• Adults Aged 35–44 Died At Twice The Expected Rate Last Summer, Life Insurance Data Suggests
  Adults Aged 35–44 Died At Twice The Expected Rate Last Summer, Life Insurance Data Suggests

  Authored by Margaret Menge via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  Death claims for working-age adults under group life insurance policies spiked well beyond expected levels last summer and fall, according to data from 20 of the top 21 life insurance companies in the United States.

  

  Death claims for adults aged 35 to 44 were 100 percent higher than expected in July, August, and September 2021, according to a report by the Society of Actuaries, which analyzed 2.3 million death claims submitted to life insurance firms.

  The report looked at death claims filed under group life insurance policies during the 24 months of the COVID-19 pandemic, from April 2020 to March 2022. The researchers used data from the three years before the pandemic to set a baseline for the expected deaths.

  While COVID-19 played some role in the majority of the excess deaths for adults over the age of 34 during the two pandemic years, the opposite was true for younger people. For people 34 and younger, the number of excess non-COVID deaths was higher than those related to COVID, the data show.

  During the third quarter of last year, deaths in the 25-to-34 age bracket were 78 percent above the expected level and, for people aged 45 to 54, 80 percent higher than expected. Excess mortality was 53 percent above the baseline for adults aged 55 to 64.

  The Society of Actuaries (SOA) asked all 20 of the participating life insurance companies how they determine the cause of death for the purpose of recording claims. Of the 18 that responded, 17 said they list COVID-19 as the cause of death if it’s listed anywhere on the death certificate, while eight of the 18 said they go further and communicate with relatives and the medical examiner and look at other sources to try to determine the true cause of death.

  One life insurance company stated that it recorded COVID-19 as the cause of death only when it could be determined to be the primary cause of death on a death certificate.

  The report also notes that white-collar workers had the highest number of excess deaths during the two years studied. The group, which includes accountants, lawyers, computer programmers, and most other jobs done in an office setting, had 23 percent more deaths than expected.

  The sharp increase of deaths among working-age people was first brought to light by Scott Davison, CEO of the Indianapolis-based life insurance company OneAmerica, who said in a virtual press conference on Dec. 30, 2021, that his company and the life insurance industry as a whole was seeing a 40 percent increase in deaths among people ages 18 to 64.

  Davison said at the time that this represented the highest death rates in the history of the life insurance business, and that an increase in mortality of just 10 percent would constitute a “three-sigma” event, a once-in-200-year catastrophe.

  OneAmerica is one of the 20 companies that contributed data for the SOA report. The others include Aflac, Anthem, The Hartford, Lincoln Financial Group, MetLife, New York Life, and Principal Financial.

  Edward Dowd, a hedge fund manager who has been studying excess mortality for the past several months and has an upcoming book on the topic, Cause Unknown, says the rate of deaths among young people is alarming. He pointed out that excess deaths peaked around the time the Biden administration mandated COVID-19 vaccines and companies rushed to comply.

  “Temporally, in that three-month period, the change was such that, there was something that occurred,” he said. “Well, we all know what occurred in August, September, and October. It was Biden’s mandates on Sept. 9, and a lot of corporations anticipating those mandates.”

  President Joe Biden on Sept. 9, 2021, mandated COVID-19 vaccines for federal employees and health care workers in facilities certified by Medicare and Medicaid. The same day, the president tasked the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) with implementing a nationwide vaccine mandate on private businesses with 100 or more employees.

  

  The U.S. Supreme Court struck down the OSHA mandate in January but allowed the mandate for health care workers to remain in place.

  The campaign to vaccinate the majority of the population against COVID-19 is the largest vaccination campaign in the history of the world.

  As of Aug. 31, about 90 percent of Americans 18 or older had gotten at least the first dose of one of the COVID-19 vaccines, and 77 percent had gotten both a first and a second dose.

  Dr. Robert Malone, a physician and research scientist credited with the invention of the mRNA technology for use in vaccines, says excess mortality must always be studied to determine whether a vaccine or medicine really is safe.

  “Excess mortality should be a signal, a trigger,” he told The Epoch Times. “When we see excess mortality like that—basically if you’re running a clinical trial and you see this kind of excess mortality, you stop the trial. And you investigate the cause before you proceed. And if you’re marketing a drug, generally, with this kind of data, you stop the distribution of the drug until you have sorted it out.”

  

  Malone mentioned what he calls the “classic example” of thalidomide, a morning sickness medication prescribed to a small number of pregnant women in the United States in the late 1950s and early ’60s that was effective in treating morning sickness, but caused severe deformities in their unborn children.

  The drug maker had pressured the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to approve the drug, but the FDA refused, based on the deformities that had been reported.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 23:40

• Taiwan Has The Fastest Internet In The World, USA Is 4th…
  Taiwan Has The Fastest Internet In The World, USA Is 4th…

  According to the cable.co.uk broadband speed league 2022, Taiwan is on top of the world when it comes to fast internet, with an average download speed of 135.88 Mbps – 13.55 more than second-placed Japan.

  As Statista’s Martin Armstrong details below, Asia features prominently at the top end of the rankings, with Singapore and Hong Kong also recording mean speeds of 100 Mbps+.

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  For this infographic, we excluded places with populations of less than one million.

  When including all of the measured locations, Macao on the south coast of China has the fasted broadband on average, with a whopping 262.74 Mbps. In second place would be the small island of Jersey, located in the English Channel, with 256.59 Mbps.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 23:20

• Homeland Security May Have Allowed Dangerous, Unvetted Afghans Into US: Inspector General
  Homeland Security May Have Allowed Dangerous, Unvetted Afghans Into US: Inspector General

  Authored by Naveen Anthrapully via The Epoch Times,

  During the evacuation of Afghanistan from July 2021 to January 2022, the United States brought nearly 80,000 Afghan citizens into the United States, but the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) failed to fully vet some of the evacuees, potentially allowing individuals who pose a national security risk into the country, according to a recent report.

  

  The DHS Office of Inspector General (OIG) conducted an audit to determine the extent to which the DHS screened, vetted, and inspected the evacuees.

  “We determined some information used to vet evacuees through U.S. Government databases, such as name, date of birth, identification number, and travel document data were inaccurate, incomplete, or missing,” the OIG said in its Sept. 6 report (pdf).

  “We also determined [Customs and Border Patrol] admitted or paroled evacuees who were not fully vetted into the United States.” As a consequence, the DHS may have admitted individuals into the country who pose a risk to national security and threaten the safety of local communities, the OIG warned.

  The audit found that of the 88,977 evacuee records inspected, 417 did not have first names, 242 did not have last names, and 11,110 had their date of birth recorded as Jan. 1.

  In addition, 7,800 records had missing or invalid travel document numbers while 36,400 records had a “facilitation document” as the travel document type. During the audit, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) could not define what the “facilitation document” was.

  One evacuee paroled into the United States by CBP was earlier liberated from an Afghan prison by the Taliban. Another evacuee paroled into the country posed national security concerns. CBP allowed 35 evacuees to board a flight to the United States even though they lacked a green status card required for travel.

  Admitting Potential Threats

  During a recent daily briefing, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre insisted that the DHS OIG report did not take into account the “rigorous, multilayered screening, and vetting process” the Biden administration took. However, an earlier Department of Defense (DOD) report and whistleblower claims support the OIG report.

  A Pentagon audit of the civilian evacuation effort in Afghanistan released in February warned about potentially dangerous individuals being brought into the United States.

  The DOD National Ground Intelligence Center (NGIC) identified “50 Afghan personnel in the United States with information in DoD records that would indicate potentially significant security concerns” in its February 2022 audit report (pdf).

  One whistleblower claimed that the DOD failed to properly vet 324 Afghan evacuees who appeared on the department’s Biometrically Enabled Watchlist that includes suspected terrorists.

  In August 2022, U.S. Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) urged the DOD to investigate the whistleblower allegations.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 23:00

• Iran Unveils New Stealth Combat Vessel With Vertical-Launch Missiles
  Iran Unveils New Stealth Combat Vessel With Vertical-Launch Missiles

  A new Iranian-built advanced tech combat patrol vessel has just been put into service by the IRGC Navy. Iran’s military is claiming that the vessel, named the “Shahid Soleimani” – has a stealth capable body and design, giving it “radar-evading stealth technology, meaning that it has a very low level of radar cross-section,” state sources say.

  According to Bloomberg, citing state media, the vessel is the country’s first to be equipped with a “vertical launch, short- and medium-range air defense system” – and was unveiled at a Monday ceremony at the port city of Bandar Abbas, overseen by Major General Mohammad Bagheri, the Chief of General Staff of the Armed Forces, and IRGC chief Hossein Salami.

  

  The Shahid Soleimani is further being touted as capable of possessing higher maneuverability and smaller radius of rotation given the unique designed, compared to ships of similar size. Bagheri described of the new naval vessel, “The design and construction of this vessel was done by the elite youth and university graduates of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and it has a stealth-equipped body with a very low radar cross section, which can be considered as a national achievement for the country.”

  Earlier this summer, as construction was being completed, the naval analysis site USNI News previewed the following capabilities based on available radar images of the vessel seen from overhead: 

  These missile boats offer more conventional capabilities than the myriad of small boats operated by the IRGC-N. They could operate as command vessels for swarms of smaller boats armed with rockets, torpedoes, mines, lightweight anti-ship missiles and drones. They could also operate independently, offering a longer-range arm of the IRGC. Either way, the two new types of catamaran are likely to spearhead the IRGC-N’s modernization.

  While Iran struggles to build larger warships and incorporate modern weapon systems, it continues to innovate and modernize in other fields. Its ballistic missiles are treated with respect, as are its drones and cruise missiles. Iran can build submarines and, now, modern missile corvettes.

  Additionally this week Bagheri issued fresh warnings to the United States and Israel, citing the Iranian navy’s ability to secure the strategic Strait of Hormuz. The top general said in addressing naval officers:

  “Also, the Zionist regime’s joining the terrorist U.S. Army’s Central Command can create threats for us. We do not tolerate Zionism, and in addition to protesting through the country’s foreign policy apparatus, we declare that we will not tolerate such development of espionage and creating threats, and we will not make any compromises regarding the rights of the Iranian nation and the security of our seas and land.”

  First Video of IRGC Navy Shahid Soleimani class catamaran corvette.
  The vessel is claimed to have VLS for AD missiles with 150 km range. A helipad with Bell-206 helicopter and crane for supporting IRGC fast attack crafts can be seen at the first glance. pic.twitter.com/e8eypVIKV4

  — Mehdi H. (@mhmiranusa) September 5, 2022

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

  The remarks came a day after the United States flew two nuclear-capable B-52H Stratofortresses over the Middle East on Sunday in a message aimed at Tehran. Three Israeli F-16 fighter jets had briefly joined the US mission as the bombers made their way “through Israel’s skies on their way to the (Persian) Gulf,” the Associated Press reported. 

  Last week the US and Iran had multiple encounters and intercept incidents in the Gulf region, with the Iranians claiming to have seized and then let go of several US sea drones. The second Friday incident took place in the Red Sea, involving the intervention of a US warship and helicopter which forced an Iranian patrol to release a pair of seized small surface vessels seized earlier the same day.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 22:40

• Xi Doubles Down On COVID-Zero Before Party Congress
  Xi Doubles Down On COVID-Zero Before Party Congress

  By Jacob Gu, Bloomberg Markets Live analyst and reporter

  China’s tightening of Covid-fighting measures has diminished hope that the ruling Communist Party may start relaxing the rigorous restrictions after it concludes its 20th Party Congress in October. Doubling down on the Covid Zero policy may not only cause more pain in the already struggling economy, but also undermine confidence among investors and the general public, something former Premier Wen Jiabao has said is “more important than gold and money.”

  The nation’s National Health Commission (NHC) on Thursday announced a raft of new measures in its fight against the Covid-19 virus, including asking people to minimize travel during the Mid-Autumn Festival next week and National Day holidays in October. People traveling via airplanes and railways will need to present negative PCR test results within 48 hours prior to boarding. They must show proof of a negative test within 72 hours when checking into hotels and visiting tourist attractions.

  In a reversal of its guidance in June, the NHC now requires all regions to conduct regular PCR testing, regardless of whether they have outbreaks or not. Previously, the authorities refuted such tests as unnecessary.

  The new measures, which start on Sept. 10 and end on Oct 31, seem to be designed for minimizing outbreak risks before the Party Congress scheduled for mid-October.

  To some China watchers, such as Nomura’s economist Ting Lu, the Covid Zero policy is unlikely to change until at least 2023 because Beijing may either extend or reintroduce these measures after October. It’s partly due to the calendar: the virus is more infectious during the winter; millions of people will travel during the Chinese New Year holidays in January; and the once-in-a-decade central government reshuffling is due at the National People’s Congress’s annual session in March.

  Market sentiment is already poor. The CSI 300 Index tracking companies listed in Shanghai and Shenzhen ended a two-day advance. Chinese shares traded in the US tumbled.

  Even before the new rules were announced, economists were already busy lowering forecasts for China’s economy. Nomura this week cut its forecast for 2022 growth to 2.7% from 2.8%. On Thursday, Barclays lowered its growth estimate to 2.6% from 3.1%, citing challenges including Covid lockdowns. Of 78 market participants polled by Bloomberg, 25 now see China’s growth below 3% this year.

  The Covid policy is increasingly unpopular among some Chinese and it’s politically sensitive. On Wednesday, Huatai Financial Holdings (HK) published a report saying an analysis of pandemic data in Asia suggests that the death rate from Covid variant BA.5 is lower than that of influenza. The report, co-authored by chief economist Eva Yi and analyst Xun Zhu, went viral on social media before Huatai shelved the analysis, even though it didn’t comment on Beijing’s policy.

  Nobody is expecting the strict rules to be removed before the Party Congress. But political and policy finesse will be in urgent need afterward to save the economy and restore confidence following the prolonged quixotic fight against Covid, before it’s too late.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 22:20

• It Appears Money Can Buy Happiness After All…
  It Appears Money Can Buy Happiness After All…

  Throughout history, the pursuit of happiness has been a preoccupation of humankind.

  Of course, we humans are not just content with measuring our own happiness, but also our happiness in relation to the people around us – and even other people around the world. The annual World Happiness Report, which uses global survey data to report how people evaluate their own lives in more than 150 countries, helps us do just that.

  The factors that contribute to happiness are as subjective and specific as the billions of humans they influence, but there are a few that have continued to resonate over time.

  Family.

  Love.

  Purpose.

  Wealth.

  As Visual Capitalist’s Nick Routley details below, the first three examples are tough to measure, but the latter can be analyzed in a data-driven way.

  Does money really buy happiness? Let’s find out…

  Wealth and Happiness

  To crunch the numbers, we looked at data from Credit Suisse, which breaks down the average wealth per adult in various countries around the world.

  The chart below looks at 146 countries by their happiness score and wealth per adult:

  

  While the results don’t definitively point to wealth contributing to happiness, there is a strong correlation across the board. Broadly speaking, the world’s poorest countries have the lowest happiness scores, and the richest report being the most happy.

  Regional and Country-Level Observations

  While many of the countries follow an obvious trend (more wealth = more happiness), there are nuances and outliers worth exploring.

  • In Latin America, people self-report more happiness than the trend between wealth and happiness would predict.

  • On the flip side, many nations in the Middle East report slightly less happiness than levels of wealth would predict.

  • Political turmoil, an economic crisis, and the devastating explosion in Beirut have resulted in Lebanon scoring far worse than would be expected. Over the past decade, the country’s score has fallen by nearly two full points.

  • Hong Kong has seen its happiness score sink for years now. Inequality, protests, instability, and now COVID-19 outbreaks have placed the region in an unusual zone on the chart: rich and unhappy.

  Examining Inequality and Happiness

  We’ve looked at the relationship between wealth and happiness between countries, but what about within countries?

  The Gini Coefficient is a tool that allows us to do just that. This measure looks at income distribution across a population, and applies a score to that population. Simply put, a score of 0 would be “perfect equality”, and 1 would be “perfect inequality” (i.e. an individual or group of recipients is receiving the entire income distribution).

  Combined with the same happiness scale as before, this is how countries shape up.

  

  While there is no ironclad conclusion that can be derived from this dataset, there are big picture observations worth highlighting.

  The 5 Countries With Highest Income Inequality

  

  First, countries with lower income inequality tend to also report more happiness. The 5 countries in this dataset with the highest inequality (shown above) have an average happiness score 1.3 lower than the 5 countries with the lowest inequality (shown below).

  The 5 Countries With Lowest Income Inequality

  

   

  Next, interesting regional differences emerge.

   

  Despite high income inequality, many Latin American countries report levels of happiness similar to many much-wealthier European nations.

  The Bottom Line

  People have been seeking understanding on happiness for millennia now, and it’s unlikely that slicing and dicing datasets will crack the code. Still though, much like the pursuit of happiness, the pursuit of understanding is human nature.

  And, in more concrete terms, the more policymakers and the public understand the link between wealth and happiness, the more likely we can shape societies that give us a better chance at living a happy life.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 22:00

• Texas Sees Record 25.6% Tax-Revenue Surge Amid High Inflation
  Texas Sees Record 25.6% Tax-Revenue Surge Amid High Inflation

  Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  Tax revenue in Texas grew by a record 25.6 percent for the 2022 fiscal year through August, according to the latest tax collection data released by the state Comptroller of Public Accounts, Glenn Hegar.

  

  All-funds tax collection for fiscal year 2022 until August came in at $77.2 billion, beating projections made in the Certification Revenue Estimate by nearly $841 million, the data show.

  Since 1988, the growth in the all-funds tax collections has exceeded the prior fiscal year by double digits just five times. And even then, the increases were only in the range of 10 to 13 percent. The 26 percent increase in fiscal 2022 until August is almost double the largest increase seen since 1988.

  In a Sept. 1 press release, Hegar credited the higher sales tax collections to economic growth and inflation. As demand remains strong, both individuals and businesses continue to pay elevated prices for goods, he pointed out.

  State sales tax receipts tend to spike during periods of high inflation. The 12-month Consumer Price Index (CPI), a measure of annual inflation, has remained above 7 percent for every single month in 2022, hitting a peak of 9.1 percent in June.

  The CPI was only at 1.4 percent in January 2021 when President Joe Biden took office. In a recently published survey conducted by The Dallas Morning News and the University of Texas at Tyler, 48 percent of respondents blamed Biden and Congress for inflation and the rising cost of living.

  Texas does not have a corporate income tax or state income tax meaning the state is highly reliant on sales taxes for its revenue. Sales tax accounts for 56 percent of all tax collections in Texas and is the largest source of government funding.

  Sector-Wise Tax, Future Collections

  “The strong growth in August came from receipts remitted by the oil and gas mining sector, which were up by nearly 80 percent compared with a year ago,” Hegar said in the release.

  “Receipts from the construction, manufacturing, and wholesale trade sectors showed double-digit growth for the ninth consecutive month, demonstrating continued strong spending by businesses in the state.”

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 21:40

• These Are The World's Most-Searched Consumer Brands In 2022
  These Are The World’s Most-Searched Consumer Brands In 2022

  In today’s fast-paced world, a strong brand is a powerful asset that helps a business stand out in a sea of competition.

  What are some of the most popular brands around the world? One way to gauge this is by looking at Google searches to see what consumers are searching for online (and therefore, what brands they’re paying the most attention to).

  As Visual Capitalist’s Carmen Ang details below, this graphic by BusinessFinancing.co.uk uses data from Google Keyword Planner to show the world’s most searched consumer brands in the twelve months leading up to March 2022.

  

  Methodology

  To source this wide of a dataset, the team at BusinessFinancing.co.uk first compiled a list of well-known brands, using a number of reputable sources including Forbes, the Financial Times, BrandDirectory, and more.

  From there, the team created a shortlist of popular consumer brands. This year, they focused on businesses that sell products and services, so some of the big tech companies like Google and Meta were excluded from the 2022 ranking.

  Next, the team used Google Ads API to extract search volume data for the shortlisted brands. They looked at a couple of things:

  • The monthly average of searches over the last 12 months for the brand name alone (e.g. “Nike”)
  • Brand name with the corresponding sector added to the keyword (“Nike clothing”), which helped offset the skew in search volume for generic terms like “Apple” or “Amazon”

  They did this for every country in the world with data available. Here’s what they found.

  The Top 5 Most Searched Brands

  While Netflix is the most frequently searched brand in the highest number of countries (92), Amazon takes the top spot when it comes to total search volume.

  Here’s a look at the top five most search brands by average global monthly searches:

  

   

  But a brand’s search popularity doesn’t necessarily reflect that the business is thriving. For instance, in April 2022, Netflix announced it had lost around 200,000 subscribers throughout Q1.

   

  The week of the announcement, Netflix’s stock price dipped below $200—the lowest it had been since 2017.

  Smartphones

  Apple and its iPhone take the top spot when it comes to smartphone searches, which may be unsurprisingly considering the top five best-selling smartphones in 2021 were all iPhones.

  

  View the high resolution of this infographic by clicking here.

  It’s worth noting that the top five best-selling smartphones only capture a fraction of the overall smartphone market, and while iPhones are undeniably popular, they only make up 16.7% of worldwide smartphone sales.

  Gaming

  Epic Games, the creator and platform of Fortnite, maintains its status as the most searched-for gaming brand worldwide, with an average of 14.9 million global monthly searches.

  

  View the high resolution of this infographic by clicking here.

  No other gaming company came close to Epic Game’s search volume. For instance, Nintendo, which came in second place, only averaged 3.2 million searches a month.

  However, Nintendo still managed to generate more than $16 billion in revenue throughout 2021, triple the gross revenue that Epic Games made the same year.

  Fast Food

  KFC was the most searched fast-food company in more than 83 countries, making it the most popular worldwide.

  

  View the high resolution of this infographic by clicking here.

  However, it’s worth noting that, while McDonald’s ranked first in fewer countries, it had a higher global monthly search average than its fried chicken competitor.

  In 2021, KFC generated approximately $2.79 billion in global revenue, while McDonald’s brought in $23.2 billion.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 21:20

• The "Correct" Attitude About The War In Ukraine
  The “Correct” Attitude About The War In Ukraine

  Authored by Finn Andreen via The Mises Institute,

  There are themes in the West that are difficult to question without running the risk of receiving sharp criticism. For the following themes, for example, there is a position considered “correct” by Western collective opinion: “Welfare State,” “climate policy,” “multicultural society,” or “covid-19 vaccination.”

  It is implied that the “acceptable” position to each one of these themes can and should be adopted without any prior critical analysis at the individual level.

  The list of these themes is not static; new ones rise to prominence in society, while others become less important over time. In recent years two new themes have emerged: “authoritarian Russia” and “communist China,” which is not surprising considering that Washington, and thus, by extension. the West, has decided to treat these two nations as strategic enemies.

  

  A recent study shows, for example, that in a very short time the percentage of Americans with a negative view of China increased dramatically, from 46 percent to 67 percent. This is not a coincidence, but the result of a media communication strategy.

  The Critique of the Antiwar Position

  As far as Russia is concerned, the “correct” attitude to have in the West, especially since the start of the Ukraine conflict on February 24, 2022, is no less than an absolute condemnation of that country. Support for Ukraine must be comprehensive and can receive social confirmation by a small blue and yellow flag on Facebook. Unconditional support for the economic war waged by Western leaders against Russia is also socially required for Europeans, even though they will be the first to suffer from it.

  It is for this reason that the Amnesty International report of August 4, 2022, which confirmed that “Ukrainian forces putting civilians at risk and violating the laws of war when they operate in populated areas” became a media bomb, not only in Ukraine but also in the West. This report disturbs a lot of people because it is not in line with the black and white view of Russia as a criminal aggressor and Ukraine as an innocent victim.

  The people who do not take the “correct” stance on the conflict in Ukraine are often accused of being “pro-Russian,” even when this stance simply consists in being objective; by considering the recent history and behavior of the various protagonists. They are considered “pro-Russian” because they do not express unconditional support for Ukraine, but more often, propose conditions for peace. Indeed, the position of most of these critics is not at all “pro-Russian,” but “pro-peace” by supporting active Western efforts to reach a ceasefire, thus sparing as many Ukrainian lives as possible.

  Western media did not react when, on July 14, 2022, the Ukrainian government published a black list of Western politicians, academics, and activists who, according to Kiev, “promote Russian propaganda.” This list includes leading Western intellectuals and politicians, such as Republican Senator Rand Paul, former Democratic Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, military and geopolitical analyst Edward N. Luttwak, the political realist John Mearsheimer, and award-winning freelance journalist Glenn Greenwald.

  Though this Ukrainian blacklist should obviously have been condemned in the West, it has hardly elicited any reactions at all, because the Western media already agree with its conclusion: the people on the list are already criticized in their own countries for not adopting the pro-Ukrainian position. Moreover, would the Ukrainian government have dared to publish such a list if it had not had the prior agreement of Washington?

  The Formation of the Collective Opinion

  What is happening in the case of the attitude toward Russia, as well as in the other themes mentioned above, is not surprising or new. In his famous work, On Liberty (1859), John Stuart Mill is perhaps today best known for his prescient early warning of the dangers of the “collective opinion”; the “tyranny of the majority” in the form of “the dominant opinions and feelings that society is trying to impose” on a minority.

  Society’s majority is naturally intolerant of nonconformism, because thinking like everyone else gives psychological comfort and strengthens social ties. Yet, though society depends on collective opinion for its social cohesion, paradoxically it also depends for its well-being on views that run counter to this majority opinion. Just as natural science progresses only through the sometimes tortuous but generally respectful process of peer review, society also needs minority opinions and dissident voices to curb the permanent search for consensus on the part of the majority.

  But minority opinions will suffocate if there is no deeper understanding of Mill’s idea. Fortunately, this understanding exists today. To Mill’s “collective opinion” were added fundamental sociological concepts, such as “crowd psychology” (Gustave Le Bon, 1895), the “political formula” (Gaetano Mosca, 1923), “propaganda” (Edward Bernays, 1928), the “role of the intellectuals” (F.A. Hayek, 1949), the “banality of evil” (H. Arendt, 1963), the “manufacturing of consent” (Chomsky and Herman, 1988), and recently the concept of “mass formation psychosis” (Matthias Desmet).

  This accumulated knowledge in the reference above leaves no doubt about the will and the ability of Western political and financial elites to form and direct collective opinion through the control that they exert explicitly and implicitly on the editorial boards of traditional media and on social media platforms. The development of the opinions of Western majorities to the themes mentioned at the beginning of this article is largely the result of these elites” influence on Western public opinion. The collective opinion with respect to climate change is probably the most glaring example of this influence today, considering the significant economic consequences that it will have for Western society.

  Libertarianism Is the Only Solution

  Political globalization, an antiliberal process which has been underway for several decades, has the effect of aligning national political centers and thus reducing plurality. Gradually, Western political power is flowing toward supranational institutions (like the UN, the EU, the World Economic Forum). This centralization of political power, and the resulting economic concentration of business, including concentration of media groups that this has entailed enables and facilitates the formation of public opinion by the Western elites.

  The political philosophy that theoretically is best placed to solve this dilemma of modern society is libertarianism, because it clearly argues for a significant and definitive reduction of political power, both nationally and internationally.

  One of the strengths of libertarianism is precisely the importance it places on the cultural and intellectual plurality of a free society. This is the famous “marketplace of ideas” which, like the free market in goods and services, can only exist partially with the pervasive crony capitalism and massive State intervention that most Western societies are subject to today. In a free society, that is, a highly decentralized society with a weak State having at most a night watchman role, the formation of public opinion by political elites then becomes impossible.

  The present moment in history represents a particular threat to freedom, because the ruling globalist elites now have an unprecedented opportunity to shape the attitudes and opinions of their societies, in their own, often twisted, interests. At the same time, the new and easy access by the general public to alternative analyses and independent information, can counteract this nefarious trend. In these social conditions, Western voices of freedom must continue to present libertarianism, not only for its economic benefits but also as a means of liberating Western peoples from the chains of directed collective opinion.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 21:00

• "Really A Desperate Time": Summer Drought Wreaks Havoc Across Northeast Farmland
  “Really A Desperate Time”: Summer Drought Wreaks Havoc Across Northeast Farmland

  Drought conditions expanded and intensified over the Northeast this summer, according to the latest report from the US Drought Monitor. 

  Extreme drought plagues eastern Massachusetts, including Boston, and southern and eastern Rhode Island. A severe drought is more widespread, encompassing much of South Jersey up to the coastal area of Maine. Much of the Northeast is in abnormally dry conditions as of Thursday. 

  

  The emergence of the Northeast drought comes as the US West experiences a historic megadrought threatening supplies of fresh water, food, and hydropower. 

  

  As of Tuesday, not a single county in Connecticut, Massachusetts, or Rhode Island is free of drought (and or dry conditions). This will impact the summer’s growing season and may shrink crop yields.

  In Rhode Island, farmers who can typically harvest hay three times in a season are expected to do so only once this year. Because each harvest varies in quality and size, that means losing about half the value of the entire crop, estimated Henry Wright, who grows about 300 acres (121 hectares) of hay and corn. 

  The fields are in such poor condition that as the season winds down, Wright is unlikely to be able reseed in the fall. He’ll have to wait until next year, shortening the growing season. He expects the 2023 hay crop to be only 10% to 20% of normal. 

  “It’s just not going to happen,” said Wright, who’s also president of the Rhode Island Farm Bureau. “This is really a desperate time.”

  In parts of Massachusetts in late August, the Charles River, which runs along Harvard University’s campus and is the site of a world-renowned annual rowing competition, shrank to a trickle. Near the Cochrane Dam on the border of the towns of Needham and Dover, the river mainly became a series of disconnected puddles and pools. 

  In Rhode Island, “we had fairly normal rainfall through June, then it just dropped off the edge of a table,” said Ken Ayars, chief of the agriculture and forest environment division at the state Department of Environmental Management.

  The drought is also affecting the quality of the feed that’s available, which will impact how much milk the cows produce. And because cows don’t sweat, they don’t do well in the heat, which can further affect their milk supply. Osofsky expects the herd’s output to be down about a fifth this year, shaving 20% off his annual profit of $300,000 to $400,000. And that’s excluding the additional expense of buying feed. 

  “The whole dairy game is milk,” Osofsky said. “It’s making as much milk as we can as cheaply as we can. So this has made it terribly expensive to do.” — Bloomberg 

  The drought has also impacted some drinking water reservoirs across New Jersey. In July, the Murphy administration asked New Jersey residents and businesses to conserve water due to moderate to severe drought impacting parts of the state. The water crisis appears worse further north. 

  The drought has impacted farmers and their crops in Connecticut, meanwhile in Massachusetts over 100 towns and cities have put in place water restriction due to low flow on local rivers. We’ll cover all that today at 2pm on @NBCNewsNow @NBC10Boston @NBCConnecticut @TelemundoNI pic.twitter.com/09veGssLvE

  — Grace Gómez (@GraceGomez) September 2, 2022

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

  “The scene of the Charles is bad — but unfortunately not unique in Massachusetts.” Across the state, drought has severely impacted local rivers, particularly Boston’s own Charles River.
  How the Charles River is being affected by drought – The Boston Globe
  At Millennium Park in… pic.twitter.com/f2FTRDTBOt

  — Melissa Green (@Melissa67773819) September 1, 2022

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

  Brad Rippey, a meteorologist with the US Department of Agriculture, said a high-pressure system above the Northeast had been the source of the dryness. He said the system blocked storms from coming into the region, contributing to less rainfall. 

  Rippey said 40% of the US is consumed in a drought. A protracted La Niña weather pattern has meant hotter and drier weather conditions in the West. 

  The odds of La Nina sticking around through January are now 80%, up from 72% a month ago, according to a new forecast by the US Climate Prediction Center. This could be the third time since 1950 when the weather phenomenon occurred in three consecutive years. 

  

  So is La Nina to blame for chaotic weather patterns across the US, or is it “climate change” as the mainstream media is hellbent on convincing the masses the world is headed for climate doom? 

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 20:40

• Greenpeace Co-Founder Patrick Moore Says Climate Change Based On False Narratives
  Greenpeace Co-Founder Patrick Moore Says Climate Change Based On False Narratives

  Authored by Lee Yun-Jeong via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  Patrick Moore, one of the founders of Greenpeace, said in an email obtained by The Epoch Times that his reasons for leaving Greenpeace were very clear: “Greenpeace was ‘hijacked’ by the political left when they realized there was money and power in the environmental movement. [Left-leaning] political activists in North America and Europe changed Greenpeace from a science-based organization to a political fundraising organization,” Moore said.

  

  Moore left Greenpeace in 1986, 15 years after he co-founded the organization.

  “The ‘environmental’ movement has become more of a political movement than an environmental movement,” he said. “They are primarily focused on creating narratives, stories, that are designed to instill fear and guilt into the public so the public will send them money.”

  He said they mainly operate behind closed doors with other political operatives at the U.N., World Economic Forum, and so on, all of which are primarily political in nature.

  The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [IPCC] is “not a science organization,” he said. “It is a political organization composed of the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Program.

  “The IPCC hires scientists to provide them with ‘information’ that supports the ‘climate emergency’ narrative.

  Their campaigns against fossil fuels, nuclear energy, CO2, plastic, etc., are misguided and designed to make people think the world will come to an end unless we cripple our civilization and destroy our economy. They are now a negative influence on the future of both the environment and human civilization.”

  “Today, the left has adopted many policies that would be very destructive to civilization as they are not technically achievable. Only look at the looming energy crisis in Europe and the UK, which Putin is taking advantage of. But it is of their own making in refusing to develop their own natural gas resources, opposing nuclear energy, and adopting an impossible position on fossil fuels in general,” Moore wrote.

  The Left ‘Hijacked’ Greenpeace

  

  He said “green” for the environment and “peace” for the people were the organization’s founding principles, but peace was largely forgotten, and green had become the sole agenda.

  “Many [so-called] ‘environmental’ leaders were now saying that ‘humans are the enemies of the Earth, the enemies of Nature.’ I could not accept that humans are the only evil species. This is too much like ‘original sin,’ that humans are born with evil, but all the other species are good, even cockroaches, mosquitos, and diseases,” Moore argued.

  He said the new dominant philosophy is that the world would be better if fewer people existed.

  “But the people who said this were not volunteering to be the first to go away. They behave as if they are superior to others. This kind of ‘pride’ and ‘conceit’ is the worst of the Cardinal Sins,” Moore said.

  Environmental Activist

  As a prominent scholar, ecologist, and long-time leader in the international environmental field, Patrick Moore is widely regarded as one of the world’s most qualified experts on the environment. He is also a founder of Greenpeace, the world’s largest environmental activist organization.

  Moore received his Ph.D. in Ecology from the University of British Columbia in 1974 and an Honorary Doctorate of Science from North Carolina State University in 2005.

  

  He co-founded Greenpeace in 1971 and served as president of Greenpeace Canada for nine years. From 1979 to 1986, Moore served as the Director of Greenpeace International, a driving force shaping the group’s policies and directions. During his 15-year tenure, Greenpeace became the world’s largest environmental activist organization.

  In 1991, Moore founded Greenspirit, a consultancy focusing on environmental policies, energy, climate change, biodiversity, genetically modified food, forests, fisheries, food, and resources.

  Between 2006 and 2012, Moore served as co-chairman of the Clean and Safe Energy Coalition, a U.S.-based environmental advocacy group.

  In 2014, he was appointed Chairman of Ecology, Energy, and Prosperity of Frontier Centre for Public Policy, a non-partisan Canadian public policy think tank.

  In 2019 and 2020, Moore served as the Chair of CO2 Coalition, a U.S.-based nonprofit environmental advocacy group dedicated to disputing false claims on CO2 as relates to climate change.

  False Narrative on Chlorine

  “At the time I decided to leave Greenpeace, I was one of 6 Directors of Greenpeace International. I was the only one with formal science education, BSc Honors in Science and Forestry, and Ph.D. in Ecology. My fellow directors decided that Greenpeace should begin a campaign to ‘Ban Chlorine Worldwide.’”

  Moore said it is true that elemental chlorine gas is highly toxic and was used as a weapon in World War I. However, chlorine is one of the 94 [naturally-ocurring] elements on the Periodic Table and has many roles in biology and human health. For example, table salt (NaCl or Sodium Chloride) is an essential nutrient for all animals and many plants. It is impossible to “ban” NaCl.

  

  He pointed out that adding chlorine to drinking water, swimming pools, and spas was one of the most significant advances in public health history in preventing the spread of water-borne communicable diseases such as cholera. And about 85 percent of pharmaceutical drugs are made with chlorine-related chemistry, and about 25 percent of all our medicines contain chlorine. All halogens, including chlorine, bromine, and iodine, are powerful antibiotics; without them, medicine would not be the same.

  “Greenpeace named chlorine ‘The Devil’s Element’ and calls PVC, polyvinyl chloride, or simply vinyl, ‘the Poison Plastic.’ All of this is fake [and] to scare the public. In addition, this misguided policy reinforces the attitude that humans are not a worthy species and that the world would be better off without them. I could not convince my fellow Greenpeace directors to abandon this misguided policy. This was the turning point for me,” Moore said.

  False Narrative on Polar Bears

  When asked how Greenpeace utilizes its massive donations, Moore said it was used to pay for “a very large staff” (likely over 2,000), extensive advertisements, and fundraising programs. And virtually all of the organization’s ads for fundraising are based on false narratives, which he had thoroughly disproven in his books, one example being the polar bears.

  

  “The International Treaty on Polar Bears, signed by all polar countries in 1973, to ban unrestricted hunting of polar bears, is never mentioned in the media, Greenpeace, or politicians who say the polar bear is going extinct due to melting ice in the Arctic. In fact, the polar bear population has increased from 6,000 to 8,000 in 1973 to 30,000 to 50,000 today. This is not disputed,” Moore said.

  “But now they say the polar bear will go extinct in 2100 as if they have a magic crystal ball that can predict the future. In fact, this past winter in the Arctic saw an expansion of ice from previous years, and Antarctica was colder during the last winter than in the past 50 years.”

  Moore said that he does not pretend to know everything and predict the future with confidence like many in the “climate emergency” business claim they can do.

  The Goal of the ‘Environmental Apocalypse’ Theory

  “I believe the human population has always been vulnerable to people who predict doom with false stories,” Moore said.

  “The Aztecs threw virgins into volcanos, and the Europeans and Americans burned women as witches for 200 years claiming this would ‘save the world’ from evil people. This has been [referred to as] ‘herd mentality,’ ‘groupthink,’ and ‘cult behavior.’ Humans are social animals with a hierarchy, and it is easiest to gain a high position by using fear and control.”

  Moore said the environmental apocalypse theory is mostly about “political power and control,” adding that he is dedicated to showing people that the situation is not as negative as they are told.

  “Today, in the richest countries, our descendants are making decisions that our grandchildren will have to pay for,” he said. “Predictions that the world is coming to an end have been made for thousands of years. Not once has this come true. Why should we believe it now?”

  “People are naturally afraid of the future because it is unknown and full of risks and difficult decisions. I believe there is also an element of ‘self-loathing’ in this apocalypse movement.”

  Moore said the young generation today is taught that humans are not worthy and are destroying the earth. This indoctrination has made them feel guilty and ashamed of themselves, which is the wrong way to go about life.

  The Demonization of Carbon Dioxide

  “Very few people believe the world is not warming. The record is clear that the world has been warming since about the year 1700, 150 years before we were using fossil fuels. 1700 was the peak of the Little Ice Age, which was very cold and caused crop failures and starvation. Before that, around 1000 A.D. was the Medieval Warm period when Vikings farmed Greenland. [And] before that, around 500 A.D. were the Dark Ages, and before that, the Roman Warm Period when it was warmer than today, and the sea level was 1–2 meters higher than today,” Moore said.

  

  “Even until about 1950, the amount of fossil fuel used and CO2 emitted were very small compared to today. We do not know the cause of these periodic fluctuations in temperature, but it was certainly not CO2.”

  Moore clarified that the “minority opinion” is not about the history of the Earth’s temperature, but it is the relationship between the temperature and CO2 that is at the center of the dispute.

  “In this regard, I agree that many believe CO2 is the main cause of warming. CO2 is invisible, so no one can actually see what it is doing. And this ‘majority’ are mainly scientists paid by politicians and bureaucrats, media making headlines, or activists making money. [The rest are] the public who believe this story even though they can’t actually see what CO2 is doing,” Moore said.

  Moore provided a graph of temperature continuously measured over 350 years (from 1659 to 2009) in central England. “If carbon dioxide was the main cause of warming, then there should be a rise in temperature along the carbon dioxide curve, but it doesn’t,” he explained.

  

  Moore described the demonization of CO2 as “completely ridiculous.” He added that CO2 is the basis of all life on Earth and its concentration in the atmosphere today, even with the increase, is lower than it has been for a large majority of life’s existence.

  Rising CO2 Correlates With Increased Plantation: Study

  A study in 2013 found that increased levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) have helped boost green foliage across the world’s arid regions over the past 30 years.

  

  The Australian government agency CSIRO conducted the research in collaboration with Australian National University (ANU). The data was based on satellite observations from the year 1982 to 2010 across parts of the arid areas in Australia, North America, the Middle East, and Africa.

  It found an 11 percent increase in foliage cover in the studied area due to what’s called “CO2 fertilization.”

  The study said a fertilization effect occurs when elevated CO2 levels enable a leaf during photosynthesis—the process by which green plants convert sunlight into sugar—to extract more carbon from the air or lose less water to the air or both.

  “If elevated CO2 causes the water use of individual leaves to drop, plants in arid environments will respond by increasing their total numbers of leaves. These changes in leaf cover can be detected by satellite, particularly in deserts and savannas where the cover is less complete than in wet locations,” according to Randall Donohue, the CSIRO research scientist.

  Breaking the Global Warming Narrative

  “Climate alarmists prefer to discuss climate knowledge only since 1850. The time before this they referred to as the pre-industrial age. This ‘pre-industrial age’ was more than 3 billion years when life was on the Earth. Many climate changes [occurred during that period], including Ice Ages, Hothouse Ages, major extinctions due to asteroid impacts, and other unknown causes,” Moore said.

  “Today, the Earth is in the Pleistocene Ice Age, which began 2.6 million years ago. … So, the most recent major glaciation, which peaked 20,000 years ago, was not the end of the Ice Age. We are still in the Pleistocene Ice Age no matter how the climate alarmists wish to deny this.”

  He said the great irony of the present panic about the climate is that the Earth is colder today than it was for 250 million years before the Pleistocene Ice Age set in. And CO2 is lower now than in more than 95 percent of Earth’s history.

  “But you would never know this if you listen to all the people who benefit from the lie that the Earth will soon be too hot for life and that CO2 will become higher than in Earth’s history,” Moore said.

  ‘More CO2 Is Beneficial to the Environment and Humans’

  According to Moore, nearly all commercial greenhouse farmers worldwide buy CO2 to inject into their greenhouses to realize up to 60 percent higher crop yields.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 20:20

• Apple's Big Product Launch: It Was All About The iPhone Price
  Apple’s Big Product Launch: It Was All About The iPhone Price

  For those who missed it, and to be honest there was not much if anything new…

  Apple executives after selling everyone the iPhone 11 for the 4th time pic.twitter.com/DDgVsA9H7z

  — Marcus Hutchins (@MalwareTechBlog) September 7, 2022

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

  … as even Steve Job’s daughter joked, here is a snapshot of everything that was announced at yesterday’s iPhone 14 reveal, courtesy of Goldman:

  • Pro pricing unchanged, Satellite connectivity, new premium Watch, all as expected Apple’s big Fall event revealed mostly incremental improvements (in GIR’s opinion) as the company launched a new iPhone, Watch, and AirPods.

  • Apple kept its USD pricing for all models of iPhone unchanged and inserted the new 14+ at the price we had expected. Rod believes this is likely the best pricing outcome for Apple as it avoids increasing the risk of Pro downgrades to non-Pro models and preserves some ASP with the 14+ at a higher pricepoint.

  • With regards to international prices, the company did partially adjust pricing for USD strength in international markets though the partial adjustment suggests a possible tradeoff of margin for unit demand.

  • As for other features, Apple launched a new Emergency SOS service via satellite connectivity in all new iPhones and is surprisingly offering the service free for 2 years.

  • The company also launched a new premium Watch Ultra priced at $799 which features a larger 49mm titanium case and a redesigned digital crown among other things. This had been heavily speculated in the press and the product is more or less in line with those reports.

  • Since the Apple Watch Ultra is a completely new product we expect most press to focus on this as the product release nears on September 23. We are particularly interested in how consumers react to the significantly larger size though the feature set looks attractive for outdoor enthusiasts.

  • Finally, the company also rolled out an upgrade to its popular AirPods Pro product with longer battery life and better sound quality. Apple’s stock was up slightly on the day but Rod sees little reason for incremental positivity on a product launch that was largely as expected

  Apple now has an iPhone for (almost) every wallet, starting with the budget-friendly iPhone SE from $429 and ending with the top-of-the-line 1TB 14 Pro Max for a whopping $1,599 in the United States (and significantly more in other parts of the world).

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  Looking at the reactions from the broader analyst community, Apple analysts said the biggest takeaway from the company’s product event was its pricing strategy, after the iPhone maker unveiled new versions of its smartphone and watch:

  Piper Sandler (overweight, PT $195)

  • Most importantly, average selling prices for these new phones were kept consistent with last year’s models
  • “Given the constrained economic environment we think this is an incremental positive”

  Canaccord Genuity (buy, PT $200)

  • Apple met investor expectations with its product launch and “has a strong lineup to deliver healthy holiday sales”
  • The company’s ecosystem approach, which includes an installed base that exceeds 1.8B devices globally, “should continue to generate strong services revenue”
  • “Longer term, we expect the higher margin services revenue growth to outpace total company growth and drive gross margin expansion”

  KeyBanc Capital Markets

  • The addition of incremental 4G/5G bands in the new iPhones is a “moderately positive for the RF group” that includes AVGO, QRVO, SWKS
  • Meanwhile, Apple’s decision to standardize eSIM might be a negative for wireless carriers, particularly AT&T and Verizon, as it makes switching carriers easier

  Wells Fargo Securities (overweight, PT $185)

  • The announcements “again prove to be more evolutionary than revolutionary,” and therefore the lack of change in the pricing strategy for Pro and Pro Max models is important; “we think investors were expecting up to a $100 price increase on the new high-end devices”
  • Apple’s expanded Apple Watch line-up is “an incremental positive”

  Evercore ISI (outperform, PT $185)

  • The announcements were “largely as expected,” though “some may be slightly surprised by the lack of pricing action”

  Wedbush (outperform, PT $220)

  • The lack of a price increase was a surprise to the Street
  • “We believe Apple is expecting another heavy iPhone Pro and Pro Max mix shift which is a clear positive for [average selling prices] heading into FY23”

  Bloomberg Intelligence

  • “Overall, we don’t anticipate that these new products are likely to spur noticeable sales growth in the company’s next fiscal year”

   

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 20:00

• County Official In Nevada Arrested In Connection With Murder Of Las Vegas Reporter: Report
  County Official In Nevada Arrested In Connection With Murder Of Las Vegas Reporter: Report

  Authored by Mimi Nguyen Ly via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  Police have arrested a county official in Nevada in connection to the recent murder of a Las Vegas Review-Journal investigative reporter who had written articles about the official, the newspaper reported.

  

  The murdered reporter, Jeff German, was found dead outside his home on Sept. 3. He died of “multiple sharp force injuries” in a homicide, the Clark County Office of the Coroner/Medical Examiner said on Sept. 4. Police said at the time that German appeared to have been in an altercation with another person prior to the stabbing.

  Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo told the Las Vegas Review-Journal around 6:30 p.m. local time on Sept. 7 that Clark County Public Administrator Robert Telles had been arrested.

  The newspaper reported that shortly before Lombardo’s confirmation, police in tactical gear had surrounded Telles’ home, and about 30 minutes later, Telles was wheeled out of his home on a stretcher and was loaded into an ambulance.

  The arrest comes after officers executed search warrants on Telles’ residence earlier in the day. Local outlets reported that a home at which officers were seen belongs to Telles. The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department confirmed to The Epoch Times the execution of warrants were related to German’s murder.

  Vehicle at Crime Scene Matches Description of One in Official’s Garage

  Police had interviewed Telles and searched his home, including his vehicle, which matched the description of a vehicle witnesses saw at the scene of the crime.

  Police on Sept. 6 had released an image of the vehicle, which was described as a 2007 to 2014 red or maroon GMC Yukon Denali with chrome handles, a sunroof, and a luggage rack.

  Reporters with the Las Vegas Review-Journal said that they saw Telles in the driveway of his home with a vehicle matching the description. The GMC vehicle, as well as a second vehicle, were towed from Telles’ property at about 12:50 p.m local time on Sept. 7, reported the outlet.

  Telles did not speak to reporters outside his home around 2:20 p.m., after he was interviewed and searched by police. He was wearing what appeared to be a hazmat suit and sandals, as if he had discarded his clothes, or surrendered them as evidence.

  German, 69, was well known in Las Vegas for his decades of reporting on political malfeasance and organized crime.

  

  Telles, who is due to leave office in January, had lost the Democratic primary election in June. The 45-year-old official’s failed reelection bid came shortly after German reported that Telles had an inappropriate relationship with a subordinate and treated workers poorly.

  On Twitter in June, Telles called German “obsessed” with him and said that his wife had caught German going through his trash. “Looking forward to lying smear piece #4 by @JGermanRJ,” Telles wrote on June 18 on Twitter. “I think he’s mad that I haven’t crawled into a hole and died.”

  German had also previously written other articles that involved Telles and had recently filed public records requests for emails and text messages between Telles and three other county officials.

  In a letter on his website, Telles said that the articles German authored had contained false allegations. “I know that Clark County will find that I have done nothing wrong,” he wrote of German’s allegations.

  Arrest of Official an ‘Enormous Relief’: Newspaper Editor

  Glenn Cook, the Las Vegas Review-Journal’s executive editor, said on Sept. 7 that Telles’s arrest is “at once an enormous relief and an outrage for the Review-Journal newsroom.”

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 19:40

• China's "ESG" Funds Include Coal Companies And Firms Tied To Alleged Human Rights Violations In Xinjiang
  China’s “ESG” Funds Include Coal Companies And Firms Tied To Alleged Human Rights Violations In Xinjiang

  Further proving that ESG investments can include…anything anybody wants…and proving that the entire notion of ESG investing is one giant racket, it was reported this week that ESG investment initiatives in China have investors funneling their cash into liquor and coal companies. 

  Fund manager Hou Chunyan, who recently pitched ESG investing as a way to stay compatible with China’s goals of “common prosperity”, said in a presentation in June that her fund, the Da Cheng ESG Responsibility Investment Mixed Fund, doesn’t exclude coal companies or liquor stocks, according to Yahoo/Bloomberg. 

  Additionally, the piece notes that ESG funds also invest in chemical manufacturers and solar and technology firms tied to forced labor in Xinjiang. 

  President Xi Jinping’s net-zero commitment and anti-poverty campaigns have prompted 112 new ESG funds to pop up in China over the last 20 months, according to Bloomberg data. This is about three times as many that debuted over the four years prior. 

  Retail investors in China are providing plenty of demand for the funds, Fidelity said. There are now $50 billion in ESG assets in China – about double what there was in the beginning of 2021. 

  And because “ESG” in China also means tethering your fund to China’s political goals, about 15% of the country’s ESG funds are invested in coal. More than 60% own steel companies, who are massive consumers of the country’s coal. 

  

  Bradford Cornell, emeritus professor of financial economics at UCLA, told Bloomberg: “People say ESG like we’ve agreed upon what it is — we’ve not. In China, the rules on environmental and social issues are made by the Chinese Communist Party.”

  Liu Xiangfeng, whose Beijing-based firm, QuantData, specializes in ESG analysis, added: “A local analyst would consider being a state-owned enterprise a good thing, while their counterpart in Europe might consider it a deal-breaker. There is culture and ideology involved.”

  The country’s CSI 300 ESG Leaders index includes China Shenhua Energy Co., which gets 78% of its revenue from coal mining, and alcohol company Kweichow Moutai Co.

  About 10% of the country’s ESG funds also hold Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology Co., which is a company that has already been placed under U.S. trade sanctions due to alleged human rights violations in Xinjiang. 

  Shirley Xu, head of ESG research at China Asset Management Co., said: “As an asset manager in China, aside from using international ratings as a reference, we must follow China’s current stage of industry development and invest accordingly.” 

  Boya Wang, an ESG analyst at Morningstar Inc. concluded: “The government is bound to generate its own interpretation of ESG, because they want to make sure it will not conflict with the country’s national economic strategies…social inequality and local unemployment top the agenda.”

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 19:20

• Judge Bars Official Who Took Part In Jan. 6 From 'Seeking Or Holding' Office
  Judge Bars Official Who Took Part In Jan. 6 From ‘Seeking Or Holding’ Office

  Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  A judge in New Mexico has barred an official who was convicted for being on the grounds of the U.S. Capitol while it was breached on Jan. 6, 2021, from seeking or holding state or federal office, and removed the official from his position.

  

  State District Court Judge Francis Mathew found that Couy Griffin, an Otero County commissioner, took an oath to support the U.S. Constitution when assuming the position.

  Mathew also concluded that the Capitol breach was “an insurrection against the U.S. Constitution” and that Griffin “engaged in” the insurrection when he entered restricted Capitol grounds.

  Three New Mexico residents, represented by the Washington-based nonprofit Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics, had asked the court to bar Griffin from holding office.

  They pointed to Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which says that no person shall hold a federal or state office if they “having previously taken an oath … to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.”

  Due to the breach constituting an insurrection and Griffin participating after taking an oath in support of the Constitution, Griffin was disqualified from holding a state or federal office as of the day of the breach, according to the new ruling.

  “Mr. Griffin aided the insurrection even though he did not personally engage in violence,” Mathew said. “By joining the mob and trespassing on restricted Capitol grounds, Mr. Griffin contributed to delaying Congress’s election-certification proceedings.”

  Griffin, who also founded a group called Cowboys for Trump, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. A phone call to the number listed for him on the Otero County website was not answered.

  The two other Otero County commissioners did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 19:00

• Lender Seizes Evergrande's Hong Kong Headquarters
  Lender Seizes Evergrande’s Hong Kong Headquarters

  It may not have been China’s Lehman, but just like Lehman, Evergrande’s sprawling headquarters now belongs to someone else: according to the FT, Evergrande’s Hong Kong headquarters building has been seized by a lender after the struggling Chinese property developer defaulted on a loan and twice failed to sell the building.

  The lender, whose identity has not yet been confirmed, informed Evergrande earlier this week that it had appointed a receiver to take charge of the property, which is valued at $1.2 billion. Citing four sources, the FT notes that the lender had security over the China Evergrande Centre – a 26-story tower near the city center of Hong Kong island – which allowed it to take charge of the asset.

  

  Evergrande had reportedly pledged the building in exchange for loans from a consortium of lenders led by China CITIC Bank International, the HK-based subsidiary of the Chinese state-owned bank. The unnamed lender had appointed receivers from restructuring firm Alvarez & Marsal.

  Last September, as an Evergrande default loomed, CITIC Bank told its investors that its loans to the developer were pledged against valuable security, although it did not provide further details. We now have a hint what said security may have been.

  Evergrande was infamously the most prominent developer to default in 2021 as a liquidity crisis gripped the Chinese property sector. It told creditors in January that it would unveil a preliminary plan by the end of July to restructure its $300 billion of liabilities, which include $20 billion of offshore bonds, but it missed that deadline and instead said it had only made “positive progress” toward a proposal.

  The property developer had twice attempted to sell the tower. Last October, Chinese state-owned Yuexiu Property pulled out of a reported $1.7 billion deal to buy the building over concerns about the developer’s financial situation. It put the headquarters back on the market in July, attracting a number of bids including from Li Ka-shing’s Hong Kong property developer CK Asset Holdings. However the sale again fell through because the bids were too low, reflecting Evergrande’s desperate need to raise cash.

  Evergrande has been divesting assets including property and its stakes in companies in a bid to repay some of its creditors. Its chair has also put his personal assets up for sale, including private jets. This week, Evergrande said it would sell its remaining stakes in China’s Shengjing Bank for $1.1 billion.

  The developer, which is listed in Hong Kong but whose shares have been suspended from trading since March, has not yet informed the market that a receiver has been appointed over one of its large Hong Kong assets. Earlier this year, Oaktree Capital, a $158 billion American asset manager, seized two of Evergrande’s prized assets after it defaulted on loans that totaled around $1 billion. The assets were a large development site in Hong Kong, where Evergrande’s chair Hui Ka Yan had intended to build a Versailles-like mansion and a sprawling residential and tourism resort near Shanghai called “Venice.”

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 18:40

• Rand Paul: "America Should Be Appalled" At Fauci Covering His Tracks
  Rand Paul: “America Should Be Appalled” At Fauci Covering His Tracks

  Authored by Steve Watson via Summit News,

  Appearing on Fox News Wednesday, Senator Rand Paul slammed Anthony Fauci for taking the default position of trying to “cover up” his activities, including potentially encouraging social media companies to censor medical information.

  

  After a federal judge ordered the release of emails Fauci sent to social media platforms concerning what he defined as ‘misinformation’, many want to know exactly what Fauci asked of them.

  “His response was not that I’ll look into it or I’ll reveal that. His response was, by law, we don’t have to tell you which companies gave us how many royalties and to which scientists,” Paul said of Fauci, noting that the emails sent to social media bosses could reveal censorship efforts.

  “I think that all of America should be appalled that America’s doctor, the leading expert on COVID in public health, doesn’t want to divulge information, doesn’t want to divulge his communications with Big Tech,” Paul urged, adding that Fauci’s “modus operandi” is to “cover up”.

  Watch:

  As part of a lawsuit brought by Louisiana Republican Jeffrey Landry, the federal judge ruled that Fauci and White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre need to make public all relevant communications with Big Tech within the next three weeks.

  Landry and Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt argued in an initial filing that “having threatened and cajoled social-media platforms for years to censor viewpoints and speakers disfavored by the Left, senior government officials in the Executive Branch have moved into a phase of open collusion with social-media platforms under the Orwellian guise of halting so-called ‘disinformation,’ ‘misinformation’ and ‘malinformation.’”

  Elsewhere during the interview, Senator Paul commented on revelations by Gun Owners of America that the FBI pressured Americans into signing forms that relinquished their right to purchase, possess and use firearms. 

  “There is a certain irony to saying to someone you have to be mentally competent to sign this statement that says you’re not mentally competent to have a gun,” Paul noted, adding “So there is that that might be a quandary if you get into a court of law. How someone that’s mentally incompetent to own a gun could be competent to sign away their gun rights.”

  “I think the whole problem we have right now is that there’s a burden upon the FBI to prove to the American public that they are not partisan,” Paul said, adding “This goes back to 2016 when they used a foreign intelligence warrant to go after Donald Trump and his campaign.”

  “A foreign intelligence warrant which should be used on foreigners in a secret court was used to go after a major presidential, you know, candidate,” the Senator reiterated.

  *  *  *

  Brand new merch now available! Get it at https://www.pjwshop.com/

  In the age of mass Silicon Valley censorship It is crucial that we stay in touch. We need you to sign up for our free newsletter here. Support our sponsor – Turbo Force – a supercharged boost of clean energy without the comedown. Also, we urgently need your financial support here.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 18:20

• California's Power Grid Turmoil Spurs Diesel Demand For Generators
  California’s Power Grid Turmoil Spurs Diesel Demand For Generators

  A record-setting heat wave pushed California’s power grid to the limit this week as California Independent System Operator (CAISO) called for customers to limit their electricity usage or risk widespread power blackouts. 

  Fear of power rationing led top power consumers, such as hospitals, data centers, and manufacturing plants, to fill up their diesel storage tanks to ensure generators had enough fuel to prepare for future brownouts and blackouts, according to Bloomberg, citing fuel distributors in the state. 

  

  The move to top off the tanks of diesel generators helped push supplies at storage facilities across the state to the lowest levels since 2019 — making the fuel primarily used in industrial applications even more scarce, resulting in higher prices. 

  

  “The buying spree comes as the state endures a record-breaking heat wave that’s pushed the electricity system to the brink. California on Wednesday declared another power-grid emergency after managing to avoid rolling blackouts on Monday and Tuesday,” Bloomberg noted.

  And it wasn’t just commercial customers preparing generators for a grid-down situation. Residential customers, especially ones with Teslas, were filling up their gas-powered generators this week to ensure they had on-demand power to charge their EVs. 

  

  Californians are learning the hard way after politicians and unelected officials spent years decarbonizing the grid by decommissioning fossil fuel power generators for unreliable solar and wind while ignoring nuclear has made the state’s grid susceptible to failure during peak demand hours. 

  And somehow, the state wants to ban new sales of gas-powered vehicles by 2035. Instead of unreliable green energy sources, perhaps nuclear is the answer for California’s grid troubles. 

   

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 18:00

• "Weak Links" Are Being Exposed – Jeff Gundlach Warns "The Period Of Abundance Is Over"
  “Weak Links” Are Being Exposed – Jeff Gundlach Warns “The Period Of Abundance Is Over”

  Authored by Christoph Gisiger via TheMarket.ch,

  Jeffrey Gundlach, CEO of DoubleLine, worries that the Federal Reserve is overreacting in the fight against inflation. He expects a severe slowdown of the economy and says how investors can navigate today’s challenging market environment. A conversation with the Bond King.

  When Jeffrey Gundlach speaks, financial markets around the globe listen carefully. The founder and CEO of DoubleLine, a Los Angeles based investment boutique mainly specializing in bonds, ranks among America’s highest-profile investors. On Wall Street, he is known for speaking his mind.

  According to his view, one of the biggest risks right now is that the Federal Reserve is doing considerable damage to the economy with its aggressive rate hikes:

  «The next shock is that we’re having to put in a big overreaction to the inflation problem which we created from our initial reaction of excess stimulus,» Mr. Gundlach says.

  «My guess is that we will end up creating momentum that’s more deflationary than a lot of people believe is even possible.»

  In this in-depth interview with The Market NZZ, the market maven explains why he expects a severe economic downturn in the coming months, where he sees the weak links in the system, and where he spots opportunities for prudent investments in today’s volatile market environment.

  

  Mr. Gundlach, financial markets are in a fragile state. Inflation is the highest in more than four decades, and stocks as well as bonds suffered significant losses this year. What’s on your mind in light of this environment?

  The Federal Reserve is very keen on preserving what is left of its credibility and reputation because they have not been able to execute on their interest rate plans for many years. Every time they try to tighten monetary policy, it doesn’t take long for the economy to get weak, and they get embarrassed. In the past, the Fed was able to pivot like it did at the end of 2018 when it completely reversed its course in just six weeks because the stock market collapsed. It was able to do that because the inflation rate was still below 2%, so it didn’t seem to have much of a near-term consequence.

  And how about today?

  This time, the inflation rate is 500+ basis points higher than the yield on any Treasury bond, and the Fed has said forcefully and repeatedly that they are going to bring it down. Therefore, they are not in a position to do a quick pivot.

  What do you think happens next?

  Weirdly, the market consensus thinks that the Fed is going to raise rates somewhat more, maybe even 125 or 150 basis points, and then, around six or seven months from now, the market expects that they mysteriously are going to start easing. Basically, the idea is that they are going to hike interest rates significantly more, and then they are going to drop them back down. To me, that’s a strange thing to predict because why bother with anything then? If you’re taking rates up and then back down, why bother taking them up? Why not just do nothing? It’s like a six-foot-tall man who’s in shape and weighs 185 pounds saying: «I’m going to put on 100 pounds this holiday season, and then I’ll take it off with a crash diet by Easter.» What’s the point of that? That’s not healthy, it’s very bad.

  But isn’t the idea here to give the economy a quick hit so that inflationary pressures subside and the system can recalibrate on a more balanced basis?

  Sure, but what you’re implying here is that the inflation rate goes down from 9% to 2% which is the Fed’s goal within a year or by the end of next year. That’s sort of the hope. But if this would be really possible, if the inflation rate were to fall so quickly and so sharply, why do you think it would stop at 2%? Why wouldn’t you think it goes negative? Why wouldn’t you think so much momentum towards a slowing economy might overshoot on the deflation side?

  How serious is the risk of deflation, in your view?

  Due to the pandemic, we did this huge amount of radical economic policy. The idea was that it was going to be free money and free growth with no bad consequences. But of course, we’ve had bad consequences. Now, people are thinking we can just do this reactionary shock to the economy by taking the federal funds rate up to 3.5% or 4%. But if that’s enough to weaken the economy to take 7 percentage points off the inflation rate, why wouldn’t it be 15 points? So maybe, we are going to get a delayed reaction that’s deflationary, just like we had a delayed reaction that was highly inflationary.

  What would that mean for financial markets?

  These shock-and-awe tactics work with a delay, and if you overdo them, you end up getting tremendous incremental volatility. We’ve had so much economic volatility in the past two and a half years compared with the preceding decade where the economy grew more or less steadily at 2% and the inflation rate never truly budged. Then, we introduced all these extraordinary policies that work with a lag. We just keep doing them until they kick in after the lag, and by then we’ve greatly overdone it. I think that’s the message of the bond market. Why else would we have interest rates so far below the inflation rate and such a flat yield curve?

  

  Into this highly volatile situation, we have a Fed that is expected to do $1 trillion of quantitative tightening over the next twelve months. Will this become an additional burden for the economy?

  Yes, that will add to economic weakness. The consumer is very weak as you can see with some of the upper middle-class oriented retail chains like Nordstrom. Nordstrom’s stock lost 25% just last month. All these things that are aspirational purchases rather than necessities have fallen off the cliff because people have to spend too much money on gasoline and food. In contrast, low-end retailers like Walmart had an explosion in new customers. Many of them used to shop at Whole Foods, now they shop at Walmart because the food there is about 30% cheaper. Walmart is also reporting a significant shift in their customers paying with credit cards, not debit cards. In other words, shoppers are borrowing to buy food.

  However, the labor market is still performing quite robustly.

  It’s highly suspicious. The labor market is screwed up because of all the dislocation. People still don’t know what the future is for office work, or for hybrid work. Looking ahead, it’s hard to figure out where the economic strength is supposed to come from. It’s pretty obvious that the consumer is not in good shape. Therefore, it’s not surprising that we’re seeing weakness in some of the former stock market darlings like Peloton. Peloton’s stock is down like 97% from its high, and it looks like it’s going to zero. Zoom and all the other darlings of the lockdown are collapsing as well. My guess is that a lot of them are going to go bankrupt.

  

   

  In this context, where are the weak links investors should pay close attention to?

   

  The large banks in Europe continue to perform very poorly. I see Credit Suisse is backing away from trying to be a Wall Street and United States titan. Their stock just seems to never go up. Deutsche Bank fared a little bit better, but interest rate suppression policies had made it impossible for European banks to make money. In the American economy, the weak links are producers and retailers of discretionary goods because the people don’t have the money to buy them. It’s like French President Macron recently said: The period of abundance is over. The weak links are those that benefit from abundance. We’re in an economy that doesn’t have the liquidity. There is no more funding for questionable ventures, for non-profitable businesses. Those are the weak links: The people that were living off of free money and cheap money and not making any money.

  What is the probability of a more severe economic downturn in this regard?

  Again, the overarching theme people are not fully appreciating is that we have become unhinged in terms of our economic parameters versus trying to manage the economy gradualisticly, as we did for quite a while. All of sudden, we’ve decided we had to respond in a way that is not all gradualistic. We had to damn the torpedoes and just go for it. That took us off balance, and we’re having a hard time finding our footing. It’s going to take a long time to find footing, but the next shock is that we’re having to put in a big overreaction to the inflation problem which we created from our initial reaction of excess stimulus. My guess is that we will end up creating momentum that’s more deflationary than a lot of people believe is even possible.

  Do you think Fed Chair Powell has the stamina to resolutely continue his fight against inflation if the signs of an economic slowdown continue to pile up?

  He has to. He’s not going to stop. He waffled too much in the past. He made policy pivots on small changes of data, and that put him in an unfortunate light. Now, he has made a pledge to bring inflation down, and he can’t break it without strong evidence that the reason for the pledge has passed. He can’t say «we have won the inflation battle» if the consumer price index stays above 6%. If Powell changes his rhetoric, he will go down in history as a joke. He has said unequivocally and repeatedly that he’s not going to stop just because we get one or two good inflation numbers or we get a little bit of economic weakness. I’m paraphrasing here because he doesn’t want to say it so directly, but essentially, he stated that the Fed doesn’t care if we have a mild recession.

  

   

  But what happens if this turns out to be a severe downturn?

   

  Powell is in an unstable place right now because it probably can’t last. He has a supposedly good employment market. While that’s suspicious, the unemployment rate is at 3.7%, and there are a lot of job openings, which gives the Fed cover to fight inflation. By a mild recession Powell means the unemployment rate goes up to 4%. If it rises to that level, I think he can continue with inflation fighting. But what if the unemployment rate goes up to 8%? Then what? We know exactly what’s going to happen: In the next recession, the US is going to go on a much more aggressive round of free money.

  You’re referring to another money printing binge?

  Much bigger. That’s their methodology: zero interest rates and money printing. It started back in the 2000s, and we’ve been at it ever since. And it always takes a bigger dose. Once you’re on a debt-financed scheme, you always have to borrow more.

  What then, would you advise monetary policy makers to do right now?

  I think Powell should slow down. The Fed should actually not raise the target rate by 75 basis points at the next meeting. They should do 25 basis points, and let a little time pass. Powell can keep playing the inflation fighter as long as he’s raising rates gradually. I wouldn’t even care if he skipped a meeting: A 25 basis point hike in September, and then pause at the next FOMC meeting in November. Let’s wait and see what happens because the bond market should be listened to: Every time the bond market is at odds with consensus economists, the bond market is right. And the bond market is saying that yields are peaking.

  But wouldn’t waiting raise the risk of persistently high inflation?

  We had this incredible shock of liquidity injected into the system in the second quarter of 2020, and the negative consequences really didn’t show up for over a year. The inflation rate didn’t start to go up significantly until the second half of last year. That’s why we should wait. We started raising rates meaningfully in May, so let these hikes percolate through and see what happens. But Powell can’t do that. He has stated so forcefully and repeatedly that he’s not going to let up until he sees inflation coming down in a «convincing» way. Satisfying these conditions is going to take some time. But I think he should slow down.

  How can prudent investors navigate this challenging environment?

  This has been a capital preservation situation for the past year. Beginning of this year or a year ago, stocks, by historical measures, were extremely overvalued in terms of P/E ratios, price-to-book, and all kinds of measures. Except for one thing: As overvalued stocks were versus historical measures, they were actually cheap to bonds. Bonds were even more overvalued, and it’s surprising to people that bonds are down as much as stocks this year. The only thing that’s up at all is commodities, and that ended too back in June. Nothing is really up since the Fed started raising interest rates in earnest in June. So it’s just a capital preservation market.

  That doesn’t sound encouraging. Is there nothing investors can do?

  The problem is that financial markets are entirely balanced upon zero interest rates and quantitative easing. The Fed pledged that was going away, and they are still speaking like they have the intention of further honoring that pledge. As a consequence, your financial assets are devaluing. If people really wanted to invest in something fundamentally, you probably want to invest in something like an energy company. You actually want to have the most old-school types of assets, things producing something that’s needed: farm land, food, energy, oil. Those are the places where you can protect yourself from inflation. These are also assets that are somewhat recession proof. People have to buy food and other necessities, but there is nothing left for all of this abundance spending.

  What about bonds, DoubleLine’s core competence?

  As I said, bond yields are probably in the process of peaking out. Parts of the yield curve have been inverted for a while, so it’s very reasonable to expect an economic downturn of significance within a year. We’re heading into the lean years, and that’s probably a situation where ultimately income becomes harder to come by. That’s why bond yields have been stuck at around 3% to 3.25% for about three or four months now. It sends the message that high-quality bonds might actually perform reasonably well as unattractive as they are versus inflation. In fact, they already have. The long bond got to 3.50%; it’s up in price the past few months. That’s why I think investors should own bonds instead of stocks; bonds are cheap to stocks.

  

   

  Where do you see the most attractive opportunities for fixed-income investments?

   

  Because of the illiquidity and the redemptions from the bond industry, spreads on non-government bonds were widening in a pretty powerful way until the middle of the summer. For instance, junk bonds started out this year with a yield of about 5%, and they got up to about 10%. Some emerging market bonds are yielding 15%, 18%. These are risky, but they are so much more attractive than stocks. Some bonds have yields of 10% to 12% and have prices of 75 cents on the dollar. Think about what the return potential is here: If you have a yield of 10-12%, and you have a 10% price gain, you could easily make 20-25%. It’s very unlikely that you make that from stocks. The bond market has gone from no value anywhere two years ago to abundant value relative to stocks.

  A key question is also what the dollar is going to do after the recent strong rally. How do you view the outlook for the greenback?

  The dollar is in the very late stages of its strength. The dollar will go up until the next recession, and then it will drop precipitously. I have been bullish on the dollar for over a year, but I’m extremely bearish on the dollar for the next ten years.

  A weaker dollar should be good for emerging markets, shouldn’t it?

  Yes, when the dollar tops out, you should own nothing but emerging markets if you’re an extremely aggressive investor. I wouldn’t do it personally because I’m a low-risk personality type, but emerging markets will do very, very well. They’re so cheap compared to developed markets, and their currencies will appreciate, I think, in the next recession. That means you could have a double win when you’re a US dollar-based investor. But I don’t think it’s going to happen this year. That might be a story for 2023.

  China looms particularly large for many investors in emerging markets since it represents an outsize stake in many EM funds. How should one deal with that in times of rising geopolitical tensions?

  I wouldn’t invest in China. I think there is just too much uncertainty. Tensions between China and the United States are high, and likely to get much worse. If you’re an American, you might not even be able to redeem your investment. So I would stay out of there, but Asia ex-China I would invest in.

  Should investors rather buy bonds or shares when it comes to emerging markets?

  I think you would buy both when we get to the next recession, after we have perhaps a Treasury rally. I think bonds broadly will do reasonably well, and in emerging markets they’re so much cheaper than in the United States. Right now, emerging market portfolios yield about 9.5%. So if the currency goes your way, and the yield goes your way, you make a lot of money off emerging markets.

  

   

  How about Europe? Do you spot opportunities for investments in Europe?

   

  We own European stocks. I think in the next recession they will do better, and they’re cheaper than US stocks. Europe doesn’t have the same sort of crazy zombie companies to the extent we do in the United States. It’s the zombie companies that are really going to have problems, and the US is loaded with zombie companies. And again, ultimately the dollar will depreciate, which is another reason we like European stocks. So far, this position hasn’t been a tremendous benefit to us, but it hasn’t hurt either. That’s actually a good sign. Europe was underperforming the United States almost all the time for a decade, and that stopped two years ago. When the trend stops, it takes a while for it to reverse, but once it stops, it tends to reverse.

  You started your career in the investment industry in the early Eighties when the general environment was somewhat similar to today. Looking back on your experience in all kinds of markets, what is the most important thing in investing?

  You have to buy when prices are low. I’m not making a joke, I mean it. Every time when there is a problem in the bond market, money pours out. There is greed and fear: Greed is powerful, but fear is more powerful. Yet, there is one thing that is even more powerful: need. When you need something, you have to have it. If people need to make a certain investment return, what they will do when opportunities go down is increase their risk because they need a higher return. They can’t live on a 3% return, they need 6%. So when there is no 6%, they try to manufacture a 6%. As a result, their risk goes up, up, up, up, up, and then they’re maximum exposed to risk. Next, prices collapse, and then they sell because their fear is so great. Instead, they should be buying. Right now, the bond market is very attractive, but no one is listening because everybody is selling. You’re supposed to be buying when people are selling, and that opportunity is still very strong today.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 17:40

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• First Came 9/11, Then COVID-19, What's The Next Crisis To Lockdown The Nation?
  First Came 9/11, Then COVID-19, What’s The Next Crisis To Lockdown The Nation?

  Authored by John and Nisha Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,

  “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary.”

  – H.L. Mencken

  First came 9/11, which the government used to transform itself into a police state.

  Then the COVID-19 pandemic hit, which the police state used to test out its lockdown powers.

  In light of the government’s tendency to exploit crises (legitimate or manufactured) and capitalize on the nation’s heightened emotions, confusion and fear as a means of extending the reach of the police state, one has to wonder what so-called crisis it will declare next.

  It’s a simple enough formula: first, you create fear, then you capitalize on it by seizing power.

  

  Frankly, it doesn’t even matter what the nature of the next national emergency might be (terrorism, civil unrest, economic collapse, a health scare, or the environment) as long as it allows the government to lockdown the nation and justify all manner of tyranny in the so-called name of national security.

  Cue the Emergency State.

  Terrorist attacks, mass shootings, “unforeseen economic collapse, loss of functioning political and legal order, purposeful domestic resistance or insurgency, pervasive public health emergencies, and catastrophic natural and human disasters”: the government has been anticipating and preparing for such crises for years now.

  As David C. Unger writes for the New York Times: “Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness have given way to permanent crisis management: to policing the planet and fighting preventative wars of ideological containment, usually on terrain chosen by, and favorable to, our enemies. Limited government and constitutional accountability have been shouldered aside by the kind of imperial presidency our constitutional system was explicitly designed to prevent.”

  Here’s what we know: given the rate at which the government keeps devising new ways to establish itself as the “solution” to all of our worldly problems at taxpayer expense, each subsequent crisis ushers in ever larger expansions of government power and less individual liberty.

  This is the slippery slope to outright tyranny.

  You see, once the government acquires (and uses) authoritarian powers—to spy on its citizens, to carry out surveillance, to transform its police forces into extensions of the military, to seize taxpayer funds, to wage endless wars, to censor and silence dissidents, to identify potential troublemakers, to detain citizens without due process—it does not voluntarily relinquish them.

  The lesson for the ages is this: once any government is allowed to overreach and expand its powers, it’s almost impossible to put the genie back in the bottle. As Harvard constitutional law professor Laurence Tribe recognizes, “The dictatorial hunger for power is insatiable.”

  Indeed, the history of the United States is a testament to the old adage that liberty decreases as government (and government bureaucracy) grows. To put it another way, as government expands, liberty contracts.

  In this way, every crisis since the nation’s early beginnings has become a make-work opportunity for the government.

  Each crisis has also been a test to see how far “we the people” would allow the government to sidestep the Constitution in the so-called name of national security; a test to see how well we have assimilated the government’s lessons in compliance, fear and police state tactics; a test to see how quickly we’ll march in lockstep with the government’s dictates, no questions asked; and a test to see how little resistance we offer up to the government’s power grabs when made in the name of national security.

  Most critically of all, it has been a test to see whether the Constitution—and our commitment to the principles enshrined in the Bill of Rights—could survive a national crisis and true state of emergency.

  Unfortunately, we’ve been failing this particular test for a long time now.

  Indeed, the powers-that-be have been pushing our buttons and herding us along like so much cattle since World War II, at least, starting with the Japanese attacks on Pearl Harbor, which not only propelled the U.S. into World War II but also unified the American people in their opposition to a common enemy.

  That fear of attack by foreign threats, conveniently torqued by the growing military industrial complex, in turn gave rise to the Cold War era’s “Red Scare.” Promulgated through government propaganda, paranoia and manipulation, anti-Communist sentiments boiled over into a mass hysteria that viewed anyone and everyone as suspect: your friends, the next-door neighbor, even your family members could be a Communist subversive.

  This hysteria, which culminated in hearings before the House Un-American Activities Committee, where hundreds of Americans were called before Congress to testify about their so-called Communist affiliations and intimidated into making false confessions, also paved the way for the rise of an all-knowing, all-seeing governmental surveillance state.

  By the time 9/11 rolled around, all George W. Bush had to do was claim the country was being invaded by terrorists, and the government used the USA Patriot Act to claim greater powers to spy, search, detain and arrest American citizens in order to keep America safe.

  By way of the National Defense Authorization Act, Barack Obama continued Bush’s trend of undermining the Constitution, going so far as to give the military the power to strip Americans of their constitutional rights, label them extremists, and detain them indefinitely without trial, all in the name of keeping America safe.

  Despite the fact that the breadth of the military’s power to detain American citizens violates not only U.S. law and the Constitution but also international laws, the government has refused to relinquish its detention powers made possible by the NDAA.

  Then Donald Trump took office, claiming the country was being invaded by dangerous immigrants and insisting that the only way to keep America safe was to expand the reach of the border police, empower the military to “assist” with border control, and essentially turn the country into a Constitution-free zone.

  That so-called immigration crisis then morphed into multiple crises (domestic extremism, the COVID-19 pandemic, race wars, civil unrest, etc.) that the government has been eager to use in order to expand its powers.

  Joe Biden, in turn, has made every effort to expand the reach of the militarized police state, pledging to hire 87,000 more IRS agents and 100,000 police officers. Read between the lines and you’ll find that Biden has all but declared war on the American people.

  What the next crisis will be is anyone’s guess, but you can be sure that there will be a next crisis.

  So, what should you expect if the government decides to declare another state of emergency and institutes a nationwide lockdown?

  You should expect more of the same, only worse.

  More compliance, less resistance.

  More fear-mongering, mind-control tactics and less tolerance for those who question the government’s propaganda-driven narratives.

  Most of all, as I point out in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, you should expect more tyranny and less freedom.

  There’s every reason to worry about what comes next.

  Certainly, the government’s past track record and its long-anticipated plans for instituting martial law (using armed forces to solve domestic political and social problems) in response to a future crisis are cause enough to worry about the government’s handling of the next “crisis.”

  Mark my words: if and when another nationwide lockdown finally hits—if and when we are forced to shelter in place— if and when militarized police are patrolling the streets— if and when security checkpoints have been established— if and when the media’s ability to broadcast the news has been curtailed by government censors—if and when public systems of communication (phone lines, internet, text messaging, etc.) have been restricted—if and when those FEMA camps the government has been surreptitiously building finally get used as detention centers for American citizens—if and when military “snatch and grab” teams are deployed on local, state, and federal levels as part of the activated Continuity of Government plans to isolate anyone suspected of being a threat to national security—and if and when martial law is enacted with little real outcry or resistance from the public—then we will truly understand the extent to which the government has fully succeeded in acclimating us to a state of affairs in which the government has all the power and “we the people” have none. 

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 09/08/2022 – 00:05

• Virtual 'Teslasuit' Could Make 'Sex In Metaverse' Possible
  Virtual ‘Teslasuit’ Could Make ‘Sex In Metaverse’ Possible

  Virtual reality suit maker “Teslasuit” has a human-to-digital interface full-body suit with 90 electrodes designed to trick the body into feeling anything from a hug to raindrops to even the impact of a gunshot. The suit user can strap on VR goggles to ‘touch’ objects in the metaverse. 

  National Enquirer spoke with Teslasuit VP Paul Nickeas earlier this year about the suit’s “wide range of realistic sensations from the feeling of a raindrop to the impact of a gunshot.” 

  

  Nickeas told Daily Star this week more about the suit’s capabilities and real-world applications: 

  “The Teslasuit works via biometry, haptics and motion capture, with the wearer being calibrated via a gaming PC, so can be propelled into extended or virtual reality.

  “Obviously the use cases are truly far-reaching – from medical rehabilitation, to training for dangerous work scenarios in a safe to fail environment.

  “We are extremely excited about how our technology can be utilised for all aspects of the metaverse from gaming, training to now fashion.”

  BBC’s Sarah Cox experienced the world’s first “digital hug” while wearing the suit even though the man on the other end was across the room — she felt the hug via the suit’s electrodes.  

  “I could feel it all down my back, and on my shoulders, and on my stomach … and it’s just really exciting,” Cox said. 

  Teslasuit (unaffiliated with Elon Musk’s Tesla Motors) was never designed for hugs nor something more intimate such as sex. However, the sex industry has been quickly moving into VR as lovemaking could take a futuristic sci-fi turn with these suits. 

  “Users might go online, chat with a sex worker via webcam, agree on terms, and then synchronize their Teslasuits for a completely tactile sexual experience – all the while being thousands of miles away,” The Future of Sex’s Ben Barnes wrote. 

  One adult industry source told the National Enquirer that the porn industry is closely watching the development of these suits:

  “Once they get hold of suits like these, they will hack them for sex or build sensors for erogenous zones.” 

  With how things are going and the billions of dollars being poured into the metaverse by mega-corporations, there’s no doubt within this decade that some of the human population will be using VR for work, education, and/or sex. It seems wearing full-body haptic suits might also be part of the VR experience. 

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 23:45

• 'They' Are Definitely Getting Prepared. Are You?
  ‘They’ Are Definitely Getting Prepared. Are You?

  Authored by Michael Snyder via The End of The American Dream blog,

  The ultra-wealthy are some of the best preppers in the entire world.  I realize that statement may sound strange to many of you, but it is actually true.  The elite are very well aware that we are on the precipice of a full-blown societal meltdown, and many of them are spending enormous amounts of time, money and energy to prepare themselves for the extremely difficult times that are rapidly approaching.  In some cases, ultra-wealthy individuals are forking out giant mountains of cash for luxurious underground bunkers in the middle of nowhere.  In other cases, elitists are actually buying citizenship in far away foreign lands that they think will be safe. 

  We are talking about some of the smartest and wealthiest people in our entire society, and they are so freaked out about what is coming that they have become absolutely obsessed with trying to save themselves.

  

  Many of these individuals got to where they are today by staying one step ahead of everyone else.  That is why it is so alarming that 2,150 corporate executives sold off shares in their own companies in the month August alone.  Do they know something that the rest of us don’t?

  Of course when things start getting really bad, many among the elite do not plan to stick around to see what happens.  The following comes from a Guardian article entitled “The super-rich ‘preppers’ planning to save themselves from the apocalypse”…

  Many of those seriously seeking a safe haven simply hire one of several prepper construction companies to bury a prefab steel-lined bunker somewhere on one of their existing properties. Rising S Company in Texas builds and installs bunkers and tornado shelters for as little as $40,000 for an 8ft by 12ft emergency hideout all the way up to the $8.3m luxury series “Aristocrat”, complete with pool and bowling lane. The enterprise originally catered to families seeking temporary storm shelters, before it went into the long-term apocalypse business. The company logo, complete with three crucifixes, suggests their services are geared more toward Christian evangelist preppers in red-state America than billionaire tech bros playing out sci-fi scenarios.

  There’s something much more whimsical about the facilities in which most of the billionaires – or, more accurately, aspiring billionaires – actually invest. A company called Vivos is selling luxury underground apartments in converted cold war munitions storage facilities, missile silos, and other fortified locations around the world. Like miniature Club Med resorts, they offer private suites for individuals or families, and larger common areas with pools, games, movies and dining. Ultra-elite shelters such as the Oppidum in the Czech Republic claim to cater to the billionaire class, and pay more attention to the long-term psychological health of residents. They provide imitation of natural light, such as a pool with a simulated sunlit garden area, a wine vault, and other amenities to make the wealthy feel at home.

  Of course the vast majority of us don’t have lots of extra money to spend on a giant underground bunker.

  But for those that can afford it, I certainly can’t blame them for wanting one.

  Things are going to get really bad in the years ahead.

  Other ultra-wealthy individuals are shelling out cash for “golden passports” that grant them citizenship in a second country…

  Loaded liberals are forking out millions of dollars for ‘golden passports’ because they are scared of a Trump-led civil war in 2024, immigration lawyers have revealed.

  The wealthy wokes are spending huge sums to bag visas that allow them escape to countries like Austria, Turkey, Jordan and the Caribbean, according to attorneys running the processes.

  Consultants say they’ve seen a massive spike in interest for citizenships for second countries over the last few years.

  In theory, such a plan sounds good.

  If things get crazy in the United States, just hop on a private plane and head to a nice peaceful nation on the other side of the planet.

  But what if we are facing emergencies that are truly global in nature?

  In that case, such a plan may not work as well.

  If you would like a “golden passport” in the future, you might want to start saving up your money, because they aren’t cheap…

  The cost of acquired citizenship ranges from the low six-figures to many millions of dollars.

  Some Atlantic islands are ultimately affordable, while chic-European countries will cost you a pretty-penny.

  Sadly, the vast majority of the population simply cannot afford to do much at all to prepare for the hard times that are approaching because most people are just barely scraping by these days.

  In fact, many Americans that are working as hard as they can “do not earn enough to cover a basic family budget”…

  More than one-third of U.S. families that work full time year-round do not earn enough to cover a basic family budget, according to a recent report from researchers at Brandeis University’s diversitydatakids.org program at the Institute for Child, Youth and Family Policy.

  The situation is even more dire for Black and Hispanic families, according to the report. More than half cannot afford basic needs, compared to 25% of white families and 23% of Asian and Pacific Islander families. Inequities remain even when controlling for education and occupation.

  I was stunned when I first came across those numbers.

  And things are particularly bad for families that are considered to be “low income”…

  For low-income families – those whose income falls below 200% of the supplemental poverty measure, or $52,492 for two adults and two related children in 2020 it’s – 77% who can’t pay the bills despite working full time.

  In 2020, more than a quarter of the population, 89.7 million people, were considered low income per the Population Reference Bureau, a nonprofit that collects statistics for research on the health and structure of populations.

  So many people out there are just trying to survive from month to month.

  In an article that I posted a couple of days ago, I mentioned the fact that about 20 million households in the United States are currently behind on their utility bills.

  If you can’t even pay your power bill, of course you don’t have any money for prepping.

  Survey after survey has shown that well over half of the country is living paycheck to paycheck, and that means that the majority of the population simply does not have the resources necessary to adequately prepare for what is ahead of us.

  But the elite have more cash than they know what to do with, and they are spending big to try to ensure that they will survive whatever happens.

  If you have the resources to do so, I would encourage you to also work feverishly to get prepared before the window of opportunity that we currently have closes completely.

  *  *  *

  It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 23:25

• Putin Threatens "Scam" Ukraine Grain Export Deal, Says Most Ships Diverted To EU
  Putin Threatens “Scam” Ukraine Grain Export Deal, Says Most Ships Diverted To EU

  President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday threatened to abandon the UN-brokered Ukraine grain export deal which has lately been declared by Turkey to be a ‘success’ – given at this point dozens of cargo ships have now traversed the Black Sea from Ukrainian ports since the agreement signed in Istanbul went into effect. 

  The Russian leader alleged while giving an opening speech before the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok on Wednesday that Western powers are acting “like colonial powers” and using the deal deceptively. He described that while Western officials decried Russia’s blocking food from getting to global south countries, such as in Africa or in Asia, the reality is that most of the ships to depart through the ‘safety corridor’ so far have ended up in Europe, according to his assertions. 

  

  The grain deal, finalized in late July, was preceded by months of EU and US officials decrying Moscow policies in blockading Ukraine’s coast, which they said would cause famine in the developing world – heavily reliant on grain from the region. The Kremlin response was to blame Ukraine’s military for mining its own ports. 

  “What we see is a brazen deception … a deception by the international community of our partners in Africa, and other countries that are in dire need of food. It’s just a scam,” Putin said.

  Putin is accusing Ukraine’s Western backers of “cheating” by adopting the cause of poorer countries when it comes to public rhetoric, but in reality diverting food shipments:

  “Only 3% of the grain being exported from Ukraine is going to developing countries, the majority is going to Europe… over the past decades European countries have acted like colonial powers, they are continuing to act like that today,” Putin claimed.

  “Once again, they have deceived developing countries,” he continued, saying “it may be worth considering how to limit the export of grain and other food along this route.”

  According to the figures offered by Putin during the speech: 

  Putin said, without citing a source, that only two of 87 ships, carrying 60,000 tonnes of products, went to poor countries, as he accused the West of acting as colonial states.

  “That’s how it is – they were once colonisers and have remained so on the inside,” he said of European countries.

  “Almost all the grain exported from Ukraine is sent not to the poorest developing countries, but to European Union countries,” Putin told an economic forum in the eastern city of Vladivostok on Wednesday.

  “I will certainly consult on this subject with the President of Turkey, Mr. Erdogan, because it was him and me who worked out a mechanism for the export of Ukrainian grain,” Putin said. Putin and Erdogan are expected to meet on the sidelines of a regional summit hosted by Uzbekistan next week. China’s Xi Jinping is also expected to meet with the Russian leader. 

  Russian President Vladimir Putin says the West deceived poor nations via Ukraine grain deal, claiming Ukraine needed access to sea shipping to stop surging food prices & risk of famine. Almost all grain is flowing into the EU & not the poorest countries.pic.twitter.com/bPdXHMKI4w

  — Fiorella Isabel (@FiorellaIsabelM) September 7, 2022

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

  CNN and Reuters have attempted to fact-check Putin’s words, and are rejecting his assessment: 

  In a statement to CNN, the United Nations said that under the Black Sea Grain Initiative, roughly 30% of “grains and other foodstuffs” have made it to low- and lower-middle-income countries, or approximately 700,000 metric tons.

  Among countries classified by the World Bank as low- or lower-middle-income, the UN says that 10% of the initiative’s exports have been sent to Egypt, 5% to Iran, 4% to India, 3% to Sudan, 2% to Yemen, 2% to Kenya, 1% to Somalia, 1% to Djibouti, and less than 1% to Lebanon.

  If Russia indeed does either back out or attempt to renegotiate the UN grain deal, which required the assent of both the Ukrainian and Russian sides, as well as Turkey, this would mark the collapse of the only ‘bright spot’ to come out of negotiations thus far throughout six months of conflict. It would also no doubt add to growing global economic woes amid rising energy and food prices. 

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 23:05

• Taibbi: The People Versus The Unelected
  Taibbi: The People Versus The Unelected

  Authored by Matt Taibbi via TK News,

  Review of The Lords of Easy Money, by Christopher Leonard, Simon and Schuster, 384 pages

  Click here for Q&A with the author.

  

  In Chicago on July 8, 1896, a former Nebraska congressman named William Jennings Bryan strode onstage at the Democratic National Convention and delivered one of the most famous speeches in American history. A populist and free silver advocate, Jennings stood in opposition to the Wall Street-backed Republican Party, which sought more power for creditors by supporting a gold standard. “You shall not press down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns,” Bryan thundered, to close his address. “You shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.”

  Bryan’s speech can feel inaccessible today because it belonged to an era when “managing the money supply was still in the public realm of democratic action,” as author Christopher Leonard puts it in his remarkable book The Lords of Easy Money. The fights that now take place in the secrecy of the Federal Reserve were then a near-constant concern of congress and a source of bitter conflict between east and west, rich and poor, city-dwellers and farmers. Silver dollars had the de facto impact of increasing the money supply and making farm or prospecting debt easier to repay, while the “organized wealth” Bryan opposed sought a gold standard to keep returns on those loans high. The “Cross of Gold” speech came just after a Great Financial Panic in 1893, and though he would lose to William McKinley, Bryan set the terms for generations of controversies about who got to control the levers of finance.

  On May 15, 2010, at a similar juncture a few years removed from a financial crash, a little-known Federal Reserve Bank president from Kansas City named Thomas Hoenig gave a controversial interview to the Wall Street Journal, called “The Fed’s Monetary Dissident.” Hoenig spoke as the economy was pulling out of the 2008 emergency, and as a voting member of the Federal Open Market Committee or FOMC, which helps set interest rates, he took the rare step of publicly disagreeing with peers. “We’ve gotten through the crisis,” he said. “We ought to be thinking about the long run.” Hoenig violated an unspoken taboo, reminding readers that the Fed’s work isn’t just a technocratic process, but “also an allocative policy,” i.e. one that helped pick society’s economic winners and losers — the stuff of politics.

  Under the leadership of its soft-spoken, bearded, nebbishy new chairman Ben Bernanke, the central bank had just undertaken the financial equivalent of a Normandy invasion in response to the 2008 crash, adding $1.2 trillion to the money supply in two years, or more than it had in total in every year between 1913 and 2008. Hoenig was concerned because instead of taking early signs of recovery as a chance to pull back, Bernanke was pouring more troops into theater, flooding the economy with money with plans to keep borrowing rates at or near zero for “an extended period” (it would turn out to be ten years). Hoenig worried the Fed was addicting Wall Street to cheap cash, upsetting the delicate balance of financial power he’d spent a life trying to maintain. “I can’t guarantee the carpenter down the street a margin,” he said. “I really don’t think we should be guaranteeing Wall Street… by guaranteeing them a zero or near zero interest rate environment.”

  Hoenig’s clipped remarks didn’t land with the fanfare of Bryan’s grandiloquent oratory. In fact, it’s hard to imagine two men with less in common, stylistically. Hoenig was and is a reserved former soldier and number-cruncher who disdained limelight and believed in economy in all things, including words, while Bryan was a man born for the soapbox. Moreover, in a misdiagnosis that that persists to this day, Hoenig’s remarks were criticized as the tightwad meanderings of a hard-money reactionary, an impression that grew stronger when “The Fed’s dissident” was lionized in congressional hearings by the likes of “End the Fed” campaigner and gold-standard advocate Ron Paul. If Bryan wanted to loosen the money supply, and Hoenig wanted to rein it in, what linked them? What could American history’s prototype populist possibly share with a fusty economic traditionalist like Hoenig?

  In fact there were similarities. Hoenig’s critics tended to see things backwards, pegging beliefs of his we’d now recognize as economic populism as conservatism, and more importantly mis-labeling the bank-friendly, trickle-down policies of Bernanke as liberal progressivism. This radical switcheroo, turning traditional perceptions of liberalism and conservatism on their head, soon spread to non-financial arenas, as elite officials pitched themselves as progressives, deriding opponents as conspiracist reactionaries. Hoenig is essentially patient zero of this phenomenon, and his story is explained brilliantly in The Lords of Easy Money, in my mind the first book that makes the inner workings of the Fed truly accessible to ordinary readers.

  Leonard gets particularly high marks because the Fed — whose officials always used dullness and inscrutability to deflect public scrutiny — is nearly impossible to make interesting and understandable. Leonard pulls it off. A neophyte will come away from The Lords of Easy Money understanding the mechanics of money creation, and the bank’s awesome influence in widening the wealth gap and driving political divisions.

  Subscribers can read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 22:45

• "Winter Is Coming": Taiwan Export Slowdown Implies Darkening Clouds For Global Economy
  “Winter Is Coming”: Taiwan Export Slowdown Implies Darkening Clouds For Global Economy

  The slowdown in Taiwan’s exports is further evidence that the risks to the global economic outlook are tilted to the downside and could imply more turmoil is ahead. 

  A statement from the Finance Ministry in Taipei said exports grew a paltry 2% in August compared with the same month last year — the slowest pace of growth since July 2020, when exports only grew by .3%. Bloomberg noted economists were expecting an increase of 11.6%. 

  

  Imports also decelerated, rising by 3.5% in August, compared to a 19.4% expansion in July. Economists were anticipating an 8.7% rise. 

  Beatrice Tsai, the Ministry of Finance’s chief statistician, said the trade slowdown suggests “winter is coming.” She outlined how double-digit export growth in the third quarter is unlikely, adding September exports could contract by 3% versus a year ago. 

  Taiwan’s dominance in semiconductor fabrication is a good barometer of global chip demand. 

  “While demand for integrated circuits and mineral products continued to be hot, export sales of traditional products such as plastics and base metals were sluggish due to weak end-user demand,” according to a statement from the finance ministry.

  The slowdown in exports is a troubling sign that the global tech sector could be entering an alarming downturn due to lackluster consumer demand worldwide: 

  “There are clearer signs showing that the tech sector has entered a downturn, driven by weakening global demand for mobile phones, PCs and other consumer electronics products, which also weighs on demand for the upstream semiconductors,” said Ma Tieying, an economist at DBS Group Holdings Ltd.

  Some macro-tourists closely watch Taiwan’s export data as an early indicator of turning points for the global economy. 

  Global growth from Asia to Europe to the US has shown signs of deceleration this summer (IMF warned about this in July), with fears major economies could slide into recession amid a flurry of central banks increasing interest rates to combat the highest inflation in decades. 

  A notable index followed by many is JP Morgan Global Manufacturing PMI. The latest print last month showed global manufacturing is nearing contraction. It fell from 51.1 in July to 50.3 in August. 

  

  To sum up, consumer demand is weakening in an environment of high inflation. Central banks aggressively raise interest rates that could tilt developed and emerging economies into recession. 

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 22:25

• Hedges: Stop Pretending US Is A Functioning Democracy
  Hedges: Stop Pretending US Is A Functioning Democracy

  Authored by Chris Hedges via Scherpost.com,

  There are no institutions, including the press, an electoral system, the imperial presidency, the courts or the penal system, that can be defined as democratic. Only the fiction of democracy remains.

  

  End Game. (Mr. Fish)

  There is a fatal disconnect between a political system that promises democratic equality and freedom while carrying out socioeconomic injustices that result in grotesque income inequality and political stagnation.

  Decades in the making, this disconnect has extinguished American democracy. The steady stripping away of economic and political power was ignored by a hyperventilating press that thundered against the barbarians at the gate — Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, the Taliban, ISIS, Vladimir Putin — while ignoring the barbarians in our midst.

  The slow-motion coup is over. Corporations and the billionaire class have won. There are no institutions, including the press, an electoral system that is little more than legalized bribery, the imperial presidency, the courts or the penal system, that can be defined as democratic. Only the fiction of democracy remains.

  The political philosopher Sheldon Wolin in Democracy Incorporated: Managed Democracy and the Specter of Inverted Totalitarianism calls the U.S. system “inverted totalitarianism.” The façade of democratic institutions and the rhetoric, symbols and iconography of state power have not changed. The Constitution remains a sacred document.

  Collective Self-Delusion

  

  July 4, 2019, Washington, D.C. (Joe Lauria)

  The U.S. continues to posit itself as a champion of opportunity, freedom, human rights and civil liberties, even as half the country struggles at subsistence level, militarized police gun down and imprison the poor with impunity, and the primary business of the state is war. 

  This collective self-delusion masks what America has become — a nation where the citizenry has been stripped of economic and political power and where the brutal militarism practiced overseas is practiced at home.

  In classical totalitarian regimes, such as Nazi Germany or Stalin’s Soviet Union, economics was subordinate to politics. But under inverted totalitarianism, the reverse is true. There is no attempt, unlike fascism and state socialism, to address the needs of the poor. Rather, the poorer and more vulnerable you are, the more you are exploited, thrust into a hellish debt peonage from which there is no escape.

  Social services, from education to health care, are anemic, nonexistent or privatized to gouge the impoverished. Further ravaged by 8.5 percent inflation, wages have decelerated sharply since 1979. Jobs often do not offer benefits or security.

  [You can watch an interview I conducted in 2014 with Sheldon Wolin here.]

  In my book America: The Farewell Tour, I examined the social indicators of a nation in serious trouble. Life expectancy in the U.S. fell in 2021, for the second year in a row. There have been over 300 mass shootings this year. Close to a million people have died from drug overdoses since 1999. There are an average of 132 suicides every day. Nearly 42 percent of  the country is classified as obese, with one in 11 adults considered severely obese.

  These diseases of despair are rooted in the disconnect between a society’s expectations of a better future and the reality of a system that does not provide a meaningful place for its citizens. Loss of a sustainable income and social stagnation causes more than financial distress.

  Diseased Society

  

  Evicted from their homes, Seattle. (Joe Lauria)

  As Émile Durkheim points out in The Division of Labor in Society, it severs the social bonds that give us meaning. A decline in status and power, an inability to advance, a lack of education and adequate health care, and a loss of hope result in crippling forms of humiliation. This humiliation fuels loneliness, frustration, anger and feelings of worthlessness. 

  In Hitler and the Germans, the political philosopher Eric Voegelin dismisses the idea that Hitler — gifted in oratory and political opportunism but poorly educated and vulgar — mesmerized and seduced the German people. The Germans, he writes, supported Hitler and the “grotesque, marginal figures” surrounding him because he embodied the pathologies of a diseased society, one beset by economic collapse and hopelessness.

  Voegelin defines stupidity as a “loss of reality.” The loss of reality means a “stupid” person cannot “rightly orient his action in the world, in which he lives.” The demagogue, who is always an idiote, is not a freak or social mutation. The demagogue expresses the society’s zeitgeist.

  The acceleration of deindustrialization by the 1970s, as I write in America, The Farewell Tour, created a crisis that forced the ruling elites to devise a new political paradigm, as Stuart Hall explains in Policing the Crisis. Trumpeted by a compliant media, this paradigm shifted its focus from the common good to race, crime and law and order.  It told those undergoing profound economic and political change that their suffering stemmed not from rampant militarism and corporate greed but from a threat to national integrity.

  The old consensus that buttressed New Deal programs and the welfare state was attacked as enabling criminal Black youth, “welfare queens” and other alleged social parasites. This opened the door to a faux populism, begun by Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, which supposedly championed family values, traditional morality, individual autonomy, law and order, the Christian faith and the return to a mythical past, at least for white Americans.

  The Democratic Party, especially under Bill Clinton, moved steadily to the right until it became largely indistinguishable from the establishment Republican Party to which it is now allied. Donald Trump, and the 74 million people who voted for him in 2020, were the result.

  Political Theater

  

  Biden speaks in Philadelphia. (White House Photo)

  It will do no good, as Biden did on Thursday in Philadelphia, to demonize Trump and his supporters in the way they demonize Biden and the Democrats. Biden, raising clenched fists, backlit by Stygian red lights and flanked by two U.S. Marines in dress uniforms, announced from his Dantesque stage set that “Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our Republic.” 

  Trump called the speech the most “vicious, hateful and divisive speech ever delivered by an American president” and attacked Biden as “an enemy of the state.” 

  Biden’s frontal assault widens the divide. It solidifies a system where voters do not vote for what they want, since neither side delivers anything of substance, but against what they despise. Biden did not address our socioeconomic crisis or offer solutions. It was political theater.

  Anti-politics masquerades as politics. No sooner does one money-drenched election cycle end, the next one begins, perpetuating what Wolin calls “politics without politics.” These elections do not permit citizens to participate in power.

  The public is allowed to voice opinions to scripted questions, which are repackaged by publicists, pollsters, political consultants and advertisers and fed back to them. Few races, including only 14 percent of congres­sional districts, are considered competitive. Politicians do not campaign on substantial issues but on skillfully manufactured political personalities and emotionally charged culture wars. 

  Omnipotence 

  

  The Pentagon. (Joe Lauria)

  The militarists, who have created a state within a state and who plunge us into one military debacle after another, consuming half of all discretionary spending, are omnipotent. The corporations and billionaires, which orchestrated a virtual tax boycott and gutted regulation and oversight, are omnipotent.

  The industrialists who wrote trade deals to profit from unemployment and underemployment of U.S. workers and sweatshop labor overseas are omnipotent. The insurance and pharmaceutical industries that run the healthcare system, whose primary concern is profit not health and who are responsible for 16 percent of the worldwide reported deaths from COVID-19 although we are less than 5 percent of the global population, are omnipotent.

  The intelligence agencies that carry out wholesale surveillance of the public are omnipotent.

  The courts that reinterpret laws to strip them of their original meaning to ensure corporate control and excuse corporate crimes, are omnipotent. The courts gave us Citizens United, for example, which permits unlimited corporate financing of elections by claiming it upholds the right to petition the government and is a form of free speech.

  Spectacle

  

  July 4, 2019, parade in Washington, D.C. (Joe Lauria)

  Politics is spectacle, a tawdry carnival act where the constant jockeying for power by the ruling class dominates the news cycles, as if politics were a race to the Super Bowl. The real business of ruling is hidden, carried out by corporate lobbyists who write the legislation, banks that loot the Treasury, the war industry and an oligarchy that determines who gets elected and who does not. It is impossible to vote against the interests of Goldman Sachs, the fossil fuel industry or Raytheon, no matter which party is in office.

  The moment any segment of the population, left or right, refuses to participate in this illusion, the face of inverted totalitarianism resembles the face of classical totalitarianism, as Julian Assange is experiencing.

  Our corporate overlords and militarists prefer the decorum of George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Joe Biden. But they worked closely with Trump and are willing to do so again.

  What they will not allow are reformers such as Bernie Sanders, who might challenge, however tepidly, their obscene accumulation of wealth and power. This inability to reform, to restore democratic participation and address social inequality, means the inevitable death of the republic.

  Biden and the Democrats rail against the cultish Republican Party and their threat to democracy, but they too are the problem.

  *  *  *

  Author’s Note to Readers: There is now no way left for me to continue to write a weekly column for ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show without your help. The walls are closing in, with startling rapidity, on independent journalism, with the elites, including the Democratic Party elites, clamoring for more and more censorship. Bob Scheer, who runs ScheerPost on a shoestring budget, and I will not waiver in our commitment to independent and honest journalism, and we will never put ScheerPost behind a paywall, charge a subscription for it, sell your data or accept advertising. Please, if you can, sign up at chrishedges.substack.com so I can continue to post my Monday column on ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show, “The Chris Hedges Report.”

  This column is from Scheerpost, for which Chris Hedges writes a regular column. Click here to sign up for email alerts.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 22:05

• Xi's First Overseas Meeting In Years Will Be With Putin In Uzbekistan Next Week
  Xi’s First Overseas Meeting In Years Will Be With Putin In Uzbekistan Next Week

  Russian President Vladimir Putin confirmed Wednesday while addressing the Eastern Economic Forum (EEF) in Vladivostok that he will soon meet in person with Chinese President Xi Jinping, which will mark a significant first bilateral summit since Russia launched the Ukraine invasion on Feb.24. 

  Putin told the forum held in Russia’s far east that “I hope to see Xi Jinping in Uzbekistan soon.” As we described earlier, the Chinese delegation was the largest in attendance for the annual economic meeting.

  

  Kremlin officials also confirmed to the Associated Press that “Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping to meet next week at summit in Uzbekistan.” The two large nuclear-armed nations also just wrapped up a week of joint war games, among multiple other nations represented, at Vostok 2022 in the same far eastern region of Russia.

  CNN notes that “On Wednesday, China’s number three leader Li Zhanshu, a member of the Chinese Communist Party’s Politburo Standing Committee, became the highest ranking official to leave China since 2020, when he arrived in Vladivostok to attend the Eastern Economic Forum. Li was expected to meet Putin on Wednesday, according to Tass.”

  As for President Xi, he rarely leaves the country, and the Uzbekistan summit will be his first overseas trip since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020.

  Russia’s ambassador to Beijing Andrey Denisov described the significance in state media:

  “This summit promises to be interesting, because it will be the first full-fledged summit since the pandemic,” Denisov said, according to Tass.

  “I do not want to say that online summits are not full-fledged, but still, direct communication between leaders is a different quality of discussion … We are planning a serious, full-fledged meeting of our leaders with a detailed agenda, which we are now, in fact, working on with our Chinese partners,” the diplomat said.

  On Tuesday the Kremlin had issued a statement underscoring the importance growing Chinese cooperation: “Russia-China relations of comprehensive partnership and strategic cooperation are developing progressively,” it said just ahead of Putin’s address to the EEF.

  The statement further hailed “China’s balanced approach to the Ukraine crisis” and its “understanding” of what’s driving Moscow’s ‘special operation’ in Ukraine. 

  Vladimir Putin oversaw “Vostok 2022”, the military drills in Russia’s far east involving over 50,000 troops from 14 countries pic.twitter.com/EHtMIaY0XP

  — South China Morning Post (@SCMPNews) September 7, 2022

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  Just days before the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Moscow and Beijing had declared a “no limits” partnership amid a growing standoff with the West, which has since included unprecedented sanctions and economic war against Russia as punishment for its military offensive.

  In October, Russia and China held joint naval drills in the Sea of Japan. Days later, Russian and Chinese warships held their first joint patrols in the western Pacific. The next month, South Korea’s military said it had scrambled fighter jets after two Chinese and seven Russian warplanes intruded into its air defense identification zone during what Beijing called regular training. Thus it’s clear that the past years have seen these two nuclear-armed superpowers grow in not only economic cooperation but military coordination as well.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 21:45

• ECB Preview: 50 or 75?
  ECB Preview: 50 or 75?

  Submitted by Newsquawk

  Summary:

  • Up until a few weeks ago, expectations for the September meeting had been coalescing around the prospect of an additional 50bps hike by the ECB, taking the deposit rate to 0.5%. However, a source report on 26th August revealed that some policymakers wish to discuss a 75bps rate rise due to the deterioration in the inflation outlook, with the prospect of a looming recession not a justification for slowing or halting policy normalisation.
  • Thereafter, a speech by Germany’s Schnabel reinforced the Governing Council’s tightening ambitions by noting that both the likelihood and the cost of current high inflation becoming entrenched in expectations are uncomfortably high, and she added that central banks need to act forcefully in this environment.
  • August HICP data saw the headline rate climb to 9.1% Y/Y from 8.9%, and the super-core metric advance to 4.3% Y/Y from 4.0%, prompting concerns that second-round effects from energy inflation are making their way through the economy.
  • Accordingly, the likes of Goldman Sachs, Credit Suisse, BofA, JPM and several others adjusted their calls in favour of a 75bps move, an outcome that markets are currently assigning with an approximate 95% probability. Looking further ahead, markets are pricing just under 175bps of tightening by year-end (including September).
  • Elsewhere, aspects of the Q&A will likely focus on the ECB’s plans for its APP reinvestments after reports suggested that it could begin discussing ending reinvestments, albeit a decision is not expected to be forthcoming with rates viewed as the preferred tool for tightening.
  • The accompanying staff economic forecasts will likely see upward revisions to the 2022 and 2023 inflation projections of 6.8% and 3.5% respectively, with Morgan Stanley pencilling in an upgrade to the 2024 forecast of 2.1% to 2.2%. From a growth perspective, 2022 GDP is expected to forecast trivially higher at 2.9% vs. 2.8% in June, with 2023 growth expected to be cut to 0.4% from 2.1%.

  PRIOR MEETING: Despite expectations for a 25bps hike across the ECB’s three key rates, policymakers opted to “go big” and deliver 50bps worth of tightening, taking the deposit rate to 0% and therefore drawing a line under the Bank’s NIRP. Alongside this, the Bank refrained from providing explicit guidance for the September meeting and instead adopted a meeting-by-meeting approach. The Governing Council was also able to agree on an anti-fragmentation tool named the Transmission Protection Instrument (TPI), aimed at ensuring that the monetary policy stance is transmitted smoothly across all euro area countries. That said, PEPP will remain the first line of defence to counter risks to the transmission mechanism related to the pandemic. President Lagarde said that the Governing Council rallied around the consensus of a 50bps hike and that the ECB is accelerating the normalisation process, but not changing the ultimate point of arrival. In terms of the details of TPI, Lagarde noted that all nations are eligible, the ECB is capable of “going big” on the instrument, whilst the activation of TPI is at the discretion of the Governing Council. Furthermore, the followup press release noted that purchases under TPI could be suspended if it is judged that persistent tensions are due to country fundamentals.

  RECENT ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENTS: August inflation metrics continued to advance further with Y/Y HICP climbing to 9.1% from 8.9% and the super-core metric advancing to 4.3% from 4.0%, prompting concerns that second-round effects from energy inflation are making their way through the economy. The Eurozone’s 5y5y inflation expectations metric sits around 2.16% compared to 2.05% at the time of the July meeting. From a growth perspective, Q2 Q/Q GDP was revised lower to 0.6% from 0.7%. The more timely PMI data showed the August composite-wide metric falling to 48.9 from 49.9 amid a decline in services to 49.8 from 51.2 and a drop in manufacturing to 46.9 from 49.8. The report made for grim reading with S&P Global noting “the latest PMI data for the eurozone point to an economy in contraction during the third quarter of the year”, adding that “cost of living pressures mean that the recovery in the services sector following the lifting of pandemic restrictions has ebbed away”. On the employment front, S&P Global stated that “the rebuilding of workforces following the pandemic is also losing steam, with firms increasingly reluctant to hire  additional staff”. The Eurozone unemployment rate as of July, remains at its historical low of 6.6%.

  RECENT COMMUNICATIONS: At Jackson Hole, Germany’s Schnabel (27th Aug) stated that both the likelihood and the cost of current high inflation becoming entrenched in expectations are uncomfortably high, adding that central banks need to act forcefully in this environment. Her German counterpart Nagel (30th Aug) echoed this sentiment noting that rate hikes should not be delayed by fears of a possible recession. Other known hawks on the Board such as Latvia’s Kazaks, Austria’s Holzmann and Estonia’s Mueller suggested that 50bps and 75bps should be on the table for the upcoming meeting, whilst Netherland’s Knot noted that he is leaning towards a 75bps move. Elsewhere, the typically more centrist Villeroy of France (27th Aug) suggested that the Bank could be at the neutral rate before year-end with another significant step in September (his estimate of neutral is somewhere between 1-2%). Belgium’s Wunsch (30th Aug) suggested that the Bank could need to raise rates to a level that starts to restrict economic activity or above what is considered the “neutral” rate. Chief Economist Lane (29th Aug) called for a more measured approach by suggesting that it makes sense to allow the financial system to absorb rate changes in a step-by-step manner, adding that “the same cumulative rate hike over a fixed interval is less likely to generate adverse feedback loops if it takes the form of a multistep calibrated series rather than a smaller number of larger rate increases”. Known-dove Stournaras of Greece (30th Aug) stated that further and gradual normalisation will be appropriate, adding that the ECB does not need to take very large steps. Stournaras estimates the neutral rate to be between 0.5-1.5%.

  RATES: Consensus expects the ECB to raise the deposit rate by 75bps to 0.75%. However, there is a notable split in analyst views as per Reuters polling with 34/67 expecting 75bps, 29 expecting 50bps and four expecting just a 25bps move. Market pricing is more convinced over a larger-than-usual increment with 75bps priced at a circa 95% probability. Expectations for a 75bps move were stoked after a source report on 26th August revealed that some policymakers wish to discuss a 75bps rate rise due to the deterioration in the inflation outlook, with the prospect of a looming recession not a justification for slowing or halting policy normalisation. Thereafter, a speech by Germany’s Schnabel and rhetoric from other officials (see above) reinforced the Governing Council’s tightening ambitions. Accordingly, and in the wake of another firmer-than-expected Eurozone inflation report, the likes of Goldman Sachs, Credit Suisse, BofA, JPM and several others adjusted their calls in favour of a 75bps move with desks of the view that such a move would provide policymakers an opportunity to front-load hikes and signal their tightening ambitions. That said, the likes of ING, who expect just a 50bps move, think that such a magnitude would be a compromise, with a 75bps rise looking like “one bridge too far” for the doves. Beyond Thursday’s decision, markets price in around 100bps of tightening (excluding this week) by year-end which would imply 50bps moves at the October and November meetings. One nuance for the press conference and highlighted by SGH Macro is that markets will be looking to see whether a 75bps move would see 25bps “borrowed or brought forward from a future hike” given that at the July meeting, President Lagarde suggested that the larger-than-expected move did not change the ultimate destination of the policy path. Elsewhere, market participants will be looking for any indications as to where the ECB sees the neutral rate (generally considered to be somewhere between 1-2%) and how far the ECB is willing to go above the neutral rate into restrictive territory.

  

  BALANCE SHEET: At the July meeting, the Governing Council was also able to agree on an anti-fragmentation tool named the Transmission Protection Instrument (TPI), aimed at ensuring that the monetary policy stance is transmitted smoothly across all euro area countries. That said, it was noted that PEPP remains the first line of defence to counter risks to the transmission mechanism related to the pandemic. In terms of the details of TPI, Lagarde noted that all nations are eligible, the ECB is capable of “going big” on the instrument, whilst the activation of TPI is at the discretion of the Governing Council. Lagarde later clarified that the four conditions for TPI are as follows: 1. Compliance of EU fiscal framework, 2. Absence of severe macro imbalances, 3. Fiscal sustainability, 4. Sound and sustainable macro policies. The follow-up press release noted that purchases under TPI could be suspended if it is judged that persistent tensions are due to country fundamentals. Traders will be cognisant of the upcoming Italian election on September 25th. Elsewhere, aspects of the Q&A will likely focus on the ECB’s plans for its APP reinvestments. Recent reports suggested that the Bank could begin discussing ending reinvestments at an upcoming meeting, albeit September is judged to be too soon for such a discussion with rate hikes viewed as the preferred tool for tightening. As such, Lagarde is unlikely to give too much away on this front. Furthermore, when such a move comes, it will potentially need to be squared up against ongoing reinvestments under PEPP and any potential purchases under TPI.

  ECONOMIC PROJECTIONS: The accompanying staff economic forecasts will likely see upward revisions to the 2022 and 2023 inflation projections of 6.8% and 3.5% respectively to somewhere in the region of 8.1% and 4.5%. As ever, the 2024 projection will be a key focus to see how the Governing Council judges the impact of current policy on the medium-term inflation outlook, with the current 2.1% forecast expected to be nudged higher to 2.2%. It is worth noting that the projections will likely need to be taken with a huge pinch of salt given the uncertainty of the outlook and the fluidity of the European gas situation. On that very point, the cut-off date for submitting forecasts will have pre-dated the recent shutting off of NS1 which subsequently sent European gas prices surging. From a growth perspective, 2022 GDP is expected to forecast trivially higher at 2.9% vs. 2.8% in June with 2023 growth expected to be cut to 0.4% from 2.1% and 2024 to be lowered to 1.6% from 2.1%.

  MARKET REACTIONS: Finally, ahead of tomorrow’s ECB meeting, the team from ING Economics analyze four potential scenarios on a scale from dovish to ultra-hawkish and what this can mean for EUR/USD and EUR rates (full report link here):

  

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 21:25

• Maryland County To Enforce Youth Curfew After "Armed And Dangerous Children" Spark Murderous Month
  Maryland County To Enforce Youth Curfew After “Armed And Dangerous Children” Spark Murderous Month

  A county in Maryland near Washington, D.C., just recorded the deadliest month in decades. Local government officials are fed up with the surge in violent crime and announced a curfew for young people, which will last for a month, according to The Washington Times. 

  Prince George’s County Executive Angela Alsobrooks held a press conference Monday about the new curfew would begin next weekend and last for 30 days. Anyone under 17 will be forbidden from public areas between 10 pm and 5 am on weeknights unless escorted by a parent. On weekends the curfew begins at midnight and will be enforced by police.  

  Alsobrooks’ announcement comes as county police investigated 24 killings in August alone, a record high. 

  

  She said an “eye-popping” 430 arrests of juveniles this year is a doubling of last year’s figures — adding a lot of violent crime is being committed by young people. 

  “At this point, these kids don’t just need a hug, they need to be held accountable,” Alsobrooks said. “I know it’s not a popular thing to say, but it’s a fair question: Where are their parents? Where are the aunties, where are the uncles and other family members who are responsible for them?”

  She warned there’d been a dangerous spike in carjackings by “armed and dangerous children,” calling it a severe problem. 

  The last time a youth curfew was implemented in the county was in 1995. Punishments for parents are fines up to $250.

  Prince George’s County Police Chief Malik Aziz said the number of juveniles being repeatedly arrested is “deeply troubling.” 

  Gun blog Bearing Arms pointed out: 

  “So I have to give Prince George’s County credit for looking for ways to reduce homicides that don’t involve gun control, but I’m not sure interfering with the rights of an entire segment of people of whom a small percentage are bad actors, but still account for less than a quarter of all violent crimes is the way to go.”

  … and what happens if the curfew doesn’t work?

  Curious what you think… weigh in. Do you think enforcing the curfew will help stop the violence?
  Prince George’s County Executive Alsobrooks announced Monday a curfew that would ban youth from public places late at night, citing an increase in gun violence & carjackings. pic.twitter.com/dysRnrxvab

  — Annie Yu (@AnnieYuTV) September 6, 2022 

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  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 21:05

• Despite Unprecedented Tightening This Year, The Fed's Still Nowhere Near 'Destination Restrictive Territory'
  Despite Unprecedented Tightening This Year, The Fed’s Still Nowhere Near ‘Destination Restrictive Territory’

  By Ven Ram, Bloomberg markets analyst and reporter

  US nominal yields are quite the rage these days.

  And the dollar is having a heyday like no other, with the yen, the euro and the pound desperately in need of some smelling salts – except that there is just no one to nurse the non-dollars back to health in quick order.

  

  Underpinning the inexorable increase in dollar-denominated nominal yields and the chutzpah in the greenback is, of course, the surge in inflation-adjusted yields in the state-side.

  Five-year real rates have shot up some 100 basis points in the space of just over a month, and so have 10-year rates – more or less.

  

  And yet it doesn’t look like we are almost there when it comes to the end of possible strength in the dollar and the surge in nominal rates.

  Witness Fed Richmond President Thomas Barkin remarking that the “destination is real rates in positive territory and my intent would be to maintain them there until such time as we are really convinced that we put inflation to bed.”

  That, of course, means that after spades of tightening so far this year, the Fed is still nowhere in sight of Destination Restrictive Territory.

  If the Fed was naive (or artful enough to make everyone buy the story) in projecting just 75 basis points of increase for all of 2022 at the end of last year, now the boot is fully on the other foot.

  Having already raised rates by 225 basis points, the prospect of taking it higher by another 150 basis points in short order is now more or less the base case.

  On the other side of the pond, the European Central Bank is prepared to be more hawkish than even real hawks that spread their wings and soar over the sky… and that means euro-area rates are going to end up a lot higher this year than anyone imagined.

  Still, that’s not to say that President Christine Lagarde and her governing council will be able to match Chair Jerome Powell and Co. in their fire power. And that will still mean vulnerability for the euro.

  And we haven’t even mentioned the Bank of Japan’s nonchalance amid all this tumult, which of course leaves the yen exposed toward 150 per dollar.

  And there is no need to shed a tear for the pound.

  If you are going to fiddle as London burns and inflation comes scorching down, you could hardly persuade currency traders to accept deeply negative real yields as compensation and put up with it with a happy face.

  It just ain’t happening, Mr. Andrew Bailey, unless the Bank of England decides to amuse everyone with fairy tales. Not that anyone is in the mood for it…

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 20:45

• When The Tide Turns, Brace For A Face-Ripping Yen Rally
  When The Tide Turns, Brace For A Face-Ripping Yen Rally

  As discussed earlier, the yen (and the yuan, and the euro, and pretty much every non-USD currency) is in the midst of a steep sell-off, but – as Bloomberg’s Simon White warns – when the trend turns, underlying processes are primed to see it rise significantly.

  As we pointed out this afternoon, the Japanese currency is on course for its weakest annual performance versus the dollar since at least the 1960s…

  

  … and as White notes, on the surface the reason is simple: the Federal Reserve is raising rates aggressively while the Bank of Japan is keeping them ultra-low. But the underlying processes are less obvious

  Understanding the yen means understanding capital flows. Japan is a net capital exporter, which means the capital flows of domestic investors, rather than foreign investors, are the dominant long-term driver of the currency.

  Momentum is driving the yen now, but its fall this year likely has two principal underlying drivers:

  • Japanese investors have been buying more foreign equities
  • Rising energy prices are leading to more capital outflow

  Yield differentials are having little direct impact. The rise in US short-term yields relative to long-term ones has made FX-hedged USTs unattractive to Japanese investors.

  Instead, the Japanese have ramped up net purchases of foreign equities. Unlike debt, equity purchases tend to be unhedged or underhedged, meaning the flow is yen-negative.

  Rising energy prices are also leaning on the yen. In normal times, when energy prices are more contained, a weaker yen boosts exports and therefore Japanese growth. But growth is not picking up. Exports have risen, but imports have climbed even more, meaning the trade balance is now in deficit.

  With not enough dollars from exports to pay for more expensive energy, in aggregate Japan is selling foreign assets — mainly debt securities — to get dollars. As debt is more likely to be FX hedged, unwinding the hedge is yen-negative as there is no offsetting capital flow back into Japan.

  

  Normally a large yen-stabilizing flow would come from Japanese investors FX hedging their international portfolios, but it doesn’t look like this is happening. The chart below shows Japan listed-companies’ FX-hedging sensitivity is low right now. Simply put, if the trend in the yen is bolstering your returns, why stand in the way of it?

  

  Moreover, foreigners have been largely absent from Japanese asset markets. Also, tourism has slumped. Japan has been all but closed to foreigners since the pandemic, taking the net annual travel surplus of over $50 billion in 2019 to almost zero now.

  But here’s the thing about the yen — it’s like a catapult. The more it’s stretched, the greater its propensity to rebound.

  Japan is the world’s largest net creditor. Rather than triggering a capital outflow, any domestic shock in Japan tends to trigger net inflows as capital is repatriated. With a net international investment position (NIIP) of almost $3.5 trillion, the amount of capital returning is potentially vast, with a powerful strengthening effect on the yen.

  The yen’s slide is slowing growth, making a real-growth shock more likely, especially as there are signs inflation is moving to a higher and unstable regime. Furthermore, the risk is increasing the government or central bank intervenes to stabilize the currency, or the BoJ abandons or loosens its cap for 10-year JGB yields.

  Any of those would trigger a reversal in the yen that could very quickly become self-reinforcing. Firms would be more inclined to reset FX hedges if they thought the yen’s trend had reversed. Foreign assets would be sold for yen as capital would be returned home.

  Demand for dollars to pay for energy would decline. Foreigners would be more inclined to buy Japanese assets if they thought the currency was on an upward trend. And as the border is gradually opened up, there will be plenty of pent-up demand for cheap Japanese holidays and business travel.

  The yen after such a catalyst could very quickly change direction and rally hard. Suddenly, USDJPY at 120 looks more likely than USDJPY at 160. Options currently imply the second is seven times more probable than the first by the end of the year. As contrarian trades go, they don’t get much more compelling than a stronger yen.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 20:25

• The 'Inflation Reduction Act' Will Increase Inflation & Impoverish Middle-Class Americans
  The ‘Inflation Reduction Act’ Will Increase Inflation & Impoverish Middle-Class Americans

  Authored by Pete Hoekstra via The Gatestone Institute,

  House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wondered aloud how Republicans could vote against Mother Earth. West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin possibly wondered how Republicans could vote against his so-called “Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).” In reality, Pelosi was closer to describing the contents of the IRA than was Manchin.

  The IRA is revolutionary in what it purports to do for the climate. The only impact it will have on inflation is to increase it.

  

  The IRA deliberately sets about impoverishing many Americans by increasing taxes “on everyone” and increasing tax audits at the same time as prices are skyrocketing. Imposing steeper taxes at a time of steeper prices may not mean that much to the rich, but has the effect of a stealth double-tax that crushes especially middle- and working-class families, who now find themselves forced to choose between necessities such as food, gasoline or rent. Reports state that 42% of Americans are struggling financially.

  The political theory governing this economic sledgehammer seems to be seems to be that a bigger, centralized government that controls people is “better” — at least for the politicians — than a government that prizes the individual, individual freedoms and the ability to spend hard-earned money the way he or she wishes, rather than how government chooses to spend it for him. This Marxist view looks at people not as individuals, but as a collective for the government to organize as it wishes or “thinks best” (for whom? The government or the people it is organizing?) — not quite what the framers of our Constitution had in mind. It is apparently easier for a government to control citizens without freedoms – economic or otherwise, as in China or North Korea — than citizens with free choice, unpredictability and the opportunity to achieve the American Dream — who will not as dependent on the government to be a nanny-state for them. The government can then promise everyone goodies to keep them dependent, while it decides what to dole out, when and to whom: what cars you must buy, what doctors and healthcare you are allowed to have; what “social justice” (here and here) and gender issues your children are to be taught in school; which companies — possibly of campaign donors — should be rewarded with subsidies and handouts, and which, such as donors to other political parties, should be targeted for audits and confiscations.

  As the cost of energy — gasoline, heating, air-conditioning — continues to rise, in addition to financing America’s adversaries that produce oil and gas such as Iran, Russia and Venezuela, all purchases for Americans, in an increasing downward spiral, become increasingly unaffordable. All goods that are manufactured or transported continue to cost more, forcing Americans to pay even higher prices for virtually everything. Already squeezed, many Americans will be forced to start buying less. Restaurants, even fast-food places, for instance, will become luxury items and attract fewer customers; many small businesses will be forced to close and their employees will be laid off, creating still less purchasing power. Even if the government hands out a few hundred dollars, that is hardly enough to keep up with an 8.5% inflation rate. If the Biden administration believes that the top earners in the US are not paying their fair share of taxes, then Congress should change the tax laws. Between incentivizing the golden goose and killing it are many shades of gray.

  If all that were not punishing enough for the average American, the Internal Revenue Service will now get $80 billion to hire 87,000 new IRS agents to conduct more audits and tax-collection. The Biden administration’s promise not to increase the taxes of households making less than $400,000 a year is about as solid as the Obama administration’s promise that “You can keep your doctor [and] healthcare”. The White House has been claiming that the government is going after only “the ultra-wealthy and corporations.” Really?

  First, as the adage goes, “Corporations don’t pay corporate taxes, people do.” Corporations simply pass on the increased expense by raising the price of their products or cutting jobs. The result, of course, is that even more people will be thrown out of work and unable to buy these now “luxury” items.

  Second, of course, whoever imagined that doubling the size of the IRS is just what the American people have been pining for — spending $80 billion of the American taxpayers’ hard-earned money to target not Russia, China or Iran — but Americans? Or political opponents? On the charm scale, it is right up there with the government labeling parents “domestic terrorists.”

  Moreover, these 87,000 new IRS agents will likely have zero interest in taking on either well-lawyered corporations or “ultra-wealthy” individuals. Incidentally, at what dollar amount does a wealthy person become “ultra”? Any self-respecting IRS agent would presumably prefer to come away from an IRS chat with something to show for it. The easiest target, of course, would be small business owners and middle-class individuals, for whom hiring a lawyer or accountant to refute a claim would cost more than just paying the IRS to go away. Just think of the IRS auditing, say, a lawyered-up Amazon corporation, which, until 2020, paid no taxes: “So, Walter, how’d it go today?” “Uh, zip.” What sort of return on investment for hiring 87,000 new IRS agents is that?

  The best news of all, however, is that they are armed! The IRS recently took down a recruiting ad — at the same time as many Americans are advocating for gun control — saying that agents must be “willing to carry a firearm” and “use deadly force, if necessary.” Now, that is what you might call persuasive. It also uncomfortably resembles the start of an armed federal militia to federalize the police, replace those precincts that were defunded, and begin targeting Americans — call it the Papa Doc or Venezuela model — definitely not what the founding fathers had in mind. That is where they came in, and the reason for the Second Amendment.

  The government, the Wall Street Journal determined, was embarking on a plan, to “raise a total of $739 billion in revenue, and spend a total of $433 billion…. to reduce the deficit by about $102 billion over a decade” – in government terms, a rounding error, with your tax dollars. But not a dollar for more Homeland Security agents to address the nearly 5 million illegal aliens — including 900,000 “gotaways” — rampant human trafficking, escalating child sex slavery, and massive drug smuggling that resulted, last year alone, in more than 107,000 deaths.

  Just as ruinous for Americans but a windfall again for Russia, are the new taxes the IRA slaps on oil and natural gas — precisely when much of the world, and Europe in particular, are counting on the US to help them out this winter after Russian President Vladimir Putin turned off the taps.

  If the Inflation Reduction Act has nothing to do with bringing down inflation, what it does have something to do with is purportedly funding climate change and green energy. “The package,” again according to the Wall Street Journal, “will spend roughly $369 billion on climate and energy programs, including tax credits for buying electric and hydrogen vehicles and making energy-efficient home improvements,” most of which are made in — China. Reality, as author and climate change expert Bjørn Lomborg keeps insisting, is that when alternatives to fossil fuels become “much less expensive and more effective,” everyone will choose them without being forced:

  “By forcing up the price of fossil fuels, policy-makers have put the cart before the horse. Instead, we need to make green energy much cheaper and more effective.

  “Humanity has relied on innovation to fix other big challenges. We didn’t solve air pollution by forcing everyone to stop driving, but by inventing the catalytic converter that drastically lowers pollution. We didn’t slash hunger by telling everyone to eat less, but through the Green Revolution that enabled farmers to produce much more food.”

  How comforting, however, to see that families having trouble buying gasoline at $4.50 a gallon (down from $5!) will now be able to rush out and buy a $60,000 electric vehicle! Not surprisingly, the minute tax credits to buy electric vehicles was announced, some car companies, while insisting the two events were not connected — perish the thought! – raised their prices by $6,000-$8,500, “roughly matching the $7,500 tax credit introduced under the inflation bill.”

  If there are cuts in drug prices, ordinarily that would be wonderful – if they did not also mean government interference in the private business of pharmaceuticals and the resultant impediment to research and development in tackling diseases, among others, such as cancer, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.

  As for Nancy Pelosi’s climate change part: as long as China “is building more than half of the world’s new coal power plants,” and all of us on the planet are breathing the same air, we are essentially depriving Americans of low-cost energy independence while enriching, again, overt adversaries such as Russia and Iran that export oil for as high a price as they can. Other countries are likely to be less passionate about having clean energy and more passionate about the bottom line. Russia, for instance, has been trying for years to limit America’s oil production to prod the US to transfer its dependence on oil to, you guessed it again!, Russia. If the US had the widespread, inexpensive oil production it enjoyed two years ago, Putin would never have had the resources even to think of invading Ukraine. The US is, quixotically, funding both sides of this war.

  Last week, the US Congress approved a $10,000-$20,000 Student Loan Relief plan – with the actual cost to taxpayers estimated at $1 trillion — with a T — over ten years. The cost of that will be unfairly dumped on the shoulders of the 62% majority of Americans — often lower-income, blue-collar Uber-drivers, welders, small shopkeepers — who never went to college. It is a grotesque reverse transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich. As Florida Governor Ron DeSantis put it:

  “It’s unfair to force a truck driver to pay a loan for someone who got a PhD in gender studies. Taxpayers shouldn’t be footing the bill for student loan relief and Biden’s order isn’t constitutional. If anything, universities handing out worthless degrees should be on the hook.”

  “Constitutional” in his statement means that the president does not have the power to allocate money; that is the Congress’s job.

  Moreover, no one will ever repay a student-loan again – why should they? The giveaway incentivizes people just to hang around and wait for loans to be forgiven. Anyone who ever struggled or held down two jobs to repay a student loan must now feel like a chump. Worse, universities — who are not being called on to use part of their gargantuan endowments to help cover this lavishness — will simply be encouraged to raise their fees even further.

  The biggest surprise of all in the IRA may have been, unbelievably, a new “Green Bank”, filled with $27 billion of your money for the Environmental Protection Agency — which, of course, knows so much about banking. It is supposed to be a “fund for clean energy projects,” but, as the government, cagily warns, “false claims risks exist.” What could possibly go wrong?

  The Inflation Reduction Act and Student Loan Relief Act and all these giveaways by the government, are yet more examples of government largess with the money of its citizens. Once again, politicians are taking taxpayer money and distributing it to favored causes and businesses, and then limiting the choices we can make as to how we want to live. It is bad policy in a country where freedom is supposed to reign.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 20:05

• Florida 'Mother Theresa' Was Actually Running $196 Million Ponzi Scheme According To SEC
  Florida ‘Mother Theresa’ Was Actually Running $196 Million Ponzi Scheme According To SEC

  A Florida woman whose website claimed she was “often referred to as ‘Mother Teresa’ in her community” was actually running a multi-million dollar Ponzi scheme which promised investors 120% – 180% annual returns, federal prosecutors allege.

  Broward County resident Johanna Garcia, connected investors with companies which needed short-term financing – promising the investors huge returns. Between June 2020 and August 2021, her company, MJ Capital Funding LLC took in more than $196 million from over 15,400 investors. She created a tool known as a “merchant cash advance” or MCA to provide loans to small businesses via a now-defunct website.

  

  Garcia told prospective investors that they were “purchasing future receivables,” which guaranteed them a share of the recipient businesses’ income for months. According to the SEC, however, she was using new investors’ funds to satisfy payments to existing investors – fueling a Ponzi scheme, NPR reports. Company insiders, meanwhile, are accused of spending millions of dollars on travel, luxury goods, clothing and other items.

  “From June 1, 2020 through August 31, 2021, the MJ Companies misused investor funds by making payments totaling at least $61.8 million to sales agents for promoting investments in the MJ Companies,” reads a new complaint against unlicensed broker, Pavel Ruiz.

  The SEC also alleges that MJ Capital used unlicensed brokers and sales agents to sell unregistered securities. Supporting the scheme, the authorities allege, was Pavel Ruiz, 29, an MJ Capital board member whose sales team of some 70 agents allegedly reeled in at least $46 million from more than 5,100 investors.

  Ruiz reaped large rewards from his work, allegedly taking in $292,000 in commissions. But he also diverted some $7.7 million directly into his personal accounts or ones he controlled, according to the SEC. It says he used some of the money to “purchase crypto assets and a luxury vehicle.” -NPR

  After initially filing a complaint against Garcia last year, a federal judge has since frozen her companies’ assets and ordered them into receivership.

  Last week, the SEC filed the second complaint – this one against Ruiz, which came on the same day as the US Attorney’s Office in the Southern District of Florida accused the unlicensed broker of conspiracy to commit wire fraud – which could land him in prison for 20 years.

  Garcia’s name does not appear in the criminal filing against Ruiz; she is referred to only as “Co-conspirator 1,” identified as the company’s leader. When NPR asked the U.S. Attorney’s Office if Garcia might also face criminal charges, a representative said on Monday, “Pursuant to DOJ policy, we can neither confirm nor deny the existence of an investigation.”

  Last week, the SEC and Garcia agreed to a partial settlement that would essentially put the agency’s complaint against her on the back burner. They jointly asked Judge Raag Singhal to approve the deal, citing potential complications from what Garcia has called a “parallel federal criminal investigation.”

  The proposed wording of the order accepting the partial settlement states, “the SEC can address its request for monetary relief once criminal sentencing is concluded (in the event that the Defendant does not prevail at trial).” -NPR

  The investigation began in 2021, when someone created a website with a URL similar to MJ Capital’s, but which accused them of running a Ponzi scheme. Garcia sued the site’s creator in federal court, demanding a jury trial on grounds of defamation. Two months later the FBI became involved – with an undercover agent visiting MJ Capital’s office posing as a prospective investor. The agent gave them $10,000, which they were told would generate a guaranteed 10% annual return.

  A change.org petition in support “to come together in support of Johanna in this time of need” has reached more than 3,200 signatures as of this writing.

  

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 19:45

• Buchanan: How Liberal Elites Detest Middle America
  Buchanan: How Liberal Elites Detest Middle America

  Authored by Pat Buchanan,

  Speaking at a San Francisco fundraiser in 2008, Barack Obama sought to explain the reluctance of working-class Pennsylvanians to rally to his cause.

  “You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and … the jobs have been gone now for 25 years, and nothing’s replaced them.”

  “And it’s not surprising, then, they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment … as a way to explain their frustrations.”

  Translation: The world has left Middle America behind, and Middle America has reacted by clinging to its bibles, bigotries and guns.

  

  Eight years later, Hillary Clinton was the Democratic nominee and, at a fundraiser in New York, addressed the same issue:

  “You know, to just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right? … The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic — you name it.”

  “Now, some of those folks — they are irredeemable, but thankfully they are not America.”

  Last week, President Joe Biden addressed the same issue. But it was not with an off-the-cuff remark that our president revealed his thoughts.

  At Independence Hall in Philadelphia, whence came the Declaration of Independence and Constitution, and flanked by two U.S. Marines, Biden described the Middle Americans of 2022. Only now they’re known as “MAGA Republicans,” and no more anti-American assemblage is to be imagined.

  In a speech he labored on for days, the president described that half of the Republican Party he sees as wedded to “semi-fascism.”

  “The Republican Party today is dominated, driven and intimidated by Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans. And that is a threat to this country.”

  “MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our Republic.”

  “MAGA forces … promote authoritarian leaders, and they fan the flames of political violence that are a threat to our personal rights, to the pursuit of justice, to the rule of law, to the very soul of this country.”

  “MAGA forces are determined to take this country backwards — backwards to an America where there is no right to choose, no right to privacy, no right to contraception, no right to marry who you love.”

  Biden is here hypocritically denouncing as “backward” moral stands championed by his own Catholic faith — opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage — that he himself held not so long ago.

  Biden went on:

  “MAGA Republicans do not respect the Constitution. They do not believe in the rule of law. They do not recognize the will of the people. They refuse to accept the results of a free election.”

  “MAGA Republicans … embrace anger. They thrive on chaos. They live, not in the light of truth but in the shadow of lies.”

  “MAGA Republicans look at America and see carnage and darkness and despair. They spread fear and lies. Lies told for profit and power.”

  “MAGA Republicans … are destroying American democracy.”

  On Labor Day, Biden returned to the theme:

  “Extreme MAGA Republicans … embrace political violence … (and) defend the mob that stormed the Capitol. And people died.”

  This is the place at which Biden has arrived, 19 months into a presidency that began with his commitment to bring America together:

  “Today, on this January day, my whole soul is in this: Bringing America together. Uniting our people. And uniting our nation. I ask every American to join me in this cause.”

  After 19 months in office, Biden has given up on that cause, for a new cause. The name of the game now is an old one: divide et impera, divide and conquer. Biden hopes to split “mainstream Republicans” off from “MAGA Republicans” and demonize the latter as intolerable allies or partners in our democracy.

  Indeed, the catalogue of sins and crimes Biden attributes to MAGA Republicans — extremism, violence, mendacity, authoritarianism — not only raises a question as to the state of the soul of the nation; it raises a question of its continuance as a democratic republic.

  At his first rally following the Biden diatribe, Trump called the president “an enemy of the state” and Biden’s speech, “the most vicious, hateful and divisive … ever delivered by an American president.”

  In an earlier time, this exchange between the two presidents might have been settled with pistols at dawn.

  A house divided against itself cannot stand, said Abraham Lincoln, invoking a biblical truth. While the attributes and conduct Biden attributes to MAGA Republicans may not be such as to make a civil war inevitable, they surely do raise the question of whether our republic ought to endure or to be dissolved.

  Indeed, Biden should be asked what differentiates MAGA Republicans who back Trump, given the crimes Biden listed, from the Black Shirts who accompanied Benito Mussolini on the March on Rome?

  Does Biden believe MAGA Republicans are as sincere in their beliefs and the methods they espouse to advance those beliefs, as Biden himself, Nancy Pelosi and Kamala Harris are in theirs?

  And if so, what do we have left in common?

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 19:25

• Pentagon Halts F-35 Stealth Jet Deliveries Over Use Of Chinese Alloy
  Pentagon Halts F-35 Stealth Jet Deliveries Over Use Of Chinese Alloy

  The Pentagon suspended the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II deliveries over Chinese rare-earth metals used in magnets for pumps on the stealth fighter jet. 

  Defense Department spokesman Russell Goemaere told Bloomberg in an email that the F-35 program office “temporarily paused the acceptance of new F-35 aircraft to ensure the F-35 program’s compliance” with DoD rules sourcing “specialty metals.” 

  

  Goemaere said the Chinese alloy won’t disrupt operations with F-35s in deployment with US military and global partners because “the magnet does not transmit information or harm the integrity of the aircraft and there are no performance, quality, safety or security risks associated with this issue.”

  The defense official said the F-35 program office “found an alternative source for the alloy that will be used in future turbomachines.” 

  “We are working with our partners and DoD to ensure contractual compliance within the supply chain … and are working with the DoD to resolve the issue as quickly as possible to resume deliveries,” Lockheed told Bloomberg. 

  Chinese alloy found in F-35s is no surprise, considering the country controls the global rare-earth metals market. 

  A Congressional Research Service report found that F-35s use about 920 pounds of rare earths per plane, mainly for electronic warfare sensors, electrical power systems, and magnets.  

  

  The US relies heavily on Asian countries for 80% of its rare-earths needs. There have been moves by the Biden administration to increase domestic supply chains as a priority to mitigate if China were to impose an export ban on US defense companies. 

  Rare earths are also central in manufacturing night vision goggles, precision-guided missiles, and drones. On the civilian side, metals are critical for electric vehicles and smartphones. 

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 19:05

• IRS Official in Charge Of 87,000 New Agents Played Key Role In Obama-Era Targeting Scandal
  IRS Official in Charge Of 87,000 New Agents Played Key Role In Obama-Era Targeting Scandal

  Authored by Fred Lucas via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  House Republicans say they will keep a “watchful eye” on the Internal Revenue Service official tapped to run the centralized office housing 87,000 incoming new agents because she has ties to the IRS’ targeting of tea party groups during the Obama administration.

  

  The Daily Signal first reported that IRS Commissioner Charles Rettig had appointed Nikole Flax, commissioner in charge of the IRS’ Large Business & International Division, to lead the establishment of the agency’s centralized office.

  In 2014, Flax was among seven IRS employees who said their computers had crashed, making it impossible for them to provide information sought by the House Ways and Means Committee in investigating the agency’s targeting of tea party and other conservative groups.

  Flax made 31 visits to the Obama White House from July 2010 through May 2013.

  “Every American should be concerned that a key player in the IRS’ targeting of conservative groups and ensuing cover-up has been tapped to oversee the implementation of Democrats’ tax and spending bill,” Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), ranking member of the House Oversight and Reform Committee, told The Daily Signal.

  

   Lois Lerner Connection

  In an email sent May 8, 2013, Lois Lerner, head of the IRS’ tax-exempt organizations unit when the scandal erupted, told Flax that she received a call about working with the Justice Department to pursue certain political organizations that “lied” on IRS forms.

  Lerner was the central figure of the Obama administration’s IRS targeting scandal. She said her computer also crashed.

  Lerner invoked her Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate herself in testimony before the House Oversight and Reform Committee. After being placed on paid administrative leave, she retired later in 2013.

  The IRS didn’t respond directly to the concerns raised by Flax’s background. Instead, the agency referred The Daily Signal to Rettig’s memo to staff announcing that Flax would run a new “centralized office” to implement elements of the tax and spending legislation that Democrats dubbed the Inflation Reduction Act. The package, signed into law by President Joe Biden, provides $80 billion for the IRS to add almost 87,000 new agents.

  Despite the computer crash during the congressional investigation of IRS targeting, Rettig said that Flax would work with Congress and others in her new role leading the effort.

  “Nikole has an extensive background in a variety of roles across the IRS since 2008,” Rettig’s memo says, adding: “Her wide range of experience will serve her well as she works with internal and external stakeholders, including Treasury, Congress, IRS employees and taxpayers.”

  Rettig’s memo to IRS staffers about the new office also quotes Flax.

  “This is a historic time for the IRS, and we are working to move quickly to begin work on the Inflation Reduction Act signed into law earlier this week,” Flax is quoted as saying. “This is an exciting opportunity, and we will be moving quickly with our work.”

  Flax became director of the IRS Large Business & International Division in 2021. Previously, she had been deputy commissioner for the division since 2017.

  Flax also is a former chief of staff to IRS Commissioner Steve Miller and was assistant deputy IRS commissioner for services and enforcement.

  Republicans on the House Oversight and Reform Committee will monitor the IRS’ actions, Comer said.

  “This entrenched bureaucrat will oversee the establishment of a new, centralized IRS office and the hiring of up to 87,000 IRS agents, which raises concerns that the Swamp could weaponize new resources to target and harass Americans,” Comer said in a statement provided to The Daily Signal.

  “Oversight Committee Republicans will keep a watchful eye on this office. If there is a whiff of government abuse, we will work to hold bad actors accountable,” he said.

  ‘Frequent Visitor to White House’

  In 2014, then-House Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp (R-Mich.) accused the IRS of “lying” by attempting to hide two years of emails from Lerner and other officials.

  “Despite their attempt to bury the missing Lerner emails on page 15 of a 27-page letter that arrived late Friday, we now know documents from other central figures, like Nikole Flax, are missing,” Camp said in a joint statement with Rep. Charles Boustany (R-La.), then-chairman of the Ways and Means oversight subcommittee.

  The two Republican lawmakers added:

  “The fact that Ms. Flax was a frequent visitor to the White House and the Eisenhower Executive Office Building only raises more questions. Who was she visiting at the White House and what were they talking about? Was she updating the White House on the targeting or was she getting orders?

  “These are answers we don’t yet have, because—surprise, surprise—a few computers crashed. Plot lines in Hollywood are more believable than what we are getting from this White House and the IRS.”

  When testifying before the House Ways and Means Committee in 2014, IRS Commissioner John Koskinen defended Flax, saying she had two IRS computers and that her IRS emails should be intact.

  “Those press releases with regard to Nicole Flax were inaccurate and misleading and it demonstrates why we’ll provide this committee a full report … when it is completed,” Koskinen told the committee. “We are not going to dribble out the information and have it played out in the press.”

  A string of audits and congressional investigations found that the IRS improperly targeted tea party and other conservative groups during the 2010 and 2012 election cycles by holding up their applications for tax-exempt status.

  Chronology of IRS Scandal

  In May 2013, the Treasury Department’s inspector general for tax administration released a report asserting that in the 2010 and 2012 election cycles, the IRS “used inappropriate criteria that identified tea party and other organizations applying for tax-exempt status based upon their policy positions.”

  That finding prompted investigations by the House Ways and Means Committee and the House Oversight and Reform Committee, which concluded in 2014 that top IRS officials knew of the targeting of conservative groups and decided against informing Congress.

  In 2015, the Senate Finance Committee released its findings that Lerner’s personal and political views played a role. The report said:

  “Lerner orchestrated a process that subjected these applicants to multiple levels of review by numerous components within the IRS, thereby ensuring that they would suffer long delays and be required to answer burdensome and unnecessary questions.”

  Another report, from the Government Accountability Office in 2016, stated that the IRS still might be targeting some nonprofits unfairly “based on an organization’s religious, educational, political, or other views.”

  Nevertheless, Justice Department prosecutor Barbara Bosserman—who had donated a total of $6,750 to Barack Obama’s presidential campaigns and the Democratic National Committee from 2004 to 2012—declined to press charges after investigating the matter.

  The IRS ultimately settled lawsuits with several tea party and other conservative groups in 2017 and 2018.

  In 2016, Congress approved a provision to prevent the IRS from doing anything to target organizations or groups applying for tax-exempt status.

  Reprinted by permission from The Daily Signal, a publication of The Heritage Foundation.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 18:45

• Retail Traders Throw In The Towel
  Retail Traders Throw In The Towel

  Two months ago, when stocks were still sliding ahead of the mid-summer bear market meltup, we looked at investor sentiment and found that retail (as well as institutional) investors were in the process of capitulating.

  

  This capitulatory sentiment quickly reversed however, once stocks first rose above 4,000, then the 500% retracement and eventually were on the verge of breaking above the 200DMA… but failed and have since stumbled again dragging everyone’s mood along with them.

  So fast forwarding two months, and taking another look at sentiment again, it would be safe to assume that with stocks sliding, that the mood has once again turned dire. And sure enough, as Vanda Research observes in its latest weekly note (available to pro subscribers), speculative retail traders are throwing in the towel.

  As Goldman’s Michael Nocerino wrote in his market wrap, saying that the bank is “seeing the absence of the retail investors (just look at bitcoin/meme stocks) as it’s back to school/work”, Vanda Research confirms that retail investors’ inflows into US securities continue to drop as the sell-off deepens, and suspects that “the lack of buying is originated from the increasing risk aversion of retail traders – who are waiting for a more favorable environment before trying to time the market or pick new stocks.” Translation: it makes no sense to buy the dip if tomorrow a bigger dip will emerge. 

  The lack of retail engagement can be observed by the low turnover (in line with 2019 levels). At the same time, individuals with a long term investment horizon are still net bullish – and indeed, net purchases remain relatively strong, close to the 2020-2022 average.

  

  That said, Vanda expects the retail inflows to slow further if equities continue to fall – especially if the sell-off is driven by the  underperformance of mega-caps.

  A better indicator of retail capitulation comes from Vanda’s tracker of total retail investors’ traded value in US securities, which has dropped to pre-Covid levels, or around $11BN per day…

  

  … and while net inflows have also been dropping, they remain in line with the post-Covid average. Vanda believes that this discrepancy is due to a change in investors’ behavior, as most of the active retail speculative investors gave up on day trading and now prefer to wait for a change in the macro-economic conditions. On the other side, a large portion of retail traders buy the dip with ETFs or favorite stocks in auto-pilot as they have a long term investment horizon.

  Of course, when one cuts to the chase, sentiment is always just a function of price, which is a problem since the average retail investor’s portfolio drawdown is again approaching -30%. As a result, risk-aversion is likely to only pick-up as the YTD PnL dramatically declines.

  

  In this context, Vanda thinks that the main risk on the downside is an underperformance of mega-caps – as retail investors are heavily exposed to stocks like: AAPL, TSLA, AMZN and NVDA; the retail tracking company expects portfolios to experience large losses if these companies underperform over the next few weeks which could eventually lead to a full-scale capitulation.

  Another pattern that reinforces this bearish view is the recent drop in levered long ETFs net inflows. After an initial rebound in TQQQ purchases during the first stage of the sell-off, which started with the Jackson Hole symposium, Vanda noticed a sharp decline in net inflows. Probably, retail traders do not dare to bet on a quick rebound  – or they even added bearish positions by buying SQQQ (most bought security yesterday).

  

  A more granular look at retail flows finds that investors’ flows into semis stocks show resilience as the US unveils the details of its Chips plan. One possible catalyst is the signing of the $52BN Chips for America plan into law on 9th August. The package is expected to funnel more than $70bn into the US semiconductor industry and set aside approximately $200bn for scientific and technological research. However, shares of semiconductor stocks (SOXX) have shed more than 16% since mid-August, lagging broader US equity indices as Fed tightening and global slowdown fears dominated headlines. Nevertheless, as the charts below show, the recent slump hasn’t deterred retail investors who have continued to step up buying in both cash equity and options markets ($730MM and $310MM in the last five trading days, respectively).

  

  Interestingly, despite its recent woes, NVDA remains a retail favorite within the semiconductor universe, with over $600MM net retail flows over the past two weeks. The stock has now slid 29% since the disappointing earnings pre-announcement on August 8th. The move was likely also driven by worries about the knock-on impacts of the CHIPS bills on its sales to China. According to Bloomberg data, the stock derives around 57% of its revenue from China and Taiwan, but that doesn’t seem to worry retail investors much as they continue offering exit liquidity to the pros.

  

  One place where the retail mania has certainly burst is Bed Bath stock – here, retail investors appear to have abandoned this summer phenomenon stock entirely as the company announced plans to lay off 20% of staff and close 150 stores, and following the sudden death of its CFO. That said, sporadic bursts in the trading of meme stocks will remain a feature of equity markets in the future. However, repeated attempts have displayed a decreasing impact on overall markets over time as investors of all stripes have learned how to navigate these highly speculative events. In particular, meme stock trading phases are shorter and unsustainable during bear markets.

  

  So could a rush for the safe havens foreshadow better times ahead? Vanda thinks so, noting that the recent rout in financial markets has pushed retail investors towards bonds and gold, driving a change in their short-term purchasing pattern. As frequently noted, retail investors’ bias is predominantly contrarian when it comes to risky assets. Conversely, this investor cohort tends to momentum-trade safe havens such as bonds and gold. So, the jump in purchases for these havens – off the back of price declines – indicates an increasingly bearish shift in sentiment. When considering retail’s ‘late-to-the-party’ track record in timing bottoms, this could actually foreshadow an improving outlook for equities in the days ahead.

  

  More in the full note available to pro subscribers.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 18:26

• Inflation Now Causing Hardship For Majority In US: Gallup
  Inflation Now Causing Hardship For Majority In US: Gallup

  By Jeffrey Jones of Gallup

  A majority of Americans, 56%, now say price increases are causing financial hardship for their household, up from 49% in January and 45% in November.

  

  The latest reading includes 12% who describe the hardship as severe and 44% as moderate.

  

  The results are based on an Aug. 1-22 web survey that interviewed over 1,500 members of Gallup’s probability-based panel.

  Although more Americans now than last fall say they are experiencing hardship, the percentage who are suffering severe hardship has held relatively steady at around 10%. Lower-income Americans are more likely than others to be experiencing severe hardship — 26% of those whose annual household income is less than $48,000 say prices are causing severe hardship for their families. That compares with 12% of middle-income Americans and 4% of upper-income Americans.

  Lower-income Americans are about as likely now as last fall to say they are experiencing either severe or moderate hardship — 74%, compared with 70% in November.

  Middle-income (63%) and upper-income (40%) Americans remain significantly less likely than lower-income Americans to say they are experiencing hardship. However, sharply more middle- and upper-income Americans are struggling now than were last November. The increase has been greater among middle-income Americans — up 17 percentage points — than among upper-income Americans — up 12 points.

  

  Reports of financial hardship also differ by partisanship. Republicans (67%) are far more likely than Democrats (44%) to say rising prices are hurting their families. Independents fall between the party groups, at 56%.

  These party differences are consistent with Republicans’ being more likely to mention inflation as the most important problem and to rate the economy more negatively than Democrats and independents do, likely because of the presence of a Democratic president in the White House.

  Spending, Travel, Driving Cutbacks Most Common Response to Inflation

  A new question in the survey asked those experiencing hardship to list some of the specific things they are doing to respond to the effects of inflation.

  The most common action, mentioned by 24% of those experiencing hardship, is to reduce spending, including buying less in general or buying only essential items. Another 17% say they are traveling less or canceling vacations, while the same percentage indicate they are driving less or trying to use less gas.

  Other common strategies for dealing with higher prices are buying cheaper goods or generic brands of products (12%), eating out less (10%), buying fewer groceries or growing their own food (10%), staying home (8%), and cutting down on entertainment expenses (8%).

  Seven percent say they have tried to increase their income by working more hours, finding a second job or looking for a new job. Three percent say they are delaying medical procedures or appointments, and another 3% are delaying home improvement or maintenance projects.

  Two percent each say they are downsizing or selling things they own, using savings, or using credit cards or loans. One percent are using food banks or applying for assistance.

  

  Adults of different income levels are about equally likely to report taking the most commonly mentioned actions. However, upper-income people are more likely than lower-income people to say they have cut back on travel and eating out, perhaps because they are more likely to do those activities under normal circumstances.

  Bottom Line

  With high inflation persisting for over a year, a majority of Americans now say they are experiencing financial hardship from higher prices. Lower-income Americans were mainly affected early on, but most middle-income Americans and a substantial minority of upper-income Americans are now feeling the strain of higher prices.

  To address the hardship inflation is causing them, Americans are largely making sacrifices by buying less, cutting back on discretionary spending and cutting back on recreational activities. Some have resorted to more significant measures such as finding another job, incurring debt, postponing medical care or applying for assistance.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 09/07/2022 – 18:05

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• Visualizing The World's Flight-Paths And Airports
  Visualizing The World’s Flight-Paths And Airports

  There are up to 8,755 commercial flights in the air at any given time of day. These flights transport thousands of people (and millions of dollars worth of goods) around the world.

  But where are these people and goods headed? This map from Adam Symington uses historical data from OpenFlights to visualize the world’s flight paths.

  As Visual Capitalist’s Carmen Ang details below, the graphic shows a comprehensive data set encompassing 67,663 different routes that connect 10,000 different airports across the globe.

  

  A Note On the Data

  The map uses an OpenFlights database provided by the third-party source that hasn’t been updated since June 2014.

  Because of this, the data used for the graphic is of historical value only. However, this detailed map sparked our curiosity and got us wondering—what are some of the busiest aviation hubs around the world right now?

  We did some digging, and here’s what we found.

  Busiest Airports by Passengers

  There are several ways to gauge an airport’s popularity. One way is to measure total passenger traffic throughout the year.

  According to Airports Council International (ACI), eight of the top 10 busiest airports for passenger traffic in 2021 were in America. Here’s a look at the top 10 list, as of April 11, 2022:

  

   

  In 2021, the airport with the most passenger traffic was Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. It accommodated more than 75 million passengers last year—a 76.4% increase compared to 2020 figures.

   

  Hartsfield-Jackson is well-known for being one of the busiest airports in the world. One reason for this is its convenient location—according to the airport’s official website, Atlanta is within a two-hour flight from 80% of the U.S. population.

  Dallas/Forth Worth (DFW) came in second place, seeing 62.5 million passengers throughout 2021. DFW was one of the only airports to boost its service offerings throughout the pandemic, and is also the main hub for American Airlines, the world’s largest airline by fleet size.

  Busiest Airports by Cargo

  While the U.S. dominates the ranking when it comes to passenger traffic, the list is much more diverse when looking at air cargo volumes. Here’s a look at the ranking, based on loaded and unloaded freight and mail (including transit freight):

  

   

  Hong Kong (HKG) takes the top spot since the airport processed more than 5.0 million metric tonnes of freight and mail throughout 2021.

   

  Hong Kong has been known as one of the busiest air cargo hubs for over a decade and is able to maintain this reputation because of its strategic location, impressive infrastructure, efficient customs, and business-friendly trade regulations.

  The COVID-19 Impact on Aviation

  The global pandemic hit the aviation industry hard. At its lowest point, international travel was down 98% from normal levels.

  While the aviation industry is starting to recover from its COVID-induced slump, things still haven’t fully bounced back yet, especially in places like Shanghai, where lockdowns are still being mandated.

  But experts remain hopeful for the future. According to ACI World’s General Director Luis Felipe de Oliveira, last year’s recovery was just the beginning.

  “With many countries taking steps towards the return of a certain normality, lifting almost all the health measures and travel restrictions as supported by science, we welcome the continuation of air travel demand’s recovery in 2022.”

  -LUIS FELIPE DE OLIVEIRA, ACI WORLD’S DIRECTOR GENERAL

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 23:20

• US, China Reportedly Want Same Moon-Landing Sites: "Could Be The First Potential Point Of Conflict Over Resources Beyond Earth"
  US, China Reportedly Want Same Moon-Landing Sites: “Could Be The First Potential Point Of Conflict Over Resources Beyond Earth”

  Authored by Katie Hutton via TheMindUnleashed.com,

  The United States and China are preparing for an embarrassing showdown in the event that both countries decide to land their respective lunar rockets on identical locations near the Moon’s south pole, which, according to the present plans, may very well transpire.

  

  According to SpaceNews, both NASA and China’s space agency have discovered various landing locations that are comparable to one another for their respective lunar missions. These landing sites include the Shackleton, Haworth, and Nobile craters, which are situated close to the lunar south pole.

  According to SpaceNews, both organizations may have selected these locations because of their elevated heights, favorable lighting conditions, and closeness to shadowy craters that have the potential to store lunar water ice. These factors may have contributed to their decision.

  Futurism notes that it is currently unknown how the United States and China intend to deal with the possibility of a landing site overlap during their respective moon missions, which are scheduled to take off in the years 2025 and 2024, respectively.

  The fact that more and more nations are considering sending astronauts to the Moon has created a brand-new problem for scientists to solve.

  According to SpaceNews, the United States is in a difficult circumstance when it comes to space agreements with China as a result of a budget resolution insert defined as the “Wolf Amendment.”

  The “Wolf Amendment” is a stipulation that was introduced in 2011 by then-representative Frank Wolf (R-VA) and severely restricts NASA’s ability to work with China in any capacity. The unwillingness of countries to play nice when it comes to space is undoubtedly going to cause many issues going forward in the Space realm. And some fear that this will usher in further Space militarization.

  Despite the efforts of past presidents Barack Obama and Donald Trump to participate in space negotiations with China, the conversations ultimately did not get very far. According to the findings of the report, the administration of President Joe Biden does not now have any apparent intentions to re-engage in the discussions.

  Although the two nations’ options for landing locations on the moon aren’t exactly shocking, they might be a historic first nevertheless. And we should expect to see more instances like this in the future as tensions rise and humans continually venture into space.

  “It is not hard to see why they both want the same spots,” space and law policy professor Christopher Newman told SpaceNews. “It is prime lunar real estate for in-situ resource utilization.”

  “This could be the first potential point of conflict over resources beyond Earth,” he added.

  Newman stated that in addition, on the basis of the fact that both sides had signed the Outer Space Treaty, they should, in principle, “accept the use of celestial bodies for peaceful purposes.”

  “It will be interesting to see what happens,” Newman tells SpaceNews, adding that “a lot will depend on who gets there first.”

  Folks, it looks like we could have a good old fashioned show down.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 23:00

• Pentagon Makes "Unusual" Announcement Ahead Of ICBM Launch
  Pentagon Makes “Unusual” Announcement Ahead Of ICBM Launch

  “There will be an operational test launch of an Air Force Global Strike Command unarmed Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile early tomorrow morning, Sept. 7, from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California,” Pentagon spokesman Brigadier-General Pat Ryder told reporters on Tuesday. 

  Ryder said the ICBM test would be “routine,” adding Russia was notified per treaty obligations about Wednesday’s test. But as AP noted:

  “The announcement ahead of the launch was unusual; the Pentagon has not confirmed recent tests until after they take place.” 

  He said the objective of the test “is to demonstrate the readiness of US nuclear forces and provide confidence in the security and effectiveness of the nation’s nuclear deterrent.” 

  .@PentagonPresSec: There will be an operational test launch of an Air Force Global Strike Command unarmed Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile early tomorrow morning, September 7, from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. pic.twitter.com/DkYdPvwUa9

  — Department of Defense 🇺🇸 (@DeptofDefense) September 6, 2022

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

  The test comes weeks after a Minutemen III ICBM launch on Aug. 16 was postponed twice before to avoid any misunderstandings between Russia and China.

  Nuclear tensions between the US and Russia have only accelerated in the last six months because of the ongoing Russian-Ukraine war. NATO countries’ fierce hybrid fight against Russian forces by supplying Ukraine’s military with weapons puts the world on a dangerous path to expanded conflict. 

  Then Sino-US tensions reached levels not seen in decades last month when US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taipei angered Beijing, who then launched a war drill around the self-ruled island it claims as its own. 

  Western globalist elites are hellbent on destabilization to contain the emergence of a multipolar world. 

  Perhaps the Pentagon now feels a pre-launch ICBM press conference is needed to project military dominance (or what’s left of it) to countries that challenge its unipolar world as a way to preserve its hegemony. 

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 22:40

• What Is America's Goal For The Ukraine War? Answer: We Don't Have One
  What Is America’s Goal For The Ukraine War? Answer: We Don’t Have One

  Authored by Daniel Davis via 19fortyfive.com,

  Does America Have a Goal or Strategy for Ukraine? 

  On Friday, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen announced the G7 had agreed to impose a price cap regime on Russian oil. As with most other actions by the U.S. and Europe related to Russia’s unjust war against Ukraine, the announcement of the cap was big on rhetorical flourish, but thread-bare on any evidence of a coherent strategic objective.

  (19FortyFive Contributing Editor Daniel L. Davis, author of this article, analyzes the situation in Ukraine on Fox News above.)

  The intent of the cap is to set a global price just above Russia’s marginal cost so that Moscow won’t make a profit on the sale of oil but high enough that Russia won’t stop producing altogether. Current global demand can’t be met without the nearly nine million barrels of oil per day provided by Russia, and if Putin were to stop producing suddenly, the resulting supply shock could send the price of oil into the stratosphere.

  The purpose of the cap, Yellen claimed, would be to “deliver a major blow for Russian finances and will both hinder Russia’s ability to fight its unprovoked war in Ukraine and hasten the deterioration of the Russian economy.” It remains to be seen if the G7 can make good on its aspiration and actually develop and implement a worldwide price cap scheme. But along with other actions sponsored or endorsed by the United States government, it is far from certain what end state Washington hopes to obtain.

  On February 7, about three weeks before Putin ordered the Russian military to invade its smaller neighbor, President Biden threatened to “impose the most severe sanctions that have ever been imposed” should Russia invade. Four days later, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan explained that President Biden “believes that sanctions are intended to deter.  And in order for them to work — to deter, they have to be set up in a way where if Putin moves, then the costs are imposed.”

  Yet after the threats of sanctions failed to deter Putin, Biden adjusted the rationale when he claimed that in fact “no one expected the sanctions to prevent anything from happening.” Instead, he continued, the sanctions were designed to show Western “resolve,” which, over time, “will impose significant costs on him (Putin).” Even with this new claim on his justification for sanctions, there was no explanation for what these “significant costs” were designed to accomplish. The Administration’s lack of focus didn’t stop there, unfortunately.

  In late April, Secretaries of Defense and State, Lloyd Austin and Antony Blinken, traveled to Kyiv to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to explore ways the U.S. could help Ukraine’s military. Following their meeting, Austin said the United States wanted to see Ukraine remain a “sovereign country,” and that the U.S. wants “to see Russia weakened to the degree that it can’t do the kinds of things that it has done in invading Ukraine.” It’s what Austin, Blinken, and Biden have not said, however, that illustrates a continuing problem with American foreign policy.

  

  HIMARS Attack. Image Credit: Creative Commons.

  To date, none of America’s top leaders have said how our support for Kyiv is expected to achieve the outcomes sought. No one has articulated what a “weakened” Russia looks like or how we’ll know when that standard has been reached – or even why weakening Russia is a vital interest to the U.S. that is worth taking huge risks. These are not just academic or hair-splitting questions. They are foundational. Here’s why:

  Since even before the war began, the United States has had no vision for the end state it wishes to produce. For example, if Biden’s objective prior to 24 February genuinely was to deter Russia from launching a war, it should have been clear beyond a reasonable doubt that a threat of sanctions alone would not have been sufficient to convince Putin not to invade.

  Washington would have had to be aggressively engaged diplomatically with both Kyiv and Moscow to use the full heft of U.S. power to find a route to prevent war. There is no evidence the U.S. put any serious diplomatic effort towards averting war. Without a clearly articulated objective, there was nothing to guide the various departments of the Administration on how to achieve the desired outcome. The result was predictable: policy failure.

  Virtually the only objective voiced by any member of Biden’s national security team since the war began has been Austin’s aforementioned desire to see Russia “weakened.” Yet if the White House doesn’t know what a weakened Russia looks like, how will it ever know if its actions are contributing towards a successful outcome beneficial to America? That’s where we are right now.

  We send multiple rounds of multi-billion-dollar support to Ukraine, including some modern and some antiquated gear, but it is not a coherent set of military kit tied to enabling a specific capacity in the Ukraine Armed Forces. The White House leads multiple tranches of sanctions against Russia, but there is no declared purpose as to what they are intended to produce.

  

  RGW-90 rocket launcher in Ukraine. Image Credit: Creative Commons.

  Since we don’t know what we’re trying to accomplish, no one can tell the American people how much the effort is going to cost, how long it’s going to last, or even what success would look like. If this sounds familiar, it should: it is basically the same aimless, incompetent foreign policy the United States has been pursuing for decades.

  • We fought a generational war in Afghanistan that never bothered to set an objective; no one in power even articulated what success would look like, and thus no victory of any sort was ever achieved;

  • We started a war in Iraq beginning in 2003 that quasi-ended in 2011, only to return again in 2014 – without any president bothering to set an attainable military objective or even articulating what the Force was there to accomplish so the American people could know when the operation could successfully end – and it continues without success or end to this day.

  • We have had the same malady in our actions in Syria, Libya, Somalia, Niger, and many other locations in Africa: the government has not identified any attainable military objectives whose accomplishment would benefit our country and signal the end of the mission – and thus none have benefitted the U.S. and most still drone unsuccessfully on.

  The cost to the United States for all these failures has been profound – and now we’re creating a new mission without a clear objective and no identifiable end state. The Russia-Ukraine war just passed the six-month mark. The danger isn’t as much that we might still be trying to divine the Administration’s objectives six years from now – though that sad outcome is entirely possible – but that this war could one day spill over Ukraine’s borders and get us sucked into a war we should never have fought and from which we could never benefit.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 22:20

• The Periodic Table Of Endangered Elements
  The Periodic Table Of Endangered Elements

  The building blocks for everything on Earth are made from 90 different naturally occurring elements.

  As Visual Capitalist’s Carmen Ang and David Cole-Hailton shows in the graphic below, made by the European Chemical Society (EuChemS), of these 90 different elements, which ones are in abundance and which ones are in serious threat as of 2021.

  

  On the graphic, the area of each element relates to its number of atoms on a logarithmic scale. The color-coding shows whether there’s enough of each element, or whether the element is becoming scarce, based on current consumption levels.

  While these elements don’t technically run out and instead transform (except for helium, which rises and escapes from Earth’s atmosphere), some are being used up exceptionally fast, to the point where they may soon become extremely scarce.

  One element worth pointing out on the graphic is carbon, which is three different colors: green, red, and dark gray.

  • Green, because carbon is in abundance (to a fault) in the form of carbon dioxide

  • Red, because it will soon cause a number of cataphoric problems if consumption habits don’t change

  • Gray because carbon-based fuels often come from conflict countries

  For more elements-related content, check out our channel dedicated to raw materials and the megatrends that drive them, VC Elements.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 22:00

• FBI Ignored 'Eyewitness Testimony' Of Joe Biden’s Involvement In Son’s China Deal: Senator
  FBI Ignored ‘Eyewitness Testimony’ Of Joe Biden’s Involvement In Son’s China Deal: Senator

  Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.) said that the FBI ignored eyewitness testimony regarding President Joe Biden’s involvement in his son’s dealings with a Chinese conglomerate about a month before the 2020 election.

  

  The former Senate Homeland Security Committee chairman told the New York Post that “suppression and censoring of his testimony and Hunter’s influence peddling impacted the 2020 election” far worse than anything China or Russia could have achieved.

  About a month before the November 2020 election, a former associate of Hunter Biden, Tony Bobulinksi, told media outlets that Joe Biden was involved with his son’s and brother Jim Biden’s dealings with CEFC, a Chinese Communist Party-linked energy conglomerate. Bobulinksi confirmed the authenticity of emails sourced from the younger Biden’s laptop hard drive that referred to Joe Biden as “the big guy” due to a 10 percent cut in the new corporate organization.

  “Unfortunately, Tony Bobulinski’s first-hand eyewitness testimony regarding President Biden’s knowledge of Hunter Biden’s compromising web of foreign financial entanglements, especially with the Chinese, was not only ignored by the media, but also by the FBI,” Johnson said this week, referring to the 2020 claims.

  The Epoch Times reached out to the FBI for comment.

  Senate Report

  Johnson along with Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who has long investigated Hunter Biden, published a lengthy report on the Bidens’ business dealings in September 2020 (pdf), which raised questions about the younger Biden’s reportedly lucrative position at Ukrainian gas company Burisma Holdings while his father was vice president and took a leading role in handling the Obama administration’s relations with Ukraine.

  The senator’s comment came in response to reports alleging that former FBI special agent Timothy Thibault, who departed the bureau last month, hid intelligence that was provided by Bobulinski.

  Thibault was named several times by Grassley and Johnson in letters to the FBI and claimed the former agent displayed an animus toward former President Donald Trump. Whistleblowers from within the bureau told Grassley that the FBI had obtained information in 2020 about “criminal financial and related activity” on behalf of Hunter Biden, according to one of the senator’s letters (pdf), dated July 25, which was then allegedly suppressed by Thibault.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 21:40

• Mike Wilson Sees Stocks Tumbling To 3,400 In 3 Months, Slashes S&P EPS Forecasts As "Fire & Ice" Shifts Into High Gear
  Mike Wilson Sees Stocks Tumbling To 3,400 In 3 Months, Slashes S&P EPS Forecasts As “Fire & Ice” Shifts Into High Gear

  Over the weekend, in Morgan Stanley’s Sunday Start note, the bank’s in-house permabear Mike Wilson, previewed the topic of his weekly fire and brimstone sermon, which ironically was fire and ice, part 2, and his justification for why stocks are going far lower: his view that “this this time the decline in stocks will come mostly via lower earnings (and a higher equity risk premium) rather than higher rates” adding that the bank’s leading earnings models are all flashing red for the S&P 500, “and we have high confidence that the decline in NTM S&P 500 EPS forecasts is far from over.”

  Well, judging by today’s aggressive ERP expansion which saw all asset slump, Wilson was right again (and as usual miles ahead of the consensus). But just so Wall Street is up to speed with his latest worldview, Wilson spends much of his latest weekly note laying out his new concept, writing that while “fire and Ice” – Wilson’s framework which defined much of the past year –  has proven to be an effective way to describe the first half of this year – as Fed tightening in response to historically high inflation, the Fire, has weighed heavily on valuations for all asset markets while growth has also disappointed…the Ice – he writes that “part 2 will turn out to be more Icy than Fiery as slowing growth becomes the bigger concern for stocks, rather than inflation and the Fed.“

  Here are some more details on how Wilson sees the transition from part 1 to part 2 of “fire and ice”:

  At the risk of stating the obvious, 2022 has been a challenging year for stock investors of all stripes. The Russell 3000 is down approximately 18% (total return) year to date (YTD): and while Russell 3000 Growth has underperformed significantly (-24%), it’s been no picnic for value investors either (-11%). Clearly, the relative value trade of value over growth has worked well this year, but we note it’s mostly been due to Energy’s outperformance combined with defensive cohorts, rather than cyclicals like Financials. In fact, only 2 sectors, Energy and Utilities, are up in absolute terms this year while just 24% of all stocks in the Russell 3000 are in positive territory. To put that into context, in 2008, 48% of Russell 3000 stocks were up on the year as we entered the month of September. Suffice it to say, this year has been historically bad for stocks in terms of both price and breadth, but that is not a sufficient reason to be bullish. We think that poor breadth is indicative of more challenges to come on the growth side of the equation, which we address in our note today. While some have recently argued the breadth thrust off the June lows is a sign of better times ahead, we firmly disagree as our top down earnings work does not support such a conclusion. Meanwhile, that breadth thrust is losing altitude quickly and looks vulnerable to taking out the 50-day moving average, something it did not do off the March 2020 lows. Let the debate begin.

  

  Of course, as bad as it’s been for stocks, it’s been even worse for bonds on a risk-adjusted basis: 20-year Treasury bonds are down 24% YTD and the Barclay’s Agg. Index is off by 11%.

  Finally, commodities have been a mixed bag, too, with most commodities down on the year despite heightened inflationary concerns. To wit, the CRB RIND index, which measures the spot prices of a wide range of commodities, is down 7% YTD. Cash, on the other hand, is no longer trash, especially if one has taken advantage of the higher front-end rates. Interestingly, most of the damage for bonds was front end loaded as the Fed made its pivot clear in January.

  Wilson next reminds readers that he turned more positive on bonds versus stocks back in April, and while since then bonds have outperformed modestly, he argues that they now appear poised to see further outperformance technically and fundamentally if the second half brings more concern about growth rather than inflation as we expect. Outside the US, the picture is even clearer with bonds having outperformed stocks since June of 2021 with the global economy in far worse shape than the US.

  

  Next, Wilson extends on what he wrote over the weekend, and notes that while the June low for stocks and bonds was dramatic, he has been consistently in the camp that it wasn’t “THE low” for the S&P 500 in this bear market, but having said that, Wilson is more confident it was the low for long-term Treasuries for this cyclical bear market in view of the Fed’s aggressive action that has yet to fully play out in the real economy (well, maybe not, with 10Y yields soaring as we type this and threatening to break above the YTD highs). The MS strategist concedes that it may also have been the low for the average stock, given how poor the breadth was at that time, and the magnitude of the decline in certain stocks. His more pessimistic view on the S&P 500 index, meanwhile, is based on analysis that indicates all of the 30% de-rating in the forward S&P 500 P/E that occurred from December to June was due to higher rates: “we know this because the equity risk premium (ERP) was flat during this period. Meanwhile, forward NTM EPS estimates for the S&P 500 have come down by only ~1.5% and P/Es are now ~8% higher. With rates now ~30bp below the June highs, the ERP has fallen once again, to just ~285bp. This makes little sense, particularly given the significant slowdown in earnings we think is still to come.”

  

  And so, with the Fed dashing hopes for a dovish pivot (at least until futures tumble another 10%), Wilson thinks that asset markets may be entering fire and ice part two. In contrast with part one, this time the MS strategist contends that the decline in stocks should come mostly via a higher ERP and lower earnings rather than higher rates.

  Meanwhile, the bank’s earnings models are all flashing red for the S&P 500, and Wilson is highly confident that the decline in NTM S&P 500 EPS forecasts is far from over. In short, Wilson writes that “part two will be more icy than fiery, the opposite of 1H22. That’s not to say rates don’t matter – they do – and we expect bonds to perform better than stocks in this icier scenario.”

  What about the timing on Wilson’s “icy” forecast? Well, as the weather turns appropriately chilly this fall, so should growth – he writes – which could weigh mightily on stocks given the paltry ERP investors are getting paid to take this risk.

  And just to confirm his renewed bearish fervor, today Wilson revised his S&P 500 EPS estimates lower, and writes that “while we took our first cut to these numbers in our mid-year outlook, we waited to do the larger downward revision until now in order to better time the actual fall in bottom-up estimates, which drive stock prices. Our experience – i.e., prior mistakes – has taught us that it always takes longer for these cuts to play out than it should given the typical corporate optimism about the future.”

  So what are Wilson’s new S&P ESP forecasts following today’s downward revisions which point to continued and increasingly significant EPS growth downside well into 2023? Here is the answer:

  • cut the 2022 base case EPS estimate to $220 from $225 (down 2%),
  • 2023 base case estimate cut to $212 from $236 (down 10%),
  • 2024 base case estimate cut to $226 from $237 (down 5%).

  The ’22/’23/’24 base case estimates are now 3%/13%/14% below consensus, respectively, and more notably, in Morgan Stanley’s base case, 2023 now marks a modest earnings contraction (-3% year-over-year growth), although Morgan Stanley is still terrified to make a recession its base case scenario (that would scare off too many clients).

  The logic here is that nominal top line growth slows, but remains positive (mid-single-digit territory), while margins contract materially (1-1.5% margin compression) driven by sticky cost pressures, particularly on the labor side. The bank’s 2023 bear case EPS is  modestly lower to $190 from $195 – a case which continues to assume an economic recession (consistent with views published in our mid-year outlook), and implies an 11% year-over-year EPS growth contraction. The ’23 bull case EPS forecast also comes down to $234 from $245. In this scenario, nominal top line is slightly better and margin pressure is less significant.

  

  Yet while the bank slashes its EPS forecasts, its price targets set in June do not change, and EPS downside is offset by modest upside in P/E multiple expectations (ye olde goalseeking trick). The good news is that the bank’s new price and multiple expectations
  are point in time, June 2023 estimates. By then, Wilson notes, equities will be processing the growth path into 2024 (a  reacceleration), not the decelerating growth path into 2023 that’s in the rear view. As such, Wilson’s call for price downside as a result of declining EPS into mid-2023 – the basis of this note, and a high conviction view – is very much a tactical view (next 3 months). To further reinforce this point, the strategist notes that the market multiple typically troughs when EPS is only a third of the way through its decline (i.e., price front-runs EPS declines).

  Putting it all together, Wilson’s base case tactical view remains that fair value price for the S&P 500 is ~3,400, and while he expects that price level to be reached before year end, stocks will then work back toward 3,900 by mid next year (actually they will be much higher as the QE needed to monetize all the energy stimmies will long have been in play by then). As previously noted, Wilson thinks tactical fair value in his bear case (an economic recession) is 3,000, which implies an overshoot to the downside of his June ’23 bear case price target in advance of that date.

  * * *

  Wilson’s bottom line: the next several quarters will end up containing some of the most significant downward revisions to forward EPS forecasts seen in the past several cycles. As for valuation, the Morgan Stanley strategist thinks very little of these revisions have actually been discounted, as evidenced by the still depressed ERP component of the S&P 500 P/E ratio. While that view could be challenged as a subjective one, Wilson is confident that his ERP model suggests it is at least 100bps too low today and probably even more since the US is headed toward a recession (our bear case). That said, the strategist certainly appreciates that “this debate is what makes a market and have no illusion markets can trade more richly than they should for long periods of time.” On that note, he thinks the increased size of QT that is expected to begin this month could play a significant role in changing the market’s view of fair value for the ERP.

  Full Mike Wilson report available to pro subscribers.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 21:20

• A Glitch In The Matrix? Researchers Explore Déjà Vu… And How The Brain Can Sometimes Short-Circuit
  A Glitch In The Matrix? Researchers Explore Déjà Vu… And How The Brain Can Sometimes Short-Circuit

  Via The Epoch Times,

  Have you ever experienced the sudden feeling of somehow being exactly where you’ve been before, doing exactly what you swear you’ve already done? It could be while rearranging your living room, having a conversation, or simply sitting alone doing nothing.

  If so, you’re not alone.

  This feeling of familiarity is, of course, known as déjà vu (a French term meaning “already seen”) and it’s reported to occur on an occasional basis in 60 to 80 percent of people. It’s an experience that’s almost always fleeting and it occurs at random.

  So what is responsible for these feelings of familiarity?

  Despite coverage in popular culture, experiences of déjà vu are poorly understood in scientific terms. Déjà vu occurs briefly, without warning, and has no physical manifestations other than the announcement: “I just had déjà vu!”

  Many researchers propose that the phenomenon is a memory-based experience and assume the memory centers of the brain are responsible for it.

  

  Memory Systems

  The medial temporal lobes are vital for the retention of long-term memories of events and facts. Certain regions of the medial temporal lobes are important in the detection of familiarity, or recognition, as opposed to the detailed recollection of specific events.

  It has been proposed that familiarity detection depends on rhinal cortex function, whereas detailed recollection is linked to the hippocampus.

  The randomness of déjà vu experiences in healthy individuals makes it difficult to study it in an empirical manner. Any such research is reliant on self-reporting from the people involved.

  Glitches in the Matrix

  A subset of epilepsy patients consistently experience déjà vu at the onset of a seizure—that is, when seizures begin in the medial temporal lobe. This has given researchers a more experimentally controlled way of studying déjà vu.

  Epileptic seizures are evoked by alterations in electrical activity in neurons within focal regions of the brain. This dysfunctional neuronal activity can spread across the whole brain like the shock waves generated from an earthquake. The brain regions in which this electrical activation can occur include the medial temporal lobes.

  Electrical disturbance of this neural system generates an aura (a warning of sorts) of déjà vu prior to the epileptic event.

  By measuring neuronal discharges in the brains of these patients, scientists have been able to identify the regions of the brain where déjà vu signals begin.

  It has been found that déjà vu is more readily induced in epilepsy patients through electrical stimulation of the rhinal cortices as opposed to the hippocampus. These observations led to the speculation that déjà vu is caused by a dysfunctional electrical discharge in the brain.

  These neuronal discharges can occur in a non-pathological manner in people without epilepsy. An example of this is a hyponogogic jerk, the involuntary twitch that can occur just as you are falling asleep.

  It has been proposed that déjà vu could be triggered by a similar neurological discharge, resulting in a strange sense of familiarity.

  Some researchers argue that the type of déjà vu experienced by temporal lobe epilepsy patients is different from typical déjà vu.

  The déjà vu experienced prior to an epileptic seizure may be enduring, rather than fleeting—as it is for those who don’t have epileptic seizures. In people without epilepsy, the vivid recognition combined with the knowledge that the environment is truly novel intrinsically underpins the experience of déjà vu.

  Mismatches and Short Circuits

  Déjà vu in healthy participants is reported as a memory error, which may expose the nature of the memory system. Some researchers speculate that déjà vu occurs due to a discrepancy in memory systems leading to the inappropriate generation of a detailed memory from a new sensory experience.

  That is, information bypasses short-term memory and instead reaches long-term memory.

  This implies déjà vu is evoked by a mismatch between the sensory input and memory-recalling output. This explains why a new experience can feel familiar, but not as tangible as a fully recalled memory.

  Other theories suggest activation of the rhinal neural system, involved in the detection of familiarity, occurs without activation of the recollection system within the hippocampus. This leads to the feeling of recognition without specific details.

  Related to this theory, it was proposed that déjà vu is a reaction of the brain’s memory systems to a familiar experience. This experience is known to be novel, but has many recognizable elements, albeit in a slightly different setting. An example? Being in a bar or restaurant in a foreign country that has the same layout as one you go to regularly at home.

  Even more theories exist regarding the cause of déjà vu. These span from the paranormal—past lives, alien abduction, and precognitive dreams—to memories formed from experiences that are not first-hand (such as scenes in movies).

  So far, there is no simple explanation as to why déjà vu occurs, but advances in neuroimaging techniques may aid our understanding of memory and the tricks our minds seem to play on us.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 21:00

• Kansas School District Pays $95K Settlement After Suspending Teacher For Not Using Preferred Pronouns
  Kansas School District Pays $95K Settlement After Suspending Teacher For Not Using Preferred Pronouns

  A Kansas school district has agreed to pay a settlement of $95,000 in a civil lawsuit brought by a teacher who was suspended for refusing to use the preferred pronouns of a self-declared trans student (a female demanding to be referred to as “he/him”).

  Pamela Ricard, a math teacher at Fort Riley Middle School, says she was pressured by school officials to placate a trans student in her class by using preferred pronouns.  When Ricard asked for a religious exemption to the rule she was allegedly denied.  Ricard also claimed that the school district forced teachers to lie to parents about students and their trans status, and even asked teachers to not use student trans names during parent/teacher conferences in order to avoid revealing any sensitive information.    

  Ricard received a three day suspension after referring to the trans student as “Miss,” and for using the student’s legal enrolled name.  She was warned that any further “misgendering” would lead to more disciplinary actions.  

  It is important to note that there are no laws in the state of Kansas requiring that anyone use transgender pronouns, and that these rules were being unilaterally enforced by school district officials.  The Fort Riley School District was cornered into settlement when a federal court ruled in May that Pamela Ricard had a religious right to refuse censorship and to refuse to submit to pronoun requirements.  They also ruled that teachers cannot be pressured to keep secrets from the parents of trans students.

  

  The Kansas incident is only one of thousands of exposed events that prove the existence of a concerted widespread social justice agenda within the American school system.  Though the political left has consistently claimed that such an agenda does not exist and that parent accusations are nothing more than “conspiracy theory,” the evidence is undeniable.  

  The exposure of transgender indoctrination and policy enforcement in schools led to a national firestorm over Florida’s anti-grooming bill, which leftists called the “Don’t Say Gay Bill.”  The bill, now passed into law, prevents teachers from engaging in sexualized discussions or sexualized propaganda lessons with young children, and also demands that teachers share their lesson plans with parents.  Teachers that violate the law can be fired.

  Multiple states across the country have had to formulate similar pieces of legislation as a means to stop intersectional ideology from being injected into school curriculum.  Florida alone found that at least 44% of school textbooks the state reviewed contained multiple instances of social justice propaganda including Critical Race Theory propaganda.  Interestingly, the majority of the propaganda was discovered in books for children K-5. 

  Desantis provided multiple examples of leftist and CRT propaganda implanted in school texts, but to this day leftists claim no examples were given and that CRT is “not real.” 

  Twitter group ‘Libs Of TikTok’ famously showcased hundreds of video, made mostly by teachers, in which they openly admit to indoctrinating students with LGBT and CRT propaganda in their classrooms.  The group has faced multiple suspensions from various social media platforms, and has been accused of “hateful conduct” simply for reposting the videos to their own account.  

  The trans movement is a movement to control and to dictate speech while pretending it is a movement for civil rights.  No one has a right to compel another person by force or coercion to use their preferred pronouns.  The entire situation can be bewildering because of the multiple tentacles the extreme left employs in their culture war, but there are some rules that can help to clear the fog and confusion.

  The first rule which makes it possible to understand and predict the actions of the social justice left:  They ALWAYS lie.

  The second rule is:  They always double down on the lies.

  The third rule is:  They always gaslight when they are caught lying.

  The fourth rule is:  Believe what you see right in front of your eyes, not what they say that you should see.      

  The Kansas settlement for Pamela Ricard reveals yet another piece of the hidden puzzle that is woke ideology within public schools.  It is an indoctrination process that has been ongoing for years and only recently have parents started to notice and become involved.  

  Interestingly, though, in the case of Fort Riley, it was apparently school district officials that were threatening teachers in order to make them comply with the agenda, rather than specific teachers trying to slip their propaganda under the radar.  This shows that leftist teachers grooming children is not the only concern – We must also watch out for School board members and other officials using their power to frighten non-woke teachers into silence.    

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 20:40

• "Blackouts Imminent" – 75,000 Powerless As Record California Power Usage Sparks 'Demand Response Event'
  “Blackouts Imminent” – 75,000 Powerless As Record California Power Usage Sparks ‘Demand Response Event’

  Update (2030ET): As was expected earlier, California power usage surged to a record high this afternoon raising the emergency status of the state’s electrical system to the highest possible level amid a blistering heat wave, which means rolling blackouts are imminent.

  

  This triggered a “demand response event”…

  

  And CA ISO is warning of more “blackouts imminent”.

  “This is going to be so dicey,” Michael Wara, director of Stanford University’s climate and energy policy program, said earlier in the day.

  “There’s a gap for two hours in the evening right now between available supply and projected demand.”

  This farce for one of the most-taxed states comes just four days after President Biden’s Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm praised the state’s green energy policies.

  Granholm said that California was leading the nation in green energy development and praised its ability to shape national energy policy, according to an interview conducted by Fox 11 Los Angeles.

  “I love the fact that California is unabashedly bold about (green) energy policy,” Granholm stated, calling the state as a green “leader” for the rest of the country.

  “California’s boldness has … shaped our willingness in the federal government to move further and faster,” she said of California’s green energy policies.

  California’s energy policy has currently left 75,000 Californians without power already…

  

  And the state’s largest power company, PG&E Corp., said in a statement that it had notified about 525,000 homes and businesses that they could lose power for up to two hours.

  So this is what the rest of America can look forward to?

  *  *  *

  Update (1700ET): As we warned about earlier, Califiornians are apparently not heeding officials’ warnings that they should sacrifice their comfort for the sake of whatever business or social-engineering plan is the new thing.

  CAISO shows that usage is up 13% today from yesterday at the same time of day and for a second consecutive day, the state’s grid operator issued a level-2 energy emergency alert.

  

  The emergency declaration allows officials to order some large power consumers to shut down in a last-ditch effort to avoid outages.

  “We are heading into the worst part of this heat wave, and the risk for outages is real and it’s immediate,” California Governor Gavin Newsom said in a video posted Tuesday on Twitter. He urged residents and businesses to cut back on energy use during the late afternoon and early evening to help the state avoid outages.

  And average day-ahead prices for power on Tuesday in the southern part of the state surged 44% to $300.55 a megawatt-hour, the highest in 18 months.

  

  With heat soaring things are only likely to get worse:

  “We’re looking at a lot of records today,” said Bob Oravec, a senior branch forecaster at the US Weather Prediction Center.

  “They are having a lot of issues with power out there, and this isn’t going to help.”

  *  *  *

  California narrowly avoided rotating outages on Monday while power grid officials asked customers to conserve electricity amid a record-breaking heatwave.

  The prospect of outages did not bother Californians. Many customers continued to use appliances, air conditioning, and at-home electric vehicle chargers despite conservation pleas from California Independent System Operator (CAISO). 

  Monday was the fifth straight day CAISO warned about a blistering heat wave that pushed its electric system to the brink. Even though no widespread blackouts were reported, electricity demand surged to one of the highest levels (52,646 megawatts), outlining how customers widely ignored conservation calls. 

  

  A Reuters report showed soaring demand for electricity sent power prices in the state to the highest levels since August 2020.

  Power prices at the Palo Verde hub in Arizona and SP-15 in Southern California rose to $850 and $505 per megawatt hour, respectively. That was their highest levels since hitting record highs of $1,311 in Palo Verde and $698 in SP-15 in August 2020 when the ISO last imposed rotating outages.

  CAISO predicts demand could reach all-time high levels today as homes and businesses turn their thermostats down to escape triple-digit temperatures.

  

  And since Californians aren’t conserving electricity as demand steadily rises, this could mean CAISO would instruct utilities to start imposing rotating outages if duress on the grid continued — maybe then, after the fact, customers will get the message to conserve. 

  Elliot Mainzer, CEO of CASIO, said Monday: “We need a reduction in energy use that is two or three times greater than what we’ve seen so far as this historic heat wave continues to intensify.”

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 20:39

• Top Senator: FBI Director Wray Must Do "Much More" To Combat Agency Bias
  Top Senator: FBI Director Wray Must Do “Much More” To Combat Agency Bias

  Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times,

  Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) proclaimed this week that FBI Director Christopher Wray has to do “much more” to deal with alleged bias inside the bureau amid whistleblower claims that agents slow-walked an investigation into Hunter Biden and the current probe targeting former President Donald Trump.

  “We wouldn’t even know about it if there weren’t whistleblowers, very patriotic people in the Justice Department that came to me and gave me this information about Thibault,” Grassley, the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, told Fox News on Monday, referring to former FBI special agent Timothy Thibault, who left the bureau several weeks ago.

  

  Grassley said Thibault allegedly opened an investigation into Trump “based upon very just fuzzy newspaper reporting and then closes down an investigation on Hunter,” referring to President Joe Biden’s son.

  “At least Wray moved him out of that position. Now he is not even in the department,” the Republican senator continued.

  “But I think Wray has to do much more to come up with a plan to show that this political bias within the FBI is going to be attacked and rooted out.”

  “Total transparency is important,” he concluded. “The public’s business has to be public.”

  Whistleblowers

  A lawyer for Thibault, an assistant special agent in charge at the FBI’s Washington Field Office, confirmed that he departed the bureau in late August, although the lawyer disputed claims that he “did not supervise the investigation” into Hunter Biden and wasn’t “involved in any decisions related to any laptop that may be at issue in that investigation.”

  The lawyers also said there was nothing controversial about how he was escorted out of the building following his departure.

  

  Chuck Grassley (R-IA) speaks during a Senate Judiciary hearing in Washington, DC on April 20, 2021. (Bill Clark-Pool/Getty Images)

  Thibault turned in his security badge before he “walked with two long-time special agent friends through the field office to finish processing his paperwork,” Thibault’s lawyers added to The Epoch Times. “He walked out of the building by himself. Claims to the contrary are false.”

  In late July, Grassley said that “highly credible” whistleblowers approached his office and said there is widespread bias within the FBI, including efforts to discredit or downplay investigations into Hunter Biden There was a 2020 FBI intelligence assessment, Grassley wrote in a letter, that was “used by an FBI headquarters team to improperly discredit negative Hunter Biden information as disinformation.”

  “Based on allegations, verified and verifiable derogatory information on Hunter Biden was falsely labeled as disinformation,” he said, citing whistleblower claims.

  While the FBI whistleblowers have not been identified, a lawyer for several of them told the Washington Times late last month that agents have “lost confidence” in Wray’s leadership amid the bias allegations.

  “I’m hearing from [FBI staff] that they feel like the director has lost control of the bureau,” Kurt Siuzdak, a lawyer and former agent who represents FBI whistleblowers, said in an interview last week. “They’re saying, ‘How does this guy survive? He’s leaving. He’s got to leave.’”

  “All Wray does is go in and say we need more training and we’re doing stuff about it, or we will not tolerate it,” added Siuzdak.

  The Epoch Times has contacted the FBI for comment.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 20:20

• Putin Attends Military Drills With China, Hails Beijing's "Balanced Approach" To Ukraine Crisis
  Putin Attends Military Drills With China, Hails Beijing’s “Balanced Approach” To Ukraine Crisis

  President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday attended and observed the Vostok-22 Russian war games in person, held in the country’s far east, as well as in waters just off the eastern coast.

  Crucially, the exercises featured Chinese military participation, and others including military units from India and Syria. “According to Moscow, over 50,000 soldiers and more than 5,000 units of military equipment, including 140 aircraft and 60 ships, were to be involved in the drills,” The Moscow Times writes.

  

  This year’s drills are being described as greatly scaled down compared to the largest Vostok games which took place in 2018 – which is no doubt due to Russia’s concentration of forces for its invasion of Ukraine.

  The ongoing drills began on Sept. 1 and are scheduled to end on Wednesday. “Putin met Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and military chief of staff Valery Gerasimov at the Sergeyevsky military range and later observed the final phase of the military exercises,” The Moscow Times describes.

  Putin is also in the far east to address the Eastern Economic Forum hosted in the port city of Vladivostok, where an estimated 5,000 people are in attendance for the four-day conference that kicked off Monday. The largest delegation in attendance is from China:

  At the forum’s plenary session Putin will be joined by China’s top legislator Li Zhanshu — who ranks third in the Chinese government hierarchy — with a bilateral meeting also on the agenda.

  Li will become the highest-ranking Communist party politician to travel to the country since Moscow’s military intervention in Ukraine.

  The Kremlin issued a statement underscoring the importance of the large Chinese presence: “Russia-China relations of comprehensive partnership and strategic cooperation are developing progressively,” it said before the bilateral meeting with Putin.

  The statement further hailed “China’s balanced approach to the Ukraine crisis” and its “understanding” of what’s driving Moscow’s ‘special operation’ in Ukraine.

  Keeping with tradition, Putin, Shoigu, and Gerasimov are all at the Sergeevsky training area for the active phase of this year’s annual strategic command-staff exercise, which is Vostok 2022. https://t.co/Rqf8UQodWF pic.twitter.com/INm8hGdrQj

  — Rob Lee (@RALee85) September 6, 2022

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

  In October, Russia and China held joint naval drills in the Sea of Japan. Days later, Russian and Chinese warships held their first joint patrols in the western Pacific. The next month, South Korea’s military said it had scrambled fighter jets after two Chinese and seven Russian warplanes intruded into its air defense identification zone during what Beijing called regular training.

  Just days before Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine, Beijing and Moscow announced a “no limits” partnership, although U.S. officials say they have not seen China evade U.S.-led sanctions on Russia or provide it with military equipment. Russia’s eastern military district includes part of Siberia and has its headquarters in Khabarovsk, near the Chinese border.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 20:00

• Huh? Biden Screams That He "Beat Pharma This Year"
  Huh? Biden Screams That He “Beat Pharma This Year”

  Authored by Steve Watson via Summit News,

  During a Labor Day speech in Milwaukee Monday, Joe Biden screamed that he “beat pharma this year” despite the fact that he provided billions in record profits for the pharmaceutical industry by attempting to enforce vaccine mandates.

  

  Watch:

  Pres. Biden hails bill putting cap on out-of-pocket prescription drug costs for Medicare recipients: “We beat Pharma this year! And it mattered! We’re going to change people’s lives.” https://t.co/WpjeEnDOqR pic.twitter.com/paEy4CF8Pg

  — ABC News (@ABC) September 5, 2022

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

  Biden repeated the claim at a second speech in Pittsburgh:

  Biden: “I have been fighting pharma for my entire career, my entire career, and we finally beat pharma!”

  Back in the real world, big pharma have raked in record amounts of money since he took office off the back of the plandemic. pic.twitter.com/C8bOYelHRF

  — Ioan Haboczki (@haboczki) September 6, 2022

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

  A few violent extremists took issue with Biden’s claim:

  Biden didn’t beat Big Pharma; he invited them into the WH #BidensLying https://t.co/I5abwDBfXv

  — mjsb (@mjsb143) September 6, 2022

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

  Crooked Biden beat Pharma this year by transferring tens of billions to their packets.

  — A My Burakami (@JohnOrlinski) September 6, 2022

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

  I’m confused why is Biden super angry yelling here? Also what does he mean by beat pharma??? What did we beat as I’m sure big pharma has profited so much from these poison vaccines

  — Coollatiaslatios (@pikachusandile8) September 6, 2022

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

  Biden: “we beat Pharma this year”

  Apparently another teleprompter mistake. The correct line was “we helped Pharma beat their earning estimates this year” 🤡pic.twitter.com/4QdVkNfTCV

  — Dr. Eli David (@DrEliDavid) September 5, 2022

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

  Oh, you beat pharma, @potus.

  I’m sorry, I meant to say you helped pharma beat record profits! 😂 https://t.co/rgntH48RUq pic.twitter.com/zIWXo8YIzp

  — Viva Frei (@thevivafrei) September 5, 2022

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

  Biden: “We Beat Pharma this year and it Mattered”

  Was that before or after they mandated the Jab, gave them trillions of dollars, and voted them immunity from prosecution?

  No One has been Beaten, except for US Tax Paying Citizens!!!
  🙄🙄🙄

  — Chuck Sharp (@Chuck69i) September 6, 2022

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

  “I have been fighting pharma for my entire career—my entire career—and we finally beat pharma!” ~ Joe Biden

  FunFact: Donors from pharmaceutical industry contributed $6.3 million to the 2020 campaign of Joe Biden ( this is just the official figure)pic.twitter.com/xJKvfO91Ng

  — The Poll Lady (@ThePollLady) September 6, 2022

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

  It took less than one year for Joe Biden to go from “Pandemic of the unvaccinated” to “we beat pharma this year” https://t.co/lRcO5EAQrx

  — Rising serpent 🇺🇸 (@rising_serpent) September 6, 2022

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

  *  *  *

  Brand new merch now available! Get it at https://www.pjwshop.com/

  In the age of mass Silicon Valley censorship It is crucial that we stay in touch. We need you to sign up for our free newsletter here. Support our sponsor – Turbo Force – a supercharged boost of clean energy without the comedown.
  Also, we urgently need your financial support here.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 19:40

• California's 2035 EV Mandate Being Debated In More Than Dozen States
  California’s 2035 EV Mandate Being Debated In More Than Dozen States

  More than a dozen states are now debating whether to adopt California’s radical green vehicle initiative, which bans all gasoline-powered new car sales by 2035.

  Fox News reported seventeen states could soon be on a path to follow the Golden State’s emission standards.

  Several of the 17 states are likely to move forward with the plan, including Washington, Massachusetts, New York, Oregon, and Vermont. California’s restrictions are the strictest in the country, mandating that all new vehicles run on either electricity or hydrogen by 2035.

  Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, New Jersey, New Mexico, the District of Columbia, and Rhode Island are other states that might consider the new emission standards. 

  Meanwhile, Colorado, Pennsylvania, and Virginia are three states rebelling against rapidly moving toward electric vehicles. 

  

  The problem with states mandating future new car sales to be 100% electric in 13 years is that power grids will need a drastic upgrade to handle the millions of new EVs. Consider California. There are more than a million plug-in vehicles registered in the state, and in the last week, utility officials requested EV owners not to charge their vehicles due to a menacing heatwave. 

  Without a power grid overhaul to reliable on-demand clean energy, such as nuclear, grids across the country will be under extreme duress in the future of increased EVs on roads, leading to instability issues and frequent blackouts, similar to a third world country (or California). 

  Forcing everyone to depend on a battery without a grid overhaul sounds like a catastrophe waiting to happen.

  Let’s hope this 2030 prediction doesn’t play out:

  Its 2030

  Your house is 99 degrees and you cant put on AC because the governor declared an emergency

  You get into your EV but the screen says it wasn’t charging, governor’s orders

  You decide to go to a park but a cop stops you saying its illegal to leave your quarantine zone https://t.co/MDzjYWsl5Y

  — Tim Pool (@Timcast) September 1, 2022

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

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 19:20

• The Vital Role Of Nuclear Power In Reducing Emissions
  The Vital Role Of Nuclear Power In Reducing Emissions

  Authored by Robert Rapier via OilPrice.com,

  • The growth of the renewable energy industry in the last decade has been remarkable, but these new technologies cannot supply global energy demand.

  • Nearly every model out there points to the important role nuclear power must play in an energy system designed to reduce emissions.

  • In order to ensure the future of nuclear power, the world needs safe reactor designs, effective waste disposal solutions, and more political support.

  Any time I write about nuclear power, it evokes passionate responses from readers. That was certainly the case following my previous article, Nuclear Power Could Cut The World’s Carbon Emissions In Half.

  

  There is always a contingent who are convinced that all we need is solar power. I tend to think of these people as those “who haven’t done the math.” They provide lots of qualitative responses like “solar is cheaper than nuclear power” and cite solar energy’s incredible growth rate.

  It is true that solar is ramping up rapidly. In fact, I have written about it many times. All the way back in 2007 I wrote The Future is Solar. I have written dozens of articles on the topic since. But some solar proponents always try to convince me that we don’t need nuclear by citing facts I already know.

  Consider one of the responses to a discussion that broke out on Twitter following my previous article. Jigar Shah is the director of the Loan Programs Office of the U.S. Department of Energy. He was the founder of one of the early, successful solar companies, SunEdison. There isn’t a bigger advocate of cleantech out there than Jigar. But he knows that solar can’t do it alone, tweeting in response to someone who suggested otherwise:

  It is not a choice between the two. #solar will grow as fast as it physically can and won’t be 100%. Same with #wind, #geothermal, #hydro, #BiomassCCS, #efficiency, etc. You still have a huge political/resiliency hole that #nuclear has to fill. Every model shows it. #cleanfirm

  — Jigar Shah (@JigarShahDC) August 27, 2022

  [ZH: the tweet has since been deleted]

  Jigar argues that as fast as solar grows, it won’t be fast enough. There is a hole that nuclear has to fill. “Every model shows it.”

  In fact, the International Energy Agency knows it, projecting that we will need to double the world’s nuclear output by 2050 to reach net zero energy.

  That’s the difference between someone who has looked in detail at the numbers and someone who hasn’t. It’s the reason so many environmental organizations and advocates have come to the conclusion that if we don’t have a faster ramp-up of nuclear power, the world is going to keep burning coal.

  Look, I wish renewables could do it all. But the largest renewable market in the world certainly doesn’t think so.

  China has rolled out more solar power in recent years than any other country. Last year China’s solar output increased by 66 terawatt-hours (TWh). That was good for 35% of the entire global increase in solar power. China’s total solar generation for the year — 327 TWh — was double that of the U.S., which is in second place globally.

  But that hasn’t stopped China from building both new coal-fired power plants and new nuclear plants. China’s coal consumption has more than doubled in the past 20 years. The country accounts for 53.8% of the world’s coal consumption, and last year China set a new record for coal consumption.

  However, China has recognized that solar power — as fast as they are adding it — can’t do it all. That’s why China’s nuclear power output is growing steadily. Over the past decade, China’s average annual growth in nuclear power output was 16.7% — the most for any country except Iran. Over that time, China’s nuclear power consumption has increased by 320 TWh, and they still have 21 nuclear reactors under construction.

  Total global nuclear consumption increased by 148 TWh in the past decade, which means outside of China, nuclear power consumption declined over the past decade.

  Where is nuclear power growing? Below are the 10 countries with the fastest growth rates for nuclear power over the past decade.

  1. Iran — 41.9% average annual growth from 2011-2021

  2. China — 16.7%

  3. Pakistan — 14.9%

  4. Argentina — 5.4%

  5. India — 3.1%

  6. Russia — 2.5%

  7. Mexico — 1.7%

  8. Czech Republic — 0.8%

  9. Belgium — 0.5%

  10. Slovakia — 0.2%

  Global growth is an anemic 0.5%. In the U.S., which is still the world’s largest market for nuclear power with a 29% share globally — nuclear output declined by 0.2% on average over the past decade. The European Union saw an even bigger decline, at 1.3% per year.

  The EU overall is dependent upon nuclear power for 11% of its primary energy consumption. For the U.S. that number is 8.0% (this is for all energy consumption). In contrast, Asia Pacific’s, which is the region responsible for most of the world’s carbon emissions, is only dependent on nuclear power for 2.4% of its primary energy consumption.

  Can Asia Pacific region continue to develop with renewables supplying the bulk of the new energy demand? Given the rapid growth of overall energy demand in the region, it appears highly unlikely that renewables alone can meet the demand. In recent years this has translated into a large expansion of fossil fuel consumption in these regions.

  More nuclear power in developing regions could help supply growing energy demands without a continued explosion in the region’s carbon dioxide emissions. However, the world needs safe nuclear reactor designs, effective waste disposal solutions, and more political support.

  In the next article, I will relay findings on all of these fronts from a recent conversation I had with Dr. Kathryn Huff, the Assistant Secretary for the Office of Nuclear Energy.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 19:00

• Biden Issues "Final Decision" On State Sponsor Of Terror Label For Russia
  Biden Issues “Final Decision” On State Sponsor Of Terror Label For Russia

  President Joe Biden has made up his mind regarding whether or not to designate Russia an official ‘state sponsor of terror’ – after both the Ukrainian government as well as some prominent Democratic Congressmembers have been pushing hard for him to do so.

  Biden has “made a final decision against designating Russia as a state sponsor of terror,” White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre said Tuesday, according to Reuters. She described that “The designation of Russia as state sponsor of terror could delay food exports and jeopardize deals to move goods through the Black Sea,” according to a press readout.

  

  The reference wis to a delicate UN-brokered agreement between Russia, Ukraine, and Turkey to allow grain exports to leave Ukrainian ports through a monitored ‘safety corridor’. 

  Jean-Pierre was following up on a comment made by Biden the day prior:

  U.S. President Joe Biden on Monday said Russia should not be designated a state sponsor of terrorism, a label Ukraine has pushed for amid Russia’s ongoing invasion while Moscow has warned it would rupture U.S.-Russian ties.

  Asked if Russia should be designated a state sponsor of terrorism, Biden told reporters at the White House: “No.”

  In July, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told Secretary of State Antony Blinken that the White House must designate Russia or else Congress would do it. The formal designation would allow the further expansion of sanctions on the targeted nation, and would place Russia on the list with Cuba, Iran, North Korea, and Syria.

  While some countries like Latvia and Lithuania have already made the formal designation, the US administration has consistently resisted calls to do so, with Secretary of State Antony Blinken recently arguing that a terror designation wouldn’t change things much:

  “The costs that have been imposed on Russia by us and by other countries are absolutely in line with the consequences that would follow from designation as a state sponsor of terrorism,” he said in July.

  Earlier in the now six-month Ukraine conflict, the Biden administration began using the word “genocide” when talking about alleged Russian atrocities (but more recently has stopped using the specific word), but has so far resisted some Congressional calls to label Russia a terror state sponsor. 

  TL;DR
  Moscow is mainly the same as it was. Most people are carrying on as normal, and for the most part, change is barely noticeable. However, prices of certain things have skyrocketed (restaurants, clothes, travel), and there are signs things may get worse.

  — Jonny Tickle (@jonnytickle) September 6, 2022

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  Moscow has previously warned that if the US went through with a terror label designation, it would immediately sever all diplomatic relations. While relations are already of course at a low point in recent history due to the ongoing Ukraine invasion, each side still has their embassies open and diplomats in residence – though John Sullivan, the US ambassador to Moscow, has announced his retirement this week after nearly three years at the post.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 18:40

• Oil Market Is Short On Conviction And Positioning
  Oil Market Is Short On Conviction And Positioning

  By Alex Longley, Bloomberg markets live commentator and reporter

  Last year a much-loved phrase of Goldman’s commodity guru Jeff Currie was that the oil market was long on conviction, short on position — in the third quarter, the oil market has been short on both conviction and position.

  Currie’s premise last year was that a huge chunk of the oil market was bullish but that traders weren’t backing those in a big way. Right now, the oil market is gripped by a whirlwind of headlines — a cap on Russian oil prices, a surprise OPEC+ cut, a global growth slowdown and the potential return of Iranian oil supplies to name but a few — but options trades show the huge spread of views out there.

  On Monday, 5,000 Brent $200 calls for October traded. A cheap punt on higher prices, pretty straightforward. But on the same day, another trader was buying ratio $70/$75 put spreads for October. A cheap bet on a collapse in prices over the next two weeks.

  

  With futures open interest generally falling as well, it’s clear that the oil market remains light on position. But what the options market tells us right now, is that unlike the pre-war oil market, lots of traders are also struggling with conviction in the face of big intraday price swings.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 18:20

• "A Dangerous Escalation": Majority Of Americans Think Biden Speech Was "Designed To Incite Conflict"
  “A Dangerous Escalation”: Majority Of Americans Think Biden Speech Was “Designed To Incite Conflict”

  

  A majority of Americans, 56.8% think Biden’s declaration of war on Trump voters was a “dangerous escalation in rhetoric” which was “designed to incite conflict amongst Americans,” according to a new poll by the Trafalgar group.

  

  Perhaps even more telling is that 71% of Democrats said Biden’s speech – in which he said “MAGA forces” pose a “clear and present danger” to Democracy – thought it was simply “acceptable campaign messaging that is to be expected in an election year.”

  

  What should worry Democrats is that 62% of independent voters agreed with 89.1% of Republicans who said the speech was a “dangerous escalation.”

  This, from the president who campaigned on uniting America against hatred. 

  Conservatives on social media were appalled at the speech.

  I work hard, garden, cook, bake, spin, knit weave and throw pots. I’ve been married 33 years and have two grown kids. I’ve owned businesses and pay taxes.

  I am a threat to the very soul of this nation.

  — Rani, Last of The Red Hot Boomers (@ShadesOfRani) September 4, 2022

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

  pic.twitter.com/qAVpdrNHzd

  — Joshua Hamm (@Joshua_R_Hamm) September 2, 2022

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  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 18:00

• Why Some Cities May No Longer Be Viable
  Why Some Cities May No Longer Be Viable

  Authored by Charles Hugh Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,

  Any city whose lifeblood ultimately depends on hyper-globalization and hyper-financialization will no longer be viable.

  

  The human migration from the countryside to cities has been an enduring feature of civilization. Cities concentrate wealth, productivity and power, and so they’re magnets to talent and capital, offering newcomers the greatest opportunities.

  Cities are efficient, packing population, productivity and wealth creation into small areas. Slums and sweatshops are immensely profitable, and cramming people into centers of manufacturing is far more efficient than scattering people and production across a landscape.

  Cities generally arose on coastal harbors, navigable rivers or the confluence of overland trade routes, as these hubs enabled profitable trade and transport of goods protected by defensible barriers.

  In sum, cities offered unmatchable advantages over more widely distributed settlements, trade and production. Given their typically strategic location and regional dominance, they tend to become political, military and cultural centers as well as economic / financial heavyweights.

  But the nature of cities has changed, and so has their viability as magnets for talent and capital. I recently discussed these shifts with longtime correspondent T.D., who succinctly summarized the economic foundations of New York City–a set of dynamics that applies in one way or another to virtually all major cities globally: cities are transport / value-added hubs.

  “With the creation of the Erie Canal, New York became a major port and city, a place where cheap immigrant labor and the precursors to all sorts of products could be immediately brought together in a value-added manner for finishing into a manufactured product which was then cost effectively shipped onward.”

  These longstanding economic foundations began shifting in the 1970s. Slums and manufacturing were deemed undesirable for environmental and aesthetic reasons, and globalization began chipping away at manufacturing within costly urban zones as production was shipped to lower-cost regions.

  The other core dynamic of the past 40 years, financialization, replaced value-added trade and goods with value-added financial instruments and services. As globalization and financialization transitioned to hyper-globalization and hyper-financialization, cities became magnets for real estate speculation, global capital seeking a safe place to park money, healthcare and higher education. status-enhancing conspicuous consumption and entertainment, i.e. the good life of diverse cultural attractions, neighborhoods, venues, cafes, bars and nightlife, all of which are the foundation of global tourism, now the primary industry in many cities.

  The shift to finance funded both the speculation and the consumption. Cities morphed from centers of value-added manufacturing and trade to financial transactions and the origination of financial instruments, developments which enabled and expanded a series of ever-larger speculative bubbles.

  Cities have always been more expensive than the countryside, but hyper-financialization has boosted urban costs to the point that only the top 10% or 20% can own their own home and afford all the good things the city has to offer without family wealth or speculative gains banked by playing hyper-financialization games.

  One driver of higher costs is cities are magnets for graft, corruption, insider deals and quasi-monopolies, as the aggregation of money and power make the rewards of insider self-service irresistible. All of these forms of skimming add cost without adding any value to residents or enterprises.

  Even worse, they erode competence and accountability, as the essence of insider self-service is the elimination of accountability so low-level corruption and incompetence cannot be reined in. Insiders have a free hand to exploit their access to the enormous flows of money and power that sluice through every major city.

  As T.D. explained, large-scale industry is the only force with sufficient heft to demand competence and accountability of city governments. The current batch of what passes for “industry”–tourism, hospitals, universities, museums, etc.–can’t threaten to leave, as their own existence depends on the city. None wield sufficient political power to clamp down on corruption and incompetence.

  As the energy, water, waste and transport infrastructure decays to the point of breakdown, industry would have stepped in and demanded managerial competence to get it fixed because industry needed those systems to survive. The complaints of highly segmented service industries don’t seem to wield the same power or urgency.

  As for finance, it’s already global, and it right-sizes its footprint to match the flows of capital sluicing through the city as well as its costs and amenities. If any of these factors goes the wrong way, finance will abandon the city in a New York Minute.

  In effect, globalization and financialization have hollowed out the traditional economic foundations of cities in favor of services and entertainment which are dependent on the speculative gains of financialization. Should the flood of wealth being generated by ceaseless hyper-financialization reach its zenith and crash, cities will lose their source of wealth and income even as their managerial competence has been eroded by the very success of financialization in generating staggering flows of money.

  Given an ever-expanding flood of money, competence and accountability can both be dispensed with. If the flow of money keeps expanding, simulacra of accountability and competence will do just fine.

  But when the flood of money dries up, and the city needs administrative competence and accountability to adapt, these have decayed to the point nobody in power has any experience of anything but an ever-expanding flood of money.

  In other words, the “efficiencies” of the city now depend on the permanent expansion of hyper-globalization and hyper-financialization, both of which are increasingly vulnerable to decay, downsizing or collapse.

  Any city whose lifeblood ultimately depends on hyper-globalization and hyper-financialization will no longer be viable. Non-viability of the globalized, financialized urban model is currently considered “impossible.” Let’s check in around 2030 and make an accounting of the second-order effects of the demise of globalization and financialization. One such effect might be a reversal of the human migration as people leave no-longer-viable urban zones en masse.

  *  *  *

  My new book is now available at a 10% discount this month: When You Can’t Go On: Burnout, Reckoning and Renewal. If you found value in this content, please join me in seeking solutions by becoming a $1/month patron of my work via patreon.com.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 09/06/2022 – 17:44

Digest powered by RSS Digest

• Saving America's Future
  Saving America’s Future

  Authored by Lawrence Kadish via The Gatestone Institute,

  Standing at a podium in Philadelphia, US President Joseph Biden recently sought to leverage the heritage of a city that gave birth to our American democracy while making such a fiercely partisan speech that its ultimate legacy may be to further divide a divided nation. Had he been more truthful about our nation’s current challenges, he might have stood inside a supermarket where prices for basic staples needed by working families are skyrocketing.

  

  He also could have chosen many of our New York neighborhoods where career criminals have essentially been presented with a “get out of jail” card by many in Biden’s political party.

  Then again, he could have stood next to a gasoline pump and acknowledged that his energy policies have returned us to an era of being energy dependent on foreign nations that are hostile to the very democracy he is sworn to protect.

  These realities reveal that America is at a dangerous tipping point, where the future of our nation is literally in question. One suspects no one in the White House is asking themselves how they can avoid previous leadership failures that allowed countries to go from global dominance to history’s dustbin. They need only look at the arc of time for nations such as Spain, the Netherlands and Britain to see how inept, incompetent or weak leadership led to their inevitable collapse as the dominant nation of their time. It is as if there is a house at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue with no one in it.

  The Chinese, however, are students of history. With an economy that reaches around the globe and a military now capable of patrolling the Pacific, it is apparent they are betting that America will fail its test of leadership and follow others in relinquishing its global dominance. In this case, China is ready to assume that role.

  The stark reality is that the current White House occupants have compounded error upon error. A speech long on partisan rhetoric but short on competence will not address the strategic errors in judgment being made by those who took a sacred oath of office to preserve, defend and protect our nation.

  There is still time to hand a new generation of Americans a strong nation capable of defending its values, its citizens and its future, but that will require us to recognize what other nations refused to acknowledge: that history’s tipping point is before us.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 23:30

• Zero-COVID In China: Lockdowns Of Major Cities Continue
  Zero-COVID In China: Lockdowns Of Major Cities Continue

  After the controversial, two-months long coronavirus lockdown of Shanghai, China has once again placed a city of more than 20 million people under house arrest.

  As Statista’s Katharina Buchholz details below, a coronavirus lockdown in Chengdu in Central China that had started on Thursday was prolonged Monday.

  Mass tests are being carried out after the city saw 71 new Covid-19 cases on Sunday. While officials said the restrictions would continue until at least Wednesday, residents are uneasy due to similarities to the Shanghai lockdown, which was also announced in a piecemeal fashion. In April and May, almost 25 million people had been confined to their homes in Shanghai, with many suffering from inadequate food supply, lack of medical attention and psychological distress.

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  In Southern tech hub Shenzhen, a weekend lockdown was lifted while restrictions in some parts of the city continue. The announcement had led to panic buying Friday in the city that had been under a full lockdown for a week in March already and now fears a second confinement could happen. Shenzhen saw 87 new virus cases Sunday. In March, it was the biggest city China had locked down to-date after a surge in coronavirus cases not seen since the first wave of infections in early 2020 emerged there. The Southern tech hub and special economic zone is only about one hour away from Hong Kong, which also saw a record-breaking Covid outbreak around that time.

  According to Our World in Data, China on Sunday recorded more than 3,000 new coronavirus cases. The highest-ever case count in the country occurred on April 14 of this year at around 29,500, almost double the 2020 high of 15,000 cases (February 13).

  After the major lockdowns of Wuhan and other cities in Hubei province ended in late March and early April of 2020, China had successfully followed a zero-Covid strategy for most of 2020 and 2021. Ever since the more contagious Omicron variant emerged, however, it has challenged China’s approach of zero tolerance towards the disease.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 23:00

• In His First Trip Abroad Since The Start Of The Pandemic, China's Xi Will Visit Producer Of Half The World's Uranium
  In His First Trip Abroad Since The Start Of The Pandemic, China’s Xi Will Visit Producer Of Half The World’s Uranium

  In his first overseas trip since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, Chinese President Xi Jinping will visit the country responsible for roughly half of the world’s uranium production.

  

  On September 14, Xi will visit Kazakhstan, the SCMP reported citing a Monday announcement at a briefing by the Kazakh foreign ministry. It follows months of speculation about the location of Xi’s first trip abroad since he went to Myanmar in January 2020. Beijing’s strict zero-Covid policy has curtailed travel inside and out of the country, and Xi and other senior figures have not left China since the start of the pandemic.

  Of the 25 Politburo members, only foreign policy chief Yang Jiechi has travelled abroad. Meanwhile, the country’s No 3 official, Li Zhanshu, will go to Russia on Wednesday in a sign that China’s top officials are resuming international travel. Li, head of the legislature, will also visit Mongolia, Nepal and South Korea.

  As reported previously, Indonesian President Joko Widodo has said Xi will visit Bali for the Group of 20 summit in November – where Vladimir Putin and Zelenskyy will also be present.

  Xi will meet Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev for talks the host government said were “aimed at further deepening the eternal comprehensive strategic partnership and developing political, trade, economic, cultural and humanitarian cooperation”.

  

  The visit could be followed by a trip to Uzbekistan to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit, according to the SCO’s official Telegram channel. In a post on Sunday, the SCO said that “the leaders of all states confirmed their full-time participation in the summit” in Samarkand, to be held on September 15 and 16.

  More importantly, in Uzbekistan, Xi would be expected to meet Russian leader Vladimir Putin for the first time since the pair announced a “no limits” partnership on the eve of the Beijing Winter Olympics. Just three weeks later, Russian forces invaded Ukraine, leading to much speculation about how much Xi and other Chinese leaders knew about the operation in advance.

  The pair have been in telephone contact since – notably on Xi’s 69th birthday on June 15. At the time, Chinese state media quoted Xi as saying that “China is willing to continue to support the Russian side on issues related to core interests and major concerns such as sovereignty and security, to work closely on strategic cooperation between the two countries”.

  Russia is one of eight member states of the SCO, along with China, India, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. There are four observer states in the process of acceding to the forum – Afghanistan, Belarus, Iran and Mongolia – while Armenia, Azerbaijan, Cambodia, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Türkiye are dialogue partners.

  Temur Umarov, an expert on China and Central Asia at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said that choosing the region as a first overseas trip emphasized Beijing’s ambitions to expand its influence there. Indeed, it is hardly a coincidence that China is heading to the one country responsible for nearly half of the world’s uranium production.

  A violent crackdown on civil unrest in Kazakhstan in January caught Beijing by surprise, Umarov said, with Russian troops being sent in to quell the protests. In total, there were more than 200 deaths, Human Rights Watch has said.

  “We should remember that at that time, China looked so weak in Central Asia and Russia was very active,” Umarov said. “It was a pivotal moment that made China realise that something should be done to expand their understanding of Central Asia, to extend China’s ability to forecast what was going on and what will be happening in Central Asia.”

  Separately, in July, after 20 years of negotiations, Beijing agreed with Bishkek and Tashkent to begin building the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway next year. It will give China another railway route into Central Asia in addition to existing links with Kazakhstan, and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine appears to have given the project some impetus.

  Previous media reports had speculated that Xi’s first overseas visit would be to Saudi Arabia. Meanwhile, the South China Morning Post reported in July that China had asked the leaders of some Western European countries to visit Beijing in November, taken by some as an indication that Xi would be confirmed for a third term as Communist Party chief at the national congress in October.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 22:00

• Brazil's Democracy Under Threat: Supreme Court Blocks President's Social Media
  Brazil’s Democracy Under Threat: Supreme Court Blocks President’s Social Media

  Authored by Augusto Zimmermann via The Epoch Times,

  In Brazil, some judges have highly ambitious political goals and make decisions accordingly.

  The current presiding justice at the nation’s Supreme Electoral Court is Alexandre de Moraes. He was elected as the presiding electoral officer in August, in a public ceremony with 2,000 guests at the court auditorium. He was a member of the Brazilian Social Democratic Party before being nominated justice of the nation’s Federal Supreme Court on Feb. 22, 2017.

  Before being nominated to the nation’s highest court, as reported by the French daily Le Monde, he was at the centre of a controversy when the daily Estadão published an investigation showing that he had intervened as a lawyer in at least 123 legal cases to defend a corporation that some have argued is suspected of being linked to Brazil’s main drug trafficking group, the First Command of the Capital.

  Moraes, who is now the nation’s top electoral officer in Brazil and responsible for overseeing the presidential elections, has issued numerous “monocratic decisions” against “misinformation,” in addition to sending some of President Jair Bolsonaro’s friends and supporters to jail, confiscating their electronic devices, and freezing their bank accounts.

  On March 18, for example, Moraes ordered the nationwide suspension of the messaging app Telegram. The ruling came after Telegram ignored an earlier order to block the account of Allan dos Santos, a supporter of Bolsonaro accused of spreading “misinformation.” He had previously issued a warrant for the arrest of Santos in October.

  In his ruling suspending Telegram nationwide, Moraes mentions its failing to remove “misleading” content from Bolsonaro’s own Telegram page. As reported, not only did he order the shutdown of the message app nationwide but also ordered Apple and Google to introduce “technological obstacles” to block Telegram on their operating systems and withdraw it from their digital stores in Brazil.

  Bolsonaro, who seeks reelection in October, relies on Telegram to reach his voter base. He has more than a million followers on the platform and this could prove crucial to his electoral campaign.

  

  Brazilian Supreme Court judge Alexandre de Moraes is pictured during a session to rule on whether former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva should start a 12 year prison sentence for corruption, potentially upending this year’s presidential election, at the Supreme Court in Brasilia, Brazil, on April 4, 2018. (Victoria Silva/AFP via Getty Images)

  ‘Authoritarian Decisions’

  On March 19, during the popular television program “Os Pingos nos Is” from Jovem Pam, journalist Augusto Nunes accused Moraes of committing several illegalities, including the abuse of authority and the violation of a cláusula pétrea (“stone clause”) in the Brazilian Constitution that makes freedom of expression an inalienable right of the citizen.

  Nunes also criticized the silence of politicians about Moraes’s “decisions,” including the banning of Telegram nationwide.

  “It’s time to demand senators and judges handcuffed for their cowardice. And those appointed by President Jair Bolsonaro have to explain how long this cowardly silence they have maintained in the face of arrogance will last,” he said.

  On May 27, 2020, Justice Moraes, who had become the nation’s top electoral officer, ordered the federal police to launch an operation probing businessmen, bloggers, and politicians allied to Bolsonaro. In the decision that authorised the operation, he also determined the blocking of all their accounts on social media outlets such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. According to him, the monocratic decision is necessary for the interruption of “misinformation” and “fake news.”

  The investigation on “misinformation” conducted by Moraes concerns more generally the dissemination of information regarding the transparency of electronic voting machines and the credibility of the Brazilian electoral commission, which is actually headed by Moraes himself.

  Filipe Martins, the special advisor to the presidency of the Republic for international affairs, commented that “journalists, humorists, and ordinary citizens who act spontaneously are being treated as bandits for daring to express opinions that displease the establishment.”

  …

  Bolsonaro says democracy is now under serious attack in the country. He has accused these unelected judges of practising political interference and trying to deploy a judicial dictatorship.

  “Brazil is on the road to dictatorship. This is how dictatorships start now. You lose your freedom little by little, then one day you look, and you are completely tied up,” he told network Jovem Pan.

  After knowing all these extraordinary things, who would disagree? The democratic system is clearly being undermined by the replacement of the rule of law with the rule of judges. In fact, the premise that unelected judges know better what is best for the nation is elitist and utterly undemocratic.

  It is ironic to see that now the major threat to democracy in Brazil now comes not from elected politicians but from a highly anachronistic judicial oligarchy.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 21:30

• "Toxic" Dust Storm Hits Burning Man, Causing Total Whiteout
  “Toxic” Dust Storm Hits Burning Man, Causing Total Whiteout

  The final weekend of Burning Man nearly ended earlier as visibility deteriorated to zero during a massive dust storm. 

  On Saturday, Burning Man’s official Twitter account tweeted the gates into the festival in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert were closed “due to whiteout conditions.” Event staff requested festivalgoers: 

  “Do not drive. Vehicles are becoming stranded and lost on the playa.” 

  The #BRC Gate is currently closed in both directions (ingress and egress) due to whiteout conditions. Do not drive. Vehicles are becoming stranded and lost on the playa. Delay your departure until the weather has cleared.

  — Burning Man Project (@burningman) September 3, 2022

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  From a distance, the National Weather Service of Reno’s stationary cameras captured the moment when dust rolled across the festival area, severely impacting visibility for the tens of thousands of people. 

  View from the Fox Mountain @AlertWildfire camera looking at dust blowing off the Black Rock Desert. At this point, dust is not impacting any major roadways, but it certainly is affecting a certain temporary city. Winds to continue through sunset before becoming lighter overnight. pic.twitter.com/ApYjICHvTw

  — NWS Reno (@NWSReno) September 3, 2022

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  A passenger on a commercial flight captured a clearer view of the dust storm affecting the festival. 

  The Chronicle says Burning Man got hit by a huge dust storm. Here it is from the air around 2:45PM Pacific time (on a commercial flight). Picture quality is junk, but if you zoom in you can see the street outline pic.twitter.com/sV3WYni5Vj

  — Jonathan Claybaugh (@JonathanClayba1) September 4, 2022

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  The dust storm was so big that a weather satellite spotted it. 

  Dust storm kicking up on the #BlackRockDesert. Looks like a “fun” day at #BurningMan pic.twitter.com/1knjxxGqcD

  — Neil Lareau (@nplareau) September 3, 2022

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  On the ground, festivalgoers looked miserable on the last weekend of the nine-day event. The San Francisco Standard pointed out that the dust in the area is full of “alkaline” and is “quite toxic.” 

  

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

  Total whiteout in daytime at times with gusting winds, can’t even locate the sun, at Burning Man, @SaigonTheKomodo and @Nican shown between Fur Camp and Coyote Garden pic.twitter.com/iImr8Lbkzx

  — Spottacus (➡paw,mff) (@Spottacus) September 3, 2022

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  30mph winds are tearing apart our camp, and there’s fuck all we can do about it. Grey Skies (our big shelter) has lost half of her grommets already, just gotta ride it out and hunker down.

  Burning man sucks, don’t come 🤗 pic.twitter.com/U8pVc78ke7

  — Maly ❤️‍🔥 Burning Man (@malytwotails) September 3, 2022

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  San Francisco Chronicle said the dust storm nearly “ruined the annual torching of a giant wooden effigy.” But by late Saturday evening, the gates reopened, and around 2200 local time, the statue went up in flames. 

  

  Toxic dust wasn’t the only thing festivalgoers had to worry about — daytime highs hit triple digits, sending some people home early.  

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 21:00

• Deadly Earthquake Hits China's Southwestern Sichuan Province
  Deadly Earthquake Hits China’s Southwestern Sichuan Province

  A powerful earthquake rocked a mountainous region of China’s southwestern Sichuan province on Monday. At least 46 people are dead, in the latest problems mounting for the province hit by historic drought and Covid lockdowns. 

  The 6.8 magnitude earthquake hit Luding county in western Sichuan, about 120 miles west of the provincial capital of Chengdu, reported China Earthquake Administration. 

  

  Videos posted on social media showed damaged building structures and landslides.

  An earthquake of magnitude 6.8 struck the Sichuan Province of China this afternoon. The epicenter of the quake is located at a town of Luding at a depth of 16 km.
  Seven people have lost their lives so far. Further reports of the damages are are awaited. pic.twitter.com/lQMm0R0eVK

  — Dil Bahadur Pakwal (@dil_pakwal) September 5, 2022

  September 5, 2022CGTN Chinese President #XiJinping has stressed that saving people’s lives should be the top priority for disaster relief work in the quake-hit areas in Sichuan Province. #China President Xi stresses saving lives as top priority for quake relief in #Sichuan #World pic.twitter.com/9anbTO1eYU

  — long chen 陈 龙🐲🇨🇳🐲 (@HongLong_Chen) September 5, 2022

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

  BREAKING 🇨🇳 : A 6.8-magnitude earthquake jolted #Luding County, southwest China’s Sichuan Province Monday.
  ♦️The tremor was felt in Chengdu, the capital of #Sichuan.
  #China #EarthQuake pic.twitter.com/UsYxM4CyEw

  — Zaid Ahmd  (@realzaidzayn) September 5, 2022

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  🇨🇳CHINA

  🚨Preliminar. #Sismo de magnitud 6.6 en 🇨🇳#China. Se localiza en Western #Sichuan y tuvo una profundidad de 10 kilómetros. Hay altas probabilidades de daños y víctimas pic.twitter.com/GX8IMJBj0I

  — Noticias 507 y El Mundo (@agrimensuraferg) September 5, 2022

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

  Various types of infrastructure, such as roads and power lines, also appear to be damaged. 

  

  At least 6.8 magnitude #earthquake on the Richter scale jolts China’s southwestern Sichuan province. The epicenter of this catastrophe is about 43 kilometers (27 miles) southeast of Kangding city. #BreakingNews #China #Sichuan pic.twitter.com/p9aWgWmVma

  — TheBlogger (@Thebloggerinfo) September 5, 2022

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  A 6.8-magnitude #earthquake jolted #Luding county in Ganzi Tibetan autonomous prefecture in #Sichuan province at 12:52 pm on Monday. A total of 21 people were killed and 30 were injured. pic.twitter.com/O5Cer0Fd9f

  — BeijingNews 新京报 (@BJNewsWorld) September 5, 2022

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  At least 46 people killed after strong earthquake hits China’s Sichuan province – Xinhua pic.twitter.com/0ij0qySBd0

  — BNO News (@BNONews) September 5, 2022

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  Tremors were felt in Chengdu, a megacity with 21 million people currently under Covid lockdown. Besides lockdowns, the metro area has already faced power rationings due to drought and heatwaves this summer. 

  A question we have: When an earthquake strikes, can those under mandatory Covid lockdown exit their homes or condos to avoid danger?

  Sichuan is located on a major fault and is considered one of the country’s most highly active quake areas. In 2008, Chengdu was hit by a devastating 8.2 magnitude quake, leaving more than 69,000 dead. 

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 20:00

• Retired US General Tells Ukraine "Better To Negotiate Now Than Later"
  Retired US General Tells Ukraine “Better To Negotiate Now Than Later”

  A retired Pentagon general has issued a rare call for Ukraine to immediately enter negotiations with Russia toward finding a peaceful solution to the now six-month long war. This comes after weeks of reports of a ‘stalemated’ battlefield along eastern and southern lines, and amid Western leaders increasingly acknowledging “uncomfortably low” and depleted weapons stockpiles.

  Army brigadier general Mark T. Kimmitt, who had served as Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs under the George W. Bush administration, warned in a Wall Street Journal op-ed days ago that the current policy of ramping up weapons systems to Kyiv is only likely to lead to more casualties.

  He wrote in the Thursday article that “older and less advanced” systems which are increasingly making up the bulk of what’s now being supplied “may indicate that battlefield consumption rates have outpaced production to a point where excess inventories provided to Ukraine are nearly exhausted.”

  

  Kimmitt argued that the “dwindling stocks of leading-edge weapon systems” in NATO countries will inevitably lead to a prolonged conflict, and a longer war will in turn result in “more pressure from supporting nations, sustained inflation, less heating gas, and falling popular support.” He concluded:

  “This likely will mean muddling through a long war, with more casualties.”

  Outlining the “logistic peril” of getting NATO weapons to the Ukrainians, the retired general explored three options which involve varying means of keeping the weapons flowing and thus digging deeper into NATO stockpiles, but which will also ensure escalation – even including supplying Kyiv with longer range missiles.

  But Kimmitt then offers a final available option, which he admits no one including the Zelensky government itself seems willing to take seriously (given also the Ukrainian president has recently been vowing the “liberation” of Crimea). This last option – the path of serious negotiations – would involve Ukraine pushing for “an interim diplomatic resolution without (or with) territorial concessions.”

  “There is little incentive to negotiate” at the moment, Kimmitt acknowledges, but Zelensky “must recognize that diminishing resupplies would have a disastrous effect on his army, not merely for battlefield operations but for the message of declining outside support it would send to the people of Ukraine.”

  “Beginning the diplomatic resolution would be distasteful, and perhaps seen as defeatist, but as there is little chance of climbing out of the current morass, it may be better to negotiate now than later.”

  Such realism appearing in a mainstream outlet when it comes to the Ukraine debate is a rarity, but as Russia and the West continue their game of chicken over Ukraine, now clearly a full-blown proxy war, likely more such urgings for negotiated settlement will appear in public discourse.

  * * *

  Meanwhile, Russia too is putting Europe on notice regarding energy sanctions, as indeed both sides continue digging their heels in deeper…

  “Winter will be big – only dusk and snow”

  A propos of absolutely nothing, Gazprom releases an eerie two-minute video showing how a cold winter will freeze Europe to death pic.twitter.com/3KSmbhWe59

  — Max Fras (@maxfras) September 5, 2022

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  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 19:00

• Who Benefits From US Government Claims That The UFO Threat Is Increasing "Exponentially"?
  Who Benefits From US Government Claims That The UFO Threat Is Increasing “Exponentially”?

  Authored by Caitlin Johnstone via Medium.com,

  A US senate report which is an addendum to the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2023 has people talking due to the surprising statements it includes about the US government’s current position on UFOs.

  I mean Unidentified Aerial Phenomena.

  I mean Unidentified Aerospace-Undersea Phenomena.

  This latest moniker for the thing we all still think of as UFOs is the US government’s way of addressing how these alleged appearances, which began entering mainstream attention in 2017, are said to be able to transition seamlessly from traveling through the air to moving underwater in what’s been labeled “cross-domain transmedium” movement. Because branches of the US war machine are roughly broken up into forces specializing in air, sea, land and space operations, the notion that these things move between those domains gets special attention.

  UFO enthusiasts are largely focusing on a part of the addendum which oddly stipulates that the government’s newly named Unidentified Aerospace-Undersea Phenomena Joint Program Office shall not be looking into objects “that are positively identified as man-made,” because of the obvious implications of that phrase. This is understandable; if you’ve got a government office that’s responsible for investigating unidentified phenomena, you can just say it won’t be looking into phenomena that are “positively identified”. You wouldn’t have to add “identified as man-made” unless you had a specific reason for doing so.

  After years of revelations about strange lights in the sky, first hand reports from Navy pilots about UFOs, and governmental investigations, Congress seems to have admitted something startling in print: it doesn’t believe all UFOs are “man-made.” https://t.co/LrNgDc3auH

  — VICE News (@VICENews) August 23, 2022

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  But for me the claim that really jumps off the page, authored by Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman Mark Warner, is the claim that these unidentified aerospace-undersea phenomena are a “threat” that is increasing “exponentially”.

  “At a time when cross-domain transmedium threats to United States national security are expanding exponentially, the Committee is disappointed with the slow pace of DoD-led efforts to establish the office to address those threats,” Warner writes in the report.

  “Exponentially” is a mighty strong word. Taken in its least literal sense, it means that threats to US national security from UFOs are increasing at an alarmingly rapid rate. That they have swiftly become much greater than they used to be.

  What is the basis for this incendiary claim? What information are US lawmakers being given to make them draw such conclusions and make such assertions? There’s a long chain of information handling between an alleged UFO encounter and a US senator’s pen, and corruption can occur at any point in that chain (including the first and last link).

  I remain comfortably agnostic about most aspects of the UFO question, up to and including the possibility that there are actual extraterrestrial or extradimensional beings zipping around our planet in technology our science cannot comprehend. But one thing I absolutely will take a hard and fast position on is that the moment the US government starts labeling something a “threat”, all trust and credulity must be immediately be thrown out the window.

  #1 most read on our #Bestof2014 list: Reports of unusual activity in the skies in the ’50s? It was us.http://t.co/BKr81M5OUN (PDF 9.26MB)

  — CIA (@CIA) December 29, 2014

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  This is after all occurring as the US enters a steadily escalating new cold war against both Russia and China, and we know that during the last cold war the CIA sought to exploit public panic about UFOs as a psychological weapon against the Soviets, and that the CIA has claimed that its newly developed spy planes were responsible for many UFO sightings in the 1950s, and that the US military was working on developing “flying saucer” aircraft during that same time. It also occurs after the assistant secretary of the Air Force for acquisition, technology and logistics stated at a 2020 conference that the Air Force has a brand new aircraft prototype, designed using new digital engineering technology, that has “broken a lot of records.”

  This new mainstream UFO narrative also has highly suspicious origins, with key players ranging from shady US intelligence cartel operatives like Lue Elizondo and Christopher Mellon, to corrupt senator Harry Reid and his plutocratic campaign donor Robert Bigelow, to Blink-182’s Tom DeLonge, who believes humanity is being tormented by malevolent extraterrestrials who feed off negative human emotions and that the US military is heroically protecting us from their evil agendas. Filmmaker Steven Greenstreet put out a short, well-sourced documentary with The New York Post this past May laying out copious amounts of evidence that the groundwork for the new UFO narrative was built on journalistic malpractice and negligence, obfuscation, omission, and outright lies. The footage we’re being shown of these supposed vehicles to justify this new narrative consist of blurs, flashes and smudges which can all be explained by mundane phenomena.

  So in my opinion this isn’t a subject we can just ignore, as weird and uncomfortable as the subject of UFOs might be for serious analysts. Whatever the subject, when you’ve got the US government claiming on highly suspect grounds that there’s an exponentially growing threat that urgently needs to be addressed militarily, it’s time to sit up and start paying attention.

  Not that I myself have any clear idea of what’s going on here beyond the distinct impression that we are being deceived about something potentially very important. And I don’t get the impression that other people have a very clear picture of what’s going on either.

  Some say this is just a scam to get more funding for the Space Force or the military in general. That could very well be, but as far as publicly available information goes we’re not seeing anyone saying anything like “Hey we need $40 billion to address this UFO problem.”

  Some say this is part of an agenda to justify getting weapons into space, but I suspect anyone likely to support that agenda would support it with or without the claim that we need to fight ET. And again, there’s the problem that nobody’s saying “Hey we need to get weapons into space because of UFOs.”

  Some say this is just a deliberate “distraction” designed to keep people from focusing on more important issues, but the problem there is that (A) the empire doesn’t normally roll out distractions in that way, and (B) the UFO issue isn’t getting much mainstream attention. It’s a peripheral story, dwarfed in comparison to real propaganda initiatives like Ukraine.

  Some say there’s a conspiracy to use high-tech weaponry to create a false flag alien invasion and unite humanity under a one world government, but that’s a fairly mainstream idea that’s being pushed on viral Netflix films by known fraud Steven Greer. I think the world is paranoid enough at this point that few would buy such a psyop even if it were somehow convincingly orchestrated.

  Some say this narrative is all a cover for new technology the empire is keeping under wraps, presenting an official position that the US government has nothing to do with the strange vehicles people are seeing in the air as stated in the ODNI’s report on UFOs last year. That would certainly explain the empire’s cockiness in confronting Russia and China simultaneously when public knowledge of its economic and military capabilities would indicate that that’s a bad idea.

  It could be as simple as the fact that once it becomes the established orthodoxy in Washington that UFOs are a threat and something needs to be done about them, it’s a safe bet that we’re going to see massive amounts of money moving around to deal with that threat and the emergence of war machinery that can be used in future confrontations with Russia and China. There are any number of creatures lurking in DC who would stand to benefit from that happening, and would stand to benefit from pushing that agenda. It’s possible that contracts have already been signed. It’s possible that finances have already been allocated for it from the war machine’s dark money slush fund, and that all this public talk is just narrative management to preemptively justify that spending when information about it comes out.

  Or maybe it’s some mixture of these things, or none of them. I don’t know. I do know that someone’s benefitting from all this. And I know it’s unreasonable to expect the most murderous and tyrannical regime on earth to tell us the truth about UFOs when it would stand nothing to gain by doing so, and we ordinary people should therefore do our best to understand what’s happening for ourselves.

  I think it would be good if people on the anti-empire fringes of the spectrum started looking at this thing more and describing what they’re seeing, even though it’s impossible to see everything behind the walls of government opacity. Otherwise the only people looking at it will be UFO enthusiasts who just want “disclosure” at any cost, and the operatives of the empire itself.

  *  *  *

  My work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, following me on Facebook, Twitter, Soundcloud or YouTube, buying an issue of my monthly zine, or throwing some money into my tip jar on Ko-fi, Patreon or Paypal. If you want to read more you can buy my books. The best way to make sure you see the stuff I publish is to subscribe to the mailing list for at my website or on Substack, which will get you an email notification for everything I publish. Everyone, racist platforms excluded, has my permission to republish, use or translate any part of this work (or anything else I’ve written) in any way they like free of charge. For more info on who I am, where I stand, and what I’m trying to do with this platform, click here. All works co-authored with my American husband Tim Foley.

  Bitcoin donations:1Ac7PCQXoQoLA9Sh8fhAgiU3PHA2EX5Zm2

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 18:30

• Suspect At Center Of Russiagate Hoax Wants Charges Thrown Out
  Suspect At Center Of Russiagate Hoax Wants Charges Thrown Out

  The primary source of Hillary Clinton’s hoax dossier used to paint Donald Trump as a Russian stooge wants a federal judge to dismiss charges filed against him for allegedly lying to federal agents about where he obtained salacious claims he fed the dossier’s author, Christopher Steele.

  

  Russian national Igor Danchenko says that the five false statement charges against him were improperly filed because the statements he made were “literally true.”

  According to the indictment, Danchenko lied about his contacts with “Russians,” his travels to Russia, and the identity of his sources. (Those are just some of the lies.)

  According to charging documents, Danchenko denied ever having communicated with longtime Clinton associate, Charles Dolan – a US-based PR expert.

  In John Durham’s words (via Techno Fog):

  

  More via the Epoch Times:

  Danchenko also lied, according to the documents, about believing that a phone call he received came from a businessman Sergei Millian described in court papers as Chamber President-1 and that the person on the other end told him certain information, and that he arranged to meet the person in New York.

  “In truth and fact … DANCHENKO never received such a phone call or such information from any person he believed to be Chamber-President 1, and DANCEHNKO [sic] never made any arrangements to meet with Chamber President-1 in New York,” the indictment states. “Rather, DANCHENKO fabricated these facts regarding Chamber President-1.”

  ‘Ambiguous Answers’

  In the new filing, Danchenko says that his answers did not violate the law, which prohibits making “materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or representation” to federal agents or in federal court.

  “The law criminalizes only unambiguously false statements that are material to a specific decision of the government. By contrast, literally true or ambiguous statements, even if they are unresponsive or misleading, or false statements about ancillary matters, do not give rise to criminal liability,” Danchenko said through his counsel.

  Danchenko sat through numerous interviews with the FBI in 2017, according to the filing. During the interviews, Danchenko did say he didn’t talk to Dolan about specific allegations in the dossier, and that he believed he received a call from Millian, but those were “equivocal and ambiguous answers … prompted by fundamentally ambiguous questions,” the defendant said, asserting the statements “are literally true, and are immaterial as a matter of law.”

  The lawyers noted that Danchenko was not among those charged by former special counsel Robert Mueller’s team with making false statements.

  The charges against him came from special counsel John Durham’s team.

  Neither prosecutors nor the judge overseeing the case, U.S. District Judge Anthony Trenga, a George W. Bush appointee, have responded to Danchenko’s filing.

  Danchenko is scheduled to go on trial on Oct. 11.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 18:05

• Russia To Legalize Use Of Cryptocurrency In International Trade: Report
  Russia To Legalize Use Of Cryptocurrency In International Trade: Report

  Authored by ‘NAMCIOS’ via BitcoinMagazine.com,

  • Russia is close to pushing legislation for the use of cryptocurrency in international trade.

  • In current conditions “it is impossible to do without cross-border settlements in cryptocurrency,” the Bank of Russia and Ministry of Finance have reportedly agreed.

  • The necessary regulatory framework will still need to be introduced.

  The Bank of Russia and the country’s Ministry of Finance have reconsidered their positions toward cryptocurrency, acknowledging it to be necessary to legalize the use of cryptocurrencies in cross-border settlements, per a report by local news outlet TASS.

  

  According to TASS, the two government bodies have agreed that “it is impossible” to continue without enabling cryptocurrency as a legal payment method for international trade.

  The move comes as Russia dabbles on how to best regulate the Bitcoin and cryptocurrency markets. Swamped in Western sanctions, the world’s largest country has sought alternatives to the U.S. dollar so as to guarantee the efficient trade of its commodities.

  In March, the chairman of the country’s Congressional energy committee, Pavel Zavalny, said the country was open to taking payments for natural gas and other natural resources exports in bitcoin.

  “When it comes to our ‘friendly’ countries, like China or Turkey, which don’t pressure us, then we have been offering them for a while to switch payments to national currencies, like rubles and yuan,” Zavalny said at the time.

  “With Turkey, it can be lira and rubles. So there can be a variety of currencies, and that’s a standard practice. If they want bitcoin, we will trade in bitcoin.”

  In May, it was reported that Russia was “actively discussing” using cryptocurrency in international trade.

  Now, the imminent actualization of such a move shifts the tide as President Vladimir Putin last year had dismissed the possibility in an interview at the Russian Energy Week event in Moscow.

  “I believe that it has value,” Putin said at the time, referring to bitcoin.

  “But I don’t believe it can be used in the oil trade.”

  According to TASS, the necessary regulatory framework to enable cross-border settlements in cryptocurrency in Russia will still be introduced.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 17:40

• California Declares Grid Emergency (For 5th Straight Day) As Blackout Risks Surge
  California Declares Grid Emergency (For 5th Straight Day) As Blackout Risks Surge

  For the 5th straight day, California Independent System Operator (California ISO) declared a grid emergency Monday afternoon. The grid operator forecasts record high demand on Tuesday, with the possibility of ‘rotating outages’ as early as today. A menacing statewide heatwave has sparked huge demand for electricity while generating capacity remains subdued. 

  *CALIFORNIA GRID CEO SAYS ROTATING OUTAGES ‘POSSIBLE’ MONDAY

  And California didn’t even get disconnected from Russia

  — zerohedge (@zerohedge) September 5, 2022

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  The historic heat bearing down on California will push the state’s electricity system to its limit. Millions of homes and businesses are cranking air condition use to the max, contributing to what could be record high electricity demand tomorrow. 

  *CALIFORNIA ISO SEES ALL-TIME RECORD DEMAND ON TUESDAY

  — zerohedge (@zerohedge) September 5, 2022

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

  The grid operator is preparing for electricity demand to hit 48.9 GW on Monday, the most since 2017, with a record high expected on Tuesday. 

  Notably, despite 5 days of warnings, the virtuous Californians are using more electricity today than at any time during the week…

  

  Bob Oravec, a senior branch forecaster with the US Weather Prediction Center, told Bloomberg many areas in the state would register in triple-digit territory early this week. 

  Much of California is under an excessive heat warning for the next four days. Sacramento could reach 113 on Monday and 115 on Tuesday shattering records for those days, Oravec said. Downtown Los Angeles reached 103 on Sunday, which was the first time the temperature broke 100 this year. – Bloomberg 

  

  Daily high temps across the state should peak by mid-week. 

  

  Power prices in the southern part of the state jumped above $200 per megawatt hour. 

  

  California ISO warned that ‘rotating outages’ are possible Monday, adding customers need to reduce energy consumption even more, to keep the lights on.

  *CALIFORNIA NEEDS 2X TO 3X MORE CONSERVATION TO KEEP LIGHTS ON

  Why is nobody volunteering to turn off all their appliances?

  — zerohedge (@zerohedge) September 5, 2022

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

  State officials continue to ask residents not to charge EVs to help with grid stability. 

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 17:15

• Here Comes Part Two Of Morgan Stanley's "Fire and Ice"
  Here Comes Part Two Of Morgan Stanley’s “Fire and Ice”

  From Michael Wilson, Morgan Stanley chief US strategist

  Fire and Ice Part Deux

  At the risk of stating the obvious, 2022 has been a challenging year for stock investors of all stripes. The Russell 3000 is down approximately 16% (total return) year to date (YTD), and while Russell 3000 Growth has underperformed significantly (-22%), it’s been no picnic for value investors either (-9%). Only Energy and Utilities are up, and just 24% of all stocks in the Russell 3000 are in positive territory for the year. To put that into context, in 2008 48% of Russell 3000 stocks were up on the year as we entered the month of September. Suffice it to say, this year has been historically bad for stocks, but that is not a sufficient reason to be bullish.

  As bad as it’s been for stocks, it’s been even worse for bonds on a risk-adjusted basis. More specifically, 20-year Treasury bonds are down 24% YTD and the Barclays AGG index is off by 11%. Finally, commodities have been a mixed bag too, with most commodities down on the year despite heightened inflationary concerns. To wit, the CRB RIND index, which measures the spot prices of a wide range of commodities, is down 7% YTD. Cash, on the other hand, is no longer trash, especially if one has been able to take advantage of higher front-end rates.

  So, what’s going on? In our view, asset markets are behaving right in line with the fire and ice narrative we laid out a year ago. In short, after ignoring the warning signs from inflation last year, and thinking the Fed would ignore them forever, asset markets quickly woke up and discounted the Fed’s late but historically hawkish pivot to address it. Indeed, very rarely has the Fed tightened policy so quickly. Truth be told, as one of the more hawkish strategists on the Street last December, I never would have bet the Fed would be doing multiple 75bp hikes this year, but here we are. Don’t fight the Fed.

  While the June low for stocks and bonds was dramatic, we’ve consistently been in the camp that it wasn’t THE low for the S&P 500 in this bear market. Having said that, we are more confident it was the low for long-term Treasuries in view of the Fed’s aggressive action that has yet to fully play out in the real economy. It may also have been the low for the average stock, given how bad the breadth was at that time and the magnitude of the decline in certain stocks. Our more pessimistic view on the major index is based on analysis that indicates all of the 31% de-rating in the forward S&P 500 P/E that occurred from December to June was due to higher rates. We know this because the equity risk premium (ERP) was flat during this period. Meanwhile, forward NTM EPS estimates for the S&P 500 have come down by only 1.5% and P/Es are now 9% higher. With rates about 25bp below the June highs, the ERP has fallen once again, to just 280bp. This makes little sense in a normal environment but especially given the significant slowdown and earnings cuts we think are still to come.

  With the Fed emphatically dashing hopes for a dovish pivot, we think that asset markets may be entering fire and ice part deux.

  In contrast with part one, this time the decline in stocks will come mostly via a higher ERP and lower earnings rather than higher rates. Our leading earnings models are all flashing red for the S&P 500, and we have high confidence that the decline in NTM S&P 500 EPS forecasts is far from over.

  

  In short, part deux will be more icy than fiery, the opposite of 1H22. That’s not to say rates don’t matter – they do – and we expect bonds to perform better than stocks in this icier scenario.

  If Friday marked a short-term low for long-duration bonds (high in yields), the S&P 500 and many stocks could get some relief again as rates come down prior to the next round of earnings cuts. However, make no mistake, as the weather turns chilly this fall, so will growth, which will weigh mightily on stocks given the paltry ERP investors are getting paid to take this risk.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 16:50

• Ukraine's Largest Nuclear Power Plant Is Again Knocked Off Electrical Grid
  Ukraine’s Largest Nuclear Power Plant Is Again Knocked Off Electrical Grid

  For only the second time in its history, the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine – which is Europe’s largest – has been fully cut off from the electrical grid, reportedly due to shelling. The past days have seen the plant repeatedly suffered complete disconnection from the power grid, with the plant’s back-up safety systems being activated.

  “Ukraine’s embattled Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant’s last working reactor has been switched off from the grid after the facility was disconnected from its last remaining power line due to shelling, Ukraine’s power plants operator said Monday,” AFP writes.

  

  The shutdown was once again reported to be due to shelling, based on a fresh statement from Ukraine’s nuclear power operator Energoatom. “Power unit (reactor) No. 6 was shut down and disconnected from the grid” after a fire ignited that was “triggered because of shelling”.

  Throughout the summer both sides have consistently accused the other of shelling and damaging the facility, after some 500 Russian troops began occupying it in March.

  Just days ago, a UN-authorized visit by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) found that the nuclear plant is at risk given that the “physical integrity of the plant has been violated, several times,” according to a Friday press briefing given by Director-General Rafael Grossi, who led the team in person.

  Grossi underscored that “The military activity and operations are increasing in that part of the country, and this worries me a lot.” At least two IAEA exports have stayed at the embattled nuclear plant on a “permanent basis” in order to monitor safety.

  The primarily Ukrainian engineers which run the plant have maintained operations under the watch of the Russian troop presence. Zaporizhzhia supplies some 30% of Ukraine’s electrical needs.

  ⚡️Energoatom: Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant’s last operating reactor disconnected from grid.

  Ukraine’s state nuclear operator Energoatom said that the last working power line at the Russian-occupied plant was disconnected as a result of a fire caused by Russian shelling on Sept. 5.

  — The Kyiv Independent (@KyivIndependent) September 5, 2022

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  Meanwihle, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in a Sunday interview with ABC News that Russia with using the site as a “nuclear weapon”… 

  Russia’s military presence at the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant, Zelensky said, is tantamount to Russia occupying “six Chernobyls,” referring to the site of a 1986 nuclear meltdown in Ukraine under the former Soviet Union.

  “You see, they occupied our nuclear station, six blocks. The biggest in Europe,” Zelensky told ABC “World News Tonight” anchor David Muir in an interview excerpt shared Sunday.

  He then underscored: “It means the biggest danger in Europe. So, they occupied it. So that is — means that they use nuclear weapon. That is [a] nuclear weapon.”

  The Kremlin has claimed late last week a group of Ukrainian commandos tried to storm the plant from the river, but that the assault was repelled. The Russian side has also alleged Ukraine is attempting a ‘false flag’ operation at the plant in order to frame Moscow for some kind of disaster.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 16:25

• Big Labor Traps Workers in Unions They Oppose
  Big Labor Traps Workers in Unions They Oppose

  Authored by Mark Mix, op-ed via NewsWeek.com,

  This Labor Day, you may see headlines about a supposed “boom” in union organizing, and while high-profile union campaigns against well-known companies like Starbucks and Amazon have generated buzz, Department of Labor numbers showed unions lost 241,000 members last year.

  Less likely to make headlines is a trend Big Labor’s cheerleaders wish to ignore: the significant increase in efforts by workers seeking to remove long-entrenched unions from their workplaces.

  Employees across the country have submitted a wave of petitions to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), asking the federal agency to schedule votes to remove unpopular unions, a process known as “decertification.”

  In fact, according to the NLRB’s own data on petitions for elections to either install or remove a union, a unionized private-sector worker is more than twice as likely to be involved in a decertification effort as a similar nonunion worker is to be involved in efforts to unionize his or her employer.

  Another recent analysis found decertification petitions to the NLRB have increased by a whopping 42 percent this year. That’s 16 percent higher than the increase in petitions seeking to bring in a union (when counting the Starbucks campaign once, rather than tallying each individual location’s petition).

  When you consider that NLRB policies make it impossible for most workers to hold a decertification effort outside a brief 30-day window once every three years, the jump in decertification efforts looks even starker. There is no similar limitation on when petitions can be filed to trigger unionization votes.

  What we’ve seen here at the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, which provides free legal aid to workers, confirms this trend. Foundation staff attorneys have received a record number of requests for legal assistance over the last couple of years from workers seeking help to navigate the NLRB’s maze-like decertification process.

  While you may not have heard about the wave of workers seeking to free themselves of unwanted unions, you can be sure Big Labor and its political allies know exactly what’s going on.

  

  NEW YORK, NEW YORK – JULY 20: Employees of HarperCollins Publisher participate in a one-day strike outside the publishing houses offices in Manhattan on July 20, 2022 in New York City. The strikers, who work in a variety of departments at the company, have been bargaining for a union contract since December 2021. Salary, a commitment to diversity and union security rights are some of the demands the workers have presented to the company. The union, Local 2110 of the UAW, represents more than 250 HarperCollins employees in the design, editorial legal, marketing, publicity, and sales departments.SPENCER PLATT/GETTY IMAGES

  You see, rather than ask why so many workers want to escape union ranks, union bosses and their Biden administration allies are pulling out all the stops to make it even more difficult for hard-working Americans to participate in a decertification election.

  The Biden-backed PRO Act – Big Labor’s top legislative priority – is a laundry list of new power grabs for union organizers. It would wipe out all 27 Right to Work laws that make union dues voluntary.

  Other PRO Act provisions, like mandating “Card Check” recognition that bypasses secret-ballot votes for unionization, and permitting unionization to be forced on gig economy workers, have also made headlines. Yet the bill also includes new statutory prohibitions on decertification elections, including giving union officials the ability to automatically delay any decertification vote through unproven allegations called “blocking charges.”

  But with the PRO Act stalled in the Senate, the Biden NLRB isn’t waiting on Congress to stifle decertification efforts.

  Biden-appointed union activists at the NLRB are seeking to squelch decertification efforts through bureaucratic fiat. This includes reversing the Election Protection Rule, a set of common-sense, if modest, reforms previously adopted by the NLRB that removed multiple Board-invented barriers to worker-backed decertification. One of those reforms that the Biden Board seeks to reverse allowed workers to challenge a union’s installation through Card Check with a private, secret-ballot vote.

  Meanwhile, the former union lawyer who was appointed top prosecutor at the Labor Board has said she intends to overturn the Foundation-won Johnson Controls precedent, which allowed employers to act on workers’ majority petitions and end the union’s “representation” through withdrawal of recognition. Johnson Controls also allowed union officials to seek an automatic secret-ballot vote to try to counter such withdrawal petitions, but few unions have opted for that because they fear private, secret-ballot elections.

  The fact that the NLRB is helping Big Labor strong-arm workers into joining union ranks, and going to such lengths to block workers from escaping, shows just how out of touch the NLRB is in protecting the rights of workers—one of which is the statutory right to decertify.

  Instead of improving the service they provide to attract more workers to voluntarily join union ranks, union bosses are simply doubling down on exercising their coercive government-granted powers to get workers under their control.

  In the short term, rigging the rules might help keep forced union dues flowing, but over the long run it will only further alienate union bosses from the workers they claim to represent. This is not a prescription for satisfied workers on Labor Day.

  *  *  *

  Mark Mix is president of the National Right to Work Committee.

  NEWSWEEK NEWSLETTER SIGN-UP >

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 16:00

• Suicide Blast At Russian Embassy In Kabul Kills 2 Diplomats
  Suicide Blast At Russian Embassy In Kabul Kills 2 Diplomats

  On Monday an unknown militant targeted Russia’s embassy in the Afghan capital of Kabul in a suicide attack, with the Russian Foreign Ministry subsequently confirming two diplomats were killed and multiple people wounded. 

  “At 10:50 am Kabul time on Sept. 5, an unidentified militant set off an explosive device in the immediate vicinity of the entrance to the consular section of the Russian embassy in Kabul,” an official ministry statement said.

  

  “As a result of the attack, two employees of the diplomatic mission were killed, and there are also Afghan citizens among the wounded.”

  Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov condemned the “terrorist act” – which coincidentally came on the heels of the first anniversary of the Taliban takeover of Kabul, and of the deadly events surrounding America’s hasty August 2021 final exit from the country.

  A statement from the Afghan Taliban’s interior ministry suggested the suicide blast and casualties could have been much worse as the bomber may not have fully reached his intended target:

  “It was a suicide attack, but before the bomber could reach his target, he was targeted by our forces and eliminated,” Afghan Interior Ministry spokesman Abdul Nafy Takor told AFP.

  Asked whether the target was the Russian embassy, Takor said: “Yes.” An Afghan civilian was killed and several others wounded in the attack, he said.

  The attack may have also been targeting Afghan civilians applying for a Russian visa. “The blast went off at the entrance to the embassy’s consular section, where Afghans were waiting for news about their visas, according to the Russian Foreign Ministry and the state news agency RIA Novosti,” The Washington Post details.

  “A Russian diplomat had emerged from the building to call out the names of candidates for visas when the explosion occurred, the agency said,” according to the report.

  #Breaking Aftermath of a reportedly suicide attack at the door of Russian embassy in Darul Aman #Kabul, #Afghanistan that killed at least 3 people and injured dozens today at 10:51 am.

  There is not even a day without explosion💥 in Afghanistan. pic.twitter.com/JTRXz63shS

  — Aisha Ahmad (@AishaTaIks) September 5, 2022

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  While these kinds of bombings against foreign embassies and international institutions have become more rare since the Taliban takeover (given that in prior years it was often Taliban militants themselves conducting attacks against foreign targets, and many countries have also shuttered their consuls), the anti-Taliban ISIS-K group has remained active in conducting suicide bombings. And at times, rival Talban factions particularly in the south of the country and along the Pakistan border have clashed.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 15:35

• "The EU Makes Its Peace With Economic War… And The Global Neoliberal System Is Collapsing Around Us"
  “The EU Makes Its Peace With Economic War… And The Global Neoliberal System Is Collapsing Around Us”

  By Michael Every of Rabobank

  No role for payrolls, or G7 oil-price caps

  For those paying not attention to war or peace, US payrolls coming in largely in line with consensus didn’t move markets much on Friday. Weak factory orders that followed did: but markets would have seized on shoelace futures for any excuse to tell themselves the Fed is going to back off on rate hikes – when it isn’t.

  Then the G7 announced the imposition of an as-yet unspecified December price cap on Russia’s oil exports –and Russia turned off Nord Stream 1 gas flows– and markets tumbled. Stocks and bonds went down – but Brent oil went up before easing off highs.

  The G7 proposal is that they can bring down the cost of energy by using its monopoly on oil tankers and insurance to force Moscow to sell oil at a lower price, choking off its export earnings and war budget to boot. This could work: unless Russia refuses to sell oil to anyone who imposes the price cap, which it will; or Western tankers refuse to comply, or make offshore ship-to-ship transfers; or Western insurers won’t play ball; or India and China start their own insurance schemes; or third parties buy the cheap oil, blend it, and sell it back to world markets at higher prices (and maybe even split the gains with Russia). Meanwhile, thousands of inspectors would be needed to (inefficiently) police it. In short, this G7 scheme plays at a ‘war economy’ rather than doing it for real, “because markets”, and oil prices are more likely to trend higher than lower against such a backdrop.

  That is ironically also the backdrop for the OPEC+ meeting today, which energy markets will be looking to with anticipation: might we see cuts in output.

  Meanwhile, European electricity prices could reportedly hit new highs this week, when the flood of problems already flowing from energy prices is already staggering: 6 out of 10 British manufacturers may go the wall; experts warn of energy rationing that could see Brits told not to cook until after 8pm, pubs close at 9pm, and three-day weeks at schools; aluminium smelters and steel mills are closing; fertilizer companies are shuttering; the Netherlands warns of a plunge in flowers, fruit, and vegetable output, with that of bricks also tumbling; Spanish output of ceramic tiles has halted; and a slew of Italian firms didn’t come back after the summer break. Regardless of gas storage levels for THIS winter, Europe faces an industrial supply-chain collapse – and just as it is has pledged to re-arm to face a worrying geopolitical future.

  The EU makes its peace with economic war

  As such, even though markets are still pricing for local and global commercial activity to continue as before, it is no surprise that the global neo-liberal market system is collapsing around us.

  In the US, Trump-era tariffs on China were just extended; the White House is also considering dramatic restrictions on outward investment to China after its limits on semiconductor sales.

  But that is far from all: after saying it will halt market mechanisms in energy last week, and German rolling out another EUR65bn in price subsidies over the weekend, the EU may be shifting towards a war economy.

  As Reuters puts it: “The EU executive has been looking at how to avoid the supply bottlenecks that accompanied the coronavirus pandemic and no longer wants to rely on companies… to take precautions on their own. The so-called internal market emergency instrument, set to be presented on September 13, lays out several stages that open up varying powers to the Commission depending on the situation.” Via this new instrument the Commission will reportedly seek emergency powers giving it the right to re-organise supply chains; sequester corporate assets; re-write commercial contracts with suppliers and customers; order companies to stockpile strategic reserves; and force them to prioritise EU orders over exports. This is in effect a mirror of the ‘US Defence Production Act’ –  and the current crisis suggests it is likely to be needed soon, and perhaps on a large scale. Colour me unsurprised if so, even if you have to colour markets red.

  2016’s ‘Thin Ice’ showed how rapidly global neoliberalism would unravel based on heterodox economics, which shows neoliberalism’s Achilles’ heels, transition economics, which dissects how planned Soviet economies were turned into market economies, and realpolitik pointing to geopolitical rivalry as the trigger. The combination of the first two has been fabulously instructive, and predictive, in watching post-2008 market economies make the reverse journey, crisis by crisis, into crony socialism for the rich; the last matters too, as lots of people knew the neoliberalism wasn’t working –hence ‘lower for longer’– but couldn’t see how a left-wing policy backlash would happen. The answer was always that once we moved into the realm of national security, such populist policies would happen wrapped in the flag.

  The way to fight economic war

  The same framework can predict what now should logically follow.

  Central bank will keep raising rates rise to deal with inflation – “No Escape From Biggest Bond Loss in Decades as Fed Keeps Hiking,” said Bloomberg this weekend. That said, some will be more willing than others to accept that fact: the Kiwi press, for example, is quoting RBNZ Governor Orr saying, “We’re not there yet, but we’re close,“ on a peak in rates, under the headline “Adrian Orr accepts mortgage rates could fall next year.” Really? Is that how you win an economic war?

  Alongside higher rates, MMT will also need to back state spending in vital areas. Such hypothecated credit will reallocate scarce resources towards supply-chain restructuring and away from the likes of too-much high-end housing. Indeed, the question is when/if we also get non-fungible credit to key firms that can only go into specific physical capital rather than being arbitraged. It might take a central bank digital currency to do it, but it will happen: you don’t win wars with SPVs and spivs.

  MMT will probably also be used to supress energy prices to maintain as much industrial supply as possible, and to minimize household pain. In which case, we will have to see the Commission’s proposed industrial policy too: because if we do not have energy rationing by price, which the Soviets avoided, then we will have it by diktat, as the Soviets then had to do. And note the Soviets only avoided a currency collapse with capital controls and fixed exchange rates.

  We will also require friendshoring or onshoring to recycle capital and keep production in ‘safe’ hands. It’s time for market analysts to stop looking at papers on the benefits of free trade, and to instead read academic papers from other disciplines, such as ‘Wartime Commercial Policy and Trade between Enemies’ (Grinberg, 2021), which assesses how trade works during wars. Grinberg shows there are rare examples of countries selling weapons to their enemies: in the Siege of Grave, the French commander was ordered to sell gunpowder to the Dutch forces besieging his town. There is evidence for business-as-usual non-military trade despite bloodshed in smaller wars: during the Crimean War (1853-56), flax, hemp, linseed, and tallow trade continued between the UK and Russia given no alternative buyers or sellers. Even early in WW1, UK-German trade-flows were so large that they were allowed to continue either directly or via third parties.

  However, the key conclusion is the more a war is seen as existential and/or long term, the more trade is disrupted, whatever the costs – and business lobbying has little effect on such national security decisions.

  It’s existential to get this call right

  It goes without saying this war is existential for Ukraine; and Russia says it is for it too. The above hypothesis suggests the Commission’s latest policy proposals say the war is also existential and/or long-term for Europe. By contrast, the G7’s laughable oil-price cap says Ukraine is a far less important, shorter term struggle. Either that, or it reflects the ‘Crimean’ reality that there is no alternative oil seller or buyer. In which case, no, not just back to “because markets”…. the Commission’s proposals for rationing by diktat and industrial policy are going to be needed even more, as shown above.

  The alternative policy call stemming from the populist right and left –even from heterodox voices who predicted this neoliberal collapse, such as the brilliant Steve ‘MMT’ Keen– is to say ‘give Putin Ukraine to get cheap gas’. However, this is a simplistic “because not markets” view which fails to see the logical and historical risks that a Western retreat could open the door for more, and more global, war; for more, and more global weaponization of commodities and trade; and, though nobody in the West will publicly admit it, for a huge tail risk to the living standards it (fairly or unfairly) enjoys.

  In short, this war clearly remains both existential and long-term: and Grinberg’s hypothesis, and my own ‘Thin Ice’ framework, say commercial activity will shift accordingly. Indeed, if the Commission crosses the looming policy Rubicon, the EU may not be able to go back to ‘normal’ until its economy has been restructured defensively – literally so; and until geopolitical risks have been resolved by said defensive actions; and that might take years, or even *decades*.

  Markets will have to make their peace with the reality of economic war: more state controls on what you can and can’t do; rationing by price or by diktat; MMT; perhaps non-fungible credit; higher structural inflation; higher interest rates; mercantilism in ideological blocs; and a broad reversal of globalisation’s trend of higher asset prices and lower goods prices.

  You have not seen what Ga-Liz-riel has seen

  Against this backdrop, Ga-Liz-riel Truss is likely to be selected as the new UK PM today and assume office tomorrow – to face perhaps 20% inflation, strikes, recession, shortages, blackouts, ‘economic’ war with Russia, and possible trade war with the EU over Northern Ireland.

  Her philosophy of “geoliberalism” makes her a foreign policy leader in shining armor with blade out for Russia and China. Yet her Brexit self-confidence may also see her dive into the sea to swim away from allies in Europe and the West, ending up on a raft. Further, while absolutely cognizant of the ongoing economic war, having called for the G7 to become an “economic NATO”, and backing a new global “Network of Liberty”, her domestic policy is hard to reconcile with it.

  Truss is adamantly backing tax cuts for high earners and businesses, despite all the evidence that this is the worst possible way to run MMT or boost the supply-side; and she may also introduce Covid-scale price subsidies to keep energy lower. If so, that is a belt and braces, and sword and shield and plate-mail armour, approach that will artificially suppress supply shocks while juicing demand, and yet doing nothing to restructure supply chains defensively, or to reallocate physically scarce resources. Nobody wins an economic war that way.

  Apparently, however, we should all expect confident Ga-Liz-riel statements that: “You have not seen what I have seen.” Like the 1970’s collapse in Sterling, where the IMF had to be called in?

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 15:10

• Russia Sanctions Ben Stiller & Sean Penn In New Blacklist Of 25 Americans
  Russia Sanctions Ben Stiller & Sean Penn In New Blacklist Of 25 Americans

  Russia announced Monday that it has blacklisted American actors over their activities in support of the Ukrainian government, also as retaliation for recent anti-Kremlin US sanctions. In total 25 US citizens, including senators and analysts at think tanks, are on the updated list.

  The list of those now banned from entering Russia “on a permanent basis” – according a Russian foreign ministry statement – includes Ben Stiller and Sean Penn, both of which met with President Volodymyr Zelensky in June. 

  

  A foreign ministry statement said the fresh action is in response to the “ever-expanding” US sanctions “against Russian citizens”. At this point, an estimated more than one thousand American nationals have been barred from entering Russia. 

  “As a measure in response to the ever-expanding personal sanctions on Russian citizens by [the US President] Joe Biden’s administration a permanent ban to enter the Russian Federation has been imposed on another group of US Congress members, high-ranking officials, members of the business and expert community and cultural figures (25 people),” the statement reads.

  “The hostile actions of US authorities, which continue to follow a Russophobic course, destroying bilateral ties and escalating confrontation between Russia and the United States, will continue to be resolutely rebuffed,” the ministry said.

  In late June Stiller traveled to Ukraine to meet with Zelensky, declaring the president “my hero”:

  “It’s a great honor for me.. you’re my hero!” said Stiller, a UN goodwill ambassador who met the Ukrainian leader on World Refugee Day.

  “What you’ve done, the way that you’ve rallied the country, the world, it’s really inspiring,” said the 56-year-old American comedian referring to Zelensky’s countless speeches to audiences around the world to rally support for his embattled country.

  Zelensky’s office released video of the meeting with the Hollywood star…

  As for Sean Penn, he was actually in Ukraine working on a documentary at the moment Russia invaded on Feb. 24.

  Ukraine subsequently bestowed top state awards to both Stiller and Penn “for support, upholding freedom and independence of Ukraine” – which they’ve continued to do in public statements and on social media.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 14:45

• Country Singer Jason Aldean Dropped By Longtime PR Firm Over Wife's Gender Comments
  Country Singer Jason Aldean Dropped By Longtime PR Firm Over Wife’s Gender Comments

  Authored by Jonathan Turley,

  Country singer Jason Aldean has been dropped by his longtime PR firm, GreenRoom PR, after his wife, Brittany Aldean, criticized early interventions on gender transitioning for young children.

  Brittany Aldean said that she was thankful that her parents did not intervene during her “tomboy phase” because she loves being a female. Various stars and advocates denounced her and GreenRoom then dropped her husband. What is interesting is that the company had its client list displayed yesterday but just removed the list and its home page. The effort may be to protect other country stars from the backlash of staying with the company when it is effectively blacklisting an artist for the political or social views of his spouse.

  

  Tyne Parrish, the co-owner of The Green Room called it a “difficult decision after 17 years to step away from representing Jason.”

  The call for the firm to drop the artist grew after this statement last week in an Instagram post by Aldrean that she would “really like to thank my parents for not changing my gender when I went through my tomboy phase.”

  “The Bones” singer Maren Morris later commented on Pope’s post, writing, “It’s so easy to, like, not be a scumbag human? Sell your clip-ins and zip it, Insurrection Barbie.”

  Aldrean later responded to her critics by saying “Advocating for the genital mutilation of children under the disguise of love and calling it ‘gender affirming care’ is one of the worst evils.”

  Singer and songwriter Cassadee Pope responded to Brittany Aldean’s post on Twitter, noting that Brittany Aldean’s alleged “tomboy phase” in no way compares “to someone wanting to transition.”

  Pope captured the essence of any people are angry with the comment.

  However, my concern, as usual, is with the free speech implications of what has become a type of blacklisting culture for those with unpopular or controversial political, social, or religious views. I understand the objections to Aldean’s comments but the response is reminiscent of the campaign against JK Rowling as a TERF (Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminist), including banning and burning her books. There is no willingness to separate her creative work from her personal views.

  In this case, a singer is being blacklisted because his wife (and possibly Aldean himself) hold conservative views on gender transitioning for young children. Yet, while some artists have joined the campaign, most others are silent, including the country singers represented by Green Room PR.

  Those listed artists included Lauren Akins, Tucker Beathard, Dierks Bentley, Bobby Bones, BROOKS & DUNN, Travis Denning, Patrict Droney, Caylee Hammack, and others. The home page now says simply “Contact: news@thegreenroompr.com” if you want to know who the firm represents or anything about the firm.

  The concern is clearly that these artists might make the “difficult decision” of separating from the firm after it dropped a fellow artist over the political and social views of his spouse.  The firm yielded to the pressure on one side but seems to be moving to protect itself from a backlash from country music fans.

  I would be raising the same free speech concerns if an artist was dropped because a spouse supported gender transitioning. The issue is whether the arts community should impose a de facto political litmus test for artists.  Blacklisting by studios and firms was common in the 1950s when communists and other political dissenters were being attacked by figures like Eugene McCarthy. The left has now embraced the practice in a far more extensive systems of banning books, speakers, and events by those who hold opposing views.

  Here is Aldean’s interview on Fox News:

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 14:20

• China Slashes FX Deposit Requirement To Prop Up Yuan… But Only Delays The Inevitable
  China Slashes FX Deposit Requirement To Prop Up Yuan… But Only Delays The Inevitable

  With the yuan in freefall, on Monday morning China announced it will cut the reserve requirement ratio on FX deposits by 2% from 8% to 6%, effective September 15th, in a move aimed to stem its currency’s fall. This announcement came after more than 3% depreciation of the USDCNY since mid-August on the back of a stronger USD. This was China’s second FX RRR cut this year – on 25 April, PBOC cut the RRR on FX deposits by 1% from 9% to 8% after CNY depreciated by almost 3% against the USD in one week.

  According to Goldman, this cut should help increase FX liquidity onshore, easing FX appreciation (i.e., CNY depreciation) pressures as a result. And while the actual liquidity impact from this cut looks modest by Goldman’s estimates – onshore FX deposits stood at $674BN as of July 2022, so a 2% cut implies $13BN liquidity release – this cut serves as a strong policy signal that the PBOC is uncomfortable with the rapid depreciation of the currency especially ahead of the 20th Party Congress in October; sure enough the USDCNH appreciated slightly immediately after this announcement.

  Indeed, as Goldman’s Maggie Wei writes, the countercyclical factor (CCF) in the daily fixing also implies strengthening bias by the PBOC in recent days.

  

  The bank found a similar pattern ahead of the previous 19th National Party Congress in October 2017, when policymakers leaned against CNY depreciation through more negative CCF ahead of the Congress, though policy signals were less obvious going into the Congress in 2017.

  

  Looking forward, Goldman expects USD strength to continue in the near term, and local Covid outbreaks and property weakness to continue to drag on activity growth in China. As such, the bank expects USDCNY to depreciate to 7.0 over a 3-month horizon. After the 20th Party Congress, Wei adds that “policymakers might also have higher tolerance for CNY weakness” –  during a press conference this afternoon (September 5th), PBOC deputy governor Liu Guoqiang stated the exchange rate has been more flexible and acting as the automatic stabilizer of both the macroeconomy and the global balance of payments. He added that the exchange rate should demonstrate two-way fluctuations, and not necessarily stick to any fixed number. Goldman agrees, and thinks the PBOC might have tolerance for further CNY depreciation against the USD, especially as the broad USD continues to strengthen, though they might want to avoid continued and too fast one-way depreciation if possible.

  Bloomberg’s Simon White agrees and writes that “the forces causing the yuan to decline are structural, and there is a mounting likelihood that China may eventually drop the fixed-exchange rate regime altogether.”

  As White adds, Beijing’s FX RRR cut “is unlikely to be enough to countervail the structural problems in China putting pressure on the nominally-closed capital account. China’s response to the economic impact of lockdowns has been to aim stimulus at the predominantly export-facing SOE sector. The result has been a surge of almost $0.5 trillion in China’s trade surplus since 2020.”

  Indeed, a look at the underlying drivers of the surplus gets to the heart of China’s main problem: the surplus grew not just due to a surge in exports, but a stagnation in imports. Stimulus in China comes at a cost to the household sector, a net importer. In a sign of the poor sentiment and pessimism in the household sector — driven by financial repression, lockdowns and collapses in property prices — new CNY loan growth for households has fallen to at least 13-year lows.

  

  The bottom line, according to the Bloomberg commentator, is that China’s growth model is broken, as the loss in demand from the household sector is greater than any gain from the export sector, leading to lower growth overall, and thus greater pressure on the capital account. This is enough to push the yuan lower, but China also faces a mounting risk from its heavy debt load.  China has had the largest rise in private debt levels since 2010, and its debt-service ratio is through the danger level of 20%.

  And while high debt when growth is strong and rising is manageable, it becomes much less so when growth is falling.

  There are several levers China can pull to alleviate the growth impact from increased capital flight. One of these is allowing the yuan to weaken. But if the pain becomes too much, White believes that China may choose to abandon its fixed-rate regime altogether, which would have many profound (and dire for the status quo) implications, including for EM monetary policy and global supply chains.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 09/05/2022 – 13:55

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• Biden Puts The 'Total' In Totalitarianism
  Biden Puts The ‘Total’ In Totalitarianism

  Authored by Roger Kimball via AmGreatness.com,

  America has come perilously close to the edge of the point of no return…

  

  Joe Biden certainly set the punditocracy abuzz with his neo-totalitarian performance piece at Independence Hall in Philadelphia on Thursday. The significance of that speech can be broken down into three parts, two of which have already received abundant commentary. 

  The first has to do with the theater of the piece, its optics or stagecraft. As many commentators (myself included) noted, the feel of the event was distinctly, and distinctively, bombastic. The melodramatic red lighting, the presence of armed Marines flanking the president, and Biden’s hectoring, gesticulating delivery made the event seem eerily reminiscent of a speech by Stalin, Mao, or—the closest parallel—that diminutive former house painter who, for a few short years, mesmerized the world with his elaborately staged rallies before pushing ahead with more kinetic activities. 

  To those who object that I am flirting with Godwin’s Law by invoking old AH, I reply that the flirtation was not mine but the doing of Biden’s producers and puppeteers. The visual similarity between Joe Biden’s event and some nighttime events at Nuremberg are just too striking to be coincidental. Leni Riefenstahl, as someone noted, would have been proud. Those who point out that Biden’s speech took place on September 1, a fraught day on the Polish border anno domini 1939, may be too ingenious for this historically illiterate age, but who knows? Often these things are, as our Marxists friends like to say, no accident. There are wheels within wheels. 

  Which brings me to the question of the intent behind the theatrics. Was this exercise in garish, totalitarian kitsch a “gaffe,” as some are saying—an aesthetic miscalculation for which that blinking inarticulate muppet who is Biden’s press secretary will have to apologize? Apparently not, since she just said that the speech was “not political.” 

  The entertainment committee never sleeps. 

  A year or so back, I might have thought that the theatrics were inadvertent. I have changed my mind. Having watched Biden’s Justice Department morph into an American Stasi with the FBI conducting predawn raids against various Trump supporters, arresting former aides and confiscating the mobile phones and other property of his lawyers, I now think that the tactics of intimidation are part of a larger strategy. The FBI’s raid last month on Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s Palm Beach residence, belongs in this category, as of course do the hundreds of indictments and incarcerations of January 6 protestors. Almost all of those unfortunate souls wind up being charged with minor torts like “parading” in or around the Capitol, yet are nonetheless thrown in a special D.C. gulag for months before being found guilty by biased juries and subject to enhanced sentences handed down by Trump-hating judges.

  None of this is adventitious. Like the intimidating and slightly unhinged theatrics of Biden’s speech, they are all deliberate scare tactics, warnings to us all of what can happen to those who dissent. The spectacle of 87,000 newly minted IRS agents waiting in the wings is another part of that “shock-and-awe” campaign. 

  Beyond Theatrics

  So much for the theatrics of the speech. What about its substance? It was a tooth-and-claw attack on Donald Trump and the MAGA agenda. How sharp were those teeth and claws? Trump and his supporters, said Biden, shaking his fists, represent “an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic.” “The very foundations of our republic,” forsooth! A week earlier, he noted that the problem was “not just Trump, it’s the entire philosophy that underpins the . . . semi-fascism” of the MAGA agenda. 

  The response to this unprecedented attack by a sitting president against his predecessor—as well as against the tens of millions (more than 74 million we are told) of his predecessor’s supporters—has been so robust that Biden felt it necessary to walk back his remarks, sort of. “I don’t consider any Trump supporter a threat to the country,” he said Friday, after saying just that on prime-time television to the entire nation the night before. 

  But wait, what is the MAGA (or, to quote the results of the lucubrations of Biden’s focus group, “ultra-MAGA”) agenda that is supposedly so dangerous? It’s worth keeping the meanings of these epithets in mind. When Donald Trump first proposed his “Make America Great Again” formula, he specified several things that it encompassed.  At the top of the list were efforts to restore American prosperity, in part by exploiting our enormous energy resources, in part by abolishing mischievous and burdensome regulation, in part by cutting taxes and providing incentives for American business to hire Americans and produce their goods in America. 

  Also at the top of the list was the integrity of our southern border, stanching the flow of illegal immigration, and rebuilding a military that had been woefully neglected during the Obama years. Elsewhere on the domestic front, Trump battled against political correctness and what has come to be called “identity politics.” He largely remade the federal judiciary, seeing three Supreme Court justices and hundreds of lower court federal judges confirmed, all of whom were nominated because they subscribed to a Antonin Scalia-like judicial philosophy that limited the role of judges to interpreting the law in the light of the Constitution, not making law under the inspiration of their personal policy preferences. 

  In the sphere of foreign policy, the MAGA agenda meant “putting America first.” He insisted that our NATO allies begin to shoulder their stipulated financial burden, challenged China on trade and military adventurism, and scuttled the disastrous Obama-era nuclear deal (since renewed) with Iran. Trump also stood firmly against the democracy-exporting (or, more accurately, “democracy”-exporting) policies of the Bush era. America would go to war not to promulgate democracy but only to defend its own interests. His Abraham Accords brought peace to the Middle East, a world historical achievement for which Trump deserved the Nobel Peace Prize. 

  And how did all that work out? Pretty well, I’d say. By the time Trump left office, America was a net exporter of energy; illegal immigration had slowed to a trickle; before the onslaught of COVID, his policies had resulted in the lowest unemployment in decades, the lowest minority unemployment ever. Wages were rising, especially at the lower rungs, and the stock market was booming. All-in-all, MAGA meant American prosperity and success. 

  It did not, however, bode well for the elite globalist agenda which rested upon endless foreign wars, the neglect of American workers, and a disdain for traditional bourgeois values like hard work, family solidarity, and local initiatives. 

  Biden’s handlers have attempted to co-opt or usurp the epithet “MAGA” and transform it into something ominous. But what it means is not some existential threat to “the very foundations of our republic.” On the contrary, it is an affirmation of the principles of limited government and individual liberty that undergird the foundations of the American republic. 

  The Goal Is Control

  Which brings me to the third current of significance in Biden’s performance. There was a theatrical aspect, a substantive aspect—the attack on Trump, his supporters, and all things MAGA—and there is the long strategic game implied not just in Biden’s speech but in the extraordinary, overweening activity of his administration.

  In “Joe Biden and the Sovietization of America,” a column that will be published in the October edition of Spectator World (available online mid-September), I mention in passing the practice of Gleichschaltung, the attempt to bring all aspects of life into alignment with the governing philosophy of the state. The term was popularized in Germany in the late 1930s, but it describes a process that is common to all totalitarian societies (indeed, it describes the effort that puts the “total” in “totalitarian”). Among other things, it involves the politicization of all aspects of life, the surrender of individuality to ideology. George Orwell sketched the process in Nineteen Eighty-Four. Lenin and Stalin brought that fiction to real life in their iron-fisted control of life in the Soviet Union. Xi Jinping continues that legacy today in China. What we call “political correctness” hints at the program, for really to be politically correct is to suffuse every element of one’s life with the dogmas that the ruling consensus has defined as the correct orthodoxy. The fascistic formula “the personal is the political” gives one expression to this idea, since, taken seriously, it denies the legitimacy of the personal altogether. 

  The Biden regime is making great strides in this direction. As Josh Hammer observes in a penetrating column, Biden apparatchiks are moving on multiple fronts to abolish the distinction between the public sector and the private sector. Late last month, the world was treated to Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg confessing on Joe Rogan’s podcast that, yes, the FBI did in fact put pressure on the social media giant to bury news about Hunter Biden’s “laptop from hell”—news that very likely would have changed the results of the 2020 election had it been allowed to circulate. Entities like Facebook and Twitter, Hammer points out, “no longer qualify as meaningfully ‘private’ and have instead simply become appendages of the state.” They are simply part of the propaganda machine of the ruling party. Citing Missouri Attorney General (and U.S. Senate candidate) Eric Schmitt, Hammer describes the “vast censorship enterprise” promulgated by the state. Former U.S. Representative Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) described aspects of this enterprise in his book Countdown to Socialism. 

  But the goal of total control involves more than censorship. It also involves the insinuation of the state into the most intimate areas of our private lives. One example is the Biden regime’s new weaponization of Title IX legislation. This brief statute, which, in just a couple of lines, says that institutions that receive federal funds may not discriminate on the basis of sex, has been enlisted in the campaign to abolish natural sexual identity and replace it with a polymorphous, “gender fluid” model. Among other things, this radical new interpretation of Title IX gives teachers priority over parents on matters of sex and gender, requiring, for example, that “K-12 schools support socially transitioning children to a different gender without requiring notice to parents, the involvement of medical professionals, or legal documentation.” 

  The late Andrew Breitbart liked to point out that politics is downstream from culture. Indeed it is. It saddens me to report, though, that the Left seems to have a livelier appreciation of this fact than the Right. Barack Obama came to office promising to “fundamentally transform the United States of America.” Obama laid the groundwork for that transformation. Now his bumbling, senescent protégé, aided by an army of Obama-era lieutenants, a compliant media, and a corrupt deep-state bureaucracy, is completing the job. 

  There is, I know, a point of no return, a point beyond which a society beset by totalitarian impulses must either rebel or succumb utterly. Are we there yet? I do not know. I do sense, however, that we have come perilously close to the edge. I pray that it is not too late. 

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 23:30

• New Mexico Town Has Only 20 Days Of Fresh Water Left
  New Mexico Town Has Only 20 Days Of Fresh Water Left

  The city of Las Vegas, New Mexico, has 20 days of fresh water left, and officials are searching for alternative sources to prevent contaminated water from flowing to households and businesses, according to CNN. 

  Not to be confused with Las Vegas, Nevada, the 13,000-person city in San Miguel County relies solely on the now contaminated Gallinas River, which is full of ash and debris after the Calf Canyon-Hermits Peak Fire. 

  

  Las Vegas’ water treatment facility typically uses chlorine to clean the water, but it becomes carcinogenic when mixed with carbon-infused water because of all the ash. 

  “We need to get the carbon out of the water before we add disinfection,” Las Vegas Utilities Director Maria Gilvarry recently told residents at a public meeting. 

  We noted in late July (T-minus 50 days to no fresh water) that there was no immediate solution to fix the town’s water woes. Time is running out to find new water sources. 

  City officials are testing water in a nearby lake that could be their saving grace and buy the water-stricken town a few months. The tests take several days, and the hope is the water has less ash that would allow it to be run through the treatment facility. 

  “Our fingers are crossed on that,” Las Vegas Mayor Louie Trujillo said, adding the tests “will determine the quality of water we’re going to be sending to one of our reservoirs.”

  Gilvarry said if the water source is good enough, the city would have about two months of added water capacity, enough time to install upgraded treatment systems capable of processing the sediment-heavy water. 

  If the water tests are inadequate, city and state officials would implement a boil-water order and possibly increase rationings.

  Las Vegas has entered the final countdown until it exhausts all fresh water. Residents have been learning to live with less. They might have to live with a lot less if an immediate solution isn’t found. 

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 23:00

• 5 Psychological Experiments That Explain The Modern World
  5 Psychological Experiments That Explain The Modern World

  Authored by Kit Knightly via Off-Guardian.org,

  The world is a confusing place. People do things that don’t make any sense, think things that aren’t supported by facts, endure things they do not need to endure, and viciously attack those who try to bring these things to their attention.

  

  If you’ve ever wondered why, you’ve come to the right place.

  Any casual reader of the alternate media landscape will eventually come up with a reference to Stanley Milgram, or Philip Zimbardo, the “Asch Experiment” or maybe all three.

  “Cognitive Dissonance”, “Diffusion of Responsibility”, and “learned helplessness” are phrases that regularly do the rounds, but where do they come from and what they mean?

  Well, here are the important psycho-social experiments that teach us about the way people think, but more than that they actually explain how our modern world works, and just how we got into this mess.

  1. THE MILGRAM EXPERIMENT

  The Experiment: Let’s start with the most famous. Beginning in 1963, Yale psychologist Stanley Milgram conducted a series of experiments now referred to as the Milgram Obedience Experiments.

  The setting is simple, Subject A is told to conduct a memory test on Subject B, and administer electric shocks when he makes mistakes. Of course, Subject B does not exist, and the electric shocks are not real. Instead, actors would cry, ask for help or pretend to be unconscious, all the while Subject A would be encouraged to carry on administering the shocks.

  The vast majority of subjects carried on with the test and gave the shocks, despite the distress of “Subject B”.

  The Conclusion: In his paper on this experiment Stanley Milgram coined the term “diffusion of responsibility”, describing the psychological process by which a person can excuse or justify doing harm to someone if they believe it’s not really their fault, they won’t be held accountable, or they do not have a choice.

  The Application: Almost literally endless. All institutions can use this phenomenon to pressure people into acting against their own moral code. The army, the police, hospital staff – wherever there is a hierarchy or perceived authority, people will fall victim to the diffusion of their own responsibility.

  NOTE: They made a decent film about Milgram, and the backlash his experiments caused called Experimenter. In recent years there has been a major pushback on this experiment, with articles in the MSM attacking the findings and methodology and new “researchers” claiming “it does not prove what you think it does.”

  *

  2. THE STANFORD PRISON EXPERIMENT

  The Experiment: Only slightly less famous than Milgram’s work is Philip Zimbardo’s Prison Experiment, carried out at Stanford University in 1971. The experiment set up a mock-prison for a week, with one group of subjects designated “guards” and the other “prisoners”.

  Both sides were provided uniforms, and prisoners were given a number. The guards were ordered to only ever address prisoners by their number, not their name.

  There were a number of other rules and procedures, detailed here.

  In brief, over the course of the week, guards became increasingly sadistic, dealing out punishments to disobedient prisoners and rewarding “good prisoners” in order to try and divide them. Many of the prisoners simply took the abuse, and in-fighting began between “trouble makers” and “good prisoners”.

  Though technically not an “experiment” in the purest sense (there was no hypothesis to test, and no control group), and perhaps impacted by “demand characteristics”, the study does reveal interesting patterns of behaviour in its subjects.

  The Conclusion: Prison guards became sadistic. Prisoners became obedient. All this despite no real laws being broken, no real legal authority, and no real requirement to stay. If you give people power and dehumanise those below them, they will become sadistic. If you put people in prison they will act like they are in prison.

  In short, people will act the way they are treated.

  The Application: Again, endless. We’ve seen it all through Covid, if you start treating people a certain way, the majority will go along with it and blame the minority who refuse to cooperate. Meanwhile, police forces around the world were suddenly granted new powers, and promptly abused them because the maskless and unvaxxed had been dehumanised in their eyes. Those reactions were engineered, not accidental.

  *

  3. THE ASCH EXPERIMENT

  The Experiment: Another experiment in conformity, not as brutal as Milgram or Zimbardo, but perhaps more unsettling in its findings.

  First conducted by Solomon Asch in the 1950s, the setup is a simple one. You put together a panel of subjects, one real subject and a handful of fake subjects.

  One by one the subjects are asked a series of multiple-choice questions to which the answer is always obvious, and all the fake subjects will get every answer wrong. The question is whether or not the real subject will maintain his own correct answer, or begin to conform with the group.

  The Conclusion: While most people maintained their right answers, the “error rate” in the experiment group was 37% versus less than 1% in the control group. Meaning 36% of subjects eventually began to change their answers to align with the consensus, even though they knew they were wrong.

  Around one-third of people will either pretend to change their minds for the sake of conformity or, more alarmingly, will actually alter their beliefs if they find themselves in the minority.

  The Application: Staged or invented polls, falsified vote counts in elections, bot accounts on social media, astroturfing campaigns. Media headlines proclaiming “everyone knows X” or “only 1% of people think Y”.

  There are a great many tools you can use in order to create the impression of a fake “consensus”, a manufactured “majority”.

  NOTE: The experiment has been done a million times in dozens of variations, but perhaps the most interesting finding is that putting just one other person in the panel who agrees with the test subject seemed to reduce conformity by 87%. Essentially, people hate being a lone voice but will tolerate being in the minority if they have some support. Good to know.

  *

  4. FESTINGER’S COGNITIVE DISSONANCE EXPERIMENT

  The Experiment: The least well-known experiment on the list, but in some ways the most fascinating. In 1954 Leon Festinger created an experiment to evaluate the phenomenon of cognitive dissonance, his setup was again quite simple.

  A subject is given a repetitive and dull physical task to do (originally turning wooden pegs, but other variations use other tasks).

  After the task is complete, the subject is instruced to go and prepare the next subject (actually a lab assistant) for the task, by lying and telling him/her how interesting the task was.

  It’s at this point the subjects are divided into two groups, one group is offered $20 to lie, the other only $1.

  This is the real experiment.

  The Conclusion: After lying to the fake subjects, and being paid their money, the real subjects take part in a post-experiment interview and record their genuine thoughts on the task.

  Interestingly, the 20-dollar generally told the truth, that they found the task dull and repetitive. While the one-dollar group, more often than not, claimed to have genuinely enjoyed the task.

  This is cognitive dissonance in action.

  Essentially, for the $20 group, the money was a good reason to lie to their fellow test subject, and they could justify their own behaviour in their head. But, for the $1 group, the meagreness of the reward made their dishonesty internally unjustifiable, so they had to unconsciously create their own justification by convincing themselves they weren’t lying at all.

  In summary, if you offer people a small reward for doing something, they will pretend to enjoy it, or be otherwise invested, to justify only making a small profit.

  The Application: Casinos, computer games and other interactive media use this principle all the time, offering players very little pay off knowing they will convince themselves they are enjoying playing. Big corporations and employers can likewise rely on this phenomenon to keep wages down, knowing that low paid workers have a psychological mechanism that may convince them they enjoy their jobs.

  NOTE: A variation on this experiment introduces a third group, who are paid nothing to lie. This group is not affected by cognitive dissonance, and will honestly appraise the task just as the well-paid group do.

  *

  5. THE MONKEY LADDER

  The Experiment: Now this is a somewhat controversial addition to the list, but we’ll get to that later. It’s a very famous experiment you’ve probably heard cited dozens of times.

  In the 1960s scientists at Harvard put five monkeys in a cage with a stepladder in the middle. Atop the stepladder is a bunch of bananas, however each time a monkey tries to climb the ladder they are all sprayed with ice-cold water. Eventually, the monkeys learn to avoid the ladder.

  Then one monkey is removed and a new monkey is introduced. He naturally goes straight for the ladder and is set upon by the other four monkeys.

  Then a second monkey is removed, and another new monkey is introduced. He naturally goes straight for the ladder and is set upon by the other four monkeys…including the one who was never sprayed.

  They continue to replace each monkey in turn, until no monkeys are present who were ever sprayed with water, and yet they all refuse to go near the stairs and prevent all the new monkeys from doing so.

  Now, the obvious conclusion here is that people can be conditioned to mindlessly follow rules they do not understand.

  The only problem with that is that none of this ever happened.

  Yes, that’s the controversy I mentioned earlier. Despite being easily found on every corner of the internet, despite magazine articles explaining it and animations recounting it…it never happened. The experiment appears to be entirely apocryphal.

  No ladder, no monkeys, no cold water.

  So while this supposed experiment doesn’t actually teach us about herd mentality, it does explain the modern world, because it shows us how easily a myth can be worked into a reality through sheer dint of repetition.

  BONUS: MONKEY LADDER REDUX

  That’s right, it doesn’t stop there, there’s another twist.

  National Geographic did actually recreate the fictional monkey ladder experiment using people:

  One subject walks into a doctor’s waiting room filled with fake patients. When a bell sounds, all the fake patients stand up for a second and then retake their seats.

  After this process repeats a few times, the fake patients are slowly removed one-by-one until only the subject of the experiment remains. Then secondary real subjects are introduced one at a time.

  The experiment seeks to answer the following questions:

  a) Will the original subject stand up at the bell without knowing why?

  b) Will they will continue to stand up when they are alone in the room?

  c) Will they then teach this behaviour to the new subjects?

  The answer to all three appears to be “yes”.

  Now, while far less scientific than the other four experiments, I include this here for a very specific reason. The above video of the experiment doesn’t just record the conforming behaviour but describes it as possibly beneficial. Adding that herd behaviour saves lives in the wild and is “how we learn to socialise”.

  A very interesting take, don’t you think?

  So, while the fake monkey experiment that never happened was used to teach us about the perils of herd mentality, its nonexistence actually teaches us about the perils of non-primary sources and the group consciousness’s ability to confabulate.

  Meanwhile, the real monkey experiment is used to sell us the idea that herd mentality does exist but is potentially a good thing. Raising the possibility the whole thing could have been staged, simply to promote conformity.

  …Isn’t the world a strange and confusing place?

  *

  So, there they are. Five of the most critical pieces of psychological research ever done, hopefully going forward nobody will be left in the dark when these concepts or experiments are referenced.

  But the point of this article is not to just make you, the reader, understand these experiments…it is also meant to remind you that they do.

  The people in charge, the elite, the 1%, “The Party”. The powers that be – or shouldn’t be – whatever you want to call them.

  They know these experiments. They have studied them. They’ve probably replicated them countless times on grand scales and in unethical ways we can barely imagine. Who knows exactly what takes place in the dank dark dungeons of the deep state?

  Just remember, they know how the human mind works.

  • They know they can make people do anything if they reassure them they won’t be held responsible.

  • They know that they can rely on people to abuse any power they’re given, OR believe they are powerless if they’re treated that way.

  • They know that peer pressure will change a lot of people’s minds even in the face of undeniable reality, especially if you make them feel completely alone.

  • They know that if you offer people only a small reward for completing a task, they will make up their own psychological justification for taking it.

  • They know that people will mindlessly do whatever everyone else is doing without ever asking for a reason.

  • And they know that people will happily believe something that never happened if it is repeated often enough.

  They know all of this. And they use that knowledge all the time – All. The. Time.

  Every commercial you see, every article you read, every movie they release, every item on the news, every “viral” social media post, every trending hashtag.

  Every war. Every pandemic. Every headline.

  All of them are constructed with these principles in mind to elicit specific emotional reactions that steer your behaviour and beliefs. That’s how the media works, not to inform you, not to entertain you…but to control you.

  And they have it down to a science. Always remember that.

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 22:30

• Judge Tosses Lawsuit By Hitler-Praising, TDS-Stricken Fired Yale Psychiatrist
  Judge Tosses Lawsuit By Hitler-Praising, TDS-Stricken Fired Yale Psychiatrist

  A far-left psychiatry professor who sued Yale for firing her over unhinged comments she made against then-President Donald Trump, just had her lawsuit tossed by a federal judge, according to the Hartford Courant.

  

  Lee argued that Yale fired her in response to a January 2020 tweet that characterized “just about all” Trump supporters as suffering from “shared psychosis,” and that Trump lawyer Alan Dershowitz had “wholly taken on Trump’s symptoms by contagion.”

  She also tweeted that Trump was “worse than Hitler,” and then when challenged, stuck her other foot in her mouth – tweeting “Donald Trump is not an Adolf Hitler. At least Hitler improved the daily life of his followers, had discipline, and required more than himself to gain the respect of his followers.“

  Just incredible stuff here…my god. pic.twitter.com/Hq2QcMiuzN

  — Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) November 2, 2020

  Lee, herself clearly suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS), used her Yale credentials to author a book, conduct interviews, and form a group – the “Independent Expert Panel for Presidential Fitness” – all aimed at taking down Trump over what they said was a lack of mental fitness.

  

  Crickets over Biden’s obvious dementia, by the way.

  Lee came under scrutiny from colleagues and leaders at Yale, as The Western Journal‘s Jared Harris notes.

  Dr. John Krystal, chair of the university’s psychiatry department, blasted the political activity happening under the guise of professional conduct.

  “I want to emphasize that you did not make these statements as a layperson offering a political judgment,” Krystal wrote in a 2020 letter to Lee. “You made them explicitly in your professional capacity as a psychiatrist and on the basis of your psychiatric knowledge and judgment.”

  “For that reason,” he continued, “the committee decided it was appropriate to consider how these statements reflected your ability to teach trainees.”

  One major factor in Krystal’s reaction to Lee’s political action is likely the “Goldwater Rule,” a professional standard from the American Psychiatric Association that warns against diagnosing someone without an evaluation.

  While it seems like an obvious step in diagnosis, Lee, who is not a member of the APA, argued that the danger from Trump outweighed the need for clinical evidence.

  Citing a supposed “duty to warn” the public about Trump’s mental state, Lee filed a lawsuit arguing that her own unhinged assault against the president wasn’t partisan slander but a professional obligation.

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

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 22:00

• Semper Sigh: Biden's Use Of The Marines Violated Long-Standing Federal Policies And Regulations
  Semper Sigh: Biden’s Use Of The Marines Violated Long-Standing Federal Policies And Regulations

  Authored by Jonathan Turley,

  Below is my column in the New York Post on the controversial speech of President Joe Biden in Philadelphia. The speech has received sharply different reviews from “disgusting” and “hateful” to a historic declaration of war against the enemies of the state. Some like Elie Mystal insisted that the speech did not go far enough because all Republicans are white supremacists, not just MAGA Republicans. I thought the speech was divisive and inflammatory. However, it was not the content but the optics of the speech that was particularly unsettling.  Framing Biden were two Marines standing like nutcracker props in a highly political speech. His use of the Marines (and the Marine band) violated long-standing rules for shielding the services from such political events.

  

  Here is the column:

  President Joe Biden’s speech in Philadelphia has produced sharply different responses from the media. On CNN, it was praised as a rallying cry for patriots. On conservatives sites, it was denounced as hateful and divisive.  For many of us, however, the optics was a glaring distraction with the intense red background and prominently placed Marines framing the President. The use of the Marines and the Marine band raised concerns given the clearly political purpose of the speech. Indeed, the networks did not view the speech as an address to the nation and refused to give the White House primetime slots.

  While White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre assured the media that “it’s not a political speech,” it was unabashedly political from calls to get the vote out to direct attacks on “MAGA Republicans” and Donald Trump. That again raised the legal questions over the use of the Marines in such a speech. Even CNN flagged the concern over the use of the Marines and CNN chief White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins stated the obvious that “it was a very political speech.”

  The optics of the speech instantly became a source of Internet chatter with the weird red background that made the President look like he was giving a stump speech from Dante’s Inferno. Indeed, it almost had that High Chancellor Adam Sutler look from V for Vendetta. (The comparison ultimately did not end with just the optics. Sutler warned his inner circle that “every day…brings us closer to November” and “I want this country to realize that we stand on the edge of oblivion. I want every man, woman and child to understand how close we are to chaos…to remember why they need us!”).

  

  However, it was the use of the Marine guards that most stood out — framing the President as he declared Trump supporters to be a threat to democracy . Biden denounced “MAGA Republicans” thirteen times as well as repeated references to his past and possible future political opponent, Donald Trump.

  The speech was obviously political, as noted by CNN’s Collins, as a “full frontal attack” on his political opponents.

  The United States has long drawn a line between the work of federal employees in public service and the use of such employees for political purposes. The Hatch Act was passed in 1939 to curtail the political activities of civilian federal employees.

  The Marine Corps expressly forbids personnel from being used or participating in such political events.

  “Active duty members will not engage in partisan political activities, and all military personnel will avoid the inference that their political activities imply or appear to imply DoD sponsorship, approval, or endorsement of a political candidate, campaign, or cause.”

  The other services have also drawn a bright line against such appearances. Army officials, for example, stress that their rules bar such involvement because “actual or perceived partisanship could undermine the legitimacy of the military profession and department.”

  In Department of Defense Directive 1344.10 the long list of prohibited involvement in political events include:

  “Attend partisan political events as an official representative of the Armed Forces, except as a member of a joint Armed Forces color guard at the opening ceremonies of the national conventions of the Republican, Democratic, or other political parties recognized by the Federal Elections Committee or as otherwise authorized by the Secretary concerned.”

  These rules also expressly bar the wearing of uniforms at such political speeches: “The wearing of the uniform by Service members … is prohibited … during or in connection with furthering political activities, private employment, or commercial interests, when an inference of official sponsorship … for the activity or interest may be drawn.”

  There are obviously gray areas for a president who is necessarily accompanied by members of the military. Moreover, drawing the line between what is a presidential address and what is a political speech is often difficult. Presidents are politicians and often use official statements to slam their critics or opponents. Such events often have color guards and military bands.

  The enforcement of such rules are also rather anemic. Even violation of the Hatch Act are routinely brushed aside by presidents and both the Biden and Trump administrations have violated the Act in the past.

  Yet, what is interesting is the relative silence of many in the media on the use of these Marines as virtual nutcracker props for a political speech. The media overwhelmingly condemned President Trump for his picture in front of St. John’s Church after the clearing of Lafayette Park in 2020. While the media falsely claimed that the park was cleared for the photo ed, many criticized the photo with military and law enforcement officials as inappropriate. Later, Gen. Mark A. Milley, apologized for being in the photo, declaring “My presence in that moment and in that environment created a perception of the military involved in domestic politics.”

  Yet, Milley has said nothing about supplying not just the Marine Band but Marines to stand directly behind Biden at a political speech as he denounced his political opponents as threats to democracy and part of what he was called a “semi-fascist” movement. Those Marines stood at attention as the President declared “Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic.” (Apparently, nothing says that you are against fascism as much as labeling your political opponents enemies of the state with Marines on either side of you).

  The use of the Marines would certainly seem to “create a perception of the military involved in domestic politics.” Moreover, the message sent to other military personnel, particularly other Marines, is that support for the President’s opponents is considered a threat to the constitutional Republic.

  The Washington Post previously objected to the use of the Marine band at the White House when President Trump was viewed as giving a political speech. During the Trump Administration, others joined such criticism including Members of Congress and public interest groups.

  Alice Hunt Friend, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told the Post that the use of the band was a “big violation” since “Americans who see uniformed military personnel at partisan political functions may assume the military has a partisan identity. Presidents running for reelection always have to take extra care to keep their military aides out of their campaign activities.”

  Those voices are, thus far, silent in President Biden’s use of these Marines for a highly partisan and divisive speech.

  Winston Churchill once said that it is “always dangerous” for military to find themselves mixing with politics because “they enter a sphere in which the values are quite different from those to which they have hitherto been accustomed.” That was never more evident as two young Marines stood at attention as their president accused millions of their fellow citizens of being enemies of the constitutional Republic. They deserved better from the President.

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 21:30

• China Warns Of 'Counter-Measures' After Biden Approves $1.1bn Arms Sales To Taiwan
  China Warns Of ‘Counter-Measures’ After Biden Approves $1.1bn Arms Sales To Taiwan

  China is “firmly opposed” to the Biden administration’s approval of more than $1.1 billion in arms sales to Taiwan, and says to expect “counter-measures” in response.

  

  Chinese embassy spokesman Liu Pengyu said on Saturday that the sales “severely jeopardize China-US relations and peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait,” and has called on Washington to “immediately revoke” them.

  Full statement (via Twitter):

  #Taiwan is an inalienable part of the #Chinese territory. The United States interferes in #China’s internal affairs and undermines China’s sovereignty and security interests by selling arms to the Taiwan region. It runs counter to international law and basic principles in international relations, and violates the one-China principle and provisions of the three China-US joint communiques, especially the August 17 Communique.

  It sends wrong signals to “Taiwan independence” separatist forces, and severely jeopardizes China-US relations and peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait. China is firmly opposed to this.China urges the US side to honor its commitment, earnestly abide by the one-China principle and the three China-US joint communiques,stop arms sales to and military interactions with Taiwan, and immediately revoke relevant arms sales to Taiwan, lest it should cause more damages to China-US relations and peace and stability across the #TaiwanStrait.

  China will resolutely take legitimate and necessary counter-measures in light of the development of the situation.

  Paging John Cena…

  

  Tensions between Washington and Beijing have intensified since House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit last month, which China had warned against – and responded to by ordering military drills around the island nation after she had left.

  On Saturday, Taiwan said it “highly welcomes” the arms, and thanked the Biden administration for “continuing to implement its security commitments to Taiwan.”

  “In response to China’s recent continuous military provocations and unilateral changes in the status quo and creating crises, Taiwan’s determination to defend itself is extremely firm,” Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement, adding “This batch of arms sales includes a large number of various types of missiles that are needed to strengthen Taiwan’s self-defense, which fully demonstrates that the great importance the US government attaches to Taiwan’s defense needs, assisting our country to obtain the equipment needed for defense in a timely manner and to enhance our national defense capabilities.”

  On Thursday, Taiwan’s military shot down a drone near one of its island outposts near the Chinese coast, which happened just one day after Taiwan was able to repel drones hovering over three of the islands it occupies near the Chinese port city of Xiamen.

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 21:00

• Will OPEC Cut Oil Output On Labor Day?
  Will OPEC Cut Oil Output On Labor Day?

  Authored by Tsvetana Paraskova via OilPrice.com,

  • OPEC is meeting on September 5 to discuss the state of the oil market.

  • The cartel is considering slashing oil production.

  • Reports of where oil demand is heading remain mixed.

  Saudi Arabia’s signal from two weeks ago that OPEC+ could decide to cut production at any time, in any form, managed to lift Brent oil prices to above $100 per barrel for around a week.   

  But this week, fresh lockdowns in China, intensified fears of recession, and guidance that the Fed will continue with the large key rate hikes sent oil prices tumbling to the low $90s.    

  

  While OPEC insists that oil demand is robust and will be so through the end of the year, data suggests that demand in the world’s top oil importer, China, has been weak this summer amid COVID lockdowns and slowing factory activity. 

  Overall Asian crude imports are estimated to have slowed in August from July, with imports in India, the world’s third-largest crude importer, also down month on month, according to Refinitiv Oil Research data cited by Reuters’ Asia Commodities and Energy Columnist Clyde Russell. 

  OPEC+ is meeting on September 5 for its regular monthly gathering to assess market conditions and decide how to proceed with the pact which currently expires in December this year. The group, in theory, rolled back by the end of August all the massive cuts from May 2020, but it’s estimated to be 2.9 million barrels per day (bpd) below the collective target. 

  Now the million-dollar question is: Will there be new cuts? And will cuts help support what looks like a softening physical crude market? 

  Per a Bloomberg survey of 19 industry analysts, OPEC+ is expected to keep the oil output target for October at the same level as in September when they meet next week. 

  Moreover, refiners in Asia expect Saudi Arabia to slash the price of its flagship grade to Asia for October amid lackluster fuel demand and increased competition from crude from other regions. If next week Saudi Aramco indeed slashes its prices, it would be an admission of a weakening demand for Middle Eastern crude in the key oil importing region, Asia. 

  OPEC insists that oil demand is strong. Global oil demand is still robust and will be such through the end of this year, OPEC Secretary General Haitham al-Ghais told Reuters last month, noting that the recent sell-offs didn’t reflect fundamentals and were driven by fear. 

  But the latest data compiled by Refinitiv paints a different picture.

  Chinese imports in August are expected to be only slightly above the July arrivals, and the June-August overall imports are estimated at around 1.5 million bpd below the 2021 average rate of purchases, Reuters’ Russell notes. 

  In July, crude throughput at Chinese refineries slumped to the lowest level since the height of the pandemic in March 2020, amid unplanned facility outages and lower processing rates at independent refiners due to declining refining margins. A new round of tax probes on private refiners, the so-called teapots, could slow down further the crude processing rates at the world’s top crude oil importer, while this week’s new lockdowns in several large cities are not helping demand, either. 

  Fears of demand destruction with slowing industrial activity not only in China, but also in Europe and the U.S., sent this week oil prices down to the levels from before August 21 when Saudi Energy Minister, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, said that OPEC+ was ready to cut production at any time in any form if it believes it would bring stability to the “schizophrenic” oil market.  

  If OPEC+ surprises most market observers and does announce cuts on September 5, it could support oil prices for some time. However, the more likely outcome of Monday’s meeting could be a wait-and-see approach and a vague statement of readiness to do whatever it takes to “stabilize” oil prices, which in OPEC+’s parlance typically means “lift” oil prices. 

  Two large uncertainties are hanging over the market apart from where demand will go from here, and they could prompt OPEC+ to wait for more clarity ahead of announcing possible production cuts. These are the so-called Iranian nuclear deal and the oil supply from key OPEC+ member Russia, which could dip from very resilient current levels once the EU embargo on seaborne Russian crude and fuel imports comes into full force in early 2023 and countries announce a price cap on Russian oil.    

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 20:30

• Buffett's BYD Sales Add To Chinese Stock "Pain Trades"
  Buffett’s BYD Sales Add To Chinese Stock “Pain Trades”

  By George Lei and Ye Xie, Bloomberg Markets live commentators and reporters

  Three things we learned last week:

  1. There have been strong inflows into China’s stock market, despite the nation’s economic challenges. Chinese equity funds, led by ETFs, received $3 billion in the week through Aug. 31, in contrast to an outflow of $9 billion from global equity funds, according to EPFR Global and Citigroup. Foreign investors appear to be unfazed by the weak market performance, as renewed Covid outbreaks sent Chinese stocks to a three-month low.

  

  In August, long-only managers added bets on consumer-service names as part of the “reopening trade” as well as electric- vehicle makers, such as BYD Co., to gain exposure to the growth factor, according to Morgan Stanley. But their timing wasn’t particularly good. Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway started trimming its massive stake in BYD, putting the shares under pressure.

  Meanwhile, restaurant and traveling names such as Yum China, H World and Trip.com aren’t performing well amid the spreading Covid cases. “The recent lockdown in some China major cities and investors’ transactions on BYD imply a prolonged wait for these trades to add values,” Morgan Stanley’s analysts led by Gilbert Wong wrote in a note.

  

  2. The number of Chinese cities grappling with virus outbreaks is now almost as high as it was at the peak of the Omicron wave earlier this year. The southwestern metropolis of Chengdu locked down its 21 million residents, and Shenzhen’s 17.5 million inhabitants now fear a second city-wide shutdown this year.

  Since May, China has adopted a mass-testing strategy, setting up tens of thousands of testing booths across major cities. Authorities hoped frequent testing would help them avoid lockdowns and enable most business activities to carry on. The highly- transmissible BA.5 variant, however, has left the strategy increasingly ineffective and economic pains are mounting.

  

  3. Policy divergence is putting the yuan under pressure, but the People’s Bank of China has resisted the currency’s depreciation. Friday’s US jobs report is unlikely to prompt the Federal Reserve to change its hawkish message. It’s a coin toss between a 75-bp or a 50-bp rate hike at the Fed meeting later this month. This week, the European Central Bank is likely to raise rates by 75 bps. Facing depreciation pressure, the PBOC has set the yuan fixing stronger than expected. It has slowed the yuan’s decline, at least for now.

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 20:12

• As Europe Implodes, It Plans "Radical Intervention" Including Price-Setting, Suspending Derivatives Markets And Europe-Wide Margin Call Bailouts
  As Europe Implodes, It Plans “Radical Intervention” Including Price-Setting, Suspending Derivatives Markets And Europe-Wide Margin Call Bailouts

  Just when you thought the narrative couldn’t get any more idiotic, Europe shocks just about everyone.

  A few days after the EU threatened commodity traders it would stage an “emergency intervention” to crush energy prices which were rising at a pace of about 20% per day (perhaps Europe can now print nat gas and electricity in addition to monetizing all deficits while injecting trillions in the process)…

  EU emergency intervention pic.twitter.com/bN0fYl9uEW

  — zerohedge (@zerohedge) August 29, 2022

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  … a move which actually worked for a few days until Putin reminded Europe who’s boss late on Friday when Gazprom suddenly decided it would “completely halt” all Nord Stream 1 transit altogether due to an “oil leak“, with the news sending global stock markets plunging and threatening to push European gas and power prices back to all time highs when markets reopen on Monday as well as forcing Sweden to follow Austria and Germany in bailing out energy companies as Nordic authorities warned of a “Lehman” moment risk, late on Sunday Bloomberg reported that European ministers will discuss “special measures to rein in soaring energy costs – from gas-price caps to a suspension of power derivatives trading – as the bloc scrambles to respond to latest developments in the deepening crisis.” A draft document seen by Bloomberg News notes that the Czech Republic, which holds the European Union’s rotating presidency, is set to include those tools on a list of emergency intervention options to be discussed at a meeting of energy ministers on Friday.

  While anything it does is doomed to fail, Europe has been scrambling to stave off an energy catastrophe that’s threatening to become an economic, social, and even financial crisis too.

  European leaders have been working for months to try to offset the impact of Russia’s squeeze on gas — a move they describe as the weaponization of energy. But the decision late Friday by Gazprom PJSC to keep the crucial Nord Stream pipeline shut brought on a new sense of panic.

  In response to soaring energy prices and rationing of firewood, over the weekend, Germany – the country most affected by the Nord Stream cutoff – unveiled a $65 billion package meant to boost demand and to protect consumers, with a levy on windfall profits, in effect completely undoing the ECB’s efforts to squash demand by hiking interest rates and ending QE, similar to what the Biden admin is doing to the Fed in the US.

  Powell: pain is coming; we are going to crush demand.

  Biden: midterms are coming, we are going to boost demand, discharge debt and come up with stimmies and new definitions

  — zerohedge (@zerohedge) August 26, 2022

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  At the same time, thousands of Czechs protesting in the streets this weekend served as a reminder of the social and political risks.

  “It is clear that the upcoming heating season will test the resilience of the EU energy market,” the Czech presidency plans to tell member states, according to the draft document for the emergency meeting. “It is critical to take stock of market developments and identify possible measures to address high electricity prices driven by high gas prices.”

  So what can Europe do? Nothing really, but it will pretend to be in control until the bitter end. The options the Czech presidency is set to suggest – according to Bloomberg – would complement measures floated by the European Commission in a policy note seen by Bloomberg last week. They included a power-demand reduction and price caps on renewables, nuclear and coal, all of which are of course dead-ends. The presidency is poised to propose similar “solutions” in the power sector and float the following additional tools:

  To limit the impact of gas prices on power prices:

  • temporarily capping the price of gas used for electricity generation
  • putting a price ceiling on gas imported from Russia
  • temporary exclusion of power production from gas from merit order and price setting on the electricity market could also be an option

  Uhm, someone should tell Europe that since Russia is already barely exporting any “weaponized” gas to Europe to destroy the continental economy, setting a price cap on whatever molecules of gas are left won’t really do anything at all. But this is what happens when Europe is run by absolute idiots.

  It gets better: to increase liquidity in the energy market, where virtually nobody trades any more since there is simply no physical with which to hedge financial positions, Europe will propose:

  • an urgent Europe-wide credit line support for market participants faced with very high margin calls
  • capping the limits for margining or automatic price ceiling adjustment
  • temporary suspensions of European power derivatives markets.

  In short, Pierre Andurand was not only absolutely spot on when he said the “oil market is completely broken” but now every other commodity market is about to be “regulated” to death. Which means paper prices may soon hit 0 as physical prices approach asymptote (i.e +∞).

  The Czech presidency is also set to suggest an even more humiliating and laughable assessment of how the EU could use its “carbon market” to address high electricity prices and ensure a quick deal on a commission proposal earlier this year to sell some permits withdrawn from the market and kept in a special reserve. Such sales – Bloomberg reports – “would boost supply of emission permits, helping lower their prices.” Spoiler alert: they won’t do jack shit.

  And in typical European word goulash style, the most hilarious idiocy was as usual saved for last: here it is from Bloomberg.

  The planned intervention should be designed in a way to avoid an increase in gas consumption or jeopardize the efforts to cut gas demand. It should be simple to implement and coordinate across the bloc and be consistent with the bloc’s climate goals, the presidency said in the draft document.

  Yup “simple to implement”, and this is where laughter breaks out. Why? Because as even Goldman said on Friday, nothing Europe does will lead to lower prices and if anything will send prices much higher. First, we excerpt from Goldman’s Damien Couravlin who explains – once again – why Europe’s “brilliant” plans always works in theory and collapse in practice (full note available to pro subs):

  

  And while Europe’s increasingly cartoonish leaders live in a Never Never land where they sacrifice their populations to freeze so they can continue their pro-Ukraine virtue signaling, here is Goldman explaining why Putin’s response will lead to a “significant rally” in nat gas prices (full note here for pro subs).

  

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 19:43

• Buying Or Renting? The Old Question Is Back
  Buying Or Renting? The Old Question Is Back

  Op-ed by Jeffrey A. Tucker via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  Every young person moving into adulthood faces the great question of whether to buy or rent their primary residence. That question just became much more complicated.

  

  The ratio between the two just expanded to the greatest gap since 2008, and it does not favor buying. Mortgage rates have made buying completely unaffordable even for those who can get a mortgage. That’s why housing demand has suddenly fallen off a cliff.

  The Mortgage Bankers Association reports that before lockdowns, median mortgage payments and asking rents were equal at $1,200. The choice was really about making the best choice to fit with career plans and duration of residency. Since lockdowns, rents have risen 10 percent to $1,314 while mortgage payments have risen 58 percent to $1,893. Now it is a different matter. It is about figuring out how to avoid being pillaged.

  Maybe the answer seems to favor renting. But not so fast: rental vacancies are now lower as a percentage of overall units on the market than they have been since 1983. That means it’s not so easy to get a place to live. The sheer number of applications means that renters can be extremely fussy about whom they accept or reject. A sketchy job history, an uncertain living situation, a ding on your credit report can all lead to a turndown. Plus the terms can be egregious: long leases, huge upfront payments, and strict terms for breaking them.

  Meanwhile, we’ve not seen this much upward price pressure on rents in nearly 40 years.

  

  But put yourself out there in the home-buyer’s market and prepare yourself for sticker shock. The median home price has doubled since 2007. And it’s not just the price of homes. It’s the stringent credit conditions plus stunning mortgage rates that mean paying far more for far less. Once you add in the homeowners association fees, plus property taxes, it starts to feel utterly crazy, to say nothing of maintenance.

  Just since January, the number of homes sold in the United States has fallen 26 percent. One might suppose that this would lead to dramatic downward price pressure. But that’s not what happened in an economy with unrelenting currency devaluation. Prices have softened, to be sure, but we won’t see a crash like 2008. That’s because the purchasing power of money in general is falling.

  The inflation virus strikes in ways that are impossible to predict. Housing has cooled and so has jet fuel. There are no bargains in housing but you can fly coast to coast now for about $150. September flights from New York to Miami are at rock-bottom prices not seen in decades. This is because airlines have so tightly managed bookings that even small changes in consumer demand reflect very quickly in wonderful bargains.

  So while the flights are cheap, the hotels, food, and entertainment once you get to your destination are not. And this is why so many consumers today are rethinking travel plans.

  But staying home is no great shakes either because electricity and other utility bills are right now absorbing the highest levels of inflationary energy. Real-time year-over-year increases are running 14.6 percent. Those prices hit renters and buyers equally.

  So much for the old saw that buying a home is an investment while renting is just throwing money away. In today’s market, the opposite seems true. The more you save by renting instead of buying is money that you can invest.

  Of course it would be nice to have a good investment at hand. Nearly half of American households have nothing left after paying the bills for investment. Saving rates keep falling and have hit 5 percent. And credit card debt is rising. Among those who can afford to invest, getting a return above inflation is nearly impossible.

  The Fed seems determined to deliver unrelenting bad news to the stock market, even regarding bear markets as a sign of success. This is because current Fed policy isn’t really about sponging up the liquidity it dumped by the many trillions during 2020 and 2021.

  Instead it is about cooling off economic output, which these aging Keynesians believe bears the main responsibility for inflation. That means orchestrating something approximating a recession. The White House is on notice that this is happening and is preparing every manner of messaging to get people not to notice that they are getting poorer by the day.

  Meanwhile, the latest employment report offers only more confusion. More jobs, yes, but labor force participation is still stuck far below pre-lockdown levels. Worker to population levels are the same. The unemployment rate is ticking up, nowhere near alarming levels but the trend is only going to get worse over the months as we all settle into the reality that the recession is real.

  Indeed, as I’ve argued, the recession never really went away!

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 19:30

• Trump Says November Election's A "Referendum" On "Enemy Of The State" Biden
  Trump Says November Election’s A “Referendum” On “Enemy Of The State” Biden

  At his first rally since the FBI’s raid on Mar-a-Lago, former President Trump took aim at President Biden and the Democrat’s recent warnings about “MAGA Republicans”, calling the current president an “enemy of the state.”

  Trump calls Biden an “enemy of the state” at his rally. pic.twitter.com/oE5gcbMuZZ

  — Radio Duindorp (@radioduindorp) September 4, 2022

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  Speaking to supporters in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania on Saturday, the former president addressed Biden’s primetime speech by deeming it the “most vicious, hateful, and divisive speech ever delivered by a [U.S.] president.”

  Trump claimed Biden was “vilifying 75 million citizens, plus another probably 75 to 150 [million], if we want to be accurate about it, as threats to democracy and as enemies of the state.”

  “You’re all enemies of the state,” he told the crowd to boos against Biden.

  “He’s an enemy of the state if you want to know the truth. The enemy of the state is him and the group that control him, which is circling around him. ‘Do this, do that, Joe.’”

  At another point during the Save America rally, Trump addressed the Mar-a-Lago raid, calling the investigation into whether he mishandled classified documents “one of the most shocking abuses of power by any administration in American history.”

  “Another one of our highest priorities under a Republican Congress will be to stop left-wing censorship and to restore free speech in America,” Trump continued.

  “We don’t have free speech. Go out and sign up now, by the way, for Truth Social. Anybody on Truth Social? It’s hot. And it’s much better than Twitter.”

  

  Finally, Trump urged Americans to vote for Republican candidates in November, saying the midterm election results will serve as a referendum on the Biden administration.

  “This election is a referendum on skyrocketing inflation, rampant crime, soaring murders, crushing gas prices, millions and millions of illegal aliens pouring across our border, race and gender indoctrination, converting our schools,” Trump said on Sept. 3.

  “And above all, this election is a referendum on the corruption and extremism of [President] Joe Biden and the radical Democrat Party.”

  “If you want to stop this destruction of America, you must vote Republican, you must go out and vote,” Trump added.

  “We are just two months away from the most important midterm election in American history,” Trump continued, “We need a landslide so big that the radical left just cannot rig it.”

  A “historic victory” for the Republican Party in November would pave the way for GOP lawmakers to tackle issues currently plaguing the nation, according to Trump.

  “Among our highest priorities must be to end the nightmare Joe Biden and congressional Democrats have created on our southern border,” he said.

  According to a recent USA TODAY/Ipsos poll (pdf), 59% of Republican voters said Trump should be the GOP nominee in 2024 and he “deserves reelection.” What’s more, 82 percent of Republican voters believe Trump can win the 2024 election. In contrast, only 44 percent said Biden should be the Democratic nominee in 2024 and deserves reelection. Only 60 percent of Democratic voters believe Biden could win in 2024.

  Trump Rally v Biden Rally
  It’s crystal clear who the majority of American people would rather have as their president. pic.twitter.com/fE85ztq9FE

  — Let’s Go Brandon 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 🇺🇸 (@DeplorableLozz) September 4, 2022

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

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 19:00

• Déjà Vu: Argentines Are Once Again Voting For More Inflation While Remaining In Denial
  Déjà Vu: Argentines Are Once Again Voting For More Inflation While Remaining In Denial

  Authored by Marcos Falcone via The Mises Institute,

  On July 2, Martín Guzmán, Argentina’s Minister of Economy, finally resigned. Guzmán, who holds a PhD in economics from Brown University and studied under Joseph Stiglitz, had originally been introduced as the “rational” element of the left-wing coalition that came to office three years ago. But there is only so much time that can pass until inconsistent policies produce undesirable outcomes, something about the United States needs to learn in order to avoid Argentina’s mistakes. Indeed, it is probably a good idea to avoid 7.4 percent monthly inflation figures, like the one Argentina just released.

  

  Argentina’s Guzmán had been appointed by President Alberto Fernández in December 2019 with the impossible task of expanding the size of government and simultaneously bringing down poverty and inflation. This recipe is the same that former presidents Néstor and Cristina Kirchner tried between 2003 and 2015, which in the end caused annual deficits of about 8 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) and inflation to soar to 40 percent. From 2015 to 2019, former president Mauricio Macri reduced the deficit but failed to achieve a fiscal surplus. Even so, the unpopular effects of fiscal adjustment, plus a combination of clumsiness and bad timing during his entire tenure cost him reelection.

  The pandemic, which caught the new government by surprise only three months after it took office, seemed like an opportunity for Kirchnerists to engage in modern monetary theory–style policies and mock those who warned about their consequences. Though Guzmán raised taxes, most government spending was financed through an increase in the money supply, the effects of which were bound to be delayed because of lockdowns.

  But in 2020, economists who were close to the administration were writing op-eds in which they suggested explanations as to why increasing the monetary supply not only did not cause inflation, but actually decreased it. The country was once again running high deficits, but Guzmán did not seem to care about them and contended that these were temporary measures.

  After the pandemic was over, instead of returning toward a path of fiscal balance and debt reduction, Guzmán accelerated the path toward high deficits, which can only be sustained by money printing, since markets did not trust Argentina’s government bonds. As a result, public spending currently is increasing more rapidly than revenue, and it is uncertain whether the country will meet the deficit target that was agreed with the IMF only last year in order to avoid defaulting on its debt. Meanwhile, annual inflation has risen to 70 percent and since Guzmán’s resignation, the peso fell more than 20 percent against the dollar.

  In this context, it may be surprising that markets interpreted Guzmán’s exit as bad news. Yet the fall of Guzmán and the arrival of new minister Silvina Batakis, who only lasted a few weeks and has already been replaced by “superminister” Sergio Massa, symbolized the victory of the “irrational” wing of the government led by Vice President (and former president) Cristina Kirchner, who is actually the one who selected President Fernández as her running mate back in 2019. In the past, Kirchner has argued that economic theories do not work in Argentina, and she is known for advocating permanent economic stimulus even if this means excessive money printing.

  If we are to believe insiders, Guzmán and Batakis both tried to correct the course of the economy and Massa will continue to pursue that goal, with the vice president as the main source of opposition. But if Massa fails and government policies on public spending stay the same, they will drive Argentina’s economy toward hyperinflation, which is the only possible outcome for a country with perpetually high deficits and no access to debt markets.

  This is not the first time that Argentina’s economy has been on the verge of collapse. In the minds of the public, the hyperinflations of 1975 and 1989–90 are still remembered. But the very policies that underlie these crises, which are related to extravagant levels of public spending, high deficits, and ultimately an excessive increase in the monetary supply, are yet to be repudiated by a majority of voters, as exemplified by Fernández and Kirchner’s win in 2019. History seems to have a way of repeating itself.

  Argentina’s example should serve as a warning to other countries of what can happen if the populist fantasy of creating money out of thin air clings onto the minds of key public officials and voters for too long. In the United States, for example, the Biden administration is showing signs of adhering to delusional theories about the economy that resemble those of Argentine Kirchnerism.

  Indeed, President Biden believes that one of his tweets can bring down gas prices, Senator Warren keeps blaming corporate greed for inflation, Democratic legislators praise acts to reduce inflation as though if monetary policy was just wishful thinking. But ignoring the fact that excessive money printing has an effect on price levels, or arguing that companies charge more because they are evil, are excuses that we have seen in Argentina at the beginning of inflationary processes, and we know what comes next. We do not want to end in that path.

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 18:30

• BLM Chapters Accuse Parent Organization's Leader Of Millions In Fraud: Lawsuit
  BLM Chapters Accuse Parent Organization’s Leader Of Millions In Fraud: Lawsuit

  A lawsuit filed on Thursday in Los Angeles Superior Court accuses Black Lives Matter (BLM) and its leader, Shalomyah Bowers, of using foundation funds as his “personal piggy bank” and acting as a “rogue administrator” and a “middle man turned usurper.”

  

  Bowers, who became head of the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation in April, and is accused of paying millions to his own Bowers Consulting Firm, as well as diverting funds from a new group called Black Lives Matter Grassroots, Inc. – a coalition of BLM chapters.

  In total, over $10 million of donors’ money was siphoned by Bowers, including $2,167,894 paid to Bower’s firm in 2021, the lawsuit alleges.

  The lawsuit seeks damages and restitution, as well as a temporary restraining order to block the foundation from using BLM accounts, or its website.

  

  Bowers told the NY Post that the lawsuit is nothing more than a power grab by disgruntled activists who want to wrest control of the movement, including California State University Pan-African Studies professor Melina Abdullah.

  

  “The assets that we built, the financial resources, the social media platforms and the name ‘Black Lives Matter’ have been taken from us and are under the control of consultants,” said Abdullah, BLM Grassroots director and a co-founder of the BLM Los Angeles chapter.

  BLM Grassroots was launched three months ago, records show. It claims to represent BLM chapters across the country.

  The new group was founded in California in May by Walter Mosley, the lawyer who also drafted the lawsuit against Bowers, according to court papers. Mosley formerly represented Black Chyna in a law suit against Kim Kardashian in 2018. -NY Post

  In court papers, Abdullah is described as having been “engaged in intuitive protest simultaneous to the online activism of the three co-founders,” whatever that means.

  “It’s the most insane thing I’ve read in a court pleading, and it’s signed under penalty of perjury when they know it’s a lie,” said Bowers, who told the Post that the Foundation has recently undergone audits which don’t show $10 million going to him or his firm.

  “We are in the process of correcting things, of fixing things and dealing with disgruntled people who want to take over the group,” he continued.

  The lawsuit comes months after BLM founder Patrice Cullors stepped down amid reports of extensive real estate purchases, as well as internal criticism over the foundation’s operations. She named two organizers as interim executives – however months later both individuals said they never actually acted in those roles due to an inability to reach an agreement over the scope of their positions.

  What is Black Lives Matter doing with all the money they’re accumulating if not helping their local chapters and Black-owned businesses to advance?

  They seem to be fundraising for the sake of fundraising.

  All talk, all woke. https://t.co/8KSKvJHoq3

  — JD Rucker (@JDRucker) March 4, 2021

  According to the BLM Grassroots lawsuit, Bowers – who had been handling the administration under Cullors, took control of the operation, shutting out the grassroots chapters.

  “We’re asking for accountability,” said BLM Grassroots director of operations, Angela Austin, who added that the local chapter was locked out of its social media accounts after the killing of Patrick Lyoya in Grand Rapids, and that they had been given no commitment from BLM for continuing funding.

  “We’re fighting for the soul of Black Lives Matter,” said Abdullah. “Black Lives Matter belongs to the people who birthed and built it.”

  As American Thinker‘s Rajan Laad notes:

  While Bowers is claiming innocence, it would not be surprising if he did indeed profit from BLM. Despite their claims, BLM seems to me founded for solely pecuniary gains.

  BLM is a perfect instance of how modern liberalism functions as an extremely lucrative business model.  BLM merely expanded on the extortion business model of veteran race hustler Al Sharpton, which is ‘give us your money else we’ll brand you racist,’ but did it on a much larger scale.  Al Sharpton must feel like a worn-out pair of shoes in the bottom drawer of a shoe case.

  “Black Lives Matter” began as a trend on social media, in 2013 following Trayvon Martin’s death. Soon it evolved into a slogan used by ‘protestors’ across the US.

  In the death of George Floyd in 2020, BLM saw their biggest opportunity to take the ‘movement’ to the next level and become the sole arbiters in matters of race.  In parallel, BLM carried out ‘protests’, which were actually riots all over America.

  Dozens of people were killed and numerous others injured and thousands of businesses and properties, many minority-owned, were looted, torched, or otherwise vandalized. 

  Axios revealed that the total insured property losses incurred during the riots are between $1 to $2 billion dollars. The actual number including losses of uninsured property must be considerably higher.

  That must not have mattered to BLM.  For BLM, the riots were a promotional event that caused their coffers to be overflowing.

  BLM was supported by the Democrats and their propagandists in the media because they could blame the riots on Trump and benefit from it politically. The Democrats, too, saw this as an opportunity to raise funds.

  The noise created such a frenzy that anybody who was anybody began donating to BLM

  Hollywood stars such as Angelina Jolie, Steve Carell, Seth Rogen, Kate Beckinsale, Jennifer Lopez, Ryan Reynolds, etc. donated to BLM.

  Some stars even bailed out BLM rioters who were taken into custody.

  Big tech firms such as Google committed $12 million. Facebook and Amazon donated $10 million. Apple pledged $100 million, and so did Walmart. Target pledged $10 million while Home Depot announced  $1 million.

  BLM didn’t make any verifiable promises; their goal was unstated, esoteric, and symbolic which ensured they could keep collecting without any oversight.

  Rich donors didn’t verify how their donations were spent. Their sole purpose of donating was to be regarded as among ‘the good ones’. It was also like protection money to prevent BLM thugs from banging at their doors.

  In the end, BLM managed to make $90m in just one year over the death of George Floyd.

  Read the filing below:

  Black Lives Matter Grassroo… by samtlevin

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 18:00

• Where's The Outrage? America's Leaders Are Fiddling While The Country Burns
  Where’s The Outrage? America’s Leaders Are Fiddling While The Country Burns

  Authored by J.Peder Zane via RealClearPolitics.com,

  Where’s the outrage? Bob Dole asked in the middle of the scandal-plagued presidency of Bill Clinton scandals. Voters, it turned out, cared more about prosperity.

  

  But as U.S. politics has descended into tribal warfare, that blinding emotion has become the default position of both major political parties. Each sees the other side as more than outrageous – as threats to self-government itself. Democrats are trumpeting the upcoming midterms as a battle for democracy against their “semi-fascist” enemies; Republicans are largely running on the promise to investigate and punish the Biden administration.

  Lost in this Revenge Play politics is thoughtful discussion about how to address our nation’s pressing problems. Yes, politicians issue policy statements and even pass legislation, but where are their specific plans to reduce the national debt, tame brewing foreign threats, tackle crime, and whip inflation? We now know the Biden administration cynically used the name, “Inflation Reduction Act,” to drum up support for climate and health care initiatives it had failed to pass before and that had nothing to do with corralling price increases. At a time when about 70% of Americans believe the country is on the wrong track, does anyone believe either party knows how to set things right?

  The GOP still pretends to be the party of small government and fiscal responsibility, but it has not only failed by any measure to achieve either, it no longer even tries. It’s just words, words, words.  

  Democrats have long claimed that they know how to fix things through government action, but six decades of failed social policies have thoroughly undermined that notion. Joe Biden’s recent declaration that he will erase a massive tranche of student debt is remarkable for many reasons. His unilateral, probably unconstitutional, move is a sure sign of our broken government drift towards authoritarianism. The wildly different estimates of its costs, which range from $300 billion to nearly $1 trillion, are yet more evidence that nobody knows what they’re doing. Can you imagine running a business like that? The truly astonishing thing is that no one is claiming it addresses the immense and urgent problem of the high cost of college, which is strongly tied to wrongheaded federal loan policies. Democrats don’t even pretend to have the answer. They are raising the red flag, finally admitting they only know how to throw money at the issue (using taxpayer money to buy votes in the midterms).

  Republicans are pointing this out, but where’s their plan?

  Then, of course, there is the abject failure by both parties to deal with the COVID-19 crisis that has already taken more than 1 million American lives.

  Recent studies show that the lockdowns that kneecapped our economy were not an effective deterrent against the spread of the disease. The closure of schools set back, perhaps irreparably, the education of millions of children. The trillions of dollars the federal government rushed out the door to mask the problems their policies created are now a case study of waste, fraud, and abuse. In the Aug. 16 article, “Prosecutors Struggle to Catch Up to a Tidal Wave of Pandemic Fraud,” which detailed how “those dollars came with few strings and minimal oversight,” the New York Times reported:

  In the midst of the pandemic, the government gave unemployment benefits to the incarcerated, the imaginary and the dead. It sent money to “farms” that turned out to be front yards. It paid people who were on the government’s “Do Not Pay List.” It gave loans to 342 people who said their name was “N/A.”

  Those COVID failures, and myriad others, underscore the incompetence of our leaders. At bottom, the Democrats have mostly bad answers for our problems and Republicans have almost no answers at all.

  In this context, the furious outrage that drives our politics is revealed as a cynical act of bipartisanship: It is the intentional effort by leaders from both parties to protect themselves. They have weaponized anger, keeping we the people’s eyes fixed on each other’s throats so that we don’t hold them to account for their failures. Don’t blame us, it’s your neighbor that’s the problem. Why worry about policy when we are battling existential threats to the nation’s soul?

  The culture war is real and it is important. But our high-dudgeon focus on woke leftists and extreme elements on the right is also a top-down strategy aimed at drawing attention away from Washington’s ineptitude. Our leaders are fiddling while the country burns: When will we stop dancing to their outrageous tune?

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 17:30

• American Library Association Removes Webpage Promoting 'Secret' LGBT Messaging In Libraries
  American Library Association Removes Webpage Promoting ‘Secret’ LGBT Messaging In Libraries

  Authored by Jackson Elliott via The Epoch Times,

  The American Library Association (ALA) destroyed a webpage that taught librarians how to secretly promote pro-LGBT messaging.

  

  The original page, written by Maryland librarian Tess Goldwasser, told librarians how to sneak pro-LGBT books into towns that don’t want them.

  “Do you work for a library in a small, rural, conservative community? Are you a frontline staff member there, with no managerial or administrative authority? Do you wish you could do more to make your library more inclusive to the LGBTQIA++ community, but meet with resistance?” the post about LGBT book month read. “I hope it’s not just me!”

  Now, the link to the page leads to an error message. A search of ALA’s website doesn’t show the original page, although it does show the page’s old entry on search results.

  

  The error message on the American Library Association’s website at the page that once displayed advice on how to secretly promote pro-LGBT programming. Screenshot taken Sept. 3, 2022. (The Epoch Times)

  The Epoch Times contacted the ALA but has yet to hear back.

  Articles Removed

  According to Dan Kleinman, the leader of the library watchdog group Safe Libraries, the ALA has a long history of actions like these.

  “This is an established pattern by the American Library Association of hiding things from the public,” he said.

  “When the public sees what they’re doing and becomes aware of it and they realize how embarrassing it looks, they take it down.”

  Kleinman added that on numerous occasions, he has seen the ALA remove articles from its site.

  

  Safe Library leader Dan Kleinman visiting New York City, New York. (Photo courtesy of Dan Kleinman)

  In one instance, Kleinman publicized an ALA page that insisted that librarians can’t determine whether something is child pornography because they aren’t judges.

  Then the ALA changed the page, he said. After the controversial claim was gone, the ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom director Jamie LaRue mocked him for saying it was there without proof, Kleinman said.

  The ALA’s dabbling in drag queen story hour started with San Francisco librarian Michelle Tea, Kleinman said. From there, it became a global phenomenon.

  In its rush to popularize radical gender activism, the ALA put safety on the back foot, Kleinman said. In one case, child sex offender drag queens were allowed to read to children at a Houston, Texas library.

  “The reason why they didn’t follow their policy to vet people before they let them go see children is because the librarians felt that it would have been a microaggression to assume the drag queen had a criminal record,” said Kleinman.

  Far-Left Ideology on Gender

  The ALA originally began promoting far-left gender ideology five decades ago under the leadership of Judith Krug, the director of the American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, Kleinman said.

  Krug shifted libraries to oppose censoring information to children, he said.

  “No longer would they keep them from inappropriate material. Now, they would make sure that they got that inappropriate material. And they would leave it up to the parents to decide to stop it,” Kleinman said.

  “And at the same time, they would mislead parents so the parents couldn’t stop or weren’t aware that they should be.”

  To oppose this spread of radical sexual material to young children, parents need to get informed and run for office on school and library boards, Kleinman said.

  “So many people are just simply not aware of this issue. That’s why it goes on. That’s why these librarians get to screw people over,” he said.

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 17:30

• Argentine Health Officials Link "Aggressive" Pneumonia Deaths To Legionnaires' Disease
  Argentine Health Officials Link “Aggressive” Pneumonia Deaths To Legionnaires’ Disease

  Argentine health officials announced on Saturday that a pneumonia of previously unknown origin has been linked to Legionnaires’ disease – a rare bacterial infection of the lungs, after four people in a clinic in northwestern Tucuman province died. Seven others are currently infected.

  

  The cases have been linked to a single private clinic in the northwestern city of San Miguel de Tucumán, according to the WHO’s regional office, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO).

  Health Minister Carla Vizzotti told reporters in a Saturday statement that Legionnaires’ had been identified as the cause of double pneumonia in the four who died after the rare bacterial infection was initially ruled out, according to a Friday report by Reuters.

  

  On Tuesday, five health care workers and a patient who required intensive care were reported with pneumonia of unknown origin. Their symptoms emerged between Aug. 18 – 22.

  Then on Thursday, three more cases were reported by local health officials, bringing the total number to nine, and on Friday and Saturday Argentina reported the 10th and 11th cases.

  The most recent death was that of a 48-year-old man with underlying health problems, which followed a 70-year-old woman who had undergone surgery in the clinic.

  In total, 11 cases have been identified – nearly all involving clinic staff according to provincial officials. Of the seven under care, “four remain hospitalized, three of them under respiratory assistance, and three are under home surveillance, with less complicated clinical symptoms,” said provincial health minister Luis Medina Ruiz on Saturday, who added that “toxic and environmental causes” could not be ruled out – and that the clinic’s climate control systems were being checked.

  

  Reported symptoms include fever, muscle and abdominal pain and shortness of breath, with several patients experiencing pneumonia in both lungs.

  The disease first appeared in 1976 at a meeting of the American Legion veterans group in Philadelphia, PA, and was linked to contaminated water or unclean air conditioning systems.

  When the outbreak first appeared in Tucumán, officials first tested for Covied-19, flu and hantavirus, ruling them all out. Samples were then analyzed by the Malbran Institute in Buenos Aires, which pointed to Legionnaires’.

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 17:00

• Latest Revelations About Mar-a-Lago Raid Unlikely To Sway Midterm Voters, Strategists Say
  Latest Revelations About Mar-a-Lago Raid Unlikely To Sway Midterm Voters, Strategists Say

  Authored by Michael Washburn via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  The fresh controversy stoked by ongoing revelations about the FBI’s raid of the Mar-a-Lago home of former President Donald Trump, including the release on Sept. 2 of a detailed inventory of documents and items retrieved in the raid, is unlikely to have a significant effect on the outcome of the November midterm elections, political strategists have told The Epoch Times.

  

  The issues of concern to voters still struggling with massive inflation, and a bloated national debt exacerbated by President Joe Biden’s plan to forgive some $500 billion worth of federal student loans, will be much more decisive factors in the minds of voters heading to the polls, the strategists say.

  Reports on Friday that a small number of the thousands of documents seized by federal agents contained information labeled secret, confidential, or top secret, might appear to some observers to spell bad news for the former president and his anticipated 2024 reelection bid. U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon has made public an inventory of the items of property taken in the raid, the vast majority of which—11,179—were not classified as in any way secret or confidential. But, according to a tally compiled by the New York Post, 54 documents were labeled “Secret,” 31 were “Confidential,” and 18 were officially “Top Secret.”

  The secret and top-secret documents were found in Trump’s office and in a storage room on the property, the Post reported.

  Muted Impact

  In spite of these revelations, the investigation into documents transferred from the White House at the time of Trump’s departure in January 2021 is still at an early stage, is prone to missteps and possible backfiring, and none of the findings are likely to dissuade voters from supporting Republican candidates or drive them to cross the political aisle and vote for the incumbent party, experts say. In part, this is simply a function of the timing of the investigation and of the November elections.

  “I think there will be more activity by the Department of Justice, but they will be careful. If they make a misstep, it will benefit Trump. I don’t think raid will affect the midterms much unless there is an indictment of Trump, which I think is very unlikely before November,” Keith Naughton, the principal of Silent Majority Strategies, a political consultancy based in Germantown, Maryland, told The Epoch Times.

  Naughton acknowledged that the raid, and recent statements by Trump, such as his call for a redo of the 2020 election, may motivate voters already inclined to support Democrat candidates. But while Democrats may hope that the raid and subsequent revelations prove highly embarrassing to Trump and the GOP, the truth is that most of the electorate will still vote on the basis of the larger economic issues affecting their day-to-day lives, Naughton believes.

  “The student loan giveaway by Biden is backfiring badly and the economy is not really improving, even if inflation is moderating a bit. Republicans and independents will turn out to vote against Biden’s flailing policies,” Naughton said.

  Naughton alluded to a debt forgiveness plan that has left even former Democrat officials and left-leaning economists expressing concerns about the feasibility of the measure and its long-term impact on the economy, what with a federal deficit of $1 trillion and some $30 trillion of overall government debt.

  The fallout from this measure is likely to be severe for Democrat candidates as the public comes to perceive more and more that a purportedly altruistic measure works to the disadvantage of poorer citizens in the long term while pushing government debt to ever more unsustainable levels, some economists believe.

  “I suspect this supposed to be a first step to making taxpayers liable for all student loans, and eventually to the federal government making college ‘free.’ College education would then be a transfer from the less well-off to the wealthier, who have much higher rates of college preparation and attendance. It would also put the federal government on an even faster track to a debt crisis,” Charles Steele, Chair of the Department of Economics, Business, and Accounting at Hillsdale College in Michigan, told The Epoch Times.

  The question of whether Trump may or may not have violated the Presidential Records Act of 1978, which established a highly specific protocol regarding the handling of documents by outgoing presidents, is a partisan-driven distraction from the issues on people’s minds, he continued.

  “The New York-Washington media axis is obsessed with Trump, the raid, and the January 6 hearings, and is very much out of touch. The rest of the country is much more concerned with the cost of living and issues affecting their livelihoods,” Naughton said.

  The Greater Mobilizer?

  Some commentators believe that, regardless of public concerns about the raid or what legal consequences the FBI’s actions and the ongoing investigation may have, challenges loom for Republican candidates in an environment where significant backlash against the Supreme Court’s recent divisive ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which reversed Roe v. Wade, is all but inevitable.

  “Democrats are motivated by the Dobbs decision in a far greater way than the raid motivates Republicans,” David Carlucci, a former New York State senator who now works as a political consultant, told The Epoch Times.

  In the past, the issue of legal access to abortions was not quite the dealbreaker that it has become in the months since the Dobbs ruling, Carlucci argued. The decision has changed the game, and Republicans ignore this at their peril.

  “Republican politicians have for years been able to be pro-life and still get pro-choice voter support. Pro-choice voters have felt secure [in the belief] that access to a safe abortion would be protected. Moderate Republicans now have to carry water for their most conservative Republican counterparts because strict abortion bans are very much a concern for moderate voters,” Carlucci said.

  But other observers reject this analysis and argue that federal law enforcement has already committed such severe missteps in the execution of the raid and attempts to justify it that the fallout will give Trump-endorsed candidates an edge in the midterms.

  Rick Wiley, a political consultant who worked on Trump’s 2016 campaign, told The Epoch Times that the raid and its aftermath have “fired up” the GOP base.

  “The raid at Mar-a-Lago is one of those moments in history, where you remember where you were when you heard they raised the President’s private residence. And overwhelmingly, people are saying, ‘Was all this necessary?’ That’s a problem for the FBI and DOJ. They left everyone in the dark for days before they gave a half-hearted, at best, explanation for what happened, and most people were left scratching their heads,” Wiley said.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 16:30

• Amazon Blocks Negative Reviews Of Its Woke Lord Of The Rings Series
  Amazon Blocks Negative Reviews Of Its Woke Lord Of The Rings Series

  Not long ago, if a company or corporation faced intense backlash from millions of their intended customers, they would try to fix the problem and appease the people that put money in their pockets.  In the past few years, though, things have changed.  Now, if millions of people don’t like a product they are attacked and shamed by companies as “bigots, racists, misogynists, etc.”  The idea is a rather authoritarian one – The consumer is now beholden to the establishment and its business partners.  If the establishment approves of a product you are not allowed to dislike or criticize that product.   If you do, you are a bad person with malicious intent.

  The business/buyer relationship has become a landowner/peasant relationship.  In their minds they have cast pearls of propaganda and because you are swine you just see it as garbage.  

  In the case of popular media and streaming entertainment when the public or a fandom criticizes a product the corporate response is to call it “review bombing.”  There is, of course, no such thing.  As a production company you must acknowledge that a large number of people don’t like your film or TV show and you are losing customers – You don’t own them, they own you.  

  For Amazon, the intention was to take yet another beloved property (Lord Of The Rings) and twist it into a vehicle for more woke propaganda, including intersectional feminist messaging and forced diversity casting for a story that was written as an ancient historical record of England.  Imagine if a company decided to make a movie about a fantastical African mythology and half the casting was white?  It would not go over very well…

  

  Is ‘The Rings Of Power’ the worst case of leftist propaganda ever created?  No, but it is the straw that broke the camel’s back.  This time the fandom is in heavy opposition and is not afraid to speak out.  The American consumer has grown weary and frustrated with the endless injection of social justice politics into our entertainment culture and now they are fighting back and speaking out.  

  Amazon and leftists in general are not happy about this.  Amazon is particularly worried because they have spent billions in production costs already for a show that now has a 37% audience ratings score on Rotten Tomatoes.  It appears they have decided that they won’t allow the same thing to happen on their own website.  

  Amazon is currently blocking reviews for 72 hours in order to “weed out the trolls.”  Meaning, they will most likely remove numerous negative reviews and keep all positive reviews in order to artificially boost the show’s audience rating.  There has been suspicion of this kind of behavior by Amazon and other websites in the past when it comes to woke productions, but this is the first time they have blatantly declared censorship of negative reviews.  At the very least, it is a sign of panic among the Hollywood establishment as they face widespread exposure of their propaganda.        

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 16:00

• Michigan Investigates Missing Voting Equipment That Ended Up On eBay
  Michigan Investigates Missing Voting Equipment That Ended Up On eBay

  Authored by Mimi Nguyen Ly via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  Police in Michigan are working with the state government to investigate how a piece of voting equipment ended up for sale online, according to Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson.

  “We are actively working with law enforcement to investigate allegations of an illegal attempt to sell a voter assist terminal acquired in Michigan,” Benson said in a statement.

  “Voter assist terminals are not used to tabulate ballots, but are typically used by voters with disabilities who need assistance marking their ballot privately at polling places,” she said.

  “While our elections remain secure and safe, we take seriously all violations of election law and will be working with relevant authorities to ensure there are consequences for those who break the law.”

  The machine had disappeared from the Colfax Township in Wexford County.

  

  Colfax Township Clerk Becky Stoddard confirmed to the Cadillac News that the equipment taken was a voter assist terminal machine or tablet from her township. Wexford County Clerk Alaina Nyman told the outlet that the voter assist terminal was noticed as missing some time before the August primary.

  “The equipment that went missing was not anything that could change a vote. It was a touchscreen [Voter Assist Terminal] machine,” Nyman said. “No election data was on it and you can’t get into the machine without the program cards and those were all accounted for.”

  Under Michigan election law, it is a felony to “conceal, withhold, or destroy a ballot box or voting machine,” as well as to “obtain undue possession of that ballot box or voting machine.”

  Connecticut Man Obtained Device From eBay: Reports

  Harri Hursti, a cybersecurity expert in Connecticut, said he had purchased a Michigan voting device on eBay for $1,200. He told WJBK that he then reached out to state officials after the purchase went through.

  On Twitter, Hursti wrote: “I contacted MI authorities even before the machine arrived – and before I even knew for certain if the machine had been used in Michigan.

  “I still do not know that as a fact, because the machine is still in an [unopened] box,” he added.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Sun, 09/04/2022 – 15:30

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• Why Are Leftists Obsessed With Destroying Hero Culture?
  Why Are Leftists Obsessed With Destroying Hero Culture?

  Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.us

  In the movie ‘Batman: The Dark Knight’ the well regarded district attorney Harvey Dent makes a statement that has since woven itself into our popular culture to the point that we often hear it quoted as if it was said by some ancient philosopher.  He noted:

  “You either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain.”  

  The most predictable interpretation of this is that there is a fine line between doing good and doing evil with the best of intentions.  People can start out as heroes and quickly fall to darkness in the name of serving the “greater good.”  I think there is more meaning behind the quote, however.  

  There is also the issue of historical revision and the fact that the heroes of yesterday might be considered the terrorists of tomorrow given who is in charge of writing the history books or reporting the news.  Sometimes heroes become villains through their own mistakes, other times they are just rewritten that way.    

  For example, today we hear constant gnashing and wailing from the political left about the “crimes” of the Founding Fathers and why they should be erased or canceled from our cultural zeitgeist.  They have even attempted to revise the very foundations of American history through their “1619 Project” as they assert that no American accomplishment is valid because “everything” was built around the institution of slavery.  They make no mention that slavery was an institution in every single culture on the planet since civilization began, but that doesn’t matter to them.  

  The goal of the 1619 Project was to diminish or dismiss everything distinctly American, right down to the revolution that founded our nation.  What they care about is the deconstruction of heroes, in part because if you can destroy the character of a hero then you might be able to also destroy what they stood for in the process.  And, if you can destroy the ideals of a society, it becomes a lot easier to then control that society.  

  When the political left seeks to undermine the legacy of the founders they aren’t just engaging in character attacks against men who can no longer defend themselves, they are also attempting to sabotage the vision those men created – The vision of a free republic outside of the dictates of collectivism and monarchy (rule by the elites).     

  Obviously the Founding Fathers are no longer alive, but there are millions of people that have carried on their legacy for generations that are in fact still living to see their heroes be made into monsters through revisionism.  

  But the destruction of heroes goes even deeper than historical rewrites.

  Leftists are also targeting the very foundations of heroic archetypes and mythologies by attacking hero representations in our society.  They are seeking to change the nature of heroism by hijacking cultural pillars and erasing beloved stories and characters in order to “reboot” them in the image of the leftist cult.  This is usually done under the cover of “diversity and equity” as a means to obscure the true agenda.  Let’s break down the tactics and motives behind this trend…

  Rewriting Heroes To “Reflect Our Modern Era”

  Woke ideology does not reflect our modern era in any way; it is actually a masked version of the old social models of collectivism and communism, specifically the social Marxism displayed by Mao’s Cultural Revolution.  The only difference is today we have online struggle sessions and corporations are fully onboard with the movement.  When leftists claim they are fighting the system, they have no idea what this really means.  The system loves woke politics. 

  Leftists use the reflection argument all the time to justify the gutting of hero mythologies and replacing them with vapid clones.  A recent example would be the latest Amazon release of their Lord Of The Rings prequel series.  I wrote about this extensively in my article ‘Amazon’s Woke Lord Of The Rings Is The Death Rattle Of Social Justice Content.’   To summarize, the new Lord of The Rings is designed to spread a political message and undermine the values of the past rather than tell a meaningful organic story.  Amazon even released their woke Lord of The Rings on the anniversary of Tolkien’s death.

  Sometimes this propaganda is subtle, and sometimes it’s a train wreck in your face.

  

  Specifically I examined the political left’s obsession with injecting their own Cultural Marxism into every new entertainment product as a means to saturate the media space with their ideology.  When they say they want to rehash old stories and old heroes but write them to “reflect the world of today,” what they are really doing is erasing past ideals and principles and eliminating choice.  They don’t want you to see the world from different points of view; you are only allowed to see it from THEIR point of view.  This is the exact opposite of good story telling.  

  Diversity As A Crutch And A Cudgel

  Diversity is meaningless.  It serves no purpose in terms of heroic representations.  People identify with actions and deeds and principles, not skin color.  Leftists in Hollywood do not actually care about diversity of skin color, they only care about two things – Using minorities as a crutch to justify poor storytelling and lazy productions, and using minorities as a cudgel or weapon when they face criticism.

  That is to say, when they make garbage media with no imagination or effort, they announce “we got diversity, though,” and this is supposed to make you want to watch their products anyway, otherwise you might be “racist.”  By extension, when you dare to criticize the political pontificating and terrible writing in their media, they can then say “our stories are fantastic, you just don’t like us because we hire brown people.”  See how that works?  They use minorities as a shield, either for their ineptitude or their malicious intent, but they DO NOT care about such people if they can’t exploit them.  

  “Diversity and inclusion” is the new slave plantation that leftist elites in Hollywood use to farm virtue points and ESG loans.  That’s all there is to it.  If they actually respected the idea of presenting diverse heroes, they would create original minority heroes and write them well.  Or, they would pick minority heroes from real history and avoid implanting current day woke politics into that era.      

  Narcissists Can’t Write Heroes

  It has long been my contention that the leftist ideology is rooted in appeals to narcissism.  Everything about it is based in entitlement rather than sacrifice.  It is based in demands for special treatment rather than respect for accomplishment and merit.  It is based in equity of outcome while eliminating equality of opportunity.  A person that has embraced the victim mentality can never be a hero or imagine how a hero would act.  They have no relationship to the concept, because narcissists are usually villains in the real world and villains tend to see themselves as victims while they spend their time victimizing others.  How else can they justify the evils they do?

  No Conservative Heroes Allowed

  As our media world was overrun with woke ideologues over the years the depictions of heroes and villains have become utterly twisted.  Heroes act selfishly with ego and hubris, and villains are usually depicted as either misunderstood people that are only reacting to the trespasses of society, or they are ridiculous exaggerations of conservatives and liberty activists.  This trend has become an epidemic in films, television, video games, comic books, etc.  Only in the past couple of years has there been mass push-back against the agenda, but there is a long way to go before things can change for the better.

  Many of these woke productions fail miserably, but they aren’t necessarily interested in box office success or making money.  Again, what they care about is saturation, as well as murdering the hero archetype openly where everyone can see.  They want to destroy your heroes in front of you and replace them with woke pod people.  This is what they care about.   

  The biggest problem is that most conservatives ignored the culture war while only focusing on fleeting political battles.  They acted as if the culture war didn’t matter, and in the process we have almost lost our country completely.  Future generations need heroic ideals and examples to live by, among real live people as well as in popular media.  By ignoring the culture war, conservatives ignored the future.  

  There are some people out there that are working to change our country’s course by producing original media with a heroic message based in American foundations of freedom, individualism, self reliance and meritocracy.  I’m working to join them by producing my own graphic novel project based on a survivalist hero.  The best we have is Burt Gummer from Tremors – He’s great, but we need more.  Readers who are interested in original non-woke entertainment can learn more about that project HERE.  

  It’s important not to underestimate the power of media in culture.  There is a reason why leftists are so obsessive with it; by changing all our heroes to villains they hope to change our values and our behaviors.  They aren’t just rewriting movies, or characters, or comic books, they are trying to rewrite us.  

  The only way to stop this is to identify the threat, neutralize the propaganda, and then bring back legitimate hero culture by writing it once again with our own hands and our own deeds.             

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 23:30

• Activists More Than Halfway To Forcing Constitutional Amendment Convention
  Activists More Than Halfway To Forcing Constitutional Amendment Convention

  Authored by Brian McGlinchey via Stark Realities   

  Though it’s received relatively little attention, a conservative-led drive to call a convention to consider amendments to the U.S. Constitution has been making steady progress, and is now more than halfway toward realizing its goal.

  At a time when Americans are increasingly polarized — to the extent that 43% think a civil war will erupt in the next decade — should you be alarmed or enthused?

  Article V of the Constitution provides two avenues for amendments. Under the first one, Congress proposes amendments that are enacted if three-fourths of the state legislatures approve them. That’s the way all amendments have been advanced so far.

  Conservative activists want to knock the dust off the other Article V provision, which empowers state legislatures to “call a convention for proposing amendments.”

  To trigger a convention that way, two-thirds of the state legislatures must call for one, and governors have no say in the matter. States would then send delegates to a convention where proposals would be put forth and debated. In the end, the convention is only a vehicle for proposing amendments.

  As with congressionally-proposed amendments, ratification of any convention-proposed amendment requires the approval of three-fourths of the states. That approval must come from the state legislatures or, if states choose, a ratifying convention in the state.

  So far, 19 state legislatures have called for an amendments convention, which means advocates are more than halfway toward the 34 they need. Though that still leaves lots of work to do, there’s a sense of growing momentum, as four states joined the cause in 2022 alone: Nebraska, South Carolina, West Virginia and Wisconsin.

  Today, Republicans have full legislative control in 30 states. (That doesn’t count Nebraska, which has a nonpartisan, unicameral legislature and is already on board.)

  

  With political winds seemingly favoring the GOP in the coming November elections, a few more states could flip to full Republican control, including Minnesota and Nevada, which have yet to call for a convention.

  It isn’t all about Red vs Blue, however: Convention advocates have also targeted Republicans who’ve opposed their efforts. Convention of States Action and its affiliates spent over $600,000 in at least five state primary contests.

  Convention of States Action’s model language for state legislatures seeks to limit the scope of the convention to “proposing amendments…that impose fiscal restraints on the federal government, limit the power and jurisdiction of the federal government, and limit the terms of office for its officials and for members of Congress.”

  Many right-leaning advocates see a convention as an opportunity to rein in a federal government that is — thanks in part to the Supreme Court’s wildly creative interpretations of the Commerce Clause — operating far beyond the bounds of the Constitution, dominating countless aspects of American life that, according to the 10th Amendment, are to be exclusively under the purview of state governments.

  “The states have sort of lost their voice, and all we can do now is beg from the cheap seats and say, ‘Hey, don’t do that’,” South Carolina state rep. Bill Taylor, who led a successful constitution-calling effort, told Insider.

  Though the largest convention drive is led by conservatives, some liberals are itching for a state-led constitution-editing session of their own. Prompted by the Citizens United decision, progressive commentator Cenk Uygur launched Wolf PAC to push for a convention geared toward campaign finance reform. Four legislatures have advanced the Wolf PAC convention application.

  In 2016, Convention of States Action held a mock constitutional convention, and six amendments proposals were advanced. Among other things, they included:

  • Congressional term limits

  • Requiring a two-thirds vote of the House and Senate to increase the public debt

  • Restoring the Commerce Clause to its original intent and scope

  • Repeal of the 16th Amendment, which gave us the income tax

  • Giving states, by a three-fifths vote, the power to negate any federal law, regulation or executive order

  • Giving Congress an easy means of overriding federal regulation

  

  While the conservative drive has largely stayed under the major media radar, there is a growing sense of alarm among liberals. Former senator Russ Feingold is promoting a new book he co-authored: “The Constitution in Jeopardy.” In an interview with ABC News, he said the effort could result in reduced federal protection of the environment, civil rights and voting rights.

  There are also alarmists among some conservatives who conjure images of a “runaway convention” that ignores the stipulated scope and advances any number of unwelcome amendments — for example, an evisceration of gun rights.

  Even if the convention somehow went off the deep end, it’s important to remember that it only proposes amendments. Calling a convention requires the support of 34 legislatures, but any proposed amendment must then garner the support of 38 of them—some of which didn’t even support having a convention.

  With that built-in friction acting as a brake on extreme ambitions, amendments would seemingly require at least some bipartisan appeal to make it across the goal line. In that light, perhaps the proposal with the best chance of passing the high ratification hurdle would be one establishing congressional term limits, which is a central thrust of the conservative-led effort.

  A 2021 Rasmussen survey found 87% of Republicans, 83% of Democrats and 78% of independents favor them, which means state legislatures would face bipartisan pressure to ratify them if given the opportunity.

  The mere drive to hold a convention may have its own prodding effect on various fronts. Looking back, a state-led push for an Article V convention to bring about the direct election of U.S. senators was still one state short when Congress decided to yield to growing pressure and propose such an amendment on its own.

  Though it’s understandable that liberals would view a conservative-led constitutional-amendment push with deep unease — just as conservatives would were the roles reversed — limiting the power of the federal government may be the surest way to avert more acrimonious division in the country.

  The intensity of today’s division springs from the fact that we have an increasingly powerful central government — including a increasingly unchecked executive branch — imposing its will on 331 million people spread across a vast country containing many different subcultures and sets of values.

  Liberals and conservatives are thus compelled to clash with increasing intensity over who gets to control levers the Constitution never even authorized. The more we rightly restore authority to state and local governments, the lower the national political stakes for all of us, and the lower our collective temperature.

  However, the federal government won’t surrender that power on its own — which is exactly why the founders gave us this other avenue of amending the Constitution.

  Indeed, as one contemporaneous account recorded, George Mason, in urging the adoption of the state-driven convention avenue, argued that, without it, “no amendments of the proper kind would ever be obtained by the people, if the government should become oppressive.”

  Stark Realities undermines official narratives, demolishes conventional wisdom and exposes fundamental myths across the political spectrum. Read more and subscribe at starkrealities.substack.com

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 22:30

• In Uncertain Times, Americans Stick With Fast Food
  In Uncertain Times, Americans Stick With Fast Food

  U.S. fast food and other limited service restaurants did not only get through the pandemic better than the restaurant industry as a whole – in high inflation times, affordable fast food has also been seeing steadily growing sales while other restaurant types could not uphold their post-pandemic growth trajectory.

  In fact, as Statista’s Katharina Buchholz details below, in June, the latest month on record with the Census Bureau, quick service restaurant sales grew by 14.4 percent, while those of other restaurants were down to 9.2 percent year-over-year.

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  Sales of limited service restaurants – which were well equipped to pandemic lifestyles due to their emphasis on take-out and drive-thru experiences – did not dip as much in the pandemic as those of regular restaurants did.

  However, by spring of 2021, other restaurant sales had one more overtaken fast food sales and stayed on a higher growth trajectory after leaving pandemic effects behind. In June, however, other restaurant sales slipped by almost $1.7 billion compared to May, while limited service restaurant sales only decrease by $150 million.

  According to Bloomberg, drive-thru services have been aiding fast food chains as they stayed popular beyond the pandemic. In February, U.S. drive-thru sales were 20 percent higher than they had been in the same month two years earlier.

  Industry publication QSR is even speaking of a “golden age of fast food” as sales and restaurant numbers are expanding in the sector, while also acknowledging headwinds like the hiring crunch, inflation

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 22:00

• Watch: Drone Captures Images Of Mexican Drug Cartel Camp
  Watch: Drone Captures Images Of Mexican Drug Cartel Camp

  Authored by Allan Stein via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  The first gunshots seemed to come down the mountain on the other side of Arizona’s border fence with Mexico, just east of Arivaca, where rival drug cartel factions battle to the death for supremacy.

  Sam, my security guide, listened closely as more shots rang out.

  They were hunters, no doubt, though not the kind you would typically expect.

  “Where exactly do you think the shots are coming from?” I asked Sam nervously from the back seat of his pickup truck.

  “I think they’re to the right,” Sam said, focused on the nearest mountain. “They could be on top of that big peak as well.”

  

  It’s not as if we were invisible, clambering noisily up the winding dirt fire road in the border zone known as the California Gulch, part of the Coronado National Forest in southern Arizona.

  Our arrival in Sam’s gargantuan white Chevy Silverado on the sweltering morning of Aug. 25 was about as clandestine as a bullhorn in a public library.

  “They could be warning shots”—for us, Sam said. “But this is where they’re coming. Right here.”

  Sam is the pseudonym he uses to conceal his identity and that of his security company in Arizona. He’s been threatened by the Sinaloa Cartel for conducting border-watching activities. He now fears for the safety of his employees and family.

  

  Below our position, the unfinished Trump border wall and fence stretched east and west for miles, then abruptly stopped. On the U.S. side of the border, cattle grazed among dry clumps of grass or basked in the imperfect shade of sparse shrubbery, swatting flies with their tails.

  The jagged peaks on the Mexican side of the steel-grated border fence loomed green and majestic. Strange, though, how nature doesn’t immediately reveal its secrets. Hidden among the Las Guijas Mountains are some of the worst elements of the Sinaloa Cartel, Sam said.

  “How strong is your stomach?” Kyle, Sam’s security specialist, had asked me the day before.

  The fact that I enjoyed watching gory horror movies was good enough for Kyle to share an actual cell phone video of a man being mauled by two pit bulls in a Mexican border town not far from us.

  Unfortunately some things cannot be unseen.

  Kyle said that kind of cartel brutality is common in cities and towns on the Mexican side of the border fence.

  

  “These guys are battling for control of the Sinaloa Cartel. You have fights within fights,” said Sam, speaking both from experience and professional intelligence gathering.

  Sam believes cartel mayhem eventually will spill across the U.S. border in military force, bringing death and destruction to Americans—but not if a coalition of private citizens, law enforcement, and security firms that he envisions has its say.

  The real battle, he said, is not about winning hearts and minds.

  It’s about matching intel with intel, using superior surveillance techniques and equipment to beat the drug and human smugglers.

  For this purpose, Sam’s company recently acquired a $33,000 JTI-branded drone which they frequently use to conduct border reconnaissance missions for clients and law enforcement.

  

  The drone is a beast of versatility equipped with high-definition and thermal cameras, and high-powered zoom lenses.

  Kyle operates the drone from the pickup bed using a console and laptop computer for imaging purposes. The drone has a maximum range of five miles traveling at speeds over 48 mph hundreds of feet above the ground. Batteries are interchangeable and last 45 minutes on a single charge.

  You can hear the drone yet rarely see it at higher altitudes housed in fortified gray plastic with four propellers to carry it aloft.

  

  Sam and Kyle’s mission today was to seek out and photograph nearby cartel encampments on Mexico’s side of the border fence.

  Kyle took the drone out of a suitcase, then placed it in the middle of the fire road as he prepared for take-off. With the push of a console button, the drone whirred to life, propellers spinning like a supercharged weed-whacker.

  Up—up—and away the drone went with the turn of a joystick.

  Kyle monitored the action on the console screen while Sam watched on a laptop computer. The rugged mountain terrain below seemed alien in both viewfinders, taking shape when Kyle maneuvered to a lower altitude.

  “My guess is there are two factions here,” Sam said. “One is trying to keep [the other] from pushing east, the other west. We think they’re on the peak right below us—oh, there they are!”

  One of the factions is Los Chapitos, whose founder is Ivan Archivaldo-Guzman Salazar, alias “Chapito,” a Mexican narco trafficker and son of imprisoned druglord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman.

  Guzman was head of the Sinaloa Cartel until his arrest and extradition to the United States in 2017.

  

  The other faction is El Mayo, led by suspected Mexican drug kingpin Ismael Maro Zambada Garcia.

  Sam said both factions currently are at war to control the entire Sinaloa Cartel on Arizona’s southern flank.

  High above the nearest mountain less than a half mile away, the drone’s camera suddenly spied two blue tarps spaced about 25 yards apart. In one of the tents, a man could be seen talking frantically on a hand-held radio.

  As Kyle zoomed in closer, the screen showed another man in body armor walking out of the bush, carrying what appeared to be an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle—definitely cartel.

  “We found his [expletive]!” Sam shouted and gave Kyle a fist pump, but it was too soon to celebrate.

  At that moment, the man looked up and saw the drone.

  He raised his rifle, and took aim.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 21:30

• Texas Tax Haul Soars By Record 26% in 2022 Fiscal Year
  Texas Tax Haul Soars By Record 26% in 2022 Fiscal Year

  The Texas government just closed out its 2022 fiscal year with a bang. On Thursday, the state comptroller reported that the Lone Star State’s tax revenue rocketed by 25.6% to a total of $75.21 billion.

  It’s only the fifth time since 1988 that revenue grew by a double-digit percentage — and it’s double the next largest increase over that 34-year span.  

  “Revenues continue to outpace even our most recent forecast as All Funds tax collections closed the fiscal year $841 million above the projection in our Certification Revenue Estimate,” said state Comptroller Glenn Hegar in an official release. 

  That’s a stark contrast to California, which saw July revenue come in 12% below forecast.

  Texas has been a major beneficiary of migration from California: Over the last census cycle, 34% of new Texans arrived from California alone. Meanwhile, New York saw personal income tax collection fall 3.2% from April 1 through July.  

  “Economic growth and inflation have driven higher sales tax collections as demand remains strong and businesses and consumers continue to pay elevated prices for goods,” said Hegar.

  Gains in petroleum revenue led the way: Natural gas production tax revenue rocketed 185% to $4.5 billion, while oil production tax revenue grew a whopping 84% to $6.4 billion. 

  However, the broader revenue picture was rosy too:

  • Sales tax revenue rose 19.3% to $43 billion

  • Motor vehicle sales and rental tax revenue was up 12.5% to $6.45 billion

  • Franchise tax revenue leapt 25.2% to $5.67 billion

  The sales tax is the state’s largest source of funding, representing 56% of all tax collections. It’s imposed at a rate of 6.25%; combined with local sales taxes, the total at the register can be as high as 8.25%.

  Texas is one of only seven states with no personal income tax — along with Alaska, Florida, Nevada, South Dakota, Wyoming and Washington.  

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 21:00

• Judge Dismisses Carter Page Lawsuit Against FBI Despite 'Deeply Troubling' Surveillance
  Judge Dismisses Carter Page Lawsuit Against FBI Despite ‘Deeply Troubling’ Surveillance

  Authored by Katabella Roberts via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit brought by Carter Page, a former associate of President Donald Trump, over the FBI’s controversial surveillance of him as part of its investigation into the Trump campaign.

  

  U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich issued the ruling on Thursday stating that Page, who was an informal presidential campaign adviser to Trump in 2016, cannot sue the FBI or other former officials involved in the $75 million lawsuit (pdf).

  Page filed the suit in 2020 against the FBI, the Justice Department, and multiple former FBI officials for damages stemming from what he called the “unlawful spying” against him over the now disproven allegations that the Trump campaign was colluding with Russia.

  In the lawsuit, Page accused the federal agencies and ex-officials of violating his constitutional rights and other legal rights by unlawfully surveilling him, noting that the “defendants’ unjustified and illegal actions (including violations of federal criminal law)” had “violated federal statutes enacted to prevent unlawful spying on United States persons, as well as the Constitution.”

  Defendants listed in the lawsuit included former FBI director James Comey, former Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe, former top counterintelligence official Peter Strzok, and former FBI lawyer Kevin Clinesmith.

  Clinesmith pleaded guilty in 2020 to doctoring an email from the CIA to make it appear as if Page was not an agency asset, without disclosing that Page was an approved operational contact for the CIA who reported on his interactions with Russian intelligence officers.

  The email was used to obtain spy warrants to surveil Page.

  Friedrich noted that the “FBI’s conduct in preparing the FISA warrant applications to electronically surveil Page was deeply troubling” and that the government itself has “conceded that it lacked probable cause for two of the warrants.”

  ‘No Actionable Claim’

  However, Friedrich, a Trump appointee, ruled that the lawsuit be thrown out because Page had “brought no actionable claim against any individual defendant or against the United States.”

  “In part, that is because Page faces at least three statutory roadblocks. First, Congress has not created a private right of action against those who prepare false or misleading FISA applications,” the judge wrote, noting that “both the plain language and the structure of FISA make clear that civil liability under 50 U.S.C. § 1810 attaches only to those who conduct or perform electronic surveillance.”

  Secondly, the judge noted that Congress has “not provided for damages claims against federal officers for constitutional violations stemming from unlawful electronic surveillance in the national security context,” and thirdly, “Congress has not waived the United States’s sovereign immunity for this kind of claim.”

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 20:30

• Want To Get Away? These Are The Top 25 Islands To Visit In 2022
  Want To Get Away? These Are The Top 25 Islands To Visit In 2022

  After a pandemic-induced slump, travel is finally started to pick up again in many parts of the world. After years of waiting, where are people itching to go to on their next vacation?

  Visual Capitalist’s Raul Amoros and Carmen Ang created this infographic, using survey data from Travel + Leisure (T+L) magazine, to highlight the 25 top-ranked islands to visit around the world.

  

  Methodology of the World’s Best Awards

  Before diving in, it’s worth summarizing the methodology and briefly explaining how T+L compiled their findings. Each year, T+L conducts an annual global survey that uncovers the top travel experiences worldwide.

  In the survey, readers were asked to rate a range of things, including their favorite islands to visit. Islands were rated based on a few categories, including:

  • Activities and sights

  • Natural attractions and beaches

  • Food

  • Friendliness

  • Overall value

  Each category was given a score of excellent, above average, average, below average, or poor. From there, each island’s final tally was calculated, based on the average scores across all categories. Below, we’ll dive into the 2022 rankings based on these scores.

  The 5 Top-Ranked Islands to Visit

  At the top of the list, there’s a good mix of European, Asian, and South Pacific islands. Here’s a look at the top five islands, along with some context that explains why respondents ranked them so highly:

  1. Ischia, Italy

  Nestled in the gulf of Naples about an hour away from the mainland, this charming volcanic island takes first place because of its charming villages, pristine beaches, and welcoming locals.

  It’s also well-known for its hot springs, which are easily accessible by either taxi or public transport.

  2. The Maldives

  Famous for its baby-blue waters, respondents ranked the Maldives as their second-favorite island destination. Located in the Indian Ocean, this collection of islands is well-known for stunning beaches, as well as excellent snorkeling and diving. With a wide range of luxury resorts, the Maldives is also a popular honeymoon destination.

  3. Bali, Indonesia

  This Indonesia island ranks third on the list because of its picturesque natural beauty, rich culture, and a diverse range of outdoor activities like surfing, diving, and hiking. It’s also well-known for its art, music, and traditional dance performances. As the only predominantly Hindu province in Indonesia, visitors get a chance to learn more about Balinese Hinduism.

  4. Milos, Greece

  Located in the Aegean Sea, Milos is well-loved by visitors because of its tranquil beaches. And while the island is a popular tourist destination, it offers a slightly slower pace that its neighbors Santorini or Mykonos.

  5. Fiji Islands

  This remote group of islands in the South Pacific Ocean ranked fifth on the list because of their rich marine life and friendly locals. Well-known for its excellent diving, it’s been labeled the “soft coral capital of the world.”

  Top Ranking Islands, by Region

  Seven of the top 25 island destinations are in Europe, making it first on the list by region. Southeast Asia comes in close second, with six islands in the top 25.

  

   

  As the data shows, a majority of the islands rank highly because of their beautiful beaches and thriving marine life.

  However, there are a couple of outliers on the list. One good example of an outlier is Mackinac Island, which is well-loved for its historical attractions (Mackinac Island is home to a colonial fort built in the 18th century).

  One thing is clear from these rankings—whether you’re a diver, a history buff, or a foodie, there are a number of world-class island destinations that offer an experience of a lifetime.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 20:00

• "They Are Trying To Assassinate": Bannon Accuses Biden Of Stirring Anti-Right Hatred After Home 'SWATed' Again
  “They Are Trying To Assassinate”: Bannon Accuses Biden Of Stirring Anti-Right Hatred After Home ‘SWATed’ Again

  Authored by Eva Fu via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  

  Former White House adviser Steve Bannon has accused President Joe Biden of stoking hatred after police descended on Bannon’s Washington home over a fake report of a gunman on the loose. The incident occurred shortly before Biden’s Thursday speech attacking MAGA Republicans.

  Firefighters and police officers were sent to Bannon’s home on Sept. 1 evening, where he broadcasts his “War Room” radio program, DC’s Metropolitan Police Department told The Epoch Times. They left after finding no shots fired and no one hurt.

  It was the second time Bannon has been a victim of swatting, a harassment tactic of calling the emergency police line with a false claim of criminal activity so as to dispatch a law enforcement team to a particular address. Such practices can be traumatizing for the targeted person and have turned fatal in the past.

  “These are attempts to have the police kill me,” the 68-year-old, who was not home at the time, told The Epoch Times on Sept. 2. The previous hoax call in July prompted some 80 officers to swarm Bannon’s home, he said.

  With one wrong assessment from the police or an inadvertent move from the other party, Bannon added, things could have turned ugly.

  “It’s very dangerous, they are trying to assassinate,” he said. “They’re trying to weaponize the police to get into a situation where they inadvertently kill the political opponents of the Biden regime.”

  annon was not the only conservative targeted in recent months. In late August, police showed up at Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s (R-Ga.) door in the early morning hours, two days in a row, in response to fake reports of a shooting at the residence. Following the first police response, the caller called back using a computer-generated voice, saying that they were upset over Greene’s “stance on ‘trans-gender youth’s rights.’”

  A jury in Washington convicted Bannon, who worked in the Trump administration, of being guilty of contempt of Congress in July over his refusal to comply with a subpoena issued by the House Jan. 6 select committee.

  Bannon on Friday blamed Biden for escalating hostility against Trump supporters. He noted the prank call had occurred less than an hour before Biden used his primetime speech to attack “MAGA Republicans” who embrace Trump’s “Make America Great Again” slogan.

  

  In Biden’s words, these individuals, together with Trump, “represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic.”

  Bannon described the caller, who like in Greene’s case had used a machine-generated voice, as “very sophisticated.”

  “This directly comes from the White House. They’ve stirred up the most dangerous and deranged members of their party,” he said.

  “What they wanted was a visual of the police around my place with me coming out … so they can play that split screen with Biden speech in Philadelphia,” said Bannon. “The deranged followers of Joe Biden timed this perfectly.”

  Bannon said Biden’s remarks were what Mao Zedong, the first leader of the Chinese communist regime, would have given during the Cultural Revolution, a campaign that Mao unleashed in 1960s to crush his political opponents. The movement brought the country into a decade of political and social chaos where frenzied young ideologues traveled around China and destroyed the country’s traditional heritage, and harassed and publicly denounced anyone deemed to be class enemies.

  “The Chinese ‘laobaixing’ has gone through this,” said Bannon, using a Chinese term for the general populace. “They’ve seen where they demonize their fellow countrymen as enemies.”

  What has played out in communist China is now repeating in America, said Bannon.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 19:30

• President Biden Says He'll Attend Detroit Auto Show Because He's A "Car Guy"
  President Biden Says He’ll Attend Detroit Auto Show Because He’s A “Car Guy”

  President Joe Biden is going to be expected at the forthcoming Detroit Auto Show that will be taking place in two weeks. It’ll mark the first time he has visited Detroit since his days as Vice President, Bloomberg noted last week. 

  “I’ll be there. I’m a car guy, as you kind of noticed,” Biden said last week when asked if he was going to attend. 

  Sure, we noticed. In fact, we couldn’t help but notice that Biden is such a car guy that his administration is trying to force through counterproductive and burdensome environmental and EV requirements for auto manufacturers. Biden apparently has such reverence for the industry he has decided that it needs to be changed in its entirety.

  The new requirements and subsidies under the Biden administration have forced automakers to fundamentally change their vehicle lineups and how they operate. They’ve also become a tax on the American people that is dropping straight to the bottom line of auto manufacturers, as we’ve noted over the last week that automakers are raising their EV prices by almost the exact amount that the Biden administration is offering in subsidies to buyers.   

  And he’s such a fan of U.S. auto companies that Biden has barely acknowledged U.S. automaker Tesla’s existence, simply because the company isn’t embracing unionization amongst its workers. 

  

  Recall, back in May, we noted when Musk delivered a scathing criticism of Biden and the President’s handling of inflation. Musk told a virtual conference ;last month that he believes the government has printed too much money in recent years.

  “I mean, the obvious reason for inflation is that the government printed a zillion amount of more money than it had, obviously,” Musk said, likely referring to COVID-19 relief stimulus packages worth trillions of dollars that were passed in recent years.

  If governments could merely “issue massive amounts of money and deficits didn’t matter, then, well, why don’t we just make the deficit 100 times bigger,” Musk asked. “The answer is, you can’t because it will basically turn the dollar into something that is worthless.”

  During the same conference, Musk said: “The real president is whoever controls the teleprompter” and “The path to power is the path to the teleprompter.”

  Biden was officially invited to the Auto Show by Maureen Donohue Krauss, chief executive officer of the Detroit Regional Partnership, who also sought out Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo to attend.

  The show starts on September 14 and the last sitting President to attend was Barack Obama, Bloomberg noted. 

  Biden concluded: “As my grandfather used to say, with the grace of God and the goodwill of my neighbors, I’ll see you at the Auto Show.”

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 19:00

• Over 50 Biden Administration Employees, 12 US Agencies Involved In Social Media Censorship Push: Documents
  Over 50 Biden Administration Employees, 12 US Agencies Involved In Social Media Censorship Push: Documents

  Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  More than 50 officials in President Joe Biden’s administration across a dozen agencies have been involved with efforts to pressure Big Tech companies to crack down on alleged misinformation, according to documents released on Aug. 31.

  

  Senior officials in the U.S. government, including White House lawyer Dana Remus, deputy assistant to the president Rob Flaherty, and onetime White House senior COVID-19 adviser Andy Slavitt, have been in touch with one or more major social media companies to try to get the companies to tighten rules on allegedly false and misleading information on COVID-19, and take action against users who violate the rules, the documents show.

  In July 2021, for instance, after Biden said that Facebook was “killing people” by not combating misinformation effectively, an executive at Meta reached out to Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, a Biden appointee, to say that government and Meta teams met after the remarks “to better understand the scope of what the White House expects from us on misinformation going forward.”

  The same executive later wrote to Murthy saying, “I wanted to make sure you saw the steps we took just this past week to adjust policies on what we are removing with respect to misinformation, as well as steps taken to further address the ‘disinfo dozen,’” including removing pages linked to the group.

  The White House publicly pressured social media companies to take action against a group that officials dubbed the “disinformation dozen,” which a nonprofit claimed were producing the bulk of “anti-vaccine misinformation” on the platforms. Also in July 2021, Murthy said Facebook hadn’t done enough to combat misinformation.

  Flaherty, director of digital strategy for the White House, told Slavitt and others in April 2021 that White House staff would be briefed by Twitter “on vaccine misinfo,” with the meeting including “ways the White House (and our COVID experts) can partner in product work,” according to one of the messages.

  In another exchange that year, a Department of Treasury official working on “mis, dis, and mal-information” told Meta workers that the deputy Treasury secretary wanted to talk about “potential influence operations.”

  In a text in February 2021, meanwhile, U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Director Jen Easterly wrote to another agency official that she was “trying to get us in a place where Fed can work with platforms to better understand the mis/dis trends so relevant agencies can try to prebunk/debunk as useful.”

  The documents were part of a preliminary production in a lawsuit levied against the government by the attorneys general of Missouri and Louisiana, later joined by experts maligned by federal officials.

  “If there was ever any doubt the federal government was behind censorship of Americans who dared to dissent from official Covid messaging, that doubt has been erased,” Jenin Younes, a lawyer with the New Civil Liberties Alliance who is representing some of the plaintiffs in the case, said in a statement. “The shocking extent of the government’s involvement in silencing Americans, through coercing social-media companies, has now been revealed.”

  ‘Censorship Enterprise’

  Plaintiffs said the massive pressure campaign amounted to a “Censorship Enterprise” because it involved so many officials and agencies.

  Government lawyers only identified 45 officials at five agencies—the Department of Homeland Security, CISA, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and Murthy’s office—who communicated with social media companies on misinformation, although documents they produced showed others were involved, including officials at the Census Bureau and the Departments of Treasury and State.

  Responses from the Big Tech companies also revealed more officials involved with the effort.

  Meta has disclosed that at least 32 federal officials, including top officials at the White House and the Food and Drug Administration, were in communication with it about content moderation. Many of the officials weren’t identified in the response by the government.

  YouTube disclosed 11 officials not divulged by the government and Twitter identified nine, including senior officials at the State Department.

  “The discovery provided so far demonstrates that this Censorship Enterprise is extremely broad,” plaintiffs said, adding later that “it rises to the highest levels of the U.S. Government, including numerous White House officials.”

  Additionally, the FBI wasn’t identified even though the agency recently said, after Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg revealed that the bureau reached out before the 2020 election, that it routinely issues communications to social media companies.

  To read more and see all of the documents, click here…

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 18:30

• JPM: "Clients Will Feel More Comfortable Buying Stocks After We See Panic Selling"
  JPM: “Clients Will Feel More Comfortable Buying Stocks After We See Panic Selling”

  One week ago, as stocks tumbled after the bear-market rally fizzled halted abruptly by the 200dma, even Goldman’s biggest trading desk bull, Scott Rubner, capitulated and responding to client questions whether this is the time to sell, he said yes, and warned that as markets enter September, traditionally the weakest month for stocks, with CTAs turning full-blown sellers (see “Now It Gets Ugly: CTAs Turn Short, Have Over $8BN To Sell This Week“), it’s time to play defense (a call which he has doubled down on in his latest note from Friday which we will discuss shortly and is available to pro subscribers).

  But it’s not just Goldman (and Bank of America) that warn there is more pain to come: somewhat shockingly – at least to those who still read and believe the weekly notes from Marko Kolanovic – JPMorgan desk trader Andrew Tyler echoed Goldman’s (and BofA’s) skepticism and on Friday wrote that “after 5, consecutive days of selling, we received a number of questions about whether we had seen panic selling. We have not.”

  As Tyler explains (maybe to the likes of Kolanovic who will be shocked that it is possible to work at JPMorgan and to have a bearish view of things) what we are seeing is not a bull market but rather a “multi-quarter bear market”, and one of its hallmarks is that it can be characterized as “orderly selloff”, which is to be expected with hedge fund net leverage still extremely low and far greater than normal bearishness (via puts) than in normal selloffs.

  As such, JPMorgan still awaits “one of those ‘flush days’ where you have VIX spike to the 40-50 range, the market falls ~4%, and you begin getting calls from relatives about which assets to sell.”

  As Tyler concludes “some clients have mentioned that after they see an event like that, then they would feel more comfortable buying dips.”

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 18:00

• California Gov. Newsom Reaped $10.6 Million In Campaign Cash From 979 State Vendors Who Pocketed $6.2 Billion
  California Gov. Newsom Reaped $10.6 Million In Campaign Cash From 979 State Vendors Who Pocketed $6.2 Billion

  By Adam Andrzejewski, author of OpenTheBooks substack

  California Governor Gavin Newsom has quietly solicited millions of dollars in campaign donations from state vendors, key people, employees, or their affiliated corporate political action committees.

  

  While progressives decry corporate money in politics, Governor Gavin Newsom has embraced the highly unethical practice of soliciting campaign cash from state contractors.

  Our auditors at OpenTheBooks.com found 979 state vendors who gave $10,561,828 in political donations to Newsom during his 2010, 2018, recall election, and 2022 election cycles. Meanwhile, these companies reaped $6,201,978,173 in state payments.

  

  These donations represented the equivalent of more than 40-percent of the current cash on hand – $24 million – in the governor’s campaign committee as of 08/01/2022, according to disclosures.

  We created an interactive map displaying by ZIP Code all of the governor’s campaign contributions—by name and employer, amount donated, when, and where located – across America. Just click a pin (ZIP Code) and scroll down to see the results that render in the chart beneath the map.

  Mapping campaign donations: Newsom For California Governor 2010, 2018, 2022:

  

  We reached out to Newsom and his press secretary Daniel Lopez requesting comment — giving the governor a chance to defend his fundraising practice. We will update the piece if the Newsom responds on the record.

  Since 1940, however, individuals and entities negotiating or working under federal contracts have been prohibited from giving political cash to federal candidates, parties, or committees. In California, however, this political patronage is perfectly legal (at least for now).

  Here are some of the companies who gave campaign cash to Gov. Newsom and separately received state payments. In all these examples, the donations came from the organization itself or its executives, employees, subsidiaries, partners, or political action committees during Newsom’s 2010, 2018 and 2022 election cycles.

  I. MAJOR HEALTH CARE COMPANIES – Gave $691,615 in campaign donations and received $1.9 billion in state payments.

  • Anthem Blue Cross (health insurance provider) received $844,875,535 in state payments while donating $69,305 during Newsom’s 2018 and 2022 elections— $40,000 of that was during the 2022 cycle.

  • UnitedHealth Group (managed health care and insurance provider) received $544,245,717 in state payments while donating $120,900 between the 2018 and 2022 cycles — $62,000 was donated in the 2022 cycle. Even the Chief Compliance Officer Joy Hia donated $500 to the 2022 campaign.

  • Centene Corporation (Fortune 500 managed care company) and Health Net, LLC, a major subsidiary, which provides health plans for those with Medicare and Medicaid, received $206,155,778 in state payments while donating $242,550. The company itself donated $121,800 while then-CEO Michael Neidorff gave $120,400 between 2018 and 2022. Not included is an additional $120,400 from wife Noemi Neidorff. Michael Neidorff passed away on April 7, 2022.

  • Kaiser Permanente received $172,217,805 while employees donated $35,910 including the vice president of government relations, Gary Cohen ($5,000 | 2018 election). Blue Shield of California received $74,283,100 in state payments while donating $102,550 including $70,200 from the company and $32,350 from key executives and employees. Masimo Corporation, a health-tech company, received $3,820,654 in state payments and gave $120,400 to Newsom’s 2018 and 2022 races – half of the donations came in 2022.

  II. MAJOR UTILITY COMPANIES – Gave $405,601 in campaign donations and received $430,416,420 in state payments

  • Pacific Gas & Electric Company (PG&E) based in San Francisco heavily criticized for its role in the California wildfires and recently came out of bankruptcy. The company received $323,777,292 in state payments (FY2021) and gave $123,929 in donations for the 2018 election. These donations included five and six figure gifts from five C-suite execs including CEO Geisha Williams ($10,000). Due to continuing scandals, Newsom stopped taking donations from PG&E after his election in 2018. The company also gave $358,000 between 2011-2018 to Newsom’s wife, Jennifer Siebel Newsom’s charity.

  • Edison International, with subsidiaries Southern California Edison and consultancy, Edison Energy, LLC, received $100,575,389 in state payments and gave $67,850 in campaign donations through the company, key employees, and staff. Additionally, the company’s trade association, Edison Electric Institute, donated $15,000 to Newsom’s 2018 race.

  • Calpine Corporation, the largest generator of electricity from natural gas and geothermal sources in the United States with 33 facilities in California received $3,134,154 in state payments and gave $109,822 in campaign donations. CEO Thad Hill gave $10,000 and other top execs gave $12,500 to Newsom.

  • California Water Service Company (Cal Water) received $2,121,724 in state payments and gave $94,000 between Newsom’s 2018 and 2022 campaigns.

  • California American Water Company, a subsidiary of American Water – the largest publicly-traded water and wastewater utility in the U.S. – received $807,861 in state payments and gave $10,000 through their employees PAC in the 2018 election. American Water also gave at least $5,000 to the governor’s wife’s charity in 2019.  

  III. MAJOR TELECOM COMPANIES – Gave $241,959 in campaign donations and received $420.3 million in state payments

  • AT&T received $260,394,271 in state payments and donated $82,210 to Newsom’s 2018 campaign. Public affairs executive Ken McNeely donated $17,000 between the 2010 and 2018 campaigns and also co-chaired the 2019 Flip The Script Gala for The Representation Project, a non-profit founded by Gavin Newsom’s wife Jennifer Siebel Newsom.

  • Verizon received $130,184,875 in state payments and donated $46,700 with the majority of the donations ($45,000) through the company itself.

  • Telrite Holdings (Life Wireless) received $9,102,033 in state payments and donated $10,000 to the 2018 campaign. California operates its LifeLine, the free phone program for low-income residents.

  • Comcast received $20,627,409 in state payments and donated $103,049. The company itself gave $29,200. Employees gave $73,849 including senior executive vice president David Cohen, based in Philadelphia, who gave $29,200 to the 2018 election. The company also gave at least $15,000 to The Representation Project (Newsom’s wife’s charity).

  IV. BIG LAW – top nine firms gave $198,142 in campaign donations and received $28.6 million in state payments

  We found nine law firms that reaped $28,615,984 in state payments and gave $198,142 in campaign cash to the governor. These donations came the law firms, principals, partners, key employees, or staff.

  Top donors included Nixon Peabody who gave $94,272 and received nearly $2.2 million in payments; Perkins Coie who gave $36,400 and received $1.4 million in payments; and Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe donated $31,710 to Newsom and received $4.3 million in state payments. Others prominent firms backing the governor and receiving millions of dollars in state payments included: Loeb and Loeb ($11,850) and Munger Tolles & Olson ($5,750).

  V. BIG BANKS – Gave $186,836 in campaign donations and received $781 million in state payments.

  • Bank of America received $508,725,231 in state payments while donating $13,026. $10,000 came through their state and federal political action committee in 2018 while $3,026 was donated by employees.
  • Citigroup received $264,640,535 in state payments while donating $147,050. CEO William Mills donated $24,600 to Newsom’s 2018 race. The Citigroup state political action committee donated $110,600 between the 2018 and 2022 races.
  • Wells Fargo received $7,578,648 in state payments while donating $26,760 to Newsom’s 2018 race – staff gave $21,760 and the bank’s PAC donated $5,000.

  OTHERS

  Two railway companies with quasi-marketplace monopolies reaped nearly $47,505,454 in state payments during fiscal year 2021 and gave $112,400 in campaign donations to Newsom since 2010. BNSF Railway Company received $40,411,142 in state payments and gave $26,200 between the 2018 and 2022 campaigns. Union Pacific Railway Company received $7,094,312 in state payments and gave $86,200 in the 2018 and 2022 elections.

  Ten California based Native American tribes donated over $841,800 to Newsom’s campaign fund and their benefits are harder to quantify. Although those tribes received $8,753,578 in state payments (FY2021), their casinos are a highly regulated state business (in addition to many other interests before the state).

  

  Jennifer Siebel Newsom’s non-profit loophole

  While the governor was soliciting state vendors for campaign donations, Mrs. Newsom, the first partner, Jennifer Siebel Newsom, solicited state vendors for donations to her charity, The Representation Project.

  Major corporations with state contracts or business before the state gave the charity five and six figure gifts. The Sacramento Bee and Washington Post previously identified the companies and today we know just how much those corporations reaped in state agency payments. (23 and Me is the only donor that wasn’t on the state vendor list, however, they had an interest in 2021 state legislation regulating the use of consumer genetic data.)

  IRS 990 informational returns for The Representation Project show that Siebel-Newsom took $1.5 million in salary from 2013-2021 and another $1.6 million in payments to her private company, Girls Club Entertainment since 2012.

  Summary

  In all the examples identified above, no quid-pro-quo is alleged or implied; however, the patterns are troubling. In fact, the individual transactions are legal at arm’s length.

  But that’s precisely the problem. Politicians preside over, in essence, a legalized money-recycling scheme aimed at monetizing incumbent political power.

  Newsom didn’t answer our question as to whether soliciting state contractors for campaign cash was ethical. Meanwhile, California residents are left with skyrocketing taxes and an increasingly bleak future.

  We can blame Governor Newsom, but he is just a reflection of today’s broken culture of public service.  

  Methodology: We matched companies donating to Newsom For California 2010, 2018, 2022, as disclosed by the California State Board of Elections, to state payment transactions from fiscal year 2021– which we compiled through 442 California Public Record Act requests. To the extent that the information contains government errors, our report will reproduce those errors. No quid pro quo or illegal activity by any elected official, company or individual referenced in this piece is implied or intended. Gavin Newsom was elected governor in 2019.

  We have requested comment from the governor and The Representation Project, the first partner’s public charity.

  ADDITIONAL READING

  • Historic Announcement– California’s Books Are Open – 201,000 Vendors Received $87 Billion In State Payments | OpenTheBooks.Substack.com | August 2022
  • California’s Accounting System Cost $1.1 Billion And Still Can’t Produce A State Checkbook | Forbes | December 12, 2019
  • California Is The Only State To Hide Its Spending | Forbes | December 7, 2021
  • California Wants To Keep $300 Billion In Spending A Secret | Editorial, Orange County Register | May 2, 2022

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 17:30

• Elite NYC Private School Director On Leave After Admitting To 'Sneaking' Political Agenda Into Classrooms
  Elite NYC Private School Director On Leave After Admitting To ‘Sneaking’ Political Agenda Into Classrooms

  Jennifer “Ginn” Norris, director of student activities at the Trinity School – who was placed on leave following the Project Veritas report – told the undercover news organization that she and other teachers had been turning the $60,000 per year Upper West Side school into a place “where conservatives would not feel comfortable.”

  

  An administrator from a Manhattan private school admitted on undercover video that she hates “horrible” white students who have been pushing back against the far-left ideology she abuses her position to promote.

  “There’s always groups of teachers who want to do these [activist] things but the administration just wouldn’t let us,” said Norris. “So, we’ve been just sneaking things in [through] the cracks.”

  Norris also said that with a new progressive administration in place, she no longer “felt like a double agent,” and could freely promote her political views.

  “I don’t hide how I feel, but I can’t pretend I’m [not] promoting an agenda even though I clearly am with all the stuff I’m doing,” she said.

  More via The Epoch Times:

  In her role, Norris has the opportunity to bring in guest speakers twice a week. She said that while she allowed students to vote on which speaker would come to campus, she made sure to not put any Republican or conservative voice “on the plate” for them to consider.

  “So, you guys wouldn’t let Republican perspectives on campus?” the undercover journalist asked.

  “I won’t,” Norris replied.

  “I’m in charge as far as [the administration] are concerned,” she added. “So, if they want to [bring Republican speakers], then somebody else has to do it. Because—not on my watch, I guess.”

  In another exchange, Norris told the journalist that students at her school are encouraged to attend left-wing demonstrations, particularly those that are anti-Trump, anti-gun, and pro-abortion.

  “They went to the women’s rights marches after Trump. They went to all the gun ones, the March For Our Lives,” Norris said, noting that students still have to serve detention for missing classes, but teachers will “talk about social justice” with them during those hours.

  “So it’s like the punishment of detention, but it’s not punishment at all,” she said.

  At one point in the conversation, Norris suggested she has problems with white male students who dare to disagree with them.

  “Unfortunately, it’s the white boys who feel very entitled to express their opposite opinions and just push back,” Norris said. “There’s a huge contingent of them that are just horrible.”

  When asked about what she thinks of “Republican white guys,” she replied that she thinks they’re “really awful people” who “need to go.”

  “They’re so protected by capitalism. It makes me sad.” she said. “I think they’re really awful people. That’s kind of what I’m afraid of with my white students that are rich.”

  This video is the latest episode of Project Veritas’ four-part series “The Secret Curriculum,” which exposes efforts to indoctrinate children with socialist ideology. It is unclear where or when the footage was taken, but the dates on the clip reads June 12 and 15.

  Eric Trump, the second son of President Donald Trump, shared the video on Twitter, saying he feels sad to see this as a former Trinity student.

  “I went to Trinity in the early 90’s,” he wrote. “The school was fantastic. It is so sad to see this nonsense… It is truly a disgrace to some of the amazing teachers I once had.”

  Trinity’s principal Stephen Kolman and Norris couldn’t be immediately reached for comment regarding the content of the video.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 17:00

• US Government Seized Over 11,000 Non-Classified Documents From Trump’s Home
  US Government Seized Over 11,000 Non-Classified Documents From Trump’s Home

  Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  FBI agents seized over 11,000 documents and photographs without classified markings from the home of former President Donald Trump, according to an inventory released on Sept. 2.

  

  Agents during the Aug. 8 raid at Mar-a-Lago seized 11,179 materials that were not marked classified, the inventory says.

  They also took 103 documents marked classified, including some marked top secret.

  The warrant, approved by U.S. Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart days earlier, enabled agents to seize any documents with classification markings, as well as containers in which the documents were located and any containers stored or found together with the documents.

  It also let agents seize information regarding the retrieval, storage, or transmission of national defense information or classified material; any government and/or presidential records created between Jan. 20, 2017, and Jan. 20, 2021; and any evidence “of the knowing alteration, destruction, or concealment of any government and/or Presidential Records, or of any documents with classification markings.”

  A property receipt, or inventory list, was given to a Trump lawyer as agents left, but the more detailed inventory list was submitted to a federal court on Friday on the orders of a judge.

  U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, is considering whether to appoint a special master to review the materials the government seized and separate out those that may be privileged.

  The more detailed receipt also shows that the government seized 1,673 magazines/newspapers/press articles and other printed media, some dating back to 2008; 48 empty folders with classified banners; 42 empty folders labeled “return to staff secretary/military aide”; 19 articles of clothing/gift items; and 33 books.

  The original inventory listed no gifts or clothing, no folders, and no books.

  It primarily listed boxes of items, miscellaneous documents, some classified, and binders of photographs.

  The government later acknowledged that it seized three passports from Trump that have since been returned.

  Spokesman Responds

  Taylor Budowich, a Trump spokesman, said the new list “only further proves that this unprecedented and unnecessary raid of President Trump’s home was not some surgical, confined search and retrieval that the Biden administration claims, it was a SMASH AND GRAB.”

  “These document disputes should be resolved under the Presidential Records Act, which requires cooperation and negotiation by NARA, not an armed FBI raid,” he added.

  The investigation started after a referral from the National Archives and Records Administration.

  The agency received boxes of documents from Mar-a-Lago in January and identified some with classified markings. Officials notified the Department of Justice, which later gained access to the materials and confirmed the markings.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 16:30

• Insiders Are Dumping Stocks At The Fastest Pace In Months
  Insiders Are Dumping Stocks At The Fastest Pace In Months

  Having aggressively bought the f**king dip off the March 2020 lows, supported a tsunami of free money spewing forth from every government orifice, it appears that ‘insiders’ have little interest in catching the falling knife now that The Fed has turned its back.

  As Bloomberg reports, corporate insiders dumped their own shares aggressively in August, with some 2,150 executives hitting the sell button, the most since November 2021 on a net basis.

  That’s pushed the ratio of insider selling to buying to the highest since February, data compiled by the Washington Service show.

  “It’s yet another signpost, another signal that there is a high degree of uncertainty around the future,” Quincy Krosby, LPL Financial’s chief global strategist, said by phone.

  “The view is that, with regards to both selling and buying, corporate insiders know what they’re doing. It adds to this general sense of uncertainty that’s already out there.”

  

  The surge in insider-selling matches the slumping sentiment toward third-quarter operating margins, with expectations falling to 16.08% from 16.87% over the past eight weeks, data compiled by Bloomberg Intelligence show.

  “A tremendous amount of weakness was clearly anticipated ahead of summer’s earnings, but even more is expected, given the pace of negative revisions picked up as the breadth of weakness spread beyond growth in recent weeks to include value stocks,” Gina Martin Adams, chief US equity strategist at Bloomberg Intelligence, said in a note.

  And don’t forget, it’s that time of the month again…

  

  Finally, we note that it wasn’t just ‘insiders’, global equity funds had outflows of $9.4 billion in the week to Aug. 31, the fourth-largest redemptions this year, according to EPFR Global data cited by BofA. US equities had the biggest exodus in 10 weeks, while $4.2 billion left global bond funds.

  Don’t fight The Fed works both ways…

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 16:00

• "Suicidal" Pilot Lands In Mississippi Field, Taken Into Custody
  “Suicidal” Pilot Lands In Mississippi Field, Taken Into Custody

  Update (1147 ET): A reporter via local news WTVA has recorded a video of the crashed plane in a field in Northeast Mississippi. 

  WTVA reporter Bronson Woodruff is at the landing site in a field southeast of Ashland. pic.twitter.com/eQH4ROAhvP

  — WTVA 9 News (@wtva9news) September 3, 2022

  Axios reported that the plane went down, and the subject is in custody, according to the Benton County Sheriff’s Office. 

  * * * 

  Update (1120ET): NPR and PBS reporter Ian Saint said the plane flying over Northeast Mississippi is piloted by Cory Patterson.

  Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal has also confirmed that “multiple law enforcement, airport, and local authorities have identified the subject as Cory Patterson of Shannon.”

  BREAKING: Multiple law enforcement, airport and local authorities have identified the subject as Cory Patterson of Shannon. https://t.co/HZddmyr76t

  — Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal (@DJournalnow) September 3, 2022

  An alleged Facebook post from Patterson said:

  “Sorry everyone. Never actually wanted to hurt anyone. I love my parents and sister this isn’t your fault. Goodbye.”

  

  Flight track data shows Patterson is still flying (as of 1112 ET) in the northern part of the state. 

  

  “All citizens should be on alert and aware of updates from the Tupelo Police Department,” Gov. Tate Reeves tweeted earlier. 

  * * *

  A plane has been circling a Northeast Mississippi town since early morning. The pilot is threatening to intentionally crash into a Wal-Mart store.

  According to local news WTVA, the Tupelo Police Department received reports about a pilot of an airplane (possibly King Air type) circling above Tupelo. The pilot contacted 911 and threatened to crash the plane into a Wal-Mart on West Main. 

  

  “TPD has worked with Wal-Mart West and Dodges on West Main to evacuate the stores and disperse people as much as practical. TPD also has been able to begin talking with the pilot directly,” WTVA said. 

  Flight data via FlightAware shows the plane’s current position (as of 0949 ET). 

  

  Video of the plane has surfaced on social media. 

  @BronsonWTVA not sure what’s going on, but this plane has been flying in circles for 45 minutes around Tupelo. pic.twitter.com/agE5MpWPt1

  — Nick Nichols (@Nickfivecents) September 3, 2022

  NOW – Pilot threatens to crash a hijacked aircraft into a Walmart in Tupelo, Mississippi.pic.twitter.com/ITcj757113

  — Disclose.tv (@disclosetv) September 3, 2022

  Suicide pilot circling Tupelo…right above me…staying with a friend less than 1/4 mile from his target…took this video from her doorstep pic.twitter.com/pAHMzDaXsI

  — Mary Ellen Rogers (@MEMOfficScorer) September 3, 2022

  Possible stolen aircraft flying around Tupelo, Mississippi. Pilot has threatened to crash into a nearby Walmart. #tupelo #plane pic.twitter.com/pIHfzAx9Bo

  — GPrice (@GaylePrice) September 3, 2022

  “The pilot of the hijacked private plane from Tupelo is making his way closer to MEM airspace & rain moving in. At some point he’s going to get in the way of commercial aircraft arriving/departing there. He’s been around 1,000-1,500 ft. Someone is going to have to make a call…,” one Twitter user said. 

  The pilot of the hijacked private plane from Tupelo is making his way closer to MEM airspace & rain moving in. At some point he’s going to get in the way of commercial aircraft arriving/departing there. He’s been around 1,000-1,500 ft. Someone is going to have to make a call… pic.twitter.com/qzDuCvmTO9

  — Nathan Crace, ASGCA (@lipouts) September 3, 2022

  Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves said law enforcement and emergency managers are “closely tracking this dangerous situation.”

  State law enforcement and emergency managers are closely tracking this dangerous situation. All citizens should be on alert and aware of updates from the Tupelo Police Department. https://t.co/hQ8GxcR8s0

  — Governor Tate Reeves (@tatereeves) September 3, 2022

  *Developing

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 15:47

• The Overreach Of The Biden Administration Has Led To The Dropping Of The Executive Mask
  The Overreach Of The Biden Administration Has Led To The Dropping Of The Executive Mask

  Authored by Tho Bishop via the Mises Institute (emphasis ours),

  On Thursday night Joe Biden was propped up behind the presidential seal in front of historic Independence Hall and gave the most provocative and divisive speech in modern American history. With the site of the signing of the Declaration of Independence cloaked in an ominous blood red, Biden sputtered his way through an attack on “insurrectionists” he labeled as threatening American democracy, political norms, and the rule of law.

  

  The optics of the event were likely the idea of a proud Biden staffer, fresh off receiving a $10,000 subsidy to their student loan debt, leaning into the “Dark Brandon” aesthetic that has become popular among regime loyalists on Twitter. To Americans outside of this Very Online echo chamber, the imagery drew connotations of sinister authoritarian regimes ranging as Nazi Germany, the Empire of Star Wars, or the fascist regime of V for Vendetta.

  The substance of the speech supported these comparisons. It was the display of a weak regime projecting strength at a time of mass unpopularity and rising polling numbers of political opponents in pivotal midterm elections.

  None of this is a surprise.

  As I noted after the chaotic 2020 election, the federal government faced a threat it has not seen in over a hundred years. Concerns over the integrity of the 2020 election struck at the core of the institution’s democratic legitimacy. The result was a Biden inauguration fortified with thousands of national guard members that the Democrat Party didn’t trust with ammunition.

  The path the Biden administration took could have gone one of two ways. The regime could have fallen back on the power of moderation, restoring the isolated Washington uniparty by staffing the executive branch with prominent Republicans who always preferred the Clintons and Bidens over Trump—even if the smart ones refused to say so explicitly—while pursuing a standard policy agenda of foreign intervention, reckless spending, and fortifying the supremacy of the federal government over state control. These policies would have continued American decline but could have served to lull Americans to pre-Trump apathy by reminding them that federal elections have no real consequences for Washington.

  Instead, the Biden regime doubled down on the excesses of the Obama era, attacking hot-button issues such as gun rights, tying state funding to public school promotion of child mutilation and sterilization, and leveraging their control over large corporations to censor political opponents and mandate covid vaccinations of employees. Along the way, they secured funding to increase, arm, and expand the scope of federal agencies—an Imperial Guard for Washington elites to remind red states who is truly in charge.

  From the golf courses of Mar-a-Lago, the specter of Donald Trump continues to animate Capitol Hill. C-SPAN hearings over January 6 have been coordinated for prime-time viewing, while his supporters have been subjected to federal prosecution, solitary confinement, and financial ruin.
  These concerns may be justified. Outside of Washington, “MAGA Republicans” have found success, particularly in the high-profile senate and governor races.

  In Arizona, Blake Masters and Kari Lake conquered John McCain’s former state running on a platform against the 2020 election and the anarcho-tyranny of Biden-era policies while being viciously attacked by both the corporate press and establishment Republicans. In Ohio, Peter Theil-backed J.D. Vance leaned into opposition to American financing of the Ukrainian government while overcoming two more traditional Republican candidates. In Florida, Governor Ron DeSantis has secured the position as the only Republican with the popularity that rivals Trump by translating Trump-style rhetoric into aggressive state policy, with a particular focus on attacking the public healthy tyranny of the soon-to-debate Dr. Fauci.

  A common theme of this new class of Republicans has been their explicit calls to stand against the “regime,” railing against Washington’s “administrative state,” and their interest in the intellectual works of “dissident right-wing thinkers.” They have been supported by a maligned by a vocal group of MAGA House members, such as Marjorie Taylor Green, Matt Gaetz, Thomas Massie, and Lauren Boebert, who have seized on the overzealousness of the Biden administration to normalize calls to defund the FBI and other cherished Washington institutions.

  The primary success of a potential new class of MAGA Senators has created new pressures for Mitch McConnell. Long established as the kingpin of beltway Republican politics, his criticism of the “quality” of candidates has earned him strong public rebukes from Florida Senator Rick Scott—a political figure with both the ambition and financial resources to threaten McConnell.

  All of this is creating a unique moment in American history.

  The overreach of the Biden administration has led to the dropping of the executive mask. No longer is there any pretense of governing all Americans—the notion of liberal persuasion is dead. Brute force and the abolishment of governing norms—such as the facade of a politically independent Supreme Court, state control of elections, or the role of the filibuster in the Senate—are now accepted by mainstream Democrats as necessary to usher in a modern version of reconstruction on the parts of America that still fly Trump flags.

  Meanwhile, the most vocal anti-Trump Republicans have faced brutal defeats electorally but still have a home in the comfortable confines of Washington. While Liz Cheney’s blowout primary defeat means she will be giving up the pretense of representing Wyoming, she has been welcomed to the friendly confines of AEI. The View or CBS News are willing to welcome various former Trump administration figures so long as they engage in the public ritual of condemning their previous boss. The impact of these decisions, however, is declining interest in traditional conservative think tanks, respect for corporate media, and the legacy of formerly prominent Republican legislators and dynasties.

  The regime’s most powerful tool—a federal uniparty that fights on Sunday News Shows but works together and socializes in the real world—is fraying fast.

  Republican Congressional offices are being flooded with calls and emails attacking once noncontroversial issues such as foreign aid, the FBI, and the security of elections. While the wiliest of Washington creatures know how to pretend to sympathize with these concerns, the more mediocre ones flounder—with numerous Republican incumbents now forced to move their office from Capitol Hill to K Street.

  The real question will be what comes after 2022. While the sulfur and brimstone tones spewing from Joe Biden may spark news cycles, economic distress continues to dominate the concerns of voting Americans. At the same time, Hispanic Americans, many of which are alarmed about the cultural radicalism of the modern Democratic Party, are undermining the assumptions of the “demographics are destiny” framework that has dictated so much of the Left’s political strategy in the recent decades.

  Attempts to smear new-Republican Hispanics as the new “white nationalists” is surprisingly having little impact.

  While Joe Biden mocks “brave, right-wing Americans” that cling to the notion that their AR-15 can protect them from the F-15s he controls, the mentally declining commander-in-chief should pay more attention to his government’s failures in Afghanistan. The Afghan military surrounded billions of dollars in high-tech military supplies to Taliban forces not because they were out-armed but because the incompetent and kleptomaniac “liberal” regime America installed lacked the true support of the people and was not a cause many saw dying for.

  Likewise, the collapse of military enlistment in the American military reflects the sincere and growing disillusionment with Washington itself. While state propaganda may be trying to make the military appeal to America’s growing transgender population, they don’t seem up to the task of replacing young, white working-class men the modern class of Generals dismisses as privileged.

  As Murray Rothbard noted in Anatomy of the State, the state needs more than guns and bureaucrats to thrive. It needs the implicit consent of the people.

  Thanks to Joe Biden, and his friends in both political parties, instead tens of millions of Americans are growing increasingly comfortable considering themselves enemies of the state.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 15:30

• IAEA Chief Outlines Gravest Risk To Ukraine Nuclear Power Plant
  IAEA Chief Outlines Gravest Risk To Ukraine Nuclear Power Plant

  International Atomic Energy Agency Director-General Rafael Grossi says that a team of inspectors which arrived Thursday will stay present at the embattled Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant on an indefinite basis in hopes of ensuring its safe operation. He returned from the site and briefed reporters in Vienna, outlining the looming concerns.

  “The gravest risk to the embattled Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant is physical damage to equipment from shelling that could lead to a release of radiation,” he warned.

  

  “It is obvious there is a lot of fighting in general in this part of Ukraine,” Grossi said, and observed that “The military activity and operations are increasing in that part of the country, and this worries me a lot.”

  “It’s obvious that the plant, and the physical integrity of the plant has been violated, several times. [Whether] by chance [or deliberately], we don’t have the elements to assess that. But this is a reality that we have to recognize, and this is something that cannot continue to happen,” he told the Friday press briefing, without assigning blame for which side shelled the facility.

  He further affirmed of the IAEA team he led to the site that “six of the agency’s experts remain at the plant” to maintain “permanent presence on site… with two of our experts who will be continuing the work.”

  “We’re glad that Russian Federation did what it needed to do to keep our inspectors safe…” pic.twitter.com/yDZyUPOpGA

  — ДражаМ (@DrazaM33) September 1, 2022

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

  While no unsafe radiation levels or any kind of leak has yet been detected, Grossi still painted a picture of the crisis at Europe’s largest nuclear power plant – which before the war supplied 30% of Ukraine’s electricity needs – as a potential disaster waiting to happen if extra measures aren’t taken to restore operations up to standard: 

  Overall, not one of what the nuclear monitoring agency calls the seven pillars of nuclear safety, which include physical integrity, reliable external power and availability of spare parts, remains intact, Grossi said.

  He said that most of the shelling of the plant occurred in August, which was when each warring side intensified accusations that the other was behind the attacks.

  Some 500 Russian troops have occupied the site since March, with mostly Ukrainian engineers still operating it. He praised the plant’s technicians for coping under wartime stresses, saying it is “admirable for the Ukrainian experts to continue to work in these conditions.”

  I am finishing my first visit to #Ukraine’s #Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant.@IAEAorg is here to stay and will maintain a continued presence at #ZNPP. pic.twitter.com/k4zO3IMe2I

  — Rafael MarianoGrossi (@rafaelmgrossi) September 1, 2022

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

  Interestingly, the assessment of his team appeared to directly contradict what Ukrainian officials have been alleging regarding Ukrainian engineers being tortured amid a Kremlin orchestrated ‘cover up’. The Associated Press wrote: 

  But on some points, the agency’s initial assessment was more optimistic than the picture painted by Ukrainian officials, who had said that engineers and other employees had been subjected to harsh interrogation and even torture, raising stress levels when they returned to work in reactor control rooms and in other critical jobs.

  Ukrainian officials have long argued that the plant’s engineers should be viewed as hostages who are being hindered from operating or speaking freely, but Grossi’s eyewitness account did not in any way back the claims.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 15:00

• Top Climate Adviser Gina McCarthy Leaving White House, John Podesta Joining
  Top Climate Adviser Gina McCarthy Leaving White House, John Podesta Joining

  Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours)

  White House national climate adviser Gina McCarthy is leaving her position, the White House said Friday as it also confirmed reports that former Hillary Clinton campaign manager John Podesta is joining the Biden administration.

  “Gina is indeed leaving us,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said at a briefing Friday in response to questions about McCarthy’s departure. “She, as you know, has been a leader in what we have seen as one of the largest investment in dealing” with the climate, Jean-Pierre said.

  

  It’s not clear why McCarthy is leaving the White House. She has not issued a public comment about leaving.

  At the same time, President Joe Biden said in a statement that Podesta, whose emails were leaked by WikiLeaks ahead of the 2016 election and contained controversial material, will be joining the administration to serve as a senior advisor on “clean energy innovation and implementation.”

  Podesta served as the White House chief of staff under President Bill Clinton and was also a senior Obama administration official before he became Clinton’s campaign manager. Podesta was most recently at the left-wing Center for American Progress think tank, which he founded.

  “We are fortunate that John Podesta will lead our continued innovation and implementation,” Biden said in a statement on Friday. “His deep roots in climate and clean energy policy and his experience at senior levels of government mean we can truly hit the ground running to take advantage of the massive clean energy opportunity in front of us.”

  

  Podesta was tapped to “oversee implementation of the Inflation Reduction Act’s expansive clean energy and climate provisions and will chair the President’s National Climate Task Force in support of this effort,” the White House said.

  Podesta will not replace McCarthy. Her former deputy, Ali Zaidi, was named to be the White House’s national climate advisor, said Biden in a statement.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 09/03/2022 – 14:30

Digest powered by RSS Digest

• Boost Election Integrity Now
  Boost Election Integrity Now

  Authored by Paula Stern & Robert Kueppers via RealClearWire,

  With the selection of candidates mostly complete, Labor Day marks the traditional start of the 2022 fall mid-term election season. With the nation facing historic economic, social, and geo-political challenges, the stakes are high for the control of Congress. Confidence in the integrity of the election is essential, given that the outcome may continue to mirror the razor-thin margins in Congress today.

  

  Polls are indicating that Americans are losing confidence in the integrity of our elections. Such a decline in voter confidence is dangerous to the fabric and effectiveness of our democracy. It is incumbent upon public and private sector leaders to act quickly to restore Americans’ confidence in the integrity of our elections. Ensuring a credible election is a shared responsibility.

  Here are 10 steps we should take to ensure that our elections are not only secure but also accessible and credible.

  1. Have a voter-verified paper trail. Require paper ballots to assist with audits and recounts and ensure that all voting machines produce a paper record of ballots cast.

  2. Start counting sooner. To help achieve a quick count as more citizens employ different ways to vote, states should both start counting early ballots before Election Day. This will increase confidence that the vote count is credible and secure. 

  3. Modernize and secure voting equipment. While many jurisdictions have modernized their voting equipment, too many state and local governments have underinvested in it over the past decade, raising fears that their systems can be compromised. At a minimum for this election, all components of election equipment capable of connection to the internet should be disabled and rendered unusable. By 2024, no election equipment should be capable of any connection to the internet at all.

  4. Make sure people are adequately trained to perform their role. Election administrators should prioritize recruiting and training poll workers to ensure elections run smoothly.

  5. Employ credible audits. Rigorous, nonpartisan audits can raise confidence in elections. Virginia’s audit of two districts in its 2021 House of Delegates elections, for instance, found that there was a 99.743 percent likelihood that the result in the district studied was correct — and only a .00256293556 percent chance that it was wrong.

  6. Make voting accessible. States should promote access to the polls by providing at least 10 days of early voting, including some evening and weekend hours. They should also ensure a sufficient number of polling places so that in-person voters do not have to wait in long lines that discourage turnout.

  7. Protect election administrators. Action on the state and local level, including the enforcement of federal laws against voter intimidation, will help ensure that those who administer elections, from precinct workers to state election officials, and voters are free from harassment or intimidation. The US Election Assistance Commission has developed a helpful resource for election official security, including guidelines on what constitutes harassment and how to report incidents. Reporting harassment will help support the Department of Justice’s task force, which will partner with and support U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and FBI field offices to investigate and prosecute these offenses where appropriate.

  8. Modernize the Electoral Count Act. Congress should act quickly to update the Electoral Count Act of 1887, which regulates how Congress counts the states’ electoral votes for president. There is a strong vehicle to do so: A bipartisan group of 16 Senators has introduced legislation which would raise the threshold for raising challenges to a state’s electors, and confirm that the vice president has a ceremonial role in counting electoral votes, among other provision.

  9. Beef up security funding for elections. Since 2017, the Department of Homeland Security has treated election systems as critical infrastructure, just as water and electrical systems are. In line with this, Congress should increase resources, including clear cyber hygiene guidance, for state and local governments to strengthen both physical- and cyber-security efforts for this election — and for the next cycle.

  10. Business must play a role. In early 2022, the annual Edelman Trust Barometer, an important study across 28 countries measuring popular trust in institutions such as business, government, and the media, concluded that business emerged as the most trusted institution. It should leverage that role in the interest of promoting secure and credible elections, including initiatives to give time off from work to vote or to serve as nonpartisan observers at polling places, inform workers of rules and changes in polling places and voting requirements in the communities where they operate, and provide sources for accurate information.

  These are strong steps to promote secure, credible, and accessible elections. But time is short. Public policy leaders, in concert with business leaders, must move quickly to adopt these steps, both for this cycle and the fast-approaching presidential election in 2024.

  *  *  *

  Paula Stern is former chairwoman of the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) and founder and president of The Stern Group. Robert Kueppers is Former Senior Partner, Global Regulatory & Public Policy, Deloitte LLP. They are Trustees of the Committee for Economic Development of The Conference Board (CED) and co-chair CED’s Sustaining Democratic Institutions Committee.

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 23:40

• These Are The Most Popular Fast Food Brands In America
  These Are The Most Popular Fast Food Brands In America

  Ever since the McDonald brothers created the concept of fast food in 1940, the restaurant’s golden arches have continued to beckon customers to its quick, cheap, and tasty meals.

  McDonald’s is still the most popular fast food brand in America today – with $46 billion in systemwide sales last year.

  This graphic by Visual Capitalist’s Avery Koop uses data from a report on America’s top 50 fast food chains by Quick Service Restaurant (QSR) Magazine. The popular brands are sized by their 2021 systemwide sales and broken down into six broad categories: Burger, Chicken, Snack, Pizza, Sandwich, and Global.

  

  Note: a number of these figures are estimates. Unofficial figures are noted in the graphic with an asterisk.

  The Most Popular Fast Food Companies

  It’s indisputable that McDonald’s is America’s favorite fast food restaurant, if not the world’s. McDonald’s sales are almost double the second the place restaurant’s, Starbucks—totaling $46 billion compared to the coffee shop’s $24 billion.

  Here’s a closer look at the numbers:

  

  Most of the top 20 restaurants are extremely well known, like Chick-fil-A in third place and Taco Bell in fourth. Some of these chains, however, will be unrecognizable depending on which part of the U.S. you live in. While Bojangles is ubiquitous in the Southeast, for example, many on the West Coast may have never heard of it.

  Some of the lower ranking restaurants include Shake Shack (#45), White Castle (#50), and the Canadian-founded Tim Hortons (#47).

  Fast Food Industry Trends

  America’s fast food industry is expected to generate $331 billion in sales in 2022, and many restaurants are capitalizing on trends shaped in part by the pandemic.

  Fast food companies are already somewhat ideal for pandemic conditions with drive-thrus, fast service, and a model that doesn’t encourage sitting down to eat.

  Looking to the future, Starbucks, for example, has claimed 90% of its new stores will feature drive-thrus. Digital sales and transactions that limit contact, making fast food even more quick and convenient, are growing as well. Starbucks’ mobile order service has grown 400% over the last five years. And in 2021, the delivery side of their business grew 30% year-over-year, according to the QSR report.

  Additionally, the report featured 50 up-and-coming fast food companies to watch in the industry. Here’s a look:

  

  Some of these are well-established fast food joints that are simply growing their sales, like Cinnabon, while others are newer to the scene.

  America’s Favorite Fast Food

  Using the ranking’s food categories, we calculated the total sales in each category from the top 50 to figure out which foods are America’s favorites. The winner is evidently burgers, with $92.2 billion in collective sales. Here’s a look at the breakdown:

  

  Sales at Burger restaurants were more than double the runner-up, which was Snacks. After all, nothing is more American than a classic hamburger and fries.

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 23:20

• The World Of Tomorrow: Seven Trends In Bitcoin Mining And Energy
  The World Of Tomorrow: Seven Trends In Bitcoin Mining And Energy

  Authored by Ruda Pellini via BitcoinMagazine.com,

  Bitcoin could enable humanity to take the next step in energy production and usage through the capabilities it unlocks…

  

  The world is no longer the same – it is constantly changing. And this transformation is happening increasingly faster. In reality, the “new normal” is a constant transformation and the only certainty is change.

  The Information Age arrived and with that several concepts had to be updated so as not to be destroyed by the new. Paradigm shifts are taking place all around us and anyone who doesn’t understand this will quickly fall behind.

  The changes that bitcoin has already brought and will continue to bring to the world are not just monetary. We are facing a new energy revolution as well. And anyone who doesn’t keep up to date with new trends will be disrupted.

  Thinking in this context, I have separated seven trends in the energy market to help you anticipate what is on the horizon and approaching quickly.

  1. RENEWABLE ENERGIES WILL BE WIDELY ADOPTED

  The transition to renewable energy has reached a point of no return. As time goes on, this sector will become increasingly efficient. Today, in appropriate places, wind and solar energy are already the cheapest and most efficient ways of generating energy.

  With popular pressure for a cleaner energy matrix and more investment in research, this trend will intensify.

  Another issue is that the perception that fossil fuels are stable sources of energy has suffered a setback with the invasion of Ukraine and its aftermath. While the generation of renewable energy can usually be done at or near consumption points, oil and natural gas depend on major global producers, a complex supply chain and are more influenced by geopolitics.

  The only fossil energy source that tends to remain competitive in the medium term as a form of energy generation is natural gas.

  

  Image source

  2. RENEWABLE ENERGY GENERATION OPERATIONS WILL BE MULTIMODAL

  A significant portion of energy production in Brazil is hydroelectric. In addition, in the country there are several reservoirs which are basically flat surfaces and, as Brazil is a tropical country, they have a high rate of sunlight.

  In the future, these reservoirs will be used as solar generation parks and will be integrated into the hydroelectric substation, which will allow the integration and transmission of this generated energy to the electrical grid. In windy places, wind turbines will also be installed, further increasing the use of the enterprise. This logic does not apply only to Brazil, but to any countries where wind and solar energy are viable in the same region.

  3. DISTRIBUTED GENERATION WILL BE WIDELY ADOPTED

  Until the beginning of the last decade, there was no distributed energy generation around. Since then, this form of generation has seen exponential adoption. This trend will continue for a long time, as penetration of this form of generation is still incipient.

  In the future, individual consumers will be able to install their own solar panels on the roof of their homes or join small cooperatives, such as condominiums or clubs, and build small generators for electricity.

  

  Image source

  4. WASTE OF IDLE ENERGY TRENDS TO ZERO

  In 2009, humanity invented a technology that allowed the monetization of stranded energy. The name of that technology? Bitcoin mining. Thanks to this process, it is now possible to convert energy into money, regardless of where that energy is located.

  A clear example of this stranded energy monetization process is, “the burning of natural gas associated with oil exploration,” AKA flaring. Currently, most of this surplus gas is flared because it is not economically viable to use it. With bitcoin mining, this scenario has changed and there is a great tendency for this gas to be used to fuel bitcoin mining operations.

  With that, a gas that was wasted became monetizable. An example of this logic is Exxon starting a pilot bitcoin mining project in 2021.

  This same logic can be applied to any other form of minimally accessible stranded energy, such as, for example, with biogas and from dumps and landfills.

  5. ELECTRIC GRIDS WILL BECOME MORE ROBUST AND ENERGY WILL BECOME CHEAPER FOR THE CONSUMER

  Currently, electrical grids are designed to produce energy to meet peak demand. However, there is no viable way to store this energy and it is idle at most times when demand is not at its peak.

  As a way of monetizing surplus energy, bitcoin mining allows for the construction of oversized networks. These networks will not need to be anchored to calculations that focus on avoiding waste and targeting the moment of peak demand, which always incurs a risk of miscalculation and blackouts.

  A consequence of this logic is that without the need to charge the final consumer for the production of surplus energy, the price of energy will decrease considerably.

  6. BITCOIN MINING AND ENERGY SECTORS WILL MERGE

  We currently think of bitcoin mining and energy sectors as two independent sectors, but in the future they will merge.

  The characteristics of bitcoin mining make this activity attractive for the energy sector, which is observable in its incipiency. The logic presented in the item above implies that power generators will adopt bitcoin mining as a way to monetize their idle energy.

  7. HUMANITY’S ENERGY GENERATION CAPACITY WILL INCREASE SIGNIFICANTLY, AND WITH IT THE DEGREE OF HUMAN PROGRESS

  The consequences of the existence of a technology that makes it possible to monetize idle and stranded energy are broad and profound.

  Currently, human beings fail to take advantage of a significant portion of the energy they produce because it is not feasible to transport and store this energy. Thanks to bitcoin mining, this logic will be reversed.

  Several energy sources in remote locations will become economically viable. Two clear examples of this are:

  • Deserts, places with huge potential for generating solar energy.

  • Volcanic islands, places with huge potential for generating geothermal energy.

  The absence of a consumer market near these locations prevented these energy sources from being used by humanity. With the invention of a technology that allows the monetization of idle energy, this dynamic has changed.

  This also implies that the increase in demand for solar panels, wind turbines and other materials needed for energy generation will generate more research and innovation in the sector and, consequently, make this equipment cheaper.

  THE THIRD ENERGY REVOLUTION

  Finally, it is worth remembering that energy is the only universal currency. In other words, there is no poverty, but energy poverty. Likewise, having access to more energy will unlock a great revolution in humanity.

  Our species has already made two major evolutionary leaps related to unlocking different ways of using energy:

  1. When we mastered fire and learned to cook, we started to ingest more calories in less time and with that our brain developed.

  2. When we started to access energy stored and concentrated over millions of years by geological processes, the so-called fossil fuels, we became an industrial society and our population exploded.

  The monetization of idle and stranded energy capacity, whether solar in deserts, winds or geothermal potential on volcanic islands, will allow us to take the third evolutionary leap in terms of energy use.

  The world of tomorrow will be a world with an abundance of energy, and therefore, an abundance of resources.

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 23:00

• New ATF Document Reveals Gun Owners Who Own 'Pistol Braces' Could Be Forced To Register
  New ATF Document Reveals Gun Owners Who Own ‘Pistol Braces’ Could Be Forced To Register

  Readers know the Biden administration has weaponized the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) to wage war on law-abiding gun owners and manufacturers.

  AmmoLand News reported the latest move by the ATF could force law-abiding gun owners who own pistol braces to register them with the federal government. 

  

  The plan (or request) for a registry of pistol braces was buried within a document about a budget justification from the ATF to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). Here’s what the document says:

  “Due to the upcoming Amnesty Registration of Pistol Brace weapons, photos of the weapon being registered will be required to prove the weapon does utilize a pistol brace in its configuration and would qualify for an amnesty registration.”

  

  “Our ATF inside sources have told AmmoLand News that the ATF was planning for an amnesty period where gun owners would be able to register their braced pistols as short-barreled rifles (SBR) and that it is expected they will receive a free tax stamp,” AmmoLand’s John Crump said. 

  Ammoland believes there are roughly four million pistol braces in the US, while gun blog website Silencer Central has the figure between three and seven million. 

  The Biden administration has requested the ATF to redefine the definition of a firearm and change rules surrounding pistol braces. 

  Democrats have rushed to try and ban anything guns or gun components. Democratic Rhode Island congressman David Cicilline told members of a House Judiciary Committee this summer that pistol braces turn “weapons into automatic weapons” and said, “it becomes a bump stock.”  

  Republican congressman Thomas Massie responded to Cicilline’s ridiculous claims, indicating braces are neither a bump stock nor make the weapon fire faster. Instead, it’s to shoot more accurately for stabilization purposes. 

  Here’s the full exchange between the Democrat and Republican lawmaker. It just shows how uninformed Democrats are about guns. 

  “The final pistol stabilizing device rule has not been unveiled. Based on this budget request and information from our sources, it seems to include a registry,” Crump concluded, adding the new rule could be unveiled by December of this year, which would mean millions of law-abiding gun owners who own braces would have to file sometime next year.

  Remember, we’ve told readers the ATF has a secret database of “nearly a billion gun records.” The purpose of any registry on a long enough timeline is confiscation. 

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 22:40

• Real Deterrence Of China Will Be Uncomfortable
  Real Deterrence Of China Will Be Uncomfortable

  Authored by Jennifer Bradley via RealClear Wire,

  The pace of China’s nuclear modernization has been described as breathtaking by Adm. Charles Richard, commander of U.S. Strategic Command. The increased size and sophistication of the capabilities being developed make them a strategic threat to the U.S. and its allies. Along with that threat comes the uncertainty around how large China plans to grow its force. 

  

  To deal with this threat, it is tempting to reach for the Cold War playbook and enhance deterrence. Arms control negotiations and agreements played a pivotal role in reducing risk, increasing transparency, and promoting stability between the United States and the Soviet Union. But China is not the Soviet Union, and arms control will not address this threat.

  For arms control to be effective, at least two parties must be willing to negotiate. Unfortunately, China is not. Beijing has steadfastly refused to even entertain the idea of joining any nuclear arms control negotiations. It remains opaque on its current nuclear capabilities, its intentions for its nuclear modernization program, and any changes in nuclear doctrine its leaders may be contemplating. It is easy to point to the disparity in the size of China’s nuclear arsenal compared to those of the United States and Russia, but to understand China’s resistance to nuclear arms control, it is imperative to examine its strategic culture.

  Understanding the context

  The late Colin S. Gray wrote, “Policy and strategy will be influenced by the cultural preferences bequeathed by a community’s interpretation of its history as well as by its geopolitical-geostrategic context.” Assessing strategic culture provides a method for understanding the behavior and decision-making of states, while also guarding against one’s own ethnocentric biases. Examining China’s strategic culture offers insight into its consistent and strong resistance to nuclear arms control negotiations that the United States continues to advocate for. 

  A preference for secrecy and deception is a key component of Chinese strategic culture that influences its national security policy development. The importance of deception is emphasized in both classical and contemporary Chinese military writings. Sun Tzu, one of the most well-known classical Chinese strategists, stated, “All warfare is based on deception.” But the core components of secrecy and deception as beneficial strategic concepts are peppered throughout modern Chinese strategy documents. They are referred to as methods for enhancing deterrence, or for gaining advantage should deterrence fail. Even Deng Xiaoping’s famous twenty-four-character strategy contained the essential directives to “hide our capacities and bide our time,” relying on secrecy and deception to achieve China’s strategic objectives.

  Arms control, in order to be successful, requires a verification regime to ensure that treaty signatories are meeting their obligations. This need for verification is in direct conflict with Chinese cultural preferences for secrecy and deception. Skeptics may counter that China has participated in many other arms control regimes in the past, including the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty and the Biological Weapons Convention – and it has signed the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, although it has not ratified it. Participating in these treaty organizations bolsters China’s image as a responsible international stakeholder, but secrecy and deception have also influenced Beijing’s involvement in these treaty regimes: China’s record on proliferation runs counter to its obligations under Article I of the NPT, the BWC does not have a formal verification regime that China has to adhere to, and though adherence to the CTBT is voluntary, a report published by the U.S. State Department in 2020 suggests that China has repeatedly blocked the flow of data from International Monitoring System stations used to monitor nuclear testing activity calling into question activities at China’s Lop Nur test sites. 

  In other words, even as China benefits from the prestige of membership in these arms control regimes, it also subverts its obligations. It is not subject to verification requirements and maintains the ability to hide illicit behavior.

  How to maintain real deterrence

  If arms control is not a viable solution to address the risk of China’s strategic breakout, then what path should the United States take? Due to the uncertainty and increased risk caused by China’s actions, the United States must hedge against this threat. A hedging strategy is a prudent course of action to reduce risk, strengthen deterrence and assure allies of U.S. commitment to security obligations. 

  An effective hedging strategy will ensure that the recapitalization of the U.S. nuclear force remains funded and on track. It will promote flexibility of U.S. nuclear capabilities to guarantee the ability to respond to any level of escalation by our adversaries. This flexibility requires continued commitment to the nuclear-armed Sea-Launched Cruise Missile (SLCM-N) in order to compete with capabilities that both China and Russia are developing. Finally, a hedging strategy will not reduce the role of nuclear weapons in national security unilaterally, especially as both China and Russia are increasing the prominence of nuclear weapons in their strategies. These measures are not akin to an arms race, but rather they ensure that the U.S. nuclear force is ready and reliable, and that our adversaries believe it poses a credible threat.  

  The nuclear threat posed by China is growing – how much so will remain unclear, because of its cultural preferences. This requires the United States take prudent measures to enhance deterrence of China, in ways tailored to this threat and this century, not the last. The uncertainty caused by the growing Chinese threat is uncomfortable – but deterrence has always been an uncomfortable proposition. It relies on convincing adversarial leaders with unique cultures, values, and worldviews that restraint is in their best interests. During the Cold War, leaders in the Soviet Union decided that arms control served their own national security, and the treaty regimes reduced tensions and enhanced deterrence. But until China’s leaders reach that same conclusion, the United States must become comfortable with being uncomfortable. A hedging strategy to ensure our deterrent remains robust and credible will ensure that China remains uncomfortable as well. 

  *  *  *

  Jennifer Bradley is a Senior Deterrence Analyst at U.S. Strategic Command. The views represented are those of the author and do not represent U.S. Strategic Command, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 22:20

• Taiwanese Billionaire Puts Up $32 Million To Train Army Of 'Civilian Warriors' Against Chinese Invasion
  Taiwanese Billionaire Puts Up $32 Million To Train Army Of ‘Civilian Warriors’ Against Chinese Invasion

  The founder of a major microchip producer has reinstated his Taiwanese citizenship and pledged to spend $32 million of his own money to train “civilian warriors” to prepare for a Chinese invasion.

  

  Wearing a bulletproof vest, billionaire Robert Tsao, founder of United Microelectronics Corp, announced at a Thursday press conference that the Chinese Communist Party’s threat to Taiwan was growing. The 75-year-old says he plans to train “three million people in three years,” and will work with the island’s civilian defense organization – the Kuma Academy.

  “Given the Chinese Communist Party’s record of atrocities against its own people and its brutal domination of those like the Uyghurs who are not even Chinese, the CCP’s threats have only ignited among the Taiwanese people a bitter hatred against this threatening enemy, and a shared determination to resist,” he said in a prepared statement.

  “I am back in Taiwan, and I will die in Taiwan. I will not watch the CCP turn Taiwan into another Hong Kong,” he said during his speech in Taipei.

  According to the Guardian, 60% of the funds would go towards the army of “warriors,” while 40% would be to train another 300,000 in how to shoot.

  “If we can successfully resist China’s ambitions, we not only will be able to safeguard our homeland but make a big contribution to the world situation and the development of civilization,” he said.

  Tsao was formerly an active supporter of unifying Taiwan with China, and had renounced his Taiwanese citizenship in protest against a government investigation of his company. However, he told Radio Free Asia that he had a change of heart after witnessing the crackdown on Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement, particularly the Yuen Long MTR attack. On Thursday he also announced he had renounced his Singaporean citizenship and that his Taiwanese citizenship had been restored and he planned to “die in Taiwan and stand with its people”. -The Guardian

  Established in 2021, the Kuma academy is aimed at training Taiwan’s civilian population in guerilla warfare, self-defense, and first-aid skills.

  “This goal is ambitious and the challenge is daunting, but Taiwan has no time to hesitate,” the academy said in a statement, citing efforts by the British after the second world war, as well as the Ukrainian response to the ongoing Russian invasion.

  The academy – which was approached by Taso after launching a fundraiser – said that the will of Taiwan’s people to resist a CCP invasion would “determine the outcome of the war.”

  “War is not a matter for a few people, and defending Taiwan is for every Taiwanese. Everyone has the ability and responsibility to contribute their own strength in the war.”

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 22:00

• Megadrought Threatening Millions Of Americans With Loss Of Water And Power
  Megadrought Threatening Millions Of Americans With Loss Of Water And Power

  Authored by Katie Spence via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  The Colorado River Basin meanders through seven U.S. states and supplies water to Lake Powell in the Upper Basin and Lake Mead in the Lower Basin. In turn, these reservoirs deliver water and power to millions of Americans.

  

  They’re also going dry.

  Indeed, on Aug. 16, 2021, the Bureau of Reclamation issued the first Level One Shortage Condition in the Lower Basin when Lake Mead fell below 1075 feet.

  Then, in March 2022, the bureau reported that Lake Powell fell below the target elevation of 3,525 feet for the first time since the 1960s.

  

  Pointedly, these drops threaten hydropower generation and municipal water needs for 40 million Americans.

  And while Congress has taken steps to address the flagging water supply, a 20-year megadrought and unsustainable allotments are hampering its efforts.

  In 1999, Lake Powell averaged a water elevation of almost 3,681 feet, and Lake Mead was almost near capacity at 1,220 feet near the dam.

  After more than 20 years of drought, the West has officially entered a megadrought (meaning 20 or more years), and Lake Powell’s water level is down almost 150 feet. Lake Mead’s water level is down nearly 176 feet.

  Indeed, the period from 2000 to 2021 was the driest on record for many states in the West.

  The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) designated 63 out of 64 Colorado counties as natural disaster areas due to drought and declared natural disaster areas in several Wyoming counties.

  

  In Mancos Valley, an area considered a Colorado agricultural utopia with cooler weather and “plenty” of water, streams ran at half the average flow, reducing water for hundreds of farmers and ranchers.

  Moreover, headwaters for the Colorado River Basin start in Colorado and Wyoming, meaning the lack of water didn’t just affect the two states.

  “Water conditions on the river depend largely on snowmelt in the basin’s northern areas [of Colorado and Wyoming],” states a Congressional Research Service report (CRS).

  Still, it could probably pull through if the megadrought was the only problem facing the Colorado River Basin. Unfortunately, federal and state mismanagement compound the megadrought, driving the river to the brink of disaster.

  Unsustainable Drains

  In 1922, the Basin States of Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona, and California established the Colorado River Compact to release water from the lakes based on basin storage conditions.

  Specifically, under the compact, each basin is allocated 7.5-million-acre feet (MAF) per year—one-acre foot equals about 326,000 gallons—and a certain percentage goes to the Basin States based on water levels in the dams.

  At its peak, Glen Canyon Dam on Lake Powell can store 26.2 MAF, and Hoover Dam on Lake Mead can store 26.1 MAF, according to CRS.

  

  In 1944, the United States entered a treaty with Mexico to provide an additional 1.5 MAF from the basin to Mexico.

  Markedly, at the onset of the compacts, federal and state governments assumed that river flows would average 16.4 MAF per year, states CRS. But that turned out to be a deeply flawed assumption.

  From 1906 to 2020, the actual river flows averaged 13.9 MAF, but consumption and losses averaged approximately 15 MAF. Demand outpaced supply.

  Drought and Hydroelectric Plants

  According to the Department of Energy, hydropower is primarily used for ramping energy flexibility and represents less than 6.7 percent of U.S. electricity generation capacity.

  In other words, if an area relies on solar and exceeds capacity, or the sun sets, hydropower can “ramp up” energy production quickly—hydropower provides approximately 40 percent of black start resources (restoring a power station to operation without relying on the external electric power transmission network after a total or partial shutdown).

  It’s also considered one of the “cleanest” and “cheapest” forms of energy.

  However, hydroelectricity generation depends on funneling large amounts of water from elevated heights through power plants typically found inside dams, according to the Water Resources Research Center, making significant river systems a vital resource.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 21:40

• Friday Humor: White House Takes Credit For Creating 10 Billion Jobs
  Friday Humor: White House Takes Credit For Creating 10 Billion Jobs

  It appears Common Core math has crept its way into the highest echelons of the Biden administration.

  On Friday, White House spox Karine Jean-Pierre attempted to actually answer a question – except, while her boss can’t read a teleprompter – Jean-Pierre apparently can’t read a binder when she’s not deflecting.

  

  When asked what she thinks about a variety of terrible metrics since Biden took office, she panicked and attempted to rattle off a list of economic accomplishments, which did not go well.

  “Under President Biden, student test scores has gone backwards, inflation has gone the wrong direction, workers’ real wages have come down. We’re seeing spending on programs and promised that at some point in the future, the transition will be over. What, in the last 20 months, where’s the progress?” asked Fox Business correspondent Edward Lawrence.

  After rattling off some broad brush strokes, Lawrence reiterates: “But inflation still outpaces wages,” to which Pierre turned to her trusty binder of accomplishments, where she noted that the White House has created “nearly ten-thousand million jobs,” which she bragged was “the fastest job growth in history – so you’re asking me ‘where’s the success?’“

  Watch:

  Perhaps if you divide the number of jobs people have to hold down to make ends meet…

  They finally admitted that 100 million Americans need to hold 100 jobs each to survive in the greatest economy ever https://t.co/1toXbhaXwF

  — zerohedge (@zerohedge) September 2, 2022

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

  Will someone please ask her what jobs they created? People going back to work after a pandemic is not job creation

  — TexasV 🇺🇸 (@Texasblue1) September 2, 2022

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

  She uses the same math as her boss

  — Our World Is Run By Pedos (@Wattsdj1) September 2, 2022

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

  Why not just say eleventy-billion jobs?

  — Rusty 🎙️ (@rustyweiss74) September 2, 2022

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

  Clearly deflection is her strong suit.

   

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 21:20

• Gates Left Open To Prevent Flooding Highlight Breaches, Weaknesses In Arizona's Wall With Mexico
  Gates Left Open To Prevent Flooding Highlight Breaches, Weaknesses In Arizona’s Wall With Mexico

  Authored by Allen Stein via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  The Chevy pickup truck growled like a wary pitbull as it crept along the narrow dirt road parallel to Arizona’s southern border wall fence with Mexico.

  Sam, the owner of a private Arizona security firm, stopped the truck and put the gear in park.

  “We’re on the Roosevelt Easement right now,” he says bluntly. “The federal government owns this entire road.”

  

  Something, though, was glaringly out of place on Aug. 24.

  Three massive irrigation gates built into the steel border wall fence were open for anyone to walk through.

  

  On the Mexican side of the border wall, fresh water bottles lay on the ground, covered in dew. Someone had also left origami puppets with the words “Peace” and notes in Spanish and English in plastic zip-lock bags.

  “Look with compassion on the whole human family; take away the arrogance and hatred which infect our hearts; break down the walls that separate us,” the note read.

  Humanitarians leave water bottles, food for the illegals, and even children’s toys to pick up as they cross into the United States through the open gates, says Sam, the pseudonym he uses to protect his identity.

  “There’s another open gate “bigger than this one, down that way,” he says, pointing up the easement. “There are five or six gates like this”—all open.

  

  “And this is the new wall Trump built. What sense does it make? How about closing the gates?”

  Sam believes the Roosevelt Easement is key to border security through enforcement from the federal level.

  The easement is a 60-foot-wide dirt road owned by the federal government along the U.S.-Mexico border, spanning nearly 2,000 miles across three of the four border states.

  In 1907, President Theodore Roosevelt established the federal easement with the intention of protecting border states against smugglers operating between the United States and Mexico.

  Border wall construction in Arizona stopped soon after President Joe Biden took office in 2021. Its projected construction cost was over $21 billion, requiring nearly four years to complete.

  

  Sam says the Roosevelt Easement is like a constitutional “no man’s land” where federal law enforcement could do the most good at preventing illegal immigration.

  In July 2020, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management announced the transfer of 65.74 acres of federal public lands in Arizona and New Mexico to the U.S. Army to aid the installation of power and utility infrastructure to support border wall security.

  On Aug. 24, much of that infrastructure appeared incomplete along the portion of easement between Bisbee and Douglas.

  Sam tells The Epoch Times that thousands of illegals pass easily through breaches in the wall each month with little to stop them.

  Signs written in Spanish greet the migrants with an emergency phone number to call. “No Trespassing” signs are written in English.

  “I tried to push one [gate] shut. It’s pretty hard to shut,” says Kyle, Sam’s security specialist, riding in the truck’s passenger seat. “They would be damned secure if they were [kept] shut.”

  “There are people here that are tired of the bull,” Sam adds. “People aid the cartels and the migrants because they’re migrants themselves.”

  Further up the road, a lone U.S. Border Patrol officer sat in a pickup truck, watching as we approached.

  “Why are the irrigation gates kept open?” an Epoch Times reporter asked.

  The officer responded that the gates stay open during monsoon season, allowing water and debris to wash through and prevent flooding.

  “But doesn’t that make it easy for migrants to cross into the United States?” the reporter asked.

  The officer nodded and said the location has been “somewhat active” with illegal crossings.

  

  As we moved further up the easement, we found more open gates and even strips of camouflage fabric caught in barbed wire, signs of illegal crossings.

  “Whoever was hauling backpacks got hung up on here,” Kyle says.

  Illegals purchase camouflage backpacks and other necessities at makeshift stores along the human smuggling routes run by the Mexican drug cartels. It’s kind of like a mini-retail chain, Kyle says.

  Sam says many illegals would stop coming if law enforcement had the manpower and resources to intercept them and send them home.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 21:00

• The Race For The Moon Continues
  The Race For The Moon Continues

  Engine trouble led to the postponement of NASA’s Artemis 1 mission earlier in the week, but is now scheduled to launch tomorrow afternoon. The flyby is scheduled to be the start to a new program of U.S. government lunar missions almost exactly fifty years after the Apollo project, which landed the first humans on the moon, ended. Since then, no manned missions have visited Earth’s closest companion in space.

  As Statista’s Katharina Buchholz details below, Artemis 1 will be the first of three missions that are aiming to put a person back on the moon by 2025.

  Not only in the U.S., race for the moon is starting anew as several more countries and private companies have announced lunar missions.

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  After the successful landings of Chinese probes Chang’e 3 in 2013, Chang’e 4 in January 2019 and Long March 5 in 2020, who will be the next space agency or company succeeding in reaching the moon? Our graphic gives a rundown of the main lunar missions announced to-date. Given the uncertainties of space flight, the dates may be subject to change.

  After two failed mission by the Israeli private company SpaceIL in April 2019 and the Indian space agency ISRO in July of that year, the next soft landings on the moon are scheduled by U.S. companies Astrobotic Technology and Intuitive Machines, which are planning to bring landers and rovers to the moon towards the end of this or the beginning of next year as part of NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services program that has been giving out contracts to companies to develop capabilities to fly to the moon’s South pole which is interesting for resources utilization. Japanese company iSpace is also planning to launch its Hakuto lander later this year, which will place the Rashid rover developed by the United Arab Emirates Space Agency on the moon in early 2023.

  Amidst global upheaval following Russia‘s invasion of Ukraine, the country’s first launch from its resurrected moon program Luna is believed to have been delayed to the coming year at least. The lander mission was originally scheduled to be followed up by a orbiter in 2024 and a manned mission to the moon’s orbit in 2029. The space agencies of Japan and India are also reaching for the moon in 2023 with one lander mission each. Turkey wants to reach the moon as well that year, albeit with an easier impactor mission. A soft landing is scheduled to follow by 2028.

  New launches from China and the European Space agency are expected in 2024 and 2025, respectively, and focus on resources utilization concepts, as does NASA’s Viper rover program that will be realized in cooperation with private companies starting in 2024. In addition, NASA and ESA are scheduled to begin work on a space station in lunar orbit the same year.

  South Korea already got a head start for its lunar program with the successful launch of a lunar orbiter in early August which is currently on the way to the moon. The country wants to achieve a soft landing on the moon by 2030.

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 20:40

• The Pandemic Did This? New York Times Fails Fact Check
  The Pandemic Did This? New York Times Fails Fact Check

  Authored by Debbie Lerman via The Brownstone Institute,

  Yesterday, September 1, 2022, The New York Times had a front page story entitled: “The Pandemic Erased Two Decades of Progress in Math and Reading.”

  

  The first paragraph states that “National test results released on Thursday showed in stark terms the pandemic’s devastating effects on American schoolchildren, with the performance of 9-year-olds in math and reading dropping to the levels from two decades ago.”

  Further down, the article says: “Then came the pandemic, which shuttered schools across the country almost overnight” and “experts say it will take more than the typical school day to make up gaps created by the pandemic.”

  The definition of a pandemic, according to the Bulletin of the World Health Organization (ref: Last JM, editor. A dictionary of epidemiology, 4th edition. New York: Oxford University Press; 2001) is “an epidemic occurring worldwide, or over a very wide area, crossing international boundaries and usually affecting a large number of people.”

  According to the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology, “an epidemic occurs when an infectious disease spreads rapidly to many people.”

  Thus, a pandemic is a disease that spreads rapidly to many people all over the world.

  Based on this pretty much universally accepted definition, a pandemic can do exactly one thing: it can spread disease to many people around the world.

  What can a pandemic NOT do?

  A pandemic cannot impose mandates or lockdowns.

  A pandemic cannot block borders or force people to stop traveling.

  A pandemic cannot shutter schools – overnight or otherwise.

  A pandemic cannot impact math and reading.

  A pandemic cannot cause learning gaps.

  What can our response to a pandemic do?

  If we decide to shut down schools for months and years on end in response to a pandemic, then it is our response that has caused whatever educational deficits and devastation to children ensue. It is not the pandemic.

  In case there’s any doubt that the effects of a pandemic are separate and distinct from society’s response to the pandemic, we can take a look at Sweden, where schools were never shut down, and where there was no learning loss (ref) and much less devastation to schoolchildren than in countries that closed schools (ref) during the Covid pandemic. 

  Blaming the pandemic for anything other than disease and/or death is misinformation.

  The New York Times headline and article contain clear and uncontestable instances of misinformation.

  Here is the information from the article, stated in a factually correct way:

  US public health leaders and politicians mandated prolonged school shutdowns in response to the Covid pandemic, and these school shutdowns had devastating effects on schoolchildren, creating learning gaps and erasing decades of progress in math and reading.

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 20:20

• Stop Freaking Out About Drinking Recycled Poo-Water, Expert Says
  Stop Freaking Out About Drinking Recycled Poo-Water, Expert Says

  The head of the UK’s Environment Agency says that people need to be ‘less squeamish’ about drinking “toilet-to-tap” water from treatment plants, as countries and states around the world move towards recycling sewage.

  

  According to a Sunday op-ed in The Times, Sir James Bevan writes that “drinking recycled sewage is the future.”

  

  “The recent rainfall hasn’t changed the underlying position in this country: many parts are likely to stay in drought for months, and if we have a dry winter then next year will be even more challenging,” Bevan writes. “We will need to be less squeamish about where our drinking water comes from. Part of the solution will be to reprocess the water that results from sewage treatment and turn it back into drinking water — perfectly safe and healthy, but not something many people fancy.”

  Bevan’s op-ed comes as US water supplies are under strain due to an ongoing, and worsening drought which has resulted in ten areas being given drought status by the Environment Agency.

  Because of this, he says that people simply need to “change the way they think about water,” and “treat it as a precious resource, not a free good.”

  

  “If we are going to get there, we are all going to have to think differently. Some of these measures will be unpopular, so future governments will need to show political will,” he said.

  Earlier this year, Singapore’s water agency launched a beer made with recycled sewage water in order to raise awareness over the country’s water security issues (and probably to mask the taste of poo).

  Last month we reported that Los Angeles County is considering a similar move to recycle wastewater to taps.

  “There’s been a public health legacy where sanitary engineering practices and regulators considered sewage a waste, it was something to be avoided, something to be feared,” said Brad Coffey of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California. “Now that we have the technology … the public, the regulators, the scientific community has much greater confidence in our ability to safely reuse that water supply.”

  The plan hinges on the State Water Resources Control Bord, which legislators have tasked with developing a set of uniform regulations by Dec. 31 which would govern potable reuse.

  “This is going to be the future of L.A.’s water, the future of the state’s water supply,” said Gonzalez, who added that the Headworks project could come online within the next five years.

  LA’s plans are much bigger than that, however – as the city has set out to recycle 100% of its wastewater by 2035 per a pledge made by Mayor Eric Garcetti several years ago.

  In order to achieve this, LA’s Hyperion Water Reclamation Plant – which currently only treats wastewater so it’s clean enough to release into Santa Monica Bay – must be completely converted into an advanced water purification facility which produces water that’s clean enough to consume.

  What else are you going to use to wash the bugs down, after all?

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 20:00

• Have We Entered The New Dark Ages?
  Have We Entered The New Dark Ages?

  Authored by MN Gordon via EconomicPrism.com,

  Elizabeth Warren must be a fool.  That, or she thinks the rest of us are fools.

  The Senator recently took to CNN to publicly fret over the Federal Reserve’s rate hikes.  She’s worried they will tip the economy into recession.

  What’s Warren afraid of?  Her fears have already come true.

  The U.S. economy already is in a recession.  GDP data alone shows the economy contracted in both the first and second quarter of 2022.

  The technical definition for a recession has long been understood to be two consecutive quarters of declining GDP.  So, by definition, the economy is in a recession.  Everyone knows this, save President Biden and Warren.

  Recessions may not be agreeable.  But they are necessary.  In fact, the present recession is precisely what’s needed to clean up the consumer price inflation mess that Warren and her colleagues made.  There are consequences for mass money printing.  And they must be reckoned one way or another.

  The fundamental fact is today’s consumer price inflation fiasco is a direct result of Washington’s spending policies.  The coronavirus hysteria provided the perfect excuse to spew printing press money into the economy.  Warren was one of the greatest advocates.

  The Fed, for its part, merely obliged the wishes of Congress.  It created credit from thin air and loaned it to the Treasury in the form of Treasury note purchases.

  The Treasury then obliged the wishes of Congress.  It used the money that was borrowed from the Fed to fund stimmy checks, PPP, and generous federal unemployment payments.  This was all to meet the legislative demands of Warren and the other knaves in Congress.

  Money Destruction

  There’s never a good time to spew printing press money into the economy.  But the years 2020-21 were particularly bad.  That’s because governments the world over locked down their economies for no good reason at all.

  The United States, Europe, and nearly every government across the globe took its cues from Communist China.  The coronavirus curve wasn’t flattened.  But the economy was.

  Then politicians like Warren took a bad situation and made it vastly worse by spewing printing press money everywhere.  Maybe they thought they were helping.  Maybe they believed the promise of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) would make all their socialist dreams come true.

  Regardless, their actions were highly destructive.  And now we all must live in the discombobulated world they made.

  The critical point is that the creation of greater quantities of money by central planners does not magically increase the quantity of goods and services.  The addition of newly created money is not readily greeted with a corresponding increase in production.

  Similarly, newly created money does not magically increase people’s claims to goods and services.  It does not increase how much they can consume.  Rather, it dilutes each individual monetary unit, which then appears as rising prices.

  The genesis of consumer price inflation can be found in money supply inflation.  Money supply inflation is the direct act of central planners.  The inflation of the money supply comes first.  Consumer prices then follow, especially when the printing press money is injected into the economy via government giveaways.

  Broken Supply Chains

  The 2020-21 government mandated lockdowns succeeded in disrupting supply chains.  Many links in the chain were broken.  Some supply chains that were incrementally connected over the last 30 years were broken forever.

  There’s no going back to the way things were prior to March 2020.  Yet, in addition to the ramifications of government mandated lockdowns and mass money spewing, the world continues to change in important ways.

  Geopolitical shifts since the start of the Russian-Ukraine war are momentous.  Sanctions imposed on Russia have put Europe in a position where it can no longer consume cheap, abundant Russian natural gas.

  This is an example of a supply chain that’s broken for good.  It will never be repaired.  The implications of this new reality are just setting in as winter appears in the distance.

  Germany is particularly vulnerable to disruptions in Russian gas.  Before the war started, more than half of its gas came from Russian imports.  Now Germany is having to quickly develop contingencies.

  One option is to restart coal plants that had already been shut down as part of its plan to phase out coal by 2030.  But coal is also in a supply crunch.

  In Poland, for example, cars are lining up at the Lubelski Wegiel Bogdanka coal mine.  People are waiting day and night to stock up on heating fuel in advance of winter.  Demand for coal has forced Bogdanka and other mines to ration sales.

  What’s going on here?  How did everything get so screwed up?  Have we entered the new dark ages?

  Have We Entered the New Dark Ages?

  Unless there’s a miracle, this winter will be an absolute calamity for Europe.  French President Emmanuel Macron recently clarified the situation for his cabinet.

  “What we are currently living through is a kind of major tipping point or a great upheaval … we are living the end of what could have seemed an era of abundance … the end of the abundance of products of technologies that seemed always available … the end of the abundance of land and materials including water.”

  Spanish Defense Minister Margarita Robles also warned of what’s to come, saying, “We [Europeans] are going to have a winter of great suffering.”

  Both Macron and Robles fail to mention the source of the great upheaval and winter of suffering.  That it’s elitist policies from the U.S. and Europe that have put everyone in such a pinch.

  In reality, there is an abundance of resources and the talent and capability to efficiently deliver them to market.  But government lockdowns, climate change policies, and senseless sanctions are standing in the way.

  One example of the absurdity of it all was recently identified by ZeroHedge, who detailed how Europe is paying inflated prices for Russian liquified natural gas (LNG) that’s been laundered through China.  Somehow ‘dirty’ LNG from Russia magically becomes ‘clean’ when it’s brokered from China.

  Here in the U.S. these mega disruptions are less pronounced, at least for now.  Yet the U.S. is not exempt.  Not with the current cadre of elitists doing everything they can to inhibit productivity and then paper over it with printing press money via misnomers like the Inflation Reduction Act.

  As noted above, the U.S. is already in a recession.  The bear market rally has stalled out and reversed just as the calendar turns to September – the worst month of the year historically for U.S. stocks.  And September is followed by October, a month which has delivered several of the most epic stock market crashes on record.

  So as the market slides into the fall, and the economy contracts, high consumer prices will persist.  They must.  Elitist policies assure it.

  

  There is one way out, however.  But it won’t be very pleasant.  As the Fed yanks the cheap money rug out from under the economy the recession could turn into a decade long depression.

  And if that doesn’t do it, a new dark ages will.

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 19:40

• "Worst Has Yet To Come": Civil Unrest Set To Surge Worldwide As Socioeconomic Pressure Builds, Report Warns
  “Worst Has Yet To Come”: Civil Unrest Set To Surge Worldwide As Socioeconomic Pressure Builds, Report Warns

  Soaring food, energy, and shelter inflation have led to what could be a new era of civil unrest worldwide. Pockets of unrest have been observed in Sri Lanka, Peru, Kenya, Ecuador, Iran, and Europe. New research forecasts a broader wave of discontent is just ahead. 

  While this topic of developing social unrest is hardly new, we discussed it in late 2020, “Why Albert Edwards Is Starting To Panic About Soaring Food Prices,” and Rabobank’s Michael Every noted in April 2021: “We Are Edging Closer To A Biblical Commodity Price Increase Scenario.” 

  Earlier this year, Rockefeller Foundation President Rajiv warned that a “massive, immediate food crisis” is nearing. The UN said this summer that the world is “marching towards starvation” with an increased likelihood of civil unrest and political violence. 

  Making sense of the impending global turmoil is Verisk Maplecroft, a UK-based risk consulting and intelligence firm. They have just published an updated version of the Civil Unrest Index (CUI), covering seven years of data, showing the last quarter saw the most countries ever since the index was created move higher in civil unrest risks (101 of the 198 countries tracked by the firm saw increased risks of civil unrest, while only 42 experienced reduced risks).

  “The impact is evident across the globe, with popular discontent over rising living costs emerging on the streets of developed and emerging markets alike, stretching from the EU, Sri Lanka, Peru to Kenya, Ecuador, and Iran, ” Verisk wrote in the report, adding conditions are worsening as the frequency of protests and labor strikes could accelerate into fall. 

  

  “Although there have been several high-profile and large-scale protests during the first half of 2022, the worst is undoubtedly yet to come,” the firm warned.

  Verisk noted Algeria has the highest likelihood of projected civil unrest over the next half year because of rising inflation. Other areas include Europe, mainly due to energy hyperinflation decimating household finances.

  “Bosnia and Herzegovina, Switzerland, Netherlands, Germany, and Ukraine are all among the states with the biggest projected increases in risk,” the report said. 

  

  “Only a significant reduction in global food and energy prices can arrest the negative global trend in civil unrest risk. Recession fears are mounting, and inflation is expected to be worse in 2023 than in 2022,” Verisk said.

  The question remains if central banks can arrest inflation with the most aggressive interest rate hikes in decades. If not, then Verisk expects: “the next six months are likely to be even more disruptive” than earlier this year. 

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 19:20

• Crypto.com Mistakenly Transfers $7 Million To Australian Woman In Refund Blunder
  Crypto.com Mistakenly Transfers $7 Million To Australian Woman In Refund Blunder

  Authored by Katabella Roberts via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  A Melbourne woman received quite the surprise when she discovered that nearly AU$10.5 million ($7.2 million) was accidentally deposited into her bank account by the digital currency app Crypto.com.

  

  The Singapore-based company discovered during a December audit that it had mistakenly refunded AU$10.47 million to Thevamanogari Manivel in May 2021, when it was attempting to issue a refund of just AU$100 ($70).

  According to court documents (pdf), the incident happened after an account number was accidentally entered into the payment amount field by an employee instead of the AU$100 amount.

  However, the mistake was not realized by the company until months later by which time Manivel, with some help from her sister, Thilagavathy Gangadory, had already gone on quite a spending spree.

  She also failed to notify Crypto.com of the mistake.

  Crypto.com, which lost roughly $34 million worth of cryptocurrency in a hack earlier this year, has filed a lawsuit against Manivel and her sister seeking the return of the millions of dollars.

  But according to the lawsuit, Thevamanogari Manivel has already spent some of the money, transferring $10.1 million into a joint account, and another $430,000 to a joint account with her daughter.

  She also purchased a AU$1.35 million five-bedroom property in Craigieburn, located in suburban Melbourne.

  “It is established that the Craigieburn Property was acquired with funds traceable to the Wrongful Payment and would never have been in Gangadory’s hands if the wrongful payment had not been made,” lawyers for Crypto.com wrote in the lawsuit. “Thus, Gangadory was unjustly enriched by receiving the purchase price of the Craigieburn Property out of the Wrongful Payment, and the first plaintiff is entitled to recover an amount representing that price.”

  The court froze Manivel’s bank account in February this year. However, Victoria’s Supreme Court has now ordered that the million-dollar property be sold and that Manivel return the money to the company.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 19:00

• Crushed Scores And Crushed Skulls: Children Pay Grim Lockdown Price
  Crushed Scores And Crushed Skulls: Children Pay Grim Lockdown Price

  The disturbing evidence against lockdowns piled even higher this week, with new studies on two continents showing that children not only suffered significant learning loss but sharply higher abuse at home too.  

  First, French researchers found abusive head trauma among infants in the Paris metro area doubled during the second year of the pandemic, reports MedPage Today. Worse yet, mortality rates among those abused infants soared nearly 10-fold, suggesting greater ferocity.   

  Interestingly, the stats held steady through the first year of the pandemic and its associated government lockdowns, only to erupt in 2021. The researchers hypothesize that the pattern reflects an “accumulation of psychosocial distress over time.”

  They attribute that distress to lockdown measures that “deteriorated the psychosocial situation of adults, increased the periods where parents or guardians were at home for a prolonged time with their children, and reduced the intensity of prevention and early detection programs.”

  Like other victims of maniacal Covidian coercion, Parisians were subjected to lengthy lockdowns, curfews and daycare closures, as public health officials gave no consideration to collateral effects of their policies. 

  “Economic loss and unemployment, mental disorders such as acute and post-traumatic stress disorders and depression or suicidal behaviors are known risk factors for [child abuse and neglect],” the Université Paris Cité researchers wrote. 

  Meanwhile, a new federal study found that both math and reading scores for 9-year-old Americans tumbled during the pandemic’s first two years.  

  “Reading scores saw their largest decrease in 30 years, while math scores had their first decrease in the history of the testing regimen behind the study,” reported the Associated Press. 

  “I was taken aback by the scope and the magnitude of the decline,” Peggy G. Carr, commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics, told The New York Times. 

  Shutdown-happy public health officials and teachers unions tag-teamed to pummel black and brown kids hardest. White students’ math scores dropped 5 percentage points, but black scores tumbled 13 points and Hispanics shed 8 points. Asian and native American scores managed to hold steady. 

  The children damned by overreaching public health officials may never reach their pre-pandemic potential. “Student test scores, even starting in first, second and third grade, are really quite predictive of their success later in school, and their educational trajectories overall,” said Susanna Loeb, Brown University’s director of the Annenberg Institute. 

  Asked on Thursday about the steep toll that school shutdowns took on children, barrier-breaking White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre showed that black lesbians are fully capable of the mind-boggling dishonesty that’s required when serving as the Biden administration’s script-reading, identity-politics hood ornament.

  Pretending that Democrats, teachers unions and liberal media weren’t the leading proponents of school closures, Jean-Pierre implied those closures were a product of pandemic mismanagement on the part of  Donald Trump and the Republican Party: 

  Jean-Pierre blames Trump for schools being closed during Covid and says schools re-opening “was the work of Democrats in spite of Republicans” pic.twitter.com/X9kQjlzvHY

  — Washington Free Beacon (@FreeBeacon) September 1, 2022

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

  Sadly, if our society can’t unite in acknowledging the intrinsic dangers of lockdowns, we’re at risk of being victimized by them again, with the ill effects falling heaviest on those with the smallest voices.  

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 18:40

• Prosecutors Identify Police Supervisor Who Beat Woman On Jan. 6
  Prosecutors Identify Police Supervisor Who Beat Woman On Jan. 6

  Authored by Zachary Stieber and Joseph M. Hanneman via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  The Washington D.C. police officer who beat a Minnesota woman with a metal baton at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, is a 19-year veteran with a history of use-of-force complaints.

  

  Victoria C. White, of Minnesota, was struck nearly 40 times in a four-minute span in the Lower West Terrace tunnel leading into the U.S. Capitol, security video footage showed.

  The officer who delivered most of the blows was identified in new court filings as Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) commander Jason Bagshaw, 45.

  “The tunnel CCTV footage shows that over an almost two-minute span running from approximately 4:07:00 to 4:08:54 p.m., Lieutenant Bagshaw repeatedly struck, or tried to strike, the woman in red with his baton,” U.S. prosecutors said in one of the briefs (pdf).

  Bagshaw has since been promoted to commander.

  Prosecutors also acknowledged that Bagshaw “threw five left-handed jab punches in the direction of the woman in red’s head or upper body” and included an image showing Bagshaw with his left fist raised while standing near White, or the woman in red.

  MPD use-of-force policies advise officers to avoid striking the head.

  Bagshaw did not respond to a message. MPD did not respond to requests for comment. The agency said previously it wasn’t aware of the surveillance footage, released in December 2021 by attorney Joseph McBride, showing one of its officers pummeling White.

  Bagshaw, the video shows, struck White’s head eight times, then punched her with his left fist. He later made a fist and punched White in the face and head six times. Another officer—with both hands on his baton—jammed the butt of the weapon at White’s face and then rammed her with the baton 10 times, the video footage shows.

  Prosecutors attempted to defend the strikes.

  “While many observers might instinctively cringe at the sight of a male police officer using a baton to strike, or attempt to strike, the head, neck, and shoulder area of a smaller woman, there are many possible lawful justifications for Lieutenant Bagshaw’s use of force,” they said.

  “The woman in red’s location alone was criminal, making her subject to arrest, and it presented a threat to the officers and the U.S. Capitol. Here, there is no evidence in the trial record explaining how the woman penetrated the phalanx of officers, whether she was armed at the time, or if she had threatened or undertaken violent action against an officer. Depending on these circumstances, an officer may have been justified in using violent force against her. It is possible that Lieutenant Bagshaw struck her for no justifiable reason. But it is also possible he struck her to disarm her, or to subdue her after she attacked an officer,” they added.

  White’s case was featured in The Epoch Times documentary “The Real Story of Jan. 6.”

  “The first blow came to my head by a metal baton,” White said in the film. “It was really bad. I remember trying to keep myself up. I was scared I would be trampled.”

  

  In the film, use-of-force expert Stan Kephart said striking White in the head was a potentially fatal mistake.

  “The head is a sphere. What happens when you strike a spherical object with a blunted object, at least resistance and glances off the head. That’s a possibility. The second thing is you can hit them flush and kill them,” Kephart said. “If your intent was to kill them, you should have been using a firearm and not a baton.”

  Bagshaw’s History

  Bagshaw, who started working for the department in 2003 and has been promoted twice since Jan. 6, 2021, has been the subject of multiple complaints over the years.

  In one instance, a Washington resident accused him of working with other officers to try to cover up an illegal beating in 2013. Bagshaw falsely said in an application for a search warrant for the man’s home that a taxi driver told him the man looked like a man who had assailed the driver, according to court filings.

  Bagshaw testified in a deposition that another officer told him the driver did not know if the man was one of the men who assailed him. The case was settled out of court.

  In another case, which is still ongoing, Bagshaw and other MPD officers were accused of violating the constitutional rights of protesters who gathered in Lafayette Square near the White House in the wake of George Floyd’s death. A second case that is ongoing says Bagshaw instructed officers to beat a woman who was protesting the death of her son at the hands of the police.

  In a December 2020 incident documented on video shared on Instagram and other social media websites, Bagshaw picked up a man identified as a medic, carried him a short distance, and tossed him to the pavement.

  In mid-July 2022, Bagshaw shot an armed man to death in a crowded restaurant district on D.C.’s waterfront. Bagshaw, who was off-duty at the time, said he fired after witnessing Lazarus David Wilson, 23, of Dumfries, Virginia, pointing a firearm at patrons.

  One Step Toward Justice

  White told The Epoch Times she identified Bagshaw as her attacker weeks ago, based on security video and other sources.

  She said his identity being made public is just one step toward justice in her case.

  Publicity on the details, however, sparked her post-traumatic stress disorder from the Capitol incident and 10 years of domestic abuse by her ex-husband, she said.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 18:20

• Which Is The Fastest Fast-Food Drive-Thru?
  Which Is The Fastest Fast-Food Drive-Thru?

  Taco Bell is the fast food chain that has the fastest drive-thrus in America. 

  

  As Statista’s Kathrina Buchholz details below, according to a study done by industry publication QSR, Taco Bell customers have to wait an average of 4 minutes and 28 seconds for their orders. The study included 1,007 visits to the ten biggest drive-thru restaurant chains across all U.S. regions and all times of the day.

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  KFC, Carl’s Jr./Hardee’s and Dunkin’ Donuts all stayed under 5 minutes per order when the study was carried out, placing them in ranks 2-4.

  McDonald’s just cracked the 5-minute mark and came fifth.

  The study also concluded that McDonald’s had by far the most locations with order-confirmation boards and that customers could expect the biggest drive-thru order accuracy at Chick-fil-A.

  The chicken chain had the slowest drive-thru in the survey by far, but was also the place where most vehicles lined up in the drive-thru on average (4). This is many more than the next busiest competitors, McDonald’s, at an average of 2.2 cars waiting.

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 18:00

• Whistleblower Lawyer: FBI Agents Have Lost Confidence In Director Wray
  Whistleblower Lawyer: FBI Agents Have Lost Confidence In Director Wray

  Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  A lawyer representing several unnamed FBI whistleblowers said Wednesday that agents have lost confidence in the bureau’s leadership amid recent controversy.

  

  The FBI and the Department of Justice (DOJ) have faced Republican criticism over the raid of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago, while a number of whistleblowers have provided testimony to GOP lawmakers about alleged political bias at the bureau. Over the past weekend, high-ranking FBI agent Timothy Thibault departed the agency amid whistleblower complaints.

  “I’m hearing from [FBI personnel] that they feel like the director has lost control of the bureau,” Kurt Siuzdak, a lawyer and former agent who represents FBI whistleblowers, told the Washington Times on Wednesday. “They’re saying, ‘How does this guy survive? He’s leaving. He’s got to leave.’”

  Siuzdak told the paper that FBI agents have told him they’ve “lost confidence” in FBI Director Christopher Wray. “All Wray does is go in and say we need more training and we’re doing stuff about it, or we will not tolerate it.”

  In March, Siuzdak told the New York Post that he left the FBI after a 25-year career as an agent due to what he says is a lack of accountability among FBI managers and the bureau’s leadership. He blamed it on political biases held by top managers and leaders.

  Whistleblowers, Siuzdak told the paper this week, have alleged that Wray didn’t take action on a variety of matters, including sexual harassment claims and agents being forced to sign fake affidavits. Trump nominated Wray in 2017 after firing former Director James Comey.

  When contacted by The Epoch Times last week about recent whistleblower claims, the FBI issued a statement that the “men and women of the FBI do their jobs with rigor, objectivity, and a fierce commitment to our mission.”

  “All FBI employees are held to the highest standards of professional and ethical conduct. Allegations of misconduct are taken seriously and referred to the Inspection Division or the Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General. Through the disciplinary process, the FBI will continue to hold employees accountable for any substantiated misconduct,” the agency added.

  The FBI on Wednesday appeared to send the same statement to the Washington Times about Siuzdak’s interview. The Epoch Times has contacted the agency for additional comment.

  More Details

  Last week, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) said he’s received new whistleblower complaints from FBI employees, calling for a new investigation.

  “The guy told me that he loves the bureau, that he doesn’t want to see the bureau defunded or destroyed, but that he really feels a need to come forward so that there’s a focus on the things they ought to be doing, not trying to affect political outcomes,” the GOP lawmaker said.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 09/02/2022 – 17:40