Nov 07

Today’s News 7th November 2016

  • Here's What Happened When A Hillary-Supporting MIT Professor Decided To Analyze Her Emails…

    Submitted by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

    A few days ago, Cesar A. Hidalgo published a very important article titled, What I Learned From Visualizing Hillary Clinton’s Emails.

    So who is Cesar Hidalgo?

    César A. Hidalgo is associate professor of media arts and sciences at the MIT Media Lab and the author of Why Information Grows: The evolution of order from atoms to economies. He has also lead the creation of data visualization sites that have received more than 100 million views, including datausa.io, dataviva.info, atlas.media.mit.edu, immersion.media.mit.edu, pantheon.media.mit.edu, streetscore.media.mit.edu, and others (see chidalgo.com for more details).

    At this point, I’m sure you’re wondering why I’m highlighting this guy’s post two days before the Presidential election. It’s for two reasons. First, the piece offers a very good representation of the sort of peer pressure that can come down upon an academic for being seen as having the “wrong” political opinion. Second, and perhaps most important, his email visualization tool taught him that the current state of our government in these United States simply can’t achieve the best outcomes for the public at current scale (size, geographic/cultural diversity, etc).

    With all that out of the way, I’m going to highlight what I found to be the most powerful part of his piece.

    Enjoy:

    So what did we learn by making this dataset accessible?

     

    We learned a few things about what Clinton’s emails said, about how the media works, and about how people interpreted the project.

     

    We made clinton.media.mit.edu publicly available last Friday night (October 28, 2016). We launched with a single story, written by Alejandra Vargas from Univision.

     

    My intuition was that the story was likely to get picked up by other news sources. After all, the tool facilitated people’s ability to read and understand the content of these emails, and the connections of the people involved in them. But I was wrong—it has been nearly a week since we released the project and no other major news source has picked up the story, despite having been viewed by more than 300,000 people in less than a week.

     

    So how did we get so much traffic without any news coverage? The answer is social media. So far, the tool has been shared widely on Twitter, Facebook, and for a brief but intense time, on Reddit. Its spread has been fueled by different motives, and also, has been battled in different ways.

     

    Many reporters shared the news on their personal accounts understanding that the tool represents a different form of data reporting, or data journalism: one where people are provided with a tool that facilitates their ability to explore a relevant dataset, instead of being provided with a story summarizing a reporter’s description of that dataset.

     

    Another group of people that shared the news were interface designers, who understand that there is a need to improve the tabular interface of present day email clients, and that the inbox we presented in this project was an attractive new alternative.

     

    But many people also shared our site claiming that this was evidence of Clinton’s corruption, and that the site supported Trump. More on that later.

     

    But the spread of the site was not without its detractors. A few hours after we released the site I received a message from a friend telling me that what I had done was “a huge mistake” and that I should have waited to post this until “later in the year.”

     

    A few days later, outside my lab, a member of a neighboring research group called me a “Trump supporter” and told me that I should have only made that site available if it also included Trump’s emails. I told him that I would be happy to include them, but I had no access to the data. In haste, this colleague began emailing me news articles, none of which provided access to the alleged public dataset of Trump emails.

     

    Later, a friend of one of my students posted the news on Reddit, where it went viral. And I mean really viral. It became the top story of the Internetisbeautiful subreddit, and made it to Reddit’s front page. It collected more than 3,000 upvotes and 700 comments. But as the story peaked, a moderator single-handedly removed it in an authoritarian move, and justified this unilateral silencing of the post by adding a rule banning “sites that serve a political agenda or that otherwise induce drama.” Of course, the rule was added AFTER the post was removed.

    Reddit appears to be rampant with censorship these days.

    So when it comes to media, social or not, I learned that providing information directly to people so that they can inspect it and evaluate it, is a value that many people consider second to supporting their preferred electoral choice. The twist is that I don’t support Trump. In fact, I don’t support him at all. I think he is potentially a threat to global security, and also, a candidate that has shown repeatedly to be a dividing rather than unifying force. He has failed to respect contracts numerous times, defrauding contractors; and he certainly has shown little respect for people’s development by creating a fraudulent university. So I think he is ill prepared for most jobs, including a difficult one like that of being president.

     

    I support Clinton in this election, and even though I don’t get to vote (As a green card holder I just pay taxes), I want her to win next Tuesday. I really do. But I understand that this is my own personal choice, a choice that I want to make sure is informed by my ability to evaluate information about the candidates directly, and by a media that is more transparent than the one we now have. Trust me, if I had Trump’s tax records, I would also think it is a good idea to make a tool that makes them more easily digestible. But my reason to make that tool, once again, would not come from my support for Clinton, or my opposition to Trump. It would come from my support for a society where people have direct access to relevant sources of information through well-designed data visualization tools.

    Now here’s where we get into very important lessons about the future.

    So what did I learn about Clinton’s emails? One of the advantages of helping design a data visualization tool is that you get an intimate understanding of the data you are visualizing. After all, you have to explore the data and use the tool to make dozens of design decisions. In this case, the development cycle was particularly fast, but nevertheless I got to learn a few things about the data.

     

    Of course, the whole point of making this tool is that you can use it to come up with your own interpretation of the data. That said, you might be curious about mine, so I’ll share it with you too.

     

    What I saw on Clinton’s emails was not surprising to me. It involved a relatively small group of people talking about what language to use when communicating with other people. Also, it involved many unresponded-to emails. Many conversations revolved around what words to use or avoid, and what topics to focus on, or how to avoid some topics, when speaking in public or in meetings. This is not surprising to me because I’ve met many politicians in my life, including a few presidents and dozens of ministers and governors, so I know that what work means to many people in this line of work, on a daily basis, is strategizing what to say and being careful about how to say it. I am sure that if we had access to Trump’s emails we would see plenty of the same behavior.

     

    So what I got from reading some of Clinton’s email is another piece of evidence confirming my intuition that political systems scale poorly. The most influential actors on them are spending a substantial fraction of their mental capacity thinking about how to communicate, and do not have the bandwidth needed to deal with many incoming messages (the unresponded-to emails). This is not surprising considering the large number of people they interact with (although this dataset is rather small. I send 8k emails a year and receive 30k. In this dataset Clinton is sending only 2K emails a year).

     

    Our modern political world is one where a few need to interact with many, so they have no time for deep relationships?—?they physically cannot. So what we are left is with a world of first impressions and public opinion, where the choice of words matters enormously, and becomes central to the job. Yet, the chronic lack of time that comes from having a system where few people govern many, and that leads people to strategize every word, is not Clinton’s fault. It is just a bug that affects all modern political systems, which are ancient Greek democracies that were not designed to deal with hundreds of millions of people.

     

    On another note, this exercise also helped me reaffirm my belief that the best way to learn about the media is not by reading the news, but by being news. I’ve had the fortune, and misfortune, to have been news many times. This time, I honestly thought that we had a piece of content that some media channels would be interested in and that it would get picked up easily. I have many reporter friends who are enthusiastic about new forms of data journalism, and that actually have been positive and encouraging this week. So I imagined that there was a good chance that a reporter would see the site, go to his or her editor, and say: “Hey, I have an interactive data visualization of all Clinton’s emails. Can I write a story on it?” and the editor would say: “Of course, make it quick.” I don’t know if these conversations actually happened, but given the large volume of traffic our project received I would be surprised if they didn’t. I learned that the outcome was not the one I intuited.

     

    And this brings me to my final point, which is that while I support Clinton in this election, and I think Trump is a bad choice for president (a really bad one), I still think that we should work on the creation of tools that improve the ability of people to personalize scrutinize politically relevant information. I now understand that much of the U.S. media may not share that view with me, and that I think this is an important point of reflection. I hope the media takes some time to think about this on November 9 (or the week after).

     

    Also, the large number of people who were unable to interpret our tool as anything but an effort to support or oppose a political candidate?—?and that was true for both liberals and conservatives?—?speaks to me about an ineffective public sphere. And that’s something I think we should all be concerned about. This polarization is not just a cliché. It is a crippling societal condition that is expressed in the inability of people to see any merit, or any point, in opposing views. That’s a dangerous, and chronic, institutional disease that is expressed also in the inability of people to criticize their own candidates, because they fear being confused with someone their peers will interpret as a supporter of the opposing candidate. If you cannot see any merit in the candidate you oppose, even in one or two of the many points that have been made, you may have it.

     

    So that’s how this election has muddled the gears of democracy. When we cannot learn from those we oppose, or agree when they have a valid point, our learning stops. We keep on talking past each other. I know that this election has made learning from those we oppose particularly difficult, but the difficult tests are the ones that truly show us what we are really made of. These are the situations that push us to see past all of the things that we don’t like, or don’t agree on, so we can rescue a lesson. You may not agree with me, but I hope at least I gave you something to think about.

    While his points about media censorship and peer pressure are self-explanatory, I want to take a quick moment to discuss his most meaningful insight, which is the idea that “political systems scale poorly.” This is hugely important, because as the current status quo system collapses, many of us in the Western world will be presented with an incredible opportunity to do things completely different. Unfortunately, none of the candidates in the 2016 election (including Sanders and Trump) have been promoting the idea of political decentralization, which is the direction I think we need to move toward. In voting for Brexit, that’s exactly what the British people professed a preference for, and it’s what we need here in America.

    In some important ways, I think we should look back toward the original concept of government as understood by our founders. A loose-knit collection of largely self-governing states that are bonded together in certain important ways, yet independent and sovereign in all other ways. Indeed, I think we can break things up even further than that, but let’s start there for the time being.

    If we want to stick with representative democracy, I think for it to work best, it needs to be very local. I think the future of mankind depends on us getting our political systems right, and I think governance has to be shifted to the local level as much as possible.

    This all reminds me of Aldous Huxley’s extremely prescient warning in his 1958 book Brave New World revised (see my review of it), in which he wrote:

    Or take the right to vote. In principle, it is a great privilege. In practice, as recent history has repeatedly shown, the right to vote, by itself, is no guarantee of liberty. Therefore, if you wish to avoid dictatorship by referendum, break up modern society’s merely functional collectives into self-governing, voluntarily co-operating groups, capable of functioning outside the bureaucratic systems of Big Business and Big Government.

    Bottom line: We need to decentralize everything, especially government.

  • Major Quake Strikes Cushing, Oklahoma – Near US' Largest Oil Storage Facility

    Shortly after 1945 local time, a strong 5.0 magnitude earthquake struck some 50 mile northeast of Oklahmoa City. The nearby town of Cushing, home of America's largest oil storage facility, experienced structural damage and lost power.

    This was Oklahoma's 5th largest quake..

    No injuries have been reported.

     

    As Bloomberg reports, the quake struck 2km west of Cushing, Oklahoma, according to USGS.

    Cushing is location of largest oil storage site in U.S. where benchmark WTI crude futures are delivered.

    Quake at depth of 5km.

    Cushing fire officials haven’t yet received any calls for damage at the oil tank yard, and no injuries have been reported, News9 Oklahoma’s Justin Dougherty says in posting on Twitter.

    Oklahoma registered 5.6 magnitude earthquake in September, tying state record set in 2011; number of earthquakes measuring 3.0 or higher reached 890 last year.

    FOX23 reports that Payne County Emergency Management officials confirm power was cut off to Cushing following the earthquake, and The Cimarron Tower Apartments in Cushing were evacuated.

     

    For now there i sno reaction in WTI Crude…

    As a reminder, several energy producers, and also the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, are facing lawsuits because of seismic activity allegedly linked to oilfield wastewater disposal in Oklahoma and other states

  • Doug Band Accuses Chelsea Of Using Clinton Foundation Money To Pay For Her Wedding

    A couple of days ago we shared a Podesta email from Doug Band about Chelsea talking openly in public about her “internal investigation” into the Clinton Foundation. 

    As with many of the Doug Band email chains, the rabbit hole just got a little deeper today with Band accusing of Chelsea of “using foundation resources for her wedding and life for a decade” among other accusations.  He also concludes with another veiled threat on the consequences “once we go down this road….”

    The investigation into her getting paid for campaigning, using foundation resources for her wedding and life for a decade, taxes on money from her parents….

     

    I hope that you will speak to her and end this

     

    Once we go down this road….

     

    Doug Band

     

    The implications are troubling: as our friends from the Southern Investigative Reporting Foundation point out, “*If true* people (then) worth well into 8 figures used 501c3 $ to pay for a wedding.“

    The latest Band email comes after he previously accused Chelsea of talking about her “internal investigation” in the Clinton Foundation with “one of the bush 43 kids.”

    I just received a call from a close friend of wjcs who said that cvc told one of the bush 43 kids that she is conducting an internal investigation of money within the foundation from cgi to the foundation

     

    The bush kid then told someone else who then told an operative within the republican party

     

    I have heard more and more chatter of cvc and bari talking about lots of what is going on internally to people

     

    Not smart

    Something tells us that Chelsea and Doug may not be on speaking terms for a while after all the WikiLeaks revelations.

  • Vatican Warns Of "Path Of Bloodshed" In Venezuela If Talks With Anti-Maduro Political Leaders Fail

    A few weeks ago we warned that Venezuela was on the verge of revolution after Maduro took steps to block a recall referendum that many thought would have resulted in his ouster.  In response, Maduro’s political opposition urged Venezuelans to take to the streets to protest the move which they say was tantamount to a coup.  Here’s what we wrote before:

    Once a “flagship socialist nation,” Venezuela has suffered over the past couple of years from a dramatic economic crisis that has resulted in severe shortages of food, clean water, electricity, medicines and hospital supplies all of which have resulted in a desperate population which has resorted to the black market and violence for survival.  That said, Venezuela likely inched one step closer to revolution on Friday when Maduro’s leftist government took steps to block a recall referendum that could have resulted in his ouster.  According to the US News and World Report, Venezuelan opposition leaders are calling the efforts of Maduro “a coup” in light of the broad based public support of the recall effort.

     

    Venezuela is bracing for turbulence after the socialist government blocked a presidential recall referendum in a move opposition leaders are calling a coup.

     

    The opposition is urging supporters to take to the streets, beginning with a march on a major highway Saturday led by the wives of jailed activists, while a leading government figure is calling for the arrest of high-profile government critics.

     

    Polls suggest socialist President Nicolas Maduro would lose a recall vote. But that became a moot issue on Thursday when elections officials issued an order suspending a recall signature drive a week before it was to start.

     

    “What we saw yesterday was a coup,” said former presidential candidate Henrique Capriles, who had been the leading champion of the recall effort. “We’ll remain peaceful, but we will not be taken for fools. We must defend our country.”

     

    International condemnation was swift. Twelve western hemisphere nations, including the U.S. and even leftist-run governments such as Chile and Uruguay, said in a statement Friday that the suspension of the referendum and travel restrictions on the opposition leadership affects the prospect for dialogue and finding a peaceful solution to the nation’s crisis.

    Venezuela

     

    Apparently we weren’t that far off with our “revolution” prediction as the Vatican and the Union of South American Nations were recently called in to negotiate a truce between the Venezuelan government and the opposition leaders as the situation has continued to spiral out of control.  In order to calm tensions, Maduro agreed to release a few political opposition members from prison and the opposition called off a symbolic “trial” in congress against Maduro and a street protest.  That said, as Yahoo News points out, if continued talks brokered by the Vatican fail the result could well be “bloodshed.”

    If upcoming Vatican-backed talks between Venezuela’s bitterly antagonistic government and opposition fail, the result could well be “bloodshed,” a papal envoy warned Saturday.

     

    “If one delegation or the other ends the dialogue, it’s not the pope but the Venezuelan people who will lose, because the path then could truly be one of blood,” Archbishop Claudio Maria Celli told the Argentine daily La Nacion in Rome, after visiting Caracas.

     

    -‘Very ugly’ situation –

     

    There are fears a breakdown in the talks could see a return of street confrontations between anti-Maduro protesters and security forces, and possibly an escalation into outright violence.

     

    “There are people who aren’t afraid to see bloodshed. This is what worries me,” Celli told the newspaper.

     

    He said Pope Francis was playing a “strong role” in the talks.

     

    “We are running a risk,” he admitted. “We will see. May God help us.”

    That said, there are already signs that talks between Maduro and his opposition are breaking down as opposition leaders have demanded the release of more “political prisoners” while Maduro has shot back: “There can be no ultimatums.”  Given the extreme economic crisis in Venezuela that has resulted in severe food shortages, hyperinflation and so forth, we’re not sure that Venezuelans will be willing to maintain the Vatican’s truce much longer without some meaningful concessions from Maduro’s leftist government.

  • The TRUTH about REDNECKS in America and in Politics

    Redneck culture doesn’t get much attention – until now.  That’s because that generally they stick to themselves, don’t participate in the mainstream, and don’t come to town too often.  As we explain in our best selling book Splitting Pennies – the world isn’t as it seems.  Rednecks don’t rule the world, but – from time to time they do get their moment of glory.  There’s no better metaphor to understand Politics than with than Rednecks.  You know there’s an old expression, you can take the kid out of the city but you can’t take the city out of the kid.  In the south they say ‘born and bred’ whatever that means.  Let’s take 2 significant Redneck political examples as ‘rich Rednecks’ who popularized Redneck culture in politics; Bill Clinton, and Lee Atwater.  First let’s hear from Bill Clinton in his full backwoods accent:

    You know, if you played this for any Southerner, and didn’t tell them it was “Bill Clinton” speaking, they’d think he was one of they own!  Spoken like a true Southerner.  But we’ve been convinced, that Bill Clinton is a guy with a high IQ, a Rhodes scholar.. a ‘genius.’  Well he certainly is a good ol’ boy.  Just google a few keywords about Bill such as “Clinton Body Count” and “Clinton Drugs Arkansas Importation” just to name a few.  Sadly, Bill grew up in a typical Redneck environment, from Wikipedia:

    He was the son of William Jefferson Blythe Jr. (1910–1946), a traveling salesman who had died in an automobile accident three months before his birth, and Virginia Dell Cassidy (1923–1994). His parents had been married on 4 September 1943, but this later proved to be bigamous, as Blythe was still married to a previous wife…Clinton says he remembers his stepfather as a gambler and an alcoholic who regularly abused his mother and half-brother, Roger Clinton Jr., to the point where he intervened multiple times with the threat of violence to protect them…

    The next significant Redneck in American politics, is Lee Atwater – you can say he is the inventor of dirtball politics.  Slumbag politics.  Negative campaign ads.  Before Lee’s aggressive campaigns against Democrats, such a thing didn’t exist.  If you really want to understand how our modern political system works, THIS IS A MUST WATCH: Boogie Man: The Lee Atwater Story

    So, in some way, the current election really is based on a Redneck ideaology.  Lee Atwater wasn’t just a Redneck, he was Openly Redneck.  He wasn’t like Bill Clinton, trying to act like something he’s not.   

    The Clinton campaign is using Lee’s dirty tricks right out of his Redneck playbook but they’ve taken it to a whole new level.  So it’s a little ironic when Bill is teasing that Trump supporters are a bunch of Rednecks.  Well this is partially true, but with 94 Million Americans ‘out of the workforce’ who can blame them.  Many Rednecks were not born Rednecks, they became so by years of being disenfranchised by the mainstream, for one reason or another.  One sad Redneck demographic are War Vets, who don’t get the treatment they need for their disability being exposed to the cocktail of Military grade chemical weapons, radiation, and other exposure they have during wartime.  

    Another bright example of the Redneck connection to politics is the Redneckary of George Dubya – the Bushes are from Connecticut.  They have yachts.  GW graduated from Yale.  Lee taught them well.  So GW bought a Texas ranch, a pickup truck, and learned how to shoot a gun.  And he took to the Redneck culture real well (‘Specially Drankan!).  By the time it came to vote, GW had a landslide in the Red states.  

    It’s still unknown how many Rednecks will come out of the woods and vote for Trump.  But it looks like – it will be many!  Remember, they don’t participate in polls, so there’s no data on their behavior.  They have TVs mostly, but it’s only to watch Wrastlin’ (that is, WWF).  

    The Truth is that Rednecks don’t often participate and they certainly aren’t the mainstream.  But when they do it, they do it big.  They ‘Git R Done’.  And in the case of Lee Atwater, they do know how to swing an election.  This election, they clearly support Trump.  However, the mainstream establishment is pulling out all the stops, even asking illegals to vote.  If the story of Redneck Bill Clinton teaches us one thing – don’t bet against a Redneck!  The South Will Rise Again!

    Checkout our series on Redneck Investin’ Redneck Investin Part 2 – The evolved Redneck – READ before RIOT | Zero Hedge  and Redneck Investin Part 1 – A look from the other side | Zero Hedge

    For a full edumacation explainin what is muny and how you can get lots of it, without selling cans, checkout Splitting Pennies – Understanding Forex.  

  • Wikileaks Releases 8,200 Emails From DNC Hack; Reveals Collusion Between CNN And Democrats

    With Wikileaks releasing what may have been the final 2,073 Podesta emails in part 32 of its ongoing dump of hacked campaign chairman emails, with the dramatic discoveries over the past week largely overshadowed by the FBI “scandal” which has now fully blown over after Director Comey first zigged, announcing in a cryptic statement he was reopening a probe into Clinton’s email server last Friday, only to zag just 9 days later when the FBI reported it had found nothing material in the 650,000 emails found on Anthony Weiner’s laptop, the whistleblower organization appeared to have run out of steam.

    However moments ago, Wikileaks announced the release of another huge batch of hacked DNC emails, which it dubbed #DNCLeak2, contained some 8,263 previously unseen, hacked DNC emails – a server penetration which had previously been attributed either to the Guccifer 2.0 hacker, or Vladimir Putin, and which over the summer cost Debbie Wasserman Schultz her job when it was revealed that the DNC was rigging the primary in HIllary’s favor – going public for the first time.

    While we expect the FBI to fully parse, scan and finalize it report on this batch within the next 10 or so minutes, and to conclude there is nothing of significance in the pile, we will as usual try to find anything particularly relevant, although if the Podesta emails – which provided an explicit admission by an internal review of the Clinton Foundation that it was breaking the law on at least one occasion, and that Teneo, CGI and the CF were operated as “political organizations”, meant to boost “pay to play” – failed to get an indictment out of the FBI, we truly doubt that anything that is contained in tonight’s 8,000 emails will sway the so-called law enforcement authorities into action.

    As usual, readers are warmly invited to submit any material discoveries our way at the usual address.

    * * *

    In an April 2016 email from DNC research director Lauren Dillon, we find that CNN’s Wolf Blitzer had tasked the DNC with coming up with questions for his interview of Donald Trump:

    Wolf Blitzer is interviewing Trump on Tues ahead of his foreign policy address on Wed.

     

    Please send me thoughts by 10:30 AM tomorrow.

     

    Thanks!

    The DNC was quick to oblige, even if ultimately the interview ended up getting cancelled.

    * * *

    Also in April 2016, Dillon was tasked by CNN to come up with questions, only this time for Ted Cruz and Carly Fiorina:

    * * *

    An email from May 2016, shows yet another instance of the DNC creating and approving a fake Craigslist ad seeking to mock Donald Trump.

    The DNC’s outside councel at Perkins Coie was not particularly impressed the ideas, with lawyer Jacquelyn Lopez noting that “the defamation risk here is too high. I know we are going for a parody, but given the content of the post (his private business practices, sexual harassment, etc) we would open ourselves up to a defamation suit if we posted.“

    That however did not ruin the DNC’s enthusiasm:

    Apparently Graham took this all the way to Marc, and he said no. So if we do this, we need to get Amy and Lindsey to agree that we’re ok with the possibility of getting sued.

    * * *

    Jackie said to Cate “if you think getting sued would be awesome publicity and Amy and Lindsey are willing to go there, then let’s talk, but…”

    * * *

    Rapid team has signed off, we just need to decide within this group IF we want to take this to lindsey / amy / luis

    * * *

    If we have a likelihood of getting sued I need to look at it closely too if you want to move forward.

     

    You can take it to them first to decide and if they say no that will save me time but I may end up making edits – or I may not – before it actually goes out.

     

    My team if great as you know but I lawsuit should be on my shoulders.

    Ultimately, it is unclear if the DNC ended up running the mocking Craig’s List ad.

    * * *

    Last but not least, a May 2016 DNC email reveals the culprit behind Donald Trump’s exorbitant tax loopholes. And it is, drumroll, William Jefferson Clinton.

  • Meet The Million Dollar Donors (Spoiler Alert: They Are "With Her")

    Submitted by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

    A few days ago the Wall Street Journal published a very powerful piece titled, The Million-Dollar Donors. What you’ll see should sufficiently dash any and all fantasies that Hillary Clinton is for the average person.

    Here are a few of the graphics:

    screen-shot-2016-11-05-at-12-31-00-pm

     

    screen-shot-2016-11-05-at-12-31-14-pm

     

    screen-shot-2016-11-05-at-12-31-29-pm

    For additional graphics and more detailed information, click here.

    So are you ready?

    screen-shot-2016-11-05-at-12-33-54-pm

  • Doug Noland Interview: "In The Next Crisis The Fed's Balance Sheet Will Hit $10 Trillion"

    The global bubble that central banks have kept afloat for the past eight years, based on sovereign and government debt, as well as central bank credit, runs right to the heart of the monetary system. That, according to Doug Noland, means we are in for a bigger crash and deeper dislocation when it all comes to an end, and Noland has a good idea which will be the first central bank to crack.

    Doug Noland of McAlvany Wealth Management has a long history in the hedge fund industry as a short seller, having worked with Gordon Ringoen and Bill Fleckenstein among others, but is perhaps best known for his ability to spot bubbles ahead of the crowd.

    Studying credit data, he was initially concerned about the balance sheet expansion of Freddie and Fannie in the early 90s and started writing about the mortgage finance bubble in 2002. He also called the government finance bubble in April 2009.

    In an interview with Real Vision TV, Noland said the current market bubble is a dangerous place to be and there has been a major shift from previous boom bust scenarios, where the impact has been more limited. He also examines how support from central banks has led the markets to ignore the risk – and what happens when that support is taken away.

     

    Deeply Systemic Bubble – Consequences Unknown

    “This bubble is deeply systemic,” he said “I thought the bubble burst in ’08. I thought we were going into another depression. I wrote as much. Well, in early ’09, I had to come out and say– I started warning about the potential for what I called back in, I think it was April 2009, the global government finance bubble.

    “I think we’re late, but this is a different type of a bubble because it’s global. Very different dynamics. The other thing is it’s gone to the heart of money and credit. Right now this bubble is being fed by government debt, sovereign debt, and central bank credit. Back when WorldCom debt and Telecom debt was driving the technology bubble, in my mind that can only go on so long. People will have enough of that junk debt and that will end that cycle.

    “The mortgage finance bubble was a little different. That was more money-like. Moneyness of credit is a term I used during that period. People had insatiable demand for GSE credit, insatiable demand for AAA rated mortgage backed securities. That bubble could go much longer, as it did, go longer, have a much deeper impact on economic structure.

    “This bubble, again, it’s gone to the heart and soul of money and credit. And right now central bankers are basically doing everything to keep it going. So this one, we’re what, eight years into it? I think we’re really late, but we don’t know to what extent central bankers will continue to try to sustain the backdrop.”

    * * *

    Which Central Bank Domino Will Fall First

    Although the markets are ignoring the risk and continuing to move higher, cracks are starting to appear in the global environment, Noland said. As stresses and strains become evident among central banks, the discussion is turning to which will be the first of the dominos to fall, because the greater concern is that once faith goes in one central bank, the ripple effect will be fast and fatal.

    “There’s a lot of complacency here in this country because the Fed postponed its QE, and the bull market just continued and everything looked fine,” Noland said. “Well part of the reason they were able to do that is because of the massive QE globally and the flow of finance into the US from QE abroad.

    “But right now, it seems like the Bank of Japan is in the crosshairs. They’ve tried to devalue their currency, that didn’t work. Their latest spin is to try to manipulate their yield curve, and that certainly hasn’t worked so far. So I think the Bank of Japan is in the forefront of a credibility crisis. I think in Europe, the ECB is only one step behind. Their QE has certainly destabilized finance throughout Europe and is playing a major role in the European bank issues right now.

    * * *

    Danger, Desperation and a $10 Trillion Balance Sheet

    All the policy measures in play now are reactive, with helicopter money and fiscal stimulus the latest ideas on the table and we’re now hearing the Fed wants the ability to buy equities. With the Fed looking at a balance sheet of around $10 trillion, Nolan said things are starting to look desperate.

    “I’ve often contemplated the size of the Fed’s balance sheet, and I don’t think $10 trillion is ridiculous,” he said. “I said that before and it sounded outrageous. I think the next crisis, the next serious de-risk and de-leveraging, the Fed’s balance sheet is going to probably have to double again. Larry Summers was out also saying there’s a role for buying– continuous buying of stocks and corporate debt by central bankers. Yeah. They’re desperate. It’s a global bubble. And the markets believe they’ll do anything to keep it going, and that’s just a very dangerous place to be.“

    * * *

    Markets Believe Central Banks Will Save Them but Cracks Mean Caution

    Markets are convinced that central bankers will not allow an institution like Deutsche Bank to fail, Noland said, but indications of stress can be seen in the currency swaps market. “You don’t hardly even see it in Deutsche Bank senior CDS because the perception is there’s no way they’re going to allow this,” he said. “Their CoCo bonds and some of the more mezzanine debt, yeah, that’s under pressure. But in the market there is confidence that they will not allow a crisis with that institution.”

    “To me there are enough cracks out there, there are enough cracks to be extremely cautious. For me, I would not be exposed to global securities markets, I would not be. We’re in the environment now where to survive, people have had to ignore risk. And they’re ignoring it today as much as ever. I don’t want to be in that situation because the risks are so high. I don’t want to be in the market when everyone else comes to realize, recognize that there are risks.”

    * * *

    The Short Opportunity of a Lifetime

    For now, Noland is in the process of putting together a new venture with David McAlvany, which he said is exciting and because he thinks “this is the opportunity of a lifetime on the short side. But I’m happy to be watching from the sidelines right now,” he said, with some ferocious tops in chaotic markets.

    “I think it’s time to be risk averse. I’m a big fan of the precious metals, I think they’re investable. To me, marketable securities, they’re not investable to me because I don’t know what the risk is. And I know the market wants to ignore the risk. What do we do if central bankers back away? What is the risk profile for economies, for the financial markets?

    “I was very concerned back in 2007. I was very concerned with the consequences of this bubble imploding. I’m much more worried today. In 2007, I wasn’t worried about the world. I wasn’t worried about geopolitical. And I never want to be part of the lunatic fringe, but if people aren’t concerned about geopolitics right now, they’re not paying attention.

    * * *

    A Destructive Bubble Squandering Wealth

    When this particular episode ends and people really understand how much money has been spent propping up a broken system, the divisions in society and mistrust of governments evident in the past year could move to more extreme levels.

    “For me, bubbles are always about a redistribution and a destruction of wealth. During the bubble, there is perceived wealth that keeps the system inflating. People believe there’s all this wealth and securities and asset prices, etc. And they find out when the bubble bursts that a lot of that wealth was actually squandered. The problem with this global government finance bubble– we’ll call it that– is this is a redistribution of wealth globally.

    “And this is not going to sit well. Right now, global central bankers are all working together to try to keep the global financial system liquid, levitated. Politicians generally are cooperating, but you can see society starting to fray here. This is not working right. This is archaic, but this is the consequence of unsound money. History tells us this, right? Society here in the US, people don’t trust their institutions, they don’t trust their politicians, they don’t trust Wall Street, they don’t trust the banks. That’s not a good place to be.”

    Watch the full interview on Real Vision TV, one of the best sources of in-depth interviews with many of the worlds most respected investors, analysts, investment strategists and geopolitical analysts.  No ads, no bias, no bullshit.  Try it free for 7 days.

  • Goldman Spots Odd "Asymmetry" In Chinese Yuan Fixing As Outflows Accelerate

    Starting in early June, when Goldman’s FX team unveiled the Yuan doom loop…

     

     

    … the bank has been esecially bearish on the Chinese currency, a trade reco with which the investment bank has been surprisingly on the money.

    And with Chinese FX data which is expected to show an acceleration in capital outflows on deck, the market’s attention will be increasingly more focused on the Yuan. Which brings us to the latest note by Goldman’s FX team, in which we find that Robin Brooks et al appears to have discovered a curious “asymmetry.”

    Here is Goldman’s explanation of what it uncovered:

    We have spent recent weeks modeling the fixing mechanism for $/CNY. In the process, we uncovered meaningful asymmetry, meaning that the RMB does not reverse declines made on Dollar strength when the Dollar weakens. This episode of Dollar weakness is a case in point, with the CFETS basket resuming its fall after a period of stability (Exhibit 4). Even beyond the trade-weighted decline in the RMB, we have argued that a rising USD makes things difficult for China, because it means that $/CNY has to fix higher (Exhibit 5), which carries the risk of accelerating capital flight. Hedging costs for RMB downside have pulled back, offering a compelling entry point should Dollar strength resume on a Clinton win.

     

    And some more details:

    We often encounter the view that the RMB is asymmetric, by which people mean that the currency weakens when the Dollar appreciates, but doesn’t commensurately strengthen when the greenback weakens. Intuitively, the fact that the CFETS basket has fallen around 10 percent while the Dollar has been stuck in a range means that this is true almost by definition. This FX Views test for this asymmetry evaluates how severe it is currently, and tracks how it has evolved over time. We find that the response in $/CNY fixings became asymmetric in the direction of RMB weaker from March of this year, but has shown signs of abating recently. In a way, our results are statistical proof of a “bias to depreciate,” which we see as supportive of our shift to a more bearish RMB view this summer, after being more-constructive-than-consensus early this year. We continue to think that hedging RMB weakness is attractive, even with forwards moving to price a bit more depreciation.

    Finally, in light of the recent exposure of Chinese capital flight which as calculated by GS was some 3 times greater than the official number, Barclays expects a significant drop in FX reserve when the latest official Chinese FX reserve number is announced shortly, confirming that China’s capital flight is accelerating notably.

    USDCNY came close to breaching 6.80 on USD strength. We think the pullback will be short lived and, as likely to be revealed in FX reserves data over coming days, capital outflows will put further pressure on the CNY. Much will depend on the USD, but assuming that the USD continues to appreciate in the months ahead, China’s referencing of the CNY NEER basket implies more potential upside for USDCNY and USDCNH

    A reminder of what China’s FX reserves look like:

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Nov 06

Today’s News 6th November 2016

  • MOST Voters Now Think Clinton Broke the Law

    McClatchy reports:

    A total of 83 percent of likely voters believe that Clinton did something wrong – 51 percent saying she did something illegal and 32 percent saying she something unethical but not illegal.  Just 14 percent said she’s done nothing wrong.

     

    By comparison, 79 percent think Donald Trump did something wrong, though not nearly as many think he did something illegal. Just 26 percent think he’s done something illegal, while 53 percent think he’s dome something unethical but not illegal. Just 17 percent think he’s done nothing wrong.

    The difference between 17% and 14% thinking that Trump and Clinton, respectively, did nothing wrong is trivial.

    The real difference is that twice as many voters think Clinton broke the law as think that Trump did.

  • Trump Rushed Off Stage In Nevada By Secret Service

    Details surrounding the event are few – according to initial unconfirmed reports, a person in the crowd allegedly pulled a gun –  but shortly after appearing on stage at a Nevada rally, Donald Trump was rushed off stage by Secret Service agents.

     

     

    While many have donned their tin foil hats over the past few months, the big question everyone is asking is – will the establishment use the ultimate tool to stop Trump winning the election? Initial unconfirmed reports suggest that a man in the crowd pulled a gun:

    According to The Hill, the Republican presidential nominee noticed a protestor in the crowd and told event security to remove him. But as Trump looked out over the crowd to spot the protestor, two men in suits ran to the stage, grabbed him by the shoulders, and rushed him behind the curtain. 

    A group of security officials jumped over the barricade, protecting the stage and looking into the crowd, backing up shocked attendees who tried to take video of the protestor. 

    Security led a bald man out of the convention hall as the crowd cheered and also booed the protestor.

    And moments later:

    Trump returned to the stage moments later to continue his speech. “Nobody said it was going to be easy for us, but we will never be stopped. Never ever be stopped,” Trump said. “I want to thank the Secret Service. These guys are fantastic – they don’t get enough credit,” he said.:

    A few minutes later, the businessman paused to thank his supporters for helping to protect him as the man rushed the stage.

    “I want to thank all these people,” he said, pointing to the area where the man was stopped.

    “I saw what you were doing – that’s a tough group of people right there. I saw that, that was pretty amazing. Nobody messes with our people,” he said.

    Below is a photo of the alleged gunman:

    ABC News reported no weapon was found on the man, according to sources. However, shouts from the crowd about a gun elevated the Secret Service’s response.

    Trump’s campaign released a brief statement that echoed the candidate’s appreciation for Secret Service, but did not provide any additional information as to what had occurred. The tense situation came during a slew of Trump rallies three days before the election, as the businessman and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton criss-cross the country before Election Day.

    Trump did not appear to cut his rally short Saturday, despite the interruption. The incident took place about 35 minutes into his speech and he spoke for another 10 minutes after returning to the stage. NBC reported that no weapon was ultimately found on the alleged attacker. 

    According to the latest update, the man detained by SWAT has been released:

  • Can The Oligarchy Still Steal The Presidential Election?

    Authored by Paul Craig Roberts via Strategic-Culture.org,

    The election was set up to be stolen from Trump. That was the purpose of the polls rigged by overweighting Hillary supporters in the samples. After weeks of hearing poll results that Hillary was in the lead, the public would discount a theft claim. Electronic voting makes elections easy to steal, and I have posted explanations by election fraud experts of how it is done.

    Clearly the Oligarchy does not want Donald Trump in the White House as they are unsure that they could control him, and Hillary is their agent.

    With the reopening of the FBI investigation of Hillary and related scandals exploding all around her, election theft is not only more risky but also less likely to serve the Oligarchy’s own interests.

    Image as well as money is part of Oligarchic power. The image of America takes a big hit if the American people elect a president who is currently under felony investigation.

    Moreover, a President Hillary would be under investigation for years. With so much spotlight on her, she would not be able to serve the Oligarchy’s interests. She would be worthless to them, and, indeed, investigations that unearthed various connections between Hillary and oligarchs could damage the oligarchs.

    In other words, for the Oligarchy Hillary has moved from an asset to a liability.

    A Hillary presidency could put our country into chaos. I doubt the oligarchs are sufficiently stupid to think that once she is sworn in, Hillary can fire FBI Director Comey and shut down the investigation. The last president that tried that was Richard Nixon, and look where that got him.

    Moreover, the Republicans in the House and Senate would not stand for it. House Committee on oversight and Government Reform chairman Jason Chaffetz has already declared Hillary to be “a target-rich environment. Even before we get to day one, we’ve got two years worth of material already lined up.” House Speaker Paul Ryan said investigation will follow the evidence.

    If you were an oligarch, would you want your agent under this kind of scrutiny? If you were Hillary, would you want to be under this kind of pressure?

    What happens if the FBI recommends the indictment of the president? Even insouciant Americans would see the cover-up if the attorney general refused to prosecute the case. Americans would lose all confidence in the government. Chaos would rule. Chaos can be revolutionary, and that is not good for oligarchs.

    Moreover, if reports can be believed, salacious scandals appear to be waiting their time on stage. For example, last May Fox News reported:

    “Former President Bill Clinton was a much more frequent flyer on a registered sex offender’s infamous jet than previously reported, with flight logs showing the former president taking at least 26 trips aboard the “Lolita Express” — even apparently ditching his Secret Service detail for at least five of the flights, according to records obtained by FoxNews.com.

     

    “Clinton’s presence aboard Jeffrey Epstein’s Boeing 727 on 11 occasions has been reported, but flight logs show the number is more than double that, and trips between 2001 and 2003 included extended junkets around the world with Epstein and fellow passengers identified on manifests by their initials or first names, including “Tatiana.” The tricked-out jet earned its Nabakov-inspired nickname because it was reportedly outfitted with a bed where passengers had group sex with young girls.”

    Fox News reports that Epstein served time in prison for “solicitation and procurement of minors for prostitution. He allegedly had a team of traffickers who procured girls as young as 12 to service his friends on ‘Orgy Island,’ an estate on Epstein’s 72-acre island, called Little St. James, in the U.S. Virgin Islands.”

    Some Internet sites, the credibility of which is unknown to me, have linked Hillary to these flights.

    This kind of behavior seems reckless even for Bill and Hillary, who are accustomed to getting away with everything. Nevertheless, if you are an oligarch already worried about the reopened Hillary email case and additional FBI investigations, such as the one into the Clinton Foundation, and concerned about what else might emerge from the 650,000 emails on former US Rep. Weiner’s computer and the NYPD pedophile investigation, putting Hillary in the Oval Office doesn’t look like a good decision.

    At this point, I would think that the Oligarchy would prefer to steal the election for Trump, instead of from him, rather than allow insouciant Americans to destroy America’s reputation by choosing a person under felony investigations for president of the United States.

    Being the “exceptional nation” takes on new meaning when there is a criminal at the helm.

  • Julian Assange's Most Incendiary Interview: "Hillary Clinton Is The Central Cog Of The Establishment"

    In what may be his most provocative and incendiary interview ever given, Wikileaks founder and whistleblower Julian Assange – who realizes that if Hillary Clinton wins the presidency his prospects turn even more bleak – spoke to Australian journalist and documentary maker John Pilger, and summaraized what he has gleaned from the tens of thousands of Clinton emails released by WikiLeaks this year in the following interview courtesy of RT and Dartmouth films.

    John Pilger, another Australian émigré, conducted the 25-minute interview at the Ecuadorian Embassy, where Assange has been trapped since 2012 for fear of extradition to the US. Last month, Assange had his internet access cut off for alleged “interference” in the American presidential election through the work of his website. 

    Full interview transcript below:

    ‘Clinton made FBI look weak, now there is anger’ 

    John Pilger: What’s the significance of the FBI’s intervention in these last days of the U.S. election campaign, in the case against Hillary Clinton? 

    Julian Assange: If you look at the history of the FBI, it has become effectively America’s political police. The FBI demonstrated this by taking down the former head of the CIA [General David Petraeus] over classified information given to his mistress. Almost no-one is untouchable.  The FBI is always trying to demonstrate that no-one can resist us.  But Hillary Clinton very conspicuously resisted the FBI’s investigation, so there’s anger within the FBI because it made the FBI look weak.  We’ve published about 33,000 of Clinton’s emails when she was Secretary of State.  They come from a batch of just over 60,000 emails, [of which] Clinton has kept about half – 30,000 — to herself, and we’ve published about half.

    Then there are the Podesta emails we’ve been publishing.  [John] Podesta is Hillary Clinton’s primary campaign manager, so there’s a thread that runs through all these emails; there are quite a lot of pay-for-play, as they call it, giving access in exchange for money to states, individuals and corporations. [These emails are] combined with the cover up of the Hillary Clinton emails when she was Secretary of State, [which] has led to an environment where the pressure on the FBI increases. 

    * * *

    ‘Russian government not the source of Clinton leaks’

    JP: The Clinton campaign has said that Russia is behind all of this, that Russia has manipulated the campaign and is the source for WikiLeaks and its emails. 

    JA: The Clinton camp has been able to project that kind of neo-McCarthy hysteria: that Russia is responsible for everything.  Hilary Clinton stated multiple times, falsely, that seventeen U.S. intelligence agencies had assessed that Russia was the source of our publications. That is false; we can say that the Russian government is not the source.

    WikiLeaks has been publishing for ten years, and in those ten years, we have published ten million documents, several thousand individual publications, several thousand different sources, and we have never got it wrong. 

    * * *

    ‘Saudi Arabia & Qatar funding ISIS and Clinton’

    JP: The emails that give evidence of access for money and how Hillary Clinton herself benefited from this and how she is benefitting politically, are quite extraordinary. I’m thinking of  when the Qatari representative was given five minutes with Bill Clinton for a million dollar cheque.

    JA: And twelve million dollars from Morocco …

    JP: Twelve million from Morocco yeah.

    JA: For Hillary Clinton to attend [a party].

    JP: In terms of the foreign policy of the United States, that’s where the emails are most revealing, where they show the direct connection between Hillary Clinton and the foundation of jihadism, of ISIL, in the Middle East.  Can you talk about how the emails demonstrate the connection between those who are meant to be fighting the jihadists of ISIL, are actually those who have helped create it.

    JA: There’s an early 2014 email from Hillary Clinton, not so long after she left the State Department, to her campaign manager John Podesta that states ISIL is funded by the governments of Saudi Arabia and Qatar.  Now this is the most significant email in the whole collection, and perhaps because Saudi and Qatari money is spread all over the Clinton Foundation.  Even the U.S. government agrees that some Saudi figures have been supporting ISIL, or ISIS. But the dodge has always been that, well it’s just some rogue Princes, using their cut of the oil money to do whatever they like, but actually the government disapproves.

    But that email says that no, it is the governments of Saudi and  Qatar that have been funding ISIS.

    JP: The Saudis, the Qataris, the Moroccans, the Bahrainis, particularly the Saudis and the Qataris, are giving all this money to the Clinton Foundation while Hilary Clinton is Secretary of State and the State Department is approving massive arms sales, particularly to Saudi Arabia.

    JA: Under Hillary Clinton, the world’s largest ever arms deal was made with Saudi Arabia, [worth] more than $80 billion.  In fact, during her tenure as Secretary of State, total arms exports from the United States in terms of the dollar value, doubled.

    JP: Of course the consequence of that is that the notorious terrorist group called ISIl or ISIS is created largely with money from the very people who are giving money to the Clinton Foundation.

    JA: Yes.

    JP:That’s extraordinary. 

    * * *

    ‘Clinton has been eaten alive by her ambition’

    JA: I actually feel quite sorry for Hillary Clinton as a person because I see someone who is eaten alive by their ambitions,  tormented literally to the point where they become sick; they faint as a result of [the reaction] to their ambitions. She represents a whole network of people and a network of relationships with particular states.  The question is how does Hilary Clinton fit in this broader network?  She’s a centralising cog. You’ve got a lot of different gears in operation from the big banks like Goldman Sachs and major elements of Wall Street, and Intelligence and people in the State Department and the Saudis.

    She’s the centraliser that inter-connects all these different cogs.  She’s the smooth central representation of all that, and ‘all that’ is more or less what is in power now in the United States. It’s what we call the establishment or the DC consensus. One of the more significant Podesta emails that we released was about how the Obama cabinet was formed and how half the Obama cabinet was basically nominated by a representative from Citi Bank. This is quite amazing. 

    JP: Didn’t Citibank supply a list …. ?

    JA: Yes.

    JP: … which turned out to be most of the Obama cabinet.

    JA: Yes.

    JP: So Wall Street decides the cabinet of the President of the United States?

    JA: If you were following the Obama campaign back then, closely, you could see it had become very close to banking interests. So I think you can’t properly understand Hillary Clinton’s foreign policy without understanding Saudi Arabia.  The connections with Saudi Arabia are so intimate.

    * * *

    ‘Libya is Hillary Clinton’s war’

    JP: Why was she so demonstrably enthusiastic about the destruction of Libya? Can you talk a little about just what the emails have told us – told you – about what happened there? Because Libya is such a source for so much of the mayhem now in Syria: the ISIL, jihadism, and so on. And it was almost Hillary Clinton’s invasion. What do the emails tell us about that?

    JA: Libya, more than anyone else’s war, was Hillary Clinton’s war. Barak Obama initially opposed it. Who was the person championing it?  Hillary Clinton.  That’s documented throughout her emails. She had put her favoured agent, Sidney Blumenthal, on to that; there’s more than 1700 emails out of the thirty three thousand Hillary Clinton emails that we’ve published, just about Libya. It’s not that Libya has cheap oil. She perceived the removal of Gaddafi and the overthrow of the Libyan state — something that she would use in her run-up to the general election for President.

    So in late 2011 there is an internal document called the Libya Tick Tock that was produced for Hillary Clinton, and it’s the chronological description of how she was the central figure in the destruction of the Libyan state, which resulted in around 40,000 deaths within Libya; jihadists moved in, ISIS moved in, leading to the European refugee and migrant crisis.

    Not only did you have people fleeing Libya, people fleeing Syria, the destabilisation of other African countries as a result of arms flows, but the Libyan state itself err was no longer able to control the movement of people through it. Libya faces along to the Mediterranean and had been effectively the cork in the bottle of Africa. So all problems, economic problems and civil war in Africa — previously people fleeing those problems didn’t end up in Europe because Libya policed the Mediterranean. That was said explicitly at the time, back in early 2011 by Gaddafi:  ‘What do these Europeans think they’re doing, trying to bomb and destroy the Libyan State? There’s going to be floods of migrants out of Africa and jihadists into Europe, and this is exactly what happened.

    * * *

    ‘Trump won’t be permitted to win’

    JP: You get complaints from people saying, ‘What is WikiLeaks doing?  Are they trying to put Trump in the Whitehouse?’

    JA: My answer is that Trump would not be permitted to win. Why do I say that?  Because he’s had every establishment off side; Trump doesn’t have one establishment, maybe with the exception of the Evangelicals, if you can call them an establishment, but banks, intelligence [agencies], arms companies… big foreign money … are all united behind Hillary Clinton, and the media as well, media owners and even journalists themselves.

    JP: There is the accusation that WikiLeaks is in league with the Russians. Some people say, ‘Well, why doesn’t WikiLeaks investigate and publish emails on Russia?’

    JA: We have published about 800,000 documents of various kinds that relate to Russia. Most of those are critical; and a great many books have come out of our publications about Russia, most of which are critical. Our [Russia]documents have gone on to be used in quite a number of court cases: refugee cases of people fleeing some kind of claimed political persecution in Russia, which they use our documents to back up.

    JP: Do you yourself take a view of the U.S. election?  Do you have a preference for Clinton or Trump?

    JA: [Let’s talk about] Donald Trump. What does he represent in the American mind and in the European mind?  He represents American white trash, [which Hillary Clinton called] ‘deplorable and irredeemable’.  It means from an establishment or educated cosmopolitan, urbane perspective, these people are like the red necks, and you can never deal with them.  Because he so clearly — through his words and actions and the type of people that turn up at his rallies — represents people who are not the middle, not the upper middle educated class, there is a fear of seeming to be associated in any way with them, a social fear that lowers the class status of anyone who can be accused of somehow assisting Trump in any way, including any criticism of Hillary Clinton. If you look at how the middle class gains its economic and social power, that makes absolute sense.

    * * *

    ‘US attempting to squeeze WikiLeaks through my refugee status’

    JP: I’d like to talk about Ecuador, the small country that has given you refuge and [political asylum] in this embassy in London.  Now Ecuador has cut off the internet from here where we’re doing this interview, in the Embassy, for the clearly obvious reason that they are concerned about appearing to intervene in the U.S. election campaign.  Can you talk about why they would take that action and your own views on Ecuador’s support for you?

    JA: Let’s let go back four years.  I made an asylum application to Ecuador in this embassy, because of the U.S. extradition case, and the result was that after a month, I was successful in my asylum application. The embassy since then has been surrounded by police: quite an expensive police operation which the British government admits to spending more than £12.6 million. They admitted that over a year ago.  Now there’s undercover police and there are robot surveillance cameras of various kinds — so that there has been quite a serious conflict right here in the heart of London between Ecuador, a country of sixteen million people, and the United Kingdom, and the Americans who have been helping on the side.  So that was a brave and principled thing for Ecuador to do. Now we have the U.S. election [campaign], the Ecuadorian election is in February next year, and you have the White House feeling the political heat as a result of the true information that we have been publishing.

    WikiLeaks does not publish from the jurisdiction of Ecuador, from this embassy or in the territory of Ecuador; we publish from France, we publish from, from Germany, we publish from The Netherlands and from a number of other countries, so that the attempted squeeze on WikiLeaks is through my refugee status; and this is, this is really intolerable. [It means] that [they] are trying to get at a publishing organisation; [they] try and prevent it from publishing true information that is of intense interest to the American people and others about an election.

    JP: Tell us what would happen if you walked out of this embassy.

    JA: I would be immediately arrested by the British police and I would then be extradited either immediately to the United States or to Sweden. In Sweden I am not charged, I have already been previously cleared [by the Senior Stockholm Prosecutor Eva Finne]. We were not certain exactly what would happen there, but then we know that the Swedish government has refused to say that they will not extradite me to the United States we know they have extradited 100 per cent of people whom the U.S. has requested since at least 2000.  So over the last fifteen years, every single person the U.S. has tried to extradite from Sweden has been extradited, and they refuse to provide a guarantee [that won’t happen].

    JP: People often ask me how you cope with the isolation in here. 

    JA: Look, one of the best attributes of human beings is that they’re adaptable; one of the worst attributes of human beings is they are adaptable.  They adapt and start to tolerate abuses, they adapt to being involved themselves in abuses, they adapt to adversity and they continue on. So in my situation, frankly, I’m a bit institutionalised — this [the embassy] is the world .. it’s visually the world [for me].

    JP: It’s the world without sunlight, for one thing, isn’t it?

    JA: It’s the world without sunlight, but I haven’t seen sunlight in so long, I don’t remember it.

    JP: Yes.

    JA: So , yes, you adapt.  The one real irritant is that my young children — they also adapt. They adapt to being without their father. That’s a hard, hard adaption which they didn’t ask for.

    JP: Do you worry about them?

    JA: Yes, I worry about them; I worry about their mother.

    * * *

    ‘I am innocent and in arbitrary detention’

    JP: Some people would say, ‘Well, why don’t you end it and simply walk out the door and allow yourself to be extradited to Sweden?’

    JA: The U.N. [the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention] has looked into this whole situation. They spent eighteen months in formal, adversarial litigation. [So it’s] me and the U.N. verses Sweden and the U.K.  Who’s right?  The U.N. made a conclusion that I am being arbitrarily detained illegally, deprived of my freedom and that what has occurred has not occurred within the laws that the United Kingdom and Sweden, and that [those countries] must obey. It is an illegal abuse.  It is the United Nations formally asking, ‘What’s going on here?  What is your legal explanation for this? [Assange] says that you should recognise his asylum.’ [And here is]

    Sweden formally writing back to the United Nations to say, ‘No, we’re not going to [recognise the UN ruling], so leaving open their ability to extradite.

    I just find it absolutely amazing that the narrative about this situation is not put out publically in the press, because it doesn’t suit the Western establishment narrative — that yes, the West has political prisoners, it’s a reality, it’s not just me, there’s a bunch of other people as well.  The West has political prisoners. Of course, no state accepts [that it should call] the people it is imprisoning or detaining for political reasons, political prisoners. They don’t call them political prisoners in China, they don’t call them political prisoners in Azerbaijan and they don’t call them political prisoners in the United States, U.K. or Sweden; it is absolutely intolerable to have that kind of self-perception.

    JA: Here we have a case, the Swedish case, where I have never been charged with a crime, where I have already been cleared [by the Stockholm prosecutor] and found to be innocent, where the woman herself said that the police made it up, where the United Nations formally said the whole thing is illegal, where the State of Ecuador also investigated and found that I should be given asylum.  Those are the facts, but what is the rhetoric? 

    JP: Yes, it’s different.

    JA: The rhetoric is pretending, constantly pretending that I have been charged with a crime, and never mentioning that I have been already previously cleared, never mentioning that the woman herself says that the police made it up.

    [The rhetoric] is trying to avoid [the truth that ] the U.N. formally found that the whole thing is illegal, never even mentioning that Ecuador made a formal assessment through its formal processes and found that yes, I am subject to persecution by the United States.

  • California Secessionists To Meet At Capitol Day After Presidential Election

    Submitted by Joseph Jankowki via PlanetFreeWill.com,

    An organization which has the aims out separating the state of California from the Union of the United States is set to hold a meeting at the state capitol in Sacramento on Wednesday, November 9, 2016, the day after the presidential election.

    The Yes California Independence Campaign, which is based in San Diego, describes itself as a “nonviolent campaign to establish the country of California using any and all legal and constitutional means to do so.”

    The group is currently trying to qualify a citizen’s initiative in 2018 to get a referendum for secession on the ballot in 2019, reports SF Gate. They will be in Sacramento in hopes to gather support for the state’s exit, or the “Calexit”, as they call it.

    “In our view, the United States of America represents so many things that conflict with Californian values, and our continued statehood means California will continue subsidizing the other states to our own detriment, and to the detriment of our children,” reads Yes California’s official website.

    The group’s page reads on:

    Although charity is part of our culture, when you consider that California’s infrastructure is falling apart, our public schools are ranked among the worst in the entire country, we have the highest number of homeless persons living without shelter and other basic necessities, poverty rates remain high, income inequality continues to expand, and we must often borrow money from the future to provide services for today, now is not the time for charity.

     

    However, this independence referendum is about more than California subsidizing other states of this country. It is about the right to self-determination and the concept of voluntary association, both of which are supported by constitutional and international law.

     

    It is about California taking its place in the world, standing as an equal among nations. We believe in two fundamental truths: (1) California exerts a positive influence on the rest of the world, and (2) California could do more good as an independent country than it is able to do as a just a U.S. state.

    Yes California’s website lays out 9 different points covering topics the group believes will benefit from a California exit from the US, including education, peace and security, debt and taxes and immigration…

    THE CASE FOR INDEPENDENCE IN 9 SIMPLE POINTS
    Being a U.S. state is no longer serving California’s best interests. On issues ranging from peace and security to natural resources and the environment, it has become increasingly true that California would be better off as an independent country. Here’s a summary of why we think so.

     

    1. PEACE AND SECURITY
    The U.S. Government spends more on its military than the next several countries combined. Not only is California forced to subsidize this massive military budget with our taxes, but Californians are sent off to fight in wars that often do more to perpetuate terrorism than to abate it. The only reason terrorists might want to attack us is because we are part of the United States and are guilty by association. Not being a part of that country will make California a less likely target of retaliation by its enemies.

     

    2. ELECTIONS AND GOVERNMENT
    California’s electoral votes haven’t affected a presidential election since 1876. On top of that, presidential election results are often known before our votes are even counted. So, why should we keep subjecting ourselves to presidents we play no role in electing, to 382 representatives and 98 senators we can’t vote for, and all the government officials and federal judges appointed by those very same people we don’t elect.

     

    3. TRADE AND REGULATION
    The U.S. Government maintains a burdensome trade system that hurts California’s economy by making trade more difficult and more expensive for California’s businesses. As long as California remains within this burdensome trade system, we will never be able to capitalize on the trade and investment opportunities that would be available to us as an independent country. On top of that, the United States is dragging California into the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement which conflicts with our values.

     

    4. DEBT AND TAXES
    Since 1987, California has been subsidizing the other states at a loss of tens and sometimes hundreds of billions of dollars in a single fiscal year. As a result, we are often forced to raise taxes and charge fees in California, and borrow money from the future to make up the difference. This is partly why California presently has some of the highest taxes in the country, and so much debt. Independence means that all of our taxes will be kept in California based on the priorities we set, and we will be able to do so while repaying our debts and phasing out the current state income tax.

     

    5. IMMIGRATION
    California is the most diverse state in the United States and that is something we are proud of. This diversity is a central part of our culture and an indispensable part of our economy. As a U.S. state, our immigration system was largely designed by the 49 other states thirty years ago. This immigration system has since neglected the needs of the California economy and has hurt too many California families. Independence means California will be able to decide what immigration policies make sense for our diverse and unique population, culture, and economy, and that we’ll be able to build an immigration system that is consistent with our values.

     

    6. NATURAL RESOURCES
    Certain minerals and other natural resources like coal, oil, and natural gas are being extracted from California at below market value rates by private corporations with the permission of the U.S. Government. While a small portion of the revenue is shared with us, our share has been withheld during times of sequestration. That means the U.S. Government is paying their debts with royalties collected from selling off California’s natural resources. Independence means we will gain control of the 46% of California that is currently owned by the U.S. Government and its agencies. We will therefore take control of our natural resources and be the sole beneficiary of royalties collected if and when they are extracted from our lands.

     

    7. THE ENVIRONMENT
    California is a global leader on environmental issues. However, as long as the other states continue debating whether or not climate change is real, they will continue holding up real efforts to reduce carbon emissions. The truth is this country accounts for less than five percent of the world’s population yet consumes one-third of the world’s paper, a quarter of the world’s oil, 27 percent of the aluminum, 23 percent of the coal, and 19 percent of the copper. Independence means California will be able to negotiate treaties to not only reduce the human impact on our climate but also to help build global resource sustainability.

     

    8. HEALTH AND MEDICINE
    The Affordable Care Act was enacted by the U.S. Government to lower the cost of health care and expand health insurance coverage to the uninsured, yet millions of Californians still lack access to quality health care because they can’t afford it. For many, access to hospitals and medicine is a life or death issue. Independence means we can fund the health care programs we want and ensure everyone has access to the medicines they need because our taxes will no longer be subsidizing other states. Finally, California can join the rest of the industrialized world in guaranteeing health care as a universal right for all of our people.

     

    9. EDUCATION
    California has some of the best universities but in various ways, our schools are among the worst in the country. Not only does this deprive our children of the education they deserve, but it also costs taxpayers billions in social services and law enforcement expenses linked to lacking opportunities resulting from poor education. Independence means we will be able to fully fund public education, rebuild and modernize public schools, and pay public school teachers the salaries they deserve. On top of that, independence means freedom from federal education policies and one-size-fits-all standards set by political appointees on the other side of the continent.

    One blog post on their page draws parallels with a “Calexit” and the recent referendum known as “Brexit” that passed in the UK in June which showed that most British people are ready for their country to leave the EU.

    The push for secession is nothing new to California. In 1941 the mayor of Port Orford, Oregon, Gilbert Gable, proposed the idea to push the Oregon counties of Curry, Josephine, Jackson, and Klamath to join with the California counties of Del Norte, Siskiyou, and Modoc to form a new state, later named Jefferson.

    Modoc County of Northern California voted in 2013 to join neighboring Siskiyou County in a push to secede from the State of California.

    In 2014, two counties in northern California petitioned for the right to form a 51st State of America, which they also wanted to name Jefferson.

  • Shocked CNN Admits Clinton Has Dropped Below 270 On Electoral Map

    Despite the very recently increasing lead of Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump in the "polls", even CNN has been forced to admit today that "this race has tightened."

    In a shocking turn of events for the Clinton campaign's propaganda arm, the latest snapshot of the Electoral College map heading into the final days shows Hillary Clinton has dropped below 270 electoral votes for the first time in CNN's electoral map when adding up the states that are either solidly Democratic or leaning in her direction.

     

    CNN made four moves in the map since their last update and all of them are in Donald Trump's direction.

    Maine's 2nd Congressional District moves from "battleground" to "lean Republican"

     

    New Hampshire moves from "lean Democrat" to "battleground"

     

    Ohio moves from from "battleground" to "lean Republican"

     

    Utah from "battleground" to "lean Republican"

    Leaving the scorecard as follows…

     

    As The Hill notes, Trump has been closing in on Clinton's lead both nationally and in several battleground states. Although the Democratic nominee still holds an advantage, CNN's map now shows more opportunity for the GOP nominee to reach the required number of electoral votes to secure the presidency.

    * * *

    Ironically, given our earlier comment, CNN has now folded again and admit their latest national poll shows Trump and Clinton deadlocked.

    Another national survey shows a near-even race between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump in the final weekend before Election Day.

     

    The former secretary of state has 44% of support among likely voters in a McClatchy-Marist poll released Saturday while the businessman has 43%, within the poll's margin of error.

     

    Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson has 6% of the vote while Green Party nominee Jill Stein garners 2%.

     

    "Although Clinton and Trump are separated by the slimmest of margins, the Electoral College can present a very different picture," said Dr. Lee M. Miringoff, director of The Marist College Institute for Public Opinion. "Close popular votes can, but do not necessarily, translate into tight battles for 270 electoral votes."

     

    The poll included voters who are undecided but leaning toward a candidate or who have already voted.

     

    When the McClatchy-Marist poll last reported these results in September, Clinton was ahead of Trump by 6 points among likely voters nationally.

  • Preppers Stockpile Survival Food On Fears Of Post-Election Chaos

    The 2016 election year is bringing out the worst among some elements of society. From vandalism to physical assaults to large scale race riots to terrorist bombings and mall stabbings, STHFPlan's Stefan Gleason notes that social disorder has become a more prominent feature of life in a polarized America.

    It’s easy (and politically convenient) for the establishment media to blame Donald Trump for inflaming the political divide. In reality, Trump supporters have far more often been the victims rather than the instigators of political violence.

     

    Moreover, the forces driving social unrest have been building for years. Surveys show that large numbers of Americans – including Republicans and Democrats, blacks and whites – agree that race relations have worsened under President Obama’s watch. The nation’s first half-African president has repeatedly sided with racial agitators and refused to denounce antipolice riots. His attorney general, Loretta Lynch, has given legal legitimacy to vicious racial narratives that have little to no basis in fact.

     

    In addition to leaving the country with fresh new racial wounds, the outgoing Obama administration will leave America with a doubling of the national debt to nearly $20 trillion, a historically low rate of workforce participation, 20 million more people on food stamps, and a shrinking middle class whose earnings aren’t keeping up with surging costs of things like health insurance.

     

    People are frustrated, restless, angry. And officially, we aren’t even in a recession yet. Officially, the inflation rate remains below 2%.

     

    What happens when the economy and stock market start tanking? Or when costs for fuel, food, and other consumer goods start taking off again?

    Well, it appears the answer – as so many have already realized – is finally being recognized by the mainstream media as NBC News reports, preppers are running up sales of emergency survival food due to election night doomsday concerns…

    While sales for "long term food" typically see an increase around natural disasters and elections, "this is more intense than what we saw in 2012," said Keith Bansemer, VP of marketing for My Patriot Supply, a manufacturer and seller of survival food. During the previous election his company saw sales double. This time it's triple.

     

    "We have everyone we can on the phones," he said. "We are overwhelmed."

     

    Purchases at other long term food supply companies are up as well. Emergency preparedness online store TheEpicenter reports a 6 percent uptick in year over year sales.

     

    What's feeding this new urgency?

     

    Survivalist consumers says they're preparing for post-election unrest that could involve everything from massive riots, to power grid outages, to the total collapse of the financial system where a can of food becomes currency.

     

    And it's not just guys digging a hole on their farm and filling it with MRE's who are driving sales, companies say, but schoolteachers, moms, and successful financial planners. Nor is it limited to just rural areas.

    For $2,000 spent at Legacy Foods, you could eat three square meals a day for an entire year. That's 1,080 servings. TheEpicenter has a 14-day supply kit for $235 that's recently been "selling really well," said owner Bryan Nelson. The most popular entry-level seller at My Patriot Supply is a 3-month supply for $497. It comes a in nondescript gray slim line totes bin designed to be easy to stack in the back of a closet or slip under your bed. Big name retailers are in on the game. Costco sells a 1-month supply of 390 servings in plastic gallon buckets for $114.99. Wal-Mart has a bucket deal, too.

    As one 41-year-old "urban prepper" from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania predicts, a Trump win will see the urban poor revolting across the nation and the imposition of martial law to quell riots and the burning of businesses.

    But he's also getting ready for the possibility of a Clinton victory that he says could lead to conflict with Russia and "World War 3 in 2017."

     

    Either way, Freddy's ready – with both supplies and a word of advice.

     

    "At minimum stock up your cabinets as if you knew a hurricane was coming," he said. "It'll be like a hurricane that could touch every city in America."

     

    "You hear them saying, no matter who wins, I know I could take a positive step myself and secure what's important," he said. "They're securing their food supply."

    Simply put, as SHTFPlan.com's Mac Slavo writes, there will come a time when it's too late and you'll be begging to have your old life back…

    With the things heating up just days before what is arguably the craziest Presidential election in American history, Joe Joseph weighs in on the latest leaks, the potential for post-election unrest, and looming crisis.

    They’re so worried about… ‘maybe at the end of the day I might not be able to sit in my Barca lounger at the end of the night’ or ‘I might not be able to watch that football game on Sunday’… Let me tell you… If things go the way that The Powers That Shouldn’t Be want them, there will be no Barca lounges and there will be no NFL.

     

    So it’s either we do things now while we have the chance… because there will come a time when it’s too late.. and you will be begging to  have your old life back.

    And the answer’s going to be, ‘you had the opportunity and now it’s gone.’

     

    There’s a lot of things here in the United States, in the western world and in society that we used to have and used to enjoy… quality of life… the ability to earn a liveable wage… fast evoparting… those used to be a lot more present… people used to be a lot more comfortable..

     

    And it’s just not the case anymore… And it’s only going to get worse…

     

    Unless we the people draw the line in the sand and we stick with it.

    …

  • Class 8 Truck Orders Continue To Plummet Posting 20th Consecutive Monthly YoY Decline

    For months now we have been writing about the massive collapse of class 8 truck orders.  Just a few days ago we pointed out that order declines are coming just as large public trucking companies around the country are being forced to slash fleets amid slumping demand and slack capacity.  According to the Wall Street Journal, several U.S. trucking companies, including Swift, Werner and Covenant, have all been forced to cut 1,000s of trucks from their fleets as “overcapacity has driven down pricing.”  Of course, all this means that class 8 truck manufactures are unlikely to see an uptick in new orders anytime in the near future with Werner promising it won’t add trucks “until they see meaningful improvement in the freight and rate markets.”

    “We haven’t seen any difficulty in finding trucks,” said Ken Forster, chief executive of logistics company Sunteck Transport Group, a broker based in Jacksonville, Fla., that finds and books trucks for freight shippers. “It’s clear that overcapacity has driven down pricing.”

     

    In quarterly earnings reports this month, Swift Transportation Co., Werner Enterprises Inc. and Covenant Transportation Group Inc. said they have pulled a combined hundreds of trucks from service since the second quarter.

     

    Idling trucks is a way large fleets can quickly reduce capacity to match demand, which has stagnated this year amid uneven retail imports and sluggish growth for manufacturers.

     

    Swift, the country’s largest truckload carrier, counted 581 fewer trucks in the third quarter than it did this time last year, and plans to cut an additional 200 trucks in the fourth quarter. The company’s fleet tops 19,000 big rigs.

     

    Werner, the fifth-largest U.S. truckload carrier, according to SJ Consulting Group, said it cut its fleet by 240 trucks in the quarter ended Sept. 30 from a year earlier. The company posted a 41% drop in third-quarter net profit, to $18.9 million, and said in its earnings statement that it won’t add trucks “until we see meaningful improvement in the freight and rate markets.”

    Warnings like the one above from Werner do seem to be playing out the monthly net class 8 truck order data.  Net orders for the month of October 2016 were down 46% compared to last year.  In fact, the level of trailing 12-month net orders is the lowest since January 2011 and down 49% from there February peak.

    July Class 8 Truck Orders

     

    Moreover, monthly truck orders have now declined YoY for 20 consecutive months.

    Class 8 Net Orders

     

    Unfortunately, as BMO’s Joel Tiss points out, things are likely to get worse for the class 8 truck OEM’s before they get better.  With October net orders “much worse than expected” and build rates at 17-18k units, Tiss expects the total backlog to increase to 81-82k units later this month.  Moreover, Tiss points out that increasing backlog and softening 2016 orders are likely to put further downward pressure on 2017 and 2018 forecasts for the OEMs.

    With October builds probably in the 17–18K range, we expect total backlog of 81–82K units when reported later this month. October is a closely watched month for truck demand—historically accounting for about 9% of full-year intake—as OEMs roll out next year’s models, and big fleets set budgets and start placing orders. Based on this, and combined with an average 26% increase from September (13.9K units last month) and where levels have been running this year, October’s tally is much worse than expected.

     

    ACT’s 2016 North American Class-8 outlook calls for a 30% YoY drop in production (227K units vs. 323K in 2015) and 19% lower retail sales (251K vs. 310K in 2015). The 2017 forecast assumes another down year for production and retail sales (-11% and -17%, respectively), with particular weakness in the U.S. For 2018 and 2019, ACT believes the 2017 electronic logging device (ELD) mandate will reduce capacity (5–10% expected) and drive overall industry profits higher, resulting in a solid rebound in truck builds. For 2020, ACT sees a strong pre-buy ahead of the second phase of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions standards starting in 2021, causing another big drop in production that year (-39% forecast).

     

    With U.S. Class-8-truck demand set to decline another 17% or so in 2017 following a 19% drop this year, we expect to see production cuts that began in 1H16 continue into 2H. Also, we have heard from some large dealers that used-truck inventories remain above optimal levels, weighing on used prices and affecting new trucks as well. The combination of lower production and weaker prices could put more pressure on 2017 and 2018 forecasts.

    But, it’s probably nothing.

  • Saturday Humor? Are Americans Too Scared To Consider What Drove Trump's Resurgence In The Polls?

    Are the non-deplorable Americans about to reach the fifth and final “acceptance” stage of Kubler-Ross grieving for a return to the old normal?

    WASHINGTON – Claiming it felt queasy just thinking about what the cause could be, the nation’s populace said Monday it was too terrified to look at what Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s recent rise in the polls was attributed to.

     

    “I know that he just got a pretty big bounce, but frankly, I don’t think I can handle any more information than that,” said Salem, OR resident Tina Redmond, one of the millions of Americans who had learned of Trump’s 2.5-point increase over the previous week’s polling and were too frightened to find out why.

     

    “Once I heard that number, I just couldn’t bear even one more detail. I know if I see a single word of explanation, I won’t sleep for a week – it’s just too horrifying.”

     

    At press time, the nation had learned that support for third-party candidates remained high among millennials and was scared to death of hearing anything further.

    Source: The Onion

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Nov 05

Today’s News 5th November 2016

  • Julian Assange Says Trump Won't Be Allowed To Win, "Clinton And ISIS Are Funded By The Same Money"

    One day after Julian Assange officially revealed for the first time that the source of hacked Podesta and DNC emails in Wikileaks’ possession is not Russia, in the second excerpt from the John Pilger Special, to be broadcast by RT on Saturday Julian Assange accuses Hillary Clinton of misleading Americans about the true scope of Islamic State’s support from Washington’s Middle East allies.

    As previously reported, in an August 17, 2014 email made public WikiLeaks last month, Hillary Clinton, who had served as secretary of state until the year before, urges John Podesta, then an advisor to Barack Obama, to “bring pressure” on Qatar and Saudi Arabia, “which are providing clandestine financial and logistic support to ISIS and other radical Sunni groups.”

    “I think this is the most significant email in the whole collection,” Assange, whose whistleblowing site released three tranches of Clinton-related emails over the past year, told Pilger in the interview. “All serious analysts know, and even the US government has agreed, that some Saudi figures have been supporting ISIS and funding ISIS, but the dodge has always been that it is some “rogue” princes using their oil money to do whatever they like, but actually the government disapproves. But that email says that it is the government of Saudi Arabia, and the government of Qatar that have been funding ISIS.”

    As recounted by RT, Assange and Pilger, who sat down for their 25-minute interview at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London where the whistleblower has been a refugee since 2012, also talked about the conflict of interest between Clinton’s official post, her husband’s nonprofit, and the Middle East officials, whose stated desire to fight terrorism may not have been sincere.

    John Pilger: The Saudis, the Qataris, the Moroccans, the Bahrainis, particularly the first two, are giving all this money to the Clinton Foundation, while Hillary Clinton is secretary of state, and the State Department is approving massive arms sales, particularly Saudi Arabia.

    Julian Assange: Under Hillary Clinton – and the Clinton emails reveal a significant discussion of it – the biggest-ever arms deal in the world was made with Saudi Arabia: more than $80 billion. During her tenure, the total arms exports from the US doubled in dollar value.

    JP: Of course, the consequence of that is that this notorious jihadist group, called ISIL or ISIS, is created largely with money from people who are giving money to the Clinton Foundation?

    JA: Yes.

    The conversation then turns to the imminent presidential election: Pilger questioned Assange over increasingly frequent accusations from the Clinton camp, and Western media, that WikiLeaks is looking to swing next week’s US presidential election in favor of Donald Trump – perhaps at Russia’s behest.

    However, just as he did last week, Assange again dismissed the prospect of Trump, who is almost tied in the polls, winning as unlikely, and not necessarily due to his standing with the electorate.

    “My analysis is that Trump would not be permitted to win. Why do I say that? Because he has had every establishment off his side. Trump does not have one establishment, maybe with the exception of the Evangelicals, if you can call them an establishment,” said Assange. “Banks, intelligence, arms companies, foreign money, etc. are all united behind Hillary Clinton. And the media as well. Media owners, and the journalists themselves.”

    He is right, but the same was said about Brexit.

  • CLiNToN PaY To PLaY…PART II

    PAY TO PLAY

  • "This Quickly Escalates Into Open Warfare" – Why The Government Is Preparing For Post-Election Chaos

    Submitted by Mac Slavo via SHTFPlan.com,

    There have been a wide array of reports suggesting that the U.S. government is preparing military and Homeland Security assets for widespread election fall out. Given the mainstream media’s inclination towards Hillary Clinton and recently presented evidence that Democrat operatives have been attempting to illegally influence the ballot box through falsifying votes and electronic tampering, it appears that concerns surrounding a rigged election are not necessarily unfounded, as President Obama would have us believe.

    With the election just days away, the fix appears to be in and some Americans are readying themselves for a confrontation should one be necessary.

    As the most divisive presidential election in recent memory nears its conclusion, some armed militia groups are preparing for the possibility of a stolen election on Nov. 8 and civil unrest in the days following a victory by Democrat Hillary Clinton.

    They say they won’t fire the first shot, but they’re not planning to leave their guns at home, either.

     

    …

     

    Trump has repeatedly warned that the election may be “rigged,” and has said he may not respect the results if he does not win. At least one paramilitary group, the Oath Keepers, has called on members to monitor voting sites for signs of fraud

     

    …

     

    Over the past week, some prominent Trump supporters have hinted at violence.

     

    “If Trump loses, I’m grabbing my musket,” former Illinois Representative Joe Walsh wrote on Twitter last week. Conservative commentator Wayne Root fantasized about Clinton’s death while speaking at a Trump rally in Las Vegas on Sunday.

     

    Back in Georgia, the Three Percent Security Force wrapped up rifle practice in the midday sun. They then headed further into the trees to tackle an obstacle course with loaded pistols at their sides, ready for whatever may come.

     

    Source: Zero Hedge via Raw Story

    The story comes from the mainstream media, of course, and ties in the Oklahoma City bombing, Waco and the Ruby Ridge incidents, all of which involved people with ties to militias.

    The way the report itself is framed appears to have the purpose of sowing seeds of “crazy conspiracy theorists” into the minds of the general public so that if push comes to shove government actions will be justified in the eyes of the American citizenry.

    But whatever the narrative, it is clear that the possibility of post-election chaos is becoming all the more probable. Whether the initial outcome shows a Trump win or a Hillary win, there are going to be tens of millions of very pissed off people in this country. And there’s a very good chance that some of them will take action, which according to Mike Adams could subsequently lead to open warfare on the streets of America:

    As I’ve publicly predicted numerous times over the last year, if Donald Trump wins, the radical extreme leftists go on a violent rampage that leads to the rest of us begging for martial law. After half a dozen cities burn with riots and looting, Trump invokes a national emergency, deploying National Guard troops across the most devastated urban areas, and the radical left finds itself in a shooting war with the government.

     

    If Hillary Clinton wins, all the Trump supporters who have been violently assaulted, spat upon and physically attacked by the radical left un-holster their concealed weapons and start shooting back. This quickly escalates into open warfare between lunatic leftist Hillary supporters and armed Trump “Second Amendment” people who basically figure they’ve got nothing left to lose anyway, so why not fight to save America?

     

    Full Report: The Election Is A Ticking Time Bomb: “Chaos Will Erupt In Less Than 100 Days”

    It would only take a small group, perhaps even one that’s operating under a false flag, to light a wildfire that could spread from coast to coast. The assets, as Jeremiah Johnson warns, have already been put into place by the Obama administration:

    In summary, the U.S. is prepositioning its “enemy-assets” to blame – on what the administration does – for a collapsed election labeled as “rigged” or the suspension of the election for any number of reasons, real or illusory, such as a genuine attack the U.S. provokes or an attack the U.S. carries out on itself.  Civil unrest and/or war are the escape hatches to bail out of the Constitution and to take control of the country…not letting either crisis go to waste.  With civil rest or a world war, the administration will be handed the country on a platter – indefinitely – and the election will be a moot point, whether it happened or not.

     

    Full report: The United States Is Pre-Positioning “Enemy Assets” In Preparation For A Rigged Election

    All of this may sound extreme, but this Presidential election has been nothing short of insane thus far.

    Whatever the outcome, there will be calls of rigging from both sides, especially if it happens to be Hillary Clinton who , as evidence shows, has been rigging things all along.

    It only took one bullet in 1914 to lead to widespread global confrontation. In the end, no one really cared who fired it or who got shot. The assets had already been positioned ahead of time and were just waiting for someone to detonate the powder keg.

    If this is the case in America today, then this election will not end on November 8th, but could drag on for weeks or months as we saw with Bush vs. Gore in 2000.

    Should tensions heat up and lead to confrontation, it is possible that President Obama will call for a national emergency and activate the Doomsday Executive Order to “restore order.” In this instance, the entire country could be on lock-down, so preparing for this outcome now in the event of curfews, rationing or any number of other potential scenarios is in order.

  • Commuter-In-Chief: Obama Cuts Sentences Of 72 More Drug Dealers; Total Exceeds Previous 11 Presidents Combined

    Earlier today President Obama commuted the sentences of another 72 federal prisoners bringing his total to 944, more than the previous 11 presidents combined.  This latest move is just further evidence of his stated intention to ramp up commutations throughout the remainder of his presidency.  While the President often claims publicly that his commutations are only for “low-level” and “non-violent” criminals, The Hill points out that 16 of the 72 commutations from today were for people serving life sentences. 

    Friday’s clemency grants include 16 people serving life sentences. More than two dozen will be released as early as next spring, but many will not be freed immediately.

     

    Some will not get out of prison until fall 2018. Other inmates’ releases are conditional on them entering enter residential drug treatment programs.

     

    During the final stretch of his presidency, Obama has ramped up his use of clemency power to free prisoners serving lengthy sentences handed down during the government’s war on drugs.

    In his typical fashion, the President also took to Twitter to brag about his latest “accomplishment.”

     

    Of course, Obama has repeatedly denounced long sentences for “nonviolent, low-level” drug offenses as overly punitive, arguing they’ve had a devastating impact on “communities of color.”  That said, we would encourage everyone to take a look at the DOJ’s list of offenses committed by the folks that Obama is intent upon releasing.  Below is a brief sample…do these look like “nonviolent, low-level” criminals to anyone?

    Gerardo Hernandez – Conspiracy to commit an offense against the United States, 18 U.S.C. § 371; conspiracy to gather and transmit national defense information, 18 U.S.C § 794(c); conspiracy to commit murder, 18 U.S.C. § 1117; fraud and misuse of documents, 18 U.S.C § 1546(a); possession with intent to use five or more fraudulent identification documents, 18 U.S.C. § 1028(a)(3); acting as an agent of foreign government without prior notification to the Attorney General, 18 U.S.C. § 951

     

    Anthony Pender – Possession of a firearm by convicted felon; possession with intent to distribute 50 grams or more of cocaine base

     

    Tesmone Darin Paschal – Possession with intent to distribute 50 grams or more of cocaine base; aided and abetted in the possession of a firearm by a convicted felon

     

    Mark Foster – Conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute five kilograms or more of cocaine, 21 U.S.C. §§ 846 & 841(b)(1)(A); carrying or possessing a firearm during and in relation to a drug trafficking crime, 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)

     

    Ali Reno Harden – Possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1); possession of a firearm having an obliterated serial number, 18 U.S.C. § 922(k); possession with intent to distribute more than five grams of cocaine base, 21 U.S.C. §§ 841(a)(1) & 851; possession of a firearm during the commission of a drug trafficking crime, 18 U.S.C. § 924(c); possession of marijuana, 21 U.S.C. §§ 844 & 851

    Finally, here is the full statement from the President’s White House blog released earlier today:

    Following last Thursday’s grant of 98 commutations, today, President Obama granted commutation to another 72 federal inmates. In just an eight-day period, the President has issued two rounds of grants, totaling 170 commutations. With today’s grants, the President has now commuted the sentences of 944 individuals, including 324 life sentences.

     

    What President Obama has done for commutations is unprecedented in the modern era. The President is committed to reinvigorating the clemency authority, demonstrating that our nation is a nation of second chances, where mistakes from the past will not deprive deserving individuals of the opportunity to rejoin society and contribute to their families and communities. The President’s 944 commutation recipients have earned that second chance — whether by obtaining a GED, taking vocational programming to learn skills for future employment, or addressing the substance abuse that so often has led to their criminal conduct. These stories demonstrate that neither society nor these individuals benefit from disproportionate sentences that keep rehabilitated individuals incarcerated, even after they have been adequately punished for their wrongdoing. The personal stories behind each of the President’s commutation recipients underline the individualized consideration that goes into each grant.

     

    Only Congress can achieve the broader reforms needed to ensure our federal sentencing system operates more fairly and effectively in the service of public safety. As Congress returns this month, it is essential that they take up bipartisan criminal justice reform legislation, including reforms that address the excessive mandatory minimum sentences that imprisoned many of the individuals receiving commutation today.

    944 extra democrat voters and counting…

  • Hillary And Bill Clinton: The "Bonnie & Clyde" Of American Politics

    Submitted by Wayne Madsen via Strategic-Culture.org,

    Whether the information originated from hacked e-mails and computer files or Freedom of Information Act requests, the revelations about the political and business activities of Hillary and Bill Clinton and their cronies hearken back to another era, the Great Depression of the 1930s and the crime spree of another unscrupulous couple: bank robbery desperados Bonnie and Clyde.

    Aside from Hillary Clinton running her own lucrative «off-the-books» foreign policy via her private email servers and e-mail chain of associates and flunkies, it was her and her husband’s joint Clinton Foundation and Teneo Capital operations that scream out the word «corruption.» The servers were merely a mechanism by which the Clintons ran their own «pay-to-play» racketeering operation, something that would have been the envy of a contemporary of Bonnie and Clyde, Chicago crime boss Al Capone.

    Teneo, which runs a hedge fund operation and a «private intelligence» service jam-packed with former Central Intelligence Agency operatives, is where Mrs. Clinton’s «gal pal» and aide Huma Abedin worked simultaneously to her government employment with the State Department. The Federal Bureau of Investigation’s probe of 650,000 emails found on the laptop computer of disgraced former New York Democratic Representative Anthony Weiner, the estranged husband of Abedin, is but the proverbial tip of the iceberg. While FBI agents pore through Abedin’s emails that were discovered on the laptop and looking Mrs. Clinton’s emails that were either not destroyed by her aides or which were never accounted for, the real story is the FBI’s investigation of the Clinton Foundation and Teneo.

    Five FBI field offices are investigating the racketeering of the foundation and the foreign connections of Teneo. The offices include New York; Los Angeles; Washington, D.C.; Little Rock, Arkansas; and Miami. Little Rock is the home of the Clinton Foundation, while New York is the home base of Teneo. The addition of the Miami field office to the Clinton probe is significant. One of Teneo Intelligence’s many global offices is located in Bogota, Colombia. A secretive Colombian private equity fund, «Fondo Acceso», financed by Mexican mega-billionaire Carlos Slim and Canadian mining magnate Frank Giustra, is run out of the Clinton Foundation’s Bogota office. Tracking the money being fed into the Clinton Foundation may include proceeds from the illegal narcotics traffic in Colombia and other nearby countries. The Bogota activities of the Clinton Foundation, «Fondo Acceso», which ironically means «Access Fund», and Teneo appear to be concentrated in the Chico Business Park in the Colombian capital. Therefore, the involvement of the Miami office, in investigating Clinton Foundation funding, including the major donations from Slim and Giustra, makes a world of sense.

    Teneo was co-founded by longtime Bill Clinton associate Doug Band, who served in Clinton’s White House Counsel’s Office and later as Clinton’s chief aide in the Clinton Foundation and its associated Clinton Global Initiative. Band’s brother is Bill Clinton’s medical doctor who accompanies the ex-president on foreign trips. Doug Band was the point person who lobbied the incoming Barack Obama administration in 2008 to appoint Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State.

    Mrs. Clinton’s tenure at State ensured that there was little separation between her department, the Clinton Foundation and Global Initiative, and Teneo. Abedin served as Mrs. Clinton’s «transition team» leader as the Secretary of State left the department to launch her presidential candidacy after the November 2012 election. From that time on, Mrs. Clinton, Abedin, Doug Band, Clinton’s campaign chief John Podesta, and others engaged in an email flurry to 1) ensure that the files in the private servers were either scrubbed or sanitized; 2) to officially sever all links between them and the Clinton Foundation and Teneo; and 3) to paint a picture for the public that all was well and legal with Mrs. Clinton’s term as America’s chief foreign policy executive. Unfortunately, the entire Clinton team has been exposed with the publication of emails from Mrs. Clinton’s swearing in as Secretary of State in 2009 to after she launched her campaign for the White House in 2013.

    The picture painted by the emails is one of modern-day gangsters milking everything they possibly could out of supposed public service.

    The FBI’s New York field office is also likely looking at Teneo’s dealings with other Clinton allies. It was Teneo that advised former New Jersey Democratic Governor Jon Corzine's MF Global investment firm as it was collapsing amid charges of major fraud by Corzine, a Clinton loyalist. It is also known as Mrs. Clinton communicated with President Obama over her private server and that Obama used a pseudonym. Obama lied to the American people when he stated that he first learned of the existence of Mrs. Clinton’s server from news media reports. There is little wonder why Obama has refused to condemn FBI director James Comey for re-launching his probe of the Clinton emails, based on the discovery of the additional traffic on Weiner’s laptop. Presidents who dug themselves deep into scandals by lying about «what they knew and when they knew it» helped sink the administration of Richard Nixon and almost cost Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton their presidencies. Obama was wise not to interfere in the FBI’s many criminal cases now building up like a tidal wave against Mrs. Clinton.

    The many Clinton scandals also involve the illegal shipment of U.S.- and foreign-manufactured weapons to jihadist rebels in Libya and Syria against U.S. law. When Clinton and Abedin oversaw the jihadist rebellions in both countries, the U.S. was subject to imposing a United Nations arms embargo directed against both civil war theaters. The sudden decision on October 5, 2016, by the Justice Department to drop all charges against the State Department-licensed Turi Defense Group of Arizona and its owner, Marc Turi, for violating U.S. law by shipping unregistered weapons to Libyan rebels, some of which were transferred to Syrian rebels by the CIA station in Benghazi, indicates that Attorney General Loretta Lynch wanted the Turi case to disappear before the November 8th election.

    The federal trial of Turi and his company was due to begin on November 8th. The indictment of Turi was brought in the U.S. Court for the District of Arizona in Phoenix. Phoenix's Sky Harbor International Airport was the scene of an impromptu and highly-questionable tarmac meeting between Bill Clinton and Attorney General Lynch on June 27, 2016. Turi claims that approval for the secret weapons shipments to Libya and onward to Syria were personally approved by Mrs. Clinton and had a green light from the CIA. Any new email or other evidence that Mrs. Clinton authorized illegal weapons shipments to jihadist terrorists would have required the FBI to broaden its investigation of both Hillary and Bill Clinton, as well as Lynch. Mrs. Clinton may have violated federal law by permitting the shipment of weapons to belligerent parties in Libya and Syria; Mr. Clinton may have obstructed justice in talking to the Attorney General; and Lynch may have violated her oath of office in misusing her position as the nation’s chief law enforcement officer in furtherance of a criminal conspiracy to obstruct justice.

    The Clinton scandal, in many ways, resembles the Iran-Contra episode more than it does Watergate. In Watergate, the cover-up by Nixon and his cronies, in many respects, was worse than the original crimes. In Iran-Contra, the arms and drugs smuggling crimes were equal to the cover-up, including the criminal role of then-Vice President George H. W. Bush in the entire affair. With the Clintons’ «E-mailgate», shipping U.S. weapons to terrorists and accepting foreign campaign donations from dodgy regimes in Saudi Arabia, Morocco, and Qatar are every bit as bad as the obvious ensuing cover-up by Hillary Clinton and her and her husband's cronies.

    If these many cases are what the FBI and its offices in Washington, New York, Little Rock, Los Angeles, Miami, and possibly Phoenix, are now looking at, the FBI director had every right and a constitutional responsibility to inform Congress and the voting public. And FBI director Comey has every right not to tip off to the Clinton gang what he and the bureau may have on them, evidence demanded now by Mrs. Clinton and her supporters. This evidence may become material to the impeachment of Mrs. Clinton from the office of president of the United States should she be elected on November 8th.

  • Iranian Revolutionary Guard Commander Boasts That The US In "Strong Decline"

    Seemingly no amount of cash ransom payments, made in the form of Swiss Francs and Euros (you know, because USD just wasn’t acceptable), are sufficient to buy off a continuously defiant Iranian government.  Time and time again the Iranians continue act in a provocative fashion either taking our sailors hostage or provoking our navy fleet in international waters but we still grant more concessions.  According to the Daily Mail, the latest Iranian insults come courtesy of Revolutionary Guard commander, Hossein Salami, who told a crowd gathered to celebrate the 1979 US Embassy siege that the US is in “strong decline.”

    A senior Iranian military official welcomed Thursday what he said was the “strong decline” of the United States, during celebrations marking the start of the 1979 US embassy siege.

     

    “America is no longer number one and the first power of the world,” deputy Revolutionary Guards commander Hossein Salami told thousands gathered outside the former US mission in Tehran.

     

    “America’s political will can no longer manage political and military development in… the world of Islam. America’s political power has strongly declined.”

    Iran

     

    Perhaps we’re naive but this all sounds more like taunting than a country that wants to engage in reasonable discourse with the United States.  Perhaps Secretary of State John Kerry could explain one more time why we lifted sanctions against a country whose commander tells a group of students that “our fight with Americans will continue” all while those students shout “death to America?”

    Every year on November 3-4, Iran celebrates the 444-day siege of the embassy when more than 50 diplomats, staff and spies were taken hostage by Islamist students demanding the extradition of the shah, who had fled to America after being deposed a few months earlier in the Islamic revolution.

     

    The crisis severed US-Iranian diplomatic ties for decades, but Tehran last year clinched a deal with world powers to curb its controversial nuclear programme in exchange for an easing of economic sanctions.

     

    Protesters on Thursday chanted the traditional rallying cries of “Death to America” and “Death to the House of Saud”, in reference to Iran’s regional rival Saudi Arabia.

     

    But the US remains Iran’s main enemy, and Tehran and Washington back opposing sides in several regional conflicts, including Syria and Yemen.

     

    “Our fight with the Americans will continue” Salami said. “Pursuing our ideals in the world of Islam and in Iran, we will recognise no stopping point or red line.”

    Meanwhile, this is what we received in return for lifted sanctions and billions of cash:

     

    Mr. Obama, might we suggest it’s time for a new approach?

  • …And The Dominoes Fall

    With Guy Fawkes Day tomorrow, and America’s “most important election ever” just around the corner, we thought this clip prescient as we have a feeling the dominoes are going to fall soon…

    “…so much chaos, someone will do something stupid… and when they do, things will turn nasty”

    h/t Jim Quinn’s Burning Platform blog

  • Civil War II – Fourth Turning Is Intensifying (Part 1)

    Submitted by Jim Quinn via The Burning Platform blog,

    “History offers even more sobering warnings: Armed confrontation usually occurs around the climax of Crisis. If there is confrontation, it is likely to lead to war. This could be any kind of war – class war, sectional war, war against global anarchists or terrorists, or superpower war. If there is war, it is likely to culminate in total war, fought until the losing side has been rendered nil – its will broken, territory taken, and leaders captured.” – The Fourth Turning – Strauss & Howe -1997

    As we enter the final stretch of this vitriolic, deplorable, venomous, propaganda saturated, deceitful, rigged presidential election spectacle, it becomes painfully obvious this Fourth Turning is careening toward bloodshed, bedlam, confrontation, and civil war. The linear fixated establishment, who fancy themselves intellectually superior to the irredemables, are too blinded by their sociopathic, increasingly audacious subversion of the Constitution, to grasp the level of rage and disillusionment of a white working class that has been screwed over for decades.

    As the Wall Street shysters frantically accelerate their embezzlement of what remains of middle class wealth, with the Fed and the corporate media propagandists as their wing-men, the country devolves into a corporate fascist state. The disposition of the nation grows dark like the sky before an approaching deadly blizzard. As passions boil over and violence portends, this Fourth Turning hastens towards a bloody decade ahead with an uncertain climax.

    If you think this is just hyperbole, you either haven’t studied history or your cognitive dissonance and normalcy bias prevent you from seeing the unavoidable societal altering clashes, which occur like clockwork on an eighty year cycle, when the portents are right in front of your eyes. Historian Arnold Toynbee’s great war cycle that arise every 80 years or so, aligns perfectly with the Fourth Turning generational theory. Great wars occur when the generation that doesn’t remember the last catastrophic war ascends to leadership of the country.

    We are eight years into a Crisis period which won’t end until the mid-2020s. As this bitterly vicious presidential campaign accelerates towards a finale which will leave the country divided and irate, the hostile opposing forces will be seeking revenge, retribution, and retaliation no matter the outcome. There is no doubt the regeneracy is well under way.

    “The next Fourth Turning is due to begin shortly after the new millennium, midway through the Oh-Oh decade. Around the year 2005, a sudden spark will catalyze a Crisis mood. Remnants of the old social order will disintegrate. Political and economic trust will implode. Real hardship will beset the land, with severe distress that could involve questions of class, race, nation and empire. The very survival of the nation will feel at stake. Sometime before the year 2025, America will pass through a great gate in history, commensurate with the American Revolution, Civil War, and twin emergencies of the Great Depression and World War II.” – Strauss & Howe – The Fourth Turning 

    It was five years ago I spent a couple fascinating hours with Neil Howe, co-author of the Fourth Turning, during the Occupy Wall Street protests. He thought the protests were all passion and no depth, engineered by anarchist Boomers. He was right. I thought OWS might be the start of the regeneracy, but it flamed out quickly. It was only a foreshadowing of what was to come. Whatever event or movement created the regeneracy, it would be driven by the toxic combination of debt, civic decay, and global disorder.

    Neil was particularly worried about the Federal Reserve zero interest rate policy and how it was ruining our economic system, creating disincentives to saving and encouraging warped, debt driven speculation. And that was in 2011. The Fed keeping interest rates near zero on behalf of a corrupt establishment for the last eight years has been the primary factor in creating the anger, disillusionment and revolutionary spirit driving the regeneracy.

    No critical thinking human being can deny this tumultuous presidential election and its equally turbulent primaries have been fueled by the dreadful self-serving response of the establishment to the 2008 Wall Street created financial collapse; the geopolitical anarchy created by U.S. interventionism in the Middle East; the civic decay created by a failing government educational system; rampant debt financed materialism enabled and encouraged by the financial/media complex; and racial division facilitated by the president and his social justice warrior brethren.

    The rescue of Wall Street and destruction of Main Street by the Fed, Wall Street and the captured politicians of both parties in Washington D.C. has created the angry, acrimonious, throw the bums out mood boiling over in flyover America. The widening Grand Canyon gap in wealth between the haves and the have nots, produced by solutions from sociopaths in suits has reached the pitchfork and torch level.

    The linear thinking ruling class has been in denial since this Crisis catalyzed in September 2008. Their looting, pillaging and ransacking campaign, designed to enrich and empower a small cadre of shadowy, powerful, wealthy men, had been successful for decades. When you control the currency and interest rates; rig the financial markets; buy the politicians; write the laws and regulations; own the corporate propaganda machines known as the mainstream media; operate a high tech surveillance state; create a dumbed down populace through government school indoctrination; and distract the masses with iGadgets, reality TV, hero worship, professional sports, social media, irrelevant cultural issues, and literally thousands of other modern day bread and circuses; you become arrogant and careless.

    These sociopaths are so consumed with their ravenous fleecing of the middle class, waging wars for profit, and shredding the Constitution, they failed to recognize 2008 for the seismic earth shattering event that will change everything. The mood of the country shifted like tectonic plates beneath the nation. The mood continues to grow dimmer, as the peasants grow poorer and the modern day aristocracy (Wall Street bankers, corporate executives, corrupt politicians, shadowy billionaires) accumulate obscene ill-gotten wealth through their complete capture of the system. This perverted, degenerative, criminal degradation of our society is powerfully summed up by Jesse from Jesse’s Café Americain:

    “Not all sociopaths wield knives and knotted cords. Some wear suits, and are exceptionally intelligent and articulate, obsessively driven, and are able to use and undermine the law and the rules for their advantage, like weapons.  It is never about the win, never about the money.  It is about the kill, the expression of their hatred, about elevating themselves with the suffering of others. Bind, torture, kill.  Not only with ropes and knives, but also with power and money, and the subversion of law.  Lawlessness is their addiction, their will to power.

    When societies become lax and complacent, these sociopaths can possess great political power through great amounts of unprincipled money.  And over time they become almost anti-human, destroyers of all that is good, all that is life, all that offends their insatiable sickness with its goodness.  They twist the public against itself, and turn a broad sweep of society into their killing grounds. This is the undeniable lesson of the last century.  There are monsters, and they walk among us.”

    Neil Howe has noted in previous articles the catalyst, climax and resolution of Fourth Turnings can be specifically dated. But the regeneracy is more of an era than a date. With only three previous American Fourth Turnings, I imagined the regeneracy to be a specific event where the American people, faced with growing peril and danger, put aside their differences and rallied around a strong leader to build something new. Boy was I wrong.

    In retrospect, the American people were numbed by the Great Depression and the bloody initial battles of the Civil War. They just let FDR and Lincoln do whatever they needed to do. The regeneracy marks a growth in centralized authority and resolute governance at a time of great risk and urgency. I believe this era of regeneracy began at the outset of the presidential primaries early in 2016.

    Based upon the reaction of the citizens in the last ten months, the dire problem facing the nation, perceived as the largest threat to our future, happens to be the Deep State establishment currently ruling the country. The captured mainstream media and grey beards running both political parties were completely stunned, horrified, and irate at the unprecedented success achieved by the two anti-establishment candidates, Trump and Sanders.

    This election was supposed to follow the script as planned and coordinated by the establishment, with Hillary Clinton defeating Jeb Bush and continuing the corrupt status quo policies agreed to by the bought off leaders of both parties. They badly miscalculated the mood of the country and the whirlwind of change seeking to sweep away the stubborn remnants of a crooked, decrepit, putrid, existing social order. This collective middle finger to the establishment could only happen during a Fourth Turning.

    This regeneracy is well under way and is poised to transform and replace the very foundation of this crumbling empire of debt, delusions, and denial. The unanswered question is what happens next. I posed that question to Neil Howe five years ago and he said the specific events of a Fourth Turning are unknowable, but the reaction to those events by the generational cohorts is consistent over time.

    We are seeing the reaction of critical thinking Americans as they come to the realization the system is rigged against them. A revolutionary spirit is once again rising among the deplorables. I also asked Neil about the theory Fourth Turnings alternate between external conflicts and internal conflicts. He found the subject fascinating, but didn’t think there were enough data points to make a determination.

    Based on the current path of this Fourth Turning, I’m now convinced of this alternating sequence between advancement cycles and atonement cycles. The advancement cycles can be seen as establishing, whereas atonement cycles are disestablishing. It is apparent each Fourth Turning alternates between an external struggle and an internal struggle. The American Revolution was a struggle against an external oppressor – Great Britain.

    The Civil War was an internal struggle between the industrial North and the agrarian South. The Depression/World War II struggle was mainly against an external threat – Germany, Japan, and Italy. The American Revolution established our country. There was optimism and elation as a new republic, forged under an enlightened Constitution and led by judicious intelligent men, was born. It was clearly an advancement cycle.

    The Civil War disestablished states’ rights, slavery, agrarian society and Constitutional rights. It was an atonement cycle for our actual and implicit sins. There was no glorious high. The resolution felt more like defeat, with the country exhausted, bitter and angry. The country had exhausted itself, spilling the blood of over one million men. The new High after an atonement cycle is like a cold miserable rainy dark Spring.

    The Great Depression/World War II Fourth Turning established a new world order led by the United States. As the only major country left unscathed by the ravages of global war, the U.S. became the producer for the world, whose dollar was unquestioned as the currency of global trade. The new High was unleashed with fanfare and adulation. It was like a delightfully warm Spring, with flowers blooming and children frolicking.

    All signs point toward this Fourth Turning being a life or death struggle between the ruling class of sociopathic bankers, corporate elites, and sleazy politicians versus the oppressed and infuriated middle class. The lying, deceit, rigging, deception, theft and other crimes perpetrated by the ruling elites will be atoned for. The heroic patriotic revelations from Edward Snowden, Julian Assange, and Bradley (Chelsea) Manning proving the government and politicians to be lying, corrupt, immoral, sociopathic traitors to the Constitution have undermined the last vestiges of trust in the system and the establishment. The alignment of generational dynamics will provoke the responses to events moving forward. We have been badly led. A silent coup by Deep State perpetrators has led to the complete capture of our economic, financial, judicial and political systems.

    A vast swath of the populace has been lured into living beyond their means. The existing system is unsustainable. The Boomer generation does not want to yield on their perceived entitlements. The Millennial generation is saddled with un-payable debts, living in their parents’ basements, working the night shift at Ruby Tuesday. Generation X is trapped in the middle of this generational struggle. The huge economic imbalances, created by politicians buying votes and engineering wealth inequality to benefit the few, have built up over decades like flood waters behind a weakening levee. When the levee breaks the morally bankrupt criminal social order will be swept away in the raging torrent to follow.

    Winter will eventually turn into Spring, but it might be a bitter, gloomy, austere Spring. Every Fourth Turning brings on forecasts of imminent doom, but that is also a trait of Prophet (Trump, Clinton) Generations. It’s how they feel about the prospects of their imminent die off; they expect the entire world to go with them. The 2008 financial crisis was horrific, scary and an eye opener for those who blindly believed what they were told by their establishment zoo keepers. The regeneracy has begun; trust in the system has further disintegrated; this presidential election has further deepened this distrust of the entrenched establishment; and the coming bust for stocks, bonds, and real estate will knock out the supports for the dwindling remaining trust in this crooked system.

    “This might result in a Great Devaluation, a severe drop in the market price of most financial and real assets. This devaluation could be a short but horrific panic, a free-falling price in a market with no buyers. Or it could be a series of downward ratchets linked to political events that sequentially knock the supports out from under the residual popular trust in the system. As assets devalue, trust will further disintegrate, which will cause assets to devalue further, and so on.”

    Eventually, all of America’s lesser problems will combine into one giant problem. The very survival of the society will feel at stake, as leaders lead and people follow. The emergent society may be something better, a nation that sustains its Framers’ visions with a robust new pride. Or it may be something unspeakably worse. The Fourth Turning will be a time of glory or ruin.” – Strauss & Howe – The Fourth Turning

    The next ten or so years will be atonement for decades of bad choices, corrupt leadership, living beyond our means, waging wars of choice across the globe, believing blatant falsehoods, exhibiting willful ignorance, ignoring facts, and failing to uphold the Constitution. Don’t think you can escape the consequences of this Fourth Turning. It doesn’t matter whether you lived according to a moral code, avoided debt, worked hard, paid taxes, and generally lived an upstanding honorable life.

    The death and destruction headed our way will engulf the innocent as well as the guilty. I’m reminded of the penultimate scene in Clint Eastwood’s dark, brooding, vengeful western Unforgiven when Little Bill Daggett laments to “killer of women and children” William Munny that he doesn’t deserve to die this way. Munny responds, “deserves got nothin’ to do with it.” Then he pulls the trigger. This is the kind of future we will be dealing with, whether we like it or not.

    In Part Two of this article I will use recent polling data to assess where the most likely sparks will arise to start the civil war conflagration which will accelerate the crumbling of the American Empire. To reinforce the obvious, Fourth Turnings NEVER de-intensify. They end after the spilling of much blood, incomprehensible destruction and the total defeat of the vanquished.

  • Demystifying The Chinese Yuan

    With one of the world’s largest economies and a growing financial sector, China continues to rise as a global power. And, as The Money Project notes the country’s currency, the Chinese yuan (officially the Renminbi), is also starting to mature.

    The most recent evidence of this? The IMF’s decision to include the yuan as a part of its SDR international reserve asset, a basket of major world currencies:

    The Chinese economy is significant on a world stage, but its currency and financial system still have major growing up to do.

    Courtesy of: The Money Project

     

     

    China is walking a fine balance: it desperately wants to legitimize its currency, but it also must find ways to keep its economic engine moving forward.

    The Yuan’s Wild Ride So Far

    In the early 1980s, the Chinese began to implement ‘Socialism with Chinese characteristics’, by opening up the state-controlled economy to the global market in very limited ways.

    Since being on the world stage, the yuan has been all over the place. It’s been pegged to the U.S. dollar, unpegged, and then temporarily re-pegged again during the Financial Crisis.

    Most recently, the currency was devalued sharply in 2015 to make up for slowing GDP growth. Today, it sits at six-year lows against the U.S. dollar.

    The PBOC and the Chinese Yuan

    The strategy used by The People’s Bank of China has not been easy to follow.

    China wants its currency to matter, but it is also guilty of intervening in currency markets according to the priorities of the day.

    In September 2016, for example, the country increased overnight borrowing rates and bought up the yuan in large amounts to counteract shorting from international traders.

    The Fix Is In

    Onshore, the yuan is allowed to trade within 2% of the PBOC reference point.

    The previous day’s trading might be a factor in setting this. Then again, it may not matter. The decision is not up to the market. Value is set by unnamed officials behind the scenes.

    This “flexibility” allows China to swing between different strategies for the yuan.

    The Dragon’s Gambit

    China can print money endlessly to keep the yuan’s value artificially low, which is good for manufacturers. This is handy in a case such as when exports fall year-over-year, and the economy is slowing.

    But in other cases, China has different priorities, such as protecting the value of the yuan during times of international uncertainty. It can help to do this by securing the yuan with surprise gold holdings announcements or by dumping massive amounts of U.S. Treasuries to prop up the yuan’s price.

    Sometimes these divergent strategies appear to be operating in the same week. Who’s in charge?

    International currency traders ultimately don’t know how these decisions are made, or who is making them.

    The Golden Hoard That Wasn’t

    China’s currency manipulation has helped it to accumulate massive foreign exchange holdings. But these holdings are not a sign of economic strength or a basis for investment in the country’s future. They’re a hedge against currency flight. When the economy is sinking, the government can use these reserves to prop it back up.

    The Dragon Sleeps

    According to the Bank of International Settlements, trading volume of the Chinese yuan has doubled over the last three years.

    But the U.S. greenback and other top currencies have a huge advantage: people think they know what they are worth. The value isn’t set by government apparatchik.

    For now, the Chinese yuan remains a sleeping dragon. If China ever really joins the global market in a meaningful way, watch the currency wake up and breathe fire.

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Nov 04

Today’s News 4th November 2016

  • "Something Big Is Underway On All Fronts"

    Submitted by Jeremiah Johnson (nom de plume of a retired Green Beret of the US Army Special Forces) via SHTFPlan.com,

    As of this writing, the increased U.S. troop presence in Eastern Europe includes a battalion-sized element of American troops being emplaced in the Suwalki Gap, Polish territory that borders Lithuania in a 60-mile stretch of corridor.  The Russian Defense Ministry announced that 600 Russian and Belarussian airborne troops conducted training exercises in Brest, on the Belorussian-Polish border only a few miles from where the U.S. forces are deploying in Poland.  This on the heels of Britain deploying 800 men, tanks, and jets to Estonia, along with pledges of Challenger 2 tanks, APC’s (Armored Personnel Carriers), and drones.  Two companies of French and Danish Soldiers will join the British in the deployment to Estonia.

    For the first time since 1945, Norway has violated its treaty with Russia (then the Soviet Union) not to station foreign troops on its soil.  A company of U.S. Marines will soon be stationed for a 6-month deployment in Norway.  The situation is heating up in Ukraine, according to a report on fort-russ.com entitled Ukraine Moves Massive Force up to Lugansk Frontline, published October 28, 2016.  The report reveals the Ukrainian Army is deploying 3,500 soldiers and 200 armored vehicles of the 15th Motorized Infantry Brigade to Krasny Oktyabr in the district of Lugansk in Eastern Ukraine.  For the first time in history, Romanian airspace is being patrolled by the RAF (Royal Air Force) of Britain.

    In addition, the Ukrainian National Guard is deploying a tactical company equipped with 82 mm mortars and AGS-17 auto grenade launchers, along with APC’s and missile launchers.  A separate reconnaissance battalion named the “Night Shades,” a nationalist volunteer battalion will be deploying to Lugansk as well.  No doubt they will receive a “warm” reception, as the fighting has been ongoing in the region for more than two years.  The area is a severe flashpoint, as the separatists are ethnic Russians of Ukrainian nationality who wish to secede in the manner that Crimea did…Russia annexed them after the popular vote to leave Ukraine.  Now (since December 2015) the Congress gave the green light to send weapons and munitions to Ukraine; the “holdup” is due to Obama not wanting to jeopardize the election of Hillary Clinton, as the Russians have stated weapons to Ukraine means war with the U.S. and NATO.

    Meanwhile the Varshankya-class stealth subs are deploying into the Black Sea as the Russian fleet is moving toward Syria.  The Russian and Syrian armies continue to bomb and attack the al-Nusra/Jabhat Fatah ash-Sham fighters emplaced in the city of Aleppo.  The mainstream media, meanwhile, is faltering in its attempt to create a “sacred U.S.-coalition crusade” to “free the city of Mosul,” as the offensive is not working quite as planned.  There are also reports that the U.S. government has plans to “navigate” Islamic terrorists from Mosul into Syria, to cause more problems for Assad and the Russians; the mainstream media is notoriously silent on the collateral damages being caused by the U.S.-led Mosul attacks, in which U.S. aircraft are supporting with bombing missions.

    Let’s be clear on this: The U.S. is beefing up conventional forces of American troops into Eastern Europe and convincing NATO countries to augment these deployments with soldiers and equipment.  The Russians have been responding with opposing counter-deployments to offset the U.S.-NATO movements.  The aggressive stance is being taken by the U.S.-NATO-IMF hegemony in its military buildup in Eastern Europe and the Baltic States, the very “backyard” of Russia.

    The bottom line: the stage is being set to start WWIII on the slightest provocation.

    The domestic perspective yields that just a few weeks after the ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) transfer from U.S. control to (basically) the UN on October 1, 2016, the U.S. has had a DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attack from hackers on October 21, 2016 affecting the east and west coast of the U.S. as well as Texas and part of Europe.  Just one week before, on OCtobr 13, 2016 Obama signed an Executive Order for Space Weather anomalies just “in case” some “space weather anomaly” were to cripple the power grid and electrical infrastructure of the United States.

    Something even worse that happened may really tie into this.

    Last week it was reported by the U.S. Army that Major General John Rossi had committed suicide.  Rossi had been slated to take over as the Commander of U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command, and the Army Forces Strategic Command.  General Rossi was about to complete 33 years of service and was only 55 years old.  He was “found” at Redstone Arsenal, and the Army just ruled it a suicide.  The Daily Mail on dailymail.co.uk reported that a U.S. government official told USA Today: “It seemed that Rossi was overwhelmed by his responsibilities” as a potential reason for his suicide.

    The problem is, he committed suicide on July 31, 2016…and it’s taken two months for the Army to rule it as being a suicide?

    With the command assignment, Rossi would have been privy to every procedure and protocol to defend the United States against an ICBM (intercontinental ballistic missile) attack or an EMP (electromagnetic pulse) attack or event.  He would know everything from the “top” down: that is, the Commander-in-Chief (Obama) would have to foster a one-on-one relationship with the man who would hold the key post to defending against a foreign missile attack.

    Maybe this time the missile would not have been foreign, or if it was?  It may not have been the leader of a foreign country to direct it against the United States.

    It is almost impossible to believe that a Major General of the United States Army just receiving a top command post, a 55-year-old soldier…a general officer…with 33 years of service, a wife, and a loving family would “off” himself because of being “overwhelmed by responsibility.”  Men such as Rossi (the highest-ranking member of the military to do such a thing) do not shirk responsibility: they meet it, head on.  The whole thing stinks of a purge, in the manner that the entire military of the United States has been purged of hundreds of senior General Staff officers, Admiralty, and Senior Noncommissioned Officers…replaced by “yes” men over the course of Obama’s term.

    The whole thing stinks of an assassination: no suicide note, no real press coverage, and nothing from his friends, family, or fellow soldiers.  This occurs, and then Obama signs his Executive Order to “protect” us from the dreaded space anomaly that will take down our infrastructure.  Could this have possibly been a suicide?  Think of all of the heartache and grief his family is going through with his loss.  What about the benefits and retirement that his family would lose with such an act?  If he really committed suicide, then it was probably because he found out about something so heinous, so vile that would occur to the U.S. that he couldn’t live with it and probably couldn’t stop it.

    Bottom line: Was he terminated when he wouldn’t go along with a false flag EMP-plan conceived by Obama to take down our grid, cripple our response time, and set the stage for martial law and the suspension of all rights under the Constitution of the United States?

    As I have mentioned in the past, I repeat once again:

    The next war will be initiated by an EMP device detonated above the continental United States followed by a limited nuclear exchange and then conventional warfare.

    I never said that it wouldn’t be Obama who initiated the EMP device, and in all probability if he doesn’t initiate it…he’ll either provoke it, allow it, or request it.  We haven’t even mentioned the voting (early voting) taking place where fraud is occurring in Maryland, Virginia, Illinois, and Florida, among others.  The illusion of the vote: the joke of the year, but the joke is on us.

    And Obama is the joker, setting the stage for the transfer of power.  That transfer is not going to occur with the losing candidate (in either case) going gently into that good night.  The stage is set for a war to begin.  The stage is set for a false flag operation to take down our grid.  The stage is set to steal the election for Clinton or declare it null and void.  Within the next few weeks, the future of the United States will be decided…with or without the consent of the governed.

  • What Does It Take To Bring Hillary Clinton To Justice?

    Authored by Pepe Escobar, originally posted op-ed via RT.com,

    Virtually the whole planet holds its collective breath at the prospect of Hillary Clinton possibly becoming the next President of the United States (POTUS).

    How’s that humanly possible, as the (daily) Bonfire of The Scandals – relentlessly fed by WikiLeaks revelations and now converging FBI investigations – can now be seen from interstellar space?   

    It’s possible because Hillary Clinton, slouching through a paroxysm of manufactured hysteria, is supported by virtually the whole US establishment, a consensual neocon/neoliberalcon War Party/Wall Street/corporate media axis. 

    But History has a tendency to show us there’s always a straw that breaks the camel’s back. 

    This could be it – as revealed by WikiLeaks; March 2, 2015, the day when John Podesta wrote, “we are going to have to dump all those emails.”

    That happened to be the exact same day it was revealed Hillary Clinton had used a personal email server as Secretary of State. 

    Yet this reveals only part of the puzzle. There’s got to be a response to Podesta’s email – which WikiLeaks may, or may not, leak in the next few days before the election. If the back and forth clearly shows intent (to mislead), then we’ve got a 100 percent smoking gun: the whole Clinton (cash) machine narrative – according to which Hillary just deleted "personal" emails – crumbles like the ultimate House of Cards.    

    Moreover, that would unveil what was from the start the privileged Clinton machine strategy: to thwart the subsequent internal State Dept. and FBI investigations. 

    As far as the Clinton machine is concerned, an interlocking influence peddling pile up is the norm. John Podesta also happens to be the founder of the Center for American Progress – a George Soros operation and prime recruiting ground for Obama administration officials, including US Treasury operatives who decided which elite Too Big To Fail (TBTF) financial giants would be spared after the 2008 crisis. DCLeaks.com, for its part, has connected Soros Open Society foundations to global funding rackets directly leading to subversion of governments and outright regime change (obviously sparing Clinton Foundation donors.)

    Exceptional bananas, anyone? 

    The perfectly timed slow drip of WikiLeaks revelations, for the Clinton machine, feels like a sophisticated form of Chinese torture. To alleviate the pain, the relentless standard spin has been to change the subject, blame the messenger, and attribute it all to “evil” Russian hacking when the real source for the leaks might have come straight from the belly of the (Washington) beast.   

    At the Valdai discussion club last week, it took President Putin only a few sentences to debunk the whole Clinton machine narrative with a bang:

    “Another mythical and imaginary problem is what I can only call the hysteria the USA has whipped up over supposed Russian meddling in the American presidential election. The United States has plenty of genuinely urgent problems, it would seem, from the colossal public debt to the increase in firearms violence and cases of arbitrary action by the police. You would think that the election debates would concentrate on these and other unresolved problems, but the elite has nothing with which to reassure society, it seems, and therefore attempt to distract public attention by pointing instead to supposed Russian hackers, spies, agents of influence and so forth.

     

    I have to ask myself and ask you too: Does anyone seriously imagine that Russia can somehow influence the American people’s choice? America is not some kind of ‘banana republic’, after all, but is a great power. Do correct me if I am wrong.”

    Reality, though, continues to insist on offering multiple, overlapping banana republic instances, configuring a giant black hole of transparency. 

    Anthropologist Janine Wedel has been one of the few in Clinton-linked US mainstream media acknowledging how Bill Clinton, while Hillary was Secretary of State, perfected his version of “philantro-capitalism” (actually a money laundering “pay to play” racket), a practice “by no means confined to the Clintons”.    

    And the racket prospered with inbuilt nuggets, such as Hillary being perfectly aware that prime Clinton Foundation donors Qatar and Saudi Arabia were also financing ISIS/ISIL/Daesh.  

    Huma, the Fall Princess 

    Now, less than a week before the election, we have come to the crucial juncture where the WikiLeaks revelations are merging with the FBI investigations – all three of them. 

    Exhibit A is this WikiLeaks bombshell; Peter Kadzik, who’s now in charge of the Department of Justice (DOJ) probe into the 650,000 emails found on the laptop shared by Clinton’s right-hand woman Huma Abedin and her estranged, pervert husband Anthony Wiener, is a Clinton asset.

    Not only Kadzik was an attorney for Marc Rich when he was pardoned by Bill Clinton; Podesta – as also revealed by WikiLeaks – thanked Kadzik for keeping him “out of jail”; and it was Kadzik who gave Podesta a secret heads up on the Clinton email investigation.  

    The Clinton machine, starring a self-described virtuous Madonna, is actually a pretty nasty business. Huma and her family’s close connections to Saudi Arabia – and the Muslim Brotherhood – are legendary (that includes her brother Hassan, who works for Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi). Podesta, by the way, is a handsomely remunerated lobbyist for Saudi Arabia in Washington; that’s part of the Clinton Foundation connection.

    Yet now, with Huma in the spotlight – still maintaining she didn’t know all those emails were in her and Wiener’s laptop – it’s no wonder Hillary has instantly downgraded her, publicly, to “one of my aides”. She used to be Hillary’s ersatz “daughter”; now she’s being framed as The Fall Princess. 

    And that brings us to the intersection of those three FBI investigations; on Hillary’s Subterranean Email Server (in theory closed by FBI’s Comey last summer); on the Clinton Foundation; and on Wiener’s sexting of minors. The FBI has been investigating the Clinton Foundation for over a year now. Let’s try to cut a long story short.

    Follow the evidence

    Last July, the DOJ – under Clinton/Obama asset Loretta Lynch – decided not to prosecute anyone on Emailgate. And yet FBI director Comey – who nonetheless stressed Hillary’s “extreme carelessness” – turbo-charged his no-denial mode on another investigation, as in the FBI “sought to refocus the Clinton Foundation probe.” 

    Soon we had Clinton Foundation FBI investigators trying to get access to all the emails turned over in the Emailgate investigation. The East District of New York refused it. Very important point; up to 2015, guess who was the US attorney at the East District; Clinton/Obama asset Lynch. 

    Enter an extra layer of legalese. Less than two months ago, the Clinton Foundation FBI investigators discovered they could not have access to any Emailgate material that was connected to immunity agreements. 

    But then, roughly a month ago, another FBI team captured the by now famous laptop shared by Huma and Wiener – using a warrant allowing only a probe on Weiner’s sexting of a 15-year-old girl. Subsequently they found Huma Abedin emails at all her accounts – from Humaabedin@yahoo.com to the crucial huma@clintonemail.com.  This meant not only that Huma was forwarding State Dept. emails to her private accounts, but also that Hillary was sending emails from the “secret” clintonemail.com to Huma at yahoo.com. 

    No one knew for sure, but some of these emails might be duplicates of those the Clinton Foundation FBI investigators could not access because of the pesky immunity agreements. 

    What’s established by now is that the metadata in the Huma/Wiener laptop was duly examined. Now picture both teams of FBI investigators – Clinton Foundation and pervert Wiener – comparing notes. And then they decide Huma’s emails are “relevant”. 

    Key questions apply; and the most pressing is how the emails were deemed “relevant” if the investigators could only examine the metadata. What matters is that Comey certainly was made aware of the content of the emails – a potential game-changer. That’s why one of my sources insists his decision to go public came from above. 

    The other key question now is whether the DOJ – via Kadzik? – will once again thwart another investigation, this time on the Clinton Foundation. Senior, serious FBI agents won’t take that – massive euphemism – kindly.

    The FBI has been on the Clinton Foundation for over a year. Now, arguably, they are loaded with evidence – and they won’t quit. Winning the presidency now seems to be the least of Hillary Clinton’s Bonfire of Scandals’ problems. 

  • Turkish Police Raid Opposition Headquarters, Arrest Pro-Kurdish Party Leaders

    Back in May, just two months before the Turkish “coup”, we reported that the puppet parliament of Turkish president Erodgan agreed to strip its members of immunity, a move which we predicted would “be used by Erdogan to prosecute members of the pro-Kurdish HDP, parliament’s third-biggest party, as well as anyone else he choose to take down.“

    Six months, and one fake coup which concentrated virtually all domestic political power in Erdogan’s hands later, we were proven right, when overnight two co-leaders of Turkey’s pro-Kurdish, People’s Democratic Party (HDP) and at least 11 more MPs were detained overnight as police raided homes in Ankara and eastern Kurdish-majority areas. Local media reported that other than in Ankara and Diyarbakir, the arrests have been made in the eastern and southeastern Turkish cities of Hakkari, Mardin and Batman. The arrests are linked to “terrorist propaganda” cases, Reuters said.


    The raids took place on Thursday night in several Turkish cities

    Turkish police raided the Ankara house of co-leader Selahattin Demirtas and the house of co-leader Figen Yuksekdag in Diyarbakir, the largest city in Turkey’s mainly Kurdish southeast, the party’s lawyers told Reuters. “HDP call international community to react against Erdogan Regime’s coup,” the party said on Twitter, referring to President Tayyip Erdogan.


    Selahattin Demirtas was detained at his home in Diyarbakir

    Police also raided and searched the party’s head office in central Ankara. Television images showed party officials quarreling with police during the raid, and a Reuters witness said many police cars and armed vehicles had closed the entrances to the street of the HDP headquarters.

    Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag were detained at their respective homes as part of a “counter-terrorism inquiry”, security sources quoted by Anadolu news agency said. At least nine other HDP MPs were also taken into custody.

    The lawmakers were detained after “failing to appear for a summons to testify as part of a counter-terrorism investigation,” Anadolu state news agency reported.

    The testimonies are connected to “terrorist propaganda” probes related to the Kurdish militant group PKK, and to the pro-Kurdish protests with violent clashes of October 2014, which HDP co-chair Demirtas is accused of inciting. The MPs were required to show up for testimonies after their parliamentary immunity was lifted thanks to the abovementioned law passed earlier this year. The two HDP leaders reportedly vowed not to testify.

    Police broke into the home of HPD co-leader Figen Yüksekda? in Diyarbakir and detained her early Friday, while Selahattin Demirtas was detained in his Ankara house

    The party’s lawyers told Reuters that 11 other HDP parliamentarians were also arrested in the raids, with two more wanted for arrest. Local media reported that other than in Ankara and Diyarbakir, the arrests have been made in the eastern and southeastern Turkish cities of Hakkari, Mardin and Batman.

    Those detained included HDP’s deputy speaker in the Turkish parliament, RIA Novosti reported. “Deputy speaker of parliament Pervin Buldan has also been detained in Ankara,” the HDP representative was quoted as saying.

    The HDP, which is in strong opposition to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government and supports the Kurdish- and other minorities, has been accused of having links to PKK, which Ankara considers a terrorist organization.

    Meanwhile social networks could not be accessed from inside Turkey. Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Whatsapp were inaccessible, even when users tried to circumvent restrictions using a virtual private network (VPN).

    Mr Demirtas had tweeted about his arrest before the sites were restricted. Another MP from the party who is currently abroad, Ertugrul Kurkcu, told the BBC that the detentions were “totally unlawful”. He said: “This crackdown tonight is nothing to do with procedural law, criminal law, any law whatsoever or the constitution. This is an unlawful hijacking of HDP parliamentarians.

    “The Turkish government is heading towards a dictatorship of Nazi style [sic].

    “Will the Turkish government abide by the internationally accepted standards of parliamentary democracy? This is the basic question.”

    Turkey claims that the HDP has links to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), a militant group, but the party strongly denies this. The PKK is deemed a terrorist organisation by the US, the European Union and Turkey.

    Turkey remains under a state of emergency that was imposed after a failed coup in July. The emergency allows President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his cabinet to bypass parliament when drafting new laws and to restrict or suspend rights and freedoms. About 100,000 public sector employees with alleged links to the coup’s alleged mastermind were subsequently purged from their jobs.

    The HDP entered the Turkish parliament for the first time last year, when it won 59 seats and became the country’s third-largest party. It had done so after at least two people died in explosions at one of its rallies. But just three months later, against a backdrop of rising violence between Turkish forces and the PKK, a crowd attacked the HDP’s offices in Ankara.

    The next day, Mr Demirtas accused the ruling party of orchestrating nationalist attacks. Turkish politicians normally have immunity from prosecution, but this was removed from the HDP earlier this year.

    The take home message: after cracking down on the rank and file, the police, army, the state workers in the aftermath of July’s “failed coup”, Erdogan has now gone after the third largest political party in Turkey, and his on his way to becoming a full-fledged dictator, and all thoughout the humanitarian,democratic western powers sit back and pretend not to see Turkey’s collapse into a dictatorial power.

  • The October Payrolls Report: What Wall Street Expects

    While the October payrolls report, due out at 8:30am on Friday, has taken on a secondary importance in light of the market’s near certainty that the Fed will hike rates in December (absent a Trump victory and/or a market crash), analysts and traders will surely be concerned any prominent outlier prints that deviate too far from the consensus estimate of 175K. So, in preview of tomorrow’s biggest economic update, here is a snapshot of what Wall Street expects.

    According to consensus, while estimates point to a pick up in payrolls growth for October, but jobless claims and ADP report have sent mixed signals ahead of NFP release; still, the number should be strong enough to prompt the Fed to raise rates in December, strategists say. 

    • The average Nonfarm payrolls estimate stands at 175k, up modestly from September’s +156k
    • The Unemployment rate seen at 4.9% vs 5.0%
       
    • Average weekly hours exp. at 34.4
    • Average hourly earnings exp. +0.3% m/m, vs +0.2% in September

    This is what the latest ADP report said:

    “Job growth remains strong although the pace of growth appears to be slowing,” Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics Inc. in West Chester, Pennsylvania, said in a statement. Moody’s produces the figures with ADP. “Behind the slowdown is businesses’ difficulty filling open positions. However, there is some weakness in construction, education and mining.”

    The Nov. 2, FOMC statement was optimistic:

    “The labor market has continued to strengthen and growth of economic activity has picked up from the modest pace seen in the first half of this year. Although the unemployment rate is little changed in recent months, job gains have been solid”

    Summary Analyst Views:

    Deutsche Bank (Joe Lavorgna)

    • Headline and private payrolls are expected to rise 150k, slowing moderately
      from their three-month trailing averages of 192k and 177k, respectively
    • A similar reading to the ADP report for today’s employment report from the BLS
      will certainly keep the Fed on track to hike in December.
    • “The October employment report should
      strengthen the Fed’s resolve to raise rates next month…. the bar is fairly low with respect to
      what the Fed needs to see from the October labor data.”

    FTN (Jim Vogel, in note)

    • Current market expectations are in line with December rate hike; only a figure of 125k or less could push market-implied Fed hike odds below 65%
    • Payrolls of 150-200k would see UST 5Y yield between 1.27-1.32%, UST 10Y yield between 1.79-1.84%

    Barclays (Michael Gapen, in note)

    • Recent data on jobless claims “supportive of further improvement in labor market conditions this year”
    • “However, over the past few months, the relationship between claims and employment seems to have weakened somewhat and we have chosen to take less signal from the ongoing declines than we have in the past”

    BMO (Ian Lyngen, in note)

    • ADP miss suggests “marginal downward skew” in NFP report
    • Notes relevant correlation between the two measures that has held up 9 times in last 12 months

    Morgan Stanley (Ted Wieseman, in note)

    • Lowers payrolls forecast to 185k from 205k
    • ADP miss points to weakness ahead of NFP report; overall figure of +147k was “far enough below” MS estimate of 197k to prompt a downward adjustment to payrolls prediction

    * * *

    One notable point brought up by Joe Lavorgna, and the reason why going forward, he is “less sanguine on the labor market.” is that as the chart below indicates, “the year-over-year change in temporary hiring leads that of the overall labor market by two quarters. Temp hiring has been trending noticeably lower as of late. If temp hiring began declining outright on an annual basis, the risk of a more concerning slowdown in hiring would increase.”

    * * *

    According to Southbay Research, today’s Challenger Layoffs, and seasonal retail hiring holds the key to the October Payrolls report, as retailers are scrambling for workers.

    Retail stores Are Hiring Earlier

    Thanks to Amazon, big box stores continue to cut store fronts.
    This year brought another wave of big-box store closings (Walmart, JC Penny, Macy’s, etc).  On top of that is the bankruptcy of Sports Authority.

    No drop in hiring despite fewer store fronts

    With hundreds of fewer brick-and-mortar stores, we should expect fewer retail seasonal workers.
    In fact, the opposite is the case: (per Challenger Gray) announced seasonal retail hiring will slightly exceed last year’s.  The reason: more online shopping is driving more logistical/inventory/shipping support.

    Early Hiring?

    Seasonal hiring kicks off in October: last year 194K people were hired (not seasonally adjusted).
    More importantly, the trend over the last few years is towards earlier October hiring.
    Is that the case this year?

    Per Challenger Gray, October job cut announcements were (-1K), much lower than last year’s (-5K).
    That could be a sign that retailers are staffing up early.

    One possible driver: Halloween spending. 

    Per the National Retail Federation, spending this year was up 10% over last year.

    * * *

    Finally, here is Goldman’s comprehensive preview of what to expect:

    Payrolls Preview

    We forecast an increase of 185k in nonfarm payroll employment for October, slightly above consensus expectations. An expected rebound in employment growth for state and local governments, as well as education- and health care-related industries, is a key reason for the acceleration from a 156k gain in payrolls in September.

    We look for a decline in the unemployment rate to 4.9%, which is now unusually high compared with continuing jobless claims. Favorable calendar effects as well as strengthening underlying wage tends likely boosted average hourly earnings by 0.3% month-over-month.

    We forecast that nonfarm payroll employment increased by 185k in October, slightly more than expected by consensus estimates (+175k). Although payroll growth edged down to 156k in September, much of the slowing was concentrated in state and local government employment and (private) education and health care employment. In September these industries added just 14k jobs, compared with an average monthly increase over the prior twelve months of 61k (Exhibit 1). A partial rebound in these sectors—with other industries steady—would be enough to lift payroll growth into the high-100k range.

    Expecting a Rebound in Government, Education and Health Employment

     

    Arguing for a stronger report:

    • Jobless claims: Initial claims for unemployment insurance benefits have continued to trend down, with the four-week moving average falling to 252k in the October survey week from 258k in the September survey week. The decline would have been even larger except for a rise in claims in the Southeast due to Hurricane Matthew (see below) and an unusually large increase in claims in Kentucky (which we believe was related to a temporary auto plant shutdown). In general, the level of initial claims looks consistent with very low layoff activity in the economy.
    • Manufacturing surveys: The majority of the employment components of the various monthly manufacturing surveys improved in October. The ISM manufacturing (+3.2pt to 52.9), Philly Fed (+1.3pt to -4.0), Kansas City Fed (+10 to +7), and Richmond Fed (+16pt to +3) measures all rose, while the Dallas Fed employment index declined (-2.1pt to +0.2). Manufacturing employment fell by 13k in September, and has declined by 5k on average over the last six months.
    • Seasonals: Seasonal factors are mildly positive for payroll growth this month, in our view. Since the 2008-9 recession, October payroll growth has surprised consensus expectations to the upside two-thirds of the time, with an average surprise of 45k. Moreover, October has often featured favorable revisions: the average two-month revision in the October employment report has been 67k since 2010, 37k since 2005, and 42k since 2000 (Exhibit 2).

    October Employment Reports Often Feature Upward Revisions

     

    Arguing for a weaker report:

    • Job availability: The Conference Board’s labor differential—the difference between the share of households saying that jobs are plentiful and the share saying they are hard to get—declined 3.1 points to +2.2. Despite the pullback, the labor differential remains near a post-crisis high.
    • ADP: ADP reported a 147k gain in private payroll employment in October, below a revised +202k increase in September. The ADP report introduced methodological changes this month, and will now offer more details by sector. Our preliminary analysis suggests that the forecast performance of the ADP series should be similar under the new methodology.
    • Hurricane Matthew: Hurricane Matthew struck the Southeastern US in early October, and may have weighed on payroll employment growth in some states. Initial jobless claims in the region were cumulatively about 10k above their pre-hurricane trend during the middle weeks of last month (with most of the effects in North Carolina). We therefore expect a modest drag from the hurricane of 5-10k on October payroll employment growth (see here for more details).

    Neutral factors:

    • Service sector surveys: The employment components of some service sector surveys deteriorated in October, but most appear consistent with healthy payroll gains. In particular, the ISM non-manufacturing report’s employment index declined to 53.1 following a record monthly increase to 57.2 in September. Aside from the September value, however, the index is at its highest level of this year. Among the regional surveys, the NY Fed index rose slightly (+1.6pt to +9.7, not seasonally adjusted) and the Richmond Fed measure was unchanged (at +6), although the Philly Fed index (-10.8pt to +8.5) and Dallas Fed index (-1.7pt to +2.7) declined. Service sector employment rose 157k last month, and has increased 163k on average over the last six months.
    • Job cuts: Announced layoffs reported by Challenger, Gray & Christmas were little changed at 31k for October. Announced job cuts have remained within a narrow range over the last six months and, like initial jobless claims, appear consistent with generally low layoff activity.

    We expect that the unemployment rate declined to 4.9% in October from an unrounded 4.965% previously. On a rounded basis, the headline U3 unemployment rate edged up by one-tenth in September, and is now up three-tenths from a cyclical low of 4.7% in May. A further increase in the U3 unemployment rate would be surprising in light of the continued decline in the number of unemployment insurance benefit recipients (Exhibit 3). The U3 and U6 measures of labor utilization may take on heightened importance this month, given Fed officials’ focus on the degree of slack remaining in the labor market.

    Unemployment Rate High Compared to Continuing Claims

    We forecast that average hourly earnings for all workers rose by 0.3% (mom) in October, in large part reflecting favorable calendar effects. We expect the year-on-year rate to remain at 2.6%. The broader wage data remain encouraging: our wage tracker—which aggregates four measures of wage growth—also stands at 2.6% year-on-year, a sign that diminishing slack is boosting wage growth.

  • Donald Trump & The Passion Of The Christ

    Authored by Antonius Quinas via AntoniusAquinas.com,

    If Donald Trump can somehow defeat the Wicked Witch of Chappaqua despite vote rigging, outlandish media bias, backstabbing by his own party’s elites, and opposition of Wall Street, his victory may be the most serious setback for The Establishment since, perhaps, the release of Mel Gibson’s blockbuster movie, The Passion of the Christ.

    Both Gibson and Trump faced seemingly impossible odds at the start of their quests and were viciously attacked and undermined by the usual Establishment suspects, yet, in Gibson’s case, he was able to beat the bastards at their own game producing one of the most accurate and authentic Christian movies ever made which garnered over a half billion dollars and numerous cinematic awards!

    Unfortunately, Mel Gibson did not parlay his enormous success and cause further aggravation for the Entertainment industry with additional non-cultural Marxist features, but fell prey to booze and the pleasures of the flesh.  Moreover, Gibson, who was once a traditional Catholic who rejects the heretical changes brought about at the Vatican II Anti-council, could have been a force in a counter insurgency to rid the Church of its current horde of apostates including its head honcho.

    If Trump wins he will have completed what earlier populists, most specifically Ross Perot and Pat Buchanan, had started, but were unable to complete.  A real challenge to the two-party duopoly could have taken place had Perot and Buchanan stuck with the Reform Party and built it up as a legitimate alternative.

    A Trump Presidency will, at the very least, put a temporary halt to the totalitarian liberal order’s relentless drive to render American sovereignty and create a multicultural society via mass controlled (and uncontrolled) immigration.  There would be no return from such a demographic onslaught and political realignment, at least through the ballot box, with the only alternative being secession or the emergence of a strongman who would violently suppress the Left.

    A Trump victory would not only be a blow against the entrenched political class, but like Gibson’s great movie, it would be a mighty and much needed knockdown of the mass media.  No presidential candidate has ever dared to openly take on the mainstream media and expose it for what it truly is – the propaganda arm for the New World Order and the purveyors of degenerate cultural Marxism.

    The protagonist in The Passion of the Christ has often been referred to as “The Prince of Peace,” which is somewhat of a misnomer.  The Christ of the Scriptures is a fighter who spends a good portion of His ministry battling and upbraiding the corrupt Church officials and hierarchy of the day who were not properly shepherding His flock.

    Similarly, Donald Trump has always considered himself a fighter (counter puncher) who has promised to get rid of the corruption and criminality that pervades the political establishment, especially the Clinton cartel.  Trump is uniquely qualified for such a task because, unlike nearly every other politician, he is not beholding financially to anyone.

    Most importantly, Trump will set a new course in US foreign policy which will lead to a de-escalation in tensions around the globe especially with Russia.  High praise was attributed to the peacemakers by the Author of the Beatitudes who said: “Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called children of God.”

    Not only for America, but a Trump victory will have positive reverberations throughout the Western world which would surpass that of the surprising Brexit vote.  European anti-immigration groups and organizations would undoubtedly become further emboldened both psychologically and financially in their struggle to stem the tide of massive unwanted and society-wrecking immigration.  There is no telling what the effect would be when the chief executive of the world’s dominant power would be in sympathy with those who have courageously sought to preserve their families, heritage and way of life from the wicked designs of the New World Order.

    While Mel Gibson self destructed after the phenomenal success of the The Passion of the Christ, his movie still stands not only as an inspirational and moving cinematic masterpiece, but as a glorious blow against the Establishment.  A Trump victory could mean an even greater strike against our globalist masters.

  • FBI Agents: Hillary Is The "Antichrist Personified"

    Having exposed the mutinous divide between The FBI and The Department of Justice, it appears the drip-drip-drip leaky bucket has turned into a spigot as The Guardian cites several seriously pissed off agents describe the FBI as "Trumplandia."

    As The Hill details, in a report published Thursday, multiple sources within the FBI say that deep antipathy toward Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and anger that FBI Director James Comey did not bring charges against her this summer have motivated leaks that could damage her presidential campaign.

    One agent told The Guardian that many at the bureau view Clinton as the “antichrist” and are supportive of Trump.

    The currently serving FBI agent said Clinton is “the antichrist personified to a large swath of FBI personnel,” and that “the reason why they’re leaking is they’re pro-Trump.”

     

    “The FBI is Trumpland,” said one current agent.

    But another FBI source disputed the level of support Trump has within the bureau, according to The Guardian.

    “There are lots of people who don’t think Trump is qualified, but also believe Clinton is corrupt,” the source said. “What you hear a lot is that it’s a bad choice, between an incompetent and a corrupt politician.”

    According to the report, the tensions boiled over in July when Comey declined to recommend charges against the Democratic presidential nominee for possibly mishandling classified information through her use of a private email server to conduct government business, according to the FBI agent.

    “Many FBI agents were upset at the director, not because he didn’t [recommend to] indict, but they believe he threw the FBI under the bus by taking the heat away from DoJ [Department of Justice],” the former bureau official said.

    As The Hill concludes, there have been further leaks about internal fights within the FBI and other possible investigations since the Comey news broke, all of which has suggested an agency in a public war with itself.

  • Voter Fraud Allegations Surface In California As Man Discovers 83 Live Ballots At His Doorstep

    For the past couple of days we’ve been writing about a police investigation underway in Delaware County, PA related to a potentially illegal scheme to fraudulently register voters.  As it turns out, the left coast may be experiencing some voter fraud of their own…shocking. 

    According Fox News, San Pedro, CA resident Jerry Mosna got a bit of a surprise on Saturday morning when he discovered 83 actual live 2016 ballots on his doorstep.  All 83 of the ballots were addressed to his neighbor but each had a different name.  Given that his neighbor is an 89-year old lady, who lives alone in her two bedroom apartment, Mosna was fairly confident that the ballots were not intended for her and reported them to his county registrar. 

    The 83 ballots, each unused, were addressed to different people, all supposedly living in his elderly neighbor’s two-bedroom apartment.

     

    “I think this is spooky,” Mosna said. “All the different names, none we recognize, all at one address.”

     

    His wife, Madalena Mosna, noted their 89-year-old neighbor lives by herself, and, “Eighty people can’t fit in that apartment.”

     

    They took the ballots to the Los Angeles Police Department, but were directed to the post office. They felt little comfort there would be an investigation, and called another neighbor, John Cracchiolo – who contacted the Los Angeles County Registrar’s office.

     

    A spokeswoman for the Registrar said the office will investigate. Both Cracchiolo and Jerry Mosna told FoxNews.com they think they stumbled upon a case of fraud.

    Ballots

     

    Of course, just like in Pennsylvania, California officials are warning people not to jump to conclusions because this is all likely just a simple mistake.  In this particular case, apparently we’re to believe that extra live ballots were randomly printed with the names of 83 different people on them and then sent to the same address because of a “system error.”  We assume the “system error” has been linked back to Russia by 784 distinct U.S. intelligence agencies but we’re awaiting official confirmation on that.

    In a statement, the office of the Registrar said, “We are carefully reviewing our records and gathering information to fully identify what took place.  Our preliminary assessment is that this appears to be an isolated situation related to a system error that occurred causing duplicate ballots to be issued to an address entered for a single voter. We are working directly with the system vendor to ensure the issue is addressed and to identify any similar occurrences.”

    Voter

     

    And we’ll end with this summary just one more time:

  • AP To Clinton Campaign: We Are Preparing To Report FBI Has Thumb Drive, But Can Be Steered Away

    Moments ago, after teasing its twitter followers to “stay tuned for our FBI-DoJ #PodestaEmail special circa 4pm EST” Wikileaks released what appears to be part 28 of its Podesta dump, dubbed the “DoJ/FBI/Huma special” and includes some 1,308 emails, bringing the total to 45,526 in total emails released. 

    We assume the batch will be heavily focused on the DOJ, FBI and Huma, and will present readers with any relevant emails as we find them.

    * * *

    In an email from June 10, 2011 from now-campaign communication manager Jenn Palmieri to John Podesta and Neera Tanden, Palmieri writes – regarding Huma Abedin following the first Anthony Weiner scandal – that it is…

    “Time to get in the haz mat suits… Bust in that house and get Huma the hell out of there.”

    Tanden responds “Lord have mercy.”

    We assume this was a reference to one of the early Anthony Weiner scandals, and a harbinger of things to come regarding Huma’s husband. In retrospect, they should have followed their rhetorical advice.

    * * *

    On August 27, 2015, an email from Lanny Davis, special counsel to President Bill Clinton, and spokesperson for the President and the White House on matters concerning campaign-finance investigations and other legal issues,  appears to suggest that both Fox news and Megyn Kelly were part of the campaign’s pre-coordination with journalists. Davis tells Jen Palmieri the following “personal” thoughts, which suggest getting a guarantee from Megyn Kelly that she won’t be “tough on Hillary” in a proposed interview – which could be a “ratings and media bonanza” – meant to explain why Hillary “wiped” her server.

    Dear Jen,

     

    I know what I’m about to propose is very risky and will be instinctively viewed negatively on the first reaction. But because of the high advantages that I see, perfectly aware of the risks, I think this proposal should be considered.

     

    I propose that the Secretary be on the Megyn Kelly File show for at least 30 minutes. I believe I can reduce the risks, since I know Megyn and Roger Ailes very well, by ensuring that the Secretary will have an opportunity to answer tough questions on emails and other issues without interruption.

     

    In fact, I believe it is in the interest of Secretary Clinton as well as Fox for the questions to be tough, something we should not fear as long as she has an opportunity to answer. I know she will do well with adequate preparation, and especially after yesterday’s excellent statement taking full responsibility for mixing personal an official business on a single email device.

     

    I still believe the issue of the wiping out of uthe private server still needs to be dealt with – e.g., simply stating that was done primarily to protect personal privacy on personal emails but she made the mistake of mixing personal with official on the server because she was using a single device, and she should have been more transparent shortly after she left office.

     

    This interview has the potential to be a ratings and media bonanza. I have confidence she would hit a political home run and have a massive audience to deliver her message without a filter.

     

    Of course there is a risk that Megan will try to show how tough she can be, even tougher than on Trump. I am assuming the worst case on that risk. But if we have a guarantee, which I believe We will get, that she will have an uninterrupted chance to respond to every question, and we have time to prepare, I think this could be a major plus and even a game changer in the various negative narratives about the Secretary being largely inaccessible and sometimes testy with the media.

     

    It would be so much better to be able to talk to you on the phone about this and discuss the pros and cons. If you are willing and available, what would be the best time in the best telephone number?

     

    With warmest regards, and thanks as always for your consideration of my ideas,

     

    Lanny

    He follows up four days later with the following:

    Would love a chance to talk on phone – a few additional background points re conversation I had with Roger Ailes and Megyn some time ago on the subject of HRC pre – announcement.

    It is unclear what was the ultimate fate of the “personal” proposal.

    * * *

    In an email dated 8/11/15, Hillary’s lawyer David Kendall expressed some notable concern about information related the AP preparing to report that the FBI has taken possession of Hillary’s thumb drive, a story which the campaign has vocally denied. Which may also explain why as AP journalist Eric Tucker notes, “If you wanted to steer us away and say that we are misinformed, then I would gladly accept that as well.”

    Recall that on a previous occasion, Kendall made it clear that the official talking point was to deny that the thumb drive had been handed over to the FBI:

     I can see why you might not want to say who the turnover was to, but it seems to me omitting this may be misinterpreted and certainly will trigger another round of questioning. This may defeat the whole point of the exercise. The statement could be read to imply we turned over the thumb drive and server to the State Department—which we didn’t (“There they go again—misleading, devious, non-transparent, tricky etc.”). I would recommend saying “to the Department of Justice.”

    Curiously, over a year later, we learned that the thumb drive had in fact been turned over to the FBI, however as the FBI reported two months ago, it was somehow “lost” in the process.

    A laptop containing a copy, or “archive,” of the emails on Hillary Clinton’s private server was apparently lost—in the postal mail—according to an FBI report released Friday. Along with it, a thumb drive that also contained an archive of Clinton’s emails has been lost and is not in the FBI’s possession.

     

    The thumb drive containing the second copy of the archive also was never found.

     

    “Neither Hanley nor [the Platte River employee] could identify the current whereabouts of the Archive Laptop or the thumb drive containing the archive, and the FBI does not have either item in its possession,” the FBI report stated.

    Full exchange below:

    Hi David,

     

    We have been told, and we are preparing to report, that the FBI has taken possession of the thumb drive that was once in your possession. This is what we have been informed, and we wanted to see whether there was any sort of comment that could be provided. If you wanted to steer us away and say that we are misinformed, then I would gladly accept that as well. But we have solid reason to believe this. We’d welcome any comment you can offer. Thanks very much.

     

    Eric

     

    Wiki

  • Government Pension Plans Are Headed For Disaster

    Submitted by Robert Fellner via The Mises Institute,

    The combined debt held by U.S. public pension plans will top $1.7 trillion next year, according to a just-released report from Moody’s Investors Services.

    This “pension tsunami” has already forced towns like Stockton, California and Detroit, Michigan into bankruptcy. Perhaps no government mismanaged their pension as badly as Puerto Rico, where a $43 billion pension debt forced the commonwealth to seek protection from the federal government after having defaulted on its obligations to bondholders — a default which is expected to spread to retirees in the form of benefit cuts.

    While the disastrous outcome of Puerto Rico’s pension plan — which is projected to completely run out of assets by 2019 — represents the worst-case scenario, the same series of events that led to its demise can be found in most public pension plans nationwide.

    There are three primary culprits that can be found in nearly every state suffering from a public pension crisis:

    1. The use of accounting gimmicks that are designed to shift costs onto future generations — an approach outlawed for private pension plans and rejected by both public and private plans in Canada and Europe.
    2. Lawmakers, acting in their political self-interest, who have catered to the past demands of government unions to enrich their members’ benefits while passing the costs onto future generations.
    3. A broken governance structure where public pension board members are actually penalized in tangible ways for acting responsibly, and are rewarded by choosing to delay the day of reckoning.

    Perhaps the most concise assessment of public pensions came from the former chief actuary for the nation’s largest public pension fund — CalPERS — who noted simply that: “Politics and pensions just don’t mix.”

    And it’s not just "liberal" states like California who have succumbed to the siren call of public pensions. My home state of Nevada — historically thought to be a bastion of limited government thought — is in a proportionally deeper hole than our California neighbors!

     

    The Trouble in Nevada 

    While most financial experts are warning of future teacher shortages, decaying roads, higher taxes and cuts to public safety, the Public Employees’ Retirement System of Nevada (PERS) is confident they can avoid all that by doing one simple thing: produce investment returns higher than what even Warren Buffett expects to get! 

    Because PERS has failed to hit its investment targets over the past 5-, 10-, 15-, 20- and 25-year periods, government workers’ retirement costs have soared to today’s record-high 28 percent of pay (40.5 percent for police and fire officers) — which now consumes more than 12 percent of all Nevada state and local government tax revenue combined.

    And as more money is sent to PERS, less is available for salaries, like the only $34,684 offered to new Clark County school teachers last year — almost certainly a driving factor behind the district’s perennial teacher shortages. 

    What’s worse, over 40 percent of what all government workers — excluding police and fire officers — pay towards PERS is spent on the system’s previously accrued debt, rather than on financing the employee’s future benefits.

    Consequently, all new hires are expected to be net losers under PERS — receiving a benefit worth less than its total cost — which, unsurprisingly, will “negatively affect current teacher quality and retention,” according to scholars at the Bureau of Labor and Statistics.

    Retirement costs for police and fire officers are even higher: Paying PERS an amount equal to 40.5 percent of their salary means fewer cops on the street. 

    The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, for example, has sat on roughly $100 million in funds explicitly designated for hiring new cops for over a decade now — likely anticipating the future explosion in retirement costs to come. In fact, despite the surplus, Metro is pushing for yet another tax hike, citing their ever-increasing personnel costs.

    But that was just the tip of the iceberg.

    PERS debt is projected to explode over the next decade, rising from roughly $11.4 billion to over $38 billion if the average 5.85 percent annual investment return forecast of the consultant hired by PERS — Wilshire Associates — is accurate:

    To put that in perspective, in 2013 Nevada spent less than $3 billion on police, highways, and fire protection combined.

    Servicing a debt of this size would require similarly massive increases in contribution rates, inevitably requiring lower wages for government workers, cuts to vital services, and higher taxes. 

    At that point, it’s likely that there would simply not be enough taxes to hike and services to cut to make PERS solvent — leaving no other choice but to cut the benefits promised to retirees.

    In order to avoid that fate, and save PERS, Nevada lawmakers must act with the urgency that this situation demands.

    How We Got Here

    PERS is different from retirement accounts in the private sector, where workers’ contributions are deposited directly into individually owned accounts.

    In PERS, workers’ retirement contributions are all pooled together in one large fund, with members promised a fixed future benefit based on salary and work experience — similar to how Social Security works. 

    Consequently, PERS must make a series of projections to determine how much workers must contribute in order to ensure their promised, future benefit is fully funded. One of the most significant projections PERS makes is its assumed 8 percent annual investment return.

    In other words, PERS would consider a $10 payment due in 30 years as fully funded with only $1 today — as the expected gains from investing that $1 would bridge that $9 gap over time.

    Unfortunately, if PERS investments underperform that target, taxpayers and government workers must bail them out via higher contribution rates.

    But using expected investment returns to discount guaranteed future benefits amounts to serious malpractice, which is why such an approach is rejected by private US pension plans, public and private plans in Canada and Europe, and 98 percent of financial economists. US public pension plans are the only dissenters from this consensus.

    The easiest way to see why this is wrong is to look at what happens by raising that rate. Imagine if the governor and the legislature uniformly demanded the PERS board must immediately pay down the approximately $11 billion unfunded liability it currently reports.

    That sounds like an impossible task, right?

    But because of the flawed PERS accounting methodology, the board could appear to pay off that entire amount in an instant. All that would be needed is for the PERS investment advisor to claim that instead of an 8 percent annual return, he now believes PERS can return 10.5 percent.

    Presto! PERS would have eliminated their entire $11 billion debt, and would actually enjoy a slight surplus to boot!

    Of course, their actual unfunded liability — over $50 billion using correct accounting — hasn’t changed.

    If that approach sounds fishy to you, you’re in good company. 

    But given that this is the approach PERS board members employ, they should be extremely vigilant in ensuring their assumed investment return is one that they can confidently expect to hit.

    Instead, they ignore both their poor past performance, as well as the projections of their own, hand-picked consultants who are warning that the board’s assumed annual rate of return is far too high.

    After a careful selection process, PERS last year commissioned a second-opinion review by Wilshire Associates, which, on August 20, 2015, informed the Board that it was most likely to realize only an average annual return of 5.85 percent over the next decade — not the 8 percent minimum PERS must hit to avoid falling further into debt.

    Wilshire’s assessment of lower expected future returns is shared by virtually all major industry experts.

    The McKinsey Global Institute, for example, warned that, “After an era of stellar performance, investment returns are likely to come back down to earth over the next 20 years.” Based on McKinsey’s projections, PERS can expect a 20-year return ranging from as low as 4.6 percent under a “slow-growth” recovery to as high as 7.4 percent under a “growth-recovery” scenario.

    Even investing guru Warren Buffett uses a mere 6.5 percent assumed long-term rate of return for Berkshire Hathaway’s pension plan.

    Because of this, most US public pension plans are now lowering their investment targets. For example, the nation’s largest public pension plan — CalPERS — implemented a plan last year to gradually drop their 7.5 target to 6.5 percent over the next several years.

    A Broken Governance Structure

    So why does PERS — in defiance of its peers, experts, and its own consultants — continue to employ an 8 percent assumed rate of return?

    Political self-interest.

    After PERS investment advisor Ken Lambert offered a few half-hearted reasons to justify dismissing the Wilshire report — the Board asked for a precise calculation of what lowering its rate to 7 percent would entail.

    Such a move would increase the non-safety contribution rate from 28 to 38 percent of pay, at which point, according to Lambert, “We’ll all go home” — apparently predicting massive rebellion by public employees that would drive the current board and its staff out of office.

    PERS here illustrates the core error built into the governance structure of US public pension plans: Short-term board members, with no skin in the game, face a set of incentives where they are actually punished for doing the right thing, and benefit from pushing costs off onto future generations.

    Given that understanding, it’s easy to see why PERS characterized the Wilshire report as meriting “no rush, no real urgency” and containing “nothing [that] is actionable,” when Nevada State Education Association president Ruben Murillo repeatedly, and correctly, pressed the board for answers.

    PERS now finds itself in a Catch-22 situation: Because board members have for so long failed to face reality, costs will skyrocket if they should now adopt correct assumptions. Yet, failing to do so will only compound their initial mistake — and the resultant carnage — when the day of reckoning finally arrives.

    Significantly, because PERS only has about 72 cents of every dollar of promised benefits on hand, the system actually needs to outperform its 8 percent investment target. Only then would the system have enough money to make good on its promises.

    Making matters worse is the fact that PERS is now cash-flow negative — paying out more in benefits than it collects in taxpayer and employee contributions. 

    If this trend persists and Wilshire’s projected investment returns are realized, PERS could easily find itself approaching a funded ratio of only 50 percent — which is considered a “crisis-point” that is “very difficult to climb out of,” by CalPERS Chief Investment Officer Ted Eliopoulos.

    Even though the call for reform enjoys widespread, bipartisan support and includes at least one former PERS board member, Warren Buffett’s assessment of public pensions still rings sadly true in Nevada:

    There probably is more managerial ignorance on pension costs than any other cost item of remotely similar magnitude. And, as will become so expensively clear to citizens in future decades, there has been even greater electorate ignorance of governmental pension costs.

    Thankfully, there is still time left to save PERS, but the particulars of reform are much less important than acknowledging the fundamental problems. As officials with Oregon’s pension plan stated of their similar crisis: “This is becoming a moral issue. We can’t just talk about numbers anymore.”

    Conclusion

    In theory, government is ostensibly designed to override the allegedly short-sighted, greedy nature of individual actors with policies that are long-term oriented and designed to maximize the general welfare.

    Yet, as the case of public pensions (not to mention infrastructure spending, the national debt, entitlements, etc.) reveals, the political process actually does the exact opposite: it actually rewards those who underfund the present and defray costs onto future generations.

    Thus, asking for lawmakers to “be more responsible” or “think about the future” misses the point. We are all self-interested actors. Instead of wishing this wasn’t so, it would be vastly more effective to embrace this reality and restrict the role of government to only those areas that it is well-equipped to provide.

    As Ron Seeling said, “Politics and pensions just don’t mix. That’s all there is to it.”

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Nov 03

Today’s News 3rd November 2016

  • Military Miscalculations

    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 we’re covering military miscalculations

    When it comes to the stock and bond markets, the mandate’s pretty simple. Deny, then inflate another bubble. The central banks will continue to do this until the market takes their ability to do so away. It’s going to be quite something to witness.

    What about geopolitics, though?

    This is a bit trickier to determine, though for anyone with a history book or two thumbs and a search engine we know it can affect asset prices and global capital flows in ways that central bankers only wished they could.

    NATO’s biggest buildup on Russia’s borders since the cold war. That’s what the Guardian’s calling it.

    “Britain is sending fighter jets next year to Romania. The US is dispatching troops, tanks and artillery to Poland. Germany, Canada and other Nato countries also pledged forces at a meeting on Wednesday of defence chiefs in Brussels.”

    NATO is already wobblier than a 2 year old without trainer wheels, and EU disintegration will continue to accelerate as nationalistic parties are elected across Europe. With an increasing focus on protecting their self interests rather than that of Europe, NATO’s days are probably numbered.

    Germany, the strongest military power in Europe will remain reluctant to “lead the charge” due to it’s …ahem history, and the Brits reeling from Brexit have little appetite for military aggression, and that really leaves the empire. You see Europe is going to continue building walls. That’s defensive not aggressive.

    Then of course there is the South China sea dispute.

    US South China Sea Dispute

    Gone are the days when challenging the empire was a no-no. Tis no trivial matter.

    China will continue to flex its muscles. After all its achilles heel is that its access to global sea lanes is blocked by a ring of small islands. Controlling these is both militarily strategic as well as economically strategic. America will increasingly be put to the test.

    The Empire’s Involvement

    Let me be clear. America is not threatened in any way. No foreign power will attack the US. But then they don’t need to. Osama Bin Liner did more damage with a rag tag army of sandal-wearing goat herders than any nation state has managed to do since WWII. Like all empires in their final years, the threat comes from within. Washington doing what Washington does: something incredibly stupid.

    Which of course brings us to crook vs jerk.

    It’s one reason the American elections actually matter this time around, which makes this Presidential election unusual.

    Trump wants to “make America great”. War with Russia appears thankfully not to have crossed his mind.

    My guess is he’d rather build a new hotel in Moscow and bring reality TV to the White House than sit in the radiation footprint Washington after poking the bear.

    Hillary, on the other hand, is all for it. Her military understanding being that of steamed spinach, and being surrounded by an entire cadre of imbeciles who’ve gone before her: Bush, Cheney, Obama, that guy Bill.

    In a recent speech she made her stance very clear:

    “Our power comes with a responsibility to lead, humbly, thoughtfully, and with a fierce commitment to our values — because when America fails to lead we leave a vacuum that either causes chaos or other countries or networks rushing to fill the void.”

    Oh, you mean like the power vacuums in the middle east now filled by ISIS?

    And this doozy:

    “We can’t cozy up to dictators, we have to stand up to them.”

    Surely she can’t be referring to her push to take down Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. That gambit left Libya in absolute chaos, resulting in the terror group Daesh rising in power and displacing an estimated 400,000 people, all of them mad at America and Europeans and now targeting them in their home towns.

    She seems eager to step up the game from her predecessors who made a habit of only attacked small third world countries with sand.

    “We need to respond to evolving threats, from states like Russia, China, Iran and North Korea.”

     

    “We need a military that is ready and agile so that it can meet the full range of threats — and operate on short notice across every domain — not just land, sea, air, and space, but also cyber space.”

    Russia, sweetheart, is a nuclear power. China, a nuclear power.

    Iran and North Korea? Look cupcake, if you can’t control a tiny pile of sand like Iraq, pray tell how you’re going to go after Iran.

    The voting populace doesn’t want it. “Let me just relax and watch gratuitous violence on Netflix, dammit. And I don’t give a hoot about Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, or Yemen and I sure as hell don’t want to pay for it.”

    Even those who can’t read (a substantial and growing number) question why on earth US troops loiter in far flung places being terribly unsuccessful – repeatedly.

    us-military-presence-abroad_mapbuilder

    The shortlist of active candidates doesn’t look pretty either:

    • Iraq? a mess with no control and a power vacuum (as discussed in “7 Steps to the Easiest Short in Recent History.”) which looks a whole lot worse than Saddam.
    • Afghanistan? Disaster. Still no control. Billions spent.
    • Libya? Whoohoo, Gaddafi is overthrown and now the refugees can pour into Europe unrestrained. Oops, hadn’t thought of that. Actions have consequences. Someone ought to tell these guys.
    • The war in Somalia where US forces are fighting a clandestine war against rebels sucks more capital from the US treasury. But never mind, the world still wants US debt… until it doesn’t.
    • The Saudis propped up by Washington are now murdering Yemenis. Wining friends and influencing people folks.
    • Assad is bad and so supporting ISIS in Syria while fighting them in Iraq, Afghanistan and increasingly on US streets is logical. What was the definition of insanity again?

    I could list many more but you get the picture.

    In fact, the US has over 1,400 military bases in over 120 countries. Not bad for a country which is importing capital rather than exporting it.

    And while this is happening, the rest of the world pivots.

    Russia is getting chummy with Iran, China, and now Turkey, which for scholars of history is the pivotal access point for both Europe and the Arab world. The Asian countries increasingly move East towards China, the latest being Duterte of the Philippines who has promised to kick the US out.

    screen-shot-2016-11-02-at-9-51-55-am

    “For as long as I am there, do not treat us like a doormat because you’ll be sorry for it. I will not speak with you. I can always go to China.”

    Maybe it’s just me but “go to hell you son of a whore” sounds awfully like Asia pivoting away from the US. Puts a bit of a spanner in the Obama administrations “Pivot Asia” foreign policy plan.

    Some Troubling Signs

    What has been troubling to watch from afar and as a non-American who typically doesn’t care who wins most elections, is the very obvious prepping of war Hillary’s camp has been doing over the last few months.

    The Russians are hacking the election, they’re dangerous, they’re expanding, they’re killing ISIS civilians in Syria, and they may even be the cause of global warming climate change not to mention diabetes.

    It stands to reason: after all, Bill managed to distract an easily distracted electorate from his affair with Monica Lewinsky by launching missiles at Sudan. Why not threaten Russia to distract from the now daily barrage of revelations about the Clinton crime syndicate? Peter Thiel stated the threat lucidly in his recent address at the National Press club:

    “Now Hillary Clinton has called for a no fly zone over Syria. Incredibly that would be a mistake even more reckless than invading Iraq, since most of the planes flying over Syria today are Russian planes, Clintons proposed course of action would do worse than involve us in a messy civil war, it would risk a direct nuclear conflict.”

    Trump is a blowhard and Hillary part of the deep state. Happy days!

    And now it seems that the outcome rests on a large swathe of the electorate drunk on football, Kim Kardashian’s latest antics, and prime time TV. Geopolitical knowledge? Not featuring so much.

    The risk is that Washington in desperation does something phenomenally stupid rather than simply dumb which it’s proven itself quite adept at.

    The empire will continue to lose its grip but if history is any indication (and it is) then it may not do so quietly.

    Question

    Military Miscalculations Poll

    Cast your vote here and also see what others the biggest threat is

    Know anyone that might enjoy this? Please share this with them.

    Investing and protecting our capital in a world which is enjoying the most severe distortions of any period in mans recorded history means that a different approach is required. And traditional portfolio management fails miserably to accomplish this.

    And so our goal here is simple: protecting the majority of our wealth from the inevitable consequences of absurdity, while finding the most asymmetric investment opportunities for our capital. Ironically, such opportunities are a result of the actions which have landed the world in such trouble to begin with.

    – Chris

    “Military intelligence is a contradiction in terms.” — Groucho Marx

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  • Russia: The West Is Trapped In Its Own "Propaganda-Created World"

    Submitted by James Holbrooks via TheAntiMedia.org,

    As the American corporate media continues to tow the official line that Russia is working to undermine U.S. elections, the head of the U.K.’s MI5 spoke with the Guardian on Tuesday. It was the first time an acting spy chief has given a newspaper interview in the agency’s 107-year history, and the subject matter important enough to prompt such an atypical occurrence was hardly a surprising one — Russia.

    Or, more accurately, Russia as the big bad enemy.

    “Russia increasingly seems to define itself by opposition to the west and seems to act accordingly,” MI5 chief Andrew Parker told the Guardian. “You can see that on the ground with Russia’s activities in Ukraine and Syria. But there is high-volume activity out of sight with the cyber-threat.”

     

    “Russia has been a covert threat for decades,” he continued. Then, evoking the U.S. election hacking hype, he added, “What’s different these days is that there are more and more methods available.”

    And according to Parker, Vladimir Putin’s Russia is utilizing these methods in “increasingly aggressive ways” to project its global influence:

    “It is using its wide range of state organs and powers to push its foreign policy abroad in increasingly aggressive ways — involving propaganda, espionage, subversion and cyber-attacks. Russia is at work across Europe and in the U.K. today.”

    The Kremlin was quick to issue a response to the Parker interview, one the Guardian detailed in a follow-up piece.

    “Those words do not correspond to reality,” spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said flatly. With regard to alleged U.S. election tampering, he added, “Until someone produces proof, we will consider those statements unfounded and groundless.”

    Russia’s embassy in London, meanwhile, stated on Twitter it was “saddened to see a professional trapped to [sic] his own propaganda-created world.” Accompanying that tweet was the movie poster for the 1966 film The Russians are Coming, the Russians are Coming.

    In the buildup to the U.S. presidential election on November 8 — and as Russian submarines are spotted off the British coast — Western nations are again amping up the anti-Russian narrative.

    On October 7, for instance, the United States officially accused Russia of attempting to intervene in the U.S. political system. Then, just days ago, Western member countries of the G7 alliance agreed that continued sanctions against Russia for its role in Ukraine and Syria were “vital.”

    For his part, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s response to such recriminations has been largely one of amusement, as demonstrated by comments he made last week.

    While speaking to foreign policy experts in Sochi, Putin dismissed the “hysteria about Russia’s influence on the U.S. presidential election,” adding the “mythical and fictitious” issue has been used to distract the American voter from real problems facing the United States government.

    “Does anyone seriously think Russia can somehow influence the American people’s choice?” Putin asked. “Is America some kind of banana republic? America is a great power!”

    A great power, the Russian president made certain to note, with a top notch propaganda arm:

    “I would like to have such propaganda machine in Russia, but, regrettably, there is no such thing,” Putin said, touching on the bought and paid for nature of Western corporate media. “We don’t have such global media as CNN, BBC and others.”

  • Currency Chaos Continues As Gold Tops $1300 Again, Nasdaq Futures Tumble Below Key Support

    While Facebook's after-hours demise weighed on stock indices (Nasdaq futures broke key 100-DMA support), the overnight action in Asia is centered on currency turmoiling…

    Facebook's plunge is hammering the NASDAQ but that drop accelerate as currencies snapped in AsiaPac…

     

    Pushing Nasdaq futures below the key 100-day moving-average…

     

    But the real fun is in Currencies tonight… (as traders focus on the World Series)

    USDJPY broke below its 100-DMA, having fallen (Yen strength) non-stop since The BoJ…

     

    Plunging through 103.00 stops…Chatter of a FOX news headline triggering the move…

    And the Mexican Peso pounding continues, testing to 19.50..

     

    With the USD Index extending its losses to three-week lows…

     

    Sending Bitcoin soaring..

     

    And the Long Bond is ripping higher (yields lower)…

     

    And safe haven bids have pushed gold back above $1300…

  • Secret Recordings Fueled Mutinous FBI Investigation of Clintons Despite DOJ Orders To "Stand Down"

    It’s looking increasingly like there is an ongoing mutiny underway within the FBI as the Wall Street Journal is reporting that, according to “officials at multiple agencies”, FBI agents felt they had adequate evidence, including “secret recordings of a suspect talking about the Clinton Foundation”, to pursue an investigation of the Clinton Foundation but were repeatedly obstructed by officials at the Department of Justice.

    Secret recordings of a suspect talking about the Clinton Foundation fueled an internal battle between FBI agents who wanted to pursue the case and corruption prosecutors who viewed the statements as worthless hearsay, people familiar with the matter said.

     

    The roots of the dispute lie in a disagreement over the strength of the case, these people said, which broadly centered on whether Clinton Foundation contributors received favorable treatment from the State Department under Hillary Clinton.

     

    Senior officials in the Justice Department and the FBI didn’t think much of the evidence, while investigators believed they had promising leads their bosses wouldn’t let them pursue, they said.

    Despite clear signals from the Justice Department to abandon the Clinton Foundation inquiries, many FBI agents refused to stand down.  Then, earlier this year in February 2016, the FBI presented initial evidence at a meeting with Leslie Caldwell, the head of the DOJ’s criminal division, after which agents were delivered a clear message that “we’re done here.”  But, as the WSJ points out, DOJ became increasing frustrated with FBI agents that were “disregarding or disobeying their instructions” which subsequently prompted an emphatic “stand down” message from the DOJ to “all the offices involved.”

    As 2015 came to a close, the FBI and Justice Department had a general understanding that neither side would take major action on Clinton Foundation matters without meeting and discussing it first. In February, a meeting was held in Washington among FBI officials, public-integrity prosecutors and Leslie Caldwell, the head of the Justice Department’s criminal division. Prosecutors from the Eastern District of New York—Mr. Capers’ office—didn’t attend, these people said.

     

    The public-integrity prosecutors weren’t impressed with the FBI presentation, people familiar with the discussion said. “The message was, ‘We’re done here,’ ” a person familiar with the matter said.

     

    Justice Department officials became increasingly frustrated that the agents seemed to be disregarding or disobeying their instructions.

     

    Following the February meeting, officials at Justice Department headquarters sent a message to all the offices involved to “stand down,’’ a person familiar with the matter said.

     

    The FBI had secretly recorded conversations of a suspect in a public-corruption case talking about alleged deals the Clintons made, these people said. The agents listening to the recordings couldn’t tell from the conversations if what the suspect was describing was accurate, but it was, they thought, worth checking out.

    Hillary

     

    Despite the warnings, FBI agents continued to press forward leading to a tense August 12th call between a “senior DOJ official” and the FBI deputy director, Andrew McCabe, which ended abruptly when McCabe bluntly asked “are you telling me that I need to shut down a validly predicated investigation?”

    In subsequent conversations with the Justice Department, Mr. Capers told officials in Washington that the FBI agents on the case “won’t let it go,” these people said.

     

    As a result of those complaints, these people said, a senior Justice Department official called the FBI deputy director, Mr. McCabe, on Aug. 12 to say the agents in New York seemed to be disregarding or disobeying their instructions, these people said. The conversation was a tense one, they said, and at one point Mr. McCabe asked, “Are you telling me that I need to shut down a validly predicated investigation?’’ The senior Justice Department official replied: ”Of course not.”

    With that, it seems that we’re starting to get a little more insight into why the FBI didn’t “follow protocol” by alerting the DOJ before sending their most recent letter to Congress announcing the re-opening of Hillary’s email investigation.

    Meanwhile, Fox News reported earlier this evening that “sources” claim to have an “avalanche of evidence” in their case against Hillary and that “barring obstruction” they would continue to push for an indictment.  The next 5 days should be very interesting.

  • Not Guilty: The Power Of Nullification To Counteract Government Tyranny

    Submitted by John Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,

    “The people have the power, all we have to do is awaken that power in the people. The people are unaware. They’re not educated to realize that they have power. The system is so geared that everyone believes the government will fix everything. We are the government.”—John Lennon

    How do you balance the scales of justice at a time when Americans are being tasered, tear-gassed, pepper-sprayed, hit with batons, shot with rubber bullets and real bullets, blasted with sound cannons, detained in cages and kennels, sicced by police dogs, arrested and jailed for challenging the government’s excesses, abuses and power-grabs?

    Politics won’t fix a system that is broken beyond repair.

    No matter who sits in the White House, the shadow government will continue to call the shots behind the scenes.

    Relying on the courts to restore justice seems futile.

    Indeed, with every ruling handed down, it becomes more apparent that we live in an age of hollow justice, with government courts, largely lacking in vision and scope, rendering narrow rulings focused on the letter of the law. This is true at all levels of the judiciary, but especially so in the highest court of the land, the U.S. Supreme Court, which is seemingly more concerned with establishing order and protecting government agents than with upholding the rights enshrined in the Constitution.

    Even so, justice matters.

    It matters whether you’re a rancher protesting a federal land-grab by the Bureau of Land Management, a Native American protesting an oil pipeline that will endanger sacred sites and pollute water supplies, or an African-American taking to the streets to protest yet another police shooting of an unarmed citizen.

    Unfortunately, protests and populist movements haven’t done much to push back against an authoritarian regime that is deaf to our cries, dumb to our troubles, blind to our needs, and accountable to no one.

    It doesn’t matter who the activists are (environmentalists, peaceniks, Native Americans, Black Lives Matter, Occupy, or the Bundys and their followers) or what the source of the discontent is (endless wars abroad, police shootings, contaminated drinking water, government land-grabs), the government’s modus operandi has remained the same: shut down the protests using all means available, prosecute First Amendment activities to the fullest extent of the law, and discourage any future civil uprisings by criminalizing expressive activities, labelling dissidents as extremists or terrorists, and conducting widespread surveillance on the general populace in order to put down any whispers of resistance before it can take root.

    Thus, if there is any means left to us for thwarting the government in its relentless march towards outright dictatorship, it may rest with the power of juries and local governments to invalidate governmental laws, tactics and policies that are illegitimate, egregious or blatantly unconstitutional.

    Just recently, in fact, an Oregon jury rejected the government’s attempts to prosecute seven activists who staged a six-week, armed takeover of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge.

    In finding the defendants not guilty—of conspiracy to impede federal officers, of possession of firearms in a federal facility, and of stealing a government-owned truck—the jury sent its own message to the government and those following the case: justice matters.

    Many other equally sincere activists with eloquent lawyers and ardent supporters have gone to jail for lesser offenses than those committed at the Malheur Refuge, so what made the difference here?

    The jury made all the difference.

    These seven Oregon protesters were found not guilty because a jury of their peers recognized the sincerity of their convictions, sympathized with the complaints against an overreaching government, and balanced the scales of justice using the only tools available to them: common sense, compassion and the power of the jury box.

    Jury nullification works.

    As law professor Ilya Somin explains, jury nullification is the practice by which a jury refuses to convict someone accused of a crime if they believe the “law in question is unjust or the punishment is excessive.” According to former federal prosecutor Paul Butler, the doctrine of jury nullification is “premised on the idea that ordinary citizens, not government officials, should have the final say as to whether a person should be punished.”

    Imagine that: a world where the citizenry—not the government or its corporate controllers—actually calls the shots and determines what is just.

    “We the people” can and should be determining what laws are just, what activities are criminal and who can be jailed for what crimes.

    This is where the power of jury nullification is so critical: to reject inane laws and extreme sentences and counteract the edicts of a profit-driven governmental elite that sees nothing wrong with jailing someone for a lifetime for a relatively insignificant crime.

    Jury nullification is a powerful reminder that, as the Constitution tells us, “we the people” are the government.

    For too long we’ve allowed our so-called “representatives” to call the shots. Now it’s time to restore the citizenry to their rightful place in the republic: as the masters, not the servants.

    Nullification is one way of doing so.

    Various cities and states have been using this historic doctrine with mixed results on issues as wide ranging as gun control and healthcare to “claim freedom from federal laws they find onerous or wrongheaded.”

    Where nullification can be particularly powerful, however, is in the hands of the juror.

    The reality with which we must contend is that justice in America is reserved for those who can afford to buy their way out of jail.

    For the rest of us who are dependent on the “fairness” of the system, there exists a multitude of ways in which justice can and does go wrong every day. Police misconduct. Prosecutorial misconduct. Judicial bias. Inadequate defense. Prosecutors who care more about winning a case than seeking justice. Judges who care more about what is legal than what is just. Jurors who know nothing of the law and are left to deliberate in the dark about life-and-death decisions. And an overwhelming body of laws, statutes and ordinances that render the average American a criminal, no matter how law-abiding they might think themselves.

    If you’re to have any hope of remaining free—and I use that word loosely—your best bet remains in your fellow citizens.

    Your fellow citizens may not know what the Constitution says and they may not know what the laws are, but if you’re lucky, those who serve on a jury will have a conscience that speaks louder than the legalistic tones of the prosecutors and the judges and reminds them that justice and fairness go hand in hand.

    That’s ultimately what jury nullification is all about: restoring a sense of fairness to our system of justice. It’s the best protection for “we the people” against the oppression and tyranny of the government, and God knows, we can use all the protection we can get.

    It’s also a powerful way to remind the government—all of those bureaucrats who have appointed themselves judge, jury and jailer over all that we are, have and do—that we’re the ones who set the rules.

    So how do you not only push back against the police state’s bureaucracy, corruption and cruelty but also launch a counterrevolution aimed at reclaiming control over the government using nonviolent means?

    You start by changing the rules and engaging in some (nonviolent) guerilla tactics.

    Employ militant nonviolent resistance and civil disobedience, which Martin Luther King Jr. used to great effect through the use of sit-ins, boycotts and marches.

    Take part in grassroots activism, which takes a trickle-up approach to governmental reform by implementing change at the local level (in other words, think nationally, but act locally).

    And then, as I explain in more detail in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People, nullify everything. Nullify the court cases. Nullify the laws. Nullify everything the government does that is illegitimate, egregious or blatantly unconstitutional.

  • According To Obama, This Is The Reason Why Hillary Isn't "50 Points Ahead"

    Having expressed her frustration at not being 50 points ahead against a man who is supported by mere deplorables…

     

    Hillary Clinton piled on this week exclaiming Trump supporters as "dark ", "divisive", and "angry" (all 40-plus percent of the US population of them)…

     

    And so, with neither the racist nor the Putin-puppet label sticking to Trump, as Liberty Blitzkrieg's Mike Krieger so eloquently notes, Team Clinton and its lobotomized surrogates have regressed back to square one: playing the woman card.

    As a reminder Krieger noted earlier this week, a professor of linguistics at Berkeley just published an article at Time claiming (with zero evidence of course), that the Hillary Clinton email server scandal only exists because she is a woman. Here’s a brief snippet of what she said:

    ‘It’s not about emails; it’s about public communication by a woman’

     

    I am mad. I am mad because I am scared. And if you are a woman, you should be, too. Emailgate is a bitch hunt, but the target is not Hillary Clinton. It’s us.

     

    The only reason the whole email flap has legs is because the candidate is female. Can you imagine this happening to a man? Clinton is guilty of SWF (Speaking While Female), and emailgate is just a reminder to us all that she has no business doing what she’s doing and must be punished, for the sake of all decent women everywhere. There is so much of that going around.

     

    It’s not about emails; it’s about public communication by a woman in general. Of course, in the year 2016, no one (probably not even The Donald) could make this argument explicitly. After all, he and his fellow Republicans are not waging a war on women. How do we know that? They have said so. And they’re men, so they must be telling the truth.

    I know. It’s really hard to believe the above is real, but it is.

    But now President Obama himself is now getting in the mud.

    Here’s what he had to say today in Ohio, according to NBC:

    COLUMBUS, Ohio — President Barack Obama said Tuesday that sexism is to blame for the tight race for the White House, telling an Ohio crowd that “Hillary Clinton is consistently treated differently than just about any other candidate I see out there.”

     

    Obama went on: “There’s a reason we haven’t had a woman president.”

     

    Speaking specifically to “the guys out there,” Obama told them to “look inside yourself and ask yourself, if you’re having problems with this stuff how much of it is that we’re just not used to it?”

    Yep, because the American public handily elected a black man twice, but somehow we all draw the line at a woman. Perhaps, just perhaps, the problem is with Hillary.

    Moving along, all this reminded me of a very prescient comment made by Glenn Greenwald a couple of years ago, which I highlighted in the post, Glenn Greenwald on the 2016 Elections – “They’ll Probably Have a Gay Person After Hillary”:

    Hillary is banal, corrupted, drained of vibrancy and passion. I mean, she’s been around forever, the Clinton circle. She’s a fucking hawk and like a neocon, practically. She’s surrounded by all these sleazy money types who are just corrupting everything everywhere. But she’s going to be the first female president, and women in America are going to be completely invested in her candidacy. Opposition to her is going to be depicted as misogynistic, like opposition to Obama has been depicted as racist. It’s going to be this completely symbolic messaging that’s going to overshadow the fact that she’ll do nothing but continue everything in pursuit of her own power. They’ll probably have a gay person after Hillary who’s just going to do the same thing.

    Obama could’ve gone out on a high note, but he decided to go low.

    Sad!

  • Why The U.S. Presidential Election Has The Entire World Confused

    Submitted by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.com,

    Well, everyone thought it was a sure thing — Hillary Clinton had the White House in the bag; the entire political system from the DNC to the RNC and the mainstream media had already called the election over and done. Online gambling sites listed Clinton as a sure bet and Irish site Paddy Power even paid out one million dollars on the assumption of a Clinton win.  And then, one Weiner ruined everything — Anthony Weiner.

    The revelation of an October surprise re-opening of the FBI’s investigation into Hillary Clinton’s misuse of classified data on private and vulnerable email servers does not come as a shock to me, but it certainly does to many people around the world.  Hundreds of mainstream outlets are scrambling to spin the news as misconduct by the FBI rather than a victory for the halls of justice.  Numerous alternative media analysts are rushing to cover their butts and admit that there is now a “chance” of a Trump win.  Confusion reigns supreme as the weirdest election in U.S. history continues to bewilder observers.

    The first issue that needs to be addressed is the lack of an open mind displayed by some when it comes to the real purpose behind this election.  The second issue here, of course, is one of timing.

    Through the majority of this election cycle the public consensus has been that Clinton will win. Some argued that Trump would not be able to compete with the leftist media empire standing against him, while others have argued that the entire system including the Republican establishment would ensure that Trump would fail.  The alternative media has in the past simply pointed out that elections have always been rigged, either by the elites playing both sides of the competition, or through outright voter fraud.  They have assumed that the elites want Clinton, and therefore, the election has already been decided.

    I tend to agree with the latter point of view, though I disagree with the conclusion.  U.S. elections are indeed controlled, and have been for decades, primarily through the false left/right paradigm.  However, as I have been pointing out since I correctly predicted the success of the Brexit referendum, I don’t think that Clinton is the choice of the elites.

    I outline my reasons for this conclusion in-depth in articles like '2016 Will End With Economic Instability And A Trump Presidency', published in August.  For the past several months it seems as though I have been the only person holding the view that Trump will be president.  Only in the past few days have I received emails from readers stating that they used to think I was probably crazy, but now they aren’t so sure…

    To be clear, my position is that Trump is slated to take the White House and that this is by design.  This has been my position since before Trump won the Republican Primaries, it was my position when the election cycle began, it has never changed, nor have my views on the reasons for this outcome ever changed.  Of course, the election is not over yet, and if Clinton ends up soiling the already thoroughly soiled Oval Office with her presence, then everyone can color me confused as well.  That said, here are some issues that I think many people are overlooking when coming to conclusions on the election and the events surrounding it.

    Clinton Is The Worst Candidate The Elites Could Have Chosen

    I have been studying the activities and behaviors of establishment elites for over a decade and I have to say… they are not stupid.  They certainly have hubris, and I would not call them “wise,” but they are definitely devious.  They know how to rig a game.  They know how to play both sides.  They know how to cheat to get what they want when it comes to politics and how to manufacture consent from portions of the public.  They’ve been doing it a long time.  They have mastered it.

    So, in my view it is rather insane for the elites to field a candidate such as Hillary Clinton IF the entirety of their globalist empire hangs in the balance (I don't think it does).  Though she is fond of BleachBit, the woman is unbleachable.  With a decades-long rap sheet from her work at Rose Law Firm (in which document destruction and “misplacement” was apparently routine) to her interference with investigations into Bill Clinton’s sexual indiscretions, to the strange odyssey surrounding her lies on the Benghazi attack, as well as her rampant mishandling of classified documents as head of the State Department, not to mention the Clinton Foundation’s pay to play scandals, it is impossible to endear her to the masses.  Her dismal crowd turnouts are rather indicative of this.

    On top of all this, Clinton’s anti-Russia rhetoric is coming off as absolutely crazy, and I think this is by design.  Many in the alternative media, while assuming that Clinton is paving the way for WWIII, forget that the average person may not be up to speed on the same information we are, but most of them aren’t ignorant.  Clinton’s ravings on Russian hacking and potential war are even putting liberals off rather than inspiring their confidence.

    One would think that if the elites have their veritable pick of any politician to represent their interests in the White House and convince the American public to go along for the ride, Clinton would be the worst choice. Even if the intention were to rig the election in favor of Clinton, she would be a lame-duck president the second she took office, and, her mere presence would galvanize conservatives to the point of mass rebellion.

    This is not generally how the elites play the game.  Instead, they prefer co-option to direct confrontation.

    Which President Is Better For The Elites During An Economic Breakdown?

    If you consider the premise that Clinton is NOT the chosen one, and that the entire election is theater, the situation changes rather drastically.

    Those that follow the underlying economic data that the mainstream tends to ignore know that large swaths of the global financial system are not long for this world. With Europe’s banking system plunging towards a Lehman-style event, the OPEC production freeze deal ready to fall apart yet again, and the Federal Reserve threatening to raise rates into recessionary conditions in December, our already floundering fiscal structure is approaching another crisis.

    My question has always been who would the elites rather have in office when this crisis occurs?  I’ve said it a hundred times before and I’ll say it again here: with Clinton in office, globalists and international financiers get the blame for any economic downturn.  With Trump in office, conservative movements will be blamed.  In fact, I suggest anyone who doubts this scenario watch stock market reactions every time Trump rises in the polls or Clinton faces renewed scandal.  The narrative is already being prepared — a Trump win equals a market loss.

    For those that think it outlandish that the public could be tricked into blaming Trump and conservatives for an economic crisis, I suggest they consider that possession is nine-tenths of the law in the minds of many.  People can also be irrational when facing financial ruin.  I would remind readers that history is written by the victors.  The globalists plan to be victorious in the dismantling of America and our founding principles.  Whether or not they succeed is really up to average conservatives and liberty proponents, not Trump.

    The FBI’s Move Prepares The Way For Trump

    Clinton and the DNC argue that FBI Director James Comey’s announcement of a re-opened investigation is politically motivated.  And they are right, sort of.  The real motivation, I believe, is that Clinton was never meant to win the election in the first place, and that the elites want Trump placed in power during the final hours of the U.S. economy.  Everything else is just a Kabuki dance.

    The democrats are crying foul and accusing Comey of “working with Putin,” or working with the alt-right.  The nefarious Harry Reid has even accused the FBI of hiding Trump’s supposed ties to the Russian government and violating the Hatch Act.

    I think much of this outrage is real, as I believe much of the mainstream media attacks on Trump are coming from people who really think they are waging a propaganda war to get Hillary Clinton elected.  This, however, does not mean that the elites plan to install Clinton.

    Some might see my position as bizarre.  I understand.  But equally bizarre to me are some of the rationalizations people attempt to argue when dealing with the Comey revelation.

    For example, the argument that the entire re-opening of the investigation is a complex ploy designed by the establishment to distract away from the Wikileaks data dumps.  This makes little sense.  If anything, the re-opening investigation is only bringing MORE attention to the Wikileaks data, not less.  If the elites were hoping to create a distraction, they failed miserably.

    The FBI’s announcement ONLY harms the Clinton campaign.  Period.  Even if it fizzles out, even if they announce that nothing was found, the investigation hitting the news streams so close to election day refocuses all public attention back on Clinton’s corruption and will continue to do so for the next week at least.  The idea that the elites hope to use it to help Clinton is nonsensical.

    I have also seen the argument that Comey is acting to cover his own posterior, perhaps because of a fear that Trump may steal away a victory.  I find this equally absurd. Months back the consensus among alternative analysts was that Comey (placed in the FBI by Obama) was a traitor and the FBI was a puppet agency of the establishment.  Now, suddenly, Comey is worried about a possible Trump win and so takes an action which might self-fulfill the prophecy?

    Comey does what he is told.  The FBI is an owned and operated elitist franchise.  They do not go rogue.  If the rogue FBI narrative were true and Comey actually feels the need to cover his bases with Trump, then it is only because he knows something the rest of us do not.  With Clinton in office, his goose would be cooked after this little incident.  Comey only gains an advantage if Trump is slated to win.

    Trump May Or May Not Be Aware Of The Plan

    The bottom line, according to the evidence I have seen in terms of elitists influence over U.S. elections, is that if Trump wins it will only be because they wanted him to win. The FBI firestorm this past week  appears to support my view and we still have another week left for further Clinton ugliness to be revealed.  I also expect that if Trump wins, the reaction from conservatives and liberty activists will be that the event was a “miracle,” a shocking upset against the establishment.  Much like the reaction to the Brexit referendum.  I continue to hold that conservatives and sovereignty champions in Europe and America are being set up to take the fall for a coming global destabilization.

    I have not taken this position just to be contrary.  If I think about it honestly, my position is truly a losing position.  If I am mistaken and Clinton wins on the 8th then I’ll probably never hear the end of it, but that’s a risk that has to be taken, because what I see here is a move on the chess board that others are not considering.  If I’m wrong, then I’m wrong.

    That said, if I am right, then I still lose, because Trump supporters and half the liberty movement will be so enraptured that they will probably ignore the greater issue — that Trump is the candidate the elites wanted all along.

    If I am right, I cannot say either way if Trump is aware that he will be a potential scapegoat for the elites.  With Trump on the way to the White House I can guarantee a Fed rate hike in December.  Imagine what a staged war between Trump and the Federal Reserve will do to the U.S. dollar? What a way to destroy the currency's world reserve status and make way for the IMF's Special Drawing Rights!  I also suspect that widespread rioting is on the schedule as well from various social justice mobs; a perfect excuse for expansive martial law measures, don’t you think?

    The point is, as horrifying as a Clinton presidency might be to conservatives (or to everyone), don’t get too comfortable under Trump.  The party is just getting started and our vigilance must be even greater with a conservative White House, because, like it or not, everything Trump does is going to reflect on us.  We can no more allow unconstitutional activities under Trump than we could under Clinton.  If you think the election has been chaotic and confusing so far, just wait until after it is over.

  • Wikileaks Exposes Collusion Between Clinton Campaign, State Department, And New York Times

    And the hits just keep on coming.

    At the same time as the latest Wikileaks email dump revealed an email sent from the gmail account of DOJ assistant attorney general, Peter Kadzik, to the gmail account of John Podesta, warning him of a FOIA case that would make it “a while before the State Department posts the [Hillary] emails”, an off-the-record communication which the DOJ apparently had no complaints about, we learned of another coordinated, collusive event, this time involving not the Department of Justice, but the Secretary of State, the New York Times, and the Clinton campaign.

    In an email dated March 1, 2015, just one day before the NYT’s story revealing that Hillary Clinton had a personal email server, a State Department official, Lauren Hickey, coordinated with Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign staffers Heather Samuelson as well as Philippe Reines and Nick Merrill, on a statement given to The New York Times regarding how to frame its landmark story.

    In the email also sent from the gmail account of State Department press aide Lauren Hickey (laurenashleyhickey@gmail.com), the government employee told Clinton aides that then-State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki had “just cleared” a statement to a New York Times reporter. Hickey attached the statement, which appeared to include a change made at the behest of the Clinton aides.

    “Yes on your point re records – done below,” she wrote although it is unclear what change the Clinton campaign had requested.

    Hi guys – Jen just cleared. She made the highlighted change — just rephrased a line about NARA updates state is undertaking. Yes on your point re records – done below. And yes will let you know — should be in the new few minutes.

    The statement describes the State Department’s efforts to respond to document requests from the House Benghazi Committee, which uncovered the existence of Clinton’s server.

     “From the moment that the Select Committee was created, the State Department has been proactively and consistently engaged in responding to the Committee’s many requests in a timely manner, providing more than 40,000 pages of documents, scheduling more than 20 transcribed interviews and participating in several briefings and each of the Committee’s hearings.

    One day after the exchange, the New York Times published its “groundbreaking”, if preapproved report revealing Clinton’s server to the public. A short time later, Hillary Clinton would announce her candidacy for president.

    In a briefing Wednesday afternoon, State Department spokesman John Kirby declined to comment on the alleged leaked documents in a statement, but noted that “[providing] accurate information to the media and the public related to former Secretary Clinton’s emails… at times required communicating with her representatives to ensure accuracy.”

    Stated simply, collusion happen: it’s all for the sake of “accuracy.”

    To summarize: on the same day we obtained evidence of collusion between the Clinton campaign’s chairman, John Podesta, and one of the top-ranked staffers at the Justice Department, we also have confirmation of collusion between the State Department, the Clinton campaign and the New York Times.

    Or, as president Obama put it, “an honest mistake.”

    * * *

    The email in question showing the coordinated effort between State, the NYT and the Clinton campaign is shown below.


  • What Keeps Elliott's Paul Singer Up At Night: "A Spike In Inflation Could Leat To A Market Crash"

    One month ago, Bridgewater’s Ray Dalio warned the New York Fed that even a modest, 1% rise in rates, and thus inflation, would lead to trillions in losses and “trigger the worst price decline in bonds since the 1981 bond market crash.” Now, it is the turn of Elliott Management’s Paul Singer. In a letter to investors seen by CNBC’s Kate Kelly, Elliott Management execs warned of essentially the same thing: that a rapid inflation is the $30 billion hedge fund’s biggest concern in the current environment, and that such a spike would not only collapse bond prices, but potentially lead to a stock market crash.

    “This may seem like a strange thing to worry about under the current circumstances, but the tide toward inflation could turn rather abruptly,” wrote the money managers in their Q3 letter dated Oct. 28. “If inflation starts accelerating to an annual rate of high single digits or greater, it will be quite difficult for the mix of strategies that Elliott favors to ‘keep up.'”

    However, sudden price hikes were only one of the Elliott team’s worries, according to the recent letter. Another is Singer’s biggest recurring fear: that the artificial market created by central bankers over the past 7 years will undergo rapid “renormalization.” Lingering over Elliott’s portfolio management is a persistent fear that central bankers — by collectively cutting interest rates 673 times since the financial crisis — have so upended the natural price levels of stocks, bonds and many other assets, “that the economy and markets are operating in denial of reality.”

    Paraphrasing from the latest Greenlight letter, sent on the same day, in which David Einhorn said that “we have central bankers who are determined to see flashing lights that aren’t there…. we are more than seven years into an economic recovery, yet central bankers behave as if we’re still in crisis”, Elliott writes that “every sniffle is being treated by central banks as acute respiratory distress syndrome worthy of ‘code-blues’ and teams of frantic pumpers and fixers…  what this policy landscape has engendered is a widespread belief, or at least a strong suspicion, that stock and bond prices won’t ever be allowed to go down in any meaningful way.”

    Such a mentality, according to Singer, “has encouraged massively risky behavior.”

    Aside from his traditional pessimistic warning that the central-bank created “market” will implode sooner or later, Elliott predicts that during the coming months or years, oil prices will trend higher than their current $45 level, but not by much. “The oil market has largely achieved balance,” the managers wrote, “albeit with high stock levels, and we expect medium-term price appreciation to be limited by the return of U.S. production growth in the $50-60 range.”

    Singer also touched on one of his long-running favorite investments, gold, and noted that its flat performance during the third quarter, and the move down in response to the increasing belief that the Fed will soon rate interest rates, seemed puzzling: “Given the market gyrations that have accompanied each of the Fed’s previous attempts at hiking policy rates over the last few years, now would seem to be an inopportune time to abandon the only actual safe haven that investors may reach for as an alternative to the really bad deal offered by fixed income instruments given current pricing.“

    Translated: Elliott is buying gold here.

    Singer then looked at Europe, and specifically Italy which he said is in a state of “tremendous flux” that will only continue should Prime Minister Matteo Renzi fail to win a Dec. 4 referendum intended to simplify the country’s governance.

    “The resulting unrest may be more impactful than Brexit,” the letter stated. Meanwhile, in Germany, the straits faced by Deutsche Bank, the troubled financial giant now in talks to settle fraud charges with the U.S. Justice Department, may be overplayed in the market, given that the German government, in Elliott’s view, will do whatever is ultimately needed to stabilize the biggest German lender.

    “Regardless of what Chancellor (Angela) Merkel currently says, Germany will stand behind Deutsche Bank in extremis.”

    He is right,

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Nov 02

Today’s News 2nd November 2016

  • "The Clinton Presidency Is Going To Be A Miserable Slog"

    Submitted by Michael Krieger via Liberty Bliztkrieg

    For a long time now, I’ve felt that no matter who wins this election, the U.S. is in for extremely difficult times over at least the next 4 years. The reason is twofold. First, when you combine Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders supporters (the latter didn’t just disappear), a majority of the population is in full on revolt against the status quo. This mood isn’t going anywhere. Combine this backdrop with the very high likelihood of an economic downturn, and you have a recipe for mayhem. This isn’t even taking into account the possible end to a multi-decade secular bull market in sovereign bonds, the ramifications of which represent a financial extinction-level event for much of the Western world.

    When I look at the financial markets and note that they appear totally unwilling to even flirt with the very real possibility of a Trump victory, I conclude that the current status quo assumption is not only that Hillary will win, but that after she wins, the social mood will get better. I, on the other hand, think it will get far, far worse, as disgusted Trump and Sanders supporters push back relentlessly from day one. As I noted earlier today on Twitter:

     

    Of course, I’m not the only one. Michael Brendan Dougherty wrote an excellent piece earlier today published at The Week titled, The Clinton Presidency is Going to be a Miserable Slog, which is my must read of the day.

    Here it is:

    Being on the cusp of electing the first woman president, and defeating a snarling, newly crass, and nationalist Republican Party should feel energizing for the American left. But it’s been tiring. The Democrats aren’t just electing a woman. They’re stuck electing this woman, Hillary Clinton. It’s been a slog.

     

    Clinton could not easily put away her socialist challenger Bernie Sanders. She would not release the transcripts of the paid speeches she gave to Wall Street banks. She could not name her accomplishments as secretary of state. She could not quite escape her own role in managing the political fallout from her husband’s affairs, or the appearance of corruption in the Clinton Foundation’s pioneering work in the field of do-gooder graft.

     

    When FBI Director James Comey gave us a healthy reminder of Clinton’s email scandal last week, liberals must have realized: It’s not just the campaign. The Clinton presidency is going to be a slog, too.

     

    The Clinton standard of political behavior has always had a lawyerly slipperiness to it. When the scandals come, it depends on your definition of “is.” When the headlines erupt, suddenly we discover that all of Clinton’s friends signed an affidavit contradicting the latest accuser or whistleblower. And, really, what difference, at this point, does it make? Partisans will note that Clinton’s ethical lapses and faults are minor compared to Donald Trump’s. Those comparisons are not going to matter in a few days.

     

    Some may object. They’ll reply that the only problem is the aggressive prosecutorial zeal of the Republicans. And it is true that Republicans have an ongoing grudge against Clinton. But let’s posit the existence of a vast right wing conspiracy that hates President Obama just as much as it hates the Clintons. Why is it only able to turn up news-driving scandals on the latter? Could it be that Obama, however detested by conservatives, conducts himself with higher ethical standards than Bill and Hillary?

     

    Clinton’s scandals and misdeeds often have little to do with the Democrats’ battle with Republicans. Clinton played fast and loose even with the Obama administration’s own rules. Obama had forbidden Clinton from giving a government job to the Clinton’s on-demand schemer Sidney Blumenthal — yet Clinton kept him on the payroll of her “charity” and kept up correspondence with him about Libya, even as he had business interests in a post-Gadhafi state. Despite explicit rules set by the Obama administration, the Clinton Foundation continued to operate as a bank in which foreign leaders and governments could deposit their quids, while Clinton was at the head of the State Department, able to distribute pro quos in return.

     

    Beyond the propensity to generate scandal, there is a larger reason that Clinton’s administration will be a slog. The 2016 election has been characterized by a demand for great change. And Hillary Clinton has run as the defender of the way things are, the way they’re going, and who they’re going for.

     

    Hillary Clinton received a vigorous challenge from a left wing that isn’t afraid to label themselves socialists. America’s center-right party ditched its commitments to establishment doctrine on free trade and liberalized immigration, and challenged the wisdom and justice of America’s post-Cold War political order. But Hillary Clinton will enter the White House as the caretaker for the status quo in American political life.

     

    Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders were not the men to carry forward this message of discontent to real political triumph. Both candidates represented their cause poorly. Trump was at once too crude and unethical himself. And Sanders had none of the political instincts and savvy to really go after Clinton in the primaries.

     

    Clinton is the face of a prosperous, grasping establishment that won’t bear challenge from the left or right. Her ability to survive scandal after scandal will not be received as some testament to her political canniness or some deep integrity. It will be received as just the system defending its own from attack. Her survival and her ability to win is a a tribute to the power and self-regard of our political class. And this class has no plausible solution for the nation’s foreign policy, for its immigration system, or for an economic system that abets the elite’s secession from their own nation.

     

    Clinton’s presidency will be a slog because she is exactly like the system she defends. She can point to the great wealth this system produces for its top clients. But neither she nor her cheerleaders can really claim that it looks like wisdom or justice to anyone else.

    Well done, Mr. Dougherty.

    In Liberty,
    Michael Krieger

  • 4 Times As Many Americans Think Biased U.S. Media – Not Foreigners Such As Russian Hackers – Real Threat To Fair Election

    A Suffolk University/USA Today poll released Friday found that 75.9% of Americans believe the mainstream media “would like to see [Hillary Clinton] elected president.”

    The poll also found that only 10% of Americans believe that “foreign interests such as Russian hackers” are “the primary threat that might try to change the election results”. In contrast, 45.53% believe “the news media” is the primary threat to the election:

    media-election

    Indeed, the New York Times, Boston Globe,  Los Angeles Times, CNN and other mainstream media admitted to us they were going to try to throw the election for Hillary.  (And leaked emails show widespread collusion between the media and the Clinton campaign.)

    Americans widely distrust the mainstream media. With good reason …

  • Can The American People Defeat The Oligarchy That Rules Them?

    Authored by Paul Craig Roberts,

    Aren’t you surprised that Hillary and the presstitutes haven’t blamed Putin for FBI director Comey’s reopening of the Hillary email case? But the presstitutes have done the next best thing for Hillary. They have made Comey the issue, not Hillary.

    According to US Senator Harry Reid and the presstitutes, we don’t need to worry about Hillary’s crimes. After all, she is only a political woman feathering her nest, just as political men have done for ages. Why all this misogynist talk about Hillary? The presstitutes’ cry is that Comey’s alleged crime is far more important. This woman-hating Republican violated the Hatch Act by telling Congress that the investigation he said was closed is now reopened. A very strange interpretation of the Hatch Act. During an election it is OK to announce that a candidate for president is cleared but it is not OK to say that a candidate is under investigation.

    In July 2016 Comey violated the Hatch Act when he, on orders from the corrupt Obama Attorney General, announced Hillary clean. In so doing, Comey used the prestige of federal clearance of Hillary’s violation of national security protocols to boost her standing in the election polls.

    Actually, Hillary’s standing in the polls is based on the pollsters over-weighting Hillary supporters in the polls. It is easy to produce a favorite if you overweight their supporters in the poll questions. If you look at the crowds attending the two candidate’s public appearances, it is clear that the American people prefer Donald Trump, who is opposed to war with Russia and China. War with nuclear powers is the big issue of the election.

    Hillary’s problem has the ruling American Oligarcy, for which Hillary is the total servant, concerned. What are they going to do about Trump if he wins? Will his fate be the same as John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King, George Wallace? Time will tell. Or will a hotel maid appear at the last minute in the way that the Oligarchy got rid of Dominique Strauss-Kahn?

    All of the American and Western feminists, progressives, and left-wing remnant fell for the obvious frame-up of Strauss-Kahn. After Strauss-Kahn was blocked from the presidency of France and resigned as Director of the IMF, the New York authorities had to drop all charges against Strauss-Kahn. But Washington succeeded in removing Strauss-Kahn as a challenge to its French vassal, Sarkozy.

    This is how the American Oligarchy destroys those it suspects might not serve its interests. The corrupt self-serving Oligarchy makes sure that it owns the government and the media, the think tanks and increasingly all of the major universities, and, of course, through the presstitutes, Americans’ minds.

    The Oligarchs are now hard-pressed to rescue Hillary as US president, so let’s see if the Oligarchs can once again deceive the American people.

    While we wait, let’s concern ourselves with another important issue. The Clinton crime syndicate in the closing years of the 20th century allowed a small handful of mega-corporations to consolidate the US media in a few hands. This vast increase in the power of the Oligarchy was accomplished despite US anti-trust law. The media mergers destroyed the American tradition of a dispersed and independent media.

    But really, what does federal law mean to the One Percent. Nothing whatsoever. The One Percent’s power makes them immune to law. Hillary’s crimes might cost her the election, but she won’t go to jail.

    Not content with 90% control of the US media, the Oligarchy wants more concentration and more control. Looks like they will be getting it, thanks to the corrupt US government. The Federal Trade Commission is supposed to enforce US anti-trust law. Instead, the federal agency routinely violates US anti-trust law by permitting monopoly concentrations of business interests.

    Because of the failure of the federal government to enforce federal law, we now have “banks too big to fail,” unregulated Internet monopoly, and the evisceration of a dispersed and independent media.

    Not so long ago there was a field of economics known as anti-trust. Ph.D. candidates specialized in and wrote dissertations about public control of monopoly power. I assume that this field of economics, like the America of my youth, no longer exists.

    As Rahul Manchanda explains, “yet again another huge media conglomerate is being swallowed and acquired by another huge media conglomerate, to create another gargantuan media outlet, in another consolidation of the enormous power, money, wealth, intimidation, conspiracy and control” that eviscerates the US Constitution and the First Amendment.

  • "The Frightening Thing Is People Don't Know They're Selling Insurance" – An Interview With An Ex-Canyon CDS Trader

    With his valuation expertise rooted in derivatives, Ice Farm’s Michael Green, whose work has frequently graced this website in the past, has always been one step ahead of the market and built his career at Canyon Capital profiting from mispricing and arbitrage in CDS, which he believes are currently underpricing risk in today’s markets.

    Just as the hedge fund community vastly overpaid for its CDS protection following the 2008 downturn, today in an interview with Real Vision TV, Green says it’s the other way around and suggests that the market is selling insurance over and over again without recognizing what they are actually selling, effectively paying more premium for doing the same thing.

     

    Green, who founded ICE Farm Advisors in 2014, has had a unique approach for years. Starting out at Bain Capital, he fine-tuned his approach to modelling and valuation in small cap value stocks at the sharp end of the dot com cycle, initially turning down the opportunity to join Canyon in ’99. Seven years later he opened Canyon’s New York office, which he built from scratch to a $2 billion plus operation, focusing on macro expressed through derivatives.

    Everything Flows Through Derivatives First

    Outlining his perspective, Green said there’s a ton of academic research that’s come out in the past couple of years which validates this, but the one place you’d go to if you have knowledge to express your point of view, is the market that rewarded you for the accuracy and timeliness of your information. “Into the derivatives world you would go,” he said. “You’d buy calls instead of buying stock. And there’s a ton of empirical research that supports this idea, that information flows first into the derivatives market.”  

    Green said his initial approach focused on the idea that, instead of trying to value the derivatives based on an assumption of log normality in terms of the distribution of probabilistic outcomes, he would take the prices as a given and then compare that distribution to the historical empirical in order to try and understand where the market is expressing preferences. This method delivered some fascinating insights.

    The Black Swan was Overcooked

    If you rewind to 2008, Green believes all the signals from the derivatives market suggested that selling insurance was a sensible strategy. Nassim Taleb’s Black Swan is often cited as the catalyst for the shift towards ‘owning the tails’ but Green said in his view, people over-interpreted some of that and paid way too much for that insurance.

    “If you look at 2007 when Taleb published The Black Swan, if you’d gone into the market and you tried to purchase a put option that paid out in the event that the S&P fell by 50% over the next two years, the market would have priced that somewhere around 5%, a 5% probability, which relative to the empirical, the historical distribution of about 4%, it was like 25% markup. And that’s pure profit for an investment bank that is underwriting those puts,” Green said.

    “By the point that that market peaked in June of 2012, the probability that the market was placing on that 50% decline over the next two years had risen to 47%. And this is three years after the market had been rallying, 3 and 1/4 years after the March, 2009 lows that you were seeing this sort of pricing that exists in the market.”

    This was simply a function of there being non-economic buyers of insurance, he said, while the ability to sell those derivatives had collapsed.

    “One of the things I spent a lot of time writing about and communicating with investors, clients, is the idea that the world has now shifted completely in the opposite direction, that people are selling that insurance over and over and over again, not recognizing what they’re actually selling, and not necessarily conducting an evaluation of, are there cheaper ways to sell that– or more expensive ways to sell that same insurance, effectively capturing more premium for doing the same thing.

    “And it’s become a market where in 2012 I would talk to people about the strategies. And I was, again, very fortunate that Canyon would allow me to do, selling this insurance and selling these puts. And we were generating fantastic returns. And probably the biggest benefit I provided to Canyon Partners was saying, don’t overpay for the insurance that everybody wants you to have in your portfolio.”

    Hedge Funds Getting It Wrong

    Back in 2009, Green said, every hedge fund on the planet had to show investors their book of hedges which were designed to prevent a repeat of the impact of the 2008 crash.  “And this was happening in the context of a market that had already fallen by 50%, actually 60%. And they were just fantastically overvalued. People would be buying 9% yielding investment grade paper and think they were getting a fantastic deal, and then buying CDS protection or buying puts on the underlying equity that had an effective yield of, in some cases, as high as 50%,” he said.

    “And it was just, it was an amazing, amazing time. And what I kept articulating was we should be selling the insurance and shorting the underlying securities. And by and large it was a great strategy. Today it’s the opposite. People are selling insurance on both sides. And honestly, the more frightening thing is they don’t know that they’re selling insurance.”

  • Flint Woman Whose Debate Question Donna Brazile Leaked Says Hillary "Should Be Disqualified"

    Submitted by Joseph Jankwoski via PlanetFreeWill.com,

    On Monday, it was revealed by WikiLeaks that the interim chair of the Democratic National Committee Donna Brazile provided a debate question to John Podesta and Jennifer Palmieri of the Clinton campaign ahead of a CNN-hosted debate between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.

    This marks the second time that Brazile has been caught tipping off the Clinton campaign to a coming question.

    In a March 5 email with the subject line “One of the questions directed to HRC tomorrow is from a woman with a rash,” Brazile tips the Clinton campaign off to a question that will be asked at the next night’s debate regarding the water crisis in Flint, Michigan.

    “Her family has lead poison and she will ask what, if anything, will Hillary do as president to help the ppl of Flint,” Brazile’s email reads.

    Lee-Anne Walters, the Flint women whose question was mentioned in advance to Hillary Clinton, appeared on Fox News on Tuesday where she said that the democratic nominee should be disqualified from the presidential race.

    “I was disgusted by Hillary’s answer when she first answered it, I’m even more so now,” Walters said. “And I feel she should be disqualified because it gave her an advantage that she shouldn’t have had.”

    During the March 6 debate, Walters asked the democratic candidates if they would promise to make it a requirement for public water systems to remove all lead service lines throughout the United States.

    Hillary responded by promising a commitment to changing the water systems inside the country and remove lead “from everywhere” within five years.

    Lee-Anne Walters’ described Clinton’s response as a “cop out”.

    “The answer she gave is the cop out answer to take it away from water and put funds where there are already funds,” Walters said. “If she is elected she is only going to be in office for four years, not five years, so how does that work?”

    Although she shared the question with mentors, Walters told Fox News that she does not believe that her question was able to get to Donna Brazile beyond CNN.

    CNN took three questions from Walters prior to the debate and it is unclear whose decision it was to ask the specific question the Flint women addressed to the candidates on March 6.

    CNN has since cut ties with Brazile, a veteran political analyst for the network, saying in a statement that it is “completely uncomfortable” with hacked emails showing that Hillary was provided debate questions in advance.

    Brazile’s CNN contract was suspended when she became interim DNC chair over the summer.

    CNN president Jeff Zucker described Brazile’s actions as “unethical” and “disgusting”.

  • No One Will Be Happy

    From the Slope of Hope: Near the end of the book The Big Short, there is a scene in which two of the principal characters are sitting outside in downtown Manhattan during the throes of the financial crisis. The entire financial world is in absolute pandemonium, but as they look around them…………nothing. Birds are singing. Children are playing. People are walking around, getting their errands done. A guy passes by on a bicycle. Nothing is different than it ever was.

    That’s always been one of my favorite parts of the book, because the contrast between what those guys were experiencing (being completely and utterly enveloped in global chaos) and what was going on in the normal world is applicable in so many facets of life.

    I begin this post with that anecdote because, with but a single week left until we have elected a new President, it seems everyone is convinced that Things Will Be So Different once the deed is done.

    To my way of thinking, a single word will capture the state of the nation depending on the outcome. If Clinton is elected (which, in spite of all the problems pressing against her, still seems more likely than not to happen), the word will be ‘anger“. If Trump is elected, the word will be “shock“. Those are very different outcomes.

    Clinton supporters, I’m sure, would counter that the word should instead be “relief’, since they will declare the world has collectively dodged a bullet in the form of Donald Trump, and now we can all get back to the way things should be. Well, yes, I’m sure relief (and to those who think gender is such a BFD when it comes to elected positions, “jubilation”) would be the word expressed by her supporters, but within days, I suspect a portion of them, and the entirety of everyone else, will be angry. And that anger, in the days, weeks, and months that follow, will likely swell. You know how the most virulent anti-smokers are those who quit smoking? It’ll be the same for those who voted for her and then realize how pissed-off they are at her.

    The reason for this, I’d like to suggest, is that people will believe she “got away with it.” The $200 million in speaking “fees.” All the dirty political tricks. Screwing Bernie out of his nomination. All the dirty laundry from her husband’s term, such as pardoning Marc Rich (to say nothing of blue dresses). All the lies about the email server. Hell, all the lies in general. I’m sure we’re all losing track of the lies by this point. So the gestalt will be this woman (yay! A woman president! Clinically speaking, at least) has cheated her way to the top.

    What will the response be to that anger? Oh, lots of things, I imagine. Popularity rankings that range from low to vanishingly low. Impeachment proceedings. Special prosecutors. Stonewalling. Gridlock. All in all, a goddamned miserable time in the oval office. We may well even see her chucked out of the office and have goofy-looking Tim Kaine suddenly be the leader of the free world.

    Then, on the other hand, Trump might win. As of last Thursday, this seemed like a laughable impossibility. Judging from the behavior of the financial markets lately, the likelihood has increased from No F_cking Way to Well Maybe.Since I live in the Bay Area, this entire geographic zone is at risk of seismic activity from all the jaws that would hit the ground if Trump were elected POTUS. Believe me, the bone-deep smug assurance that Clinton will absolutely win, no matter what, exists end to end in the SF Bay Area.

    What would happen following a Trump victory is much harder for me to conjure. If he wins and both houses of Congress are Republican, well, gridlock may well be over. As of this writing, the betting odds seem to give him only a 26% chance of winning, so it would be – – as I said – – a shock if he won (particularly here in the Hillary-worshiping Bay Area).

    As for the markets, even though the pattern is quite complex, the chart below, posted at the SocialTrade web site, may provide some insight. First, here’s the chart (whose pattern was posted a few weeks ago), and the price action has been following it to the letter:

    So let’s assume for a minute that we don’t know the outcome of the election, but we know that the above pattern is how prices are going to play out. One scenario that would fit this neatly would be:

    (1) Increasingly strong odds of a Trump victory, pushing the S&P down to around 2000, near the Brexit low

    (2) Then, on Election Night, a Clinton victory, which would be followed by a relief (there’s that word again) rally as everyone cheers on “normalcy”, pushing the S&P to a recovery of about 2100, similar to where we are right now.

    (3) And then, once the fireworks in NYC (which she’s already arranged) are done being shot off, and the cheers about how great it is to have a Woman President have died down, then all holy hell starts breaking lose, and the “anger” I mentioned begins to express itself in the form of a vengeful Congress (to say nothing of the nearly 50% of the country that had voted for Trump), and the S&P 500 would go into a free-fall, approaching levels similar to what we saw at the start of 2016, with the cash index around 1850 (in other words, a drop of more than 10% in a relatively short amount of time).

    If none of this pans out, you are welcome to have the money back you paid to read this post. With so much uncertainty ahead, however, I thought these possibilities were worth sharing. In the end, though, it’s going to be a lot like that scene from The Big Short. Next Tuesday night is going to seem like such a big, huge, world-changing deal. But when you walk outside on Wednesday morning and look around…………nothing will have changed, with one notable exception: about half the country is going to be really pissed off.

  • BofA Institutional Clients Sell Stocks For A Record 21 Straight Weeks Due To Soaring Redemptions

    Over the weekend, we presented an excerpt from the latest weekly note by One River Management’s Eric Peters, in which he shared an look into hedge fund psychology, explaining why despite the market being at all time highs, nobody has any faith in said “market any more:

    “My company is in structural decline,” he said gazing across Gotham, high in the corner office. “Made it through denial, anger, bargaining, and given that we’re having this conversation, I suppose I’m mostly through depression.” Which leaves the final stage of grief and loss; acceptance.

     

    The transition from active management to passive has been devastating for those who’ve devoted their lives to the former.

     

    “I wonder whether the deep pessimism that we confront every day in our own businesses helps explain why we’re so skeptical of all time S&P highs.”

    Perhaps, but it helps explain why as Bank of America reports in its latest weekly client flow update, the bank’s largest, institutional clients have now sold stocks for a record 21 consecutive weeks. According to BofA, last week, during which the S&P 500 fell 0.7%, BofAML clients were net sellers of US equities for the third consecutive week (-$0.9bn vs. -$0.4bn the prior week). Of these, institutional clients continued to lead the selling; this group has now sold US stocks for the last 21 weeks.

    The reason for the relentless selling? They have no choice, as they continue to be bombarded with redemption requests by clients who can’t wait to shift from active to passive – and much cheaper – funds:

    Record outflows this year from active funds—a large sub-set of the institutional client grouping—have likely been a big contributor here. (Meanwhile, passive funds have seen slowing but continued inflows this year, and we’ve seen a similar trend in BofAML clients’ purchases of ETFs—see Table 1). Hedge funds also sold stocks (for the second consecutive week), while private clients were small net sellers after three weeks of buying. Clients continued to sell both large and small caps but buy mid-caps, which are the most expensive size segment. Buybacks by corporate clients slowed slightly vs. the prior week, and month-to-date are tracking the lowest of any Oct. since 2010.

     

    What were they selling? Pretty much everything, but especially consumer discretionary.

    Clients sold stocks in six of the eleven sectors last week, led by Consumer Discretionary and Industrials—both of which have seen generally weak results and guidance so far this earnings season. ETFs and Financials stocks saw the largest inflows. Sales of Discretionary stocks last week were their largest since last December and the seventh-largest in our data history (since ‘08), led by both institutional and hedge funds clients’ sales. This sector continues to have the longest selling streak at 18 consecutive weeks; but as we noted earlier in Sept, the selling streak could have legs given how crowded the sector is by active funds. Industrials has the next-longest selling streak at nine weeks; meanwhile, Telecom continues to have the longest buying streak (in 15 of the last 16 weeks).

    Finally, putting the “smart money” selling in context, both YTD and since the start of the Second Great Depression, it almost seems like “greater fool” retail investors are still deserpately needed for the final paper-to-cash handoff.

    But aside from the relentless “smart money” selling, remember: There Is No Alternative to stocks…

  • If Hillary Clinton Is Charged With Obstruction Of Justice She Could Go To Prison For 20 Years

    Submitted by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse blog,

    In the world of politics, the cover-up is often worse than the original crime.  It was his role in the Watergate cover-up that took down Richard Nixon, and now Hillary Clinton’s cover-up of her email scandal could send her to prison for a very, very long time.  When news broke that the FBI has renewed its investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails, it sent shockwaves throughout the political world.  But this time around, we aren’t just talking about an investigation into the mishandling of classified documents.  I haven’t heard anyone talking about this, but if the FBI discovers that Hillary Clinton altered, destroyed or concealed any emails that should have been turned over to the FBI during the original investigation, she could be charged with obstruction of justice.  That would immediately end her political career, and if she was found guilty it could send her to prison for the rest of her life.

    I have not seen a single news report mention the phrase “obstruction of justice” yet, but I am convinced that there is a very good chance that this is where this scandal is heading.  The following is the relevant part of the federal statute that deals with obstruction of justice…

    Whoever knowingly alters, destroys, mutilates, conceals, covers up, falsified, or makes a false entry in any record, document, or tangible object with the intent to impede, obstruct, or influence the investigation or proper administration of any matter within the jurisdiction of any department or agency of the United States or any case filed under Title 11, or in relation to or contemplation of any such matter or case, shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.

    If Hillary Clinton is sent to prison for 20 years, that would essentially be for the rest of her life.

    I have a feeling that the FBI is going to find a great deal of evidence of obstruction of justice in Huma Abedin’s emails.  But unfortunately there is not likely to be a resolution to this matter before November 8th, because according to the Wall Street Journal there are approximately 650,000 emails to search through…

    As federal agents prepare to scour roughly 650,000 emails to see how many relate to a prior probe of Hillary Clinton’s email use, the surprise disclosure that investigators were pursuing the potential new evidence lays bare building tensions inside the bureau and the Justice Department over how to investigate the Democratic presidential nominee.

     

    Metadata found on the laptop used by former Rep. Anthony Weiner and his estranged wife Huma Abedin, a close Clinton aide, suggests there may be thousands of emails sent to or from the private server that Mrs. Clinton used while she was secretary of state, according to people familiar with the matter. It will take weeks, at a minimum, to determine whether those messages are work-related from the time Ms. Abedin served with Mrs. Clinton at the State Department; how many are duplicates of emails already reviewed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation; and whether they include either classified information or important new evidence in the Clinton email probe.

    Of those 650,000 emails, an inside source told Fox News that “at least 10,000” would be of interest to the investigation.

    At this point, FBI officials have not even begun searching through the emails, because a search warrant has not been secured yet.  The following comes from CNN…

    Government lawyers haven’t yet approached Abedin’s lawyers to seek an agreement to conduct the search. Sources earlier told CNN that those discussions had begun, but the law enforcement officials now say they have not.

     

    Either way, government lawyers plan to seek a search warrant from a judge to conduct the search of the computer, the law enforcement officials said.

    But the FBI is reportedly already searching a laptop that was co-owned by Anthony Weiner and Huma Abedin, and no warrant was necessary for that search because Weiner is cooperating with the FBI.

    Many have been wondering why FBI Director James Comey would choose to make such a bold move just over a week until election day.  Surely he had to know that this would have a dramatic impact on the election, and it is unlikely that he would have done so unless someone had already found something really big.  In addition, Comey was reportedly eager to find an opportunity to redeem himself in the eyes of his peers at the FBI.  The following is an excerpt from a Daily Mail article that was written by Ed Klein, the author of a recently released New York Times bestseller about the Clintons entitled “Guilty As Sin“…

    ‘The atmosphere at the FBI has been toxic ever since Jim announced last July that he wouldn’t recommend an indictment against Hillary,’ said the source, a close friend who has known Comey for nearly two decades, shares family outings with him, and accompanies him to Catholic mass every week.

     

    ‘Some people, including department heads, stopped talking to Jim, and even ignored his greetings when they passed him in the hall,’ said the source. ‘They felt that he betrayed them and brought disgrace on the bureau by letting Hillary off with a slap on the wrist.’

     

    According to the source, Comey fretted over the problem for months and discussed it at great length with his wife, Patrice.

     

    He told his wife that he was depressed by the stack of resignation letters piling up on his desk from disaffected agents. The letters reminded him every day that morale in the FBI had hit rock bottom.

    So what happens next?

    In the most likely scenario, the FBI will not have time to complete the investigation and decide whether or not to charge Hillary Clinton before the election.  This means that we would go into November 8th with this scandal hanging over the Clinton campaign, and that would seem to be very good news for Donald Trump.

    However, it is possible that once the FBI starts searching through these emails that they could come to the conclusion very rapidly that charges against Clinton are warranted, and if that happens we could still see some sort of announcement before election day.

    In the unlikely event that does happen, we could actually see Hillary Clinton forced out of the race before November 8th.

    Once again, this appears to be very unlikely at this point, but it is still possible.

    If Clinton was forced to step aside, the Democrats would need to come up with a new nominee, and that process would take time.  In an article later today on The Most Important News I will reveal who I believe that nominee would be.

    In such a scenario, the Democrats would desperately need time to get their act together, and so we could actually see Barack Obama attempt to delay or suspend the election.  The legality of such a move is highly questionable, but Barack Obama has not allowed a little thing like the U.S. Constitution to stop him in the past.

    This week is going to be exceedingly interesting – that is for sure.

    The craziest election in modern American history just keeps getting crazier, and I have a feeling that even more twists and turns are ahead.

    It sure seems ironic that Anthony Weiner is playing such a central role this late in the story, and I can’t wait to see what is in store for the season finale.

  • BleachBit Looks To "Clean Up" By Selling Actual Microfiber "Cloth Or Something" For $3 Each

    Once just an obscure open source piece of software known only by the techies of the world, Hillary’s use of BleachBit to delete her 33,000 emails so that, to quote Trey Gowdy, “even God couldn’t read them” has turned the company into a common household name.  As such, the company has now launched a new product, the “Cloth or Something,” to capitalize on its new found fame.

    As BleachBit points out, the “Cloth or Something” is easy to “stash in burn bags” and is “guaranteed not to prove intent.”

    • After you have smashed your BlackBerry, don’t forget to wipe the fingerprints from your email server with this non-abrasive, soft microfiber Cloth or Something.
    • Thin, foldable size makes it easy to stash the Cloth or Something in burn bags.
    • 6″ x 6″ size quickly wipes even the biggest email servers with thousands of emails.
    • Buy an extra cloth for your VIP (VERY VIP) client.
    • FREE: Optionally autographed by Andrew, creator of BleachBit.
    • Printed in the USA!
    • Guaranteed not to prove intent, or you will get a full refund paid when you are released from prison.
    • First-class shipping and handling is a flat rate of $2 per order.
    • Yes, this cloth is real, and you can really buy it.

    So, “don’t wait for your subpoena,” order one today!

    BleachBit

     

    And, for those of you with handheld devices, BleachBit also offers this handy 20-ounce BlackBerry smashing device…“the grip is specially designed not to retain fingerprints.”

    BleachBit

     

    Finally, just because it feels appropriate…

Digest powered by RSS Digest

Nov 01

Today’s News 1st November 2016

  • Inside The Invisible Government: War, Propaganda, Clinton, & Trump

    Submitted by John Pilger via Strategic-Culture.org,

    The American journalist, Edward Bernays, is often described as the man who invented modern propaganda.

    The nephew of Sigmund Freud, the pioneer of psycho-analysis, it was Bernays who coined the term “public relations” as a euphemism for spin and its deceptions.

    In 1929, he persuaded feminists to promote cigarettes for women by smoking in the New York Easter Parade – behaviour then considered outlandish. One feminist, Ruth Booth, declared, “Women! Light another torch of freedom! Fight another sex taboo!”

    Bernays’ influence extended far beyond advertising. His greatest success was his role in convincing the American public to join the slaughter of the First World War.  The secret, he said, was “engineering the consent” of people in order to “control and regiment [them] according to our will without their knowing about it”.

    He described this as “the true ruling power in our society” and called it an “invisible government”.

    Today, the invisible government has never been more powerful and less understood. In my career as a journalist and film-maker, I have never known propaganda to insinuate our lives and as it does now and to go unchallenged.

    Imagine two cities.

    Both are under siege by the forces of the government of that country. Both cities are occupied by fanatics, who commit terrible atrocities, such as beheading people.

    But there is a vital difference. In one siege, the government soldiers are described as liberators by Western reporters embedded with them, who enthusiastically report their battles and air strikes. There are front page pictures of these heroic soldiers giving a V-sign for victory. There is scant mention of civilian casualties.

    In the second city – in another country nearby – almost exactly the same is happening. Government forces are laying siege to a city controlled by the same breed of fanatics.

    The difference is that these fanatics are supported, supplied and armed by “us” – by the United States and Britain. They even have a media centre that is funded by Britain and America.

    Another difference is that the government soldiers laying siege to this city are the bad guys, condemned for assaulting and bombing the city – which is exactly what the good soldiers do in the first city.

    Confusing? Not really. Such is the basic double standard that is the essence of propaganda. I am referring, of course, to the current siege of the city of Mosul by the government forces of Iraq, who are backed by the United States and Britain and to the siege of Aleppo by the government forces of Syria, backed by Russia. One is good; the other is bad.

    What is seldom reported is that both cities would not be occupied by fanatics and ravaged by war if Britain and the United States had not invaded Iraq in 2003. That criminal enterprise was launched on lies strikingly similar to the propaganda that now distorts our understanding of the civil war in Syria.

    Without this drumbeat of propaganda dressed up as news, the monstrous ISIS and Al-Qaida and al-Nusra and the rest of the jihadist gang might not exist, and the people of Syria might not be fighting for their lives today.

    Some may remember in 2003 a succession of BBC reporters turning to the camera and telling us that Blair was “vindicated” for what turned out to be the crime of the century. The US television networks produced the same validation for George W. Bush. Fox News brought on Henry Kissinger to effuse over Colin Powell’s fabrications.

    The same year, soon after the invasion, I filmed an interview in Washington with Charles Lewis, the renowned American investigative journalist. I asked him, “What would have happened if the freest media in the world had seriously challenged what turned out to be crude propaganda?”

    He replied that if journalists had done their job, “there is a very, very good chance we would not have gone to war in Iraq”.

    It was a shocking statement, and one supported by other famous journalists to whom I put the same question — Dan Rather of CBS, David Rose of the Observer and journalists and producers in the BBC, who wished to remain anonymous.

    In other words, had journalists done their job, had they challenged and investigated the propaganda instead of amplifying it, hundreds of thousands of men, women and children would be alive today, and there would be no ISIS and no siege of Aleppo or Mosul.

    There would have been no atrocity on the London Underground on 7th July 2005.  There would have been no flight of millions of refugees; there would be no miserable camps.

    When the terrorist atrocity happened in Paris last November, President Francoise Hollande immediately sent planes to bomb Syria – and more terrorism followed, predictably, the product of Hollande’s bombast about France being “at war” and “showing no mercy”. That state violence and jihadist violence feed off each other is the truth that no national leader has the courage to speak.

    “When the truth is replaced by silence,” said the Soviet dissident Yevtushenko, “the silence is a lie.”

    The attack on Iraq, the attack on Libya, the attack on Syria happened because the leader in each of these countries was not a puppet of the West. The human rights record of a Saddam or a Gaddafi was irrelevant. They did not obey orders and surrender control of their country.

    The same fate awaited Slobodan Milosevic once he had refused to sign an “agreement” that demanded the occupation of Serbia and its conversion to a market economy. His people were bombed, and he was prosecuted in The Hague. Independence of this kind is intolerable.

    As WikLeaks has revealed, it was only when the Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad in 2009 rejected an oil pipeline, running through his country from Qatar to Europe, that he was attacked.

    From that moment, the CIA planned to destroy the government of Syria with jihadist fanatics – the same fanatics currently holding the people of Mosul and eastern Aleppo hostage.

    Why is this not news? The former British Foreign Office official Carne Ross, who was responsible for operating sanctions against Iraq, told me: “We would feed journalists factoids of sanitised intelligence, or we would freeze them out. That is how it worked.”

    The West’s medieval client, Saudi Arabia – to which the US and Britain sell billions of dollars’ worth of arms – is at present destroying Yemen, a country so poor that in the best of times, half the children are malnourished.

    Look on YouTube and you will see the kind of massive bombs – “our” bombs – that the Saudis use against dirt-poor villages, and against weddings, and funerals.

    The explosions look like small atomic bombs. The bomb aimers in Saudi Arabia work side-by-side with British officers. This fact is not on the evening news.

    Propaganda is most effective when our consent is engineered by those with a fine education – Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, Columbia — and with careers on the BBC, the Guardian, the New York Times, theWashington Post.

    These organisations are known as the liberal media. They present themselves as enlightened, progressive tribunes of the moral zeitgeist. They are anti-racist, pro-feminist and pro-LGBT.

    And they love war.

    While they speak up for feminism, they support rapacious wars that deny the rights of countless women, including the right to life.

    In 2011, Libya, then a modern state, was destroyed on the pretext that Muammar Gaddafi was about to commit genocide on his own people.  That was the incessant news; and there was no evidence. It was a lie.

    In fact, Britain, Europe and the United States wanted what they like to call “regime change” in Libya, the biggest oil producer in Africa. Gaddafi’s influence in the continent and, above all, his independence were intolerable.

    So he was murdered with a knife in his rear by fanatics, backed by America, Britain and France.  Hillary Clinton cheered his gruesome death for the camera, declaring, “We came, we saw, he died!”

    The destruction of Libya was a media triumph. As the war drums were beaten, Jonathan Freedland wrote in the Guardian: “Though the risks are very real, the case for intervention remains strong.”

    Intervention — what a polite, benign, Guardian word, whose real meaning, for Libya, was death and destruction.

    According to its own records, Nato launched 9,700 “strike sorties” against Libya, of which more than a third were aimed at civilian targets. They included missiles with uranium warheads. Look at the photographs of the rubble of Misurata and Sirte, and the mass graves identified by the Red Cross. The Unicef report on the children killed says, “most [of them] under the age of ten”.

    As a direct consequence, Sirte became the capital of ISIS.

    Ukraine is another media triumph. Respectable liberal newspapers such as the New York Times, the Washington Post and the Guardian, and mainstream broadcasters such as the BBC, NBC, CBS, CNN have played a critical role in conditioning their viewers to accept a new and dangerous cold war.

    All have misrepresented events in Ukraine as a malign act by Russia when, in fact, the coup in Ukraine in 2014 was the work of the United States, aided by Germany and Nato.

    This inversion of reality is so pervasive that Washington’s military intimidation of Russia is not news; it is suppressed behind a smear and scare campaign of the kind I grew up with during the first cold war. Once again, the Ruskies are coming to get us, led by another Stalin, whom The Economist depicts as the devil.

    The suppression of the truth about Ukraine is one of the most complete news blackouts I can remember. The fascists who engineered the coup in Kiev are the same breed that backed the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941. Of all the scares about the rise of fascist anti-Semitism in Europe, no leader ever mentions the fascists in Ukraine – except Vladimir Putin, but he does not count.

    Many in the Western media have worked hard to present the ethnic Russian-speaking population of Ukraine as outsiders in their own country, as agents of Moscow, almost never as Ukrainians seeking a federation within Ukraine and as Ukrainian citizens resisting a foreign-orchestrated coup against their elected government.

    There is almost the joie d’esprit of a class reunion of warmongers.

    The drum-beaters of the Washington Post inciting war with Russia are the very same editorial writers who published the lie that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction.

    To most of us, the American presidential campaign is a media freak show, in which Donald Trump is the arch villain.

    But Trump is loathed by those with power in the United States for reasons that have little to do with his obnoxious behaviour and opinions. To the invisible government in Washington, the unpredictable Trump is an obstacle to America’s design for the 21stcentury.

    This is to maintain the dominance of the United States and to subjugate Russia, and, if possible, China.

    To the militarists in Washington, the real problem with Trump is that, in his lucid moments, he seems not to want a war with Russia; he wants to talk with the Russian president, not fight him; he says he wants to talk with the president of China.

    In the first debate with Hillary Clinton, Trump promised not to be the first to introduce nuclear weapons into a conflict. He said, “I would certainly not do first strike. Once the nuclear alternative happens, it’s over.” That was not news.

    Did he really mean it? Who knows? He often contradicts himself. But what is clear is that Trump is considered a serious threat to the status quo maintained by the vast national security machine that runs the United States, regardless of who is in the White House.

    The CIA wants him beaten. The Pentagon wants him beaten. The media wants him beaten. Even his own party wants him beaten. He is a threat to the rulers of the world – unlike Clinton who has left no doubt she is prepared to go to war with nuclear-armed Russia and China.

    Clinton has the form, as she often boasts. Indeed, her record is proven. As a senator, she backed the bloodbath in Iraq.  When she ran against Obama in 2008, she threatened to “totally obliterate” Iran. As Secretary of State, she colluded in the destruction of governments in Libya and Honduras and set in train the baiting of China.

    She has now pledged to support a No Fly Zone in Syria — a direct provocation for war with Russia. Clinton may well become the most dangerous president of the United States in my lifetime –a distinction for which the competition is fierce.

    Without a shred of evidence, she has accused Russia of supporting Trump and hacking her emails. Released by WikiLeaks, these emails tell us that what Clinton says in private, in speeches to the rich and powerful, is the opposite of what she says in public.

    That is why silencing and threatening Julian Assange is so important. As the editor of WikiLeaks, Assange knows the truth. And let me assure those who are concerned, he is well, and WikiLeaks is operating on all cylinders.

    Today, the greatest build-up of American-led forces since World War Two is under way – in the Caucasus and eastern Europe, on the border with Russia, and in Asia and the Pacific, where China is the target.

    Keep that in mind when the presidential election circus reaches its finale on November 8th,  If the winner is Clinton, a Greek chorus of witless commentators will celebrate her coronation as a great step forward for women. None will mention Clinton’s victims: the women of Syria, the women of Iraq, the women of Libya. None will mention the civil defence drills being conducted in Russia.  None will recall Edward Bernays’ “torches of freedom”.

    George Bush’s press spokesman once called the media “complicit enablers”.

    Coming from a senior official in an administration whose lies, enabled by the media, caused such suffering, that description is a warning from history.

    In 1946, the Nuremberg Tribunal prosecutor said of the German media: “Before every major aggression, they initiated a press campaign calculated to weaken their victims and to prepare the German people psychologically for the attack. In the propaganda system, it was the daily press and the radio that were the most important weapons.”

    This is adapted from an address to the Sheffield Festival of Words, Sheffield, England.    

  • Berkeley Professor Claims Clinton Email Investigation Nothing More Than A Sexist "Bitch Hunt"

    Submitted by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

    Today’s college-related article is not about safe spaces, macro aggressions and trigger warnings. Rather, it’s about a remarkably stupid claim made by Robin Lakoff (a professor of linguistics at the University of California, Berkeley), that the entire email scandal plaguing Hillary Clinton is a nothing more than a vast patriarchal driven conspiracy manufactured by men for the sole purpose of taking down a strong and powerful woman. No, I’m not kidding.

    Here are a few excerpts from the delusional Time published article, Hillary Clinton’s Emailgate Is an Attack on Women:

    ‘It’s not about emails; it’s about public communication by a woman’

     

    I am mad. I am mad because I am scared. And if you are a woman, you should be, too. Emailgate is a bitch hunt, but the target is not Hillary Clinton. It’s us.

     

    The only reason the whole email flap has legs is because the candidate is female. Can you imagine this happening to a man? Clinton is guilty of SWF (Speaking While Female), and emailgate is just a reminder to us all that she has no business doing what she’s doing and must be punished, for the sake of all decent women everywhere. There is so much of that going around.

     

    If the candidate were male, there would be no scolding and no “scandal.” Those very ideas would be absurd. Men have a nearly absolute right to freedom of speech. In theory, so do women, but that, as the creationists like to say, is only a theory.

     

    Clinton’s use of a personal server has not been found to be a crime. Then how is it that so many have found the charge so easy to make, and make stick? How has her use of the server made plausible all the claims that she is “deceptive” and “untrustworthy”?

     

    It’s not about emails; it’s about public communication by a woman in general. Of course, in the year 2016, no one (probably not even The Donald) could make this argument explicitly. After all, he and his fellow Republicans are not waging a war on women. How do we know that? They have said so. And they’re men, so they must be telling the truth.

     

    But here’s Hillary Rodham Clinton, the very public stand-in for all bossy, uppity and ambitious women. Here are her emails. And since it’s a woman, doing what decent women should never do—engaging in high-level public communication—well, there must be something wrong with that, even if we can’t quite find that something. We will invoke the terminology of criminal law to account for our feelings. She’s getting away with treason! Put her in jail! We can’t quite put our fingers on it, but the words sure do make a lot of people feel better, so they must be right.

    So that’s the take of Berkley linguistics professor Robin Lakoff. Now here’s the take from Charles S. Faddis, a former CIA operations officer with 20 years of experience in intelligence operations.

    As Mr. Faddis writes in an Op-ed published at The Hill:

    I have worked in national security my entire life. Most of that has been in the intelligence community surrounded by classified information. For twenty years, I worked undercover in the Central Intelligence Agency, recruiting sources, producing intelligence and running operations. I have a pretty concrete understanding of how classified information is handled and how government communications systems work.

     

    Nobody uses a private email server for official business. Period. Full stop.

     

    The entire notion is, to borrow a phrase from a Clinton campaign official, “insane.” That anyone would presume to be allowed to do so is mind-boggling. That government officials allowed Hillary Clinton to do so is nauseating.

     

    Classified and unclassified information do not mix. They don’t travel in the same streams through the same pipes. They move in clearly well defined channels so that never the twain shall meet. Mixing them together is unheard of and a major criminal offense.

     

    If you end up with classified information in an unclassified channel, you have done something very wrong and very serious.

     

    Accidentally removing a single classified message from controlled spaces, without any evidence of intent or exposure to hostile forces, can get you fired and cost you your clearance. Repeated instances will land you in prison.

     

    Every hostile intelligence agency on the planet targets senior American officials for collection. The Secretary of State tops the list. Almost anything the Secretary of State had to say about her official duties, her schedule, her mood, her plans for the weekend, would be prized information to adversaries.

     

    It is very difficult, in fact, to think of much of anything that the Secretary of State could be saying in email that we would want hostile forces to know.

     

    As we wait for more information on the latest revelations, let’s quickly note what we already know Hillary Clinton did.

     

    While Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton exclusively used a private email address for official business. Instead of using a State Department account, she used a personal email account, housed on a private server located in her home in Chappaqua, New York. The Department of State exercised zero control or oversight in this process. No government security personnel were involved in protecting them.

     

    When the House Select Committee on Benghazi asked to see these emails, the Department of State said they did not have them. Clinton’s lawyers then went through all the emails on her server. They turned over 30,000 emails they decided were work related and deleted all of the rest.

     

    How they made the decision as to which emails to share and which to destroy remains unknown. Active government officials were not involved in this process.

     

    Hillary says she did not use the account to transmit classified information. This has been proven false. The FBI found over 100 messages that contained information that was classified when sent, including numerous email chains at the level of Top Secret/Special Access Programs. They don’t get any more highly classified, it’s the virtual summit of Mt. Everest. One theme pertained to the movement of North Korean nuclear assets obtained via satellite imagery. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out this is extremely sensitive information.

     

    The FBI found another 2,000 messages containing information that should have been classified at the time it was sent. How much more classified information may have been in the tens of thousands of emails, which Clinton’s lawyers erased, is completely unknown.

     

    Hillary Clinton supporters like to ask rhetorically, “Well, what about Colin Powell?” Nice try, but using your own private email address which received 2 emails determined to be classified later, is nothing like deliberately operating a home brewed server, and then see it handle thousands of classified e-mails.

     

    What happens next we do not know. What we do know already is this. While serving in one of the most senior positions in the United States Government, Hillary Clinton was at a minimum, grossly negligent in the handling of classified information and when confronted with this practice, acted immediately to destroy information and prevent a full, fair and complete investigation of any damage to national security.

     

    Anyone else who did such things in the government would long ago have been tried, convicted and sent to jail.

     

    You decide if you want to send her to the White House instead.

    I’ll let readers decide who has a better read on the situation. In the meantime, back to your safe spaces my little snowflakes.

    screen-shot-2016-10-31-at-3-31-14-pm

  • Bank Of Japan Leaves Policy Unchanged; Warns Growth, Inflation Outlook Skewed To Downside

    Expectations for the BoJ meeting tonight were for no change (and perhaps lowering its inflation and growth outlooks) and markets were braced for a whole lot of nothing with overnight USDJPY vol at its lowest of the year (for a BoJ meeting). Sure enough that is what they got. "No change" across anything policy but cuts to inflation expectations (as well as warnings of a downside skew for growth) left the yen slightly higher.

    • Bank of Japan Keeps 10-Year JGB Yield Target About 0%
    • BOJ Maintains Policy Balance Rate at -0.1%
    • BOJ Board Votes 7-2 to on Neg Rate
    • BOJ FY2017 Core CPI Forecast Is 1.5%; Prev. Forecast 1.7%
    • "With regard to the risk balance, risks to both economic activity and prices are skewed to the downside."
    • BOJ isn't seeing any near term turnaround for exports. Says sluggishness is expected to remain "for some time."

    There was some chaos in Nikkei Futures ahead of The BoJ…

     

    Since The BoJ unleashed its curve-management plan, things have been oddly stable…

    While Yen has weakened around 4 handles…

     

    Banks have gone nowehere…

     

    As the yield curve has remained relatively flat…

     

    And managing 10Y yields appears to be holding for now…

     

    But while levels/prices may look stable, as Goldman notes, JGB market functionality has already deteriorated and we expect it to continue to deteriorate under the yield curve control, as long as the BOJ continues with the current monetary policy.

    Bond market functionality has been deteriorating even prior to the introduction of yield curve control in late September. In the BOJ’s bond market survey, the DI for bond market functionality deteriorated to -46 in August 2016, as compared to -25 in February 2015, when the survey first started (see Exhibit 3). Deterioration in the DI was particularly noticeable after the adoption of the negative rate policy.

    Exhibit 3: DI on Bond market functionality


    Source: BOJ

    With the addition of 10-year JGB yield control on top of the negative interest rate policy, we expect long-term rates to become more “fixed” and market functionality to decline even further. Already, on October 19, an entire day went by with no transactions made in newly issued 10-year JGBs (according to the Japan Bond Trading Co.). This is the first time in 13 months, since September 24, 2015, that no transactions have been made for an entire day.

    We believe that the BOJ is also concerned about impairment of JGB market functionality, in that it may potentially cause large stress in the market when the BOJ decides to raise its policy rates in the future. We see little way to get around this issue, however, as long as the BOJ maintains current monetary policy.

  • 17 Shot Dead As Chicago Records Deadliest Weekend Of 2016

    After a summer of extreme violence, homicides in Chicago were supposed to slow down going into the fall and winter months.  But, that certainly does not appear to be happening as the city just recording its most violent weekend of the entire year with 52 people shot and 17 of them killed.  This weekend’s violence brings the tally of year to date killings in Chicago to 646, an annual run-rate which implies the most violent year since the mid-90s.

    According to the Chicago Tribune, of the 17 victims from this weekend’s violence, 7 of them were under the age of 20, with the youngest victim being only 14.

    The weekend toll also was deadlier than the three long summer holiday weekends when violence typically spikes because of the warm weather. Six people were fatally shot over the Memorial Day weekend, five over the Fourth of July weekend and 13 people over Labor Day weekend, according to Tribune data.

     

    This past weekend there were shootings in every area of the city but the Far North and Northwest sides, according to police. Of the 17 people who were killed, seven were younger than 20.

     

    The youngest was 14-year-old Demarco Webster Jr., described by his grade school principal as one of her best students. Demarco had planned to run for student council and try out for basketball, and he was being recruited for an NAACP leadership program.

     

    A little more than 24 hours later, 17-year-old twins Edward and Edwin Bryant were killed in an apparent drive-by shooting in Old Town. Police responding to calls about gunfire found one of the boys lying on the sidewalk in the 400 block of West Evergreen Avenue and another around the corner in the 1300 block of North Hudson Avenue.

     

    “The two brothers, as far as we can tell, they didn’t have any documented gang affiliation,” said Johnson, who noted police recovered video of the shooting. “But the individuals they were with did.”

    While journalists suggested that the police department was caught off guard by gang violence linked to large crowds around Wrigley Field, police Superintendent Eddie Johnson insists that extra resources were deployed to the most dangerous neighborhoods around Chicago.

    “It was a tough weekend, but that just goes back to what I’ve been saying all the time,” he told reporters.  “Listen, until we start holding repeat gun offenders accountable for these crimes, we’re going to keep seeing cycles of gun violence like this.”

     

    Johnson denied that the department was caught off guard by the mostly gang violence on the South and West sides while deploying hundreds of extra officers for crowd control outside Wrigley Field for the Cubs’ three World Series games over the weekend.

     

    “We had canceled days off as well as (required) 12-hour shifts over the entire weekend, so I’m confident that we had the resources out there” in the most dangerous neighborhoods, he said.

     

    According to HeyJackass!, killings from this weekend bring YTD Chicago homicides up to 646, a 51% increase versus last year.

    Chicago

     

    Meanwhile, YTD killings imply a run-rate of 775 homicides for the year which would be the highest since the mid-90s.

    Chicago

     

    And, of course, the majority of the violent crime continues to occur in the gang-ridden South and West side neighborhoods.

    Chicago

     

    Finally, roughly 95% of the violent crime committed so far in 2016 has been against minority citizens with nearly 80% of the shootings going unsolved.

    Chicago

  • Janet Tavakoli: Life And Death On Wall Street

    Submitted by Adam Taggart via PeakProsperity.com,

    Financial markets and derivatives authority Janet Tavakoli returns to the podcast to discuss a number of the themes contained in her new book Decisions: Life And Death On Wall Street.

    She paints a particularly informative timeline of the greed and rot that has come to dominate the modern financial system, and how its tentacles have fully penetrated and subjugated the halls of power in Washington DC.

    We're in precarious times for sure. What we have done is unprecedented in the history of the United States. We got rid of the benchmark, the gold standard. We don’t have any any stable benchmark anymore. Instead, we have currencies that are being benchmarked off of each other.

     

    If you're measuring your weight you want a scale, right? You want an actual measurement of weight, not a relative one. You don’t want to be comparing yourself a bunch of obese guys in the gym. You need a standard benchmark. So once you get rid of the benchmark, then you can eat whatever you want and exercise as little as you choose that's okay. Well it is not okay. We all know that. But that's exactly what we've done in finance. We're printing money like mad. We've created a huge distortion where, for years, savers have gotten negative real interest rates. Negative real interest rates in the United States for a long, long period of time, and in Europe we now have sovereigns of course who are paying both negative nominal and negative real interest rates.

     

    This is unprecedented in the history of finance. I talked to a retired head of the Chicago Fed (so I've probably narrowed the field because I don’t know how many of them are still living) and he said None of us knows what is going on. We've never done anything like this before. They don’t know what the end game is. They're totally at sea and it's their own fault because they got rid of our scale. They got rid of our own benchmarks, and they're trying to muddle through without having any way of measuring what we are doing. 

    But not all of her message is gloom. She explains how the battle between corruption and fairness is cyclical; and that history has plenty of examples where a just band of concerned agents can (over time) "kick the bums out":

    Henry Kluz was somebody who saw communists in his time try the same kind of ideological subversion that we are seeing right now in the United States and they failed because there were a lot of people to push back. But he also saw people try to crash the markets when Grant was running against Horace Greeley. And he formed a group of 70 men that he got together to oppose Tammany Hall. Tammany Hall controlled New York. They – they were very corrupt. They had a lock on it. They paid off hired sons, daughters, relative of other politicians. They were getting the votes. And Henry Kluz was a financier. He was born in Britain. And he observed these people and he said, you know, none of these people really like each other. They're not bound together by blood. They're not bound together by friendship or even by a common ideology. All these people care about is making money and paying off their friends in power. That's all. Other than that, none of these people had each other’s back. And he said We can defeat them. And so his group of 70 overthrew the Tweed Ring. One by one, they knocked the pillars out from under these guys. It took a while, but they did it.

     

    It was just people who were fed up with the corruption. Kluz did it in his time. It can be done. It's not easy, but people who really have an idea of what the country should look like can defeat people who have inveigled themselves into the system and corrupted it. Now we see the same thing in finance. I have a group of friends who are appalled at what has happened in the financial system. But their voices have been pretty well silenced. They didn’t use garrotes or daggers to the throat or shoot them in the chest (at least not in most cases), but they have silenced them by squelching them from the public view – at least for now.

     

    So I do encourage people to read the histories of finance and to see that nothing has really changed. But things can change and this isn’t the first time we've had to fight this battle. 

    Click the play button below to listen to Chris' interview with Janet Tavakoli (72m:22s).

  • FBI Finds No Links Between Trump And Russia, Probing Manafort Instead

    With the FBI accused of pushing the Clinton campaign, which as recently as a week ago was seen as invincible as it stormed toward the November 8 presidential election, over the proverbial cliff, it was perhaps inevitable that in order to preserve the appearance of impartiality the Bureau would proceed with a probe of Trump’s own campaign. And, according to NBC which cited law enforcement and intelligence sources, it has done so by focusing on Trump’s former campaign manager Paul Manafort, and specifically his foreign business connections.

    The news of the inquiry, which has not blossomed into a full-blown criminal investigation, emerges just days after FBI Director James Comey’s disclosure that his agency is examining a new batch of emails connected to an aide to Hillary Clinton. It also comes a day after Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid criticized Comey’s revelation and asserted that Comey possesses “explosive information about close ties and coordination between Donald Trump, his top advisors, and the Russian government.”

    As a reminder, Manafort, who resigned as Donald Trump’s campaign manager in August, was previously an international political consultant. He became a liability for the Trump campaign amid reports of his involvement with a pro-Russian political party in Ukraine. One damaging New York Times story earlier this year alleged the party had earmarked more than $12 million in under-the-table cash payments, raising questions about whether Manafort had run afoul of U.S. lobbying laws that would he require he register as  “foreign agent” with the Justice Department.


    Manafort’s name in an alleged payment ledger

    What received far less focus at the time of Manafort resignation, is that as part of the probe, the FBI was also looking into the PR firm of John Podesta’s brother, the Podesta Group founded by prominent democrat Tony Podesta.

    But back to Manafort, and the NBC story, which in retrospect is merely a regurgitation of a CNN report from August 19, which reported the exact same thing over two months ago: the FBI did not comment. Manafort told NBC News “none of it is true … There’s no investigation going on by the FBI that I’m aware of.” He said he had never had ties to Russian president Vladimir Putin, or had dealings with Putin and his government. He said any suggestion of such ties was “Democratic propaganda.”

    “This is all political propaganda, meant to deflect,” he said.

    Furthermore, it appears that the latest news is actually a step down from the origianl CNN report: sources told NBC that the FBI review is not a full-blown criminal investigation, but rather an initial inquiry.

    NBC News reported in August that Manafort was a key player in multi-million-dollar business propositions with Russian and Ukrainian oligarchs — one of them a close Putin ally with alleged ties to organized crime — which foreign policy experts said raised questions about the pro-Russian bent of the Trump candidacy. A few days later, amid other reporting on Manafort’s Ukraine ties, Manafort was ousted from the campaign.

    Rep. Adam Schiff of California, the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, regularly receives sensitive briefings. Schiff said he could not discuss Reid’s assertions, but he said, “Americans have every right to be concerned about what they see in terms of Trump advisors and their closeness with the Kremlin, Trump’s policies vis-a-vis Russia, Trump’s potential financial interest, all of those things ought to be of deep concern to voters.”

     

    He added, “Whether an investigation is appropriate depends on whether there’s evidence of criminal connections. Of course the intelligence community wants to know what foreign influence Russia may be looking to exert in the United States.”

     

    Manafort was paid millions of dollars — $12.7 million in cash, according to The New York Times—representing a pro-Russian politician in the Ukraine.

    Meanwhile, Democrats have used this renewed opportunity of ties between a former Trump staffer and Russia, or rather Ukraine, to pitch the worn out propaganda line that Trump is nothing more than a KGB plant.

    Trump has taken a series of pro-Russian positions that experts from both parties say are far outside the mainstream, and inexplicable from a political viewpoint. He continues to cast doubt on Russian involvement in election hacking, for example, despite the intelligence community’s public assessment.

     

    “The relationships that Trump’s advisors have had with pro-Russian forces are deeply disturbing,” David Kramer, a former senior State Department official in the George W. Bush administration and a former adviser to Marco Rubio’s presidential campaign, told NBC News in August. “Trump’s attitude on Russia is not in line with most Republican foreign-policy thinking. Trump has staked out views that are really on the fringe.”

    Yes, heaven forbid someone step out of line with most Republican foreign-policy thinking, which incidentally, is a carbon copy of most Democrat foreign-policy thinking these days: shoot first, bomb second, and only ask questions if you are subpoenaed by Congress.

    * * *

    Meanwhile, not content with letting the Russian “angle” drop, on Monday evening, the master of propaganda, John Podesta himself, whose brother would be in the same trouble as Manafort if not more if the FBI were truly probing pro-Russian/Ukrainian lobbying connections, tweeted that “Donald Trump has a secret email server set up to communicate privately with the Russian Alfa Bank.”

    Which is wonderful (granted he may be borrowing a little too heavily from the Hillary Clinton script), the only problem is that at almost exactly the same time, the NYT reported that U.S. Officials Doubt Donald Trump Has Direct Link to Russia.

    For much of the summer, the F.B.I. pursued a widening investigation into a Russian role in the American presidential campaign. Agents scrutinized advisers close to Donald J. Trump, looked for financial connections with Russian financial figures, searched for those involved in hacking the computers of Democrats, and even chased a lead — which they ultimately came to doubt — about a possible secret channel of email communication from the Trump Organization to a Russian bank.

     

    Law enforcement officials say that none of the investigations so far have found any link between Mr. Trump and the Russian government. And even the hacking into Democratic emails, F.B.I. and intelligence officials now believe, was aimed at disrupting the presidential election rather than electing Mr. Trump.

    In other words, the FBI itself is telling the Democrat establishment to move on and find a different attack on Putin because the “Putin agent” is getting old. Alas, that means either more tax stories or more allegations of rape, both of which the public appears to no longer care as much about.

  • The secret explosive connection between TRUMP and RUSSIA exposed

    The last few days have certainly been historic for American politics!  Contrary to what the Mainstream Media, Democrat controlled White House, Senate, and other powerful groups are saying – this election is a unique, unprecedented, history making, game changing, paradigm shifting, superbowl of superbowls.  As we explain in our best selling book Splitting Pennies, and as eloquently described today by Peter Thiel – the main reason for problems in America is simple; hyperinflation.  If you haven’t yet watched, this groundbreaking public speech supporting a renegade non-Elite candidate by an Elite himself (although, controversial) check it out here on Zero Hedge or here on Bloomberg, and in summary:

    AMERICA’S OVERPRICED HEALTH CARE SYSTEM MIGHT HELP SUBSIDIZE THE REST OF THE WORLD, BUT THAT DOES NOT HELP AMERICANS WHO CANNOT AFFORD IT AND THEY HAVE STARTED TO NOTICE. OUR YOUNGEST CITIZENS MAY NOT HAVE MEDICAL BILLS, BUT THEIR COLLEGE TUITION KEEPS ON INCREASING FASTER THAN THE RATE OF INFLATION, ADDING MORE EVERY YEAR TO OUR $1.3 TRILLION MOUNTAIN OF STUDENT DEBT. AMERICA HAS BECOME THE ONLY COUNTRY WHERE STUDENTS TAKE ON LOANS THEY CAN NEVER ESCAPE, NOT EVEN BY DECLARING BANKRUPTCY. STUCK IN THIS BROKEN SYSTEM, MILLENNIALS ARE THE FIRST GENERATION THAT EXPECT THEIR OWN LIVES TO BE WORSE THAN THE LIVES OF THEIR PARENTS. WHILE AMERICAN FAMILY EXPENSES HAVE BEEN INCREASING RELENTLESSLY, THEIR INCOMES HAVE BEEN STAGNANT. IN REAL DOLLARS, IMMEDIATE HOUSEHOLD MAKES LESS MONEY TODAY THAT MADE 17 YEARS AGO. NEARLY HALF OF AMERICANS WOULD NOT BE ABLE TO COME UP WITH $400 IF THEY NEEDED IT FOR AN EMERGENCY. YET, WHILE HOUSEHOLDS STRUGGLED TO KEEP UP WITH THE CHALLENGES OF EVERYDAY LIFE, THE GOVERNMENT IS WASTING TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS ON TAXPAYER MONEY ON FARAWAY WARS. RIGHT NOW, WE’RE FIGHTING FIVE OF THEM. IN IRAQ, SYRIA, LIBYA, AND SOMALIA.

    Studies have been done – the real cause of social revolution, the ‘let them eat cake’ syndrome, is not anything other than simple hyperinflation.  When the cost of staple foods, and basic life, are more than a certain percentage of average income, people riot.  One interesting example are the Onion riots of India – a staple in Indian cuisine.  This was the cause of the American Revolution, the British wanted to tax Americans into poverty.  The financial controls were so severe, the idea of “America” was more about having our own currency than our own country.  But a country is a currency, and tax is connected to the ‘functional currency’ which again, is attached to the collecting organization (government) and the amount of guns they have to collect taxes.

    Thiel may be a closet Genius hitting the nail right on the head with this short characterization of the current situation, at possible risk to his own business and peers.  Bravo!  To paraphrase the point, the ‘system’ – which means the government and the financial system, which have become like one, have become disfunctional.  The fact that Clinton is a criminal is really a side issue, there are thousands of corrupt criminal politicians keeping the dead system afloat for a few more years, taking bribes and looking the other way.  As proven by QE, the Fed can’t print our way out of this one.  

    So what is the connection between TRUMP and RUSSIA?

    The breakdown in the system, the reason TRUMP has so much support, is because he is an anti-establishment candidate.  For better or worse, he’s just NOT a politician.  He is a vote against the last 30 years of Elite dominated foreign policy, monetary policy, wars, social degradation, and general decline.

    Trump represents the ‘truther’ movement.  For 30 or arguably 60 years, the Elite have used a tool of complex social engineering, call it programming, call it brainwashing, call it propoganda, call it what you will.  Through simple TV advertising, movies, music, events like the Shell Air & Sea show, Burning Man, Lollapalooza, Facebook, and other means – the Elite have manipulated the greater masses of the population (probably, about 95%) with little ease.  Pull a lever here, false flag there – boom.  Another puppet in office (Obama).  Another bubble created.  Another opportunity to fleece the growing upper class of their easy bubble gotten gains.  Another opportunity for BIG money to strike it REALLY BIG.  This is nothing new, this has gone on for 200 years in the west.  Well, the Bolshevik’s tried to stop the Oligarchs, and had the Soviet Union, which was a unique country ruled by party hardliners.  Only comparable to the NAZIs and a few other autocratic regimes, the Soviet Union, anyone would agree, was NOT dominated by foreign power, foreign influence, AT ALL.  The United States, has been a foreigner free for all.  Proponents of the melting-pot model, the multi-ethnic, multi-gender, trans-gender-ethnic-soup model – will say that this is a good thing.  Maybe it is philosophically.  But practically, when 70% of the CIA is OUTSOURCED it is a security risk.  When ISRAELI companies provide secure encrypted recording of police communications and other national sensitive functions, there exists something we like to call CONFLICT OF INTEREST.  How nice, their company is even called “NICE.”  So, are we also to outsource the software used for nuclear launch codes?  I mean how far does it go, when it becomes ridiculous?

    The point is that, the system has evolved to be based on corruption, conflict of interest, waste, irrationality – and it cannot last.  It’s a big bubble – a multi-epoch super bubble.  Does it mean end of the world?  Of course not.  Does it mean the end for business as usual?  Yes, for sure.  

    To understand the secret connection between Trump and Russia first understand the ‘conspiracy’ that exists between the current donor class, the .01 percent, Illuminati, Soros, Rockefeller, Grace, Rothschilds, Cargill-MacMillan, Kochs, British Royals, Hottingers, .. etc.  There are about 10,000 of them.  To put it in writing, THERE IS NO CONSPIRACY.  New World Order is a wet dream, they have delusions of grandeur.  It certainly would be convenient for them.  Like George Bush said, his job would be ‘so much easier if he was a dictator.’  You have to understand what ties all these families together.  Yes, some of them are friends, they go skiing together, but mostly, they don’t even speak to each other.  They have simply something called COMMON INTEREST.  Their interest is simple, make interest on their interest in their bank account, maintain the status quo, and ensure their multi-generational survival at the top.  They don’t need to meet in dark rooms and plot and plan or send secret messages between each other – it’s known in their conscious minds.  They know, for example, what a TRUMP in the White House means for them.  

    But is TRUMP really an existential threat to the Elite?  Certainly not.  If you look at the period of medieval to pre-industrial Europe, there was an anti-feudal social movement that led to the Renaissance, Capitalism (call it ‘mercantilism’), and finally the Industrial Revolution.  They evolved – but – the Elite still maintained power.  Although, not as direct feudal kings, they now allowed the house of commons to ‘decide’ about issues such as how many parking spaces should be in front of Buckingham palace.  But they still owned all the land.  Slavery became virtual – chains were exchanged for a control of the money supply, financial tactics were used instead of physical tactics.  It was a ‘banks not tanks’ method, and it’s still in use today.  In fact, if you look back 300 or 500 years, most of the Elite of that time, are still around with their trust funds.  But due to imbreeding, laziness, and just an addiction to ‘rich life’ – few of these families do anything substantial.  They rely on new blood, like Bill Gates, to bring innovation to the Illuminati.  As long as they are not threatened, and allowed to ‘own’ the new player, you can sit at the table.

    Trump represents truth, not in that he is an honest person, but in that, he doesn’t use deceit, manipulation, propoganda, and common social programming techniques to gain power.  He’s an honest guy, generally.  The fact that he’s a womanizing jerk, a real a-hole, is even a testament to his honesty.  Voters for Trump, don’t necessarily like Trump like an individual, they like what he represents.  And that is what politics is SUPPOSED to be about.  He called out that the elections are rigged.  Many have known that for YEARS.  I can tell you (author speaking) seeing this first hand in 2000 in Palm Beach County, the voting system is completely rigged.  Anyway the point is that Trump represents a silent growing majority of ‘truthers’ who simply want and end to the current lies and tricks and foolish deceptions that can easily be disproved with the internet.

    Democrats accuse FBI of hiding ‘explosive truth’ about Trump-Russia ties

    What’s different about this election is WIKILEAKS.  It was WIKILEAKS that made this election a game changer, not Russia.  The Elite used Russia as a poor excuse for ‘truth’ movement, of which WIKILEAKS is a major component.  Many people have been part of a growing truth movement since the questionable official explanation of 911.  Well, in the year 2001, Wikileaks didn’t exist.  This is a good resource for those who aren’t familiar, that you can forward to your friends who aren’t ‘in the know’: 

    The Top 100 Most Damaging WikiLeaks

    So, why is all this a game changer?  Because it’s all out in public.  We knew politicians were corrupt, but now we have it in writing, IN THEIR OWN WORDS.  Why did Clinton say ‘they’ll send us to the gallows’ because Wikileaks exposed their private communications, their own stupidity and sloth, their unprofessional behavior, and in general a disfunctional system.  

    1. Trump and Russia are pro-business

    The connection between TRUMP and RUSSIA is they have a pro-business COMMON INTEREST.  Trump certainly doesn’t speak Russian and 100% for sure there is no communication between camp Trump and the Kremlin, this is tantamount to cold war delusions that Russians were hiding nuclear missiles on the dark side of the moon.  People who are pro-Trump are really not ‘pro-Trump’ as much as they are ‘pro-Fact’ – and this is how Russian politics works.  Simply put, Putin cleaned house years ago and it’s an ongoing effort, see an example of one of the most recent stings against a local corrupt mayor:

    Governor of Kirov Region detained while receiving €400k bribe

    The governor of the Kirov Region has been caught “red-handed” while receiving a bribe of €400,000 ($446,000). According to investigators, he was getting the money from a company associated with the criminal case of anti-corruption activist Aleksey Navalny.  The head of the region in Central Russia Nikita Belykh  has been detained and a criminal case launched, spokesman of Russia’s Investigative Committee Vladimir Markin announced on Friday. Belykh was caught red-handed while receiving the money in euro currency at a Moscow restaurant, he added, saying that investigators will seek the governor’s arrest.

    Russian politics is certainly a lot different, any country must be looked at through it’s own cultural lenses.  This is not a sanitization of Putin – he’s built his own $1 Billion dollar palace on the Black Sea and certainly enjoys the benefits of his position.  Well, maybe it’s not for ‘him’ it’s for “Russia” but someone needs to use this place, right?  

    2. The Elite hate Russia and Trump 

    Read our recent article for a detailed analysis Why the Elite hate Russia. Why the Elite hate Russia

    Why do the Elite hate Trump?  Simple – 1) they don’t control him explicitly and 2) Trump poses a threat to them, unlike other wanna be Elites who will just do what they say.  For example, if elected would Trump enforce various laws that current politicians have blatantly broken?  As the commander in chief, Trump wouldn’t be so easy to control, assassinate, or subvert.

    3. Trump and Russia are powerful by themselves

    Trump is a billionaire.  How many times over?  Who cares – he lives the life.  He has wealth.  So he bankrupted himself a few times – it’s a smart business move.  There’s even university classes “Strategic Bankruptcy” that means they teach this in school!  Clinton, Obama, the Bush Family, they didn’t build their own empires the hard way, they did things for Elite’s and they were rewarded.  Trump may have inherited an Empire from his father, but so what – he turned it into an even bigger one.  How many trust fund babies do you know that work (most of them, skiing and in and out of rehab, visiting the administrator monthly to get their check).

    Russia – has tried hard to rebuild their economy.  The fact that they have been villanized, well – it’s offensive.  Why? Because they are doing what the Americans suggested to them!  They ‘broke down that wall’ as we told them, they are building free markets, a commodity and stock exchange, growing their middle class, and much more.  It’s all commendable, and they are following the CIAs playbook that was given to them in 1991.  Ask any Russian, even the oligarchs – it’s not easy.  They are fighting a huge demographic problem, declining population, drug problems, health issues, and most importantly – a cultural mentality that still thinks that people who make money that we call ‘entrepreneurs’ are ‘criminals’ they called “Speculant” or “Speculators” during the Soviet times.  Imagine what leaders like Putin face every day, explaining to a population that has been taught that it’s illegal to ‘profit’ because it’s ‘dishonest’ to go out and invest and start a business.  If anyone can understand this what they face, what they have acheived, it is really commendable.  They still have a long way to go, but this Soviet mentality has been deep rooted into their culture not only by Soviet propoganda, but Stalin killed millions who weren’t like this.  So it’s a LOT deeper than we can even begin to imagine.  And here the Elite are using them as a scapegoat.  How dare they?  They should be ashamed of themselves!

    4. Russia and Trump have common enemies

    Whether ISIS is a machination of the CIA at this point is irrelevant, radical Islam is a global problem that threatens the very existence of western culture.  As long as there’s a guy willing to strap a bomb to his chest and blow himself up on a bus, the West is threatened.  It’s only a matter of time before they evolve and crawl out of their caves and start doing real damage.  The Elite in the west really isn’t equipped to deal with a REAL threat, as they’ve been dealing with artificial threats that they create for the last 60 years.  It’s easy to deal with an enemy like Iraq, when you know all their chemical weapons because you sold them to him.

    ISIS went a little too far.  They wanted an enemy ‘without borders’ that it would be impossible to disprove a negative (there can be terrorists anywhere) – the problem is, the methodology created by the CIA planners was so convincing, it now is a self-feeding mechanism and radical ISLAM is a fast growing popular movement in the world.  The West isn’t likely going to make the Middle East glass anytime soon, especially with our friends “Israel” right in the middle of it – so this is a REAL PROBLEM that the current Elite really cannot solve.  Terrorists cannot be killed with tanks and ICBMs or B2 bombers.  Because, how do you know who is a Terrorist?  How do we not know that right now, there aren’t terrorists applying for jobs in DHS, the FBI, CIA, wherever – the world isn’t flat anymore.  The problems created in the last generation cannot be solved by those from the last generation or those who think like this ‘industrial’ model created after WW2.  

    Probably, speaking as a technologist, the only group that can really solve this problem are scientists or Silicon Valley.

    5. Trump and Russia are both in circumstances where they are forced to be practical

    Critisize Putin for this and that, Russia has led itself in a great direction – and is probably one of the top 5 optimized nation-states in the world.  We don’t need to do studies to see that countries like Switzerland, New Zealand, Singapore, Sweden, and others are the most efficient and economically optimized countries in the world.  They also enjoy the longest human life spans, best health care (on a results basis) and are the most wealthy.  We have to in this light add Russia to this list of WELL RUN countries.  It is certainly not the most wealthy, poverty in Russia however is less and less – Russia has vast economic problems it faces.  However the difference between Russia and Switzerland is that Russia is HUGE.  The advantages of Malta, Switzerland, and others is that they are tiny micro-countries.  But Russia actually is too – Basically Russia is Moscow, with a big backyard, and St. Petersburg.  However you look at it, Russia has been in a situation last 20 years that it really needed to use every dollar in the best possible way, not because they are honest people, or because they like to save money, but for SURVIVAL.  The only reason Russia is a functioning super power, is because they make very good use of their resources.  As the engineer anecdote goes:

    “Did you know NASA invented a pen that can write on the Space Station?  It only cost $20 Million in R&D!  The Russians, used an old pencil.”

    Simply put, Russia didn’t have the opportunity to create QE, spend Trillions on wars, borrow their way into a debt hole, and so on.  They needed to make good use of their resources and they do.  They are growing.

    Trump, call him what you want, he’s in the private sector.  Unlike government officials, i.e. Clinton, Bush, whatever- when you are in private business, you are only as good as your last trade.  That means, you are always one step away from bankruptcy, from disaster.  Uncle Sam doesn’t bail out failed businesses.  But if you are in the government, it works the opposite (at least in the US government).  If a guy does a bad job, ‘promote him’ so goes the saying.  That means, Trump has constantly had to reinvent himself, to overcome the countless failures and exist in business, for his own SURVIVAL.  Trump doesn’t have a government fund paying his bills.  He depends on his own business to maintain his life.  Many in his situation have folded, and are living under a bridge, or worse.

    These are all common interests, that make it seem as if there is a ‘conspiracy’ between Russia and Trump.  But just like there’s no ‘conspiracy’ between Reid and Rothschilds, they just have common interest.  And for a strange time in American politics, that didn’t happen for at least 50 years, there’s a candidate (Trump) that’s in common interest with the majority of voters.

    For those who have read our book explaining how the financial system works Splitting Pennies – this is not news – but what Trump has done is magnified all these common interests into support – a vote for Trump is a vote against the Establishment.  And I think that Trump doesn’t care about that, because even as a megalomaniac, he does share these common interests with voters, has the same gripes and complaints about the inefficient government and useless wars and horrid regulations stifling business.  

    See previous articles on this topic for your reference:

    Secret TRUTH about Russia EXPOSED – Why the Elite hate Russia – Russia key player US Democrat War on Intelligence for Election 

    Whatever happens on November 8th, the truth will win.  Thank you, Donald Trump!

    For a detailed lesson on how the financial markets work, checkout Fortress Capital Trading Academy

  • Over Half A Trillion In M&A: October Mergers Smash All Records With $500.1 Billion In Deals

    Last week David Rosenberg pointed out that mega Merger Manias like the one we are experiencing “invariably takes place at or near cycle peaks, as companies realize that they can no longer grow their earnings organically. We have just witnessed five multi-billion dollar deals this past week alone — $207 billion globally (AT&T/Time Warner; TD Ameritrade/Scottrade) in what has been the most active announcement list since 1999 … what do you know, near the tail end of that tech bull market too.”

    And now that October is officially over, we can close the books on what has been an unprecedented month for M&A. According to Bloomberg, in the month when a chill was sent through the spines of corporate CFOs and their investment bankers over fears that rates are about to rise and thus make debt-funded deals more expensive, the scramble to acquire competitors went off the charts, leading to an all time high in global M&A with almost half a trillion dollars of mergers and acquisitions announced globally.

    CenturyLink Inc.’s $34 billion acquisition of Level 3 Communications Inc., as well as General Electric Co.’s deal to combine its oil and gas division with Baker Hughes Inc., pushed October’s deal volumes to about $489 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That’s the highest amount for at least 12 years, topping the previous record of $471 billion in April 2007, the data show.

    Deallogic had a slightly different higher October deal total, calculating that the value for mergers and acquisitions for October actually surpassed the half a trillion mark, hitting $500.1B, but the idea is the same and adds that global deal volume has only been higher during five other months in records going back to 1995. More than half of the deals have been based in the US, where M&A volume has already hit a monthly record of $321.2 billion. That’s about a third higher than the next biggest month on record, according to Dealogic.

    Cited by Bloomberg TV, Bob Profusek, partner and chair of the global M&A practice at law firm Jones Day said that “every weekend recently has been busy.”

    According to the Jones Day lawyer “the fundamental drivers are still there,” Profusek said. “Low growth — which is bad for most things, but it’s good for M&A because that’s how you get growth — and very accommodating capital markets.” More important, however, are concerns that the period of low interest rates is coming to an end, prompting corporations to scramble and issue debt now while it is still cheap.

    Profusek worked for Potash Corp. on its merger with Agrium Inc., and is advising Reynolds American Inc. on British American Tobacco Plc’s $47 billion bid for the rest of the company.

    The mega deals dominated October, with just eight transactions accounting for more than $300 billion of the October total. The biggest deal of the year, AT&T Inc.’s $85.4 billion bid for Time Warner Inc., was revealed on Oct. 22 in a rare Saturday deal announcement. So far this year, 32 deals valued at more than $10 billion have been struck. That puts 2016 on track to beat every year since 2007 except for last year, when a bumper 52 transactions of that size or more were announced.

    “Size matters,” said Profusek, “particularly because we’re in a very challenging regulatory environment right now.”

    The massive size of M&A also means that the market is skeptical many of them will close, or will ultimately find financing should rates spike higher prior to closing. Almost 30 deals announced since the start of 2015 have not yet closed, including Dow Chemical Co.’s $59 billion merger with DuPont Co., which was pushed back until next year. The two health insurance megadeals – Anthem Inc.’s bid for Cigna Corp. and Aetna Inc.’s offer for Humana Inc. – are also still pending. Both those deals are currently trading with at least $40 gaps between the offer price and the target’s current share price, indicating investors are pessimistic they will close.

    As Bloomberh observes, “despite currency and equity markets reacting skittishly to poll results and news sentiment in the final days before the U.S. presidential election, M&A activity is forging ahead.”

    “I don’t hear boards or management really putting the election high on their list of concerns,” Frank Aquila, partner at law firm Sullivan & Cromwell LLP, said in a telephone interview. “Unless there is some sort of regulatory deadline or tax deadline that people are working to, deals get there when they get there.”

    And yet, according to companies, the biggest reason why consumer spending is weak and deteriorating is precisely due to the election. Almost as if someone is lying…

  • 48% Of Russians Fear Syrian Conflict Will Lead To World War III

    A recent Russian polls revealed something disturbing: according to almost half of the respondents, the deteriorating relations between Russia and the West caused by the ongoing crisis in Syria could develop into a global military conflict. As RT reports, the share of those who see the probability of World War III in the near future as high or very high is now at 48% and those who appraise it as low or very low comprise 42% of Russian society, according to the privately-owned public opinion research center Levada. The remaining 10% of respondents said they couldn’t give a simple answer to the question.

    Another question revealed that Russians are skeptical there will be a peaceful solution to the Syrian crisis, with a greater number seeing a non-violent outcome as more likely than not: when poll respondents were asked if they considered it possible that Russia and the West would eventually find a mutually acceptable solution to the crisis, 35% answered that this scenario was likely or very likely. Thirty-nine percent evaluate the probability of such an outcome as low or very low and 26 percent said that they couldn’t answer the question.

    Perhaps indicative of Russia’s clinical nationalism, just over half, or 52%, of Russians said they approve of their country’s involvement in the Syrian conflict while 26%  said they had a negative or sharply negative attitude to this. Just under a quarter – 23 percent – couldn’t answer the question about their personal view on the subject. Those who thought that Russia should continue the operation and those who thought that airstrikes should be stopped were divided 49 percent against 28 percent respectively, with 24 percent finding the question too difficult to answer.

    A similar poll conducted a year ago by the Levada Center showed that over 70% of Russian citizens supported the air operations against IS terrorists in Syria, and almost a half of them agreed that it was right for Russia to support the government of Syria’s democratically-elected President Bashar Assad.

    A different poll conducted earlier this month by the state-run research center VTSIOM showed that 73% of Russians believed that Western criticism of the air force’s counter-terrorism operation in Aleppo, Syria, was ungrounded and prejudiced. Only 6 percent said the allegations of wrongdoing on the part of the Russian military have some basis in reality.

    Perhaps Russians don’t watch CNN?

    The poll also found that the level of awareness about the situation in Syria and the Russian Air Force operation against ISIS terrorists there remained fairly high. Russia first deployed an air force contingent in Syria in 2015, after receiving a request for military help from the Syrian government, which is currently battling Islamic State and affiliated groups. Russian war planes began launching airstrikes on ISIS targets in Syria on September 30, 2015. 

    Eighteen percent said they were very closely following developments in Syria and 64 percent revealed partial familiarity with the issue. Just under a fifth – 17%– said that they were not interested in news about Syria.

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Oct 31

Today’s News 31st October 2016

  • The Loosening Grip – A Beginner's Guide To The Death Throes Of Empire

    Submitted by Fred Reed via FredOnEverything.com,

    Oh good. The world reaches a crossroads, or probably a road off a cliff, just when I want to relax and watch gratuitous violence on the tube. To judge by the rapid drift of events aboard our planetary asylum, the talons of Washington and New York on the world’s throat are fast being pried a-loose. The Global American Imperium is dying. Or so it sure looks anyway.

    I say talons of  “New York and Washington” because America’s foreign policy, forged in those two cities, belongs entirely to them. Americans have no influence on it. Further, none of of what the Empire does abroad is of any benefit to Americans. Do you care at all what happens in Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen, or the South China Sea?  Do you want to pay for it? America has been hijacked.

    And the Empire prospereth not. It prospereth very not. Consider the recent record of the world’s  hyperpower:

    Washington does not have control of Afghanistan, and obviously is not going to.

     

    Washington does not have control  of Iraq, and appears unlikely to.

     

    Washington did not back Iran down, and isn’t going to.

     

    Washington did not back Russia down in Ukraine and Crimea, and isn’t going to.

     

    Washington did not back China down in the South China Sea and, while this is perhaps not over, the Empire seems to be losing.

     

    Washington has not backed North Korea down and is not going to.

     

    In the Philippines, President Duterte has told Obama to “go to hell” as being “the son of a whore,” which may be taken to indicate latent hostility. He is vigorously seeking rapprochement with China. While Washington may have him murdered, it seems to be losing control of the Little Vassals of ASEAN.

     

    Turkey seems to be cuddling up to Russia–that is, looking East like Duterte. Maybe Washington can turn this around temporarily, but there-s a whole lot of wavering going on.

     

    Meanwhile Washington thrashes around impotently as per usual in Syria, and, though the jury remains out on this one, looks to have poor prospects. If Washington–AKA New York–loses here, after doing so in Iraq, Libya, Somalia, and Afghanistan, the Empire will beyond redemption be on the downward slope.

    The United States is not in danger. The Empire is. This is not good. Empires, the Soviet Union notwithstanding, seldom go quietly. Either Washington gambles on war of some sort against Russia, or Russia and China, in the desperate hope of reversing things, or the Empire  gets slowly eaten. Or not so slowly. Once one country pries itself loose, many may rush for the door.

    New York may go for calculated war against Russia–say, cyberwar expected not to turn into shooting war, shooting war in Syria not expected to turn into global shooting war, global shooting war not expected to turn into nuclear war. This will be a  crapshoot. Note that America has badly misguessed the outcomes of every war since Korea.

    This is why the American election actually matters, unusual in Presidential contests. It is Blowhard against Corruption, a swell choice, but Trump is firmly against war with Russia, and Hillary for. Her military understanding is that of a fried egg.

    The woman is both a fool and a knave but, it seems, Trump has talked trash, and therefore she will likely be President. Weirdly, the future of the world depends on how an excited electorate of political middle-schoolers responds to one candidate’s dirty talk. From a curmudgeon’s point of view, it is pretty funny. It is funnier if one lives  outside of the radiation footprint.

    But back to business. The seaboard Axis of Evil needs a war because almost every tide runs against it. Proximately, the Axis has pushed China, Russia, and Iran together against the Empire. (First rule of empire: Do not let the dissidents unite.) Many signs suggest that the world, or much of it, is beginning to see China as its future. The BRICS, the SCO, the NDB, the AAIB–all exclude the US. China becomes the major trading partner of country after country. The twilight deepens.

    Not all goes wrong for the Empire–not yet, but things are getting spooky. On the European Peninsula of Asia, countries remain docile, especially England and, much more importantly, Germany. Yet even among Washington’s European harem, there seem to be faint stirrings of a forgotten independence. As I understand it, Germany’s businessmen would very much like to end Washington’s sanctions on Russia and improve trade with China, which would be greatly to the benefit of the Peninsula.  Washington won’t let them. It can’t. If the Europeans did what would be good for themselves, and looked to Eurasia, then the fat lady, already warming up, would burst into full bellow.

    Which, methinks, raises the likelihood that Washington will in desperation do something phenomenally stupid. At this writing Hillary’s camp seems to be prepping the public for war with Russia. The telescreen tells us day after day that Putin is Hitler, that Russia is expanding, that the Russkies are hacking the election, that they cause indigestion and falling hair. Is this just Hillary waggling her codpiece in the expectation that Moscow will demurely back down, as God intended? Or will she again send other people’s children to fight for her in somebody else’s country? 

    The larger picture, assuredly obvious to New York, is truly grim–for New York, not for Americans. China has a huge population of a billion Han Chinese, versus two hundred million Caucasian Americans–these being the scientific, technological and entrepreneurial brains of the Empire. One must not notice this, but you can bet that New York and Beijing do. Economically China is growing hugely, advancing technologically at a high rate, building rail lines that now extend from  the Chinese Pacific coast to Madrid. It will increasingly dwarf the Empire no matter what happens–short of a world war.

    The curtain falls in ways unnoticed. China recently launched a communications satellite, the world’s first employing quantum cryptographic links, which cannot be intercepted. The intention of this, as well of the QC link from Beijing to Shanghai, is to keep the NSA off China’s back. A small thing, perhaps. Yet if successful and adopted en masse by other countries weary of Washington’s meddling, the result will be a loosening of the Empire’s grip on everybody’s communications.

    For the Empire it is, as Elvis sang, “now or never.” Lenin spoke of “useful idiots.” Ours aren’t even useful, but they call the shots.

  • American Dream, Revisited

    Authored by Pepe Escobar, originally posted op-ed via Strategic-Culture.org,

    Will Trump pull a Brexit times ten? What would it take, beyond WikiLeaks, to bring the Clinton (cash) machine down? Will Hillary win and then declare WWIII against her Russia / Iran / Syria «axis of evil»? Will the Middle East totally explode? Will the pivot to Asia totally implode? Will China be ruling the world by 2025?

    Amidst so many frenetic fragments of geopolitical reality precariously shored against our ruins, the temptation is irresistible to hark back to the late, great, deconstructionist master Jean Baudrillard. During the post-mod 1980s it was hip to be Baudrillardian to the core; his America, originally published in France in 1986, should still be read today as the definitive metaphysical/geological/cultural Instagram of Exceptionalistan.

    By the late 1990s, at the end of the millennium, two years before 9/11 – that seminal «before and after» event – Baudrillard was already stressing how we live in a black market maze. Now, it’s a black market paroxysm.

    Global multitudes are subjected to a black market of work – as in the deregulation of the official market; a black market of unemployment; a black market of financial speculation; a black market of misery and poverty; a black market of sex (as in prostitution); a black market of information (as in espionage and shadow wars); a black market of weapons; and even a black market of thinking.

    Way beyond the late 20th century, in the 2010s what the West praises as «liberal democracy» – actually a neoliberal diktat – has virtually absorbed every ideological divergence, while leaving behind a heap of differences floating in some sort of trompe l’oeil effect. What’s left is a widespread, noxious condition; the pre-emptive prohibition of any critical thought, which has no way to express itself other than becoming clandestine (or finding the right internet niche).

    Baudrillard already knew that the concept of «alter» – killed by conviviality – does not exist in the official market. So an «alter» black market also sprung up, co-opted by traffickers; that’s, for instance, the realm of racism, nativism and other forms of exclusion. Baudrillard already identified how a «contraband alter», expressed by sects and every form of nationalism (nowadays, think about the spectrum between jihadism and extreme-right wing political parties) was bound to become more virulent in a society that is desperately intolerant, obsessed with regimentation, and totally homogenized.

    There could be so much exhilaration inbuilt in life lived in a bewildering chimera cocktail of cultures, signs, differences and «values»; but then came the coupling of thinking with its exact IT replica – artificial intelligence, playing with the line of demarcation between human and non-human in the domain of thought.

    The result, previewed by Baudrillard, was the secretion of a parapolitical society – with a sort of mafia controlling this secret form of generalized corruption (think the financial Masters of the Universe). Power is unable to fight this mafia – and that would be, on top of it, hypocritical, because the mafia itself emanates from power.

    The end result is that what really matters today, anywhere, mostly tends to happen outside all official circuits; like in a social black market.

    Is there any information «truth»?

    Baudrillard showed how political economy is a massive machine, producing value, producing signs of wealth, but not wealth itself. The whole media / information system – still ruled by America – is a massive machine producing events as signs; exchangeable value in the universal market of ideology, the star system and catastrophism.

    This abstraction of information works as in the economy – disgorging a coded material, deciphered in advance, and negotiable in terms of models, as much as the economy disgorges products negotiable in terms of price and value.

    Since all merchandise, thanks to this abstraction of value, is exchangeable, then every event (or non-event) is also exchangeable, all replacing one another in the cultural market of information.

    And that takes us to where we live now; Trans-History, and Trans-Politics – where events have really not happened, as they get lost in the vacuum of information (as much as the economy gets lost in the vacuum of speculation).

    Thus this quintessential Baudrillard insight; if we consider History as a movie – and that’s what it is now – then the «truth» of information is no more than post-production synch, dubbing and subtitles.

    Still, as we all keep an intense desire for devouring events, there is immense disappointment as well, because the content of information is desperately inferior to the means of broadcasting them. Call it a pathetic, universal contagion; people don’t know what to do about their sadness or enthusiasm – in parallel to our societies becoming theaters of the absurd where nothing has consequences.

    No acts, deeds, crimes (the 2008 financial crisis), political events (the WikiLeaks emails showing virtually no distinction between the «nonprofit» Clinton cash machine, what’s private and what’s public, the obsessive pursuit of personal wealth, and the affairs of the state) seem to have real consequences.

    Immunity, impunity, corruption, speculation – we veer towards a state of zero responsibility (think Goldman Sachs). So, automatically, we yearn for an event of maximum consequence, a «fatal» event to repair that scandalous non-equivalence. Like a symbolic re-equilibrium of the scales of destiny.

    So we dream of an amazing event – Trump winning the election? Hillary declaring WWIII? – that would free us from the tyranny of meaning and the constraint of always searching for the equivalence between effects and causes.

    Shadowing the world

    Just like Baudrillard, I got to see «deep» America in the 1980s and 1990s by driving across America.

    So sooner or later one develops a metaphysical relationship with that ubiquitous warning, «Objects in this mirror may be closer than they appear».

    But what if they may also be further than they appear?

    The contemporary instant event/celebrity culture deluge of images upon us; does it get us closer to a so-called «real» world that is in fact very far away from us? Or does it in fact keep the world at a distance – creating an artificial depth of field that protects us from the imminence of objects and the virtual danger they represent?

    In parallel, we keep slouching towards a single future language – the language of algorithms, as designed across the Wall Street / Silicon Valley axis – that would represent a real anthropological catastrophe, just like the globalist/New World Order dream of One Thought and One Culture.

    Languages are multiple and singular – by definition. If there were a single language, words would become univocal, regulating themselves in an autopilot of meaning. There would be no interplay – as in artificial languages there’s no interplay. Language would be just the meek appendix of a unified reality – the negative destiny of a languidly unified human species.

    That’s where the American «dream» seems to be heading. It’s time to take the next exit ramp.

  • Harry Reid Blasts Comey As Mainstream Media Admits "This Is The Worst Possible Situation" For Hillary

    You now it's bad when…

    MSNBC anchor and commentator Andrea Mitchell (second only to John Harwood in the media pecking order of suck-up-iness to Clinton) is forced to admit: "This is the just worst possible situation for the FBI for the country, for Hillary Clinton certainly."

    "For Hillary Clinton to go nuclear on Comey yesterday was a deliberate decision. They’re trying to rally the base. And she did this in Daytona. She did this going then to an historically African-American college and had a huge rally there on the football field.”

    “She’s really now taking this to Comey."

    “And they made a deliberate decision to do this. If she’s elected, she has to live with James Comey who has a ten-year term. That is a very hostile situation and a dangerous situation. Let me point out, John Kerry in Ireland said he has not been notified. Comey did not know what these emails were and whether they were work-related.That is the question that is raising so many concerns.”

    * * *

    Of course, it's not just the media, Democrats have blasted Comey for making the announcement less than two weeks before Election Day, with Senate minority leader Harry Reid claiming Comey may have violated federal law…

    “I am writing to inform you that my office has determined that these actions may violate the Hatch Act,” Reid wrote in a letter to Comey, according to the Wall Street Journal.

    The Hatch act prohibits government officials from using their positions to influence an election.

    “Through your partisan actions, you may have broken the law.”

     

    “When Republicans filibustered your nomination and delayed your confirmation longer than any previous nominee to your position, I led the fight to get you confirmed because I believed you to be a principled public servant,” Reid wrote.

     

    “With the deepest regret, I now see that I was wrong."

    Full letter below:

    Which is esecially ironic as House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi was so full of priase just 3 months ago… calling Comey, a former George W. Bush administration official, as “a great man” that Americans “are very privileged” to have leading the federal agency.

    Forward to 6:45…

    But we conclude with the utter desperation of the Democrats to distract (through lies and obfuscation) once again via Harry Reid…

  • Looming Philadelphia Public Transit Strike Threatens To Backfire On Unions' Election Hopes

    With Democratic"Get Out The Vote" rallies springing up everywhere around Philadelphia (culminating with a Katy Perry concert this weekend) and Hillary clinging to a lead in Pennsylvania, perhaps the Transport Workers Union should have picked a better week to start a mass transit strike – potentially threatening to cut turnout among the African-American community dramatically on election day.

    As FiveThirtyEight wrote, when most people think of battleground America, they think of Florida and Ohio, two of only three states (along with Nevada) that have voted for the winner of every presidential election since 1996. They tend not to think of Pennsylvania as a classic “swing state” — it has voted for the Democrat in every election since 1992, and it didn’t even crack the top 10 in 2012 campaign ad spending.

    But in 2016, Pennsylvania could be the keystone of the Electoral College and the ultimate arbiter of whether Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton resides at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

    Which perhaps explains the major push to increase turnout and "get out the vote"…

    So far so good as far as polls go, Pennsylvania is leaning to Hillary (pre-FBI emails)…

     

    But there may be a problem for Hillary Clinton's campaign turnout (aside from the FBI emails debacle), as 6ABC news reports, members of the Transport Workers Union are set to walk off the job on Monday night bringing public transportation in the city to a halt unless an agreement can be reached.

     

    Talk continued on Wednesday, but negotiations have been very slow going, and issues like pensions remain to be resolved. That is why at this point people are starting to talk about strike contingency plans.

    "People are going to have to be creative. They're going to have to think of ways to get to work," says SEPTA's Director of Media Relations, Carla Showell-Lee.

    If there is a TWU walkout November 1st, city buses, trolleys, the subway and EL will not run.

    *  *  *

    With Trump winning among blue-collar and disaffected voters, Philadelphia’s large African-American population is key for Clinton to ensure the state and a public transport shutdown in the city is far more likely to affect Hillary's base ability to get to polling stations than Trump's.
     

  • Wikileaks Warns It Is Launching "Phase Three" Of Its Election Coverage

    On Sunday night, Wikileaks enigmatically tweeted that it would launch “phase 3 of [its] US election coverage” in the coming week. The site put politicians on notice Sunday evening in a tweet that also included a plea for donations.

    “We commence phase 3 of our US election coverage next week. You can contribute: https://shop.wikileaks.org/donate  @WLTaskForce” the whistleblower website announced moments ago.

    As the Hill noted, Wiki did not provide information about what the third phase entails or if there are still more revelations to come. As a reminder, Wikileaks’ founder Julian Assange currently finds himself in the Ecuador embassy where his internet access has been revoked for the duration of the presidential campaign to avoid the appearance of intervention.

    Wikileaks supporters, now including a number of disgruntled GOP nominee Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders supporters, promptly replied with tweets expressing hope that phase three would ultimately damage Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s campaign. User “CorruptMedia” responded with a Photoshopped estimating what CNN coverage of Clinton being escorted to jail would look like.

    A new archive of Clinton-related documents would further irk a campaign still reeling from FBI director James Comey’s announcement on Friday that new emails related to the Clinton server probe had been discovered.

    But there is at least some reason to believe Wikileaks could release material that is not solely Clinton related. Julian Assange, the head of Wikileaks, has stated that he would publish information from Trump if the site were sent any.

    Wikileaks has already posted hacked emails from the Democratic National Committee and Clinton campaign chief John Podesta: the former led to the resignation of former DNC chair Debbie Wasserman-Schultz after it was revealed that the DNC was actively scheming to prevent Bernie Sanders’ nomination;  the former has led to a series of dramatic revelations into the strategic operations of the Clinton campaign, with the most damaging emails exposing the Clinton Foundation and WJC’s consulting outfit Teneo as an “influence-peddling” pay-to-play organization as noted most recently in “Doug Band To John Podesta: “If This Story Gets Out, We Are Screwed”“

  • 'Anonymous' Threatens North Dakota Governor After Pipeline Employees Caught Infiltrating Protests To Incite Violence

    You know the Dakota Access Pipeline protests are working when oil interests start resorting to underhanded tricks to paint water protectors in a negative light. TheAntiMedia.org's Nick Bernabe reports that, as the fight against the pipeline grows in North Dakota and around the country, dirty tricks are being deployed in an apparent attempt to delegitimize the opposition.

    Dakota Access Employee Tries to Incite Violence, Sheriff’s Department Makes False Report That He Was Shot by Protesters

    Mother Jones journalist Wes Enzinna, who was at the protests, says he witnessed a Dakota Access LLC employee try to infiltrate the Dakota Access Pipeline protests:

    “An armed security agent employed by the company behind the controversial Dakota Access Pipeline was arrested Thursday after he was caught entering the camp of activists protesting near the Standing Rock Indian Reservation in southern North Dakota. After a car chase and a standoff during which he allegedly pointed his assault rifle at a local Sioux teenager, the man, whose ID indicated he was an employee of Dakota Access LLC, was arrested and handed over to the FBI.”

    According to an official statement from the tribe, the man fired several shots from his gun before being peacefully apprehended by tribal police. Witnesses at the scene say he pointed his gun at several protesters. The man was clearly trying to provoke violence that could later be used to demonize protesters who have so far remained peaceful.

    The Morton County Sheriff’s Department circulated a false report claiming the man was shot, presumably by protesters. As you can see in the images above, the man was not harmed. The Sheriff’s Department has since retracted that report. Anti-Media’s attempts to obtain clarifying comments from Morton County Sheriff’s were ignored.

    Fake Internet Trolls Slam Dakota Access Pipeline Protests, Promote Pipeline on Twitter

    dakota access sock puppet

    With very little organic support for the Dakota Access Pipeline remaining, groups allied with the pipeline builders now seem to be creating paid Internet trolls or bots to slam protesters while praising the pipeline.

    DESMOG, an environmental blog, conducted an investigation and found what it says are “sock puppet” accounts tied to an oil industry lobby operating on Twitter:

    “A DeSmog investigation has revealed the possibility that a front group supporting the controversial Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) — the Midwest Alliance for Infrastructure Now (MAIN) — may have created fake Twitter profiles, known by some as ‘sock puppets,’ to convey a pro-pipeline message over social media. And MAIN may be employing the PR services of the firm DCI Group, which has connections to the Republican Party, in order to do so.

     

    “DeSmog tracked down at least 16 different questionable Twitter accounts which used the #NoDAPL hashtag employed by protesters, in order to claim that opposition to the pipeline kills jobs, that those protesting the pipeline at the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s encampment use violence, and that the pipeline does not pose a risk to water sources or cross over tribal land.

     

    “On September 13, people began to suspect these accounts were fake, calling them out on Twitter, and by September 14, most of the accounts no longer existed.”

     

     

    With the Dakota Access Pipeline builders resorting to backhanded trickery, it’s clear the tide is turning against the pipeline following law enforcement’s overwhelming militarized crackdown of the protests.

    And now, as Anonews reports, Anonymous warns the governor to back off or they will release documents showing the conflict of interest and then goes on to say that if one protestor on the Indian side is harmed, Anonymous will “release docs on” the individuals responsible.

    “We decided to stand with the Native Americans whose land you raped, whose sacred lands you destroyed.”

     

    “We know where you live. Everyone you know. And everything there is to know about you.”

    While translating that threat—which extends to individual Guardsmen—is perilous, according to Anonymous, it has in the past involved monkey wrenching individual credit ratings, cancelling credit cards—electronic mischief ranging from embarrassing to harmful.

  • "We Decided To Close Our Firm" – A Hedge Fund's Lament

    Several astute observations on the ongoing transition from active to passive management in general, and what is shaping up as the worst year for hedge funds since the financial crisis in particular, that are sure to resonate among our hedge fund readers courtesy of Eric Peters, CIO of One River Asset Management.

    “We decided to close our firm,” read the email from a friend.

    I moved it to a folder that’s filling up fast. Been a brutal year in an unforgiving industry. Change is in the air. It usually arrives slowly, quietly, fog. But sometimes change is a hurricane.

    Today’s tempest is snapping saplings, uprooting oaks. A large state pension just announced a “Back to Basics” investment strategy; the commission voted unanimously to fully redeem from seven of the industry’s most prestigious hedge funds. They’re not the only ones heading Back to Basics.

    Industry redemptions this year are $60bln; on track to match the 2009 record. Back then outflows were driven by losses. Now they’re driven by insufficient profits, high fees, and a general aversion by hedge fund managers to take enough risk to earn 8% annual returns.

    Because that’s what investors must generate to meet long-term retiree obligations.

    And if states can’t meet those obligations they’ll raise taxes, reduce investments, or cut pensions – leaving broke Baby Boomers diaper-less.

    But raising taxes and reducing investment is self-defeating; slowing growth, reducing productivity.

    So how will “Back to Basics” solve America’s intractable pension problem? With bond yields at 5,000 year lows, and stocks at valuations exceeded only during the 1929 and dotcom bubbles, a Back to Basics solution is an oxymoron.

    Back to Basics is the exact opposite of what’s needed. Unless of course it means liquidating your portfolio and going short because everything’s overvalued. Or unless Back to Basics means market timing, because overvalued assets can still rally, just not indefinitely. And of course, shorting and market-timing are things that hedge funds do uniquely well.

    Which is why we’re not the problem, we’re part of the solution. That’s why today’s hedge fund tempest presents extraordinary opportunity. For those who evolve, bend, and survive this storm.

    * * *

    “My company is in structural decline,” he said gazing across Gotham, high in the corner office.

    “Made it through denial, anger, bargaining, and given that we’re having this conversation, I suppose I’m mostly through depression.” Which leaves the final stage of grief and loss; acceptance.

    The transition from active management to passive has been devastating for those who’ve devoted their lives to the former.

    “I wonder whether the deep pessimism that we confront every day in our own businesses helps explain why we’re so skeptical of all time S&P highs.”

  • Doug Band To John Podesta: "If This Story Gets Out, We Are Screwed"

    Until the Friday blockbuster news that the FBI was reopening its probe into the Hillary email server, the biggest overhang facing the Clinton Campaign was the escalating scandal involving the Clinton Foundation, Doug Band’s consultancy firm Teneo, and Bill Clinton who as a result of a leaked memo emerged was generously compensated for potential political favors by prominent corporate clients using Teneo as a passthru vehicle for purchasing influence.

    In a section of the memo entitled “Leveraging Teneo For The Foundation,” Band spelled out all of the donations he solicited from Teneo “clients” for the Clinton Foundation.  In all, there are roughly $14mm of donations listed with the largest contributors being Coca-Cola, Barclays, The Rockefeller Foundation and Laureate International Universities. Some of these are shown below (the full details can be found in “Leaked Memo Exposes Shady Dealings Between Clinton Foundation Donors And Bill’s “For-Profit” Activities“)

    Foundation Donations

     

    Band also laid out the millions in speaking fees arranged by Teneo:

    Foundation Donations

    Further, the head of Teneo also offered the following commentary on the “$50 million in for-profit activity” he was able to secure for Bill Clinton (as of November 2011) as well as the “$66 million in future contracts, should he choose to continue with those engagements.”

    Independent of our fundraising and decision-making activities on behalf of the Foundation, we have dedicated ourselves to helping the President secure and engage in for-profit activities – including speeches, books, and advisory service engagements.  In that context, we have in effect served as agents, lawyers, managers and implementers to secure speaking, business and advisory service deals.  In support of the President’s for-profit activity, we also have solicited and obtained, as appropriate, in-kind services for the President and his family – for personal travel, hospitality, vacation and the like.  Neither Justin nor I are separately compensated for these activities (e.g., we do not receive a fee for, or percentage  of, the more than $50 million in for-profit activity we have personally helped to secure for President Clinton to date or the $66 million in future contracts, should he choose to continue with those engagements).

     

    With respect to business deals for his advisory services, Justin and I found, developed and brought to President Clinton multiple arrangements for him to accept or reject. Of his current 4 arrangements, we secured all of them; and, we have helped manage and maintain all of his for-profit business relationships.  Since 2001, President Clinton’s business arrangements have yielded more than $30 million for him personally, with $66 million to be paid out over the next nine years should he choose to continue with the current engagements.

    In effect, what Band was doing, as the NYT’s Nick Confessore summarized, “was selling his clients on idea that giving to foundation was, in essence, a way to bolster their influence. Clinton & Band built a platform for executives to bolster their companies’ images, bathe in BC’s praise, and do some good, while Teneo extracted earnings for Band and, depending on what you see in these e-mails, Clinton himself. Teneo paid Clinton until late ’11.“

    As Confessore also pointed out, “I guess you can wave it all off as a nothingburger. But Chelsea Clinton and some of Clinton’s other aides were clearly freaking out.”

    And he concluded by saying “Generally, the emails show Clinton’s *own closest aides* troubled or horrified by things that her surrogates have spent years waving off.“

    Today, with this context, we focus on one particular email disclosed in the latest Podesta email release, in which an email from Doug Band to Cheryl Mills and John Podesta dated November 12, 2011, or just days before the abovementioned memo was sent out, admits that “I’m starting to worry that if this story gets out, we are screwed.”

    Here is the full email:

    Need get this asap to them although I’m sure cvc [Chelsea Clinton] won’t believe it to be true bc she doesn’t want to Even though the facts speak for themselves.

     

    John, I would appreciate your feedback and any suggestions I’m also starting to worry that if this story gets out, we are screwed. Dk [Declan Kelly] and I built a business. 65 people work for us who have wives and husbands and kids, they all depend on us. Our business has almost nothing to do with the clintons, the foundation or cgi in any way. The chairman of ubs could care a less about cgi. Our fund clients who we do restructuring and m and a advising the same just as bhp nor tivo do. These are real companies who we provide real advice to through very serious people. Comm head for goldman, dep press secretary to bloomberg, former head of banking, and his team, from morgan stanley for asia and latin am.

     

    I realize it is difficult to confront and reason with her but this could go to far and then we all will have a real serious set of other problems. I don’t deserve this from her and deserve a tad more respect or at least a direct dialogue for me to explain these things. She is acting like a spoiled brat kid who has nothing else to do but create issues to justify what she’s doing because she, as she has said, hasn’t found her way and has a lack of focus in her life. I realize she will be off of this soon but if it doesn’t come soon enough…

    Four years later, the story is out, not thanks to Chelsea Clinton as Doug Band was concerned, but due to a hack of John Podesta’s email account.

    However, in light of the latest FBI scandal involving Anthony Weiner, It remains to be seen if either Band or the Clintons are screwed – it appears that the general public has more than enough distractions to forget about this potential graft scandal involving the Clintons and their influence-peddling clients.

  • Should Democrats Ask Clinton To Step Aside?

    Authored by John Kass, originally posted at The Chicago Tribune,

    Has America become so numb by the decades of lies and cynicism oozing from Clinton Inc. that it could elect Hillary Clinton as president, even after Friday's FBI announcement that it had reopened an investigation of her emails while secretary of state?

    We'll find out soon enough.

    It's obvious the American political system is breaking down. It's been crumbling for some time now, and the establishment elite know it and they're properly frightened. Donald Trump, the vulgarian at their gates, is a symptom, not a cause. Hillary Clinton and husband Bill are both cause and effect.

    FBI director James Comey's announcement about the renewed Clinton email investigation is the bombshell in the presidential campaign. That he announced this so close to Election Day should tell every thinking person that what the FBI is looking at is extremely serious.

    This can't be about pervert Anthony Weiner and his reported desire for a teenage girl. But it can be about the laptop of Weiner's wife, Clinton aide Huma Abedin, and emails between her and Hillary. It comes after the FBI investigation in which Comey concluded Clinton had lied and been "reckless" with national secrets, but said he could not recommend prosecution.

    So what should the Democrats do now?

    If ruling Democrats hold themselves to the high moral standards they impose on the people they govern, they would follow a simple process:

    They would demand that Mrs. Clinton step down, immediately, and let her vice presidential nominee, Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia, stand in her place.

    Democrats should say, honestly, that with a new criminal investigation going on into events around her home-brew email server from the time she was secretary of state, having Clinton anywhere near the White House is just not a good idea.

    Since Oct. 7, WikiLeaks has released 35,000 emails hacked from Clinton campaign boss John Podesta. Now WikiLeaks, no longer a neutral player but an active anti-Clinton agency, plans to release another 15,000 emails.

    What if she is elected? Think of a nation suffering a bad economy and continuing chaos in the Middle East, and now also facing a criminal investigation of a president. Add to that congressional investigations and a public vision of Clinton as a Nixonian figure wandering the halls, wringing her hands.

    The best thing would be for Democrats to ask her to step down now. It would be the most responsible thing to do, if the nation were more important to them than power. And the American news media — fairly or not firmly identified in the public mind as Mrs. Clinton's political action committee — should begin demanding it.

    But what will Hillary do?

    She'll stick and ride this out and turn her anger toward Comey. For Hillary and Bill Clinton, it has always been about power, about the Clinton Restoration and protecting fortunes already made by selling nothing but political influence.

    She'll remind the nation that she's a woman and that Donald Trump said terrible things about women. If there is another notorious Trump video to be leaked, the Clintons should probably leak it now. Then her allies in media can talk about misogyny and sexual politics and the headlines can be all about Trump as the boor he is and Hillary as champion of female victims, which she has never been.

    Remember that Bill Clinton leveraged the "Year of the Woman." Then he preyed on women in the White House and Hillary protected him. But the political left — most particularly the women of the left — defended him because he promised to protect abortion rights and their other agendas.

    If you take a step back from tribal politics, you'll see that Mrs. Clinton has clearly disqualified herself from ever coming near classified information again. If she were a young person straight out of grad school hoping to land a government job, Hillary Clinton would be laughed out of Washington with her record. She'd never be hired.

    As secretary of state she kept classified documents on the home-brew server in her basement, which is against the law. She lied about it to the American people. She couldn't remember details dozens of times when questioned by the FBI. Her aides destroyed evidence by BleachBit and hammers. Her husband, Bill, met secretly on an airport tarmac with Attorney General Loretta Lynch for about a half-hour, and all they said they talked about was golf and the grandkids.

    And there was no prosecution of Hillary.

    That isn't merely wrong and unethical. It is poisonous.

    And during this presidential campaign, Americans were confronted with a two-tiered system of federal justice: one for standards for the Clintons and one for the peasants.

    I've always figured that, as secretary of state, Clinton kept her home-brew email server — from which foreign intelligence agencies could hack top secret information — so she could shield the influence peddling that helped make the Clintons several fortunes.

    The Clintons weren't skilled merchants. They weren't traders or manufacturers. The Clintons never produced anything tangible. They had no science, patents or devices to make them millions upon millions of dollars.

    All they had to sell, really, was influence. And they used our federal government to leverage it.

    If a presidential election is as much about the people as it is about the candidates, then we'll learn plenty about ourselves in the coming days, won't we?

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Oct 30

Today’s News 30th October 2016

  • ABC/Wapo Effectively Admit To Poll Tampering As Hillary's "Lead" Shrinks To 2-Points

    Just yesterday we wrote about the very curious ABC / Wapo poll which seemed to show Hillary’s blow-out 12-point lead from last Sunday get cut in half in a matter of just two days.  But the ABC/Wapo enigma continues to grow today as their latest poll shows the presidential race has now tightened to just 2 points, which is within the margin of error.  Ironically, these new results do not reflect the latest FBI bombshell as polling was concluded on October 27th and it still includes an 8-point sampling advantage for democrats.

    METHODOLOGY – This ABC News/Washington Post poll was conducted by landline and cellular telephone Oct. 24-27, 2016, in English and Spanish, among a random national sample of 1,148 likely voters. Results have a margin of sampling error of 3 points, including the design effect. Partisan divisions are 37-29-29 percent, Democrats-Republicans-independents.

    So what happened?  For months we have argued that these goal-seeking reports (aka “Polls”) can be easily manufactured to show whatever results are desired by simply “tweaking” the sample pool.  WikiLeaks even exposed a handy guide 37-page poll-rigging guide on how to “include ethnic ‘oversamples’ as required” to manufacture the desired poll numbers.  But, with today’s latest ABC / Washington Post poll, the real “smoking gun” admission is revealed as the pollsters admit that the narrowing of their polling results are “not mainly about people shifting in their candidate preference” but about how their sample pool was constructed.

    “Changes in the poll’s latest four nights compared with the previous four are not mainly about people shifting in their candidate preference, but about changes in who’s intending to vote.”

    So that’s how you manufacture inane results like this:

    ABC / Wapo Poll

     

    Now, while ABC / Wapo claim that the 10-point swing (in less than a week) was driven by changes in “who’s intending to vote,” we find it quite curious that their own data shows just a 2-point swing in people who said they were “certain to vote” on 10/23, when the poll reflected a 12-point Hillary lead, and 10/27 when the lead had collapsed to just 2 points.  So, are we really expected to believe that a 2-point swing in voter intentions somehow translated to a 10-point swing in the poll results?  Not likely…something tells us it had a little more to do with including “ethnic ‘oversamples’ as required.”

    ABC

     

    So, now that ABC / Wapo have effectively declared their own poll utterly useless, the question is what were their motivations for skewing their polling data?  We have a couple of ideas:

    • Trump is simply experiencing a huge surge in momentum…seems odd to have this kind of surge on minimal news (remember the poll was taken prior to the recent FBI disclosures).
    • ABC / Wapo pollsters got a slap on the wrist from the Hillary campaign for getting a bit overzealous on their manufactured 12-point “lead” which could have resulted in lower voter turnout for Hillary.
    • ABC / Wapo reviewed early voting stats starting to come in around the country and realized that their polls were in no way reflective of reality and decided they’d rather not lose ALL credibility (though it may be a bit too late for that).

    Anyway, those are a couple of our ideas…what say you?

  • "We Risk Being Collateral Damage In The Neocon Lust For War"

    Submitted by Chris Martenson via PeakProsperity.com,

    The winds of change are now swirling so rapidly that it's hard to make sense of what’s happening. And adding to the confusion is an all-out effort by the establishment to convince the masses that, despite the multiplying signs of instability, "everything is fine".

    The deceptions surrounding us are now constant and impossible to avoid. How much longer will it take until a critical mass of the populace starts to see through the delusion?

    The stock and bond markets are rigged by central banks and their allies to go ever higher, enriching an elite few at the expense of everyone else. The mainstream media over-reports the inconsequential, and under-reports the most important things.  It’s truly astonishing what is not being reported on, presumably in an effort to minimize attention on some really important matters (Yemen, Russia’s increasing concerns over western actions, Wikileaks on HRC, etc).

    If it all weren’t so serious, it would be humorous because the chicanery is now so over-the-top obvious. 

    The elites often commit crimes without any consequences.  It's so bad, we've seen the architects of wars based on lies get promoted to positions of greater power, now telling new lies on an even grander scale. (In DC, the polite term du jour is “fabrications”. But we’re all friends here, so let's use proper language: lies are lies.)

    Meanwhile, whistleblowers end up facing the full weight of the law. And the little people face harsh, draconian consequences for even the most minor of infractions.

    As James Howard Kunstler succinctly puts it: Racketeering is ruining us.

    If you can make a lot of money doing it, in the US that’s A-OK with the powers that be. Who cares about the collateral damage, as long as Uncle Sam and his cronies get their cut?

    The Winds Of Change

    But this all is going to come crashing down, because it has to. Not because of a sudden case of enlightenment by the elites, but because of math.

    Simple math, too. 

    While there are lots of sub-equations we could parse through, the parent of them all is this one: Endless exponential growth on a finite planet is impossible.

    It’s really that simple. And what’s transpiring now is nothing more complicated than what happens when a culture’s main growth narrative no longer matches the limits of its reality.

    Unfortunately, it’s possible to fool people for just long enough into thinking it’s a workable plan. Give something a couple of decades in the sun (cheap, plentiful petroleum, for example) and entire institutions, political and monetary systems and dogmas will be fashioned around it. 

    This kind of self-delusion is not new for humans. It's no different than if an ancient tribe was luckily blessed with 40 years of dependable rains which they attributed to a specific set of rituals.  It’s not too long before correlation becomes confused with causation. And when the expected rains start ceasing to arrive, the rituals get more convoluted and increasingly desperate measures are called for to appease the angry gods.

    Eventually, finally, people slowly wake up to the fact that their rituals and the weather never had anything to do with each other. But by then, society has usually torn itself apart, unable to align the contradictions. 

    This is what’s happening now. The narrative we live by is breaking down, and increasingly, our desperate ruling elites simply don’t know what to do.  People are confused and so they want to either return to the past “Make America Great Again!”) or they want to cling to the present (“Stronger Together"…as in don’t rock the boat, preserve the status quo!).

    Neither will work of course because the rains have ceased for reasons that have nothing to do with America's elaborate but quirky rituals (the current presidential race being a prime example of such).

    And this is why, despite the fact that our true challenges are rooted in the mathematics of resource depletion, our undoing will come when the social fabric tears apart.

    Which is why the current unrest escalating all over the globe is so important to track. As we watch less-resourced societies begin to fail in advance, we better understand the nature of the reckoning heading our way.

    Among the many conflicts that are boiling over, the one that concerns me the most — by far — is the West's very intentional efforts to demonize Putin specifically, and Russia generally.

    The tactics being used are no different from those used to disparage Saddam and his regime right before the invasion of Iraq.  We’ve been down this path before; the playbook is literally exactly the same.

    Blatantly obvious propaganda is being used, most heavily by the very same (and unrepentant) main stream media outlets that were used the last time around — when we ended up commencing a 'pre-emptive' war based on ginned-up intelligence that turned out to be wholly false. We owe it to ourselves not be so easily led this time around.

    The Winds Of War

    The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

    ~ H. L. Mencken

    Now, I'm sensitive to the idea put forth by some that this whole Putin demonization is merely the latest use of a hobgoblin intended to help get HRC elected president.

    Obviously if this is true, it goes well beyond HRC herself. In the military industrial complex, there's a vast host of self-interested parties who feast on war and whose paychecks and future prospects depend heavily on it. There even are a few demented souls in the halls of power who believe in war as the best way to project one’s influence. Stew them together and you have a pretty good handle on what DC is all about these days.

    So I'm sympathetic to the temptation to think: “Hey, it’s always a safe bet during an election year to try and appear tougher than your opponent…this is all just election year politicking and it will pass and fade after November 8th.”

    Here’s why I don’t think that’s accurate. In fact, I think something deeper and more sinister has been set in motion. 

    The blackballing of Putin and Russia started years ago, in 2013, when Putin managed to convince then-president of Ukraine Yanukovych to back out of the agreement intended to bring Ukraine into the EU fold as the final NATO brick in the wall.

    That set-back enraged the neocons in Washington DC mightily and they’ve been rapidly anti-Putin ever since.  This neocon grudge has found help and support ever since from the UK, US, and EU press which were also willing partners in selling the fraudulent “evidence” that led to the Iraq war — and Libya, too, and now Yemen and Syria.

    As examples, these cartoonish magazine covers (both from 2014) look like they were designed by Intro to Psychology 101 students asked to create a propaganda hit piece:

    Heck, there's even potential evidence as far back as 2008: as exemplified by this TIME magazine cover where the "TIME" banner was placed behind Putin’s head in such a way that the peaks of the M gave him "horns".  (For fun, see how many example of other leaders you can find where TIME did this — there are precious few. The logo is almost always in front):

    So the demonization began a long time ago, well before it’s reasonable to suspect HRCs advance team could start scheming about how to use an anti-Putin stance against Trump, or any other opponent. 

    But the media has continued to beat the Putin=bad drums, and with increasingly volume. Here are a few more recent examples:

    The message: Putin is manipulating us, and anybody who falls for it is a sucker. And if you dare to question the integrity of the US elections, which there is ample evidence that it is vulnerable to fraud & manipulation (listen to our podcast with election integrity analyst Brad Friedman), you are Putin’s patsy.

    And here’s my favorite propaganda piece to date because it’s so blatantly over-the-top that it takes on a very special quality of being so bad it’s good. This is The Rocky Horror Picture Show of magazine cover art:

    Okay, with all that said, we’ve established that “someone” has had it out for Putin for quite a long time.  We might surmise who or what agencies that might be, but such speculation is best reserved for those with greater insights than I happen to have.

    I just know propaganda when I see it. And I see it in the examples above, and in the media pervasively today. So where does this lead us?

    Well, given the fact that Russia has just undertaken the largest nuclear readiness drill in its history involving its citizens, maybe we should think that Putin and Russia are no longer amused by all this antagonism and are taking it as something more sinister than simple politicking.

    Or we should pay attention that Russia recently announced the arrival of its latest nuclear ICBM (nicknamed Satan-2) capable of delivering 15 warheads each. 

    And let’s not forget the even more recent announcement that a hypersonic glider warhead had been successfully tested, against which our military currently has no defense.

    None of those Russian moves are being made in a vacuum of course. They've come only after many repeated provocations by the West, including assembling the largest gathering of military brigade forces on Russia’s borders since WW II. These are the kind of threats, mind you,  that would have caused the US to go into an absolute snit long ago were the situation reversed.

    The real question is: Why?  What’s the plan here, if any exists?  Who’s behind all this and why? If we can answer any of these, then perhaps we can assess the risks regular people like us and our loved ones may be facing as potential "collateral damage" of this warmongering.

    The So-Called Elites

    The “who” has emerged in this election, at least partially. We now have a few names to put to the program, and they're familiar ones.

    This is, generally speaking, the same cast of characters that has been agitating for a more belligerent global stance prior to 9/11.  Many of these names surfaced on my radar when the Project for a New American Century statement of principles was published in 1997. That document is pretty much all you need to read to understand the last 20 years of US foreign policy.

    I mean, if you only had just one document to read on the topic, this one would pretty well sum it all up. 

    Well, here they all come again. This time right on the front page of the Washington Post, making renewed calls for an even more aggressive and bellicose US military posture. For anybody concerned about conflict with Russia, this is more terrifying than any haunted house you could possibly visit this Halloween:

    Washington’s foreign policy elite breaks with Obama over Syrian bloodshed

    Oct 20, 2016

     

    There is one corner of Washington where Donald Trump’s scorched-earth presidential campaign is treated as a mere distraction and where bipartisanship reigns. In the rarefied world of the Washington foreign policy establishment, President Obama’s departure from the White House — and the possible return of a more conventional and hawkish Hillary Clinton — is being met with quiet relief.

     

    The Republicans and Democrats who make up the foreign policy elite are laying the groundwork for a more assertive American foreign policy, via a flurry of reports shaped by officials who are likely to play senior roles in a potential Clinton White House.

    It is not unusual for Washington’s establishment to launch major studies in the final months of an administration to correct the perceived mistakes of a president or influence his successor. But the bipartisan nature of the recent recommendations, coming at a time when the country has never been more polarized, reflects a remarkable consensus among the foreign policy elite.

     

    This consensus is driven by a broad-based backlash against a president who has repeatedly stressed the dangers of overreach and the need for restraint, especially in the Middle East. “There’s a widespread perception that not being active enough or recognizing the limits of American power has costs,” said Philip Gordon, a senior foreign policy adviser to Obama until 2015. “So the normal swing is to be more interventionist.”

     

    “The American-led international order that has been prevalent since World War II is now under threat,” said Martin Indyk, who oversees a team of top former officials from the administrations of Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton assembled by the Brookings Institution. “The question is how to restore and renovate it.” The Brookings report — a year in the making — is due out in December.

     

    Taken together, the studies and reports call for more-aggressive American action to constrain Iran, rein in the chaos in the Middle East and check Russia in Europe.

     

    The studies, which reflect Clinton’s stated views, break most forcefully with Obama on Syria. Virtually all these efforts, including a report released Wednesday by the liberal Center for American Progress, call for stepped-up military action to deter President Bashar al-Assad’s regime and Russian forces in ­Syria.

     

    “You can’t pretend you can go to war against Assad and not go to war against the Russians,” said a senior administration official who is involved in Middle East policy and was granted anonymity to discuss internal White House deliberations.

    (Source)

    There’s a lot to unpack in there. Let’s get started.

    The article begins with the disquieting assertion that the presumptive return of a more hawkish Hillary Clinton to the white house is “being met with quiet relief.” You mean the longest stretch of active war in US history hasn't been enough for some of these folks? 

    I talk with a lot of people in the military who are sick and tired of America's endless wars and their endless rotations with no end in sight and no clear mission.  Nobody can articulate what the US is doing in Afghanistan any more (and noting the enormous increase in heroin production is considered impolite).

    Next, the article is loaded with “normalizing” words, such as ‘consensus,’ ‘broad-based’ and ‘bipartisan’ to make it seem that a more hawkish stance is really getting back to something we can all agree on. It’s centrist, bipartisan and broad-based after all.

    It’s also insane when you combine it with the later part about how these folks want to undo the restraint of Obama and go after Syrian and Russian forces directly.

    I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Getting into a shooting war with Russia would be a terrible idea. Insane really.

    Not least of which is because, even if things don’t go nuclear (which they very well could given where we are in the shredding of the past narratives), then the US will discover that projecting its power all over the world is a heck of a lot harder when your navy is being sunk by the latest next-generation anti-ship missile technology.

    Trust me, the petrodollar will get a lot weaker in a skinny minute as soon as American military power is revealed as stoppable.

    I have a lot of faith in the training and equipment of the US military. But I also have faith in the power of a swarm of anti-ship hypersonic missiles to do a lot of damage.

    The US Presidential Election

    I'm on record as saying that I very much distrust the close relationship HRC has with the neocons and her hawkish foreign policy stance. Also, I do trust her readiness and willingness to get the US into more wars.

    In the second presidential debate, she came right and said that she supports a no-fly zone over Syria. Quoting a US military general, I've since explained that doing so would meet the definition of an open act of war against Russia.

    While there are a lot of issues on the table this election, I'm very much a single-issue voter when it comes to getting into a war with Russia. I want no part of it. I can't imagine any sane American would. 

    At best, it would be a wildly destructive waste of time, life and money. At worst it ends with an EMP (if we're lucky) or nuclear disaster (if we're not).  Instead, we in the West should be confronting our massive overhang of debt, our looming energy predicament, and a host of ecological train wrecks right now — not stuck in the fantasy that global warfare is somehow glorious or 'winnable'.

    After the next war, there won’t be any bountiful period of economically-simulative rebuilding that some have wistfully longed for. That takes energy. And in case anybody missed it, the 'high net energy' conventional oil slipped into the rearview mirror almost ten years ago now. There won’t be any super-duper rebuilding after the next big war. Just a massive struggle to get us back to even.

    So hey, let’s not do that. OK?

    Back to the main point here. The HRC campaign has several very close ties with the neocons who were instrumental in selling the Iraq war. None quite as prominent as Michael Morell:

    Clinton Adviser Proposes Attacking Iran to Aid the Saudis in Yemen

    Oct 26, 2016

     

    Michael Morell is a former acting director of the CIA and a national security adviser to Hillary Clinton — one who is widely expected to occupy a senior post in her administration.

     

    He is also an opponent of the Iran nuclear agreement, a defender of waterboarding, and an advocate for making Russia “pay a price” in Syria by covertly killing Putin’s soldiers.

     

    On Tuesday, Morell added another title to that résumé: proponent of going to war with Iran, for the sake of securing Saudi Arabia’s influence in Yemen.

     

    “Ships leave Iran on a regular basis carrying arms to the Houthis in Yemen,” Morell said, in remarks to the Center for American Progress, the liberal think tank founded by Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta. “I would have no problem from a policy perspective of having the U.S. Navy boarding their ships, and if there are weapons on them, to turn those ships around.”

     

    Morell did note, per Bloomberg’s Eli Lake, that this policy “raised questions of international maritime law.”

     

    Which is a bit like saying, “Breaking into someone’s home, putting a gun in their face, and demanding they hand over all their weapons raises questions about armed-robbery law.”

    (Source)

    To me this is not an individual interested in a little Putin-bashing for the sake of votes. This is a guy who's deadly serious about using US power to get into a conflict not just with Russia, but with Iran as well.

    Either of these adversaries could lead us into an armed confrontation that could escalate in ways we’d very seriously regret.

    Even ‘just’ the shutting of the Strait of Hormuz would be a huge and mortal blow to a world economy saddled with low growth and enormous piles of debt.  Iran could accomplish this easily using the mobile, land based missile launchers they currently have in stock.

    Sink a couple of Very Large Crude Carriers (VLCCs) and it’s a whole new ball game for world trade. 

    In case you don’t take Mr. Morell all that seriously, I should remind you that he was the person who personally vetted and scrubbed the presentation that Colin Powell gave to the UN on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction that led to the final war resolution.

    Clearly telling a few, uh, "fabrications" is well within his talent center if/when needed to get the job done.  He’s deadly serious about entering a conflict with Russia and Iran and he has Hillary’s ear.  Hopefully other more moderate people do as well, but my concern still lies with the fact that some people will hear equal arguments but then make the decision based on how they lean.

    Hillary leans hawkish. That’s just a matter of record at this point. As even liberal-leaning Chris Matthews of Hardball said recently, “People don’t change because we swear them into the White House.”

    Nope. The best rule of relationships I have is: You'll be disappointed if you are expecting (requiring, or hoping for) them to be different  tomorrow than they are today.

    Conclusion

    While I've focused on the election in this article, it may not even be relevant at all.  That is, there may well be a machine running in the background that is larger than any potential candidate or President. It may well be that the careful preparation of propaganda groundwork against Putin that began in 2008 is part of a large plan the public is being intentionally kept in the dark about. Who knows?

    But learning how Obama has frustrated the aspirations of the neocons vis-a-vis Syria and Russia tells me that the office of the president does matter, at least to a point. 

    I was personally horrified by what the US has brought to bear on Iraq, Libya, Syria and Afghanistan.  All in the service of Deep State objectives that are anything but obvious. 

    My growing concern here is that the juggernaut that leads to war has already been untethered and is building up steam. I see it in the propaganda pieces against Russia on an almost daily basis. And I see Russia doing everything it can to both try and get the West to calm down and be reasonable, while getting its own citizens ready in case those efforts fail.

    NATO is ramping up the pressure. Western media is faithfully (again) running necon talking points as if they were pearls of wisdom. We are heading back to the future.

    Recently, for the very first time in my entire life, I have begun undertaking actual personal preparations for nuclear war. 

    I absolutely deplore that I feel this is necessary. But a core tenet we live by here at PeakProsperity.com is that when anxiety builds, you need to align your actions with your beliefs. Right now, my beliefs are loudly telling me that the risk of a serious conflict with Russia breaking out are no longer dismissable.

    Similarly, I've committed to readers that when something concerns me enough to take action in my own personal life, I'll share it.

    In Part 2: My Personal Preparations For Nuclear War, I share the steps I've taken this week as well as additional precautions folks concerned about this topic should consider.

    Look, it's crazy were even talking about this. But as this article has shown, there's ample evidence that the pressure between the West and Russia is building. Given the outsized risks involved, making an investment in safety is only prudent. After all: nuclear way is one of those potential scenarios where its far better to be early or overenthusiastic in your precautions, than a day late.

    Click here to read Part 2 of this report (free executive summary, enrollment required for full access)

  • Social Media Blackout? FBI Emails Are Not 'Trending' On Twitter, Facebook, Buzzfeed, Or Snapchat

    They are not known as 'weapons of mass distraction' for nothing…

     

    In the 24 hours since FBI Director Comey dropped perhaps the biggest bombshell of the entire Presidential campaign, sending Democrats (and media) scrambling headless-chicken-like for answers (and blame-scaping), does anyone else find it odd that 'FBI Emails' does not appear to be a hot topic, trending, big deal on any social media?

    Snapchat…"Hot"

    h/t @CharlieKrik11

     

    Facebook… "Trending"

    h/t @MichaelDuncan

     

    Twitter…"Top Moments"

    h/t @kierobar

     

    Buzzfeed… "Trending Now"

    *  *  *

    As Liberty Blitzkrieg's Mike Krieger recently asked (and answered), why are these things happening in the first place?

    Apple claims not to endorse candidates, but their actions suggest otherwise, and some of their executives – including CEO Tim Cook – actively support Clinton’s campaign. Buzzfeed recently obtained an invitation to a private $50,000-per-plate fundraiser Cook is hosting for Clinton with his Apple colleague, Lisa Jackson, at the end of this month.

     

    Apple isn’t the only corporation doing Clinton’s bidding. Wikileaks founder Julian Assange said Clinton made a deal with Google and that the tech giant is “directly engaged” in her campaign. It’s been widely reported Clinton hired Eric Schmidt—chairman of Alphabet, the parent company of Google—to set up a tech company called The Groundwork. Assange claims this was to ensure Clinton had the “engineering talent to win the election.” He also pointed out that many members of Clinton’s staff have worked for Google, and some of her former employees now work at Google.

    Of course, I covered Groundwork earlier this year. See: Meet “Groundwork” – Google Chairman Eric Schmidt’s Stealth Startup Working to Make Hillary Clinton President

    Twitter is another culprit. The company has gotten a lot of slack for banning conservatives and Trump supporters such as Breitbart’s Milo Yiannopoulos and, most recently, rapper Azealia Banks after she came out in support of Trump. Twitter has provided vague answers as to why conservative voices have been banned while they’ve allowed other users to call for the killing of cops.

     

    Just yesterday, Buzzfeed revealed that the social media giant’s top executive personally protected the President from seeing critical messages last year. “In 2015, then-Twitter CEO Dick Costolo secretly ordered employees to filter out abusive and hateful replies to President Barack Obama.”

     

    The founders of some of the most popular pro-Trump Twitter handles – including @USAforTrump2016 and @WeNeedTrump—insist Twitter is censoring their content. They’ve pointed out that Twitter changes trending hashtags associated with negative tweets about Clinton (which has been reported before). On August 4, shortly after the hashtag “HillaryAccomplishment” began trending, it was taken over by anti-Clinton users, who used it to mention Benghazi or Emailgate. Eric Spracklen, @USAforTrump2016 founder, noticed the hashtag was quickly changed—pluralized to #HillarysAccomplishments.

    Many people have pointed out the exact shenanigans described above for other Clinton-related hashtags. In fact, it’s been my self-described progressive friends who have been most up in arms about it.

    “They take away the hashtag that has negative tweets for Clinton and replace it with something that doesn’t so the average person doesn’t see what was really trending,” Spracklen said. “This happens every day.”

     

    This new strand, where one cannot even search for alternative viewpoints amid technology companies who stand to benefit from the free-trade policies and eased immigration regulations of a Clinton presidence, represents a dangerous sea change. There’s absolutely no question the digital forums we use every day are censoring conservatives and favoring Clinton. You can’t simply scroll through photos on Instagram, look for a video game in the App Store or do a quick Google search without being fed anti-Trump and pro-Clinton propaganda.

    Personally, I’ve definitely noticed a big-time pro-Clinton bias in my Twitter stream on a daily basis, and I don’t follow people/organizations that would define themselves as overtly pro-Clinton. That’s my honest perception, and I don’t have a dog in this fight.

    * * *

    "Squirrel!"

     

  • HBO Officially Killed The Cable Bundle And ESPN Looks To Be The Biggest Victim

    Last April, HBO effectively marked the death of the cable TV bundle when they decided to launch “HBO Now” and sell their content directly to consumers for $15 per month.  While other “over-the-top” providers have existed for years, this decision was pivotal because it was the first time that any major content provider decided to break with the traditional cable delivery model and go direct to consumer.  Within a year, HBO Now had amassed 1 million subscribers.  Meanwhile, Pay TV households collapsed around the same time as “cord cutting” accelerated.

    Per the following data from Barclays’ Media and Telecom analyst, Kannan Venkateshwar, the decline of Pay TV households really accelerated in 2Q 15 around the same time that HBO Now was launched. 

    Cable TV

     

    Meanwhile, the number of broadband-only households also surged.

    Cable TV

     

    Now, the biggest beneficiary of the cable TV bundle, ESPN, which exploited it’s “must have” content for decades to negotiate ever higher rates with cable TV providers while forcing those rates down the throats of consumers by insisting its content be included in all of the channel “bundles”, finds itself in the unfamiliar territory of losing millions of subs per year amid surging contents costs.  In fact, according to Outkick The Coverage, ESPN lost over 600,000 subscribers in October alone which is worth over $50mm in annual revenue.

    Yesterday Nielsen announced its subscriber numbers for November 2016 and those numbers were the worst in the history of ESPN’s existence as a cable company — the worldwide leader in sports lost 621,000 cable subscribers. That’s the most subscribers ESPN has ever lost in a month according to Nielsen estimates and it represents a terrifying and troubling trend for the company, an acceleration of subscriber loss that represents a doubling of the average losses over the past couple of years, when ESPN has been losing in the neighborhood of 300,000 subscribers a month.

     

    These 621,000 lost subscribers in the past month alone lead to a drop in revenue of over $52 million and continue the alarming subscriber decline at ESPN. Couple these subscriber declines with a 24% drop in Monday Night Football ratings this fall, the crown jewel of ESPN programming, and it’s fair to call October of 2016 the worst month in ESPN’s history. But this isn’t just a story about ESPN, the rapid decline in cable subscribers is hitting every channel, sports and otherwise. It just impacts ESPN the most because ESPN costs every cable and satellite subscriber roughly $7 a month, over triple the next most expensive cable channel.

    The historical cable TV game goes a little something like this…in any given market there is typically 3-4 subscription TV providers (2 satellite companies, 1 (or more) cable providers and a Telco).  Those providers sign multi-year deals to buy content from media companies (e.g. ESPN, Discovery, Time Warner, Viacom, etc. etc) and then bundle them all together and pass the costs of those contracts along to consumers. Every 3-5 years those content contracts come up for renewal and the cable providers (i.e. consumers, since the costs just get passed along) are effectively forced to pay whatever increase ESPN (and others) asks for or risk losing millions of subscribers. 

    Now, there are roughly 100mm pay TV households in the U.S. and, because of the channel “bundling” scam, approximately 90% of them are forced to “buy” ESPN whether they consume sports content or not.  Moreover, because ESPN is considered “must have” content they’re able to extract the most value from the cable providers getting roughly $7 per sub per month, or more than double the next highest content provider…tack on a little extra margin for the cable provider and the average consumer is paying $120 per year for ESPN even if they never watch a single minute of sports programming…seems fair, right? 

    Fortunately for consumers, and not so much for ESPN, the power in the system, courtesy of “over-the-top” content providers like HBO and Netflix, is just starting to shift from the media companies to consumers…which will be disastrous for the historical beneficiaries of the cable bundle.  Outkick The Coverage laid out the math on what pay TV sub losses means for ESPN:

    A loss of 3 million subscribers would leave ESPN with 86 million subscribers in 2017. That would be down roughly 15 million subscribers in the past five years alone. Given that ESPN makes right at $7 a month from every cable and satellite subscriber a year, that means ESPN’s subscriber revenue would be $7.22 billion in 2017. Toss in an additional $1.8 billion or so in advertising revenue and ESPN’s total revenue would be $9 billion. We don’t know what the costs of running ESPN are — employees, facilities, equipment, and the like have to cost a billion or more — but it’s fair to say that ESPN is probably still making money in 2017. Just nowhere near what they used to make.

     

    But those sports rights costs are going up and those subscriber revenue numbers are going down.

     

    So if we’re very conservative and project that ESPN continues to lose 3 million subscribers a year — well below the rate that they are currently losing subscribers — then the household numbers would look like this over the next five years:

     

    2017: 86 million subscribers

     

    2018: 83 million subscribers

     

    2019: 80 million subscribers

     

    2020: 77 million subscribers

     

    2021: 74 million subscribers

     

    At 74 million subscribers — Outkick’s projection for 2021 based on the past five years of subscriber losses — ESPN would be bringing in just over $6.2 billion a year in yearly subscriber fees at $7 a month. At $8 a month, assuming the subscriber costs per month keeps climbing, that’s $7.1 billion in subscriber revenue. Both of those numbers are less than the yearly rights fees cost.

     

    Uh oh.   

    But that’s just the short-term incremental impacts.  The real question is how many consumers would actually purchase ESPN if the bundle truly disappeared and consumers were given the option to buy all content a la carte (which we suspect is the inevitable end game)?  If we assume that 45mm households would be willing to purchase ESPN directly, at their current cost of $7 per month, then that would equate to roughly $3.8BN in revenue per year or about half of their $7.5BN in annual content costs…which we suspect is a slight problem for Disney.

    But, like it not, a la carte content purchases are the way of the future.  While cable providers used to be incentivized to protect the “channel bundle” the advent of the internet and over-the-top content providers means that their true value offering to consumers is now in their broadband and not the content.  Therefore, it’s not terribly surprising that, as Bloomberg points out, new a la carte, streaming TV services are becoming very popular.

    AT&T Inc. set a price of $35 a month for a new online-streaming TV service with 100 channels or more, and the company may experiment with “a la carte” programming, giving customers choice on what channels they pay to watch.

     

    DirecTV Now will be priced to compete with two leading online TV providers — Sony’s PlayStation Vue and Dish Network Corp.’s Sling TV. PlayStation Vue starts at $39.99 for 60 channels and runs as high as $54.99 for more than 100 channels. Sling TV begins at $20 for 28 channels and goes as high as $40 for a 48-channel multi-screen package.

     

    The competition for cable-like online services is suddenly fierce. YouTube has been working for months on the paid live-TV streaming service, called Unplugged. Hulu LLC, which is co-owned by Fox, Disney, Comcast Corp. and Time Warner, will introduce its own service in the coming months, and Amazon.com Inc. and Apple Inc. have explored the idea.

    Of course, ESPN isn’t the only content company that has benefitted from the forced charity of the American consumer.  We suspect the many other cable content providers are also about to face a very turblent transition as well.

  • Attorney General Lynch 'Pleads Fifth' On Secret Iran 'Ransom' Payments

    Authored by Adam Kredo, originally published via The Washington Free Beacon,

    Attorney General Loretta Lynch is declining to comply with an investigation by leading members of Congress about the Obama administration’s secret efforts to send Iran $1.7 billion in cash earlier this year, prompting accusations that Lynch has “pleaded the Fifth” Amendment to avoid incriminating herself over these payments, according to lawmakers and communications exclusively obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.

    Sen. Marco Rubio (R., Fla.) and Rep. Mike Pompeo (R., Kan.) initially presented Lynch in October with a series of questions about how the cash payment to Iran was approved and delivered.

    In an Oct. 24 response, Assistant Attorney General Peter Kadzik responded on Lynch’s behalf, refusing to answer the questions and informing the lawmakers that they are barred from publicly disclosing any details about the cash payment, which was bound up in a ransom deal aimed at freeing several American hostages from Iran.

    The response from the attorney general’s office is “unacceptable” and provides evidence that Lynch has chosen to “essentially plead the fifth and refuse to respond to inquiries regarding [her] role in providing cash to the world’s foremost state sponsor of terrorism,” Rubio and Pompeo wrote on Friday in a follow-up letter to Lynch, according to a copy obtained by the Free Beacon.

    The inquiry launched by the lawmakers is just one of several concurrent ongoing congressional probes aimed at unearthing a full accounting of the administration’s secret negotiations with Iran.

    “It is frankly unacceptable that your department refuses to answer straightforward questions from the people’s elected representatives in Congress about an important national security issue,” the lawmakers wrote. “Your staff failed to address any of our questions, and instead provided a copy of public testimony and a lecture about the sensitivity of information associated with this issue.”

     

    “As the United States’ chief law enforcement officer, it is outrageous that you would essentially plead the fifth and refuse to respond to inquiries,” they stated. “The actions of your department come at time when Iran continues to hold Americans hostage and unjustly sentence them to prison.”

    The lawmakers included a copy of their previous 13 questions and are requesting that Lynch provide answers by Nov. 4.

    When asked about Lynch’s efforts to avoid answering questions about the cash payment, Pompeo told the Free Beacon that the Obama administration has blocked Congress at every turn as lawmakers attempt to investigate the payments to Iran.

    “Who knew that simple questions regarding Attorney General Lynch’s approval of billions of dollars in payments to Iran could be so controversial that she would refuse to answer them?” Pompeo said. “This has become the Obama administration’s coping mechanism for anything related to the Islamic Republic of Iran – hide information, obfuscate details, and deny answers to Congress and the American people.”

     

    “They know this isn’t a sustainable strategy, however, and I trust they will start to take their professional, and moral, obligations seriously,” the lawmaker added.

    In the Oct. 24 letter to Rubio and Pompeo, Assistant Attorney General Kadzik warned the lawmakers against disclosing to the public any information about the cash payment.

    Details about the deal are unclassified, but are being kept under lock and key in a secure facility on Capitol Hill, the Free Beacon first disclosed. Lawmakers and staffers who have clearance to view the documents are forced to relinquish their cellular devices and are barred from taking any notes about what they see.

    “Please note that these documents contain sensitive information that is not appropriate for public release,” Kadzik wrote to the lawmakers. “Disclosure of this information beyond members of the House and Senate and staff who are able to view them could adversely affect the diplomatic relations of the United States, including with key allies, as well as the State Department’s ability to defend [legal] claims against the United States [by Iran] that are still being litigated at the Hague Tribunal.”

     

    “The public release of any portion of these documents, or the information contained therein, is not authorized by the transmittal of these documents or by this communication,” Kadzik wrote.

    Congressional sources have told the Free Beacon that this is another part of the effort to hide details about these secret negotiations with Iran from the American public.

    One senior congressional source familiar with both the secret documents and the inquiry into them told the Free Beacon that the details of the negotiations are so damning that the administration’s best strategy is to ignore lawmakers’ requests for more information.

    “Every Obama administration official and department involved in the Iran Deal appear to be running for cover,” the source said. “Like we feared, the [Iran deal] is turning out to be a disaster and Iran is emboldened in its aggression. Evidently Attorney General Lynch and the Department of Justice have decided ‘refusal to cooperate’ is their best strategy. But this is dangerous and ultimately won’t protect them from anything.”

  • China's Blowing Out TED-Spread Has Traders Bracing For A Cash Shortage

    This past July, we lamented that as a result of the now implemented money market reform which sent Libor soaring, Wall Street had lost one of its most dependable, forward-looking crisis indicators: the TED-Spread (the difference between LIBOR and 3 month TSYs), something which Bloomberg also figured out last week.

    Specifically, we said that “now the regulatory intervention is set to pressure what have traditionally been reliable metrics indicative of funding stress and systemic risk, among them swap spreads, the TED-Spread and the FRA-OIS spread, the market is about to lose the last metric indicative of underlying tensions. After all, with central bank intervention having broken all conventional signalling pathways, including equities, corporate bonds, Treasuries, and VIX, there will no longer be any reliable sources hinting at fundamental risk in the market, certainly for the short-term and perhaps over an indefinite amount of time.”

    However, one place where the TED spread – ironically – is still a valid indicator of liquidity concerns, is oddly enough China. And it is in China where traders in the local interest-rate swap market are bracing for a cash shortage as a result of the blowout in the premium for the 1-year swap rate over the 1-year sovereign bond yield to 52 basis points, the widest since July 2015.

    As Bloomberg reminds us, this is China’s version of the familiar TED spread, which in the US is (or rather was) a gauge of stress that compares funding costs for banks and the government.

    “This is a signal in the market that swap traders are readying for tighter liquidity as the government tries to prevent a property bubble,” said Iris Pang, senior economist for Greater China at Natixis Asia Ltd. in Hong Kong. “Further tightness may be very limited because the PBOC doesn’t want to put financial stress on the market.

    The good news: it is still well below the 140 basis points reached during the trust finance crackdown of early 2014. The bad news is that as reported last week, China has just launched a new crackdown, this time on on the infamous Wealth-Managemnt Products, shadow banking conduits which amount to just under $1.9 trillion in products, the immediate result of which has been the recent 10% surge in bitcoin. Which means that should absent another liquidity injections elsewhere, the drought is set to get far worse.

    The recent, sharp move in the swap spread is the result of market concerns that the government is seeking to crackdown on the local housing bubble:

    The fixed cost to receive the seven-day repurchase rate for a year climbed to an 18-month high on concern the People’s Bank of China will tighten its purse strings after property prices surged 40 percent in Shanghai last month from a year earlier.  The one-year swap rate reached 2.73 percent on Friday in Shanghai, matching the highest level since April 2015, while the seven-day repo rate reached a one-month high on Thursday. The one-year sovereign yield was at 2.19 percent, heading for a third annual decline. 

    Making matters worse, China Securities Journal reported on its front page that finance companies need to prepare for “tight days” as monetary policy shifts to focus on deleveraging.

    The “good” news from this upcoming liquidity shortage, is that China’s government bond yields, already near all time lows, are set to drop even further, as bond investors – who assume the market’s reaction to a Chinese growth slowdown is similar to that in the US – are preparing to benefit from the slower economic growth that may result. “Any decline in real estate activity is likely to dent growth in the world’s second-largest economy, providing a tailwind for government bonds”, according to ING and DBS.

    And while it is all connected, the liquidity shortage, the drop in yields, and the rising swap spreads, the cash squeeze also reflects the flight from a weakening yuan. While China’s SAFE reported that 44.7 billion in yuan payments left the nation last month, up from August’s outflow of $27.7 billion, Goldman’s calculation was nearly double that, or some $78 billion in September outflows. As a result of the return of China’s banking sector bogeyman, which as we reported last week just hit a staggering 200 trillion yuan…

    … the Chinese currency continued to slide this past week, bringing its drop against the dollar to 4.2% YTD, the most among 11 Asian currencies tracked by Bloomberg.

    How should one trade this reacceleration in Chinese capital outflows, Yuan devaluation and overall economic deterioration? One way, as Kyle Bass has done, is to short the Yuan outright, and in size. Another, as we did last September, and as Corriente’s MarK Hart discussed in February, is simply to go long bitcoin – a trade that has returned over 200% in just over a year.

    Of course, one doesn’t have to trade it at all: sitting back and watching events unfold may be just as satisfactory.

  • The US Navy – Screwing The Taxpayers, And Defense Innovators

    Submitted by Duane via Free Market Shooter blog,

    ghost-boat

    Self-made millionaire Gregory Sancoff has spent a decade and $19 million building a highly unusual stealth boat. Called Ghost, it’s designed to be faster, more stable, and more fuel-efficient than anything currently in the U.S. Navy’s fleet, he says. “It’s such a smooth ride, you can sit there and drink your coffee going through six-foot swells,” he proudly told Bloomberg Businessweek in 2014.

     

    But there’s a problem: The Pentagon doesn’t want Sancoff’s boat—and also won’t let him sell it abroad.

    Source:  The Feds Won’t Buy this $19 Million Stealth Boat – Or Let It Be Sold Abroad  |  Bloomberg

    A little background is necessary here – Gregory Sancoff is a self-made millionaire who spent some of his own fortune building a stealth boat for the U.S. Navy.  The Navy has chosen not to purchase Sancoff’s “Ghost” boat.  That is fine… except, the Navy has deemed the technology too classified to allow him to sell it anywhere else.  How does this make any sense, if he developed the boat all on his own, without any government funding or assistance?

    Apparently, this all happened because he patented his invention, and tried to sell it to the Navy.  The Navy was initially interested, but also served him with secrecy orders, and later placed his firm under watch of International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR).  Though you would think he would have some legal recourse here, such action is made extremely difficult, as he is not a large-scale defense firm such as Lockheed, and does not have the same legal resources at his disposal.

    The outlook for Juliet isn’t great. Last year, the U.S. patent office issued 95 secrecy orders—one for every 6,628 applications, as Joshua Brustein wrote in June. Most of those inventions were developed by large companies, specifically for the military or other government agencies. But as Brustein points out, the orders “are a different sort of ordeal for private inventors, about a dozen of whom file patent applications that are made secret by government mandate each year.” Inventors who break gag orders can lose their patent rights, or face fines or incarceration. And while some secrecy orders are reversed each year, others date back as far as the 1940s.

    If Sancoff’s boat contains such sensitive technology that it cannot be sold abroad, why doesn’t the US Navy just buy his prototype from him?  They won’t need to contract his firm to build a fleet, but they can purchase the technology for use in other DARPA projects. $19 million is but a drop in the bucket of the Navy’s ~$380 billion dollar budget, after all.

    Apparently, $19 million is too much to spare for a stealth boat, when you’ve already wasted $23 billion building three stealth destroyers, that have been watered down from their own original plans, and don’t even have close-in air defenses.

    160421-N-YE579-005 ATLANTIC OCEAN (April 21, 2016) The future guided-missile destroyer USS Zumwalt (DDG 1000) transits the Atlantic Ocean during acceptance trials April 21, 2016 with the Navy's Board of Inspection and Survey (INSURV). The U.S. Navy accepted delivery of DDG 1000, the future guided-missile destroyer USS Zumwalt (DDG 1000) May 20, 2016. Following a crew certification period and October commissioning ceremony in Baltimore, Zumwalt will transit to its homeport in San Diego for a Post Delivery Availability and Mission Systems Activation. DDG 1000 is the lead ship of the Zumwalt-class destroyers, next-generation, multi-mission surface combatants, tailored for land attack and littoral dominance. (U.S. Navy/Released)

    The Zumwalt class stealth destroyer was originally contracted in the 1990’s to eventually replace the Navy’s aging Arleigh Burke class destroyers.  Similar to so many monstrous defense projects, the Zumwalt was plagued with delays, cost overruns, and subsequent cost cutting measures that led to a far less capable destroyer than was originally planned, and the buy was correspondingly cut from 32 copies to just three.  With questionable self-defense capabilities, this destroyer cannot be deployed to any hotspot without external support, as a ship with similar defenses was recently destroyed by very unsophisticated weapons.  Originally expect to run at ~$300 million a copy, the smaller buy and higher costs pushed the cost of the remaining three to about $8 billion apiece.

    So, just to clarify – the US Navy can afford to waste $23 billion on a stealth destroyer of questionable efficacy, but can’t afford to spend less than 0.001% of that cost on a stealth boat prototype, even if solely for the sake of using the technology in future designs.  Is it any wonder why even our unpopular Congressional leaders are telling the military to stop buying equipment it doesn’t need?  Perhaps the DoD should be more supportive of innovators who spend their own dime to develop new technologies, instead of screwing them over every step of the way, and instead choosing to continue wasting taxpayer dollars on flawed designs?

    The defense procurement process is beyond flawed; it is in need of a complete overhaul.  The Pentagon needs to focus on building out more prototypes, and testing them in the field before committing to buying large numbers of untested designs.  Smaller defense projects with room for expansion will leave the DoD more nimble, and more able to quickly adapt to new challenges posed by differing adversaries with increasingly differing tactics.  And, one of the best ways to do that is to encourage innovators like Sancoff, who are willing to invest their own resources to build prototypes, not discourage them. 

    But look on the bright side – the DoD won’t spend $19 million on a stealth boat prototype, instead choosing to waste $23 billion on three neutered stealth destroyers… but at least its not a $1.5 TRILLION dollar project that is “too big to fail”, so it must proceed in its screwing of the taxpayer.

    F35-problems

  • Economist Predicts Rising Obamacare Costs Will Lead To Riots

    Now that it is widely accepted by everyone except the president in denial, that Obamacare is an epic debacle, one which boosts GDP because it is fundamentally a tax that counts toward healthcare expenditures yet takes away from other discretionary spending leading to a downtrend in overall US consumption, most also have an opinion on how it unwinds. However, few are as gloomy as economist Chris Butler of Butler, Lanz and Wagler, who discussed the rising cost of health insurance plans rising next year under the Affordable Care Act, and said he expects riots as the populace begins to expresses outrage upon learning many will be priced out of health care options.

    Butler told Chris Stigall on Talk Radio 1210 WPHT to expect more public demonstrations of anger as prices move upward.

    Cited by CBS Philadelphia, Butler said that “right now, I think you do have to say that A, it’s failing and that B, I think next year, you’re going to have a bunch of people that don’t get the subsidies that make the premiums a little bit more affordable that are just going to riot because it’s just too expensive for most people if you don’t qualify for subsidies.”

    Butler said he still objects to court rulings siding with the government requiring individuals to purchase insurance or pay a penalty. In that case, he will be even angrier to learn that according to Obamacare architect Jonathan Gruber, the “solution” to prevent millions of Americans opting to pay penalties instead of be enrolled, is to hike the penalty even more.

    “You can go back to the Supreme Court decision on this. I’m still shocked that we are being told that our constitution says that it is allowable to force to people to buy something. When I hear people talk about forcing them, not only to buy something, but to make the penalty stiffer if they don’t, I just get queasy.”

    Butler told WPHT there could be simple solutions to lower costs and cites buying plans across state lines as an example.

    “Do you know what New Jersey is anticipating, their’s is considerably less, as I recall, than Pennsylvania, yet we are not allowed to cross state borders to buy insurance. There are a lot of states, by the way, that have big cities on borders that are actually going to have huge increases but they border on a state that is quite reasonable in its growth in premium costs. We talked about that while all of this was being discussed back in 2010, some of the quick fixes you could make that would have a difference to our healthcare system, that was one of them, allow people to buy insurance across state lines to help equalize some of this stuff.”

    Well, according to many the US is on the verge of full-blown rioting and even civil war on any given day: might as well throw in one more catalyst that will unleash chaos. After all, as Krugman said in March, “The important point about war from macroeconomic point of view is that it was a very large fiscal stimulus”

  • The Vexed Question Of The Dollar

    Submitted by Alasdair Macleod via GoldMoney.com,

    There is little doubt that the rapid expansion of both dollar-denominated debt and monetary quantities since the financial crisis will lead us into a currency crisis.

    We just don’t know when, and the dollar is not alone. All the major paper currencies have been massively inflated in recent years. With the dollar acting as the world’s reserve currency, where the dollar goes, so do all the other fiat monies. Until that cataclysmic event, we watch currencies behave in increasingly unexpected, seemingly irrational ways. The fundamentals for Japan are not good, yet the yen remains the strongest currency of the big four. The Eurozone risks a systemic collapse, overwhelmed by political and financial headwinds, yet the euro’s exchange rate has proved relatively impervious to this deep uncertainty. The British economy is strongest, yet sterling is the weakest of the four majors.

    If nothing else, today’s foreign exchanges are evidence that subjectivity triumphs over macroeconomic thinking. Mackay’s Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds beats computer modelling every time. Furthermore, any official attempt to establish a rate for the dollar has to address two separate questions: the value of the dollar relative to other currencies, and its purchasing power for goods and services.

    The chart below indicates how the dollar has behaved against other currencies over the last five years, both on a trade weighted and on a predefined currency basis (DXY).

    It should be noted that the dollar has risen on both these measures by roughly 18% since early 2014. At the same time, the Chinese yuan has fallen against the dollar by about 12%, so it has actually risen slightly against the DXY basket as a whole, particularly against the euro component, where it has gained 12% since early 2014. This matters, because far from devaluing, which is what we are routinely told by dollar-centric analysts, the yuan has been relatively stable over time against a basket of currencies. It has been weak against the dollar and yen, but strong against both the euro and sterling.

    We should look at this from the Fed’s Federal Open Market Committee’s point of view. America runs a record trade deficit with China, and the only major economies where China’s terms of trade have improved are with the US, excepting Japan. Therefore, the Fed is bound to be very sensitive to the dollar’s exchange rate with China’s yuan. Furthermore, on two occasions when the Fed had signalled it was going to raise the Fed Funds Rate, it backed off when the Chinese lowered the rate at which it had pegged the yuan to the dollar. Chinese devaluation against the dollar is obviously a prime concern for the Fed.

    The situation becomes better understood when the Peoples Bank’s position is taken into account. The bank has been selling US Treasury stock in large quantities, stockpiling commodities and oil with the proceeds, though it has been diversifying into Japanese Government bonds as well. China’s dollars have been welcomed by markets, which are short of both quality collateral and raw currency. However, China’s supply of both has failed to stop the dollar rising against the yuan. Furthermore, China isn’t the only Asian and Middle Eastern state selling American paper, so the demand from other international players on the buy side has been immense, enough to determine the underlying direction of the dollar’s exchange rate.

    The situation is being exploited by the Peoples Bank. In effect, the Peoples Bank is in a position to dictate Fed policy by adjusting the rate at which it is prepared to supply dollars into the market. So long as the dollar remains fundamentally strong, it only has to slow the pace of Treasury and dollar sales for the dollar to rise, and therefore the Fed’s planned interest rate rises to be deferred. This is not understood properly by western commentators, who erroneously think China is being forced to defend a declining yuan. Nothing could be further from the truth. It will be interesting to see whether this happens again ahead of the December FOMC meeting, when for the umpteenth time we have been promised a rise in the Fed Funds Rate.

    A major consideration behind China’s foreign exchange policy is the outlook for the euro. The Eurozone represents a market as large as the US, with the added importance of being tagged onto the Asian continent. There can be little doubt that China sees her own long-term future being aligned more with Europe than America, despite Europe’s current troubles. It is, if you like, a situation that is primarily of strategic importance. Europe’s economy will need rescuing at some stage, and is therefore a future opportunity for China’s intervention.

    That plan is for the long term, and becomes increasingly valid the deeper the hole the Eurozone digs for itself. A disintegration of the EU would also be beneficial for Chinese ambitions. Meanwhile, in the short-term the euro has broken a crucial trend-line against the dollar, having completed a continuation head-and-shoulders pattern, targeting the 1.0600 area, which is the previous low seen in March and November 2015. This is our second chart. 

    Neither the Peoples Bank nor the Fed need to be chart experts to see what’s happening. Brexit was very bad news for the euro, because it is a racing certainty that the event will turn out to be just the start of a new round of political and economic trouble for the Eurozone. The Italian economy in particular is imploding, with a non-performing loan problem that is roughly 40% of private sector GDP.

    So China can for the moment steer a course for the yuan between the euro’s devaluation and the dollar’s rise. The Fed sees in euro weakness an increase of currency-induced deflation for the US economy, and a loss of competitiveness for US exports. Chinese exporters are obvious beneficiaries as well, so the blame for deflation will be on China’s foreign exchange machinations.

    Anyway, China probably cares less than she ever did about the long-term consequences of her actions on the US economy. China has been selling her US Treasuries and reducing her dollar exposure to add to her stockpiles of raw materials and oil. She wants to keep her over-indebted businesses trading by maintaining a favourable exchange rate with the dollar, particularly given the developing train wreck that’s the Eurozone. And there’s not a lot the Fed can do about it.

    Gold and commodities

    The principal driver for the gold price is the prospect of monetary inflation transmuting into price inflation, and the inability of central banks to respond to this threat by raising interest rates sufficiently to control the balance of consumer preferences between goods and holding money.

    We are, of course, measuring gold in dollars, because the latter is the reserve currency for all the others. But, as stated above, there are two exchange considerations, the first being the dollar against other currencies, and the second the dollar against a basket of commodities. And here, we should note that over the long-term, the prices of commodities measured in gold are considerably more stable than the prices of commodities measured in fiat currencies.

    China has behaved as if she is thoroughly aware of gold’s pricing attributes, and has a deliberate policy of dominating the market for bullion. This is very different from the US’s domination of gold paper markets. Not only has China invested in unprofitable gold mines to become the largest producer at about 450 tonnes annually, but the state monopolises China’s refining capacity. She also imports doré for refining from other countries, and without doubt since 1983 has accumulated substantial quantities of bullion not included in monetary reserves. Furthermore, it is the only country that has encouraged its population, through television and other media, to accumulate physical gold. Make no mistake, for the last thirty-three years, the Chinese government has made a credible attempt to gain ultimate control over the physical gold market, and to extend gold’s protection to her own citizens.

    China does not manipulate the gold price. Instead, as described earlier, she is manipulating the dollar by regulating the exchange rate and by discouraging the Fed from raising interest rates. It is a temporary balancing act that only continues so long as desperate banks and their indebted borrowers continue to scramble for dollars, and China knows it. The Fed, for the moment, appears to be powerless to manage economic outcomes and is firmly trapped by China’s currency management, with interest rates stuck at the lower bound. And to make it worse, the weak euro, against which the dollar index (DXY) is very heavily weighted (57%!), threatens to force the DXY index even higher. The result, inevitably, is that monetary policy cannot be used to address future price inflation, which virtually guarantees there will be a higher gold price in 2017 and beyond.

    This is why, despite American wishful thinking, gold remains at the centre of the financial system. It is central partly because China’s ensures it is, and it is also China’s ultimate money for commodity and trade purposes.

    China most likely has enough gold to fully compensate for her reserve losses from the destruction of the dollar and the other fiat currencies on her reserve book. She is deliberately selling down her dollar exposure anyway, while she can. Lest we forget, communist economists in China were taught that capitalism destroys itself. For them, there is no clearer proof than the performance of the US economy and the dollar, and they do not intend to get caught up in its demise. Understand this, and you understand all.

    While the monetary role of gold in the future has yet to be determined by China, and it will be China or the markets that make the decision, for the moment it can be regarded as the ultimate insurance against global currency failure.

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Oct 29

Today’s News 29th October 2016

  • Come Hillary or High Water, It’s Just About Hell Week for the Economy

    The following article by David Haggith was published first on The Great Recession Blog: 

    Is Hillary Clinton crazy?

    Election week is only about a week away. No matter who wins, rage will break out across the US landscape because, for the time being, the flames are kept minimally under a lid by hope on each side that their candidate will win. If Hellary Clinton loses, the establishment will come unhinged. If Trump loses, the Tumpettes are already sounding their war cry against the election results. Nothing is going to settle down no matter who wins; but to give Trump’s supporters some encouragement, should the worst befall them, I offer the following silver lining:

    As horrible as I believe a Hillary presidency would be — with its suffocating smog of endless scandals and swirl of smoke clouds from all the wars she would continue to instigate — as she so clearly did while senator and then secretary of state — a Hillary presidency would have one great benefit: it would in fairly short order bring clarity for the entire nation to the fact that the nation’s economic ruin is the fault of the establishment (something about which many are obviously in great denial or they wouldn’t vote for Hillary in the first place).

    Hillary is as establishment as you get; so is Obama; so was George Bush (both of them); so are most of the Republicans and Democrats in congress. While that is stating the obvious, the point I am working up to is that a Hillary victory is a chance for a total flush four years from now.

    The US economy is beyond saving at this point, anyway, regardless of who wins, and it will take a crash to push the reset button and wake America up. Having that crash hit while the establishment fully holds the reins should leave 100% of the blame at their feet, and it’s not the much longer to wait.

    I was thinking of writing about this hope when I read the following from David Stockman about what Hillary will face as president if she wins, with which I entirely agree, though I’d give a much shorter timeframe for the inevitable chain of events to come:

     

    …because things are going to blow up in the next four years, there will be a stock market crash, there will be a recession, the annual deficit will be back in the plus trillion dollar category very soon and it will all come down on her head and on the watch of the establishment….

     

    And maybe that will wake up the public, because it’s going to be bad. And what Trump proved in this campaign is that the establishment, you know, will do anything politically to stop a challenge. But if we have the crisis that I know is coming, then maybe this thing can be busted wide open and we have a chance to clear the decks and start again. (Newsmax)

     

    That, I think, is the best outcome from this election — national clarity when it all comes down as it most certainly is beyond saving at this point. For that reason only, I think a Hillary victory would actually be the best thing to happen to us (economically, but I am not sure it is worth the other non-financial costs we’d pay). The crash of the entire economy around Hillary’s feet would galvanize the resistance to the establishment and all but assure an anti-establishment victory across the entire political landscape in the next election.

     

    Signs of indifference that needs to break

     

    The flatlining stock market, which I wrote about in my last article, barely had enough energy to raise an eyebrow today at the ostensibly good news that GDP growth doubled since last quarter to almost 3% — a number associated with fairly normal US economic growth.

    It didn’t go up because, “Yay, the economy is finally running at normal speed” or down because “Yikes, that means the Fed will be more likely to raise interest rates.” Instead of either response, like a dying person, the market couldn’t have cared less what was happening economically in the world today. That says to me the crash is imminent.

    This same day, it registered the kind of upheaval that will come from the establishment if Trump wins. The market immediately plunged a hundred points when news broke of another FBI investigation that could cause trouble for Hillary. Not to worry, though, the Fed or government fix kicked in shortly thereafter and brought the market back up to its flatline status quo.

    My biggest concern if Hillary wins is that Trump (and with him all anti-establishment voters) will be made into the establishment’s scapegoat. They have already been preparing for this in consort with their media supporters, through whom they plan to say to American voters, “We told you the stock market would crash and take the economy down with it you elected Trump. See what happens when you don’t listen to us and support the superior establishment.”

    Of course, a world raging with wars, as I’ve shown Hellary has planned, is a steep price to pay for the opportunity to lay all blame for our economic doom at the establishment’s feet. That’s why it’s hard to say a Hillary victory, besides meaning I have to endure four years of nausea is worth the cost. I have no idea how bad the cost in wars might actually get if she wins.

     

    The US economy is sinking fast, regardless of today’s GDP number

     

    Consider the following recent headlines as a sign of the way the national and global economy continue to slide into the abyss of the Epocalypse — regardless of what the GDP data indicated today: (The headlines help explain the continual decent that is seen in the flatlining graph of the Dow I presented earlier this week even during a time when the government appears to have pulled out all stops to keep the economy afloat through the election year.)

     

    • “Caterpillar Posts Lower Earnings, Cuts 2016 Outlook” Cat has been in relentless decline for the last three years because heavy industry all over the world (including in the US) is in decline, so companies are not buying heavy equipment.
    • “Twitter Said to Plan Hundreds More Job Cuts as Soon as This Week” Twitter is symptomatic of a decline throughout high-tech. The euphoric ride up for unprofitable companies came to an end more than a year ago, just as happened when the euphoric dot-com boom went bust. Even Apple, which carried the Tech sector on its back for years, reported its first annual decline in sales since 2001 due to a 17% drop in China, and China was the market that was maintaining some demand for the rest of the world.
    • “Italian Bank to Cut 2,600 Jobs, Close Branches in Rescue Overhaul” Italy’s oldest bank and Germany’s oldest and largest bank continue to teeter on the edge of bankruptcy. These are some of the oldest banks in the world — banks that survived the Great Depression — but their days are clearly numbered. “The bank published the plan Tuesday as it posted a 1.15 billion-euro ($1.3 billion) loss for the three months through September.”
    • “Ford to Idle Four Factories as Slowing Sales Bloat Inventory” The press was crowing in their mind-numbing way about how well American auto manufacturers were doing all of last year and at the start of this year. I said it wasn’t so — that US automakers would find themselves in a bad situation this year because because they’re now counting leases as sales and would soon be getting back millions of used cars and because they repeated all their past financial gimmicks: absurdly slack credit terms on their internal auto loans looked just like what auto manufacturers were doing before the economic crisis of 2007-8 … when I also said automakers would be going down within a year. Those slack loan terms, coupled with an increase in defaulting loans, made me say last year, “What’s your end game for next year once you have pulled sales from that year into the present with these easy-to-walk-away-from terms?” Well, we’re there … again! Its even falling apart in the area of Ford’s greatest strength — its truck and SUV plants. Mustang sales, too, dropped 32% at the start of this auto year (September).
    • “Harley-Davidson Plans to Cut Jobs as US Sales Fall 7 Percent” Things are not looking any better for the nation’s oldest continuously operating motorcycle manufacturer either. “The motorcycle manufacturer cited continued slowed U.S. motorcycle industry growth as the main factor for weaker retail sales.”
    • “RED ALERT: Get ready for a ‘severe fall’ in the stock market, HSBC says” A technical analyst for one of the world’s largest banks now warns that the current stock market pattern looks eerily similar to the pattern that immediately preceded the crash in 1987.
    • “Bank of America has a recession warning that’s downright ‘scary’” BofA joins HSBC to say it sees a chilling trend: “We are seven years into a full-fledged, all out, central bankers doing everything they can to stimulate demand.” Yet demand is beyond evasive. “There are a lot of itchy trigger fingers. There’s lot of violent trades that can really roil a fairly complacent environment.”
    • “China facing full-blown banking crisis, world’s top financial watchdog warns” “The Bank for International Settlements warned in its quarterly report that China’s ‘credit to GDP gap’ has reached 30.1, the highest to date and in a different league altogether from any other major country tracked by the institution. It is also significantly higher than the … the US subprime bubble before the Lehman crisis. Studies of earlier banking crises around the world over the last sixty years suggest that any score above ten requires careful monitoring.”
    • “Biggest market crash in HISTORY is coming as HUGE debt bubble bursts, top investor warns” Michael Pento, a bond fund manager who has written for The Huffington Post, Bloomberg, Peak Prosperity, USA Watchdog, and who has often appeared on CNBC says we are now living in “the most dangerous [time] I have ever witnessed in my entire life – and I’ve been investing for over 25 years. The membrane has been stretched so wide and so tight that its about to burst.”
    • “Why the Stock Market Could Be Headed for a 1987-like Crash” Chris Matthews writes in Fortune that “we’re in the middle of the longest earnings recession since 2008…. What’s worse, estimates show that they will decline for a sixth straight quarter…. But Jim Bianco, president of Bianco Research argues that even this forecast might be overly optimistic…. Big picture, all the lines are headed down.”

     

    That is far from a list of all that is currently going wrong with the US economy. It’s simply the headlines that caught my eye in the last week or two. The economy is dying to where the establishment can barely even keep the stock market alive at a time when it would be devastating for them to have it crash. Nothing has the power to save us from this fate, not even the braggadocios Trump.

    If Hillary wins, all hell will break loose. It’s a rage that needs to happen, and it will be next to impossible to deny where the blame lies (I think, although the grip of economic denial has been indefatigable so far). Not saying I wish a Hillary victory on the nation or the world; just trying to be an optimist by pointing out the silver lining on the clouds.

    Clarity and breaking out of economic denial so that we get a real grasp of what we need to do are more important for the nation than anyone’s poorly conceived economic recovery plan at this point. Until the nation gets real about what its problems are, its not going to find any real answers to them. That has to start with the majority of people coming to grips with the fact that the establishment doesn’t have any answers at all. It’s not even looking for an answer.

  • In Leaked Memo, James Comey Explains Why FBI Told Congress About Reopened Clinton Probe

    Having been the whipping boy of Republicans everywhere since July, following his announcement the FBI would not recommend charges against Hillary Clinton, then shockingly making the “most hated list” of every Democrat with the even more stunning news the FBI had reopened its probe of Hillary Clinton, bureau director James Comey just can’t seem to win.

    So in an attempt to justify his actions, a “leaked” memo emerged on Friday evening courtesy of Fox News, which explains why Comey took the unusual step of deciding to inform Congress that the FBI had reopened its investigation into Clinton’s private email server. The memo reveals two main arguments: a sense of obligation to lawmakers and a concern that word of the new email discovery would leak to the media and raise questions of a coverup.

    These two arguments prompted the FBI director to release his brief letter to Congress on Friday and has sent the presidential race into a tailspin less than two weeks before Election Day. It placed Comey again at the center of a highly partisan argument over whether the nation’s top law enforcement agency was unfairly influencing the campaign.

    In a memo explaining his decision to FBI employees soon after he sent his letter to Congress, Comey said he felt “an obligation to do so given that I testified repeatedly in recent months that our investigation was completed.” He admitted that he broke with custom in alerting lawmakers that the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private email server was being reopened because of its political sensitivity.

    He further explained to FBI employees that “Of course we don’t ordinarily tell Congress about ongoing investigations, but here I feel an obligation to do so given that I testified repeatedly in recent months that our investigation was completed. I also think it would be misleading to the American people were we not to supplement the record.”

    What made this case special in Comey’s eyes is that Clinton is seeking the White House in an election on Nov. 8. In other words, both internal pressure to preempt leaks (from disgruntled employees?) and a sense of “obligations” is why Hillary’s campaign is in full damage control mode right now.

    “At the same time, however, given that we do not know the significance of this newly discovered collection of emails, I don’t want to create a misleading impression,” Comey’s letter continued. “In trying to strike that balance, in a brief letter, and in the middle of an election season, there is significant risk of being misunderstood, but I wanted you to hear directy from me about it.”

    As reported previously, the bombshell revelation that newly discovered emails had prompted a new look into whether Clinton or those around her had broken the law my mishandling sensitive information rocked the race for the White House Friday. Comey informed eight Republican lawmakers that new emails had surfaced that were relevant to the investigation, and warranted a new look.

    Comey announced in July that the FBI had wrapped up a year-long investigation into Clinton’s use of a private email server for official business and concluded that while she was “extremely careless,” he could not recommend that the Justice Department seek an indictment. The decision was blasted by Republicans, and FoxNews.com reported earlier this month that career DOJ and FBI workers were furious.

    Now, it is the democrats turn to rage at Comey and the FBI, although Comey likely did not have much choice: had he kept the information secret, it certainly would have leaked as we predicted; as such his best recourse was to come clean, although many have speculated about the cryptic nature of the disclosure.

    Needless to say, all Comey would need to do to regain the Demcorats’ trust and favor is to announce in just a few days that nothing material has been found and that the second probe is also over.

    Full memo below.

  • New Clinton Emails Emerged As Part Of FBI Probe Into Anthony Weiner

    In the latest stunning revelation in today’s saga involving the FBI’s second probe, moments ago the NYT reported that the new emails uncovered in the closed investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server were discovered on a computer belonging to Anthony D. Weiner, the estranged husband of Huma Abedin, a top aide to Mrs. Clinton.

    In a stunning letter to Congress, the F.B.I. director, James B. Comey, said that emails had surfaced in an unrelated case, and that they “appear to be pertinent to the investigation.” It remained unclear, however, if the emails were sent from Mrs. Clinton’s private server, which has already been thoroughly examined by the F.B.I.

    The F.B.I. is investigating illicit text messages that Mr. Weiner sent to a 15-year-old girl in North Carolina. The bureau told Congress on Friday that it had uncovered new emails related to the Clinton case — one federal official said they numbered in the thousands — potentially reigniting an issue that has weighed on the presidential campaign and offering a lifeline to Donald J. Trump less than two weeks before the election.

    The NYT adds that Comey said the F.B.I. was taking steps to “determine whether they contain classified information, as well as to assess their importance to our investigation.” He said he did not know how long it would take to review the emails, or whether the new information was significant. A senior law enforcement official said that the emails belonged to Ms. Abedin and were backed up on Mr. Weiner’s computer. The officials said the F.B.I. has not looked at the emails to determine their significance.

    Meanwhile Hillary demanded that the FBI disclose all the information it has: “We are calling the F.B.I to release all the information that it has,” Mrs. Clinton said in an evening news conference that took issue with Mr. Comey for making the disclosure 11 days before the election. “Let’s get it out.”

    Until recently Anthony Weiner was married to Hillary Clinton’s closest aide, Huma Abedin, who separated from Weiner in August after it emerged that Weiner had engaged in an online affair with an underage girl. Such behavior had destroyed his congressional career and his 2013 mayoral campaign.

    The F.B.I. told Congress that it had uncovered new emails related to the closed investigation into whether Mrs. Clinton or her aides had mishandled classified information, potentially reigniting an issue that has weighed on the presidential campaign and offering a lifeline to Donald J. Trump less than two weeks before the election.

    As NBC’s Pete Williams adds, in looking at Weiner’s laptop, investigators discovered Huma also used the laptop—which contained some Huma/Hillary emails.

    Meanwhile, Trump was ebulient. After deriding the F.B.I. for weeks as inept and corrupt, Mr. Trump went on to praise the law enforcement agency. “I have great respect for the fact that the F.B.I. and the D.O.J. are now willing to have the courage to right the horrible mistake that they made,” Mr. Trump said, referring also to the Department of Justice. “This was a grave miscarriage of justice that the American people fully understand. It is everybody’s hope that it is about to be corrected.”

    “Perhaps, finally, justice will be done,” he declared at a campaign rally in New Hampshire.

    And then there was this: Rep. Tim Ryan, an Ohio Democrat, suggested to CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on Friday that the Russians may have played a role in the FBI reopening its investigation into Hillary’s email server after discovering new documents.

    It wasn’t just the Democrats. Rush Limbaugh said the FBI is starting a new review of Hillary Clinton’s emails to distract voters from WikiLeaks’s revelations about her. “[FBI Director James] Comey is just doing this to take everybody’s attention off of the WikiLeaks email dump,” Limbaugh said on his radio broadcast Friday.

    “The cynical view is that Comey is still carrying water for Clinton and is trying to get everybody to stop paying attention on the WikiLeaks dump because it’s starting to have an impact.”

    “So you announce you’re opening the inquiry, get everybody all hot and bothered and focused on it, and after three or four or five days, you announce it’s a false alarm, nothing to see her, investigation now officially over, and meanwhile, in that five day period, everybody’s forgotten about WikiLeaks.”

    Limbaugh said WikiLeaks emails are exposing the Democratic presidential nominee’s secrets and damaging her White House bid. “The WikiLeaks scandal right now is starting to hurt because it is exposing the fraud and the hustling and the collusion and the corruption that is going on at the Clinton Foundation,” he said. “You start messing around with things that are supposed to be charitable to serve humanity, you end up profiting personally from it. That’s easy to understand.

    “Everybody knows that’s not nice. Everybody understands that you’re not supposed to get rich off a charity. And the news here is that the Clintons have done that and are doing that,” he added.

    At this point in the must surreal campaign in history, he just may be right.

    * * *

    One clue as to what precisely the FBI may have uncovered comes courtesy of FOIAed Judicial Watch email disclosures, revealed one month ago, according to which Hillary Clinton’s chief of staff at the State Department, Cheryl Mills, had received classified national security information through one of two or three personal, unsecured email accounts she regularly used to communicate with Clinton aide Huma Abedin.

    Approximately 10 percent of Abedin’s emails released through Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act requests were addressed to one of Mills’ various personal email addresses. As WND reported at the time, several were found to contain such highly sensitive material that the State Department redacted 100 percent of the content pages, marking many pages with a bold stamp reading “PAGE DENIED.”

    Of the more than 160 emails in the latest Judicial Watch release, some 110 emails – two-thirds of the total – were forwarded by Abedin to two personal addresses she controlled. The Washington Times reported in August 2015 that the State Department had admitted to a federal judge that Abedin and Mills used personal email accounts to conduct government business in addition to Clinton’s private clintonemail.com to transact State Department business.

    In a curious twist, one heavily redacted email, dated May 15, 2009, was sent by the infamous Doug Band (who until today was the primary source of headaches for Hillary Clinton due to his role as head of the Clinton Foundation-linked Teneo consulting firm whose recently leaked confidential memo exposed the fund flows involving Bill Clinton), to Mills at a personal address and to Huma Abedin at her State Department address.

    Band was forwarding to Mills and Abedin an email request from an associate who was seeking a State Department position in Charleston, South Carolina. Attached was a letter that the office-seeker had first sent to Bill Clinton containing the office-seeker’s resume . In the email Band was making a State Department job request on behalf of a Clinton Foundation and/or Teneo-related person.

    The email from Band was completely redacted, except for a salutation and first sentence. The letter the office-seeker had sent to President Clinton, as well as the office-seeker’s résumé, was redacted except for a phrase that reads, “Well organized, driven professional.”

    A second email dated May 15, 2009, was sent by Abedin from her State Department email to her personal email, presumably humamabedin@yahoo.com. Abedin apparently was archiving in her personal email account an email Hillary Clinton sent her from Clinton’s private email server at HDR22@clintonemail.com. Abedin was asked to print out attachments to an email Mills sent via a private address the previous day to Clinton involving “timetables and deliverables” for her review via Alec Ross, a technology policy expert who then held the title of senior adviser for innovation to Secretary Clinton.

    The two pages of timetables and deliverables attached to the email were 100 percent redacted, with “PAGE DENIED” stamped across the first redacted page.

    * * *

    Ironically, it appears that Donald Trump was spot on once again, first with a recent statement on the Huma-Abedin split:

    DONALD J. TRUMP STATEMENT ON HILLARY CLINTON’S BAD JUDGMENT

     

    “Huma is making a very wise decision. I know Anthony Weiner well, and she will be far better off without him. I only worry for the country in that Hillary Clinton was careless and negligent in allowing Weiner to have such close proximity to highly classified information. Who knows what he learned and who he told? It’s just another example of Hillary Clinton’s bad judgment. It is possible that our country and its security have been greatly compromised by this.” – Donald J. Trump

    and then, previously with this August 3, 2015 tweet:

    Well, maybe not tell the world, but certainly drag Hillary into another scandal just as she appeared certain to win the election with less than 2 weeks until D-Day.

     

  • Another Black Swan Hits The US Presidential Election

    Submitted by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

    By now, everyone on planet earth has heard about the bombshell news just announced by the FBI that it was re-opening its investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private email server. Here’s the text of FBI head James Comey’s letter to Congressional leaders.

    screen-shot-2016-10-28-at-1-03-50-pm

    Obviously, lots of people are out there pontificating on what, if anything, this means. As such, I’m going to add my two cents to the conversation.

    I’ve prided myself on unemotionally calling this election how I see it the whole time, because I’m neither a Hillary Clinton nor Donald Trump supporter. Being free of the tremendous baggage that comes with cheerleading a particular candidate in this contentious election, I had consistently predicted a Trump victory until the Access Hollywood tape emerged. At that point I penned a thought-piece titled, Donald Trump is in Trouble – Part 2, in which I changed my forecast to a Hillary Clinton victory.

    Here’s some of what I wrote:

    After watching yesterday’s audio and reading through the Wikileaks revelations, my prediction has changed for the first time this election. All things equal from here on out (meaning no additional huge revelations against Hillary), I think Hillary Clinton will defeat Donald Trump. I don’t think it’s going to be a landslide, but I think she’s probably going to win. The audio was very harmful for Donald Trump, and now I’m going to explain why.

     

    First of all, if you want to accurately forecast the outcome of this election you need to get into the minds of the masses. Just like trading financial markets, what you think is right doesn’t matter. What matters is what everyone else collectively thinks, and whether or not they’re going to get off their asses and vote. A big part of why I thought Trump would win related to the fact that I believe many people were simply looking for an excuse to vote for him. Justified disgust with the status quo in general, and Hillary Clinton in particular, pushed millions of Americans into the camp of being willing to take a gamble on Trump despite disliking him personally and disagreeing with him on many issues. I felt strongly that there were millions upon millions of Americans you could place into this category — people who were “flirting with the idea of voting Trump.” I believe a significant amount of these people will not vote for him as a result of the audio. Will it be the majority of them? Probably not, but it will be a material number and arguably enough to swing the election. No, I don’t think these voters will shift to Hillary, and no, I don’t think committed Trump voters will change their minds. However, I do think enough of these willing to be convinced, leaning-Trump types will now stay home or vote third party. It’s these voters who I expected to swing the election in Trump’s favor, and they are now unreliable.

     

    Does Trump’s vulgarity excuse the incalculable crimes of Hillary Clinton and her husband, making them preferable in this election? No it doesn’t, but that’s not the point of this article. Most voters are too superficial, too busy trying to survive and too uninformed to weigh all the very important issues rationally. As an example, think about how most conversations are going to go down this weekend. Let’s say you’re out with a bunch of friends for drinks tonight. Someone says, “so have you seen the Trump audio?” If someone in the group hasn’t, someone will pull out their phone and it’ll be watched in 3 minutes. What if someone then says, “yeah, but have you seen the leaked Hillary emails?” What will your response be? You can’t adequately explain the importance of that to your friends in 3 minutes. Instead, you’ll have to send them a lengthy article that they’ll never read. So by the end of this weekend, pretty much everyone in America will have heard the Trump audio, while maybe 10% will take the time to analyze what came out of Wikileaks. There goes your election.

    Understanding the craziness of the election, I finished the piece with the following.

    Despite all of that, I still can’t say with certainty that Hillary will win. However, I do think the landscape has changed enough, that for the first time this entire election season, I am no longer confident of a Trump victory. Then again, I was absolutely convinced that Hillary was unelectable after she collapsed on 9/11 and mislead everyone about her health, and I was wrong about that. That’s how completely crazy this election is, and there’s still a month to go. Anything can happen, particularly with the debate coming up this Sunday. So while it’s certainly not out of the question, there will have to be some very material events over the next month to put Trump back in the driver’s seat.

    While the Wikileaks emails have been an important factor in keeping this race close, I didn’t think they were sufficient to alter my forecast of a Clinton victory. I think the reopening of the FBI investigation is enough of a black swan to materially change the course of this race.

    Clinton supporters will read this and think I’m insane. They will think this because they are anticipating a landslide victory for Hillary. I never expected a landslide, so I think this news tips the election into a total tossup situation. My reasoning for the change is the same that led me to switch my forecast to Hillary after the Access Hollywood video was released. The primary reason I initially thought Trump would win related to the fact I believed enough people would be willing to vote for a person they don’t really like in order to blow up the status quo. I felt that the video recording of Trump’s vulgar commentary was enough to put those people into the absentee or third party column, despite millions of Americans looking for an excuse to vote for Trump due to the well understood awfulness of Hillary. This has changed, and voters now have the excuse to vote Trump they needed.

    That reason is simple. The problems with Hilary Clinton will never go away. They will always resurface or new problems will emerge, and it has nothing to do with a “vast rightwing conspiracy.” It has to do with her. It has to do with the fact that her and her husband are career crooks, warmongers, and shameless looters of the American public. This re-opening of the FBI investigation just hammers all of that home for everyone. We know what 4 years of Hillary will look like. It’ll be Obama cronyism on steroids, plus endless investigations with a side of World War 3. I don’t think people want that, and so more Americans than the pundits realize will take a gamble on Trump.

    As a caveat, the above forecast assumes this new FBI investigation is not closed before November 8th. If it is, I think she’ll win. If not, I think Trump has even odds to win, if not better.

    Of course, with 11 days left in this crazy election, many more black swans could emerge. Stay tuned.

  • How To Make 2016 The Most Offensive Halloween Ever

    Social justice warriors have vowed to call the police on people wearing “offensive” Halloween costumes.

    So in an effort to ensure the special snowflakes aren’t triggered, Paul Joseph Watson explains how to keep Halloween ‘safe’… kinda.

  • Dramatic 2006 Recording Captures Hillary Clinton Proposing To Rig The Palestine Election

    Hillary Clinton does not believe that US elections can be rigged, however it appears that when it comes to the rigging of foreign elections, she has a different opinion.

    This emerged today courtesy of a leaked September 2006 recording between Hillary, who was then running fore reelection as a US Senator and Eli Chomsky was an editor and staff writer for the Jewish Press. As the Observer, which released the recording writes, the tape is 45 minutes and contains much that is no longer relevant, such as analysis of the re-election battle that Sen. Joe Lieberman was then facing in Connecticut.

    But a seemingly throwaway remark about elections in areas controlled by the Palestinian Authority has taken on new relevance amid persistent accusations in the presidential campaign by Clinton’s Republican opponent Donald Trump that the current election is “rigged.”

    In the recording Clinton, who is speaking to the Jewish Press about the January 25, 2006, election for the second Palestinian Legislative Council (the legislature of the Palestinian National Authority), weighed in about the result, which was a resounding victory for Hamas (74 seats) over the U.S.-preferred Fatah (45 seats).

    “I do not think we should have pushed for an election in the Palestinian territories. I think that was a big mistake,” said Sen. Clinton. “And if we were going to push for an election, then we should have made sure that we did something to determine who was going to win.”

    The last statement is damning, and suggests that “making sure” that the desired party wins is something of a noram among top Washington circles, even if thrown around in jest.

    The Observer notes that Chomsky recalls being taken aback that “anyone could support the idea—offered by a national political leader, no less—that the U.S. should be in the business of fixing foreign elections.”

    A good follow up question would be if Clinton feels the same way about the US 2016 presidential election, in which it is clear who Hillary, and her campaign staff, would push for to win.

    In another tangential part of the recording, Chomsky is heard on the tape asking Clinton what now seems like a prescient question about Syria, given the disaster unfolding there and its looming threat to drag the U.S., Iran and Russia into confrontation.

    “Do you think it’s worth talking to Syria—both from the U.S. point [of view] and Israel’s point [of view]?”

    Clinton replied, “You know, I’m pretty much of the mind that I don’t see what it hurts to talk to people. As long as you’re not stupid and giving things away. I mean, we talked to the Soviet Union for 40 years. They invaded Hungary, they invaded Czechoslovakia, they persecuted the Jews, they invaded Afghanistan, they destabilized governments, they put missiles 90 miles from our shores, we never stopped talking to them,” an answer that reflects her mastery of the facts but also reflects a willingness to talk to Russia that sounds more like Trump 2016 than Clinton 2016.

    The conclusion comes a few moments later when Clinton said, “But if you say, ‘they’re evil, we’re good, [and] we’re never dealing with them,’ I think you give up a lot of the tools that you need to have in order to defeat them…So I would like to talk to you [the enemy] because I want to know more about you. Because if I want to defeat you, I’ve got to know something more about you. I need different tools to use in my campaign against you. That’s my take on it.”

    Ironically taking the “moral” ground and slamming Putin as evil is precisely what the Obama administration has done; we can only imagine what Hillary – and her Secretary of State – will do  in Syria and across the globe, if elected president through rigged elections or otherwise.

    Full recording below:

  • New Research Finds Minimum Wage Ballot Initiatives Could Cost 300,000 Jobs In These 4 States

    Seemingly no amount of empirical evidence can convince progressives that raising minimum wages to artificially elevated levels is a bad idea.  Somehow the basic idea that raising the cost of a good ultimately results in lower consumption of that good just doesn’t compute.  Though it does seem odd that progressives in states like California lean heavily on higher taxes as a way to curb, for example, fuel consumption.  Could it be that the left actually does understand the basic economics of the minimum wage debate but don’t find the math behind it to be particularly “politically expedient” in certain instances?

    Be that as it may, in four states across the country this November voters will decide whether or not to hike minimum wage anywhere from 32% to 60% over the next three years.  And, according to research from the American Action Forum (AAF), those wage hikes could cost Arizona, Colorado, Maine and Washington a total of nearly 300,000 jobs.

    While proponents of these measures hope they will improve the welfare of low-wage workers, American Action Forum (AAF) research has consistently shown that proposals to raise the minimum wage often hurt those they intend to help by increasing joblessness among low-skilled workers and failing to deliver income gains to those who actually need assistance. So, what would happen in these states if each measure were approved? These minimum wage increases would come at a total cost of 290,000 jobs.

    Minimum Wage

     

    Meanwhile, AAF points out that historical data indicates that every 10% increase in the real minimum wage equates to a roughly 0.3% – 0.5% decrease in future job growth.

    While proposals to raise the minimum wage are well intended, it is important to take into account the negative labor market consequences. Recently, Meer & West (2015) found that raising the minimum wage reduces job creation. Specifically, they found that a 10 percent increase in the real minimum wage is associated with a 0.3 to 0.5 percentage-point decrease in the net job growth rate. As a result, three years later employment becomes 0.7 percent lower than it would have been absent the minimum wage increase.

    Minimum Wage

     

    Of course, despite how futile our efforts might be, we have frequently presented empirical evidence (see below) proving that minimum wage results in permanent jobs losses for the same low-skilled workers they’re intended to help.  Though despite the piling up mountain of evidence on the harmful “unintended consequences” of artificially high minimum wages, we suspect we already know how this story ends.  After all, it’s much easier to win elections by promising people more stuff rather than less.  And, as an added bonus, when it all goes horribly wrong it’s very easy to lay the blame at the feet of the wealthy 1%’ers who are behind all the layoffs.  Checkmate.

    Minimum Wage

     

    * * *

    Excerpts from our previous post “Something “Unexpected” Happened When Seattle Raised The Minimum Wage“:

    The latest research comes from the University of Washington which researched the impact of Seattle’s recent minimum wage hike on employment in that city (as background, Seattle recently passed legislation that increased it’s minimum wage to $11 per hour on April 1, 2015, $13 on January 1, 2016 and $15 on January 1, 2017).  “Shockingly”, the University of Washington found that Seattle’s higher minimum wages “lowered employment rates of low-wage workers” (the report is attached in its entirety at the end of this post).  

    Yet, our best estimates find that the Seattle Minimum Wage Ordinance appears to have lowered employment rates of low-wage workers. This negative unintended consequence (which are predicted by some of the existing economic literature) is concerning and needs to be followed closely in future years, because the long-run effects are likely to be greater as businesses and workers have more time to adapt to the ordinance. Finally, we find only modest impacts on earnings. The effects of disemployment appear to be roughly offsetting the gain in hourly wage rates, leaving the earnings for the average low-wage worker unchanged. Of course, we are talking about the average result.

     

    More specifically, we find that median wages for low-wage workers (those earning less than $11 per hour during the 2nd quarter of 2014) rose by $1.18 per hour, and we estimate that the impact of the Ordinance was to increase these workers’ median wage by $0.73 per hour. Further, while these low-wage workers increased their likelihood of being employed relative to prior years, this increase was less than in comparison regions. We estimate that the impact of the Ordinance was a 1.1 percentage point decrease in likelihood of low-wage Seattle workers remaining employed.  While these low-wage workers increased their  quarterly earnings relative to prior years, the estimated impact of the Ordinance on earnings is small and sensitive to the choice of comparison region. Finally, for those who kept their job, the Ordinance appears to have improved wages and earnings, but decreased their likelihood of being employed in Seattle relative other parts of the state of Washington.

    Still not convinced?  How about a recent report from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco that finds that “higher minimum wage results in some job loss for the least-skilled workers—with possibly larger adverse effects than earlier research suggested.”

    How do we summarize this evidence? Many studies over the years find that higher minimum wages reduce employment of teens and low-skilled workers more generally. Recent exceptions that find no employment effects typically use a particular version of estimation methods with close geographic controls that may obscure job losses. Recent research using a wider variety of methods to address the problem of comparison states tends to confirm earlier findings of job loss. Coupled with critiques of the methods that generate little evidence of job loss, the overall body of recent evidence suggests that the most credible conclusion is a higher minimum wage results in some job loss for the least-skilled workers—with possibly larger adverse effects than earlier research suggested.

    Don’t trust theoretical Federal Reserve Bank studies?  How about recent hard evidence from Starbucks (which we noted here)?  One year ago, we noted that Starbucks CEO, Howard Schultz, won over progressives when he said that minimum wage “should go up across the country” and that Starbucks would “pay above the minimum wage in every state we operate.”  Sounds fantastic, right?

    One year ago, when the political push to raise the minimum wage hit a crescendo, the CEO of Starbucks had some words of caution. Howard Schultz told CNN that minimum wage “should go up across the country”, however he warned that “it will be very difficult for small business in the country at a $15 level to pay those kinds of wages.” What about for his own company? “For Starbucks come January 1 we are taking wages up across the country and we will pay above the minimum wage in every state we operate. Starbucks is way above the minimum wage. I have always looked at total compensation.”

    Unfortunately, it turns out that Schultz isn’t one of those “practice what you preach” kind of guys.  Per our previous note:

    One year later, something “unexpected” has happened as a result of the Schultz’ all too eager push to “share” his company’s success by hiking minimum wages, namely the realization by the company’s employees (if not so much the CEO, management and certainly shareholders) that total compensation is a function of two things: hourly wages and number of hours worked.

     

    As Reuters reports, an online petition accusing Starbucks of “extreme” cutbacks in work hours at its U.S. cafes, hurting both employee morale and customer service, has been signed by more than 9,000 people. Suddenly Starbucks’ eagerness to raise its wages becomes all too clear: after all, it would merely have to reduce work hours, to keep profitability humming.

     

    The world’s biggest coffee chain, trying to address cooling growth at its U.S. shops, recently introduced technology that allows customers to order and pay from mobile devices. That service aims to boost sales and reduce bottlenecks in stores; it also aims to reduce work hours.

     

    In short: Starbucks is finding itself in a sales and profit squeeze (its shares have gone nowhere for the past year), and having been such a fervent supporter of minimum wage hikes, is now far less willing to “share” its success as a company, especially if it means a stagnant stock price for the foreseeable future.

  • Watergate's Carl Bernstein: FBI Wouldn't Reopen A Probe Unless It Is "A Real Bombshell"

    In the aftermath of the so-called Cocktober surprise unveiled this afternoon by the FBI when the bureau announced it was reopening a probe into Hillary Clinton’s email server because “new evidence has come to light” after “materials” were found on equipment belonging to Anthony Weiner and Huma Abedin, the question on everyone’s lips – and certainly Hillary Clinton‘s and most democrats – is why did the FBI do this now, 11 days before the election, in a way that did not even coordinate with the White House?

    One opinion belongs to Watergate journalist Carl Bernstein, who just days after his infamous peer Bob Woodward said that the “Clinton foundation is corrupt, it’s a scandal” said that “her conduct in regard to the e-mails is really indefensible and if there was going to be more information that came out, it was the one thing, as I said on the air last night, actually that could really perhaps affect this election.  We don’t know what this means yet except that it’s a real bombshell. And it is unthinkable that the Director of the FBI would take this action lightly, that he would put this letter forth to the Congress of the United States saying there is more information out there about classified e-mails and call it to the attention of congress unless it was something requiring serious investigation. So that’s where we are…”

    Courtesy of Real Clear Politics is the full transcript:

    CARL BERNSTEIN: Well, there’s no question that the e-mails have always been the greatest threat to her candidacy for president, that her conduct in regard to the e-mails is really indefensible and if there was going to be more information that came out, it was the one thing, as I said on the air last night, actually that could really perhaps affect this election.

     

    We don’t know what this means yet except that it’s a real bombshell. And it is unthinkable that the Director of the FBI would take this action lightly, that he would put this letter forth to the Congress of the United States saying there is more information out there about classified e-mails and call it to the attention of congress unless it was something requiring serious investigation. So that’s where we are…

     

    Is it a certainty that we won’t learn before the election? I’m not sure it’s a certainty we won’t learn before the election. 

     

    One thing is, it’s possible that Hillary Clinton might want to on her own initiative talk to the FBI and find out what she can, and if she chooses to let the American people know what she thinks or knows is going on. People need to hear from her… 

     

    I think if she has information available to her from the FBI or any other source as to her knowledge of what these e-mails might be, hopefully she will let us know what they are and what is under discussion here. 

     

    Right now we’re all talking in a vacuum but I want to add here that in the last, oh, 36, 48 hours, there has been an undercurrent of kind of speculative discussion among some national security people that something might surface in the next few days about e-mails, and I think the expectation in this chatter — and I took it as just chatter but informed chatter, to some extent — was that it would relate to another round of WikiLeaks e-mails, which our Justice Department people seem to be saying is not the case, but there has been some noise in the national security community the last day or two of this kind of possibility of some kind of revelation. 

     

    But this is her achilles heel and we have to remember that it also comes on the — back to the word heel — of the revelations about the Clinton Foundation. So the confluence of all of this is bad for her as it stands now but with some knowledge she might be able to stop, turn things around, and give us some idea of what’s going on in a way we might not otherwise know, and also it’s very possible that some members of congress very quickly are going to get an idea of what these e-mails are, and what this is all about, and for whatever purpose put some information out there.

    Full video below:

  • Hillary Holds 4 Minute Press Conference: Demands "Full And Complete Facts" From FBI

    Blink and you missed it: in a brief, 3 minute 47 second address to the press, a defiant Hillary slammed the FBI, said that she hopes that whatever information the Bureau has will be shared with the American people and added that she is confident that no charges will be brought against her by the FBI, while taking the opportunity to ask people to go out and vote for her.

    She took three questions which some have mockingly said were drafted and/or preapproved by Clinton campaign direction of communications Jennifer Palmier.

    “We are 11 days out from perhaps the most important national election of our lifetimes,” Clinton said during the brief press conference in Des Moines, Iowa. “Voting is already underway in our country, so the American people deserve to get the full and complete facts immediately.” 

    Hillary revealed that the FBI had not contacted her before or since Comey sent a letter to lawmakers Friday afternoon.

    “So we don’t know the facts, which is why we are calling on the FBI to release all the information that it has,” she said. “Even Director Comey noted that this new information may not be significant, so let’s get it out.”

    Comey’s letter said that the FBI was reviewing pertinent emails that it found in an unrelated investigation, but did not reveal much more than that. Republicans and the GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump quickly pounced on the news. 

    Clinton was asked about a New York Times report that said the FBI had found the new emails in its separate investigation into Anthony Weiner’s sexting scandal.

    “We’ve heard these rumors,” she said “We don’t know what to believe. And I’m sure there will be even more rumors. That’s why it’s incumbent on the FBI to tell us what they’re talking about, Jeff. Your guess is as good as mine and I don’t think that’s not good enough.”

    Watch the brief recording below:

     

    Hillary’s statement was similar to what Tim Kaine said earlier: it’s “very, very troubling” that the FBI is releasing information about a new probe into emails that may relate to Hillary Clinton just 11 days before the election. The Democratic vice presidential nominee is commenting on the development in an interview with Vice News.  Kaine says the FBI director needs to provide more details on the situation. He suggests it’s troubling that members of the press are finding out information before campaign officials. Kaine’s comments in turn echo the a statement made by Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta, and thus by Hillary.

    * * *

    Finally, President Obama is staying silent – for now – on the FBI director’s announcement of an investigation into new emails related to Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server. Obama is in Orlando, Florida, where according to AP he is encouraging voters – young voters in particular – to take advantage of their opportunity to cast their ballots before Election Day on Nov. 8.

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