my whole life to realize today I had already met you.

    In 1971 I was 10 years old, living in Ohio. The Vietnam War was a part of our town’s life, same as the Fruehauf tractor-trailer plant with its 100 percent union workforce, the A&P and the Pledge of Allegiance. Nobody in my house went to war, but neighbors had gold stars in their windows and I remember one teacher at school, the one with the longer hair and the mustache, talking about Vietnam.

    It meant little to me, involved with oncoming puberty, but I remember my mom bringing home from the supermarket a newsprint quickie paperback edition of the Pentagon Papers. There of course was no Internet and you could not buy the Times where I lived. Mom knew of politics and Vietnam maybe even less than I did, but the Papers were all over the news and it seemed the thing to do to spend the $1.95. When I tried to make sense of the names and foreign places it made no impact on me.

    I didn’t understand then what you had done. While I was trying to learn multiplication, you were making photocopies of classified documents. As you read them, you understood the government had knowledge early on the war could not be won, and that continuing would lead to many times more casualties than was ever admitted publicly.

    A lot of people inside the government had read those same Papers and understood their content, but only you decided that instead of simply going along with the lies, or privately using your new knowledge to fuel self-eating cynicism, you would try to persuade U.S. Senators Fulbright and McGovern to release the papers on the Senate floor.

    When they did not have the courage, even as they knew the lies continued to kill Americans they represented, you brought the Papers to the New York Times. The Times then echoed the courage of great journalists and published the Papers, fought off the Nixon administration by calling to the First Amendment, and brought the truth about lies to America. That’s when my mom bought a copy of the Papers at the A&P.

    You were considered an enemy of the United States because when you encountered something inside of government so egregious, so fundamentally wrong, you risked your own fortune, freedom, and honor to make it public. You almost went to jail, fighting off charges under the same draconian Espionage Act the government still uses today to silence others who stand in your shadow.

    In 2009 I volunteered to serve in Iraq for my employer of some 23 years, the Department of State. While I was there I saw such waste in our reconstruction program, such lies put out by two administrations about what we were (not) doing in Iraq, that it seemed to me that the only thing I could do — had to do — was tell people about what I saw. In my years of government service, I experienced my share of dissonance when it came to what was said in public and what the government did behind the public’s back. In most cases, the gap was filled only with scared little men and women, and what was left unsaid hid their flaws.

    What I saw in Iraq was different. There, the space between what we were doing (the waste), and what we were saying (the chant of success) was filled with numb soldiers and devastated Iraqis, not nerveless bureaucrats. It wasn’t Vietnam in scale or impact, but it was again young Americans risking their lives, believing for something greater than themselves, when instead it was just another lie. Another war started and run on lies, while again our government worked to keep the truth from the people.

    I am unsure what I accomplished with my own book, absent getting retired-by-force from the State Department for telling a truth that embarrassed them. So be it; most people at State will never understand the choice of conscience over career, the root of most of State’s problems.

    But Dan, what you accomplished was this. When I faced a crisis of conscience, to tell what I knew because it needed to be told, coming to realize I was risking at the least my job if not jail, I remembered that newsprint copy of the Papers from 1971 which you risked the same and more to release. I took my decision in the face of the Obama administration having already charged more people under the Espionage Act for alleged mishandling of classified information than all past presidencies combined, but more importantly, I took my decision in the face of your example.

    Later, whistleblowers like Chelsea Manning, Julian Assange, and Edward Snowden would do the same. I know you have encouraged them, too, through your example and with personal messages.

    So thank you for the books you sent Dan. Thank you for your courage so that when I needed it, I had an example to assess myself against other than the limp men and women working now for a Department of State too scared of the truth to rise to claim even a whisper of the word courage for themselves.

    Fast-forward to 2021. In these last few years the term “whistleblower” has been co-opted such that a Deep State operative was able to abuse the term to backdoor impeachment against a sitting president. The use of anonymous sources has devolved from brave individuals speaking out against a government gone wrong into a way for journalists to manufacture “proof” of anything they want, from claims the president was a Russian spy to the use of the military to create a photo op in Lafayette Park.

    On this anniversary we look at individuals like Ellsberg and reporters like those at the Times and know it is possible for individuals with courage to make a difference. That is something worth remembering, and celebrating.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 06/30/2021 – 00:05

  • IDF Forces Deploy New Semi-Autonomous Robots To Gaza Border 
    IDF Forces Deploy New Semi-Autonomous Robots To Gaza Border 

    An armed robot equipped with optical sensors and a 7.62mm machine gun has been spotted on the Gaza border by the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a secular Palestinian Marxist–Leninist organization, according to The Times of Israel’s Emanuel Fabian.

    Israel Defense Forces (IDF) appear to have deployed a new semi-autonomous robotic ground tank called the Jaguar that patrols the Gaza border and removes soldiers out of harm’s way from sniper attacks by Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad groups. 

    The Jerusalem Post said Israel Aerospace Industries’ Elta systems develop the unmanned ground vehicle in close collaboration with IDF’s Ground Forces Command. 

    The Jaguar military robot is on a six-wheeled chassis that is heavy-duty and highly maneuverable, equipped with a weapon station, communications and sensors. A turret is mounted on the front of the robot, firing a 7.62mm MAG machine gun that can be operated remotely. 

    “We have led a groundbreaking technological development – an independent robot that reduces the combat soldier’s friction with the enemy and prevents risks to human life,” Lt.-Col. Nathan Kuperstein, Head of Autonomy and Robotics at the IDF’s Land Technology Division, said. “It even knows how to charge itself – almost like an iRobot.”

    The Jaguar can be used for several types of missions including, intelligence, surveillance, and armed reconnaissance. 

    What remains a mystery is when IDF forces deployed ground robots on the border. But this isn’t the first time the country has used artificial intelligence to defend its homeland. 

    In May, during Operation Guardian of the Walls, the IDF heavily relied on robots and machine learning to intercept missiles from Gaza Strip aimed at Israeli cities. 

    Israeli appears to be shifting to automation and artificial intelligence to defend against attacks from Gaza. 

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 23:45

  • An Unflinching Guide To Biden's Immigration Fiasco
    An Unflinching Guide To Biden’s Immigration Fiasco

    Authored by Charles Lispon via RealClearPolitics.com,

    The crisis of illegal immigration – to give this calamity its true name – is growing increasingly grave. The reason is no mystery. The Biden administration replaced policies that staunched the illegal flow of migrants with policies that actually encourage it.

    Instead of securing the U.S. border, the administration says it wants to deal with the “root cause,” desperation in Central America. That won’t work for two reasons. First, the administration doesn’t have the tools to markedly change conditions in Central America. Second, even if the policies could stimulate economic growth, improve safety, and reduce corruption—spoiler alert, they can’t—they won’t have any significant impact for years. Under even the most optimistic scenarios, they couldn’t reduce immigration anytime soon. It’s a policy based on a mirage.

    The Biden team is certainly right that bad conditions in Mexico and Central America drive immigration. But it’s easy to show that’s the wrong explanation for our current crisis. The reason, as all social scientists know, is that “you cannot explain change with a constant.” What is constant here? Poverty, corruption, and danger in Mexico and Central America. Since those “root causes” have not changed over the past year, they cannot explain the dramatic rise in illegal immigration since Biden took office. What does explain it? The administration’s decision not to secure the southern border and to give up any serious effort at preventing illegal immigration. Migrants have gotten the message, and they are coming north in unprecedented numbers.

    The media, always eager to protect their favorite political party, never asked Vice President Kamala Harris three crucial questions after her “root causes” trip to Guatemala and Mexico.

    • Can the U.S. really do much to improve conditions there?
    • Would relatively modest improvements have much impact on migration? And, crucially,
    • How long before these policies can have a major impact, if they work at all?

    Back in the real world, the best Biden-Harris can expect is some small, slow improvements. Desirable as those are for humanitarian reasons, they would have no effect on migration for decades.

    Meanwhile, the flood continues unabated. When the administration repeats its false mantra “the border is closed,” they should add the Monty Python phrase “Wink, wink. Nudge, nudge.”

    Normally, the flood of illegals would recede at least briefly during the summer because Mexico’s scorching temperatures make the trek so dangerous. This year, however, the caravans keep coming. Why? Because migrants see a window of opportunity that might close if the U.S. comes to its senses. So do “coyotes,” who profit from trafficking humans and drugs. They need not worry. The Biden administration is locked into its catastrophic policies and its lovefest with their party’s left wing, which refuses even to acknowledge the problem and would rebel at tough policies to prevent illegal crossings. They refuse even to call them “illegal.” Too harsh. Too accurate.

    It is unclear whether administration officials actually wanted more illegal immigrants or simply wanted to undo everything Donald Trump did and hope for the best. Whatever their goals, they quickly unwound all Trump’s immigration policies without checking to see what was working. They didn’t talk with border patrol agents (they are now firing the leaders) or consult with elected officials along the border—not even the Democrats. They didn’t ask anyone in Mexico City if the Trump policies were working and sustainable. They didn’t check with development experts to see if aid would have much impact. Due diligence was replaced with utter negligence.

    What immigration policies did the Biden administration change? What are the results so far?

    The Wall

    Trump’s policy: Build an impermeable wall in the most accessible locations, despite strong opposition from Democrats.

    Biden’s policy: Stop building the wall on day one. Stop building even portions that were already funded and under construction. Better to waste the money than to complete a successful project.

    The result: Gaping holes made illegal crossing easy. Ceasing construction sent a powerful signal to potential migrants that U.S. policy was now much more lax.

    The Rhetoric

    Trump’s policy: We will keep you out of the country. Migrants and coyotes believed him because he also implemented tough anti-immigration policies.

    Biden’s policy during the campaign: We are a welcoming country; Trump’s policies are inhumane. During a 2019 Democratic debate on ABC, he told Univision’s Jorge Ramos, “We’re a nation that says, ‘You want to flee, and you’re fleeing oppression, you should come.'”

    Biden’s policy two months into office: You can still come illegally, but please wait a little. As Alejandro Mayorkas, secretary of Homeland Security, put it, “We are not saying, ‘Don’t come.’ We are saying, ‘Don’t come now.’”

    Biden’s policy five months into office: Please don’t come.

    The result: The Biden-Harris “don’t come” message has gone unheeded. Without concrete policies to back it up, people don’t believe it.

    Remain in Mexico While Seeking Asylum in the U.S.

    Trump’s policy: Negotiated agreement Mexico, requiring asylum seekers to stay there until their U.S. application was decided. Formally known as the Migrant Protection Protocols.

    Trump’s policy: Get Mexico to guard the U.S. border. As a 2019 Reuters headline put it, “Mexico says it has deployed 15,000 forces in the north to halt-U.S.-bound migration.

    Biden’s policy: End the agreement with Mexico, which also withdrew its troops, leaving the border essentially unguarded on both sides.

    The result: After Biden switched policies, hundreds of thousands of additional asylum seekers have crossed into the U.S. instead of waiting in Mexico. Since only a federal judge can decide their cases and since the backlog is now four-to-six years and growing, these migrants are simply released into the U.S. and told to return in a few years for a court date. Some do; some don’t. Those who do attend are mostly turned down and deported.

    Refuse Entry Because of Communicable Diseases

    Trump’s policy: Under Title 42 of the U.S. Code, customs officers were authorized to prohibit entry of adults who might have a communicable disease such as COVID. Almost three-quarters of adult migrants at the border were refused entry.

    Biden’s policy: End the use of Title 42 this summer.

    The result: The change will lead to an immediate surge in illegal immigrants. No one knows if that will lead to more communicable diseases and preventable deaths.

    Grant Non-Immigrant Visas

    Trump’s policy: Sharply limited visas because they posed “a risk of displacing and disadvantaging United States workers.” (Proclamations 10014, 10052)

    Biden’s policy: Revoked Trump’s policy a month after taking office because it prevents family reunification and “harms industries in the United States that utilize talent from around the world.”

    The result: The numbers of visa admittees will jump sharply, returning to Obama-era levels. According to the State Department’s Visa Office: “From fiscal years 2016 through 2020, immigrant visas … declined from 617,752 to 240,526. Nonimmigrant visas declined from 10,381,491 to 4,013,210. Among specific immigrant categories, visas for immediate relatives fell from 315,352 to 108,292.” The Biden administration is moving back to the higher figures.

    Prohibition on Entry From Some Countries, aka ‘Muslim Travel Ban’

    Trump’s policy: Utter chaos shortly after inauguration when he announced Executive Order 13769, “Protecting the Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry.” Most countries on the banned list had majority-Muslim populations. After courts injunctions, Trump issued a replacement order, added some non-Muslim countries, and faced still more legal difficulties. The administration’s stated rationale was the countries were not banned for religious reasons (there were lots of Muslim-majority countries not on the banned list) but solely because they could not reliably vet travelers and identify terrorists, which were standard U.S. requirements. In 2018, a 5-4 vote of the Supreme Court allowed the Trump program to go into force.

    Biden’s policy: Ending the court-approved travel ban on Inauguration Day.

    Result: No problems with Biden’s policy, so far.

    Will There Be Political Consequences?

    Whatever the motives for Biden’s immigration policies, the results have been a fiasco. Nothing is halting the tsunami of illegal immigrants, dangerous drugs, and gang members from coming. Nothing is stopping the human traffickers from scaling up their despicable trade or molesting women and children en route. The effects will be felt across the U.S. as more illegal immigrants move into communities, more gang members set up operations, and more opioids and hard drugs hit the streets.

    Biden and the Democrats are likely to pay a political price, even as the media downplays the issue. You can already hear yelps from Democrats representing border districts. Among national figures, the worst hit will be Vice President Harris, who has been the hapless point person for these hapless policies.

    In Harris’ defense, she has been handed a no-win job. The administration created the problem, and there is no way they can ameliorate it without infuriating their base. To change policies dramatically would be to concede a huge, unforced error. Worse, it would force Biden to revert to some of Trump’s policies because they actually worked.

    That won’t happen.

    Instead, Biden will cling to his current, failed policies as long as he can. Polls already show voters are unhappy. What they want is a government that fulfills its primary responsibility: provide citizens with a safe environment. They believe our country—any country—has the right to decide who can enter and to demand that they come here legally. If this bunch of politicians won’t meet that responsibility, many voters are bound to think, “Maybe I should vote for somebody who will.”

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 23:25

  • San Francisco Homeless Camp Costs $60,000 Per Tent, Per Year
    San Francisco Homeless Camp Costs $60,000 Per Tent, Per Year

    Today in “liberals making wonderful capital allocation decisions with your tax dollar news”…

    It turns out “solving” the homelessness problem that has (along with sky high taxes) been plaguing San Francisco, driving residents out of the city (and state), is a costly endeavor.

    In fact, a homeless encampment run by San Francisco costs the city $60,000 per year, per tent, the NY Post reported this week. 

    The city has six “safe sleeping villages,” which offer up tents and three meals a day to homeless people. They also provide security and washrooms. 

    Mayor London Breed reaffirmed her commitment to find care for the homeless (and burn through tons of taxpayer cash), stating last week: “For those exhibiting harmful behavior, whether to themselves or to others, or those refusing assistance, we will use every tool we have to get them into treatment and services, to get them indoors. We won’t accept people just staying on the streets, when we have a place for them to go.”

    The news comes as San Francisco mulls renewing the program, which could cost about $57,000 per tent. There are currently about 260 tents, the report notes.

    The city is paying “about twice the median cost of a one-bedroom apartment for each tent”, the report says. And the encampment is being funded by a 2018 business tax known as Proposition C. 

    The city is expecting to spend more than $1 billion over the next two years on homelessness. Mayor Breed calls it a “historic investment,” according to the SF Chronicle

    Supervisor Hillary Ronen said at a budget meeting: “It is a big deal to have showers and bathrooms, and I don’t dispute that. But the cost just doesn’t make any sense.”

    Supervisor Matt Haney, chair of the board’s Budget and Finance committee, argued for the idea: “In the past, the city would spend a lot of money without a plan. Now we actually have a plan. Prop. C is the plan. Now we have to make it work and make it real, we have to track outcomes and follow the data and be transparent about successes and challenges.” 

    Good luck with that.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 23:05

  • By 2030 You'll Own Nothing And You'll Be Happy
    By 2030 You’ll Own Nothing And You’ll Be Happy

    Authored by Bruce Wilds via Advancing Time blog,

    The title of this article projects an ominous future where the masses are controlled by a few. Over the years I have written several articles covering the elite gathering in Davos. The global elites see the World Economic Forum (WEF) as an opportunity to promote their views and various causes.

    These people often fail to see that many of us have come to view Davos, as a notorious rendezvous for the world’s elite that grant us the honor of paying for their schemes in some way or form.

    Such gatherings are not for our sake but more for the benefit of plutocrats like Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg and Amazon’s Jeff Bezos. The Global Reset they are pushing often reeks of their desire to “break the world” with their ruthless corporate agendas that continue to move political power into the hands of the globalist elite. To counter this attitude reassuring words are cast out over the airwaves to us, the minions of the world, to encourage faith in their wisdom. Oh, what a tangled web those in charge of our fate have woven for us as they rush to sell and bargain away our freedom for power and wealth

    When the WEF revealed its Davos 2021 Agenda, it confirmed the event this year would be digital and herald the public unveiling of its Great Reset Initiative. Angel Gurría and Klaus Schwab have outlined how governments and businesses can shape a new labor market that supports workers to thrive in the future. This underlines how the covid-19 pandemic has accelerated systemic changes that were apparent before its inception.

    The Covid-19 pandemic has been used as confirmation that no institution or individual alone can address the economic, environmental, social, and technological challenges of our complex, interdependent world. It is also being touted as a reason to support the “The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.” One hundred and ninety-three UN member states adopted this 15-year global framework and its ambitious set of 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in September 2015.

    With 169 targets and over 230 indicators, the 2030 Agenda envisions a secure world free of poverty and hunger, with full and productive employment, access to quality education, and universal health coverage. Thrown into the mix is the achievement of gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls, and an end to environmental degradation.

    The 2030 Agenda is a global framework of action for people, the planet, prosperity, peace, and partnership. It integrates social, economic, and environmental dimensions of sustainable development, as well as peace, governance, and justice elements. It makes clear that developing and developed countries alike will implement the Agenda. This is important in ensuring that no one is left behind in the achievement of the SDGs.

    https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=wef+own+nothing&&view=detail&mid=31BF038609615C11271E31BF038609615C11271E&&FORM=VRDGAR&ru=%2Fvideos%2Fsearch%3Fq%3Dwef%2Bown%2Bnothing%26%26FORM%3DVDVVXX

    A great deal of attention has been given to some of the ideas and vision the WEF has floated. A powerful one became visible when WEF public relations released a video entitled: “8 Predictions for the World in 2030. Its 2030 agenda offers a telling glimpse into what the technocratic elite has in store for the rest of us. It promotes the idea that  by 2030 “You will own nothing. And you’ll be happy. The UN’s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is a comprehensive plan that outlines how we can abolish poverty and transform the world into a peacefulsustainable environment for all. 

    When persuasive speakers cloak an agenda in flowery rhetoric, it is often difficult to determine what is noble or separate something altruistic from a sinister plot. Nor, can we be certain that events will unfold more favorably if simply left to develop on their own rather than being manipulated. Still, the ideas flowing out of the World Economic Forum and those seeking a reset and a New One World Order reek of self-serving bias. 

    Not all of what the world economic forum predicts will happen but events are being shaped to unfold in that way. Examining what is being called for, sheds a bit of light on how we might expect our future to look. The ideas and predictions of the WEF do not seem so farfetched when you consider,

    • Many people are already comfortable and busy renting things like cars, tools, apartments, so this has become a normal way to live. It is easy to argue that shared commodities save resources.  

    • Many people think the US will be unable to keep its position as the world leader. In fact, in many ways, the US has already abdicated this role.

    • When it comes to things such as organ printing we tend to jump the gun in predicting it is just around the corner but research is continuing and huge progress is being made.

    • The argument you simply can’t feed 10 billion people with meat and move these people into heavy consumer-based lifestyles has merit. At some point, the population must stop expanding or we will create a nightmare of food shortages and cause more damage to the planet. 

    • Down the road, billions of people will be displaced, especially at the shore, because of rising sea levels. Others because of droughts. This means we will have to learn how to deal better with migration or we will have huge cultural wars.   

    • Western values are already being tested because of globalization and migration. The fact that change and the future might scare us does not mean we can simply deny reality and call everything we don’t like or understand a conspiracy. Life is impermanent and nothing stays the way it is. We all die eventually and history shows even big civilizations vanish. 

    The agenda to change the world includes things such as controlling people through things such as social credit scores. Expect these to be linked to those you associate with including family members you seldom agree with. Sadly, the people that drew up this plan forgot that what they are proposing is the abolition of private property or communism a theory that has failed to ever bring prosperity to any country. 

    Another key part of this plan focuses on controlling the masses, this is also problematic and reeks of totalitarianism. While many people view big tech as the great enabler, a very dark side of it exists, surrendering to its allure gives big tech and those in charge of it the power to enslave the human race. When mankind turns its future over to technology and no longer takes responsibility for learning the most basic lessons that have brought us so far it gives up its soul. The idea we will move in the direction of creating a benevolent form of artificial intelligence that will protect and watch over us is far-fetched. It is frightening to entrust that in the future machines will value the contributions humans make to the overall scheme of things.

    Intertwined and masked within the WEF plan are a lot of factors that will negatively impact people. These include a total lack of privacy, the loss of control to move about freely, or the ability to purchase anything you want with your money and controlling how that property is used. Of course, this is all for the greater good, but is it?  History shows that in a society where private ownership is banned or not encouraged people lack skin in the game. This tends to result in people failing to shoulder responsibilitfor much of what happens.

    In the past, each year as the highfalutin Davos extravaganza unfolded I seem to get a pain in my stomach that some might consider envy, but having attended my share of events I consider it more of a sickening feeling related to the over the top self-importance of many attending. Much of my angst is directed at the politicians and such that have their travel expenses picked up by governments. 

    How ironic that we pay the same clowns that create so many of our problems to gather in luxury to discuss how they might further their deeds. I find it so interesting that someone flying across the globe on a private aircraft can sit down and discuss their environmental concerns and how each of us must do more to save the planet. In some ways, a person might even go so far as to describe such a gathering as downright evil.

    In his writings, George Orwell pointed out that when society has a problem rather than rely on education, the natural impulse of totalitarians is to limit the choices or speech of others.  The instinct to compel rather than to persuade is evident in many politicians across the world. As big businesses and big tech have grown to where the rival or control governments, it is not surprising to see their leaders adopt this attitude. While growing inequality makes the prediction you will own nothing more likely, it does little to guarantee we will be happy. 

    *  *  *

    The three articles below are related to this post.

    https://brucewilds.blogspot.com/2020/01/davos-where-elite-decide-our-fate.html

    https://brucewilds.blogspot.com/2020/04/government-overreach-is-taking-away.html

    https://brucewilds.blogspot.com/2020/08/the-spreading-feeling-this-is-happening_2.html

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 22:45

  • Best Places To Live On A $50k Salary In Every State 
    Best Places To Live On A $50k Salary In Every State 

    By now, it’s become quite clear, even to the working poor, that quantitative easing and all the easy money policies by the Federal Reserve have created some of the worst wealth inequality this nation has ever witnessed. With inflation soaring and millions of people left in the dust as the rich get richer, GOBankingRates has compiled the best places to live comfortably on a $50,000 salary.

    These days, it makes no sense for the working poor to live in big cities where living costs are skyrocketing, and their insurmountable debts continue to pile up. The best thing one can do, for the own sanity and health, is to move to an area where they can afford to live and save money.  

    GOBankingRates compiled places in each state where someone earning $50,000 a year could live comfortably. 

    The study identified towns with at least 5,000 households and a median income between $45,000 and $50,000 a year using data from the U.S. Census Bureau, then looked at the basic cost of living as sourced from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The city with the most left over from $50,000 after covering expenses in each state was selected. For Alaska, Hawaii, Maryland and North Dakota, income restrictions were relaxed.

    Here’s a partial list of cities in each state that a person making just $50,000 per year can live comfortably and save money:

    Montgomery, Alabama

    • Median income: $48,011

    • Total annual necessities: $20,775

    • Amount (from $50,000) left over after annual necessities: $29,225

    Fairbanks, Alaska

    • Median income: $62,602

    • Total annual necessities: $30,786

    • Amount (from $50,000) left over after annual necessities: $19,214

    Kingman, Arizona

    • Median income: $49,029

    • Total annual necessities: $23,723

    • Amount (from $50,000) left over after annual necessities: $26,277

    Paragould, Arkansas

    • Median income: $45,841

    • Total annual necessities: $20,140

    • Amount (from $50,000) left over after annual necessities: $29,860

    El Centro, California

    • Median income: $47,864

    • Total annual necessities: $25,803

    • Amount (from $50,000) left over after annual necessities: $24,197

    Sterling, Colorado

    • Median income: $45,647

    • Total annual necessities: $22,545

    • Amount (from $50,000) left over after annual necessities: $27,455

    New London, Connecticut

    • Median income: $46,298

    • Total annual necessities: $24,551

    • Amount (from $50,000) left over after annual necessities: $25,449

    Wilmington, Delaware

    • Median income: $45,032

    • Total annual necessities: $24,426

    • Amount (from $50,000) left over after annual necessities: $25,574

    Myrtle Grove, Florida

    • Median income: $47,941

    • Total annual necessities: $22,900

    • Amount (from $50,000) left over after annual necessities: $27,100

    For the complete list, click here

    In the age of remote working, making the switch to a small town or to an affordable one is easier than ever. Just hope the internet connection can support Zoom calls. Then again, there’s always Starlink… 

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 22:25

  • New York City Mayor's Race "Plunges Into Chaos" As 130,000 'Test-Run' Votes Lead To Unprecedented "Discrepancy"
    New York City Mayor’s Race “Plunges Into Chaos” As 130,000 ‘Test-Run’ Votes Lead To Unprecedented “Discrepancy”

    Update (2220ET): The BOE has confirmed Hardt’s reporting:

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    *  *  *

    Update (2220ET): Wtih the New York City Mayoral race “plunged into chaos” (as the NYT puts it), journalist Bob Hardt now reports that the Board of Elections counted 130,000 ‘test-run’ votes, which would account for most of the ‘discrepancy’ reported earlier. Hardt added that the BoE will now head ‘back to the drawing board’ to produce corrected ranked-choice numbers tomorrow. Presumably by then the outcome of the election will have been decided and things can go smoother then…

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    *  *  *

    Hours after the New York City’s Board of Elections released an updated ranked voting tally for the Democratic Primary which showed frontrunner Eric Adams’ lead shrinking considerably, BOE officials acknowledged a ‘discrepancy’ in the ballot count.

    At issue: on the day of the primary, the BOE reported just under 800,000 votes with 96.6% of scanners reporting. On Tuesday, however, the tally was 941,832 votes – nearly 20% higher, according to PIX11.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    The new figures narrows Adams’ lead over former sanitation commissioner Kathryn Garcia to just 51.9% (368,898) to 48.9% (352,990) – while there are still 100,000 absentee ballots which need to be processed, and could tip Garcia over the top.

    In response, Adams’ campaign fired off a statement questioning the count, and demanding an explanation for the “irregularities.”

    “The vote total just released by the Board of Elections is 100,000-plus more than the total announced on election night, raising serious questions,” reads the statement. “We have asked the Board of Elections to explain such a massive increase and other irregularities before we comment on the Ranked Choice Voting projection.

    Liberals, in response, accused Adams of going ‘full Trump’ and spreading ‘the big lie’ – that the election isn’t as secure as advertised.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 22:22

  • China: 100 Years Of Chaos
    China: 100 Years Of Chaos

    Authored by Bill Blain via MorningPorridge.com,

    “My little baby is all grown up and saving China.”

    The big event this week is how China celebrates 100 years of it’s Communist Party. What does it mean for markets, and where is China likely to go from here?

    Lots going on this week in terms of the data and the end of Q2 – across financial markets investors will be scrabbling to ring fence returns made this year, and figure out where they are going to come from in the remaining quarters. Just how vulnerable, or resilient markets prove to be – well, that is always the question.

    However, the really big event this week is China celebrating 100 years of the CCP on Thursday. Actually, no one knows the exact date the cadre first assembled in a Shanghai smoky room – as he grew the cult, Mao only chose July 1st as an auspicious date for the commemoration years later. He who wins writes the histories..

    More than a few market speculators fear the Chinese may decide to do something silly to mark the day – I suspect lots of very long dull speeches.

    There are lots of questions around the 100 years of Chinese Capitommunism.

    How has communism thrived and survived in China when it so spectacularly failed in Russia, Eastern Europe and Cuba? How does the cult of Xi compare to the cult of Mao? How sustainable is the party’s role and control of the state? Can China take on the west economically and win? What about the aspirations of the Chinese people?

    You will find a multitude of opinions, answers and imaginings in the press this week.

    In the words of the old Chinese curse, the CCP’s rule has been “interesting”. Chaotic recovery paralleling the Soviet Union is one reading of Chinese history post-Communist victory in 1945. Just like in Russia the initial state collectivisation/industrialisation plans following the civil war caused untold misery and deaths through starvation as it became clear the revolutionary government lacked skills and personnel – who had fled the nation.

    Famine was followed by the purges of the Cultural Revolution shoring up the Party’s status, before the spikes in the ongoing chaotic sequence dampened. From the 1980s New Economic Polices (initially straight out the Soviet playbook) moved the political sequence onto less volatile growth track incorporating a thousand flowers and capitalism with Chinese characteristics from 1980. Where Russia failed – the state effectively captured by the kleptocracy of Oligarchs – China proved more stable.

    The CCP succeeded on two levels. Its survived, and despite the unpleasantness, it delivered its side of the bargain with the people – jobs and rising prosperity. To stay on track – its demonstrated ruthlessness, clamping down hard in Tibet, Hong Kong and Xinjiang. In 1989 when the process generated just a little too much freedom and aspirations, leading to near revolution out of Tiananmen Square.

    Today we see the Chinese economy challenging the US in terms of scale – but not in terms of per capita. We see the Chinese military challenging the US hegemony. But, don’t forget; 55 years ago we though the USSR would win the race to the moon. Much is being written on how successful China will be as the challenger state to the USA – but none of it is set in the stone of history yet!

    The CCP faces far more friction and strife than we perceive from the west.

    It is no longer a revolutionary party. It is the party of state. Its longevity will depend on how it adapts to an ever changing political landscape. Its biggest threat may be its size.  Xi is merely the first among his cohort of party princelings, the children of the generation purged during the cultural revolution, to have reached the top. Like any good classical hero, his primary concern is to secure and hold his powerbase; purging rivals, dispensing with term limits on office, and launching his own Xi cult to out-shine previous emperors.

    The reality is the CCP mirrors the Dynasties that have shaped China’s. Typically they fell because they became ossified and unable to react to counter new threats – there is a danger the same is happening to the party of Xi.

    But, give Xi credit. He’s strengthened the party and yoked it successfully under his patronage. The party presents a simple choice to Chinese who want to get on in business – join the party and do our bidding in return. That’s also a recipe for corruption. Meanwhile, the core working population (in urban areas) get their jobs and rising standards of living demonstrated nightly on the Televiewer – last night it was China’s Mar’s rover, while all sources of dissent are quietly crushed by the state apparatus.

    China has one standout advantage over its rivals. Homogeneity.

    There isn’t much talk about diversity in the Chinese Congress – Han culture doesn’t have much truck with outsiders. It rejoices in how fragmented the distrusting tribes of the West have become. It’s not just race or tribe, Xi will be laughing at the increasing polarisation and fracture between Republicans and Democrats, and the way in which Western commercial and business exceptionalism is being assaulted from within by the ill-considered consequences of Wokery, ESG tomfoolery and a growing fearfulness to speak out or criticise.

    When it comes down to predicting the future I always go with the simple manta – it will not be a bad as we think, nor will it be as good as we hope. The reality is China is part of the global economy. It is exciting and full of opportunity, but it’s also repressive and breaches much of what we can accept morally – the Uyghurs and Hong Kong being the obvious abuses.

    I reckon China boils down to a number of scenarios:

    • China is brought down by the increasing bureaucracy of the Party’s attempts to control everything, or, it succeeds in finding the balance between control and economic freedom, while building the bones of its new surveillance capitalist state innovating tech and finance.

    • China’s botched human rights, and wolf-warrior diplomacy, closes doors and markets around the globe, forcing the Middle Kingdom’s economy to domesticise, or, the next generation of CCP leaders come early and steer China back onto an open trade, capitalist economic accommodation with the west.

    • Trade wars and embargos stifle Chinas efforts to invent and innovate, causing its economy to decline medium term, or China sets its own tech ecosystem that competes directly with the west in global markets.

    These are all scales. They usually find balance.

    My own guess is China will increasingly struggle to balance the bureaucracy of state vs wealth, its ageing demographics will slow growth, it will be forced to adopt a more measured diplomatic role (scaling back on geopolitical tensions), while a mature Chinese tech sector could prove a massive spur to the development of the next generation of tech advances in the West.

    On the other hand… lots of observers reckon its classic Thucydides Trap which originally posited the Peloponnesian Wars between Sparta and the rising strength of Athens became inevitable. Carthage and Rome is another example….

    Hope not…

    *  *  *

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    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 22:05

  • 76% Of San Francisco Voters Want More Cops As Crime, Appalling Street Conditions Get "More Brazen"
    76% Of San Francisco Voters Want More Cops As Crime, Appalling Street Conditions Get “More Brazen”

    A recent poll conducted by the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce found that 76% of residents want more police in high-crime neighborhoods, at a moment people are fleeing the liberal, extremely high cost of living west coast city in droves, heading for places like Austin in Texas.

    A seemingly endless amount of public funds have also been poured into “solving” the homelessness problem that has (along with sky high taxes) been plaguing San Francisco, adding to residents’ desire to get out of the city.

    Via Chicago Tribune

    Fox writes of the survey among 520 registered voters who reside in the city that “Roughly 80% of those polled said addressing homelessness is a top priority. About 76% of those polled want more cops in high-crime neighborhoods, the report said.”

    And here’s some key conclusions from the new poll, according to one local prominent online magazine:

    Well, somewhere around 40 or 50 percent of people living here — people living here who respond to polls, that is — say they plan to leave in the next few years. And many of these people have told pollsters that the city’s biggest problems these days are crime, homelessness, and “street behavior.”

    San Francisco “Poop Patrol” via AP

    Rapidly deteriorating “street conditions” – which includes everything from feces all over public sidewalks, to needles littering community areas, to vagrancy, theft, and the ever present threat of harassment – are further leading respondents to answer in the following ways, as detailed by SFist

    • This year’s poll, like last year’s, found 70% city residents saying that quality of life in the city has declined. 80% of residents polled said that addressing homelessness needs to be a high priority for the city, and 88% said that the problem had gotten worse in the past few years.
    • 71% also said that “street behavior” has gotten worse. And 80% of San Franciscans support expanding conservatorship laws and making it easier to forcibly commit the mentally ill for treatment.
    • Also, 76% of San Franciscans said that it should be a high priority for the city to increase the number of police officers in high-crime neighborhoods, and 60% supported prioritizing funding for police academy classes and recruiting new officers.

    This also as The San Francisco Chronicle has noted that “tourists are back” after a long COVID lockdown in much of the city, but this has translated to thefts becoming “more brazen”.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    City data shows a whopping 753% jump in car break-ins for May 2021 when compared to figures from May 2020. This might account for the surprising rise of a “bring back the police” mentality in one of America’s most progressive cities.

    …Though we doubt that those polled would actually admit to “wanting more police” publicly, or in front of their friends and neighbors.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 21:45

  • Supreme Court Leaves Eviction Moratorium Intact As Roberts And Kavanaugh Join Liberals
    Supreme Court Leaves Eviction Moratorium Intact As Roberts And Kavanaugh Join Liberals

    While it has long been known that Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts is a CINO (conservative in name only), it may come as a surprise that one of Trump’s own SCOTUS appointees, Brett Kavanaugh, sided with the three supreme court justices in a divided decision refusing to lift the moratorium on evictions implemented by the CDC during the covid pandemic and which is due to expire in any case at the end of July.

    The 5-4 vote had little practical value, and rejected calls by landlords and real-estate trade associations from Alabama and Georgia to block the moratorium while their challenge goes forward. They contend the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention exceeded its authority by imposing the ban.

    Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh joined the court’s three liberals in the majority. Kavanaugh cast the pivotal vote, saying he was letting the ban stay in effect even though he thought the CDC had exceeded its power.

    “Because the CDC plans to end the moratorium in only a few weeks, on July 31, and because those few weeks will allow for additional and more orderly distribution of the congressionally appropriated rental assistance funds, I vote at this time to deny the application,” Kavanaugh wrote.

    One wonder how he would have voted if the moratorium was set to end at the end of the year, or next summer? We’ll find out after the next split vote from SCOTUS. In any case, Kavanaugh said he would require congressional authorization to extend the ban beyond July 31, something the CDC has said it doesn’t intend to do but then again the CDC also appears unaware of the full-court press from the mainstream media to elevate the panic level over the Delta variant to code red in advance of another round of global lockdowns.

    The other eight justices gave no explanation. Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett said they would have blocked the moratorium. The liberals, of course, were all for letting squatters live rent free in perpetuity.

    The decision came after a federal trial judge ruled that the moratorium exceeded the CDC’s authority but then put a stay on the ruling while the government appealed. The challengers then asked the Supreme Court to lift the stay.

    The ban applies to tenants who, if evicted, would have “no other available housing options.” The CDC and President Joe Biden’s administration say the moratorium is geared toward protecting tenants who would be forced to live in close quarters elsewhere or become homeless and dependent on shelters.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 21:36

  • NSA Claims No Spying On Tucker Carlson In Broadly-Worded Denial
    NSA Claims No Spying On Tucker Carlson In Broadly-Worded Denial

    The National Security Agency (NSA) has responded to allegations by Fox News host Tucker Carlson that they’ve been monitoring the communications between members of his crew with the intention of getting the show canceled.

    In a Tuesday tweet that nobody can respond to, the agency said that the allegation is “untrue,” adding “Tucker Carlson has never been an intelligence target of the Agency and the NSA has never had any plans to try to take his program off the air.”

    “NSA has a foreign intelligence mission. We target foreign powers to generate insights on foreign activities that could harm the United States. With limited exceptions (e.g. an emergency), NSA may not target a US citizen without a court order that explicitly authorizes the targeting.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    Really?

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    While the suggestion that the NSA wouldn’t spy on Americans (beyond undefined ’emergencies’) is beyond laughable…

    let’s let Glenn Greenwald do the heavy lifting on this one – as his journalism brought us the Snowden leaks which revealed a widespread domestic surveillance apparatus.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

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    Many possibilities exist given the broad scope of their answer.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsSo Tucker is told by an NSA whistleblower that he’s being spied on, and the Pentagon just fired a pro-Trump security official for ‘unauthorized disclosure of classified information’ from the NSA. Who wants to play connect-the-dots?

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 21:22

  • Biden Plans Anti-Monopoly Executive Order Targeting Big Business
    Biden Plans Anti-Monopoly Executive Order Targeting Big Business

    Yesterday, a US district judge tossed out an anti-trust case brought against Facebook by the federal government and a coalition of states (swiftly sending the tech giant’s market cap past the $1 trillion mark). At the same time, reports emerged claiming the DoJ’s anti-trust division was preparing to revive a Trump-era anti-trust push targeting Google’s display ad business.

    With Lina Khan in charge at the FTC and Tim Wu installed as special assistant to the president on competition, increasing attention is being paid to the Biden Administration’s anti-trust plans now that breaking up Big Tech has become an issue with bipartisan support in Congress, with lawmakers of both parties supporting more scrutiny (while others said to be in the pocket of Big Tech have dutifully pushed back). As curiosity about the administration’s next steps mounts, WSJ reported Tuesday evening (following an earlier report from Reuters) that the White House is planning a sweeping executive order that would direct federal agencies to strengthen oversight of industries that they perceive to be dominated by a small number of companies.

    The order comes as House lawmakers are pushing ahead with a package of anti-trust legislation aimed at restraining Big Tech. The order reportedly builds on a 2016 report by the White House Council of Economic Advisors. A similar anti-trust order handed down by President Barack Obama in 2016 failed to “move the needle” on the competition front.

    The order will direct regulators of industries from airlines to agriculture to rethink their rule-making process to inject more competition and to give consumers, workers and suppliers more rights to challenge large producers.

    Based on what we know so far, it doesn’t look like the order will pressure regulators to push for the outright breakup of industrial conglomerates, large corporate farms or American tech giants.

    The goal is to broaden the way policy makers approach business concentration in the U.S., going beyond conventional antitrust enforcement focused on blocking big mergers. For example, companies in industries controlled by a small number of big firms might face new rules for disclosing fees to consumers or for their relationships with suppliers, the people familiar with the effort said.

    Opponents of tighter anti-trust rules are hopeful that the conservative SCOTUS will weigh in to block Biden’s attempts to override Congress and unilaterally impose new restrictions on American corporations (while at the same time working out a new global minimum corporate tax that would, if ever implemented, likely increase the tax bills of American multinationals).

    Big business groups and some Republicans will likely protest any new Biden measures. Businesses and conservative legal groups could challenge the rules in court, as they already have with administration moves to limit oil and gas drilling on federal lands and to extend a pandemic-related moratorium on evicting renters. Regulatory opponents are hopeful that conservative judges appointed by former President Donald Trump will make it easier to challenge Biden administration rules.

    “I find the way this is being framed questionable,” said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, an economist who worked in the George W. Bush administration and who has advised GOP lawmakers and candidates. “They’ve decided the economy isn’t competitive, but when you look closer at the data, you just don’t see a radical increase in concentration.”

    However, the supposedly “conservative” SCOTUS that Democrats spend an inordinate amount of time railing against hasn’t come through for conservatives on a handful of recent rulings, including declining to strike down the CDC’s eviction moratorium while also refusing to strike down Obamacare for the third time.

    Per WSJ, the order will likely focus on pressuring companies to disclose more information, including fees, that would provide more transparency about pricing.

    While both WSJ and Reuters reported that the executive order could land as soon as next week, White House spokeswoman Emilie Simons said no final decision has been made.

    She added that the president has in the past called for giving small farmers more protection from large concentrated farms. Biden has also called for restricting the ability of employers to force workers to sign non-compete agreements limiting their ability to go work for competitors.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 21:05

  • Fear Spreads As Another Miami Beach Condo Tower Deemed "Unsafe"
    Fear Spreads As Another Miami Beach Condo Tower Deemed “Unsafe”

    Haunted by the recent tragedy in Surfside, some residents of ocean-side apartments in South Florida have been searching for information about the structural integrity of their condominiums. The residents of a Collins Avenue building with prior warnings in Miami Beach said they are horrified about what they found.

    The fear started after Champlain Towers South, at 8777 Collins Ave., turned into the epicenter of heartbreak and grief on Thursday morning. Some of the residents of the Champlain Towers North and East decided to evacuate.

    Days following the incident, two studies on the 12-story residential structure came to light. One was a field study from 2018 by an engineering firm that discovered structural issues. Another study was from 2020 when scientists analyzed satellite data to find the tower sunk in the 1990s. 

    On Monday, residents at Maison Grande Condominium, an 18-story building with 502 units, built in 1971, were worried about the safety of their building, according to WPLG Local 10.  

    Photographs show rusted steel and cracked concrete pillars and ceilings in the parking garage of the building – a similar observation that was observed at Champlain South. 

    City records show that five inspections determined the building is an “unsafe structure.” Other warnings include the two-story parking garage and pool deck “have reached the end of their useful life and require repair, replacement,” or “a combination thereof.”

    One city official wrote in late 2020, “Structure with evidence of spalling concrete. Need to submit a report signed and sealed by [an] engineer to evaluate the structure together with methods of repairs.”

    Near the building’s entrance reads a red sign that warns: “unsafe structure” building violation notice.

    Here’s a closer view of the red sign. 

    Twitter user “Billy Corben” posted a shocking video of the structural deterioration unfolding inside the parking garage of the building. 

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    After his post went viral, he said the condo building association announced a meeting to certify the building for “50-years.” 

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    So fear grips condo owners of older buildings across Miami. Will there be a point where some residents sell their units for newer ones?

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 20:56

  • Arizona's Maricopa County Will Replace All Voting Machines After Audit
    Arizona’s Maricopa County Will Replace All Voting Machines After Audit

    Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times,

    Authorities in Maricopa County, Arizona, announced they will replace all voting machines following a Senate-ordered audit of the county’s 2020 election results.

    The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, which oversees elections in the county, issued a response to a letter sent by Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, saying the county “shares [her] concerns” that the integrity and security of the Dominion Voting Systems machines and ballots might have been compromised during the audit.

    “Accordingly, I write to notify you that Maricopa County will not use the subpoenaed election equipment in any future election,” said the letter, dated Monday.

    And in a news release, the county pledged to “never use equipment that could pose a risk to free and fair elections,” suggesting that the auditors may have compromised the machines.

    Hobbs, a Democrat, had written to the county in May that she has “grave concerns regarding the security and integrity of these machines, given that the chain of custody, a critical security tenet, has been compromised and election officials do not know what was done to the machines while under Cyber Ninjas’ control.” Cyber Ninjas is the Florida-based technology firm that helped with the audit, which was authorized earlier this year by the Republican-controlled state Senate.

    After the announcement from Maricopa County, several Republicans praised the move to do away with the machines—but not for the reasons offered by Hobbs or the county officials.

    “No more machines,” wrote Republican state Sen. Wendy Rogers on Twitter, alleging in another tweet that the machines are easily compromised.

    “Go back to the old way,” she also wrote in concurring with a tweet issued by GOP state Sen. Kelly Townsend.

    Last week, the team overseeing the audit announced that both the paper examination and counting of the ballots were finished. Senate Majority Leader Karen Fann, a Republican, told The Epoch Times over the weekend said the team will meet within the next several days and will “formulate a plan and timeline moving forward,” with other officials suggesting the audit may be completed by the end of the summer.

    Hobbs and Senate Republicans have gone back and forth in a war of words since the audit was proposed earlier this year, with the secretary of state characterizing it as a partisan operation designed to suppress voters and claimed auditors have operated with lax security.

    But Republicans have disputed Hobbs’s and other Democrats’ assertions that the audit isn’t being done securely or professionally. Fann and other GOP senators have said the audit is necessary to restore the public’s confidence in the state’s election systems.

    Alexander Kolodin, a lawyer who represents the Arizona GOP, told NTD that he believes the audit will uncover irregularities.

    “Something went wrong,” he said on June 15, “because something goes wrong in every election.”

    Meanwhile, if an audit reveals fraud, then there would be a referral to law enforcement authorities, Fann and other senators have previously said. And if fraud is revealed, according to her, they will focus on passing legislation to shore up any security flaws.

    “If the audit illuminates that there’s [sic] vulnerabilities in X, Y, and Z parts of our election system, state legislatures can target those with a laser beam and fix X, Y, and Z parts of our election system,” Kolodin also said in the interview.

    The Arizona state Senate turned over the Dominion machines to auditors to determine if any of the equipment was compromised, using a legislative subpoena issued in April to seize nine tabulating machines and 385 precinct tabulators. Dominion has categorically denied the allegations that their machines had any problems in Maricopa.

    Other than the machines, the auditors, led by Cyber Ninjas, started reviewing some 2.1 million ballots at Phoenix’s Veterans Memorial Coliseum starting several weeks ago.

    The Epoch Times has contacted the Fann’s office and Cyber Ninjas for comment.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 20:45

  • India, A Well Known Source Of Gold Demand, Is Turning A Keen Eye Toward Crypto
    India, A Well Known Source Of Gold Demand, Is Turning A Keen Eye Toward Crypto

    India has long been known for being a strong source of demand for gold – not only for wealth preservation, but also for cosmetic and jewelry purposes.

    But now it looks as though something else has caught the country’s eye: crypto.

    This could mean that the mantra that Bitcoin is equivalent to digital gold could actually be catching on, Bloomberg noted this week.

    Households in India own more than 25,000 tons of gold and, despite this, investments in crypto across the country grew from about $200 million to a stunning $40 billion over the past year, the report says. 

    The demand flies in the face of “outright hostility toward the asset class” from the country’s Central Bank, the piece notes. There are now more than 15 million Indians buying and selling cryptocurrencies, compared to 23 million in the U.S. and 2.3 million in the U.K. 

    One microcosm of the shift in demand is 32 year old Richi Sood. She put about $13,400 – some of which she borrowed from her family – into crypto instead of gold. After buying Bitcoin, Dogecoin and Ether, she cashed out part of her position to help her fund her startup company. She said: “I’d rather put my money in crypto than gold. Crypto is more transparent than gold or property and returns are more in a short period of time.”

    Sood represents where much of the growth in India is coming from: people aged 18-35. “Indian adults under age 34 have less appetite for gold than older consumers,” Bloomberg wrote, citing data from the World Gold Council.

    Sandeep Goenka, who co-founded ZebPay, said: “They find it far easier to invest in crypto than gold because the process is very simple. You go online, you can buy crypto, you don’t have to verify it, unlike gold.”

    Keneth Alvares, who is 22 years old, said: “I think over time everyone is going to adopt it in every country. Right now the whole thing is scary with regulation but it doesn’t worry me because I’m not planning to remove anything for now.”

    Part of the growth can be attributed to the country’s Supreme Court quashing a rule banning crypto trading by banking entities. This led to a trading surge, despite the fact that the country’s Central Bank shows “no signs” of embracing cryptocurrencies. 

    Other countries like the U.K. have also cracked down on crypto, with the latter banning Binance Markets from doing regulated business in the country. 

    This regulatory environment means that larger investors are less likely to talk openly about their holdings. Bloomberg spoke to one investor who owned more than $1 million in crypto; he said he is concerned about the prospect of retrospective tax raids. He has “contingency plans in place to move his trading to an offshore Singapore bank account” if a ban were to be enacted.

    The smaller investor in India seems to be taking the regulatory environment in stride, however. Sood concluded: “I am flying blind. I have a risk-taking appetite, so I’m willing to take a risk of a ban.”

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 20:25

  • With The Fed In Denial, Hawkish Bank Of Russia Sees Inflation "Not Transitory", Warns Of Possible Shock-And-Awe Rate-Hike
    With The Fed In Denial, Hawkish Bank Of Russia Sees Inflation “Not Transitory”, Warns Of Possible Shock-And-Awe Rate-Hike

    Authored by Wolf Richter via WolfStreet.com,

    US Inflation is almost as hot as in Russia, but the Fed is still blowing it off…

    Consumer price inflation in Russia is red-hot, having jumped 6.0% in May compared to a year ago, 2 percentage points above the Bank of Russia’s target of 4.0%.

    Polls in Russia show that food inflation is a top concern, currently running at 7.4%.

    But inflation in the US isn’t lagging far behind: The Consumer Price Index (CPI) jumped 5.0% in May.

    Yet the central banks are on opposite tracks in their approach to inflation.

    Federal Reserve governors keep jabbering about this red-hot inflation being “temporary” or “transitory,” and likely to disappear on its own despite huge government stimulus and the Fed’s huge and ongoing monetary stimulus, though some doubts are creeping in among a couple of them. So they’ll keep interest rates at near-zero until at least next year, and they’re still buying $120 billion a month in securities to push down long-term interest rates.

    Russia has been on the opposite trajectory, “surprising” economists at every step along the way. This trajectory started on March 19 with a 25 basis point rate hike, to 4.5%, against the expectations of 27 of the 28 economists polled by Reuters, who didn’t expect a rate hike. On April 23, the Bank of Russia hiked its policy rate by 50 basis points, to 5.0%. On June 11, it hiked by another 50 basis points to 5.5%. The next policy meeting is scheduled for July 23.

    Is a shock-and-awe rate hike next? Bank of Russia Governor Elvira Nabiullina is preparing the markets for this possibility – so it won’t be a shock, but just awe.

    At the July meeting, the central bank “will consider” an increase in the range from “25 basis points to 1 percentage point,” she told Bloomberg TV in an interview.

    “We see that inflation remains elevated” and that “inflation expectations are quite high,” she said.

    The initial factors in this surge of inflation were the weakening ruble last year and commodity and food price increases. They alone might not require a monetary policy intervention, she said.

    But now inflation expectations remain elevated, which creates second-round effects, she said.

    “That’s why we see that inflation acceleration is not transitory, as in many other countries, but more persistent,” she said. “That’s why we think we should act with rate hikes.”

    “We signaled to the markets [at the last meeting] that further policy rate increases can be necessary to curb inflation, and now we see it is warranted,” she said.

    The economy has recovered quite fast, she said. Demand growth has been outpacing supply growth. And this gap creates additional inflation pressures, and in combination with elevated inflation expectations provide us the need to neutralize our monetary policy, she said.

    “Now policy is still accommodative, if we compare the policy rate [5.5%] with the current inflation rate [6.0%] and with inflation expectations,” she said.

    This is the school of thought that negative real interest rates – interest rates below the rate of inflation – are accommodative, or stimulative for the economy. Under this theory for the US, a neutral monetary policy would be with the Fed’s policy rates at least at 3.4% if based on core PCE and at 5.0% if based on CPI.

    Nabiullina said that the magnitude of the rate hikes and the trajectory will depend a lot on the incoming data “because there are a lot of uncertainties now.”

    The Bank of Russia wants to “prevent the accumulation of inflationary risks,” but it also wants the moves to be “predictable” for the markets because sharp unexpected increases of rates can create some difficulties for markets to adapt, she said.

    Hence, the interview with Bloomberg TV. She’s clearly trying to prepare the markets for a hefty rate hike in July, perhaps a Brazilian-type rate hike of 75 basis points, or even a shock-and-awe full percentage point, while the Fed will continue to cling to its doctrine of the moment that this red-hot inflation in the US is just transitory and will dissipate on its own.

    There are whole generations who never experienced this type of inflation, this type of destruction of the dollar’s purchasing power.

    *  *  *

    Enjoy reading WOLF STREET and want to support it? Using ad blockers – I totally get why – but want to support the site? You can donate. I appreciate it immensely. 

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 20:05

  • Tom Brady, Gisele Bündchen Take Equity Stake In FTX Crypto Exchange
    Tom Brady, Gisele Bündchen Take Equity Stake In FTX Crypto Exchange

    It was a rough month for seven-time Superbowl champion Tom Brady, who top-ticked the recent collapse in bitcoin almost to the day with his “laser eyes” profile picture change, something he himself mocked yesterday when he tweeted “Alright the laser eyes didn’t work. Anyone have any ideas?”

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    It retrospect, this was a rhetorical question because just one day later we learned that Tom Brady and his wife Gisele Bündchen – best known for demanding to be paid in euros top ticking the common currency ahead of its all time high in 2008 – have taken an equity stake in crypto exchange FTX (profiled most recently here) and will receive crypto as part of an endorsement deal with the crypto exchange, which includes a bonus that will be paid in crypto.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    West Realm Shires Services, FTX Trading Limited and Blockfolio, three companies behind major global cryptocurrency exchange business FTX, announced Tuesday a long-term partnership with Brady and Bündchen.

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    “It’s an incredibly exciting time in the crypto-world and Sam and the revolutionary FTX team continue to open my eyes to the endless possibilities,” Brady said in a statement. “This particular opportunity showed us the importance of educating people about the power of crypto while simultaneously giving back to our communities and planet.”

    Both Brady, and Bündchen will serve as ambassadors for FTX, according to an announcement Tuesday reported Bloomberg. And while the cryptocurrency exchange declined to disclose their equity stake, but did say they will both receive an unspecified amount and type of crypto. Bündchen will also take on the role of FTX’s environmental and social-initiatives adviser, according to the release.

    “Tom and Gisele are both legends and they both reached the pinnacle of what they do,” said Sam Bankman-Fried, 29, founder and chief executive officer of FTX, said in a phone interview. “When we think about what FTX represents, we want to be the best product that is out there.”

    FTX, which unlike Coinbase operates outside the reach of US tax authorities and offers both cryptos and derivatives, has become one of the world’s largest crypto exchanges since its launch just two years ago. Bankman-Fried said he’s spoken with others in the past about possible partnerships, but something FTX always comes back to is, “How excited are they about it? How excited are we to deal with them?” When it comes to Brady and Bündchen, “they were both really into it.” Or maybe they were both just into the compensation they will receive for promoting it.

    In any case, the duo knows how to play their role well, and Brady has been an advocate for cryptocurrencies for the past few months, notably emerging as a big supporter of bitcoin in May when he changed his Twitter profile picture to show himself with so-called laser eyes.

    “This isn’t the first time that they’ve been involved in crypto, not the first time they’ve thought about it or even used it, which I think makes it a much more natural and authentic partnership,” said Bankman-Fried. “They’re examples of audiences we’d really like FTX to be the product for.”

    We can only assume this remark was off the cuff: if the target FTX audiences is really multi-millionaire Superbowl winners and Perfect 10 models, it will have a hard time growing.

    Bündchen expressed confidence that crypto adoption will continue to grow steadily, noting that the best part of the partnership for her was the technology’s environmental potential. “What attracted me most about this partnership was the potential to apply resources to help regenerate the Earth, and enable people to lead better lives, therefore generating real transformation in our society,” she said, clearly unaware of Elon Musk’s concerns about the electricity consumption of bitcoin.

    As Bloomberg further notes, as part of a conversation with Bankman-Fried during a conference earlier this year, brady said he, his coaches and teammates had been talking about cryptocurrencies and their vacillating prices on a daily basis. “It’s on all of our minds because we’re very interested, we’re learning more and more about these emerging markets,” he said. “So I’m a big believer in it, I don’t think it’s going anywhere,” though he added there will “absolutely” be volatility.

    Unlike Coinbase, FTX was founded with the goal of donating to charity and has earmarked more than $10 million so far to do so. FTX, Brady and Bündchen have all committed to annual multi-million dollar contributions for the duration of the partnership and Bündchen will play a role in choosing the charities. Her mandate will not be crypto-specific, Bankman-Fried said. She’s been “really involved in giving back basically her whole life and I think this is part of what appealed to her the most,” he said, adding that she’ll likely be working with the FTX Foundation“a fair bit.”

    Meanwhile, FTX has fully grasped that to really succeed in the world of crypto it has to constantly be in the headlines and shamelessly self-promote and has done just that, cinching a pact with Major League Baseball earlier this month and renaming the Miami Heat’s National Basketball Association stadium to FTX Arena, the first NBA stadium deal from a crypto firm.

    “A lot of what we’ve been looking at is what are the things that we can do that will really stand out and represent us well, fit our brand and really capture people’s attention,” said Bankman-Fried. “We’re going to be doing what we can to try to get news about FTX out there and get more eyeballs on it.”

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 19:45

Digest powered by RSS Digest

Today’s News 29th June 2021

  • Blinken Urges Allies To "Repatriate" & "Rehabilitate" Foreign ISIS Terrorists Held In Syria
    Blinken Urges Allies To “Repatriate” & “Rehabilitate” Foreign ISIS Terrorists Held In Syria

    US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Monday actually called for ISIS members held in prisons across Syria to essentially be let go to their home countries – often in Europe. He applied the words “repatriate” and “rehabilitate” to literal ISIS terrorists and their families. 

    What’s more is that he was addressing European allies, meaning in this context he’s also referencing primarily foreign fighters who joined the Islamic State. The foreign jihadists have long been considered to be the most extreme among the extreme. Here’s what Blinken said at a defense conference in Rome, according to ABC News:

    Kicking off the ministerial meeting of the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS in Rome on Monday, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken called on countries to “repatriate, rehabilitate, and where applicable, prosecute their citizens” imprisoned in Syria fighting for ISIS.

    “It just can’t persist indefinitely,” he said of the problem of the cramped ISIS prisons run by the US-backed SDF in Syria’s Eastern desert. 

    One such camp is al-Hol, which has been a security nightmare. A recent report in BBC detailed: “According to figures released by al-Hol camp’s Kurdish-led authorities, almost 61,000 people are held at the site in Al Hasakah district, including more than 16,000 families. About 2,500 of those are families of foreign IS fighters.”

    It could be that Blinken primarily had in mind family members of ISIS terrorists who are held in Syria’s prisons, but regardless it’s shocking how bluntly and easily he spoke of “rehabilitating” ISIS foreign fighters

    “We are seeing fighters of 13 and 14 years old, take up weapons to kill people, and we have to get at this from every possible angle,” he said further in the remarks.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    Another irony on top of Blinken lecturing allies that they must receive their foreign fighters back “home” is the fact that on Sunday night the Biden-ordered airstrikes actually targeted Iraqi and Syrian militia groups that actively fight remaining ISIS terrorists in the region. 

    SDF-administered al-Hol, via Al Jazeera

    But it remains that the US considers these groups currently fighting Sunni jihadists as “pro-Iranian” and “Iran-backed” – hence the Pentagon’s willingness to wage war on the Assad-Iran-Hezbollah axis while often willfully turning a blind eye to ISIS (and worse) and other Sunni terror groups.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 02:45

  • Former NHS Doc Exposes Six Impossible (British COVID) Things Before Breakfast
    Former NHS Doc Exposes Six Impossible (British COVID) Things Before Breakfast

    Authored by former HNS Doctor Toby Young via LockdownSkeptics.com,

    Alice laughed. “There’s no use trying,” she said. “One can’t believe impossible things.”

    “I daresay you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”

    I hope the readers will forgive a little self-indulgence on my part if I relate an anecdote from the tail end of my 12 years as a junior doctor in the early years of the first Blair government. At the time, the Health Secretary Alan Milburn (advised by the youthful Simon Stevens) had issued strict waiting time targets to all hospitals.

    I was tasked with sorting out the numbers of patients on the surgical waiting lists at a large teaching hospital. It became apparent that if a patient had a date for surgery, they were no longer counted as ‘waiting’, even if that date was many months in the future. Accordingly, I issued dozens of patients dates for surgery and achieved compliance with the waiting time targets at a stroke.

    There was just one problem. Both the managers and I knew that all those patients had virtually no chance of getting into the hospital on their designated dates. Due to lack of available beds, they would all be cancelled a couple of days before admission.

    At a meeting with the CEO of the Trust, I pointed this out.

    He looked me in the eye and said, “Let me make one thing clear to you. There is no problem with beds in this hospital.”

    I briefly considered debating the assertion, but realised it was a pointless endeavour.

    The facts did not fit the Chief Executive’s preferred narrative – so the facts had to change.

    He was subsequently awarded a Knighthood for services to healthcare.

    And so, here we are twenty years later – still believing six impossible things before breakfast.

    We might call it the ‘rule of six’!

    Here is my first example where a target failed to be matched by real world data. When considering facts there are three basic components. Understanding the collection process and the inherent errors and bias within that, the interpretation process, during which there will be a range of opinion, (although currently only one viewpoint is permitted) and finally presentation of the data which is open to the greatest amount of bias.

    Graph 1 shows the actual number of patients admitted with COVID from the community in June (orange bars). The blue line indicates where SAGE predicted it would be as a consequence of easing lockdown restrictions. How annoying – the data does not correlate with the prediction. In fact, hospital admissions are stubbornly refusing to increase significantly.

    Never mind. If we simply state loudly that something nasty ‘could happen’ in the future that will cover just about every situation where the observable data do not support the required conclusion. And we can also show Graph 2 – which records the number of positive ‘cases’ in May-June 2021. The public won’t realise that most of these cases were asymptomatic and they may well think that they are the same as people being admitted to hospital.

    We should try not to show Graph 3, which puts the recent rise in ‘cases’ into its proper context. Graph 2 better supports the preferred narrative, so that is the preferred one to show at press conferences. By presenting the data in this way, we are not actually lying, just presenting to the audience the information that supports our preferred outcome and not referencing information that does not support our narrative. You may very well think this is misinformation. I could not possibly comment.

    Second on my list of six is the Vaccine Minister, Nadim Zahawi. Before entering politics, Mr Zahawi ran YouGov, the political polling company. At the Government press conference on June 23rd, Mr Zahawi claimed that delaying the final milestone of ‘unlocking’ on June 21st had saved “thousands of lives”. How did he arrive at this statement?

    A recent PHE document had this to say about the number of lives saved by the vaccines:

    PHE estimates to May 30th 2021 based on the direct effect of vaccination and vaccine coverage rates, are that that 11,800 deaths were averted in individuals aged 80 years and older, 1,800 in individuals aged 70 to 79 and 400 in individuals aged 60 to 69 years giving a total of 14,000 deaths averted in individuals aged 60 years or older in England. There is increasing evidence that vaccines prevent infection and transmission.

    Did Zahawi simply parrot the PHE estimates up to May 30th, wrongly using them as an estimate of the effect of delaying unlocking past June 21st? Is this a simple misattribution error on his part, or a deliberate attempt to mislead? I note that none of the bovine journalists in attendance at the press conference challenged him on these implausible figures. On the contrary, his assertion was obligingly retweeted by Beth Rigby from Sky.

    I also note the heavy skew in prevented deaths to the older age group. Presumably, that’s because the more vaccinations are given to younger people, the Number Needed to Treat (NNT) to prevent one death goes up substantially. Based on recently published analysis of the Israeli experience, the NNT across the whole population was 16,000. Zahawi asserted that as of June 21st there were two million people over 50 who had only had one dose – let’s be generous and assume all these two million either are or are going to be vaccinated in the period between June 21st and July 19th. Using the real-world Israeli experience, this gives a predicted prevented death number attributable to vaccination of 125 for the period June 21st-July 19th (and that may be a substantial over-estimate).

    Would Zahawi have been so cavalier with the facts if he had been giving a statement to the House of Commons? Is his carelessness with attributing statistical estimates a reflection on the practices of YouGov? The reader can decide for themselves on the second impossible thing before breakfast.

    My third impossible belief is the assumption that people working for the government or supranational bodies such as UEFA or the G7 are either not susceptible to COVID infection and are therefore excused the requirements for regular testing and quarantine, or too important to be inconvenienced by the regulations for normal people.

    Kate Andrews writing in the Spectator has helpfully outlined various ‘pilot schemes’ by which Government figures and other privileged people can move around the globe freely on the basis that their activities are more important than those of the people who elect them. Here is the official extract in relation to exemptions from the regulations.

    How plausible is it that such arbitrary exemptions to the ‘rules’ will be limited to the Euro football competition or the G7 meeting? Isn’t it more likely, that, over time, the rich, powerful and well connected will be able to obtain exemptions? Maybe held on a mobile phone app for example as a ‘super vaccine passport’ allowing them to travel freely, unhindered by the majority of the population prevented from free movement by regulatory cost and red tape.

    My fourth impossible belief relates to the data on COVID spread at mass gatherings and positive test ratios on people returning from overseas travel. Here is the link to the Events Research Programme report published on June 25th I encourage readers to explore this document in detail for themselves and discover the depth of population monitoring and control it contains. I find it deeply sinister.

    The headline figures are that out of 58,000 people attending nine events, a total of 28 positive PCR cases were recorded (0.0005%). This has been reported in the press as good news from the perspective of re-opening public mass events and indeed it is.

    But delve deeper into the actual report which heavily caveats the results and recommends ongoing and more in-depth surveillance. Against a backdrop of a population antibody positivity of 80% (ONS statistics), with 60% of the adult population having received two jabs and over 80% having had one, the idea that surveillance of this type has anything to do with protecting public health seems completely implausible to me. Mark Harper MP, chair of the COVID recovery group thinks it is implausible as well – on June 16th he tweeted: “Documents I have seen confirm that work is underway in Govt to plan for Covid restrictions this autumn and winter.”

    My fifth impossible thing happened yesterday, Saturday June 26th. An enormous crowd marched from Hyde Park to Parliament Square with only the most cursory comment from the national broadcaster – and that attributed it to multiple protesting groups, rather than anti-lockdown protestors. If I hadn’t been there, I would not have believed it. I’m not a natural demonstrator – only ever attended one previous protest in 1984. Today convinced me that if there is a route out of this crisis, it will be by direct political action. What limited coverage there has been on the mainstream media has claimed the anti-lockdowners on the march were led by Covid deniers and anti-vaxxers. There is no doubt that some people on the protest were carrying such banners, but the vast majority were normal people, similar to myself. The frustration and rage at the deceptions and propaganda practiced by our elected representatives and salaried state servants were palpable. I’m already looking forward to the next one.

    Last on my list are the actions of the recently departed Health Secretary. According to his press statement on Friday June 25th, Mr Hancock believed that his recent indiscretion captured on CCTV with his close personal assistant was a purely private matter. Much has already been written in the press and on social media about this issue and I will not add to the commentary, except to suggest that if Mr Hancock really does believe his personal conduct is a purely private matter, we really are through the looking glass.

    Anyway, he’s gone and the prurient speculation around Hancock’s sexual activities are quite irrelevant to our main dilemma, the root of which lies in the dysfunction of government in a ‘managed democracy’. We are in a position where the skills and attributes needed to get elected are totally divergent from the skills needed to govern well. Elected politicians have become PR spokespeople for their factions, while unelected and unaccountable career civil servants actually run the process. Having spent my entire career observing such characters at work in ‘our NHS’, that’s something to be very worried about.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 02:00

  • When A President Lies
    When A President Lies

    Authored by David Rosen via Counterpunch.org,

    “Did you, too, O friend,
    suppose democracy was only for
    elections, for politics, and for a party name?”

    – Walt Whitman, “Democratic Vistas” (1871)

    Joe Biden received much media praise for his meeting with Russian president Vladimir Putin on June 16th. However, little attention has been paid to an issue posed by an Associate Press reporter in a press conference following the meeting: “U.S. intelligence has said that Russia tried to interfere in the last two presidential elections, and that Russia groups are behind hacks like SolarWinds and some of the ransomware attacks you just mentioned.”

    In response, Biden answered:

    Let’s get this straight: How would it be if the United States were viewed by the rest of the world as interfering with the elections directly of other countries, and everybody knew it?  What would it be like if we engaged in activities that he is engaged in?

    He concluded,

    “It diminishes the standing of a country that is desperately trying to make sure it maintains its standing as a major world power.”

    Sadly, Biden was lying, whether intentionally or out of false claim of ignorance.

    It appears that NBC News was the only mainstream media outlet that raised concern about Biden’s assertion. It noted, “the United States does interfere in foreign elections. We’ve done it for decades.” It added, “denying this basic historical reality does us no favors with the rest of the world; indeed, it hampers our ability to continue to champion democracy and human rights.” It follows outlining numerous incidents in which the U.S. intervened in the domestic electoral affairs of other countries.

    A quick search for information about U.S. backing of coups and military interventions in foreign elections is revealing. Wikipedia identifies 77 “U.S. involvement[s] in regime change” from the late-19th century through the 2010s; William Blum identifies 57 “instances of the United States overthrowing, or attempting to overthrow, a foreign government since the Second World War.” The political scientist Dov Levin notes, “between 1946 and 2000, the United States and the USSR/Russia intervened in this manner 117 times, or, put another way, in about one of every nine competitive national-level executive elections during this period.” In a 2013 study, Foreign Policy magazine detailed seven CIA orchestrated coups in the post-WW-II era.

    The follow list details some of incidents when the U.S. – to use Biden’s words — “interfering with the elections directly of other countries” since World War II.

    Syria, 1949 – as reported by Time magazine, it is “’one of the first covert actions that the CIA pulled off,’ since it had been created in 1947, according to Douglas Little, professor of history at Clark University.”

    Iran, 1953 — CIA orchestrated a coup against Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh; according to the CIA: “It was the potential … to leave Iran open to Soviet aggression — at a time when the Cold War was at its height and when the United Sates was involved in an undeclared war in Korea against forces supported by the U.S.S.R. and China — that compelled the United States [REDACTED] in planning and executing TPAJAX [the code name of the coup operation].”

    Guatemala, 1954 – the U.S. State Department moved against Guatemalan Pres. Jacobo Árbenz after he introduced land reforms that threatened the holdings of the U.S.-owned United Fruit Company; the coup forced Árbenz from power.

    Cuba, 1959-present – the U.S. government supported Fulgencio Batista, a former soldier and Cuban dictator from 1933 to 1944, who seized power for a second time in a 1952 coup. On January 1, 1959, the 26th of July Movement, led by Fidel Castro, forced Batista to flee the island. In April 1961, the U.S. launched the Bay of Pigs invasion, an unsuccessful attempt to remove Castro from power. The U.S. followed with an embargo of the island that lasted 60 years. In 1983, Pres. Ronald Reagan labeled Cuba a “terrorist state” and, in 1996, the Helms-Burton Act was adopted, further tightening the embargo. In 2009, Pres. Barack Obama eased some of the restrictions but, in 2017, Pres. Donald Trump reinstated the embargo.

    Congo, 1960 – the U.S. Senate’s 1972 Church Committee found that the CIA “continued to maintain close contact with Congolese who expressed a desire to assassinate [Patrice] Lumumba,” and that “CIA officers encouraged and offered to aid these Congolese in their efforts against Lumumba.”

    Dominican Republic, 1961 — the Church Committee found that the CIA backed the assassination of the dictator, Rafael Trujillo, through the provision of “[m]aterial support, consisting of three pistols and three carbines, was supplied to various dissidents…. United States’ officials knew that the dissidents intended to overthrow Trujillo, probably by assassination…”

    South Vietnam, 1963 – following the defeat of French forces in Dien Bien Phu in 1954 to Vietnamese nationalist forces led by Ho Chi Minh, the U.S. military sought to contain communist from the North; as detailed in the Pentagon Papers, in 1963, South Vietnamese generals — with CIA support — seized and assassinated country’s leader, Ngo Dinh Diem.

    Brazil, 1964 – U.S. Ambassador Lincoln Gordon feared that Brazilian Pres. Joao Goulart would “make Brazil the China of the 1960s” and Pres. Lyndon Johnson told CIA officials planning the coup, “I think we ought to take every step that we can, be prepared to do everything that we need to do.” President Lyndon Johnson told his advisors planning the coup,

    Chile, 1973 – the CIA backed the Chilian military’s violent overthrowing of the democratically elected leader, Salvador Allende, paving the way for the brutal — and U.S.-friendly — Augusto Pinochet

    Afghanistan, 1979-present — during the 1980s, the CIA funded military operations to frustrate the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Fighting between CIA-funded Afghans and the Russians continued through 1988 when the Russians decided to withdraw, and the CIA ended its aid in 1992. However, the attacks of September 11, 2001, led the Bush administration to conduct operations against terrorists throughout the world.  Osama bin Laden, the apparent mastermind behind the September 11th attacks, was based in Afghanistan where a U.S. military occupation will last until September 11, 2021.

    Nicaragua, 1981-1990 – in November 1981, Pres. Reagan signed National Security Directive 17, authorizing the CIA to back “democratic” leaders and take actions against the Sandinistas to stop the spread of “communism” in Nicaragua; in October 1986, Congress approved $100 million in funds for the Contras; the following year, after the discovery of private resupply efforts orchestrated by the National Security Council and Oliver North, Congress ceased all but “non-lethal” aid in 1987. The war between the Sandinistas and the Contras ended with a cease-fire in 1990.

    Russia, 1996 – as originally reported in the Los Angeles Times, “a team of American political strategists who helped Gov. Pete Wilson with his abortive presidential bid earlier this year said this week that they served as Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin’s secret campaign weapon in his comeback win over a Communist challenger.” Following the recent Biden-Putin summit, The Guardian notes,” without the chaos and deprivation of the US-backed Yeltsin era, Putinism would surely not have established itself.”

    Venezuela, 1998-present — since Hugo Chavez was elected president in 1998, the bipartisan Washington establishment has been out to put an end to what has been dubbed Latin America’s “pink tide” of socialism. As The Intercept reported, “In 2002, the Bush administration encouraged and supported a (failed) coup against Chavez. … In 2015, the Obama administration made the absurd decision to formally declare Venezuela an ‘unusual and extraordinary threat’ to U.S. national security.” In 2019, the Trump administration called Nicolás Maduro, “illegitimate” and recognized opposition leader Juan Guaidó as the interim president.

    Presidents lie – it goes with the job. If Biden lied about the U.S.’s role in innumerable coups and regime changes, one can only wonder what else he is lying about.

    More troubling, with the exception of NBC News and The Guardian, the mainstream media chose to ignore or avoid challenging Biden, thus reinforcing their role as echo chambers of Democratic-corporate establishment agenda.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 06/29/2021 – 00:10

  • India May Have Failed To Count As Many As 1 Million COVID Deaths
    India May Have Failed To Count As Many As 1 Million COVID Deaths

    With nearly 400K COVID-19 deaths, India has the world’s third-highest coronavirus death toll, following the US (in first place with more than 600K+) and Brazil (coming in second with 510K+). For months now, we have been reporting on commentary from analysts and public health experts speculating that India’s total COVID deaths might be 2x the official number. Some journalists have even found evidence of deaths that weren’t included in the official tally.

    On Monday, a story published by WSJ cited modeling from the University of Washington’s IHME institute, the not-very-accurate purveyor of COVID-19 forecasting, which suggests that India’s COVID-19 death toll might be as high as 1.1MM. This would mean that the wave of infections that spread across India in April and May (largely driven by the Delta variant) may have been the deadliest outbreak yet.

    Lacking accurate data on deaths is a problem for scientists trying to determine exactly how much deadlier the “Delta” variant is when compared with earlier strains of the virus. An accurate count is “a very important part of understanding how big a threat new variants are,” said Christopher Murray, director of the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation.

    Dr. Murray believes the scale of under-counting of COVID-linked deaths in India is similar to the scale of under-counting seen in Africa and Latin America. But even greater than the under-counting of deaths, of course, is the under-counting of total cases, he added that the institute estimates India has detected only about 3% to 5% of all infections due to insufficient testing.

    Another academic believes COVID deaths in India might be as much as 5x higher than the current tally, which would place the death toll closer to 2MM. That’s according to Murad Banaji, a mathematician at the Middlesex University in London who has been tracking the pandemic in India, estimates the country’s real death toll could be around 5x the reported figure, based partly on mortality and serosurvey data (which purports to show the percentage of antibodies in the population, data that has been collected and relied upon by India’s public health authorities).

    Of course, as we noted above, it’s not just India. The WHO believes the true number of COVID-19 cases around the world is 2x to 3x higher than the official tally.

    But India’s undercounting of deaths is especially severe because overwhelmed hospitals started turning away patients during the April-May outbreak, leaving many to die in their homes are cars. Many of these patients weren’t counted because their deaths didn’t take place in a hospital, but at home, without them ever being tested for COVID.

    Several Indian states have set up compensation funds to help families that lost loved ones during the pandemic. However, these funds typically require proof that the death was caused by COVID-19, leaving thousands of families effectively shut out of one of the most reliable sources of government support.

    In the village of Sirondhan in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, for example, Vijay Pal Singh said his 38-year-old wife, Mithilesh Devi, fell ill last month with a fever and struggled to breathe. Mr. Singh said he took her to the village clinic and several hospitals in the district, but none had available beds or testing kits.

    “She died at home, gasping for oxygen,” Mr. Singh said. Her death wasn’t included in the official Covid-19 tally, he added.

    At least 30 people died in the village in late April and early May, many suffering from Covid-like symptoms, according to villagers and social workers. A further 47 died in two neighboring villages.

    Villager Dharamvir Singh said one or two people died almost every day during the worst weeks of the second wave. He says he believes he and four members of his family were infected. No one was tested.

    “The official numbers, at least for our village and a few others close to us, are totally wrong,” Mr. Singh said.

    Government officials in the state insist that the official numbers are correct, and that there are no plans to expand or revise the tallies. This shouldn’t come as a surprise, since Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government praises states with lower numbers while castigating states with higher numbers. While some states and cities have adjusted their tallies, the official numbers likely remain far below the true figures. A recent investigation in the state of Bihar found nearly 4,000 more Covid-19 deaths, raising its toll by over 72%.

    At the very least, more communities across India are resorting to COVID prophylactics like Ivermectin, measures that have apparently helped India to finally bring its outbreak under control.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 23:50

  • Former Intel Chief Calls For "Larger Discussion" On UFOs, Warns They Display Technology US Doesn't Have
    Former Intel Chief Calls For “Larger Discussion” On UFOs, Warns They Display Technology US Doesn’t Have

    Authored by Tom Ozimek via The Epoch Times,

    Former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe said that Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon (UAP), also known as UFOs, appear to display technology that the United States does not have and could not defend against.

    Ratcliffe made the remarks in an interview on Fox News that aired Saturday, one day after the public release of a much-anticipated government report on UAPs or UFOs (pdf), which found “no clear indications that there is any non-terrestrial explanation” for the aerial phenomena, although it left open the possibility of an alien origin.

    “I’m actually glad that there’s a report out there,” Ratcliffe said in the interview, adding, “the bottom line is, unidentified aerial phenomena—many, many cases we’re able to explain it away for reasons like visual disturbances, or weather phenomenon, or foreign adversaries and their technologies, or even our own experimental technologies with certain aircraft and vehicles.”

    At the same time, he said were are a number of cases where none such explanations applied.

    “What this report really underscores … is that there are a number of instances—and the specific number remains classified—but a number of instances where we’ve ruled all of that out,” he said.

    “And there are technologies that we don’t have and frankly that we are not capable of defending against—based on those things that we’ve seen, multiple sensors, in other words, where not just people visually see it but where it’s picked up on radar, where it’s seen on satellites,” Ratcliffe said, adding that, “it’s an issue of national security.”

    Then-Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe is seen on the South Lawn of the White House, in Washington, on Dec. 12, 2020. (Al Drago/Getty Images)

    Ratcliffe suggested it’s unsettling that some of the aerial phenomena defy explanation.

    “It’s not good to say, ‘Gosh, we don’t have good answers.’ And so, we have to have a larger discussion to try and figure out specifically what this is all about,” he said.

    The report, which was issued by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) in conjunction with a U.S. Navy-led UAP task force, studied 144 observations of unidentified aerial phenomena, dating back to 2004, of which 11 caused “near misses” for military pilots.

    “UAP pose a hazard to safety of flight and could pose a broader danger if some instances represent sophisticated collection against U.S. military activities by a foreign government or demonstrate a breakthrough aerospace technology by a potential adversary,” the report reads.

    The report added that defense and intelligence analysts don’t have enough data to determine the nature of UAP observed by military pilots, noting that they could fall into a number of categories, including foreign adversary systems, natural atmospheric phenomena, or “other,” a catchall category that, theoretically, could include extraterrestrial technology.

    “UAP clearly pose a safety of flight issue and may pose a challenge to U.S. national security,” the report stated, adding that the phenomena “probably lack a single explanation.”

    The Pentagon established the Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force last August to explore observations of aircraft of unknown origin. The task force aimed to “detect, analyze and catalogue” such events, and to “gain insight” into the “nature and origins” of UFOs, the Pentagon said.

    In the run up to the release of the report, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) said last month that members of Congress and other officials need to seriously investigate UFOs and the potential threat they pose.

    Speaking to CBS News’ “60 Minutes,” the Florida Republican described a “stigma on Capitol Hill,” in which some lawmakers “are very interested in this topic,” but some “kind of giggle when you bring it up.” However, he cautioned, “I don’t think we can allow the stigma to keep us from having an answer to a very fundamental question.”

    The senator said he wants the Pentagon to come up with a process to take UAP seriously.

    “I want us to have a process to analyze the data every time it comes in,” he said. “That there be a place where this is cataloged and constantly analyzed, until we get some answers. Maybe it has a very simple answer. Maybe it doesn’t.”

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 23:30

  • "Scared Me To Death" – 2 Earthquakes Rattle Baltimore City In Days 
    “Scared Me To Death” – 2 Earthquakes Rattle Baltimore City In Days 

    Something very odd is happening around the Baltimore Metropolitan Area, where two earthquakes have been recorded in a matter of days. The occurrence of earthquakes in the metro area is rare. 

    When we think of earthquakes in the US, they’re usually in California, the Coastal Pacific Northwest, Alaska, Hawaii, among other hotbed areas. 

    But Baltimore? 

    WBAL-TV reports that a 2.6 magnitude earthquake rattled the area on Friday, and another 1.7 magnitude hit on Sunday. 

    “These little ones like this are just a very quick jolt,” Dan Blakeman, a geophysicist with the United States Geological Survey (USGS), told The Baltimore Sun newspaper. 

    “The 1.7 — if it turns out to have been felt, and it’s possible — it’d just be by people very close to where it happened,” Blakeman said.

    “There could be a couple of others here,” Blakeman continued. “A lot of times, you’ll get small quakes like this, and we’ll have maybe three or four of them, and we just call it a swarm, basically because there’s no real big aftershock. There’s no way to predict if there will be another one or not.”

    Wanda Binns, a resident of Woodlawn, the epicenter of the first quake, told WBAL, “it scared me to death. Certainly, you would expect to see it on the West Coast. Who would think of something like this happening here?”

    “It was a little scary,” said Kim Dixon of Woodlawn. “There was shaking of the house that I never experienced before.”

    The last quake to strike the area was felt in 2011 when a 5.8 magnitude was recorded in Richmond, Virginia. 

    Is the awakening of an ancient fault on the East Coast in nearing? 

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 23:10

  • Critical Race Theory Banned In 6 States (That's 44 States Too Few)
    Critical Race Theory Banned In 6 States (That’s 44 States Too Few)

    Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk.com,

    Critical Race Theory (CRT) is banned in 6 states and pending bans in at least 18 more.

    What Is Critical Race Theory?

    Critical race theory (CRT) is an academic movement of civil-rights scholars and activists in the United States who seek to critically examine U.S. law as it intersects with issues of race in the U.S. and to challenge mainstream American liberal approaches to racial justice.

    CRT views race and white supremacy as an intersectional social construction which serves to oppress people of color and marginalized communities at large (i.e gender and class).

    CRT emphasizes that merely making laws colorblind on paper may not be enough to make the application of the laws colorblind; ostensibly colorblind laws can be applied in racially discriminatory ways

    The above snip is from Wikipedia. The map is from NBC News on June 17, somehow missing Florida.

    CRT may seem benign at first glance, but it’s not. The third snip above holds one of the keys. 

    How activists and educators preach and teach CRT is the key to understanding how divisive the theory is in practice.

    Activists claim America is fundamentally racist, math is racist, the SAT College Entrance Exam is racist, and Whites are racists simply by being White.  

    Critical Race Theory Poll

    The above chart is from the YouGov report Just one-third of Americans have heard of critical race theory and believe they know what it means.

    The chart says the poll was January 23-June 15. The Poll Data it says the survey was June 13-June 15 a more believable date range. 

    Critical Race Theory by Gender and Race

    The above data is unweighted. The first chart reflects weighted data. Only blacks support CRT. 

    The poll lacks seriously needs a question regarding CRT as actually taught. 

    If more people actually understood what is going on, “bad for America” would soar.

    Battle Over Critical Race Theory

    With the above background set, please consider the WSJ article Battle Over Critical Race Theory

    Critical race theory is the latest battleground in the culture war. Since the murder of George Floyd last year, critical race theory’s key concepts, including “systemic racism,” “white privilege,” and “white fragility,” have become ubiquitous in America’s elite institutions. Progressive politicians have sought to implement “antiracist” policies to reduce racial disparities, such as minorities-only income programs and racially segregated vaccine distribution.

    The ideology has sparked an immense backlash. As Americans have sought to understand critical race theory, they have discovered that it has divided Americans into racial categories of “oppressor” and “oppressed” and promotes radical concepts such as “spirit murder” (what public schools supposedly do to black children) and “abolishing whiteness” (a purported precondition for social justice). In the classroom, critical race theory-inspired lessons have often devolved into race-based struggle sessions, with public schools forcing children to rank themselves according to a racial hierarchy, subjecting white teachers to “antiracist therapy,” and encouraging parents to become “white traitors.”

    According to a recent YouGov survey, of the 64% of Americans who have heard about critical race theory, 58% view it unfavorably, including 72% of political independents.

    That’s a major liability for the political left. Sensing that they are losing control of the narrative on race, left-leaning media outlets have launched a furious counterattack. Liberal pundits at the New York Times, Washington Post, MSNBC and elsewhere have begun spinning a new mythology that presents critical race theory as a benign academic concept, casts its detractors as right-wing extremists driven by racial resentment, and portrays legislation against critical race theory as an attempt to ban teaching about the history of slavery and racism. All three charges are false.

    The most successful campaigns have been led by racial minorities who oppose the manipulative and harmful practices of critical race theory in the classroom. Asian-Americans in particular have argued that critical race theory will undermine merit-based admissions, advanced learning programs and academic standards.

    Left is Losing the Debate

    The Journal notes that revolts against critical race theory training at high schools in liberal cities such as New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco. 

    I have commented on CRT previously, not necessarily by that name. 

    Racial Profiling

    On May 16, 2019 I discussed College Entrance Exam SAT Score Racial Profiling where 964=1223.

    To compensate for the fact that Blacks score lower on average than Asians and Whites, SAT to Give Students ‘Adversity Score’ and colleges are using that score. Numerous lawsuits ensued. 

    On December 9, 2019, diversity scores were in full swing as noted in Adversity Scores: The Latest Dumbing Down of US Education

    I did not associate SAT racial profiling with CRT, but that is what’s behind it.

    Political Interviews

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    Math is Racist

    On May 4, 2021, I noted To Promote Equality, California Proposes a Ban on Advanced Math Classes

    Actual California Board of Education Statements

    • The inequity of mathematics tracking in California can be undone through a coordinated approach in grades 6–12.

    • Middle-school students are best served in heterogeneous classes.

    • The push to calculus in grade twelve is itself misguided.

    • To encourage truly equitable and engaging mathematics classrooms we need to broaden perceptions of mathematics beyond methods and answers so that students come to view mathematics as a connected, multi-dimensional subject that is about sense making and reasoning, to which they can contribute and belong.

    The Woke Liberals Have a Bad Case of Progressophobia

    The situation is so extreme that even Leftist Bill Maher has had enough.

    In a scathing attack on CRT, Maher says The Woke Liberals Have a Bad Case of Progressophobia

    Please click on the link for a video and transcript.

    To stop this nonsense in it tracks, six states have banned teaching CRT. It’s a case of 6 down 44 to go.

    Whether voters understand the CRT name or not, they can see what’s happening.

    Appellate Court Strikes Down a Piece of Biden’s Race-Based America Rescue Plan

    On May 28, I noted Appellate Court Strikes Down a Piece of Biden’s Race-Based America Rescue Plan

    The Court ruled: “The Way to Stop Discrimination on the Basis of Race Is to Stop Discriminating on the Basis of Race.”

    I suspect a strong voter backlash against Biden’s radical attempts to appease Progressives and states efforts to promote race discrimination in the alleged name of justice.

    *  *  *

    Like these reports? I hope so, and if you do, please Subscribe to MishTalk Email Alerts.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 22:50

  • New Study Finds COVID-19 'Very Well Adapted' To Specifically Infect Humans
    New Study Finds COVID-19 ‘Very Well Adapted’ To Specifically Infect Humans

    An Australian team of researchers has published a new study which found that SARS-CoV-2, the virus which causes COVID-19, appears to be specifically adapted to attack human cells, according to the Daily Telegraph.

    Flinders University professor and vaccine researcher Dr Nikolai Petrovsky was part of a team that discovered that Covid-19 is uniquely adapted to attack human cells.

    The scientists from Flinders University and La Trobe used powerful computers to model the protein receptors in a number of animal species to see how the coronavirus’s spike protein attached itself to them.

    The theory was that if the coronavirus attached itself readily to an animal like a bat or a pangolin, it would have likely been the species that the bug used to make its leap into the human population.

    However, the modelling found that the coronavirus’s spike protein was best suited to attacking protein receptors in humans.

    “The computer modelling found the virus’s ability to bind to the bat ACE2 protein was poor relative to its ability to bind human cells,” said Flinders University epidemiologist and vaccine researcher Professor Nikolai Petrovsky, adding “This argues against the virus being transmitted directly from bats to humans.”

    “Hence, if the virus has a natural source, it could only have come to humans via an intermediary species which has yet to be found.”

    Other animals found to be relative susceptible to infection include pangolins, dogs and cats – all of which have been ruled out as an intermediary species between bats and humans.

    RMSD of overlay of S protein RBD (pink = with pangolin and turquoise = with human) complex with human ACE2 (red) or pangolin ACE2 (blue) after MD simulation showing different geometry of the two complexes.

    “Overall, putting aside the intriguing pangolin ACE2 results, our study showed that the COVID-19 virus was very well adapted to infect humans,” Professor Petrovsky said.

    The findings lend more weight to the lab-origin theory, which postulates that researchers at the Wuhan Institute of Virology became infected with SARS-CoV-2 and inadvertently spread the disease, or that it was intentionally released.

    The Australian team’s report, In silico comparison of SARS-CoV-2 spike protein-ACE2 binding affinities across species and implications for virus origin, can be found in the journal Scientific Reports.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 22:30

  • 542% Increase In Convicted Sex Offenders Arrested At Border
    542% Increase In Convicted Sex Offenders Arrested At Border

    Authored by Charlotte Cuthbertson via The Epoch Times,

    Border Patrol agents have arrested 353 illegal aliens with sex-related criminal convictions so far this fiscal year. A large number of the detainees had prior convictions for crimes involving a minor.

    In the same period in fiscal 2020, agents apprehended 55 criminal sex offenders, and 58 total in all of fiscal 2019.

    The number of criminals illegally crossing the southwest border has spiked in tandem with the border crossing surge this year. Convicted criminals are the most likely population of illegal aliens trying to avoid capture by Border Patrol.

    Border Patrol has detected more than 250,000 illegal aliens who have evaded capture so far this year, according to the newly-appointed Acting Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz on June 24. It’s impossible to estimate how many have evaded Border Patrol without detection.

    “There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t read a paper or a report from my agents that talks about criminal aliens, sexual offenders that they’ve apprehended out there,” Ortiz said during an event in Del Rio, Texas.

    “Those folks aren’t getting released in these communities. Guess what happens to them? They go to jail. When they get out of jail, they go back to their country of origin.”

    According to reports by Customs and Border Protection (CBP), many of the criminals being caught have already been deported, sometimes on multiple occasions.

    On June 24, agents in Rio Grande City, Texas, arrested convicted sex offender, Benito Gomez-Lopez, from Mexico. Gomez-Lopez was arrested in May 2020 by the Burleigh County Sheriff’s Department in North Dakota for possession of certain prohibited materials and promoting a sexual performance by a minor, according to CBP.

    He pleaded guilty to both counts and was sentenced to three years confinement, but was repatriated to Mexico in July 2020.

    On June 14, a Peruvian child rapist was arrested by Border Patrol after he entered the United States illegally near Roma, Texas, according to CBP. Pedro Asuncion ORE-Quispe, 43, had been deported in 2020 after serving over five years for felony rape of a child in Idaho.

    On June 20, Mexican national Isidro Efrain Gallardo-Rangel was apprehended as part of a group of 24 illegal aliens near Laredo. Gallardo-Rangel is a registered sex offender with an extensive criminal history and a conviction for indecency with a child in 2018 in Dallas, Texas, according to CBP.

    U.S. Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz at a community meeting in Del Rio, Texas, on June 24, 2021. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)

    Del Rio Sector

    Once a relatively quiet region for illegal border crossings, the Del Rio Sector in Texas is now the second busiest, after the Rio Grande Valley in south Texas.

    “We’ve seen a tremendous increase. So far this year, this fiscal year, today, we’ve caught 144,000 people in the Del Rio sector,” said sector chief Austin Skero on June 24.

    “We’ve gone through this before—we’ve seen these increases, these surges, for the last 30 or 40 years. It’s never been this bad. I’ll tell you that straight up, I’ve never seen it this bad.”

    Skero said the sector has seen a 1,400 percent increase in the number of sex offenders arrested by Border Patrol agents.

    A photo from a game camera that caught illegal aliens walking through private ranch land in Jim Hogg County, Texas, on March 25, 2021. (Courtesy of Susan Kibbe)

    A Del Rio resident said that prior to January he had seen two illegal aliens pass through his backyard.

    Now, he said, it’s hundreds a day.

    “I have four daughters—does it concern me when you say there’s a 1,400 percent increase in sex offenders? Yes, it concerns me,” the resident said during a border update on June 24.

    “I’m concerned about the single men who are running through my backyard, sneaking. And I’m about a 50 percent  success rate on whether or not I get an agent to come out to my place when I call. And when they do, it’s awesome, they bring helicopters, they bring support.

    “Otherwise, I’m sitting there unarmed and there’s a guy soaking wet in my backyard screaming at me in Spanish. I don’t know what to do with this guy.”

    The resident asked Border Patrol if they could provide some type of training to citizens to prepare them for such encounters.

    Skero suggested for residents to not engage with illegal aliens who are on their property and to call Border Patrol.

    “We’re going to come just as soon as we can. Sometimes it will be immediate, sometimes it might take us an hour.”

    But, he said, if an illegal immigrant is endangering a resident’s family, or is being assaultive, call 911.

    Del Rio Border Patrol Sector Chief Austin Skero at a press conference in Del Rio, Texas, on June 24, 2021. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)

    State Response

    At the behest of Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) started surging extra law enforcement resources to the border beginning in March.

    In the three months from March 4 through June 3, DPS has arrested 1,489 criminals.

    In addition, State Troopers have been involved in 340 vehicle pursuits along the border and have dealt with 630 vehicle bailouts. A bailout occurs when a vehicle being pulled by law enforcement stops and the illegal immigrant occupants scatter and flee to avoid capture.

    Abbott issued a state of disaster declaration on June 10, highlighting 34 border counties that are struggling with cross-border crime and illegal immigration.

    “We’re going to start making arrests, sending a message to anyone thinking about coming here: You’re not getting a free pass. You’re getting a straight pass to a jail cell,” Abbott said.

    Last week a prison unit in Dilley, Texas, was being emptied in preparation for illegal alien criminals.

    Abbott and Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey also issued a call for help to other governors on June 10.

    “With your help, we can apprehend more of these perpetrators of state and federal crimes, before they can cause problems in your state,” Abbott and Ducey, both Republicans, wrote in a letter.

    So far, several Republican governors have pledged support by way of sending law enforcement personnel or National Guard troops.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 22:10

  • India Sends 50,000 More Troops To Disputed Chinese Border In Major Escalation
    India Sends 50,000 More Troops To Disputed Chinese Border In Major Escalation

    After a past year of continued simmering Himalayan border tensions, particularly after the deadly June 2020 incident wherein Chinese and Indian border troops were in a fierce clash, India has escalated its stance by moving 50,000 additional troops to the Chinese border

    While the nuclear armed nation already has an estimated 200,000 stationed there, Bloomberg is reporting the alarming historic shift towards an offensive military posture against the world’s second-biggest economy“. 

    Times of India: ongoing troop surge to border.

    New Delhi is framing this as a necessary response to China’s own high altitude build-up, which reportedly stretches back to last summer, when there were skirmishes particularly along the India-Chinese border Line of Actual Control (LAC) in Galwan Valley. China has even of late reportedly militarized high altitude civilian airbases along it border with India.

    Chinese permanent or semi-permanent bases began to appear in that disputed region, as well as tanks and artillery units late last summer into Fall of 2020. The initial June 15 Galwan Valley incident which left 20 Indian troops dead and an untold number of PLA casualties, had been the worst incident in years.

    Here’s more on the significance of this “Goliath vs. Goliath” moment which too few among Western pundits seem to be taking enough notice off via Rabobank

    While previous deployments were aimed at blocking Chinese intrusions, the latest reportedly allows “Indian commanders more options to attack and seize territory in China if necessary in a strategy known as an ‘offensive defense.'” This is in response to a Chinese build-up, including the construction of airfields, runway buildings, bomb-proof bunkers, fighter jets, long-range artillery, and tanks. Markets will ignore the very fat tail risks inherent in two Asian Goliaths acting like this because of the liquidity provided by the US central-bank giant – yet the latter has no real sway in this sphere.   

    So all of this means we could soon witness another deadly border conflict on par with the June 15, 2020 fight which resulted in multiple rounds of attempted military-to-military peace talks.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    While those talks did appear to effectively diffuse the immediate potential for the outbreak of a wider border war, they clearly didn’t do much in terms of deterring a troop build-up on either side.

    Below: map showing contested border regions with both Pakistan and China, including site of the last Galwan Valley clash, which gained international attention resulting in a series of threats and counter-threats at the time…

    On this note, one Indian former army commander pointed out to Bloomberg that “Having so many soldiers on either side is risky when border management protocols have broken down,” given that “Both sides are likely to patrol the disputed border aggressively. A small local incident could spiral out of control with unintended consequences.”

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 21:50

  • Jason Whitlock: Dear Black America, We Are Being Lied To…
    Jason Whitlock: Dear Black America, We Are Being Lied To…

    Authored by Jason Whitlock via TheBlaze.com, (emphasis ours)

    Dear Black People:

    We are being lied to and set up. The mainstream media, Democratic politicians, social justice activists, and perhaps even your church pastor have led you to believe America is in the midst of a racial conflict similar to the Civil War and the civil rights movement.

    They have pitted us against the Proud Boys, the KKK, rural militia groups, and Trump supporters in a made-for-TV race war. Just five years after Barack Obama completed two terms as president of the United States, we’re supposed to believe America has been overrun by violent white supremacists determined to reinstate segregation, Jim Crow laws, and maybe even slavery.

    Evidence of this massive wave of 1920s-style bigotry amounts to three things:

    1) Republicans want all voters to show a government-issued ID;

    2) On January 6, unarmed Trump supporters crashed the Capitol and took pictures inside Nancy Pelosi’s office;

    3) Across the nation, police kill on average 250 black men and 450 white men per year.

    Oh, I almost forgot. There’s a fourth piece of evidence. Colin Kaepernick failed to land a job as a starting quarterback after pissing off a large segment of football fans by taking a knee during the national anthem.

    Those are the main smoking guns proving that white supremacy is the most dangerous domestic threat America faces. George Floyd, a habitual criminal and drug addict, is the Crispus Attucks of this raging race war. He is our rallying cry and hero.

    It’s a setup. We’re being used as decoys and distractions in a war that has nothing to do with race.

    The real war is about global power and the future of America’s system of government. This country’s elite, global citizens, and corporations prefer communism over capitalism and democracy. They prefer China’s system over our system.

    America has been the world’s leader in racial progress and fairness. The mainstream media are not allowed to explain this to you. Advertisers, aka major corporations, will no longer support media outlets that back our current democratic and capitalistic systems of governance.

    You say, what about Fox News? Turn it on. It’s filled with a bunch of MyPillow and wounded soldier commercials. America’s big, global corporations, the ones looking to improve their market share in China, are not financially supporting Fox News. The most popular voices at Fox News dislike China.

    The faux race war the mainstream media have promoted is a tool being used to convince you and non-black Americans that our system of government has been a giant failure.

    They want you to believe that a great reset is necessary to achieve fairness.

    The reset is communism, which starts with the gateway drug of socialism and ends in full-blown Marxism. China is run by the Communist Chinese Party. Communism has no respect for individual freedom or religion of any kind. Communism has no tolerance for political dissent.

    Your religion and free speech will not survive the reset. Communism is racial oppression’s best friend. When a nation is stripped of religious faith and free speech, few people have the courage to defend the rights of minorities. The elites cozying up to China do not care about you. They are aware of how despicably China treats black people. They are aware of how China squashes dissent.

    Do your own research on communism and what it stamps out and how it oppresses. Don’t take my word.

    You might be wondering why Oprah Winfrey or LeBron James or some other super popular black celebrity isn’t telling you what I am. They’re global elites. The reset won’t hurt them or their loved ones. Communism favors wealthy elites far more than capitalism and democracy do. Oprah, LeBron, and the other uber-wealthy black tokens will thrive under socialism and communism.

    You won’t. Unless you’re a 6’6″ basketball star or some other black entertainer capable of entertaining the people in power. That’s a tiny percentage of black people.

    Why won’t your favorite white cable newsman or newswoman tell you what I’m telling you? Rachel Maddow, Anderson Cooper, Chris Cuomo, Joe Scarborough, aren’t they our allies? No. They’re not. They’re political lobbyists working on behalf of the corporations and politicians pushing the reset.

    OK. What about me? You might think I’m a political partisan working on behalf of conservative Republicans. That is certainly how I’ve been painted by left-leaning media outlets and social media platforms. And I’m now partnered with Blaze Media, a platform that leans right.

    Judge my career. I have been at this for more than 30 years. I have been equally despised by the left and the right. I have publicly feuded with Bill O’Reilly and Keith Olbermann. I’ve been a guest on their old Fox News and MSNBC shows. I’ve worked and/or written for ESPN, Fox Sports, the Huffington Post, Playboy Magazine, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal. I spent years bashing Sarah Palin.

    I don’t play for any political team. I’ve never voted. I go wherever I believe I can speak, follow, and write the truth. The truth I believe the most is that Jesus Christ is our Lord and Savior.

    I believe Jesus is under attack. That’s why I’m at Blaze Media. You can’t defend Jesus at corporate media outlets. Advertisers won’t allow it. You can discuss the religion of racism every day at ESPN, CNN, MSNBC, and even Fox Sports. But it’s taboo to discuss the cure for racism — Jesus — on those platforms.

    I’m not saying any of this because there’s a big paycheck for black men espousing my views. The money for black broadcasters and journalists is connected to preaching the race-bait religion.

    Let me be clear. I’m not broke by any stretch. I’ve earned and saved a substantial sum of money. But I’ve bypassed far more money than I’ve earned with the choice I’ve made to follow the truth wherever it leads and my refusal to support the racial groupthink dictated by global elites.

    My faith won’t allow me to jump on board with the lunacy, racism, and sacrilege of Black Lives Matter, a movement founded by three lesbian self-admitted trained Marxists. BLM is an atheist movement in support of LGBTQ issues and the reshaping of America into a communist country. BLM is part of the deception.

    Black people tell me all the time: “I don’t support the BLM organization, but I support the slogan and sentiment.”

    Let me translate that. You despise the devil’s tree but love the fruit it produces. That’s some Don Lemon-Lori Lightfoot-Van Jones-Colin Kaepernick level of hypocrisy. You know, all the Malcolm X-wannabe, anti-white radicals in relationships with white partners. They hate the white tree but can’t live without the white fruit.

    We have to stop letting everyone use us. We’re being played. We’re all being played, black and white working-class people. It’s all a giant setup. Look at what they did to Trump supporters. They were manipulated into storming the Capitol, and then the corporate media portrayed it as a bloody, violent KKK rally intended to overthrow democracy. The so-called “insurrection” is an excuse for the government to seize more power and crush dissent.

    We, black people, have been convinced the crushing of working-class white people is good for us.

    It’s not. Working-class white people, Christian white people, are our true allies, not the elites. We can’t see that because of the made-for-TV hyper-focus on racial conflict.

    The defunding and demoralizing of police are tactics deployed to increase violence in major cities. Local media outlets are focusing on this rise in crime, national media outlets have followed suit, and social media platforms are generating viral videos exposing the crime wave.

    Guess who are the stars of this content. Black perpetrators.

    It’s all a massive setup. The stirring of racial animus between Obama worshippers and Trump worshippers is orchestrated by billionaire elites, executed by trained Marxists, promoted by millionaire influencers in the media, sports, and entertainment worlds, and co-signed by religious leaders pursuing popularity.

    Black America, print this letter and share it with family, friends, co-workers, and, most importantly, your pastor.

    My critics will tell you: “Oh, Jason Whitlock is a sellout. He hates black people.”

    That’s laughable. It’s part of the deception. I despise the people deceiving us, manipulating us to participate in a racial clash that will be used to destroy the religious and individual freedoms that liberated us.

    There’s a reason black and brown people across the globe fight to get into this country and excel when they do. They love the American tree and the fruit it produces.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 21:30

  • State Media Admits Kim Jong Un Looks "Emaciated", Says Population Is "Heartbroken"
    State Media Admits Kim Jong Un Looks “Emaciated”, Says Population Is “Heartbroken”

    “Everyone in North Korea is heartbroken over leader Kim Jong Un’s apparent weight loss, said an unidentified resident of Pyongyang quoted on the country’s tightly controlled state media, after watching recent video footage of Kim.” That’s according to Reuters after regional media has for a couple of weeks been consumed with speculation based on examinations of recent before and after photos.

    In mid-June, North Korean state media had issued new photos of Kim, after the strongman ruler hadn’t been seen publicly for a month. Compared to just a few months prior, he exhibited rapid weight loss. From then, side-by-side photo sets have been continuously analyzed for clues of what could be driving the new gaunter, thinner appearance: perhaps disease? or just a healthier diet and workout regimen? Extreme stress over the food and health crisis deeply impacting the country?

    Via NK News, based on a KCTV, June 22, 2021 appearance.

    What’s more unusual, strongly suggesting something serious could be happening with his health, is that his appearance is actually subject of commentary on North Korean state media itself.

    This further suggests Pyongyang wants the world to know something is going on:

    “Seeing our respected comrade General Secretary [Kim Jong Un] become emaciated like that, all the people became so heartbroken,” said a middle-aged man in an interview aired Friday evening.

    “Everyone is talking about it. We all just started to cry,” the man added. Korean Central Television (KCTV) aired the interview in a program on reactions from around the country to new propaganda songs released this week glorifying Kim and the ruling party.

    Given there’s a rapidly worsening food scarcity crisis inside North Korea, which Kim himself has increasingly addressed with unusual bluntness in official statements, Kim’s thinness could also be an intentional effort to display a “solidarity of suffering” of sorts with the common citizenry.

    Thus his appearance itself (possibly manipulated or edited in state broadcasts?) could be part of a propaganda effort to induce greater sympathy among the populace as well as globally.

    It was just weeks ago that Kim “warned about possible food shortages and called for his people to brace for extended Covid-19 restrictions as he opened a major political conference to discuss national efforts to salvage a broken economy.”

    Recent video of Kim entering state chambers while looking gaunt…

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    For over the past year North Korea has been even more isolated than usual, with Pyongyang having ordered a total closure of all borders in efforts to prevent the COVID-19 pandemic from spreading – a drastic move which at the same time has resulted in less food and medicines making it in.

    In addition to the widespread media attention given to Kim’s health, South Korean and Western intelligence agencies routinely monitor his appearance, looking for signs of health or other issues.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 21:10

  • NSA Whistleblower Reveals To Tucker Carlson That Biden Admin Spying On His Communications
    NSA Whistleblower Reveals To Tucker Carlson That Biden Admin Spying On His Communications

    Tucker Carlson says an NSA whistleblower has stepped forward and provided evidence that the National Security Agency (NSA) has been spying on him.

    “Yesterday we heard from a whistleblower within the US government, who reached out to warn us that the NSA (National Security Agency) has been monitoring our electronic communications and is planning to leak them in an attempt to take this show off the air,” said Carlson.

    The whistleblower, who is in a position to know, repeated back to us information about a story that we are working on, that could have only come directly from my texts and emails. There’s no other possible source for that information, period. The NSA captured that information without our knowledge, and did it for political reasons.

    The Biden administration is spying on is. We have confirmed that. This morning we filed a FOIA request asking for all information that the NSA and other agencies have gathered about this show.”

    Watch:

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsReaders will of course be familiar with the NSA spying revelations brought to light by Edward Snowden and WikiLeaks. Now let’s review some more recent headlines:

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 20:56

  • 5 Signs That Show That The Depravity In America Has Reached An Entirely New Level
    5 Signs That Show That The Depravity In America Has Reached An Entirely New Level

    Authored by Michael Snyder via The End of The American Dream blog,

    No matter how bad things get in this country, you can rest assured that we will always find a way to sink even lower.  From the very lowest levels of society all the way to the very highest levels of society, the level of depravity that we are now witnessing all around us is absolutely stunning.  At this point, most Americans do not have any sort of a solid moral foundation, and it shows.  Everyone is just basically doing whatever seems right in their own eyes, and that has resulted in complete and utter chaos.  We are a very, very sick nation, and we are getting even sicker with each passing day. 

    Let me give you five examples of what I am talking about…

    #1 25-year-old Joel Davis was supposed to be one of the good guys.  He was nominated for a Nobel prize after founding an organization that sought to end sexual violence against children, but how he has been sentenced to 13 years in prison for doing things that are absolutely unthinkable

    The founder of an organization dedicated to ending child sex abuse has been sentenced to 13 years in prison on child rape and child pornography charges.

    Joel Davis, 25, was convicted of ‘enticing a child to engage in illegal sexual activity,’ possession and distribution of child pornography, US Attorney for the Southern District of New York Audrey Strauss announced on Tuesday.

    Of course Davis is far from alone.  There are 780,407 registered sex offenders in America today, but that number only includes those that have actually been caught.

    At this point, our society is absolutely teeming with sexual predators, and they are represented on every level of society.

    #2 Country music fans are supposed to be much better behaved than most other music fans, but even they are starting to behave like crazed mindless zombies.  During a “Redneck Rave” in Kentucky this past weekend, there were numerous acts of violence and four dozen people were charged with various crimes

    Police said that by the end of the five-day bash, dubbed the “Redneck Rave,” one man had been impaled, one woman had been strangled to the point of unconsciousness, and one throat had been slit. In all, Edmonson authorities arrested 14 people, and charged four dozen people from five states.

    If even country music fans are starting to get this wild, I think that is a really troubling sign for our society as a whole.

    #3 Chicago has been a very violent city for a long time, but when Yasmin Perez and Gyovanni Arzuaga were dragged out of their vehicles and shot by an angry mob, it shocked the entire world

    Disturbing video footage circulating on social-media that apparently captured the 9:15 p.m. assault shows the victims either being pulled or falling out of their car — which was flying a Puerto Rican flag — then blasted at close-range by a single gunman.

    Arzuaga, 24, was fatally shot in the head, while Perez, the 25-year-old mother of the couple’s two children, was left in critical condition from a gunshot to the neck, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.

    We have now learned that Perez has died too.

    The couple had two children together, and now both of their parents are dead.

    What are those two children supposed to do now?

    #4 According to text messages obtained by the Daily Mail, it appears that Hunter Biden paid a Russian prostitute $25,000 using a financial account that was linked to his very famous father…

    Hotel bills show Hunter then moved to a $470-per-night room at The Jeremy in West Hollywood later that month, where he hired another escort while under the protection of two recently retired Secret Service agents.

    And messages saved on the laptop show Joe Biden might have inadvertently been the person actually paying the bill for the wild week, according to the messages obtained by the Post.

    In recent days, a number of extremely shocking revelations about Hunter Biden and the Biden family have come out in the British press.

    But the bigger story is that the corporate media in the United States is almost completely ignoring these revelations.  Telling the truth about the Bidens would hurt the agendas that they are trying to push, and so the Bidens are off limits for now.

    Our corporate media is deeply, deeply corrupt, and that isn’t going to change.

    #5 The week, we learned that a CDC “safety group” has acknowledged that COVID shots are causing many teens to develop a “heart inflammatory condition”

    A CDC safety group said there’s a “likely association” between a rare heart inflammatory condition in adolescents and young adults mostly after they’ve received their second Covid-19 vaccine shot, citing the most recent data available.

    There have been more than 1,200 cases of a myocarditis or pericarditis mostly in people 30 and under who received Pfizer’s or Moderna’s Covid vaccine, according to a series of slide presentations published Wednesday for a meeting of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices.

    Even though they know that this is happening, they are just going to keep giving injections to more kids.

    In the end, how many thousands upon thousands of young Americans will develop myocarditis or pericarditis as a result?

    I could make this list much longer, but I think by now you get my point.

    From the very top to the very bottom, the very fabric of our society is coming apart at the seams.

    So many of the “good guys” turn out to be quite evil, and often the wickedness in the halls of power is even worse than it is in our streets.

    Millions of Americans are working so hard to find a political solution to our problems, but the truth is that there is great depravity all across the political spectrum.  Replacing one set of depraved politicians with another set of depraved politicians is not going to accomplish much of anything.

    In the end, what we are facing is a heart problem.  The hearts of the American people need to change, but at this point much of the population is eagerly rushing toward more evil as rapidly as they can.

    Many of us will continue to call for a renewal in America, but time is running out.

    There is a little bit less sand in the hourglass with each passing day, and it won’t be too long before we reach the moment when it is entirely empty.

    *  *  *

    Michael’s new book entitled “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 20:50

  • Israel Sees Explosion Of Cases In Vaccinated Patients Caused By "Delta" Variant
    Israel Sees Explosion Of Cases In Vaccinated Patients Caused By “Delta” Variant

    More evidence is emerging to suggest that the Delta COVID variant poses a very real threat, even to patients who have already been fully vaccinated.

    As a reminder, the WHO’s new naming scheme has the most pervasive variants named after greek letters. Right now, the Delta variant is causing the most trouble worldwide.

    Source: SCMP

    It prompted UK PM Boris Johnson to delaying the end of the UK’s COVID-19 restrictions, which have been rolled back with agonizing slowness, as many Britons have complained. It is also now causing a wave of lockdowns and travel restrictions around the world as countries with lower vaccination rates have come to see it as a serious threat. Meanwhile, despite Israel’s efforts to try and suppress the variant, more cases of Delta have been detected across the country, forcing Israel’s public health authorities to consider more drastic measures.

    An outbreak of the Delta variant in Israel has spread to many vaccinated people, with about half of the adults infected already being fully innocualted with the Pfizer vaccine. Along with Moderna’s jab, the two mRNA-based vaccines are believed to be more than 90% effective against preventing COVID-19. Still, as more evidence of spread among the vaccinated arises, Pfizer and Moderna will have more incentive to market “booster” vaccines as they transition to protecting the vulnerable against COVID over the long term.

    Ran Balicer, the head of Israel’s COVID-19 government advisory committee, said that about 90% of new infections in the country were likely caused by the Delta variant.

    “The entrance of the Delta variant has changed the transmission dynamics,” Balicer said.

    Children under the age of 16, most of whom haven’t yet been vaccinated, accounted for roughly half of the new cases.

    Israel has seen the Delta variant drive cases higher for the first time in months, as the average daily count of new cases has risen to 200 from around 10 a day for most of June. It doesn’t look like much, but public health officials fear it might be the start of another wave of infections, undermining PM Bennett and former PM Netanyahu’s efforts to crush COVID entirely.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 20:30

  • Is China's Bitcoin Mining Ban A Benefit In Disguise?
    Is China’s Bitcoin Mining Ban A Benefit In Disguise?

    Authored by Fan Yu via The Epoch Times,

    Beijing’s broadening ban on cryptocurrency mining has – for now – crippled the industry and sent bitcoin prices collapsing. But as bitcoin miners move to other regions and countries, China’s recent action could usher a period of greater stability for the cryptocurrency.

    More diverse distribution of mining power and higher usage of renewable energy could also be in store.

    In late May, China’s State Council issued treatises to crack down on bitcoin trading and mining. The notices came after China’s central bank began implementing its own digital currency.

    The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) deems cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin a nuisance, disrupting economic order and facilitating illegal transfers of wealth. In addition, Beijing has decried the massive power consumption of bitcoin miners.

    Following the CCP’s call, several provinces and territories including Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, and Sichuan, have begun enforcement measures to shut down mining operations.

    And this has sent bitcoin prices tumbling. Bitcoin prices plunged below $30,000 the week of June 14 after hitting its all-time highs above $60,000 in April.

    Why the tumble? The CCP’s ban on mining has disrupted the computing power available to maintain and update the bitcoin blockchain.

    China was estimated to hold more than half of bitcoin’s mining capacity, with the majority of bitcoin miners located in the Xinjiang Autonomous region and Sichuan province. Around 65 percent of the world’s bitcoin mining was located in China as of 2020, according to an analysis by the Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index. While that market share has declined somewhat more recently, China still dominates bitcoin processing power.

    Unlike mining operations of minerals such as gold and iron, bitcoin mining does not involve hulking equipment. Bitcoin miners utilize warehouses of computers to solve computational problems to verify transaction, update, and maintain the bitcoin blockchain. In effect, the miners keep the bitcoin blockchain updated and in turn, are compensated with new blocks of bitcoin for their work.

    Since China’s ban bitcoin’s hash rate—the computational power available to mine the cryptocurrency, which is a reflection of the efficiency of the bitcoin blockchain network—has dropped by nearly 50 percent over the last month, according to data from cryptocurrency firm The Block. Xinjiang and Sichuan provinces alone are thought to have contributed to 30 percent of total mining power.

    This is definitely a near-term headwind for the industry. But China’s crackdown could be a long-term net positive development for the cryptocurrency industry.

    For one, neither China’s ban nor the subsequent collapse in hash rates should be surprising. In fact, it’s shocking that so much bitcoin mining power was concentrated in China to begin with.

    The CCP has been battling cryptocurrencies for almost a decade. Back in 2013, Beijing barred all financial institutions from handling cryptocurrencies. China then banned all initial coin offerings in 2017. By mid-2019, the People’s Bank of China blocked access to all domestic and foreign cryptocurrency exchanges to snuff out trading activity. While the CCP stopped short of declaring ownership of cryptocurrencies illegal, it had in effect banned all forms of trading and exchange, including barring domestic financial institutions from exchanging digital currencies with the yuan. Those actions were mostly centered around limiting wealth transfer but the CCP’s intent has been clear since 2013.

    So what does this mean for bitcoin and bitcoin mining? In the near term, with bitcoin mining capacity decreasing due to the CCP’s crack down, bitcoin mining becomes much more lucrative.

    “As more hashrate falls off the network, difficulty will adjust downwards, and the hashrate that remains active on the network will receive more for their proportional share of the mining rewards,” Kevin Zhang, vice president of crypto mining equipment company The Foundry, said in a recent CNBC interview. In other words, the incremental “reward” for mining bitcoins is higher when there are fewer miners.

    But there are other longer term positives.

    Less geographic concentration promises to make the bitcoin blockchain less vulnerable to the whims and regulations of a single country. Many Chinese mining operations have shipped their equipment abroad, with the United States and Kazakhstan as net beneficiaries.

    For example, the Shenzhen-based and NYSE-listed BIT Mining has shipped most of its mining equipment outside China, according to statement from the company. Approximately 320 mining machines were delivered to a facility in Kazakhstan and the company said its operations should be back online by June 27.

    A large portion of mining is expected to shift to the United States. CNBC’s Eunice Yoon tweeted on June 21 that a Guangzhou-based logistics firm was transporting 6,600 lbs of bitcoin mining computers destined for Maryland.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    Another potential beneficiary is the state of Texas, which also happens to have some of the most pro-bitcoin politicians in the United States. Texas has some of the country’s lowest energy prices and a growing share of renewable energy sources.

    And energy diversification is key. Relocating bitcoin hash rates from China to the United States—which has a much more diversified energy supply—would improve bitcoin mining’s carbon footprint, a key criticism of the cryptocurrency.

    Tesla founder and CEO Elon Musk announced that Tesla would no longer accept bitcoin until its hash rates reached 50 percent from clean energy sources. Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren has also criticism bitcoin for its energy usage and resulting impact on the environment.

    While longer term viability of cryptocurrencies and bitcoin are still up in the air, moving mining capacity outside of China is at least a tangible first step in addressing those concerns and criticisms.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 20:10

  • "It's So Out Of Control": Airlines Mull Ending Alcohol Service As In-Flight Incidents Skyrocket
    “It’s So Out Of Control”: Airlines Mull Ending Alcohol Service As In-Flight Incidents Skyrocket

    Now that Covid lockdowns are ending, Americans can get back to what they do best: getting into fist fights on airplanes.

    Yes, despite the fact that travel restrictions are ending and citizens can get back to vacationing over the summer, things continue to get ornery in the “friendly skies”.

    The incidents have become so common, there has been a discussion about ending everyone’s favorite travel companion: alcohol on flights. 

    Paul Hartshorn, Jr., communications chair for the Association of Professional Flight Attendants, told Yahoo: “Our flight attendants are being verbally abused—it’s safe to say on every flight. [They’re] physically abused in numbers we’ve never seen in the airline industry. It’s so out of control, it’s almost unbelievable.”

    American Airlines flight attendants filed 1,500 passenger disturbance reports in April, the report noted. Hartshorn continued: “More times than not, it is exacerbated by the use of alcohol in the terminal or sneaking it on board. So those go hand in hand.”

    This has resulted in the flight attendants union pushing for a delay to return alcohol service to flights. Many airlines paused alcohol service during the pandemic. American Airlines says service will resume after September 13, when it will also lift its mask rules. 

    Hartshorn continued: “The decision to delay the alcohol until masks are no longer required was a flight attendant union move. American didn’t want to do that, that was APFA.”

    The Association of Flight Attendants-CWA president Sara Nelson also advocated for the ban: “The incidents of violence on planes is out of control and alcohol is often a contributor. The federal government should provide guidance to airlines and airports on pausing alcohol sales for a period of time. We should do everything in our power to remove contributors to the problem.”

    One aptly named aviation expert, Christine Negroni, added: “I know going back many many years alcohol has been considered a high trigger for unruly passenger behavior. But I don’t know if you can put all the blame on alcohol.” 

    As a result, the FAA is stepping up consequences for unruly behavior, Yahoo notes:

    Federal officials are taking some additional steps to try to tamp down the issue. The Federal Aviation Administration has announced a “zero tolerance policy” against any interference with flight crews, as well as a handful of lofty civil fines—as high as $32,750—against passengers who committed some of the more egregious infractions.

    Recall, it was just two weeks ago we wrote about two men who were ejected from a flight in San Francisco over an argument about elbow room. 

    Two passengers had to be removed from the plane after an argument over elbow room on an armrest. We suggested then what we’ll say again now: Maybe airlines should take note of what these disruptions cost as they figure out new and creative ways to cram economy flyers even closer together. 

    Google product director Jack Krawczyk documented the spat on Twitter, writing: “On my first flight in 15 months, of course we were rerouted back to the gate because two passengers got into a physical altercation over elbow placement upon arm rests.”

    The flight was on its way to Las Vegas when the incident took place before takeoff, the NY Post reports. The men involved in the altercation haven’t been identified, but were detained when an officer arrived at the gate. 

    Despite neither man wanting to “pursue further police action”, they weren’t allowed back on the flight.

    One response to Krawczyk’s Tweet read: “This is fucking why I HATE traveling economy. You’re cramming a bunch of uneducated low lives into cheap seats with barely any leg and arm room and expecting them to be civil? Throw in them having to wear masks now and good LUCK.”

    And with airlines strapped and the government bailout dole looking like it’s finally drying up, it doesn’t look as though the situation is going to be getting better for air travelers anytime soon. 

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 19:50

  • The Technocratic Mindset Produces Only Misery And Failure
    The Technocratic Mindset Produces Only Misery And Failure

    Authored by Mark Jeftovic via BombThrower.com,

    It has the most fundamental aspect reality backwards

    Saw this article come across, come across my news alert for “Transhumanism”. In it Dr. David Eagleman talks about how not only can we augment human senses with fantastic new abilities (like to “see” heat and electromagnetic patterns), but how we’ll even be able to build machines that think too.

    There is a line in his thinking that one can glean from the article: on one side of the line are enhancements and augmentations to the human experience which are startling and amazing and which will transform our societies: even more radical life extension will be in the cards quite soon (for those who can afford it).

    Like I told Steve Bannon when we talked Transhumanism: For all intents and purposes we already have radical life extension. In the years of the Roman Empire, average life expectancy was between 18 and 25 and most people would die before age 11, from something like diarrhea. This was just normal and nobody thought it would ever change.

    Where Eagleman crosses into technocratic thinking is when he veers into the idea of being able to build thinking machines. The logic is that because we’ll be able to increasingly bioengineer our own living bodies, it means we should also be able to bioengineer a mind into machines using the same principles.

    I think this is wrong and it’s the same theoretical mistake that leads directly to technocratically inspired catastrophes.

    Yes, we continue to build on technological advancements, but we also commit a lot of unforced errors that inflict incalculable misery on humanity. These errors may manifest as policy blunders, economic crises and worse. Most recently, for example, we seem to have gotten ourselves into a global pandemic because a bunch of technocrats funded some gain-of-function experiments in hopes of preempting the next pandemic. Do you see the dynamic here?

    Over the years a lot of thinkers have pointed out that technoractic policy tracks, devised by centralized groups of experts within an elite managerial class, often bring about the very conditions they were impaneled to obviate. Raising minimum wages increases unemployment, holding interest rates to zero creates economic instability and increases wealth inequality, forcing green energy initiatives creates systems with lower energy efficiency and higher carbon footprints

    Banning guns increases gun violence, censoring “hate” speech fosters more hatred and polarization. It’s almost as if the managerial class has no awareness of second-order effects. When they inexorably come to pass they are often blamed on the very people who were counselling against the initial policy in the first place.

    Thus, financial meltdowns are blamed on runaway free markets and capitalism gone wild. Global warming (if it truly plays out along prognosticated lines) is blamed on industries who are most rapidly transitioning toward greener energy anyway (like Bitcoin mining).

    Climate change is another theme that exemplifies the technocratic dynamic: As a society we’re going to transition off of fossil fuels no matter what anybody thinks about the environment because we’re already past peak oil, and peak demand will probably flatline around 100M bpd and start coming down from there in a secular downtrend, for a variety of reasons (prolonged economic malaise and the ascent of green energy).

    Yet the most viable pathway toward transitioning away from fossil fuels, nuclear (and in this I include Thorium), is currently relegated as problematic by technocrats and ideologues.

    It all seems backwards and for a long time I’ve been positing a fundamental root cause of this backwardation. I’ve settled on something I’ve talked about before, but now I think I didn’t fully realize how fundamental this key point is. When I sat down to resume work on my forthcoming book about Techno-Utopianism and Transhumanism I tried to write around it and avoid it. But I realized I couldn’t. It is so core to the overall technocratic mindset and it’s so controversial that I have to caveat it before I say it:

    The caveat is that I don’t identify as a Christian or even a religious person per se. But I’m not an atheist either, and I’m not even agnostic. What I’m about to say is derived from my own understanding of scientific inquiry, not theological.

    The premise is that what we have the mind/matter equation completely backwards in the way we think about how the world works.

    Conventional thought is that what we experience as consciousness is something that emanates from the brain. Like steam from a kettle. This is also the core assumption of AI. If we build something that resembles a brain, it’ll think. It’s a kind of Frankenstein approach that Eagleman alludes to in his article.

    That won’t work and AI will never be achieved as long as the mechanistic, material reductionist worldview persists. Yet, technocrats put a lot of faith in AI, and they think models derived from AI are or will be superior to anything we can figure out on our own because they were outputted by machines with a bigger/faster/hardware brains.

    It is completely… wrong.

    I think that what we experience as matter are energy patterns that emanate from an underlying, and conscious sub-strata of reality. This is basic quantum theory. Quantum theory can be problematic because it opens the door to all kinds of New Age Woo Woo, which may not even be entirely wrong at its core, but is prone to deeply flawed implementations (like anything, I guess).

    People, and probably most living things, have a sense, an intuitive awareness of this sub-strata of reality. Our mythology and sacred texts are probably the stories of sometimes being more attuned to it and sometimes less so. The late British writer Colin Wilson wrote at length on the consciousness of the Egyptians of the upper kingdom, possibly over 7500 years BC. Their consciousness and language was pictorial not linear. It may even be possible (my extrapolation, not his) that the demarcation point between conscious awareness between individuals was blurred somewhat. Almost like the canine packs of Vernor Vinge’s Tines in ‘Fire Upon The Deep’.

    Owen Barfield completely rejects the conventional idea of how our language evolved, that we started with “Ug ug” and developed from there. He thinks we had that pictorial awareness, a communications protocol unimaginable to us now, that in effect condensed downwards into linear language. This is a microcosm of the tension between how the technocratic mindset views everything as complexity arising from simple, mechanistic building blocks and a more informational / probabilistic / patternist view of reality.
    Jean Gebser mapped the evolution of consciousness itself in The Ever Present Origin and today people like Ken Wilbur talk about how these different modalities of consciousness don’t supplant each other, like a linear development, but rather layer atop each other in a progression where each layer integrates those below it. At least the one we’re at today, the integrative consciousness, does so.

    My guess is in earlier days, a type of spiritual wonderment would have arisen from these glimpses of the underlying force. What I’ve grown to call “The Great Externality” because I was trying to describe it in non-religious terms. Maybe it’s more of a Great Sub-Carrier. Think if it like “dialtone of reality”. Spiritual philosophers like Alan Watts said the entire point of all life was that the universe was physically manifesting in order to experience itself. He wasn’t the first, obviously, its a variation of a theme that has been recurrent throughout all recorded history, and possibly even before.

    So what happened?

    Into this awareness came religions. Organized structures that would begin to dictate the basis on which members of society were to comprehend and approach this Great Sub-Carrier. Priesthoods evolved – the first monopolies. Religions. Hierarchies. Rulers. Subjects.

    One of the earliest forms of social deviance was heresy: approaching the Divine Sub-Carrier from a direction outside the religious structure. Can’t have that.

    This dynamic is as old as humanity. It could even be argued that historical progress is the story of the public coming to realize that the monopoly thought structure they were in was flawed or obsolete and then society moving on to the next one. The elites of the day would endeavour halt the progression or when that failed, co-opt whatever came next.

    Then new elites would erect a new orthodoxy that placed them directly in the nexus of what was unknowable and what the rabble thought they needed to know in order to perform their primary function of ….servitude.

    Today the great sub-carrier is best described by science, not religion. But again, the priesthood is saying that all knowledge of the sub-carrier should come through them. That’s Scientism. That’s Technocracy. Management by Experts.

    The last two years of life on earth are a foretaste of a full blown technocracy. Follow The Science™, plebes.

    Only our elites can fathom how to approach and extract knowledge from The Great Externality, but this time they’ve made things even worse because they have it exactly backwards. They think the Great Externality doesn’t even exist. It’s for flakes and Bible bangers. The technocratic priesthood holds that material reality is near completely understood and that our minds are side effects of chemical reactions in our brains.

    They hold that if only we can crunch enough Big Data and calculate out all the models we’ll be, like God (who doesn’t exist), able to fix everything and eliminate all bad outcomes, for everybody, everywhere. We may even be able to eliminate death, and we could upload our consciousness (which is an illusion) into the cloud and live forever.

    Because of this backwardation, we will always be careening from one catastrophe to the next, and most of them will be of our own making. We collectively suffer from an illusion that we are in control.

    But we are not in control. We’re a pattern. A dance. A cycle. Waveforms. Vibrations. What we as humans do specifically well, which is our superpower and has led to our technological advancement which could conceivably continue on a trajectory that makes humanity an interstellar phenomenon, is adapt.

    What technocrats can’t understand, or admit is that we can’t control what is going to happen. Either on an individual scale of people thinking in ways they’re not supposed to think, or geological, cultural, geopolitical or cosmic scales. We can’t get interest rates right, we can’t get everybody to agree on whether it’s “Gif” or “jif” and somehow we’re going to change the trajectory of the climate? Achieve immortality? Crank out a Singularity?

    That is highly unlikely and in trying to preempt theoretical bad outcomes we typically bring about horrible actual outcomes. The lab leak from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, if it occurred and it is looking increasingly likely that it did, was the result of gain-of-function studies on bat coronaviruses. They didn’t do it as a bioweapon. It’s not a global conspiracy to institute a Great Reset (all that talk is opportunism more than planning).

    They were trying to figure out how to plan for a future global pandemic that may catch humanity off guard and cause incalculable damage. What did they accomplish? They unleashed a global pandemic that caught humanity off guard and caused incalculable damage. Soon to be compounded by global, de-facto compulsory inoculations with experimental vaccines that have a distinctly politicized impetus behind them.

    That same dynamic is applied to economics (its where the .COM crash and Global Financial Crisis came from), and social policy (the Woke movement), to climate is all the same technocratic mindset that doesn’t understand the order of reality (mind, then matter) but even worse thinks it knows it.

    We’re stuck with that for awhile because the technocratic mindset is incapable of introspection or entertaining the possibility of being wrong about anything. The only move it knows is to double-down on failure.

    The antidote to all this is massive decentralization on a global scale, which has the added benefit that decentralization by definition, is not something that gets decided from the top (it never is). It just happens, even in spite of the people in the centre of power who may feel something about their gravitas melting away.

    That’s what has started to happen. A global opt-out. The Great Reject. As sure as the Reformation gave way to the Enlightenment despite the protestations of the Church, we’re headed into a world of networks and the sunset of nations. All the while the propagandists of  the old order shrieking that in this direction lies certain doom.

    The Enlightenment arose from an increase in the level of abstraction, structurally the universe changed from the Ptolemaic worldview (the world as the centre of all existence) to the Heliocentric solar system.

    Now we’re experiencing a similar shift away from static top-down hierarchical structures as the natural shape of civilization and toward shifting, impermanent, overlapping networks. My guess is the beginnings of quantum mechanics, over 100 years ago was the setting the table for the wider realization that we don’t live in a ping-pong ball universe where consciousness is an epiphenomenon of the brain. Rather that reality is an intersection of probabilities and information between what David Bohm called The Implicate and Explicate orders.

    Via: The Pribram-Bohm holoflux theory of consciousness: An integral interpretation of the theories of Karl Pribram, David Bohm, and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

    When AI researchers turn their attention toward building something that more closely resembles a transceiver that taps into that sub-carrier of reality, they’ll have a shot at making something that actually thinks.

    *  *  *

    To receive future posts in your mailbox join the free Bombthrower mailing listfollow me on Twitter, or use the current weakness in cryptos to take advantage of my Crypto Capitalist Portfolio trial offer.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 19:30

  • Hong Kong Bars UK Travelers Over "Extremely High" COVID Risks As Crackdown On "Foreign Influence" Continues
    Hong Kong Bars UK Travelers Over “Extremely High” COVID Risks As Crackdown On “Foreign Influence” Continues

    After Hong Kong police arrested more journalists from the now-defunct Apple Daily over the weekend, a sign that Beijing’s crackdown on democratic freedoms under the guise of the new “national security” law isn’t letting up, health authorities on Monday announced that they would bar travelers from the UK after reintroducing the UK to HK’s list of “extremely high-risk” countries.

    Two sources confirmed the decision to the SCMP, the biggest English-language newspaper in HK (it’s also owned by Jack Ma, who is now officially under the CCP jackboot). The move comes just days after the city tightened quarantine rules for foreign visitors, and also after reports in the western press claimed Beijing plans to keep its borders closed to almost all foreign travelers until the second half of next year (with a handful of exceptions for countries with high vaccination rates).

    Before ramping up the UK’s designation to “extremely high risk”, HK had already moved the UK to “very high risk”, meaning travelers would need to quarantine for 21 days upon arrival, a quarantine term that would exclude all but the most essential business travel. Hong Kong health officials claim that over the past week, the country has recorded 14,876 new COVID-19 infections and 11 related deaths on Sunday.

    Between June 21 and 27, a total of 104,052 people tested positive for Covid-19, accounting for a 58.7 per cent increase compared to the previous week. The latest COVID cases and arrivals from the UK, Indonesia and Namibia took the city’s overall tally of confirmed cases to 11,920 infections, with 211 deaths.

    Authorities in Hong Kong are also worried about a recent domestic case: a 24-year-old employee at Uptown Mall who was found to be infected has got health authorities worried about a 5th COVID outbreak should the busy shopping center end up being a “super spreader” site.

    Health officials believe the 27-year-old man may have caught the virus at an airport testing centre, as he shared the same viral footprint as three domestic workers who recently arrived from Indonesia. The building where the 24-year-old woman lives, block 10 of Tai Po Centre, was ordered into an overnight lockdown for mandatory virus screening on Sunday evening. Compulsory testing was also required of recent visitors to the mall. But the lockdown operation, which ended at about 8.30am, uncovered no cases among the approximately 390 residents screened during the night.

    Health officials previously said their genome analysis showed the 24-year-old woman carried the more transmissible L452R strain, but without the N501Y or E484K mutations, making it likely to be a Delta variant.

    In other HK news, another editorial writer from the now-shuttered Apple Daily newspaper was arrested at the airport on Sunday while attempting to flee the city.

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    Beijing has denounced the UK’s meddling as yet another example of the corrosive “foreign influence” that the new national security law – imposed on the territory last year by the CCP – prohibits.

    Many pro-democracy supporters have fled to the UK, which has offered to naturalize any Hong Kongers fleeing Beijing’s crackdown on the city’s freedoms in violation of the international treaty that sets out the terms of Hong Kong’s transition back under Chinese control. The battle over Hong Kong’s fate has badly strained relations between the UK and Beijing. And now, with flights from the UK effectively eliminated, how much harder will it be for Hong Kongers to make a break for London?

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 19:10

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Today’s News 28th June 2021

  • Thousands Of Asteroids Whizz Past Earth
    Thousands Of Asteroids Whizz Past Earth

    NASA’s Center for Near Earth Object Studies keeps an eye on the sky, surveying more than 26,000 asteroids and a much smaller number of comets that pass near Earth. Near Earth Asteroids, or NEAs, also include more than 2,000 potentially dangerous specimen, of which 158 have a diameter of more than one kilometer, making them 2.5 times as tall as the Empire State Building.

    As Statista’s Katharina Buchholz points out, anyone who has dabbled in paleontology – even in the science fiction realm of Jurassic Park or The Land Before Time – knows that a giant asteroid hitting Earth is not good news for life on the planet. In fact, there is evidence that this may have been one of the main causes of the Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction.

    But it does not take a massive asteroid to cause widespread damage. An asteroid that was only ten meters in diameter exploded 25 km above the Bering Sea in December 2019 with the force equivalent to ten Hiroshima atomic bombs. No international or national space organization had detected the small celestial object before it disintegrated above the unsuspecting Earth.

    Infographic: Thousands of Asteroids Whizz Past Earth | Statista

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    As technology has advanced throughout the decades, people have become better at seeing what is floating around us in the sky.

    According to Nasa’s CNEOS Center, only a handful of celestial objects had been detected by 1900.

    The scale of that number did not change much until the end of the century. As of 1990, only 134 Near Earth Asteroids and 42 potentially dangerous objects were detected up above.

    By comparison, 26,115 NEAs and 2,185 potentially dangerous asteroids had been identified as June 2021.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 02:45

  • Georgia & Ukraine Agree To "Commitment" Seeking NATO Membership
    Georgia & Ukraine Agree To “Commitment” Seeking NATO Membership

    Authored by Rick Rozoff via AntiWar.com,

    Georgian President Salome Zurabishvili paid a two-day visit to Ukraine earlier last week (her first) and met with her opposite number President Volodymyr Zelensky.

    Zurabishvili first came to world notice when she emerged as part of the triumvirate that took over in Georgia following the so-called Rose Revolution in late 2003 that saw incumbent head of state Eduard Shevardnadze manhandled and divested of his powers. Her colleagues were Mikheil Saakashvili, who became president, and Zurab Zhvania, whose family claims he was assassinated in 2005. That event is the prototype of what have come to be called color revolutions; after Georgia the Orange Revolution in Ukraine in 2004, the Tulip Revolution in Kyrgyzstan and the Cedar Revolution in Lebanon in 2005, and a veritable host of others, successful and otherwise, in Belarus, Moldova, Armenia, the Maldives, Venezuela, Myanmar, Iran and elsewhere.

    Deposed president Shevardnadze accused George Soros and his “philanthropies” of funding the coup in his nation. Shortly after Saakashvili and his allies came to power Soros’ Open Society Institute partnered with the United Nations Development Program to create a Capacity Building Fund for Georgia. The initiative was announced at a joint news conference with Saakashvili, the then-United Nations Development Program administrator and Soros at the World Economic Forum that year. Over 5,000 Georgian officials were paid out of the fund.

    Later that same year the Orange Revolution occurred in Ukraine and a similar triumvirate, two men and a woman (it would be the same in Kyrgyzstan in 2005), took power.

    The West, especially NATO, has always treated the two Black Sea nations as a pair. The military bloc created a NATO-Georgia Commission and a NATO-Ukraine Commission in 2008; each has been granted an Annual National Programme in those formats.

    Last year they were among the first nations to become NATO Enhanced Opportunities Partners.

    This week Ukraine’s Zelensky praised the strategic relations between the nations, affirming they shared a joint commitment to joining NATO and the European Union. He added they “agree regarding the future development of the Eastern Partnership,” whose association agreement demand on now deposed President Viktor Yanukovych led to the coup in 2014 and the resultant war in the Donbass. The Eastern Partnership, originally devised by Poland and Sweden, has as it mission the absorption of all remaining European and Caucasian former Soviet states into the European Union (and NATO) – except Russia.

    Meanwhile, characteristically hawkish Western think tanks are clamoring for more confrontation…

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    The Ukrainian head of state also spoke of strengthening military integration in the Black Sea – against Russia, of course – particularly in regard to the Ukrainian and Georgian navies.

    President Zurabishvili stated it was disappointing that the two nations “lost some time that should have been used to deepen relations,” in reference to a two-year freeze in relations after Zelensky appointed former Georgian President Saakashvili (on the run from his homeland) the chairperson of Ukraine’s Executive Reform Committee. As often occurs in such cases, Zurabishvili and Saakashvili, once coup co-plotters, soon became bitter enemies. (If she could have his head on a platter she would gleefully live up to her name.)

    She, like her Ukrainian counterpart, hailed a common commitment to NATO, the EU and de-occupation, by which she evidently meant “liberating,” respectively, Abkhazia and South Ossetia and Crimea and the Donbass from Russia. The Georgian president also denounced “daily provocations” from Russia “along the occupation line.”

    Zelensky expressed confidence that Georgia would assist his government’s de-occupation of Crimea by appointing a representative for this year’s Crimean Platform founding summit, whose purpose is to wrest Crimea from Russia.

    It’s no wonder that some NATO members are less than enthusiastic about bringing Georgia and Ukraine into their fold and providing them with Article 5 protection. Doing so in the context of “de-occupying” territory in the Donbass, the Caucasus and especially in Crimea would almost certainly provoke a military confrontation with Russia that wouldn’t remain a conventional one for long.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 06/28/2021 – 02:00

  • Politics, Profit, & Poppies: How The CIA Turned Afghanistan Into A Failed Narco-State
    Politics, Profit, & Poppies: How The CIA Turned Afghanistan Into A Failed Narco-State

    Authored by Alan Macleod via MintPresNews.com,

    The COVID-19 pandemic has been a death knell to so many industries in Afghanistan. Charities and aid agencies have even warned that the economic dislocation could spark widespread famine. But one sector is still booming: the illicit opium trade. Last year saw Afghan opium poppy cultivation grow by over a third while counter-narcotics operations dropped off a cliff. The country is said to be the source of over 90% of all the world’s illicit opium, from which heroin and other opioids are made. More land is under cultivation for opium in Afghanistan than is used for coca production across all of Latin America, with the creation of the drug said to directly employ around half a million people.

    This is a far cry from the 1970s, when poppy production was minimal, and largely for domestic consumption. But this changed in 1979 when the CIA launched Operation Cyclone, the widespread funding of Afghan Mujahideen militias in an attempt to bleed dry the then-recent Soviet invasion. Over the next decade, the CIA worked closely with its Pakistani counterpart, the ISI, to funnel $2 billion worth of arms and assistance to these groups, including the now infamous Osama Bin Laden and other warlords known for such atrocities as throwing acid in the faces of unveiled women.

    “From statements by U.S. Ambassador [to Iran] Richard Helms, there was little heroin production in Central Asia by the mid 1970s,” Professor Alfred McCoy, author of “The Politics of Heroin: CIA Complicity in the Global Drug Trade,” told MintPress. But with the start of the CIA secret war, opium production along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border surged and refineries soon dotted the landscape. Trucks loaded with U.S. taxpayer-funded weapons would travel from Pakistan into its neighbor to the west, returning filled to the brim with opium for the new refineries, their deadly product ending up on streets worldwide. With the influx of Afghan opium in the 1980s — Jeffrey St. Clair, co-author of “Whiteout: The CIA, Drugs and the Press,” alleges — heroin addiction more than doubled in the United States.

    “In order to finance the resistance for a protracted period, the Mujahideen had to come up with a livelihood beyond the weapons that the CIA was providing,” McCoy said, noting that the weapons issued could not feed the fighters’ families, nor reimburse them for lost labor:

    So what the resistance fighters did was they turned to opium. Afghanistan had about 100 tons of opium produced every year in the 1970s. By 1989-1990, at the end of that 10-year CIA operation, that minimal amount of opium — 100 tons per annum — had turned into a major amount, 2,000 tons a year, and was already about 75% of the world’s illicit opium trade.”

    The CIA achieved its goal of giving the U.S.S.R. its Vietnam, the Soviets failing to quash the Mujahideen rebellion by the time they finally pulled out in 1989. But American money and weapons also turned Afghanistan into a dangerously unstable place full of warring factions that used opium to fund their battles for internal supremacy. By 1999, annual production had risen to 4,600 tons. The Taliban eventually emerged as the dominant force in the country and attempted to gain international legitimacy by stamping out the trade.

    In this, they were remarkably successful. A 2000 ban on opium cultivation by the Taliban-led government led to an almost overnight drop to just 185 tons harvested the following year, as frightened farmers chose not to risk attracting their wrath.

    The Taliban had hoped that the eradication program would win favor in Washington and entice the United States to provide humanitarian aid. But unfortunately, history had other ideas. On September 11, 2001, the U.S. experienced a massive case of blowback, as Bin Laden’s forces launched attacks on New York and Washington. The U.S. ignored the Taliban’s offer to hand him over to a third party, instead opting to invade the country. Less than a month after the planes hit the World Trade Center, U.S. troops were patrolling the fields of Afghanistan.

    The world’s first true narco-state

    The effect of the occupation was to expand drug production to unprecedented new proportions, Afghanistan becoming, in Professor McCoy’s estimation, the world’s first true narco-state. McCoy notes that by 2008, opium was responsible for well over half of the country’s gross domestic product. By comparison, even in Colombia’s darkest days, cocaine accounted for only 3% of its GDP.

    Today, the United Nations estimates that around 6,300 tons of opium (and rising) is produced yearly, with 224,000 hectares — an area almost the size of Rhode Island — planted with poppy fields.

    Source | Dyfed Loesche | Statista

    But even while it was financing a widespread and deadly aerial spraying campaign in Colombia, the United States refused to countenance the same policy in Afghanistan. “We cannot be in a situation where we remove the only source of income of people who live in the second poorest country in the world without being able to provide them with an alternative,” said NATO spokesman James Appathurai.

    Not everyone agreed, however, that a passionate commitment to defending the quality of life of the poorest was the actual reason for rejecting the policy. Matthew Hoh, a former captain in the U.S. Marine Corps is one skeptic. Hoh told MintPress that airborne fumigation was not carried out because it would be outside the control of Afghan government officials, who were deeply implicated in the drug trade, owning poppy fields and production plants themselves. “They were afraid that, if they went to aerial eradication, the U.S. pilots would just eradicate willy nilly and a lot of their own poppy fields would be hit.” In 2009, Hoh resigned in protest from his position at the State Department in Zabul Province over the government’s continued occupation of Afghanistan. He told MintPress:

    NATO forces were more or less guarding poppy fields and poppy production, under the guise of counterinsurgency. The logic was ‘we don’t want to take away the livelihoods of the people.’ But really, what we were doing at that point was protecting the wealth of our friends in power in Afghanistan. “

    According to Hoh, there was widespread disillusionment within the military among service members who had to risk their lives on a day to day basis. “What are we doing here? This is bullshit,” was a common sentiment among the rank and file.

    A US Marine stands in a poppy field during a foot patrol at Sangin, Afghanistan. Photo | DVIDS

    The heroin trade implicated virtually everyone in power, including Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s brother Ahmed Wali, among the biggest and most notorious drug kingpins in the south of the country, a man widely understood to be in the pay of the CIA.

    U.S. attempts to stymie the opium trade, such as the policy of paying domestic militias to destroy poppy fields, often backfired. Locals came up with ways of profiting, such as refraining from planting in one area, collecting large sums of money from occupying forces, and using that cash to plant elsewhere — effectively getting paid both to plant and not to plant. Even worse, local warlords and drug bosses would destroy their rivals’ crops and collect money from the U.S. for doing so, leaving themselves both enriched and in a stronger position than before, having gained NATO forces’ favor.

    One notable example of this is local strongman Gul Agha Sherzai, who eradicated his competitors’ crops in Nangarhar Province (while quietly leaving his own in Kandahar Province untouched). But all the U.S. saw was a local politician seemingly committed to stamping out an illegal drug trade. They therefore showered him with money and other privileges. “We literally gave the guy $10 million in cash for rubbing out his competition,” Hoh said. “If you were going to write a movie about this, they’d say ‘This is too far fetched. No one is going to believe this. Nothing is this insane or stupid.’ But that is the way it is.”

    McCoy noted that the Taliban was one of the prime beneficiaries of the drug trade, and used it to increase their power and vanquish the U.S.:

    That booming opium production, and the U.S. failure to curb it, provided the bulk of the financing for Taliban, who captured a significant but unknown share of the local profits from the drug traffic, which they used to fund guerrilla operations over the past 20 years, becoming a determinative factor in the U.S. defeat in Afghanistan.”

    ‘The needle and the damage done’

    It is not particularly difficult to grow opium. Opium poppies flourish in warm and dry conditions, away from the damp and the wind. Consequently, they have found a fertile home across much of central and western Asia. The plant has flourished in Afghanistan, particularly in southern provinces like Helmand, close to the tripoint where Afghanistan meets Pakistan and Iran. Much of the irrigation system in Helmand was underwritten by USAID, an organization that acts as the CIA’s public-facing front. In full bloom, the poppy fields look spectacular, with beautiful flowers of vibrant pink, red or white. Underneath the flowers, one can find a large seed pod. Farmers harvest these, draining them of a sap which dries into a resin. This is often transported out of the country through the so-called “Southern Route” via Pakistan or Iran. But, as with any pipeline, much of the product is spilled along the way, causing an epidemic of addiction across the region.

    The effect on the Afghan population has been nothing short of a disaster. Between 2005 and 2015, the number of adult drug users jumped from 900,000 to 2.4 million, according to the United Nations, which estimates that almost one in three households are directly affected by addiction. While Afghanistan also produces copious amounts of marijuana and methamphetamine, opioids are the drug of choice for most, with around 9% of the adult population (and a growing number of children) addicted to them. Added to this has been a spike in HIV cases, as users share needles, Professor Julien Mercille, author of “Cruel Harvest: U.S. Intervention in the Afghan Drug Trade,” told MintPress.

    Only contributing further to the despair has been 20 years of war and U.S. occupation. The number of Afghans living in poverty rose from 9.1 million in 2007 to 19.3 million in 2016. A recent poll conducted by Gallup found that Afghans are the saddest people on Earth, with nearly nine in ten respondents “suffering” and zero percent of the population “thriving,” in their own words. When asked to rate their lives out of a score of ten, Afghans gave an average answer of 2.7, a record low for any country studied. Worse still, when asked to predict the quality of their life in five years, the mean answer was even lower: 2.3.

    The effects of the CIA operation to bleed the Soviets dry in Afghanistan have also produced a humanitarian crisis in neighboring Pakistan. As McCoy noted, in the late 1970s, Pakistan had barely any heroin addicts. But by 1985, Pakistani government statistics reported over 1.2 million, turning the two nations into “the global epicenter of the drugs trade” almost overnight.

    The problem has only grown since. A 2013 U.N. report estimated that almost 7 million Pakistanis use drugs, with 4.25 million requiring urgent treatment for dependency issues. Nearly 2.5 million of these people were abusing heroin or other opioids. Around 700 people die every day from overdoses. The highest rate of dependency is, unsurprisingly, in provinces on the Afghan border where heroin is manufactured. The same U.N. study notes that 11% of people in the northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa use illicit substances — primarily heroin.

    The drug crisis, of course, is also a medical crisis, with overstretched public hospitals filled with drugs-related maladies. The social stigma of addiction has ripped families apart while the money and power illicit drugs have brought has turned many towns into hotspots of violence.

    Iran has a similar number of opioid users, generally estimated at between two and three million. In towns close to the Afghan/Pakistani border, a gram of opium can be bought with loose change — between a quarter and fifty cents. Thus, despite the extremely harsh penalties for drug possession and distribution on the official books, the country has the highest addiction rate in the world

    On a micro level, addiction tears apart families and ruins lives. On an international scale, however, the opium boom has placed an entire region under significant strain. Therefore, one consequence of U.S. policy in the Middle East — from supporting jihadists to occupying nations — has been to unleash a worldwide opium addiction that has made a few people fantastically wealthy and destroyed the lives of tens of millions.

    Domestic despair

    The boom in production has also led to a worldwide disaster. In the past decade, opioid-related deaths increased by 71% globally, according to the United Nations. Much of the product grown by Afghan warlords ends up on Western streets. “I don’t see how it can be a coincidence that you have that explosive growth in poppy production in Afghanistan and then you have the worldwide opioid epidemic,” Hoh stated, a connection that raises the question of whether users in Berlin, Boston, or Brazil should be seen as victims of the war in Afghanistan as much as fallen soldiers are. If so, the numbers would be staggering. Nearly 841,000 Americans have died of a drug overdose since the war in Afghanistan began, including more than 70,000 in 2019 alone. The majority of these have involved opioids.

    Officially, the DEA claims that essentially all illicit opioids entering the U.S. are grown in Latin America. Hoh, however, finds this unconvincing. “When you look at their own information and their reports on the illicit opioid production hectarage in Mexico and South America, it is clear that there is not enough production in the Western hemisphere to meet the demand for illicit opiates in the U.S.,” he told MintPress.

    A dirty history

    The U.S. government has a long history of directly involving itself with the worldwide narcotics trade. In Colombia, it worked with President Alvaro Uribe on a nationwide drug war, even as internal U.S. documents identified Uribe as one of the nation’s most important drug traffickers, an employee of the infamous Medellin Cartel and a “close personal friend” of drugs kingpin Pablo Escobar. Profits from drug-running funded Uribe’s election runs in 2002 and 2006.

    General Manuel Noriega was also a key ally of the U.S. For many years, the Panamanian was on the CIA payroll — despite Washington knowing he was involved in drug trafficking since at least 1972. When he became de facto dictator of Panama in 1984, little changed. But the director of the Drug Enforcement Agency initially praised him for his “vigorous anti-drug trafficking policy.” Eventually, however, the U.S. decided to invade the country and capture Noriega, sentencing him to 40 years in federal prison for drug crimes largely committed while he was still in the CIA’s pay.

    At the same time as this was going on, investigative journalist Gary Webb exposed how the CIA helped fund its dirty war against Nicaragua’s leftist government through sales of crack cocaine to black neighborhoods across the United States, linking far-right paramilitary armies with U.S. drug kingpins like Rick Ross.

    An Afghan farmer collects raw opium from poppy plants in his field in Chaparhar, Afghanistan. Nisar Ahmad | AP

    To this day, the U.S. government continues to support Honduran strongman Juan Orlando Hernandez, despite the president’s well-established connections to the cocaine trade. Earlier this year, a U.S. court sentenced Hernandez’s brother Tony to life in prison for international drug smuggling, while Juan himself was an unindicted co-conspirator in the case. Nevertheless, President Hernandez has proven himself effective at suppressing the anti-imperialist Left inside his country and cementing the U.S.-backed 2009 military coup, one reason he is unlikely to face charges in the near future.

    Using the illegal drug trade and the profits from it to fund imperial objectives has been a constant of great empires going back centuries. For instance, in the 1940s and 1950s, the French Empire utilized opium crops in the so-called “Golden Triangle” region of Indochina in order to help beat back a growing Vietnamese independence movement. Going further back, the British used its opium machine to subdue and economically conquer much of China. Britain’s insatiable thirst for Chinese tea was beginning to bankrupt the country, as the Chinese would accept only gold or silver as payment. It therefore used the power of its navy to force China to cede Hong Kong, from which Britain began flooding China with opium it grew in its possessions in South Asia.

    The humanitarian impact of the Opium War was staggering. By 1880, the British were inundating China with over 6,500 tons of opium every year — equivalent to many billions of doses, causing massive social and economic dislocation as China struggled to cope with a crippling, empire-wide addiction. Today, many Chinese still refer to the era as “the century of humiliation.” In India and Pakistan, too, the effect was no less dramatic, as colonists forced farmers into planting inedible poppy fields (and, later, tea) rather than subsistence crops, causing waves of huge famines, the frequency of which had never been seen before.

    Millions of losers

    The story is much more nuanced than some “CIA controls the world’s drugs” conspiracy theories make out. There are no U.S. soldiers loading up Afghan carts with opium. However, many commanders are knowingly enabling warlords who do. “The U.S. military and CIA bear a large responsibility for the opium production boom in Afghanistan,” Professor Mercille said, explaining:

    Post-9/11, they basically allied themselves with a lot of Afghan strongmen and warlords who happened to be involved in some way in drug production and trafficking. Those individuals were acting as local allies for the U.S. and NATO, and therefore were largely protected from retribution or arrest for drug trafficking because they were U.S. allies.”

    From the ground, the war in Afghanistan has looked a lot like the war on drugs in Latin America and previous colonial campaigns in Asia, with a rapid militarization of the area and the empowerment of pliant local elites, which immediately begin to embezzle the massive profits that quietly disappear into black holes. All the while, millions of people pay the price, suffering inside a militarized death zone and turning to drugs as a coping mechanism. In the story of the opium boom, there are few winners, but there are millions of losers.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 23:45

  • Top Chinese Nuclear Expert Jumps To His Death After Power Plant Mishap
    Top Chinese Nuclear Expert Jumps To His Death After Power Plant Mishap

    On June 14, China’s Taishan Nuclear Power Plant near Hong Kong experienced damaged fuel rods that triggered a build-up of radioactive gases. French company Framatome, a part-owner of the plant, requested the US Department of Energy for assistance as an “imminent radiological threat” seemed inevitable.

    Radioactive gasses were released, and US officials at the time said the situation at the nuclear plant did not “pose a severe safety threat to workers at the plant or Chinese public.” 

    But three days later, Zhang Zhijian, one of China’s top nuclear scientists and the Vice-President of Harbin Engineering University, allegedly committed suicide after jumping off a build. 

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    Here’s the video in GIF format in case it’s deleted. 

    South China Morning Post (SCMP) said police in the capital of Heilongjiang ruled out homicide as the cause of death. 

    “Harbin Engineering University announces with deep grief that Professor Zhang Zhijian regrettably fell off a building and died at 9.34 am on June 17, 2021,” the university’s official account on Weibo wrote in a statement. “The university expresses deep sorrow over the passing of comrade Zhang Zhijian and deep condolences to his family.”

    Zhang was a professor at the College of Nuclear Science and Technology at the Harbin Engineering University and was also the Vice President of the Chinese Nuclear Society. 

    In China’s northern Heilongjiang province, Harbin Technical University is one of two Chinese universities that have close relations with the People’s Liberation Army. Last June, the university was banned from using a US-developed computer software amid souring relations with the West. 

    What’s notable is that western media or most media outlets did not attempt to piece together the puzzle that days after a nuclear power plant mishap occurred, a top scientist in the country allegedly committed suicide. Seems odd right? 

    Except for the blog “Jennifer’s World,” which explains the possible connection between Zhijian’s death and his relationships to the plant. 

    Now, the question is, why did Zhang Zhijian kill himself?

    Let’s show picture 6. This is a screenshot of the Harbin Engineering University’s announcement about his death. It only says that he “unfortunately dropped from the building and passed away at about 9:34 am on June 17.” And the police had ruled out the possibility of murder, and we feel very sorry about his death, etc.

    So, there was no explanation about the cause of his death.

    An interesting thing is, as early as 2005, Taishan Nuclear Power Plant’s Chinese owner, China Guangdong Nuclear Power Group, signed a cooperation agreement with Harbin Engineering University. According to the agreement, Harbin Engineering University would on the one hand train more talents in nuclear power for  China Guangdong Nuclear Power Group, and on the other hand, do more research. 

    It was said that the cooperation would promote the transformation of scientific research results into productivity through the combination of industry, academia and research.

    Several months after the agreement was signed, in December 2005, Harbin Engineering University established its College of Nuclear Science and Technology, and Zhang Zhijian was the head of this college. 

    Then, two years later, in 2007, China and France signed an agreement to co-build Tashan Nuclear Power Plant. 

    The construction of Unit 1 and Unit 2 of Tashan Nuclear Power Plant started in 2009, and Unit 1 entered commercial operation on December 13, 2018. 

    Then, if you check Zhang Zhijian’s bio, you would find that he had been the head of the College of Nuclear Science and Technology for ten years, from 2005 to 2015. 

    This overlapped with Tashan Nuclear Power Plant’s design and construction period. 

    During this period of time, it is very likely that Zhang Zhijian had formed a huge network with China Guangdong Nuclear Power Group and maybe other companies, institutions and officials involved in nuclear energy.

    So, Chinese commentator Zhou Xiaohui said in his article that he highly suspected that Zhang Zhijian’s suicide had something to do with the leak of Taishan Nuclear Power Plant, given he killed himself right after the CCP publicly responded to the leak, and given his close ties with China Guangdong Nuclear Power Group, as well as the entire nuclear power industry in China.

    Zhou Xiaohui said, maybe Zhang Zhijian had already been questioned by the authorities, or maybe he was given some sort of pressure, or maybe he was too frightened by the incident, or maybe he was afraid that he would be held responsible, or maybe there was something he needed to cover up with his death, etc. 

    While there’s nothing conclusive, the death of the top scientist coming days after the nuclear power plant mishap is certainly suspicious. A lot of questions remained unanswered. 

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 23:20

  • "America Is Not America Any Longer" – Giuliani Rages After Law License Suspension
    “America Is Not America Any Longer” – Giuliani Rages After Law License Suspension

    Authored by Ivan Pentchoukov via The Epoch Times,

    Rudy Giuliani, who served as the personal attorney for former President Donald Trump, on June 24 harshly criticized the decision by the New York State Bar to revoke his law license.

    “America is not America any longer. We do not live in a free state,” Giuliani said on Newsmax TV.

    “We live in a state that’s controlled by the Democrat Party, by [Gov. Andrew] Cuomo, by [New York City Mayor Bill] de Blasio, and the Democrats.”

    “We have a double standard,” he continued.

    “There’s no doubt, if I was representing Hillary Clinton, I’d be their hero.”

    The Appellate Division of the New York State Supreme Court concluded on June 24 (pdf) that Giuliani knowingly made false claims about the 2020 election and suspended his law license.

    We conclude that there is uncontroverted evidence that respondent communicated demonstrably false and misleading statements to courts, lawmakers and the public at large in his capacity as lawyer for former President Donald J. Trump and the Trump campaign in connection with Trump’s failed effort at reelection in 2020,” the court said.

    Giuliani told Newsmax that he loves practicing law and wasn’t happy about the decision. The former New York City mayor said he has been part of “some of the most bitter litigation imaginable” without the kinds of complaints that led to the suspension of his license.

    Giuliani had served as Trump’s lawyer and spearheaded a legal effort after the conclusion of the Nov. 3 election alleging that Trump was fraudulently denied victory in several battleground states, including Nevada, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Georgia.

    As part of that effort, Giuliani spoke to lawmakers in several states, urging them to assert their constitutional power and intervene in the certification of presidential electors. None of those states ended up taking action. The U.S. Congress certified Joe Biden as the victor of the 2020 presidential election.

    In a statement after the court’s decision, Giuliani’s lawyers told The Epoch Times:

    “We are disappointed with the Appellate Division, First Department’s decision suspending Mayor Giuliani prior to being afforded a hearing on the issues that are alleged.

    “This is unprecedented as we believe that our client does not pose a present danger to the public interest. We believe that once the issues are fully explored at a hearing Mr. Giuliani will be reinstated as a valued member of the legal profession that he has served so well in his many capacities for so many years.”

    Trump panned the court’s decision.

    “Can you believe that New York wants to strip Rudy Giuliani, a great American Patriot, of his law license because he has been fighting what has already been proven to be a Fraudulent Election?” Trump said in a statement, describing the case as a “witch hunt.”

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 22:55

  • Facebook Could Be Held Liable For Sex Trafficking On Its Site, Texas Court Finds
    Facebook Could Be Held Liable For Sex Trafficking On Its Site, Texas Court Finds

    In what is hopefully the first step in a long road of accountability for the big tech giants, the Texas Supreme Court ruled on Friday that Facebook can be held liable if sex traffickers use the platform to target children.

    The court said that Facebook is “not a lawless no-man’s-land” and that it could be held accountable after 3 lawsuits that involved teenage sex trafficking victims, Fox News reported.

    The victims in the lawsuits were reportedly preyed on through the social media platform, which caused prosecutors to allege that the site was negligent in not blocking sex trafficking. 

    Facebook, as it does, tried to hide behind Section 230, which says that online platforms aren’t responsible for third party content. 

    But the court disagreed, stating: “Holding internet platforms accountable for words or actions of their users is one thing, and the federal precedent uniformly dictates that section 230 does not allow it. Holding internet platforms accountable for their own misdeeds is quite another thing. This is particularly the case for human trafficking.”

    Facebook told Fox News: “We’re reviewing the decision and considering potential next steps. Sex trafficking is abhorrent and not allowed on Facebook. We will continue our fight against the spread of this content and the predators who engage in it.” 

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 22:30

  • "Nike Is A Brand That Is Of China And For China" Says Company's CEO
    “Nike Is A Brand That Is Of China And For China” Says Company’s CEO

    Authored by Samuel Allgeri via The Epoch Times,

    The CEO of Nike said that the corporation is a “brand of China” earlier this week, amid recent allegations of the company being implicated with human rights violations conducted by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

    John Donahoe, the new Nike CEO, while speaking to Wall Street analysts, said that “Nike is a brand that is of China and for China” when responding to a question about competition from Chinese companies during a fourth-quarter earnings meeting, BBC reported.

    “We’ve always taken a long term view. We’ve been in China for over 40 years,” Donahoe said, expressing his optimism that the brand will continue to grow quickly in the world’s most populous nation.

    Referring to the apparel brand’s co-founder and ex-CEO, he said: “Phil [Knight] invested significant time and energy in China in the early days and today we’re the largest sport brand there.”

    Nike was recently criticized by a U.S. senator for turning a blind eye to allegations of forced labor in China, arguing they are making American consumers complicit in Beijing’s repressive policies.

    Speaking at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on China’s repression of Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang region, Republican Senator Marco Rubio said many U.S. companies had not woken up to the fact that they were “profiting” from the Chinese government’s abuses.

    Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) on Capitol Hill in Washington on Feb. 23, 2021. (Drew Angerer/Pool/AFP via Getty Images)

    “For far too long companies like Nike and Apple and Amazon and Coca-Cola were using forced labor. They were benefiting from forced labor or sourcing from suppliers that were suspected of using forced labor,” Rubio said on June 10.

    “These companies, sadly, were making all of us complicit in these crimes.”

    Rights groups, researchers, former residents, and some Western lawmakers say Xinjiang authorities have facilitated forced labor by arbitrarily detaining around one million Uyghurs and other primarily Muslim minorities in a network of camps since 2016.

    Sophie Richardson, China director for Human Rights Watch, told the Senate panel that Beijing’s “extreme repression and surveillance” made human rights due diligence for companies impossible.

    Nike didn’t respond immediately to The Epoch Times’ request for comment.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 22:05

  • How Has Trader Positioning Changed Since The FOMC Meeting
    How Has Trader Positioning Changed Since The FOMC Meeting

    As discussed previously (see “Fed Blinks: Projects 2 Rate Hikes By End Of 2023“, “What The Market’s Shocking Response Means For The Fed’s Endgame“) June’s FOMC meeting was hawkish in several dimensions and yet, after a brief initial shock, the market reaction appears to have been somewhat muted. This has raised the question of how positioning has adjusted ahead and in the aftermath of the FOMC meeting. To answer this question, JPMorgan’s Nick Panigirtzolgou updates some of his regular positioning indicators.

    Turning first to bonds, JPM’s quant makes the following observations:

    The short base in TIP ETF, proxied by the quantity on loan as a % of outstanding shares, declined sharply around the turn of the month, while short interest in the TLT ETF tracking longer dated nominal bonds declined relatively less and saw a sharp increase in the aftermath of the FOMC meeting.

    According to JPM, the effective short interest picture “is one of investors positioning for wider breakevens and this positioning if anything increased further after the FOMC meeting.”

    At the same time, US active bond mutual funds, which entered June with elevated betas, “appear to have reduced their duration exposure sharply in the aftermath of the FOMC meeting to levels closer to their longer-term averages. “

    The bond betas of risk parity funds, which were very elevated in early June, had already moderated somewhat heading into the FOMC meeting and declined further after the FOMC meeting following the burst of bond and equity volatility which spooked potential buyers. According to JPM, “the bond beta currently stands around its long-term average, suggesting risk parity funds are largely neutral on duration currently.”

    The bank also calculates that based on its estimates, of the previous cumulative addition of duration positions in 10y USTs from early 2019 to October 2020, just over half have since been unwound.

    However, at 5y maturities only just over a fifth of the previous cumulative addition of duration exposure from late 2018 to early 2021 has been unwound (as Goldman said in a note last last week “every sell-off in 5s ends up being the opportunity of the year”).

    And since there appears to have been relatively little change in the aftermath of the FOMC meeting, JPM notes that “there is still plenty of room for investors to add shorts before positions approach their late 2018 levels.”

    Next, looking at momentum-based signals that JPM uses to proxy for positons by momentum-based investors such as CTAs suggest that they were modestly long 10y UST duration and turned largely neutral after the FOMC

    … while also adding to modest shorts in 5y. However, positions in both are relatively modest, suggesting CTAs could amplify volatility in either
    direction from here.

    What about other asset classes? Here JPM makes the following observations:

    In credit, the short interest on the LQD and HYG ETFs, the largest US HG and HY ETFs, respectively, again proxied by the quantity-on-loan as a % of outstanding shares, were already sitting at elevated levels heading into the FOMC meeting.

    Since the meeting, their short interest rose further suggesting elevated concerns among credit investors.

    Next, JPM looks at equities, where the short interest in the SPY ETF has increased markedly, suggesting investors have been adding equity downside protection.  And while momentum signals for US and non-US equities remain long, they have declined from their elevated levels earlier in the year.

    The momentum signals for US equities in particular were still at extreme levels, i.e. with a z-score above 1.5, in early April, and now stand at around 1.1. In other words, equity positions by momentum traders look less stretched.

    Elsewhere, short interest in both the EEM and EMB ETFs has if anything continued to decline (Figure 10), showing little appetite by investors to hedge EM exposures. This could suggest global investors’ EM exposures are relatively modest.

    Next, looking at commodity positions, JPM finds bullish sentiment has declined sharply: Figure 11 shows the net speculative long positions in commodity futures excluding gold from CFTC data, and shows a marked unwind in net longs. The red diamond shows a proxy for the position adjustment to the most recent days (based on the absolute change in open interest multiplied by the price change) suggesting net longs were further unwound after the FOMC meeting. This means elevated net longs that JPM had previously ssaid were a near term positioning headwind for commodities appears to have dissipated to a large extent.

    At the same time, JPM’s momentum signal for gold suggests CTAs have turned quite bearish…

    … and the magnitude of the z-score is approaching extremes seen in March 2020 and 2021, which to JPM suggest “there is a high risk that mean reversion or profit taking signals could kick in.” And since JPM prop has a habit of taking the other side of its public positions, what will most likely happen is another short squeeze sending gold sharply higher in the coming days.

    Finally, looking at FX and the all-important dollar, net spec positions have also adjusted significantly, and after starting the year with net shorts at a level last seen in 2013, these aggregate USD net shorts have largely unwound and turned close to neutral. JPM’s positioning proxy has turned modestly long USD after the FOMC meeting. Similarly, the bank’s momentum signals suggest net dollar shorts by CTAs were effectively closed after last week’s FOMC meeting.

    However, as JPM concludes, “neither the net spec positions nor our momentum signals suggest bullish dollar positions are starting to form a headwind for further dollar gains at this point, however.”

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 21:40

  • Labor Shortages And Inflation Plague California Businesses
    Labor Shortages And Inflation Plague California Businesses

    Authored by Jamie Joseph via The Epoch Times,

    There’s an irony to the new dining area at Chef Andrew Gruel’s Huntington Beach, Calif. restaurant. Although he’s now permitted to fill it to capacity under California’s lifted guidelines, he can’t find the staff to work it.

    Andrew Gruel, cofounder and executive chef at Slapfish restaurant, is pictured in Huntington Beach, Calif., on June 7, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

    Statewide labor shortages and inflation are among the challenges restaurateurs are now facing as they crawl back to life following the pandemic-induced restrictions that hammered California’s hospitality industry.

    “First and foremost, a lot of people are making enough on unemployment right now that they’re waiting this out,” Gruel, owner and head chef of Slapfish in Huntington Beach told The Epoch Times.

    The demand for labor is a sharp contrast to last December, when the state banned indoor and outdoor dining for the second time.

    Hospitality workers “hit rock bottom,” prompting Gruel to launch a GoFundMe page to support the embattled employees. He dispersed funds directly to restaurant workers and owners shortly after the ban went into effect, with donations exceeding $350,000.

    Now, that new empty dining area sits quietly in Gruel’s establishment, serving only as a reminder of the challenges he faces.

    “This was going to be kind of our newer… full-service oyster bar side,” he said.

    They require so much labor that we’re only open five days a week now and only from [3 p.m.] to close, because we can’t get the servers, we can’t get the bartenders and the oyster shuckers.

    “And I’m not implying that’s laziness, a lot of people are saying, ‘Look, we were hired, fired, hired, fired, so many times since this pandemic started,’” he said, adding that many people don’t have confidence in keeping a job while California’s state of emergency (SOE) persists.

    To incentivize workers to apply, the restaurant is offering a $500 hiring bonus coupled with wages of up to $25 an hour, Gruel said.

    Restaurant Rebound

    Other efforts to help support the industry’s revival emerged earlier this in June.

    The California Restaurant Foundation, a nonprofit that invests in the state’s restaurant workforce, partnered June 14 with celebrity Chef Guy Fieri to surprise five small business owners with a $25,000 grant.

    Jennifer Lê, co-owner of Lêberry Bakery and Donut in Pasadena, was among the recipients.

    “We are so, so fortunate … the food industry has been hit hard, so badly, last year,” Lê told The Epoch Times.

    The restaurant industry in California is estimated to generate about $97 million annually with more than 76,000 eating and drinking establishments that employ 1.8 million people, according to the California Restaurant Association. In an economic Yelp report published last year, 61 percent of restaurants permanently closed, equating to 19,590 across the country.

    Lê said her bakery normally employs upward of a dozen people, but because of the labor shortage, is struggling to fill positions.

    Her partner, Raynard Ledford, is “like a chameleon,” she said, as he’s taken on several roles around the bakery to keep the business running.

    “Unfortunately … the minimum wage in Pasadena is $13.25, which is higher than much other surrounding areas. But, when you’re given government checks that are a little bit higher, we lost a few because of that; they’ve been home for a year.”

    Lê said she’s been searching two months for a skilled cake decorator, which is a central responsibility in her bakery offering custom cake designs.

    “I know of other places; they have a 50 percent shortage of staff,” she said. “They’re just doing the best they can and it’s unfortunate.”

    Beyond Eateries

    Restaurants are not the only ones struggling with a manpower deficit.

    Brad Goehring, a wine grape grower in Lodi, told The Epoch Times the labor shortage—coupled with the state’s agricultural regulations—place a burden on small farmers and ranchers.

    “We’re just heavily overregulated, the cost of labor is minimum wage keeps going up, and our costs and administrative responsibilities keep going up. It’s really become a burden to be an employer in California,” Goehring said.

    The “unemployment all by itself” isn’t the entire reason workers aren’t returning, he said, adding: “there’s too many incentives not to come back to work,” referencing the pandemic assistance as well.

    It all resulted in Goehring’s vineyard being 50 percent short of its labor needs. Before the pandemic, there were at least 500 people picking grapes. There are now about 150.

    Time is another challenge, as the vines require consistent attention.

    Cantaloupe growers and packers are also actively hiring employees.

    “Business is highly dependent on labor, trucking, paper products, and wood pallets. All of them are suffering from labor shortages,” Erik Wilson, who owns a spraying business and grows cantaloupes told The Epoch Times. “Then, enter the drought and it’s like getting hit in the face and stomach.”

    A shortage of paper products and pallets have created a new set of challenges as harvesters are unable to transport product to stores without them, resulting in demand-driven inflation.

    “Just simple wood pallets have doubled in prices there’s almost a shortage of them,” Wilson said.

    Inflation Impacts

    Some forecasts predict the inflation rate will increase to 2.9 percent, up from a previous 2.3 percent estimate.

    It’s a concern for business owners such as Gruel.

    “We’re seeing an increase in prices across the board,” he said, adding that Slapfish will soon have to reform its menu to adjust for labor and inflation cost.

    “Food distributors can’t find people to pack the trucks, they can’t find people to load the trucks, they can’t find people to drive the trucks, food processors can’t find people to process anything.”

    Slapfish cofounder and executive chef Andrew Gruel washes floors at the Huntington Beach, Calif., location on June 7, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

    Seafood restaurants such as Slapfish are facing an increase in the cost of lobster and other seafood items. Gruel said lobster went from $18 a pound up to $40 “virtually overnight,” because “a lot of the boats couldn’t go out, or because the cost of fuel made it inefficient for the boats to go out, people weren’t dropping traps in the water.

    “Our biggest item that we sell is lobster, we are very fortunate, because we’re integrated through the supply chain. So, we’ve been able to buy some future on lobster before these issues. But because the processing facilities couldn’t find anybody to pick the lobster, then it was a perfect storm,” he said.

    “I think that we’re going to see hiccups through the supply chain for a year, two years, I don’t think we’re going to see normalcy, I fear,” Gruel said.

    “In an industry like the restaurant industry, where margins are either nonexistent or incredibly thin, you rely on projections and analysis.

    Gruel said when businesses “cannot project and analyze purchases and labor based on variable conditions that you can’t control” it makes it difficult to run a business.

    Added Wilson: “I don’t know how we’re going to get that inflation under control because people don’t think about the smallest things like wooden pallets or cardboard boxes and things that are all part of the process of getting the food from the field to a fork.”

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 21:15

  • "What If We Are Wrong": Goldman Reruns Market Forecasts Assuming Its Key Assumptions Are All Wrong
    “What If We Are Wrong”: Goldman Reruns Market Forecasts Assuming Its Key Assumptions Are All Wrong

    Halfway through 2021, the S&P 500 closed at an all time high and stands just 1% below Goldman’s year-end price target of 4300.

    So far so good, but as the bank’s chief equity strategist David Kostin concedes, his forecasts are conditional on macro assumptions: “Inflation will diminish, interest rates will rise, and a portion of President Biden’s fiscal plan will pass into law.” And, as Kostin writes in his Weekly Kickstart note, “this future is not guaranteed” and as a result, Kostin’s recent client discussions have focused around the risks to the bank’s baseline macro forecast.

    To ease client nerves, Kostin, considers three “what if” scenarios that each focus on a key macro assumption and explore the implications of alternative outcomes for US equity returns, earnings, and valuations:

    1. “What if inflation is not transitory,”
    2. “What if interest rates fall or rise more than we expect,” and
    3. “What if tax reform does not materialize?”

    So starting at the top, here are Kostin’s thoughts first on…

    1. “What if inflation does not prove transitory?”

    Goldman economists’ – just like the Fed – forecast assumes that the recent surge in inflation will prove transitory and core CPI will decline to 2.3% next year from the most recent print of 3.8% (Bank of America here is a major outlier expecting far higher inflation for the next 2-4 years). To justify its view, Goldman’s chief equity strategist says that economists’ “trimmed core PCE” shows that outliers had an outsized effect on the recent spike in inflation, and they attribute most of the above-consensus inflation readings to temporary re-opening factors that should subside within the next 3-6 months (which is bizarre in a world where container shipping rates continue to rise at an exponential pace confirming supply chains remain hopelessly broken). In addition, they believe labor supply will rebound significantly by year-end as coronavirus concerns continue to diminish and temporary supplemental unemployment benefits expire. This should ease wage pressures and reduce investor concerns about persistently high inflation in coming years.

    Ok, but what if none of this leads to lower prices?

    As Kostin admits, “higher inflation than we expect would boost sales but weigh on corporate profit margins.Inflation has been positively correlated with sales but negatively correlated with margins.” Rising input costs, including wages, could weigh on margins if companies fail to raise prices sufficiently to offset inflation. As discussed previously, many firms had begun taking price action but also expect inflation to be transitory. Based on Goldman’s top-down model, each percentage point of core CPI inflation above our forecast would lift S&P 500 sales growth by about 1 percentage point, reduce net profit margins by about 10 bp, and, for moderate changes in inflation, on net leave S&P 500 EPS unchanged relative to our baseline.

    Persistently high inflation would also “represent a substantial headwind to valuation multiples”, Kostin admits, adding that “elevated inflation would likely lead to more Fed tightening than we now expect, raising rates and reducing equity valuations.” Currently Goldman economists believe the Fed will announce in December that tapering will begin in early 2022 and Fed funds hikes will start in 2H 2023. As a result, Kostin expects the S&P 500 P/E will be roughly flat during the next year, resulting in equity prices appreciating roughly in line with EPS growth.

    That said, it is certainly true that historically US equities have performed best in low inflation environments. Since 1960, the median annualized real S&P 500 return during periods of low inflation has been 15% vs. 9% in periods of high inflation. In periods of high inflation, stocks have performed better alongside falling inflation (15%) than alongside rising inflation (2%) (we discussed this in “Goldman’s Clients Are Asking How Various Inflation Regimes Affect Stocks: Here Is The Answer“)

    Elevated inflation would boost the relative performance of stocks with high pricing power. The performance of high (GSXUSHGM) vs. low (GSXULVGM) pricing power stocks has been volatile in recent weeks alongside shifting investor views on inflation risk. At the sector level, high inflation has historically corresponded with the outperformance of the Health Care, Energy, Real Estate, and Consumer Staples sectors.

    2.“What if interest rates fall or rise more than we anticipate?”

    Goldman’s baseline 2021 S&P 500 price target of 4300 assumes that the 10-year Treasury yield will rise to 1.9% by end-2021 and that the P/E multiple remains stable around 22x. The bank’s rates strategists expect the increase in nominal Treasury yields will be led primarily by real rates and driven in part by higher global bond yields. Kostin expects the equity risk premium (ERP) will decline in the second half of this year, offsetting some of the impact of higher rates on equity valuations and leading to a roughly flat P/E multiple through year-end.

    In other words, if – all else equal – interest rates remain roughly flat through the end of this year, Goldman’s S&P 500 dividend discount model (DDM) would suggest a fair value of 4700, or 9% above the bank’s current baseline price target of 4300. If rates fail to rise because of weakening growth, then lower earnings or a higher ERP would suggest a lower S&P 500 price despite lower interest rates. However, holding baseline ERP constant, a 10-year US Treasury yield of 1.6% (the 3-month average) would lift Goldman’s DDM-implied fair value estimate to around 4700. Using the bank’s 2022 EPS estimate of $202, this would imply an NTM P/E of 23x.

    Under a different scenario, if interest rates were to overshoot Goldman’s forecast and end the year at 2.5%, but nothing else were to change, the bank’s S&P 500 DDM would imply a fair value of just 3550, or 17% below today’s price. Goldman economists expect the Fed will begin tapering its current monthly debt purchases in early 2022. This decrease in demand will likely coincide with more deficit spending and potentially greater bond issuance following the passage of President Biden’s infrastructure bill. Holding baseline ERP and EPS growth forecasts constant, Kostin says that the bank’s DDM would imply a P/E multiple contraction to 18x.

    3.“What if tax reform does not pass?”

    Kostin’s baseline earnings forecast assume that a portion of Biden’s full tax proposal will become law by year-end and take effect in 2022, reducing S&P 500 EPS by 5% relative to the forecast under current tax law. Goldman’s political economist expects that the federal statutory corporate tax rate will be raised to 25% from 21%, rather than the 28% rate proposed by Biden. He also believes that roughly half of the proposed foreign income tax hike will become law and that the capital gains tax rate for upper income individuals will be raised to 28%. Based on these assumptions, Kostin expects the S&P 500 will generate EPS of $202 in 2022 (+5% growth vs. 2021) and half the 10% EPS growth anticipated under current tax policy which sees EPS of $212 in 2022.

    Using Goldman’s baseline year-end 2021 P/E forecast of 21.3x, a “no tax reform” scenario would lift the bank’s 2022 S&P 500 EPS estimate and our year-end 2021 S&P 500 fair value estimate by 5%, supporting a price target of 4500.

    As Kostin notes, a failure to lift corporate and capital gains tax rates would generally favor Growth stocks, an assumption few find questionable. Digging deeper, although the ultimate implications of corporate tax reform are hard to predict without knowing which parts of the proposal will be enacted and in what size, it is likely that foreign-facing sectors with low effective tax rates including Communication Services, Info Tech, and Health Care appear most vulnerable. With regards to capital gains taxes, Growth stocks such as those in the Tech sector have generated the strongest returns in recent years, suggesting the largest potential risk from tax-related investor selling ahead of a potential tax hike later this year.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 20:50

  • FDA Adds Warning About Heart Inflammation To COVID-19 mRNA Vaccines
    FDA Adds Warning About Heart Inflammation To COVID-19 mRNA Vaccines

    By Jack Phillips of The Epoch Times

    A young woman receives a COVID-19 vaccine

    The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) added a warning about the risk of developing heart inflammation to information about the Moderna and Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines.

    The FDA announced earlier this month that it would add the warning after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) had reported that more cases of heart inflammation—either myocarditis or pericarditis—were found in young adults and children after they received the vaccines, which use mRNA technology.

    On June 25, the agency said that it would add revisions to its patient and provider fact sheets about the “increased risks of myocarditis (inflammation of the heart muscle) and pericarditis (inflammation of the tissue surrounding the heart) following vaccination” using the Pfizer or Moderna COVID-19 shots. The Pfizer or Moderna vaccines use mRNA technology and require two doses, whereas the vaccine made by Johnson & Johnson uses an adenovirus and requires a single dose.

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    Still, health officials have said that the risks of developing heart inflammation are outweighed by the vaccine’s benefits.

    “The risk of myocarditis and pericarditis appears to be very low given the number of vaccine doses that have been administered,” Janet Woodcock, the acting FDA commissioner, said in a statement last week. “The benefits of COVID-19 vaccination continue to outweigh the risks, given the risk of COVID-19 diseases and related, potentially severe, complications.”

    The warning issued by the FDA says that there may be increased risks “particularly following the second dose and with [the] onset of symptoms within a few days after vaccination.”

    “Additionally, the Fact Sheets for Recipients and Caregivers for these vaccines note that vaccine recipients should seek medical attention right away if they have chest pain, shortness of breath, or feelings of having a fast-beating, fluttering, or pounding heart after vaccination,” the agency said. “The FDA and CDC are monitoring the reports, collecting more information, and will follow-up to assess longer-term outcomes over several months.”

    COVID-19 is the disease caused by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus.

    There have been more than 1,200 cases of pericarditis or myocarditis in individuals who are aged 30 or younger who have received the vaccine doses, according to the latest CDC findings last week.

    The case rate, based on submissions to the FDA- and CDC-operated Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, is higher than expected in young males.

    For males between the ages of 12 and 17, the expected number of cases of heart inflammation following dose one using a 21-day window were two to 21. The observed number of cases was 32 through June 11. For males between the age of 18 and 24, the expected number of cases using the same parameters were three to 34. The observed number of cases was 47.

    Representatives for Pfizer and Moderna didn’t respond to requests for comment by press time.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 20:25

  • Biden Orders Series Of Airstrikes Along Syria-Iraq Border
    Biden Orders Series Of Airstrikes Along Syria-Iraq Border

    The Biden administration has confirmed the president ordered Sunday night airstrikes on multiple militant encampments along the Iraq-Syria border in order to “protect US personnel” – as an official Department of Defense statement in the aftermath indicated.

    “At President Biden’s direction, U.S. military forces earlier this evening conducted defensive precision airstrikes against facilities used by Iran-backed militia groups in the Iraq-Syria border region,” the late Sunday statement reads. It was reportedly a “response” to ongoing drone attacks conducted by Iran-allied forces in both countries.

    Such airstrikes began growing common place during the last year of the Trump administration amid growing tit-for-tat attacks between Iranian-backed Iraqi militias, but has been rare for the Biden White House, only happening one prior time in February that was publicly disclosed.

    The DoD press statement added of this latest attack: “The targets were selected because these facilities are utilized by Iran-backed militias that are engaged in unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) attacks against U.S. personnel and facilities in Iraq.”

    “Specifically, the U.S. strikes targeted operational and weapons storage facilities at two locations in Syria and one location in Iraq, both of which lie close to the border between those countries. Several Iran-backed militia groups, including Kata’ib Hezbollah (KH) and Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhada (KSS), used these facilities.”

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    The US military additionally called it “necessary” – saying that “President Biden has been clear that he will act to protect US personnel.”

    So far there’s no immediate reports of casualties, which will likely be coming in throughout the night. Some local sources are suggesting multiple dead and injured…

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    Crucially, nuclear talks with Iran have already entered a very uncertain end phase in Vienna – this action will likely further complicate negotiations, particularly if Tehran perceives that Biden is bent on ramping up anti-Iranian military actions once again in both Iraq and Syria, which nearly sucked Iran and the US into direct war, especially following the January 2020 assassination of Gen. Qassem Soleimani. 

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 19:56

  • Iran Refuses To Grant IAEA Access To Nuclear Facilities: "Agreement Has Expired"
    Iran Refuses To Grant IAEA Access To Nuclear Facilities: “Agreement Has Expired”

    At a moment the clock is said to be winding down toward a nuclear deal in Vienna, with both sides expressing increased frustration that things are dragging on too long, Tehran is playing hardball with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). 

    Once again it’s over access to the country’s nuclear sites according to prior arrangements: “The speaker of Iran’s parliament said on Sunday Tehran will never hand over images from inside of some Iranian nuclear sites to the U.N. nuclear watchdog as a monitoring agreement with the agency had expired, Iranian state media reported,” Reuters writes Sunday.

    Via Associated Press

    In February Iran had struck a deal for a three month extension which allowed IAEA inspectors access to remote cameras and images from sensitive facilities. This came after months of Tehran officials threatening to boot IAEA monitoring from the country altogether.

    “The agreement has expired… any of the information recorded will never be given to the International Atomic Energy Agency and the data and images will remain in the possession of Iran,” said Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf.

    Over the weekend, just as the extension is set to expire, the IAEA demanded an “immediate response” over the “possible continued collection, recording and retention of data.”

    But Iran’s position is that it’s fulfilled its obligations and therefore is not required to comply with such a request. Iranian ambassador to the IAEA, Kazem Gharibabadi, made clear to the UN watchdog that the Islamic Republic is under no such obligation.

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    This is yet the latest – but perhaps most significant – obstacle which could derail talks in Vienna. Currently there’s pressure on both sides to finalize a deal before Iran’s newly elected president, Ebrahim Raisi – a hardline protégé of the Supreme Leader – takes office in early August.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 19:30

  • Rapinoe No Victim: US Women's Soccer Team Earned More Than Men's Team
    Rapinoe No Victim: US Women’s Soccer Team Earned More Than Men’s Team

    Authored by Jennifer Braceras via InsideSources.com,

    Players on the U.S. women’s national soccer team are paid more than their counterparts on the men’s team. But Megan Rapinoe isn’t letting facts stand in the way of her p.r. campaign to pressure the United States Soccer Federation (USSF) into increasing her salary.

    In March, the gold medalist and two-time World Cup Champion complained to Congress and to President Joe Biden that she is a victim of pay discrimination. Later this month, she’ll take her case to the court of public opinion in a new documentary, LFG, that will begin streaming on HBOMax.

    Unfortunately for Rapinoe, the only court of law to rule on the matter found her claims wanting.

    In 2019, Rapinoe and her teammates sued USSF in California federal court, seeking more than $66 million in damages for alleged wage discrimination and discriminatory working conditions. The court found sufficient evidence to allow the players to proceed with their claims of unequal travel and hotel accommodations, medical support, training, and other support services. But it dismissed the players’ claims of pay discrimination, finding that the women’s team earned more than the men’s team on both a cumulative and per-game basis.

    It turns out, the Women’s National Team earned approximately $24 million overall; the Men’s National Team earned only $18 million. The average take per game was $220,747 for the women’s team, compared to $212,639 for the men’s team. And while the individual female plaintiffs made an average of $11,356 to $17,416 per game, the four highest-paid male players made an average of $10,360 to $13,964 per game.

    Facts are stubborn things. And so, Rapinoe and her teammates argued that, even though they received more money than their male counterparts, they were, nevertheless, victims of discrimination. Why?  Because they would have earned even more had they been paid under the men’s pay structure, which offers higher bonuses.

    The collective bargaining agreement for the men’s team is an incentive-based, pay-to-play contract, under which only players who are selected for training camps or particular competitions have a chance to earn bonuses. The court found that the women’s team, in fact, rejected an offer to be paid under the same structure as the men, opting instead for higher base pay and greater stability in the form of yearly salaries, paid irrespective of training camps attended or games played.

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    Late last year, plaintiffs and USSF settled the unequal working conditions portion of the case, with the federation agreeing to provide the female players with travel arrangements, hotel accommodations, staffing, and venues on par with the male athletes. Good for the women’s team. They deserve it. And that should be the end of the matter.

    In America today, however, victim status is the coin of the realm. And so Rapinoe and her merry band of warriors fight on, addicted to fame, praised by celebrities such as Jamie Lee Curtis and politicians like Vice President Kamala Harris, and feted by elites in Hollywood and Washington alike.

    In April, the players appealed the trial court’s pay discrimination ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, pressuring USSF to mediate the baseless claims ahead of the summer Olympics in Japan. And earlier this month, 13 Democratic senators sponsored a bill to withhold federal funds from the 2026 FIFA World Cup unless USSF increases pay for the women’s team. If enacted, the Give Our Athletes Level Salaries (GOALS) Act would prohibit funding for USSF, FIFA, and for host cities and state or local organizations assisting with the event, which is set to be hosted jointly by the U.S., Canada, and Mexico.

    Will USSF capitulate to Rapinoe’s demands in order to avoid a sideshow in Tokyo next month and to prevent the loss of its World Cup funding? Quite possibly. But don’t let Megan Rapinoe fool you: A victim of sex discrimination, she is not.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 19:00

  • White House Responds To Report Saying Biden To Reverse Trump's Golan Heights Policy
    White House Responds To Report Saying Biden To Reverse Trump’s Golan Heights Policy

    On Thursday the Washington Free Beacon published a story with the headline: “Biden Admin Walks Back US Recognition of Golan Heights as Israeli Territory.” This set off a wave of rumors and follow-up reports, culminating in an official Biden administration response on Friday. 

    The initial report had stated: “The Biden administration is walking back the United States’ historic recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the contested Golan Heights region along Israel’s northern border, a significant blow to the Jewish state and one of the Trump administration’s signature foreign policy decisions.” But the State Department’s Near Eastern Affairs Department tweeted in response as the claim began to spread: “US policy regarding the Golan has not changed, and reports to the contrary are false.”

    And separately a State Department official told Middle East Eye that “Our policy on Golan has not changed.”

    Perhaps most interesting in all this is that the original report forced a statement from the Biden administration affirming that it intends to keep yet another controversial Trump policy that the former president was initially fiercely criticized for, particularly from Democratic circles. It’s increasingly apparent that when it comes to Trump’s most previously contested foreign policies, Biden is now actively upholding and defending them.

    Recall that in March 2019 Trump changed the longstanding US policy, signing a proclamation of formal US recognition over the Golan Heights. 

    Netanyahu had said at the time “Israel has never had a better friend than you.” This was also amid the big move to recognize Jerusalem and the Israeli capital, which involved moving the US Embassy from Tel Aviv.

    Months ago, soon after Biden took office, among the first things that his team did was to assure the world that it would not reverse a this key Trump policy vis-a-vis Israel, as Roll Call reported at the time:

    …President Joe Biden intends to keep the U.S. Embassy to Israel in Jerusalem, where it was relocated during the Trump administration. The issue of where to locate the embassy has been a fixture of negotiations over Israeli and Palestinian territory and authority for decades.

    A White House spokesperson confirmed to CQ Roll Call the administration’s intentions, following up on a query from last Friday’s White House press briefing.

    “The U.S. position is that our embassy will remain in Jerusalem, which we recognize as Israel’s capital,” the spokesperson said. “The ultimate status of Jerusalem is a final status issue which will need to be resolved by the parties in the context of direct negotiations.”

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    The Golan issue in particular stems from a cross-administration policy which has sought to deny Syria’s Assad full control over a sovereign state. 

    The progressive wing of the Democratic party had urged Biden to reverse course on Trump’s major Israel policies; however, the White House appears to have now given its definitive answer that nothing will fundamentally change from the prior administration. 

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 18:30

  • Decentralized Finance (DeFi) 101
    Decentralized Finance (DeFi) 101

    Authored by Chris McCann via Race Capital,

    Decentralized Finance (DeFi) is redefining the future of finance. There is a major shift going on in the underlying infrastructure powering financial applications, and it’s changing the way we think about permission and control, transparency and risks.

    DeFi is a developing market sector within the intersection of blockchain technologies, digital assets, and financial services. According to DeFi Pulse, the value of digital assets locked into DeFi applications grew 10X from less than $1 billion in 2019, to over $10 billion in 2020, and over $80 billion at its peak thus far in 2021. Yet the DeFi applications and underlying infrastructure are still in its nascent stage of development.

    The goal of this report is to provide an introduction of the new emerging area of DeFi infrastructure powering DeFi apps today. While it’s easy to get caught up in the hype and speculation within the space, I’ll focus on the key components of DeFi applications, their key differentiation compared to traditional finance, potential risks, and longer term implications these DeFi apps are causing.

    Major Structural Commonalities Across DeFi Apps

    DeFi apps are financial applications with no central counterparties. In practice this means there is no institution (e.g. banks) you are interfacing with to access these financial applications; instead users interface directly with the programs (e.g. smart contracts) on top of the protocol itself. For more of a DeFi 101 primer I highly recommend this report.

    The major categories of DeFi apps include decentralized exchanges, lending platforms, stablecoins, synthetic assets, insurance, among others. While diverse in scope, all of these DeFi apps share a major set of commonalities including:

    1. Using underlying blockchains as the core ledger

    2. Open source and transparent by default

    3. Interoperable and programmable (composability)

    4. Open and accessible to all (permissionless)

    Using Underlying Blockchains as the Core Ledger

    Compared to traditional financial applications which use core banking systems (Fiserv, Jack Henry, FIS, etc.) as the underlying ledgers of record, DeFi apps use blockchains as their underlying core ledger.

    A few of the most prominent blockchains used to build DeFi apps include Ethereum, Solana, and Binance Chain, etc. These underlying blockchains store the ledger state of what is deposited into the DeFi apps, what is stored within the smart contracts, all of the transactions, and withdrawals.

    All of the core accounting functions to ensure matching inputs and outputs are handled by the blockchain itself, the DeFi apps don’t need to create external systems to reconcile balances, because all of the transactions are queryable across the various block explorers.

    In addition, compared to the traditional system there is no separate process of settling & clearing transactions. The transaction processing, clearing, and settling all happen at the same time when the transaction is broadcasted. Although it is advisable to wait around ~21 blocks or more to ensure finality on the blockchain itself.

    Open Source and Transparent by Default

    Compared to traditional financial applications which are all closed-source and built on top of proprietary systems, DeFi applications are typically entirely open sourced and built on top of open underlying blockchains.

    Banking “APIs”

    This causes three interesting properties:

    1. Composability — The DeFi app itself can be forked, remixed, and reused in many other applications (more on this below).

    2. Transparency — Since the DeFi app is open source, it is completely auditable to know exactly what the smart contract is doing in terms of functions, user permissions, and user data.

    3. Auditability — Since the underlying blockchain itself is open sourced, the entire flow of funds is completely auditable including collateral in the system, trading volume, defaults, etc.

    Unlike the traditional financial system (which is opaque), runs on a fractional reserve system, and is prone to market shocks — the DeFi system is completely transparent and over-collateralized — which allows DeFi companies to weather downturns much more efficiently.

    Interoperable and Programmable

    In order for developers to gain the trust of users, the majority of the DeFi apps are completely open source — including the front end and the smart contracts themselves. In addition, since DeFi apps all run on top of a common platform (the underlying blockchain) these DeFi apps are completely interoperable with each other and can be programmed to work with any other DeFi app in the ecosystem.

    This is commonly referred to as the “money legos” or “composability” aspects of DeFi. All of these DeFi apps are like individual lego pieces which can be remixed to work with other lego pieces to build something new.

    Contrast this to the traditional financial system where;

    • Infrastructure Fragmentation — Traditional financial apps are not built on top of common infrastructure.

    • Siloed Applications — Traditional financial apps are typically proprietary to one banking institution. For example, all of Wells Fargo’s “fintech apps” work together but not across different banking institutions.

    • Developer Unfriendly — Traditional financial apps are not made for other developers to build services on top of.

    The traditional financial system does have common standards; however, it’s extremely hard to reach consensus across market participants because financial institutions view their software as their competitive moat instead of using products as a differentiating factor.

    One of the biggest reasons why we have seen so much innovation within the DeFi space is because the systems are interoperable, it allows the developer ecosystem to have more creative expression on the products and services they create. On top of this, developers don’t need to waste time reinventing the wheel, but rather can build upon common frameworks and focus on the things that make their products special.

    Open and accessible to all

    With traditional financial applications, new users typically need to go through a lengthy onboarding process, income verifications, credit checks, or even in person meetings — just to be able to use a given financial product.

    Because of these arbitrary rules set by financial institutions, these onboarding processes are prone to bias including lending descriminationdenial of basic banking servicesopening credit lines without consentcharging illegal fees, etc.

    With DeFi applications, all you need is a wallet address to interact with these systems. DeFi apps don’t ask for income verification, they don’t need credit checks, and in most cases they don’t even need to know who you are outside of the wallet address you are using.

    This is commonly referred to as DeFi apps being permissionless. If you have the funds inside your wallet for the transaction you want to do, you can do it. There are no institutions or intermediaries to stop or deny service to you. It doesn’t matter what your background is or what country you come from, DeFi apps do not discriminate.

    This is one of the most under-appreciated aspects of DeFi products.

    Traditional Fintech Architectures vs. DeFi Architecture

    Here is a more architectural diagram on the main technical differences between a traditional fintech app and DeFi app (simplified for brevity’s sake):

    Here is a more direct comparison chart on some of the key differences between centralized and decentralized financial applications:

    DeFi Infrastructure — Market Map

    Below is a market map of two different DeFi ecosystems, one built on the Solana ecosystem and the other built on the Ethereum ecosystem.

    The reason why I am picking these two ecosystems to focus on is to show the breadth of DeFi apps being built across two different underlying protocols. I also believe Solana is the most interesting new layer one protocol because of its high transaction throughput (50K+ transactions per second), sub second latency & transaction confirmation times, and fast growing ecosystem of developers building DeFi apps on top of the Solana protocol.

    While similar in structure, each underlying protocol has its own ecosystem built on top which is largely independent of the other. Below are some of the further explanations of each layer and the tradeoffs between them.

    Base Layer (Layer One)

    The base layer is the blockchain in which the core ledger itself sits. Ethereum is the most dominant layer one today, and Solana is the most promising new entrant with faster transaction speeds, more throughput, and cheaper transactions.

    Node Infrastructure

    A never ending amount of data needs to be queried about the underlying ledger (retrieving blocks, finding transactions, syncing data, writing transactions, etc). In the Ethereum ecosystem, a whole industry sprung up to solve this need (Infura, Alchemy, etc.).

    Contrast this with Solana where the underlying ledger is fast enough and in sync enough that teams can just query Solana’s RPC nodes directly (this might not last forever though).

    Layer Two

    On Ethereum, there are various layer two solutions primarily used for scaling since Etheruem itself cannot handle all of the transactions on itself. Two of the promising scaling solutions include Matic, Optimism, among others.

    On Solana, since there is only one layer to build upon (no layer 2 scaling solution needed) there are no specialized integrations needed and no mismatches with the underlying ledger which is processing settlement.

    Order Book Aggregation

    Unique to Solana, there is an additional layer occupied by a DeFi project named Serum which provides a CLOB (Central limit order book) that is used by all of the DeFi projects built on top.

    When new DeFi projects are built on top of Solana (DEX, AMM, Options, etc.), they can pull orders from Serum and push orders back into Serum, greatly reducing the cold start challenge most new financial applications face.

    The best way to think about it is to think of it as “networked liquidity” and an “order management” system which is used by the majority of projects within the Solana ecosystem.

    One of the more innovative examples of combining a CLOB (Serum) and an AMM is Raydium (very similar to Uniswap v3). The combining of these systems allows for passive LPs with active market making using Serum.

    DeFi Toolset

    There are a set of common tools needed to operate most of these DeFi apps, either from the perspective of developers or end users. These services don’t have direct traditional finance analogies but they include:

    • Wallets — The main interface people use to store assets & interface with DeFi apps.

    • Oracles — On-chain data feeds DeFi apps use to reference prices and execute transactions against (example: liquidations).

    • Block Explorers & Analytics — Tools like Block Explorers were created to allow people to query the blockchain ledger itself directly. These are used most often when verifying transactions.

    • Stablecoins — The two main assets used in DeFi ecosystems include the underlying native protocol token (ETH or SOL) and ideally on-chain stablecoins (USDC, Dai, or Pai).

    • Front-Ends — A new emerging layer which creates easy to use front-end applications to interact with multiple DeFi projects at once, or to simplify transactions. This includes both Zapper.fi within the Ethereum Ecosystem or Step Finance within the Solana ecosystem.

    DeFi Apps

    The DeFi apps themselves are composed of all of the core financial applications which can be used directly, or embedded into other various apps within the crypto ecosystem.

    Potential Missing Pieces of DeFi Infrastructure

    When comparing and contrasting DeFi infrastructure with traditional financial infrastructure, there were a few pieces that don’t exist yet in the decentralized world that could be interesting to explore.

    A few to highlight below:

    • Consumer Applications — In the traditional financial world, consumers typically act with consumer apps (ex. Robinhood, Chime, Transferwise) not the underlying protocols themselves. The front-ends of the DeFi space could be greatly improved and intermediate much more of the total consumer experience. In general, the UI/UX of most DeFi apps are still very difficult to use from a consumer perspective.

    • CRM — The DeFi space doesn’t really have a concept of customer relationship management nor typically collects any amount of consumer data. While great from a privacy perspective, there is great value in understanding the customer better.

    • Notifications — Notifications or alerts don’t really exist at all in the DeFi space at all. On a more broader level there aren’t any great methods to communicate with users either.

    • Product Analytics — There are tools to measure blockchain activity, but not to measure engagement within DeFi applications.

    • Security — DeFi products do typically conduct security audits; however, none of the security audits guarantee the most common protections consumers are accustomed to in the traditional financial world. On top of this, the demand for security auditors outstrips the supply, so it’s a big bottleneck.

    • Transaction Rollbacks — In traditional finance, if you make a mistake, a financial institution can initiate a rollback of the transaction. This does not yet exist in DeFi.

    • Custody — Right now, most DeFi projects need to be interacted with from an individual wallet perspective. None of the custodians allow you to interact with DeFi apps.

    • Developer Platforms — Most of the developers in the crypto space are building right on top of the layer one protocol itself. There are no concepts of developer platforms or middleware just yet.

    • Embeddable Wallets — Wallets are seen as these external services, there aren’t any offerings of white-label wallets to embed these directly into the DeFi apps themselves. There are several initiatives such as Torus, but these are still in its infancy.

    • Identity — One of the biggest complaints from the traditional finance world about DeFi is the pseudonymity of users. Ideally there needs to be a way to keep out the bad actors while persevering consumer privacy.

    Future of Financial Applications

    After meeting hundreds of founders and seeing progress teams are making, one thing is very clear — the pace of innovation in DeFi is 10x faster vs. that of traditional fintech apps.

    In traditional finance:

    • The underlying ledgers are not open source nor developer friendly.

    • There are a whole host of “banking as a service” applications just to wrap underlying partner banks in developer friendly platforms.

    • Fintech apps are very challenging regulatory wise and typically take years of development before releasing a single product.

    Contrast that to DeFi where:

    • Everything is open source including the ledger itself.

    • All of the transactions are public.

    • Everything is built from the perspective of developers building applications on top of protocols.

    • New DeFi apps are built and released in weeks, not years.

    We at Race Capital believe that DeFi developers will forever change how the finance world works. We are incredibly bullish about the DeFi infrastructure stack and community.

    *  *  *

    If you are building the horizontal infrastructure layers of the new open source financial stack including: trading, lending, borrowing, and/or any horizontal tools all new DeFi projects will rely upon in the future, we want to chat with you. Send me a message > chris@race.capital

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 18:00

  • FAA Denies Boeing Permission To Move Forward In Certifying 777X Due To Serious Flight Test Incident
    FAA Denies Boeing Permission To Move Forward In Certifying 777X Due To Serious Flight Test Incident

    If it’s not one Boeing jet malfunctioning, it’s another.

    With Boeing facing an uphill climb in restoring the public’s confidence in its crash-prone 737MAX, the aerospace giant is facing fresh troubles, this time involving the updated version of the long-haul 777X jet which is facing additional testing because of what U.S. regulators called a serious test-flight incident and multiple other issues with software and inadequate data.

    In a sternly worded letter dated May 13, which was reviewed by The Seattle Times, the FAA warned Boeing it may have to increase the number of test flights planned and that certification realistically is now more than two years out, probably in late 2023.

    Two 777X flight-test planes are parked at Boeing Field on June 18.

    According to the report, the FAA cited a long list of concerns, including a serious flight control incident during a test flight on Dec. 8, 2020, when the plane experienced an “uncommanded pitch event” meaning the nose of the aircraft pitched abruptly up or down without input from the pilots. During the incident, flight-control software triggered the plane to move without pilots’ input, similar to the malfunction responsible for the two 737MAX crashes.

    Boeing has yet to satisfy the FAA that it has fully understood and corrected what went wrong that day.

    An FAA official said the drag on 777X certification is now “the subject of a lot of attention” at high levels both within the agency and at Boeing.

    “The FAA anticipates a significant impact to the level of regression testing, change impact analysis, and the potential to increase the number of certification flight tests that will need to take place,” the letter said according to Bloomberg. It was written by Ian Won, the acting head of FAA’s division overseeing Boeing.

    The FAA said in the letter it now expected the certification wouldn’t occur until mid to late 2023 and the work would take “additional resources” that could hamper other projects with the company. While the FAA doesn’t set the timing of certification work, relying on companies for that, the letter suggests the program could face delays.

    The latest delay will push the jet’s entry into commercial service into early 2024, four years later than originally planned.

    Separately, the FAA also issued a statement Sunday saying it “will not approve any aircraft unless it meets our safety and certification standards.”

    “Boeing remains fully focused on safety as our highest priority throughout 777X development,” a spokesperson at the U.S. planemaker said in a statement in response to the letter. “We are working through a rigorous development process to ensure we meet all applicable requirements.”

    The harshly-worded letter by the FAA is the latest in what has been a deteriorating relationship between the giant planemaker and its U.S. regulator prompted by issues that arose during the grounding of Boeing’s 737 Max after two fatal accidents. The FAA had previously begun using its own inspectors to approve newly built single-aisle planes and has taken multiple steps to increase oversight of the company.

    The FAA highlighted several concerns on the 777X, including a flight-control incident during a test flight on Dec. 8, 2020, when the plane experienced an “uncommanded pitch event.” That meant the nose of the aircraft rose or fell as a result of the control system.

    A similar issue triggered by a malfunction on the 737 Max pushed down that jet’s nose repeatedly during the two crashes that killed 346 people, prompting a sweeping review of how pilots interact with increasingly computerized flight-control systems. The Max was grounded for 18 months while it was redesigned.

    Bloomberg adds that the agency also told Boeing that a critical avionics system proposed for the airplane doesn’t meet requirements and expressed concern about proposed modifications involving late changes to both software and hardware in the electronics of the jet’s flight controls.

    Worse, in a hint of broader troubles for the 777X, the FAA said that European regulators are uneasy over parts of the plane’s design. “The European Union Aviation Safety Agency has not yet agreed on a way forward on the Model 777-9,” the FAA said in the letter. ​Which, of course, is understandable for a European regulator that would be delighted with pushing out its own competitor Airbus planes.

    ​Boeing announcement in January that it was postponing the 777X’s planned market entry to late 2023 was the latest in a string of delays for a jet originally slated to begin commercial service last year. Executives also disclosed that they were redesigning the jet’s actuator-control electronics at the behest of European regulators.

    “That’s still the plan”, Boeing’s Chief Executive Officer Dave Calhoun indicated in a June 3 presentation, weeks after the FAA letter.

    “That airplane, we are still confident will be certified in the fourth quarter of 2023,” Calhoun told a virtual Bernstein conference. The planemaker reset its timeline based on the 20-month review of the 737 Max and “architectural preferences” of both the FAA and EASA, he said.

    “So those are the important things with respect to how we do this,” Calhoun said. “We’ve given ourselves time to learn as we go through this.”

    Emirates President Tim Clark has repeatedly slammed Boeing for delaying the 777X program and has raised concerns over the model’s performance in desert conditions. Bloomberg reported in February that Clark’s airline could swap as many as a third of its 115 commitments for the 777-9 to the smaller Boeing 787 Dreamliner.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 17:30

  • Hedge Fund CIO: "Our Growing Acceptance Of Ever Wilder Conspiracy Theories Has Numbed Us To Everything"
    Hedge Fund CIO: “Our Growing Acceptance Of Ever Wilder Conspiracy Theories Has Numbed Us To Everything”

    By Eric Peters, CIO of One River Asset Managemetn

    “In 18 incidents, described in 21 reports, observers reported unusual Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP) movement patterns or flight characteristics. Some UAP appeared to remain stationary in winds aloft, move against the wind, maneuver abruptly, or move at considerable speed, without discernible means of propulsion. In a small number of cases, military aircraft systems processed radio frequency energy associated with UAP sightings.”

             – ODNI, Preliminary Assessment: Unidentified Aerial Phenomena
     
    “Sociocultural stigmas and sensor limitations remain obstacles to collecting data on Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP),”  wrote the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. “Narratives from aviators in the operational community and analysts from the military and Intelligence Community describe disparagement associated with observing UAP, reporting it, or attempting to discuss it with colleagues.” Nothing new there.

    Throughout human history, those comfortable in the consensus have shown utter contempt for the lonely voices who threaten to upend the prevailing worldview. And yet, without those courageous enough to speak their truth, we would live in a perpetual Dark Ages. Such is the depth of our fear of change that we persecute the brave few, even as they drag us into a better future, kicking, screaming.

    It is too early to know whether these UAP represent anomalies of earthly origin, or an extraterrestrial intelligence. But for some mysterious reason, we appear finally prepared to consider the latter.

    How we react to news is often more interesting than the events themselves. Contact with an extraterrestrial intelligence would simultaneously represent the greatest risk and opportunity in human history – far surpassing the arrival of Columbus in the Americas.

    So why are we seemingly unperturbed by today’s possibility? Perhaps collapsing faith in institutions leaves us distrustful of anything we are now told. Maybe, our growing acceptance of ever wilder conspiracy theories has numbed us to anything, everything. Or possibly, we are already processing such profound change in politics and policy – which produced successive years of 15% US federal deficits, fully funded by the central bank, even as inflation soars and we expand infrastructure spending – that we have no remaining mental space for another alien.

    But no matter, back here in our earthly existence, it is a reminder to us traders and investors that no matter how momentous the change, it only matters for markets when for some mysterious reason it starts to matter.

    Back and Forth

    In a week when the US military released its report on Unidentified Aerial Phenomena, it is awfully hard to find the energy to write (or read) any more about today’s fiscal/monetary singularity. So I’ll keep the boring crap short: Two weeks ago, the Fed surprised markets by pulling forward its plans to escape today’s inflationary policy vortex by a quarter or two. Over-leveraged traders puked. This past week, markets more or less realized there is no escaping such a strong gravitational policy pull. This back and forth will be with us for years.

    First Encounter

    “The universe is a dark forest. Every civilization is an armed hunter stalking through the trees like a ghost, gently pushing aside branches that block the path and trying to tread without sound,” wrote Liu Cixin in his brilliant sci-fi novel, The Three Body Problem, exploring the complex risks and rewards of first contact with alien intelligence. “Even breathing is done with care. The hunter must be careful, because everywhere in the forest are stealthy hunters like him. If he finds another life – another hunter, angel, or a demon, a delicate infant to tottering old man, a fairy or demigod – there’s only one thing he can do: open fire and eliminate them.”
     
    “The inhabitants are all unprovided with any sort of iron, and they are destitute of arms, which are entirely unknown to them, and for which they are not adapted; not on account of any bodily deformity, for they are well made, but because they are timid and full of terror,” wrote Christopher Columbus in 1492. “But when they see they are safe, and all fear is banished, they are very guileless and honest, and very liberal of all they have. No one refuses the asker anything that he possesses; on the contrary they themselves invite us to ask for it. They manifest the greatest affection towards all of us, exchanging valuable things for trifles, content with the very least thing or nothing at all.”
     
    “Thus it pleased God to vanquish their enemies and give them deliverance,” wrote William Bradford in 1630, his first-hand account of an early battle, having arrived on the Mayflower. “And by His special providence so to dispose that not any one of them was either hurt or hit, though their arrows came close by them and on every side of them; and sundry of their coats, which hung up in the barricade, were shot through and through. Afterwards they gave God solemn thanks and praise for their deliverance and gathered up a bundle of their arrows and sent them into England afterward by the master of the ship and called that place the First Encounter.”

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 17:00

  • US Case Against Assange Struck Major Blow As Key Witness Admits He Lied
    US Case Against Assange Struck Major Blow As Key Witness Admits He Lied

    The US government’s case against Julian Assange may be on shaky legal ground after one of their main witnesses, Icelander Sigurdur Ingi Thordarson, admitted to fabricating key accusations contained in the DOJ’s indictment, according to stunning admissions to Stundin magazine.

    Sigurdur Ingi Thordarson Mynd: Sigtryggur Ari

    Thordarson, a documented sociopath and convicted pedophile who also engaged in a “wide-ranging financial fraud,” was recruited by US authorities as a key witness against Assange after he misled them into believing he was a close associate of the WikiLeaks founder. He also lied about his position within the whistleblower organization – admitting that he established “avenues of communication with journalists and had media pay for lavish trips abroad where he mispresented himself as an official representative of WikiLeaks.”

    He also admitted to stealing documents from WikiLeaks staff by copying their hard drives, including that of WikiLeaks lawyer Renata Avila, who worked for both the organization and Assange.

    “In fact he had volunteered on a limited basis to raise money for Wikileaks in 2010 but was found to have used that opportunity to embezzle more than $50,000 from the organization.”

    Sigurdur Ingi Thordarson and Julian Assange, whose name Thordarson forged while embezzling from WikiLeaks

    What’s more, Thordarson confessed to Stundin that he “continued his crime spree whilst working with the Department of Justice and FBI and receiving a promise of immunity from prosecution.”

    The United States is currently seeking Assange’s extradition from the United Kingdom in order to try him for espionage relating to the release of leaked classified documents. If convicted, he could face up to 175 years in prison. The indictment has sparked fears for press freedoms in the United States and beyond and prompted strong statements in support of Assange from Amnesty International, Reporters without borders, the editorial staff of the Washington Post and many others. 

    US officials presented an updated version of an indictment against him to a Magistrate court in London last summer. The veracity of the information contained therein is now directly contradicted by the main witness, whose testimony it is based on. -Stundin

    The addition to Assange’s original indictment was meant to bolster the DOJ’s case by alleging illegal activity in Iceland – including attempts to hack into the computers of members of parliament and record their conversations.

    Thordarson now admits that Assange never asked him to hack or access phone recordings of MPs, and now says that he received files from a third party who claimed to have recorded the officials – offering to share them with Assange despite claiming to have no idea what they actually contained. Thordarson claims he never looked at the files and has no idea if they contained audio recordings as his third party source suggests. What’s more, Assange never instructed or asked him to access computers to try and find any such recordings, he now says.

    Meanwhile, UK Magistrate Court Judge Vanessa Baraister sided with the DOJ’s legal team – including citing the specific examples from Thordarson, despite ultimately ruling against extradition purely on humanitarian grounds related to Assange’s health, suicide risk, and the potential for mistreatment in US prisons.

    Other misleading elements can be found in the indictment, and later reflected in the Magistrate’s judgement, based on Thordarson’s now admitted lies. One is a reference to Icelandic bank documents. The Magistrate court judgement reads: “It is alleged that Mr. Assange and Teenager failed a joint attempt to decrypt a file stolen from a “NATO country 1” bank”.

    Thordarson admits to Stundin that this actually refers to a well publicised event in which an encrypted file was leaked from an Icelandic bank and assumed to contain information about defaulted loans provided by the Icelandic Landsbanki. The bank went under in the fall of 2008, along with almost all other financial institutions in Iceland, and plunged the country into a severe economic crisis. The file was at this time, in summer of 2010, shared by many online who attempted to decrypt it for the public interest purpose of revealing what precipitated the financial crisis. Nothing supports the claim that this file was even “stolen” per se, as it was assumed to have been distributed by whistleblowers from inside the failed bank.

    More deceptive language emerges in the aforementioned judgment where it states: “…he [Assange] used the unauthorized access given to him by a source, to access a government website of NATO country-1 used to track police vehicles.”

    This depiction leaves out an important element, one that Thordarson clarifies in his interview with Stundin. The login information was in fact his own and not obtained through any nefarious means. In fact, he now admits he had been given this access as a matter of routine due to his work as a first responder while volunteering for a search and rescue team. He also says Assange never asked for any such access. -Stundin

    Thordarson’s admissions to Stundin are part of a thorough report he’s compiling into his activities, which are said to include never-before-seen chat logs and new documents. The chat logs provide a comprehensive view into his communications while volunteering for Wiki”eaks in 2010 and 2011, including chats with WikiLeaks staff – as well as unauthorized communications with members of international hacking groups which he met through his role as a moderator on an open IRC WikiLeaks forum. There is no indication that the organization knew of Thordarson’s contacts with said groups, and the logs show “his clear deception,” by which he can be seen routinely inflating his position within WikiLeaks – describing himself as the #2 in command, chief of staff, and head of communications. He can be seen asking the hackers for material from Icelandic entities or to attack Icelandic websites with DDoS attacks on a regular basis.

    Sabu and the FBI

    Hector Xavier MonsegurA hacker and a member of the rather infamous  LulzSec hacker group. Mynd: afp

    Thordarson continued to step up his illicit activities in the summer of 2011 when he established communication with “Sabu”, the online moniker of Hector Xavier Monsegur, a hacker and a member of the rather infamous LulzSec hacker group. In that effort all indications are that Thordarson was acting alone without any authorization, let alone urging, from anyone inside WikiLeaks.

    What Thordarson did not know at the time was that the FBI had arrested Sabu in the beginning of June  2011 and threatened him into becoming an informant and a collaborator for the FBI. Thus, when Thordarson continued his previous pattern of requesting attacks on Icelandic interests, the FBI knew and saw an opportunity to implicate Julian Assange.

    Later that month a DDoS attack was performed against the websites of several government institutions.

    That deed was done under the watchful eyes of the FBI who must have authorized the attack or even initiated it, as Sabu was at that point their man. What followed was an episode where it seems obvious that Icelandic authorities were fooled into cooperation under false pretenses. -Stundin

    “They were trying to use things here [in Iceland] and use people in our country to spin a web, a cobweb that would catch Julian Assange,” said former Icelandic interior minister Ögmundur Jónasson, who recalled when the FBI first contacted Icelandic authorities on June 20, 2011 to warn them of an imminent and grave threat to government networks. Days later the FBI flew to Iceland and offered to formally assist in thwarting the attack – which they accepted.

    Ögmundur Jónasson, Former Iceland Minister of the Interior. Mynd: Davíð Þór

    “What I have been pondering ever since is if the spinning of the web had already started then with the acceptance of the letter rogatory establishing cooperation that they could use as a pretext for later visits,” says Jónasson.

    Iceland gets played by the FBI

    By late august 2011, Thordarson was already being pursued by WikiLeaks staff over missing proceeds from the online sales of merchandise – which he had transferred to his private bank account by forging Assange’s signature. With the staff hot on his trail, he reached out to the US Embassy in Iceland on August 23, offering to turn state’s witness. Within 48 hours, eight FBI agents took a private jet to Reykjavik, where they quickly set up meetings with their new witness as well as Icelandic state prosecutors and the State Police Commissioner.

    They were there to lay a trap

    Mid day, Mr. Jónasson, then Minister of Interior got wind of this new visit and requested confirmation that this related to the same case as earlier in the summer. “I asked on what rogatory letter this visit was based and if this was exactly the same case”, Jónasson says in an interview with Stundin. “I then found out that this was of a totally different nature than previously discussed”. He says he put two and two together and said it was obvious that the intention was to lay a trap in Iceland for Assange and other staff members of WikiLeaks. 

    Such actions were according to Jónasson way outside the scope of the agreement and thus he ordered that all cooperation with the agents be stopped and that they would be informed they were acting in Iceland without any authority. Only days later he learned that the agents and prosecutors had not yet left the country so the Ministry of Foreign Affairs contacted the US embassy with the demand they halt police work in Iceland and leave the country. -Stundin

    Yet, the FBI eventually lost interest. “At about the same time charges were piling up against Thordarson with the Icelandic authorities for massive fraud, forgeries and theft on the one hand and for sexual violations against underage boys he had tricked or forced into sexual acts on the other.”

    Read the rest of the report here.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 06/27/2021 – 16:30

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