• Former Afghan President Accuses Current Regime of 'Treason' For Permitting America to Drop MOAB

  Remember Hamid Karzai? That was Bush’s puppet in Afghanistan, post Taliban. Thanks to Karzai, Afghanistan’s opium production rose an impressive 20x under his rule — fulfilling an insatiable appetite for drug addled Americans in need of firm opiate-laced needles in their necks.
  

  Now retired, he’s pissed off that the current Afghan ruler, Ashraf Ghani, permitted the United States to drop the MOAB on their ISIS loving asses, saying, “How could you permit Americans to bomb your country with a device equal to an atom bomb? If the government has permitted them to do this, that was wrong and it has committed a national treason.”

  Ghani’s  answer to Karzai’s charges was, err, freedom: “Every Afghan has the right to speak their mind. This is a country of free speech.”

  Clearly, Karzai doesn’t agree with Fox and Friends assertion that the MOAB is equal to freedom.

  Why should Afghanistan suffer in such a massive way with a bomb so big, so dangerous that they themselves call it the ‘mother of all bombs’.

  — Hamid Karzai (@KarzaiH) April 16, 2017

  //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

  More from the former Afghan leader, calling the bomb ‘poison’ and bad for the environment — because ISIS is all about preserving a low carbon footprint.

  Local villagers said they thought the end of the world was upon them, after the U.S. dropped a MOAB on the terrorists traversing underneath the ground in elaborate tunnels.
   

  Via Daily Caller:
   
  “The earth felt like a boat in a storm,” one villager told The Guardian. He continued, “My ears were deaf for a while. My windows and doors are broken. There are cracks in the walls.” Achin’s Mayor Naweed Shinwari said “my relatives thought the end of the world had come.”
   
  “Last night’s bomb was really huge, when it dropped, everywhere, it was shaking,” one resident told Reuters. He characterized the strike as a “positive move” to rid the village of ISIS fighters. One man who lived two miles from the blast area told CNN “we were all scared and my children and my wife were crying. We thought it had happened right in front of our house.”

   
  Freedom.

  Content originally published at iBankCoin.com

  

• World's Biggest Aluminum Producer Faces Default, Warns Of "Dramatic Social Unrest" Without A Beijing Bailout

  Step aside China Huishan Dairy Holdings – China’s largest dairy producer which cratered last month after a negative Muddy Waters research report brought attention to a company we knew for one year was collateralizing its cows to fund stock buybacks – and make way for what may be the next Chinese megafraud.

  While China Hongqiao Group may be best known for being the world’s largest aluminum producer, it has in recent months featured just as prominently among short-seller reports who have accused the company of being a fraud. As the WSJ’s Scott Patterson writes, questions about China Hongqiao’s finances first emerged in November, when an anonymous short seller wrote on a website called Hongqiao Exposed that the company’s profits are “too good to be true.” China Hongqiao in the March 31 statement called the report “untrue and unfounded.”

  A subsequent 46-page report on Feb. 28 by Emerson Analytics, a trading firm focused on Chinese stock-market fraud, disclosed more allegations of fraud involving the Chinese commodity giant.

  Emerson accused China Hongqiao of “abnormally high” profits generated by underreporting production costs and disclosing electricity expenses—one of the biggest costs for aluminum producers—as much as 40% below their true cost. Emerson said it investigated Chinese electricity costs, spoke to former China Hongqiao employees and compared the company’s costs and profits with other comparable companies.

  Additionally, China Hongqiao has been more profitable than some Chinese competitors. For instance, China Hongqiao earned an average operating profit margin of 27% in the past five years, compared with minus-1.7% for state-owned Aluminum Corp. of China , known as Chalco, and 5.9% for Alcoa, according to FactSet. “People were always skeptical about how they managed to be more profitable than their peers,” said Sandra Chow, a credit analyst at CreditSights.

  And while China Hongqiao denied the Emerson report’s allegations and said it hired an investigative agency to look into the firm and people behind the claims, things are starting to unravel rapidly for the Chinese megacap.

  As Patterson reports, China Hongqiao – the world’s biggest aluminum producer – is in trouble, locked in a feud with its accountant over fraud allegations that have forced it to suspend trading of its shares and seek help from the central government in Beijing.

  Just like in the case of its cow dairy peer, the problems emerged to the surface following the bearish 3rd party reports. Just days after the Emerson Analytics note, on March 4 China Hongqiao sought assistance from a trade group, the Chinese Non-Ferrous Metals Industry Association, or CNIA, saying the short sellers’ claims of inflated profits were forcing the company’s accountant, Ernst & Young, “to adopt an extremely conservative and careful attitude.” One wonders just whose books E&Y had been reviewing until that point if it took an outside party to bring attention to potential fraud at one of its biggest Chinese clients.

  From that point, it all just spiralled out of control: on March 6, Ernst & Young notified the company it had suspended its audit of its 2016 financial results, according to a March 31 statement by China Hongqiao. Ernst & Young asked the company to commission an independent investigation into the short sellers’ claims, delaying the release of the company’s annual financial results, China Hongqiao said.

  With E&Y washing its hands of China Hongqiao, and without audited results, China Hongqiao said in its letter to CNIA, the company risks an investigation from Hong Kong securities regulators and a credit crunch. According to the WSJ, the company has about $10 billion in debt and could be in default on a $700 million loan unless it gets waivers from creditors, says Standard & Poor’s Global Ratings. S&P, citing the move by Ernst & Young, has downgraded China Hongqiao’s bonds a notch deeper into junk territory to B-plus. Once again, one wonders just who both E&Y and S&P were analyzing until the emergence of the short seller’s report.

  To be sure, in its March 31 statement, China Hongqiao denied the short sellers’ fraud allegations, calling them “untrue and unfounded.” Ernst & Young declined to comment, but by then the market had largely smelled a rat, prompting China Hongqiao to demand both the CNIA and the Chinese government to come to its aid, warning in its March 4 letter of “serious effects” if nothing is done, including “regional systemic financial risks” and “dramatic social unrest.”

  Ah yes, playing the usual assured destruction card if nothing is done card. Only in this case, the megafraud, pardon aluminum producer may have a point. You see, over the past few years,  China Hongqiao drew the attention of the global aluminum market and U.S. trade officials as it soared to the pinnacle of the industry leapfrogging the production of giant competitors like Alcoa in the U.S. and United Co. Rusal PLC in Russia.

  

  As Patterson, who has been closely following the aluminum space for years notes, the rise coincided with American allegations that Chinese companies—helped by government subsidies—flooded the world with cheap aluminum, coal and steel, depressed prices and decimated U.S. industries. U.S.-Chinese trade issues were a focus of a two-day summit last week between President Donald Trump and President Xi Jinping of China.

  The problem, now that the Company’s fraud appears to have been exposed, is that China Hongqiao, a Hong Kong-listed company, employs no less than 60,000 people. A sudden collapse may indeed result in “dramatic social unrest”

  There is a silver lining: as the WSJ adds, “trouble for Hongqiao could upend the aluminum industry in China and present an opportunity for American producers who say the company has been using unfair tactics to dominate the industry. It could also reinforce the broader concerns over what many view as questionable business practices by China’s big industrial giants, many of which are increasingly active on the global stage.”

  * * *

  Perhaps the best news from this event, should it indeed result in the insolvency of China Hongqiao, is that one of the biggest commodity zombie companies will soon be wiped out, allow competitors to take its place.

  Some statistics:

  China’s aluminum output reached an estimated 31 million tons in 2016, according to the U.S. Geological Survey, more than half of global output and up 60% since 2011. That is the year China Hongqiao went public, raising $817 million. China Hongqiao’s founder, Zhang Shiping, holds an 81% stake in the company worth $5.3 billion, according to FactSet.

   

  The U.S. government in January launched a formal complaint against the Chinese government with the World Trade Organization, accusing China of funneling artificially cheap loans from state-run banks to aluminum producers including China Hongqiao. China provides China Hongqiao with access to cheap coal, aluminum and electricity, according to the WTO complaint. The dispute shines a light on the underpinning of a Chinese aluminum boom that has roiled trade relations with the U.S.

   

  China Hongqiao’s production capacity has almost quadrupled to 6.7 million metric tons since 2011, according to commodity researcher CRU Group. Rusal can produce 4.1 million tons of aluminum a year, Alcoa up to 3.4 million tons of aluminum a year, CRU says.

  For now, it isn’t clear if the government or regulators will step in. According to the WSJ, the CNIA, the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission, and China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, which oversees China’s industrial policies, didn’t respond to requests for comment.

  The events are “very embarrassing for the Chinese and for Hongqiao,” said Paul Adkins, managing director of AZ China Ltd., a Hong Kong consultancy that tracks the Chinese aluminum industry.

  Since this is just the tip of the iceberg for China’s “walking dead” commodity companies, Beijing has an option: proceed with even more bailouts, or prepare for much more embarrassment in the coming months as the veil is lifted and China’s commodity zombies – first profiled here in October 2015 – are exposed for the entire world to see.

  

  

• Paul Craig Roberts: "It Has Become Embarrassing To Be An American"

  Authored by Paul Craig Roberts,

  It has become embarrassing to be an American. Our country has had four war criminal presidents in succession. Clinton twice launched military attacks on Serbia, ordering NATO to bomb the former Yugoslavia twice, both in 1995 and in 1999, so that gives Bill two war crimes. George W. Bush invaded Afghanistan and Iraq and attacked provinces of Pakistan and Yemen from the air. That comes to four war crimes for Bush. Obama used NATO to destroy Libya and sent mercenaries to destroy Syria, thereby commiting two war crimes. Trump attacked Syria with US forces, thereby becoming a war criminal early in his regime.

  To the extent that the UN participated in these war crimes along with Washington’s European, Canadian and Australian vassals, all are guilty of war crimes. Perhaps the UN itself should be arraigned before the War Crimes Tribunal along with the EU, US, Australia and Canada.

  Quite a record. Western Civilization, if civilization it is, is the greatest committer of war crimes in human history.

  And there are other crimes—Somalia, and Obama’s coups against Honduras and Ukraine and Washington’s ongoing attempts to overthrow the governments of Venezuela, Ecuador, and Bolivia. Washington wants to overthrow Ecuador in order to grab and torture Julian Assange, the world’s leading democrat.

  These war crimes committed by four US presidents caused millions of civilian deaths and injuries and dispossessed and dislocated millions of peoples, who have now arrived as refugees in Europe, UK, US, Canada, and Australia, bringing their problems with them, some of which become problerms for Europeans, such as gang rapes.

  What is the reason for all the death and destruction and the flooding of the West with refugees from the West’s naked violence? We don’t know. We are told lies: Saddam Hussein’s “weapons of mass destruction,” which the US government knew for an absolute fact did not exist. “Assad’s use of chemical weapons,” an obvious, blatant lie. “Iranian nukes,” another blatant lie. The lies about Gaddafi in Libya are so absurd that it is pointless to repeat them.

  What were the lies used to justify bombing tribesmen in Pakistan, to bomb a new government in Yemen? No American knows or cares. Why the US violence against Somalia? Again, no Americans knows or cares. Or the morons saw a movie.

  Violence for its own sake. That is what America has become.

  Indeed, violence is what America is. There is nothing else there. Violence is the heart of America.

  Consider not only the bombings and destruction of countries, but also the endless gratuitous, outrageous police violence against US citizens. If anyone should be disarmed, it is the US police. The police commit more “gun violence” than anyone else, and unlike drug gangs fighting one another for territory, police violence has no other reason than the love of committing violence against other humans. The American police even shoot down 12-year old American kids prior to asking any question, especially if they are black.

  Violence is America. America is violence. The moronic liberals blame it on gun owners, but it is always the government that is the source of violence. That is the reason our Founding Fathers gave us the Second Amendment. It is not gun owners who have destroyed in whole or part eight countries. It is the armed-at-taxpayer-expense US government that commits the violence.

  America’s lust for violence is now bringing the Washington morons up against people who can commit violence back: the Russians and Chinese, Iran and North Korea.

  Beginning with the Clinton moron every US government has broken or withdrawn from agreements with Russia, agreements that were made in order to reduce tensions and the risk of thermo-nuclear war. Washington initially covered its aggressive steps toward Russia with lies, such as ABM missile sites on Russia’s border are there to protect Europe from (non-existent) Iranian nuclear ICBMs.

  The Obama regime still told lies but escalated to false charges against Russia and Russia’s president in order to build tensions between nuclear powers, the antithesis of Ronald Reagan’s policy. Yet moronic liberals love Obama and hate Reagan.

  Did you know that Russia is so powerful and the NSA and CIA so weak and helpless that Russia can determine the outcome of US elections? You must know this, because this is all you have heard from the utterly corrupt Democratic Party, the CIA, the FBI, the Amerian whore media, and the morons who listen to CNN, MSNBC, NPR or read the New York Times and Washington Post.

  Surely you have heard at least one thousand times that Russia invaded Ukraine; yet Washington’s puppet still sits in Kiev. One doesn’t have to have an IQ above 90 to understand that if Russia invaded Ukraine, Ukraine would not still be there.

  Did you know that the president of Russia, which world polls show is the most respected leader in the world, is, according to Hillary Clinton “the new Hitler”?

  Did you know that the most respected leader in the world, Vladimir Putin, is a Mafia don, a thug, a tarantula at the center of a spy web, according to members of the US government who are so stupid that they cannot even spell their own names?

  Did you know that Putin, who has refrained from responding aggressively to US provocations, not out of fear, but out of respect for human life, is said to be hellbent on reconstructing the Soviet Empire? Yet, when Putin sent a Russian force against the US and Israeli trained and supplied Georgian army that Washington sent to attack South Ossetia, the Russian Army conquered Georgia in five hours; yet withdrew after teaching the morons the lesson. If Putin wanted to reconstruct the Russian Empire, why didn’t he keep Georgia, a Russian province for 300 years prior to Washington’s breakup of the Russian Empire when the Soviet Union collapsed? Washington was powerless to do anything had Putin declared Georgia to be again part of Russia.

  And now we have the embarrassment of Trump’s CIA director, Mike Pompeo, possibly the most stupid person in America. Here we have a moron of the lowest grade. I am not sure there is any IQ there at all. Possibly it reads zero.

  This moron, if he qualifies to that level, which I doubt, has accused Julian Assange, the world’s Premier Journalist, the person who more than anyone represents the First Amendment of the US Constitution, of being a demon who sides with dictators and endangers the security of American hegemony with the help of Russia. All because Wilileaks publishes material from official sources revealing the criminal behavior of the US government. Wikileaks doesn’t steal the documents. The documents are leaked to Wikileaks by whistleblowers who cannot tolerate the immorality and lies of the US government.

  Anyone who tells the truth is by definition against the United States of America. And the moron Pompeo intends to get them.

  When I first read Pompeo’s accusation against Assange, I thought it had to be a joke. The CIA director wants to revoke the First Amendment. But the moron Pompeo actually said it. https://www.rt.com/usa/384667-cia-assange-wikileaks-critisize/

  What are we to do, what is the world to do, when we have utter morons as Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, as President of the US, as National Security Adviser, as Secretary of Defense, as Secretary of State, as US Ambassador to the UN, as editors of the New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, NPR, MSNBC? How can there be any intelligence when only morons are in charge?

  Stupid is as stupid does. The Chinese government has said that the moronic Americans could attack North Korea at any moment. A large US fleet is heading to North Korea. North Korea apparently now has nuclear weapons. One North Korean nuclear weapon can wipe out the entirety of the US fleet. Why is Washington inviting this outcome? The only possible answer is moronic stupidity.

  North Korea is not bothering anyone. Why is Washington picking on North Korea? Does Washington want war with China? In which case, is Washinton kissing off the West Coast of the US? Why does the West Coast support policies that imply the demise of the West Coast of the US? Do the morons on the West Coast think that the US can initiate war with China, or North Korea, without any consequesnces to the West Coast? Are even Amerians this utterly stupid?

  China or Russia individually can wipe out the US. Together they can make North America uninhabitalbe until the end of time. Why are the Washington morons provoking powerful nuclear powers? Do the Washington morons think Russia and China will submit to threats?

  The answer is: Washington is a collection of morons, people stupid below the meaning of stupid. People so far outside of reality that they imagine that their hubris and arrogance elevates them above reality.

  When the first Satan 2 hits Washington, the greatest collection of morons in the world will cease to exist.

  The world will breathe a huge sigh of relief.

  Bring it on! Come on morons, eliminate yourselves! The rest of us cannot wait.

  

  

• Trump Tops Other Presidents In Golfing Getaways

  After his first 12 weeks on the job, a New York Times analysis has found that Donald Trump has spent more time at his private residence and on the golf course than his three predecessors.

  

  You will find more statistics at Statista

  As Statista's Nial McCarthy details, Trump has spent six of his 12 weekends at his Florida residence, considerably more time than Obama, Bush and Clinton spent away from the White House at this stage of their respective presidencies.

  When it comes to golfing, Trump has spent 17 days out on the course. After 81 days, Bill Clinton had been golfing three times while Obama and Bush left their clubs untouched. Read more on the Independent.

  

  

• USDJPY, Yields Slide, Gold Spikes As Markets Finally Respond To Latest Set Of Economic, Geopolitical Shocks

  With markets shut on Good Friday, even as the one-two knockout punch of the worst monthly core CPI print in 7 years hit…

  

  … coupled with a miss in March retail sales, which suffered their biggest two month drop in 2 years…

   

  

  … on Sunday night traders were desperate to catch up, or rather down to, the USDJPY which was the only instrument that traded through Friday’s data dump, and which at last check was trading at 108.34, nearly 100 pips below the Friday open, sliding further in early Japanese trading as the last holdouts on the reflation trade capitulate in panic, further pressured by fears over the rapidly deterioating situation in North Korea.

  

  As one would expect, a surge in the yen means continued weakness in the dollar, and sure enough on Sunday night, Donald Trump’s recent bid for a weaker greenback has been the market’s command.

  

  Predictably, and contrary to virtually every sellside analyst’s prediction for ongoing levitation in interest rates, US TSY yields have tumbled across the curve, with 5-year yields down as much as 5bps at 1.72%, lowest since Nov. 18, while the benchmark 10-year yield has slide 4bps to 2.20%, also the lowest since the election.

  

  Perhaps the one asset class where the reflation revulsion has not been observed yet is S&P futures, as the E-mini stubbornly holds out to selling pressure and is barely lower on the session following Thursday’s sharp drop.

  

  However, while equity markets may be ignoring the moves in FX and rates, gold is hardly waiting, and on Sunday night evening was trading above $1,290/oz, the highest price since the Trump electiomn… 

  

  … and poised for a key double resistance breakout.

  

  While the spike in gold is hardly a surprise in light of last week’s economic data and this weekend’s North Korean events, with spot not trading there was little opportunity for traders to take advantage of what many expected would be a sharp jump in the yellow metal. Except… that’s not quite true: as we noted on Friday, while spot may have be closed, physical vendors such as Ampex were happy to sell gold, and even better, at Thursday’s depressed price.

  Gold arb trade: Physical dealers like Apmex are still stuck at Thursday’s gold price

  — zerohedge (@zerohedge) April 14, 2017

  //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

  Finally, before we forget, there was another asset class that was surging overnight: the Turkish lire, which has been on fire ever since Erdogan won the popular mandate to become dictator, and which just as Barclays predicted, would lead to a spike in the Turkish currency… if only for a the very near future.

  

  

  

• A Visual Guide To North Korea's Military Capabilities

  With the North Korean “problem” front in center for the Trump administration, especially after Sunday’s failed ballistic missile launch prompting Trump’s top security advisor, Lt. Gen HR McMaster to “work with China on a range of options” to respond to the North Korean provocation, here are several charts and infographics summarizing North Korea’s conventional and nuclear potential, as well as its short and long-range military options.

  In terms of most immediate short-range threats, North Korean conventional artillery by the border can penetrate somewhat into South Korea, with the biggest zone of impact stretching approximately 10 miles in. That said, according to Stratfor even areas such as the capital Seoul would be within range of some of the heavier North Korean tube and rocket artillery.

  

  As the next chart demonstrates, under the Kim regime North Korea has conducted more ballistic missile launches than during the regimes of Kim John Un’s two predecessors combined.

  

  As Bloomberg notes, the regime of Kim Jong Un – which has accelerated the country’s nuclear program since taking power in 2011 – is said to possess rockets that can hit South Korea and Japan with as many as 20 atomic bombs, and it’s now focused on building a long-range missile capable of hitting Washington, D.C., with a nuclear warhead.

  The following Reuters chart summarizes what is known about NK’s current missile arsenal:

  

  

  

  The next image details the maximum estimated range of any given ballistic delivery system. While there are disagreements on how far North Korea’s most advanced missiles, the Taepodong-2 and KN-14 can reach, they are widely assumed to be able to reach most parts of the US. That said, Bloomberg cites analysts who say the Taepdong-2 has been used only for launching satellites into orbit and probably wouldn’t be suitable to deliver nuclear warheads.

  

   

  As Bloomberg also observes, more worrisome than the Taepodong-2 is the yet-to-be tested KN-08, a road-mobile intercontinental ballistic missile. Its range of about 11,500 kilometers (7,100 miles) which would threaten a host of major U.S. cities. At the beginning of the year, Kim said that North Korea was in the “last stage” of preparing to test-fire an ICBM—prompting U.S. President Donald Trump to tweet: “It won’t happen!”

  

  Furthermore, during yesterday’s “Day of the sun” parade, North Korea revealed a new ICBM which according to South Korean military officials was longer than the existing KN-08 or KN-14 ICBMs, and may thus be the longest-ranged weapon in Kim’s arsenal, if indeed it is operational.

  Finally, another potential threat is North Korea’s ability to deliver nukes to the Pacific seaboard via submarine. While the subs are diesel powered, and could be destroyed as soon as they left port – something US submarines are surely acutely aware of – they could target the US if they managed to get in close enough.

  

  

  

• When Truth Becomes Irrelevant, What Remains Is Power

  Authored by David Mackenzie via The Rebel,

  A society that cares less about policy cares more about police. Nothing could illustrate this better than the recent experience of The Rebel’s own David Menzies while reporting on the Conservative Riding Association of King-Vaughan, northwest of Toronto.

  When the rule of law is no longer respected by an organization’s supposed elite, the force of law is all that’s left. Due process bows out; the little guy bows down. That’s how it works.

  Put another way: a society that cares less about truth cares more about power. We see this inverse relationship everywhere. We live inside a culture prone to fraud but eager for accolades. We’ll gladly lie and cheat for fame— which is just one way of saying that we’ll gladly trade the truth for power.

  Think of the myriad ways in which fantasy is peddled in the hope of celebrity. We barely blink anymore at those bottom-dwelling web-ads which tell us that some blonde local-yokel is now earning $8K/week. Pictures apparently don’t lie— she’s partying right now on her private jet. And, amazingly, she’s from everyone’s hometown!

  Where truth becomes irrelevant, what remains is power. This trend has various facets. A society that no longer cares about impartial principle becomes increasingly interested in advocacy. And what, precisely, is advocacy if it is not the desire for greater influence and power?

  Hence, in times when truth matters less, partisanship matters more. Tribes and tribalism matter more.

  Sounds like us.

  A society that cares less about truth cares more about political image. That’s us, for certain.

  Recently, an Irish investigative team stated publicly that in the now infamous 2011 trial of American doctor, Kermit Gosnell (the Philadelphia abortionist convicted of multiple counts of infanticide), prosecutors only brought eight counts of murder against him out of concerns that the annual murder rate in Pennsylvania might be significantly skewed if the full count was considered.

  Sometimes truth hurts. Yet, if you haven’t noticed, culture is now more dominated by subjective feelings than by objective thoughts. Hence, it hates when it hurts.

  In a Myers-Briggs sense, it increasingly looks as though all the thinkers have retired, leaving nothing but the feelers to dominate the culture. Dr. Jordan Peterson, a notable exception, is an eminent Canadian example of what happens when thinkers think irrespective of how cultures feel. Peterson is routinely swarmed by visceral outrage— but never logically beaten in debate. His graduate students are deprived of research grants— not because of shoddy research but rather because of the coercive use of financial power. Someone is offended.

  And when truth becomes fundamentally offensive, all that remains is power.

  Ironically, a society that feels truth should never hurt usually lacks emotional maturity. It is an adolescent society. Moreover, a culture that doesn’t care about truth also cares less about principle. Its news broadcasts are more sentimental than substantive. At some point, such a society no longer even cares about definitions. It will claim that it matters less what Islamophobia is, and more that we’re outraged about it.

  Such a culture will, likewise, believe it better that we can read into the law, rather than exegete the true, original meaning. Consequently, such a “liberal” culture will despise an Antonin Scalia, and seek to reject a Neil Gorsuch.

  Additionally, a society that cares less about truth doesn’t bother to argue on truth’s behalf. It increasingly finds the justice system too adversarial, and the parliamentary system embarrassing and distasteful. Perhaps this is why Liberal Senate leader Peter Harder, when musing upon ideals, thinks a caucus of organized opposition is detrimental to Senate politics.

  Actually, he’s only partly correct. In truth, organized opposition is in no way detrimental to the quest for truth. Predictably, however, organized opposition is detrimental to power.

  And there is yet another oddity about these times in which we find ourselves. As universities have debated less about philosophy and theology, they have obsessed more about the issue of power. Moral authority has been disqualified, shouted-down and even beaten-down, by hostile theories and accusations of “privilege”. The Marxist-inspired rage is palpable, and even predictable, because the issue is one of power, not of truth.

  Historically, envy and political rage once put a man on a cross. His purpose, he said to Pontius Pilate, was “to bear witness to the truth”. Pilate didn’t care about truth, and even said as much. Not long after, however, he did say this to Jesus: “Do you realize that I have power either to free you or to crucify you?”

  Of course, Pontius. In a raw Roman world, what matters is Caesar and not Socrates.

  Power will generally attempt to kill the truth— all the way up to the One who says, “I am the truth”.

  It is a sobering political principle, well worth remembering.

  And, to this day, well worth rejecting.

   

  

  

• Insider Roger Stone: "Trump Diplomacy Is Working… It's Really Working"

  Authored by Mac Slavo via SHTFplan.com,

  

  President Trump has taken a lot of flack recently, first for his direct strike on a Syrian airfield using 59 Tomahawk missiles, then for responding to North Korean rhetoric and nuclear testing by deploying a Naval Strike Fleet to the region, and finally for dropping the world’s largest non-nuclear Mother Of All Bombs on a cave complex housing as many as 800 Islamic State fighters.

  For many, it appears on the surface that Donald Trump, the military industrial complex and Deep State operatives behind the scenes have war on their minds.

  The criticisms leveled at the President are certainly the result of real concern from his constituents, especially since as a candidate he promised to change the system and root out its corrupt and warlike culture, only to turn around and take three significant military actions within his first 100 days in office. Even if those who have railed against the President are wrong, at the very least one could argue that the criticisms are necessary in order to maintain a cross-check on the actions of the Executive Branch.

  But political insider Roger Stone, who at one point was head of Trump’s campaign, says that the President’s recent decisions prove he is a man of action who is very much uprooting the strategies, tactics and geo-political machinations of the old guard.

  According to Stone, who joined Infowars.com host Alex Jones in an interview over the weekend, President Trump is moving to permanently resolve the world’s most pressing conflicts, some of which have spanned decades:

  Obviously you have a group in the White House who think they are puppeteers… and they’d like to have Trump be their puppet… Donald Trump is no man’s puppet… he works for the American people…

   

  Whenever Donald trump has all the information he will almost invariably make the right decision… This is what’s happened here.. He elected to do a limited Syrian strike… His advisors immediately saw an opening to propose a full Vietnam-style ground war… 150,000 troops… The defense contractors were licking their chops they were so happy… the bad news for them was that so many Libertarians, so many non-interventionists, so many patriots, so many Trump supporters expressed their opposition or concern both publicly and privately that Trump now had the correct focus,.. Over the objections of his Defense Secretary Mattis… Over the objections of [National Security Advisor]  McMaster he has elected not to expand the war… to move on.

   

  In the same breath, the President’s critics tried to say ‘oh, he’s flip-flopping on China… he didn’t break their arm about currency manipulation and our trade relationships… he’s obviously abandoned those things’.

   

  No, he hasn’t abandoned those things at all… all he’s doing is prioritizing them… getting the nukes out of the hands of a maniac in North Korea and getting China’s help to do that, which appears to be happening, is a higher priority for the President right now than currency manipulation or trade… Believe me, the Chinese are going to hear about that from Trump but right now there’s a lot of good signs… If confirmed, this rejection of these enormous shipments of coal from North Korea and the replacement of these orders to purchase coal from U.S. companies by the Chinese is highly symbolic… The Chinese are trying to tell the North Koreans, ‘quit screwing around or we’re going to have to join the coalition to take you out.’

   

  This is all Trump diplomacy… It’s working… It’s really working.

   

  …

   

  I think the Chinese have now agreed to work with us in a partnership to slow the North Koreans down and get them out of the nuclear business… That alone would be a major breakthrough because as you point out, in the past they have been unwilling to get involved.

   

  As far as the MOAB bombing in Afghanistan… Donald Trump was very forthright in his campaign that he was going to crush ISIS.

   

  ISIS is a loose end created by the foreign policy of the globalists, George Bush, George W. Bush, Hillary Clinton, and Barrack Obama.

   

  Trump doesn’t have the option of doing nothing… but with a non-interventionist foreign policy going forward we won’t be creating any new organizations like ISIS.

  As both Jones and Stone suggest, Trump’s latest moves are actually a step in the right direction, as they are cleaning out the mess created by his predecessors.

  Watch the full interview with Roger Stone:

  What do you think?

  Is President Donald Trump doing the bidding of the Deep State?

  Or are his latest military actions a long-term strategy designed to finally and completely eliminate the decades’ long threats America has faced under previous globalist leaders?

  

  

• China, Russia Dispatch Naval Vessels To Track USS Carl Vinson To Korean Peninsula

  Video has been released allegedly showing a mass military mobilization in Vladivostok, Russia, just eight miles from the border with North Korea, as the world edges towards war.

  As The Express reports, the dramatic move, unconfirmed by the Russian government, was spotted by residents in the border city and posted on social media.

  According to the reports, a military convoy of eight surface-to-air missiles, part of Russian Air Defence, were on the move.

  

  The S400 anti-aircraft missiles were moved to Vladivostok, where Vladimir Putin already has a major navy base.

  Furthermore, As the following footage shows (beginning at aorund 1:20 below) Chinese military assets are also being moved to the North Korean border…

  In addition to military forces, AP reports China and Russia have dispatched intelligence-gathering vessels from their navies to chase the USS Carl Vinson nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, which is heading toward waters near the Korean Peninsula, multiple sources of the Japanese government revealed to The Yomiuri Shimbun.

  

  It appears that both countries aim to probe the movements of the United States, which is showing a stance of not excluding military action against North Korea. The Self-Defense Forces are strengthening warning and surveillance activities in the waters and airspace around the area, according to the sources.

  The aircraft carrier strike group, composed of the Carl Vinson at its core with guided-missile destroyers and other vessels, is understood to be around the East China Sea and heading north toward waters near the Korean Peninsula.

  The dispatch of the intelligence-gathering vessels appears to be partly aimed at sending a warning signal to the United States.

  Yonhap reports that the USS Carl Vinson is expected to reach South Korea's east coast by April 25th.

  

  

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• Inside The World's "Doomsday Vault"

  Imagine that the unthinkable has happened. A massive asteroid impact triggers a “nuclear winter” effect, or one of the world’s most dangerous supervolcanos erupts. Maybe Donald Trump gets in an epic Twitter feud with Kim Jong-Un that initiates World War 3. Either way, things are going sideways, and the fate of human civilization itself is at stake. Will everything be lost? Visual Capitalist's Jeff Desjardins explains…

  ENTER THE ‘DOOMSDAY VAULT’

  Well, besides the fact that the world’s cities have been replaced by smoking craters, there is some good news for the humans that survive a potentially apocalyptic scenario.

  On a remote island that is just 800 miles (1,300 km) from the North Pole, the Norwegian government has built a failsafe in the freezing cold that protects thousands of the most vital crops from extinction. Officially called the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, it already holds close to a million samples of crops around the world, with each sample holding about 500 seeds.

  Today’s infographic, from Futurism, has more on this Doomsday Vault that could one day help to save civilization:

  

  Courtesy of: Visual Capitalist

  

  

• Paul Craig Roberts Asks "Is That Armageddon Over The Horizon?"

  Authored by Paul Craig Roberts,

  The insouciance of the Western world is extraordinary.

  It is not only Americans who permit themselves to be brainwashed by CNN, MSNBC, NPR, the New York Times and Washington Post, but also their counterparts in Europe, Canada, Australia, and Japan, who rely on the war propaganda machine that poses as a media.

  The Western “leaders,” that is, the puppets on the end of the strings pulled by the powerful private interest groups and the Deep State, are just as insouciant.

  Trump and his counterparts in the American Empire must be unaware that they are provoking war with Russia and China, or else they are psychopaths.

  A new White House Fool has replaced the old fool. The New Fool has sent his Secretary of State to Russia. For what? To deliver an ultimatum? To make more false accusations? To apologize for the lies?

  Consider the audacity of Secretary of State Tillerson. He has spent the week prior to his visit to Moscow supporting incredible lies and false allegations that Assad of Syria used chemical weapons with Russia’s permission, which justified Washington’s unambigious war crime of a military attack on a country with which the US has not declared war. Less than 100 days in office, and Trump is already a war criminal along with the rest of his warmonger government.

  The entire world knows this, but no one says it. Instead, Tillerson, who has been heavy with lies and threats has the confidence to go to Moscow to tell the Russians that they have to hand over Assad to the American Uni-Power.

  Tillerson’s mission demonstrates the complete, total unreality of the world in which Washington lives. Try to imagine Tillerson’s arrogance. If you had been bad-mouthing and threatening strong, important people, would you feel comfortable going over to their house to have dinner with them? Does Tillerson think that now that Russia has largely freed Syrtia of US-supported ISIS, Russia is going to turn Syria over to Washington?

  Is he going to tell Lavrov that he didn’t really mean all those nasty lies he told about Russia, but the zionist neoconservatives made him do it? That he is not really in charge, just a tool of the Anglo-Zionist Empire?

  Is Tillerson going to apologize for White House press secretary Sean Spicer’s statement that Assad, Russia’s ally, is more evil than Hitler? 

  Maybe Tillerson is going to ask for asylum and get on the winning side.

  Stephen Cohen, one of the few remaining Americans knowledgeable about Russia, told the two CNN presstitutes and the warmonger Col. Leighton, one of the “experts” that the presstitutes roll out to pronounce the propaganda against Russia, that Russia was preparing for hot war. It seems to have gone over the heads of the CNN presstitutes and colonel. Whose payroll are they on?

  The Russian leaders, who, unlike the Western liars, speak the truth, have said clearly that Russia will never again fight a war on her own territory. The Russians couldn’t put it more clearly. Provoke a war, and we will destroy you on your own territory.

  When you watch the president and government in Washington, the European governments, especially the idiots in London, the Canadian and Australian governments, you can only marvel at the total stupidity of “Western leadership.” They are begging for the end of the world.

  And the presstitutes are at work driving toward the end of life. Huge numbers of Western peoples are being prepared for their demise, and they are protected from the realization by their insouciance.

  Washington is so arrogant and lost in its own hubris, that Washington does not understand that the years of clear as crystal lies about Russia and Russian intentions and deeds have convinced Russia that Washington is preparing the populations of the United States and Washington’s captive peoples in West and East Europe, Canada, Australia, and Japan for a US pre-emptive nuclear strike against Russia. Published US war plans against China have convinced China of the same.

  If not for war, what else is the change in US war doctrine for? George W. Bush abandoned the stabilizing role of nuclear weapons by moving them from a retaliatory function to a nuclear first strike. Then he pulled out of the anti-ballistic missile treaty concluded by President Richard Nixon. Now we have US missile sites positioned on Russia’s borders. We tell the Russians the lie that the missiles are to prevent an Iranian nuclear ICBM strike against Europe. This lie is told, and accepted by the puppets in Europe, despite the known, incontestable fact that Iran has neither nukes nor ICBMs. But the Russians do not accept it. They know it is another Washington lie.

  When Russia hears these flagrant, blatant, obvious lies, Russia understands that Washington intends a preemptive nuclear attack on Russia.

  China has reached the same conclusion.

  So, here is the situation. Two countries with nuclear forces expect that the insane fools who rule the West are going to attack them with nuclear weapons. What are Russia and China doing? Are they begging for mercy?

  No. They are preparing to destroy the evil West, a collection of liars and war criminals, the like of which the world has never previously experienced.

  It is the US, the washed-up joke of a “uni-power” that after 16 years is still unable to defeat a few thousand lightly armed Taliban in Afghanistan, that needs to ask for mercy.

  The reckless and irresponsible war talk in the US government and presstitute media and among NATO and Washington’s vassals must stop immediately. Life is in the balance.

  Putin has shown amazing patience with Washington’s lies and provocations, but he cannot risk Russia by trusting Washington, whom no one can trust. Not the American people, not the Russian people, not any people.

  By jumping on the Deep State’s propaganda wagon the liberal/progressive/left is complicit in the march toward Armageddon.

  

  

• Turkish Referendum Full Preview

  This Sunday, Turkey will vote in a hotly contested referendum on the presidential
  system, whose outcome could place sweeping new powers in the
  hands of President Tayyip Erdogan and herald the most radical change to
  the country’s political system in its modern history.

  The package of 18 amendments would abolish the office of prime minister and give the president the authority to draft the budget, declare a state of emergency and issue decrees overseeing ministries without parliamentary approval.

  

  Opinion polls have given a narrow lead for a “Yes” vote, which would replace Turkey’s parliamentary democracy with an all-powerful presidency and may see Erdogan in office until at least 2029.  The outcome will also shape Turkey’s strained relations with the European Union. The NATO member state has curbed the flow of migrants – mainly refugees from wars in Syria and Iraq – into the bloc but Erdogan says he may review the deal after the vote. Some 55 million people are eligible to vote at 167,140 polling stations across the nation, which open at 7.00 am (0400 GMT) in the east of the country and close at 5 pm (1400 GMT). Turkish voters abroad have already cast their ballots.

  The referendum has bitterly divided a nation which has already seen extensive political fracture over the past year, including one “failed coup” attempt last summer. Erdogan and his supporters say the changes are needed to amend the current constitution, written by generals following a 1980 military coup, confront the security and political challenges Turkey faces, and avoid the fragile coalition governments of the past. Opponents say it is a step towards greater authoritarianism in a country where around 40,000 people have been arrested and 120,000 sacked or suspended from their jobs in a crackdown following last July’s failed coup, drawing criticism from Turkey’s Western allies and rights groups, and resulting in the worst diplomatic relations between Turkey and Europe in recent history. Relations between Turkey and Europe hit a low during the referendum campaign when EU countries, including Germany and the Netherlands, barred Turkish ministers from holding rallies in support of the changes. Erdogan called the moves “Nazi acts” and said Turkey could reconsider ties with the European Union after many years of seeking EU membership.

  On the eve of the vote, Erdogan held four separate rallies in Istanbul, urging supporters to turn out in large numbers. “April 16 will be a turning point for Turkey’s political history… Every vote you cast tomorrow will be a cornerstone of our revival,” he told a crowd of flag-waving supporters. “There are only hours left now. Call all your friends, family members, acquaintances, and head to the polls,” he said.

  Erdogan and the ruling AK Party, led by Prime Minister Binali Yildirim, have enjoyed a disproportionate share of media coverage in the buildup to the vote, overshadowing the secular main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) and pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP). Erdogan has sought to ridicule CHP leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu, playing videos of his gaffes during rallies, and has associated the “No” vote with support for terrorism.

  Kilicdaroglu has accused Erdogan of seeking a “one-man regime”, and said the proposed changes would put the country in danger. “This is not about right or left… this is a national issue… We will make our choices with our children and future in mind,” he said during his final rally in the capital Ankara.

  The government says Turkey, faced with conflict to the south in Syria and Iraq, and a security threat from Islamic State and Kurdish PKK militants, needs strong and clear leadership to combat terrorism.

  While recent polls suggest a pick-up in momentum for “yes”, they remain close, and the large share of “undecided” voters is adding to the uncertainty. According to Wall Street banks like Barclays, a “yes” outcome will likely result in a broad-based, yet potentially short-lived, relief rally driven by a reduction in near-term political uncertainty. In the event of a less-expected “no” outcome, Barclays expect a negative market reaction and positioning for this looks most attractive via FX options.

  Below is a full preview of the Turkish referendum, whose outcome should be known sometime on Sunday night, courtesy of Barclays.

  Referendum countdown

  Turkey is heading for a public referendum on the presidential system on 16 April, this Sunday. The recent polls suggest a pick-up in momentum in favor of “yes” (Figure 1) and this is also evident in the latest surveys of pollsters such as Metropoll and Gezici, which show “yes” at around 53% as opposed to earlier surveys of below 50%. The “yes” and “no” outcomes still appear to be close on average, however, and the associated margin of error (2-3% according to pollsters) along with the large share of “undecided” voters underscores the binary nature of the referendum outcome.

  

  Achieving 50%+ support for the “yes” campaign (AKP-MHP) might look relatively straightforward at first sight, given a combined voter base of 61% (November 2015 election results) and the almost perfectly aligned rhetoric and policies of the parties. Recall that the transformation of the political landscape before and in the aftermath of the November 2015 elections led to a firm macro-level consolidation of Turkish politics along two lines: the “nationalist front” (mostly AKP and MHP voters) and the “social democrat front” (mostly CHP and HDP voters).

  However, polls suggest a less comfortable race for the “yes” campaign: i) a large number of MHP voters seem to still be unconvinced by the “yes” campaign, and ii) the true color of the “undecided voters” is hard to decipher: pollsters say voters are increasingly refraining from revealing their preference due to the mood created by the extraordinary state of affairs, and “undecided” voters could be skewed towards “no”. Metropoll argued that more than 75% of undecided need to vote “no” for it to win; while historically, undecided voters have tended to either vote for the status quo or not participate in elections. The low polling response rate due various factors (such as peer pressure in the South East and the Black Sea regions according to some pollsters) is yet another complication that could potentially be distorting the poll results.

  Nevertheless, momentum has picked up in favor of “yes” based on the most recent polls, and this has also been echoed by the political expert media commentary. Among the key catalysts, experts note the following.

  1. The effectiveness of President Erdogan’s campaign to push the “yes” votes of the AKP electorate higher (from the 80% level to the 90% level), as well as its impact on convincing more of the MHP electorate to vote “yes”.
  2. The tailwind provided by escalating tensions with the Netherlands and the EU, which is likely to help consolidate the nationalist vote.
  3. The positive impact of the improving economic sentiment recently on the “yes” campaign (Figures 2 and 3).
  4. The tactical missteps of the main opposition party CHP (i.e. comments by party officials) influencing undecided AKP voters in favor of “yes”.

  

  Overall, it is hard to simplify the referendum to a probability exercise of an early election under yes/no outcomes, given that it is far more complex and the implications are unclear (both scenarios entail an early election possibility, in our view). While markets will likely perceive near-term political risks (i.e. an early election) to be lower in the scenario of a “yes” outcome, medium-term concerns about policy uncertainty and institutional strength are likely to remain; the Venice Commission opined that constitutional changes will remove checks and balances, leading to weaker institutions. The influence of presidential advisors on policymaking and the transformation to a “new economic model” would likely be solidified under a presidential system accompanied by an accommodative monetary policy bias, a potentially looser fiscal stance and an increase in quasi-fiscal spending focused on infrastructure projects via the sovereign wealth fund (SWF). We believe that, even in the event of a “yes” outcome, the likelihood of an early election in Q4 2017/Q1 2018 is still non-negligible as President Erdogan may choose to bring forward presidential elections (from August 2019).

  * * *

  Market implications for FX, local rates and sovereign credit

  The market appears largely positioned for an outcome consistent with polls that suggest a “yes” result is most likely. In FX option markets, for example, the volatility-adjusted premium for USDTRY calls versus puts has recently dropped to multi-year lows and below-average kurtosis suggests little demand for negative tail-event protection (Figure 4). In bonds, TurkGB risk premia remain extremely low and currently offer less return than USTs on a hedged basis (Figure 5). Finally, in EM credit, Turkey YTD has outperformed the broader Bloomberg Barclays USD EM sovereign index, partially reversing the c.10% underperformance in 2016 (in total return terms).
  

  YES: A “yes” outcome would likely result in a broad-based, yet potentially short-lived, relief rally

  Despite the market’s anticipation of a “yes” outcome, we think the associated reduction in near-term political uncertainty would likely still deliver some relief rally, allowing a temporary reprieve for the TRY and a steeper curve in anticipation of a “gradual” unwinding of tight liquidity policy.

  In FX, still-large TRY political risk premia and undervaluation suggest room for appreciation following a “yes” outcome. While our estimate of the lira’s political risk premia has reduced from 15pp at the end of January, it remains relatively large at 8pp (Figure 6). Furthermore, our short-term Financial Fair Value (FFV) model suggests a 4% undervalued TRY against the USD (Figure 7).

  

  We believe risk-reward argues for being long TRYZAR targeting January highs of 3.90 with a stop-loss at 3.67 for a reward to risk ratio of 3:1 (spot reference: 3.73). We prefer this to short USDTRY as South Africa’s similarly low risk-adjusted real interest rate differentials and heightened political risk should provide a degree of protection in the event of a “no” outcome. The trade also remains positive carry.

  In rates, very low bond risk premia suggest a rates rally following a “yes” is likely to be concentrated at the front end of the yield curve as market participants will likely price a gradual unwinding of the CBT’s liquidity tightening measures. As such, we reiterate our existing trade recommendation of paying the 1s5s TRY cross-currency swap spread targeting -30bp with a stop-loss of -100bp.

  For Turkey sovereign credit, we maintain our Market Weight rating. This balances our concerns about a likely medium-term deterioration of Turkey’s credit metrics in a presidential system on the one hand with relatively attractive valuations and likely reduced near-term political uncertainty in a “yes” vote on the other hand. In the near term, we see potential for further spread compression of Turkey against South Africa, especially in the 5y sector of the curve (Turkey ‘22s vs SOAF ‘22s), with South Africa remaining vulnerable to adverse developments.

  In the corporate credit space, we also have a Market Weight rating on Turkish banks and corporates. In the case of a “yes” vote, we would expect bank seniors to benefit more than corporates given the more significant spread pick-up relative to the sovereign. Higher beta seniors trading at a discount of over 100bp to the sovereign as well as new-style Tier 2s yielding over 7% are likely best positioned to benefit, in our opinion, although this could be met with more Tier 2 supply. We would expect the opposite reaction to a “no” vote, with IG-rated corporates and more expensive bank seniors as well as old-style Tier 2s to be less vulnerable in any sell-off.

  NO: Positioning for a “no” outcome looks most compelling via FX options

  The less-expected “no” outcome will likely result in larger market movements as a higher risk of an early election would increase risk premia in the local bond curve, weigh on the lira and increase FX implied volatility, in our view.

  

  

• India Claims 500 Pakistanis (Protecting ISIS) Killed In "Treasonous" US Bombing In Afghanistan

  While US officials have upped their death count from the Afghan MOAB drop to 94, Indian authorities are claiming that at least 500 Pakistani nationals (who had been protecting the ISIS operatives in this area) were killed in the US bombing in Nangarhar province.

  

  One India reports that the area that was targetted was controlled by the Islamic State and protected by the Pakistan army, sources say.

  The operation that was jointly coordinated by the 201 Selab Corps of the Afghanistan army targeted the caves and tunnels that were used as hiding places by the IS. It is now clear that the Pakistan army was backing these IS operatives in Afghanistan, official sources also confirmed.

   

  Indian agencies who are coordinating withe counterparts in Afghanistan have learnt that there are no civilians living in the area. There were a large number of stooges of the Inter-Services intelligence who have been protecting the IS operatives in this area. The US action comes at a time when there was a huge build-up of IS forces in Afghanistan.

   

  Indian agencies say that the Pakistan army and the ISI were nurturing these operatives. The entire area that was bombed was under the control of the ISI officials backing the IS, sources also said. The impact of the bomb was so huge that it blew up at least 500 Pakistanis and an equal number of IS operatives.

  So, while India seems pleased with the result of the US bombing, not everyone else is. Reuters reports that former Afghan president Hamid Karzai accused his successor on Saturday of committing treason by allowing the U.S. military to drop the largest conventional bomb ever used in combat during an operation against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan.

  

  Karzai, who also vowed to "stand against America", retains considerable influence within Afghanistan's majority Pashtun ethnic group, to which President Ashraf Ghani also belongs. His strong words could signal a broader political backlash that may endanger the U.S. military mission in Afghanistan.

  "How could you permit Americans to bomb your country with a device equal to an atom bomb?" Karzai said at a public event in Kabul, questioning Ghani's decision. "If the government has permitted them to do this, that was wrong and it has committed a national treason."

   

  "I decided to get America off my soil," he said. "This bomb wasn't only a violation of our sovereignty and a disrespect to our soil and environment, but will have bad effects for years."

  Ghani's office said the strike had been closely coordinated between Afghan and U.S. forces and replied to Karzai's charges with a statement saying:

  "Every Afghan has the right to speak their mind. This is a country of free speech."

  Public reaction to Thursday's strike has been mixed, with some residents near the blast praising Afghan and U.S. troops for pushing back the Islamic State militants.

  

  

• Meet The Lawyer Who's Suing Saudi Arabia For Financing The 9/11 Attacks

  Authored by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

  

  I’ve stopped calling what our government has done a cover-up. Cover-up suggests a passive activity. What they’re doing now I call aggressive deception.

   

  – Former Senator Bob Graham, co-chair of Congress’s 9/11 Joint Inquiry

  With the recent arrival of our new baby daughter, free time for reading has been in extremely short supply as of late. That said, I did find some time yesterday while she was napping to read a fascinating and infuriating article published at Politico about a New York attorney’s mission to hold Saudi Arabia accountable for its role in financing the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

  Longtime readers will be aware of the fact that I’ve never accepted the U.S. government’s fairytale story about how the 9/11 attacks went down, and my suspicions of deep Saudi involvement were confirmed by last year’s release of the infamous “28 pages.” Here’s an excerpt of what I wrote at the time from the post, The 28-Pages Are Way Worse Than I Thought:

  Shortly after the release of the infamous 28-pages earlier today, the White House issued a statement dismissing allegations of Saudi involvement in the attacks of 9/11. I believe such assurances are intended to prevent people from reading it in the first place, because if you actually read them, your mouth will be wide open the entire time in disbelief.

   

  There are only two conclusions any thinking person can come to after reading the 28-pages.

   

  1. Elements within the Saudi government ran the operations behind the 9/11 attack.

  2. The U.S. government covered it up.

   

  But don’t take my word for it. You should read it yourself.

  If you missed that post the first time around, you should definitely check it out.

  Moving along, a recently published Politico piece adds additional pieces to the puzzle, and makes it clear that the U.S. government continues to intentionally cover up Saudi Arabia’s increasingly obvious role in the terrorist attack. The following should make your blood boil, and lead you to wonder why the U.S. government continues to have such deep ties to this barbaric, terrorist-funding regime.

  Here are excerpts from, One Man’s Quest to Prove Saudi Arabia Bankrolled 9/11:

  When Jim Kreindler got to his midtown Manhattan office on Friday, July 15, 2016, he had a surprise waiting for him. Twice in the previous eight years, Kreindler had been in the room as then-President Barack Obama promised Kreindler’s clients he would declassify a batch of documents that had taken on near mythic importance to those seeking the full truth of who had helped plan and fund the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Now, Kreindler learned, “the 28 pages” as they were known, were open for inspection and it was up to his team to find something of value. It wasn’t long before they did—a single, vague line about a Somali charity in Southern California.

   

  That obscure reference would soon become part of the backbone of an argument that Kreindler and his firm have been making for a long time: Without financial and logistical support from members of the government of Saudi Arabia, the 9/11 attacks would have never taken place.

   

  Sometimes it seemed as though Kreindler’s own government were actively working against the firm; agencies denied Freedom of Information Act requests and shared information with the Saudis as often as with his team. “I’ve stopped calling what our government has done a cover-up,” says former Senator Bob Graham, the co-chair of Congress’s 9/11 Joint Inquiry and the most prominent voice alleging a connection between the Saudis and the hijackers. “Cover-up suggests a passive activity. What they’re doing now I call aggressive deception.”

  It seems to me the very country in the Middle East the U.S. government should be bombing, is precisely the one it defends most aggressively.

  Saudi Arabia was Kreindler’s focus because many, including well-placed people like Graham, had long suspected that it had played a role in the plot, a charge the Saudis had always vociferously denied. Suspicions were fueled, however, by what the U.S. government had chosen not to reveal after the attacks. The post-9/11 Joint Inquiry, the first U.S. investigation led by the House and Senate intelligence committees, had exposed nearly 1,000 pages of documentation and evidence to public scrutiny. But upon its release in 2002, President George W. Bush ordered a small portion—the 28 pages—to remain classified. They were allegedly full of unpursued leads that hinted at a relationship between the 19 hijackers—15 of whom were Saudi nationals—and people possibly linked to the Saudi government. Then came the later 9/11 Commission, whose own members protested drastic, last-minute edits that seemed to absolve the Saudi government of any responsibility.

   

  On March 20, 2017, for the first time in the case’s long history, the firm named the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia as its lead defendant. This was made possible because the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act, a bill that allows U.S. nationals to sue countries even if those countries have not been deemed a state sponsor of terrorism, had passed in September and survived Obama’s veto.

  Now here’s the recent breakthrough in the case, which comes courtesy of information gleaned from a Somali man who was living in San Diego at the time of the attacks, Omar Abdi Mohamed.

  By now, according to the agent’s later grand jury testimony, Schultz knew this to be untrue. As he and Mohamed were speaking, Schultz’s colleagues were rifling through that stucco home and finding deposit slips that told a very different story. Far from destitute, the Western Somali Relief Agency had received more than $370,000 in donations in less than three years. The vast majority of that money had come from the suburban Chicago branch of an international nonprofit called Global Relief, according to the indictment that the government would ultimately file against Mohamed. In the two years between Mohamed’s first interview and his second, Global Relief had been designated by the United States Treasury Department as a supporter of terrorism due to its alleged connections to Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda, according to Schultz’s grand jury testimony. What’s more, the agents discovered checks that showed Mohamed quickly moved the cash he had received from Global Relief to a money transfer service that operated throughout the Middle East. For a nonprofit allegedly created to provide humanitarian assistance, the series of events looked suspicious. So did the fact that Mohamed refused to tell the truth.

   

  Schultz also knew something else. Mohamed had claimed that his one and only job was as a teacher’s aide. But ICE officials had just discovered that was also untrue. Even before his arrival in the United States, Mohamed had been employed as a “propagator” for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Islamic Affairs, an agency long suspected of ties to extremists. For nearly a decade, Mohamed had received $1,750 a month to provide written reports on the local Islamic community. Even Mohamed’s listed reason for obtaining a religious worker’s visa, that he was to assist a San Diego imam, had been untrue. That same imam had told Schultz that Mohamed didn’t actually do any work. The mosque where he was supposedly first employed was just a small apartment. The story had been a ruse meant to help him gain entry into the United States.

   

  This might have been the last anyone ever heard of Mohamed if it hadn’t been for a member of Kreindler’s team who noticed that one vague line in the “28 pages.” It was a reference to a Somali nonprofit that, according to an FBI agent, “may allow the Saudi government to provide al Qaeda with funding through covert or indirect means.” They knew of only one Somali nonprofit with Saudi ties in San Diego—Mohamed’s Western Somali Relief.

   

  In their 15 years on the case, Kreindler’s team hadn’t persuaded the U.S. government to provide them much of anything useful. And it certainly hadn’t had any success with the government’s Saudi counterparts. But they had spent more than a decade legally compelling some of the largest charities in the Middle East to hand over documents. Many individuals within the U.S. government knew these charities had provided financial and logistical support for the people and groups American officials labeled as terrorists. This trove of documents had grown into a database made up of terabytes worth of information—the firm’s well-organized haystack. And after Kreindler started looking more closely at Omar Abdi Mohamed, the firm found a needle.

   

  During his 2004 interview with ICE, Mohamed said he once had been visited by an official from the Saudi Ministry of Islamic Affairs, the same department from which he was receiving a monthly check. Mohamed gave the man’s name as “Khaleid”, though the last name he offered was garbled. The ICE agent helpfully provided him with one: Sowailem.

   

  Khaleid Sowailem was, at the time, the head of Da’Wah, a department within the ministry whose stated goal is proselytizing. It’s a mission the Saudis accomplish by spending more than anyone in the world to build, staff and support madrassas and mosques to spread Wahhabism, the ultraconservative form of Islam unique to the kingdom and embraced by Osama bin Laden. It’s the main reason why one analyst once described Saudi Arabia as “both the arsonist and the firefighter” when it comes to global terrorism. It only made sense, then, that a man like Mohamed, a “propagator,” would be of interest to Sowaleim, the bureaucrat in charge of propagation.

   

  Bob Graham had long suspected that men like Sowailem working in the Ministry of Islamic Affairs were the strongest link between the hijackers and the Saudis. “I came to the conclusion that there was a support network by trying to assess how the 19 hijackers could pull it off with their significant limitations,” Graham told me recently. “Most couldn’t speak English, most had never been in the United States, and most were not well educated. How could they carry out such a complex task?” Graham’s suspicions were heightened by the connections between the ministry and two men in what had come to be known as the San Diego cell.

   

  The first man was Fahad al-Thumairy, an imam at the King Fahad mosque in Los Angeles who was known for his virulently anti-American views. Thumairy was also an employee of the Ministry of Islamic Affairs. The second was Omar al-Bayoumi, a garrulous man who many in San Diego’s Islamic community assumed to be a spy, since he could often be found walking around with a video recorder, taping everyone he encountered. Bayoumi was also paid by the Saudis—he had been employed in a series of ghost jobs since the ‘70s, according to the complaint. He was also the man who had made a claim that many U.S. investigators still find too coincidental to be true.

   

  In a post-9/11 interview with the FBI, Bayoumi had said that he was dining in a Middle Eastern restaurant in Los Angeles in early 2000 when he happened to strike up a conversation with two complete strangers with familiar accents. A friendship developed, based off that single encounter. Bayoumi helped the strangers find apartments in San Diego; threw them a large welcome party; co-signed their leases and provided them money for rent; let them borrow his cellphone; even introduced them to people who helped them obtain drivers licenses and contact flight schools. Those two men were hijackers Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi, the first plotters to enter the United States, whose lives would end when American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon.

  Yep, it’s all just a coincidence, surely.

  The FBI has long believed that Bayoumi’s chance encounter came immediately after meeting with Thumairy. Shortly after that meeting, Bayoumi’s $3,000-a-month Saudi salary was bumped up to $7,000. To people like Graham, the implication was clear: Thumairy, a Ministry of Islamic Affairs employee, had tasked Bayoumi with helping the hijackers settle into a foreign country, and his Saudi employers had provided him with extra cash to do so.

  Doesn’t really take a detective to figure that one out.

  Kreindler’s team knew all of this, as did any student of 9/11. What they didn’t know was whether there was any link to Mohamed, or to the man whom ICE agents had identified as his boss. So Kreindler’s team took Sowailem’s name and plugged it into their database. They got a hit. Years before, Kreindler had received hundreds of thousands of pages of documents from a Saudi-funded charity called World Assembly of Muslim Youth, which according to the complaint, was linked to Al Qaeda. There, at the top of a single page, it found a note from Khaleid Sowailem written on official letterhead from the ministry. On that note was Sowailem’s phone number at the Saudi Embassy in Washington, D.C. They then plugged that number into the database and, again, out came a hit—this time, one that linked back to the men Kreindler and the rest of the world had already heard of.

   

  According to heavily redacted FBI records gathered after 9/11, in the three months after Bayoumi allegedly randomly ran into and befriended the two hijackers, he also made nearly 100 calls to Saudi officials in the U.S. Thirty of those calls went to the number that Kreindler had uncovered as Sowailem’s direct line. What’s more, Kreindler’s team knew that in December 2003 the U.S. State Department had quietly revoked the diplomatic credentials of two dozen Saudi personnel. Kreindler knew that the State Department published complete lists of diplomats every quarter. They checked the last listing in 2003—Sowailem’s name was on it. They then checked the first listing in 2004—Sowailem’s name was gone.

   

  According to court documents filed in the case against him, starting in December 1998 and continuing until May 2001 Omar Abdi Mohamed wrote 65 checks—some as small as $370; others as large as $60,000—to Dahabshiil. The total amount, some $370,000, is roughly the same as what the 9/11 Commission estimated as the cost of the plot.

   

  To the people at Kreindler, there’s something else suspicious about Mohamed’s money transfers. It’s not just that he lied about them to the government. Or lied about the fact that he conducted them while working for the Saudis. It’s also the timing. The transfers came just months after two massive truck bombs went off almost simultaneously in front of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. One of the statements issued by 9/11 Commission staff shows that in the aftermath of those bombings, Vice President Al Gore made a trip to Riyadh with the express purpose of getting the Saudis to give American investigators more access to people who could shed light on Al Qaeda’s financial backing—people who were already in Saudi custody. The Saudis, the 9/11 Commission staff wrote, were “reluctant or unable to provide much help … the United States never obtained this access.”

   

  Similar attempts to reach ICE’s Schultz and the FBI agent who helped investigate Mohamed were also unsuccessful. During Mohamed’s immigration trial, the government successfully persuaded a judge to suppress the evidence it had gathered against him, citing matters of national security. In late March, Jim Kreindler’s firm received a formal notice from the Justice Department that its request to review that evidence would be denied.

  Can you believe this crap? Americans knowing the truth about 9/11 is considered a risk to “national security.” What a joke.

  What happens next in Kreindler’s case against Saudi Arabia is unclear. JASTA allowed him and his firm to name the country as a defendant, but the bill has come under serious attack since its passage. (Congress overrode Obama’s veto, the first of his two terms.) Senators John McCain and Lindsay Graham have spent a considerable amount of time arguing against it, and continue to argue to water it down, saying that if other countries pass similar laws the nation hurt most by the trend may be our own. Then there is the Saudi lobbying apparatus, which at one point last fall numbered more than 10 firms and millions of dollars in fees per month. Just recently, the Daily Caller reported that U.S. military veterans were allegedly being offered what they thought were merely free trips to Washington, D.C., that were actually a Saudi-backed attempt by a lobbying firm to use former service members to argue against JASTA.

  It’s always John McCain and Lindsey Graham. Always.

  Least known of all is what might happen now that Donald Trump is president. During the campaign, Trump described Obama’s veto of JASTA as “shameful” and “one of the low points of his presidency.” Once in office, however, Trump has seemingly reverted to the status quo. He recently held a series of high-level meetings with Saudi deputies that the country’s delegates described optimistically as a “historic turning point” in the two allies’ relationship. Trump’s administration is now said to be weighing even greater involvement in Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen, which the Saudis see as a proxy battle with Iran, its primary Middle East antagonist. The Trump State Department has also approved a resumption of sales of precision-guided weapons to the Saudis, a measure that was suspended late in the Obama administration.

  For a prior article I wrote on JASTA, see: U.S. Corporations Side With Saudi Arabia Against the American People Over 9/11 Victims Bill

  It seems exceedingly unlikely that Kreindler’s firm will receive anything like the sort of treatment it got from the U.S. government during its two decades-long case against Libya. Back then, the firm worked hand in glove with high-ranking officials in the State Department in order to resolve the Lockerbie case—paying victims’ families their settlement money was one of the conditions Qadhafi had to satisfy in order to have key economic sanctions finally lifted. In lieu of that level of support, Kreindler has identified a series of smaller measures Trump could take that would still help his case and, just as important, paint a fuller picture of the years and months of stateside planning prior to 9/11. Key among those are FBI reports that might shed light on who, if anyone, was helping the terrorists in the many other American cities in which they lived. As Bob Graham points out, the only reason the evidence in San Diego is compelling is because we actually know it, a result of some good detective work by a member of his Joint Inquiry staff. “I believe if we knew all the facts,” Graham says, “We would find that there were people similar to al-Bayoumi and Mohamed in southeast Florida, Virginia and New Jersey.”

   

  That we don’t have definitive answers is a testament to the enduring secrecy that persists almost 16 years later. It’s also a testament to the patience of people like Kreindler, whose team has been working that whole time to get what it needs to prove its case, and who believes that no matter who is in office, there will only be one conclusion.

  Presidents come and go, but support for the Saudi terrorist state is timeless.

  So who does U.S. government work for anyway? Hint, not U.S. citizens.

  

  

• Doomsday Bunker Sales Soar After Trump's Military Strikes

  For the rich and famous among us, the endgame has been relatively clear for a long time: according to the surge in ultra luxury “bunkers for billionaires” being built, the way all this ends is nothing short of a whole lot of mushroom clouds around the globe, with the world’s wealthiest hoping to protect themselves in deep underground bunkers designed for just such an eventuality. That these bunkers are also ultra luxurious and extremely expensive is just the status symbol today’s billionaires are eager to show as they carry humanity’s survival “to the other side.”

  
  Interior bedroom of bunker

  
  Bunker swimming pool and garden using artificial lighting

  
  Underground bunker wine cellar

  But who said that doomsday bunkers have to be unaffordable for the common man?

  As CBS reports, while the Trump administration’s increased military strikes might cause fear for some people, for one North Texas man, it means big bucks. Nora Holloway of Dallas is one of those folks who is concerned about the state of the world. So, citing the recent bombings in Syria, Afghanistan and the growing tension with North Korea, Holloway posted online to see if anyone wanted to “go in” on an underground bunker. 

  “I’m in no position to buy one,” said Holloway. “However, I think that for a lot of people that is a serious concern and a lot of people have done so and will be doing so.”

  They have indeed, and with doomsday bunkers  no longer only confined to the 0.01%, it means Trump’s recent foreign policy overtures have led to a bonanza for bunker builders “for the rest of us.”

  “If I took 30 people and I worked 7 days a week and 24 hours a day, I still wouldn’t be caught up right now,” said Clyde Scott of Rising S Bunkers in Murchison, Texas. Scott said there is around a three-month backlog for one of his subterranean shelters.

  “They don’t really call me and ask me about the price or colors,” said Scott. “They say how fast can they get it.”

  The list is only growing with each bomb dropped and threat levied. “You should have got it 6 months ago,” said Scott. “You shouldn’t wait until the threat, until the fuse is lit on the rocket.”

  To be sure, unlike the ultraluxury bunkers discussed previously, these are at best Spartan, but at least they are affordable to most people. The most basic model is 100 square feet of protection that is installed for around $45,000. Scott said the most common is a 500 square-foot model for a family of four that runs for around $120,000.

  The bunkers have all the amenities of home, are solar powered and surrounded by 100 percent steel. Scott said only an imagination and wallet stand in the way.

  “Doomsday crazy person, ‘prepper’ that’s all kind of nutty that people make them out to be…they don’t have $3.5 million to by a 5,500 square-foot bunker. Right?” questioned Scott.

  While all of his clients are kept confidential, Scott said everyone from star athletes, Forbes 500 CEOs and maybe even an unsuspecting next door neighbor is investing underground without anyone noticing. “I’ve sold to billionaires and I’ve sold to average Joes,” said Scott. Holloway said she does not have the money but can at least dream.

  “It would prepare people, myself specifically for what could and very well may happen in the future,” said Holloway.

  A list of models can be found here. The most expensive model being offered is “The Aristocrat.” For $8.3 million, the model comes with a pool, bowling alley and gun range.

  Some examples:

  ECONOMY SURVIVAL SHELTERS, 8 X12 – MINI BUNKER – $39,500

  

   

  STANDARD SURVIVAL SHELTERS, 10×20-BASE MODEL – UNDERGROUND BUNKER – $58,500

  

   

  FREEDOM SERIES, 10×50 – FREEDOM SERIES, UNDERGROUND BUNKER – THE HOMESTEADER – $159,000

  

   

  ADMIRAL SERIES, 20×50 – ADMIRAL SERIES – UNDERGROUND BUNKER – $288,000

  

  XTREME SERIES, 2500SQFT – XTREME SERIES – UNDERGROUND BUNKER –  THE GUARDIAN – $679,000

  

   

  XTREME SERIES (BUNKER COMPLEX); UNDERGROUND BUNKER – “THE FORTRESS” – $1,009,999

  

   

  “THE PRESIDENTIAL” LUXURY BUNKER: $4,200,000

  

   

  “THE ARISTOCRAT” LUXURY BUNKER; “THE ARISTOCRAT” – $8,350,000

  

  And while it hardly needs it considering the niche audience, here is the marketing material one creates to sell a $8 million bunker.

  

  

• Why The Equity Bull Market Must Continue (Or Else)

  Via Global Macro Monitor blog,

  We have been busy crunching some very interesting data on pension funds from the most recent Federal Reserve’s,  Flow of Funds Accounts.    Check out the charts below.

  Interestingly,  the last time Private and State & Local Government Pensions were fully funded was at the end of the stock market bubble in 2000.  Pensions were 25 percent overfunded in 1999.

  

  However,  even with stocks making new highs,  these pensions remain $2.33 trillion, or 27 percent of their assets,  underfunded at the end of 2016.   Surprising.

  One would think the slope should be headed south as stocks rise, no?  Just as it was from 1995 to 2000.   On the contrary,   unfunded entitlements are heading parabolic north.

  

  Could be a combination of an under-allocation to equities since the dot.com and financial crash (see charts) and rising pension entitlements,  mainly in state and local government retirement funds.   Probably more the result of the later.

  

  The Upshot?   It seems the only way out of the pension mess — other than massive contributions, tax increases, or defaults — is a humungous equity bull market with pensions appropriately positioned.   In aggregate, they seem to be gun shy after the financial crisis with their average aggregate equity allocation only about 50 percent of what it was at the start and first few years of the new millennium.

  One caveat is the allocation data can be distorted and deceiving as equities are measured at their market value where some of the other assets are not.

  The question is:  Will Janet Yellen and President Trump do “whatever it takes to preserve” the pensions?   And will it be enough?

  

  

• Does This Energy Deal Signal A Dollar Bear Market?

  By Chris at www.CapitalistExploits.at

  Market dislocations occur when financial markets, operating under stressful conditions, experience large widespread asset mispricing.

  Welcome to this week’s edition of “World Out Of Whack” where every Wednesday we take time out of our day to laugh, poke fun at and present to you absurdity in global financial markets in all its glorious insanity.

  While we enjoy a good laugh, the truth is that the first step to protecting ourselves from losses is to protect ourselves from ignorance. Think of the “World Out Of Whack” as your double thick armour plated side impact protection system in a financial world littered with drunk drivers.

  Selfishly we also know that the biggest (and often the fastest) returns come from asymmetric market moves. But, in order to identify these moves we must first identify where they live.

  Occasionally we find opportunities where we can buy (or sell) assets for mere cents on the dollar – because, after all, we are capitalists.

  In this week’s edition of the WOW: ExxonMobil

  In January of this year, ExxonMobil spent a whopping $6.6 billion on new oil leases – a sizeable amount even for Exxon whose net income in 2016 was $7.8 billion.

  

  This was their biggest deal since the buyout of XTO Energy in 2009 when, after largely ignoring shale oil for a decade, they played catch up shelling out $41 billion for XTO – all of it in Exxon stock. More on that in a moment…

  A popular narrative around this deal is the following:

  This is dollar bearish. After all, oil and the dollar are relatively inversely correlated so why would you go spend a bunch of money on oil assets if you thought the dollar was going materially higher?

  You probably wouldn’t, so what makes Exxon special and why should we pay attention to them? Why have so many analysts been pontificating over Exxon’s moves? After all, companies, even behemoths like Exxon, get it wrong all the time.

  

  Insider knowledge:

  Since Rex Tillerson, former CEO of Exxon had just been appointed Secretary of state, and it figures that old Rex would have spent some time on the golf course with the Donald, and after chatting about that cute new intern with the lazy eye, he would have gathered some insights into Trump’s game-plan.

  And so to see XOM turn around and do this deal, it’s understandable to assume there’s some plausibility to a Trump administration that will actively devalue the dollar sending commodities in general and certainly the black stuff higher… at least in greenbacks.

  Maybe…

  Here’s a 20-year chart of Exxon Mobil.

  

  There are many many things which affect prices. Investor psychology, currency risk, sector risk… and algos… Yes, those blasted algos which I’ll come to in a minute.

  But first take a look at the valuations numbers for XOM.

  

  If you really think that XOM is worth 44x Earnings then please share with me whatever drugs you’re taking.

  Taking a look at earnings growth vs share price growth for the last five years (till Year end 2016) we can see that the share price increased by 7.2% from $84.76 to $90.89, all the while EPS decreased by 78.2% from $8.67 to $1.89. Whoah!

  Ok, so the share price has backed up a fraction and is around $83 today not $90, but we’re still staring at an over 70% collapse in EPS. 78% actually. Essentially earnings are flat while the share price has been rocketing higher. Mmmm…

  Cyclical

  It’s worth remembering that commodity markets are cyclical. They do well in good times and poor in bad. Markets it is said are forward looking. In this respect maybe just maybe investors are thinking that XOM can grow into the valuation and are pricing in this growth. In order for this to happen then presumably we’re going back to $100 oil.

  Perhaps…

  Here’s what I think is really happening:

  Machines are buying everything from currencies to equities, bonds, and anything in between. The algos dictate where the capital gets allocated.

  Where this matters for a company like Exxon is that it sits in a number of the “low vol ETPs” – I wrote about these animals before.

  So essentially what happens is the algos buy the low vol equities and ETPs, and ironically their buying depresses the volatility even more, causing the algos to recalibrate and add additional weightings to the equities exhibiting low volatility, causing more buying.

  Think of a fat kid eating candy. It tastes good so he stuffs more into his face, and that too tastes good so he shovels some more in. When he vomits we don’t know but vomit he will.

  So while the stock price is elevated you have to ask yourself the question: What would you do if you were Exxon management, staring at an overvalued stock price and being in the business of energy?

  I know what I’d do…

  I’d use my paper to acquire relatively undervalued assets. It’s the perfect trade and it’s got bugger all to do with my view on the dollar. Even if I overpay a little on the asset if I’m doing so with very overvalued paper then net-net I’m arbitraging the value difference.

  Question

  

  Cast your vote here and also see what others would do

  Have a good weekend!

  – Chris

  “Just remember that a pat on the back is only 18 inches from a kick in the behind.” — Rex W. Tillerson

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• North Korean Missile "Blows Up" During Launch; President Trump Aware, Has "No Further Comment"

  The initial official reactions to the failed missile launch are beginning to hit the wires:

  U.S. Pacific Command on North Korea missile launch:

  U.S. Pacific Command detected and tracked what we assess was a North Korean missile launch at 11:21 a.m. Hawaii time April 15. The launch of the ballistic missile occurred near Sinpo.

   

  The missile blew up almost immediately. The type of missile is still being assessed.

   

  U.S. Pacific Command is fully committed to working closely with our allies in the Republic of Korea and in Japan to maintain security.

  Additionally, Secretary of Defense Mattis says President Trump is aware of the situation and has "no further comment” on failed North Korean missile test.

  The big question is whether Trump will retaliate while VP Pence is in South Korea.

  *  *  *

  As we detailed earlier, after Saturday came and went without any provocation out of North Korea on its national holiday, many asked if Kim Jong-Un had finally learned his lesson.Well, according to South Korean news agency, not only did Kim not learn any lesson – or heed Trump's warning that a nuclear test or missile launch would be grounds for a US military strike – but Kim was not even successful in properly defying the US as according to the Joint Chiefs of the South Korean army,  North Korea fired an unidentified missile but the test failed. The incident occurred a day after Kim Jong Un oversaw an elaborate military parade in the center of Pyongyang as the world watched for any provocations that risk sparking a conflict with the U.S.

  //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

  

  According to a US official quoted by CBS, the launched missile was not an intercontinental ballistic missile, which North Korea has claimed to possess but has never successfully tested.  It’s unclear why the missile failed.

  The missile "blew up almost immediately" on its test launch on Sunday, the U.S. Pacific Command said, hours before U.S. Vice President Mike Pence was due in the South for talks on the North's increasingly defiant arms program.

  As Yonhap further reports, North Korea's attempted missile launch on Sunday ended in failure, South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said.

  “The North attempted to launch an unidentified missile from near the Sinpo region this morning but it is suspected to have failed,” the South’s Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement

  The missile launch attempt came amid rising tensions with the United States that is sending an aircraft-carrier strike group to waters off the Korean Peninsula to deter potential North Korean provocations such as a nuclear test.

  As VoA reports, there is still no information on the type of missile the DPRK tried to launch from Sinpo, where North Korea has a submarine base. What we do know, however, is that the time of the missile launch was at 06:20 am Korean time, and as Reuters also adds, the missile launched earlier this month flew about 60 km (40 miles) but what U.S. officials said appeared to be a liquid-fueled, extended-range Scud missile only traveled a fraction of its range before spinning out of control.

  “It appears today’s launch was already scheduled for re-launching after the earlier test-firing” Kim Dong-yub, a military expert at Kyungnam University's Institute of Far Eastern Studies in Seoul.

  “This launch can possibly be a test for a new type of missile or an upgrade,” Kim added. The North has said it has developed and would launch a missile that can strike the mainland United States but officials and experts believe it is some time away from mastering all the necessary technology.

  Tension had escalated sharply in the region amid concerns that the North may conduct a sixth nuclear test or a ballistic missile test launch around the April 15 anniversary it calls the "Day of the Sun."

  That said, in light of the recent NYT report that the US has been able to sabotage and remotely control North Korean launches for years courtesy of cyberattacks, one does wonder if the US did not play at least a minor role in this attempted, but failed, launch.

  Three years ago, President Barack Obama ordered Pentagon officials to step up their cyber and electronic strikes against North Korea’s missile program in hopes of sabotaging test launches in their opening seconds.

   

  Soon a large number of the North’s military rockets began to explode, veer off course, disintegrate in midair and plunge into the sea. Advocates of such efforts say they believe that targeted attacks have given American antimissile defenses a new edge and delayed by several years the day when North Korea will be able to threaten American cities with nuclear weapons launched atop intercontinental ballistic missiles.

  Sabotage or not, at this moment Vice President Mike Pence is en route to South Korea on Saturday night for meetings with officials amid increased tensions in the region over Pyongyang's nuclear program and missile tests.

  As we await more information, the immediate question is whether the mere intent to test the US' resolve, even if such an attempt was ultimately a failure will be sufficient for the US to commence bombing Pyongyang. Recall that two days ago, NBC reported that the US is prepared to launch preemptive strikes on North Korea in case Kim Jong-Un was planning on conducting a nuclear test. One can probably extrapolate the same logic to ballistic misisle launches, especially now that North Korea revealed a new, far bigger ICBM during the Saturday parade.

  

  We expect the answer whether the US will strike North Korea to be revealed within the next few hours.

  Meanwhile, courtesy of Stratfor, here are four possible scenarios on what happens next:

  A Red Line at the 38th Parallel

  A Range of Options

  Action against North Korea could take many shapes or forms, from a limited strike to a large-scale military offensive targeting all of North Korea's military assets. On the lowest end of the scale, the United States could launch a strike to punish North Korea for continuing to develop its nuclear and missile arsenal and to deter it from pursuing nuclear weapons in the future. A punitive strike may be limited to a single base or facility in the country, with the threat of further action down the line if Pyongyang doesn't alter its behavior. Though this kind of attack offers the best way to keep the situation from escalating, it would by no means ensure that North Korea heeds the United States' warning and eases up on its nuclear and missile development. Nor does it eliminate the risk that Pyongyang may respond to the strike in kind.

  Alternatively, the United States could elect to launch a more comprehensive punitive or preventive strike in an attempt to physically interrupt the nuclear and missile programs' maturation. The strikes would still be limited, focusing only on nuclear and missile infrastructure to signal that the United States is not trying to orchestrate a change in the country's leadership. This kind of operation, such as a strike on a single target, would encourage North Korea to curb its response so as not to provoke further attacks — though a full-scale retaliation could not be ruled out.

  If Washington judges that Pyongyang is likely to launch a counterattack regardless, it may decide a comprehensive campaign to degrade or eliminate North Korea's retaliatory capacity would be most prudent. This scenario would best position the United States and its allies against a North Korean response, but it would entail significant risks, virtually guaranteeing full-blown war on the Korean Peninsula. Consequently, a campaign of this magnitude would require buy-in from regional actors — something that has yet to manifest — and a buildup of military assets far greater than what the United States has deployed in the region so far. A more limited strike, be it a focused punitive strike or a larger one targeting nuclear and missile infrastructure, is more likely at this point. In the meantime, the Pentagon has rerouted several carrier strike groups to the waters surrounding the Korean Peninsula.

  Weighing the Risks

  Such an operation could involve cruise missiles as well as fixed-wing aircraft conducting strikes against various facilities across North Korea. Prime targets include the nuclear reactor or uranium enrichment facility at Yongbyon, as well as North Korean nuclear scientists. Should the United States plan more extensive strikes aimed at disabling all elements of the North Korean nuclear program, it may also deploy special operations forces to go after underground facilities that airstrikes couldn't easily or reliably destroy. But the broader the target set, the greater the risk of retaliation. North Korea has a hefty arsenal of short- and medium-range missiles that it could launch at nearby targets, including U.S. military facilities elsewhere in the region. Pyongyang's conventional artillery, moreover, could also do significant damage to northern areas of South Korea, reaching as far as the country's capital. U.S. military planners would likely view this kind of escalation as an unacceptable risk.

  

  The United States will base its decision about whether and how to strike North Korea in large part on the kind of reaction it anticipates from Pyongyang. North Korea has many reasons to mount a credible retaliation to any action taken against it, not only to maintain the appearance of a powerful actor on the global stage but also to ensure domestic stability. A weak response from North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's administration could undermine its legitimacy among the country's public or perhaps prompt a palace coup. At the same time, however, Pyongyang understands that a significant retaliation would meet with a commensurate response, which could cripple North Korea's military capabilities.

  If the United States determines the country is unlikely to take that kind of chance, it will have little else standing in the way of a military strike. Short of that scenario, however, Washington may still be willing to assume the risks of a limited retaliation. The United States could consider the launch of a small number of missiles that might be intercepted, for example, or incursions by North Korean special operations forces into South Korean territory to be acceptable consequences. Even low-level naval skirmishes may not be considered too great a repercussion. Still, anticipating the scale of North Korea's response is a daunting and treacherous gamble.

  

  Beijing's Options

  Then there's China's response to consider. Until now, Beijing has stressed diplomatic solutions to ease the rising tension, all the while warning against the chain reaction that military action against Pyongyang could set off. Beijing has consistently made clear that its red line on the issue is war or instability on the Korean Peninsula; China wants to make sure that it has a pliable buffer state along its northeastern border.

  In the event of a military strike against North Korea, China could intervene, either to support the North Korean government or to facilitate a power transition without jeopardizing order in the country. Its options for intervention range from military backing for Pyongyang to support for a U.S.-led military campaign to a decapitation strike. But whatever path it chooses, it will stay focused on ensuring the North Korean state's continuity and preventing any scenario that could lead the Korean Peninsula to unify under a competing power.

  The United States would doubtless risk a response in kind from China should it launch a military strike without consulting Beijing. And if Washington were to launch a full-scale campaign against North Korea, or if a limited attack spirals into a war, the likelihood of a Chinese military intervention to secure its interests on the Korean Peninsula will climb. Along with its desire to keep a buffer between its territory and U.S. forces in South Korea, China is worried about the threat of spillover from a potential conflict in North Korea.

  What to Watch Out For

  The window has not closed on a diplomatic solution to the problem. Pyongyang may decide to postpone its nuclear test, and the United States, in turn, could delay military action in favor of tougher sanctions. Still, given the high stakes at play, Stratfor will be watching closely for early warnings of impending military action.

  Defensive Preparations Near the North-South Border

  South Korea is always on alert during its northern neighbor's test cycles. And because it is a prime target for North Korea's prospective retaliatory action, the country is anxious about the possibility of a military strike — all the more so as it deals with prolonged political instability at home. South Korea's acting president has ordered his military to intensify preparations. But reports have yet to surface that the country is bolstering security at the border.

  A Shutdown at China's Border

  Overall, we are on the lookout for any sign that China is changing its military posture or taking steps to evacuate foreigners from North Korea. Reports suggest that China is mobilizing troops along the border, though we have not been able to verify these claims. Nonetheless, Air China — one of two airlines with service to North Korea — has announced that it is canceling flights to the country starting April 17. As one of the only countries that operate flights to North Korea, China may be trying to prove that it is willing to ramp up its economic pressure on Pyongyang. Otherwise, it may have canceled the flights simply because of low passenger turnout. The move could also be a precautionary measure, though, and we're watching to see whether it indicates that China is preparing for a military crisis.

  Changes in Travel Plans or Diplomatic Activity

  Changes to the itinerary of U.S. Vice President Mike Pence's impending 10-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region would be a red flag. He is expected to celebrate Easter with U.S. forces in South Korea. A sudden uptick in diplomatic activity between the United States and China, likewise, could signal imminent action in North Korea.

  

  

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• Video Shows Tampering with "Evidence" of Syrian Chemical Weapons Attack

  Preface: We spoke for quite a while with Dr. Postol by phone, and find him to be an ethical, honest, patriotic American man. He's made some interesting discoveries debunking the Syrian chemical weapons propaganda, and so we're helping to spread his findings.

  By Theodore A. Postol, professor emeritus of science, technology, and national security policy at MIT.  Postol’s main expertise is in ballistic missiles. He has a substantial background in air dispersal, including how toxic plumes move in the air. Postol has taught courses on weapons of mass destruction – including chemical and biological threats – at MIT.  Before joining MIT, Postol worked as an analyst at the Office of Technology Assessment, as a science and policy adviser to the chief of naval operations, and as a researcher at Argonne National Laboratory.  He also helped build a program at Stanford University to train mid-career scientists to study weapons technology in relation to defense and arms control policy. Postol is a highly-decorated scientist, receiving the Leo Szilard Prize from the American Physical Society, the Hilliard Roderick Prize from the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the Richard L. Garwin Award from the Federation of American Scientists.

  This is my third report assessing the White House intelligence Report of April 11, 2017.  My first report was titled A Quick Turnaround Assessment of the White House Intelligence Report Issued on April 11, 2017 about the Nerve Agent Attack in Khan Shaykhun, Syria and my second report was an Addendum to the first report.

  This report provides unambiguous evidence that the White House Intelligence Report (WHR) of April 11, 2017 contains false and misleading claims that could not possibly have been accepted in any professional review by impartial intelligence experts.  The WHR was produced by the National Security Council under the oversight of the National Security Advisor, Lieutenant General H. R. McMaster.

  This image was extracted from a video of a worker during midday (note shadows) on April 5, 2017 next to the crater where sarin was allegedly released according to the White House Intelligence Report (WHR) issued of April 11, 2017. 

  The WHR asserts that it reviewed commercial video evidence and concluded that sarin came from the crater next to a man.  Other video frames show unprotected workers in the crater showing no evidence of sarin poisoning at the same time the dead birds are being packaged.  The URLs to this and a related video are contained in this report.

  The evidence presented herein is from two selected videos which are part of a larger cache of videos that are available on YouTube.  These videos were uploaded to YouTube in the time period between April 5, 2017 and April 7, 2017.  Analysis of the videos shows that all of the scenes taken at the site where the WHR claims was the location of a sarin release indicate significant tampering with the site.  Since these videos were available roughly one week before the White House report was issued on April 11, this indicates that the office of the WHR made no attempt to utilize the professional intelligence community to obtain accurate data in support of the findings in the report.

  The video evidence shows workers at the site roughly 30 hours after the alleged attack that were wearing clothing with the logo “Idlib Health Directorate.”  These individuals were photographed putting dead birds from a birdcage into plastic bags.  The implication of these actions was that the birds had died after being placed in the alleged sarin crater.  However, the video also shows the same workers inside and around the same crater with no protection of any kind against sarin poisoning.

  These individuals were wearing honeycomb face masks and medical exam gloves.  They were otherwise dressed in normal streetwear and had no protective clothing of any kind.

  The honeycomb face masks would provide absolutely no protection against either sarin vapors or sarin aerosols.  The masks are only designed to filter small particles from the air.  If there were sarin vapor, it would be inhaled without attenuation by these individuals.  If the sarin were in an aerosol form, the aerosol would have condensed into the pours in the masks, and would have evaporated into a highly lethal gas as the individuals inhaled through the mask.  It is difficult to believe that such health workers, if they were health workers, would be so ignorant of these basic facts.

  In addition, other people dressed as health workers were standing around the crater without any protection at all.

  As noted in my earlier reports, the assumption in WHR that the site of the alleged sarin release had not been tampered with was totally unjustified and no competent intelligence analyst would have agreed that this assumption was valid.  The implication of this observation is clear – the WHR was not reviewed and released by any competent intelligence experts unless they were motivated by factors other than concerns about the accuracy of the report.

  The WHR also makes claims about “communications intercepts” which supposedly provide high confidence that the Syrian government was the source of the attack.  There is no reason to believe that the veracity of this claim is any different from the now verified false claim that there was unambiguous evidence of a sarin release at the cited crater.

  The relevant quotes from the WHR are collected below for purposes of reference:

  The United States is confident that the Syrian regime conducted a chemical weapons attack, using the nerve agent sarin, against its own people in the town of Khan Shaykhun in southern Idlib Province on April 4, 2017.

   

  We have confidence in our assessment because we have signals intelligence and geospatial intelligence, laboratory analysis of physiological samples collected from multiple victims, as well as a significant body of credible open source reporting

   

  We cannot publicly release all available intelligence on this attack due to the need to protect sources and methods, but the following includes an unclassified summary of the U.S. Intelligence Community’s analysis of this attack.

   

  By 12:15 PM [April4, 2017] local time, broadcasted local videos included images of dead children of varying ages.

  … at 1:10 PM [April4, 2017] local … follow-on videos showing the bombing of a nearby hospital …

   

  Commercial satellite imagery from April 6 showed impact craters around the hospital that are consistent with open source reports of a conventional attack on the hospital after the chemical attack.

   

  Moscow has since claimed that the release of chemicals was caused by a regime airstrike on a terrorist ammunition depot in the eastern suburbs of Khan Shaykhun.

   

  An open source video also shows where we believe the chemical munition landed [Emphasis Added]—not on a facility filled with weapons, but in the middle of a street in the northern section of Khan Shaykhun. Commercial satellite imagery of that site from April 6, [Emphasis Added] after the allegation, shows a crater in the road that corresponds to the open source video.

   

  Observed munition remnants at the crater and staining around the impact point are consistent with a munition that functioned, but structures nearest to the impact crater did not sustain damage that would be expected from a conventional high-explosive payload. Instead, the damage is more consistent with a chemical munition.

   

  Russia’s allegations fit with a pattern of deflecting blame from the regime and attempting to undermine the credibility of its opponents.

  Summary and Conclusions

  It is now clear from video evidence that the WHR report was fabricated without input from the professional intelligence community.

  The press reported on April 4 that a nerve agent attack had occurred in Khan Shaykhun, Syria during the early morning hours locally on that day.  On April 7, The United States carried out a cruise missile attack on Syria ordered by President Trump.  It now appears that the president ordered this cruise missile attack without any valid intelligence to support it.

  In order to cover up the lack of intelligence to supporting the president’s action, the National Security Council produced a fraudulent intelligence report on April 11 four days later.  The individual responsible for this report was Lieutenant General H. R. McMaster, the National Security Advisor.  The McMaster report is completely undermined by a significant body of video evidence taken after the alleged sarin attack and before the US cruise missile attack that unambiguously shows the claims in the WHR could not possibly be true.  This cannot be explained as a simple error.

  The National Security Council Intelligence Report clearly refers to evidence that it claims was obtained from commercial and open sources shortly after the alleged nerve agent attack (on April 5 and April 6).  If such a collection of commercial evidence was done, it would have surely found the videos contained herein.

  This unambiguously indicates a dedicated attempt to manufacture a false claim that intelligence actually supported the president’s decision to attack Syria, and of far more importance, to accuse Russia of being either complicit or a participant in an alleged atrocity.

  The attack on the Syrian government threatened to undermine the relationship between Russia and the United States.  Cooperation between Russia and the United States is critical to the defeat of the Islamic State.  In addition, the false accusation that Russia knowingly engaged in an atrocity raises the most serious questions about a willful attempt to do damage relations with Russia for domestic political purposes.

  We repeat here a quote from the WHR:

  An open source video also shows where we believe the chemical munition landed—not on a facility filled with weapons, but in the middle of a street in the northern section of Khan Shaykhun [Emphasis Added]. Commercial satellite imagery of that site from April 6, after the allegation, shows a crater in the road that corresponds to the open source video.

  The data provided in these videos make it clear that the WHR made no good-faith attempt to collect data that could have supported its “confident assessment.” that the Syrian government executed a sarin attack as indicated by the location and characteristics of the crater.

  This very disturbing event is not a unique situation.  President George W. Bush argued that he was misinformed about unambiguous evidence that Iraq was hiding a substantial store of weapons of mass destruction.  This false intelligence led to a US attack on Iraq that started a process that ultimately led to the political disintegration in the Middle East, which through a series of unpredicted events then led to the rise of the Islamic State.

  On August 30, 2013, the White House produced a similarly false report about the nerve agent attack on August 21, 2013 in Damascus.  This report also contained numerous intelligence claims that could not be true.  An interview with President Obama published in The Atlantic in April 2016 indicates that Obama was initially told that there was solid intelligence that the Syrian government was responsible for the nerve agent attack of August 21, 2013 in Ghouta, Syria.  Obama reported that he was later told that the intelligence was not solid by the then Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper.

  Equally serious questions are raised about the abuse of intelligence findings by the incident in 2013.  Questions that have not been answered about that incident is how the White House produced a false intelligence report with false claims that could obviously be identified by experts outside the White House and without access to classified information.  There also needs to be an explanation of why this 2013 false report was not corrected.  Secretary of State John Kerry emphatically testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee repeating information in this so-called un-equivocating report.

  On August 30, 2013 Secretary of State Kerry made the following statement from the Treaty Room in the State Department:

  Our intelligence community has carefully reviewed and re-reviewed information regarding this attack [Emphasis added], and I will tell you it has done so more than mindful of the Iraq experience. We will not repeat that moment. Accordingly, we have taken unprecedented steps to declassify and make facts available to people who can judge for themselves.

  It is now obvious that this incident produced by the WHR, while just as serious in terms of the dangers it created for US security, was a clumsy and outright fabrication of a report that was certainly not supported by the intelligence community.

  In this case, the president, supported by his staff, made a decision to launch 59 cruise missiles at a Syrian air base.  This action was accompanied by serious risks of creating a confrontation with Russia, and also undermining cooperative efforts to win the war against the Islamic State.

  I therefore conclude that there needs to be a comprehensive investigation of these events that have either misled people in the White House White House, or worse yet, been perpetrated by people to protect themselves from domestic political criticisms for uninformed and ill-considered actions.

  Sincerely yours, Theodore A. Postol

  Professor Emeritus of Science,
  Technology, and National Security Policy
  Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  Email: postol@mit.edu

  Video Evidence That Reveals the White House Intelligence Report
  Issued on April 11, 2017 Contains Demonstrably False Claims about a Sarin Dispersal Crater Allegedly Created
  in the April 4, 2017 Attack in Khan Sheikoun, Syria

  VIDEO #1:

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qeosawyrgyo

  Dead Birds Video:

  Note: Please see original .pdf uploaded here for more organized presentation of the screenshots.

  
  

  VIDEO # 2:

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyFAl2gjZJQ

  Idlib Health Directorate Tampering with Alleged Sarin Dispersal Site Video

  

   

   

  

• Chinese Media Almost Sets Off Military Action With Erroneous North Korea Headline

  As expected – and feared – during the annual “Day of the Sun” celebration parade (celebrating the birth of the nation’s founder), Bloomberg blasted a headline that Chinese news agency Xinhua reported that North Korea has fired a projectile.

  • NORTH KOREA FIRES PROJECTILE, MEDIA SAYS: XINHUA

  On its website, Bloomberg immediately picked up the story, and ran with “North Korea Fires Projectile Media, Says Xinhua” (at a url which still reads: “https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-04-15/north-korea-fires-projectile-media-says-xinhua“)

  

  However, it appears that the headline scanning algos made a collosal error, and that Xinhua interpreted events quite incorrectly as it was, as CBC and Reuters reports, the appearance of a new submarine-launched missile at the parade for the first time:
  

  • NORTH KOREA SUBMARINE-LAUNCHED BALLISTIC MISSILE SEEN AT MILITARY PARADE FOR FIRST TIME: RTRS

  North Korea displayed its submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBM) for the first time on Saturday ahead of a massive military parade in the capital, Pyongyang.

  State TV showed images of the Pukkuksong-2 SLBMs on trucks waiting to be paraded in front of leader Kim Jong-un.
  

  

  Immediately after, Xinhua – and Bloomberg – rushed to issue a clarification to avoid what may be a military confrontation.

  • XINHUA CLARIFIES HEADLINE ON NORTH KOREAN MISSILE
  • N.KOREA DISPLAYS BALLISTIC MISSILE AT MILITARY PARADE: XINHUA

  As a result, the BBG headline – with a URL that still says that “North Korea fires a projectile” – now reads the following:

  

  And that’s how World War 3 almost occurred.

  As CNN reports, a military parade in the heart of Pyongyang is underway where it’s expected the North Korean regime will show off some of its latest arsenal. Pictures on state television showed thousands of soldiers marching in formation alongside tanks, balloons and enormous crowds. Leader Kim Jong Un was shown clapping and smiling from a reviewing box.

  At one point, the soldiers directed a chant toward him. “We will die for you!” they yelled, CNN’s Will Ripley, who was at the event, reported. For North Koreans, April 15 is an auspicious date that sees millions celebrate the birth of the nation’s founder.

  

  

• These Are America's Most Creative Cities

  Much has been written about the role of the creative economy as a key indicator of economic health. As Visual Capitalist's Nick Routley writes, the “rise of the creative class” and “creative clusters” are concepts that inform the larger conversation on cities as the economic drivers of regions. As a result, everyone from academics to governments are increasingly looking for ways to measure the scope and size of the creative economy.

  According to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, the creative economy accounts for 4.2% of the GDP and is valued at $704 billion. It’s also a segment of the economy that’s still growing. For example, art director and graphic design jobs are growing across the country at rates of 9% and 13%, respectively.

  While there is no consensus on where to draw the line on what jobs or sectors are “creative”, we do know that cities are the primary places where measurable creative activities take place.

  Today’s infographic from Homes.com measures the number of creative jobs, creative schools, performing arts companies, and motion picture and video companies, to create the Creative City Index. While not comprehensive, it is an interesting snapshot of the creative economy of the country.

  

  Courtesy of: Visual Capitalist

  REGIONAL HUBS

  Perhaps surprisingly to some, St. Louis ranked highly in multiple categories, including education, with a high number of creative schools per capita. St. Louis also has a healthy motion picture and video editing sector.

  As housing in larger cities continues to rise out of reach for many artists and creative professionals, smaller creative hubs like St. Louis and Minneapolis could benefit from an influx of people seeking a more affordable lifestyle.

  URBAN HEAVYWEIGHTS

  New York ranked as not only America’s top creative city, but the world’s top creative hub according to a report by UNESCO and EY. As the chart below demonstrates, the creative sector is the fastest-growing segment of NYC’s economy, outpacing many traditional economic drivers.

  

  Not surprisingly, New York City dominates in specific creative categories. For example, 28% of the nation’s fashion designers reside in the five boroughs.

  As it turns out, creative economies in larger cities benefit immensely from specialization. In the visualization below, orange dots represent creative jobs in sectors more unique to that metro area. The yellow dots represent more common creative jobs. Essentially, Boston’s creative jobs are tied to industries that are unique to that region, while a city like Las Vegas (which ranked low in the index) offers creative jobs that are less specialized.

  

  The pathway to a robust creative economy requires creative jobs to grow alongside other specialized non-creative industries. This is a major reason cities with a strong technology industry presence also tended to rank well on the Creative City Index.

  

  

• Pompeo Declines to Offer Proof that Assad Gassed His Own People, Say Putin is a Liar

  Our new CIA director, Mike Pompeo, made a few comments today regarding claims by both Assad and Putin that the chemical attack in Idlib was staged.

  He declined to provide proof that could put this debate to rest, saying ‘there are things that were used to form the base of our conclusions that we can’t reveal.’ Then he went on to discredit Putin, by pointing to previous instances when the Russian leader was less than forthcoming — such as eastern Ukraine and the Malaysian airliner incident.

  Pompeo also discussed Julian Assange’s Wikileaks, saying: ‘This absurd definition would have all serious media organizations (with the exception of state owned media) transformed into ‘non-state intelligence services’– with the explicitly stated goal of stripping constitutional protections for publishers.’

  Assange replied with a mic drop tweet.

  Called a “non-state intelligence service” today by the “state non-intelligence agency” which produced al-Qaeda, ISIS, Iraq, Iran & Pinochet.

  — Julian Assange (@JulianAssange) April 14, 2017

  //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

  Content originally published at iBankCoin.com

  

• Tillerson In Moscow: Is World War III Back On Track?

  Authored by James George Jatras via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

  If anyone is worried whether the prospect of a major war, which many of us considered almost inevitable if Hillary Clinton had attained the White House, is back on track, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s visit to Moscow was cold comfort. From his remarks together with his counterpart Sergey Lavrov, there is now little reason to expect any improvement in US-Russia ties anytime soon, if ever, and much reason to expect them to get worse – a lot worse.

  There has been a great deal of speculation as to why President Donald Trump, who promised a break with the warmongering policies Hillary would have implemented, and which characterized the administrations of Barack Obama, George W. Bush, and Bill Clinton, would have bombed Syria’s Shayrat airbase in retaliation for a supposed chemical weapons (CW) strike without evidence or authorization from either Congress or the UN Security Council.

  (I won’t bore anyone familiar with Balkan affairs with the almost certain origin of the gas attack in Idlib. The odds that it was a false flag by the jihadists far, far outweigh any chance of a CW attack by Syrian government forces. To cite the «Markale market massacres» is enough. Ghouta September 2013 wasn’t the first such deception in Syria, and Idlib April 2017 won’t be the last. American media condemning Assad for the CW attack and demanding justice for the victims never mention that the site is held by al-Qaeda and that they themselves have a CW capability. Nor that the jihadists likely knew when and where Syrian planes would be operating, since the Russians would have notified the US under the deconfliction agreement. This is not to rule out the Russian explanation that the release was due to Syrian bombing of the jihadists’ CW cache but I consider the planned provocation more likely based on the timing. Predictably, an amateurish four-page paper issued by the US intelligence community to justify accusations against Assad contained zero evidence.)  

  Among the reasons speculated for President Trump’s abrupt reversal of his campaign positions:

  • Trump actually believes Assad was responsible, based on false intelligence fed to him by National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster and others, or on an emotional appeal from his daughter, Ivanka, based on sensational media coverage.
  • Trump doesn’t believe it but someone gave him The Talk: «Do what you’re told, Mr. President, or you and Barron will end up like Jack Kennedy.»
  • Whether or not he believes Assad is to blame for the CW attack, Trump wants to improve ties with the Russians and work together with them to defeat the jihadists in Syria and end the war, and perhaps cut a «grand bargain» that includes Ukraine, but he can’t because of the domestic pressure from the media, the Deep State, almost all of the Democrats, and a lot of Republicans on the evidence-free charge that Moscow tried to skew the 2016 election. (That seems to be partly working, with many formerly harsh critics now praising him. On the other hand, his own base is now split between those cheer any jingoistic use of force and those who see that another optional war will doom his domestic priority to «Make America Great Again!») The one piece of evidence that supports this conjecture is the extremely limited pinprick nature of the US strike on Shayrat.
  • Related to the previous point, given the power of the domestic forces conspiring against him, Trump needed to project strength. (My guess is that Moscow, Beijing, and others will conclude just the opposite: he is weak and not even master in his own house.)
  • Trump is impulsive and lacking in substance, so he goes for the quickest and easiest path to what he perceives to be current advantage. The praise of his former detractors – mainly those who have denigrated and derided him – will prove short-lived. At the earliest opportunity those hailing him now as «presidential» will be the first to call for his head.
  • Trump’s real priority was to impress the Chinese on Korea, with a show of force during President Xi Jinping’s summit in the US. Sending an aircraft carrier group to the waters near Korea with a barrage of bellicose rhetoric that the US will resolve the North Korea issue if China doesn’t reinforces this theory, at least in part. Whether Xi was impressed the way Trump might have intended it is another conjecture. 

  Whatever the motives, the real question is what comes next. Aside from when another false flag may occur – which Washington in effect invited with threats of a further, more devastating military action against Syria – it matters whether behind closed doors Tillerson’s proposals differed from his public comments.

  Broadly speaking, there are two possibilities:

  1.      Tillerson may have said, in effect, that Trump has laid down a marker, neutralized domestic critics, and shown he’s a big dog – now let’s get down to business. All the accusatory language is just for show, so Trump will have greater flexibility of action. In the weeks prior to the Idlib CW attack, Washington and Moscow had seemed to be coordinating on plans for an offensive against Daesh in Raqqa and airstrikes against al-Qaeda in Idlib. The US and Russia together need to find a way to wrap up this war that defeats the enemy Trump campaigned against: radical Islamic terrorism. It’s up to the Syrian people to work out who their leaders should be. If there are security concerns America’s Israeli, Turkish, and Sunni friends have, let’s find a way to address them within that larger context –

  or

  2.      Tillerson’s private comments were consistent with his public statements, amounting to imposing the US Deep State’s agenda on Moscow. That diktat gives priority to blocking some mythical «Shia Crescent» to keep our Sunni «allies» and Israel happy. Assad must go on some specified timetable, though we may grandly allow him so preside over a rump Alawite state in western Syria on a temporary basis; if Assad goes along, we’ll let him retire to Moscow, but if he waits until the next chemical provocation it’s off to The Hague or we’ll kill him ourselves. Syria must be partitioned: we will allow Moscow to participate in a marginal role on the «defeat» of Daesh with a blitzkrieg on Raqqa but then create a «Sunnistan» (or maybe more than one) in eastern Syria, run by some hand-picked jihadi group friendly to the Saudis – basically Daesh with new hats and flag: Islamic State «lite.» To limit Kurdish aspirations Turkey might be awarded a «Turkmen» zone in the new Syria, as well as primacy over a neighboring al-Qaeda-administered area. Also we can anticipate a demand that Russia be prepared to step aside and not oppose an operation for regime change in Tehran.

  Even the first message might have been a hard sell given how poisoned the well is and the depth of the abyss of Russian mistrust of the United States. No matter how positive anything Tillerson might have said privately, can anyone in Moscow now believe anything from Washington?

  But if the message was the second one, as I believe it was, the Russians would have little choice but to conclude that a major war may be unavoidable and they will plan accordingly. (China would reach the same conclusion.) Plans being made when it was assumed Hillary Clinton was going to win but tentatively mothballed with Trump’s election will be pulled out and updated. Paradoxically, Moscow might still acquiesce to Tillerson’s demands on Syria but only in the spirit of August 1939 – a temporary expedient to buy time and space for what must come.

  I of course hope the message was the first but fear it was the second. The white-hot rhetoric coming out of Washington is far in excess of that needed to position US opinion for a reasonable deal with Moscow. Quite to the contrary, it seems calculated to burn any bridges back from anything but regime change and more war. Once again, as has been the case since the Cold War ended in 1991 – but only on the Russian side – US goals look to be geopolitical and ideological, not based on American national interest. The agendas of the Deep State and our regional «allies» will continue to set US policy. Russia must be destroyed as an independent power, right after Syria, Iran, and North Korea but before China. (In a Balkan sideshow, Trump this week signed the NATO accession of Montenegro, effectively completing encirclement of Serbia. At a White House meeting with Jens Stoltenberg, Trump praised NATO.) As was the case in Bosnia, Kosovo, and Libya, and today in Syria, the US is happy to use jihadists as proxies while coldly watching them eliminate centuries-old Christian communities.

  In short, the usual. If such a path has been chose by Trump, as appears likely, it may well doom his presidency to failure. But in context, that would be the least of our worries.

  I would be very, very glad to be proved wrong.

  

  

• U.S. Insurers Sue Saudis For $4.2 Billion Over 9/11

  Authored by Jason Ditz via TheAntiMedia.org,

  Last year’s Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (JASTA), a bill which allowed Americans to sue Saudi Arabia in US court over their involvement in 9/11, has yielded another major lawsuit yesterday, a $4.2 billion suit filed by over two dozen US insurers related to losses sustained because of the 2001 attack.

  

  The lawsuit is targeting a pair of Saudi banks, and a number of Saudi companies with ties to the bin Laden family, accusing them of various activities in support of al-Qaeda in the years ahead of 9/11, and subsequently having “aided and abetted” the attack.

  "But for the assistance provided by defendants," the lawsuit said, "al Qaeda could not have successfully planned, coordinated, and carried out the September 11th attacks, which were a foreseeable and intended result of their material support and sponsorship of al Qaeda."

  The 10 defendants in the lawsuit include Al Rajhi Bank, aviation contractor Dallah Avco, the Mohamed Binladin Co, the Muslim World League, and other charities, but the biggest target is the Saudi National Commercial Bank, which is majority state-owned. The Saudi government heavily pressured the Obama Administration to block the JASTA last year, threatening to crash the US treasury market if it led to lawsuits, but overwhelming Congressional support still got it passed into law.

  While there were more than a few lawsuits already filed in the past several weeks related to JASTA, this is by far the biggest, and most previous lawsuits are still in limbo as the court and lawyers try to combine them into various class action groups.

  Historically, US sovereign immunity laws have prevented suits against the Saudi government related to overseas terrorism. With the release of the Saudi-related portions of the 9/11 Report last year, however, such suits were inevitable, and the federal government could no longer protect the Saudis from litigation.

  

  

  

• Heavily-Armed Swamp Critters – Did Trump Ever Stand A Chance?

  Authored by Bill Bonner via InternationalMan.com,

  

  By our calculation, it took just 76 days for President Trump to get on board with the Clinton-Bush-Obama agenda.

  Now there can be no doubt where he’s headed. He’s gone Full Empire.

  Not that it was unexpected. But the speed with which the president abandoned his supporters and went over to the Deep State is breathtaking.

  Worst Mistake

  Among the noise and hubbub of the election campaign, there was one message coming from the Trump team that was music to our ears.

  Middle East wars?

  He was against them, he said.

  He claimed to have opposed the 2003 attack on Iraq. He said it was one of the “worst mistakes” the country ever made.

  As for further involvement, why waste American lives and American wealth on wars you can’t win?

  “America First,” he said.

  This was a refreshing position. It put the Republican neocons and Establishment Republicans against him; many went over to Hillary rather than risk giving up their think tank grants and consulting fees.

  A 2013 poll showed 52% of Americans thought the U.S. should “mind its own business internationally.”

  But the elite gained power and money from foreign wars; they weren’t going to give them up. Non-entitlement spending in the swamp goes largely to cronies in the military-security industry.

  Pudgy Pentagon

  But Donald Trump promised a “new foreign policy.”

  No more trying to be the world’s policeman. No more fighting other people’s battles… and making things worse. No more wasting American money and American lives on foolish, unwinnable wars.

  Ending America’s pointless and unsettling romp in the desert would be a good first move.

  The bill for these misadventures is now said to be $7 trillion. As to Syria, Trump was typically direct. Don’t attack the country, he warned Barack Obama in a 2013 tweet, or “MANY VERY BAD THINGS WILL HAPPEN…”

  But then, last week… the last great hope for the Trump administration blew up in Syria. Now the neocons are delighted. And the cronies. And the zombies, too.

  Here’s the outlook: no real change to O’care. No cutbacks in entitlements. No attempt to balance the budget. No belt-tightening at the pudgy Pentagon. (Instead, it will get more money.)

  And now this: The wars in the Middle East will not only go on… they will accelerate.

  For now, the U.S. is not only fighting terrorists. It is also fighting the people who are fighting the terrorists.

  It’s a perfect Deep State war: It is guaranteed neither to win nor to lose, but simply to go on indefinitely. This gives the insiders more and more of the nation’s wealth to piddle away in absurd wars in preposterous places.

  Meanwhile, Congress adjourned. When it returns in two weeks, it will confront another crisis of its own making.

  Bloomberg reports:

  Government funding expires on April 28, which will give Congress five days to unveil, debate, and pass an enormous spending bill… or trigger a government shutdown.

   

  “What a mess,” said Paul Brace, a congressional expert at Rice University in Houston, offering his own pessimistic view of the unified Republican control of the House and Senate so far under President Donald Trump. “It was so much easier when all you had to do was oppose Obama.” […]

   

  House Republicans “have differences of opinion. And they aren’t just political differences. They are policy differences,” said Republican Senator Rob Portman of Ohio.

  Old Wounds

  It will be tough for Congress to come to terms with its budget. The debate will open old wounds and gouge new ones.

  Already, the federal budget deficit is expected to average $1 trillion a year over the next 10 years.

  Mr. Trump will want to spend more. We need to spend more on infrastructure, on the military… and to revive the economy… he’ll argue.

  Many House Republicans, especially the idealists in the Freedom Caucus, will find it difficult to go along.

  Some will notice, cynically, that the whole program – including the attack on Syria – is little different from what Hillary had offered.

  Consumer prices are already rising, others will note. Besides, who wants to go back to his home district after having signed on to $30 trillion of U.S. debt?

  Others, the activists, will want to back Trump. The Obama years have been disastrous, they will say. The typical household is little better off than it was at the bottom of the last recession.

  Half of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck. And there are 66 million working-age adults without jobs, they’ll report.

  The feds must do something! Increase spending to stimulate the economy (and not coincidentally steer a few bucks to major campaign contributors and other important hacks).

  Runaway Locomotive

  The more financially alert among members of Congress will recognize that eight years of stimulus has done little to help the real economy.

  These realists will see a runaway locomotive headed to a dangerous curve.

  They’ll want to know how the feds will finance huge new deficits just as the Fed tightens interest rates.

  But the shrewdest among them will call their brokers.

  The highest stock prices since the dot-com crash are based on the belief that, somehow, Team Trump will push through a corporate tax cut, leaving businesses with more after-tax money.

  “That’s not going to happen,” they will say to themselves.

  They will want to get out of the stock market before other investors catch on.

  *  *  *

  The "Deep State" is more dangerous than ever. It already controls just about every aspect of American life… from health care to education, from the food on our tables to the never-ending war on terror. In his latest warning, Doug Casey’s longtime friend and colleague Bill Bonner exposes how the cronies behind the Deep State have pushed the world to the brink of an irreversible disaster. Click here to learn how that disaster will unfold… and how it could change your life forever.

  

  

• China Just Flooded Its Economy With A Record Amount Of New Debt

  China vowed that this time it was serious about finally deleveraging its economy. Once again, it lied.

  First, a quick tangent: as a reminder, when it comes to the global economy, increasingly more analysts are realizing that just one number truly matters: that of the global credit impulse, which as we cautioned for the first time two months ago, had recently turned negative, mostly as a result of the recent deceleration in China’s credit creation.

  

  Then earlier this week, in a follow up report from UBS, the Swiss bank found two material developments: the reflation trade of the past year was entirely the function of Chinese credit dynamics…

  

  … and making matters worse, China’s credit impulse had now turned decidedly negative, suggesting a similar fate for the global credit impulse. 

  

  As a result we were particularly interested in the latest set of Chinese monetary aggregates released overnight. They confirmed that China is clearly not yet ready to surrender its position as the world’s primary drive of credit growth.

  On the surface, the Chinese data was bifurcated, as Chinese new bank loan issuance was lower than expected totaling just over 1 trillion yuan, lower than the CNY1.17 trillion in February and below the consensus estimate of CNY1.2 trillion, as the government has tried to contain the risks from an explosive build-up in debt and an overheating housing market, at least when it comes to the traditional banking system. Even with the “slowdown”, banks still extended the third highest loans on record for a single quarter, totaling 4.22 trillion yuan in January-March.

  

  Loans to households surged to 797.7 billion yuan in March, according to Reuters calculations using PBOC data, accounting for 78% of all new loans in the month. That was much higher than either January or February and even the 50% of new loans in 2016. The rise likely was due to individuals increasingly turning to alternative types of loans as banks tighten rules on traditional mortgages, said Wendy Chen, an economist at Nomura in Shanghai.

  “We think (the increase in short-term loans) is possibly due to attempts to circumvent strict regulations on mortgages,” said Chen. “The high loans to households reflect that property sales are still very hot, and likely shifting from top tier cities to more third or fourth tier cities.”

  As Reuters observes, a surge in household lending in March also added to worries about whether authorities will be able to get the frenzied property market under control, even as cities roll out increasingly stringent curbs on home buying. While the central bank has cautiously raised interest rates on money market instruments and special short- and mid-term loans several times in recent months, most recently just hours after the Fed hiked in mid-March to avoid another spike in capital outflows and to contain debt risks and discourage speculation, it is treading cautiously to avoid hurting economic growth.

  

  Indeed, as China’s housing market continues to overheat, more cities have implemented strict home purchase rules, with some even restricting homeowners from “flipping” or re-selling properties they have held for only a brief time.

  Yet while conventional loan issuance showed a modest moderation, it was more than offset by another dramatic surge in aggregate, or Total Social Financial, which includes both bank loans as well as off-balance sheet aka “shadow” lending, which not only rocketed in March to 2.12 trillion yuan from 1.15 trillion yuan in February and a record injection in January…

  

  … but for the first quarter, TSF reached a new record high 6.93 trillion yuan – equivalent to the size of Mexico’s economy – and well above last year’s first quarter total. At today’s Yuan exchange rate, China’s credit creation in Q1 amounted to just over 1 trillion US dollars.

  

  Entrusted loans, trust loans and undiscounted banker’s acceptances – together a good indicator of shadow banking activity – increased sharply in March. Entrusted loans rose CNY203.9 billion, trust loans were up CNY311.2 billion and undiscounted bankers’ acceptances gained CNY238.7 billion, according to MNI. These gains were several times larger than the increases of CNY166 billion, CNY73.2 billion and CNY17.3 billion, respectively, during the same period last year, and boosted Total Social Financing in March to CNY2.12 trillion, nearly double the February figure of CNY1.15 billion and the second highest level since March 2016.

  “The increase of entrusted loans, trust loans and undiscounted banker’s acceptances was probably caused by the restrictions on lending to companies in the real-estate sector and overcapacity industries, and many could only turn to shadow banking (for financing) even though it carries a higher interest rate,” said Li Qilin, chief macro analyst at Lianxun Securities in Shenzhen.

  In addition to Qilin, for most analysts, the spike in TSF financing confirms the ongoing surge in off-balance sheet lending, primarily in the largely unregulated shadow banking system, despite repeated attempts by authorities to target riskier lending in past years. Furthermore, this shadow lending surge has raised substantial doubts about the effectiveness of official efforts so far to clamp down on risks in the financial system – especially those emanating from various shadow banking intermediaries and SPVs, profiled recently in a Deutsche Bank report which cautioned that China’s entire financial system is on the edge of an “uncontrollable liquidity event”, and has prompted the central bank to inject record amounts of liquidity to keep the system stable.

  

  But wait, there’s more. 

  Loans to companies totaled 368.6 billion yuan in March, less than half the amount of household lending, PBOC data showed. That is yet another ominous signal for the economy, unless firms are finding other sources of funding (which they very likely are in the shadow banking space, suggesting the money creation process is increasingly slipping away from traditional PBOC oversight.

  Nomura’s Chen said that the spike in non-bank credit growth in March may have been due to corporate borrowers turning to alternative funding channels as high demand for household loans crowded them out from traditional bank loans. She was also optimistic that the recent record surge in shadow lending will moderate:

  “We don’t think the strength in shadow banking activity will continue,” Chen said, adding that regulators are expected to continue slowly clamping down on the sector.

  We are not so confident, as the following charts from Deutsche Bank, and associated description suggest: “There has been a sharp rise in net claims to NBFIs from banks (Figure 33). We believe this is due to rising shadow banking transactions and also arbitrage activities with funds self-circulating within the financial sector. Clearly as shown in Figure 34, small banks are key lenders to NBFIs”

  

  Perhaps our skepticism is unwarranted: in March for the first time, the PBOC’s quarterly inspection of banks’ books included off-balance sheet wealth management products to give authorities a better sense of potential risks to the financial system. It remains to be seen if the central bank will do anything to intervene and slowdown this unprecedented surge in reliance upon shadow funding sources.

  Finally, in an ominous confirmation that this glut of new credit creation is not reaching the broader economy but is getting trapped by various asset bubbles (most notably housing) M2 money supply growth hit a more than 6-month low, growing at only 10.6% y/y in March, lower than the expected 11.1% rise and down from 11.1% in February.  The government has said it expects M2 to growth about about
  12% this year.

  

  On one hand, the slowdown reflects the moderately tighter policy stance by the People’s Bank of China (PBOC), but more importantly suggesting that overall economic growth is poised for a further slowdown.

  Adding to worries that the PBOC could cause a sharp imbalance in Chinese liquidity as it attempts to trek a fine line between injecting record amounts of loans on one hand, while gently tightening on the other, is that alone with bumping up some interest rates, the PBOC withdrew 705 billion yuan from the financial system through its open market operations in the first 12 weeks of this year, a 1.1 trillion yuan negative swing from a year ago, ING estimates. That said, analysts do not expect a full-blown policy rate increase this year, which could risk a knock to economic growth ahead of a key party meeting in the autumn when a new generation of leaders will be picked.

  The central government has made containing financial risks a top priority this year, calling for vigilance against asset bubbles and urging companies to reduce leverage. But it has still targeted economic growth of around 6.5% this year, which will require the copious amounts of new credit that is continues to inject month after month, increasingly so via the unregulated shadow banking system.

  The one silver lining: most of China’s “Big Five” banks reported last month that bad loan ratios were stabilizing, likely giving policymakers more confidence that risks from bank lending are under control, although Chinese banks, which are mostly state-owned, are notorious for misrepresenting the true state of their balance sheet. Indeed, many analysts believe Chinese NPLs are far higher than banks admit, and some China watchers warn a debt crisis may be inevitable if loan and money supply growth continues to sharply outpace the rate of economic expansion for the foreseeable future (as shown in the chart below) and that a Minsky Moment may be the inevitable outcome, with the only question being “when?“

  

  

  

• North Korea TV Livestream Of "Day Of The Sun" Celebrations

  With the world’s attention falling squarely on North Korea, which celebrates its “Day of the sun” on Saturday – the country’s most important holiday – during which many speculate it may conduct a nuclear test having previously said it is “up for war” following a warning from the US that such a test would most likely like to military strikes, below find a live video feed from the state-run Korean Central Television (KCTV) which is live streaming today’s event.

  While few details about today’s schedule have been disclosed, a military parade is expected to take place later in the day.

  

  

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• For The Third Straight Month, The US Killed More Syrian Civilians Than Russia

  Authored by Alex Hopkins via AirWars.org,

  March was the deadliest month ever recorded by Airwars during the Coalition’s campaign in Iraq and Syria. This coincided with the greatest number of munitions dropped by the allies so far in the war. The high number of alleged incidents across both countries forced Airwars temporarily to pause its full vetting of Russian airstrikes in order to keep pace with the reported Coalition toll.

   

  After a disastrous strike on March 17th claimed up to 230 lives in Mosul, media attention intensified – and the Coalition began reviewing its strike policies in the campaign there. However, civilians were also killed in record numbers across the border in the vicinity of Raqqa, Syria. Indeed it appears highly likely that the Coalition killed hundreds of civilians in Syria during March, with little press coverage. Neither the campaigns for Raqqa nor Mosul have finished – and Coalition proxies backed by US forces have yet to even begin fighting in Raqqa city itself.

   

  For the third straight month the reported civilian toll of Russian airstrikes in Syria was surpassed by that of the Coalition in both Iraq and Syria. But this may change, as Moscow again ramps up its own air campaign – one that has already left thousands of civilians dead.

  Coalition military developments

  As of March 31st 2017, 11,554 airstrikes had been carried out in Iraq and 7,831 in Syria since the start of the Coalition campaign against so-called Islamic State. During March, reported strike actions in Syria decreased by 21%, with 434 reported strikes. In Iraq, 268 strikes were declared – a marginal decrease of 1% over February. Yet as the record tolls of civilians killed and bombs dropped show, these strike numbers do not tell the whole tale.

  The month actually saw the greatest number of munitions dropped during the war so far. The declared active members of the Coalition (the US, UK, France, Belgium, Denmark, Australia – along with possibly Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the UAE) dropped a total of 3,878 munitions on ISIL targets in March, according to figures published by US Air Force Central Command. This was a 13% increase over the previous month. So far this year, 10,918 munitions have been dropped on Iraq and Syria, with January, February and March each setting new records for munitions dropped. This represents a 59% rise on the number of munitions released during January – March 2016, suggesting that President Donald Trump may be following through with his election promise to “bomb the shit out of ISIS”.

  According to official figures provided to Airwars by CENTCOM, the US carried out 97% of all Coalition strikes in Syria during March. The remaining members of the alliance conducted just 13 strikes in Syria during the month – a drop of 28% on those carried out in February.  In effect, the US is carrying out a quasi-unilateral campaign against ISIS in Syria – alongside its completely unilateral campaign against al Qaeda targets.

  Over the same period there was a small decrease of 5% in declared US strikes in Iraq, with 166 airstrikes reported. According to figures provided by both the UK and France, strikes by both allies increased significantly during March. In the same four week period from February 26th to March 27th, the UK reported 41 strikes (a 128% increase on February) and France 43 strikes (a 169% rise on February).

  Given that official CENTCOM figures show that all of the US’s allies carried out 70 strikes in Iraq during March between them, and that we know that the UK uses the Coalition’s definition of ‘strike’, it appears that – as in October 2016 – France may be using a more generous definition of the term ‘strike’ than that used by the Coalition.

  Footage of an RAF Tornado strike on an ‘ISIL headquarters’, five miles east of Raqqa, on March 18th 2017.

  Advances in West Mosul and Raqqa

  The Iraqi Security Forces, backed by Coalition and Iraqi airpower, pushed further into West Mosul during March, ousting ISIL from more of the city.

  On March 15th, the 9th Iraqi Armored Division liberated the Badush subdistrict and surrounding areas. The US announced the deployment of 250 soldiers in preparation for the forthcoming attack on the the Old City, the densest-populated part of Mosul.

  Following a major casualty event in Al Jadida/New Mosul on March 17th, elements of the West Mosul offensive were reportedly paused due to growing concerns for civilian casualties, and reports that ISIL was unlawfully using local residents as human shields.

  Meanwhile in Syria, Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) accelerated their operation to isolate Raqqa, prior to a multi-pronged offensive to seize the Tabaqa Dam. In an attempt to cut the Aleppo-Ar Raqqa highway, the US made a dramatic air drop to transfer 500 SDF fighters to the southern bank of the Euphrates River. Yet these aggressive military moves carried a heavy price tag for civilians in both Iraq and Syria.

  Coalition civilian casualties

  March saw the highest number of civilian deaths likely caused by the Coalition so far in the 32-month war, as the Coalition-backed campaigns to oust ISIL from West Mosul and Raqqa continued to intensify.

  Across both Iraq and Syria, Airwars researchers tracked a record 166 incidents of concern allegedly involving Coalition warplanes – a 67% increase from the 99 events tracked in February. A massive total of 1,782 to 3,471 civilian non-combatants were alleged killed in these March events – numbers not seen from foreign strikes since the worst of Russia’s brutal air campaign in 2016.

  The unprecedented scale of the alleged death toll meant that for the third straight month, civilian casualty events reportedly carried out by the Coalition in both Iraq and Syria significantly outweighed those allegedly involving Russia just in Syria. However, according to Airwars’ most recent monitoring, Russian strikes have begun once more to reap a heavy toll and this dynamic could flip once more, especially if the Coalition is firing less often. The unilateral US strike on a regime airbase in the early hours of April 7th may also lead to a reduction of Coalition sorties to avoid confliction with Russian planes.

  Of the 166 claimed civilian casualty events attributed to the Coalition, Airwars had assessed 63 of these as fairly reported. That classification reflects an incident as having two or more credible sources, and which took place in an area where Coalition airstrikes were declared in the near vicinity. Between 477 and 1,216 non-combatants are currently assessed as likely having died in these events – over four times the 110 likely non-combatant deaths estimated for February. These are not anonymous people: 359 victims are so far named, each tracked and recorded by local monitoring groups and listed by Airwars in its public database.

  There is significant debate concerning why civilians are at far greater risk on the battlefield. The Pentagon has denied that its rules of engagement have changed under Donald Trump’s presidency, which for the moment appears to be the case. As previously reported by Airwars’ Samuel Oakford, Iraqi officials have said that it is now easier to call in US and Coalition airstrikes – though this change reportedly dates back to December 2016. Coalition spokesman Colonel Joseph Scrocca has referred to any shifts in how airstrikes are called in, and who is authorized to do so, as “merely a procedural change”. While these changes may not match the military’s official definition of new “rules of engagement,” that is little solace for those affected by the new and looser guidelines.

  Mosul: a near tripling of likely fatalities

  The steep rise in civilian deaths witnessed in the last days of February continued into March, as civilians bore the brunt of the battle for West Mosul’s densely populated areas.

  Overall, between 1,308 and 2,435 civilians were claimed killed by the Coalition in Mosul during March, across 68 separate civilian casualty events. Of these incidents, Airwars currently assesses 11 of them as likely carried out by the Coalition alone. Between 156 and 355 non-combatants likely died across these incidents – compared to 62 to 64 likely deaths in February. Additionally, at least 66 civilians were injured in these events. That low ratio of fairly assessed incidents reflects the confused situation on the ground in Mosul, where Iraqi security forces and ISIL are also responsible for many deaths. In some cases, all three may be linked to an individual incident.

  March saw the highest proportion yet of events in Iraq graded as contested, with such events more than quadrupling against February. Across 44 such incidents, between 1,017 to 1,908 civilians were claimed killed.

  “The rise in contested deaths shows the challenges we’ve faced in tracking incidents,” explains Airwars’ Iraq researcher. “Events could have been carried out by Iraqi forces or  the Coalition – and in most incidents there were reports saying that both were responsible.”

  Official data for March shows a significant Coalition escalation in West Mosul: In total,  152 airstrikes were reported near Mosul – an 11% rise on February. Yet those strike numberes mask the ferocity of the assault. Some 1,723 targets were bombed throughout the month – a sharp increase of 44% on the 1,194 bombed in February. From the outset of March it was clear that civilians were paying a deadly price for this rampup in actions.

  As with February, Airwars continued to monitor reports of the deaths of entire families. The number of women and children killed rose steeply: at least 108 children and 30 women were reported killed across ‘fair’ and ‘contested’ events, with hundreds more slain in contested actions.

  On March 2nd for example, 14 civilians from three families were reportedly killed when an airstrike targeted a car bomb parked near residential homes in West Mosul’s Nabi Sheet neighbourhood, according to local sources. FaceIraq News named the victims as Nazim Abdul Rahman Chet‘s family; the family of Dawood, Suleiman; and the family of Yousef Mahmoud Salhan.

  

  In addition to homes, Airwars monitored reported strikes that damaged or destroyed civilian infrastructure. On March 6th, Nabi Sheet was attacked again, with local sources reporting that 16 civilians died and dozens more were injured in violent clashes and airstrikes which left the area’s busy market in ruins. On the same day, local residents and security forces reported the deaths of up to 33 civilians when the Coalition struck Mosul’s train station. Sources said that the majority of the victims were former members of the Iraqi security services, army and police detained by ISIL, which was using the station as a prison.

  The frequency and severity of events in Mosul increased as the month wore on. In the two weeks from March 6th to March 19th, our researchers tracked 26 separate civilian casualty events – with over 80% of these assessed as ‘contested’ – but all of them containing at least one credible report which pointed towards the US-led Coalition.

  On March 17th-18th, in the greatest loss of life in any one casualty event of the war, upwards of 230 civilians died after a reported Coalition airstrike on the Al Jadida/New Mosul neighbourhood, sparking international outrage. Initial reports said that the Coalition struck a house near Al Rahma Al Ahli Hospital housing hundreds of displaced people. Mosul Insta put the death toll at 250. However, in a filmed visit to the scene, the head of the Iraq Provincial Council, Basma Basim, said that she feared as many as 500 had died – a figure also given by the Iraqi Observatory – though these higher allegations may reflect overall casualties in the neighbourhood, adding to the confusion surrounding the event.

  There were in addition reports of ISF artillery fire and possible ISIL truck bombs in the near area. The Coalition confirmed it had carried out a strike “in the vicinity of alleged civilian casualties” and launched an investigation.  Airwars continues to track reports of those killed in this catastrophic incident. The dead include the twin brothers Ali and Rakan Thamer Abdulla, their father Haj Thamer Abdulla and 23 other family members; the family of the wife of Karim Jassim Al Salim; Hisham Hazem and Issam Hazem of the Sheikh family, the family of Khadr Kaddawi (12 people); the Basem al-Muhzam’s family (11 people); and the Sinjari family  (30 people). 

  

  In the week of the Al Jadida incident – March 13th to 19th – the Coalition publicly declared 34 strikes in Mosul against 464 targets. On March 17th alone, the day of the event, it reported that 118 targets were bombed in four “strikes” in or near Mosul. In the days following the Al Jadida incident however, there was an almost immediate scaling back in the number of targets bombed in Mosul, according to official CENTCOM data reviewed by Airwars. From March 19th to March 31st, targets bombed fell by 59%. Over the same period there was a 75% reduction in claimed civilian fatalities.

  

  While the last weeks of March didn’t see further incidents on the huge scale of Al Jadida, West Mosul’s civilians remained at extreme risk. On March 26th – in one of  three major casualty events likely carried out by the Coalition that day – 19 members of the family of Hassan Younis Arzu al-Jarjar died in a strike on the Tawafa area of West Mosul , according to Iraqyoon, Yagein and Iraqi Spring Media.

  Later that night, another 15 or more non-combatants perished in another alleged Coalition strike, this time near Al Batool hospital in Zanjili. Some sources said the victims were mostly children and elderly people.

  The month ended on as grim a note as it had begun on, with six events reported on March 30th, likely killing a minimum of 35 non-combatants and wounding at least 27 more. In the third reported incident in the Zanjili neighbourhood in just five days, dozens of civilians died when an alleged Coalition raid and possibly mortars – of unclear origin – hit civilian homes according to multiple sources. A graphic video by Yaqein (sourced from ISIL’s media wing) offered distressing testimony in which a witness says to camera “Airstrikes are targeting us. It’s only a residential area, nothing is here…all the people are dead and nothing is left.”

  

  Raqqa: civilian deaths spiral higher

  Though international attention paid to the civilian toll in Mosul grew after the March 17th strike, there was far less consideration of deaths in Syria – particularly around Raqqa where the month proved the deadliest by far of the Coalition’s campaign. In fact the majority – 57% – of all alleged civilian casualties incidents tracked by Airwars for the month were not in Iraq but in Syria.

  Across 52 incidents incidents assessed as fair by Airwars, between 320 and 860 civilians were likely killed by the Coalition during March – almost seven times the minimum likely death toll during February. Moreover, unlike in Mosul there were barely any ‘contested’ events (only two) and only four contested events reportedly also involving Moscow. There appears little doubt the Coalition was responsible for hundreds of civilian deaths in Syria during the month.

  “Since the beginning of the year the Coalition campaign in Syria has been getting more and more intense, peaking in March,” says Kinda Hadda, head of Airwars’ Syria team. “What was notable for the month was not only the frequency of the allegations but the high casualty figures for some of those.”

  Of the 52 ‘fair’ incidents, 90% were in Raqqa governorate, where between 275 and 743 non-combatants were assessed as likely killed by Coalition aircraft. Of these, at least 52 were likely children and 45 women – over seven times the numbers killed the previous month. At least a further 255 were wounded in these events.

  “Unlike in the opposition held areas, reporting from ISIL-held Raqqa province is very difficult and dangerous,” adds Haddad. “Therefore the reporting can be quite opaque and inconsistent, and casualties could potentially be a lot higher.”

  This spike in fatalities in Syria is in some respects more troubling than the civilian death toll observed in West Mosul. To an extent, casualties were expected to rise in densely populated areas of Mosul – though based on the Coalition’s reaction, they were still caught off guard by how many perished. Yet in Raqqa, fatalities have been predominantly in villages and towns that surround the governorate’s capitol. These areas share little in common with the narrow and packed streets of West Mosul, and yet numerous and large-scale casualty events have become the norm.

  Neither can the spiraling death toll be explained by an increase in strikes and targeting. Notably, both strikes and targets bombed in Raqqa fell in March. Across 243 strikes (a decrease of 11% on February), 366 targets were bombed (down 38% from February). These factors clearly suggest the US may have changed the way it is conducting strikes in Syria – with deadly risks for civilians on the ground.

  Tabaqa in particular continued to come under attack. In March, 15 civilian casualty incidents were tracked for the city during the month, likely killing a minimum of 100 non-combatants. On March 1st, up to 12 civilians including four children died and 14 others were wounded when civilian homes near the church roundabout in the Al Thani neighbourhood were allegedly hit by the Coalition.

  

  As in West Mosul, displaced civilians repeatedly came under fire. On March 11th in Kasrat Al Faraj, east of Raqqa, up to 22 non-combatants including six children and seven women reportedly died when an alleged Coalition airstrike hit schools in the area. According to Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently, the Saqer Kureish school was among buildings struck in a midnight raid, while Syria News Desk reported that Coalition warplanes conducted four strikes which hit two schools hosting displaced people.

  The worst reported incident in Syria during the month occured on March 21st in Al Mansoura. The former Al Badiya school – now reportedly full of displaced Syrians – was hit in a confirmed Coalition raid, killing at least 33 civilians and wounding up to 56 more according to locals. The death toll continued to climb, with the majority of sources stressing that most of the victims were women and children.

  Coalition commander Lt General Townsend later denied that the strike had killed civilians – but local monitors disagreed, with some saying that up to 100 displaced families were on the premises The entire families of Khalif Al-Ayto; Kitan Al’amash and his family, Mohammed Jum’a Al-Hadid and his family;  Khaled Hasan al-Qadi and his family and the family of Saleh Mohammad al Jassem made up of 18 people were among those reported killed. Airwars has identified numerous local media reports from late February onwards stating that internally displaced civilians had been moved to the Al Mansoura area – suggesting a major intelligence failing by the US and its SDF allies.

  

  In the days prior to an offensive to retake the Tabaqa Dam on March 22nd, Airwars tracked an increase in civilian casualty events in the area, with three incidents reported on March 20th alone. Those likely left at least 12 civilians dead. Between March 21st and 22nd there were another three incidents, in which a minimum of 72 non-combatants died.

  On March 22nd, 36 named civilians died in an alleged Coalition airstrike on an automated bakery in Tabaqa’s Al Thani neighbourhood.  A local source told the Smart News Agency that there had been four raids “killing the owner of the bakery, the employees and dozens of civilians who were nearby.” Among those killed were six members of the Al-Qobos family, three from the Al Omar family and three from the Al Abed family. Some sources put the death toll as high as 52, including seven children and 10 women – with up to a further 55 wounded.

  

  Before March ended, there would be more civilian casualty events reported in Al Mansoura. On March 29th, sources said that seven or eight civilian members of a family displaced from Maskanah died when an alleged Coalition airstrike hit their car. Six civilian homes were also reportedly destroyed. Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently named some of the victims as Mohammed Al-Hasa, A’ziz Al-Hasan, Ibrahim Al-Ali, Mohammed Al-Hamid, Hasan Al-A’klah and Mahmood Al-Mohammed.

  The following day – March 30th – the family of Abd al Aziz Barakat al Ahmad Al Faraj (including his wife and four children) were reportely killed when an alleged Coalition raid hit their home in Al Mansoura.

  With the assault on Raqqa yet to begin and hundreds of civilians already dying monthly in Coalition actions, urgent action is required from the US and its allies to reduce the risk of harm to non-combatants.

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  The family of Abd al Aziz Barakat al Ahmad Al Faraj, killed in an alleged Coalition strike on their home in Mansoura, March 30th.

   

  Russian military actions and civilian casualties

  After two consecutive months of scaled-back actions in Syria, March saw a significant and lethal rise in the number of incidents of concern allegedly involving Russian warplanes. Overall there were 114 such events tracked by Airwars during March – an 80 per cent increase over February’s claimed incidents.

  Though it will be some time before Airwars can fully assess the incidents, between 165 and 292 non-combatants are alleged to have died in these 114 events. However those figures are unvetted and unfiltered, and should not be directly compared to the Coalition numbers in this report.

  “Russia’s focus seemed to be mainly on Idlib province, Hama and the Damascus eastern suburbs,” explains Kinda Haddad. “After a lull in January and February we saw a major increase in events in Syria. The end of the Astana peace talks in mid March could have been one of the factors in the spike.”

  It remains to be seen whether Russian actions will continue to rise. At least for March, the death toll attributed to the Coalition for the month was at a level comparable to the most intense periods of Moscow’s brutal air campaign in Syria during 2016.

  

  

  

• North Korea Slams Trump's "Provocative, Aggressive Words", Will Test Missiles "When It Sees Fit"

  In a terse response to President Trump's earlier threats and later promises of pre-emptive strikes, North Korea's vice foreign minister Han Song Ryol says it is not his own country but the United States and President Donald Trump who are "making trouble."

  

  Vice Minister Han made the comments in an exclusive interview with The Associated Press in Pyongyang on Friday. Trump tweeted on Tuesday that North Korea was "looking for trouble" and added that if China doesn't do its part to rein in Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions, the U.S. can handle it.

  Han cited Trump's tweets as problematic, as well as the U.S. military's participation in exercises with South Korea and an aircraft carrier's move to the region.

  "Trump is always making provocations with his aggressive words. …. It's not the DPRK but the US and Trump that makes trouble."

  Furthermore, North Korea's vice foreign minister said it will conduct its next nuclear test whenever its supreme headquarters sees fit, warning that the situation on the Korean Peninsula was in a "vicious cycle" as tensions with the U.S. and its allies deepen.

  Han told AP that Pyongyang won't "keep its arms crossed" in the face of a U.S. pre-emptive strike.

  As we detailed earlier, tensions have escalated on the Korean Peninsula, as this Saturday marks the anniversary of the birth of the nation's founder — Kim il-Sung, grandfather of the current leader, Kim Jong-un. At the highest levels in South Korea and the U.S., sources told NBC News, there are fears North Korea could mark the "Day of the Sun" by testing a nuclear device. As discussed yesterday, North Korea in the past has used these national holidays to celebrate the strengths of the regime and to reinforce the national narrative of their independence, as confirmed by Cha.

  "I think that is what President Trump is getting trying to get the Chinese to do," said Cha. "[It] would impose real pain and force real choices on North Korea — whether the costs are worth it for them to continue to pursue this program if they no longer have any sustenance."

  In addition to the coal ships, the Chinese made an important gesture at the UN Thursday: A surprising abstention on a Security Council resolution condemning a Syrian chemical weapons attack. China didn't stand with the Russians on Syria, as it has in the past.

  

  

• Peter Schiff Warns: "Nothing Has Changed Under Trump… We're Headed For A Major Crisis"

  Authored by Mac Slavo via SHTFplan.com,

  When Donald Trump was elected, there was so much optimism among libertarians and conservatives, it was almost palpable. However, it’s only been several months into his first term, and it’s becoming quite apparent that Trump is no savior. In retrospect, it was foolish to think any single person could snap his fingers, and reverse decades of financial mismanagement and political corruption. It was foolish to think that he could dismantle an entrenched bureaucracy that is more powerful than most people realize.

  But not everyone was convinced that Trump was going to be able to turn this ship around. Peter Schiff knew that the damage done by the political establishment was irreversible, and that our financial system was living on borrowed time. In a recent interview with Future Money Trends, Schiff explains why Donald Trump can’t stop the inevitable, and how you can crash proof your assets ahead of the economic pain that is coming:

  Donald Trump should already be disappointing a lot of people who thought we were going to get change, we were going to make America great again. We didn’t repeal Obamacare, that’s here to stay. Major tax reform is dead. We’re dropping bombs.

   

  I mean it’s the same old same old right? Big government… bigger deficits… more cheap money… keep the air in the bubble. We’re headed for a major major crisis.

  Watch the full interview with Peter Schiff:

  
  (Watch At Youtube)

  As for what that major crisis will be, it’s not what most people would expect. As Schiff points out, it’s not going to be triggered by one sector of the economy, as we saw in during the last financial crash. The crisis is going to emerge with the dollar itself, which Schiff says could cause precious metal prices to soar. Everyone is taking for granted the fact that the dollar is king, but it’s not going to be for long. Not when our government continues to rack up debt like a compulsive gambler; which at this point, doesn’t appear to be changing under Trump.

  The dollar is living on borrowed time, literally. And so we just don’t know. It’s like a bomb with a fuse, but we just don’t really know how long the fuse is. The dollar, I think is in a major bubble. I think it is in the process of topping out. I think once it completes this top it’s going down. And I think it’s going to take out the lows from 2008…

   

  …I think it’s going to go down for the count. Because the last time, what saved the dollar was the financial crisis, and that crisis resulted in everybody buying the dollar. But I think the next crisis is not going to be the same crisis that we had in 08. I think the dollar is going to be the crisis. I don’t think it’s going to be a bread and butter financial crisis.

   

  This is going to be a currency crisis. So it’s going to be the US government. It’s not going to be the mortgage markets that’s blowing up. It’s going to be the treasury bond market that’s blowing up. It’s going to be the Federal Reserve that’s blowing up. And this is going to be a major major negative for the dollar, not a positive.

  We really don’t know how long that fuse is, but there’s no doubt that it’s been lit. There is a frustrating truism in economics. You can easily predict if something bad is going to happen, but you can never predict when it’s going to happen.

  That’s because the economy is built on numbers that are easy to calculate, but it’s impossible to predict how people will react to those numbers. In our case, people don’t want to believe that this economy is built on a house of cards and that their standard of living is in jeopardy. That willful ignorance, that confidence, can keep the show going long after the curtain should have been drawn. However, no amount of confidence can keep an unsustainable system running forever. Eventually, reality becomes impossible to ignore.

  Trump doesn’t want to preside over a major decline in our standard of living, but ultimately that has to happen. Because this is the consequence of all this excess consumption that went on before he was president. You know, we sacrificed our future to indulge our past. The future is now the present. We’re here, and it’s time to pay the piper.

  There’s only one thing you can do, according to Peter Schiff. Prepare yourself and your family with real assets like gold and silver that will keep your finances afloat during the next currency crisis.

   

  

  

• Which Graduate Degree Gets You Out Of Debt The Fastest?

  Via Priceonomics.com,

  If you’re one of the 29% who feels their choice of major in college didn’t prepare them to secure the job they wanted after graduation, you may be considering graduate school as a shot at a do-over. Those seeking higher income may indeed find themselves better equipped after earning a graduate degree. But this second chance can come at a steep cost.

  But is it worth it? And moreover, does it matter financially if you attend a prestigious graduate school or not?

  One way of answering this question is to look at how much income you make after grad school compared to the amount of debt you've now accumulated. We decided to analyze data from Priceonomics customer Earnest, a financial services company, to see which advanced degrees produced graduates with the the most (and least) student debt and how that compared to their actual earnings after school. 

  We looked at the following graduate degrees: MDs (medicine), DDS (dentistry), Pharm D (pharmacy), MBA (business administration), JDs (law), Masters in Science or Engineering, Masters in Arts, and other masters degrees.

  We found that medical professionals take on the most debt – even when their high salaries are accounted for – while MBAs enjoy a low debt burden relative to their income.

  We also looked at the question of does the prestige of the school matter.

  We found graduate program prestige comes with tangible financial benefits: for all disciplines except medicine, graduates of top-100 programs enjoy lower debt relative to their income upon graduation. This trend continues after graduation, with the exception of engineering graduate students, where students from less prestigious schools have more favorable debt to income ratios six years after graduation than their counterparts from higher ranked schools.

  ***

  We first asked how much debt the typical graduate degree holder carries. This data is supplied by respondents looking to refinance their debt, so while it is self-reported, users must be reasonably accurate if they wish to receive realistic rate estimates. Average student loan debt – which comprises debt accumulated in college and graduate school – is reported for each degree type below.

  

  Data source: Earnest

  Future medical professionals – a category that includes doctors, dentists, and pharmacists – can expect to take on the most debt to finance their degrees. Future lawyers, too, take on six-figure debt to finance their degrees. Masters programs of all stripes are the cheapest, though graduates’ debt still ranges from around $60,000 all the way up to nearly $90,000.

  This ranking lines up with degree program duration: MD programs typically take 4 years to complete, JDs 3 years, and full-time masters programs 1 or 2 years. 

  Even with a hefty price, a degree program may be worth it if it confers earning power to match. If we account for income, do doctors still have the highest debt compared to other graduate degree-holders?

  To answer this question, we divided average debt by our respondents’ average self-reported income to calculate a debt-to-income ratio for each group of graduates. Debt-to-income ratios below 1 mean these degree-holders make more than they paid for their degree in one year. Values over 1 mean the degree cost more than what the typical graduate makes in a year.

  

  Data source: Earnest

  Even if we take income into account, medical professionals bear the greatest burden when it comes to paying for their degrees. These graduates make a solid income, but it’s not enough to balance out their formidable debt.

  Graduates with Masters of Arts degrees take second place in our debt-to-income ranking despite paying the least for their credentials. These graduates can expect relatively low starting salaries that handicap their ability to pay down debt.

  At the other end of the spectrum, MBAs enjoy the lowest debt-to-income ratio. These degrees are relatively affordable and confer high earning power. 

  The relationship between income and debt changes over time as graduates climb the career ladder and pay down their loans. We wanted to see how debt-to-income ratio changes as graduates establish themselves in their careers, so we broke our sample down by years post-graduation to chart a debt-to-income trajectory for each degree type.

  

  Data source: Earnest

  Graduates with all degree types experience a decrease in debt-to-income ratio after graduation, but in some professions, those ratios come down faster than in others.

  Medical professionals have the highest debt-to-income ratio immediately after graduation. This is likely because MDs begin their careers in residencies, which are essentially low-paid apprenticeships lasting 3 to 6 years. Once residents become practicing physicians, they can expect comfortable six-figure salaries and subsequently make fast progress on their debt. 

  In contrast, MBAs have the flattest trajectories toward debt freedom. Though they have the lowest debt-to-income ratio across the entire post-graduation time period we considered, they  make the least progress between years 1 and 11 after graduation.

  The chart below zooms in on the last data point in our chart, ranking debt-to-income ratio for midcareer professionals 11 years removed from graduation.

  

  Data source: Earnest

  Even in the middle of their careers, graduates with Masters of Arts degrees earn relatively little compared to their debt. Costly law and medical degrees hold debt-to-income ratios near 1 for lawyers and doctors, as well. 

  Professionals with degrees in business, science, or engineering fare comparatively better, making comfortably more than the cost of their degree in one midcareer year.

  Of course, all degrees aren’t created equal. Stanford’s Graduate School of Business, for example, grants its MBA recipients access to a higher-powered network than does the average public college. This advantage could translate to a real difference in earnings and, in turn, debt-to-income trajectory. 

  To see the difference grad school reputation can make, we broke our sample down based on whether a graduate’s degree program landed in the top 100 for their field, then charted debt-to-income trajectory over 11 years post-graduation.

  

  Data source: Earnest

  School reputation matters. Across a variety of disciplines, professionals who graduate from higher-ranked schools begin their careers with less debt relative to their income. And for the most part, this trend is still apparent a decade after graduation. 

  There’s one exception: medical professionals have more or less the same debt-to-income trajectory regardless of their school’s reputation. With respect to student debt, all medical degrees are created equal.

  ***

  So if you’re seeking an affordable graduate degree that will boost your earning power, what should you do?

  The “rich doctor” stereotype makes medicine look appealing, but it doesn’t do justice to the burden of financing an MD. Medical professionals take on an average debt near $200,000 to finance their degrees, and early in their careers, their income does little to offset their debt. Attending a more prestigious school doesn’t mitigate their high debt-to-income ratio; graduates of top schools pay just as much relative to their salary as grads from lower-ranked programs.

  In contrast, the average MBA makes six figures after spending one or two years in graduate school. They typically take on around $90,000 in debt, but consistently enjoy a low debt-to-income ratio. This is doubly true for graduates of top-100 business programs, who enjoy the high income that comes with access to a high-powered alumni network.

  

  

• MaKe AMeRiCa GReaT AGaiN…

  

  //embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js

• A 'Polite' History Of Government "Predictions"

  Authored by Simon Black via SovereignMan.com,

  

  Recently the Congressional Budget Office published a scathing report that the US government debt-to-GDP ratio will double over the next 30-years.

  Few government agencies are as blunt as the Congressional Budget Office.

  In fact the agency’s report plainly states that “the prospect of such large and growing debt poses substantial risks for the nation. . .”

  Echoing this sentiment, a former director of the Congressional Budget Office called the US debt:

  “a serial horror story in which the greatest economic power ever to grace the globe sails directly into self-inflicted crisis, suffering and decline.”

  Debt matters.

  Nearly every major superpower over the last thousand years, from the French Bourbon monarchy to the Ottoman Empire, was eventually crushed under the weight of its debt.

  The CBO has been sounding the alarm bells for years warning successive administrations that there will be serious, serious consequences in the future.

  The irony is that the CBO is probably being overly optimistic.

  I pulled some of their older projections from several years ago, and while they nailed the trend, they totally underestimated how severe the debt crisis would be.

  In January 2007, for example, the CBO issued its annual budget and economic outlook in which they made 10-year projections about the national debt.

  So, 10 years ago, the CBO estimated that by 2017, the “debt held by the public” would be $4.2 trillion, which they estimated would be 24.6% of GDP.

  (Note that the CBO tends to focus on “debt held by the public”, but this number is only a portion of the total national debt.)

  Now it really is 2017.

  So how much is the actual debt held by the public today?

  $14.35 trillion, or 76.5% of GDP… more than three times what the CBO projected back in 2007.

  (Bear in mind that TOTAL government debt in the US is $20 trillion, around 106% of GDP.)

  In other words, the CBO’s projection was wrong by $10 TRILLION.

  That’s not to take anything away from the CBO; as the old saying goes, predictions are hard, especially about the future.

  The agency is clearly doing its best to objectively highlight the obvious (and dangerous) trend of rising debt levels in the Land of the Free.

  Their math just happens to be off by an order of magnitude.

  It’s not just the CBO either.

  As I frequently write to you, each year the Board of Trustees of the various Social Security trust funds releases a report detailing the dismal finances of that program.

  In the Trustees’ 2005 report, for example, they projected that the trust funds would be “fully depleted,” i.e. completely run out of money, in the year 2043, nearly four decades later.

  Eh, who really cared… 40 years was such a long time away.

  The next year in the 2006 report, however, their estimated year of depletion changed to 2040… 34 years in the future.

  By 2010, it had changed again to 2037… 27 years into the future.

  And from last year’s 2016 report, the estimate changed yet again to 2034, just 18 years into the future.

  Notice the trend? In a little more than a decade, the Trustees’ estimated date when the trust funds would be fully depleted has accelerated by 9 years.

  In other words, the closer we get to the date, the more accurate their calculations become, and the faster they believe the trust funds will go bust.

  Again, it’s hard to fault the trustees.

  They have the right message: Social Security is going broke. They just happen to have been too optimistic in their timing.

  It mystifies me how this is not front-page news on a daily basis.

  I mean, the implications are enormous; the people who run the Social Security program are saying, flat out, that they’re running out of money and the program will have to curtail benefits.

  And the guys within the government who watch over the budget are shouting from the rooftops that the national debt poses substantial risks.”

  I imagine most people would probably agree that this stuff matters.

  It just doesn’t matter to them today. Or tomorrow. Or next year.

  It’s easy to put off obvious and dangerous consequences that won’t strike until several years into the future.

  Such short-term thinking is in our nature as human beings.

  It’s why we eat garbage foods that poison our bodies… because the life-threatening diabetes and heart disease won’t hit us for another couple of decades.

  This is a dangerous gamble, especially considering that there are countless solutions to distance yourself from the impact of your government’s serial irresponsibility.

  For example, there are plenty of options to establish a far more flexible, robust retirement structure like a self-directed SEP IRA or solo 401(k).

  These plans allow you to save more money for retirement, cut your administrative costs, and realize far better returns in alternative asset classes.

  As an example, instead of stuffing all of your retirement savings in an overpriced stock market, your IRA or 401(k) could own a profitable private business or royalty stream that consistently pays strong, healthy cash flow month after month.

  This way, when Social Security does go broke, you won’t be affected one bit.

  No one else can make this a priority in your life but you.

  I’ll say it again: all it takes is the right education, and the will to act.

  Do you have a Plan B?

  

  

• Russophobia Tops Trumphoria – Moscow Stocks Plunge To 8-Month Lows

  For eight straight week after President Trump was elected, global investors fell over themselves to buy Russian stocks, driving the MICEX index to record highs. However, the constant Russian headlines climaxing in the last two weeks of chaos has seen Russian stocks collapse – erasing all of the post-election gains and more.

   

  

  However, as is clear from the chart above, while Russian stocks are languishing at 8 month lows; Russian credit risk remains near 3 year lows.

  “We see no reason that the market would return to the difficult-to-justify euphoria seen in the aftermath of Donald Trump’s victory,” Sberbank CIB analysts Cole Akeson and Andrey Kuznetsov said in an e-mailed note on Thursday.

   

  “Recent events in Syria evoke a higher level of caution than in weeks prior.”

  Interestingly, the last two days have seen a notable divergence as while Tillerson and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov were talking through their disagreements in negotiations in Moscow late on Wednesday, the Micex Index closed at its lowest level since before the U.S. election but Russia's credit risk actually improved…

  

  Almost as if someone wanted to send the message (via stocks – because the mainstream can understand that) that Russia is 'bad'.

  The slump has made Russian stocks the cheapest relative to emerging-market peers since 2015.

  

  

• Canada Officially Moves To Legalize Recreational Marijuana Nationwide

  Authored by Carey Wedler via TheAntiMedia.org,

  Canada officially moved to legalize recreational marijuana on Thursday when the government introduced legislation allowing the possession of small amounts of cannabis. The new law also sets regulations for the sale, growth, and purchase of the plant.

  USA Today reports:

  “Canada’s federal government set the age at 18, but is allowing each of the provinces to determine if it should be higher. The provinces will also decide how the drug will be sold and distributed. The law also defines the amount of THC in a driver’s blood, as detected by a roadside saliva test, that would be illegal. Marijuana taxes will be announced at a later date.”

   

  Vox notes that “Canadians will be allowed to grow up to four marijuana plants per household and possess up to 30 grams per person. For the most part, the bill follows the recommendations made by a recent federal task force on marijuana legalization.”

  The outlet points out that the details of the bill could change as the bill works its way through Parliament, adding that if the legislation passes, it could be illegal under international law, which still favors prohibition. Canada joins Uruguay, the only other nation to have fully legalized recreational marijuana (Portugal has had great success with its decriminalization of all drugs).

  Canada first allowed medical marijuana for terminal illnesses in 2001, and in some parts of the country, like Vancouver, weed shops are legal and law enforcement tolerates use of the plant. But the new legislation codifies the rights of all Canadians to use it, even if it still places restrictions on use (for example, attempting to regulate THC blood content in the context of driving  a car is a controversial practice in the United States, where studies show driving while high is far less dangerous than driving drunk)

  If the law is passed, it will undoubtedly cut into crime rates in Canada, where tens of thousands of marijuana users are still arrested for possession every year.

  As the Liberal Party, which introduced the legislation, argues:

  “Arresting and prosecuting these offenses is expensive for our criminal justice system. It traps too many Canadians in the criminal justice system for minor, non-violent offenses. At the same time, the proceeds from the illegal drug trade support organized crime and greater threats to public safety, like human trafficking and hard drugs.”

  If the bill passes, Canada will join multiple U.S. states, including California, Washington, Oregon, and Alaska, which have all legalized recreational marijuana. It will join an even longer list of U.S. states and other countries relaxing laws, even if they are not outright repealing them.

  Canada has taken a forward-thinking approach to drug addiction in general; last year the country began sponsoring injection centers where heroin addicts could consume their narcotics under the supervision of a doctor.

  As mounting research shows the plant offers a wide range of medical benefits, and as the drug war continues to prove itself inefficient, ineffective, and destructive around the world, Canada’s recent move signals legalization is all but inevitable. As the Liberal Party of Canada’s website has argued:

  “Canada’s current system of marijuana prohibition does not work. It does not prevent young people from using marijuana and too many Canadians end up with criminal records for possessing small amounts of the drug.”

  

  

• Exposing Who's Behind Surging Subprime Delinquencies (Hint: Rhymes With 'Perennials')

  For months now we’ve been writing about the mysteriously rising subprime delinquencies afflicting auto ABS structures despite repeated confirmations from the Fed and equity markets that ‘everything is awesome’ (see “Auto Bubble Burst Begins As Subprime Delinquencies Soar To 2009 Levels” and “Signs Of An Auto Bubble: Soaring Delinquencies In These 266 Subprime ABS Deals Can’t Be Good” for a couple of recent examples).  Shockingly, as confirmed by the chart below from UBS strategist Matthew Mish, 2016 vintage subprime auto ABS structures are even underperforming 2007/2008 vintage securitizations.

  

   

  Now, Mish is back with more survey data explaining the who/what/when/where/why’s of spiking loan delinquencies. 

  Ironically, survey results suggest that households making over $100,000 per year are 2.5x more likely to default on loan payments over the next 12 months than those making under $40,000…because making more money just means you can afford more debt, right?

  First, the survey evidence suggests the rise in consumer default perceptions has occurred primarily in the middle and upper household incomes cohort. And those consumers concerned with missing a payment are highest in the upper income category (household incomes of $100k+). In particular, the most elevated readings occur at the lower ends of the middle and higher income categories (i.e., 50-74k and 100-149k, respectively.

  

   

  Of course, the most ‘shocking’ results of the survey suggest that our precious snowflake millennials are over 5x more likely to default than folks aged 45 and above.  That said, we suspect that many of those defaults may come from student loan debt...which is totally bogus because higher education should be ‘totes free’, right?

  

   

  In another shocking discovery, people with the most debt were also found to be most at risk of default…who knew?

  

   

  Oddly, however, households who reported being able to cover their monthly expenses were more at risk of default than households burning through cash each month…sounds like these folks have picked up some valuable lessons from Tesla on how to burn through cash without defaulting…

  

   

  Finally, this last chart was intended to shed light on why certain households are more likely to default but, in the end, the “no specific reason” category dominated responses leading UBS to conclude that people are just far more comfortable defaulting on debt, in general, in the post-crisis era.

  This mosaic seems quite consistent with the reported concerns earlier around limited positive cash flow (income vs expenses) and the broader reality that real median wage growth has been largely non-existent in recent years (and for several decades) despite rising debt levels. However, the most commonly cited reason continues to be ‘no specific reason’. While difficult to prove decisively other survey results on the millennial generation specifically seem to be consistent with the thesis that US consumer willingness to default (or the lack of stigma associated with bankruptcy) may have increased further in the post-crisis era.

  

   

  To summarize the UBS survey results, increasing delinquencies are being driven by millennials who graduated college with massive student debt balances, but were making decent money so they levered up even more to buy a house (or 2), a couple of cars and a timeshare.  That said, now that the earnings growth they expected has failed to materialize, their sense of entitlement has taken over and they’ve decided to socialize their debt burdens while completely ignoring the stigmas associated with such actions.

  

  

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• Turkey's Barks And Bites

  Authored by Burak Bekdil via The Gatestone Institute,

  • This is the first time that Erdogan is openly challenging a concerted European stand.

  Turkey's foreign policy and the rhetoric that presumably went to support it, has, during the past several years, aimed less at achieving foreign policy goals and more at consolidating voters' support for the Ankara government.

  Self-aggrandizing behavior has predominantly shaped policy and functioned to please the Turks' passion for a return to their glorious Ottoman past.

  Assertive and confrontational diplomatic language and playing the tough guy of the neighborhood may have helped garner popular support for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP), but after years of "loud barking and no biting", Turkey has effectively become the victim of its own narrative.

  In 2010, Turkey froze diplomatic relations with Israel and promised "internationally to isolate the Jewish state", and never to restore ties unless, along with two other conditions, Jerusalem removed its naval blockade of Gaza to prevent weapons from being brought in that would be used to attack Israel. Turkey's prime minister at the time, Ahmet Davutoglu, said Israel would "kneel down to us".

  In 2016, after rounds of diplomatic contacts, Turkey and Israel agreed to normalize their relations. The blockade of Gaza, to prevent shipments of weaponry to be used by Gazans in terror attacks remains in effect.

  In 2012, Davutoglu claimed that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's days in power were numbered, "not by years but by weeks or months". In 2016, Davutoglu had to step down as prime minister, but Erdogan's and his worst regional nemesis, Assad, is in power to this day, enjoying increased Russian and Iranian backing. In 2012, Erdogan said that "we will soon go to Damascus to pray at the Umayyad mosque" — a political symbol of Assad's downfall and his replacement by pro-Turkey Sunni groups. That prayer remains to be performed.

  In November 2015, shortly after Turkey shot down a Russian Su-24 military jet and cited violation of its airspace, Erdogan warned Russia "not to play with fire." As for the Russian demands for an apology, Erdogan said it was Turkey that deserved an apology because its airspace had been violated, and that Turkey would not apologize to Russia.

  In June 2016, just half a year after Russia imposed a slew of economic sanctions on Turkey, Erdogan apologized to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

  In July 2016, Erdogan apologized for downing a Russian plane, and in August he went to Russia to shake hands for normalization. Pictured: Russian President Vladimir Putin with Turkey's then Prime Minister Erdogan, meeting in Istanbul on December 3, 2012. (Image source: kremlin.ru)

  Erdogan and his government have countless times warned the United States not to side with the Syrian Kurds –whom Turkey views as a terrorist group– in the allied fight against radical jihadists of ISIL's Islamic State. In March 2017, Washington denied that Syrian Kurds were a terrorist group and pledged continued support for them.

  Erdogan's Turkey has done more than enough to show that its bark is worse than its bite. Yet it keeps barking badly. This time, the enemy to bark at, not bite, is Europe. This is the first time that Erdogan is openly challenging a concerted European stand.

  In a recent row between several European capitals and Ankara over Erdogan's ambitions to hold political rallies across Europe to address millions of Turkish expatriates, the Turkish president said he would ignore that he was unwelcome in Germany and would go there to speak to his Turkish fans.

  In response, the Dutch government deported one of Erdogan's ministers who had gone uninvited to the Netherlands to speak to the Turkish community there.

  Germany launched two investigations into alleged Turkish spying on German soil.

  Similarly, Switzerland opened a criminal investigation into allegations that Erdogan's government had spied on expatriate Turks.

  In Copenhagen, the Danish government summoned the Turkish ambassador over claims that Danish-Turkish citizens were being denounced over views critical of Erdogan.

  The barking kept on. In Turkey, Erdogan warned that Europeans would not be able to walk the streets safely if European nations persist in what he called "arrogant conduct." That comment caused the EU to summon the Turkish ambassador in Brussels to explain Erdogan's threatening language.

  Farther east, in the rich European bloc, several hundred Bulgarians blocked the three main checkpoints at the Bulgarian-Turkish border to prevent Turks with Bulgarian passports, but who were living in Turkey, from voting in Bulgarian elections. The protesters claimed that Turkish officials were forcing expatriate voters to support a pro-Ankara party.

  Meanwhile, at the EU's southeast flank, Greece said that its armed forces were ready to respond to any Turkish threat to the country's sovereignty and territorial integrity.

  What happened to Erdogan's promised "bite" that he could go to Germany to speak to the Turkish community despite repeated German warnings that he would not be welcome? "I will not go to Germany," he said on March 23.

  Erdogan may be winning hearts and minds in Turkey with his neo-Ottoman Turkey "barks." But too few foreign capitals find his threats serious, too few politicians think that he is convincing and too many people tend to believe Turkey's bark is worse than its bite.

  The recent wave of European constraints against Erdogan shows that, for the first time in recent years, Europe does not seem to fear Erdogan's bluffing and thuggishness.

  At the moment, Erdogan's priority is to win the referendum on April 16 that he hopes will change the constitution so that he can be Sultan-for-life. Picking fights with "infidel" Europeans might help him garner more support from conservative and nationalist Turks.

  When the voting is done, however, he will have to face the reality that an alliance cannot function forever with one party constantly blackmailing the other.

  

  

• Tucker Carlson Tackles the Dangerous Case of the Democratic War Party, Itching For a Fight With Russia

  During last night’s Tucker Carlson show, he attempted to find out why the democratic party, the same people who prided themselves on being anti-war during the Bush administration, were so god damned eager to wage war with just about anyone they could find willing to participate.
   
  Inside of their party is one sole source of reason, Tulsi Gabbard, Iraqi war veteran, and Congresswoman from Hawaii who sits on the Armed Services and Foreign Affairs committees. In response to Trump’s actions in Syria, Gabbard issued the following statement.
   

  “It angers and saddens me that President Trump has taken the advice of war hawks and escalated our illegal regime change war to overthrow the Syrian government. This escalation is short-sighted and will lead to more dead civilians, more refugees, the strengthening of al-Qaeda and other terrorists, and a direct confrontation between the United States and Russia—which could lead to nuclear war.
   
  “This Administration has acted recklessly without care or consideration of the dire consequences of the United States attack on Syria without waiting for the collection of evidence from the scene of the chemical poisoning. If President Assad is indeed guilty of this horrible chemical attack on innocent civilians, I will be the first to call for his prosecution and execution by the International Criminal Court. However, because of our attack on Syria, this investigation may now not even be possible. And without such evidence, a successful prosecution will be much harder.”

   

  Rep. Gabbard: “Yes, I’m skeptical” of claim Assad regime is behind chemical weapons attack https://t.co/fETssThsLF https://t.co/fpYdUNR2t4

  — CNN (@CNN) April 7, 2017

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  The subsequent result of her seemingly rational position was leaders on the left calling for her to step down.

  This is a disgrace. Gabbard should not be in Congress. https://t.co/yDTh43GZam

  — Howard Dean (@GovHowardDean) April 9, 2017

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  Carlson tackled the subject in an eloquent 1-minute monolog.
   
  
   
  One of his guests last night was a Democratic strategist, Al Mattour, war hawk — a man interested in overseeing the deaths of thousands.
   
  In a nutshell, Al believes we should wage war with anyone who attempts to ‘disrupt our elections.’ Tucker asked Mattour, plainly, ‘how does having a confrontation with Russia makes our country more safer and prosperous?’
   
  Mattour replied ‘it makes us safer in our democratic processes to make sure their integrity is preserved.’
   
  When Tucker juxtaposed China’s actions towards the United States against Russia, asking ‘why aren’t you pushing for confrontation with China? They’re doing everything Russia is doing, and more,’ Mattour agreed that we should be confronting them in a similar bellicose fashion.
   
  
   
  Lastly, Stephen Cohen, Professor of Russian studies at Princeton and NYU, an actual expert on China, weighed in, saying ‘Russia thinks we’re crazy, completely crazy.’
   
  He even took some time to express his ‘disgust’ with Al Mattour, saying ‘your previous guest, I don’t mean to be rude to him. First of all, he doesn’t know what he’s talking about. And, secondly, he excludes the reality that Russia has a politics. And the politics in Russia today as we talk is […] the concern that America is preparing war against Russia. If not on Syria, then on the other two cold war fronts […] where NATO is building up in an unprecedented way. This is not good because they have nuclear weapons and because accidents happen.’
   
  He then theorized what the conversation between Putin and Tillerson was like, pointing to the two having a history of trust together from the time Tillerson led Exxon Mobile.

  ‘Rex, says Putin, what in the world is going on in Washington?’

   
  Professor Cohen, ominously, summed it up, ‘I’m not young. I’ve been doing this 40 years, sometimes as a Professor, sometimes inside. I have never been as worried as I am today about the possibility of war with Russia.’
   
  

  Content originally published at iBankCoin.com

   

  

• E PLuRiBuS NeOCoN'eD…

  

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• Brandon Smith Warns The Next World War "Will Be Economic… Not Nuclear"

  The elite appear to have a great deal in store for President Trump’s first four years… quite a few tricks up their sleeves, if you will. As SHTFplan.com's Mac Slavo notes, the wars are already being manifested; but the larger elements of financial upheaval may take years to play out, even if there are a number of chaotic events, a bit of panic, and more of the great squeeze that is sucking the vitality of the country dry. Depending upon how things play out, people could end up better or than four years ago, or much, much worse. Theoretically, no one knows for sure which way that will go, but it appears that the global agenda is stilling rolling slowly forward, inch by inch, and about to take a big bit out of Syria, North Korea and beyond. Get ready for some big potential downturns.

  

  The Real Dangers Behind The Syrian Crisis Are Economic

  Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.com,

  Back in 2010/2011 when I was still writing under the pen-name Giordano Bruno, I warned extensively about the dangers of any destabilization in the nation of Syria, long before the real troubles began. In an article titled Migration Of The Black Swans, I pointed out that due to Syria’s unique set of alliances and economic relationships the country was a “keystone” for disruption in the Middle East and that a “revolution” (or civil war) was imminent. Syria, I warned, represented the first domino in a chain of dominoes that could lead to widespread regional warfare and draw in major powers like the U.S. and Russia.

  That said, my position has always been that the next “world war” would not be a nuclear war, but primarily an economic war. Meaning, I believed and still believe it is far more useful for establishment elites to use the East as a foil to bring down certain parts of the West with economic weapons, such as the dumping of the U.S. dollar. The chaos this would cause in global markets and the panic that would ensue among the general public would provide perfect cover for the introduction of what the globalists call the “great financial reset.” The term “reset” is essentially code for the total centralization of all fiscal and monetary management of the world’s economies under one institution, most likely the IMF. This would culminate in the destruction of the dollar’s world reserve status, its replacement being the IMF’s Special Drawing Rights basket currency system.

  Eventually, the SDR basket system would act as a stepping stone towards a single global currency system, and its final form and function would probably be entirely digital. This would give the globalists TOTAL push-button control over even the smallest aspects of normal trade. The amount of power they would gain from a single centralized digital currency system would be endless.

  Syria in itself is just one layer upon many in the process of deliberate global instability, but it seems to be vitally important to the elites given that they continually make new attempts to draw the American public into support for so called “regime change.”

  Mainstream media publications like The New York Times overtly press the narrative that Syrian president Bashar al-Assad has a long history of war crimes including the use of chemical weapons against civilians. Yet, neither The New York Times nor anyone in government has produced a single piece of compelling concrete evidence that Assad is guilty of such acts, including the latest chemical attack which the Trump administration as used as a rational for cruise missile strikes against Syrian military targets and rhetoric calling for the ousting of Assad.

  Not that I necessarily have much faith in the Assad regime, but we saw this same exact model used under the Obama administration in 2013: A chemical attack against civilians which the White House then immediately, without evidence, uses to implicate Assad and call for regime change. This tactic to seduce the American public into war fever failed, even with many acting serving military, and Obama backed away (in part) from a full blown invasion of Syria. Now, it would appear that the establishment hopes they’ll get a better response using the same con-game under Trump.

  There are far more advantages in the Trump scenario, however.

  It has been my longstanding belief since the middle of last year that Trump would undoubtedly be president of the U.S., because the international banking cabal needs a scapegoat for the ongoing economic crisis they have been engineering for many years. The Syrian strategy is a win/win for the elites under Trump because, with Trump, there is no need for moderation. If they can influence him to rampage without concern for the repercussions in the region, then their scapegoat implicates all conservatives in general with little effort on their part.

  George Soros‘ prediction that Trump “will fail” because he is “unpredictable and unprepared” and that he will “end up bad for the markets” will become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

  I warned the liberty movement over and over again after Trump’s cabinet selection that he was surrounding himself with establishment ghouls that would either run the White House in spite of him, or, that he was gladly cooperating with them. His recent high tension rhetoric against the Syrian government and against North Korea only seems to confirm my suspicions.

  So, where is this all headed? Nowhere good…

  First, consider the fact that every time it appears that the Syrian government seems to be making headway in destroying ISIS, there is suddenly another chemical attack which places Assad under suspicion. Anyone who read my article ISIS Is Being Aimed At The West By Globalists — Here’s What We Can Do About It, published in 2015, has seen the extensive evidence I outlined which shows U.S. government complicity and even direct aid in the creation of ISIS. I compared the rise of ISIS to Operation Gladio, a massive false flag project undertaken by U.S. and European governments in Europe from the 1950s to the 1990s.

  ISIS is useful as a perpetual boogeyman, and sadly, the Muslim religion has one foot stuck in the dark ages and will remain fertile ground for generating extremist groups for decades to come. The elites have every intention of protecting certain factions of ISIS in Syria, which means that ISIS will continue to spread from the area into the EU and the U.S. and terrorist attacks will continue to multiply.

  Second, we have learned that the Trump administration is perfectly willing to fast-track certain longstanding establishment projects that involve kinetic action (i.e. destruction and death). If they were happy to move so quickly to strike Syria without supplying any evidence to support the measure, then it should come as no surprise if they are willing to strike North Korea, a country with ACTUAL means to threaten American targets or our interests in the Pacific. A precedent is being set today for an ongoing program of fast moving preemptive strikes. I believe this will go even beyond Barack Obama’s notorious penchant for trigger pulling to destabilize regions.

  Third, I think many people also forget that Syria continues to maintain a mutual defense pact with Iran. Why does this matter? Syria is NOT Libya; Assad is not going to go down like Gaddafi at the hands of insurgent groups like ISIS. Regime change in Syria is going to require numerous U.S. boots on the ground. This, in turn, will invite hundreds of thousands from the Iranian Guard to intercede. If you study military preparedness around the world you know that a country like Iran or North Korea will offer far greater resistance than what we saw in Afghanistan or Iraq.

  While they are still very poor nations militarily (in terms of defense spending), they are still relatively well-trained, and the technology gap is less expansive. Many American men will die in such a fight. If ground invasion becomes an option in Syria, expect Iran to be next, and expect the option of a new “draft” to return to the U.S.  Also keep in mind that Americans will never accept military conscription today unless we suffer a massive attack on U.S. soil, or on U.S. forces abroad.  So, expect some shock and awe to occur in short order…

  Fourth, there is, of course, the ongoing question as to when U.S. and Russian forces will “stumble” over each other and someone on either side gets killed? The majority of analysts in the liberty movement expect that this is inevitable. I suppose I agree, but I do not believe the elites have been entrenching billions of dollars in control grid technology in every major city in the world just to vaporize them in a chain of mushroom clouds (this control grid includes Russian cities — just look up Putin’s Yaroslavl laws, which might make the NSA envious).

  It seems to me that the natural progression of these tensions will end in economic retaliation from the East against the West, not nuclear retaliation. The thing is, this is actually the worst case scenario.

  With nuclear conflagration comes immediate loss of full spectrum awareness for the elites. They lose their surveillance grid, they lose the means to maintain a healthy standing military, they lose the means to dictate the narrative because the mainstream media will not be functioning at that point, etc. During an economic crisis, they can shift wealth easily to safe havens, they can weaken certain militaries while strengthening others. They retain their control grid apparatus and use it effectively against the citizenry as long as there is not substantial civilian resistance, and the list goes on.

  With nuclear war there would be total chaos. With economic crisis there is controlled chaos. The establishment prefers the latter option.

  Eastern nations and their allies still hold considerable U.S. Treasury bonds in their coffers, and they still use the dollar for the most part as the world reserve currency (though they have been preparing the ground for a dollar dump since at least 2008). On top of this, many of these nations also have the option of dumping the dollar as the petro-currency and crushing our monopoly on how oil is traded globally. If any of these measures are taken by countries like Russia, China and Saudi Arabia, the U.S. economic structure will lose the last pillar holding it above water. We will effectively move into third-world status in the course of a few years.

  These are not hypothetical dangers, these are very real dangers which have already been mentioned publicly by Eastern interests in their own media. They are also dangers which SERVE the globalist agenda in the long run. As I have noted time and time again in the past with ample evidence, Eastern governments including Russia and China openly and avidly support the International Monetary Fund and continue to call for the IMF to take over global management of all monetary policy to form a single world currency system. They may be “anti-U.S." in rhetoric, but they are NOT anti-globalist.

  Syria remains a highly useful catalyst for the globalists to achieve the crisis they need to push their great reset forward. Being that they have tried to thrust Americans into that quagmire so many times over the past few years, I think it is safe to say they plan to use Syria as trigger point whether we cooperate or not.

  

  

• "Probably Nothing"

  Yesterday we highlighted the “scariest chart in the world” – we may have been premature…

  https://ssl.gstatic.com/trends_nrtr/981_RC01/embed_loader.js//

  It seems pretty clear that the neocon warmongery is working – the world is fearful, and needs government to save it…

  

  

• Is This The End Of The Trump Presidency?

  Authored by Federico Pieraccini via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

  

  On April 4 2017 in the Syrian city of Khan Shaykhun, a city controlled by western-backed terrorists, chemical weapons killed more than eighty civilians. Immediately, local and foreign sources (the White Helmets and Syrian Observatory, respectively, dubiously linked to Al Qaeda groups) blamed the Syrian Arab Army, accusing them of employing chemical agents. In the following forty-eight hours, the mainstream media flooded print media and the airwaves with information that alleged that Assad used chemical weapons. As is known, it is not the first time that the legitimate government of Syria has been accused of attacking its own people with weapons of mass destruction.

  In all similar events in the past, it has been later discovered that the chemical agents in question were used by the Al Nusra Front and Al Qaeda terrorists. In 2013, Obama tacitly rejected the argument that the Syrian Army used chemical weapons in Ghouta, deciding not to succumb to internal pressure to bomb Syria in response. Donald Trump required little confirmation before taking the initiative to cross the red line, openly attacking the Syrian army, even though his same intelligence community strongly doubted that the chemical attack took place according to the narrative advanced by the media.

  There are several hypotheses regarding what may have happened in Khan Shaykhun. The first one points to a false flag by rebels and terrorists supported by Israeli, British, Saudi and Qatari intelligence. Alternatively, it could have simply been an accident. Assad's forces could have hit a terrorist weapons cache without knowing that it was dedicated to the production and storage of chemical weapons. Another theory offers that foreign intelligence agents may have provided accurate information to the terrorists in Khan Shaykhun about what buildings were going to be targeted by Assad’s air force, thereby allowing them to move chemical weapons into the targeted locations in order to bring about a civilian massacre.

  Whatever the case may be, it is unthinkable that Assad and the Syrian army would use chemical agents against their own civilians. There is no rational reason for them to use such weapons which do not guarantee any tactical advantage and which, besides, would incite an obvious, vehement reaction from the international community — a counterproductive move from any way you look at it. This is not to mention that two days before the accident (?), Trump and Tillerson had publicly opened up to Assad, broaching a Syrian future with the president still in office. Once again, the use of chemical weapons proved to be of no tactical gain, spelling full-blown political suicide. From whatever perspective one observes the incident; an intentional chemical attack by Syrian forces is not credible and should be therefore ruled out. Furthermore, Russia saw its request for an independent investigation in the Khan Shaykhun chemical incident blocked by almost all nations belonging to the UN council, with the exception of Syria, Bolivia, China and Russia. What do the US and its allies have to hide? We all know the answer to that.

  An important factor to consider in order to understand the events surrounding the incident with chemical gases concerns the immediate American response. The bombardment with cruise missile, which caused a dozen deaths and some slight damage to Shayrat Air Base, needed at least a couple of months of preparation. This consideration helps clarify the scope of the chemical attack along with the attendant rationale and motivations.

  Notably, over the past two months, Trump has received all kinds of pressure to continue the neocon-inspired aggression against Syria. The main cheerleaders of this attack certainly fall into that category of players that includes the intelligence community, the military-industrial complex, neoconservatives, the Saudis, the Israelis, the Turks and the Qataris. It is not unthinkable that the chemical attack was an act needed in order to allow a US military response. One must not neglect to consider the very positive outcome of the meeting between Trump and the Saudi prince, the latter of whom is a major supporter of aggression against Syria. The summit between the King of Jordan and the American president the day after the events in Khan Shaykhun ought to be viewed in the same light. At the same time, other events look more than suspicious in terms of timing and motives, such as the permanent exclusion of Trump adviser Steve Bannon in favor of General H. R. McMaster (appointed by Trump). McMaster is a protégé of General Petraeus, a leading exponent of the interests of the neoconservatives. This is not to mention the exclusion of Flynn a month ago, another person who for years has advised against aggression against Syria, mainly thinking of the consequences that such a move would entail at the international level.

  Much ambiguity also remains when one considers the absence of members of the American intelligence community in the war room during the bombing of Syria on April 6. Rumors suggest that these American agencies would have recommended that Trump not act on the basis of partial or false information regarding the chemical attack in Khan Shaykhun. Trump, contrary to what he stated during the presidential campaign, has dismissed the advice of his intelligence community, preferring instead to act unilaterally under pressure from McMaster and other neocons in the administration.

  The bombardment, involving the use of 59 cruise missiles (23 hit the base, others went missing, according to the Russian ministry of defense), caused little damage to the Shayrat Air Base, thanks to the prompt evacuation of Syrian personnel, and no injuries were reported amongst the Russian contingent. The Pentagon claims to have warned the Russians of their intentions, but it is more likely that there were no alternatives, and that this act was mostly political and at no cost. Rather than reading this as a hypothetical US courtesy to the Russians (and the Syrians, because Moscow immediately warned Damascus), we must consider that a few seconds after the launch of the first cruise missile by the two destroyers in the Mediterranean, Russian forces in the area were already fully aware of the path and destination of the missiles, thereby alerting Damascus. It is also possible that the generals close to Trump advised him to alert Moscow because of the danger of a Russian reaction if hit by US missiles.

  Some doubts still remain as to the intentions and purpose of the attacks. In recent days, a hypothesis has emerged implying some sort of connivance between Russia and the United States in these attacks, apparently staged to appease the interventionists of the US deep state. There is no evidence to support this hypothesis, and the relatively limited damage to the Shayrat military airport may rest either with the high defense capabilities of the Syrian and Russians, or to the marked inefficiency of Raytheon’s cruise missiles, rather than any purposeful intention to do limited damage. In coming days, with more information available, it will be important to analyze what exactly happened to the cruise missiles that did not hit their target. As many know, it is taboo in the United States to criticize the military-industry complex, given the importance and influence it enjoys. In this sense, it is no surprise that in the United States, the press has been talking about the complete success of the attack, with 58 out of 59 missiles apparently being advertised as hitting their targets.

  For Trump it may well be the beginning of the end. The intention may have been to make a once-off attack to appease the deep state, lowering in the process the heat stemming from Russiagate, in order to allow for the implementation of national policies in line with the proclaimed America-First doctrine that has thus far been sabotaged by opponents and detractors. These same detractors now applaud Trump for what they see as his first presidential act, which involves killing civilians with missiles.

  What Trump does not appear to understand is that he has opened up a Pandora's Box that implicitly encourages foreign intelligence and terrorists in Syria to rely on American help by simply playing the chemical-gas-attack card. Trump seems unaware that he is now under the complete control of the media, the intelligence agencies, Al Qaeda, and the neocons, who are all the time working towards the involvement of the United States in ever more wars, such as with the one in Syria. Trump has intentionally sold out to the deep state in the hope of saving his presidency. However, in so doing, he is doomed to becoming a puppet of the deep state. Now let us speculate for a moment about what may happen in the coming weeks.

  In response to US aggression, Russia, Syria and Iran will increase cooperation against terrorists in Syria without any further cooperation with the United States. In this regard, we have already seen the suspension of channels of communication between Russia and the United States. The most likely reason for this is to avoid revealing to the United States the whereabouts of Russian troops in Syria. This hopefully causes huge concern for Washington, as the next American attack on Syria may impact on Russian troops. Regardless, it now seems clear that in the case of a new attack on Syria, there will be a firm and proportionate response from Moscow that could even lead to the sinking of the ships that launched the cruise missiles. It constitutes a dangerous escalation that could involve nuclear superpowers. Trump is probably betting that Moscow, in the case of another attack on Syria, would not dare attack American ships. Unfortunately for Trump and the rest of the world, his calculations are dead wrong, pushing the world to the brink of disaster in the event of another American bombardment of Syria. If Russia sinks American naval ships, and Trump does not respond, he is done. If he responds, then the world is done. Let us hope that the US does not do stupid shit (an Obama quote).

  In case al Qaeda once again uses chemical weapons, Trump will be requested to answer with force, as he has already done. If he refuses to do so, he will be immediately pilloried as Obama was in 2013, thereby committing political suicide. Trump has already lost his most loyal supporters, who had voted for him to stop US military adventures abroad. By deciding to bomb Syria, he has opened the door to either an early termination of his presidency or for a large-scale conflict. Whatever the case may be, the United States begins a new phase of conflict in the Middle East, in direct contrast to the claims made by Trump throughout the presidential campaign. It represents a 180-degree reversal in policy that reveals the real intentions of the American presidency, namely continuing the preservation of the American unipolar world, in spite of lacking the necessary operational and military capabilities. After all, Obama resisted for six years the pressure to bomb Syria coming from the extremist wing of the deep state. Trump took only eighty days to voluntarily go along with plans to attack Syria. Whatever the hidden truth of these two events, it is clear that from now on that nothing will be as before.

  

  

• Visualizing Korea's North-South Military Divide

  North Korea warned the United States that it would respond to "reckless acts of aggression" after a carrier battle group led by the 97,000-ton USS Carl Vinson was deployed to the Korean peninsula. As Statista's Niall McCarthy reports, the aircraft carrier is being escorted by a guided-missile cruiser and two destroyers equipped with Aegis technology capable of shooting down any future North Korean test missiles.

  Is North Korea's nuclear program going to be next? That's the question many experts are asking themselves after American cruise missiles struck a Syrian airbase last week. If the U.S. does carry out a pre-emptive strike, Pyongyang is likely to launch a substantial military retaliation against the south. If that nightmare does one day come to pass, how well equipped is the South Korean military to repel an offensive from the North?

  

  You will find more statistics at Statista

  The North Korean military has substantially more active (and reserve) troops than the South, though large numbers of its soldiers are underpaid and malnourished. The North also has outdated equipment and its airforce is known to still use 1950 Korean War-era MIG-15 fighters for training purposes.

  The South Korean military on the other hand boasts state of the art technology including cutting-edge tanks, warplanes and attack helicopters.

  However, Seoul is only 35 miles from the DMZ and due to North's superority in artillery, it's highly likely that the South Korean capital would suffer massive damage in a war. Even if the South repelled an invasion, success would come with substantial military and civilian casualties.

  

  

• Assange Reminds The World: "The Potential For The Disastrous Rise Of Misplaced Power Persists"

  Authored by Julian Assange, editor of WikiLeaks, published op-ed via The Washington Post,

  On his last night in office, President Dwight D. Eisenhower delivered a powerful farewell speech to the nation — words so important that he’d spent a year and a half preparing them. “Ike” famously warned the nation to “guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.”

  Much of Eisenhower’s speech could form part of the mission statement of WikiLeaks today. We publish truths regarding overreaches and abuses conducted in secret by the powerful.

  

  Our most recent disclosures describe the CIA’s multibillion-dollar cyberwarfare program, in which the agency created dangerous cyberweapons, targeted private companies’ consumer products and then lost control of its cyber-arsenal. Our source(s) said they hoped to initiate a principled public debate about the “security, creation, use, proliferation and democratic control of cyberweapons.”

  The truths we publish are inconvenient for those who seek to avoid one of the magnificent hallmarks of American life — public debate. Governments assert that WikiLeaks’ reporting harms security. Some claim that publishing facts about military and national security malfeasance is a greater problem than the malfeasance itself. Yet, as Eisenhower emphasized, “Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.”

  Quite simply, our motive is identical to that claimed by the New York Times and The Post — to publish newsworthy content. Consistent with the U.S. Constitution, we publish material that we can confirm to be true irrespective of whether sources came by that truth legally or have the right to release it to the media. And we strive to mitigate legitimate concerns, for example by using redaction to protect the identities of at-risk intelligence agents.

  Dean Baquet, executive editor of the New York Times, defended publication of our “stolen” material last year: “I get the argument that the standards should be different if the stuff is stolen and that should influence the decision. But in the end, I think that we have an obligation to report what we can about important people and important events.” David Lauter, Washington bureau chief of the Los Angeles Times, made a similar argument: “My default position is democracy works best when voters have as much information as possible . . . And that information often comes from rival campaigns, from old enemies, from all sorts of people who have motives that you might look at and say, ‘that’s unsavory.’ ”

  The media has a long history of speaking truth to power with purloined or leaked material — Jack Anderson’s reporting on the CIA’s enlistment of the Mafia to kill Fidel Castro; the Providence Journal-Bulletin’s release of President Richard Nixon’s stolen tax returns; the New York Times’ publication of the stolen “Pentagon Papers”; and The Post’s tenacious reporting of Watergate leaks, to name a few. I hope historians place WikiLeaks’ publications in this pantheon. Yet there are widespread calls to prosecute me.

  President Thomas Jefferson had a modest proposal to improve the press: “Perhaps an editor might begin a reformation in some such way as this. Divide his paper into 4 chapters, heading the 1st, ‘Truths.’ 2nd, ‘Probabilities.’ 3rd, ‘Possibilities.’ 4th, ‘Lies.’ The first chapter would be very short, as it would contain little more than authentic papers, and information.” Jefferson’s concept of publishing “truths” using “authentic papers” presaged WikiLeaks.

  People who don’t like the tune often blame the piano player. Large public segments are agitated by the result of the U.S. presidential election, by public dissemination of the CIA’s dangerous incompetence or by evidence of dirty tricks undertaken by senior officials in a political party. But as Jefferson foresaw, “the agitation [a free press] produces must be submitted to. It is necessary, to keep the waters pure.”

  Vested interests deflect from the facts that WikiLeaks publishes by demonizing its brave staff and me. We are mischaracterized as America-hating servants to hostile foreign powers. But in fact I harbor an overwhelming admiration for both America and the idea of America. WikiLeaks’ sole interest is expressing constitutionally protected truths, which I remain convinced is the cornerstone of the United States’ remarkable liberty, success and greatness.

  I have given up years of my own liberty for the risks we have taken at WikiLeaks to bring truth to the public. I take some solace in this: Joseph Pulitzer, namesake of journalism’s award for excellence, was indicted in 1909 for publishing allegedly libelous information about President Theodore Roosevelt and the financier J.P. Morgan in the Panama Canal corruption scandal. It was the truth that set him free.

  

  

• Former GM Vice Chair Trashes Tesla: "Musk Is A Great Salesman But They're Doomed. It's Going To Fail"

  For those who may have missed it, GM’s former Vice Chairman Bob Lutz dropped a whole lot of reality on some unsuspecting Tesla cheerleaders on CNBC this morning.  A rather blunt Lutz shared his views, as have we on several occasions, that Tesla’s constant cash burn combined with a barrage of competitive models that are about to hit the market likely indicate that the company is “doomed.”  As for Tesla’s gravity-defying stock price, Lutz attributed the company’s soaring market cap solely to Musk being the “greatest salesman in the world” along with his being “aided and abetted by some analysts.”

  “I am a well known Tesla skeptic.  Somehow it’s levitating and I think it’s Elon Musk is the greatest salesman in the world. He paints this vision of an unlimited future, aided and abetted by some analysts.  It’s like Elon Musk has been beamed down from another planet to show us mortals how to run a company.”

   

  “The fact is it’s a constant cash drain. They’re highly dependent on federal government and state incentives for money which constantly flows in.  They have capital raises all the time.”

   

  “Even the high-end cars that they build now cost more to build than they’re able to sell them for.”

   

  “Mercedes, BWM, Volkswagen, GM, Audi and Porsche are all coming out with 300-mile [range] electric luxury sedans…I think they’re doomed.” 

  At that point, an incredulous CNBC host was forced to step in asking “what does doomed mean?”

  “What does doomed mean?  Their stock price comes in?  They go out of business?  They have regular competition like other companies?  What do you mean by doomed?”

  Fortunately, Lutz was happy to entertain the question and explained to the shocked CNBC hosts that when your variable production costs exceed your products sales price…well, that’s a problem.

  “Their upside on pricing is limited because everybody else sells electric vehicles at a loss to get the credits to be able to sell the sport utility vehicles and the pickup trucks.  So that puts a ceiling on your possible pricing.”

   

  “And if he can’t make money on the high-end Model S and Model X’s which sell up to $100,000, how in the world is he going to make money on a $35,000 small car?  Because I have news for you, 42 years of experience, the cost of a car doesn’t come down proportional to it’s price.”

   

  “If you have a situation where the cost of producing a car, labor and materials, is higher than your sell price, your business model is flawed.  And it’s doomed and it’s going to fail.” 

  Finally, the stunned CNBC anchors offered up one more defense by highlighting the massive value of Tesla’s battery and solar operations, but were once again shut down in epic fashion…

  “The battery plant, in my estimation, is a joke.  There are no cost savings from making a lithium ion plant bigger than other people lithium ion plants, because making lithium ion cells is a fully automated process anyway.  So, whether you got full automative in a small building or 10x full automation in a big building, you’re not saving any money.” 

  

  

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• Life Expectancy Indicates A Nation's Overall Well Being – So Why Is America's Dropping?

  'Exceptional' America is seriously lagging behind in global life expectancy…

  
  Via: MesoTreatmentCenters.org

  Some additional details…

  Life Expectancy Indicates a Country’s Overall Well Being—So Why Is Ours Dropping?

  • The last time U.S. life expectancy declined at birth
    • 1992-1993: 75.8 to 75.5 years
    • Resulting from high death rates from AIDS, flu epidemic, homicide, and accidental deaths
  • After years of life expectancy gains, there is decline all across the board
    • 2014-2015: 78.9 to 78.8 years
      • Death rates rose for 8 out of 10 leading causes of death
      • Heart disease causes more than 4X as many deaths as the rest of the leading causes
      • Prescription opioid painkillers and heroin abuse are probably fueling increases in unintentional injuries
        • In 2014, the CDC reported 28,000 died due to opioid overdoses

  In 2015, Obesity Related Problems Caused 10% of US Deaths

  • Obesity increases the likelihood of heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes, and some cancers
    • 6 million or ? of Americans are obese
    • Being 40 lbs overweight cuts about 3 years off life expectancy
    • Being 100 lbs overweight reduces lifespan by about 10 years
  • The US has higher obesity rates than countries with longer lifespans
    • Japan 3.3%
    • Switzerland4%
    • Germany 20.1%
    • Spain 23.7%
    • United Kingdom 28.1%
    • Australia 28.6%
    • USA 33.7%

  America is Seriously Lagging Behind in Global Life Expectancy

  • 28th globally in average life expectancy – dead last among industrialized countries
    • 1st: Japan, 83.7 years
    • 2nd: Switzerland, 83.3 years
    • 3rd: Spain, 83.3 years
    • 7th: Australia, 82.4 years
    • 19th: United Kingdom, 81.4 years
    • 22nd: Germany, 81.2 years
    • 28th: USA, 78.8 years

  Richer Americans Live Longer Than the Poor and Middle Class

  • Men
    • 1980
      • Poorest—76.2
      • Lower middle—76.3
      • Middle—76.5
      • Upper Middle—79.9
      • Richest—82.6
    • 2010
      • Poorest—76.1
      • Lower middle—78.3
      • Middle—83.4
      • Upper middle—87.8
      • Richest—88.8
  • Women
    • 1980
      • Poorest—82.5
      • Lower middle—81.5
      • Middle—82.5
      • Upper middle—83.2
      • Richest—86.1
    • 2010
      • Poorest—78.3
      • Lower middle—79.7
      • Middle—82.9
      • Upper middle—83.1
      • Richest—91.9
  • While US wage inequality is only getting worse
    • 1979
      • Poorest 20%
        • Received 6.2% of national income
      • Richest 20%
        • Received 44.9% of national income
      • 2010
        • Poorest 20%
          • Received 5.1% of national income
        • Richest 20%
          • Received 51.9% of national

  

  

• Ben Tanosborn Asks: Is Trump's Redemption At Putin's Expense?

  Authored by Ben Tanosborn,

  Donald Trump may have been told by his advisers that launching fifty-nine Tomahawk missiles, at a $15 million cost, against the small Shayrat air base in Syria was “necessary” and morally significant in retaliation for the recent chemical attack on Khan Sheikhun.  A way to show Bashar al-Assad America’s outrage at the dictator’s presumed deeds… even if results from such action prove to be materially insignificant.

  But, was it wise or even prudent to take such unilateral action without international and/or UN pre-arranged support?  Was it really an admonition to Syria’s dictator “not to do it anymore,” as the chief honcho of the Senate, Mitch McConnell, seems to claim; or was it solely a perfect opportunity for a divided Republican Party to close ranks behind an erratic and arrogant president-by-default intent in enlisting blind support from the citizenry via his sophomoric truth-deflecting tweets?

  Could this single action by the POTUS redeem him from two years of incredibly stupid oratory and a mounting litany of Munchausen lies, and bring him back to good graces with at least a slim majority of Americans?  Could this action redeem Trump from any and all prior claims of Putinesque admiration and desire to make nice with Russia, and quickly absolve him of claimed Slavic fraternization, or any possible collusion affecting the recent presidential elections?  Most important of all, could such military deed put Donald Trump in dress-uniform as Commander-in-Chief of the “Free World,” a chosen stalwart title self-awarded by Imperial America?  Answers to these questions, whether from domestic polls or overseas voices, are likely to be heard soon… ad nauseam, as cable TV “breaking news.”

  American public opinion, molded by a less-than-inquisitive mainstream media and two similarly-hawkish political parties, has selected Russia to be America’s enemy number one… with almost the entire population, through ignorance or political apathy, unable or unwilling to acknowledge the historic sub-rosa understanding which took place in 1991 as funereal rites ended the 44-year-old Cold War, thanks in great part to Mikhail Gorbachev’s wisdom through glasnost and perestroika… and not so much to Reagan’s peace efforts or his personal charm. 

  Not content with the humanity of peace, some Americans – unfortunately those holding the reins of power – prefer to hear the sound of victory bells, not those of compromise; and any patriotic (or influential) resurgence in old enemies, no matter how geopolitically restricted, is viewed as endangering US interests, a challenge to US’ global empire.  To state it any other way would be at best deceiving, and at worst a lie.

  Chances are that all investigations aimed at finding collusion between Trump’s rickety presidential campaign gang and a Russian government connection are likely to yield only circumstantial tidbits, but nothing that could be termed conspiratorial by a long shot.  [We are not delving here into any state-sponsored cyber-spying or allied disinformation that both Russia and the US engage in to influence elections, or the success that either nation might have in that arena.]  Unfortunately for hawkish politicians in the US, led by Senators McCain and Graham, former Secretary of State Clinton and a queue of long-standing adherents of global dominance, Russia will not become the scapegoat.

  We would be remiss to question Vladimir Putin’s disdain for Hillary Clinton, or his preference for the election of Trump… it stands to reason that Clinton’s inflammatory rhetoric extending back six years left discordant notes in the Kremlin, while Donald Trump’s friendly attitude towards Putin and Russia augured the prospect of a reset in US-Russia relations with mutual benefits for both nations, including cooperation that could bring a semblance of permanent peace in the Middle East.

  But Putin may have misjudged Trump’s helter-skelter brain, and how it gravitates to a single destination unaffected by constrains of idealism or loyalty, a temple-destination solely dedicated to the veneration of oneself: the Cathedral of Narcissism exhibiting the obligatory T at its main portico.  And the opportunity that magnificently presented itself via the images of babies/toddlers in Khan Sheikun said to be victims of al-Assad’s chemical attack.  Images that Donald Trump appropriated and used in his hypocritical flight from political trouble!

  A new and improved Donald Trump is about to land at the White House: an anti-Russian Trump worthy of McCain and the Pentagon falconry; a Trump leaving behind (probably) embarrassing investigations; a Trump forging ahead as an astute politician… ready to join, and likely lead, America’s political mainstream; the mainstream he said to detest before his capture of the presidency.

  Has Vladimir Putin, unwittingly, provided Donald Trump with a free ride to an unmerited redemption?

   

  

  

• Greece Gives the World Something to Cheer: Turn Up the Decibels! – Michael Carino, Greenwich Endeavors

  Let’s get PrOGRessive SPIRIT! (Finally a positive acronym.)  We are either destined for destruction
  preferring to wallow in negativity or instead can soar with optimism.  The only difference between the two is
  perspective.  Time to focus on the
  positives in the world. I choose optimism.

  Portugal, Greece, Spain, Ireland and Italy had financial
  difficulties spending more than could be supported by tax revenues.  This was blatantly obvious during the global
  recession of 2008 and the painful but necessary fiscal adjustment that
  followed.

  Nine Years later, this period of adjustment that left
  confidence and economic growth levels low concluded last Friday.  Greece agreed to a political solution to
  conclude their third memorandum or bailout. 
  All that is left is for the technical issues to be concluded.  This is a historic moment that closes a dark
  chapter and ushers in a new age of disciplined prosperity.

  Today, German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said there
  will be no fourth memorandum and the aim of the current program is to allow
  Greece to once again tap the markets for financing needs.  Now work begins to foster even stronger
  growth levels than expected by reducing the government’s debt burden in the
  medium term.

  The consequences of pessimism and negative news headlines
  over almost a decade has left the PrOGRessive SPIRIT countries’ equity markets
  at deep discounts and presents some seldom seen opportunities.  Companies are trading at fractions of book
  value as if a massive currency devaluation or a new great recession is
  imminent.  Neither are on the
  horizon.  And now that Greece’s heavy
  government debt load is being addressed, capital controls soon lifted and Greek
  bonds inclusion into the ECB’s QE program soon to be concluded, the upswing
  should be long lasting.

  European markets should be flying and celebrating but
  victory horns haven’t been heard. 
  Unemployment is trending down as GDP is going up.  Bank balance sheets are being restored and
  confidence is returning to both public and private sectors.  Interest rates have never been lower fanning
  the flames of a strong recovery.  There
  is so much positive news and reasons for optimism.  But the public, which has been so conditioned
  to tune out the good and focus on the bad, appears to be tone deaf. 

  Greece’s current government is partly culpable for
  conditioning the public to focus on the negatives.  Greece’s Prime Minister Alex Tsipras has
  pursued policies of a hopeless romantic over the last 2 years.  His heart appears to be in the right place trying
  to help those less fortunate and most in need. 
  However, by pursuing policies that had no chances of being accepted, he
  delayed the much needed economic rebound. Instead, Greece was left with additional
  billions lost in financial markets and much lower GDP growth.  Finally accepting the bitter pill that needs
  to be swallowed, he has turned the corner and agreed to policies that will
  foster solid economic growth far into the future.

  Yes, with Tspiras agreeing to bailout conditions last
  Friday, he set the stage for a dramatic shift in sentiment and growth
  trajectory for Greece and the rest of the EU. 
  The long protracted sovereign crisis is over.  These European markets have been overlooked
  and avoided for such a long time, they now represent some of the most
  compelling stories.  Let’s roll up our
  sleeves, accept the progress and do the homework necessary to capitalize on
  these recent events.  It’s time to shed
  the cloak of pessimism we’ve been programmed to wear and put on our capes of
  optimism.

  by Michael Carino, 4/12/17

   

  Michael Carino is the CEO of Greenwich Endeavors, a
  financial service firm, and has been a fund manager and owner for more than 20
  years.  He is optimistically invested in
  Greek equities.

  

  

• Beware The Dogs Of War: Is The American Empire On The Verge Of Collapse?

  Authored by John Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,

  “No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.” — James Madison

  Waging endless wars abroad (in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and now Syria) isn’t making America—or the rest of the world—any safer, it’s certainly not making America great again, and it’s undeniably digging the U.S. deeper into debt.

  In fact, it’s a wonder the economy hasn’t collapsed yet.

  Indeed, even if we were to put an end to all of the government’s military meddling and bring all of the troops home today, it would take decades to pay down the price of these wars and get the government’s creditors off our backs. Even then, government spending would have to be slashed dramatically and taxes raised.

  You do the math.

  • The government is $19 trillion in debt.

  • The Pentagon’s annual budget consumes almost 100% of individual income tax revenue.

  • The government has spent $4.8 trillion on wars abroad since 9/11, with $7.9 trillion in interest. As the Atlantic points out, we’re fighting terrorism with a credit card.

  • The government lost more than $160 billion to waste and fraud by the military and defense contractors.

  • Taxpayers are being forced to pay $1.4 million per hour to provide U.S. weapons to countries that can’t afford them.

  • The U.S. government spends more on wars (and military occupations) abroad every year than all 50 states combined spend on health, education, welfare, and safety.

  • Now President Trump wants to increase military spending by $54 billion.

  • Add in the cost of waging war in Syria, and the burden on taxpayers soars to more than $11.5 million a day. Ironically, while presidential candidate Trump was vehemently opposed to the U.S. use of force in Syria, and warned that fighting Syria would signal the start of World War III against a united Syria, Russia and Iran, he wasted no time launching air strikes against Syria.

  Clearly, war has become a huge money-making venture, and the U.S. government, with its vast military empire, is one of its best buyers and sellers.

  Yet what most Americans—brainwashed into believing that patriotism means supporting the war machine—fail to recognize is that these ongoing wars have little to do with keeping the country safe and everything to do with enriching the military industrial complex at taxpayer expense.

  The rationale may keep changing for why American military forces are in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and now Syria. However, the one that remains constant is that those who run the government—including the current president—are feeding the appetite of the military industrial complex and fattening the bank accounts of its investors.

  Case in point: President Trump plans to “beef up” military spending while slashing funding for the environment, civil rights protections, the arts, minority-owned businesses, public broadcasting, Amtrak, rural airports and interstates.

  In other words, in order to fund this burgeoning military empire that polices the globe, the U.S. government is prepared to bankrupt the nation, jeopardize our servicemen and women, increase the chances of terrorism and blowback domestically, and push the nation that much closer to eventual collapse.

  Obviously, our national priorities are in desperate need of an overhauling.

  Surely there are much better uses for your taxpayer funds than trillions of dollars being wasted on war? The following are just a few ways those hard-earned dollars could be used:

  • $270 billion to repair U.S. public schools, and twice that much to modernize them.

  • $120 billion a year to fix the nation’s crumbling infrastructure.

  • $251 million for safety improvements and construction for Amtrak.

  • $690 million to care for America’s 70,000 aging veterans.

  • $11 billion wasted or lost in Iraq in just one year could have paid 220,000 teachers’ salaries.

  • The yearly cost of stationing just one soldier in Iraq could have fed 60 American families.

  • $30 billion per year to end starvation and hunger around the world.

  • $11 billion per year to provide the world—including our own failing cities—with clean drinking water.

  • Use the $10 billion spent every year to provide arms, equipment, training and advice internationally to more than 180 countries to start paying down the overwhelming $19 trillion national debt.

  As long as “we the people” continue to allow the government to wage its costly, meaningless, endless wars abroad, the American homeland will continue to suffer: our roads will crumble, our bridges will fail, our schools will fall into disrepair, our drinking water will become undrinkable, our communities will destabilize, and crime will rise.

  Here’s the kicker, though: if the American economy collapses—and with it the last vestiges of our constitutional republic—it will be the government and its trillion-dollar war budgets that are to blame.

  Eventually, as I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People, all military empires fail.

  At the height of its power, even the mighty Roman Empire could not stare down a collapsing economy and a burgeoning military. Prolonged periods of war and false economic prosperity largely led to its demise. As historian Chalmers Johnson warns, “Rome attempted to keep its empire and lost its democracy.”

  More than 50 years ago, President Dwight Eisenhower warned us not to let the military industrial complex endanger our liberties or democratic processes.

  We failed to heed his warning.

  The consequences, as Eisenhower recognized, of allowing the military-industrial complex to wage endless wars, exhaust our resources and dictate our national priorities are beyond grave:

  Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children… This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron.

  Wake up, America. There’s not much time left before we reach the zero hour.

  

  

• Michael Savage Laments Over Trump's Recent Decisions, Calls Yours Truly 'Vermin of the Left' in the Process

  I’ve been called many things in my life, but ‘vermin of the left’ isn’t one of them. On the Alex Jones show today, conservative talk show host Michael Savage exploded with rage after Alex began to read him my article, published on Zerohedge, which was titled “Michael Savage Turns on Trump, Says Syrian Gas Attack Was False Flag Operation.”

  Michael Savage calls me ‘VERMIN OF THE LEFT’ on Alex Jones today. Bucket list item checked off. pic.twitter.com/dCVscXMlGp

  — The_Real_Fly (@The_Real_Fly) April 12, 2017

  //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

  Obviously, if Michael read the article, he’d know that I wasn’t ‘vermin sludge’, but instead a disaffected Trump supporter, like him, who was pissed off by the war drums beating out of the White House.

  Humorously, a few month’s ago Savage praised yours truly for an article that I had written, giving it rave reviews: ‘it’s a huge story’…’a major league piece’…’first rate piece of reportage’…’it would be great on any conservative website.’

  Here is Savage praising my previous work (tips hat).

  And here is the full Jones-Savage interview, which is essentially a cry for help — with Savage lamenting over Trump’s hawkish demeanor, blaming his ‘change’ on the people around him, namely Tillerson. Savage would like Tillerson aka ‘the cromagnon’ to go back to pumping gas.

  Interestingly, this isn’t the first time Savage called me out on his show. Many years ago, when I was a younger man in my 20s, I had written an article that was critical of him, which resulted in him spending his entire 10-minute monolog in an uncontained rage, reading my article, challenging me to call his show to debate him, saying things like ‘you moron blogger you.’ I remember the day well, parked outside of a shopping mall, waiting for the Mrs. and then BAM — Savage is on the air calling me an ‘idiot, moron, blogger.’ Good times.

  Having the benefit of hindsight, I can now say Dr. Savage was right and I was wrong and for my ‘moronic article on some unknown website.’

  Thanks for the laughs, Dr. Savage.
  Content originally published at iBankCoin.com

  

• Viral Video Shows Chinese Warehouse Where Humans Were Replaced By Robots

  Even as talk about robots taking over low-(and not so low) skilled jobs has been all the rage in recent months, few Americans have been faced with the imminent threat of being displaced by Johnny 5. Not so in China, where a viral clip released by the local TV broadcaster shows an army of little orange robots sorting out packages in a warehouse in eastern China, the latest example of how machines are increasingly taking over menial factory work in the world’s most populous nation.

  The People’s Daily shared the behind-the-scenes footage of the self-charging robot army in a sorting centre of Chinese delivery powerhouse Shentong (STO) Express. The video, also released by the SCMP, shows hundreds of round Hikvision robots,  each roughly the size of a seat cushion,  swivelling across the floor of the large warehouse in Hangzhou. A worker is seen feeding each robot with a package before the machines carry the parcels away to different areas around the sorting centre, then flipping their lids to deposit them into chutes beneath the floor.

  The robots identified the destination of each package by scanning a code on the parcel, thus minimising sorting mistakes, according to the video.

  The army of robots can sort up to 200,000 packages per day and are self-charging, so they can work 24/7, although they are presently used only for about six or seven hours each time from 6pm according to a STO Express spokesman.

  An STO Express spokesman told the South China Morning Post on Monday that the robots had helped the company save half the costs it typically required to use human workers. They also improved efficiency by around 30% and maximised sorting accuracy, he said.
  

  “We use these robots in two of our centres in Hangzhou right now,” the spokesman said. “We want to start using these across the country, especially in our bigger centres.”

  Manufacturers across China have been increasingly replacing human workers with machines, for one simple reason: Chinese wage growth is soaring with average wages in China’s manufacturing sector rising above those in countries such as Brazil and Mexico.

  Meanwhile, the output of industrial robots in the country grew 30.4% last year. In the country’s latest five-year plan, the central government set a target aiming for annual production of these robots to reach 100,000 by 2020.

  Elsewhere, Apple’s supplier Foxconn last year replaced 60,000 factory workers with robots. The Taiwanese smartphone maker has several factories across China, with the bulk of the hundreds of thousands of employees set to be rep[laced by robots.

  

  

• "The System Itself Is Beyond Repair"

  Authored by Antonius Aquinas,

  The Cost Of A Trump Presidency

  

  Last Thursday’s wanton attack on a Syrian air field by the US and its bellicose actions toward North Korea have brought to the forefront the real cost of candidate Trump’s landslide victory last November.

  Unlike most laymen, accountants, and financial analysts, economists look at cost differently.  For economists, cost or more specifically, “opportunity cost,” means “a benefit that a person could have received, but gave up, to take another course of action.  Stated differently, opportunity cost represents an alternative given up when a decision is made.”

  Such thinking can be roughly applied to the political realm.  In the case of last fall’s US Presidential election, the cost of Donald Trump’s unexpected victory was not the money spent on the campaign, but the diffusion (hopefully, only temporary) of the growing anti-Establishment groundswell that was percolating not only in America, but across the globe.

  The Trump phenomenon, Brexit, Texas secession talk, anti-immigration gatherings, central bank scrutiny, the exposure and decline of the lying, dominant mass media, and other populist movements and causes were symptoms of the masses dissatisfaction with their exploitation by the ruling elites. Trump’s triumph has squashed and defused many of these populist uprisings since a number of his campaign themes empathized with these trends.

  A similar situation occurred after Ronald Reagan’s victory in the 1980 election as the great anti-government wave, which swept him into power, dried up almost immediately since Ronnie was perceived as “one of us.”  Of course, Reagan was a disaster and fulfilled none of his anti-government campaign rhetoric, but instead went on to become, for a time, the biggest Presidential spender in US history.

  A Clinton victory, although certainly tyrannical in the short run, would have, no doubt, furthered the anti-Establishment fires and inspired more.  For example, Texas may be now on the road to independence from the Federal Leviathan.

  The ills that plague the US and, for that matter, the Western world, will not be solved through a Trump Presidency in “making America great again,” but will only come about through political decentralization and the abolition of central banking with a return to sound money.  Concomitant with political decentralization and secession is military contraction, as smaller political jurisdictions will have lesser pools of wealth to tap from while the absence of an inflationary central bank will make military adventurism extremely difficult to conduct.

  Yet, before such a transformation can take place, an ideological foundation must first be established.  A Hillary Clinton Administration would have provided fertile ground for such change.

  Since the groundwork for a depoliticized world has not been laid, a Trump Presidency made sense as long as he kept as close as possible to his campaign agenda, the most important of which was foreign policy.  His condemnation of the neocons’ policies which have bankrupted the nation, murdered thousands of innocents abroad, and heighten tensions everywhere was crucial in his shocking victory last November.  It is apparent that he did not understand how important this support was or he would have never undertaken such an utterly stupid decision.

  With the strike on Syria and seemingly more military action in the offering, Trump’s Presidency is now the worst of all possible worlds, at least in the short run, for those opposed to the New World Order.  Most serious observers, however, understood, especially after the appointment of so many Goldman Sachs cretins, Israeli Firsters, and nutty warmongers to his administration, that Trump would eventually succumb to the pressure.  More importantly, Trump was never fully grounded in an America First mindset, probably not knowing where that term originated or its gallant founders.

  All, however, is not lost.

  Trump’s capitulation makes it abundantly clear that the system itself is beyond repair.  Getting the right individual to salvage the American welfare/warfare state cannot be done.  Trump had many advantages that no future candidate will likely possess which means that anybody that follows will be an “insider.”  Much of his base, therefore, will no longer support a future Republican candidate or will give him only lukewarm support .  With no independent personality to rally around, the millions of disappointed Trumpians will seek new governing paradigms which hopefully will lead to the growth of secession movements.

  Ultimately, however, a permanent American foreign policy of non intervention, peace, and free trade will only come about when there is a change in the prevailing ideology of society where all contenders for political office espouse such a notion and today’s warmongers are seen for what they are: enemies of humanity and its Creator.

  

  

• Fox's Bill O'Reilly Takes Sudden "Planned" Vacation; James Murdoch Reportedly Wants Him Gone

  Amid a sexual harrassment scandal, Fox's Bill O'Reilly surprised viewers tonight and announced he will be taking a "planned" vacation until April 24th. The timing is interesting as over two dozen companies – including Mercedes-Benz, Hyundai, BMW and Allstate – have pulled advertisements and as NYMag.com reports, two highly-placed Fox News sources say 21st Century Fox CEO James Murdoch would like O’Reilly to be permanently taken off the air.

  

  As HollywoodReporter notes, O'Reilly assured viewers that his trip was planned long ago, as he takes a vacation “often around this time of year," in order to dispel any notion that it was a forced suspension. He announced that he’d scheduled his trip “last fall” – well before the New York Times reported he paid $13 million to settle harassment claims.

  //video.foxnews.com/v/embed.js?id=5394623830001&w=466&h=263

  A Fox News source told NYMag.com's Gabriel Sherman that O’Reilly plans to return to his show on April 24. But according to four network sources, there’s talk inside Fox News that tonight’s show could be his last. Lawyers for the law firm Paul, Weiss, hired last summer by 21st Century Fox to investigate Roger Ailes, are currently doing a “deep dive” investigation into O’Reilly’s behavior. They’re focused now on sexual harassment claims by O’Reilly guest Wendy Walsh after she reported her claims via the company’s anonymous hotline.

  O'Reilly previously dismissed the charges in a statement posted to his official site soon after the report was published.

  "Just like other prominent and controversial people, I’m vulnerable to lawsuits from individuals who want me to pay them to avoid negative publicity. In my more than 20 years at Fox News Channel, no one has ever filed a complaint about me with the Human Resources Department, even on the anonymous hotline," the statement read.

   

  "But most importantly, I’m a father who cares deeply for my children and who would do anything to avoid hurting them in any way. And so I have put to rest any controversies to spare my children. The worst part of my job is being a target for those who would harm me and my employer, the Fox News Channel. Those of us in the arena are constantly at risk, as are our families and children. My primary efforts will continue to be to put forth an honest TV program and to protect those close to me."

  But as NYMag reports, Fox News co-president Bill Shine has been working hard to keep O’Reilly, sources said. But O’Reilly’s future is in the hands of the Murdochs. “It’s up to the family,” the senior Fox News staffer said. The Murdochs are presently divided over how to handle it.

   Two highly-placed Fox News sources say 21st Century Fox CEO James Murdoch would like O’Reilly to be permanently taken off the air, while his father Rupert and older brother Lachlan are more inclined to keep him.

  (A spokesperson for the Murdochs declined to comment.)

  

  

• Putin: "Idlib Was A "False Flag" Attack And We Have Learned That More Are Coming"

  With Rex Tillerson on his way to Russia, moments ago Russian president Vladimir Putin shocked reporters when he said that Russia has received intelligence from “trusted sources” that more attacks using chemical weapons are being prepared on the Damascus region, meant to pin the blame on the Assad government.

  “We have reports from multiple sources that false flags like this one – and I cannot call it otherwise – are being prepared in other parts of Syria, including the southern suburbs of Damascus. They plan to plant some chemical there and accuse the Syrian government of an attack,” he said at a joint press conference with Italian President Sergio Mattarella in Moscow

  The Russian President announced that Russia will officially turn to the UN in the Hague for an investigation of the chemical weapons’ use in Idlib.  Moscow has dismissed suggestions that the Syrian government that it backs could be behind the attack in Idlib province.

  “All incidents reminiscent of the ‘chemical attacks’ that took place in Idlib must be thoroughly investigated,” Putin said.

  Damascus denied the allegations, noting that the targeted area may have been hosting chemical weapons stockpiles belonging to Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) or Al-Nusra Front jihadists.

  The incident has not been properly investigated as yet, but the US fired dozens of cruise missiles at a Syrian airbase in a demonstration of force over what it labeled a chemical attack by Damascus.

  Putin also pointed out that the latest US missile strikes in Syria bring to mind the United States’ UN Security Council address in 2003 that led to the invasion of Iraq, an address which has now been thorougly debunked as using flawed information to garner global support for an invasion.

  “President Mattarella and I discussed it, and I told him that this reminds me strongly of the events in 2003, when the US representatives demonstrated at the UN Security Council session the presumed chemical weapons found in Iraq. The military campaign was subsequently launched in Iraq and it ended with the devastation of the country, the growth of the terrorist threat and the appearance of Islamic State [IS, formerly ISIS] on the world stage,” he added.

  The Russian president also slammed the Idlib attack, officially denouncing it as a “false flag” attack.

  Putin also said that there is no meeting with Tillerson currently on his schedule.

  Following Putin’s presser, Russian General Staff released a statement announcing that it has information of militants bringing poisonous substances to areas of Khan Shaykhun, West of Aleppo and Eastern Guta in Syria.

  Chief of the Russian General Staff Main Operational Directorate Col. Gen. Sergei Rudskoy said that the militants are trying to provoke new accusations targeted at Syrian government for alleged use of chemical weapons. The militants aim to incite the US to conduct new strikes, Rudskoy warned, adding that such measures are impermissible. He said that according to the Russian general staff new US airstrikes in Syria are unacceptable and that the Syrian forces posses no chemical weapons.

  

  

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• "It's Not A War Crime" – EU Finance Chief Attempts To Defend His "Women & Booze" Outburst

  The head of eurozone finance chiefs has hit back following his recent comments on troubled European countries, telling the media “it looks like I committed a war crime.” He insists that all he wanted to express was the idea that “solidarity is not charity.”

  

  At the end of March, Jeroen Dijsselbloem had said that “I cannot spend all my money on liquor and women and then ask for your support,” referring to certain European nations asking for bailouts.

  And now, as RT reports, in comments published on Monday by De Volkskrant newspaper, the departing Dutch finance minister attempted to clarify his remarks, explaining that “fatigue may have played a role” in the wording of his initial comments as “it was three days after the [Dutch] election.”

  The official also said that the backlash he received was just “anger at eight years of crisis policy” sweeping the EU.

  “I would have rephrased it otherwise, probably. But it was my way of making clear that solidarity is not charity,” the official told the newspaper.

  Dijsselbloem’s initial comments had sparked a wave of outrage from numerous European politicians, as well as the public.

  In the latest interview, Dijsselbloem rejected the calls for his resignation, and urged the EU to pay more attention to real issues that the union is facing.

  "It's sad that we put so much time and energy into an interview while Greece is slipping into a new crisis," Dijsselbloem said to De Volkskrant.

   

  "[It’s] really annoying that so many people were so offended and angry. But the parliamentarians are trying to push me into a corner, as if I claimed that all Southern Europeans are big spenders. Nonsense!" he added.

   

  

  

• Mac Slavo Warns Prepare For War: "It's Going To Obliterate The Global Financial System…"

  Authored by Mac Slavo via SHTFplan.com,

  

  You know what’s so tragic about America? Despite all of the wars our nation gets involved in, we’re secretly one of the most peaceful cultures on the planet. We voted for George Bush, because he promised us a non-interventionist foreign policy. We voted for Obama, because he promised to bring the troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan. We voted for Trump, because he promised to end the nation building policies of his predecessor.

  And that’s the real tragedy. We’ve been voting for peace for nearly 20 years now, and all we get is war.

  That should really tell you something. It should tell you that our system doesn’t care about what the president stands for, or what the voters want. The system is never held accountable for anything, so there is nothing stopping it. One way or another, the deep state always gets its way. So if our government wants a war, then you can bet that we’re going to war.

  That was made abundantly clear last week when President Trump ordered the bombing of an air base in Syria. The attack was so provocative, that the Kremlin went so far as to say that the US is now “only one step from war” with Russia. The man who was supposed to buck the system and drain the swamp; the man who promised to restore our relationship with Russia and pull back from brinkmanship, seems to have finally submitted to the warmongers in our government. The deep state’s plan to drag us into a horrible conflagration was only temporarily derailed by Trump, and now it appears that their plans are back on track.

  But there’s a silver lining in all of this. Once you know that war is inevitable, and you accept that fact, you can have a pretty good idea of what’s going to happen next. You can finally take steps to prepare for it.

  

  As for what to expect next, you can bet the farm that our economy is not going to survive the next major war, especially if it involves a conflict with Russia or China. Even if this war doesn’t turn into a nuclear slugfest, it’s going to obliterate the global economy and financial system.

  For years Russia and China have been building an alternative to the dollar dominated financial system. They’ve built the BRICS financial bloc, they’ve been stocking up on gold, and they’ve been establishing trade agreements that don’t involve the dollar. When war breaks out, there’s going to be another system waiting in the wings to replace the dollar, which has been the world’s reserve currency for decades. The war will motivate China, Russia, and their allies, to pull the rug out from under the current economic paradigm.

  Obviously that’s going to significantly weaken the value of the dollar, but it will be just the beginning. The cost of fighting this war will be astronomical. To give you an idea of how costly it will be, World War Two pushed our nation into the highest debt to GDP ratio that we’ve ever been in; a level we haven’t come close to again until very recently. Think about that. We have almost the same debt to GDP ratio as we had when we fought the most expensive and destructive war in our history. As the Wealth Research Group has already pointed out, the dollar is practically on life support. Our government is buried in debt and practically broke as it is, and the cost of fighting another world war would put us over the edge. We’d be bankrupt in no time at all.

  When you consider all of this, one thing is absolutely clear. If Trump drags us into another major war, regardless of whether or not it is global in scope, the dollar is going to crash. It may not even survive in its current form. And when that happens, people are going to flee toward safe haven assets. You can rest assured that gold is going to make a comeback, the likes of which none of us have seen in our lifetimes.

  The heavy hitters in the investment community have been predicting a dramatic change in the gold market for some time now. And unlike the general public, they weren’t persuaded into thinking that someone like Trump was going to save our country from collapse. For instance, Doug Casey of Casey Research; perhaps one of the most well-respected economic prognosticators, told Future Money Trends the following:

  The one thing I feel very confident of is we’re going to have financial chaos in years to come and that’s going to drive people into gold and to a lesser degree into silver.

   

  …

   

  There’s absolutely  no reason from  fundamental point of view for bonds and stocks to be as high as they are right now… We’re in for a huge political, financial, demographic and military upset… these people might start World War III or seem like they’re trying to with the Russians… It’s a very dangerous situation.

  He said that back in December, after Trump was elected but before he took office. Though he was optimistic about Trump, he clearly wasn’t convinced that he’d be able to prevent an economic collapse. Neither was Amir Adnani, the CEO of GoldMining Inc. Without even considering the possibility of war, he predicted that Trump’s policies would lead to a gold market rally.

  So this is really an exceptional window and opportunity for us. We built a war chest with over $21 million of cash on hand, the very large resource base that we have, and that serves as a key point of drawing more companies to us who want to be part of the platform that we’re building. So this is a very interesting window for us; I believe this is a temporary window as well, because there’s no doubt in my mind that the policies of President Trump will prove to be very inflationary. And these very inflationary policies will drive real interest rates into the negative territory, and I really do believe that the stage is set for higher gold prices, but of course, these things take time to develop and manifest themselves.

  But when you add war to the mix, it’s obvious that the dollar isn’t going to be able to maintain its current value. Our financial system is both fragile and under enormous pressure. It was already headed toward collapse, and the costs associated with another major war are going to expedite that process. When it happens, only the folks with real assets will be above water. Assets like land, weapons, food, and of course gold, will be the only things separating the haves from the have nots.

  

  

• PIECZENIK EXPLODES: ISSUES WARNING TO TRUMP, MATTIS AND MCMASTER ABOUT GOING TO WAR IN SYRIA

  America’s foremost expert in international affairs, having served under 5 Presidents, instrumental in the Camp David accords, in addition to playing a key role in regime changes around the globe for decades, Dr. Steve Pieczenik exploded with rage on the Alex Jones show yesterday — warning Trump and his team that war crimes would follow if they pursued a neocon agenda of war in Syria, which the American people do not want.
   
  “This is a warning to our generals, Mcmaster, and others, who think they can do a regime change in Syria. Number one, that will not be possible, not with the military, not with all the forces you have and not with the quality of the soldiers you have, the generals. Any notion of a regime change through force is both absurd or criminal. The issue of Syria and Assad have no national security interests to us at all. This will be an incredible dereliction of duty if we go to war in Syria.”
   
  He then warned Mcmaster and Mattis directly, saying that he will “come forth, and be tried for criminal activity, as will Mathis.”

  “There is no reason to put our men and women in harm’s way for oil pipelines, or whatever nonsense that is military industrial complex thinks we need to do to get in the middle east. We have no interest in the middle east.”
   
  “There is no cause for war.”
   
  “Again, we’re going through the nonsense of the neocons.”

  Dr. Pieczenik made his first public appearance in more than 30 years during the Presidential elections, saying in no uncertain terms that he represented a faction of the American intelligence community that would not allow Hillary Clinton to become the next President. Moreover, he claimed to be part of an organization that released the Podesta emails to Wikileaks. Interestingly, the mainstream media continues to ignore the good Doctor — in spite of the fact that is resume is anything but conspiratorial. He is the real deal.
   
  At one point in the interview, he got so heated that Jones had to cut him off when he threatened legal action against the President.
   

  “If this goes any step further, this is a warning to our generals, to our President, and anyone involved. Once again, we will react quite vociferously and strongly. This is grounds for all types of legal action against the President.”

   
  He further elaborated on the situation in Syria as a war that is unwinnable, describing how the Assad family was firmly entrenched and could not be displaced by American forces, who have ‘no idea what they’re doing.’

  “The people I know in the military are increasing their force structures to the degree that there is no strategy whatsoever. If you have no strategy, and regime change isn’t a strategy, do not go to war.”
   
  “The President needs to understand, if he goes to war, that’s his problem and we will have a major blowback, domestically. Our military is not prepared for this type of war. Our generals have no idea what they’re doing.”

   
  A confused Jones, obviously caught off guard by the acrimonious tone of Dr. Pieczenik, asked what had changed from Friday to cause him to issues these warnings.
   
  Pieczenik described, from a psyops point of view, the things he learned over the weekend that caused him to worry.

  “But once I hear, and I understand there are more forces placed there over the weekend, there was artillery placed in there. And in fact, they are creating in the White House, what we call a dichotomy or two messages.”
   
  “You have a purposeful confusion.”
   
  “Do not go to war in Syria.”

   
  A must listen.

  Content originally published at iBankCoin.com

  

• 1983 CIA Document Reveals Plan To Destroy Syria, Foreshadows Current Crisis

  Prophetically foreshadowing the current crisis (and apparent action plan), leaked CIA documents from the reign of Bashar al-Assad's father in the 1980s show a Washington Deep State plan coalescing to "bring real muscle to bear against Syria," toppling its leader (in favor of one amenable to US demands) , severing ties with Russia (its primary arms dealer), and paving the way for an oil and gas pipeline of Washington's choosing.

  

  As ActivistPost.com's Brandon Turbeville detailed (just a day before Trump unleashed his Tomahawks), as the Syrian crisis enters its sixth year, the Donald Trump administration is looking more and more like the Obama administration every day. With the Trump regime refusing to open useful dialogue with Russia regarding Syria, its obvious anti-Iran and pro-Israel positioning, and support for a very questionable “safe zone” plan for Syria, the odds of a rational U.S. policy in regards to Syria has lower and lower odds of existence as time progresses.

  Yet, despite the fact that the Trump administration is apparently poised to continue the Obama regime’s proxy war of aggression against the people of Syria, an example of seamless transition, it should also be remembered that the plan to destroy Syria did not begin with Obama but with the Bush administration.

  Even now, as the world awaits the continuation of the Syrian war through a Democratic and Republican administration, the genesis of that war goes back to the Republican Bush administration, demonstrating that there is indeed an overarching agenda and an overarching infrastructure of an oligarchical deep state intent on moving forward regardless of which party is seemingly in power.

  As journalist Seymour Hersh wrote in his article, “The Redirection,”

  To undermine Iran, which is predominantly Shiite, the Bush Administration has decided, in effect, to reconfigure its priorities in the Middle East. In Lebanon, the Administration has cooperated with Saudi Arabia’s government, which is Sunni, in clandestine operations that are intended to weaken Hezbollah, the Shiite organization that is backed by Iran. The U.S. has also taken part in clandestine operations aimed at Iran and its ally Syria. A by-product of these activities has been the bolstering of Sunni extremist groups that espouse a militant vision of Islam and are hostile to America and sympathetic to Al Qaeda.

  “Extremist groups that espouse a militant vision of Islam” who are “hostile to America and sympathetic to al-Qaeda” are the definition of the so-called “rebels” turned loose on Syria in 2011. Likewise, the fact that both Iran and Hezbollah, who are natural enemies of al-Qaeda and such radical Sunni groups, are involved in the battle against ISIS and other related terrorist organizations in Syria proves the accuracy of the article on another level.

  Hersh also wrote,

  The new American policy, in its broad outlines, has been discussed publicly. In testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in January, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said that there is “a new strategic alignment in the Middle East,” separating “reformers” and “extremists”; she pointed to the Sunni states as centers of moderation, and said that Iran, Syria, and Hezbollah were “on the other side of that divide.” (Syria’s Sunni majority is dominated by the Alawi sect.) Iran and Syria, she said, “have made their choice and their choice is to destabilize.”

   

  Some of the core tactics of the redirection are not public, however. The clandestine operations have been kept secret, in some cases, by leaving the execution or the funding to the Saudis, or by finding other ways to work around the normal congressional appropriations process, current and former officials close to the Administration said.

   

  . . . . . .

   

  This time, the U.S. government consultant told me, Bandar and other Saudis have assured the White House that “they will keep a very close eye on the religious fundamentalists. Their message to us was ‘We’ve created this movement, and we can control it.’ It’s not that we don’t want the Salafis to throw bombs; it’s who they throw them at—Hezbollah, Moqtada al-Sadr, Iran, and at the Syrians, if they continue to work with Hezbollah and Iran.”

   

  . . . . . .

   

  Fourth, the Saudi government, with Washington’s approval, would provide funds and logistical aid to weaken the government of President Bashir Assad, of Syria. The Israelis believe that putting such pressure on the Assad government will make it more conciliatory and open to negotiations. Syria is a major conduit of arms to Hezbollah.

   

  . . . . .

   

  In January, after an outburst of street violence in Beirut involving supporters of both the Siniora government and Hezbollah, Prince Bandar flew to Tehran to discuss the political impasse in Lebanon and to meet with Ali Larijani, the Iranians’ negotiator on nuclear issues. According to a Middle Eastern ambassador, Bandar’s mission—which the ambassador said was endorsed by the White House—also aimed “to create problems between the Iranians and Syria.” There had been tensions between the two countries about Syrian talks with Israel, and the Saudis’ goal was to encourage a breach. However, the ambassador said, “It did not work. Syria and Iran are not going to betray each other. Bandar’s approach is very unlikely to succeed.”

   

  . . . . . .

   

  The Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, a branch of a radical Sunni movement founded in Egypt in 1928, engaged in more than a decade of violent opposition to the regime of Hafez Assad, Bashir’s father. In 1982, the Brotherhood took control of the city of Hama; Assad bombarded the city for a week, killing between six thousand and twenty thousand people. Membership in the Brotherhood is punishable by death in Syria. The Brotherhood is also an avowed enemy of the U.S. and of Israel. Nevertheless, Jumblatt said, “We told Cheney that the basic link between Iran and Lebanon is Syria—and to weaken Iran you need to open the door to effective Syrian opposition.”

   

  . . . . .

   

  There is evidence that the Administration’s redirection strategy has already benefitted the Brotherhood. The Syrian National Salvation Front is a coalition of opposition groups whose principal members are a faction led by Abdul Halim Khaddam, a former Syrian Vice-President who defected in 2005, and the Brotherhood. A former high-ranking C.I.A. officer told me, “The Americans have provided both political and financial support. The Saudis are taking the lead with financial support, but there is American involvement.” He said that Khaddam, who now lives in Paris, was getting money from Saudi Arabia, with the knowledge of the White House. (In 2005, a delegation of the Front’s members met with officials from the National Security Council, according to press reports.) A former White House official told me that the Saudis had provided members of the Front with travel documents.

  Hersh also spoke with Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, leader of the Shi’ite Lebanese militia, Hezbollah. In relation to the Western strategy against Syria, he reported,

  Nasrallah said he believed that America also wanted to bring about the partition of Lebanon and of Syria. In Syria, he said, the result would be to push the country “into chaos and internal battles like in Iraq.” In Lebanon, “There will be a Sunni state, an Alawi state, a Christian state, and a Druze state.” But, he said, “I do not know if there will be a Shiite state.” Nasrallah told me that he suspected that one aim of the Israeli bombing of Lebanon last summer was “the destruction of Shiite areas and the displacement of Shiites from Lebanon. The idea was to have the Shiites of Lebanon and Syria flee to southern Iraq,” which is dominated by Shiites. “I am not sure, but I smell this,” he told me.

   

  Partition would leave Israel surrounded by “small tranquil states,” he said. “I can assure you that the Saudi kingdom will also be divided, and the issue will reach to North African states. There will be small ethnic and confessional states,” he said. “In other words, Israel will be the most important and the strongest state in a region that has been partitioned into ethnic and confessional states that are in agreement with each other. This is the new Middle East.”

  Yet, while even the connections between the plans to destroy Syria and the Bush administration are generally unknown, what is even less well-known is the fact that there existed a plan to destroy Syria as far back as 1983.

  Documents contained in the U.S. National Archives and drawn up by the CIA reveal a plan to destroy the Syrian government going back decades. One such document entitled, “Bringing Real Muscle To Bear In Syria,” written by CIA officer Graham Fuller, is particularly illuminating. In this document, Fuller wrote,

  Syria at present has a hammerlock on US interests both in Lebanon and in the Gulf — through closure of Iraq’s pipeline thereby threatening Iraqi internationalization of the [Iran-Iraq] war. The US should consider sharply escalating the pressures against Assad [Sr.] through covertly orchestrating simultaneous military threats against Syria from three border states hostile to Syria: Iraq, Israel and Turkey.

  Even as far back as 1983, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s father, Hafez Assad, was viewed as a gadfly to the plans of Western imperialists seeking to weaken both the Iraqis and the Iranians and extend hegemony over the Middle East and Persia. The document shows that Assad and hence Syria represented a resistance to Western imperialism, a threat to Israel, and that Assad himself was well aware of the game the United States, Israel, and other members of the Western imperialist coalition were trying to play against him. The report reads,

  Syria continues to maintain a hammerlock on two key U.S. interests in the Middle East:

   

  — Syrian refusal to withdraw its troops from Lebanon ensures Israeli occupation in the south;

   

  — Syrian closure of the Iraqi pipeline has been a key factor in bringing Iraq to its financial knees, impelling it towards dangerous internationalization of the war in the Gulf

   

  Diplomatic initiatives to date have had little effect on Assad who has so far correctly calculated the play of forces in the area and concluded that they are only weakly arrayed against him. If the U.S. is to rein in Syria’s spoiling role, it can only do so through exertion of real muscle which will pose a vital threat to Assad’s position and power.

  The author then presents a plan that sounds eerily similar to those now being discussed publicly by Western and specifically American corporate-financier think tanks and private non-governmental organizations who unofficially craft American policy. Fuller writes,

  The US should consider sharply escalating the pressures against Assad [Sr.] through covertly orchestrating simultaneous military threats against Syria from three border states hostile to Syria: Iraq, Israel and Turkey. Iraq, perceived to be increasingly desperate in the Gulf war, would undertake limited military (air) operations against Syria with the sole goal of opening the pipeline. Although opening war on a second front against Syria poses considerable risk to Iraq, Syria would also face a two-front war since it is already heavily engaged in the Bekaa, on the Golan and in maintaining control over a hostile and restive population inside Syria.

   

  Israel would simultaneously raise tensions along Syria’s Lebanon front without actually going to war. Turkey, angered by Syrian support to Armenian terrorism, to Iraqi Kurds on Turkey’s Kurdish border areas and to Turkish terrorists operating out of northern Syria, has often considered launching unilateral military operations against terrorist camps in northern Syria. Virtually all Arab states would have sympathy for Iraq.

   

  Faced with three belligerent fronts, Assad would probably be forced to abandon his policy of closure of the pipeline. Such a concession would relieve the economic pressure on Iraq, and perhaps force Iran to reconsider bringing the war to an end. It would be a sharpening blow to Syria’s prestige and could effect the equation of forces in Lebanon.

  Thus, Fuller outlines that not only would Syria be forced to reopen the pipeline of interest at the time, but that it would be a regional shockwave effecting the makeup of forces in and around Lebanon, weakening the prestige of the Syrian state and, presumably, the psychological state of the Syrian President and the Syrian people, as well as a message to Iran.

  The document continues,

  Such a threat must be primarily military in nature. At present there are three relatively hostile elements around Syria’s borders: Israel, Iraq and Turkey. Consideration must be given to orchestrating a credible military threat against Syria in order to induce at least some moderate change in its policies.

  This paper proposes serious examination of the use of all three states – acting independently – to exert the necessary threat. Use of any one state in isolation cannot create such a credible threat.

  The strategy proposed here by the CIA is virtually identical to the one being discussed by deep state establishment think tanks like the Brookings Institution today. For instance, in the Brookings document “Middle East Memo #21: Saving Syria: Assessing Options For Regime Change,” it says,

  Turkey’s participation would be vital for success, and Washington would have to encourage the Turks to play a more helpful role than they have so far. While Ankara has lost all patience with Damascus, it has taken few concrete steps that would increase the pressure on Asad (and thereby antagonize Tehran). Turkish policy toward the Syrian opposition has actually worked at cross-purposes with American efforts to foster a broad, unified national organization. With an eye to its own domestic Kurdish dilemmas, Ankara has frustrated efforts to integrate the Syrian Kurds into a broader opposition framework. In addition, it has overtly favored the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood over all other opposition groups. Washington must impress upon Turkey the need to be more accommodating of legitimate Kurdish political and cultural demands in a post-Asad Syria, and to be less insistent on the primacy of the Muslim Brotherhood.

   

  Some voices in Washington and Jerusalem are exploring whether Israel could contribute to coercing Syrian elites to remove Asad. The Israelis have the region’s most formidable military, impressive intelligence services, and keen interests in Syria. In addition, Israel’s intelligence services have a strong knowledge of Syria, as well as assets within the Syrian regime that could be used to subvert the regime’s power base and press for Asad’s removal. Israel could posture forces on or near the Golan Heights and, in so doing, might divert regime forces from suppressing the opposition. This posture may conjure fears in the Asad regime of a multi-front war, particularly if Turkey is willing to do the same on its border and if the Syrian opposition is being fed a steady diet of arms and training. Such a mobilization could perhaps persuade Syria’s military leadership to oust Asad in order to preserve itself. Advocates argue this additional pressure could tip the balance against Asad inside Syria, if other forces were aligned properly.

  While Syria is not in conflict with Iraq today, after being destroyed by the United States in 2003, Western Iraq now houses the mysteriously-funded Islamic State on the border between Iraq and Syria.

  That being said, this plan is not merely being discussed, it is being implemented as one can clearly see by the fact that Israel routinely launches airstrikes against the Syrian military, Turkey continues to funnel ISIS and related terrorists into Syria through its own territory, and ISIS continues to present itself as an Eastern front militarily. As a result, the “multi-front” war envisioned and written about by the CIA in 1983 and discussed by Brookings in 2012 has come to fruition and is in full swing today.

  *  *  *

  Full Document below:

  *  *  *

  Then three years later, another CIA report (found recently in CREST database by Wikileaks) confirms much of the above, raising once again the goal of reducing Russian influence, and toppling any Syrian leadership that was inclined to escalate tensions with Israel…

  Under most circumstances Moscow's position in Syria should remain strong, but should Syria suffer another devastating military defeat at the hands of Israel new leaders might decide to look elsewhere for military equipment.

   

  A shift to a Western arms supplier also could prompt parallel efforts to seek Western financial advice and support.

  Best case scenario for Washington…

  We judge that US interests in Syria probably would be best served by a Sunni regime as it might well include relative moderates interested in securing Western aid and investment.

   

  Such a regime probably would be less inclined to escalate tensions with Israel.

  Russian relations…

  Syria is the centerpiece of Moscow's influence in the Middle East. Moscow thus has a vested interest in major policy shifts or changes in Syrian leadership. The Soviet Union and its East European allies provide virtually all of Syria's arms, and the Soviets deliver more weapons to Syria than to any other Third World client.

   

  We believe Moscow's interests would be seriously jeopardized if Sunnis came to power through a civil war. Many Sunnis resent the Soviets because they are closely identified with Alawi dominance, and Sunnis would be especially hostile toward the Soviets if they had supported Alawis with military equipment and advisors in a civil war.

  SCENARIOS OF DRAMATIC POLITICAL CHANGE

  US biggest fear was series of coups over succession of Bashar al-Assad's father… That did not come to be.

  Civil war (similar to what is very evident now)…

  Sunni dissidence has been minimal since Assad crushed the Muslim Brotherhood in the early 1980s, but deep-seated tensions remain–keeping alive the potential for minor incidents to grow into major flareups of communal violence. For example, disgruntlement over price hikes, altercations between Sunni citizens and security forces, or anger at privileges accorded to Alawis at the expense of Sunnis could foster small-scale protests. Excessive government force in quelling such disturbances might be seen by Sunnis as evidence of a government vendetta against all Sunnis, precipitating even larger protests by other Sunni groups.

  Best case scenario…

  In our view, US interests would be best served by a Sunni regime controlled by business-oriented moderates. Business moderates would see a strong need for Western aid and investment to build Syria's private economy, thus opening the way for stronger ties to Western governments. Although we believe such a government would give some support–or at least pay strong lipservice–to Arab causes, this group's preoccupation with economic development and its desire to limit the role of the military would give Sunnis an incentive to avoid a war with Israel.

  However…

  We believe Washington's gains would be mitigated, however, if Sunni fundamentalists assumed power. Although Syria's secular traditions would make it extremely difficult for religious zealots to establish an Islamic Republic, should they succeed they would likely deepen hostilities with Israel and provide support and sanctuary to terrorist groups.

  It's a little late for that Islamic State genie to go back in the bottle now.

  As Brandon Turbeville concludes, the trail of documentation and the manner in which the overarching agenda of world hegemony on the behalf of corporate-financier interests have continued apace regardless of party and seamlessly through Republican and Democrat administrations serves to prove that changing parties and personalities do nothing to stop the onslaught of imperialism, war, and destruction being waged across the world today and in earnest ever since 2001. Indeed, such changes only make adjustments to the appearance and presentation of a much larger Communo-Fascist system that is entrenching itself by the day.

  

  

• Doctor Dragged From United Plane After Computer "Solves" Overbooking Problem

  A man was violently dragged off of a United Airlines flight Sunday evening after it was apparently overbooked, according to passengers who were on the plane.

  As The Courier Journal reports, a United spokesperson confirmed in an email Sunday night that a passenger had been taken off a flight in Chicago.

  “Flight 3411 from Chicago to Louisville was overbooked,” the spokesperson said. “After our team looked for volunteers, one customer refused to leave the aircraft voluntarily and law enforcement was asked to come to the gate.

   

  “We apologize for the overbook situation. Further details on the removed customer should be directed to authorities.”

  Passengers were told at the gate that the flight was overbooked and United, offering $400 and a hotel stay, was looking for one volunteer to take another flight to Louisville at 3 p.m. Monday. Passengers were allowed to board the flight, Bridges said, and once the flight was filled those on the plane were told that four people needed to give up their seats to stand-by United employees that needed to be in Louisville on Monday for a flight. Passengers were told that the flight would not take off until the United crew had seats, Bridges said, and the offer was increased to $800, but no one volunteered.

  Then, she said, a manager came aboard the plane and said a computer would select four people to be taken off the flight. One couple was selected first and left the airplane, she said, before the man in the video was confronted.

  Classic @United overbook #flight3411 and decided to force random passengers off the plane. Here’s how they did it: pic.twitter.com/UaiSKz2bHD

  — Stephen (@stephenlaca) April 10, 2017

  Bridges said the man became “very upset” and said that he was a doctor who needed to see patients at a hospital in the morning. The manager told him that security would be called if he did not leave willingly, Bridges said, and the man said he was calling his lawyer. One security official came and spoke with him, and then another security officer came when he still refused. Then, she said, a third security official came on the plane and threw the passenger against the armrest before dragging him out of the plane.

  “Everyone was shocked and appalled,” Bridges said. “There were several children on the flight as well that were very upset.”

  

  

• Postal Service Suspended In Swedish "No-Go" Zone Because It's "Not Safe"

  Last night we noted that, rather than help police arresting a suspect in Friday’s horrendous terrorist attack in Stockholm, migrant residents of the suburb of Rinkeby apparently decided instead to pelt the arresting officers with rocks.  Of course, the incident was just one more example of the unintended consequences of Sweden’s ‘open border’ policies and a direct contradiction of arguments from senior Swedish officials that would suggest that the influx of migrants hasn’t made towns like Rinkeby any less safe. 

  That said, less than 24 hours later, the Swedish postal service has been forced to suspend service to Rinkeby after declaring the area “unsafe” for workers.  So if the no-go zones in Sweden are simply ‘fake news’, as the mainstream media would suggest, perhaps they should give the ‘all clear’ to Rinkeby’s postal workers who are refusing to even go outside. 

  PostNord to stop delivery of mail in Swedish migrant suburb of Rinkeby because it’s “not safe”.

  Remind me again how safe Rinkeby is? pic.twitter.com/uY7aZG6eSS

  — Paul Joseph Watson (@PrisonPlanet) April 10, 2017

  //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

   

  Here is more on the situation from MITTI:

  The reason is that it is not considered safe for postal staff to deliver the mail at some locations in the area.

   

  It’s been messy in the area and therefore a protective stop to ensure the safety of our staff, says Maria Ibsen, press officer at PostNord.

   

  She says that they currently do not know how long the protective stop will continue. But the dialogue with several parties and hope to be able to solve.

   

  Björn Schenholm, property manager at Einar Mattsson, who manage the properties in Hjulsta, estimates that about 120 households affected by the stoppage.

  Of course, we don’t suspect you’ll read about this service interruption from any MSM outlets as they’re too busy fulfilling their obligations to suppress ‘inconvenient’ facts that may hinder their pro-globalist agendas.

  Not a single mainstream media reported the death of Ebba Åkerlund, 11 years old, killed in the Stockholm terror attack. CC @IvankaTrump pic.twitter.com/kRdOpdsAL2

  — Morris Cabrioli (@insidegame) April 10, 2017

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  That said, Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven did tell a Swedish news agency that he was “frustrated” by the news that last week’s terrorist attack was carried out by a migrant who wasn’t even supposed to be in the country.  It’s a small admission but the first step is admitting you have a problem. 

  

  

• Mike Krieger Explains His Strategy For Confronting And Defeating The Status Quo

  Authored by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

  

  There’s one main reason the vast majority of Americans continue to lose and suffer, while a very small percentage of people continue to win and prosper, and it can be summed up with one word, unity.

  I know this sounds corny and cliché, but that doesn’t make it untrue. There’s a reason a small group of vested parties are able to run this country in their interests alone while the general public gets scraps, and it’s not simply money. A big part of the problem lies in ourselves and our inability to form mass movements that cross political lines on issues of tremendous importance. The “elite” don’t suffer from such divisiveness, which is how they are able to hold on to power despite repeated failures spanning decades.

  A perfect example of how the status quo comes together when their collective interests are threatened was on full display during the 2016 election. Many of us stood in shock with our mouths open in horror as corporate Democrats, neoconservative Republicans and the corporate media formed a total alliance in opposition to Donald Trump. Those of us who pay attention to the world knew this had nothing to do with Trump’s comments about Mexicans or Muslims. All of that was merely a smokescreen for what really concerned them. What really got them terrified was the prospect that Trump would reverse course on the reckless late-stage imperial foreign policy that has been relentlessly pursued since the attacks of September 11, 2001.

  To see what I mean, watch the following video of General Wesley Clark describing the days after 9/11:

  I’m sure you noticed Syria mentioned in that clip. The plan to overthrow Syria was already laid out over 15 years ago. As you can see, they’re a bit behind schedule, which is why we witnessed complete panic when Trump won the Presidency. While I was always convinced Trump would be a ruthless corporatist at home and all his commentary against Wall Street was a lie, I held out a small degree of hope he might chart a more reasonable course on foreign policy. This is clearly not the case, and Trump has now been trapped and played by the foreign policy establishment. He is now their puppet.

  With his bombing of Syria, Trump has been successfully manipulated into a distinct foreign policy from what he promised during the campaign and adamantly warned against in 2013 when Obama was threatening military intervention in Syria. Trump was played by neocons in the Republican Party (principally John McCain and Lindsey Graham), Russia conspiracy theorists in the Democratic Party (led by Adam Schiff), and the always war-mongering corporate media. It was this unified stance by powerful interest groups ostensibly residing on conflicting sides of the political spectrum that won this fight and flipped Trump. The status quo stood together on an issue they care deeply about (provocation with Russia and war in Syria) and they are getting what they wanted.

  To see just how united the corporate press is on this issue, take a look at these tweets from Adam Johnson.

  note:@NickKristof wrote a half-dozen columns in 2011 calling for US strikes in Libya & hasnt written abt Libya since 9/7/11–or 2041 days ago pic.twitter.com/Zgurh6i2Mh

  — Adam H. Johnson (@adamjohnsonNYC) April 9, 2017

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  find someone who looks at you the way the US media looks at bombs pic.twitter.com/GdMoc33NCO

  — Adam H. Johnson (@adamjohnsonNYC) April 9, 2017

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  The top 10 US papers–USA Today, WSJ, NYT, WaPo, LAT, Daily News, Chi Tribune, Newsday, SJ Mercury, Sun Times–all endorsed Trumps airstrikes.

  — Adam H. Johnson (@adamjohnsonNYC) April 8, 2017

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  Meanwhile, let’s see how Trump’s new neocon best friends are thanking him for his reckless bombing.

  McCain: Trump's missile strikes on Syria an "excellent first step" https://t.co/pujjIKo8yd pic.twitter.com/6pbwo4PoB1

  — The Hill (@thehill) April 9, 2017

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  Punishing Assad for use of chemical weapons is good. Regime change in Iran is the prize.https://t.co/vnRo82CU4r

  — Bill Kristol (@BillKristol) April 8, 2017

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  Well yeah, Wesley Clark already told us all about that.

  Graham: Assad is telling Trump "F you" https://t.co/Qb2Gr4TPxV pic.twitter.com/Dj6E1E438c

  — The Hill (@thehill) April 9, 2017

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  Meanwhile, Graham is calling for 5,000-6,000 U.S. ground forces in Syria, so there’s that. The neocons smell blood and weakness and are now going for the jugular. Well done, Donald Trump.

  The bottom line here is we need to learn lessons from our adversaries in order to defeat them. The “elite,” or status quo, isn’t a uniform blob which maintains conformity with one another on every political issue. That said, there are some issues so important to establishment players that they will put aside all other concerns in order to defend them. Imperial wars of domination is one of these issues, which is why rather than accept defeat after the election, the truly powerful in America united like never before to paint Trump as a Putin puppet so that he’d be backed into a corner and then manipulated into doing their bidding at the appropriate moment. This is exactly what happened.

  The “elite” are very good at unifying when their key interests are threatened, while average American citizens are terrible at it. We’ve been completely divided and conquered. We’ve self-separated into ideological tribes where we support and celebrate only those thinkers who agree with us on a vast majority of issues. As such, when something like a crazy neocon war abroad becomes a reality we are totally incapable of crossing tribal lines to unite on an issue of tremendous importance. The elite have no such qualms, which is why they win and we lose.

  Going forward, we must totally dismiss the notion that movements should be centered around individual politicians, and center them around principles.  It wasn’t “getting the right person elected” that changed anything in the civil rights movement, rather it was mass popular movements by average citizens who pressured politicians. It’s never the politicians, it’s always the people. This is how it’s always been and how it must be today. I think activism has completely lost its way and until it finds strategic understanding, will continue to fail. There’s power in numbers, and we have the numbers on all sorts of issues if we can only get out of our little tribal comfort zones and accept people as allies in struggles of particular importance even if you disagree with them on a host of other issues.

  While there are a large number of issues I care deeply about, I’ve come to the conclusion that we need to pick one big issue and then build a huge tent around it. I think Trump’s recent escalation of hostilities in Syria means interventionist wars in the Middle East should be the first issue we unify to challenge. It’s high profile, extremely dangerous and the sort of thing that can generate unity amongst a huge percentage of the population.

  If war in Syria will be our first order of business, where do things stand as we speak? For one thing, I got a lot out of a recent poll highlighted by The Hill. Here’s what we learned:

  About half of Americans support the Trump administration’s decision last week to launch a missile strike on a Syrian air base, according to a new poll.

   

  A HuffPost/YouGov survey finds 51 percent of Americans support the president’s decision to order the airstrikes in retaliation for a chemical attack last week that killed civilians in northern Syrian.

   

  Thirty-two percent of Americans are opposed to the strikes and 17 percent are uncertain.

  Your immediate reaction to this may be that it’s disturbing and discouraging that 51% of Americans support the strike, and I understand that sentiment. However, given the total unified propaganda front from the tripartisan elite (corporate media and the Republican and Democratic establishment), the number is actually pretty low. Moreover, the following is encouraging.

  Slightly more than one-third of respondents think the president should not take additional military action, compared to 20 percent who believe Trump should. Another 45 percent were unsure of what the president should do regarding future military action.

  Only 20% of Americans want more strikes, but we know what McCain, Graham and Kristol want. Which makes you wonder, how will the neocons shape public opinion and get their expanded war? The corporate media, of course. This is the media’s true role in the American oligarchy. It must mold the opinions of the 45% who “aren’t sure what to do next” and convince them that more war is necessary. Be on the look out for that, because it’s coming.

  Moreover, we learned some additional information in a different poll, also highlighted by The Hill:

  Pollsters also found that 70 percent believe Trump requires authorization from Congress before pursuing additional action in Syria.

   

  Few Americans desire U.S. military involvement in Syria beyond airstrikes, however, with 18 percent supporting the use of ground troops.

  It’s very clear Americans don’t want a ground presence in Syria, but as we learned, Lindsey Graham is calling for exactly that to the tune of 5,000-6,000 troops. Again, the only way for the neocons to boost this number from 18% to something more acceptable is the corporate press. The above tells us that something to the tune of 200 million American adults may be against a ground war in Syria. If that’s right, where are the anti-war protests? Where’s the mass movement against more interventionism? Where did all the vagina hats go?

  The movement is nowhere to be seen largely because the 80% of Americans against an escalation of this war are divided and bickering on a laundry list of other issues. The public has been totally divided and conquered and remains entirely unable to come together to stop something as important as war despite agreeing with one another on the subject. This absence of unity leaves the public vulnerable to manipulation by the corporate media and politicians who want more war, which is exactly what’s going to happen if we don’t wise up.

  So how do we achieve this unity I’m calling for? It’s not going to be easy, but I think the first step is for all of us to get out of our tribes start listening to people outside our comfort zones. I try to do this here at Liberty Bltizkrieg with my posts. For example, one day you may see a video of Ron Paul and the next an interview with Chris Hedges. I don’t agree with either one on all issues, but they both have integrity and are against unethical destructive wars abroad. If people who like Ron Paul can cross over and shake hands with people who prefer Chris Hedges and agree to fight imperial war together, we can build the popular movements that will be necessary to turn this country around. If not, we will continue to lose.

  The choice is ours.

  

  

• Tomahawks Have Been The US Weapon Of Choice For Years

  Late last week, two U.S. warships fired 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles at a Syrian airbase in response to a suspected chemical weapon attack in the town of Khan Sheikhoun. As Statista's Nial McCarthy details, the Tomahawk cruise missile has been at the very tip of America's spear in every major military intervention since 1991.

  

  You will find more statistics at Statista

  In the Gulf War, 288 of the missiles were fired at targets in Iraq and this increased to 415 when Operation Desert Fox took place in the country seven years later. During Operation Odyssey Dawn in Libya in 2011, at least 112 Tomahawks were fired over the course of the conflict.

  Read more about the history of the weapons system in the Independent where the above infographic was featured.

  

  

• Millennials: A Menacing Metamorphosis To The Status Quo

  Submitted by Stock Board Asset Management

  Last week, Gordon T. Long and Charles Hugh Smith discussed in an interview of the current generational shift occurring in the United States. The interview is called Called Millennials: A Menacing Metamporsis. To note, both Gordon T. Long and Charles Hugh Smith understand their baby boomer generation is the status quo, and is currently being uprooted by the millennials, who are slated to take the reins in the next 8 years. In my opinion, this should be coined the ‘clash of generations’, where ultimately the millennials will be stitching their beliefs and ideas on the American fabric. As expressed in the interview, the status quo is underestimating the serious ramifications of this generational shift.

  General shifts in America are completely normal and have produced serious economic and or social consequences through time.  One of the best blueprints and guides of generational shifts is the Strauss–Howe generational theory explaining the four cycles of with-in a full-generation (80-100 years). In fact, starting in the 2007/2008 period,  Strauss–Howe generational theory explains how the United States started the generation shift called the Fourth Turning where the old older is destroyed giving light to the new order i.e. Millennials: A Menacing Metamporsis. 

  The interview touches on 10 important points of how the millennial beliefs and ideas will change the American landscape in the next 8 years. Changes that we see today include household formation, retail trends, transportation trends, and the shift to urbanization.

  During the US Presidential Election, the most noticeable idea that the millennial generation was underestimated by the status quo was the unanimous support for Bernie Sanders rather than the status quo Hillary Clinton.

  

  When peaking into Bernie Sanders’s platform, it understood as far-left leaning, which could highlight the core belief system of the millennials. This may serve as a guide in the direction America is headed.

  

  Millennials are virtually split when it comes to Socialism or Capitalism. This is a much different view than the status quo, which alludes to serious economic adjustments are on the horizon.

  

  As of 2017, millennials are 36% of the workforce and in 8 years are projected to be 75% of the workforce.

  

  The millennial generation has a much different composition of demographics verse the prior generation. Leads to social adjustments…

  

  

  Here is 1-4 changes of how the millennial generation is different from the past. Economic stagnation has shaped the millennial generation in to who they’re today.

  

  Student debt levels are a defining point of the millennials generation. No other generation has ever taken on this much student debt despite being the most educated.

  

  Millennials are currently making economic decisions based on the burdensome of student loan debt.

  

  A major shift in real estate as millennials demand urban centers, which is a complete flip from prior generations pushing out to suburbia.

  

  

  Millennials will have a profound change in the transportation industry. Technology and crowd sharing has pushed millennials to Uber and Lyft. This will be challenging for the auto industry to maintain auto sales, along with energy producers of crude products.

  

  Millennials are already having a drastic change in the retail space. The technology millennials are adapting is contributing to the retail apocalypse.

  

  The millennial generation has been subjected to fear and war in their entire lifespan. This generation has witnessed the negative effects of globalism hallowing out the middle class around them. Millennials search for security, which may explain why Bernie Sanders was the best platform of choice, because he offered ‘light at the end of the tunnel’.

  

  More social ramifications for the US economy are the millennials thought of various forms of debt should be forgiven. The old order has produced a debt ball and chain.

  

  Last but not least, Gordon T. Long and Charles Hugh Smith forgive the millennials and blame the educational system for why the millennials think the way they do.

  

  For the next 8 years one should sit down, strap in, and hold-on. The generational rollercoaster will involve chills and thrills, but it’s completely normal. All we say is just be on the right side of history.

  * * *

  Full video below

   

  

  

Digest powered by RSS Digest

• New York Set To Be First State With 'Free' Tuition At Public Colleges

  A last minute budget negotiation late Friday pretty much ensures that New York will be the first state to offer ‘tuition-free’ public higher education to its entitled snowflakes.  The $163 billion state budget agreement includes the Excelsior Scholarship, which covers tuition for any New Yorker accepted to one of the state’s community colleges or four-year universities, provided their family earns less than $125,000 a year.

  Of course, for politicians, ‘free’ is just a nice way of saying they’re about to jam more taxes down the throats of working Americans to cover the cost of services they may or may not use personally.

  

   

  The scholarship program will be phased in over three years, beginning for New Yorkers making up to $100,000 annually in the fall of 2017, increasing to $110,000 in 2018, and reaching $125,000 in 2019. Nearly 1
  million families will qualify for the scholarship.

  It is a last-dollar program, meaning the state would cover any tuition left over after factoring in federal Pell Grants and New York’s Tuition Assistance Program. Students must be enrolled in college full time and take at least 30 course credits a year, though those facing hardships can pause and restart the program or take fewer credits.

  As the Washington Post points out, the program is expected to cost New York taxpayers $163 million in its first year and, like all other entitlements, will only grow over time. 

  Proposed by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo in January, the scholarship taps into one of the Democratic Party’s most popular ideas and advances a bipartisan movement to lower the cost of college that is taking shape across the country.

   

  “Today, college is what high school was — it should always be an option even if you can’t afford it,” Cuomo said in a statement Saturday. “With this program, every child will have the opportunity that education provides.”

   

  Not much changed from the initial proposal, including the $163 million estimated cost for the first year of the program, though there were concessions to win over lawmakers. Award recipients attending community college now have to remain in New York for two years after graduation, while those at state universities must stay for four years. Private universities, whose leaders said the plan would undermine their schools, will see an increase in state tuition assistance funding.

  Of course, the irony of the situation is that, like many misinformed liberal entitlement programs, throwing more money at U.S. universities only serves to exacerbate the underlying problem of bloated, out-of-control college budgets.  But, on the bright side, America’s snowflakes will have yet another pool of money on which they can rely to fund their hedonistic, binge-drinking filled spring break trips to Cancun. 

  

  

• An Unhinged McCain Calls for More War in Syria, Says Russia is Guilty of War Crimes

  John McCain was on Face the Nation today, getting his neocon on, discussing the next steps that needed to be taken in Syria — dealing with Assad.

  He approved of the President’s strikes — calling it a good ‘first step.’ But, he wants MOAR — accusing both Syria and Russia of war crimes, in addition to blaming Assad for the rise of ISIS. You cannot make this stuff up.
   

  “And I think it was important. But it is now vitally important we develop a strategy, we put that strategy in motion, and we bring about peace in the region. And that obviously means that there has to be a cessation of these war crimes.
   
  John, dropping, using chemical weapons is a war crime, but starving thousands of people in prisons is also. Barrel bombs which indiscriminately kill innocent civilians, precision strikes done by Russians on hospitals in Aleppo are war crimes as well.
   
  So there’s a lot of war crimes that are taking place. And another area — aspect of this that I do not agree with the secretary is that you have to just concentrate on ISIS.
   
  We will take Mosul. We will take Raqqa. And we better have strategies as to how to handle those places once we have won it. But they are not disconnected from Bashar al-Assad and the al Qaeda and the war crimes that have been taking place.
   
  You can’t — to a large degree, Bashar al-Assad, by polarizing the Syrian people, have also given rise to ISIS and al Qaeda. So they are both connected. And I believe that the United States of America can address both at the same time. We can walk and chew gum.
   
  We have the capability to do both. And, yes, we want a negotiated settlement, but the only way that that will happen is if it is not in their interests to continue what they have been successful at for over eight years. And that is why I thought, symbolically and psychologically, the president’s action was very important, but now we better follow it up. And, by the way, we should have cratered the runways.”

   
  Seemingly ignoring the fact that ISIS and US backed ‘rebels’ in the region are responsible for the majority of civilian deaths in Syria, McCain carried on as if Assad was merely bombing civilians and not actually in the midst of a long, drawn out, civil war — which was started by ISIS. McCain wants the U.S. military to set up a ‘safe zone’ in Northern Syria.
   

  “And also, when you see these crimes that are being committed, they are horrifying. John, I also believe that a grieving mother whose child has been killed isn’t too concerned whether it is a chemical weapon or a barrel bomb. He is still slaughtering people. And we may stop the chemical weapons.
   
  But we have also got to stop the other indiscriminate, inhumane war crimes that are being committed as well. And that means, obviously, trying to set up some kind of safe zone, so that these refugees can have a place where they can be. And, also, that would help with the refugee flow issue.”

   
  In response to President Trump’s strike on the Syrian airbase, McCain thinks we should’ve done more.
   

  “Well, I think the fact that we acted was very important, and I support the president’s action.
   
  And I have been told that there was some recommendations to take out all six places that the Syrian air force operates out of. But now that they are flying again, basically, within 36 hours is not a good signal.
   
  But I would point out, taking out their — all their support facilities doesn’t let them fly with any consistency. But it — the signal that they are able to fly almost right away out of the same facility indicates that I don’t think we did as thorough enough job, which would have been cratering the runways.
   

  McCain is fucking crazy. pic.twitter.com/t7bzYJUD4I

  — The_Real_Fly (@The_Real_Fly) April 10, 2017

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  And somebody will say, well, then they can fill in the runways. Yes. And we can crater them again too.”

  Has it ever dawned on McCain and the other neocons in America that maybe, just maybe, Russia would respond to our attacks on their ally, in an effort to protect Russian soliders on the ground? Has the concept of ‘mutually assured destruction’ gone by wayside somehow — the ultimate quagmire which has kept America out of a war with Russia for the past 70 years?

  Content originally published at iBankCoin.com

  

• Bizarro World: Some Republicans Now Defending "Failing" ObamaCare

  For months now we’ve warned, as have many prominent Republican legislators, that Obamacare is on the verge of collapse (see “Obamacare On “Verge Of Collapse” As Premiums Set To Soar Again In 2017“). 

  It’s not that shocking really as the fundamental concept behind the legislation made it doomed from the start.  The idea was that, out of an abundance of compassion for their elders, young, healthy millennial families would fork up $10s of thousands of dollars each year to purchase health insurance they didn’t really need.  Those premiums would then be used to subsidize care for the elderly who consume more than their “fair share,” to quote Obama.

  Unfortunately, the basic math skills of our young millennials turned out to be better than the Obama administration had planned for and they figured out they were better off just paying the Obamacare tax to the IRS than paying the larger Obamacare ‘tax’ associated with buying a service they never use.  This “adverse selection bias” left risk pools way worse than insurers planned, which drove premiums even higher, which forced even more young people to ditch their insurance and the cycle will continue until the system ultimately fails.

  In fact, as we pointed out last week, Knoxville, TN could be ground zero for the Obamacare explosion as it’s 40,000 residents live in a county that has been left with no healthcare options for the 2018 plan year after Humana pulled out of exchanges there.

  And, with the fate of Obamacare all but sealed, you can imagine our shock to learn that several House Republicans are now apparently warming up to the legislation.

  One such person is Patrick McHenry of North Carolina who says that any efforts of the Trump administration to lure votes from the Freedom Caucus by relaxing rules to allow insurance providers to charge people with pre-existing conditions higher premiums would be a “bridge too far” for some more moderate Republicans.  Per The Hill:

  Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.), the GOP’s chief deputy whip, said Wednesday that the Freedom Caucus’s calls for states to be able to apply for waivers to repeal pre-existing condition protections are “a bridge too far for our members.”

   

  Those ObamaCare protections include what is known as community rating, which prevents insurers from charging higher premiums to people with pre-existing conditions, and guaranteed issue, which prevents insurers from outright denying coverage to them.

   

  McHenry spoke in personal terms about the importance of keeping in place those Affordable Care Act (ACA) provisions, contained in Title I of the law.

   

  “If you look at the key provisions of Title I, it affects a cross section of our conference based off of their experience and the stories they know from their constituents and their understanding of policy,” McHenry said.

   

  “My family history is really bad, and so my understanding of the impact of insurance regs are real, and I believe I’m a conservative, so I look at this, understand the impact of regulation, but also the impact of really bad practices in the insurance marketplace prior to the ACA passing,” he continued. “There are a lot of provisions that I’ve campaigned on for four election cycles that are part of the law now that I want to preserve.”

  

  Meanwhile, other Republicans are also supporting ObamaCare’s expanion of Medicaid and the so-called “minimum coverage” mandate that, among other things, requires men to pay for maternity benefits…and while it may now be customary for our snowflakes to “choose” their own gender, we’re pretty sure that biology doesn’t actually work that way. 

  Many Republicans from states that accepted ObamaCare’s expansion of Medicaid are supporting keeping it.

   

  A group of Republican senators, including Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.), the chairman of Senate Republicans’ campaign arm, last month objected to a draft of the House GOP repeal bill because it did not “provide stability and certainty for individuals and families in Medicaid expansion programs or the necessary flexibility for states.”

   

  The House bill would effectively end the Medicaid expansion starting in 2020. Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) warned that change “affects so many of our disabled individuals and families, and the working poor.”

   

  Republicans had long derided ObamaCare’s “essential health benefits,” which mandate 10 health services that insurance plans must cover. They have said, for example, that men should not be forced to pay for plans that cover maternity care.

   

  But now some Republicans are speaking up in favor of those requirements, including the chairman of the powerful Appropriations Committee, Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen (R-N.J.).

   

  “In addition to the loss of Medicaid coverage for so many people in my Medicaid-dependent state, the denial of essential health benefits in the individual market raise serious coverage and cost issues,” Frelinghuysen wrote in a statement last month announcing he would oppose the House GOP repeal bill.

   

  House Republicans even touted an amendment on Thursday that they said would bring down premiums by the government helping to pay for the costs of high-cost enrollees. That program is very similar to one that already existed in ObamaCare, called “reinsurance.”

  Of course, it’s looking increasingly likely that former House Speaker John Boehnor was right about Republicans and healthcare all long when said that the idea of a quick repeal and replace was just “happy talk….Republicans never ever agree on health care.”

  

  

• Eric Peters Calls it: "The Change Of Change Is Now Negative"

  Ahead of what we hope will be a relatively quiet week following the juggernaut from the past 7 days, we present readers with another excerpt from the latest weekly note from Eric Peters, CIO of One River, which is not only appropriate in the context of recent observation by UBS, involving the sudden collapse of the global credit impulse, but far more importantly, may be critical for those who are in the business of timing key market inflection points.

  From Weekend Notes by Eric Peters

  “The change of change is now negative,” said the CIO.

   

  “Global growth is still rising, but the rate of improvement is slowing,” he explained. “Same holds true for global inflation, oil prices, copper, iron ore. Credit growth is slowing in the US, Europe, Japan, China.”  If these things were all contracting, we’d plunge into recession, but we’re not there. We’re simply at the point in the cycle where the rate of acceleration is slowing – which is both evidence of a pause, and a precondition for every major turn.

   

  “The last time we had a major shift in the change of change was a year ago.” In Jan/Feb 2016, China was imploding. Commodity prices were tanking with equity markets, the dollar soared alongside volatility. Then China unleashed explosive credit stimulus, while the Fed blinked, guiding forward interest rates dramatically lower.

   

  Within a short time, the change of change turned positive. Which is not to say things immediately accelerated, it’s just that they started contracting more slowly. And that marked the time to buy.

   

  “Pretty much everything that happened in 2016 can be explained by two things; China and oil prices,” he said. “Literally, that’s it.”

   

  China’s stimulus-induced rebound and the oil price recovery is all that mattered.

   

  “Brexit was a joke. Trump was a joke. In fact, the only real significance of those events was that they provided investors with opportunities to jump on board the reflation trade at back near Q1 prices.” The reflation trade quietly began in the Q1 collapse, and accelerated off the extreme post-Brexit summer lows in global interest rates.

   

  “That’s what made last year remarkable. Even investors who missed the first opportunity, had two chances to make a lot of money.” You see, that reward is usually reserved for those who act on the first signs of a change in the change of change.

  Summary: as Peters helpfully points out, the change of change – that “green light” to buy risk one year ago when it flipped positive – is now negative. Or, as UBS summarized it simply in just one chart several weeks ago…

  

  

  

• Second-Order Consequences of Self-Driving Vehicles

  Authored by Mish Shedlock via Mish Talk,

  Benedict Evans, a blogger who works for a venture capital firm that invests in technology, has an interesting article on the shift to electric and self-driving vehicles.

  Please consider snips from Cars and Second Order Consequences by Benedict Evans.

  There are two foundational technology changes rolling through the car industry at the moment; electric and autonomy. Electric is happening right now, largely as a consequence of falling battery prices, while autonomy, or at least full autonomy, is a bit further off – perhaps 5-10 years, depending on how fast some pretty hard computer science problems get solved.

   

  Both electric and autonomy have profound consequences beyond the car industry itself. Half of global oil production today goes to gasoline, and removing that demand will have geopolitical as well as industrial consequences. Over a million people are killed in car accidents every year around the world, mostly due to human error, and in a fully autonomous world all of those (and many more injuries) will also go away.

   

  However, it’s also useful, and perhaps more challenging, to think about second and third order consequences. Moving to electric means much more than replacing the gas tank with a battery, and moving to autonomy means much more than ending accidents.

   

  Electric Discussion

  In regards to electric, Evans points out 150,000 gas stations while noting cigarette purchases and snacks are the way most of those stores make their money.

  What happens to those stations?

  On September 29,2015, Elon Musk said Tesla Cars Will Reach 620 Miles On A Single Charge “Within A Year Or Two,” Be Fully Autonomous In “Three Years”.

  How’s that prediction working out?

  On March 30, 2016, Bloomberg noted Tesla Model 3 Electric Car Seen Getting 225 Miles Per Charge and we are not there yet. Business insider a month later suggested a range of 215 miles.

  Quartz reports Tesla’s cheaper, more powerful battery cell is the perfect embodiment of its factory model.

   

  Supercharging

  A Tesla presskit says their “Supercharger network covers major routes in North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific. There are more than 3,000 Superchargers worldwide.”

  Their click here link for Supercharger locations turn up “404 page not found”.

  Tesla says their Supercharger can “replenish a half charge in about 30 minutes.” Why not state a quarter charge in 15 minutes or a 16th of a charge in 3.75 minutes?

  If a gas fill-up takes up to 4 minutes, then via Supercharger you will only need to stop 16 times as often for a long trip.

  Am I missing something here?

  It would be one hell of a lot easier if there was a quick and easy way to slide one battery pack out and another into its place.

   

  Home Batteries

  Evans notes …

  “More speculatively (and this is part of Elon Musk’s vision), it is possible that we might all have large batteries in the home, storing off-peak power both to charge our cars and power our homes. Part of the aim here would be to push up battery volume and so lower their cost for both home storage and cars. If we all have such batteries then this could affect the current model of building power generation capacity for peak demand, since you could complement power stations with meaningful amounts of stored power for the first time.”

   

  Long Distance Woes

  Large home batteries do not solve long distance travel.

  There either needs to be much greater battery capacity, much faster charging, or a way to quickly swap batteries.

  I suppose one could simply swap vehicles every 200 miles but that seems like quite a nuisance.

  For those who drive back and forth to work, or only drive within a city, electric works.

  But why have a car at all if that’s all you do? Fleets of self-driving cars will work quite nicely vs the cost of one of these babies.

   

  Autonomy Discussion

  Per Evans …

  The really obvious consequence of autonomy is a near-elimination in accidents, which kill over 1m people globally every year. In the USA in 2015, there were 13m collisions of which 1.7m caused injuries; 2.4m people were injured and 35k people were killed. Something over 90% of all accidents are now caused by driver error, and a third of fatal accidents in the USA involved alcohol. Looking beyond deaths and injuries themselves, there is also a huge economic effect to these accidents: the US government estimates a cost of $240bn a year across property damage itself, medical and emergency services, legal, lost work and congestion (for comparison, US car sales in 2016 were around $600bn). A similar UK analysis found a cost of £30bn, which is roughly equivalent adjusted for the population. This then comes from government (and so taxes), insurance and individual pockets. It also means jobs, of course.

   

  Even simple ‘Level 3’ systems would cut many kinds of accident, and as more vehicles with more sophisticated systems, moving up to Level 5, cycle into the installed base over time, the collision rate will drop continuously. There should be an analogue of the ‘herd immunity‘ effect – even if your car is still hand-driven, my automatic car is still much less likely to collide with you. This also means that cycling would become much safer (though you’d still need to live close enough to where you wanted to go), and that in turn has implications for public health. You might never get to zero accidents – the deer running in front of a car might still get hit sometimes –  but you might get pretty close.

  I am in complete agreement with the above. And with that is where it gets very interesting.  Evans has given this a lot of thought.

  if you have no collisions then eventually you can remove many of the safety features in today’s vehicles, all of which add cost and weight and constrain the overall design – no more airbags or crumple zones, perhaps.

   

  As more and more cars are driven by computer, they can drive in different ways. They don’t suffer from traffic waves, they don’t need to stop for traffic signals and they can platoon –  they can safely drive 2 feet apart at 80 mph.

   

  Parking is another way that autonomy will add both capacity and demand. If a car does not have to wait for you in walking distance, where else might it wait, and is that more efficient?

   

  So, the current parking model is clearly a source of congestion: some studies suggest that a double-digit percentage of traffic in dense urban areas comes from people circling around looking for a parking space, and on-street parking ipso facto reduces road capacity. An autonomous vehicle can wait somewhere else.

   

  If you remove the cost of the human driver from an on-demand trip, the cost goes down by perhaps three quarters. If you can also remove or reduce the cost of the insurance, once the accident rate has fallen, it goes down even further. So, autonomy is rocket-fuel for on-demand. This makes it much easier for many more people to dispense with a car, or only have one, or leave their car at home and take an on-demand ride for any given trip.

   

  Do you end up with reduced bus schedules? Do marginal bus-routes close, pushing people onto on-demand who might not otherwise have used it – if they can use it? Does a city provide, or subsidise, its own-demand service to replace or to supplement buses in lower-density areas? Does your robotaxi automatically drop you off at a bus stop on the edge of high-traffic areas, unless you pay a congestion charge?

   

  Then, of course, there are the drivers. There are something over 230,000 taxi and private car drivers in the USA and around 1.5m long-haul truck-drivers.

   

  Does an hour-long commute with no traffic and no need to watch the road feel better or worse than a half-hour commute stuck in near-stationary traffic staring at the car in front? How willing are people to go from their home in a suburb to dinner in a city centre on a dark cold wet night if they don’t have to park and an on-demand ride is cheap?

   

  In 2030 or so, police investigating a crime won’t just get copies of the CCTV from surrounding properties, but get copies of the sensor data from every car that happened to be passing.

   

  More Questions than Answers

  There is much more in the article. It’s worth a closer look.

  Evans raises far more questions than he answers. Yet, I think the question list is just beginning.

  My timeframe for long-haul driving jobs vanishing has not changed. I still say it starts 2021-2022 at the latest.

   

  How Many Jobs?

  All Trucking says “There are approximately 3.5 million professional truck drivers in the United States, according to estimates by the American Trucking Association. The total number of people employed in the industry, including those in positions that do not entail driving, exceeds 8.7 million.”

  I may have over-estimated the number of long-haul jobs that vanish. However, I may have under-estimated the add-on effects.

  One should presume autonomous vehicles change cities as much as cars did. That’s just a starting point for thinking about this

  — Benedict Evans (@BenedictEvans) September 19, 2016

  //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

   

  If a truck can be on the road 24 hours instead of 11, how many trucks so we need? How many people servicing trucks do we need?

  Opportunity for short-haul drivers with smaller trucks will vanish as well. How quickly?

  Package delivery by drone is going to happen, especially smaller packages in rural areas. How Quickly?

  For now, the savings on long-haul trucking are the greatest, and the obstacles the least, so I see no need to change my belief this will begin in a major way within a 2021-2022 timeframe.

  The competition is so massive, all of the above things will happen much faster than most realize.

  

  

• Bank Of America: "Previously This Has Only Happened In 2000 And 2008"

  Although it will not come as a surprise to regular readers that, for various reasons, loan growth in the US has not only ground to a halt but, for the all important Commercial and Industrial Segment, has dropped at the fastest rate since the financial crisis, some (until recently) economic optimists, such as Bank of America’s Ethan Harris, are only now start to realize that the post-election “recovery” was a mirage.

  A quick recap of where loan creation stood in the last week: according to the Fed’s H.8 statement, things continued to deteriorate, and C&I loans rose just 2.8% Y/Y, the worst reading since the start of the decade and on pace to print a negative number – traditionally associated with recessions – within the next four weeks, while total loans and leases rose by just 3.8% in the last week of March, less than half the stable 8% growth rate observed for much of 2014 and 2015.

  

  Yet while zerohedge readers have been familiar with this chart for months, it appears to have been a surprise to BofA’s chief economist. However, in a report titled “Is soft the new hard data?”, Ethan Harris confirms that he has finally observed the sharp swoon lower and is not at all happy by it.

  As he writes in his Friday weekly recap note, “this week saw some softness in hard data as auto sales and jobs growth declined sharply. While two observations do not make a trend, this occurrence nevertheless is noteworthy as on the one hand very positive sentiment indicators suggest activity should pick up… 

  

  … while on the other hand loan data suggests everybody is in wait-and-see mode pending details of fiscal stimulus (=tax reform) – which highlights the risk of softer hard economic data.”

  A frustrated Harris then admits that such a sharp and protracted decline in loan creation has only happened twice before: the 2000 and 2008 recessions.

  Weekly bank asset data shows that  C&I lending has not increased since September 7 last year (Figure 2)… 

  

   

  … the first period of no growth for at least six months since the 2008-2011 aftermath of the financial crisis, and prior to that after the early 2000s recession (Figure 3). 

   

  

   

  At the same time, consumer loan growth has slowed substantially – up just 1.4% since the US elections compared with 3.1% the same period the prior year (Figure 4).

   

  

  Then again, with tax reform seemingly dead, not even a formerly uberbullish Harris find much room for optimism…

  As tax reform by House Speaker Ryan’s own account is not going to happen anytime soon, and likely will be watered down as the Border Adjustment Tax (BAT) is replaced by a Value Added Tax (VAT) and the elimination of net interest deductibility for corporations, the biggest near term risk to our bullish outlook for credit spreads we maintain is a correction in equities – most likely prompted by weak hard data.

  … and concludes by echoing Hans Lorenzen’s recent warning, that “the biggest near term risk to our bullish outlook for credit spreads we maintain is a correction in equities – most likely prompted by weak hard data.”

  

  

• An "Investment" Even More Ludicrous Than Government Bonds

  By Chris at www.CapitalistExploits.at

  “What about investing in hard assets like diamonds?”

  I get asked this sometimes so figured I’d cover it here.

  I wrote the below piece some years ago and it answers the question about whether diamonds should be treated as a store of value in an investor’s portfolio.

  The word monopoly has its roots in the Greek words monos (single) and polein (to sell). It first appeared in Aristotle’s Politics where Aristotle describes how in Greece in the 6th century BC the philosopher Thales of Miletus cornered the local olive press market:

  “Thales, so the story goes, because of his poverty was taunted with the uselessness of philosophy; but from his knowledge of astronomy he had observed while it was still winter that there was going to be a large crop of olives, so he raised a small sum of money and paid round deposits for the whole of the olive-presses in Miletus and Chios, which he hired at a low rent as nobody was running him up; and when the season arrived, there was a sudden demand for a number of presses at the same time, and by letting them out on what terms he liked he realized a large sum of money, so proving that it is easy for philosophers to be rich if they choose.”

  Historically one of the most interesting and controversial monopolies is arguably that of the diamond market in recent times.

  Throughout history the supply of diamonds has been very scarce. So much so that it was very difficult even for the creme de la creme of society to get hold of these little stones.

  Things, however, started to change in the late 19th century when diamonds were found in South Africa and a lot of supply suddenly flooded the market. The price of what had been valuable only due to its scarcity was bound to tumble. To prevent this taking place, in 1888, a cartel with all the movers and shakers of the diamond mining world was formed under the name De Beers. And oh, what a cartel it has proved to be.

  Once the supply of the diamonds was under their control, they had to take care of the other side of the equation – the demand.

  To do this they joined forces with an advertising agency N. W. Ayer & Son to impact “social attitudes of the public at large” and thereby channel American spending toward larger and more expensive diamonds instead of “competitive luxuries”, as they put it.

  

  To prevent any price fluctuations caused by selling the diamonds they had to convince the masses to hold onto them and not to “trade”. This is where the motto “diamonds are forever” was born. With a sophisticated advertising and PR campaign they turned diamonds into epitomes of eternal romance and love. In the next few decades, sales of diamonds in the US increased a hundredfold. Not bad, right?

  However, it didn’t end there.

  They then proceeded to expand to other global markets. In Japan they literally turned a 1,500 year old Japanese marriage tradition upside down as the number of men giving diamond engagement rings to their women rapidly increased in a mere 14 years. Let me tell you, changing Japanese cultural norms is no small task, and yet today Japanese men purchase diamonds for their brides as readily as Americans or Europeans.

  Whenever a new diamond deposit was discovered in the world De Beers rushed in and bought it to minimize fluctuations in diamond prices. They had been relatively successful at that until the very end of the 20th century. At the turn of the century some of the diamond producer countries decided to bypass De Beers’ distribution channels and alternatives began to hit the market.

  Determining the validity of a diamond takes an expert, and these days even the experts struggle to tell an artificial diamond from a natural one. The average man on the street hasn’t a hope in Hell of knowing the difference.

  There are two alternatives to diamonds I’m aware of: moissanite and cubic zirconia, and neither of them have defects, which incidentally is one means of identifying fake from real diamonds. Synthetic diamonds have also been created in labs for decades now and these diamonds are indistinguishable from real diamonds because they are, in fact, diamonds. They are also produced at an absolute fraction of the price of real diamonds.

  For anyone who does a little research they’ll find that diamonds are clearly as rare as macaroni cheese and if they’re not rare, they’re not valuable. Certain diamonds, such as graded diamonds, are somewhat rare, but diamonds themselves are certainly not rare. Even if we pretended for a minute that yes, diamonds are rare, we’re faced with the problem that artificial diamonds can be created by the boatload for next to nothing.

  Diamonds aren’t liquid, either. Try selling a diamond back to Joey the jeweler and you’ll find that typically Joey will pay between 75% and 80% of the purchase price if the diamond wasn’t bought from his store and isn’t verifiable. In fact, many jewelers won’t buy a diamond back unless you’ve previously purchased that same diamond from them and have the documentation to prove it. Even then, they’ll typically only do a trade in, whereby you buy another higher priced diamond and trade your old diamond in.

  In my book, diamonds are a terrible investment. Not rare, not liquid, and not valuable.

  That’s my opinion, which is clearly not shared by the world at large. It’s the perception of rarity that matters. Not unlike the perception of safety afforded JGBs, US Treasury bonds, and EU bonds, people value these assets because they are perceived to be valuable. They’re not, but that’s beside the point… until, well… until it isn’t.

  How come people buy Rolex watches when many of the fake versions today are indistinguishable from the real ones and, according to a number of jewellers, function just as well? Why do people buy Coca Cola, paying more than any number of the cola versions out there which cost less and have the same amount of disgusting ingredients? How is it that diamonds, which are not rare, and which can be produced for a fraction of the cost, sell for such ridiculous prices?

  The answer seems to be that the con job pulled off by arguably THE most successful marketing campaign in corporate history lives on. 15 years ago, De Beers controlled about 80% of the market but that figure has now fallen below 40%. I’m simply surprised that their hold on the market has lasted as long as it has. An exceptional feat. Well done, chaps.

  A good friend of mine who is a successful real estate agent likes to say that the key to a sale is ensuring that the woman is pulled over the line. A man will rarely buy a home his wife doesn’t like. I think the same is probably true of diamonds. Try telling your fiance that you bought her a synthetic diamond engagement ring and, “Oh, honey, aren’t you glad I saved a couple of grand?” See how well that goes down.

  – Chris

  PS: Don’t forget to share this article if you liked it, and if you hated it, don’t forget to send it to everyone you know telling them how bad it is. Have a great weekend!

  “A diamond is forever.” — N.W. Ayer & Son Agency

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• China Offers "Concessions" To Avoid Trade War As Trump Readies Anti-Dumping Probe

  While there was much fanfare over last week’s summit at Mar-A-Lago between the presidents of the US and China, the tangible results to emerge from what was the year’s most important political meeting, aside for a few photo ops, were few and far between. That may change, at least for purely optical purposes, after a report in the Financial Times that China will “offer concessions” to the US to avoid a trade war, including better market access for US financial sector investments and beef, after the nation’s leaders decided last week in Florida they needed results on trade talks within 100 days.

  

  That said, as the FT itself concedes, “the two concessions on finance and beef are relatively easy for Beijing to make“, especially since one wonders which US firms are in a rush to enter the “bubble-bust” Chinese financial markets which as we described two weeks ago, are persistently on the edge of collapse- not to mention a banking system which has at least $6 trillion in bad debts – and only ever greater government intervention in the form of various Beijing backstops have kept afloat.

  In any case, for those brave enough to rush after Chinese financial “bargains”, they will now be allowed to hold majority stakes in securities and insurance companies which at present they can not do. The country’s largest companies in these sectors, such as Citic Securities and China Life Insurance, have achieved enormous scale which as the FT notes “makes them formidable competitors for new entrants to the market.” Which once again begs the question: which private investor would want to compete with the Chinese government which is the de facto owner of all financial enterprises in China?

  It is also the case that while US companies are invited to invest domestically, this would result in the creation of more Chinese jobs and perhaps boost China’s current account, without actually benefiting US-Sino trade relations.

  Additionally, the FT reports that China is also willing to end a ban on US beef imports that has been in place since 2003, “and buy more grains and other agricultural products as it seeks to reduce tensions stemming from the $347bn annual trade surplus in goods that it enjoys with its biggest trading partner.”

  Putting the relatively modest market in context, the US currently exports roughly $6 billion in beef around the world, with Japan, the biggest import market, accounting for about a quarter. It is unclear how big the potential Chinese market would be, and whether it could compete with other foreign importers. That said, the FT notes that “beef exporters have complained about the lingering Chinese ban on US imports, which was introduced after a BSE scare in the US herd.”

  The bottom line: “while a comprehensive Sino-US investment treaty remains a distant prospect, both sides are hoping to achieve a number of smaller trade deals in the coming three months.” The real take home message, however, is that if China’s concessions are only aimed at finance and agriculture, is that China will – at least for the time being – not touch its 25% auto tariffs, arguably the most controversial issue in Chinese-US trade relations.

  US officials are pressing their Chinese counterparts to lower their current 25 per cent tariff on automotive imports. Beijing in return would like greater protection for Chinese investment in the US, which tripled last year to more than $45bn, and also for Washington to relax restrictions on the sale of certain high-tech products to China. The Chinese government may simply commit to buy more US imports in the same way that Japan did in the 1980s.

  Then there is the issue of steel exports, a long-running topic of contention between the two countries: here, too, China is not budging.

  “We’re not going to export a whole lot of steel to China,” said Chad Bown of the Peterson Institute.  Thanks to a state-directed investment stimulus unleashed in the wake of the global financial crisis, Chinese steelmakers now produce more steel than the rest of the world combined. With the Chinese economy now growing at its slowest pace in a quarter century, reduced demand at home has led to a surge in steel exports, causing global prices to collapse.

  Still, with Trump’s economic successes few and far between, the president will gladly take any “concessions” the Chinese offer, even if it means little in the grand scheme of trade relations between the two nations.

  * * *

  Meanwhile, in a separate report, Axios reported that the Trump administration is preparing an executive order that would probe “unfair” product dumping from foreign companies and could result in tariffs on a wide range of products.  Here is what Axios’ Jonathan Swan said he has learned so far:

  • Steel and aluminum will be targeted.
  • Other products, including household appliances, could be targeted as well.
  • If the investigations result in new import duties it could make some consumer goods more expensive and could hurt the stock prices of American companies that rely on cheap steel imports. A good number of American manufacturing companies, however, could benefit from this hit to their low-cost competitors.

  A White House official was cited as saying this investigation is part of Trump’s effort to protect American jobs and end unfair trade practices like dumping and foreign government subsidization.

  “The administration will use the results of that investigation to determine the best path forward, which could potentially include everything from no action at all to the levying of supplemental duties,” the White House official said. “But whichever action we take will be informed by the results of the investigation and not by predetermined conclusions.”

  Axios further adds that Wilbur Ross is the point man on this executive order, which could arrive as early as late April. “But there’s no point getting too wedded to that timeline, because Trump has slowed the pace of executive actions and this is an especially sensitive one: If it’s clumsy, foreign trading partners could see this as the first shot in a trade war.“

  Keep in mind this EO would only lead to a probe, no definitive action yet. So putting it in context, if the investigation does lead to penalties on foreign trading partners, “it will be seen a big win for Steve Bannon, Stephen Miller, Peter Navarro, and other economic nationalists in Trump’s orbit. Given the Syria strikes and Bannon’s demotion from the NSC, their clout has appeared to diminish. The Goldman wing, meanwhile, will likely oppose aggressive trade moves.“

  Which, disappointingly, is what the Trump narrative in recent days has boiled down to – which camp is winning, the “nationalist” or the “Goldman” one. For now the score is firmly for the latter.

  

  

• How U.S. LNG Transformed The Market

  Authored by Nick Cunningham of OilPrice.com,

  The global market for LNG is changing quickly, spurred on by new sources of supply from U.S. shale.

  U.S. natural gas production surged over the past decade, as fracking opened up a wave of new gas supply. That wave led to a glut and a crash in prices long before shale drillers did the same for oil. The U.S. was sitting on massive volumes of gas that routinely traded as low as $2 or $3 per million BTU (MMMBtu).

  At the same time, Asian consumers – mainly Japan, South Korea and increasingly China – paid a hefty premium to import gas, with prices spiking close to $20/MMBtu following the Fukushima meltdown in 2011 that left Japan painfully short of functioning electricity capacity.

  That presented U.S. gas companies with a straightforward arbitrage opportunity – export cheap American gas to Asia, selling it for a much higher price. The race to build LNG export terminals was on.

  But by the time the first LNG export terminal in the U.S. came online in 2016, the gas market was radically changed. On the demand side, Japan – the largest LNG importer in the world – was no longer desperate for gas imports in the same way that it was back in 2011 and 2012. New renewable energy, a monumental efficiency campaign, and a greater reliance on coal cut into gas demand. China’s gas demand has also grown slower than expected.

  

   

  The effects on the supply side of the equation are arguably much more significant. LNG export capacity around the world has surged in recent years, hitting 340 million tonnes per annum (mtpa) in 2016, up from 278.7 mtpa at the end of 2011, an increase of 20 percent. New megaprojects have come online, including Chevron’s Gorgon LNG project in Australia. A whopping 879 mtpa of new export capacity has been proposed for the future, although much of that probably won’t be constructed now that the market is oversupplied.

  Surging supply and disappointing demand caused prices to come down from their peaks. Spot prices in East Asia – the Platts JKM marker – hit $19.42/MMBtu in March 2014. By 2016, Japan only paid an average of $7/MMBtu for imported LNG, or around one-third of the prices from three years ago. Spot prices for May 2017 delivery are now trading below $6/MMBtu.

  The glut of LNG today is upending long-standing trade practices. LNG has historically been traded on long-term contracts at prices linked to the price of crude oil. The volume of LNG traded had once been limited, so there wasn’t much of a true market price for the product. Fixing cargoes to the price of crude oil became a common practice. The crash of crude oil in 2014, not coincidentally, also helped push down the prices of LNG.

  Now, with so much supply on hand, the market is no longer favorable to sellers. But the U.S. is just beginning to ramp up. Cheniere Energy brought the first LNG export terminal online last year on the Gulf Coast. Other projects are under construction and by the end of the decade, the U.S. could be the third largest LNG exporter in the world behind only Australia and Qatar. By 2035, the U.S. is expected to pass them to become the largest LNG exporter in the world.

  “As U.S. exports ramp up, we’re going to see even more flexibility with more people trying to buy and trade volumes. The old models of stable long-term contracts will really have to change,” Zhi Xin Chong, a gas analyst for Wood Mackenzie Ltd., told Bloomberg. “We’ve already seen the impact of U.S. LNG on contract trends, with more destination flexibility coming into play.”

  Contracts used to not only have long time horizons, but would also prohibit buyers from reselling cargoes, limiting the development of a true market for LNG. That is changing, and the more reselling and spot purchases, the more liquid (no pun intended) the market will become.

  But just because new U.S. suppliers are adding competition does not mean that American LNG is the most competitive. At one point it was – cheap Henry Hub prices competed favorably to high-priced LNG in Asia, particularly when oil traded at $100 per barrel. But spot LNG prices in Asia are now lower than some of the American LNG contracts.

  For example, Indonesia’s Pertamina is contracted to buy LNG from Cheniere Energy at Henry Hub prices, plus 15 percent, plus a fixed $3.50/MMBtu fee, according to Bloomberg. When the deal was negotiated in 2013, that equated to something like $8/MMBtu – much better than the $18/MMBtu that LNG traded at the time. However, with spot prices down below $6/MMBtu, Pertamina is now trying to get out of its contract.

  Buyers are demanding that these age-old contract practices be scrapped. JERA Co., a partnership between Japanese utilities Chubu Electric Power and Tokyo Electric Power, is the world’s largest buyer of LNG. JERA formed a common front with Korea Gas Corp. and China National Offshore Oil Corp to establish a buyer’s club in March to force changes in the LNG market. It is sort of the opposite of OPEC – a buyer’s cartel meant to influence prices and dictate contract terms. JERA is expected to sign a deal with France’s Total, which would see flexible volumes delivered based on spot prices.

  But fixed prices and multi-year contracts are not going away entirely – they may just be shifting to lower prices and shorter terms. The former head of Cheniere Energy, Charif Souki, recently offered Japanese customers five-year contracts fixed at $8/MMBtu from an LNG export terminal on the U.S. Gulf Coast beginning in 2023, a contract much shorter than in yester-year when they spanned decades. Now head Inc., Souki is confident his capacity will sell out.

  

  

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• Former CIA Officer: "The Intelligence Confirms The Russian Account On Syria"

  Authored by Robert Parry via ConsortiumNews.com,

  President Trump earned neocon applause for his hasty decision to attack Syria and kill about a dozen Syrians, but his rash act has all the earmarks of a “wag the dog” moment.

  Just two days after news broke of an alleged poison-gas attack in northern Syria, President Trump brushed aside advice from some U.S. intelligence analysts doubting the Syrian regime’s guilt and launched a lethal retaliatory missile strike against a Syrian airfield.

  

  The guided-missile destroyer USS Porter conducts strike operations while in the Mediterranean Sea, April 7, 2017. (Navy photo by Petty Officer 3rd Class Ford Williams)

  Trump immediately won plaudits from Official Washington, especially from neoconservatives who have been trying to wrestle control of his foreign policy away from his nationalist and personal advisers since the days after his surprise victory on Nov. 8.

  There is also an internal dispute over the intelligence. On Thursday night, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said the U.S. intelligence community assessed with a “high degree of confidence” that the Syrian government had dropped a poison gas bomb on civilians in Idlib province.

  But a number of intelligence sources have made contradictory assessments, saying the preponderance of evidence suggests that Al Qaeda-affiliated rebels were at fault, either by orchestrating an intentional release of a chemical agent as a provocation or by possessing containers of poison gas that ruptured during a conventional bombing raid.

  One intelligence source told me that the most likely scenario was a staged event by the rebels intended to force Trump to reverse a policy, announced only days earlier, that the U.S. government would no longer seek “regime change” in Syria and would focus on attacking the common enemy, Islamic terror groups that represent the core of the rebel forces.

  The source said the Trump national security team split between the President’s close personal advisers, such as nationalist firebrand Steve Bannon and son-in-law Jared Kushner, on one side and old-line neocons who have regrouped under National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster, an Army general who was a protégé of neocon favorite Gen. David Petraeus.

  White House Infighting

  In this telling, the earlier ouster of retired Gen. Michael Flynn as national security adviser and this week’s removal of Bannon from the National Security Council were key steps in the reassertion of neocon influence inside the Trump presidency. The strange personalities and ideological extremism of Flynn and Bannon made their ousters easier, but they were obstacles that the neocons wanted removed.

  Though Bannon and Kushner are often presented as rivals, the source said, they shared the belief that Trump should tell the truth about Syria, revealing the Obama administration’s CIA analysis that a fatal sarin gas attack in 2013 was a “false-flag” operation intended to sucker President Obama into fully joining the Syrian war on the side of the rebels — and the intelligence analysts’ similar beliefs about Tuesday’s incident.

  Instead, Trump went along with the idea of embracing the initial rush to judgment blaming Assad for the Idlib poison-gas event. The source added that Trump saw Thursday night’s missile assault as a way to change the conversation in Washington, where his administration has been under fierce attack from Democrats claiming that his election resulted from a Russian covert operation.

  If changing the narrative was Trump’s goal, it achieved some initial success with several of Trump’s fiercest neocon critics, such as neocon Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, praising the missile strike, as did Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The neocons and Israel have long sought “regime change” in Damascus even if the ouster of Assad might lead to a victory by Islamic extremists associated with Al Qaeda and/or the Islamic State.

  Wagging the Dog

  Trump employing a “wag the dog” strategy, in which he highlights his leadership on an international crisis to divert attention from domestic political problems, is reminiscent of President Bill Clinton’s decision to attack Serbia in 1999 as impeachment clouds were building around his sexual relationship with intern Monica Lewinsky.

  

  President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at joint press conference on Feb. 15. 2017. (Screen shot from Whitehouse.gov)

  Trump’s advisers, in briefing the press on Thursday night, went to great lengths to highlight Trump’s compassion toward the victims of the poison gas and his decisiveness in bombing Assad’s military in contrast to Obama’s willingness to allow the intelligence community to conduct a serious review of the evidence surrounding the 2013 sarin-gas case.

  Ultimately, Obama listened to his intelligence advisers who told him there was no “slam-dunk” evidence implicating Assad’s regime and he pulled back from a military strike at the last minute – while publicly maintaining the fiction that the U.S. government was certain of Assad’s guilt.

  In both cases – 2013 and 2017 – there were strong reasons to doubt Assad’s responsibility. In 2013, he had just invited United Nations inspectors into Syria to investigate cases of alleged rebel use of chemical weapons and thus it made no sense that he would launch a sarin attack in the Damascus suburbs, guaranteeing that the U.N. inspectors would be diverted to that case.

  Similarly, now, Assad’s military has gained a decisive advantage over the rebels and he had just scored a major diplomatic victory with the Trump administration’s announcement that the U.S. was no longer seeking “regime change” in Syria. The savvy Assad would know that a chemical weapon attack now would likely result in U.S. retaliation and jeopardize the gains that his military has achieved with Russian and Iranian help.

  The counter-argument to this logic – made by The New York Times and other neocon-oriented news outlets – essentially maintains that Assad is a crazed barbarian who was testing out his newfound position of strength by baiting President Trump. Of course, if that were the case, it would have made sense that Assad would have boasted of his act, rather than deny it.

  But logic and respect for facts no longer prevail inside Official Washington, nor inside the mainstream U.S. news media.

  Intelligence Uprising

  Alarm within the U.S. intelligence community about Trump’s hasty decision to attack Syria reverberated from the Middle East back to Washington, where former CIA officer Philip Giraldi reported hearing from his intelligence contacts in the field that they were shocked at how the new poison-gas story was being distorted by Trump and the mainstream U.S. news media.

  

  Former CIA officer Philip Giradi. (Photo credit: Gage Skidmore)

  Giraldi told Scott Horton’s Webcast: “I’m hearing from sources on the ground in the Middle East, people who are intimately familiar with the intelligence that is available who are saying that the essential narrative that we’re all hearing about the Syrian government or the Russians using chemical weapons on innocent civilians is a sham.”

  Giraldi said his sources were more in line with an analysis postulating an accidental release of the poison gas after an Al Qaeda arms depot was hit by a Russian airstrike.

  “The intelligence confirms pretty much the account that the Russians have been giving … which is that they hit a warehouse where the rebels – now these are rebels that are, of course, connected with Al Qaeda – where the rebels were storing chemicals of their own and it basically caused an explosion that resulted in the casualties. Apparently the intelligence on this is very clear.”

  Giraldi said the anger within the intelligence community over the distortion of intelligence to justify Trump’s military retaliation was so great that some covert officers were considering going public.

  “People in both the agency [the CIA] and in the military who are aware of the intelligence are freaking out about this because essentially Trump completely misrepresented what he already should have known – but maybe he didn’t – and they’re afraid that this is moving toward a situation that could easily turn into an armed conflict,” Giraldi said before Thursday night’s missile strike. “They are astonished by how this is being played by the administration and by the U.S. media.”

  One-Sided Coverage

  The mainstream U.S. media has presented the current crisis with the same profound neocon bias that has infected the coverage of Syria and the larger Middle East for decades. For instance, The New York Times on Friday published a lead story by Michael R. Gordon and Michael D. Shear that treated the Syrian government’s responsibility for the poison-gas incident as flat-fact. The lengthy story did not even deign to include the denials from Syria and Russia that they were responsible for any intentional deployment of poison gas.

  

  The Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Ross fires a tomahawk land attack missile from the Mediterranean Sea, April 7, 2017. (Navy photo by Petty Officer 3rd Class Robert S. Price)

  The article also fit with Trump’s desire that he be portrayed as a decisive and forceful leader. He is depicted as presiding over intense deliberations of war or peace and displaying a deep humanitarianism regarding the poison-gas victims, one of the rare moments when the Times, which has become a reliable neocon propaganda sheet, has written anything favorable about Trump at all.

  According to Syrian reports on Friday, the U.S. attack killed 13 people, including five soldiers at the airbase.

  Gordon, whose service to the neocon cause is notorious, was the lead author with Judith Miller of the Times’ bogus “aluminum tube” story in 2002 which falsely claimed that Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was reconstituting a nuclear-weapons program, an article that was then cited by President George W. Bush’s aides as a key argument for invading Iraq in 2003.

  Regarding this week’s events, Trump’s desperation to reverse his negative media coverage and the dubious evidence blaming Assad for the Idlib incident could fit with the “Wag the Dog” movie from 1997 in which an embattled president creates a phony foreign crisis in Albania.

  

  A fake war scene in the dark 1997 comedy “Wag the Dog,” which showed a girl and her cat fleeing a bombardment in Albania.

  In the movie, the White House operation is a cynical psychological operation to convince the American people that innocent Albanian children, including an attractive girl carrying a cat, are in danger when, In reality, the girl was an actor posing before a green screen that allowed scenes of fiery ruins to be inserted as background.

  Today, because Trump and his administration are now committed to convincing Americans that Assad really was responsible for Tuesday’s poison-gas tragedy, the prospects for a full and open investigation are effectively ended. We may never know if there is truth to those allegations or whether we are being manipulated by another “wag the dog” psyop.

  

  

• Confused Leftists Slam 'Trumpmageddon' Despite Hillary's Call For Direct Strikes On Syrian Airfields Hours Earlier

  Authored by Mac Slavo via SHTFplan.com,

  

  With Russian warships now moving towards U.S. Navy Destroyers off the Syrian coast, liberal supporters of Hillary Clinton are freaking out about the possibility of a Trumpmaggedon nuclear war.

   

  

  Before pointing fingers at President Trump, however, it is important to note that just hours before Trump launched missile strikes against Syrian airfield targets it was none other than Hillary Clinton herself who said she would have done the same thing:

  Speaking to the New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof, Mrs Clinton said she believed the US had been wrong not to have previously launched such an offensive.

   

  She said: “Assad had an air force, and that air force is the cause of most of the civilian deaths, as we have seen over the years and as we saw again in the last few days.”

   

  “And I really believe that we should have and still should take out his airfields and prevent him from being able to use them to bomb innocent people and drop Sarin gas on them.“

  Source: Independent

  Let’s not pretend that Donald Trump did anything Hillary Clinton wouldn’t have done.

  If Trump’s Syrian strikes lead to further tension between the United States and Russia, or even widespread military conflict, it has nothing to do with a Republican or Democrat being in office, but rather, a pre-planned agenda.

  As Ron Paul highlighted this week, it’s the neo-cons who benefit most, and that includes Hillary Clinton.

  War is very good business for the military industrial complex, bank financiers, energy magnates and politicians.

  

  

• ALERT: JFK Murder Conspiracy SOLVED, but who cares

  (GLOBALINTELHUB) – 4/09/2017    Support  solid  intelligence visit our  sponsor www.splittingpennies.com 

  While the world wonders about President Trump, 54 years ago, a US President was murdered in broad daylight in Dallas, Texas; John Fitzgerald Kennedy – the only Irish Catholic President, and possibly one of the only US Presidents that was not a Freemason.  To this day, the facts surrounding this event remain clouded.  The ‘official’ Warren Commission report presents fanciful theories about a “Magic Bullet” that was able to go in and out of JFK’s body multiple times, and other wild fantasies.  But this official report is ‘official’ and any other explanation of the events of that day are ‘conspiracy theories.’  As time has passed, and secondary information surfaces, there are indications of the true power of the information that was kept secret for so long.

  The murder of JFK is perhaps one of the most significant events of the 20th century.  In the past 10 years, new information has surfaced that portends to a major re-investigation into the issue.  As well, a generation has passed since the event which took place 1963.  This article presents two unique viewpoints, previously unpublished, as well as looking at some recently released evidence:

  1. Dr. Arthur Charloff “Art”, Special Agent FBI Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
  2. The book titled Kennedy’s Last Stand: Eisenhower, UFOs, MJ-12 & JFK’s Assassination
  3. Finally, we’ll examine new evidence that has surfaced since the making of Oliver Stone’s “JFK” in 1991

  We will begin with 1. – Art’s involvement in JFK was relatively en-passant.  The FBI was called in because the Dallas police couldn’t be trusted to run a clean investigation.  Art was running the OK office (and has admitted, his station in OK was the reason he left the FBI).  Dr. Charloff is an impeccably fact-based intellectual who was a university professor and Dean of Northwood University; as well as serving as a major financial executive for corporations like Burger King Corporation and others.  For those who don’t know, most FBI recruits are from financial services, especially because the FBI investigates financial crimes.

  When I asked Dr. Charloff point blank who killed JFK he said “We’ll never know, because they killed all the witnesses!” Art was a guy doing his job, a young man at that time, who was not part of any ‘conspiracy’ and certainly wasn’t part of a committee to whitewash something the government or a group inside the government had done.  He did however, reveal things about the FBI, that may have greater meaning and implications, than his investigation of JFK.  First let’s look at where he pops up in the Warren Commission, see the full file here:  105-29WarrenCommissionFileArthurCharloff and  WH26_CE_2809

  One page highlighted:

  

  This is, for the record, a copy of Art’s CV: arthur-charloff-ph-d-1979-s-w-palm-city-road-d-772

  Art’s FBI stories range from the mundane, such as the agent partner that used to iron the crease in his boxer shorts, to the Hollywood-esque tales of how the Russian embassy brought him tea and cookies one night on a stakeout (while they were performing surveillance on them); “We see you guys sitting there watching us for many hours and thought you might be hungry or thirsty” and even came back to collect the silver tray when they were finished.

  Dr. Arthur Charloff was born in Maine, but grew up in Miami, Florida.  He obtained his PhD from University of Organizational Sciences in Belgrade, Serbia.  His genetic origins can be traced back to a town in Rovno, present day Ukraine (former USSR) – a pogrom town where all his relatives were slaughtered (those who didn’t migrate to USA.)  So, Art’s father Morris and Art were both flag waving jingoists.  Morris was a meat inspector who worked for the USDA.  When he applied for the FBI his Russian origins were an issue and he had to go through special clearances other agents avoided, to prove that he wasn’t a Russian sleeper spy.  Although not practicing, Dr. Arthur Charloff is Jewish (hence the family escaping the pogroms for the safety of America).

  What Art said about the FBI is that the FBI never ‘solves’ crimes, in a traditional sense.  It was more of a business negotiation, relying mostly on Confidential Informants (CIs) and for example in a drug bust, getting street dealers to rat out higher ups and so on up the chain.  He said that the FBI very rarely, if ever – solves crimes like you see in the films.  CIs can work with the FBI for years, even on cases not involving them (for example, a drug related CI may sit in on an organized crime case).

  Global Intel Hub interviewed Dr. Charloff telephonic-ally on March 29th, 2017 for the purposes of research for this article, and to confirm what we had previously thought about Dr. Charloff’s accounts while working for the FBI and after.

  Before getting into any detail about UFOs, Dr. Charloff stated point blank that there was a “rumor” in ‘the bureau’ as they refer to FBI, at the time, that the CIA assassinated JFK.  JFK had a lot of enemies, and wanted to dump the CIA “shit can the whole operation” as well, his brother Robert wanted to usurp the power of the CIA placing them under the DOJ (Department of Justice) of which he was in charge.  Dr. Charloff said his brother (referring to Robert Kennedy) was a ‘tough dude’ and both the Kennedy brothers were very unhappy with the CIA, and especially after the Bay of Pigs debacle.  Also, the CIA had kept JFK out of the information circle, as we shall see later, about a number of topics (at this point, we had not revealed the discoveries presented in the book about UFOs to Dr. Charloff – that was knowledge at the time).  He said that JFK really didn’t even want to be President, all of these issues seemed to bother his brother more than Jack.

  Finally he also stated this was the common opinion of FBI agents at the time, they all looked at each other and said “Something else is going on here” – but continued to do their jobs.

  I asked Dr. Charloff if he noticed anything interesting during the investigation of the murder, he said ‘no’ but later admitted that his bosses (Hoover) had forced them to wrap up the investigation early and without doing their normal due diligence as they would on a high profile murder, which the FBI had experience investigating many.  Dr. Charloff said the ‘higher ups’ simply wanted the investigation shut down and everyone was re-assigned to other cases quickly, out of the area.  They wanted to ‘get this thing closed up as soon as possible, and have no more trouble, no more discussion, about this topic.”

  Bear in mind that Dr. Charloff is a straight arrow kind of guy especially being an agent for the FBI investigating the murder of a sitting President.  Later asked about his opinion of what happened, he said the whole thing ‘stinks’ and the story about Oswald was ridiculous, how did Oswold get out of the military, why did he go to Russia, why did he do it all from the book depository – it just didn’t add up.  Finally Oswald basically threw himself into the arms of police by allowing himself to be arrested.

  The Warren Commission came up with nonsensical conclusions he said, such as the “Magic Bullet” and the lone assassin theory, that Oswald did it by himself.  No one took it seriously, at the time, but what could anyone do?  It was obviously much bigger than one agency, even bigger than the office of the President, so whatever power lurking in the shadows – was not one to mess with!

  But who did it?  In an ironic twist to this testimony, Dr. Charloff’s brother worked at the famous Area 51 military base in the Nevada desert – that’s the base that the military claims doesn’t exist.

  He said that before working there his brother had to surrender ALL of his documents, IDs, social security card, and all else.  He wasn’t allowed to talk about what he did or saw there.  After 6 months a new ‘shift’ comes in and they rotate people there like that.  At least that was how they did it back in the day.

  Why this anecdotal account from someone who is not a critical witness?  Because Dr. Arthur Charloff is a real person – who can attest to the events as they transpired, from another perspective, just an FBI special agent doing his job.

  Part 2: The Book

  Kennedy’s Last Stand: Eisenhower, UFOs, MJ-12 & JFK’s Assassination – This is a must read, for those interested in the topic of ‘information’ and ‘informatics’ even if you’re not interested in the subject of UFOs.  The point here is that documentary evidence regarding the UFO conspiracy is real and comes from the top.  A group so powerful (MJ-12) they shut out the President (Eisenhower) who overcame them only by threatening to invade Area 51 with the Army.  In the past 20 years, new evidence has surfaced, some of which is presented in the book.  Most significantly, the book points a paper trail right to the top of the CIA and beyond.

  Small background on UFO phenomenon as it pertains to this story; UFOs were first discovered by the military over Los Angeles during World War 2.  It was alarming because the Army believed that it was the enemy Japanese attacking, all they saw were ‘airships’ shooting down from the sky; the idea of Aliens or UFOs wasn’t common knowledge at the time.  See a brief summary of the “Battle of Los Angeles”:

  The Battle of Los Angeles, also known as The Great Los Angeles Air Raid, is the name given by contemporary sources to the rumored enemy attack and subsequent anti-aircraft artillery barrage which took place from late 24 February to early 25 February 1942 over Los Angeles, California.  The incident occurred less than three months after the United States entered World War II as a result of the Japanese Imperial Navy‘s attack on Pearl Harbor, and one day after the bombardment of Ellwood on 23 February. Initially, the target of the aerial barrage was thought to be an attacking force from Japan, but speaking at a press conference shortly afterward, Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox called the incident a “false alarm.” Newspapers of the time published a number of reports and speculations of a cover-up.

  Some contemporary ufologists and conspiracy theorists have suggested the targets were extraterrestrial spacecraft.  When documenting the incident in 1949, The United States Coast Artillery Association identified a meteorological balloon sent up at 1:00 am that “started all the shooting” and concluded that “once the firing started, imagination created all kinds of targets in the sky and everyone joined in”.  In 1983, the U.S. Office of Air Force History attributed the event to a case of “war nerves” triggered by a lost weather balloon and exacerbated by stray flares and shell bursts from adjoining batteries.

  After this ‘battle’ UFOs were on the radar of the military – literally.  Military planners, practically, incorporate every kind of potential attack into their strategy planning.  UFOs were not looked at scientifically by the military – simply as a potential threat, whether from Hitler or another planet they didn’t care.

  The second event that marked this age was the Roswell crash, still a big mystery to this day.  Apparently, there were 2 crashes, one with actual biological bodies, and the press release was designed to take the focus away from the more sensitive site.  According to the book, everything was taken to Area 51 for review, where the facility was placed under the security of the CIA and managed by a group formed by Truman known as MJ-12.  A lot of this is not science fiction when considering Nazi scientists developed rockets that NASA still uses to this day via Project Paperclip.  Remember that all of this happened around a time when USA was becoming a superpower, the CIA was just formed, along with the military industrial complex – including its corporate technology arm, still in use today (Silicon Valley).

  Where did the explosion of scientific developments come from such as Kevlar, the Microprocessor, fiber optics, stealth, weather modification, and other technologies come from?  Many of these developments came out by the hundreds month after month by research labs like PARC:

  PARC (Palo Alto Research Center Incorporated), formerly Xerox PARC, is a research and development company in Palo Alto, California,[1][2][3] with a distinguished reputation for its contributions to information technology and hardware systems.[citation needed]

  Founded in 1970 as a division of Xerox Corporation, PARC has been in large part responsible for such developments as laser printing, Ethernet, the modern personal computer, graphical user interface (GUI) and desktop paradigm, object-oriented programming, ubiquitous computing, amorphous silicon (a-Si) applications, and advancing very-large-scale integration (VLSI) for semiconductors.

  This all shortly after the Roswell incident.  Looking at all this from a technology standpoint is not so sensational.  The fact that the Roswell crash was in fact a UFO possibly operated by a ‘robot’ or ‘drone’ from another planet or another timeline is not so far fetched.  If the reader could be transported back to the middle ages of Europe equipped with a laser pointer, iPhone 7, automatic handgun, and other wizard’s tools, certainly the people would think that the user is a “God” who practices “Magic”.

  The interesting twist in this book is how JFK wanted to unmask all this, use it for the good of the world (in partnership with Russia) and how the group who operates above the US Government, in this case MJ-12, ordered the hit via a secretive assassination directive:

  An Mj-12 directive to kill JFK

  The most dramatic directive, likely drafted by Dulles (MJ-1), Director of CIA under JFK and apparently approved by six other MJ-12 members was a cryptic assassination directive. In full, this states: see last memo in series in link below.

  http://www.majesticdocuments.com/pdf/burnedmemo-s1-pgs3-9.pdf  

  Draft – Directive Regarding Project Environment – When conditions become non-conducive for growth in our environment and Washington cannot be influenced any further, the weather is lacking any precipitation … it should be wet.

  The term “it should be wet” is a coded command to kill someone.  

  Detractors of this book will say that the author is reaching to connect the dots, and this cryptic message is not ‘clearly’ the smoking gun evidence that everyone is looking for.  But is it?  Have a deeper look through these documents here: 

  6404101-JFK-MJ12

  To the less educated researcher, documents such as the letter from respected scientists Oppenheimer and Einstein regarding the UFO issue, and the letter from the anonymous CIA leaker re: James Angleton; may be of more significance, as the authenticity of these documents is more verifiable, and anecdotally more believable.  Einstein for example published thousands of public essays and letters on various important topics of the day; this was a time when the power Elite relied on high IQ scientists.

  There is no alternative paper trail, with a more powerful suggestion – solving the JFK murder.  Most of the files have been released in a searchable archive, which you can find here:  https://www.archives.gov/research/jfk

  It is not likely that in the next 20 years another ‘smoking gun’ document will be discovered, although it’s possible (it could be in some relatives attic, next to baseball cards and grandpas pipe saved from last century).  So it’s reasonable to conclude that 95% of relevant information regarding the JFK scenario is out there, somewhere – in the ether.  With the speed and velocity of the internet sleuth community, if there was such a relevant document such as photo (right) – it would have been distributed and redistributed, analyzed and discussed, ad nauseum.

  What is the significance of this event, you ask?  It’s a singularity, as they describe in physics (a point at which a function takes an infinite value, especially in space-time when matter is infinitely dense, as at the center of a black hole).  From one perspective, it was simply a power grab by ‘faction 2’ from ‘faction 1’ as some describe big power politics.  The Kennedy clan were outsiders, they were social climbers, they went against the power structure of the haves – case closed.  But Kennedy or someone else – something more meaningful happened here.  A group called the “Shadow Government” stopped Kennedy from exercising the powers granted to him by the Constitution and by the voters.  It puts the entire system into question, proving basically that the United States operates by Mob Rule not so much different than a banana republic.  A group of rich families and companies with deep pockets control the country through their trained surrogates.  The continuation of this can be seen with political families such as Bush and Clinton who have a statistically unusual amount of deaths of associates, friends, and workers surrounding them.  Some were even afraid to work for the Clinton camp due to the high number of workers who ‘suicided’, disappeared, had heart failure, or stabbed themselves in the back 10 times.

  Let’s thread through the irony of the power structure for the last 30 years with this interesting photo, and comparison, of a figure outside the Texas School Book Depository:

  

  The photo on right, comparing the posture of a figure standing in a suit and tie is striking.  George H.W. Bush Sr. later went on to be the director of the CIA, only for 2 years, under Gerald Ford.  But Bush’s impact on the establishment would be large, as he would later be Reagan’s Vice President (and rumored that was more of a ‘President’ during this time than Reagan ever was) and eventually President of the United States, and father of a future president, George W. Bush (his son).

  What kind of ‘organization’ is out of the public view, has the means to organize such an assassination, and the motive?  All points to one organization, really the only capable organization of organizing such a project.  Look at some evidence, such as this list compiled by Wikispooks, of attempted or successful assassination attempts on foreign leaders organized by the CIA since World War 2: https://wikispooks.com/wiki/US/Foreign_Assassinations_since_1945 And here’s “Alleged Assassination Plots Involving Foreign Leaders” as compiled by the US Senate in 1975: CIA_Alleged Assassination Plots Involving Foreign Leaders

  

  With such overwhelming evidence of the CIA’s involvement in foreign assassinations, if only one of these ‘plots’ is true it’s reasonable to assume they all are true because after all, the CIA is a spy agency, not an overt military operation, so most of this is done with the clandestine service.  And, if the CIA really does have a ‘hit squad’ trained to topple and kill foreign dictators, then it is reasonable to assume this same operative group inside the CIA could potentially use this same group domestically.  In fact, it is the only group in the world capable of assassinating a US President so successfully, including the use of insiders to change the course of the motorcade, for example.

  Or to use another analogy as a means of deductive logic, 95% of hackers are inside jobs – in other words, hackers very rarely breach security from the ‘outside’ – they rely on a rogue employee, security expert, or insider to provide key information such as passwords or other details needed to complete the job.  This must have been the case with the murder of JFK because without those on the inside, such an epic target would not have been possible to hit.  It was for this reason the ‘higher ups’ at the FBI wanted this case closed and not discussed, because there clearly were insiders working against JFK who provided key info and modifying security protocols leading to the assassination.

  As referenced by NY Times, the peak of outrage against the CIA for such plots was in the mid 1970s:

  The peak of outrage against government-sponsored assassination was the mid-1970s, when the Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations — better known as the Church committee — spent more than 60 days questioning 75 witnesses about C.I.A. plots of the late 1950s and early 1960s. Back in the darkest days of the cold war, the agency had devoted significant resources and creativity to devising unhappy ends for unsavory or inconvenient foreign leaders. Among those listed for assassination were Patrice Lumumba of the Congo, Ngo Dinh Diem of South Vietnam, Rafael Trujillo of the Dominican Republic and, most famously, Fidel Castro of Cuba, who survived no fewer than eight C.I.A. assassination plots. The senators on the committee were intent on divining the full extent of the government’s role in these plots. How much direct authority, for example, did Presidents Dwight Eisenhower and John Kennedy exert over them? The committee’s conclusions were vague at best. The truth was that neither president would have allowed his hand to show in such affairs.  Times have changed. Our president now interrupts regularly scheduled broadcasting to announce the news of an assassination himself.

  Perhaps the details of the JFK murder, public coverage, and FBI investigation would have been different had it happened in 2010.  Certainly it was a different time, before the internet, and at a time of much happiness and prosperity.  Since “JFK” we’ve had “911” which is another game changer event that put the US on a different path as it was during the 90s.  Perhaps every generation needs such an event to ‘remind’ them of who is in charge?  (Dr. Tony Blanton from Pine Crest Prep School is ringing in my ears ‘history is a struggle between the haves and the have nots and you are the movers and the shakers who are going to change society’)

  What secrets are the ‘shadow government’ protecting or are they simply exercising their power to show the have nots that their ownership of the planet is above any government, any nation state, religion, or other entity?  The UFO issue is concerning, particularly due to security concerns; because the information we do know is only bits and pieces from whistle-blowers and a few encounters that are not well documented.  There are rumors that Eisenhower himself made a deal with the Aliens to keep them a secret in exchange for technology transfer through the military and corporate America.  Maybe it was a good deal, maybe it never happened – who knows?  The point is that, until real discovery and disclosure is achieved, we will be in the dark regarding important issues that can impact daily life on planet earth.  Some important questions we need to ask beyond the shock value of understanding we are not alone in the universe:

  • Who are these aliens, what do they want?  What has been ‘agreed’ with them, if anything, and what current involvement do they have with US Military operations?
  • What of the stories that some of these creatures are multi-dimensional, or from another ‘timeline’ (that they aren’t aliens from other planets but beings that live in many dimensions)?
  • How can we address issues of exo-politics if the CIA was dethroned as the sole security to Area 51 and ultimately, controlling the diplomacy between such aliens, if any?
  • Is there any truth to the stories they are abducting humans for purposes of experimentation, whether it be biological or genetic?  What about the ‘hybrid’ projects?  If there is truth to it, how to stop it?
  • Do aliens have any current business arrangements with US corporations, US politicians, or are involved in major conflicts in any way?  If so, this urgently needs to be addressed, and contracts re-evaluated.  For example there are many accounts that UFOs were seen when nuclear warheads went dead (if even for a test).
  • Are there any secret government ‘libraries’ or ‘archives’ where files about aliens are kept, if so – where are they and in what format?

  What’s interesting about this issue that it seems to be a wealth of information right here under our own desert.  It’s like the metaphor about exploring space when we know less about our deep oceans.  There again, rumors of alien bases under the deep seas.  The amount of information regarding the veracity of such stories is immense, and it has gone parabolic in the last years as many who were alive and working during these times before modern security protocols and training were in place, are retired, dying, or have passed information onto children.

  Part 3: The New Evidence

  1963 was a long time ago.  New facts and evidence have surfaced, most interestingly – we are on the precipice of a major data dump by the US Government still to be determined, scheduled for ‘sometime’ in 2o17.  See explanation from http://2017jfk.org :

  In 1992, the President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection Act mandated that in 2017 all remaining JFK records and redactions be released. However, the National Archives has recently informed federal agencies that if they intend on maintaining secrecy over these records they should begin preparing appeals to the next president of the United States. We are working to ensure that the law is upheld.  We are calling on you, fellow Americans, to come together and ensure that our government upholds the law.

  The parallel of the information secrecy both for the JFK murder and the UFO issue, and their purported interconnection, is interesting.  If state secrets or a modern political organization were not at stake, why the hold up to release information about JFK?  Everyone mostly already believes it was the CIA, a group we have shown capable of organizing assassinations of many foreign leaders, and recently (2016) was caught meddling in a US domestic election.  The UFO issue can be the motive to cover up the JFK murder for so long, so deeply.  And the less obvious, more subtle ‘can of worms’ argument, that if the US Government lied and hid the facts about JFK, of course – everything else including the 9/11 investigation would be open for re-investigation.  This is another reason for waiting for so long because there’d be no one to ‘blame’ as those who orchestrated the conspiracy / cover-up would all be dead by now (or so the thinking of this strategy goes).

  One interesting tape was in fact found in ‘Grandpa’s Attic’ – claimed to be the most significant piece of evidence since 1963:

  A recording of radio communications to and from Air Force One on November 22,1963, discovered in 2011, is among the most important new pieces of JFK evidence to emerge in recent years,

  The tape, an edited excerpt from a longer recording, captures some of the communications of the leaders of U.S. national security agencies as they learned about the assassination of a sitting president.

  I wrote about the importance of the Air Force One tape in the fall of 2013:

  “Audio engineer on the trail of a long-lost JFK tape” (JFK Facts, Nov. 6, 2013)

  “Enhanced Air Force One tape captures top general’s response to JFK’s murder”  (JFK Facts, Oct. 19, 2013)

  You can listen to it here.
  

  Where was the Air Force One tape found?

  This old-fashioned reel of analog tape surfaced at Philadelphia auction house in 2011. The recording was found in the estate of the family of Gen. Chester Clifton, a military aide to JFK. Clifton died in 1991. His children put the estate up for auction.

  Bill Kelly, a JFK researcher, enlisted Primeau Forensics, a Michigan audio engineering firm, to produce a cleaned-up version of the tape.

  What is significant in this piece of information, as far as data analysis is concerned, is the source.  It was an unclassified transcript of a non-essential to the JFK operation (Project Environment).  It only ‘suggests’ through information via what was said and not said, and as such, is not a ‘smoking gun’.  But much like the UFO phenomenon, in a similar thread – it seems that it’s simply IMPOSSIBLE to keep such a high profile operation secret for so long.  The analogy to the UFO issue is Dr. Steven Greer’s “Disclosure Project” available at www.disclosureproject.org; in summary:

  Beginning in 1993, I started an effort that was designed to identify firsthand military and government witnesses to UFO events and projects, as well as other evidence to be used in a public disclosure. From 1993, we spent considerable time and resources briefing the Clinton Administration, including CIA Director James Woolsey, senior military officials at the Pentagon, and select members of Congress, among others. In April of 1997, more than a dozen such government and military witnesses were assembled in Washington DC for briefings with Congressmen, Pentagon officials and others. There, we specifically requested open Congressional Hearings on the subject. None were forthcoming.

  These materials are, as you can now discern, only the tip of the iceberg of what we have recorded on digital videotape. That is, from over 120 hours of testimony by over 100 witnesses we transcribed only 33 hours and then further edited materials down to a fraction of that amount. Moreover, the full archive represents the testimony of only 100 witnesses of the more than 400 identified to date. The edited testimony will be appearing in book form. A portion of it appears in The Disclosure Project Briefing Document and only small excerpts and summary bios of testimony appear in this Executive summary. We hope in the future to secure funding for a 5-6 part broadcast quality video documentary series to be made from the videotaped testimony we have as the impact of hearing and seeing these witnesses speak is very moving.

  This then brings me to my last point: The witnesses who have given testimony to date are extraordinarily brave men and women – heroes in my eyes – who have taken great personal risks in coming forward. Some have been threatened and intimidated. All are risking the ever-present ridicule that attends this subject. Not a single one of them has been paid for his or her testimony: It has been given freely and without reservation for the good of humanity. I wish to personally thank them here and extend to them my personal, highest respect and gratitude.

  This summary is focusing on the testimony of important first-hand witnesses. We have thousands of government documents, hundreds of photographs, trace landing cases and more, but it is impossible to include them in a summary of this length. These materials will be made available for any serious scientific or Congressional inquiry.

  These 2 issues are interrelated on so many levels, it’s only fitting that both have strong nonclassified, civilian groups dedicated to identifying, collecting, archiving, sorting, and classification of all relevant information on the topics.  They are after all, significant issues, with implications on all sciences.  These 2 topics may even be more important than recent scientific discoveries.  For example, as hundreds of high level government witnesses have testified in the disclosure project, one of the technologies kept under lock and key by the CIA (as reverse engineered from ET) are several energy technologies including but not limited to ‘zero point’ energy which would literally, instantly end our dependence on oil, coal, and nuclear.  This is just the tip of the iceberg, as hundreds of ground breaking tech has been leaked from ET such as thorium ‘clean’ nuclear technology, Kevlar, nanotechnology, advanced long distance energy communication, the ability to manipulate space time (or at least, to pass through a ‘wrinkle’ in time), and hundreds of others.  The business element of this provides a solid motive alone, without religious, social, or political implications.  There would be no need for 90% of the Fortune 500, the stock market would crash and the entire economic system as we know it would be immediately restructured (who would pay for gas when free energy is available?).

  The public stated reason, for locking away the JFK files for 75 years, which plausibly is also the reason of keeping UFO information secret; is that the public ‘cannot handle the truth’ – that it would be ‘too much to handle’ – the first implication being some embarrasing political facts, such as the fact that the CIA with the help of insiders like LBJ were critical to the murder or completely organized it themselves.  But that’s not hard to swallow, generations of hardened Americans watching real-time cameras on missiles bombing and maiming brown people (mostly) have become desensitized to such emotional dribble.  But the elephant was in the room all along – this ‘shocking’ fact really is shocking, because it would change every aspect of life on our planet – quite literally (not figuratively).  For example, having free energy would change manufacturing, transportation, computing – just about everything.  It would change war, it would have implications into governance, we can skip religious implications and take the lead from the Catholic Church who is ahead of the information curve on this issue (for obvious reasons).

  So there we have it, the JFK murder has been solved.  

  WHO – It was a sub-set of the Intelligence aparatus, MJ12/CIA under the direction of Allen Dulles operated by Jesus James Angleton, involving multiple CIA agents including but not limited to George H.W. Bush Sr.

  WHAT – The murder of John Fitzgerald Kennedy (JFK) US President, Elite leader, representative of the powerful Kennedy clan, Irish Catholic, father, patriot, and civil servant

  WHERE & WHEN – Dallas, Texas November 22, 1963

  HOW – A fine tuned machine prepared the ultimate kill scene, which involved extensive research and planning, significant funding, resources, highly skilled and trained soldiers, and a ‘cover-up’ scenario which had to involve LBJ and others around JFK.

  WHY – To maintain the big Illuminati secret – that the US Government has obtained technology from other worlds, given to us directly and reverse engineered, and this transfer of tech continues to this day – and that the revelation of what happened to JFK regarding the UFO issue would start a chain of events that would finally lead to the complete disclosure of this technology, and thus – change the entire global political and economic system forever.

  Research Links

  BOOKS – Kennedy’s Last Stand: Eisenhower, UFOs, MJ-12 & JFK’s Assassination

  An interesting leaked email from Edgar Mitchell to John Podesta

  The New Starting Point – Another look at JFK with new research

  Mark the Date – List of classified documents to be released regarding JFK

  7 Key Facts we’ll learn with release of JFK files

  Was JFK shot for his interest in UFOs?

  Short list of investigative groups, information sources, and other JFK related material sources:

  http://jfkfacts.org

  http://aarclibrary.org

  http://maryferrell.org

  http://jfklancer.com 

  

  

• Doug Casey On The Coming Holy War

  Via CaseyResearch.com,

  Today, we have another brand-new Conversations with Casey to share with you. In the interview below, Doug Casey and I discuss holy wars in Europe.

   

  I’m not talking about the Crusades, either. I’m talking about a modern-day holy war.

   

  Some folks will think I’m crazy for even entertaining this idea. But a few weeks ago, Turkey’s foreign minister said that “wars of religion” are coming to Europe.

   

  That’s a major warning. You have to take it seriously.

   

  So, I recently sat down with Doug to discuss this matter. I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did.

  Justin:  Doug, Turkey’s foreign minister recently said that “wars of religion” are coming to Europe. Do you think this could actually happen?

  Doug: Well, human nature hasn’t changed in many thousands of years. And religion is important to the human animal. Perhaps it’s always been something that people were prone to fight about, but the historical record shows that religious wars only started with the invention of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Of course, these religions—which have always been at war with each other, and all other religions—are similar in that they believe in one god. Pagan religions were and are accepting of other people’s gods and beliefs.

  The question is, which god is the right one? Should you believe in Yahweh, or Jesus, or Allah? Because it appears to me that they’re all very different, based upon what they say and what they have their followers believe. Islam and Christianity have been duking it out since the 7th century, and that’s unlikely to change. They both claim to have the one and only true god, but they’re very different gods—not at all the same one. So it’s an irreconcilable difference.

  Justin: So, the ingredients for a holy war have always been there?

  Doug: Yes. Up to about 100 years ago, Christians felt a moral obligation to convert everyone, including other misguided Christians. Now it’s mostly just the Muslims who feel that way. It’s entirely possible, even likely, we’re going to have an outright war of religion. Although, in the highly Politically Correct West, it will have to be called something else.

  The ongoing invasion of Europe by Muslims is one aspect of it—although that’s not so much a religious thing per se. That’s partly because the Muslims are migrating mostly for economic reasons. And because religion is a dead duck in Europe today. Europe is a post-Christian society. Very few people go to church or take Christianity seriously in Europe, it’s a very secular society. Which is a bit of a problem, because they’ve taken the State for their new god.

  But the State doesn’t promise anybody an afterlife. So, in my opinion, Europeans are actually ripe for conversion to Islam. It’s a serious problem, because Islam is incompatible with, and antithetical to Western Civilization.

  Justin: Why should the average American care about this? 

  Doug: It’s part of the gradual destruction of Western culture. Lots of termites—including socialism, cultural Marxism, gender warfare—have been eating away at the foundations of Western Civilization for decades. Islam, in itself, isn’t a real threat. The Koran, which PC types love to treat with respect, is just poorly written medieval sci-fi. It’s living proof that humans are capable of believing absolutely anything.

  That said, Islam is a threat to the West because tens of millions of migrants are being invited to come and live at the expense of the current residents. Europe will collapse from within, as did Rome. The average European believes in nothing—except that his civilization not only isn’t worthy, but is actually evil. No wonder the migrants treat them with contempt.

  The Mohammedans—although I’ll note it’s now very un-PC to call them that—are technologically and economically backward. As long as they put the Koran at the center of their lives—and they have to, because it is the direct, incontrovertible word of Allah—they’ll remain backward. If, through an accident of geology, there wasn’t a lot of low cost oil in places they live, the West would have no reason to care what they think, say, or do. They’d be no more than an interesting tourist attraction.

  The good news is that, over the next 100 years, most Muslims will fall away from their primitive beliefs. But that’s another story… And a lot is going to happen in the meantime.

  

  

• US Sends Aircraft Carrier Toward North Korea "In Response to Recent Provocations"

  One day after NBC reported that the National Security Council had presented Trump with three options vis-a-vis North Korea, namely i) put American nukes in South Korea , ii) kill Kim Jong-un or iii) use the CIA to infiltrate North Korea to sabotage or take out key infrastructure, a US carrier group has departed Singapore and is headed for North Korea.

  According to Reuters, a U.S. Navy strike group will be moving toward the western Pacific Ocean near the Korean peninsula, a U.S. official told Reuters on Saturday, as concerns grow about North Korea’s advancing weapons program.  The strike group, called Carl Vinson, includes an aircraft carrier and will make its way from Singapore toward the Korean peninsula.

  

  The move of the USS Carl Vinson “is in response to recent North Korean provocations”, an official told CNN. “We feel the increased presence is necessary,” the official said, citing North Korea’s worrisome behavior.”

  Harry Harris, the commander of U.S. Pacific Command, directed the USS Carl Vinson strike group to sail north to the Western Pacific after departing Singapore on Saturday, Pacific Command announced.

  The Vinson strike group will operate in the Western Pacific rather than executing previously planned port visits to Australia, Pacific Command said. The group will remain under the operational control of the Third Fleet.

  This year North Korean officials, including leader Kim Jong Un, have repeatedly indicated an intercontinental ballistic missile test or something similar could be coming, possibly as soon as April 15, the 105th birthday of North Korea’s founding president and celebrated annually as “the Day of the Sun.”

  At the end of March, satellite images collected by 38 North suggested that North Korea was actively preparing for a nuclear test.

  Late last week, President Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping met in Florida, where Trump pressed his counterpart to do more to curb North Korea’s nuclear program. Trump’s national security aides have completed a review of U.S. options to try to curb North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs. These include economic and military measures but lean more toward sanctions and increased pressure on Beijing to rein in its reclusive neighbor

  Last weekend, Trump told the FT in an interview, that “if China is not going to solve North Korea, we will.”

  Although the option of pre-emptive military strikes on North Korea is not off the table, the review prioritizes less-risky steps and de-emphasizes direct military action. Then again, nobody thought that Trump would launch a cruise missile strike against Syria less than a week after Rex Tillerson said Assad’s fate lies with his people and not some foreign aggressor.

  In other words, as we predicted yesterday, “with Syria down, it’s now North Korea’s turn.” Considering recent developments, Kim Jong-Un would be well advised to keep a lower profile for the next few weeks.

  Finally, for a real-time breakdown of where US Carrier and amphibious ready groups can be found at this moment, here is a handy map courtesy of Stratfor.

  

  

  

• 'Out Of This World' – NASA's Budget Is Without Parallel

  The budget afforded NASA is far and away the largest on earth…

  

  You will find more statistics at Statista

  With 19 billion dollars to play with each year, Statista’s Martin Armstrong notes the U.S. space agency can outspend the ESA, Rocosmos, CNSA, ISRO, and JAXA combined. It is important to note however, that the figure for CNSA is an estimate due to the lack of comprehensive information from the Chinese government.

  

  

• Is This The Beginning Of The End For U.S. Empire?

  Authored by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

  

  Those whom the gods wish to destroy they first make mad.

  Before I get into the meat of this post, I want to revisit something I wrote back in January.

  From the post, Very Powerful People in the U.S. Government Want War – This is Their Sales Pitch:

  We need to understand that those who want this war will be absolutely relentless. The sales pitch will not end until they get exactly what they want. This is where all of us critical thinkers need to play a key role. We must be prepared to diligently analyze all unsubstantiated official claims, and push back against the war-mongers, because we know for certain the oligarch-owned corporate media won’t. We must be prepared to inform our fellow citizens about what’s happening so that we don’t fall victim to a cheap sales pitch with devastating consequences. Unfortunately, we must also be prepared for a possible deep state false flag if the current sales tactic falls on deaf ears.

   

  America cannot win a global war of such a scale if it is based on false pretenses and in the absence of exceedingly strong public support. This support does not exist. Will this serve as a necessary restraint against the masters of war and their devious plans? It’s too early to tell, but I do know that if we are unnecessarily pushed into a global conflagration, it will not end well for us. If this is the road our twisted status quo insists on taking us down, let us never forget who they are and the self-serving motivations behind their actions.

  Four months later, the deep state got exactly what it wanted. Trump’s weaknesses have been identified and exploited, and he’s successfully been manipulated into neocon foreign policy like George W. Bush and Barack Obama before him. I’ve spent much of the past several months warning about exactly what happened last night, but the die is now cast. There’s no turning back from the path we’re on.

  And don’t give me this garbage about Trump playing “4D chess.” Trump’s a brilliant salesman, and that’s about it. There’s nothing special or superior about Donald Trump intellectually, and he’s one of the most unwise people to ever become President. There was a hope he meant what he said about non-interventionism during the campaign, but that hope should be entirely extinguished at this point. Trump is a very weak man desperately looking for praise from those he claims to hate.

  The purpose of today’s post is not to discuss what happened last night. All of you have read the news by now. My intent today is to explain what I think this means for the years ahead. I believe last night’s strike represents the beginning of the end for U.S. empire. Although the U.S. has been declining domestically for this entire century, America has still been calling all the shots on the international front. This makes sense in late-stage empire, as the focus of the fat and happy “elite” becomes singularly obsessed with domination and power, while the situation back home festers and rots.

  Trump won on an “America first” platform that promised to emphasize the well-being of American citizens over geopolitical adventurism. We now know for certain he’s been manipulated into the imperial mindset, and his recklessness will merely accelerate U.S. decline on the world stage, and in turn, back home.

  If anyone’s playing 4D chess it’s Russia. Russia is anti-fragile at this point, as has been proved by Putin’s survival in the face of economic sanctions, a collapsing ruble and a plunge in oil prices. Putin is still standing and arguably as powerful as ever. Not to mention the fact that the USSR completely disintegrated and collapsed within the past 30 years. They’ve been through a lot as a people. Meanwhile, the U.S. is extraordinarily fragile and weak by comparison, a distinction that will become quite obvious to us all in the years ahead. I don’t say this with any hint of glee or schadenfreude, I’m just stating the facts as I see them.

  None of this implies that Russia’s leadership are a bunch of good people by any means. What I am saying is that they are a thousand times more strategic and intelligent compared to U.S. leadership.

  To prove the point, this would be a good time to review a post I published back in 2014, Tensions Between the U.S. and Russia Are Worse Than You Realize – Remarks by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. Here’s some of what I noted:

  There are two reasons I think the following remarks by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov are so important.

   

  First, as someone who spends much of his time analyzing and critiquing the many destructive policy decisions made by American “leaders,” I was shocked to find how accurate his description of the U.S. power structure’s mindset seems to be. He gets it, and he is more or less trying to warn the world that America’s leaders are basically power-drunk children. I concur.

   

  Second, Lavrov also describes the negative impact that this behavior has had on the Russian psyche generally. He expresses dismay that the U.S. status quo sees the world as unipolar, and attempts to tackle every problem from the perspective that might is right. In no uncertain terms, Lavrov makes it clear that Russia will not stand for this. I don’t think the Russians are bluffing, so this is a very dangerous situation.

   

  If there was actually someone in the U.S. State Department capable of such introspective and clear thinking, we might actually defuse this situation. Don’t hold your breath.

  You should really read the entire post to see Lavrov’s comments for yourself in order to truly understand why I came to the above conclusions.

  U.S. leadership is an absolute joke and will drive this entire country into a brick wall in the years ahead. John McCain, Lindsey Graham, Chucky Schumer and Nancy Pelosi, are you kidding me? They remind me of George Armstrong Custer, and we all know how that turned out.

  The media is even worse. In what Glenn Greenwald accurately called “one of the sickest things ever to appear on US television,” MSNBC’s Brian Williams gushed about the “beauty” of U.S. cruise missiles.

  good thing we don't have govt-controlled media in this country pic.twitter.com/fLkt9lQZa6

  — Adam H. Johnson (@adamjohnsonNYC) April 7, 2017

  //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

  Here’s another sign of imperial collapse, Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, in a war zone calling the shots.

  The Endless War Collection by J. Crew pic.twitter.com/LgiRSzXAux

  — Brandy Jensen (@BrandyLJensen) April 6, 2017

  //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

  This is not the sort of thing you see in a confident, brave, and civilized nation, it’s the sort of stuff you’d expect to see toward the end. It’s the stuff of craven war-mongers, of dishonest cowards, of a totally deranged and very dangerous media. The signs are everywhere; imperial decline is set to accelerate rapidly in the coming years.

  Fine, but how is all this going to play out? Obviously nobody really knows, but I do think we’ve entered a new period in American history. I think it’s basically a crossing of the Rubicon moment for the American empire. Personally, I don’t expect a strong and visible military response from Russia in the near-term. I don’t think Putin wants to give the U.S. media and newly minted neocon Donald Trump an excuse to do anything truly crazy, which they can blame on Russia in the court of public opinion. I think Putin is too smart for that. Rather, what I think he’ll do is make all sorts of moves behind the scenes to weaken America’s economic power, while at the same time engaging in minor provocations to tempt the imbeciles in charge of U.S. foreign policy to make further mistakes abroad, to which they’ll emphatically oblige.

  In other words, Russia will attempt to make the U.S. extend itself further in a region where no real success is possible, at the same time that the American economy deteriorates further. Recall that the current very weak economic “recovery” has been going on for nearly a decade. This cycle is very long in the tooth, and all Russia really needs to do is sit back, make some moves behind the scenes and allow the U.S. to collapse upon itself in its hubris and stupidity. This is precisely what I think is going to happen.

  Finally, let’s not forget the following.

  Since 9/11:
  1) Non-stop war.
  2) Destruction of U.S. middle class.
  3) Banker bailouts
  4) Death of civil liberties.
  We showed 'em terrorists.

  — Michael Krieger (@LibertyBlitz) April 6, 2017

  //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

  Expect more of all the above as the U.S. empire enters its most devastating phase of collapse. Think about what it might mean for you and your family and prepare accordingly.

   

  

  

• Has Middle Class America Been Fleeced?

  Authored by Hunter Lewis via The Mises Institute,

  Noah Smith, writing in Bloomberg, says that middle class America has indeed been fleeced by our national economic policies. We agree. But which policies have been responsible?

  Smith mentions and immediately dismisses trade, immigration, economic regulation, and welfare policies.

  The real villain in his view is an alleged turn toward managing the economy on free market lines: “Your prosperity was taken by the very people who promised to ensure and enhance it. The decades from 1980 through 2008 were the age of neoliberalism — the ideology of the free market.”

  This is a story that we hear more and more. Neoliberals, the favorite new epithet on the left for free market exponents, have ruled the roost for decades ( note how the Obama administration is simply ignored in the preceding quote), and have left the poor and middle class far worse off than they were.

  The truth is that the Bush-Clinton-Bush-Obama era had much in common, and it was not free market principles. It was an era of unrestrained crony capitalism, in which special interests formed stronger and stronger alliances with government in order to secure economic monopolies and other privileges.

  It was also, not coincidentally, an era of repeated boom and bust, as the Federal Reserve and other central banks created immense amounts of new money to keep the crony capitalist game going. The Fed did not create all the new money to help the poor and the middle class. They did it primarily to support the government debt machine, which they worried was on the verge of collapse in 2008. The result is that government debt has now doubled in the few years since then.

  Can Noah Smith, an intelligent writer and economics professor, really believe that free market principles prevailed in recent decades? The only possible excuse for this is that crony capitalists tend to hide their actions behind free market slogans. This is genuinely confusing.

  Today, for example, we are told by most commentators that we have a choice between “free trade” and “protectionism,” and the free trade position is represented by people like Hillary Clinton and Hank Paulson, the Bush Treasury Secretary during the last Crash who rescued his old firm, Goldman Sachs, and coincidentally the value of his shares in that firm, and who more recently supported Hillary for president. To describe these people as supporters of “ free trade” is a joke. They are supporters of “ crony trade” in which so-called free trade agreements are actually written by special interests in order to escape the pressures of a genuinely free market.

  And does Smith really believe that giving government even more control over the economy will achieve anything other than making crony capitalism worse?

  Oh well, at least Smith did not equate what he called “neoliberalism” with fascism, as many on the left are now doing in books and articles. That makes a lot of sense, does it not? Proponents of more liberty in economics and other areas of our lives are somehow like Hitler or Mussolini?

  Lewis nails the dismal science but we leave it to econfinjunkie's comments to sum up the farce…

  If anyone needed one more reason to hold Noah Smith and mainstream economics in contempt, read that article.

   

  It is so much easier for those in the mainstream to be ignorant and publish crap like that than for, say, an Austrian economist to do the same. How can anyone with an advanced degree in economics say that our society is based on free market principles? It makes you wonder what they teach after high school.

   

  Starting in intro classes all the way to PhD coursework, didn't anyone ever think to point out to the future Dr. Smith and his classmates that "oh, by the way, all these principles of free markets we're talking about, they're the ideal; they don't apply to our own economy since we don't have a free market/society, because we have a central bank, minimum wages, millions of pages of regulations, bank bailouts, and on and on"?

   

  There can be a conversation about whether all these things are justified, but to say that our economy reflects a free market is to put your ignorance on full display for all to see.

  

  

• Visualizing The Netflix Generation

  Since launching in the United States in 1948, cable television quickly emerged as the media consumption method of choice for families around the world.

  Cable brought to us some of the most memorable and noteworthy events in history. People saw the fall of the Berlin Wall from their living rooms in 1989 – and many even remember being inspired by Neil Armstrong taking his first steps on the moon twenty years earlier.

  And although television is still a vital medium today, Visual Capitalist's Jeff Desjardins warns that it is also stuck in an inevitable quagmire. Digital already generates more ad revenue than television, while more people switch to streaming platforms every day.

  Make no mistake – even though there is still plenty of money to be made in television, cable is experiencing a slow death, just like other traditional media channels. It might not yet be reduced to the more niche territory of radio or print, but cable is treading the same path.

  THE DIGITAL NATIVES

  Why this is the case is very simple math.

  Even just six years ago in 2011, the average 18-24 year old millennial consumed about 25 hours of traditional television per week – today, they consume closer to 14 hours.

  That said, it’s no surprise that the first generation of digital natives skews heavily towards digital content, but what will be even more interesting is the behavior of the next generation on deck: Gen Z (born in 2000 and onwards). This cohort was born into a world of screens and iPhones, and will not be aware of a prior era. To them, flipping through channels on cable television seems even more antiquated and arbitrary than it does to older generations.

  Gen Z watches between two and four hours of YouTube and less than an hour of traditional television per day. They’re also twice more likely to use YouTube than Millennials, and a lot less likely to use Facebook.

   

  – Shireen Jiwan, chief brand experience officer at Lucky Brand

  Less than an hour per day is not very conducive to the cable business, especially when there are hundreds of channels in existence today. And while insights on Gen Z are still fluid and evolving, it’s highly doubtful that the generation will do a 360 on video anytime soon.

  In the meantime, cable’s survival as a dominant medium rests squarely on the shoulders of older generations. While it works as a business for now, cable can’t fight the demographics forever.

  

  Courtesy of: Visual Capitalist

  

  

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• "Terrorism Is Really Not That Big A Deal" Harvard Students See Trump Worse Than ISIS

  What is more dangerous: President Donald Trump’s rhetoric or ISIS?

  

  Campus Reform’s Cabot Phillips received some curious answers to that question from the hallowed halls of Harvard University, clarifying perspective on student’s mass dissonance in America…  

  “I think he’s an asshole-in-chief… Terrorism is really not that big of a deal… ISIS is not a threat to everyday life; Trump’s rhetoric and “empowering” people with hateful views is more of a threat.“

  

  

• 'Killfie' Nation – India Dominates World's Selfie-Related Deaths

  The trend of taking death-defying 'killfies' is taking its toll in a Darwinian sense… on India!

  The rise of smartphones and social media has paved the way for selfies to become a popular pastime for young people around the world, but as Statista's Felix Richter notes, sometimes people hunting for the perfect self-portrait get carried away though and put themselves and sometimes others in harm’s way. Tragic as it is, researchers from the United States and India have found that taking selfies in dangerous situations cost at least 127 lives since March 2014.

  The researchers scoured the web for news articles reporting selfie-related deaths in an effort to raise awareness and help prevent further injuries or deaths as a consequence of reckless selfie-taking. Ridiculous as it may sound, there are many ways to harm yourself while taking a selfie. The cases found by the researchers include several people falling from great heights, drowning or accidently shooting themselves while taking a selfie with a gun.

  Photographers appear to be particularly careless in India where the researchers found the most reports of selfie-related accidents by far.

  

  You will find more statistics at Statista

  

  

• Doug Casey Explains Why College Is A Waste of Money

  Via Casey Research,

  I recently sat down again with Casey Research founder Doug Casey to discuss a troubling trend: the fast-rising cost of a college education. Read our conversation below to see why Doug says relying on – and paying for – today's educational paradigm "makes as much sense as entering a Model T Ford in the 24 Hours of Le Mans"…

  Justin: Doug, I recently had an interesting conversation with my sister.

  She told me that her financial advisor suggested she start setting aside $500 to $1,000 a month to pay for her son’s college education. That’s because a four-year college education is apparently going to cost between $400,000 and $500,000 18 years from now.

  Her advisor clearly arrived at this figure based on how fast college tuition costs have been rising, which is about 6% per year based on my research.

  But you have to wonder if the cost can keep rising at this rate. It seems to me that no one will go to college if it’s going to cost a half-million bucks.

  What do you make of this trend?

  Doug: Well, the first thing—my advice to your sister is to get a new financial advisor. I fear that she’s relying on a complete imbecile. She should fire him immediately, and for a number of reasons.

  Number one is his assumption that the trend of higher college costs is going to continue to a totally unaffordable level. In fact, the cost/benefit ratio of going to college is already so out of whack that the whole system has to change radically. A college degree, even now, is of only marginal value; most everybody has one. And things that everybody has are devalued. You’re quite correct that colleges and universities today are dead ducks as businesses. Unless you’re going to learn a trade, like doctoring or lawyering, or you’re going for science, engineering, or math, where you need the formal discipline and where you need lab courses, it’s a total misallocation, even a waste of money to go to college today.

  So I applaud the fact that all these colleges and universities are dead men walking, that they’re all going to go bankrupt. They are totally overrun and infested with cultural Marxists and progressives, militant leftists that are propagandizing kids with absolutely the wrong kind of values. It’s astonishing that parents are willing to pay even today’s prices to subject their kids to four years of indoctrination. So I’m glad that they’re all going bankrupt.

  Justin: But don’t you need a college education to get ahead in life?

  Doug: It’s not necessary to go to college. You’re likely to be corrupted, and indebt yourself like an indentured servant for many years to come. The question is: Do you want an education, or do you just want a piece of paper that says you logged the time in a classroom? These are two different things. Getting an education is strictly a matter of motivation and self-discipline, not paying money to sit in a classroom. If you’ve got half a brain, you realize that you want the knowledge, not the diploma, and there’s no necessary correlation between them. Nobody can “give” you an education; it’s something you must gain for yourself.

  Most top universities now have their courses online. You can get an education by listening to these courses. And even when you’re driving your car, you should be playing CDs by The Teaching Company. They have the best professors in the world giving command performance lectures. And you can hear them an unlimited number of times. This is much better than listening to some also-ran drone on, while you may have cut the class, or be half asleep, or not taking good notes.

  Technology has changed the whole landscape of education. Its cost is approaching zero, not the stratosphere, as your sister’s advisor seems to think. If the kids insist on going to college and indenturing themselves, as well as cluttering their minds with irrelevancies and false data, then they should only consider, say, Harvard, or very few schools like it. At least there the prestige, and qualifications for admission, are so high that the connections they make may compensate for the many downsides.

  And anyway, Ray Kurzweil’s right about the Singularity, in my opinion. And he’s upped the date to when it’s going to occur to 2029, which is only 12 years from now, at which point the whole world will have changed in ways that will change the nature of life itself. So forget about saving to send your kids to college; and that goes double for your grandkids.

  Justin: I thought the same thing, Doug.

  You see, my sister’s advisor suggested that she and her husband set up a 529 plan, which is basically a tax-friendly way to save money for college. I asked her what would happen to the money if her son didn’t go to college. She said she could use the money to pay her for grandchildren’s college education.

  But, like you said, the world is going to be very different 12 years from now. Who knows what it’s going to look like 40 or 50 years from now?

  Doug: Over the next generation the world is going to change totally and unrecognizably from the way it is right now. Technological change is compounding at an exponential rate. It’s always been exponential, quite frankly. Ever since the invention of fire. But we’re now in its later stages; it’s like a Saturn rocket taking off, very slowly at first, but constantly accelerating.

  It’s going to be fascinating and fantastic to watch what happens over the next 20 years. And relying on, and paying for, today’s educational paradigm makes as much sense as entering a Model T Ford in the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

  Justin: I agree 100%. We’re living in very exciting times.

  Anyway, thank you for taking the time to speak with me, Doug. It was a pleasure, as always.

  Doug: You’re welcome.

  *  *  *

  Every month, Doug shares his unique insights in The Casey Report, our flagship publication. If you sign up today, you’ll get complete access to all of our archived content, including recent essays by Doug on the Greater Depression, the migrant crisis, and technology. You’ll also receive specific, actionable advice to help you protect and grow your personal financial empire. You can sign up for a risk-free trial of The Casey Report right here.

   

  

  

• Here Are The States With The Highest Property Taxes

  ATTOM Data Solutions has scoured county-level property tax records from across the country to figure out exactly who is getting punished the most on their real estate taxes.  To our complete ‘shock’, the resulting map looks eerily similar to the 2016 presidential electoral college map with the liberal bastions of the Northeast and Midwest suffering the highest property tax burdens.  Per RealtyTrac:

  Average Annual Property Tax was $3,296, an Effective Tax Rate of 1.15 Percent; Highest Effective Tax Rates in New Jersey, Illinois, Texas, New Hampshire, Vermont; Owner-Occupied Properties Register Higher Effective Tax Rates Than Investment Properties

   

  ATTOM Data Solutions, curator of the nation’s largest fused property database, today released a 2016 property tax analysis for more than 84 million U.S. single family homes, which shows that property taxes levied on single family homes in 2016 totaled $277.7 billion, an average of $3,296 per home and an effective tax rate of 1.15 percent.

   

  The report analyzed property tax data collected from county tax assessor offices nationwide at the state, metro and county level along with estimated market values of single family homes calculated using an automated valuation model (AVM). The effective tax rate was the average annual property tax expressed as a percentage of the average estimated market value of homes in each geographic area.

  

   

  Not surprisingly, residents of New Jersey won the award for highest property taxes of any overall state in the union while Westerchester County, the posh suburb of New York City, won for most expensive local municipality with taxes averaging over $16,000.

  

   

  Per the chart below, states with the highest effective property tax rates were New Jersey (2.31 percent), Illinois (2.13 percent); Texas (2.06 percent); New Hampshire (2.03 percent); and Vermont (2.02 percent).  Other states in the top 10 for highest effective property tax rates were Connecticut (2.00 percent), Pennsylvania (1.89 percent), New York (1.88 percent), Ohio (1.68 percent), and Rhode Island (1.64 percent).

  

   

  Meanwhile, among the 586 counties with a population of at least 100,000 and at least 10,000 single family homes, nine posted average annual property taxes of more than $10,000…and again, to our complete shock, each one of them is in a deep-blue state: Westchester, Rockland, and Nassau counties in New York; Essex, Bergen, Union and Morris counties in New Jersey; Marin County, California; and Fairfield County, Connecticut.

  Perhaps this is why our young snowflakes don’t own homes anymore…their desires to put their Ivy League anthropology degrees to good use in New York City don’t mesh well with the financial realities of implementing their socialist utopias.

  

  

• For Sale On The Dark Web: Your Tax Refund And Social Security Number

  After death, and taxes, we can now add a third 'certainty' to life – identity theft.

  Amid the business of tax season, it's not just accountants that are toiling hard to collect their fees. As Bloomberg reports, tax season is hog heaven for cybercriminals. The thought of all that personal data just sitting around, unmolested in tax documents, inspires a torrent of creepy scammer creativity.

  The Krebs on Security blog provided a glimpse earlier this year of how our tax data is bought and sold, and what scammers charge other scammers for our data.

  Founder Brian Krebs came across something he hadn’t seen before on the Dark Web: Bulk sales of W-2 forms.

  

  A scammer had phished a tax preparation firm, Krebs discovered, and was offering for sale 3,600 Florida W-2s in this cyber netherworld which, while connected to the everyday web, requires special software or authorization to access.

  Bloomberg notes that the fruits of all the successful phishing attempts wind up on the Dark Web.

  These offers can look run of the mill, complete with star ratings for sellers. Here is a screenshot showing sellers and their illegal wares, such as W-2s, taken from IBM’s report:

  

  The Dark Web has its own selling language. “Fullz” means complete information on an individual, including, according to the IBM report, “payment card information, address and contact details, and other additional pieces of personally identifiable information, such as Social Security number, a driver’s license number, and any other information sold along with the set.”

  

   

  An individual’s tax data is far more valuable than their credit card data. Stolen credit card data might sell for $1 or be given away to establish credibility on the Dark Web, said Limor Kessem, executive security adviser of IBM Security. Credit card accounts can be closed or frozen, and thus have a short criminal-shelf life.

  “Tax filing information is probably the most premium type of record criminals can buy on the underground,” said Kessem, who has been tracking this world for eight years.

   

  “It goes for $40 or $50, and unlike credit cards, never expires. People can try and get loans in someone’s name, make fake IDs in people’s names, get credit.” And of course, the top target is filing a tax return in someone's name and getting the refund.

  With phishing attacks on the rise, Bloomberg suggests a consumer’s best defense is a good offense. One of the simplest, when it comes to tax refund fraud: File your taxes early to beat would-be scammers to the punch.

  

  

• What Makes Millennials Disturbingly Different?

  Authored by Gordon Long via MATASII,

  In stealth fashion millennials are rapidly transforming society.

  Something had mysteriously changed during the 2016 US Presidential primaries when an unlikely democratic candidate burst on the national scene with an unquestionable allure for the Millennial generation. How was it that a ‘left wing’ Bernie Sanders, who was of an age that he would be considered as a very old grandfather by this young generation, could draw such rousing support? What was it about this grey haired unknown senator from Vermont who so clearly represented the expectations, aspirations and frustrations of this new ‘coming of age’ generation?

  

  Millennials have silently emerged as a powerful and influential force because of their size and because of how contrasting their beliefs are from versus previous generations including only slightly older Gen-X.

  

  Millennials have surpassed Baby Boomers as the nation’s largest living generation, according to population estimates recently released by the U.S. Census Bureau.  Millennials, defined as those ages 18-34 in 2015, now number 75.4 million, surpassing the 74.9 million Baby Boomers (ages 51-69) and Generation X (ages 35-50 in 2015) is projected to pass the Boomers in population by 2028.

  Very importantly, the Millennial generation continues to grow as young immigrants expand its ranks which presently account for over 15% of the total.

  

   

  What Makes Millennials Different?

  

  The Millennial  generation grew up during an era of unprecedented changes and shocks which have profoundly influenced their views and choices:

  1. Millennials are older in household formations  when they marry and have children compared to previous generations,
  2. Millennials have student debt loads that define and significantly frame this generations financial choices,
  3. Millennials are more educated than any previous generation as defined by percentage with undergraduate and post graduate educational attainments,
  4. There is a much more foreign born component of the millennial generation at 15%, than any generation going back to the early 1900’s European immigration wave to the US,

  

  1. Family is much more important as a result of changes in parenting since roles such as fatherhood have taken on more involvement, youth event participation and inward family cocooning. A 1997 Gallup survey found that 9 in 10 children (a population comprised entirely of Millennials that year) reported high levels of closeness with their parents and were personally happy with that relationship. Their tight relationship with their parents extends to work, where some companies report establishing relationships with parents of their Millennial employees. The Millennials’ close relationships with their parents might be related to the greater time they spent with their parents growing up. According to Pew (2014), hours spent parenting have increased for both fathers and mothers, tripling for fathers since 1985 and increasing by 60 percent for mothers. These increases have been particularly pronounced among college-educated parents, with college-educated mothers increasing their childcare time since the mid-1990s by over 9 hours per week, while less educated mothers increased their childcare time by only over 4 hours per week.

  

  1. Millennials are much more pronounced to move to Urban centers versus being interested in Suburban living,
  2. Millennial are the most technology-centric generation yet, as they came of age in  the era of the internet / smart phones and fully embraced social media to change how they communicate and socialize,
  3. Millennials also came of age during developments that deeply shaped their sense and need for security.
     • 911 and  the emerging reality of terrorism in the US,
     • Iraq and Afghanistan Wars where fellow students fought,
     • School shootings across the nation and the security changes required,
     • Corporate Downsizing, Right-Sizing and Out-Sourcing which effected their financial security of the family,
  4. The Millennial generation has a much larger sense of “entitlement” since they were often raised and educated with a sense of “you deserve” versus “you earned”,
     • Millennials believe student loans should be forgiven and is one of the reasons Bernie Sanders was so popular,
     • Millennials are much more tolerant of others and cultural differences and react strongly to hate speech, threats and racism
  5. Millennials earn 20% less than Baby Boomers did at their age.

  

  All of these differences are now being felt as the Millennial generation becomes an increasingly larger component of the US economy.

  Three Major Economic Ramifications:  My Macro Analytics Co-Host Charles Hugh-Smith believes these differences are being witnessed by the following three Economic ramifications:

  1.  Urban vs. Suburban Living

  The Shift:

  • Millennials favor foot-traffic urban shopping/entertainment/dining districts,
  • Millennials favor streets with high densities of venues, cafes, brew-pubs, etc. which are safe and close to mass transit,
  • These urban districts are expanding in small cities, college towns, etc.
  • The experience is as important as pricing: Millennials value convenience and a variety of experiences, not just convenience and price.
  • Long commutes and suburban shopping malls are not convenient to Millennials
  • Home ownership rates are falling due to the very high cost of urban-core housing,
  • By choice or necessity Millennials rent rather than buy,

  The Economic Ramification:

  • Future Single Residential Housing Requirements may be less and housing prices exposed as Baby Boomers leave their homes for Assisted Living or Nursing Homes.
  • Boomer wealth is largely tied up in costly homes–who will buy these houses as Boomers sell to downsize/retire?

  2.  Auto and Light Truck Sales

  The Shift:
  

  • Millennials favor Uber and Car-sharing over auto ownership.
  • Urban living and avoiding longer commutes reduces the need for auto ownership.

  The Economic Ramification:

  

  • This has implications for auto/truck sales and gasoline consumption.
  • Can 18M / year of auto sales be maintained?
    http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-03-04/us-motorist-unwell-miles-driven-suffer-biggest-slowdown-over-2-years

  3.  Retail Shopping and Retail Commercial Real Estate

  The Shift:
  

  • Millennials favor the convenience of online shopping,
  • Millennials do not find value in big suburban malls
  • Millennials often work a lot of hours and don’t want to waste time commuting/driving to suburban shopping.
  • Hard to beat the easy return policy of Zappos and Amazon or the value of free delivery via Amazon prime,

  The Economic Ramification:

  • The future of the Mall is likely limited as well as many “brick & mortar” retailers.
  • America is the most highly over-stored nation in the world. Excess retailing space is a massive future problem
  • Amazon has reached critical mass and as Millennials continue to dominate, online procurement and delivery will continue to accelerate.

   

  Three Major Social Ramifications:  Though it is too certain to know for certain, indications are that there are a number of social ramifications that can be expected as a result of the advent of the Millennial Generation.

  1.  Physical and Financial Security

  The Shift:
  

  • Millennials place a higher value on physical and financial security as a result of the era they grew up in,

  The Social Ramification:

  • Millennials will be willing political to sacrifice personal freedoms if it is perceived that it will allow government agencies to better ensure this.
  • Security-Surveillance methodologies and technologies will become an increasing larger way of American life.
  • Millennials are likely to be “savers” in a much larger way than the last two generations.

  

  2.  Government Entitlements

  The Shift:
  

  • Millennials  overwhelmingly believe student loans are unjust and should be a government entitlement program.
  • Existing student loans should be forgiven and paid by the government.

  The Social Ramification:

  • Candidates that run on a platform of student loan forgiveness will be elected.
  • Candidates that run on platforms of Social Security and Medicare means testing will have wide Millennial support.
  • Generally, Millennials will be more ‘left leaning’ as demonstrated by Bernie Sanders.

  

  3.  Less Materialistic

  The Shift:
  

  • Millennials having grown up with most of their needs being met are less inclined to seek satisfaction from materialism and pursue wealth accumulation.
  • Millennials are more inclined to be motivated by notoriety & seek political influence. This stems from their roots in social media,
  • This is a trend that has been seen in other countries when opportunities for wealth  creation become more restrictive.

  The Social Ramification:

  • Millennials will place in jeopardy the US economy being a 70% Consumption economy
    

  The biggest long term ramification may be the last. The era of the US economy sustaining itself via consumption may die as the Millennials become the economy! Their motivations and expectations are completely different than any prior generation and the changes will be profound.

  Charles Hugh Smith concludes that there may be a consequence which is a even bigger question.

  He asks: “Can our financial system and debt-burdened economy enable the sort of life the Millennials seek, or have we run out of room to transition to a lower consumption lifestyle and still service the growing mountain of debt?”

  His conclusion: “It seems to me that the Millennials will have to navigate a system re-set that few of them seem to anticipate!”

  WHAT IS OFTEN DUBBED “THE SNOWFLAKE” GENERATION

  

  

  

• Trump's North Korea Options: Place Nukes In South Korea Or Kill Kim Jong-Un

  With Syria down, it’s now North Korea’s turn. 

  According to NBC News, the National Security Council has presented the suddenly ragingly bellicose President Trump with several options to respond to North Korea’s nuclear program: put American nukes in South Korea or kill dictator Kim Jong-un.

  The scenarios were prepared in advance of Trump’s meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping this week. The White House has expressed hopes the Chinese will do more to influence Pyongyang through diplomacy and enhanced sanctions, but if that fails, and North Korea continues its development of nuclear weapons, there are other options on the table that would significantly alter U.S. policy.

  While Gen. John Hyten, the commander of U.S. Strategic Command, maintained on Wednesday that “any solution to the North Korea problem has to involve China” a senior intel official told NBC he doubted U.S. and China could find a diplomatic solution to the crisis. “We have 20 years of diplomacy and sanctions under our belt that has failed to stop the North Korean program,” said the official involved in the review. “I’m not advocating pre-emptive war, nor do I think that the deployment of nuclear weapons buys more for us than it costs,” but he stressed that the U.S. was dealing with a “war today” situation.

  The “nuclear” option would mark the first overseas nuclear deployment since the end of the Cold War, a move that would promptly provoke global condemnation, not least of all by China. It was not immediately clear if South Korea’s regime – in turmoil recently following the recent impeachment and arrest of ex-president Park – had been consulted with the proposed strategy. The U.S. withdrew all
  nuclear weapons from South Korea 25 years ago.

  This “option” is also facing domestic pushback: “I don’t think that [deploying nuclear weapons] is a good idea. I think that it will only inflame the view from Pyongyang,” retired Adm. James Stavridis and former NATO commander told NBC News. “I don’t see any upside to it because the idea that we would use a nuclear weapon even against North Korea is highly unlikely.” 

  South Korea’s sentiment aside, NBC notes that the US Air Force leadership doesn’t “necessarily” support putting nuclear weapons in South Korea. As an alternative, it’s been practicing sorties right out of the depths of the cold war: long-range strikes with strategic bombers — sending them to the region for exercises and deploying them in Guam and on the peninsula as a show of force.

  * * *

  The second, and just as controversial option, is to kill North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and other senior leaders in charge of the country’s nuclear

  prgoram. The overt regime overthrow option has huge downsides, said Mark Lippert, the former U.S, ambassador to South Korea, who also served as an assistant defense secretary under President Barack Obama. “Discussions of regime change and decapitation…tend to cause the Chinese great pause of concern and tends to have them move in the opposite direction we would like them to move in terms of pressure,” he said.

  Quoted by NBC, Stavridis, said that “decapitation is always a tempting strategy when you’re faced with a highly unpredictable and highly dangerous leader”, especially for a nation like the US he did not add.  “The question you have to ask yourself,” he said, “is what happens the day after you decapitate? I think that in North Korea, it’s an enormous unknown.”

  In any case, the groundwork has already been laid: as reproted one month ago, elite US forces, including  Delta Force and SEAL Team 6 have been conducting drills on taking out Kim Jong-Un, as well as practicing tactical North Korea “infiltration.” All they need is the green light.

  * * *

  A third, bonus option, is covert action, infiltrating U.S. and South Korean special forces into North Korea to sabotage or take out key infrastructure — for instance, blowing up bridges to block the movement of mobile missiles. The CIA, which would oversee such operations, told NBC News it could offer “no guidance” on this option. But Stavridis said that he felt it was the “best strategy” should the U.S. be forced to take military action. He described such action as: “some combination of special forces with South Korea and cyber.”

  One wonders if the CIA creating a “false flag” attack on South Korea (or China) using chemical weapons was one of the options under consideration.

  * * *

  Trump has already indicated he’s open to unilateral action if China fails to rein in its ally, telling the Financial Times last weekend, “If China is not going to solve North Korea, we will.”

  Until last night, his words were largely dismissed as more bluster; however having just demonstrated how quickly Trump is willing to launch offensive operations – having U-turned on his Syrian position in less than a week – suddenly the possibility of nuclear war with an irrational adversary does not look all that distant.

  

  

• David Rosenberg: "This Is A Bubble Of Historic Proportions"

  Shortly after we remarked most recently on the unprecedented Canadian housing bubble that has migrated from Vancouver to Toronto, Gluskin Sheff's Chief Economist David Rosenberg joined the growing chorus of calls for government intervention into the Toronto housing market. In an interview on BNN, Rosenberg, who correctly called the U.S. housing bubble in 2005 when still at Merrill Lynch, said the massive deviation from historical norms has him drawing comparisons between the two situations.

  “This bubble is on par with what we had in the States back in ’05, ’06, ’07,” he said. “We have to actually take a look at the situation. The housing market here is in a classic price bubble. If you don’t acknowledge that, you have your head in the sand.”

  Rosenberg warned unchecked increases in home prices are becoming a social issue. “It’s not an equity, it’s not a bond — it’s where people live,” he said. “Where home prices are in Toronto, they absorb 13 years of average family income. That is completely abnormal. We’ve never seen this before.”

  “We’re out of equilibrium, and when we’re out of equilibrium, or there’s some sort of market failure, are there grounds there for government intervention? I think even the most ardent libertarian would say ‘yes'." Rosenberg said there are a trio of levers the government can pull to cool down the market. Authorities can address supply, which he said has already been “kiboshed.” Interest rates can be raised, but Rosenberg doesn’t believe the Bank of Canada will do that.  Or new policy can be drafted to address the prevalence of speculation.

  “These are not prices driven by the local fundamentals — this is the foreign buyer coming in,” Rosenberg said. “Toronto has really emerged as a first-class city, not just politically, not just culturally and economically, but also in terms of being a major financial centre. But if you’re going to ask me at this stage, ‘do we need to approach taxation of this capital coming in differently to curb the demand?’ [That’s] absolutely right.”

  And just to make his position clear, Rosenberg also an op-ed in Canada's Financial Post on the topic, titled simply enough:

  "Make no mistake, the Toronto real estate market is in a bubble of historic proportions"

  by David Rosenberg

  The concerns about froth in Toronto’s housing market are not likely to subside given the sticker-shock from the latest report from the Toronto Real Estate Board.

  As per the March report, the average single-detached house in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) sold for $1,214,422 last month up from $910,375 in March of last year — that is a 33 per cent YoY surge, and follows a 16 per cent run-up over the prior 12 months.

  Whatever the term is for an acceleration in an already parabolic curve, well, that is what we have on our hands today.

  And it isn’t just detached homes seeing this degree of rapid price appreciation — the benchmark single-family home selling price was up 29 per cent YoY, the benchmark townhouse price was up 28 per cent and the condo/apartment composite was up 24 per cent.

  This is a bubble of historic proportions.

  Not only to have home prices in the GTA now absorb an unprecedented 13 years of median family income, but to have 30 per-cent-ish run-ups against a backdrop of a 2 per cent inflation rate, wages that are barely going up 2 per cent as well, and nominal GDP growth of around 4 per cent. This should put 30 per cent into some sort of perspective when we conclude that what we have on our hands is a near three standard deviation event.

  That alone qualifies as a bubble — if you don’t like that term, then call it a giant sud. In the past, Toronto home prices went up at an annual rate of 4 per cent in real terms, in the past year they have surged by nearly 30 per cent.

  Some context, however, is needed here.

  First, this aggressive increase in home prices in Canada’s most populous city has come (at least in part) due to strong competition among potential buyers for comparatively scant homes for sale.

  Active listings of homes available for sale in Toronto plunged 35.2 per cent YoY in March, which means that the months’ supply of houses on the market is a miniscule 0.65, down from 1.18 last March — for reference, a “balanced market” sees a months’ supply figure around 6.0. The average home that was put up for sale remained on the market for just 10 days, down from 16 days a year ago.

  These measures of “tightness” in the market are without precedent — not even the red-hot late-1980s bubble experience could ever compete with today’s backdrop.

  As well, the sales-to-new listings ratio sits well into “sellers’ market” territory at 70.8 per cent, which compares to 69.4 per cent a year ago — a ratio between 40 per cent and 60 per cent is considered indicative of a “balanced market.”

  No wonder nobody wants to list their home! It’s become such a valuable asset.

  But you see, this is where the danger comes in: when people start to view their house as some investment as opposed to a home — a place to raise the kids and play with them in the backyard.

  A house is an asset indeed, but should never be compared to a stock or a bond or even other investable properties. It is a place to live.

  Unlike a stock, which you can sell anytime and tuck away the winnings, if you sell your house, well, you still need a roof over your head. A stock with a dividend gives you an income stream, as does a fixed-income instrument. Unless you are a landlord, your house is burning cash (utilities, property taxes, maintenance), not bringing in cash.   

  So there are indeed some supply and demand fundamentals that are underpinning prices. Insofar as the demand is rising because people think they are investing in something hot just because of the accelerating momentum, well, these people are going to end up being pretty big losers. For if the government catches a whiff that it is now speculative fever that is dominating the uber-hot housing market, well that could very well elicit a response (as in capital gains taxes for those who sell within a year or two).

  At some point, a correction would be very healthy because on the other side, owners of homes will then realize that no, they did not win some lottery, and will finally be willing to start listing their property, especially those who deep down want to sell (it could well be that the move-up buyers would like to sell but can’t afford that mansion of their dreams).

  Not to mention first-time buyers who do not have the income for a down payment that any lender would consider appropriate. After all, we have hit the bizarre stage where a typical home now (and we are talking about a bungalow in Pape Village, not exactly an estate on Warren Road) would absorb 13 years of median household income.

  Not even in the late 1980s, did housing get this expensive on this basis, and we know all too well how the Bank of Canada ultimately reacted and what happened next. Stephen Poloz is definitely no John Crow — though things can always change.     

  One caveat should be noted because what is different this time around (oh, how I hate using that phrase) is that Toronto has emerged as a world-class city and the foreign buyer is clearly having an impact.

  So while Toronto residential real estate is indeed expensive for the locals, it is far less so for foreign investors, especially for Americans who can buy Canadian assets at a 25 per cent discount from a currency perspective.

  In the mid to late 1980s, Toronto did not have the Rogers Center. It did not have the Raptors. It had no decent hotel outside of the Four Seasons and the Windsor Arms. Truly great restaurants were not to be found (unless you want to count Winston’s!). There was no Drake. And Toronto FC was not in existence. Not to mention there was very little in the way of a theater district.

  While the separatist threat in Quebec gave Toronto the mantle of being Canada’s financial center back in 1976, the city was never seriously viewed as a global player in this respect until very recently. With more than 250,000 employed in the financial services sector, Toronto has very quietly emerged as the second largest financial hub in North America (after New York). Of the 84 cities surveyed in the 2015 Global Financial Centres Index, Toronto ranked 8th!

  So while prices may seem a little nutty, it is important to note that Toronto is a major financial, economic and cultural centre, and when compared to its peers globally, prices appear far less crazy, too.

  This doesn’t make the current price action justified based on local income fundamentals, but based on the foreign incomes of those wanting to establish a toehold in a stable Toronto amidst a sea of global instability, the prices are not that much out of whack.

  As per data compiled by Global Property Guide, Toronto home prices on a U.S. dollar per square metre basis rank just 14th in the world, well behind the likes of London, New York, Paris and Tokyo.

  And at the same time, if you are a family in say, Brooklyn Heights looking to buy property in Toronto it would only absorb six years of income; and if you reside in Santa Monica and feel like dipping your toes in the Toronto real estate market, it would only take up four years of your annual median take-home pay. The same (four years) holds true for those wealthy enough to be living in Knightsbridge.

  You see, when Toronto home prices are measured against incomes in other places of the world, it is not nearly as onerous (especially in Canadian dollar terms).

  In other words, many well-heeled foreigners can far better afford what the locals can’t afford here, and housing in recent years has truly become in internationally-traded asset class (though I wouldn’t recommend ripping out the foundation and exporting the structure anywhere).

  So it goes without saying that if the name of the game is to tame the flame then have the foreign investor share the blame. A tax on foreign transactions, as was already done in Vancouver, seems like a pretty good idea. And the government can at the very least use the revenues to either provide greater tax incentives to build and/or provide tax relief for the low/mid income entry-level buyer who is struggling to cobble together the funds for a down payment.

  So yes, in this sense, I would be advocating a Robin Hood style of economic policy.

  Indeed, what may be needed is a very progressive tax on foreign buying of local residential real estate in the bid to cool demand and reverse the exponential surge in home prices — a surge that is creating tremendous social problems by crowding out young families (or individuals) from chasing the homeownership dream (a typical response is for these folks is to go out and buy a condo instead, but the reality is that average prices here have also skyrocketed 24 per cent in the past year and are in a bubble of their own).

  Everyone says that the Bank of Canada cannot raise interest rates to curb the excess demand because of the deleterious effect this would have on the economy writ large (for example, taking the Canadian dollar back up to or above 80 cents which would thwart our export competitiveness which has become a longstanding role of the central bank).

  Be that as it may, the home price surge in the GTA over the past year has impaired homeowner affordability to such an extent that it is basically the equivalent of the Bank of Canada having raised rates 150 basis points — actually a 200 basis point increase if you were to look at what home prices have done to affordability ratios over the past two years (so you can’t have it both ways; the price action is basically equivalent to having five-year mortgage rates closer to 5.75 per cent than the actual posted rate of 3.75 per cent).

  Barring a bold move by the government to bring home prices to levels consistent with domestic economic fundamentals as opposed to income levels from well-heeled buyers from the U.S., China, and Europe, maybe it is time for the Bank of Canada to start playing a role and follow the Fed on a gradual rising interest rate path.

  

  

• The End Game

  Authored by Kevin Muir via The Macro Tourist blog,

  

  We all know the terrifying debt statistics. We are bombarded every day with bearish reports about the gargantuan Federal debt, and when combined with the growing private sector indebtedness, the monolithic entitlements problem, and the looming pension fund shortage, it is easy to wonder how we will ever get out of this colossal mess.

  I do not dispute the numbers one bit. We have too much debt. It’s simple math. We are screwed. Full stop. All of this debt will never be paid back in real terms. Truth be told, I am probably one of the most bearish people out there when it comes to our debt problem.

  But I differ greatly from the vast majority of my peers about what that means for the economy and financial markets.

  There are three solutions to the problem of over-indebtedness.

  The first is to grow your way out. Maybe you cut some spending, hunker down, trim up the sails, and right the ship through good old fashioned economic growth. This solution is a pipe dream left for little children and romantics. In a balance sheet challenged economy, the moment you cut spending, the paradox of thrift kicks in, and the economy rolls over. This is a lesson Japan has learned all too well over the past couple of decades. Not believing Japan’s example, the U.S. repeated the error after the credit crisis of 2008. Thinking overspending was the cause of the problem, the U.S. government (led by the Tea Party) cut discretionary spending to the bone. Remember the 2013 budget sequestration? All of that hullabaloo caused the government to shrink from 2011 to 2015.

  

  Whoa! That doesn’t follow the typical narrative of Obama as a spendthrift fiscally irresponsible President. Didn’t Federal debt balloon under his watch? How does that work? Well, the reality is much of the spending that caused the increase in overall debt was the result of automatic stabilizers – unemployment insurance, etc… Although Obama probably wanted to spend much more, he didn’t. And this is one of the reasons the U.S. economy experienced its weakest post recession recovery. Just look at that chart above. Over the past three decades there has never been a government spending decline of that magnitude.

  Now I realize many of you will probably be saying “good – that’s what’s needed. The idea of increasing spending to solve a problem of too much debt is ridiculous. The reason for the anemic recovery is that we didn’t cut enough.” Which brings me to solution number two.

  In an environment of over-indebtedness, the economy will naturally try to correct through the private sector paying down debt. But over the past half dozen decades, we have been muting regular business cycle declines through overly easy monetary policies. This has encouraged too much borrowing. We have piled more and more debt on the problem. The trouble is that we have done this for so long, the consequences of allowing the cycle to play out has become catastrophic.

  Have a look at the total U.S. credit outstanding (minus financial firms) over the past few decades.

  

  See the slight leveling off in 2007? That is the horrific debt de-leveraging that caused the greatest financial crisis since the Great Depression.

  So far all those economists of the Austrian ilk, I acknowledge that if the government and the Federal Reserve would allow the natural business cycle to operate, we would have debt destruction that would cause the financial system to reset. After this event, the economy would be all set to grow again. Yet this reset would make the 2008 credit crisis look like a warm up. We would have 1930’s style breadlines.

  I don’t buy for one second that the public has the stomach to sit through this type of event. Maybe when the problem of over-indebtedness was smaller, we might have done it. Perhaps in the 1980’s, or maybe even the 1990’s when Greenspan first brought the irrational exuberance problem to the fore, but not today. The pain that would accompany a true debt destruction reset would be too immense. The amount of social upheaval and instability would probably mean the end of the Western world as we know it.

  We can’t grow our way out the debt problem, and we certainly can’t allow it to reset through a cleansing business cycle flush, so what’s the solution?

  That leaves the one tried and true solution. For thousands of years when societies have gotten in trouble with too much debt, they have solved their problem by printing their way out of it. To think the modern day situation will be any different is naive.

  Yeah, sure there will be moments when governments flirt with the idea of prudent monetary and fiscal policy. But those periods will be fleeting. Faced with moribund growth and a steadily increasing debt burden, at the first sign of trouble they will quickly turn on the presses and resort to the time old tradition of inflating away their debts.

  Which brings me to the end game. There are many forecasts for a 2008 style collapse. The consensus is that eventually the debt burden becomes too big to bear, and the next Great Depression rolls in.

  I don’t think that is how it plays out. Most traders hedge for the previous crisis. Visions of 2008 still fill the nightmares of investors. This explains why “gurus” like Carl Icahn have long presentations where they advocate hedges that worked so well in the last crash.

  

  But what’s going to happen the moment things look dicey again? The governments and Central Banks will inflate. We saw it with BREXIT. We saw it with Eurocrisis of 2011. In fact, governments are becoming more and more quick to step on the gas pedal. They realize the costs of over inflating are far less than the costs of delaying.

  Now you might have philosophical problems with these responses. For the longest time I railed on about the dangers of irresponsible monetary policies. It got so bad that on my ski trips, my pals banned me from talking about Greenspan’s reckless behaviour.

  Yet today, I have come around to the idea that the debt problem is so pervasive, there is only way one forward – inflate. We are going to end up there anyway, so let’s just inflate away the burden and restart with a system that prevents this from ever happening again.

  All of this talk is just that though – talk. As traders we need to concern ourselves about what is, instead of, what should be.

  I don’t really care to argue about the morality of these decisions. The internet is filled with idiots shouting their opinions at the top of their lungs. The last thing you need is one more.

  But I want to leave you with this idea. Given the enormous debt problem, the notion we will pay it back in real terms through growth, or even more improbably, the idea of allowing a massive debt destruction event to reset the system, is unrealistic. Any economic weakness will be met with more printing, and more stimulus. Maybe governments allow one or two quarters of weakness. It might even drag on for a year. But then as sure as day follows night, they will inflate again. They simply cannot afford not to.

  They will do anything (and everything) to ensure the financial system doesn’t implode on itself. They will engage in massive Quantitative Easing programs. They will venture out to buy risky assets. They will even take interest rates to negative levels. It is only a matter of time before they are simply dropping cash right into individuals bank accounts.

  I wish I could take credit for this, but it was Bill Fleckenstein who said it first. They will keep printing until the bond market takes the keys away.

  Many market participants are worried about the economy rolling over. Although I understand it would cause some declines in financial markets, what would be the end result? Central Banks would ease, governments would spend, and they would find a way to prop everything back up again.

  I am not smart enough to know if we are going to get another cyclical dip that is met with more easing over the next few quarters. If I had to guess, I would say this is probable – especially in the US. I am not predicting the medium term squiggles. But if this sort of decline were to occur, it would not be the big one.

  The true end game won’t come from weakness, it will come from strength. What happens when economic growth picks up and causes inflation? Given the massive indebtedness, Central Banks will be loathe to raise rates enough to cool inflation. This will only cause more inflation.

  Eventually we will hit a point where governments will be unable to raise rates because it would crush their balance sheet, yet inflation will dictate rates be higher. This will be checkmate. Governments will have no moves. Inflation will soar, the yield curve will steepen (to record wides), and the inflationary reset will be upon us.

  The end game won’t come from a recession, it will come from a boom that gets out of control. I know that it a non-consensus minority opinion, but it’s always the story that no one is expecting that ends up being the problem.

  

  

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