Aug 23

Today’s News 23rd August 2022

  • Zelensky Says Russia's Mass Trial Of Captured Mariupol Fighters Will Make Peace Talks "Impossible"
    Zelensky Says Russia’s Mass Trial Of Captured Mariupol Fighters Will Make Peace Talks “Impossible”

    It’s obvious at this point that Ukraine’s military is seeking to expand strikes inside Russian-controlled Crimea, which this month has become an unprecedented first following a brutal, grinding more than half-year of war. Zelensky has called for its “liberation” – but if this weren’t enough to ensure that the conflict will continue to burn for at least the near to medium-term future (the war is possibly set to endure for years, according to the predictions of some US defense officials), Zelensky’s latest remarks on Monday suggest that any potential ceasefire negotiations aren’t even so much as anywhere on the horizon. 

    Zelensky called the idea of negotiations with Moscow “impossible” if Russia moves forward with plans for a mass trial of captured Mariupol defenders. “If this despicable show trial takes place, if our people are brought into this scenery in violation of all agreements, all international rules, if there is abuse … this will be the line beyond which any negotiations are impossible,” Zelensky said Monday. 

    “Russia will cut itself off from the negotiations,” he stressed. “There will be no more conversations. Our state has said everything.” Russia too has of late been expressing a similar position of being closed to talks, blaming Kiev and its Western backers, and President Putin is expected to dig in his heals further especially after the recent Crimea attacks as well as the car-bombing of Alexander Dugin’s daughter Darya on Saturday night.

    Via Reuters: A bus carrying members of the Ukrainian armed forces, who surrendered to Russian forces at the besieged Azovstal steel mill.

    In the comments he confirmed he is in ongoing conversation with United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres, French President Emmanuel Macron and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan over what Ukraine is dismissing as a show trial, saying that he expects the UN to issue clear condemnation. 

    “Everyone understands everything,” Zelensky said. “They understand what the occupiers are doing and what it threatens,” he added of international powers. “And they understand that Ukraine will not tolerate this. It will not tolerate tormenting of people about whom only one thing can be said: they are heroes of their homeland, they defended the freedom of their people from invaders on their land.”

    Russian foreign ministry officials have meanwhile complained separately that it’s the UN itself largely to blame for lack of any diplomatic process towards a negotiated settlement to the war:

    Gennady Gatilov, Russia’s permanent representative to the UN in Geneva, told the Financial Times that the UN should be playing a bigger role in attempts to end the conflict and accused the US and other Nato countries of pressing Ukraine to walk away from negotiations.

    There would be no direct talks between Putin and Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, he said. “Now, I do not see any possibility for diplomatic contacts,” Gatilov said. “And the more the conflict goes on, the more difficult it will be to have a diplomatic solution.”

    As for the hundreds of Ukrainian fighters who spent literally months holed up in the cavernous Azovstal steal plant while under siege by numerically superior Russian forces, Kremlin authorities have said they mostly make up the neo-Nazi Azov battalion. Earlier Russian media reports additionally alleged that some foreign fighters may have been in their midst as well. 

    Ukraine officials and pundits are livid over the planned optics of the trial…

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    Already, some foreign fighters, including UK nationals, were in months past sentenced to death by a local pro-Russian Donetsk court. It’s entirely possible and even likely that the captured Azov members will be issued the same sentence. Without doubt, Moscow will seek to “send a message” with this trial. Russian forces have accused Azov battalion of being genocidal and of committing ‘terrorism’ against civilians. 

    The trial is also sure to capture global headlines and likely elicit UN condemnation, also given that – as The Hill reports – “Ukraine’s military intelligence arm warned on Friday in a Telegram post that Russia has been remodeling the Mariupol Chamber Philharmonic and installing iron cages in the building for a trial on Wednesday, which marks Ukraine’s independence day and six months since the war began.”

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/23/2022 – 02:45

  • World Economic Forum Suggests There Are "Solid, Rational" Reasons To Microchip Kids
    World Economic Forum Suggests There Are “Solid, Rational” Reasons To Microchip Kids

    Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Summit News,

    Not doing their Bond villain reputation status any favors, the World Economic Forum published an article suggesting it would be a “solid, rational” move for children to be implanted with microchips.

    Yes, really.

    The idea is promoted in a blog post on the Davos elite’s website which discusses the future of augmented reality and an “augmented society.”

    “As scary as chip implants may sound, they form part of a natural evolution that wearables once underwent. Hearing aids or glasses no longer carry a stigma,” the article argues, perhaps forgetting that glasses and hearing aids aren’t embedded inside the body, nor can they be controlled by outside forces.

    “They are accessories and are even considered a fashion item. Likewise, implants will evolve into a commodity,” writes scientist Kathleen Philips, suggesting that mainstream culture and influencers will be tapped to promote implantable chips as a trendy status symbol.

    The article pushes the notion that augmented humans are inevitable and that global elites need to establish a power monopoly over the technology in order to “ethically” regulate it.

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    The technology is in need of “the right support, vision, and audacity,” which of course will be provided by your technocratic overlords, the same people who are desperately trying to censor the Internet so they can’t be criticized.

    “The augmenting technology will help in all stages of life: children in a learning environment, professionals at work and ambitious senior citizens. There are many possibilities,” writes Philips.

    “Should you implant a tracking chip in your child?” asks the scientist, adding, “There are solid, rational reasons for it, like safety.”

    As we previously highlighted, World Economic Forum chief Klaus Schwab wrote in his book ‘The Great Reset’ that the fourth industrial revolution would “lead to a fusion of our physical, digital and biological identity,” which he clarifies is implantable microchips that can read your thoughts.

    During this year’s Davos meeting of global elitists, Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla explained to Schwab how soon there would be “ingestible pills” – a pill with a tiny microchip chip that would send a wireless signal to relevant authorities when the pharmaceutical has been consumed.

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    “Imagine the compliance,” said Bourla.

    “It wasn’t that long ago that those speculating on a future where this is happening would get dismissed as conspiracy theorists, but now the world elites’ most vocal outlet is predicting that chip implants will eventually become just a commodity,” writes Didi Rankovic.

    As we previously reported, an Australian primary school predicted “microchips in student’s brains” within 10 years before subsequently deleting the newsletter that contained the creepy prophecy.

    *  *  *

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    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/23/2022 – 02:00

  • Sanctuary City Mayors Cry 'Uncle', No More Migrants!
    Sanctuary City Mayors Cry ‘Uncle’, No More Migrants!

    Authored by Joe Guzzardi via ProgressivesForImmigrationReform.org,

    Sanctuary cities are once again in the headlines.

    But this time, sanctuary cities, the bane of immigration law enforcement advocates, have a different spin. Since five-time deported illegal immigrant Jose Inez Garcia-Zarate murdered Kate Steinle in July 2015 on Pier 14 in San Francisco, state and city governments have persisted in welcoming illegal aliens and protecting them from Immigration and Customs Enforcement. San Francisco is a sanctuary city in the sanctuary state of California.

    Despite a federal immigration detention request to hold Garcia-Zarate so immigration officials could take him into custody, San Francisco authorities freed the seven-time convicted felon just three months before he killed Steinle. Eventually, Garcia-Zarate was acquitted and sentenced to time served on an illegal firearms possession charge.

    Between January 2014 and September 2015, the Center for Immigration Studies reported that sanctuary jurisdictions rejected 17,000 ICE detainer requests – 17,000 individuals who should have been deported but remained to potentially pose criminal risk to U.S. citizens. Claiming that migrants are fleeing poverty and persecution, local leaders have been willing to spend their constituents’ taxpayer dollars on affirmative benefits for the newly arrived illegal immigrants.

    Suddenly, however, with President Biden and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas opening the Southwest border to foreign nationals from 150 countries and clandestinely flying them to faraway cities, attitudes are less welcoming. New York Mayor Eric Adams said that busing migrants from Texas to mid-town Manhattan, as Gov. Gregg Abbott has done, is “cruel.” About 4,000 unlawfully present migrants have entered New York’s shelter facilities since May, an ”unprecedented surge,” said Adams, who has unsuccessfully called on the federal government to intervene.

    Washington, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser has made the same complaints as Adams, labeling the migrant flood “critical,” issuing identical rejected pleas for federal intervention. Since April, Gov. Abbott has sent more than 6,800 illegal immigrants to Washington. Bowser has begged for the National Guard to intervene “to help prevent a prolonged humanitarian crisis in our nation’s capital resulting from the daily arrival of migrants in need of assistance.” McAllen, Texas, Mayor Javier Villalobos mocked Adams and Bowser. Villalobos said: “The city of McAllen was able to deal with thousands of immigrants a day; I think they can handle a few hundred.”

    Adams and Bowser should have known that pleading with the feds, especially Mayorkas, would be futile. At the January U.S. Conference of Mayors, Mayorkas tried to sell the assembled mayors on his new, mostly gutted ICE. But the attendees wanted to hear about border enforcement, a subject Mayorkas studiously avoided.

    While it may be overly optimistic to hope for a change now that prominent Democratic mayors are experiencing first-hand the fiscal burden and public safety risks that sanctuary policies create, a shift is in the wind.

    The mere existence of sanctuary cities is illegal. Local laws that protect illegal immigrants prevent routine cooperation among municipal, state and federal law enforcement agencies. President Obama’s Attorney General Loretta Lynch realized the importance of keeping law enforcement apprised about any individual’s immigration status. Lynch warned sanctuary cities that they would not receive Justice Department funding in the 2017 fiscal year if they did not comply with 8 USC Section 1373, which prohibits any agency from restraining “in any way” the exchange of information among federal, state and local agencies regarding foreign nationals’ immigration status. Despite saber-rattling from Lynch, and then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions, funding continued.

    With millions of border crossers already released into the U.S. interior, and millions more anticipated during Biden’s remaining two and a half years in office, sanctuary cities will come under increasing pressure to provide for their unlawfully present alien residents, an untenable situation for the already underfunded, overcrowded municipalities.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 23:40

  • US Border Agents Seize 1.6 Million Fentanyl Pills In Big-Rig, Destined For US Cities
    US Border Agents Seize 1.6 Million Fentanyl Pills In Big-Rig, Destined For US Cities

    Customs and Border Protection agents in Arizona seized a mind-numbing 1.57 million fentanyl pills and 114 pounds of cocaine hidden within secret compartments of a tractor-trailer.

    Port Director Michael W. Humphries tweeted a huge cache of drugs was discovered in an “18-Wheeler trailer floor compartment” on Saturday. The vehicle was attempting to cross into Arizona from Mexico at the Nogales Port of Entry when CBP agents stopped it for inspection. 

    This massive seizure disrupted the flow of dangerous amounts of fentanyl across US cities and likely saved many lives. There was no word if this seizure was a record-breaking bust. Earlier this summer, we noted that “unprecedented levels of fentanyl” are entering the country via the southern border. 

    Last week, Humphries tweeted, “colored fentanyl pills with the appearance of candy” were seized at the port of entry. The candy-like fentanyl pills are very troubling as children could mistake the drugs for candy during Halloween.

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    In another tweet, he noted that “250,000 fentanyl pills (some of which were different colors, similar to the appearance of candy)” were seized. 

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    The seizures come as deaths from synthetic opioids are skyrocketing, up more than 56% from 2019 to 2020, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 

    “More than 56,000 people died from overdoses involving synthetic opioids in 2020,” according to the CDC.

    Besides copious amounts of fentanyl pills being seized at one land port, a tractor-trailer filled with 150 migrants was stopped in Texas. 

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    The flow of drugs and migrants across the border into the US is a tremendous problem that the Biden administration chooses to ignore.

    Democrat mayors in New York City and Washington, DC have recently awakened to the reality of a border crisis after Texas Governor Greg Abbott shipped a caravan of migrants via busses to their respective metro areas. 

    President Biden’s ongoing humanitarian and national security crisis at the border worsens by the week, and no one in his administration has yet to take responsibility for the nightmare it has created. 

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 23:20

  • FDA Finally Approved An Alzheimer's Drug… But Everything Surrounding It Is Controversial
    FDA Finally Approved An Alzheimer’s Drug… But Everything Surrounding It Is Controversial

    Authored by Kelly Song via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Aduhelm is the brand name under which the Alzheimer’s drug Aducanumab is marketed. It is developed by the U.S. company Biogen. The drug is to be administered as an intra-venous infusion every four weeks.

    A vial and packaging for the drug Aduhelm is shown on June 7, 2021. (Biogen via AP)

    The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Aducanumab in June 2021, making it the first Alzheimer’s disease medication approved by the FDA since 2003. It is also the first ever approved Alzheimer’s drug targeting the presence of amyloid beta (a type of protein) plaques in the brain.

    However, almost everything about this drug is controversial, from the theory on which the drug is developed, to its clinical trials data, to the FDA approval itself. This article aims to distill the complicated information down to a few points, which might help patients make more informed decisions.

    Key Dates Surrounding the FDA Approval of Aducanumab

    July 2020: Biogen completes submission of aducanumab data (from previously discontinued clinical trials) to FDA.

    November 2020: FDA external advisory committee rejects aducanumab because the data failed to prove the drug’s efficacy in reducing cognitive decline in Alzheimer’s patients.

    June 2021: FDA grants accelerated approval for aducanumab for patients of all stages of Alzheimer’s disease, on the condition that Biogen conducts post-approval trials (phase 4 trials) to verify the efficacy of the drug.

    Biogen’s Troubled Clinical Trials

    Biogen started two practically identical phase 3 clinical trials in August 2015 to evaluate the safety and efficacy of different aducanumab doses in patients with early stage Alzheimer’s disease.

    But in March 2019, Biogen terminated the trials after an interim futility analysis, run by an independent data-monitoring committee, predicted that the trials were unlikely to meet their primary outcomes.

    Only seven months later, in a surprise press release, Biogen revoked its earlier decision citing that a new analysis with another three months of data produced positive results. The company stated, “The positive results of this new analysis were driven primarily by greater exposure to high dose aducanumab in the larger dataset as compared to data available at the time of the futility analysis.” In the same press release, Biogen announced its plan to apply for FDA approval, “based on discussions with the FDA, the Company plans to submit a Biologics License Application in early 2020.”

    FDA Granted Approval Despite Experts’ Disapproval

    It is routine operation for FDA to invite subject matter experts, who are “outside the government with minimal conflicts of interest” to form external advisory committees and give non-binding recommendations for FDA’s consideration. In November 2020, the Peripheral and Central Nervous System Drugs Advisory Committee voted almost unanimously against the approval of Aducanumab. Out of the 11 members in the committee, 10 voted against the approval and one was uncertain.

    Seven months later in June 2021, FDA granted accelerated approval to aducanumab as a treatment for patients of all stages of Alzheimer’s disease. According to FDA, accelerated approval “allows drugs for serious conditions that filled an unmet medical need to be approved based on a surrogate endpoint.” The “surrogate endpoint” for aducanumab was the reduction in the amyloid-beta plaques.

    Dr. Patrizia Cavazzoni, Director of FDA Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, wrote in a post-approval statement that the clinical trials data show a reduction in the amyloid-beta plaques, which “is expected to lead to a reduction in the clinical decline of this devastating form of dementia.” Cavazzoni also acknowledged that “the data included in the applicant’s submission were highly complex and left residual uncertainties regarding clinical benefit.”

    In other words, although Biogen’s clinical trials data failed to prove the drug can slow down cognitive decline in patients, it did show the reduction of amyloid-beta plaque. The FDA awarded speedy approval to the drug based on the assumption that reduction of amyloid-beta plaque “is expected to lead to” a slowdown in cognitive decline in Alzheimer’s patients.

    Along with the approval, FDA gave Biogen another opportunity to prove the assumption is true via post-approval trials (phase 4 trials), which is due by February 2030. That is to say, Aduhelm will have been on the market for nine years before proof of its efficacy is required. If the drug maker fails to show the clinical benefit nine years after the accelerated approval, FDA might remove the drug from the market.

    One more detail about the FDA approval is that the drug was initially approved to treat patients with all stages of Alzheimer’s disease. One month after the approval, the FDA limited its treatment to patients with early stage Alzheimer’s disease only.

    FDA Advisory Committee Members Resign

    Within the first week of the FDA approval, three members of the Peripheral and Central Nervous System Drugs Advisory Committee resigned. They were Dr. Aaron Kesselheim at Harvard Medical School, neurologists David Knopman of the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota and Joel Perlmutter of Washington University in St. Louis.

    In his resignation letter, Kesselheim called the FDA move “probably the worst drug approval decision in recent U.S. history.” Kesselheim also wrote on Tweeter, “Accelerated Approval is not supposed to be the backup that you use when your clinical trial data are not good enough for regular approval.”

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    Knopman and Perlmutter published a comment in Neurology in July 2021. They wrote, “the clinical benefit amounted to about 3 months’ worth of delay in decline over a year,” referring to the “positive results” in Biogen’s press release in October 2019. They stated, “Combining the results from the 2 trials found no statistically significant clinical benefit for high-dose aducanumab.”

    Side Effects and Safety Issues

    Brain swelling and brain bleeding are known to be possible side effects of Aduhelm. Biogen conducted two phase 3 studies prior to the FDA approval. The phase 3 studies started in August 2015, but Biogen pulled the plug on both studies three and a half years later, in March 2019. The decision was based on a futility analysis conducted by an independent data monitoring committee, which indicated the trials were unlikely to meet their primary endpoint upon completion. That is, the trials were unlikely to prove the drug’s efficacy in slowing cognitive decline in Alzheimer’s patients.

    The safety data from the terminated phase 3 trials were published in JAMA Neurology in November 2021.  The study focused on amyloid-related imaging abnormalities (ARIA), which can cause headache, confusion, dizziness, nausea, brain bleeding, and swelling.

    The data showed that 425 out of 1,029 patients, or 41 percent, who received the high dose of the drug—the dose that the FDA later approved—experienced either brain swelling or bleeding. Furthermore, 64 patients had to stop participating in the trials because of brain swelling or bleeding.

    In September 2021, months after approval, a 75-year-old woman, a clinical trial patient who lived in Canada, experienced brain swelling after receiving infusions of the drug and died a few days later.

    The Amyloid-beta Hypothesis

    The theory behind the Aduhelm and a slew of other experimental medications for Alzheimer’s disease is the hypothesis that the excessive amount of amyloid-beta plaque in the brain impairs the normal communication within the brain and thus causes cognitive decline.

    In fact, the disease is named after the German pathologist Alois Alzheimer, who discovered amyloid-beta plaque in the brain of a patient.

    But this hypothesis has not been proven and is by itself controversial.

    Three-Quarters of FDA Funding Is From Drug Makers

    The Project On Government Oversight (POGO) is a nonpartisan independent watchdog that investigates and exposes waste, corruption, abuse of power, and when the government fails to serve the public or silences those who report wrongdoing.

    A two-part investigative report by POGO details the fact that the FDA is in the pocket of the industry it regulates. The report says, “the agency, whose responsibilities include making sure that prescription drugs sold in the United States are safe and effective, receives almost three-quarters of its funding for that work from drug makers.”

    Part II of the report exposes the “voice” of the patients at FDA meetings is often funded by drug companies as well.

    European and Japanese Agencies Reject Aduhelm

    In October 2020, Biogen applied for market permit in Europe. In December 2021, six months after FDA’s accelerated approval of Aduhelm, the European Medicines Agency rejected Biogen’s application to market Aduhelm in Europe.

    The EMA considered “the benefits of Aduhelm did not outweigh its risks.” First, the clinical trial results “were conflicting and did not convincingly show that Aduhelm was effective at treating adults with early-stage Alzheimer’s disease.” Additionally, brain scans of some clinical trial patients suggest swelling or bleeding in the brain, which is a significant safety concern.

    In the same month, Japan’s Committee on New Drugs also rejected Biogen’s application and requested more data to prove the drug’s efficacy.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 23:00

  • Just How Cooked Is The Official Jobs Data: PwC Finds More Than Half Of US Companies Are Laying Off Workers
    Just How Cooked Is The Official Jobs Data: PwC Finds More Than Half Of US Companies Are Laying Off Workers

    Nearly three months ago, when tabulating real-time mass layoffs data…

    … Piper Sandler chief economist Nancy Lazar concluded that “post-covid rightsizing means that lots more layoffs are coming” and added that “many companies overhired and overpaid during the Covid crisis.”

    Since then, it’s only gotten worse for those who track corporate layoff announcements, such as the following:

    • #1 Ultratec Inc. says that it will be laying off more than 600 workers.
    • #2 Electric truck maker Rivian will be laying off approximately 840 workers.
    • #3 7-Eleven has announced that it will be eliminating 880 corporate jobs.
    • #4 Shopify is laying off about 1,000 people.
    • #5 Vimeo says that it will be eliminating 6 percent of its current workforce.
    • #6 Redfin will be reducing the size of its workforce by 8 percent.
    • #7 Compass will be reducing the size of its workforce by 10 percent.
    • #8 RE/MAX will be reducing the size of its workforce by 17 percent.
    • #9 Robinhood will be reducing the size of its workforce by 23 percent.
    • #10 It is being reported that Ford “is preparing to cut as many as 8,000 jobs in the coming weeks”.
    • #11 Geico has closed every single one of their offices in the state of California, and that will result in vast numbers of workers losing their jobs.
    • #12 Walmart is eliminating about 200 corporate jobs as it contends with rising costs, bloated inventories and weakening demand for general merchandise.

    … and yet while initial jobless claims have indeed moved notably higher in recent months, the Bureau of Labor Statistics stubbornly refuses to report the true state of the US labor market, where despite continued softness in the Household Survey where no new jobs have been added since March, the far more politicized Establishment survey – which, after all, is what the Biden administration points toward as the only silver cloud in an otherwise recessionary and hyperinflating economy – has continued to show remarkable resilience and growth in recent months. So much so, that the differential between the Household and Establishment surveys has grown to a record 1.8 million jobs since March.

    And while one possible explanation for this bizarre divergence is the record surge in multiple jobholders who now hold both a primary and secondary full-time job…

    … even as full and part-time job gains have slumped…

    … the truth is that there is no comprehensive explanation for the variation in data. Which, needless to say, is problematic because the “solid” jobs market is one of the very few things that is preventing the Fed from substantially easing back on its hawkish policies (now that peak inflation has clearly been reached… if only for the time being), and the Fed’s sharply higher rates are already wreaking havoc on the housing market not to mention various stock sectors that have also gotten walloped.

    But what if the BLS data is not merely “off” due to benign factors such as “residual seasonality” or a post-covid hangover? What if it is intentionally manipulated to make Biden’s economy appear stronger than it is for midterm election purposes even if it means distortions across the entire market?

    We bring up all these rhetorical questions because a new survey released by consultancy PwC confirms our previous observations about rampant mass layoffs in the US labor market, and suggests that the true state of the job market is far, far uglier than the alleged 528K job gain reported by the BLS in July would suggest.

    In the PwC survey released last Thursday, which last month polled more than 700 US executives and board members across a range of industries, half of respondents said they’re reducing headcount or plan to, and 52% have implemented hiring freezes. At the same time, more than four in ten are rescinding job offers, and a similar amount are reducing or eliminating the sign-on bonuses that had become common to attract talent in a tight job market.

    At the same time, though, about two-thirds of firms are boosting pay – for those who keep their jobs – or expanding “mental-health benefits”, because we now live in a liberal dystopia where a growing number of workers are batshit insane.

    The findings, as even Bloomberg concludes, illustrate the contradictory nature of today’s labor market, where skilled workers can still largely name their terms amid talent shortages (in high demand sectors like line cooks and bartenders), even as companies look to let people go elsewhere, particularly in hard-hit industries like technology and real estate.

    “Firms are playing offense and defense with their talent strategies,” said Bhushan Sethi, joint global leader of PwC’s people and organization practice, noting that employers have to weigh reputational damage and employee morale when planning layoffs. “People have long memories, and social media plays a much bigger role now.”

    Of course, reputational damage won’t matter if a company is facing bankruptcy damage by having far too many workers and not enough cash flow.

    One big reason for the ongoing crunch in the job market is the treatment of “work from home” – having become a staple during the Scamdemic courtesy of overpaid charlatans such as Anthony Fauci, corporations are increasingly seeking a return to the “old normal” which however is proving to be quite a challenge. As a result, the PwC survey found “contradictions” in companies’ approaches to remote work. While 70% of those surveyed said they’re expanding permanent remote-work options for roles that allow it, 61% said they’re requiring employees to be in the office or job site more often.

    To be sure, some organizations could be doing both of those things at once: Roles that don’t require much in-person collaboration could go remote for good, while other staffers could be required to get back to their desks a few times a week. September is shaping up to be a line in the sand for many companies’ return-to-office plans, even though previous so-called RTO deadlines came and went.

    One thing is certain: the coming labor shock will have dire and wide-raning consequences on the broader office market: with fewer employees in offices, organizations don’t need as many far-flung locations. As such, more than one in five respondents told PwC that they plan to decrease their investment in real estate, making it the most common area of cutbacks, and yes, fewer employees.

    As for the divergence between the rosy official government labor “data” and the dire jobs picture painted by mass-terminating corporations on the ground, we are confident that the delta between the two data sets will promptly and magically resolve itself… right after the midterm elections.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 22:40

  • Fence Surrounding Biden's Delaware Beach House Costs About $500,000; Records Show
    Fence Surrounding Biden’s Delaware Beach House Costs About $500,000; Records Show

    Authored by Bill Pan via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    The price tag of a taxpayer-funded project to build a barrier around President Joe Biden’s Delaware beach house has grown to nearly $500,000, federal spending records suggest.

    In September 2021, the Homeland Security Department paid $456,548 to Delaware-based construction company Turnstone Holdings for the purchase and installation of “security fencing” surrounding the president’s Rehoboth Beach property, according to USAspending.gov, an online database operated by the Treasury Department.

    US President Joe Biden plays with his new dog Commander at Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, on Dec, 28, 2021. (Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images)

    The database entry shows two additional payments since then. One bill of $6,844 was paid in late November 2021 to cover expenses resulting from extra “gravel pads” and “crane services.” This was followed by another $26,933 bill in June, described as simply “to add funds to current project.”

    The overall cost of the fence now stands at $490,324. Although the project was originally expected to be completed by the end of 2021, its “potential end date” has been pushed back to June 6, 2023, marking a delay of more than 18 months.

    The exact reason for the setbacks remains unclear. The Epoch Times has reached out to the Homeland Security Department, listed as the main awarding agency and funding office for the contract, for further information.

    Amid a record influx of illegal crossings at the U.S.-Mexico border, the costly presidential residence fence has drawn mockery from critics of the president’s border policy.

    “So walls work at Joe Biden’s beach house but not the Southern border?” Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) wrote on Twitter.

    “You’re building $500,000 fence around your perimeter, and I don’t regret you for that—you’re the president, you deserve the security,” Virginia Lt. Gov. Winsome Sears, a Republican, said on Sunday in an interview with Fox News. “But you can’t have a fence and the rest of us don’t.”

    “People at the border need a fence,” she added.

    According to data released by the Biden administration, the number of apprehensions at the nation’s southern border is reaching the 2 million benchmark for the first time in history.

    In July, Border Patrol reported 181,552 arrests of individuals who tried to illegally cross the U.S.-Mexico border, a 5.6 percent drop from the 192,418 reported in June. With just two months before the fiscal year 2022 wraps up, the agency has already made more than 1.81 million arrests, beating fiscal year 2021’s record of 1.66 million.

    In the border town of Yuma, Arizona, the state is spending $6 million to fill a quarter-mile gap in the border barrier with shipping containers. Those 8,800-pound, 40-by-9-foot containers will be topped with razor wire once tractor-trailers move them into position.

    Tim Roemer, Arizona’s director of Homeland Security, told Phoenix radio station KTAR-FM that his state couldn’t wait any longer.

    “It’s about time they supported our border state, local law enforcement and to do something about the humanitarian crisis,” Tim said.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 22:20

  • As Singapore 'Allows' Gay Sex, Here's The Legal Status Of Homosexuality Worldwide
    As Singapore ‘Allows’ Gay Sex, Here’s The Legal Status Of Homosexuality Worldwide

    Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong announced in his annual “National Day Rally” speech on Sunday that he would lift a colonial-era ban on sex between men in the city state. As the country has become more accepting of homosexuality, Loong said that overturning the law was the “right thing to do”.

    However, Loong also said his country will amend its constitution to ensure the existing definition of marriage cannot be challenged in court.

    LGBT groups applauded Singapore’s repeal of its colonial-era penal code that criminalizes sex between men, but they expressed concern over the constitutional amendment, arguing that it would help perpetuate discrimination, Reuters reported.

    Despite its economic prowess and increasingly cosmopolitan lifestyles, Singapore has held on to conservative politics and strict penal codes. The country remains among the practitioners of the death penalty, another draconian law that has drawn criticism in the country.

    However, as Statista’s Katharina Buchholz notes, while Singaporean laws are changing, homosexuality remains punishable with imprisonment in other Asian nations, namely in Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Myanmar and neighboring Malaysia. In February of 2021, small Himalayan nation Bhutan had been the latest on the continent to abolish a ban on homosexuality .

    Infographic: The Legal Status Of Homosexuality Worldwide | Statista

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    According to Equaldex, Africa, the Middle East and Persia meanwhile are the regions where laws against homosexuality are still the most widespread.

    In 2022, homosexuality is still punishable by death in several countries and remains illegal in some form in a total of 69 nations. Especially in Africa, both a tightening and a relaxing of relevant laws are happening side by side. Between 2019 and 2021, Gabon and Botswana legalized homosexuality, while Sudan and Uganda made it punishable by life in prison.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 22:00

  • Millions Of iPhone Users Warned By Federal Agency To Change Settings Immediately
    Millions Of iPhone Users Warned By Federal Agency To Change Settings Immediately

    Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Apple Inc. and a top U.S. cybersecurity agency are urging iPhone, iPad, and Macbook users and administrators to update their iOS software amid recently discovered security vulnerabilities.

    “Apple has released security updates to address vulnerabilities in macOS Monterey, iOS and iPadOS, and Safari. An attacker could exploit one of these vulnerabilities to take control of an affected device,” the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) said in a statement on Aug. 18.

    An Israeli woman uses her iPhone in front of the building housing the Israeli NSO group, in Herzliya, near Tel Aviv, Israel, on Aug. 28, 2016. (Jack Guez/AFP via Getty Images)

    Users and administrators are urged to review Apple’s security updates page and apply the updates—MacOS Monterey 12.5.1, iOS 15.6.1, iPadOS 15.6.1, or Safari 15.6.1—as soon as possible.

    Apple released two security reports about the issue on Wednesday, although they didn’t receive wide attention outside of tech publications.

    Apple’s explanation of the vulnerability means a hacker could get “full admin access” to the device.

    That would allow intruders to impersonate the device’s owner and subsequently run any software in their name, said Rachel Tobac, CEO of SocialProof Security, in an interview with The Associated Press.

    Security experts have advised users to update affected devices—the iPhone6S and later models; several models of the iPad, including the 5th generation and later, all iPad Pro models and the iPad Air 2; and Mac computers running MacOS Monterey. The flaw also affects some iPod models.

    Commercial spyware companies such as Israel’s NSO Group are known for identifying and taking advantage of such flaws, exploiting them in malware that surreptitiously infects targets’ smartphones, siphons their contents, and surveils the targets in real-time.

    NSO Group has been blacklisted by the U.S. Commerce Department. Its spyware is known to have been used in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America against journalists, dissidents, and human rights activists.

    “The flaws were found in the kernel, a program at the core of the OS (CVE-2022-32894) and WebKit, the engine that powers the Safari web browser (CVE-2022-32893). Both flaws allow hackers to remotely execute malicious code on your iPhone, iPad, or Mac and potentially take over your device,” according to Forbes tech security writer Gordon Kelly.

    How to Update

    To update the software on an iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch, go to the Settings section. From there, tap General before tapping Software Update.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 21:40

  • China Extends Power Cuts On Menacing Drought As Lithium, Metals, Solar, And Rice At Risk
    China Extends Power Cuts On Menacing Drought As Lithium, Metals, Solar, And Rice At Risk

    Sichuan’s worst drought in over half a century forced the Chinese province to extend power cuts for industrial plants. Power rationings are essential to ease electricity demand due to a menacing heatwave and limited rainfall that is driving down hydropower generation while cooling demand skyrockets — the combination is dangerous in terms of grid stability and is primarily why power cuts were prolonged. 

    Morgan Stanley analyst Simon Lee told clients Sunday that the provinces with 84 million people and a key manufacturing hub for semiconductor and solar panels faced “the hottest temperatures and the worst drought of the past 60 years.” 

    Sichuan heavily relies on hydropower generation for 82% of its power needs. About half of the renewable energy source has been slashed because rainfall along the Yangtze River since July has been 45% below average, the lowest since 1961. Falling hydropower generation comes as electricity demand in the province jumped 65 gigawatts, nearly a quarter higher than last year. 

    Goldman Sachs’ Trina Chen wrote power curtailments pose the most significant risk to rice supplies, followed by aluminum and battery materials. 

    Bloomberg outlines the largest impacts of the heatwave and power rationings on an industrial basis. 

    Lithium & Batteries

    Sichuan produces more than a fifth of China’s lithium, according to BloombergNEF, making it one of the industries most exposed to the province’s power cuts. Top global battery producer Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., which has its second-biggest production base in Sichuan, has already halted production there. 

    Goldman said the power curbs could cost about 5% of China’s monthly output for lithium chemicals, but flagged a potentially bigger impact on lithium hydroxide and so-called “LFP” cathode used in batteries. But it also said EV-related sectors will probably get priority when industries are allowed to ramp up again.

    The Sichuan disruptions add fuel to lithium’s blistering rally in the past year. The price of lithium carbonate reached its highest since April by the end of last week, and isn’t far from a new record.

    Aluminum & Copper

    Power-intensive aluminum smelters are often at high risk when governments want to cut electricity use. Goldman says some 360,00 tons of annualized aluminum capacity has been closed, with a further 300,000 tons at risk — adding up to about 1.5% of China’s capacity. While Sichuan is a notable aluminum producer, it lags far behind top provinces Shandong and Xinjiang. And neighboring Yunnan — a major source of new output — hasn’t been hit by weather disruptions.

    Earlier in August, one of China’s biggest copper producers based in Anhui province cut output as local authorities ordered power curbs.

    Solar Sector

    About 15% of polysilicon used in solar panels comes from Sichuan, and prices for the material were already at a decade-high on strong demand for clean energy. The extension of the electricity curbs will reduce supply and likely offer more support to prices of both polysilicon and lithium, Daiwa Capital Markets wrote in a note.

    Jinko Solar Co., one of the world’s largest solar module manufacturers, said two of its plants in Sichuan have been affected by the power shortage, and said it was unclear when the units could return to full capacity. At least two polysilicon plants — run by GCL Technology Holdings Co. and Tongwei Co. — face production interruptions, the China Silicon Industry Association said last week. 

    Rice

    The six areas suffering drought — Sichuan, Chongqing, Hubei, Henan, Jiangxi and Anhui — accounted for almost half of China’s rice output in 2021, Goldman wrote in a note. China’s agriculture ministry said over the weekend that high temperatures and unusually low rains since July have posed “a severe challenge” to fall grain production.

    The ministry has asked local authorities to strengthen capital and resources investment to combat the drought, and properly allocate drought-resistant equipment and seeds. In Henan province, more than 15 million mu (1 million hectares) of crops have been affected, according to a CCTV report. 

    Diesel

    There’s also a demand boost for some sectors. Diesel purchasing is on the rise in Sichuan as industries seek alternative fuels. Local suppliers of diesel generators have already sold out after electricity rationing spurred some business owners to find alternative power supplies, industry consultant OilChem said in an online note. Some industrial users were loading diesel into barrels from retail stations, and demand has risen by up to 6%, it said.

    The ongoing drought and power curtailments across a large swath of southern China compound economic woes for an economy already decelerating at an alarming pace, forcing the country’s central bank to cut its key interest rates last week. 

    Capital Economics believes more policy support is ahead, yet “it will probably be too late too little to prevent output from stagnating this year.” 

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 21:20

  • LA Public Health Department Faces Backlash After Offering COVID-19 Test To Animals, Including Seals
    LA Public Health Department Faces Backlash After Offering COVID-19 Test To Animals, Including Seals

    Authored by Katabella Roberts via The Epoch Times,

    The Los Angeles Public Health Department is facing growing criticism over its decision to offer free COVID-19 testing for animals, despite there being no positive cases reported among animals in the area.

    LA Public Health announced the initiative on Aug. 20 and said it has received funding from the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to monitor COVID-19 in animals in Los Angeles County.

    “This project will help us to learn more about COVID-19 from a One Health perspective, meaning that we can learn more about the significance of COVID-19 in human, animal, and environmental relationships,” the public health body said.

    “Some of the funds will support local testing of animals for SARS-CoV-2. We will partner with and offer free testing to various animal care facilities and agencies throughout LA County. Our goal is to test many different species of animals including wildlife (deer, bats, raccoons), pets (dogs, cats, hamsters, pocket pets), marine mammals (seals), and more,” LA Public Health stated.

    The department noted that pet owners may be eligible to get their furry friends tested if they were exposed to a human or animal with COVID-19 or has symptoms of COVID-19.

    The tests are also eligible for “pocket pets” such as “fancy mice/rats, hamsters, hedgehogs” and more that have contact with people, even if none of those people have tested positive for COVID-19 recently.

    Out of the 177 animals that have been tested in Los Angeles County so far, including dogs, cats, bats, raccoons, skunks, rats, and sea lions, none have tested positive for COVID-19 as of Aug. 18.

    The new program has been heavily criticized on social media, with one Twitter user complaining about taxpayer funds being “frivolously spent,” while another stated that free testing “means your tax dollars.”

    “How many ways can they waste money?” one individual wrote of LA Public Health, while another joked that unicorns would be the next animals to be tested by the health body.

    Elsewhere, another Twitter user who claimed to work in veterinary medicine said she knew “nothing about this [expletive] …animals don’t get Covid-19.”

    According to the CDC, “there is no evidence that animals play a significant role in spreading SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, to people,” although there have been a limited number of reports of the virus being spread to people from infected mammalian animals during close contact. The public health agency noted that this is rare, though.

    The agency advised that people with suspected or confirmed cases of COVID-19 should avoid contact with animals, including pets, livestock, and wildlife, pointing to documented cases of animals becoming infected with the virus after contact with people with COVID-19.

    “We don’t yet know all of the animals that can get infected,” the CDC noted.

    “There is a possibility that the virus could infect animals, mutate, and a new strain could spread back to people and then among people (called spillback),” the agency added.

    “More studies and surveillance are needed to track variants and mutations and to understand how SARS-CoV-2 spreads between people and animals.”

    According to a COVID-19 data tracking dashboard for cases in animals set up by the University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna in collaboration with the Wildlife Conservation Society, there have been 717 “SARS-CoV-2 animal events” around the world since February 2020.

    An “event” is considered by the university and society as “when one single case or several epidemiologically related cases were identified by the presence of viral RNA (proof of infection) and/or antibodies (proof of exposure) in an animal.”

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 21:00

  • Russia To Raise Dugina Assassination At Emergency UN Meeting On Tuesday
    Russia To Raise Dugina Assassination At Emergency UN Meeting On Tuesday

    Russia plans to raise the assassination of Darya Dugina at a United Nations Security Council (UNSC) emergency meeting set for Tuesday. The session is expected to focus on the ongoing crisis and standoff at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station, which has come under fresh shelling that damaged transformers at the site, which Ukraine has blamed on Russia. There’s growing alarm of a ‘Chernobyl-like’ catastrophic event. 

    Russia’s deputy ambassador to the UN, Dmitry Polyanskiy, confirmed that Russia is seeking the UNSC emergency session, but said Russia will also highlight and condemn this latest in a series of “Ukrainian provocations” targeting civilians on Russian territory – after on Monday the FSB (Federal Security Service) claimed to have identified a Ukrainian operative behind the Dugin car bombing.

    “We requested an urgent meeting on Zaporozhye, where Ukrainian provocations do not stop. Of course, we will talk about this episode [the murder of Daria Dugina],” Nebenzia said, as cited in Russian media sources. “This demonstrates the nature of the Ukrainian state, because the connection between their saboteurs and this murder is obvious, which, in fact, has already been disclosed by the FSB.”

    UNSC file image

    Interestingly, US mainstream media pundits are already widely amplifying a theory that says Dugina’s killing was essentially an “inside job”. But it remains that there’s little in the way of hard proof for any of the currently competing claims and counterclaims:

    FRANCE 24’s Russia correspondent Nick Holdsworth examines the FSB’s claim that the attack on Darya Dugina was carried out by a Ukrainian woman identified as Natalia Vovk.

    “The FSB hasn’t presented any physical proof,” of its claims, explains Holdsworth. “This is an unusually quick result.”

    Addressing Russian claims that the Ukrainian secret services were responsible for the car bombing,  Holdsworth says the attack “doesn’t really carry the modus operandi of Ukrainian special services”, noting that the Ukrainians are concentrating on cutting Russian supply lines in the Crimea and eastern Ukraine.

    As for Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, the situation remains highly dangerous. Starting two days ago, President Putin signaled support for a UN-IAEA team to be dispatched to inspect the complex at a moment both warring sides have blamed the other for strikes on the plan.

    Yet, so far no concrete action has been taken, though likely there are ongoing negotiations between Russia and the UN monitoring organization. Some 500 Russian troops have occupied it since March.

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

    The White House in unison with Western allies have since Sunday called on–

    …“the need to avoid military operations near the plant” and the importance of a visit by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) “as soon as feasible to ascertain the state of safety systems.”

    We can expect full fireworks of hardline accusations to fly at Tuesday’s UNSC emergency session, also with stepped up Ukrainian attacks on Crimea looming large in the background, as well as the ongoing huge US-supplied arms flow into the conflict. But there are high hopes that sending an IAEA team to Zaporizhzhia could materialize as a result of the UNSC emergency session. 

    Further, a Monday evening report in Reuters cites US intelligence alleging that Russia is preparing major strikes on Ukraine’s infrastructure in the “coming days”.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 20:40

  • Only 13% Of Americans Believe Democrats' $369 Billion Will Reduce Inflation: Poll
    Only 13% Of Americans Believe Democrats’ $369 Billion Will Reduce Inflation: Poll

    Authored by Katabella Roberts via The Epoch Times,

    Just a small number of Americans believe that the Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) will help lower inflation across the country, according to a new poll from The Economist/YouGov.

    The survey was conducted Aug. 13–16, 2022, among 1,500 U.S. citizens age 18 and over and has a margin error of 2.9 percentage points adjusted for weighting 3 percentage points for registered voters.

    The survey asked respondents whether they believe the $369 billion earmarked for climate and energy expenditures in the bill will increase or decrease inflation. Only 13 percent said they believe it will decrease inflation, and 26 percent said they are not sure.

    A total of 38 percent of respondents said they believe it will increase inflation, while 22 percent said they think it will have no impact. In July, the annual inflation rate was at 8.5 percent.

    Among Democrats, 23 percent said they believe it will decrease inflation, with 8 percent of Republicans in agreement.

    Most Republicans, 68 percent, said the bill will increase inflation, along with 40 percent of independents and 17 percent of Democrats.

    President Joe Biden signed the IRA into law on Aug. 16. Effectively a slimmed-down version of Biden’s $2.2 trillion “Build Back Better” bill, Democratic lawmakers claim it will help lower health care and energy costs for millions of Americans.

    Cost of Living Could Get Worse

    House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said the bill will save working families an average of $1,000 a year in lower energy bills, while reducing the government’s budget deficit by $300 billion over the next decade.

    Despite those promises, 41 percent of those polled by The Economist/YouGov said that they believe inflation will be at a higher rate within six months, while 23 percent said they believe inflation will be at the same rate.

    Inflation is now costing U.S. households an extra $717 a month, according to a new analysis from the Joint Economic Committee Republicans.

    A previous poll by The Economist/YouGov found that 95 percent of Americans said they’re being affected by the soaring cost of living, which has led to higher costs for everything from food to gas.

    The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) concluded in early August (pdf) that enacting the IRA would have a “negligible” impact on inflation in 2022, while in 2023, inflation would likely either increase or decrease by just 0.1 percentage points.

    Experts have also warned that the IRA could worsen the situation for Americans, who could end up forking out even more for electricity and gasoline thanks to a number of taxes in the bill that could ultimately be passed on to consumers.

    Fears are also mounting that the bill, which grants nearly $80 billion in funding to the Internal Revenue Service, including $45.6 billion for “enforcement,” may see the agency go after middle-income Americans and small businesses with increased scrutiny and audits. The Democrats have vehemently denied this.

    An analysis by the CBO found that audits of taxpayers making under $400,000 annually will account for about $20 billion in revenue for the IRA, Fox Business reported.

    The Biden administration has declared that the bill, which was not supported by any Republicans in the House or Senate, is a “win for the American people.”

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 20:20

  • CNN Is Being Gutted Because Leftist Media Is Not As Appealing As They Fantasize
    CNN Is Being Gutted Because Leftist Media Is Not As Appealing As They Fantasize

    One thing about leftist culture that never ceases to amaze is their ability to take a failure and pretend that it was actually a success.  This attitude is perhaps an extension of their penchant for propaganda – They lie so much about everything that they end up falling victim to their own disinformation.  They tell their enemies they are winning even when they are losing, and then they actually start to believe it themselves.  

    It’s a bit like the old rule for drug dealers – Everything falls apart when you start smoking the drugs you sell.  

    For CNN and outlets like them, the problem is that you can’t run from reality forever.  If no one wants to watch your content then you can’t force them to do so.  Leftists wish they could use force, but they can’t, so instead they try to use gaslighting and shame.  This has translated into the typical tactics we see today from the media, which include race baiting and accusations of bigotry, misogyny, homophobia, fascism, etc.  These tactics really took center stage from 2016 onward and they haven’t worked yet, but the political left continues to beat that dead horse in the hopes that it will one day win the Kentucky Derby.

    They NEED regular consumers to watch their content, but they look down their noses at regular consumers and see them as untouchable peasants.  So, they don’t make content for the peasant, they make content for themselves and their friends.  This is not a recipe for a successful media network.

    In a recent article on the CNN issue, Vox (a far-left outlet) remarked on Brian Stelter being fired and his show being shut down even though he still had three more years on a six-figure contract.   David Zaslav, an executive from Discovery,  has taken oversight of Warner Brothers and its properties and has been making extensive cuts to save money and streamline the bloated company.  Vox’s position really illustrates the deeper problem within leftist media:

    “Stelter, who reportedly made close to $1 million a year, was an easy cut: His show, along with his daily media newsletter, was a big deal in media circles…but not a huge draw for normals.”

    By using the term “normals” one might conclude that Vox sees themselves and and other journalists as “extraordinary” when compared to the rest of us.  Or, maybe they are just “abnormal” – It’s hard to say.  The statement is possibly a mistaken admission of how leftist journalists truly view the world, and their view is stunted.  They see their work as vital to the masses because their PEERS and Twitter buddies see it as vital to the masses.  But mainstream journalists are too far detached from the world and reality to make objective judgment calls.  They see themselves as the saviors of humanity, but no one else sees them that way.  

    The audience numbers talk.  The money talks.  It doesn’t matter how important you think you are – You don’t own the audience, the audience owns you.  

    CNN has been a consistent loser in terms of audience numbers and ratings; their ratings have plummeted while their profits continue to slump over the past few years.   The CNN+ project was supposed to draw in millions of viewers but only generated 150,000 subscribers, and of those subscribers only 10,000 were regular watchers. 

    In other words, CNN+ would have been crushed by average YouTuber numbers and their projections for at least 29 million “super fans” were absolutely incompetent.  This is why the project was shut down within weeks by David Zaslav – It was an embarrassment from the start, built on inflated delusions of grandeur.  

    And what is CNN really built on?  What has been the company’s foundation for years?  It’s only product has been anti-conservative agit-prop.  That’s it.  That’s all they have.  This might work financially if the extreme left was as prevalent as they pretend, but if we look at the numbers and the cash flow, they are actually a tiny portion of the population puffed up and screaming as loud as they can to appear big and formidable.  CNN is failing because there is an unsustainable audience for their product.

    Warner Bros. Discovery board member and media mogul John Malone stated in an interview with CNBC that he “would like to see CNN evolve back to the kind of journalism that it started with, and actually have journalists, which would be unique and refreshing.”  CNN was always leftist, but it’s true that the social justice cultism was not all that present until the past five years.  The problem is, they see the new cultism as integral to their model and more important than making money or keeping an audience, or even being objective.

    Brian Stelter wrote in his newsletter about Malone’s potential influence and examined it on his show. He said that Malone’s comments had “stoked fears that Discovery might stifle CNN journalists and steer away from calling out indecency and injustice.” In other words, Stelter believes that CNN’s mission is righteous, therefore their inability to bring in audiences and profits should be ignored.  But what is “indecency” to Brian Stelter?  What is “injustice” to the political left? 

    Is the truth indecent?  Because there have been many times when the leftist media has attacked people for telling the truth (see CNN’s treatment of Joe Rogan’s position on covid).  Do they really want “justice,” or do they want special treatment and extra privileges while pretending to be victims?  Do they want to be treated as successful even when they are failures?  

    A large number of Americans see this type of framework for media as fraudulent and agenda driven, and so we don’t watch CNN and platforms like them.  In their political zealotry they forgot to take into account the fact that elitism is isolating unless you have force to back it.  The only way most people would watch CNN is if there was a gun pointed at their heads, and even then some people would still refuse.  This is not the trademark of meaningful journalism, it is the trademark of a heavy-handed propaganda machine. 

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 20:00

  • Maté: In FBI Vs Trump, The People Lose
    Maté: In FBI Vs Trump, The People Lose

    Via Arron Maté’s Substack,

    For my money, the early beneficiary of the FBI’s espionage investigation of Donald Trump is Donald Trump.

    According to the Washington Post, “Trump has told advisers that in the nearly two years since leaving office, no issue had better galvanized Republican voters around him.”

    A Politico poll of Republican voters in the aftermath of the Mar-a-Lago raid gave Trump a 10-point boost over his closest possible primary rival, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. Trump’s ensuing fundraising campaign has done even better, quickly topping $1 million on at least two days, a jump of at least 700%.

    Over the long run, it is difficult to form a conclusive judgment on Trump’s potential culpability in the absence of any confirmed detail about both the contents of the documents that Trump allegedly mishandled, and the evidence to support the Justice Department’s suspicions. But if the last six years of routine Trump standoffs with the national security state are any guide, the walls are nowhere closer to closing in.

    Whatever your views on Trump, it is undeniable that the permanent military-intelligence bureaucracy in Washington does not see him as one of their own, and has gone to extraordinary lengths to target him when it sees fit. It is also undeniable that the national security state’s spats with Trump have distracted the public from vital issues that impact working people’s lives and the future of the planet. This includes, I have long argued, Trump’s most harmful policies as president, which were routinely overshadowed and even exacerbated by his standoffs with the “deep state.”  

    Accordingly, it is reasonable to expect that this latest “scandal” over the potential mishandling of classified documents will continue the trend that has defined the Trump era: an intra-elite, symbiotic feud that simultaneous boosts Trump among his base, and the national security state among his foes.

    Pundits and politicians are resoundingly confident that the FBI must have the goods on Trump to have taken the unprecedented step of searching the former president’s home. This argument can only be made by ignoring that the FBI and other intelligence agencies took far more unprecedented and consequential actions against Trump when he was president, on grounds that were not only baseless, but fraudulent.

    The FBI investigated Trump as a suspected Russian conspirator and asset – and not just once, but twice: first as a presidential candidate, and then months after he took office.

    To undertake this, they relied on the Hillary Clinton-funded Steele dossier’s conspiracy theories as source material; repeatedly lied to a FISA court; and, despite the full knowledge that they had come up empty, prolonged their investigation with media leaks and court filings that falsely suggested that a collusion “smoking gun” was within reach.

    Russiagate apologists like to argue that the FBI’s use of the Steele dossier was an aberration that does not taint the whole enterprise. In fact, there are ample grounds to believe that Steele’s fabrications played an even greater role than the FBI has acknowledged – including, as I have detailed, possibly triggering the Russia investigation to begin with. But even taking the FBI’s official predicate at face value, the probe was baseless from start to finish.

    *  *  *

    Keep reading with a 7-day free trial… Subscribe to Aaron Maté to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 19:40

  • Record Number Of Americans Are "Suffering", Surpassing 2008 Crisis Levels; Gallup Poll Finds
    Record Number Of Americans Are “Suffering”, Surpassing 2008 Crisis Levels; Gallup Poll Finds

    A plethora of data points show the consumer is absolutely miserable: real wages trend lower, cost of living skyrockets, the employment market softens, savings rate collapses, credit cards maxed out, and the US economy falls into the “technical definition” of recession. 

    Capturing the plunge in consumer sentiment (at record lows) is a new Gallup survey that reveals a record number of Americans are “suffering.”

    Gallup’s Life Evaluation Index measures the quality of life of Americans by asking respondents if they’re “thriving,” “struggling,” or “suffering.” The survey is between 0 to 10. Those who check four or below are classified as suffering; seven or higher is thriving. 

    The poll found that 5.6% of Americans rate their lives as “suffering,” the highest since the index’s inception in 2008. 

    The percentage of respondents classified as thriving fell to 51.2% in July from a record high of 59.2% in June 2021. The number of people thriving is at an 18-month low. The lowest reading of respondents thriving was 46.4%, which was only measured twice, the first in November 2008 and the second in the early covid months (April 2020). 

    For the last 16 consecutive months, consumers have been crushed by four-decade high inflation as it eats away wage gains. 

    Elevated suffering rates come as the $6 trillion-plus in covid stimulus funds from 2020 has cycled through the retail chain and out of people’s pockets. It’s gone, and the massive increase in economic activity triggered is also over. The hangover stage of the covid helicopter money period is materializing — the only suffering will only worsen from here until another round of stimmy checks is seen. 

    It’s time to exit the rat-race…

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

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 19:20

  • Inspector General: US Government Left More Than $7 Billion In Military Equipment To The Taliban
    Inspector General: US Government Left More Than $7 Billion In Military Equipment To The Taliban

    Authored by Jonathan Turley,

    Defense Department Inspector General has released its long-awaited report on what the Biden Administration left behind in Afghanistan.

    It is an unbelievable list of equipment left to one of the most violent groups in the world with a history of supporting terrorist organizations. I opposed the long war in Afghanistan, so I was not among those critical of Trump or Biden in pushing to leave the conflict. However, no one has ever explained why the Biden Administration left this equipment in Afghanistan as opposed to removing it or destroying it.

    While the collapse of the Afghan government was rapid in the final days, the government had many months to prepare for the scheduled withdrawal. Yet, it took no steps to remove or destroy this equipment. Instead, it elected to leave this arsenal intact to the Taliban.

    The ground vehicle inventory alone was worth about $4.12 billion.

    In addition, the U.S. military lost $923.3 million worth of military aircraft and $294.6 million in aircraft munitions.

    The Taliban was instantly made one of the best equipped militaries in the world due to this windfall gift by the Biden Administration.

    While the report says that “some” of the aircraft were “demilitarized and rendered inoperable during the evacuation,” most of this equipment was left ready-to-use, including 316,260 small arms, including sniper rifles, machine guns and grenade launchers, were left behind, amounting to $511.8 million.

    I do not understand how this clear and unimaginable blunder has gone unaddressed. No one was fired. There is not even any evidence of discipline of any kind. The Biden Administration decided to give the Taliban billions in weapons rather than destroy them. Yet, there seems little more than a shrug and a yawn from Congress and the press.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 19:00

  • "I Always Eat Red Meat. I'm Happy": As Demand For Higher-End Cuts Slides, Beef Prices Are Falling… For Now
    “I Always Eat Red Meat. I’m Happy”: As Demand For Higher-End Cuts Slides, Beef Prices Are Falling… For Now

    While one wouldn’t know it from looking at USDA data for the uncooked beef prices…

    … there are some good news for those seeking to upgrade – however briefly – from horse or cricket in these dystopic days: according to the WSJ, beef is finally getting cheaper, bringing some economic relief to U.S. consumers. Prices of beef, typically among the costliest grocery store purchases, are falling after more than a year of increases as consumer demand softens for some cuts.

    While demand has shrunk due to the recent record surge in prices, supplies are improving due to better staffing at meat plants, and supermarkets are offering more discounts on rib-eye, New York strip and other often-expensive products.

    For months, prices for food and consumer products have been rising across grocery aisles due to higher costs of transportation, ingredients and labor. Some of the biggest increases have been in the meat section, and shoppers have been buying cheaper cuts or switching to less expensive protein like chicken, pork, horse or cricket. But now that beef prices have plateaued, consumers are finding more deals and options, industry executives and analysts told the WSJ.

    Unlike the recent USDA data, retail beef prices fell 0.7% for the four-week period ended Aug. 7, compared with the same period a year ago, according to data from research firm Information Resources Inc. That decline came after beef prices fell 1% during the prior four-week period, which was the first monthly decline since June 2021. U.S. retail beef prices hadn’t fallen for two straight months in over a year and a half, though they remain at historically high levels.

    While the pace of U.S. inflation eased slightly in July from a four-decade high as gasoline costs fell from June levels, grocery prices continued their ascent and were up 1.3% in July compared with June, and the cost of eating out at restaurants also increased. But other prices dropped: prices for rib-eye and beef loin are down nearly 10% for the four weeks ended Aug. 7 compared with a year ago, while brisket decreased about 18%. On the other ends, ground beef prices—among the cheapest beef products and still in high demand—increased about 7% over the period, compared with a roughly 20% increase in January.

    “The cost of all the stuff is piling up and it’s starting to hit people’s pocketbooks,” said Carey Otwell, director of meat and seafood at Mitchell Grocery Corp. The Alabama-based grocer is selling less premium meat such as grass-fed beef. People continue to buy lower-priced cuts like ground beef, holding up prices for those products. Mitchell’s average cost of a case of beef declined about 13% over the past 12 weeks compared with the same period a year ago.

    Arkansas-based Tyson Foods, the biggest U.S. meat processor by sales, said the company’s own average sales price for beef was 1.2% lower over the three months ended July 2, as customers opted for cheaper cuts. The wholesale price of boxed beef shipped from meatpackers as of Aug. 13 is down about 15% from a year ago, according to the Agriculture Department.

    Howard Radziminsky, a retiree who lives in Scottsdale, Ariz., said he recently bought rib-eye for $5.97 a pound and New York strip steaks for $4.77 a pound. Radziminsky, who follows a protein-heavy diet and eats red meat five to six days a week, said he hadn’t seen rib-eye sell for under $6 a pound in a while.

    “Promotional prices have come back to where they were two years ago,” he said. “I always eat red meat. I’m happy.”

    Since the start of the pandemic, meatpacking companies such as Tyson Foods, JBS USA Holdings, National Beef Packing and Cargill have said they couldn’t process as many cattle as usual because their plants were short-staffed. That constrained supplies, they said, and pushed prices higher while demand stayed hot.

    But in recent days, some of the bottlenecks at processing plants that drove prices up over the past two years have eased, improving the U.S. beef supply, said Katelyn McCullock, senior agricultural economist at the Livestock Marketing Information Center.

    “We’re getting healthier from a labor perspective,” said Shane Miller, head of Tyson’s beef and pork unit, adding that higher wages and a variety of new benefits programs have helped staffing. “We’re running more volume to our plants.”

    That said, don’t expect plunging beef prices any time seen: a tight labor market and higher employee turnover and absenteeism rates than before the pandemic at meat plants are expected to keep processing capacity limited in the industry. Boxed beef prices remain roughly 30% above their five-year average, according to the USDA. At the same time, more cattle are being directed to processing plants as ranchers shrink the size of their herds because of persistent drought conditions in parts of the U.S., helping to improve the supply of beef in stores.

    Indeed, prices for some beef cuts may not stay down for long as the cattle supply tightens. U.S. beef production is expected to decline later in 2023, constraining the supply of cattle and ultimately raising the price of beef, according to USDA and agriculture executives.

    Tyson Chief Executive Donnie King said on a call with analysts this month that he expects the company to pay more for cattle going into 2023 and even 2024 as supply tightens.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 18:40

  • A New Epidemic Of Self-Silencing Is Plaguing America
    A New Epidemic Of Self-Silencing Is Plaguing America

    Authored by Rajan Laad via AmericanThinker.com,

    A new study by the Populace organization revealed the obvious: that Americans are “self-silencing” – people saying what they think others want to hear rather than what they truly feel.

    People often reshape their privately held views to conform to what they think their group believes, despite that assessment frequently being inaccurate.

    This causes the illusion of consensus.

    The following are two of the most significant revelations from the study:

    • Four times as many Democrats say Corporate CEOs should take a public stand on social issues (44%) than actually care (11%).

    • On Education, one in three Democrats think parents should have more influence over public school curriculum, however, only one in four dares to say it publicly.

    In the current climate, it is the left that is championing the idea of groupthink which they claim is the only ‘appropriate’ way of thinking.

    Under the guise of being woke, the left is ‘canceling’ dissenters and rendering them outcasts, often by inventing claims of bigotry. Wokeism that claims to emanate from empathy is merely a euphemism for totalitarianism.

    It is hence essential to revisit the principle of free expression which is the core tenet of Democracy.

    This includes the right to opine without repercussions i.e. the right to offend, insult, satirize, and ridicule.  The result is obscene, hateful, abhorrent, and shocking ideas may be expressed.

    But personal taste can never ever be the criteria for the expression of ideas.

    The reason being what is hateful to one may be compelling to another. What is bigoted to one may be a fresh perspective to another. What is obscene to one may be artful to another. What is lewd to one may be hilarious to another. What is blunt and blatant to one may be hard-hitting to another. What is repulsive to one can be riveting to another.  

    A dogmatist to one may be a maverick to another. A rabid right-winger to one is a voice of reason to another. A hateful bigot to one could be a revolutionary to another. A mad man to one could be a genius to another.

    A healthy exchange of ideas and relentless debates, not echo chambers, facilitates personal growth and in turn societal growth. It also causes unity as people begin to empathize with the opposing point of view and indeed the individual.

    Quite often, a solitary contrarian idea that is expressed begins like a flickering flame but ends up illuminating an entire people. If a society sticks to convention, it ceases to grow.

    What is troubling is that this practice of adhering to groupthink and self-silencing is spreading like an epidemic.

    The corporate world, the news media, the entertainment industry, and even educational institutes have all been silenced by the mob.

    Individuals from this mob have been cultivated from a very young age. The indoctrination that begins young is often irreversible. For this mob, being offended or calling others pejorative epithets is the equivalent of being virtuous. Hence, they function like puritans who are perpetually looking for heresy to condemn.

    Social media plays a huge part in the development of groupthink. Quite often PR firms use bots or dummy accounts to push their agenda, which gullible users presume to be the opinion of the majority. Frequently an individual or a firm is targeted for holding the ‘wrong’ ideas.

    The result is that some chose to self-silence.

    Most people want to live a simple life. They do not want to be ostracized or rendered unemployed and unemployable.

    Hence, they nod to the most ridiculous ideas to avoid being called anachronistic or bigoted. 

    Some hope they will be spared by appeasing the mob. They hope that by making slight compromises they can avoid being attacked. But cowardice only emboldens a mob; in time, major compromises are demanded, and soon everything you held dearly has melted into thin air.

    It is also essential to understand no individual, irrespective of how cautiously restrained they are, can always hold the mob-approved thoughts. It is only a matter of time before the mob turns on its appeasers.  It therefore makes sense to challenge the mob when they take their first step.

    The mob often claims to hold the right ideas and that the rest are ignorant or bigoted. If they are indeed on the right side, they should be eager to debate and vanquish their opponents. But they do the exact opposite: instead of engaging, they shut down their opponents. Despite their claims, they live in perpetual fear that fresh ideas may sway their supporters away.

    The mob always claims to be standing against fascism.  Perhaps they fail to see the irony that it was fascists who suppressed opposing views and Nazis that burned books that they considered dissenting.

    What is troubling is that government seems to be adopting these intimidatory tactics.

    Last year the Biden’s FBI said was investigating “a disturbing spike in harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence against school administrators, board members, teachers, and staff.”  

    The goal behind this announcement was to shut down critics of the undesirable occurrences within educational institutes.

    Early this year Homeland Security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas testified that the Department of Homeland Security had set up a Disinformation Governance Board to “work and to equip local communities, to identify individuals who could be descending into violence by reason of ideologies, hate, false narratives, or other disinformation and misinformation propagated on social media and other platforms.”  The board has been ‘paused’ now.

    The goal behind this board was to cause self-silencing.

    This revelation that Americans are self-silencing should come as no surprise.

    So, what impact does this self-silencing have on society?

    A deep resentment begins to brew as a result of the repression that is almost like a ticking timebomb that explodes one day.

    It is said that to destroy a society you first begin by killing ideas. An unexpressed idea is an equivalent of killing an idea.

    All the great modern inventions, discoveries, great works of art, and literature exist because someone, somewhere dared to think differently — but most importantly, dared to express this difference of opinion without fear.  If we had all stuck to consensus, we would probably be living in the Stone Age.

    Freedom of expression emanates from freedom of thought. If people are censoring themselves, democratic values are being compromised.

    The time to rise up against this sinister totalitarian cult is now, by being the change you want to see and expressing yourself freely.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 18:20

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Aug 22

Today’s News 22nd August 2022

  • Germany To Prioritize Coal Shipments Across Rail Network Over Passenger Trains Amid Worsening Energy Crisis
    Germany To Prioritize Coal Shipments Across Rail Network Over Passenger Trains Amid Worsening Energy Crisis

    The latest sign lawmakers in Europe’s industrial heartland are preparing for what could be a disastrous winter of reduced natural gas supplies from Russia and record high electricity prices is a new proposal to prioritize Germany’s rail network for coal shipments over passenger services, according to Bloomberg, citing local newspaper Welt am Sonntag. 

    Even though Germany has promised to eliminate coal-fired power generation in the coming years, the historic energy crisis has made it more dependent on coal than ever as Russian flows of NatGas slump ahead of winter. 

    Economy Minister Robert Habeck recently said increased reliance on coal is bitter but necessary. 

    And we must give our readers a spoiler alert: there’s no way Germany will eliminate coal as a power source by 2030. If anything, it will be more reliant on it than ever unless it extends the life of its nuclear power plants. 

    “Priority is normally given to passenger transport in Germany, and timetables are geared toward it. As a result, there’s a risk of chaos on the rails from making the change,” Bloomberg said, citing the draft. 

    There’s a strong possibility the draft will be passed as a way to accelerate coal shipments via rail to power plants ahead of winter to ensure there are adequate supplies. Coal power generation is expected to soar in Europe’s largest economy this winter as a move to boost energy security.  

    The draft plan comes as German year-ahead power, a European benchmark, skyrocketed last week to a record 570 euros per megawatt-hour, with French prices rising as much as 3% to 720 euros. Coal prices in Europe also hit a record of 310 euros a ton. 

    Russia continues to squeeze NatGas flows to Europe as a heat wave limits hydroelectric and nuclear production. Rhine River levels have dropped to dangerously low levels, disrupting commodity cargos on the continent’s most important inland waterway. However, the good news this weekend is water levels have risen.  

    Germany’s increasing coal use this winter will be made possible by the rail system delivering supplies to power plants. 

    So much for the Europeans spearheading efforts toward green energy as Putin’s energy insecurity strategy appears to be a major success where it has caused stagflation and chaos across Germany. 

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 02:45

  • Geopolitics: The World Is Splitting In Two
    Geopolitics: The World Is Splitting In Two

    Authored by Alasdair Macleod via GoldMoney.com,

    While we are being distracted by Ukraine, President Putin has advanced his geopolitical goals materially. Aided and abetted by President Xi, Putin is taking the Asian continent into his control. That mission is well on its way to being achieved. He now awaits the winter months to finally force the EU to reject America’s hegemony. Only then, will the western end of the Eurasian continent be truly free of American interference.

    This article explains how he is achieving his strategic goals. It examines the geopolitics of the Asian landmass and the nations tied to it, which are commercially and financially turning their backs on the US-led western alliance.

    I look at geopolitics from President Putin of Russia’s viewpoint, since he is the only national leader who seems to have a clear grasp of his long-term objectives. His active strategy conforms closely with Halford Mackinder’s predictive analysis of nearly 120 years ago. Mackinder is regarded by many experts as the founder of geopolitics.

    Putin is determined to remove the American threat to his Western borders by squeezing the EU to that end. But he is also building political relationships based on control of global fossil-fuel supplies — a pathway opened for him by American and European obsessions over climate change. In partnership with China, the consolidation of his power over the Eurasian landmass has progressed rapidly in recent weeks.

    For the Western Alliance, financially and economically his timing is particularly awkward, coinciding with the end of a 40-year period of declining interest rates, rising consumer price inflation, and a deepening recession driven by contracting bank credit. 

    It is the continuation of a financial war by other means, and it looks like Putin has an unbeatable hand. He is on course to push our fragile fiat currency based financial system over the edge.

    Mackinder’s legacy

    In a paper presented to the Royal Geographic Society in 1904, the father of geopolitics, Halford Mackinder, effectively predicted what is happening today. In his presentation, he asked: 

    “Is not the pivot region of the world’s politics that vast area of Euro-Asia which is inaccessible to ships, but in antiquity lay open to the horse-riding nomads, and today is about to be covered with a network of railways? 

    “Outside the pivot area, in a great inner crescent, are Germany, Austria, Turkey, India, and China. And in an outer crescent, Britain, South Africa, Australia, the United States, Canada, and Japan.”

    This is shown in Figure 1, taken from the original paper presented to the Society.

    In 1919 after the First World War, in his Democratic Ideals and Reality he summarised his theory in slightly different language thus:

    “Who rules East Europe commands the Heartland;

    Who rules the Heartland commands the World-Island;

    Who rules the World-Island commands the world.”

    This is Putin’s destiny. In conjunction with China (rather than a united Germany, which is what worried politicians such as Balfour before the First World War), Russia appears to be successfully pursuing her goal of control of Mackinder’s World Island. Today, we can expand on the inner crescent concept to include Iran, the Middle East, as well as the new nations spun out of the old Soviet Union. Of Mackinder’s original inner crescent, only Germany and Austria are omitted today. Austria was the centre of the Hapsburg Empire at that time and so is no longer geopolitically important.

    Of the outer circle, we can now include most of Africa and some of South America, which are increasingly dependent on the World-Island for demand for their commodities. Without the West’s media and public seeming to realise it, there has been and continues to be an extension of Russian power through Asian partnerships which now eclipses America’s in terms of the global population covered. And if we add in China’s diaspora in South-East Asia, America and her NATO allies look like a somewhat isolated minority.

    As well as political power ebbing away from the West, economic power is as well. Hampered by increasingly expensive and anti-capitalist democratic socialism, their economies are struggling under the burden of their governments. And as the West declines, the World-Island is enjoying its own industrial revolution. The network of railways, to which Mackinder referred in 1904, has expanded from the trans-Siberian railway to China’s new overland silk roads, linking China with Western Europe and the great nations south of the original silk road.

    Russia and its ex-Soviet satellites occupy half the Eurasian continent. The Eurasian continent is 21 million square miles, or more than three times the size of all North America. Central and North America together measure some 9 million square miles, more than twice the area of Europe. Even without its ex-Soviet satellites, Russia is still by far the largest nation by land area. And together with China, Russia is nearly three times the size of the United States.

    Russia is the world’s largest single source of energy, commodities, and raw materials and as we now see can control the prices the West pays for them. As a consequence of recent sanctions, the west is paying top-rouble, while Russia’s Asian allies have energy and commodities offered at a discount payable in their own currencies, undermining the West’s relative economic position even more.

    As to whether Putin has studied Mackinder, this must be supposition. But there is no doubt that if he is not so guided, Putin is following the same predicted course. As Russia’s undisputed leader, he has played the geopolitical game masterfully. He does not fall into the traps which bedevil Western socialism. He follows foreign guidelines in the mould of the British at the time of Lord Liverpool’s Prime Ministership two hundred years ago, when the policy was not to interfere in the domestic affairs of foreign nations, except to the extent that they affected British interests.

    It is a fact of life for Putin that his allies include some very unpleasant regimes. But this does not concern him — their domestic affairs are not his business. His business is Russia’s interests, and like the British in the 1820s, he pursues them single-mindedly.

    The rationale behind Ukraine

    Ukraine was an unusual instance of Putin taking the initiative in acting against the American-led NATO alliance. But in the run-up to Ukraine, he had seen Britain leave the EU. Britain was America’s vicar on the EU’s earth, so Brexit represented a significant decline in the US’s ability to influence Brussels. Following Brexit, President Biden precipitously exited Afghanistan, taking the rest of NATO with him. Therefore, America was on the run from the Heartland. The way was open for Putin to push further and expel America from Russia’s western borders.

    To do this, he needed to confront NATO. And there is little doubt this was on Putin’s mind when he escalated his “special military operation” against Ukraine. He must have anticipated NATO’s reaction to impose sanctions, from which Russia has profited greatly. At the same time, it is the EU which has been badly crushed, a squeeze which he can intensify at will.

    The drama is still playing out. He needs to keep up some pressure on Ukraine to keep the squeeze going. He is not ready to compromise. Winter in the EU will be tougher still, with energy and food shortages likely to lead to increasing riots by the EU’s citizens. Putin will only stop when the Europeans realise that America is sacrificing them in the pursuit of its hegemony. Zelensky is little more than a puppet in this drama.

    With respect to the war on the ground, Russia has already secured its access from the Black Sea by cultivating her relationship with Turkey. As a NATO member, Turkey is hedging its bets. The Black Sea is vital to her economic interests. For this reason, Turkey is maintaining her relationship with Russia, while cooling down her antipathy to Israel (President Herzog visited Ankara in March) and mending her fences with the UAE — it’s all part of the World Island coming together.

    For the US, Erdogan is an unreliable NATO partner. Allegedly, the US tried to remove him by instigating a failed coup attempt in 2016, when he was tipped off by Russian intelligence and the coup failed. While he owes a favour to Putin, Turkey’s NATO membership leads him to be cautious. And as a born-again Sunni, he appears keen to extend Turkish influence into the Moslem nations in Central Asia, dreaming perhaps of the glory days of the Ottoman Empire.

    To further Russia’s power over energy sources upon which the Western belligerents depend, Putin has cultivated Iran, and has also made welcoming overtures to Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Sergei Lavrov, Putin’s foreign minister, took care to fully brief members of the Arab league of Russia’s energy policy in Cairo last month. The argument is simple: the West has turned its back on fossil fuels, planning to phase them out entirely in a decade or so. As producers of oil and gas, their future is to stick together with Mackinder’s World Island and its Inner Crescent. This is so obviously the case, that even Saudi Arabia is said to be seeking an association through the BRICS group.

    Whatever the merits of climate change driven policies, with respect to energy the West seems to be hell-bent on a suicide mission. But Russia’s message to its partners is that you can have oil and natural gas at a discount to what Europe has to pay. Putin is offering to release them fully from the West’s climate change ideology. 

    With the pressure he is applying on Western Europe, Putin almost certainly assumes European politicians will be driven from supporting US sanctions to a more neutral position. And Russia probably expects that non-aligned nations suffering from grain shortages will also pressure the West to bring sanctions to an end. But before Putin relinquishes the pressure on EU nations, he is still likely to insist that American influence from Western Europe is withdrawn, or at the least it is withdrawn from Russia’s western borders.

    Phase 1 has concluded. Let Phase 2 begin

    We must now turn from Putin’s supposed megalomania to the conditions faced by his Western enemies, particularly the nations in Europe and the Eurozone. Figure 2, which is of a basket of commodities and raw materials priced in euros, shows that  after a significant rise, for Europe prices have eased in recent months.

    For the beleaguered Europeans, the pause in a substantial rise in commodity prices since the Fed’s introduction of zero interest rates in March 2020 has given them temporary and minor relief from an escalating inflation headache. Perhaps it is premature, but investors in western markets are taking the pullback in commodity prices as evidence that the commodity squeeze is probably over, and that with it the problem of consumer price inflation will diminish as well. 

    Indeed, in his 1 August report for Credit Suisse, Zoltan Pozsar reported that he had visited 150 investment managers in eight European cities recently, and the consensus was just that: they think inflation is licked, recession is due, and therefore interest rates will shortly decline.

    But so long as he holds the pricing reins for energy, Putin can play with the euro to his heart’s desire. By manipulating his quasi-monopoly on energy, grains, and fertilisers he can increase pressure on the EU’s leaders to reject US hegemony. And to fully appreciate the power in Putin’s hands, it is important to understand the true relationship between fiat currencies and commodities.

    The evidence is that the volatility of commodity prices is in the fiat currency they are priced in, and not the commodities themselves. Figure 3 shows this relationship, by comparing the price of oil measured in legal money (gold) and the fiat euro currency.

    The most the price of oil in gold has varied on the upside is double at the time of the Lehman failure, whereas in euros at that time it was sixteen times. So far this year, it has been even more volatile when the price in gold fell to 70% of the 1950 price, while in euros it hit 15 — that’s 21 times as volatile.

    This finding turns all energy pricing assumptions upside-down. The chart shows that what was true before the ending of Bretton Woods was no longer true after 1971. [The euro only commencing in 2000, the currency taken before then was the German mark]. Since oil prices are wholly determined in markets whose participants all assume price volatility is in the commodity, the entire basis of price forecasting becomes undermined. That being so, if an analyst gets a forecast half right it is more by luck than judgement.

    This is the whole point behind sound money. With sound money, dealers in commodities and all other goods justifiably assume that the intermediating medium is a constant. They assume that when they receive payment, its utility is invariable. But with unbacked fiat it is different. For individual transactions, while we still assume a dollar is a dollar and a euro is a euro we all know that a currency’s utility varies. Why, then, for analytical purposes do forecasters always assume it does not? Why do analysts never take this into account in their forecasts?

    Figure 3 above proves that conventional approaches to pricing and economic forecasts involving them are nonsensical. The same is demonstrably true for all other commodities, not just oil. In current circumstances, the basis for an incorrect analysis is being used to support expectations that prices are beginning to reflect an increasing prospect of recession, which to a Keynesian or monetarist mind, means falling demand for commodities and energy leads to lower prices. But the fact remains that overnight, Putin can put the squeeze on the EU again. And armed with the knowledge that price volatility is in the currency, we know that the falling euro will do most of his work for him.

    As we approach Europe’s winter, it will not take much to drive energy prices in euros considerably higher. Putin is unlikely to make the mistake of being seen to do this deliberately. But in all probability, he need not take any significant action at all to see Western currency prices for energy and food rise again as winter approaches.

    There is a further misjudgement common to Western capital markets: this time over interest rates. In almost every piece of analysis forecasting recession, the underlying assumption is that with economies turning down demand for goods, services and credit will diminish. For these reasons, interest rate pressures are expected to decline. 

    This misunderstands the nature of credit. Almost all circulating media is commercial bank credit. Consequently, GDP is simply the sum of all bank credit used for qualifying transactions. Therefore, nominal GDP is set by the availability of bank credit, and not, as commonly supposed driven by a slowdown in economic activity. When the banking cohort contracts its collective balance sheet, interest rates initially rise because of a shortage of credit.

    These conditions are now faced by financial markets. Commercial banks are bound to seek ways to protect themselves in uncertain times. They are already looking to reduce the ratio of their assets to equity before bad debts really escalate. Banks in the Eurozone are not alone with this change in outlook. The so-called global recession is not being driven much by other economic factors, but mainly by the tendency for bank credit to be withdrawn from both financial and non-financial economic sectors.

    It is a problem poorly understood and never mentioned by analysts in their economic forecasts. But in the current economic and financial environment, the consequences lead to a conclusion about interest rates the opposite of that commonly supposed. 

    We can see from the foregoing that contrary to expectations expressed everywhere by western governments and their central banks along with the whole investment establishment, the inflation and interest rate problem is not going away. Because interest rates had been suppressed and could go no lower and for no longer, there has been a fundamental shift from a long-term decline in them, to what is increasingly sure to turn out to be a long-term trend for interest rates to rise. As it is elsewhere, the bank lending environment in Europe is deteriorating for obvious reasons. Furthermore, it comes at a time when bank balance sheet leverage is at record levels, leaving banks badly exposed to the change. 

    A severe contraction in bank credit is only in its initial stages. A second phase in the economic and financial war against Putin’s Russia will shortly emerge. Currently, we appear to be in a summer pause after the first, indicated by consolidating commodity prices. Government bond yields have declined from earlier highs. Stock markets have rallied. Bitcoin has rallied. Gold, which is the only legal money from which to escape from all this, has declined. It all indicates a false optimism, vulnerable to the rudest of shocks.

    China may be Putin’s only wildccard

    With its economy based on commodities whose values are aligned with gold and so long as the current geopolitical situation does not escalate into a wider military conflict, Russia appears to be in a strengthening economic position while her adversaries are in decline. If there is a threat to its position, it probably comes from her alliance with China, which is exposed to the West’s follies through trade. China has some wildcard problems.

    Since the death of Mao, in its rapid development China has relied on the expansion of credit through state owned banks. Bank executives are state functionaries, instead of managers on behalf of profit-seeking shareholders. It is this difference which has insulated the domestic economy from the cycles of bank credit which have plagued the West’s economic model with repetitive credit crises.

    While this lack of destructive cyclicality might be seen as a good thing, it has allowed malinvestments to build up uninterruptedly over recent decades. So, while the Chinese authorities still exercise significant control over lending, the degree of economic distortion has become a threat to further progress.

    This is being manifest in a growing property crisis, with developers going to the wall in droves. It’s not that there is unlikely to be demand for commercial and residential properties in the future: the savers are there to buy, the middle classes are growing in number, and the economy has some way to go in its development. The problem is that the property market has got ahead of itself.

    As a sector, property and related activities make up an estimated one-third of China’s economic activity. Developers have suspended completions of pre-sold properties, which citizens have bought on a pre-payment basis. Consequently, mortgage payments are being suspended by angry purchasers. Private banks have been affected, with bank runs against some of them. Some thirty real estate companies have missed foreign debt payments, with Evergrande being the most high-profile defaulter on $300bn of debt.

    Problems in property were and are still being compounded by Beijing’s zero tolerance covid policy. More so than in other jurisdictions, strictly enforced clampdowns have hit production and undermined logistics, factors that have inevitably undermined economic performance. While exports to other nations have held up well — mostly due to foreign governments’ spending deficits escalating and not being matched by increased personal savings — China’s exporters’ profits are bound to become squeezed by the West’s deepening recession. Unless, that is, China’s foreign exchange policy is to deliberately weaken the yuan against western currencies. But that will only end up destabilising the domestic economy as consumer price increases accelerate.

    And lastly, if Beijing follows up on its threats to annex Taiwan — if only to detract from domestic economic failures — a train of events is likely to be set in motion which could escalate tensions with America and its defence allies to the detriment of everyone.

    But despite the headlines from China’s property crisis, it is too early to assume China is descending into much deeper trouble. It must abandon macroeconomic policies driven purely by statistics and ensure its citizens and their business have a stable currency. Whether this is understood in Beijing is not clear.

    The fundamental difference from its Russian partner is its greater economic dependence on consumption of commodities as opposed to their production. The consequences of western economic policies set to undermine their own currencies’ purchasing power will be felt more by China than Russia. Nevertheless, an increasingly likely banking and currency crisis in the West can be weathered by China with the correct economic approach.

    The era of the dollar is ending

    While Putin appears to be gaining control of the World Island, leaving a few nations on its fringes adhering to the US and its currency’s hegemony, much of what he has achieved is through the abject failure of the West in playing this greatest of great geopolitical games. A notable feature of the West’s decline is in its embrace of anti-capitalistic and woke cultures. In this article, it would lose our focus if we drifted into the climate change debate, other than to point out that by seeking to eliminate fossil fuels in the next decade or so, the West is on a course of economic self-destruction relative to Russia’s partners, who are being offered discounted oil, gas, and coal for the foreseeable future.

    When President Nixon turned the dollar into an entirely fiat currency in August 1971, he set off a train of events which is now ending. From establishing the dollar as the world’s reserve currency, and his agreement with Saudi Arabia which led to the creation of the petrodollar, global fiat currency instability commenced as shown in Figure 3 to this article. But the fiat dollar gave both the US Government and the American banking system enormous power. That was effectively wielded, forcing recalcitrant nations to kowtow to the mighty dollar.

    The power was not used judiciously, leading to an alliance between Russia and China to protect themselves from US actions. The lessons they learned from American imperialism were not lost. Despite earlier promises to Russia not to do so, the US military directly threatened her western border. For China, though her economic and industrial revolution having been initially praised, she began to be seen as a threat to the American interests.

    This imperialism has made America few friends and many latent enemies. With repeated failures in US foreign policy in the Middle East, North Africa, Ukraine, and most recently Afghanistan, the US can now count on nations representing only about 19% of the world’s population of 8 billion people, compared with 54% allied to the World Island. This is shown in Figure 4.

    While allocating nations into these categories is somewhat subjective, it gives an approximation of the relative power of the World Island partnership compared with that of US/NATO. As the US-led partnership’s grip slackens, vested interests are sure to drive non-aligned nations towards the World Island camp, particularly when they have commodities to sell.

    Before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the sanctions that followed, none of the 170 nations in the table could do without the dollar. Russia has been forced to find alternative settlement currencies and its close allies in the Eurasian Economic Union are planning a new trade settlement currency to cut out the dollar. But the international pricing of commodities and raw materials in dollars is impossible to overcome, even for Russia.

    The World Island cannot side-line the dollar completely — it is too entrenched. While the dollar’s power is declining, the destruction of its virtual monopoly in international trade will have to come from US monetary policy itself, a process that is arguably under way.

    Since the financialisation of Western economies in the mid-eighties, the dollar has retained its credibility as the world’s reserve currency. It was achieved by ensuring a ready supply for international use, as forecast by Robert Triffin by his description of the dollar’s dilemma in the late fifties. The demand side was bolstered by the development of regulated and unregulated derivative markets, which forced foreigners to purchase dollars in order to purchase derivatives. Essentially, it was synthetic dollar demand created to satisfy speculator demand for commodities, including precious metals, by creating synthetic supply.

    When this concept is grasped, the importance of the ending of the long-term trend of interest rate suppression becomes better understood. The suppression of commodity prices by increasing synthetic supply became part and parcel of interest rate declines. Interest rates are no longer declining but rising. There will be unexpected consequences for commodity prices, which we will come to in a moment.

    There are two immediate consequences for bank lending: their lending margins improve, and the incidents of bad and doubtful debts increases. Consequently, overleveraged bank balance sheets are being cut back by banks no longer having to work them so hard to maintain bottom-line profits. And with lending risk escalating, this is a further reason to contract bank credit overall. Credit is going to be in increasingly short supply.

    There are the consequences for financial markets, including synthetic commodity supply, to be considered as well. Under the new Basel 3 regulations which were recently introduced, trading and market-making in derivatives is an inefficient use of balance sheet capacity, so these activities are bound to be reduced over time under pressure from banks’ treasury departments. In effect, the conditions that allowed banks to expand credit to finance the increase of derivative trading activities between 1985 and 2021 are being reversed. 

    According to the Bank for International Settlements, the notional value of global regulated futures totalled $40. 7 trillion last March, and in options totalled a further $54 trillion. To this must be added over $610 trillion in over-the-counter derivatives. For now, it is variations in this synthetic supply which drive pricing relationships between fiat currencies and commodities. But the impact of contracting bank credit will almost certainly lead to higher commodity prices, as this synthetic supply dries up and is increasingly withdrawn.

    Furthermore, contracting bank credit invariably leads to banking failures. And with the Eurozone’s and Japanese global systemically important banks leveraged over 20 times on average, the scale of banking failures is likely to be significantly larger than that of Lehman when it failed fourteen years ago next month.

    And finally, as insurance against a widespread fiat currency catastrophe, both Russia and China have stockpiled physical bullion. Russia is known to have about 12,000 tonnes, of which 2,300 tonnes are held as monetary reserves. It mines 330 tonnes annually, which it is now adding to its hoard. Having accumulated the bulk of its hoard before permitting the Chinese public to buy gold, China’s state probably has over 30,000 tonnes, of which only 1,776 tonnes are declared official reserves. Since its inception in 2002, China’s citizens have taken delivery of a further 20,000 tonnes from the Shanghai Gold Exchange, some of which will have returned as scrap.

    Therefore, the Russian and Chinese states between them command over 40,000 tonnes, which compares with America’s reserves, officially listed as 8,133 tonnes. As nations, they are also the two largest gold miners by output. 

    There can be no doubt that both China and Russia have a better understanding than western central banks of the relationship between money, which legally and in actuality is gold, and credit. They can only have built their reserves and mining capacity in anticipation that their currencies will need, one day, protection from a fiat currency crisis. First it was China, which accumulated most of her stash during the 1980-2002 bear market at prices as low as $275, before letting her citizens buy gold. With Russia, the accumulation has been more recent, undoubtedly seen by Putin as an essential part of his geopolitical ambitions. Both countries have concealed their true gold position, presumably so as to not threaten the dollar’s hegemony directly and to allow them to secretly add to their hoards.

    In the event of a fiat currency crisis for the dollar, both the rouble and yuan have more monetary projection backing them than in any of the currencies of their adversaries. And while the jury might be out with respect to President Xi’s geopolitical nous, there can be little doubt that Putin will do whatever it takes to protect Russia, the rouble, and his geostrategic plans from any crisis which might envelop the West.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/22/2022 – 02:00

  • Weaponizing The Bureaucracy: Who Will Protect Us From The Government's Standing Army?
    Weaponizing The Bureaucracy: Who Will Protect Us From The Government’s Standing Army?

    Authored by John & Nisha Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,

    “A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe companions to liberty.”

    – James Madison

    The IRS has stockpiled 4,500 guns and five million rounds of ammunition in recent years, including 621 shotguns, 539 long-barrel rifles and 15 submachine guns.

    The Veterans Administration (VA) purchased 11 million rounds of ammunition (equivalent to 2,800 rounds for each of their officers), along with camouflage uniforms, riot helmets and shields, specialized image enhancement devices and tactical lighting.

    The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) acquired 4 million rounds of ammunition, in addition to 1,300 guns, including five submachine guns and 189 automatic firearms for its Office of Inspector General.

    According to an in-depth report on “The Militarization of the U.S. Executive Agencies,” the Social Security Administration secured 800,000 rounds of ammunition for their special agents, as well as armor and guns.

    The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) owns 600 guns. And the Smithsonian now employs 620-armed “special agents.”

    This is how it begins.

    We have what the founders feared most: a “standing” or permanent army on American soil.

    This de facto standing army is made up of weaponized, militarized, civilian forces which look like, dress like, and act like the military; are armed with guns, ammunition and military-style equipment; are authorized to make arrests; and are trained in military tactics.

    Mind you, this de facto standing army of bureaucratic, administrative, non-military, paper-pushing, non-traditional law enforcement agencies may look and act like the military, but they are not the military.

    Rather, they are foot soldiers of the police state’s standing army, and they are growing in number at an alarming rate.

    According to the Wall Street Journal, the number of federal agents armed with guns, ammunition and military-style equipment, authorized to make arrests, and trained in military tactics has nearly tripled over the past several decades.

    There are now more bureaucratic (non-military) government agents armed with weapons than U.S. Marines. As Adam Andrzejewski writes for Forbes, “the federal government has become one never-ending gun show.”

    While Americans have to jump through an increasing number of hoops in order to own a gun, federal agencies have been placing orders for hundreds of millions of rounds of hollow point bullets and military gear. Among the agencies being supplied with night-vision equipment, body armor, hollow-point bullets, shotguns, drones, assault rifles and LP gas cannons are the Smithsonian, U.S. Mint, Health and Human Services, IRS, FDA, Small Business Administration, Social Security Administration, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Education Department, Energy Department, Bureau of Engraving and Printing and an assortment of public universities.

    Add in the Biden Administration’s plans to grow the nation’s police forces by 100,000 more cops and swell the ranks of the IRS by 87,000 new employees (some of whom will have arrest-and-firearm authority) and you’ve got a nation in the throes of martial law.

    The militarization of America’s police forces in recent decades has merely sped up the timeline by which the nation is transformed into an authoritarian regime.

    What began with the militarization of the police in the 1980s during the government’s war on drugs has snowballed into a full-fledged integration of military weaponry, technology and tactics into police protocol. To our detriment, local police—clad in jackboots, helmets and shields and wielding batons, pepper-spray, stun guns, and assault rifles—have increasingly come to resemble occupying forces in our communities.

    As Andrew Becker and G.W. Schulz report, more than $34 billion in federal government grants made available to local police agencies in the wake of 9/11 “ha[ve] fueled a rapid, broad transformation of police operations… across the country. More than ever before, police rely on quasi-military tactics and equipment… [P]olice departments around the U.S. have transformed into small army-like forces.”

    This standing army has been imposed on the American people in clear violation of the spirit—if not the letter of the law—of the Posse Comitatus Act, which restricts the government’s ability to use the U.S. military as a police force.

    A standing army—something that propelled the early colonists into revolution—strips the American people of any vestige of freedom.

    It was for this reason that those who established America vested control of the military in a civilian government, with a civilian commander-in-chief. They did not want a military government, ruled by force.

    Rather, they opted for a republic bound by the rule of law: the U.S. Constitution.

    Unfortunately, with the Constitution under constant attack, the military’s power, influence and authority have grown dramatically. Even the Posse Comitatus Act, which makes it a crime for the government to use the military to carry out arrests, searches, seizure of evidence and other activities normally handled by a civilian police force, has been greatly weakened by exemptions allowing troops to deploy domestically and arrest civilians in the wake of alleged terrorist acts.

    The increasing militarization of the police, the use of sophisticated weaponry against Americans and the government’s increasing tendency to employ military personnel domestically have all but eviscerated historic prohibitions such as the Posse Comitatus Act.

    Indeed, there are a growing number of exceptions to which Posse Comitatus does not apply. These exceptions serve to further acclimate the nation to the sight and sounds of military personnel on American soil and the imposition of martial law.

    Now we find ourselves struggling to retain some semblance of freedom in the face of administrative, police and law enforcement agencies that look and act like the military with little to no regard for the Fourth Amendment, laws such as the NDAA that allow the military to arrest and indefinitely detain American citizens, and military drills that acclimate the American people to the sight of armored tanks in the streets, military encampments in cities, and combat aircraft patrolling overhead.

    The menace of a national police force—a.k.a. a standing army—vested with the power to completely disregard the Constitution, cannot be overstated, nor can its danger be ignored.

    Historically, the establishment of a national police force accelerates a nation’s transformation into a police state, serving as the fundamental and final building block for every totalitarian regime that has ever wreaked havoc on humanity.

    Then again, for all intents and perhaps, the American police state is already governed by martial law: Battlefield tactics. Militarized police. Riot and camouflage gear. Armored vehicles. Mass arrests. Pepper spray. Tear gas. Batons. Strip searches. Drones. Less-than-lethal weapons unleashed with deadly force. Rubber bullets. Water cannons. Concussion grenades. Intimidation tactics. Brute force. Laws conveniently discarded when it suits the government’s purpose.

    This is what martial law looks like, when a government disregards constitutional freedoms and imposes its will through military force, only this is martial law without any government body having to declare it.

    The ease with which Americans are prepared to welcome boots on the ground, regional lockdowns, routine invasions of their privacy, and the dismantling of every constitutional right intended to serve as a bulwark against government abuses is beyond unnerving.

    We are sliding fast down a slippery slope to a Constitution-free America.

    This quasi-state of martial law has been helped along by government policies and court rulings that have made it easier for the police to shoot unarmed citizens, for law enforcement agencies to seize cash and other valuable private property under the guise of asset forfeiture, for military weapons and tactics to be deployed on American soil, for government agencies to carry out round-the-clock surveillance, for legislatures to render otherwise lawful activities as extremist if they appear to be anti-government, for profit-driven private prisons to lock up greater numbers of Americans, for homes to be raided and searched under the pretext of national security, for American citizens to be labeled terrorists and stripped of their rights merely on the say-so of a government bureaucrat, and for pre-crime tactics to be adopted nationwide that strip Americans of the right to be assumed innocent until proven guilty and creates a suspect society in which we are all guilty until proven otherwise.

    All of these assaults on the constitutional framework of the nation have been sold to the public as necessary for national security.

    Time and again, the public has fallen for the ploy hook, line and sinker

    We’re being reeled in, folks, and you know what happens when we get to the end of that line?

    As I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, we’ll be cleaned, gutted and strung up.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 23:30

  • "Population Will Rebel" – Swiss Police Chief Fears Social Unrest From Winter Power Shortages
    “Population Will Rebel” – Swiss Police Chief Fears Social Unrest From Winter Power Shortages

    The Swiss government is preparing rapidly for the possibility of power shortages this winter with Jan Flückiger, Secretary General of the Energy Directors’ Conference, warning that “internal security then becomes a problem,” arguing that the federal government has not yet recognized the urgency in this regard.

    In an interview with Swiss German-language daily newspaper Blick, Fredy Fässler, the Police Chief of one of Switzerland’s largest Cantons, warned that people may revolt and resort to looting if the Alpine nation is hit by a severe energy crunch this winter.

    “Imagine, you can no longer withdraw money at the ATM, you can no longer pay with the card in the store or refuel your tank at the gas station. Heating stops working. It’s cold. Streets go dark. It is conceivable that the population would rebel or that there would be looting,” he said, adding that the country’s authorities should take measures to prepare for such extreme scenarios.

    Exercises that were conducted in 2014 to prepare for a blackout scenario revealed major shortcomings, including lack of emergency generators for police, hospitals and other critical infrastructure and services, he said.

    “These shortcomings have been corrected in recent years,” the police chief noted, adding rather ominously that now “the security forces are armed” and his agency is even prepared to provide the Swiss with cash if they are unable to use cards in stores, given that relevant agreements with banks have been signed.

    Additionally, Fässler warned of looting:

    “I don’t want to paint the devil on the wall, but it has also been seen in environmental disasters that certain people have abused the situation to plunder unprotected objects. This could also be the case if the network is switched off, for example in shops where there is something to buy.”

    But he warned the federal government not to over-step its tyrannical orders pre-emptively and expected police support:

    “I appeal to the federal government to only order measures that can be implemented and, above all, controlled. We certainly won’t become the sauna police.“

    Earlier, Werner Luginbuhl, the head of Switzerland’s electricity regulator ElCom, complained that electricity was being used “completely thoughtlessly,” and urged citizens to stock up on candles and firewood due to possible power outages in the country this winter.

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

    There has been a surge in searches in Switzerland for ‘brennholz’ (firewood)…

    Fãssler’s comments come after Swiss authorities said last week that they may place restrictions on energy consumption this coming winter, signaling that “power shortages [are] among the most serious risks” for the landlocked country.

    This is Swiss officials warning of revolt and urging its people to gather firewood… not central Parisian leaders or Baltimore politicians!!!

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 23:00

  • Power Crunch Threatens Growth, Reinforces Weak Yuan
    Power Crunch Threatens Growth, Reinforces Weak Yuan

    By George Lei, Bloomberg markets live commentator and reporter

    Three things we learned last week:

    1. Electricity shortages amid a severe drought have replaced Covid lockdowns as the latest and potentially biggest threat to economic growth, at least in the month of August. Sichuan, a southwestern province with more than 83 million people, had to cut its hydropower generation by more than half as of Friday, state broadcaster CCTV reports. Dazhou, a city of more than 5 million, has implemented rolling blackouts on non-household users and is making plans for residential power cuts if the situation doesn’t improve.

    Water Flow to Three Gorges Reservoir

    The blackout in Sichuan has led to factory closures of Toyota, Panasonic and CATL, the world’s top battery maker, while threatening supply chains to automakers including Tesla. Power generation in other parts of the country may come under pressure as well. Capital Economics noted on Friday that China’s eastern provinces — industrial hubs that normally consume power from the west — are now being asked to send electricity in the other direction, leading to a quick depletion of their thermal coal inventories.
    Electricity shortages are so far at an early stage and relatively concentrated in the southwest, according to Morgan Stanley. Further deterioration, however, could start to drag on manufacturing and other economic activities, posing additional downward risks to corporate earnings and stock-market sentiment, analysts Laura Wang, Jonathan Garner and Fran Chen wrote last week.

    2. The Chinese yuan, trading both onshore and offshore, fell on Friday to the weakest since September 2020 and investors only see more downside ahead. The People’s Bank of China isn’t standing in the way of the currency’s devaluation path, and a raft of 2022 GDP downgrades (with the full impact of blackouts unknown) only add to negative market sentiment.

    The offshore yuan has lost more than 1% so far in August, on course for the worst month since April’s 4.3% plunge. Things might be a bit different this time, however, as a “slow boil” yuan decline is the most likely scenario and runaway depreciation pressures appear less acute, JPMorgan wrote in a client note on Thursday. Investor positioning on the Chinese currency is already “extremely bearish” and foreign bond outflows have also lightened up somewhat, according to the US bank.

    A gradual FX weakening could prompt the offshore yuan to first test 6.90, a level last seen in August 2020, and then onto the key 7.00 level, reached in July that year. The three-month CNH risk reversal, which measures the cost of protection against depreciation, traded around 1.3% on Friday — well above its 200-day moving average of 0.88% yet still shy of 2022 high near 1.75%, last seen on May 10.

    3. Chinese banks are poised to cut their benchmark lending rates on Monday, following the PBOC’s 10 basis-point reduction to its 1-year MLF rate last week. Seven out of 20 economists polled by Bloomberg expect a 15bps cut to the five-year loan prime rate, a reference for mortgage costs, while six see an easing of 10bps.

    Just don’t expect a turnaround any time soon. More policy support is on the way, yet “it will probably be too late too little to prevent output from stagnating this year,” according to Capital Economics.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 22:30

  • Ratio Of Full- And Part-Time Workers Spells Inflation Peak
    Ratio Of Full- And Part-Time Workers Spells Inflation Peak

    By Vincent Cignarella, Bloomberg markets live commentator and reporter

    Is the US at full employment and we just don’t know it yet?

    The ratio of full-time workers to part-time workers is at a near 20-year high. It may be turning, and a drop in the ratio may spell peak inflation as companies adjust to cut costs. That’d mean a better environment for stocks and bonds going forward.

    If the ratio falls, it likely means companies are either looking to replace higher paid full-time workers with less expensive part-time employees or they are seeing declining sales. Either way, it is a sign of rising costs and an attempt to lower them or a slowing economy.

    Both scenarios could prompt a Fed pivot. A slowing economy and peaking inflation are the signs the Fed needs to see in order to pause rate hikes.

     

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 22:00

  • What Would A Crypto Crash Mean For Markets And The Economy
    What Would A Crypto Crash Mean For Markets And The Economy

    By Peter Tchir of Academy Securities

    On “bitcoin infinity” day (apparently 8/21 is symbolic of ∞ infinity, the projected value of bitcoin) divided by 21,000,000 (the total number of bitcoin that can ever be mined), it seemed like a good time to explore what a crypto crash would look like and what it would mean for markets and the economy.

    We all know what a mortgage bank collapse looks like (Washington Mutual). We’ve seen broker dealers collapse (Lehman), we’ve seen the stress on the system when money center banks and insurance companies come under intense pressure. Heck, we’ve even endured a sovereign default (Greece). We’ve also experienced flash crashes in equities and bond yields.

    In all those cases, I would argue that having a gameplan ahead of time allowed companies and investors to profit from the events (both positive and negative). I haven’t seen much on what a crypto crash would mean, so I figured we could examine that today.

    Jackson Hole

    I could have written the 900th Jackson Hole primer, but I couldn’t bring myself to do that. I’ve already covered a lot that is applicable to Jackson Hole in Taxi Strategies, Orwellian Moments, Things You Won’t See, and Inversion and Inventories.

    My focus right now is pretty simple:

    • What is the real story on jobs?
      • The weak data is a more accurate sign of the current situation.
    • How bad is the inventory build?
      • I think it might be the worst we’ve seen in my lifetime.
    • Is the wealth effect a problem?
      • I think that the concentrated nature of the wealth effect in disruptive stocks and crypto is different than anything else we’ve experienced historically, and the housing sector weakness is ominous to me.
    • Inflation Fighting.
      • Be careful what you wish for is all that comes to mind. Time and again, lower commodity prices have accompanied stock prices as they became much lower as well and I’m not sure why that will be different this time.

    Anyways, let’s get back to being off topic and discussing a crypto crash.

    6 Impossible Things Before Breakfast

    I cannot come up with 6 impossible things before breakfast, but as the Queen suggested to Alice, you do need to practice.

    Let’s start with the premise of a crypto crash or crypto collapse. If it is impossible, then there is no point even thinking about it. However, not only is it possible, but I put the possibility of it occurring in the next year at 10% or higher. Still unlikely, but a high enough probability that I should think about what it would mean.

    Why a crypto crash or collapse seems possible:

    • It has already happened. Luna/Terra is gone. Poof. XRP is down 80% from its highs, Cardano is down 85%, Bitcoin Cash (you got to love the name) is down 91%, and Dogecoin is down 90% as well. Dogecoin was allegedly started as a joke, which makes it all the more ironic (or moronic) that an SNL skit helped pump it to the moon. So, collapses and crashes have occurred in some segments of the market, which alone tells me that it is worth exploring more.
    • This chart is precarious.

    • Bitcoin continues to hover near levels that would ensure that no “hodler,” or someone who buys crypto and will never sell (diamond hands as opposed to lettuce hands), has made money on any purchase in almost two years. That is a long time to wait to make money (or to sit on large losses). FOMO is a big part of crypto trading, and we are on the precipice of declining to levels where many could decide to take their money and run. There is an ongoing theme in crypto that the “whales” keep buying dips, which might be possible, though it seems more likely to me that many have decided to lock in massive amounts of wealth into the much maligned (but useful) “fiat” currency. Crypto bounced here recently, but that was just the first test and I suspect that there were some heavily incentivized holders who went out of their way to support the price (there really are no rules in this space). This chart, by itself, doesn’t convince me that a crash is possible, but when I highlight the other issues, it certainly adds to that overall theme that a crash or collapse is a non-zero probability event.
    • The chart isn’t much better.

     

    • The $13.5 billion trust, GBTC, is currently at a 32% discount to NAV. This isn’t an ETF, so it has the ability to trade at a discount or premium to NAV for extended periods. A 33% discount lets you buy bitcoin at the equivalent of under $14,000 ($21,000 * 67%). There is, to some extent, over $4 billion in “free” money in this stock if the discount closes to 0. It is bizarre and scary to me that the discount continues to widen. In ETF’s, I believe that discount/premium to NAV leads the way (cheapness begets lower prices and vice versa). While that view doesn’t quite translate given the nature of GBTC, it is cautionary to me.
    • A lack of interest. Recently one of the largest asset managers on the planet announced plans to collaborate with one of the largest public companies focused on crypto to work on some crypto projects. Two years ago, I can only imagine the impact that headline would have had on bitcoin. My guess is $10k in a heartbeat, but we are already back below the price when that deal was announced. Every headline like that (a year or more ago) was met with thousands (if not millions) of social media posts touting ADOPTION! While adoption is growing and more big banks have announced crypto strategies, the response seems to be more like “well, of course they are going to see if they can make money in it” rather than “OMG, XYZ just endorsed crypto, BUY!” Subtle shift in response, but an important one (albeit subjective).
    • The best “use” cases are diminishing. China, to me, has always been the best use case. A large population with enough money to matter. For all the talk about banking the unbanked, etc., which sounds nice, this isn’t what will drive crypto prices higher. There are stats saying that as many as 4 billion people are unbanked across the globe. According to the World Bank, about 700 million people make less than $2.15 per day. That is depressing, scary, and almost mind-boggling, but from the crypto perspective, it is not the poor that will drive prices (there just isn’t enough money). But China, where millions of “middle class” citizens exist under a regime where they may want to keep money outside of the system, it has always been a good use case. With the property market in tatters, a slowing economy, and the government continuing to crackdown on crypto (outside of the digital Yuan), that use case may be dropping rapidly. Sanction avoidance as a use case may also be diminishing. If you were illicitly trading embargoed products (like oil), crypto may have been the “currency” of choice. But with the U.S. looking to ease restrictions on places like Iran and Venezuela (hypothetically), maybe some of the alleged trade will come back onto the books. With China and India openly buying Russian oil and Chinese currency gaining in stature (at least amongst some nations), there is less reason to use crypto when the Yuan is about 10 times less volatile than bitcoin (30-day vol of 5.4 versus 53). Criminal activity still flourishes, though the ability to track and reclaim ransomware payments seems to be increasing.
    • It’s about blockchain and blockchain technology. The number of pundits, experts, and companies that seem to be doing contortions to pitch themselves as blockchain rather than crypto is high. Again, this is subtle, but it seems that re-positioning oneself as blockchain rather than crypto is occurring, which doesn’t bode well for crypto.
    • It’s a Ponzi scheme, but it’s our Ponzi scheme. There were always the slogans that accompanied crypto, like “have fun staying poor” but they often included passionate explanations about the greatness of crypto. The use cases would take up pages including such themes like it is banking the unbanked (already discussed), that it is an inflation hedge (hasn’t worked on that front for some time), that it is outside the reach of the government (it is being regulated more by the day, and many in crypto, after some recent highly visible failures, now seem to embrace this), that it is lower cost (costs remain high and there is little protection against mistakes or fraud, unlike with bank accounts or credit cards), or speed (but how many people really need to instantaneously shift large amounts of money, but aren’t already served by Venmo or Zell or some similar product?) I still see those arguments being made, but with far less enthusiasm. However, there is another “use case” that seems to be getting traction (at least in my social media streams). It basically amounts to the argument that convincing more people to participate will help. Kind of like “adoption” but with a more cynical tone. Basically, it is admitting that it only really works if more people get in (so get in, and get more people in). It has the advantage of being true and seems honest, but it seems like the last vestige of a pump and dump scam.

    I’m not sure about you, but that is enough for me to at least take a look at what a crypto collapse or crash would mean.

    Crypto Market Cap

    Let’s start with the market capitalization of crypto currencies as that is the most obvious and direct hit to investors. We will use coinmarketcap for this section (beware of using the link as it will ask to send notifications, know your location, etc., but I figured there should be a link to something to verify).

    • Bitcoin at $21,262 has a market cap of $406 billion.
    • Ethereum at $1,628 has a market cap of $199 billion.
    • Binance Coin at $286 has a market cap of $46 billion.
    • Then XRP, Cardano, and Solana come in between $13 billion and $17 billion.
    • Dogecoin, Polkadot (love the name), and Shiba Inu are all about $7 billion, with Avalanche, Polygon, TRON, and Uniswap, all a bit over $5 billion.

    Let’s call it about $750 billion in total market capitalization for crypto.

    To make things “simple” let’s assume that after the top 3, most of the coins could disappear and people would hardly notice (I’m assuming that many of those coins are not widely held, and a few “whales” would lose a lot, but the average person wouldn’t lose much more than what they are already prepared to lose.) If you believe that this is an area where many have spent their “winnings” or took money made in bitcoin or Ethereum to really roll the dice (which I believe), that gives us further reason to argue that the hit here would be minimal on the economy (it also makes the analysis much easier as we only have to focus on a few key currencies).

    Stablecoin Market Cap

    We need to also consider the stablecoins. Terra/Luna was supposed to be a stablecoin. Stablecoins, in theory, are backed by assets of some sort, except those that were algorithmically backed (whatever that means).

    Tether (USDT) is still the biggest at $67 billion. I love how much everything is made to sound like dollars (USD) despite the rhetoric against fiat. This stablecoin, in particular, attracts a lot of negative posts about how it is backed. The company asserts that Tether is backed by T-bills, commercial paper, etc., but to my knowledge, it has never produced a detailed list of its holdings, let alone an audited list of its holdings. This behemoth of an account ($67 billion is large even in money markets) is unknown by any money market participant I speak to (albeit that is only a handful of people outside of Academy’s strong short-term liquidity desk). Someone recently pointed out that they apparently manage that much money without a Bloomberg terminal account (there is no Bloomberg account linked to a company called “Tether,” but they could use a different name on Bloomberg to obfuscate their existence, which isn’t unheard of). Tether has seen their market cap drop from $82 billion to $67 billion, and part of that could be that some investors, given what has gone on this year, have shied away from it.

    USD Coin or USDC (again, notice how much it tries to sound like the dollar) has a market cap of $52 billion. Its market cap only peaked at $55 billion, so it has gained at the expense of USDT. Circle, which is the company behind USDC, makes a big deal out of being transparent and regulated in the U.S. I’ve had brief conversations with people involved in the company and the pitch makes sense to me (though I have not yet gone through the effort of figuring out how granular that transparency is – that’s a project for another day). But they are clearly marketing themselves on the transparency issue and have surged relative to Tether over the past year or so.

    Binance USD (BUSD) weighs in at $18 billion and is a distant third and seems relatively tied to the Binance ecosystem.

    Vegan hotdogs. When I see all these names trying so hard to associate themselves with the dollar despite being part of an ecosystem designed to avoid the dollar, I can’t help thinking about vegan hotdogs and why vegans try to replicate an already weird food, when vegan food in its own right can be awesome! But I digress.

    My view is that stablecoins and their market caps are a function of the overall utility of cryptocurrencies. If crypto crashes, we should see a decline in the market cap of stablecoins.

    Two things could occur:

    • Those backed by assets will have to sell the assets to meet redemptions. If it is a few billion and they are back by T-bills, then no sweat. Markets would digest that easily and no one would be impacted. But if the size is bigger (10s of billions) and the assets are less liquid (non-standard commercial paper programs for example) then we could see some friction in markets. Again, if we knew exactly what they held we could be more or less prepared. What they hold and the size of the selling would impact the knock-on effects of any unwind (Terra/Luna held nothing, so that didn’t spread to the greater financial system, but this could).
    • If the stablecoins don’t truly hold sufficient assets or the assets are of low quality (there are all sorts of conspiracy theories out there on what it might be invested in that isn’t worth me repeating here, even if they intrigue me) then we could see what looks like a “bank run” occur not just in stablecoins, but ultimately in the assets they hold and asset classes that compete with what they hold. Let’s just pretend, for the moment, that they have money market lending that is off the radar screen, and presumably paid a lot, as it wasn’t standard. If they have to sell, that could cause prices to plummet, possibly to a level that more traditional players sell what they have to buy this stuff, creating that first domino effect.

    There is a circularity between crypto and stablecoins. They can bring each other down.

    While crypto losses themselves will be largely isolated to the holders (we still have to dig into that), the unravelling of stablecoins is likely to influence other markets, possibly quite negatively.

    Direct Losses

    The direct losses are relatively easy to figure out.

    • Crypto losses. Let’s say $500 billion could be wiped out of crypto. While some evidence points to there being a small subset of “whales” that would bear the brunt of that loss, I think there is a broad enough swath of the population that would take a serious hit and it would affect spending in the near-term.
    • Stablecoin losses. Stablecoins in theory should have an orderly unwind. If, and that remains a question, there is a disorderly unwind of one or more stablecoins, the losses would be in the 10’s of billions (which isn’t so bad). The problem is that unlike crypto losses, where investors presumably treated this as a risky portion of their portfolio, stablecoins are viewed as cash equivalents. Losing cash is always more problematic than losing risky investments. Something to watch.
    • Public Company Losses. There are at least a couple of public companies that are linked to crypto. Then there are the miners, mostly listed on foreign exchanges. HIVE for example went from almost $2 billion to just over $400 million (higher than the recent lows of $237 million). Not a huge market cap loss, but only one of many miners out there. This would add up to more losses, some of which would hit mainstream funds. The bigger losses would likely be felt in the private domain as many of the companies in the space have not yet made the leap from private equity to public equity. The losses shouldn’t be material to the broader market, but would likely be concentrated enough to leave a mark disproportionate to the size of the losses. On the private equity side (even more than the public side) the losses will hit employees the hardest and that will hit spending.
    • Jobs.
      • If you consider day trading crypto and waiting for NFT drops to be a job, then there will be job losses.
      • The companies I’ve mentioned, both the public and private ones, will be forced to let go of employees (that already will have lost significant paper wealth). These are skilled employees, so in theory, could find other jobs, but that could be more difficult to do in an environment where crypto losses cause investors (including private equity) to be more conservative across the fintech space.
    • Domino or knock-on effects. Assuming the stablecoins hold liquid assets, that unwind should be handled easily (there is a risk that isn’t the case, at least for some stablecoins) but I won’t harp on it. There is not a lot of direct debt tied to crypto (though there are some bonds out there, but they are too small to have any material impact). I don’t see crypto being used as a major source of collateral. If bitcoin holdings, for example, were being used to leverage up stock investments, then I’d be very scared. I think some individuals may manage their personal wealth along those lines, but I don’t see it as a widespread issue (unlike housing in 2008, for example).
      • Spending. How much spending is coming from this sector and what does that mean for us?

    Spurious Correlation or Real Threat

    You can take any two data series and potentially see a correlation. They may have nothing to do with each other, so we can stare at the “correlation” chart as long as we want, but it isn’t going to help us because there is no causation. Complicating matters further, we should be looking at correlations between the rate of change rather than correlations between asset classes themselves (I vaguely remember the reasons for this, but I will ignore that technicality for today).

    Here is the SOX (Philadelphia Semiconductor Index) versus bitcoin. I chose to use this index because it is more likely to be spurious and highlights how much more correlated some individual semi-conductor stocks are.

    Spurious correlation. The argument for “spurious correlation” is strong.

    • It seems impossible that a small segment of the market, like crypto, could have a large effect on such a big diversified market.
    • Many of the things that drove crypto were also driving other industries that placed huge demands on the chip industry (video conferencing, autonomous driving, big data, etc.). So crypto was just one of many things driving those industries and those industries should not be impacted by a crash in crypto.
    • I could go on, but I can see heads nodding here, so I won’t spend any more time arguing what is a consensus (and probably correct) view.

    What if it is correlated?

    • The wealth being generated by those in crypto was large. From the miners to the “exchanges,” there was a race to capture revenue and there was plenty of revenue to capture. The spending on chips (rigs to mine, servers to provide customer service, etc.) was large. Chip companies presumably saw this demand and knew that they could charge a premium to an industry where speed and timeliness meant everything. Were chips designed specifically for the crypto industry? Was production of generics shifted to higher profit margin lines? Not only were the companies (that succeeded) spending money, but many failed business ideas (or those just not yet successful) had money to spend as well.
    • What if crypto spending went to web services (seems like it would). What if it went to advertising? (It did). What if that spending caused those companies to spend more? Maybe they needed to add systems, components, and people to keep up with the demand from the crypto industry. Did that spending then create more spending and make it very difficult (if not impossible) to figure out where crypto spending ended and where “regular” spending went?
    • How much money was crypto spending on energy? At one time I saw stories that in terms of energy usage, crypto, if treated as a nation, would have been the 10th largest country in terms of energy use. Commodity prices are always affected by the marginal 5% or 10% of demand. Is it possible that part of energy inflation was due to crypto? Does that mean policy makers are responding to a problem (high inflation) while ignoring one of the causes (because it isn’t on their radar screen, except in China, which has been clamping down on mining in that country?)

    The case for crypto being a bigger driver than previously thought may seem weak, but I cannot help but believe that it is a risk we should be discussing more than I think we are.

    What if the correlation was a driver for exciting new technologies where enormous wealth seemed possible (to such an extent) that current spending or success was irrelevant? What if crypto’s decline and potential collapse may not be causal, but is correlated to some broader move in markets and the economy? Then in that case, it might be spurious, but is still dangerous.

    Impossible Things, Black Swans, and Thinking Out of the Box

    I do not think a crypto collapse is impossible. It isn’t my base case, but there is a real possibility that it occurs.

    Black swans are things that people didn’t think were possible (and turned out to be possible). We can get a pass on missing black swans, but not if we are looking at a grey swan and choose to ignore it.

    I’m not lying awake at night thinking about a crypto collapse because:

    1. It “probably” won’t happen.
    2. If it does happen, the damage to the economy “could” or maybe even “should” be minimal.

    But I am thinking more and more about it because if there is a correlation between crypto and the broader economy (and markets) or because crypto, the broader markets, and the economy are moving to the same theme, there is serious risk to the downside. Some of this risk may not be getting priced in based on some simple charts of crypto versus other asset classes. On this broader correlation theme, check out ARKK shares outstanding because something seems to have shifted in terms of the investor mentality there.

    For those who celebrate, enjoy bitcoin infinity day! It really seems weird that not only is that a thing, but on 8/21/21 the CEO of a public company enjoyed tweeting it out. I’m possibly too old and jaded, but stuff like that seems silly rather than compelling.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 21:30

  • How Water Powers The World
    How Water Powers The World

    Discussions about the relevance and viability of renewable energy are often limited to solar and wind, two types of power sources that have risen to prominence since the turn of the century. 

    Hydropower and its role in certain countries’ electricity generation are often overlooked, even though even so-called developed nations like Norway, Austria and Canada generate sizeable shares of their electricity via hydropower plants.

    However, as Statista’s Florian Zandt shows in the inforgraphic below, based on data from BP and Ember collated by Our World in Data, Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean, in particular, rely heavily on water power.

    Infographic: How Water Powers the World | Statista

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    For example, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Lesotho or Ethiopia generated almost 100 percent of their electricity with hydropower in 2020. The latter started construction on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam in 2011, a project expected to produce 5.15 gigawatt once finished, making it the biggest dam on the continent.

    In the southern half of the Americas, Venezuela’s electricity mix consisted of 82 percent water power owed in no small part to the Guri dam with its installed capacity of 10.2 gigawatts. Ecuador, Guinea, Costa Rica and Panama also primarily rely on hydropower for electricity with shares of 78, 71 and 66 percent, respectively.

    When looking at the total energy mix, hydropower takes a backseat to emission-heavy fossil fuels. In 2019, it amounted to a share of just seven percent worldwide, according to Our World in Data. Due to the high reliance on oil and gas for heating and transport, it’s unlikely this centuries-old power source will become a contender in primary energy generation. Generating power via methods like hydroelectric dams also has other drawbacks. Funneling rivers into reservoirs can impact the habitats of some aquatic species and upset the balance of river ecosystems, as well as necessitate rehoming of residents dependent on said rivers.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 21:00

  • Facebook Fact-Check Censors Factual Claim IRS Is Arming Agents To Use Deadly Force
    Facebook Fact-Check Censors Factual Claim IRS Is Arming Agents To Use Deadly Force

    Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Summit News,

    Facebook has deployed one of its infamous ‘fact checkers’ to suggest that the completely accurate claim that the IRS is seeking to arm more agents to use deadly force was “partly false information.”

    Earlier this month, an IRS job posting was uncovered that announced the agency was looking to hire people who are ready to kill.

    The job ad listed one of the “major duties” of IRS agents to be able to “carry a firearm and be willing to use deadly force, if necessary.”

    The IRS subsequently deleted the job posting after it stoked controversy, but then a 2021 IRS annual report also came to light which showed heavily armed agents simulating an assault on a suburban home as part of their training.

    When the Heritage Foundation and Young Americans for Liberty (YAL) posted about the issue on Facebook, the Big Tech giant, relying on a ‘fact check’ carried out by Lead Stories, slapped a warning label on posts that said they constituted “partly false information.”

    Fact checks have the effect of basically blacklisting content on Facebook, burying it in the algorithm and preventing large numbers of people from viewing the content.

    ‘Fact Check: IRS Is NOT Trying To Arm All Its Agents’ shouted the headline of the article by Lead Stories.

    However, as Christina Maas notes, “The Heritage Foundation never said the IRS was arming all of its agents.”

    “In its article, Lead Stories singles out pro-liberty youth organization Young Americans for Liberty (YAL). The youth group posted a screenshot of the original job posting, and wrote: “The IRS is hiring! The government wants its IRS agents armed and its citizens disarmed. We’ll let everyone just marinate on that for a second.”

    “Lead Stories tried to make it look like YAL said the IRS is arming all of its employees. “Is the IRS trying to arm all its employees?” asked Lead Stories. “No, that’s not true: A job posting from the IRS Criminal Investigation unit, which carries firearms, does refer to carrying firearms.”

    As ever, fact checkers pedantically select a piece of language that was used (or not even used at all in this case) which might be slightly exaggerated to then declare that the entire story is “false information,” when it isn’t, it’s overwhelmingly true information.

    As we previously highlighted, fact checkers used by Facebook previously declared the Hunter Biden laptop story to be “Russian disinformation.”

    We also reported on how 11 ‘fact checkers’ are demanding that YouTube censor more videos for “misinformation,” with one of the reasons being that no one is content produced by fact checker groups.

    Back in June, USA Today, which is used as a ‘fact checker’ by social media platforms, was forced to delete 23 articles from its website after an investigation found one of its reporters had fabricated sources.

    *  *  *

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

    In the age of mass Silicon Valley censorship It is crucial that we stay in touch. I need you to sign up for my free newsletter here. Support my sponsor – Turbo Force – a supercharged boost of clean energy without the comedown. Get early access, exclusive content and behinds the scenes stuff by following me on Locals.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 20:30

  • US National Institutes Of Health Ending Subaward For Wuhan Lab
    US National Institutes Of Health Ending Subaward For Wuhan Lab

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

    The U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) has ended a subgrant to the laboratory in China located where the first COVID-19 cases were identified in 2019.

    U.S.-based EcoHealth Alliance was granted $3.7 million, starting in 2014, to study bat-related coronaviruses. It conveyed some of the money to the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), located in China.

    The grant was renewed in 2019, but suspended in 2020 because of concerns the grantees were failing to comply with conditions attached to the money.

    The NIH’s review of the concerns has concluded, Dr. Michael Lauer, an NIH deputy director, revealed in a letter on Aug. 19. It determined that all of the problems cannot be fixed.

    Therefore, the NIH informed EcoHealth Alliance that the subaward to the Wuhan lab is terminated “for failure to meet award terms and conditions requiring provision of records to NIH upon request,” Lauer wrote to Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), the top Republican on the House Oversight Committee.

    ‘Cannot Be Remedied’

    Grants from the U.S. government come with certain conditions, including timely reporting of results, and adequate monitoring of experiments.

    The EcoHealth Alliance failed to perform a review of the research conducted under the grant, which included making bat coronaviruses more dangerous, the NIH said in October 2021. The agency in January said EcoHealth Alliance failed to comply with other conditions with the grant, R01AI110964, and other awards.

    The NIH asked for plans to correct the failures, which was provided on Feb. 4, Lauer said Friday, and the NIH determined that the plans were sufficient.

    Separately, though, the NIH asked EcoHealth in late 2021, and again in January, for lab notebooks and original files from the research conducted at the Wuhan lab. It has not received them, according to the new letter.

    EcoHealth executives have said that it passed along the request but have not heard back from WIV.

    The refusal to provide the materials led to the just-announced termination of the subaward.

    “NIH has determined that WIV’s refusal to provide the requested records, and EHA’s failure to include the required terms in WIV’s subaward agreement represent material failures to comply with the terms of award,” Lauer told Drs. Aleksei Chmura and Peter Daszak, the executives, in a letter released on Friday by Comer. “NIH has further determined that in these circumstances, WIV’s refusal to provide records cannot be remedied by imposing additional conditions, and that a partial termination of award (i.e., termination of the subaward to WIV) is the only appropriate action.”

    EcoHealth did not respond to requests for comment. An email sent to the Wuhan lab bounced back.

    Will Keep Funding EcoHealth

    The NIH is not terminating any of the awards in question, R01AI110964, 1U01AI151797-01, and 1U01AI153420-01—at least for now.

    When grantees are not compliant with requirements, the preference is to work with them to bring them into compliance rather than termination, Lauer said.

    EcoHealth has successfully implemented the NIH-approved corrective plans for the latter two awards, according to the NIH. While EcoHealth will be forbidden to dole money out to WIV under the other grant, it will be able to renegotiate the objectives of the grant with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, led by Dr. Anthony Fauci.

    If an agreement is reached, the revised grant will move forward. If it is not, the grant may be terminated.

    EcoHealth was asked to outline within 30 days how it will accomplish the purpose of the grant without WIV. That will require a change in scope but the change may not depart significantly from the original project, Lauer said.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 19:30

  • Digital Clones Of Deceased Loved Ones Chat With Mourners At Own Funerals
    Digital Clones Of Deceased Loved Ones Chat With Mourners At Own Funerals

    A startup company called StoryFile has pioneered a new product that allows deceased people to address mourners at their funerals through the power of artificial intelligence.

    Known as the ‘digital afterlife’ industry, StoryFile uses 20 cameras while asking a person 250 questions before death. This data is then fed into software that creates a so-called digital clone of that person. 

    Marina Smith, an 87-year-old woman who passed in June, was given a chance to use StoryFile. Smith’s Los Angeles-based son Stephen is the company’s founder and shocked funeralgoers by creating an interactive illusion of her on a screen during the memorial service:

    “Mum answered questions from grieving relatives after they had watched her cremation,” Stephen told The Telegraph.

    “The extraordinary thing was that she answered their questions with new details and honesty,” he added. “People feel emboldened when recording their data. Mourners might get a freer, truer version of their lost loved one.”

    Earlier this year, a digital copy of former Screen Actors Guild president Ed Asner was made possible at his funeral by StoryFile. Axios reported mourners “conversed” with the holographic representation of Asner.

    “Nothing could prepare me for what I was going to witness when I saw it,” Matt Asner, the actor’s son, said last month.

    Asner added that some funeralgoers were “creeped out” because it was almost “like having him in the room.” 

    The digital afterlife industry is just taking off. Amazon has decided to jump into the game by providing an experimental Alexa feature that learns the voice of a deceased loved one. 

    Even Microsoft has acquired patented technology using social media posts to reincarnate people as “chatbots.” 

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 19:00

  • Lawsuits Coming For Entities That Don't Change COVID Mandates After CDC Update: Lawyer
    Lawsuits Coming For Entities That Don’t Change COVID Mandates After CDC Update: Lawyer

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

    Entities with COVID-19 vaccine mandates that don’t pay heed to the new Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidance will face lawsuits, a civil liberties lawyer says.

    “We don’t have a new lawsuit in the works yet. But if we see that colleges and universities and public employers are not responding to the new CDC guidance the way that they should be, then we would certainly tee up a new lawsuit,” Mark Chenoweth, president and general counsel at the New Civil Liberties Alliance, told The Epoch Times.

    Mark Chenoweth, president and general counsel at the New Civil Liberties Alliance. (Courtesy of the New Civil Liberties Alliance)

    The response to the updated guidance should be, at a minimum, a lifting of mandates for people who have recovered from COVID-19, he added.

    Such people have a high level of protection against severe illness and death, according to a number of studies. Many studies indicate the protection is higher than that of the COVID-19 vaccines—including one study funded by the CDC.

    The CDC issued updated guidance on Aug. 11, stating in part that risk for illness from COVID-19 “is considerably reduced by immunity derived from vaccination, previous infection, or both” and that “persons who have had COVID-19 but are not vaccinated have some degree of protection against severe illness from their previous infection.”

    The public health agency rolled back quarantine recommendations for people, regardless of vaccination status, citing the high amount of immunity in the U.S. population from vaccination, prior infection, or both.

    Since virtually all entities that have imposed mandates have cited CDC guidance, the entities won’t be able to argue they aren’t aware of the updated guidance, according to Chenoweth.

    That means any institution that doesn’t alter or rescind its mandate in light of the update “is ripe for a lawsuit,” he said.

    “Because the thing that the judges have said so far is that it was rational for these employers to follow CDC guidance, but now the CDC guidance is different. And if they’re now going forward with these mandates for example, against people who have natural immunity in the teeth of the CDC guidance on that question, then I think it’s going to be much harder for them to win even a rational basis challenge to their policies.”

    Suits

    The New Civil Liberties Alliance has brought lawsuits against Michigan State University (MSU), the U.S. government, Fairfax County Public Schools, George Mason University, and Rhode Island officials over mandates that the legal group says are illegal.

    They have focused on how entities aren’t granting exemptions to people with proof that they’ve recovered from COVID-19.

    While one of the cases won the plaintiff an exemption from the mandate, judges have ruled against many others, often tracing the mandates to CDC guidance.

    “Plaintiffs have the burden of negating every rational basis that supports the MSU vaccine mandate, and the Court finds that they have failed to do so,” U.S. District Judge Paul Maloney, a George W. Bush appointee, wrote in February as he dismissed the suit.

    “CDC guidance is clear: ‘[V]accination remains the safest and primary strategy to prevent SARS-CoV2 infections,’” he added. “In achieving MSU’s stated legitimate goal of protecting its students and staff from COVID-19, it was plainly rational, in July 2021 when MSU established the policy, for MSU to rely on CDC guidance and require its students and staff to receive the COVID vaccination.”

    The CDC has long maintained that vaccination is superior to natural immunity, and urged people with natural immunity to get vaccinated, even though many studies show that natural immunity provides better protection than vaccination and some suggest that people who recovered from COVID-19 are at higher risk of side effects if they do get a vaccine.

    Moreover, some experts say getting vaccinated after recovery doesn’t make sense because the increase in protection is negligible, though others say the increase is worth the risk.

    Could Have Changed in 2021

    Chenoweth said the CDC should have updated its guidance in 2021.

    “I think it’s remarkable that it’s taken the CDC this long to come around to admitting the science on this topic. The science was there at least a year ago when we started litigating the issue of whether or not folks with natural immunity should be subjected to vaccine mandates,” he said.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 18:30

  • These Three Liberal-Controlled Cities Have Worst Post-COVID Downturn Rebounds
    These Three Liberal-Controlled Cities Have Worst Post-COVID Downturn Rebounds

    The progressive approach to law enforcement in certain major US cities, supported by George Soros and others, has been a complete failure as residents’ quality of life has collapsed. Soaring violent crime and controversial open-air drug markets plague the downtown areas of San Francisco, Cleveland, and Portland, transforming these areas into wastelands. 

    A recent study commissioned by the Institute of Governmental Studies at the University of California Berkeley found that San Francisco’s downtown activity was only 31% this spring (between March and May) compared to pre-Covid levels. Cleveland was at 36%, and Portland was at 41%.

    Meanwhile, after the pandemic, Salt Lake City, Utah, Bakersfield, California, and Columbus, Ohio, experienced the most massive booms in downtown activity.

    Source: Daily Mail 

    Researchers used data from 18 million smartphone users traveling through America’s busiest metro areas to determine which downtown areas bounced back the most and least. 

    What’s striking in the data is that the worst bouncebacks are in liberal-controlled metro areas that have either defunded the police or at least tried, allowed for open-air drug markets, and made shoplifting only a misdemeanor. 

    The study’s results are no surprise to readers as disastrous progressive policies ignited a tsunami of violent crime in liberal-controlled cities, resulting in an exodus of the population with migration trends to metro areas where law and order were more stable (such as towns in Montana). 

    The common denominator among the metropolises with the smallest downtown activity bouncebacks is controlled by Democrats who endlessly create havoc at the expense of law-abiding citizens. 

    However, there is good news. People are waking up from their liberal amnesia and are ousting those who have made things worse for them. 

    A perfect example is San Francisco’s chief prosecutor Chesa Boudin who was booted from office this summer. He was backed by Soros and came under fire for failed progressive criminal-justice reform policies that led to a sharp increase in drug overdose deaths, homelessness, and thefts, including smash-and-grab robberies, car burglaries, shoplifting, and other property crimes.

    Third on the list is Portland, for the lowest bounceback in downtown activity. This liberal-controlled area is no stranger to readers as the metro area is plagued with soaring homelessness, drug overdoses, and surging violent crime after left-wing protests called for defunding the police. 

    The progressive mismanagement of America’s cities has only accelerated post-Covid, resulting in a mass exodus of households and businesses fleeing these hellholes for ones that are safe and economically friendly. The exodus will continue, pushing some liberal cities to the proverbial financial edge as their tax base evaporates. 

    America’s cities need a new generation of leaders who will be brave enough to counter decades of failed progressive leadership and inform voters their collapse in quality of life is due to bad policymaking. 

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 18:00

  • Census Bureau Admits Overcounting 7 Blue States, Just 1 Red State
    Census Bureau Admits Overcounting 7 Blue States, Just 1 Red State

    Authored by Hans Von Spakovsky via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    In a shocking report, the U.S. Census Bureau recently admitted that it overcounted the populations of eight states and undercounted the populations of six states in the 2020 census.

    The Census Bureau has not explained how it got the 2020 census so wrong. (hapabapa/Getty Images)

    All but one of the states overcounted is a blue state, and all but one of the undercounted states is red.

    Those costly errors will distort congressional representation and the Electoral College. It means that when the Census Bureau reapportioned the House of Representatives, Florida was cheated out of two additional seats it should have gotten; Texas missed out on another seat; Minnesota and Rhode Island each kept a representative they shouldn’t have; and Colorado was awarded a new member of the House it didn’t deserve.

    These harmful errors also mean billions in federal funds will be misallocated. Funding for many federal programs is distributed to the states based on population. Overcounted states will now receive a larger share of federal funds than they are entitled to, at the expense of the undercounted states.

    The Census Bureau has not explained how it got the 2020 census so wrong. This is particularly troublesome because the bureau reported an error rate of 0.01 percent in the 2010 census—an overcount of only 36,000 people, a statistically insignificant mistake.

    The 2020 errors were discovered through the “2020 Post-Enumeration Survey.”

    After each census, the bureau interviews a large number of households across the country and then compares the interview answers with the original census responses. The 2020 survey showed that the bureau overcounted the population in Delaware, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New York, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Utah. The largest mistake was in President Joe Biden’s home state of Delaware, which was overcounted by 5.45 percent.

    The states whose populations were undercounted were Arkansas, Florida, Illinois, Mississippi, Tennessee, and Texas. The largest error in the undercount was in Arkansas, where the population count was off by 5.04 percent.

    The original census reported that Florida needed only 171,500 more residents to gain another congressional seat. Yet the survey shows that Florida was undercounted by over three-quarters of a million people. The bureau also said that Texas needed only 189,000 more people to gain another congressional seat. The survey shows that Texas was undercounted by 560,319 residents.

    Minnesota, according to the original census report, would have lost a congressional seat during reapportionment if it had 26 fewer residents; the survey shows the state was overcounted by 216,971 individuals. Similarly, Rhode Island would have lost a seat if the Census Bureau had counted 19,000 fewer residents. It turns out that the state was overcounted by more than 55,000 individuals.

    The Associated Press quoted John Marion of Common Cause in Rhode Island admitting that the state would benefit from this mistake, including “more representation in Congress.”

    Unfortunately, the federal statutes governing the census and apportionment provide no remedy to correct this problem. And it would be very difficult to devise an acceptable remedy this far after the fact.

    The census is geared to providing a count of the population on one specific date, in this case April 1, 2020. A remedy that involved ordering the Census Bureau to conduct another actual recount in the 14 affected states—a complex, expensive undertaking—would provide numbers on a different date than the original census, whose population totals would still be in effect for the rest of the states. This would raise fundamental fairness issues, given the high mobility of our population.

    The concept of conducting a new census of the entire nation also seems impractical.

    One thing, however, must be done. Congress needs to use its oversight authority to investigate and determine why these errors happened, particularly since they didn’t occur in the 2010 census. Lawmakers should then make the changes necessary to ensure this does not happen again.

    Originally published by The Washington Times. Reprinted by permission from The Daily Signal, a publication of The Heritage Foundation.

    Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times or Zero Hedge.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 17:30

  • San Francisco Cops Catch Catalytic Converter Thief Red Handed – Then Let Him Go
    San Francisco Cops Catch Catalytic Converter Thief Red Handed – Then Let Him Go

    As a wave of catalytic converter thefts intensifies around the country, one would think that cops in major cities would want to make examples of offenders – especially those caught in the act.

    One would be wrong… at least when it comes to San Francisco.

    At around 3am Tuesday in the city’s Richmond District, witnesses saw a catalytic converter theft in progress and called the cops. A man was backing a stolen Honda Accord into a parking space – the ‘donor’ car – while a second suspect sat nearby in a jeep.

    “I woke up to the sound of you know, like, drilling. It was extremely loud,” said resident Morgan Heller, who immediately called police – who arrived in three minutes, according to KTVU.

    Jeep guy took off before the cops arrived, but Heller and her roomate kept their eye on the first suspect. Much to their surprise, the cops let him go.

    “I heard them say, ‘You are free to go,” said Heller, who said the suspect even asked officers where the closest bust stop was.

    “I was like, ‘Why not do the white-glove treatment and just order him an Uber?” asked Heller. “It was embarrassing… The overall assessment is that we have to do better than this.”

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsTheir excuse? Cops told Heller their computer systems were down, so they couldn’t positively ID the suspect, or find the owner of the Honda – so they let him go.

    “To see such inaction, its hard for me to understand what is the threshold for arrest and what is a reasonable expectation for police action,” said Heller.

    The SFPD released the following statement in response to the incident: “Our job is not just to enforce the law, but to ensure everyone is protected by the law. Releasing a possible suspect does not mean the investigation is over. In fact, it means the investigation is just beginning.“

    Sure.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 17:00

  • Morgan Stanley: Cash Looks "Relatively Attractive" Right Now
    Morgan Stanley: Cash Looks “Relatively Attractive” Right Now

    By Andrew Sheets, Chief Cross-Asset Strategist for Morgan Stanley

    Sunday Start: What If Holding Cash Is Just Efficient Asset Allocation?

    Since mid-2009, a question that seems easy in hindsight and but felt difficult at the time was what to do with cash. On the one hand, it didn’t yield anything, and allocating to anything else usually did better. But the last 12 years have also been a period of profound pessimism – on the outlook for banking, Europe and long-term growth. The intensity of the GFC and the events that followed meant that in the darkest moments more than a few CFOs and investors likely mumbled a silent prayer: If we make it through this, we will never be caught without liquidity again.

    Holding cash, in other words, was an explicitly defensive decision for much of the last 12 years. Of course it offered a worse return than anything else in the market. That was the point. Holding cash was the price of security, an insurance policy against that prevailing gloom. And like insurance, it could be expensive. USD cash underperformed both the S&P 500 and the US 10-year every year from 2010 to 2020 except two (2013 and 2018).

    But the idea that holding cash means paying for insurance is no longer accurate. US 6-month T-bill yields (3.1%) are the highest since late 2007 and offer 157bp more than the dividends of the S&P 500, 21bp more than US 10-year Treasuries and just 60bp less than the US Aggregate Bond index. For USD investors, cash has ceased to be a material drag on a portfolio’s current yield.

    The numbers may be less extreme in Europe, but still represent a change of regime. German 6-month bill yields, at +0.3%, are positive for the first time since 2014. For the last eight years, holding ‘cash’ in Europe cost a significant amount of money. Not anymore.

    All of this has a number of implications.

    • First, we think that holding USD cash looks relatively attractive on a cross-asset basis. It offers a high current yield. It offers liquidity. If offers a better 12-month total return than our strategy forecasts imply for US equities, US Treasuries and either US IG or HY credit (with considerably less volatility). As a result, our Core+ optimized fixed income portfolios (see Cross-Asset Dispatches: AGG+ and CORE+ Optimal Fixed Income Portfolios: July 2022, July 29, 2022) are generally OW short-dated fixed income. USD cash also performs well versus other currencies; our FX strategists project further USD strength, especially against EUR, aided in part by the dollar’s attractive yield. One exception is EM sovereign debt, which should outperform cash, and which we’ve recently raised to OW (see Cross-Asset Dispatches: Bears Watching, August 5, 2022, and EM Sovereign Credit Strategy: Dialing Risk Up Another Notch, August 10, 2022).
    • Second, high yields on short-term safe assets create a risk of outflows that needs to be monitored, as it reduces the cost for investors to step out of the market. For the moment, we are more relaxed about outflows (see Cross-Asset Dispatches: More Relaxed about Outflows, July 29, 2022), given strong consumer finances, better recent cross-asset performance and the simple fact that terrible 1H performance didn’t trigger a rush for the proverbial exits.
    • Third, and another factor that may be limiting outflows, is that not all ‘cash’ is created equal. While US 6-month T-bills yield ~3.1%, the yields on 6-month US bank CDs are just 0.9% (and the Bankrate.com average for a US bank savings account is just 0.13%). For gathering assets and adding yield, it seems like an unusually good time to add value with money market strategies. This also raises some interesting questions around bank net interest margins, and it seems appropriate to note that the price/book ratio of EU banks was 57% higher the last time German bill yields were positive.

    For much of the last 12 years, cash yielded nothing, and allocating to it represented a deliberate choice to pay an often high price for insurance. But times change. Cash yields have risen sharply at a time when Morgan Stanley’s forecasts for global cross-asset returns are low, squeezed by tighter policy if economic data continue to hold up, and higher risk premiums if the data turn down. The market is giving investors the opportunity to earn ~3% on safe, liquid T-bills, or ~5% on safe (but less liquid) short-duration CLO AAAs, and somewhere in-between for other AAA securitized paper that has cheapened as banks have faced RWA constraints. These aren’t the most exciting investments, but sometimes it makes sense to take what the market gives you.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 16:30

  • Lithium Prices Putting EV Producers Under Pressure
    Lithium Prices Putting EV Producers Under Pressure

    With demand for electric vehicles on the rise, and production bans for petrol and diesel cars in some key markets on the horizon, one of the key metals required to fuel this mobility boom, has been surging in price lately.

    As Statista’s Martin Armstrong shows in the chart below, based on price-tracking from Trading Economics, Lithium carbonate, essential for the production of the batteries used in EVs, has experienced a meteoric rise in cost over the last few months – being traded consistently above the 450,000 Chinese yuan/tonne mark since February.

    Infographic: Lithium Prices Putting EV Producers Under Pressure | Statista

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    With the current global supply chain issues and demand forecast to rise aggressively over the next few years, producers of electric vehicles are now under increasing pressure to maintain their pricing models, while also facing down significant hurdles to meet their production goals.

    Worse still, analysts are predicting new lithium price highs around the corner, not the relief that the motor industry so desperately needs.

    Even more troubling, as Autumn Spredemann writes at The Epoch Times, while increased domestic lithium production plays a crucial role in President Joe Biden’s green energy plan, lithium mining has quietly revealed itself to be a significant contributor to environmental pollution in the frantic rush to abandon fossil fuels.

    Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm said Biden’s historic investment in electric battery production and recycling would give the United States “the jolt it needs to become more secure and less reliant on other nations,” in a May 2 press release.

    Though some environmental experts believe that when it comes to lithium extraction, the end doesn’t justify the means.

    “Our position is: mining is very destructive to the environment and communities. It needs to be approached judiciously,” John Hadder, director of Great Basin Resource Watch, told The Epoch Times.

    In November 2021, United Nations  Secretary-General Antonio Guterres remarked, “We’re digging our own graves” with mining, drilling, and burning during a world leader’s summit on climate change.

    At the other end of the lithium debate are the spent electric batteries. Improperly disposed lithium batteries can be very unstable, causing landfill fires that can go on for years. The resultant toxic chemicals released into the air can also impact air quality and carbon emissions.

    Vegreville explained batteries can be recycled, but lithium-ion units are especially dangerous due to fire hazards.

    “One of the most ecologically friendly ways to dispose of a lithium-ion battery is to dismantle it,” he said.

    Though the demand for lithium batteries is set to become a $116 billion industry by the year 2030, leaving some experts concerned that production may outstrip the industry’s ability to properly handle waste on the back end.

    The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency admits special recycling and hazardous waste facilities are needed to deal with the influx of electric batteries. One standard electric car battery on average weighs over 1,000 pounds.

    In other words, the recycling end will need to be a highly regulated, multi-million dollar industry in its own right to reduce pollution and fire hazards.

    Moreover, Hadder says the current political demand for lithium could end with a push for more toxic, unsustainable projects in the long run. And while he supports a transition to renewable energy overall, the current gold rush mentality for lithium is anything but green.

    “What we’re seeing now is a repeat of patterns and practices of the past,” Hadder said.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 16:00

  • Inflation Is Quietly Stripping Us Of Our Private Property Rights
    Inflation Is Quietly Stripping Us Of Our Private Property Rights

    Submitted by QTR’s Fringe Finance

    I used to scoff at the mention of ‘The Great Reset”, or the idea that a handful of elites are running the global show behind the scenes. Needless to say, on the other side of the pandemic, I have warmed up to the idea in a big way. I can’t help but feel as though some often talked about conspiracy theories are in the process of unfolding right before our very eyes, whether via premeditated means or just from plain old dumbass incompetence from global politicians and Central Banks.

    As anybody who is harshly critical of the idea of a “Great Reset” will tell you, one of the key tenets of a post-apocalyptic, Klaus Schwab-run world is the idea that we will no longer have private property rights. This comes from a statement that Schwab made, predicting what life would be like in the year 2030:

    “You’ll own nothing” — And “you’ll be happy about it.”

    And while today’s lesson is rather elementary, it’s worth noting that this conspiracy theory not only isn’t too far from the truth, it could very well be in the midst of taking place right before our eyes.

    I had to look no further than my own personal circle to find recent examples of grown adults who were having difficulty making ends meet due to rising prices. These people had some money saved up, but still could not keep up with the price of rent and housing, and ultimately wound up giving up on having their own place and moving back home with their parents.

    When I was discussing this example on my most recent podcast, I had the revelation that, as is true with anything economic, this same situation was playing out millions of times over, with millions of other Americans, every day. In other words everyone is having the same problem: they simply can’t afford things anymore and, with inflation at between 8% and 9%, the value of their savings is collapsing.

    In just 3 years, things cost between 15% and 20% more than they did when many savers were putting away a majority of their money – before the pandemic. The purchasing power of the dollar is down by about 20% over the same time.

    USD Purchasing Power (5 Years) via TradingEconomics.com

    Those who are still working on a wage that isn’t 20% higher than it was just 3 years ago are losing significant ground. Those who have stopped working and are either on a fixed income or are living off savings have been hit even worse (especially if you’re living off a pension managed by some of the absolute worst managers to ever step foot in front of a Bloomberg terminal, like this one and this one).

    This financial pressure is widely talked about when it comes to people paring back their discretionary spending. We hear the news talk about a slowdown in spending all the time when economic times get tougher – it’s one of the dynamics that creates recession and de-leveraging cycles. But what happens when it’s the cost of shelter (i.e. rent and housing) and real estate that are also getting too expensive for everyday buyers. This is talked about far less, so let’s quickly think about what it could mean for the future.

    Today’s article is free because I believe the content to be too important to put behind a paywall. If you enjoy this piece, have the means and want to support my work, I’d be humbled to have you as a subscriber: Yes, I want 70% off a subsription. 

    In Klaus Schwab’s future, borrowing the words of Judge Smails, “you’ll get nothing and like it!”

    We are all Spaulding

    It’ll be this way because everything will be communal and shared. The focus will be taken away from private property and private property rights.

    Inflation helps this narrative greatly. If you have less purchasing power to buy discretionary items then, by proxy, you have less private property.

    The scary thing is when this dynamic starts to extrapolate itself over people’s real estate and land ownership. In other words, a future where nobody can afford a second set of golf clubs doesn’t seem that post-apocalyptic, but a future where fewer and fewer people own land and house, and where the geographical distribution of the world’s livable area starts to fall into the hands of the richest few and state backed entities – well, this seems extremely post-apocalyptic.

    While I admit this is a bit “fringe” at the moment (hey, it’s what I do), I now can’t help but think of inflation as a way to help strip away people’s individual private property rights. When you take away a person’s private property, private property rights don’t hold the same meaning to them. Do people that don’t want to own guns care about the right to own guns? Probably not as much as those who are avid sportsman or want to own guns for personal protection.

    If you haven’t yet, I would encourage you to listen to my most recent podcast with Andy Schectman, where he lays out the de-dollarization path we could be on and how the global economic landscape is shifting before our eyes. In his estimation, everything that needs to be happening for ‘The Great Reset” to take place on or ahead of schedule is already happening.

    And as I said to him, while I may have laughed at the idea a couple of years ago, I found myself with my jaw agape by the end of the interview – because as much as I didn’t want him to, his post-apocalyptic scenario was making a whole lot of sense.

    I know this is somewhat of a basic lesson in economics, but the next time you hear the Biden administration refer to inflation at 0% sequentially, despite the fact that it was up more than 8% from the year prior, take it personally. Remember that every positive CPI print we see represents the percentage of things you can buy less of with the same money you had a year prior.

    If you could afford 8% more “stuff” last year with the same dollar, what type of mental gymnastics do you need to perform to convince yourself that your rights to private property aren’t being whittled away and taken out from underneath you?

    Our freedom versus Schwabism | Meer

    Thank you for reading QTR’s Fringe Finance . This post is public so feel free to share it: Share

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 15:30

  • Baltimore On Pace For Possible Record Murders As Local NAACP Asks Governor To Deploy National Guard
    Baltimore On Pace For Possible Record Murders As Local NAACP Asks Governor To Deploy National Guard

    Baltimore City reached 231 homicides since the start of the year and is on pace for a possible record year of murder.

    Just an hour north of the White House, the Democratic-controlled metro area is in ruins with no signs of waning violence as President Biden’s ‘unity in America’ has died. 

    Newly elected Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott has blamed everyone from the media to gun companies for the worsening violence. 

    The 38-year-old politician announced a year ago that his five-year plan would reduce violence, though the plan could be a massive failure this year as the current rate of homicides is above a five-year trend, implying 300 homicide level could be reached as early November with the possibility of a record number of murders (if the pace continues) at the end of the year. 

    If the dreaded 300th homicide level is breached later this year, it will be the eighth consecutive year. 

    Democrats have controlled Baltimore for more than half a century. The failure of Baltimore as a city should be directed at those with progressive policies and ideas about policing and operating a city. 

    But there is a glimmer of hope for the city: Baltimore state’s attorney Marilyn Mosby, who aligned herself with radical criminal justice reformers, just lost in the Democratic primary. She acknowledged a federal investigation into her finances cost her the election.

    Mosby was the youngest chief prosecutor of any major US city and was sworn into office in 2015. Ever since she retained her position, homicides and violent crime surged. 

    Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan recently commented on the crime epidemic and directed blame on city leadership:  

    “I’ve been focused on getting the leadership in Baltimore to take it more seriously. I hope they develop a real crime plan and start arresting more, prosecuting more and putting them in jail,” Hogan said.

    Hogan’s directed blame on leadership makes perfect sense since Mosby’s controversial “no prosecution policy” for drug possession and prostitution has backfired by making the city even more dangerous as criminals run free as those in San Francisco. 

    Scott might need to tweak his crime reduction plan or face the wrath of Hogan or even voters. This comes as a civil rights organization (Randallstown’s chapter of the NAACP) in a suburb in Baltimore County requested the governor to declare a “public emergency” and deploy the National Guard to the city to quell out-of-control violent crime. 

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/21/2022 – 15:00

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Aug 21

Today’s News 21st August 2022

  • Chang: China Is Preparing To Go To War
    Chang: China Is Preparing To Go To War

    Authored by Gordon Change via 19fortyfive.com,

    Last month, a Chinese entrepreneur making medical equipment for consumers told me that local officials had demanded he convert his production lines in China so that they could turn out items for the military. Communist Party cadres, he said, were issuing similar orders to other manufacturers.

    Moreover, Chinese academics privately say the ongoing expulsion of foreign colleagues from China’s universities appears to be a preparation for hostilities.

    The People’s Republic of China is preparing to go to war, and it is not trying to hide its efforts. Amendments to the National Defense Law, effective the first day of last year, transfer powers from civilian to military officials.

    In general, the amendments reduce the role of the central government’s State Council by shifting power to the CMC, the Communist Party’s Central Military Commission. Specifically, the State Council will no longer supervise the mobilization of the People’s Liberation Army.

    As Zeng Zhiping of Soochow University told Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post,

    “The CMC is now formally in charge of making national defense policy and principles, while the State Council becomes a mere implementing agency to provide support for the military.”

    In one sense, these amendments were window dressing. “Recent changes to China’s National Defense Law that diminish the power of the State Council are largely political posturing,” Richard Fisher of the Virginia-based International Assessment and Strategy Center told me soon after the amendments went into effect. “The Chinese Communist Party and particularly its subordinate CMC have always held supreme power over decisions regarding war and peace.”

    Why then do we care about the National Defense Law amendments?

    The amendments, Fisher tells us, “point to China’s ambition to achieve ‘whole nation’ levels of military mobilization to fight wars and give the CMC formal power to control the future Chinese capabilities for global military intervention.”

    “The revised National Defense Law also embodies the concept that everyone should be involved in national defense,” reports the Communist Party’s Global Times, summarizing the words of an unnamed CMC official. “All national organizations, armed forces, political parties, civil groups, enterprises, social organizations, and other organizations should support and take part in the development of national defense, fulfill national defense duties, and carry out national defense missions according to the law.”

    As Fisher told 19FortyFive this month, “For the past 40 years, China’s Communist Party has been preparing for brutal war, and now the ruling organization is accelerating its plans.”

    The Party, as it readies itself for combat, is leaving nothing to chance. In March, its Central Organization Department issued an internal directive prohibiting the spouses and children of ministerial-level officials from owning foreign real estate or shares registered offshore. The ban also appears to apply to such officials themselves as there are reports of their selling foreign assets. Moreover, such officials and immediate families are not, except in limited circumstances, allowed to open accounts overseas with financial institutions.

    The directive, issued soon after the imposition of sanctions on Russian officials for the “special military operation” in Ukraine, appears designed to sanction-proof Chinese officials.

    J-10 Fighter.

    Moreover, the central government is trying to sanctions-proof itself. On April 22, officials from the finance ministry and central bank met with representatives of dozens of banks, including HSBC, to discuss what Beijing could do in the event of the imposition of punitive measures on China.

    The holding of the “emergency meeting,” reported by the Financial Times, is ominous.

    “The officials and attendees did not mention specific scenarios, but one possible trigger for such sanctions is thought to be a Chinese invasion of Taiwan,” the FT noted.

    The fact that Chinese officials held the meeting is a clear indication that Beijing is planning belligerent acts.

    “Be ready for battle.” That’s how Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post summarized Chinese ruler Xi Jinping’s first order to the military of 2019. In January of that year, he gave a major speech to the CMC on making preparations for war, and the address was then broadcast nationwide.

    Foreign analysts debate whether China is going to war anytime soon. The Chinese political system has become less transparent over time, so it is not clear what senior leaders are thinking.

    Image of J-20 fighter. Image Credit: Chinese Internet.

    Yet it is clear what senior leaders are in fact doing. They are getting troops ready for another advance below the Line of Actual Control in Ladakh, preparing to seize more Indian territory in the Himalayas. They renewed, in November of last year and this June, attempts to block the resupply of a Philippine outpost at Second Thomas Shoal, in the South China Sea. They ordered four vessels to enter Japan’s sovereign water around the disputed but Japanese-controlled Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea in late July. They are directing continual provocations around Taiwan, including a violation of the island’s sovereign airspace in early February.

    And there is something else that is unmistakable: Xi and senior leaders are getting China’s citizens ready for war.

    *  *  *

    A 19FortyFive Contributing Editor, Gordon G. Chang is the author of The Coming Collapse of China and The Great U.S.-China Tech War. Follow him on Twitter @GordonGChang. 

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 23:30

  • Daughter Of Putin Ally Killed In Car Bombing Outside Moscow
    Daughter Of Putin Ally Killed In Car Bombing Outside Moscow

    Update(2310ET): Russia’s English language state RT News is confirming the death of Darya Dugina, the daughter of veteran Russian political commentator and Putin ally Alexander Dugin, in what appears to have been a targeted hit – possibly an attempt on her father Alexander’s life. RT however is still calling the reports “preliminary” until government authorities confirm the identity of the deceased. 

    “The incident took place on a highway some 20 kilometers west of Moscow around 21:35 local time, with witnesses saying that the blast rocked the vehicle right in the middle of the road, scattering debris all around,” according to new details in RT. “The crippled car, fully engulfed in flames, then crashed into a fence, according to photos and videos from the scene.”

    “Emergency services said one person was inside the car and was instantly killed by the blast and crash – a female whose body was reportedly recovered burned beyond recognition.”

    RT writes further: “Authorities have yet to confirm the identity of the victim, but multiple Russian Telegram channels and media sources reported that the victim was 30-year-old Darya Dugina (Platonova). Her father, Alexander Dugin, was spotted at the scene soon after the incident, visibly shocked, according to several videos circulating on social media.”

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

    While an official cause of the blast hasn’t been identified as yet, there’s widespread speculation it was an Improvised Explosive Device (IED). 

    There’s also much speculation centered on the apparent bombing being a likely attempt on Alexander Dugin, with unconfirmed reports saying she had been driving his car and he was in another vehicle.

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

    According to The Daily Beast, citing local reports: 

    Alexander Dugin was meant to be in the vehicle his daughter was driving but had gotten in a different one at the last second, according to Pyotr Lundstrem, a Russian violinist quoted by the outlet.

    Dugin had reportedly been following right behind his daughter and had watched as her car exploded. Photos shared by Baza appeared to show Dugin distraught at the scene, holding his head in both hands as he stood in front of the fiery wreckage.

    And more:

    Denis Pushilin, the Russian proxy leader of Ukraine’s occupied Donetsk, angrily blamed “terrorists of the Ukrainian regime” for the blast, writing on Telegram that they had been “trying to liquidate Alexander Dugin” but “blew up his daughter.”

    “In loving memory of Darya, she is a true Russian girl,” Pushilin wrote.

    Pro-Kremlin Telegram channels and social media pages similarly blamed Ukraine for the explosion and called on Russians to “avenge” Dugina’s death.

    This, along with recent attacks inside Crimea, could indeed mean greater escalation in the Ukraine war.

    * * *

    The daughter of Alexander Dugin – a close ally and adviser to Russian President Vladimir Putin – has reportedly been killed in what many are assuming was an assassination attempt meant for her father.

    Darya Dugin was ‘blown to pieces’ near Moscow suburb of Bolshiye Vyazyomy, according to reports, which say that Alexander had originally planned to travel back with her from a festival before deciding to ride in a separate car, according to the Daily Mail and other outlets.

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

    According to Russian’s state-owned TASS, local law enforcement confirmed that a Toyota Land Cruiser Prado had blown up, but did not confirm the victim’s identity – only that it was a female. A man identified by TASS as a Dugin associate said it was Darya, but there has been thus far no official confirmation.

    Russian outlet Baza reports that the 29-year-old had been returning home from “Tradition” – a literature and music festival, when the blast occurred. She was reportedly driving for around 10 minutes before the detonation. The outlet also quoted Russian violinist Pyotr Lundstrem, who (and how would he know?) that Alexander was meant to be in the vehicle. Instead, he was reportedly following her car when it exploded.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsDugin is the former chief editor of the pro-Putin Tsargrad TV network, and has been often portrayed in Western media as being a ‘mastermind’ of the Ukraine invasion, as well as an intellectual / philosopher who’s had a large influence in Russia’s post-Soviet nationalism.

    Alexander Dugin and Darya Dugin, via Telegram

    In an Instagram post, Denis Pushilin, head of the Donetsk People’s Republic in eastern Ukraine, called it an ‘attack’ by ‘vile villains,’ adding “The terrorists of the Ukrainian regime, trying to eliminate Alexander Dugin, blew up his daughter… In a car. Blessed memory of Daria, she is a real Russian girl!”

    “The tenacity of these Ukro-Reich morons is amazing. Everyone, if possible, needs to be home in the next hour,” he added.

    An alleged photo of the scene was posted to Telegram by “MOW!” Moscow News, with the caption (translated): “All that remains of the blown up car of the daughter of the famous public figure Alexander Dugin on the Mozhaisk highway in the Moscow region. The SUV of Darya Dugina detonated while driving, after which it caught fire.”

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

    Check back for updates…

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 23:10

  • All The Contents Of The Universe, In One Graphic
    All The Contents Of The Universe, In One Graphic

    Scientists agree that the universe consists of three distinct parts: everyday visible (or measurable) matter, and two theoretical components called dark matter and dark energy.

    As Visual Capitalists’s Mark Belan explains below, these last two are theoretical because they have yet to be directly measured – but even without a full understanding of these mysterious pieces to the puzzle, scientists can infer that the universe’s composition can be broken down as follows:

    Let’s look at each component in more detail.

    Dark Energy

    Dark energy is the theoretical substance that counteracts gravity and causes the rapid expansion of the universe. It is the largest part of the universe’s composition, permeating every corner of the cosmos and dictating how it behaves and how it will eventually end.

    Dark Matter

    Dark matter, on the other hand, has a restrictive force that works closely alongside gravity. It is a sort of “cosmic cement” responsible for holding the universe together. Despite avoiding direct measurement and remaining a mystery, scientists believe it makes up the second largest component of the universe.

    Free Hydrogen and Helium

    Free hydrogen and helium are elements that are free-floating in space. Despite being the lightest and most abundant elements in the universe, they make up roughly 4% of its total composition.

    Stars, Neutrinos, and Heavy Elements

    All other hydrogen and helium particles that are not free-floating in space exist in stars.

    Stars are one of the most populous things we can see when we look up at the night sky, but they make up less than one percent—roughly 0.5%—of the cosmos.

    Neutrinos are subatomic particles that are similar to electrons, but they are nearly weightless and carry no electrical charge. Although they erupt out of every chemical reaction, they account for roughly 0.3% of the universe.

    Heavy elements are all other elements aside from hydrogen and helium.

    Elements form in a process called nucleosynthesis, which takes places within stars throughout their lifetimes and during their explosive deaths. Almost everything we see in our material universe is made up of these heavy elements, yet they make up the smallest portion of the universe: a measly 0.03%.

    How Do We Measure the Universe?

    In 2009, the European Space Agency (ESA) launched a space observatory called Planck to study the properties of the universe as a whole.

    Its main task was to measure the afterglow of the explosive Big Bang that originated the universe 13.8 billion years ago. This afterglow is a special type of radiation called cosmic microwave background radiation (CMBR).

    Temperature can tell scientists much about what exists in outer space. When investigating the “microwave sky”, researchers look for fluctuations (called anisotropy) in the temperature of CMBR. Instruments like Planck help reveal the extent of irregularities in CMBR’s temperature, and inform us of different components that make up the universe.

    You can see below how the clarity of CMBR changes over time with multiple space missions and more sophisticated instrumentation.

    What Else is Out There?

    Scientists are still working to understand the properties that make up dark energy and dark matter.

    NASA is currently planning a 2027 launch of the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, an infrared telescope that will hopefully help us in measuring the effects of dark energy and dark matter for the first time.

    As for what’s beyond the universe? Scientists aren’t sure.

    There are hypotheses that there may be a larger “super universe” that contains us, or we may be a part of one “island” universe set apart from other island multiverses. Unfortunately we aren’t able to measure anything that far yet. Unravelling the mysteries of the deep cosmos, at least for now, remains a local endeavor.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 23:00

  • Biden Misled Public On Afghanistan; New GOP Report Finds
    Biden Misled Public On Afghanistan; New GOP Report Finds

    Authored by Susan Crabtree via RealClear Politics (emphasis ours),

    The frantic and deadly U.S. evacuation from Afghanistan was so disorganized that 1,450 children were evacuated without their parents, and senior leaders in Vice President Kamala Harris’ and first lady Jill Biden’s offices, as well as one of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, asked private veteran groups for assistance evacuating certain people from the country.

    In the waning days of the evacuation, more than 1,000 women and girls waited more than 24 hours on dozens of buses, desperately circling the Kabul airport and trying to avoid Taliban checkpoints. Many of them were told multiple times they were not allowed to enter the airport. Now, nearly a year since the Taliban took control of the country, fewer than one-third of them have managed to flee the country.

    These are just some of the findings in a new report by Republicans on the House Foreign Affairs Committee one year after the Taliban swept into the Afghan capital of Kabul, almost instantly rolling back more than two decades of U.S. and NATO military support and nation-building efforts.

    More broadly, the report, which RealClearPolitics obtained late last week, asserts President Biden and top officials in his administration repeatedly – and perhaps intentionally – misled the American people when they said the fall of Kabul came as a surprise and there was no alternative other than depending on the Taliban for security in the Afghan capital as the U.S. military evacuated hastily.  

    The report asserts that the chaotic withdrawal that left more than 800 American citizens stranded in the country was completely avoidable if Biden and his national security team had listened to the warnings and advice of military leaders, U.S. diplomatic officials operating on the ground, and international allies.

    It adds that one of the most tragic outcomes of the evacuation – the death of 13 U.S. servicemembers and 160 Afghans in a suicide bombing at the Kabul airport – could have been prevented if the administration had accepted the Taliban’s Aug. 15 offer for the U.S. to control the capital city’s security until the end of the withdrawal.

    Such an arrangement would have allowed American forces to extend the airport’s security perimeter, creating more space for evacuating Afghans and a far more orderly process. It also would have prevented U.S. servicemembers from being penned in amid the frantic crush of Afghans desperately trying to board U.S. military planes, leaving them vulnerable to the suicide attack, several former officials told committee Republicans, according to the report.

    “There were many sins if you will – there was a complete lack of and failure to plan,” Rep. Mike McCaul, the top Republican on the panel told CBS News’ Face the Nation Sunday. “There was no plan executed.”

    In a new memo over the weekend, the White House started defending its decision to withdraw troops, arguing that the move strengthened U.S. national security by freeing up military and intelligence agents and assets. The memo, written by National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson and first reported by Axios, is a direct response to the House Republicans’ interim report outlining their view of the administration’s withdrawal failures.

    It assails the House Republicans’ report as a partisan exercise “riddled with inaccurate characterizations, cherry picked information, and false claims…. It advocates for endless war and for sending more troops to Afghanistan, and it ignores the impacts of the flawed deal that former President Trump struck with the Taliban,” the memo states.

    Republicans are standing by their findings, arguing that a failure to plan left the State Department with only 36 consular officers at the airport trying to process hundreds of thousands of people in a matter of days. These officials were overwhelmed, McCaul said, but the lack of resources for a withdrawal of this magnitude was just one of the many mistakes involved in failing to plan for Kabul’s fall despite multiple warnings.

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    Several top U.S. military leaders for months had warned the president that the Afghan government would likely collapse if the U.S. left fewer than 2,500 troops stationed there, the report states.

    The report also cites “more realistic assessments on the ground,” including a July 13, 2021, embassy cable from 23 U.S. personnel assigned to the embassy in Kabul, which reportedly contained “a stark warning” about the potential collapse of the Afghan state. The cable, which the Wall Street Journal first reported a year ago, and was sent to Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Director of Policy Planning Salman Ahmed, called on the State Department to respond more urgently to the Taliban’s offensive.

    Although Blinken acknowledged the existence of the cable, he has refused to share it or disclose his response to it with congressional committees, including the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

    The biggest mistake of all, McCaul argued, was Biden’s rejection of the Taliban’s offer for the U.S. to take control of Kabul’s security until the evacuation was over.

    “Think about what that would have changed,” McCaul said. “We had to rely on the Taliban to secure the perimeter of [the airport], that led to the chaos, and it also led to the suicide bomber who killed 13 servicemen and women and injured hundreds of people.”

    The Biden administration also rebuffed other offers that could have helped prevent the frantic crush of Afghans at the airport and preserve America’s reputation abroad, the report states. U.S. leaders ignored a proposal from Guam for the U.S. territory to serve as an interim processing center to help evacuate interpreters and other at-risk allies. It similarly declined an offer from Pakistan to have a facility there serve as a transit center for evacuees, despite other facilities in Qatar and Germany reaching capacity.

    The report, which will serve as a roadmap for several lines of inquiry if Republicans win back the majority in either chamber this fall, is based on open-source information, along with interviews with U.S. officials and civilians involved in evacuating U.S. citizens and Afghan allies. Several whistleblowers who requested anonymity also played a key role, along with sworn statements by U.S. military personnel who were part of the investigation into the August 26, 2021, suicide bombing at the Kabul airport.

    The State Department did not comply with requests for documents and transcribed interviews with 34 administration officials involved in the Afghanistan evacuation effort. The report also criticizes the full House Foreign Affairs Committee, led by Democratic Rep. Greg Meeks of New York, for holding just one full committee hearing with senior Biden administration officials on the Afghanistan withdrawal even though it’s widely recognized as one of the worst U.S. foreign policy failures in decades.

    While the report says more State Department resources would have helped ease panic and confusion, it faults the agency for basic communication miscues that further exacerbated the chaos.

    By ignoring early warnings that they were not moving quickly enough to evacuate Americans and at-risk Afghans who had worked directly with the U.S. government, they left American citizens, green-card holders, and Afghan allies approved for departure stranded outside airport gates with no assistance.

    “Attempts by members of Congress and their staff to help their constituents or other would-be evacuees were often stymied by out-of-office replies to email requests and broken links to web pages mean to submit information,” according to the report.

    It also criticizes U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan Ross Wilson for going on a two-week vacation as Afghanistan was falling apart. Wilson took his summer break immediately after accompanying then-Afghanistan President Ghani to a late June meeting with Biden who promised the Afghan envoy, “We’re going to stick with you, and we’re going to do our best to see to it that you have the tools you need.”

    “There were no decisions made in the embassy until [Ross] returned in mid-July. This made action impossible,” a U.S. military officer told Army investigators. “Ground could have been gained at this time if the embassy had been able to do anything.”

    A couple of weeks later, it was Biden and Blinken who were on vacation at Camp David and the Hamptons, respectively, when alarms began sounding at the Pentagon for the need to relocate all of U.S. embassy personnel to the Kabul airport. Before the move, the personnel were being ordered to destroy sensitive documents in response to new fears of an immediate Taliban takeover of Kabul.

    All these hasty actions left no time for the State Department to speed up the processing of immigration applications for the Afghan allies Biden had promised to protect.

    There were no plans made to evacuate tens of thousands of U.S.-trained Afghan commandoes and other elite units who possess sensitive knowledge about American military operations.

    Also left behind: women leaders and soldiers whom Americans had promised sanctuary, along with more than 10,000 Afghans who had been employed by Embassy Kabul since it was re-established in 2001 and thousands more who worked with U.S. Agency for International Development.

    Nearly one year after the last U.S. troops left Afghanistan, the Biden administration still lacks a plan to help these at-risk Afghan allies who fought and worked alongside U.S. forces, even though the administration has admitted that the Taliban and other terrorist groups have subjected these U.S. allies to killings and forced disappearances.

    And, despite Biden’s assurances that the U.S. had accomplished its original goal of expelling al Qaeda and other terrorist groups from the country, the report points to the recent U.S. strike against Ayman al Zawahiri, a top al Qaeda leader, who was living freely in downtown Kabul, as proof of the group’s presence in Afghanistan.

    “Thankfully, al Zawahiri was killed by a U.S. drone strike last month, but officials warn that al Qaeda and ISIS-K continue to grow their presence in Afghanistan,” the report states.

    Meanwhile, the withdrawal has wreaked havoc on the country’s economy, with some estimates that 95% of the country needs emergency assistance to avoid hunger. With the Taliban back in control, there are reports of targeted revenge killings against those who worked with the U.S. government or military. U.S.-based volunteer groups seeking to aid Afghan evacuees have reported nearly 500 reprisal attacks, including beheadings, hangings, severed limbs, lash marks, and car shootings.

    The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan reported in July 2022 that these killings are often carried out “execution style – for example, when an individual is taken out of their house and shot almost immediately,” the report notes.

    One of the worst casualties of the U.S. withdrawal from the country is the dramatic regression of women and girls, who are now ordered to wear burqas and are prevented from attending school or universities or even from walking unaccompanied in public places.

    Child marriage is also reportedly on the rise with girls as young as nine years old being sold into marriage to pay off debts, or families being forced to marry off their young daughters to Taliban fighters, the report states, quoting PBS documentary filmmaker Ramita Navai’s comments earlier this month after two visits to Afghanistan.

    The report also cites a finding by Amnesty International that “many women protesters” in Afghanistan who demonstrated against the Taliban’s repressive policies “have been subjected to arbitrary arrest and detention, enforced disappearance and torture,” including Taliban-administered beatings and electric shocks with tasers.

    Although Blinken acknowledged reprisal attacks and killings earlier this year, the report points out that the secretary played down the Taliban leadership’s responsibility for the deaths.

    “We are of course seeing retribution, attacks by Taliban against those who are part of the former government,” he told a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on April 28. “These seem to be, for the most part, not centrally directed, that is they – they tend to be happening at a local level, but they’re happening.”

    Many of these allies are still sheltering in safe houses, afraid that the Taliban informants will expose their previous work with the U.S. government or NATO allies. Each passing week, they have fewer resources to purchase basic items such as food, fuel, and shelter.

    With the State Department unable to aid these people, the task of clothing, feeding, and sheltering tens of thousands of Afghans has fallen to outside veteran or humanitarian groups or sympathetic individuals. With almost no support from the U.S. government, some of the personnel running these groups, many of them comprising military veterans, have drained their personal retirement accounts, quit jobs, and suspended their small businesses in order to raise the funds to operate these networks of safe houses.

    “But these funds are not limitless, and the resource strains incurred have endangered the continued existence of these safe houses which many Afghans and Americans rely on for their very survival,” the report concludes.

    Susan Crabtree is RealClearPolitics’ White House/national political correspondent.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 22:30

  • Is Your Government Ready For Another Pandemic?
    Is Your Government Ready For Another Pandemic?

    With polio now confirmed in New York City’s wastewater and monkeypox having spread around the world – albeit with mortality rates remaining low – it appears that disease outbreaks are happening faster and more frequently than before.

    While greater media attention has certainly heightened awareness, we’re also seeing the ripple effects of a number of factors including population growth, which means more people are living in closer proximity to potentially infected animals, climate change, which is making diseases more severe, and even the decline of vaccine coverage for other diseases over past years, as reported by the OCHA. Not to mention the fact increased trade and travel as well as rapid urbanization – where levels of contact between people is high and living conditions can be unhygenic – are also making transmission easier.

    But how ready are the world’s governments for another – unfortunately, fairly inevitable – health crisis?

    As Statista’s Anna Fleck details below, a survey carried out by the OECD in 2021 found that perceptions of government preparedness vary greatly around the world, with a fairly even split of opinions, favoring slightly more positive. People living in Luxembourg and Ireland, for instance, thought more highly of their government’s healthcare strategies, with 69 percent and 60 percent, respectively, saying they thought their leaders would be ready. Just over half of Brits felt the same.

    In Austria, however, trust on the topic was fairly low, with 29 percent of people saying they thought their government would be ready. Japan came in with 32 percent feeling confident in the government, although a greater share than any other felt ambivalent about the issue – responding that they felt either ‘neutral’ or ‘didn’t know.’

    Infographic: Is Your Government Ready for Another Pandemic? | Statista

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    According to the report, public trust in government rise and fell throughout the pandemic, with a show of support for governments at the start, versus later when the death count started to rise. The authors note that the survey’s results likely correspond to the intensity of the pandemic at the time, in November 2021. They add:

    “It is also worth noting that – in spite of the many challenges governments faced in effectively responding to the economic and health exigencies of the pandemic – this finding suggests that people see governments as having learned from the information gained during this experience.”

    The countries surveyed included Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Colombia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Iceland, Ireland, Japan, Korea, Latvia, Luxembourg, Mexico, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Sweden and the United Kingdom.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 22:00

  • Finnish Prime Minister 'Party Girl' Submits To Drug Test Over Leaked Videos
    Finnish Prime Minister ‘Party Girl’ Submits To Drug Test Over Leaked Videos

    Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin has found herself at the center of a bizarre tabloid-fueled “scandal” after days ago multiple videos of the 36-year old head of state were leaked showing her recently partying with friends and local celebrities.

    One of the videos purportedly shows her dancing very close-up to a man that’s not her husband, according to Fox News, with the whole spectacle leading to charges from media and the public of “inappropriate” behavior for someone in the nation’s highest office.

    Marin has even been accused of being on drugs when the ‘wild’ party videos were taken, something she has firmly denied. Finnish politicians and opposition factions have been behind some of the drug use accusations. 

    “I did nothing illegal,” Marin said at a Friday press briefing responding to the allegations, according to a translation from the BBC. “Even in my teenage years I have not used any kind of drugs.”

    Media coverage of the videos has taken over headlines in Finland and quickly went international, leading to the prime minister agreeing to submit to a drug test, in a highly unusual and unprecedented scenario: 

    Finland’s prime minister has said she has taken a drug test, after new footage emerged showing the leader dancing with a Finnish popstar.

    Sanna Marin, 36, came under fire this week after a leaked video showed her partying, with some politicians saying she should be tested for narcotics.

    At a news conference on Friday, Ms Marin said she had taken the test and expects the results next week. The prime minister repeated her denials that she has ever taken drugs.

    Many of Marin’s supporters as well as media pundits have charged critics with unwarranted attacks over the party videos simply because she’s a woman.

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    Strangely (or perhaps entirely to be expected), Russia and Vladimir Putin have even the conversation, with some pundits claiming that pro-Russian “trolls” are primarily responsible for driving the “scandal” into the spotlight. 

    The claim is that “Russian media accounts” have sought to spread the now viral clips in order to stir fresh domestic controversy at a moment Finland is applying to join NATO.

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    “I think my ability to function was really good. There were no known meetings on the days I was partying,” the Finnish leader said in her defense. “I trust that people understand that leisure time and work time can be separated.”

    “If someone has kissed me on the cheek, there’s nothing inappropriate or something I can’t handle or tell my husband,” Marin added, commenting on the video where she was seen getting physically close with a pop star.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 21:31

  • Victor Davis Hanson: 'Civil War' Porn
    Victor Davis Hanson: ‘Civil War’ Porn

    Authored by Victor Davis Hanson via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    As President Joe Biden’s polls stagnate and the midterms approach, we are now serially treated to yet another progressive melodrama about the dangers of a supposed impending radical right-wing violent takeover.

    Georgians hold signs in front of the Georgia State Capitol in support of the challenge to Marjorie Taylor Greene’s qualification for the ballot under the insurrection Clause of the 14th Amendment, in Atlanta, on April 21, 2022. (Derek White/Getty Images for MoveOn)

    This time the alleged threat is a Neanderthal desire for a “civil war.”

    The FBI raid on former President Donald Trump’s Florida home, the dubious rationale for such a historic swoop, and the popular pushback at the FBI and Department of Justice from roughly half the country have further fueled these giddy “civil war” conjectures.

    Recently “presidential historian” Michael Beschloss speculated about the parameters of such an envisioned civil war.

    Beschloss is an ironic source. Just days earlier, he had tweeted references to the executions of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, who passed U.S. nuclear secrets to the Soviet Union in the 1950s, in connection with the FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago.

    That was a lunatic insinuation that Trump might justly suffer the same lethal fate due to his supposed mishandling of “nuclear secrets.” Unhinged former CIA Director Michael Hayden picked up on Beschloss death-penalty prompt, adding that it “sounds about right.”

    Hayden had gained recent notoriety for comparing Trump’s continuance of the Obama administration’s border detention facilities to Hitler’s death camps. And he had assured the public that Hunter Biden’s lost and incriminating laptop was likely “Russian disinformation.”

    So, like the earlier “Russian collusion” hoax, and the January 6 “insurrection,” the supposed right-wing inspired civil war is the latest shrill warning from the Left about how “democracy dies in darkness” and the impending end of progressive control of Congress in a few months.

    On cue, Hollywood now joins the civil war bandwagon. It has issued a few bad, grade-C movies. They focus on deranged white “insurrectionists” who seek to take over the United States in hopes of driving out or killing off various “marginalized” peoples.

    Pentagon grandees promise to learn about “white rage” in the military and to root it out. But never do they offer any hard data to suggest white males express any greater degree of racial or ethnic chauvinism than any other demographic.

    When we do hear of an insurrectionary plan—to kidnap the Michigan governor—we discover a concocted mess. Twelve FBI informants outnumbered the supposed four “conspirators.” And two of them were acquitted by a jury and the other two so far found not guilty due to a mistrial.

    The buffoonish January 6 riot at the Capitol is often cited as proof of the insurrectionary right-wing movement. But the one-day riotous embarrassment never turned up any armed revolutionaries or plots to overthrow the government.

    What it did do was give the Left an excuse to weaponize the nation’s capital with barbed wire and thousands of federal troops, in the greatest militarization of Washington, D.C. since the Civil War.

    In contrast, Antifa and BLM rioters were no one-day buffoons. They systematically organized a series of destructive and deadly riots across the country for over four months in the summer of 2020. The lethal toll of their work was over 35 dead, $2 billion in property losses, and hundreds of police officers injured.

    Such violent protestors torched the ironic St. John’s Episcopal church and attempted to fight their way into the White House grounds. Their violent agenda prompted the Secret Service to evacuate the president of the United States to a secure bunker.

    The New York Times gleefully applauded the rioting near the White House grounds with the snarky headline “Trump Shrinks Back.”

    As far as secession talk, it mostly now comes from the Left, not the Right. Indeed, a parlor game has sprung up among elites in venues such as The Nation and The New Republic imaging secession from the United States. Blue-staters brag secession would free them from the burden of the red-state conservative population.

    Over the last five years, it was the Left who talked openly of tearing apart the American system of governance—from packing the Supreme Court and junking the Electoral College to ending the ancient filibuster and nullifying immigration law.

    Time essayist Molly Ball in early 2021 gushed about a brilliant “conspiracy” of wealthy tech lords, Democratic Party activists, and Biden operators.

    Ball bragged how they had systematically poured hundreds of millions of dark money into changing voting laws, and absorbing the role of government registrars in key precincts.

    What was revolutionary were new progressive precedents of impeaching a president twice, trying him as a private citizen, barring minority congressional representatives from House committee memberships, and tearing up the state of the union address on national television.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 21:30

  • Ex-FBI Agent Pleads Guilty To Destroying Evidence
    Ex-FBI Agent Pleads Guilty To Destroying Evidence

    Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    A former FBI agent said he is pleading guilty to paying a business to wipe his computer hard drive to make it unavailable for forensic examination, according to a statement.

    The FBI headquarters in Washington on Jan. 2, 2020. (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times)

    Former FBI agent Robert Cessario was charged with corrupt destruction of record in an official proceeding in connection to the trial of former Arkansas Republican state Sen. Jon Woods, local media reported.

    On Wednesday, Cessario issued a statement saying that he is pleading guilty as part of a plea deal in the case.

    “I erased the contents of the computer hard knowing that the court has ordered that the computer be submitted for a forensic examination,” the former federal agent stated in court documents, according to local Arkansas news outlets. “I did so with the intention of making the contents of the computer’s hard unavailable for forensic examination.”

    “Ex-FBI Agent Pleads Guilty To Destroying Evidence, that is, Cause No. 5:17-CR-50010, United States v. Woods et al,” Cessario’s statement continued, adding that he “corruptly performed and had performed, the erasures with intent to impair the integrity and availability of the computer hard drive and its contents for use in that official proceeding.”

    He added: “I am guilty of the violation alleged.”

    Court documents show Cessario faces as many as 20 years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000 and three years of supervised release, according to local media reports. His sentencing will come at a later date, which has not been disclosed.

    Woods’s Trial

    The case stems from the trial involving Woods, who in 2018 was convicted of mail fraud and wire fraud charges. Woods was accused of taking kickbacks in return for steering state grants to Ecclesia College in Springdale.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 20:30

  • Where Will The World's Next 1,000 Babies Be Born?
    Where Will The World’s Next 1,000 Babies Be Born?

    Every four minutes, approximately 1,000 babies are born across the globe. But in which countries are these babies the most statistically likely to come from?

    Using data from the CIA World Factbook, Visual Capitalist’s Carmen Ang shows this this graphic by Pratap Vardhan (Stats of India) that paints a picture of the world’s demographics, showing which countries are most likely to welcome the next 1,000 babies based on population and birth rates as of 2022 estimates.

    The Next 1,000 Babies, By Country

    Considering India has a population of nearly 1.4 billion, it’s fairly unsurprising that it ranks first on the list. Of every 1,000 babies born, the South Asian country accounts for roughly 172 of them.

    It’s worth noting that, while India ranks number one on the list, the country’s birth rate (which is its total number of births in a year per 1,000 individuals) is actually slightly below the global average, at 16.8 compared to 17.7 respectively.

    China, which comes second on the list, is similar to India, with a high population but relatively low birth rate as well. On the other hand, Nigeria, which ranks third on the list, has a birth rate that’s nearly double the global average, at 34.2.

    Why is Nigeria’s birth rate so high?

    There are various intermingling factors at play, but one key reason is the fact that Nigeria’s economy still is developing, and ranks 131st globally in terms of GDP per capita. Further, access to education for women is still not as widespread as it could be, and research shows that this is strongly correlated with higher birth rates.

    The World’s Population Growth Rate is Declining

    While there are hundreds of thousands of babies born around the world each day, it’s worth mentioning that the world’s overall population growth rate has actually been declining since the 1960s.

    This is happening for a number of reasons, including:

    • Increased wealth around the world, which research has correlated with fewer births

    • Various government policies discouraging large families

    • The global shift from rural to urban living

    By 2100, global population growth is expected to drop to 0.1%, which means we’ll essentially reach net-zero population growth.

    This would increase our global median age even further, which poses a number of economic risks if countries don’t properly prepare for this demographic shift.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 20:00

  • Fargo School Board Reinstates Pledge Of Allegiance After National Public Outcry
    Fargo School Board Reinstates Pledge Of Allegiance After National Public Outcry

    Authored by Jeff Louderback via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    After criticism from conservative lawmakers and backlash from citizens nationwide, the Fargo Board of Education on Aug. 18 voted to reverse course on its previous week’s decision to stop reciting the Pledge of Allegiance before its meetings.

    New U.S. citizens recite the Pledge of Allegiance during their naturalization ceremony at George Washington’s residence in Mount Vernon, Virginia, on July 4, 2022. (Stefani Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images)

    On Aug. 9, seven of the board’s nine members, including four newcomers who took office in June, voted to cancel a previous board measure that was instituted in March before the election.

    Board vice president Seth Holden said at the Aug. 9 meeting that the Pledge of Allegiance was contrary to the district’s diversity, equity, and inclusion priorities.

    “Given that the word ‘God’ in the text of the Pledge of Allegiance is capitalized, the text is clearly referring to the Judeo-Christian God, and therefore, it does not include any other faiths such as Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism,” Holden said, adding that this made the pledge of allegiance a “non-inclusionary act.”

    Reciting the pledge is a “non-inclusionary act” and there is text within the pledge that is “simply not true,” Holden added.

    “The statement that we are ‘one nation under God’ is simply an untrue statement,” Holden said. “We are one nation under many or no gods.”

    Tracie Newman, who is board president, recommended that a member recite “a shared statement of purpose that would bring us all together” at the start of the meetings instead of the pledge, adding that it would be “unifying.”

    “I’m just not sure that reciting the Pledge of Allegiance is a useful way to begin every one of our board meetings,” Newman said at the Aug. 9 meeting.

    North Dakota’s Republican Party called the board’s Aug. 9 vote “laughable” and an “affront to our American values.”

    Republican State Sen. Scott Meyer told North Dakota media outlets last week that he would start work on a school voucher bill draft to allow public money to pay for private school tuition.

    “These positions like by the Fargo School Board just don’t align with North Dakota values,” he said. “The logical solution is to just give parents that option to help educate their kids.”

    Robin Nelson was one of two board members who voted on Aug. 9 to keep the pledge.

    “It was a very easy ‘no’ vote from me from the get-go. I knew right away it would be controversial,” Nelson told Fargo’s Valley News Live.

    “Our focus should be on our great students and teachers and education, but this is going to detract from that and really shed more negative publicity on the Fargo school district, and quite frankly, we don’t need that.”

    Nelson’s words were proved correct. The decision prompted an outcry across the country, which led the board to hold the Aug. 18 meeting to discuss reinstating the pledge.

    “That is perpetuating Critical Race Theory, which is against the law in North Dakota,” Fargo parent Jake Schmitz told Fox & Friends last week following the initial vote to ban the Pledge of Allegiance.

    “The next logical step in the progression is [they’ll] want to remove it from schools because it’s a non-inclusionary act which is a bunch of [expletive].”

    At the special meeting on Aug. 18, the board discussed the volume of angry emails and voicemails directed at members.

    Nyamal Dei, a refugee from war-torn Sudan, was among those who received messages from irate citizens.

    Dei was one of the seven members who voted on Aug. 10 to eliminate the pledge. At the special meeting, she was the only board member to vote no on reinstatement.

    “We won’t be rewarding our children or students in our district for acting in this way,” Dei said at the special meeting.

    “But know that this moment will pass. Let’s get back to the work that we are elected to do and that is to find a solution to our teacher shortages, mental health issues, and academic achievement for our students.”

    Greg Clark, who also serves on the board, said that less than 20 percent of the “angry messages” were from Fargo residents.

    He admitted that his vote to reinstate the pledge was influenced by people who do not live in the district.

    “But I hope you’ll forgive me because I truly believe it is in the best interest of our schools to do so,” Clark said.

    “The disruptions and the threats must end so that we can have a successful start to our school year.”

    Holden voted to bring back the pledge, but not before expressing reluctance.

    “Do you concede the battle to win the war?” Holden said.

    “I’m also concerned about what might happen to this board in the future because we’re going to have to probably be prepared to take more heat than we normally do for decisions that we make because that there may be a perception of success.”

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 19:30

  • Is Ethereum's Censorship-Resistance Under Attack: A Recap Of The Biggest Crypto News In The 2nd Week Of August
    Is Ethereum’s Censorship-Resistance Under Attack: A Recap Of The Biggest Crypto News In The 2nd Week Of August

    By Lucas Campbell of Bankless

    The recent sanction of Tornado Cash from the U.S. treasury has had a windfall of effects on crypto.

    A developer was arrested and a string of “decentralized” applications have banned wallets that have touched Tornado Cash.

    People are afraid of OFAC. These guys are nothing to mess with. If you don’t comply with their demands, there’s a really good chance you go to jail.

    This collective fear and action from OFAC are sparking debate among the community.

    On one hand, protocol teams are worried. For most, prison time is not an option to consider (understandably). Companies will comply if threatened with jail time.

    At the very least, if these companies are working in the best interest of crypto, they’ll fight it in the legal system. But that will take years and millions (and millions and millions) of dollars.

    On the other hand, crypto is about open, unstoppable access to money and finance. The idea that “DeFi” apps are banning access because certain wallets directly (or indirectly) used a sanctioned code goes against the ethos and mission of crypto.

    Satoshi would be pissed. This isn’t what we’re here for.

    Regardless, this looming threat becomes a serious issue when looking at Ethereum’s validator set.

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

    A handful of companies are responsible for operating a majority of the validators on Ethereum.

    What happens if OFAC starts demanding these companies to censor specific transactions via their validators (or go to jail)?

    Will they bend the knee?

    Will they shut down their staking services?

    Will validators accept it and get slashed by the network, losing user deposits?

    This is a big unknown right now, but any of these outcomes are possible.

    Before you say “Ethereum would never support censorship”, there are a lot of nuances behind this, primarily with Flashbots and block building, that go above my head.

    Regardless, this was a major discussion on the Ethereum Core Devs meeting this week, and there’s a lot to unpack here. I recommend listening to the discussion and reading Tim Beiko’s thread on the topic to get the full rundown.

    Starts at 18:11.

    Is Ethereum’s censorship resistance under attack?

    The honest answer is that it’s not entirely clear right now.

    The Best Monetary Asset

    Four weeks from now, Ethereum will be in a post-merge world. Issuance will be reduced by 90% and net inflation will virtually become neutral, if not negative.

    This creates a compelling case for ETH as a monetary asset in an increasingly inflationary world.

    • Fiat is currently inflating at 12.8% per year.
    • Gold sits at 1.79%
    • After the next Bitcoin halving in 2024, BTC’s inflation rate will be 0.88%.

    Post-Ethereum Merge?

    ETH issuance falls to 0.18% based on current demand levels where it could potentially go negative if demand recovers to same the levels as a few months ago.

    Most people looking at this graph might respond “But Apple is sitting at -3.78%! That’s the better store of value.”

    True—sort of.

    But Apple stock is not a monetary asset. You can’t instantly transfer it to anyone in the world. You can’t buy anything with it. You don’t have global access to lending, borrowing, trading, or earning yield.

    Apple stock has no credible neutrality. There’s no decentralization.

    It’s not a Medium of Exchange or a Unit of Account.

    Issuance is just one part of it.

    But when you factor in all of it, ETH becomes a highly favorable monetary asset in the current landscape.

    Other News

    Celsius owes $6.7 billion in crypto tokens and only holds $3.8 billion; Genesis CEO quits amidst job layoffs; Mailchimp cracks down on crypto newsletters; The SEC sues Dragonchain; Canada lays new crypto regulations; The NFT market faces a potential liquidity crisis?

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 19:00

  • Republican Voter Enthusiasm For Midterms Boosted By Mar-a-Lago Raid: Poll
    Republican Voter Enthusiasm For Midterms Boosted By Mar-a-Lago Raid: Poll

    Authored by Rita Li via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Before-and-after survey results show the FBI’s Mar-a-Lago raid last week largely encouraged Republican voters to go to the ballot box in November for the midterms.

    An aerial view of former U.S. President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home after Trump said that FBI agents searched it, in Palm Beach, Florida on Aug. 15, 2022. (Marco Bello/Reuters)

    The FBI on Aug. 8, in an unprecedented move, raided the home of former President Donald Trump for a potential violation of the Espionage Act, before allegedly finding four sets of top-secret documents and seven other sets of classified information that the former president removed from the White House.

    One poll (pdf) conducted from Aug. 13–16 by the Economist/YouGov, found that 51 percent of Republican respondents said they were more enthusiastic about the 2022 midterm elections compared to the previous congressional election year. It turned out to be a 6 percent increase from an Aug. 7–9 poll result (pdf), showing only 45 percent were more devoted to voting.

    The growth was smaller when it came to Democrat and Independent voters—both increased after the raid by one point to 36 percent and 25 percent respectively. Both surveys asked 1,500 adult citizens nationwide, declaring a margin of error of 2.9 percentage points.

    The recent raid by the FBI in Palm Beach has solidified Trump’s hold on the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, according to conservatives and analysts. Trump’s family and aides also slammed the move as being politically motivated to prevent the former president from regaining the presidency.

    The release of findings came as Trump’s 2022 endorsement record grows to 209–17, according to Breitbart, after five “America First” candidates he backed won their primary races in Wyoming and Alaska Tuesday night.

    Incumbent Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) lost her seat in the U.S. House of Representatives on Aug. 16, without coming close to her Trump-endorsed challenger, Harriet Hageman, who doubled Cheney’s votes to win the Wyoming primary.

    Trump had three other endorsements in Tuesday’s state races: Wyoming State Rep. Chuck Gray, who secured the nomination for secretary of state, and incumbent State Treasurer Curt Meier advancing in his renomination bid, as well as Brian Schroeder, former head of Veritas in Cody who lost his bid to maintain his position as state superintendent.

    In Alaska, both Trump-endorsed candidates—former Gov. Sarah Palin and Kelly Tshibaka—advanced to general election races.

    Tshibaka, along with Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who voted to impeach Trump for inciting the Jan. 6 Capitol protest, advanced to the ranked-choice election from the open primary on Aug. 16.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 18:30

  • CNN Boss Warns 'Unsettled' Staff To Prepare For 'More Changes'
    CNN Boss Warns ‘Unsettled’ Staff To Prepare For ‘More Changes’

    CNN Boss Chris Licht’s efforts to restore credibility to the far-left, ratings-challenged network is far from over.

    According to multiple reports, Licht has warned employees to brace for “more changes” following the departure of Reliable Sources host Brian Stelter.

    “I want to acknowledge that this is a time of significant change, and I know that many of you are unsettled,” said Licht during a Friday morning editorial call, according to the Hollywood Reporter. “There will be more changes and you might not understand it or like it all.”

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsAccording to a June Axios report, Licht has been preparing to boot on-air personalities who can’t break free of their crippling Trump Derangement Syndrome.

    CNN’s new boss, Chris Licht, is evaluating whether personalities and programming that grew polarizing during the Trump era can adapt to the network’s new priority to be less partisan.

    Why it matters: If talent cannot adjust to a less partisan tone and strategy, they could be ousted, three sources familiar with the matter tell Axios.

    Details: Licht wants to give personalities that may appear polarizing a chance to prove they’re willing to uphold the network’s values so that they don’t tarnish CNN’s journalism brand.

    • For on-air talent, that includes engaging in respectful interviews that don’t feel like PR stunts. For producers and bookers, that includes making programming decisions that are focused on nuance, not noise. -Axios

    “We will continue covering media stories, including on TV, when warranted,” Licht reportedly said on the Friday call, in response to concerns that the network may no longer cover media issues following Stelter’s ouster, adding that the Reliable Sources newsletter will be revived under reporter Oliver Darcy.

    “I really appreciate all that Brian has done to build the media beat for CNN. He’s a great human being and a good person. I wish him all the best on his new venture,” he added.

    That said, the Daily Beast reached out to CNN, which confirmed Licht’s comments, but said they don’t reflect any specific changes.

    “We’re constantly changing things and making decisions,” they added.

    Since Licht took over in the wake of ex-boss Jeff Zucker’s unceremonious firing over an office romance with his top lieutenant Allison Golust (who’s also gone), he’s cut loose a swath of staffers, and changed several editorial guidelines – including reducing the use of “Breaking News” for on-air banners, and the use of less partisan terms to describe election fraud claims.

    A source also told the Beast that Licht’s recent decisions may have more to do with billionaire mogul and influential WarnerDiscovery shareholder John Malone, who told CNBC last year that he’d “like to see CNN evolve back to the kind of journalism that it started with, and actually have journalists, which would be unique and refreshing.”

    “Everything about this rollout points to John Malone and [Discovery CEO] David Zaslav,” said a source familiar with the situation, adding “Chris Licht did not want to do this.”

    Either way, looks like more CNN employees may have to learn a new skill.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 18:00

  • Investors Have Now Spent $5 Billion Pursuing The "Holy Grail Of Energy"
    Investors Have Now Spent $5 Billion Pursuing The “Holy Grail Of Energy”

    By Alex Kimani of Oilprice.com

    What do The Dark Knight Rises, Back to the Future, Oblivion, and Interstellar all have in common? They are sci-fi blockbusters that showcase a technology that scientists consider to be the Holy Grail of Energy: Nuclear fusion. Theoretically, two lone nuclear reactors running on small pellets could power the entire planet, safely and cleanly. That’s the promise of nuclear fusion. So, why are we still relying on fossil fuels? What’s stopping us from building these reactors everywhere?

    After all, scientists have been working on nuclear fusion technology since the 1950s and have always been optimistic that the final breakthrough is not far away. Yet, milestones have fallen time and again and now the running joke is that a practical nuclear fusion power plant could still be decades away.

    Well, the past few years have witnessed a resurgence in the field with a handful of startups setting up shop to make nuclear fusion an everyday reality. Interestingly, the vast majority of the sector’s funding has come from the private sector rather than public investments.

    According to the second global fusion industry report published by the Fusion Industry Association (FIA), private investment in fusion technology hit $4.7 billion in total, dwarfing the $117 million of public investment. Also, the current year is proving to be a watershed moment for fusion technology, with the amount of funding in 2022 more than doubling the industry’s entire historic investment to the tune of $2.83 billion.

    Fusion Startups

    To date, Commonwealth Fusion Systems has bagged the largest amount of funding for a fusion startup. Back in December, the Massachusetts-based fusion startup snagged more than $1.8 billion in the largest private investment for nuclear fusion yet from a plethora of big-name investors including Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, George Soros via his Soros Fund Management LLC, and venture capitalist John Doerr.

    Commonwealth Fusion System is in good company.

    On Nov. 5, Helion Energy announced that it had raised $500 million in its latest fundraising round, making it the second-largest-ever single fundraising round for a private fusion firm. Helion has a chance to surpass Commonwealth Fusion System since its latest round of funding includes an additional $1.7 billion tied to certain performance milestones. Meanwhile, Canada’s General Fusion has closed a $130 million fundraising round that was oversubscribed. General Fusion plans to launch an even bigger fundraising effort soon.

    Google and Chevron participated in a $250-million funding raise for TAE Technologies, a nuclear fusion startup with an unconventional strategy, back in June. Since then, TAE has raised a total of $1.2 billion.

    “It’s a sign of the industry growing up,” General Fusion Chief Executive Christofer Mowry has told the Wall Street Journal. 

    Various fusion companies are pursuing different designs for fusion reactors, though the majority rely on fusion that takes place in plasma. Commonwealth Fusion has successfully tested the most powerful fusion magnet of its kind on Earth that would hold and compress the plasma.

    Commonwealth Fusion Systems is collaborating with MIT to build their fusion reactor. The team has planned a fusion experiment they have dubbed Sparc which is about 1/65th the volume of the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER). The experimental reactor will generate about 100MW of heat energy in pulses of about 10 seconds – bursts big enough to power a small city. The team anticipates that the output will be more than twice the power used to heat the plasma thus overcoming the biggest technical hurdle in the field: positive net energy from fusion. The Sparc team has set an ambitious target to have the reactor running in about 15 years.

    But why have scientists so far failed at replicating a natural process that powers the stars in our universe?

    Extreme Challenge

    Turns out that the conditions necessary for nuclear fusion to take place present an extreme challenge for us earthlings. 

    Fusion works on the basic concept of forging lighter elements into heavier ones. When two hydrogen atoms are smashed together hard enough, they fuse to form helium. The new atom is less massive than the sum of its parts, with the balance converted to energy in the E=MC2 mass-energy equivalence.

    Ok, that’s a bit simplistic since hydrogen atoms do not fuse together directly but rather in a multi-step reaction. Anyway, the long and short of it is that nuclear fusion produces net energy only at extreme temperatures – in the order of hundreds of millions of degrees celsius. That’s hotter than the sun’s core and far too hot for any known material on earth to withstand.

    To get around this quagmire, scientists use powerful magnetic fields to contain the hot plasma and prevent it from coming into contact with the walls of the nuclear reactor. That consumes insane amounts of energy. 

    Stars have it easy in this regard thanks to their immense masses and powerful gravitational fields that hold everything together. For instance, the sun is 333,000 times the mass of the Earth with a gravity ~27.9 times that of Earth.

    Unfortunately, every fusion experiment so far has been energy negative, taking in more energy than it generates thus making it useless as a form of electricity generation. 

    Getting the initial fusion reaction is not a problem – keeping it going is, not to mention that building nuclear reactors takes some extremely sophisticated feats of engineering.

    International Megaproject

    But now scientists are confident that they are close to building a nuclear reactor that will produce more energy than it consumes. 

    The Saint-Paul-les-Durance, France-based upcoming International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) is the world’s largest fusion reaction facility that aims to develop commercially viable fusion reactors.

    Funded by six nations including the US, Russia, China, Japan, South Korea, and India, ITER plans to build the world’s largest tokamak fusion device, a donut-shaped cage that will produce 500 ME of thermal fusion energy. 

    The device will cost ~$24 billion with a delivery date set at 2035. The giant machine – the biggest fusion machine ever built – will weigh in at an impressive 23,000 tonnes and will be housed in a building 60 meters high.

    So, what’s different this time around?

    Scientists have successfully developed a new superconducting material – essentially a steel tape coated with yttrium-barium-copper oxide, or YBCO, which allows them to build smaller and more powerful magnets. This lowers the energy required to get the fusion reaction off the ground.

    According to Fusion for Energy – the EU’s joint undertaking for ITER – 18 niobium-tin superconducting magnets aka toroidal field coils will be used to contain the 150 million degrees celsius plasma. The powerful magnets will generate a powerful magnetic field equal to 11.8 tesla, or a million times stronger than the earth’s magnetic field. Europe will manufacture 10 of the toroidal field coils with Japan manufacturing nine.

    However, it will be another decade before a full-scale demonstration power plant will be built using lessons learned from ITER. The industrial fusion power plants will thereafter be connected to the grid.

    The ITER site construction is nearly 80% complete.

    With all that said… it seems nuclear fusion remains (but hopefully not forever) over a decade away.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 17:30

  • UC Berkeley Student Housing Co-Op Bans White People From Common Areas
    UC Berkeley Student Housing Co-Op Bans White People From Common Areas

    A UC Berkeley off-campus housing co-op has banned white people from entering common spaces in order to protect people of color (POC) from so-called “white violence.”

    As first reported by The College Fix and confirmed elsewhere, house rules for the 30-room “Person of Color Theme House” leaked to Reddit read: “Many POC moved here to be able to avoid white violence and presence, so respect their decision of avoidance if you bring white guests.”

    “White guests are not allowed in common spaces,” reads the rule under “Guests in Common Spaces.”

    Via Berkeley subreddit

    The top comments in the notoriously liberal subreddit noted the obvious racism:

    “In order to beat racism we must first become racists ourselves!” wrote one user, /u/Educational-Net303.

    Also banned from the POC House:

    “Avoid bringing parents/family members that express bigotry,” adding “Queer, Black, and Indigenous members should not have to avoid common spaces because of homophobic or racist parents/family members.”

    Via The College Fix

    Of note, the facility is not run by UC Berkeley, as Assistant Director of Media Relations Adam Ratliff told the outlet, adding that it’s “not the role of the campus” to comment on what they do.

    “As this involves an off-campus non-affiliated landlord, the campus has no ability under the Code of Student Conduct to discipline the landlord,” said Ratliff.

    The Person of Color Theme House, a five-story, 30-room home that can accommodate up to 56 students, exists to serve “low-income, first generation, immigrant and marginalized students of color.”

    It’s part of the Berkeley Student Cooperative, a nonprofit housing cooperative established to provide affordable housing to Bay-area college students.

    Since it was established in 2016, the POC house has faced its share of internal problems.

    One former member wrote in a Medium article that the house has become known for its “call-out culture” perpetuated by “the lack of intersectionality.”

    “Several members have been criticized for being white/white passing, aligning themselves with whiteness, or allowing white violence in the house,” she wrote.

    Stephen Ross, cooperative experience manager for the Berkeley Student Cooperative, told The College Fix that “neither the BSC nor the POC house has an official policy” excluding white guests from common spaces. -The College Fix

    “White people can and do live in POC house, but the focus for POC house is providing a safe and supportive living environment for people of color,” said Ross – though he added that each of the 20 BSC houses “have their own culture and practices” that develop ovver time, adding that members actively work toward “not making Whiteness central to the experience for members living in the house.”

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 17:00

  • Illegal Transaction?: Shaquille O'Neal's Crypto-Mixer Move Just Crossed The Line…
    Illegal Transaction?: Shaquille O’Neal’s Crypto-Mixer Move Just Crossed The Line…

    Authored by Scott Hill via BombThrower.com,

    Basketball Entrepreneur, Shaquille “Big Sexy” O’Neal just crossed the line.

    Here’s the Etherscan page for Shaq’s NFT project showing the sanctioned, illegal transaction.

    The US Treasury announced sanctions applied to Tornado Cash transactions beginning last Monday.

    I’m not suggesting that Shaq’s done anything wrong, but this is an example of why the Treasury’s attack on Crypto mixing services via sanctions is unworkable.

    Who Gets Invited To The Crypto Mixers?

    Mixers are tools within the Cryptocurrency ecosystem that allow users to deposit tokens, combine them with other people’s tokens, and then withdraw to an unrelated wallet. They can be used simply for privacy reasons, or it can be used to hide the tracks of illicit funds.

    The US Treasury was obviously focused on the latter when it sanctioned Tornado Cash, with an estimated $455M washed through Tornado over the last few years by North Korean hacker group Lazarus. 

    I’m not defending the ability to hack and launder money, but you can walk the line if one can actually be laid down. Lazarus has been a scourge on the Crypto industry since at least 2017 and I would love nothing better than to see them dealt with effectively and severely. But that’s the problem…

    The solution to Crypto hacks needs to be effective or there’s no point.

    According to Chainalysis’ research on the topic, for every criminal use of crypto mixers, there appears to be a legitimate use. So a large part of the pushback on this round of sanctions is to do with preserving privacy tools in an increasingly aggressive surveillance state that jeopardizes citizens’ legitimate need for privacy in everyday life. 

    Privacy is normal and needs to be defended.

    Among notable legitimate and extremely necessary uses of privacy tools that have come out since the sanctions announcement are Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin using Tornado Cash to donate money to Ukrainians. This reduced their risk. Blockchain developers can also use untraceable funds to seed new projects without exposing their entire net worth.

    However, this article isn’t about privacy. There’s plenty written about that elsewhere. I’m talking about why sanctions aren’t the right tool for this problem. 

    Sanctions Didn’t Stop Party Crasher Lazarus

    This isn’t the first mixer the US has sanctioned. In May, the Treasury sanctioned Blender.io, another mixing service that had also been used extensively by Lazarus group. In that case, the sanctions worked well to shut down the service.

    They had no meaningful effect on the Lazarus group who simply kept hacking and moved to the next mixer.

    Blender.io was a custodial mixer. Users deposited funds into a centralized custodian who would then mix your funds and return them. The people running the service were targeted by sanctions and shut down. 

    Tornado Cash is structured differently. Rather than having a centralized custodian making decisions it’s simply a smart contract hosted on the Ethereum blockchain which holds funds prior to mixing and withdrawal. It’s just a piece of code that will continue running indefinitely and doing what it was designed to do. No one that can take it down. It is an immutable smart contract. 

    Tornado Cash is Bitcoinesque. It cannot be changed. It cannot be removed. 

    The Treasury seems to not really be aware of this distinction. The actual text of the sanctions has identified a range of wallet addresses associated with the smart contract as being prohibited to transact with. Treasury hasn’t identified any specific people or organizations, other than a website that hosts a front end for accessing the service. That makes this the first time the Treasury has sanctioned code, rather than people or corporations.

    Enforcement: “Buzzkill” US Treasury Just Doesn’t Get It

    How will this be enforced? No one really knows, but so far Circle has frozen USDC currently held in the smart contract awaiting withdrawal. Circle’s CEO doesn’t seem very happy about being forced to do this. There are also significant amounts of Ethereum and Wrapped Bitcoin also held in the smart contract.

    BitGo, the issuer of Wrapped Bitcoin can’t freeze their tokens and Ethereum also can’t be frozen at the protocol layer. The only logical way that US based companies like Coinbase can comply with sanctions is to prevent tokens that have been through Tornado Cash from being deposited onto their platforms.

    Which raises a huge issue. Because tokens can’t be frozen on the protocol layer, these tokens are free to move around in the Ethereum DeFi ecosystem prior to deposit on Coinbase. Regular users will have a very hard time knowing whether or not tokens that they receive are going to be accepted with major US based companies.

    We don’t have any guidance from the Treasury on how this is supposed to be dealt with, but I imagine there are currently extremely frustrated calls between Crypto exchanges and the Treasury department trying to sort out this issue without breaking Ethereum.

    The Treasury department might have just accidentally broken Ethereum fungibility.

    Do I think that is the likely outcome here? No, not at all. But it does speak to how recklessly uniformed and uncaring the US Treasury is becoming regarding the collateral damage of using sanctions to solve every problem. There doesn’t appear to have been any consultation with major Washington based Crypto education groups like Coin Center and the DeFi Education Fund.

    Will the US Treasury be educated enough to make restrictions and reform possible. We don’t yet know how strict the Treasury will instruct US corporations to be about blocking deposits from Tornado Cash. Using blockchain records, it’s perfectly possible to trace Tornado Cash use through several transactions. It’s less possible to do the same through a DeFi system which inherently mixes up funds so that their origin can’t be ascertained.  

    The maximum enforcement would be to block all deposits from DeFi because some deposits would have touched Tornado Cash at some point in time.

    This highlights how useless sanctioning a medium of exchange really is. Usually transactions with a particular party are the sanctioned activity. This is what it means to have effective measures against cybercrime. These sanctions won’t shut down Tornado Cash and they won’t stop Lazarus Group. They have the potential to cripple Ethereum, if they’re applied strictly. It’s fundamentally a losing game. The USTreasury is playing whack-a-mole with privacy tools. 

    So what happens when a government enacts an absurd law that can’t be enforced and doesn’t really make any sense?

    People immediately break the law.

    Guilty By Association: Shaq, Fallon And Others Get Dusted

    Numerous celebrities and notable Crypto figures including Shaq, Jimmy Fallon, Brian Armstrong the CEO of Coinbase, Crypto Exchange cold wallets and numerous others got dusted by Tornado Cash transactions.

    Dust attacks aren’t new, they’ve been around as long as I’ve been in Crypto. They describe when a wallet gets sent useless or harmful tokens without their consent. There is no need to accept Crypto transactions, they just show up when someone sends them to your wallet. 

    Someone with a balance held in Tornado Cash started sending small Ethereum transactions to a range of known celebrity wallet addresses without their approval or knowledge. On the first day of sanctions over Tornado Cash. 

    Did Shaq violated sanctions? Arguably yes.

    Sanctions violations are strict liability offenses. There doesn’t need to be any intention to perform a transaction with the sanctioned party. There doesn’t have to be any benefit gained by transaction. All that needs to be shown is that a transaction occurred.

    There is a defense that best efforts were taken to comply with sanctions. The prosecuting body will look at what steps were taken to avoid breaching sanctions, that will affect their likelihood to prosecute and the severity of the punishment. But what could Shaq have done to avoid breaching sanctions?

    There is nothing that anyone could have done to avoid breaching sanctions by receiving unsolicited Tornado Cash transactions.

    Obviously Shaq and Jimmy Fallon are not going to get prosecuted for sanctions violation because someone else sent them some Ethereum, but the fact that these celebrities will need to be excused for something that is arguably a breach of US sanctions according to the letter of the law is a big problem. 

    If The Rules Are A Bluff, What Happens Next?

    The sanctions are at best ineffective. Tornado Cash is the second mixer that has been sanctioned because it was used by Lazarus. The first set of sanctions just meant that Lazarus moved to using Tornado Cash instead of Blender.io. I imagine that due to the lack of enforceability of this round of sanctions, they won’t even stop Lazarus from using Tornado Cash as their mixer of choice. 

    Will it change how Crypto exchanges treat mixed funds? Unlikely. Major US exchanges already had a responsibility to refuse shady deposits under existing anti-money laundering provisions. There were already reports earlier this year of Coinbase refusing to credit deposits directly from mixers or funds that had recently been through a mixer. 

    What is the point of sanctioning Tornado cash if it doesn’t shut down the service or slow down Lazarus group?

    Well it will likely prevent law abiding US citizens from accessing a financial privacy tool for non-criminal purposes. Fight for the Future compared the sanctions to banning email because it can be used for phishing scams. The Cato Institute noted that “Punishing every American by going after technology is not the solution for dealing with criminals”.

    Banning mixers to stop cyber crime is like digging up roads to prevent carjackings.

    I’m much more concerned about the big picture problems with this style of enforcement. The demonstrated lack of basic understanding of how this technology works and what they are doing at the Treasury department is frankly terrifying. 

    It’s one thing to deliberately destroy Crypto ecosystems with regulation. It’s an entirely different thing to do it by accident. 

    The Ethereum blockchain is open and readable. There are numerous firms and hobbyists who monitor transactions. All eyes will be on Tornado Cash to see if it continues to operate or if the sanctions shut it down. In the day after the sanctions came into effect almost $3M moved through Tornado Cash.

    Sanctions are a powerful tool, but they are completely unsuited to dealing with decentralized or ungoverned entities like Tornado Cash. There is no one for the government to threaten here. There’s just users accessing open source code to assert their privacy. 

    If the US Government is going to bluff, I’d prefer it if the entire world couldn’t see that bluff fail in real-time. 

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 16:30

  • The Countries Supplying The EV Lithium Rush
    The Countries Supplying The EV Lithium Rush

    With both the demand and cost of lithium rising dramatically over the last few months, and forecast to do so into the future, this infographic from Statista’s Martin Armstrong takes a look at the countries which mine the most of the metal, and where the largest reserves are held.

    Infographic: The Countries Supplying the EV Lithium Rush | Statista

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    The shift towards electric-powered mobility has really picked up pace in recent years and is only set to intensify as bans around the world on petrol and diesel car production come into place. As data from the U.S. Geological Survey shows, Australia and Chile are the countries best positioned to capitalize on the lithium rush. In 2021, 55,000 metric tons of the metal crucial to EV battery production was mined ‘down under’ – more than double of that extracted in Chile. The South American country does however have considerably larger reserves of the natural resource, as the infographic shows.

    Important to note is that production figures for the United States were not published by the source in order to “avoid disclosing company proprietary data”. Reserves in the country are however recorded at 750,000 metric tons in 2021.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 16:00

  • Why Home Prices Haven't Crashed Yet
    Why Home Prices Haven’t Crashed Yet

    Submitted by EPB Macro Research’s Eric Basmajian, 

    Real home prices are going to fall, and it’s going to cause a massive negative wealth effect. Real home prices are much more impactful for the wealth effect compared to nominal home prices. Many people invest in real estate as an asset to beat inflation. If inflation is 10% and your home goes up 15%, you beat inflation by 5%, and thus, you are 5% wealthier in real terms. If inflation is 10% and your home goes up 5%, you lost 5% of your purchasing power in an asset that is supposed to give you protection, and you are actually worse off.

    Also, real home prices are the best measure of the true performance of real estate as an asset class across long periods of time. You can’t compare home prices today to those in the 1970s without looking at them in real or inflation-adjusted terms.

    This chart shows real home prices since the 1970s, and you can see that real home prices have declined several times, mainly around the recessionary periods.

    The 2000s recession was an outlier in which home prices rose in real terms.

    The financial crisis in 2008 caused home prices to decline by almost 30% in real terms. It took until 2021 to regain the peak in real home prices in 2006, 15 years!

    Over the last ten years, real home price growth averaged 4.5%, which is way higher than the 20-year average of 2%.

    Consumers and investors became accustomed to home prices rising sharply above the rate of inflation and a source of wealth building, particularly when using high amounts of leverage and mortgage debt.

    With the feeling that home prices would always rise above inflation and nearly 5% above inflation, a prevailing sentiment was born that you could leverage your way to wealth. But now, real home prices are starting to decline.

    One month is certainly not a trend, but this is where the EPB process becomes very powerful and why studying leading indicators is critical when determining what noise is and what’s the start of a new trend.

    There are several key leading indicators of real home prices, but this video covers just three: the months’ supply of new homes, the spread between 30YR mortgage rates and 30YR Treasury rates, and the growth rate of real M2. All three indicators imply the rate of real home price appreciation is likely to decline in the months ahead.

    This video explains the data behind these leading indicators and real home prices.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 15:30

  • Restaurants In Lockdown-Loving, High-Crime Cities Still Reeling While Others Thrive
    Restaurants In Lockdown-Loving, High-Crime Cities Still Reeling While Others Thrive

    More than two and a half years after the Covid-19 pandemic reached America, there’s a enormous divide among America’s restaurant markets. In deep-blue cities that embraced lockdowns, the number of diners is still far below pre-pandemic levels. Meanwhile, restaurant businesses are prospering in states that were quickest to reject Covidian authoritarianism.  

    That’s the finding of a Fox News report centered on data from OpenTable, a company that helps more than 60,000 restaurants worldwide manage reservations, payments and operations.  

    Civil unrest and crime have likely played a defining role too. It’s probably no coincidence that the worst-performing city — Minneapolis — was at the epicenter of the George Floyd riots that ravaged deep-blue cities. Strikingly, the number of average daily diners in Minneapolis is still less than half what the city enjoyed in pre-Covid, pre-Floyd 2019.  

    “We’re just getting killed in Minneapolis,” restauranteur Greg Urban told Fox News. “People don’t feel safe. They don’t feel safe coming to Minneapolis. It’s a public safety issue right now.” 

    Happily, Urban is geographically — and politically — diversified, with nightspots in Austin, Pensacola and Lakeland, Florida too. 

    The 10 worst cities represent a who’s who of cringe-inducing, high-crime, vaccination-forcing, mask-adoring metropolises, with the likes of San Francisco, Portland, Seattle and Philadelphia rounding out the top five losers. 

    Meanwhile, the list of the 10 best-performing restaurant cities includes four from Florida which, under Governor DeSantis, helped set an example that emboldened other red-state governors to shift policies and begin rising out of the depths of public health madness. Underscoring a clear Sunbelt trend, Texas and Arizona placed two cities apiece. 

    10 Worst Lockdown-Hammered Restaurant Cities (Change in Daily Diners: July 2022 vs July 2019)

    1. Minneapolis (-54.3%)

    2. San Francisco (-45.9%)

    3. Portland (-45.2%)

    4. Seattle (-40.8%)

    5. Philadelphia (-39.2%)

    6. New York (-37.9%)

    7. St. Louis (-28.2%)

    8. Washington, DC (-27.3%)

    9. Baltimore (-24.9%)

    10. Chicago (-22.8%)  

    10 Best-Performing Restaurant Cities (Change in Daily Diners: July 2022 vs July 2019)

    1. Las Vegas (+35.7%)

    2. Fort Lauderdale (+34.0%)

    3. Miami (+32.8%)

    4. Austin (+27.3%)

    5. Naples (+25.4%)

    6. Tampa (+22.3%)

    7. Nashville (19.2%)

    8. San Antonio (+18.6%)

    9. Scottsdale (+18.0%)

    10. Phoenix (+14.3%)

    Source: OpenTable via Fox News 

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/20/2022 – 15:00

Digest powered by RSS Digest

Aug 20

Today’s News 20th August 2022

  • Something Is Looming Geopolitically, And We Better Start Taking It Seriously
    Something Is Looming Geopolitically, And We Better Start Taking It Seriously

    Authored by ‘Sundance’ via The Last Refuge blog,

    As a result of western governments’ taking collective action under the auspices of a ‘climate change’ agenda, we are on the cusp of something happening with ramifications that no one has ever seen before.

    Western governments’, specifically western Europe, North America (U.S-Canada) and Australia/New Zealand, are intentionally trying to lower economic activity to meet the intentional drop in energy production.

    This is the core consequence of the Build Back Better agenda as promoted by the World Economic Forum.

    Anyone who says there is a reference point to determine both the short-term and long-term consequences is lying. There is no precedent for nations’ collectively and intentionally trying to reduce economic activity.

    Hiding behind the false justification that current inflation is driven by too much demand, central banks in Europe, the Bank of England, Bank of Canada and U.S. federal reserve are raising interest rates.  The outcome we are currently feeling is an intentional economic contraction and global recession.

    The Build Back Better monetary policy is successfully shrinking western economic activity; however, the impacted nations that produce goods for markets in North America and Europe, specifically southeast Asia, Japan and China, are not raising interest rates in an effort to try and offset the drop in demand.  China has announced they are dropping their central bank rates in a desperate effort to lower costs and keep their export dependent economy working.

    Underneath all of this, is a drop in energy production in the same nations trying to lower economic activity.  The political policymakers are attempting to manage this process without informing the citizens of the unspoken goal.   Shortages of oil, coal and natural gas are self-inflicted problems, all part of the BBB agenda.

    Beyond the massive increases in energy costs, which is the true source of inflation and a direct/intentional outcome of the BBB effort, Europe is now facing a looming winter without the energy resources to heat homes and sustain people.  Things are going to be very uncomfortable in Europe this winter as roaming brownouts are now predicted.

    As the collective west attempts to, using their words, “manage the transition,” they do not have mechanisms to control an outcome of this magnitude.  It is simply too big a situation to manage.  Where the rubber meets the road, the think-tanks and high-minded climate change ideologues do not have the ability to manage a transition and still meet the needs of people.  Beyond the esoteric thinking, there are real consequences from these actions.

    Many people have discussed the potential for longer-term food shortages and recently, shorter-term winter heating.  However, beyond that, the downstream geopolitical consequences are seemingly being ignored.  Instead, what we see is an effort to keep pretending the climate change ends will justify the means (disruption of energy production).

    In this connected world, when the western nations stop buying things, we find ourselves domestically with economic trouble.  Businesses fail, unemployment rises, financial stress ripples throughout the economy, dependency on government subsidy increases and real pain is felt.  However, beyond the domestic issues the supplier nations run into even bigger problems.

    Unemployment in Malaysia, Vietnam, South Korea, Japan, Taiwan and even China, creates an entirely different set of regional stability issues on a geopolitical level.

    There is no precedent for this.  Never before in the history of industrialized nations has any government intentionally tried to lower its economic activity.  It has never been done with intent before because within the contraction nations get more poor, people suffer.

    Not only has no single nation ever tried to intentionally shrink its wealth, but there is no precedent whatsoever for an alliance of nations to join together with the same purpose. While this might seem like an academic economic modeling exercise, unfortunately it is very real.  What I am describing is happening right now, and we had better start talking about it before the unforeseen consequences start to become a crisis.

    In North America (U.S-Canada), Europe and Australia, there will continue to be massive increases in food prices as a result of the collapse in energy production.  Beyond the western nations there will be food shortages as a result of lowered harvest yields and less industrial food production.  This is not controversial.

    It is also not controversial that regions with harsh winter climates are going to be paying much more for scarce heating resources.

    That being accepted, what happens geopolitically, even militarily, when the entire global economy starts to feel the impacts from western nation economic contraction on a scale -created by collective action- that has never been seen before.

    I have no idea what that big picture consequence looks like, but whatever “that” is, will be happening at the same time as people everywhere will be more desperate as an outcome of their economic position.  I don’t have the answers, but I sure as hell can see the problem coming.

    Political leadership in the aforementioned western nations are seemingly, perhaps intentionally, keeping people distracted with domestic shiny things to occupy time.  However, someone needs to start talking about, and seriously challenging, the big picture consequence of this Build Back Better future, before it’s too late.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 23:40

  • ATF Shows Up At People's Homes To Confiscate Rare Breed FRT-15 Triggers
    ATF Shows Up At People’s Homes To Confiscate Rare Breed FRT-15 Triggers

    A new report from the gun blog website AmmoLand Shooting Sports News claims that Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) agents have shown up at the homes of “multiple people” to confiscate previously legal forced reset triggers for AR-15 style rifles that were recently classified as “machine guns.” 

    According to the report, it is unknown how the ATF acquired the customers’ information – though the owners in question acquired their triggers via Gun Broker or the Rare Breed Triggers website.

    Rare Breed Triggers FRT – Animation from RARE BREED TRIGGERS on Vimeo.

    “It is possible the ATF received the customers’ information from credit card processors or shipping companies,” AmmoLand said, adding the federal agency had received customer information from Authorize.net and Stamps.com to track people who’ve bought 80% lowers from gun parts kits manufacturer Polymer80. 

    A person named “Paul Britton Finch” is allegedly one of those gun owners who got a knock on the door from ATF agents. 

    “Just a heads up, I got a visit today from the AFT for a trigger I bought from gunbroker and one from Rare Breed directly…hide your dogs, ladies and gentlemen. They’re comin’ a knocking,” Finch said in a post in what appears to be a gun forum. 

    He continued: “I don’t want to say much more on here because they [ATF] do infact watch this group and who posts what information. so take what you will of it. They’re out there with all the information you used to buy them with and enough to prosecute you if they want to push it. Yeah it sucks, but that’s the reality of it right now.” 

    Finch provided pictures of the special agent’s identification card who visited his home that served him with a “warning notice: you may be in violation of federal law.” The notice was dated Aug. 16. 

    We have thoroughly covered the ATF’s battle against Rare Breed Triggers. The gun parts company once legally sold a drop-in trigger for an AR-15-style rifle that forces the trigger to reset at such a high speed that it increases the weapon’s fire rate. 

    Meanwhile, people are learning to 3D print these triggers, posing an even larger challenge for the ATF.

    Under the Biden administration, the ATF has waged war against gun companies, parts manufacturers, and law-abiding citizens. 

    Last month, a Delaware man was stunned when special agents rang his doorbell and asked if they could do an inventory audit of his legally-obtained firearms. 

    And last summer we told readers that the “puzzle pieces were all laid out” – in terms of how the ATF, weaponized under the Biden administration, would try to ban semi-automatic rifles.

    One year later, the US House of Representatives passed a bill to ban importing, selling, manufacturing, or transferring semi-automatic assault weapons. However, it has no chance of passing in the Senate. 

    Meanwhile, the online gun community is quickly accelerating the 3D printing technology of guns that can be entirely printed at home, even the plastic ammo. We’ve pointed out that others have printed weapons at home for under $350, while one company in Austin, Texas, unveiled the 0% lower earlier this year. 

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 23:20

  • These Are The 10 Biggest Military Spending Nations In The World
    These Are The 10 Biggest Military Spending Nations In The World

    As Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has continued, military spending and technology has come under the spotlight as the world tracked Western arms shipments and watched how HIMAR rocket launchers and other weaponry affected the conflict.

    But, as Visual Capitalist’s Niccolo Conte details below, developing, exporting, and deploying military personnel and weaponry costs nations hundreds of billions every year. In 2021, global military spending reached $2.1 trillion, rising for its seventh year in a row.

    Using data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), this visualization shows which countries spent the most on their military in 2021, along with their overall share of global military spending.

    Which Countries Spend the Most on Military?

    The United States was the top nation in terms of military expenditure, spending $801 billion to make up almost 38% of global military spending in 2021. America has been the top military spending nation since SIPRI began tracking in 1949, making up more than 30% of the world’s military spending for the last two decades.

    U.S. military spending increased year-over-year by $22.3 billion, and the country’s total for 2021 was more than every other country in the top 10 combined.

     

    The next top military spender in 2021 was China, which spent $293.4 billion and made up nearly 14% of global military spend. While China’s expenditure is still less than half of America’s, the country has increased its military spending for 27 years in a row.

     

    In fact, China has the largest total of active military personnel, and the country’s military spending has more than doubled over the last decade.

    While Russia was only the fifth top nation by military spending at $65.9 billion in 2021, it was among the higher ranking nations in terms of military spending as a share of GDP. Russia military expenditures amounted to 4.1% of its GDP, and among the top 10 spending nations, was only beaten by Saudi Arabia whose spending was 6.6% of its GDP.

    Military Collaboration Since the Russia-Ukraine Conflict

    Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February has resulted in seismic geopolitical shifts, kicking off a cascade of international military shipments and collaboration between nations. The security assistance just sent by the U.S. to Ukraine has totaled $8.2 billion since the start of the war, and has shown how alliances can help make up for some domestic military spending in times of conflict.

    Similarly, Russia and China have deepened their relationship, sharing military intelligence and technology along with beginning joint military exercises at the end of August, alongside other nations like India, Belarus, Mongolia, and Tajikistan.

    Since China’s breakthrough in hypersonic missile flight a year ago, Russia has now been testing its own versions of the technology, with Putin mentioning Russia’s readiness to export weaponry he described as, “years, or maybe even decades ahead of their foreign counterparts”.

    Sanctions and Energy Exports: New Weapons in Modern Warfare

    Along with advanced weaponry, sanctions and energy commodities have become new tools of modern cold warfare. As Western economic sanctions attempted to cripple Russia’s economy following its invasion, Russian gas and oil supplies have been limited and forced to be paid in rubles in retaliation.

    Global trade has been turned into a new battlefield with offshore assets and import dependencies as the attack vectors. Along with these, cyberattacks and cybersecurity are an increasingly complex, obscure, and important part of national military and security.

    Whether or not Russia’s invasion of Ukraine ends in 2022, the rise in geopolitical tensions and conflict this year will almost certainly result in a global increase in military spending.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 22:40

  • Details Of New Iran Nuclear Deal Approved By Tehran: Report
    Details Of New Iran Nuclear Deal Approved By Tehran: Report

    Authored by Dave DeCamp via AntiWar.com,

    As the US is considering Iran’s response to an EU proposal to revive the nuclear deal, known as the JCPOA, The Cradle reported on Thursday the details of the agreement Tehran put forward. The Cradle report cited an unnamed Iranian source who said that the deal includes comprehensive sanctions relief for Iran and a series of measures meant to deter the US from withdrawing from the agreement in the future.

    Iran has to shut down some centrifuges to bring its nuclear program back into the limits of the JCPOA. The source said that the centrifuges will be left in a state such that if the US pulls out of the deal again, the centrifuges could be restarted within a year.

    Iran’s FM Hossein Amir-Abdollahian with EU’s Josep Borell, AFP/Getty Images

    “The platforms of the centrifuges will not be destroyed and their connections and electricity are collected, which brings our rebuildability to under one year and is a kind of guarantee,” the source said.

    The source said that altogether, there are 21 guarantees written into the deal to alleviate Iran’s concerns about the US withdrawing from the agreement. Under one guarantee, if the US leaves the deal, there will be a three-year and one-month grace period during which foreign companies will be unaffected by sanctions.

    It’s not clear if any guarantees that are reliant on US action would be enforceable on a future administration. Since the JCPOA is not a treaty, the next administration will not be bound by the agreement, and that issue has been a significant factor in the talks between the US and Iran.

    During earlier negotiations in 2021, when the two sides were close to a deal, Iran wanted President Biden to give a guarantee that the US would stay in the agreement just for his term in office, but he refused, and the talks stalled.

    According to The Cradle report, the ball is once again in Washington’s court. If the US approves the deal, its implementation will take place in stages. The first step would be the signing of the agreement in Vienna. Then, the US would cancel three executive orders signed by President Trump that withdrew the US from the JCPOA.

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    Iran would then have 60 days to test the sanctions relief by selling oil to Western countries and accessing Iranian funds that were frozen overseas. Sanctions against the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) will remain in place, although some will be eased by allowing Western business with Iranian companies that make “transactions” with the IRGC.

    The Iranian government declined to verify the details of The Cradle report, but Iranian media has said the main outstanding issue with the US was over “guaranteeing the continuation” of the JCPOA. It’s not clear when the US will respond to Iran’s proposal, and the Biden administration is coming under pressure from Israel and Iran hawks in Washington to scrap the negotiations altogether.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 22:20

  • Streaming Viewership Tops Cable TV For First Time, Nielsen Says
    Streaming Viewership Tops Cable TV For First Time, Nielsen Says

    For the first time, streaming platforms surpassed cable as the most popular way to consume shows, live broadcasts, and movies, according to new data from Nielsen. 

    It was only a matter of time before streaming platforms, led by Netflix, would dominate how Americans watch television. In July, Nielsen revealed US households that streamed content accounted for 34.8% share of total consumption versus 34.4% for cable. 

    Source: Axios

    Netflix continues to be the most used streaming platform, accounting for 7.7% of the total share of consumption in the month. YouTube, Amazon Prime Video, and Disney+ increased their share last month to 7.3%, 3%, and 1.8%, respectively. HBO Max was around 1%. 

    Streaming usage has surged over the years and was supercharged during the virus pandemic lockdowns, though Netflix earlier this year disclosed in a first-quarter earnings report that years of blowout subscriber beats have ended with the first subscriber loss for a quarter since 2011. In the second quarter, the streaming giant reported another loss of subscribers. 

    Also, consumers are grappling with price hikes across many streaming platforms. Netflix and Disney have raised their prices this year, leaving consumers with tough choices. 

    Infographic: Price Hikes Leave Streaming Customers With Tough Choices | Statista

    Nielsen reported earlier this year almost 60% of Americans using streaming devices have three or more video subscriptions, and with mounting inflation and negative real wage growth — some consumers are cutting back on the most expensive packages. 

    Looking at the age gap in TV consumption and more streaming platforms acquiring live sports broadcasting rights, the future does look bright for streaming industry.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 22:00

  • Inflation Sends Car Ownership Costs Soaring To Over $10,000 Per Year: AAA
    Inflation Sends Car Ownership Costs Soaring To Over $10,000 Per Year: AAA

    Authored by Katabella Roberts via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Owning and operating a new car has become increasingly more expensive over the last year, driven predominantly by inflation and rising fuel prices, according to the American Automobile Association’s (AAA’s) annual “Your Driving Costs” report.

    Gas stations serve customers at peak prices in Irvine, Calif., on Feb. 23, 2022. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

    The overall average cost to own and operate a new car in 2022 is $10,728 on an annual basis, or $894 per month, marking a considerable increase from 2021 when owning a new car cost $9,666 annually, or $805.50 per month, according to AAA.

    That marks a nearly 11 percent increase from last year.

    AAA’s report (pdf) looked at 45 models in nine vehicle categories to come up with the average annual cost of owning and operating a new vehicle.

    AAA selects top-selling, mid-priced models and compares them across six categories: fuel, maintenance and repair and tire costs, insurance, license/registration/taxes, depreciation, and finance charges.

    The study, which does not account for used car prices, assumes a five-year ownership period, with the vehicle being driven 15,000 miles annually, or a total of 75,000 miles.

    It found that it would cost drivers of gas-powered vehicles approximately $2,700 a year to fuel up, while owners of electric vehicles that charge at home would need around $600 a year to charge that vehicle to cover the same distance, marking a difference of $2,100 annually.

    Fuel costs in the study were projected based on a weighted average of the first five months of this year, during which time they cost drivers about 17.99 cents per mile or $3.999 per gallon.

    ‘Purchase Price Not the Whole Story’

    However, gas prices have drastically increased since early March, in part because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the ongoing supply chain crisis, meaning Americans are now having to splash out more if they want to own a vehicle. AAA noted that the cost of vehicle ownership has increased accordingly since its Your Driving Costs evaluation was completed.

    As of Aug. 18, the national average price for gasoline was $3.94 per gallon, up more than $1 per gallon compared with August 2019 and 2020, albeit much lower than the $5 per gallon prices seen in June.

    “You’re usually focused on the purchase price and that is not the whole story. Not even close,” Greg Brannon, director of automotive engineering for AAA, told USA Today. “I think [$10,000 is] a number that will surprise a lot of people.”

    “We’re all feeling that at the pump,” Brannon said. “That is driving a big piece of [the annual price increase], and particularly with Americans’ desire to drive things like pickup trucks that don’t get good fuel economy.”

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 21:40

  • Republicans Call For Pelosi To End House Proxy Voting
    Republicans Call For Pelosi To End House Proxy Voting

    On Friday, the House of Representatives passed the so-called Inflation Reduction Act, a $420 billion package that funds 87,000 more IRS agents, raises corporate taxes, throws hundreds of billions of dollars at climate projects and imposes a new tax on stock buybacks. 

    There was plenty at stake in a bill that proponents are calling “historic,” and yet 158 House members — more than a third of the body — didn’t even bother showing up for the vote. Rather, they were content to take advantage of proxy voting rules that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi controversially ushered in during the pandemic and still clings to like microchip stocks.

    To use proxy voting, House members must submit a signed statement to the House clerk declaring they are “unable to physically attend proceedings in the House Chamber due to the ongoing public health emergency.” In reality, members are using the scheme to take early recesses, schmooze donors and campaign for office. 

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    Despite the fact that only a few hardcore Branch Covidians still think Covid-19 presents a “public health emergency,” Pelosi on Aug. 9 extended proxy voting rules until Sept 26. Serving as an accomplice in the farce, House Sergeant at Arms William Walker continues to certify that a public health emergency exists. 

    Even The New York Times has spotlighted the ulterior motives: 

    Perhaps no one has benefited more from the arrangement than Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who recently informed lawmakers that proxy voting would be in effect for the remainder of the summer. It has allowed Ms. Pelosi, whose majority is so slim that she can afford to lose no more than four Democrats if every member is present and voting, to all but ensure that absences alone do not cost her pivotal support.

    Central Texas House Republican Chip Roy decried the state of affairs in a colorful text to the Austin American-Statesman: 

    “It’s bullshit the Democrats can just call a last-minute vote knowing half their caucus are free to vote by proxy. And it’s perhaps even higher level bullshit that many Republicans (even ones who signed litigation challenging it) similarly proxy vote and stay on vacation while those of us trying to defend any semblance of fidelity to the Constitution and respect of the institution to look each other in the eye and treat our offices with respect — and it’s exquisite next level bullshit that the Supreme Court hid behind speech and debate to avoid the plain text, obvious unconstitutionality of not being present to do our jobs.”

    Chip Roy represents parts of San Antonio, Austin and the Texas Hill Country (Michael Brochstein/Sipa USA via Reuters)

    In January, the Supreme Court chose not to hear an appeal by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, who’d argued proxy voting is unconstitutional. Earlier, in a 3-0 decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia said courts had no jurisdiction to rule on House procedures, which are adopted under the Constitution’s speech or debate clause. The court didn’t rule on whether proxies count toward a quorum. 

    That lawsuit originally had more than 150 Republican House members listed as plaintiffs. In the end, there were just two: McCarthy and Roy. While others still supported the suit, many removed their names after they’d used proxy voting themselves and reasoned it wouldn’t help the case to keep plaintiffs who’d taken advantage of the very rule they were challenging. 

    Austin Republican representative Michael McCaul told the Statesman that proxy voting is having an insidious effect: 

    “The broader concern is that it encourages disengagement by members — hearings and markups are nearly empty with little attendance. There is no reason to extend remote voting. It’s time we return to regular order — members should be here in D.C. working for their constituents.”

    While this tweet doesn’t actually show proxy voting, it does illustrate the disengaged culture that McCaul spoke of, as an Arizona Democrat casually registers a committee vote from some leisurely setting far from DC:

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    The Senate hasn’t adopted a proxy voting provision. The House rule does not allow a “general proxy.” Absent members must provide exact instruction on each vote. Present members can vote on behalf of up to 10 others.

    In the military, Democratic New Jersey Rep. Albio Sires would be derisively called “retired on active duty.” Cruising through his final term, the 71-year-old voted entirely by proxy from January through April.   

    As mentioned earlier, many Republicans are indulging in the rule, too. For example, several GOP members declared they were unable to physically attend proceedings because of the purported health emergency, only to instead attend the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC).  

    Pelosi may not have the power to extend proxy voting much longer. “If Republicans earn back the majority, proxy voting will be eliminated on Day One,” a spokesman for McCarthy said in January. 

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    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 21:20

  • Watch: Border Patrol Unlocking Gates For Illegals; Rand Paul Says Time For "Zero Tolerance Policy"
    Watch: Border Patrol Unlocking Gates For Illegals; Rand Paul Says Time For “Zero Tolerance Policy”

    Authored by Steve Watson via Summit News,

    Video of Border Patrol agents unlocking a gate in Eagle Pass and allowing illegal immigrants to pour through after the National Guard had locked it prompted Senator Rand Paul to call for a ‘zero tolerance policy’ to be implemented.

    Screenshot

    Fox News reporter Bill Melugin tweeted footage of the incident, noting “For the first time, we witnessed the TX National Guard close & lock a gate on private property at a major crossing area in Eagle Pass, denying entry to migrants who just crossed illegally & expected to be let in. Border Patrol then came w/ a key & let them in for processing.”

    Meliugin also noted “Border Patrol opening gates etc to allow migrants in is not new. They have to process migrants on US soil per federal law. What’s new is TX is now closing the gate & denying entry at this major crossing location. Always open in months past, including this video I shot in May.”

    Commenting on the video, Senator Rand Paul stated “The Democrats love illegal immigration, and so they have not been willing to change the laws.”

    “Anybody who is caught in the act of coming in should be immediately placed back on the other side. No process, nothing. If you were caught breaking in, not through a normal portal of entry, you should go back on the other side of the river immediately,” Paul asserted.

    The Senator further explained that he would like to see more incentives for legal immigration as a way of stemming the influx of undocumented migrants.

    “We should put more resources to allow more people to come and apply in a normal fashion at the port of entry. But I would have zero tolerance.”

    “Once you did that for about six months, and while I was not opposed to the wall, I think you could do it with helicopters and with maybe 50 stations along the border, and you could have it done in a month,” Paul said:

    Watch:

     

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 21:00

  • Federal Government To Stop Paying For COVID Shots, Tests, & Treatments
    Federal Government To Stop Paying For COVID Shots, Tests, & Treatments

    The Biden administration is starting to transition the federal government away from paying for Covid-19 vaccines, tests and treatments, with the shift likely to materialize this fall.    

    “One of the things we’ve spent a lot of time thinking about in the last many months…is getting us out of that acute emergency phase where the US government is buying the vaccines, buying the treatments, buying the diagnostic tests,” White House Covid-19 Response Coordinator Ashish Jha said at a US Chamber of Commerce Foundation event on Tuesday. 

    “My hope is that in 2023, you’re going to see the commercialization of almost all of these products,” Jha added. “Some of that is actually going to begin this fall, in the days and weeks ahead.” Earlier this year, a White House request for another $10 billion in pandemic response funding stalled in Congress. 

    On Thursday, The Wall Street Journal reported that, on Aug. 30, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) will host a meeting of pharmaceutical companies, state health departments and pharmacies to start sorting out how to make the transition, which also include regulatory adjustments.

    Referring to the broader transition, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America SVP Anne McDonald Pritchett told the Journal “there are issues of reimbursement, equitable access to vaccines and treatment, and distribution that need to be resolved.” 

    “Resolving the issue of equitable access” loosely translates to figuring out how to still give many tests, vaccines and treatments away to the uninsured and others — so drug companies will still be reaping some benefit from governmental redistribution of wealth where Covid-19 is concerned. 

    The federal government has already stopped buying monoclonal antibody treatments, such as Eli Lilly’s bebtelovimab. The list price is $2,100 a dose, and Lilly is working with HHS to transition to direct sales to health care providers. At the same time, “Lilly is coordinating with the US government to identify solutions so that uninsured, lower-income individuals can access bebtelovimab,” an Eli Lilly spokeswoman told Bloomberg. 

    Pfizer and Moderna racked up $79 billion in Covid vaccine sales in 2021 alone, the Journal reports, with sales juiced by public health officials’ false claims of efficacy, coupled with coercive vaccination requirements imposed by governments, schools and employers. 

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    Moving forward, Covid-associated prices will be subject to negotiations among drug-makers, pharmacy benefit managers and insurance companies. Kaiser Family Foundation executive vice president Larry Levitt told the Journal the net effect will likely be higher prices and higher insurance premiums.

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    However, after The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday that planning for the transition is getting underway in earnest, shares of vaccine makers slumped: Moderna was down 5% and Pfizer down nearly 2%. “Moderna will be at a disadvantage as the Covid-19 vaccines enter the commercial market, as it goes up against Pfizer, which has a substantially larger commercial infrastructure,” said Josh Nathan-Kazis of Barron’s. 

    While the inept government middleman was in the mix, Pfizer and Moderna were happy to churn out far more vaccines than the market demanded. Between December 2020 and mid-May of this year, US federal agencies, pharmacies and states threw out a whopping 82.1 million Covid-19 vaccine doses. 

    Meanwhile, in mid-October, the Biden administration is expected to extend the declared Covid-19 public health emergency into January 2023, ensuring midterm voters are still benefitting from expanded Medicaid coverage and higher payments to hospitals.  

    What a racket. 

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 20:40

  • Tent Cities Are Taking Over Vast Stretches Of Our Major Cities (And It's Only Going To Get Worse)
    Tent Cities Are Taking Over Vast Stretches Of Our Major Cities (And It’s Only Going To Get Worse)

    Authored by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse blog,

    If brighter days are ahead for the U.S. economy, why are so many tent cities popping up all over the nation?  At this point things are so bad that even the New York Times is admitting that “America’s homelessness problem has the makings of an acute crisis”.  That article goes on to explain that our homeless population is steadily rising.  Tonight, hundreds of thousands of our fellow Americans will be sleeping in tents, under bridges, in overcrowded shelters or in their vehicles.  Of course there are many that are so addicted to drugs or alcohol that they just sleep wherever they end up passing out.  This is a tragedy that is growing with each passing day, and it is only going to get worse in the months ahead as the U.S. economy slows down even more.

    Earlier today, I was truly stunned by a Fox News article about what is going on in Portland right now.  Tent cities are literally taking over entire neighborhoods, and many residents are “resorting to selling their homes” as a result…

    Residents in a Portland, Oregon, neighborhood are resorting to selling their homes and moving due to homeless encampments right outside their front doors.

    “It’s a little scary because I know there is mental illness and that concerns me,” North Portland resident Maria Inocencio told KGW8.

    Residents of North Portland said at least three families on one street have left in recent days due to the homeless camps, and KGW8 reported seeing for-sale signs up and down streets.

    Portland was once such a beautiful place, but now it has literally been transformed into a hellhole.

    Needless to say, Portland is far from alone.  From Seattle all the way down to San Diego, communities all along the west coast are being plagued by relentlessly growing encampments.  In many cases, such encampments are magnets for drug addicts and other societal outcasts.

    But this is not just a west coast problem.

    Let me give you are couple of examples.  In recent weeks, tent cities have been popping up all over Pittsburgh…

    “We want immediate action. We want to see people in homes. There’s a humane way to deal with homelessness,” said Pittsburgh City Council president Theresa Kail-Smith.

    Homeless camps are popping up all over the Northside.

    You’ll see them on the Riverfront Trail to Millvale.

    Another makeshift tent city popped up underneath the Andy Warhol Bridge.

    And in Fayetteville, North Carolina one burgeoning homeless camp recently made news because it features quite a few registered sex offenders…

    There are 843 registered sex offenders living in Cumberland County. For dozens in Fayetteville, their home is a tent alongside the road.

    Deputies in the Sheriff’s Office Sex Offender Registration Enforcement Unit (SOREU) learned the group of offenders are homeless and stay in a tent community along where the busy Martin Luther King Jr. Freeway (Highway 87) goes over Gillespie Street. Some live under the overpass while others live in a nearby field beside Gillespie Street.

    From coast to coast, this is becoming an enormous issue.

    And the truth is that it is only going to intensify as the months roll along.

    In 2008 and 2009, millions of Americans lost their jobs as the economy plunged into a major downturn.

    Once those people lost their jobs, many of them could no longer afford their homes and soon found themselves on the streets.

    I wish that we would never have to see anything like that again.  It was truly a very dark chapter in our history, and countless people had their lives turned completely upside down.

    Unfortunately, it is starting to happen again.

    As I detailed earlier this month, large companies are starting to lay off workers in substantial numbers.

    This even includes Facebook.  This week, we learned that Facebook recently used a very unique method to lay off one group of workers…

    A group of about 60 contractors who work with Facebook learned they were laid off this week after they were chosen ‘at random’ by an algorithm.

    The layoffs are the latest example of Big Tech reining in spending and hiring, as just days ago Apple let go of about 100 recruiters.

    Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has also recently said he will weed out underperforming employees with ‘aggressive performance reviews’ as the company braces for a deep economic turndown.

    I suppose that is one way to avoid personal responsibility for firing someone.

    “Don’t blame me – it was the algorithm”.

    If a big corporation that is swimming in cash like Facebook already feels forced to “thin the herd”, I think that is a very bad sign for the employment market as a whole.

    In the months ahead, I think that there will be a lot more layoffs all over the country.

    And this comes at a time when the housing market is starting to collapse.

    Existing home sales in the United States have now fallen for six months in a row, and the numbers for the month of July were downright depressing…

    Sales of previously owned homes fell nearly 6% in July compared with June, according to a monthly report from the National Association of Realtors.

    The sales count declined to a seasonally adjusted annualized rate of 4.81 million units, the group added. It is the slowest sales pace since November 2015, with the exception of a brief plunge at the beginning of the Covid pandemic.

    Sales dropped about 20% from the same month a year ago.

    I anticipated that home sales would be lower than last July, but a 20 percent drop is pretty catastrophic.

    And as the Federal Reserve continues to raise interest rates, it is probably inevitable that the numbers will get even worse.

    The stage is being set for a historic economic meltdown, and I would encourage you to do what you can to get prepared for it.

    2008 and 2009 were extremely bitter.

    What is coming will likely be even worse.

    And as the economy deteriorates, tent cities will continue to take over more neighborhoods all over America.

    But don’t look down on those that are living in tents.

    With a run of bad luck, you could be one of them too.

    *  *  *

    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
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 20:20

  • The Great Resignation Is Coming To An End As Workers Return Back To Their Old Jobs
    The Great Resignation Is Coming To An End As Workers Return Back To Their Old Jobs

    So it turns out the grass isn’t always greener on the other side…

    That’s what many who quit during “The Great Resignation” are apparently finding out, judging by a new Bloomberg piece that is highlighting how many people are returning to the old jobs that they quit over the last couple of years.

    4.2% of all new hires for companies that advertised jobs on LinkedIn were boomerangs in Q1 this year – meaning employees that returned to their old jobs – the report says, This compares to 3.3% in 2019, showing clearly that people are returning to their old jobs. Firms are even “boasting” on places like social media, the report says. 

    Companies are writing blog posts and sharing photos of employees returning to their respective firms. Dan Black, EY’s global leader for talent attraction, commented: “On social media, you can very easily click back in and say, ‘Hey, I’d love to talk to someone again about maybe reengaging in employment with the firm.” 

    The move goes to show that the recent jobs data isn’t necessarily indicative of a strong economy, but rather could mean the opposite: that people are returning back to work because rising rates, inflation and recession are starting to mire their quality of living. 

    Rachel Bentley, a 31-year-old from Austin, Texas who went back to her job at Duo, told Bloomberg: “I just realized that startups don’t really offer a lot of family benefits that larger companies do.” By going back she was able to reconnect with old friends…oh, and double her pay. 

    Adam Kail, founder and chief executive officer of Harrison Gray Search and Consulting commented on the trend: “The hard reality is that at 30, 40, or even 50, it’s really hard to change careers and maintain the lifestyle you’re used to. I’ve seen people switch careers drastically but in a short period of time realize, ‘I’m not as happy doing something I like more, but with my pay a third of what it was before.’”

    Matthew Wragg, CEO of engineering and tech recruitment firm Gattaca, told Bloomberg he has hired 6 former employees back over the past three months. He commented: “You’ve got that cultural cognizance. They know the culture. They know the operating processes.” 

    A study of about 30,000 employees who returned to their old jobs found that employees generally performed with the same efficiency as before they left the first time. This has been prompting companies to examine why these employees left in the first place. Poor cultural fits or underperformance generally don’t solve themselves upon coming back to a firm, so companies want to be cognizant of such reasons for leaving. 

    Mark Royal, a senior director at consultant Korn Ferry, offered up tips for those wanting to go back to their old jobs: “You want to be framing it in terms of what you’ve learned in the role you’re now leaving and what you can bring back to your former employer and why that will be valuable for you both.”

    First question you should address: at what point, exactly, did you learn that free Covid money wasn’t going to last forever and how did this effect your search for a job…

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 20:00

  • Oversight Democrats Demand Federal Intervention Against 'Election Misinformation'
    Oversight Democrats Demand Federal Intervention Against ‘Election Misinformation’

    Authored by Joseph Lord via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Democrats on the House Oversight Committee demanded in an Aug. 11 report that the federal government do more to respond to alleged “election misinformation,” which they say has weakened the capacity of election offices across the United States to carry out their official duties.

    Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.), chairwoman of the House Oversight Committee, speaks during a hearing in Washington on June 8, 2022. (Andrew Harnik/Pool/Getty Images)

    The committee report claimed that so-called misinformation efforts led by President Donald Trump and other conservatives have overwhelmed election offices and caused an uptick in threats against election workers (pdf). To respond to this, Democrats said, “strong federal leadership is needed.”

    “Lies and confusion about the 2020 election are an ongoing threat to representative democracy,” the report states. “Misinformation and disinformation drive fraudulent efforts to cast doubt on legitimate election results, increase threats to election administrators, and create pathways for bad actors to subvert our democratic elections.”

    In the same strain, the report added, “Lies about our elections, whether intentional falsehoods or pervasive misunderstandings, endanger both the democratic system and the people who administer our elections.”

    Threats Against Election Workers Allegedly Increased

    A key focus for Democrats in the report is the ways that the alleged misinformation about the 2020 election has increased threats against election officials and made it more difficult for them to do their jobs.

    “Election officials have been continuously vilified by conspiracy theorists led by former President Donald Trump and his supporters,” the Democrats wrote in one section of the report.

    In a subsection about “disinformation campaigns” carried out by “malicious domestic actors,” the report dives deeper into Democrats’ claims on this front.

    “Leading up to the 2020 presidential election, misinformation about all aspects of the voting process surged,” they wrote. “The coronavirus pandemic created a unique environment for voter confusion as states sought to adapt their rules on registering and voting by mail, creating opportunities for online misinformation to spread widely across the country.

    “After the election, some elected officials leveraged voters’ distrust to question the election results by espousing the ‘Big Lie’—the false claim that former President Donald Trump was the true winner of the 2020 election. These elected officials carried a dangerous message: that election administrators were to blame for the ‘stolen’ election.

    “Election administrators informed the Committee that responding to the influx of threats and disinformation required hours of work and increased security that made it more difficult for them to do their jobs. The President of the Election Officials of Arizona reported to the Committee that responding to the surge of concerns about voting by mail was ‘distracting us to the point where we can’t get our real work done.’ As each new false allegation of voter fraud was released and spread online, ‘the angry phone calls and threats start anew.’

    “The President of the Florida Supervisors of Election told the Committee they ‘have been consumed with responding to numerous public records requests, debunking election myths, and increasing voter education efforts to strengthen voter confidence in the elections process.’

    “The mounting pressures facing election workers and administrators are compounded by a vicious cycle of misinformation intended to reduce public faith in our election system.”

    The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) did find in an investigation that more than 1,000 election workers reported contacts that were “hostile or harassing.”

    However, though the report implies that the uptick has caused a great deal of violence, DOJ findings showed that only about 11 percent of those reports—about 110 cases—met the threshold for federal criminal investigation.

    Election Integrity Laws Targeted

    A key critique in the Democrats’ report involved efforts by state legislatures to tighten their election security laws in the wake of continuing concerns over the integrity of the 2020 election.

    In late 2021, Democrats in Congress attempted to respond to this spurt of tighter election laws—which many Democrats characterized as a “new Jim Crow”—with a series of ill-fated bills to strengthen federal control over elections.

    Though those efforts failed one by one to win enough support in the Senate, where Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) joined Republicans in opposing several of the proposals, Democrats have remained frustrated with the litany of new laws. The Aug. 11 report makes clear that these laws are still a prime target for disgruntled Democrats.

    The report contends that “dangerous, misinformation-driven, so called ‘election integrity’ laws … threaten to undermine the voting process in future elections.”

    Since the 2020 election, the report says further down, “state legislators have … introduced and passed hundreds of election laws based on the Big Lie. Some of these bills would give partisan legislators more control over non-partisan election systems, while simultaneously making it more difficult for election officials to effectively do their jobs.”

    Throughout the report, Oversight Democrats leave no doubt as to whom they blame for the rise in “misinformation”: President Donald Trump and his conservative allies.

    “Misinformation led to violent death threats against local election officials, often inspired by comments from right-wing politicians and activists, leading many experienced officials to leave their positions,” the report claims.

    In another section, Democrats named several conservative commentators who have cast doubt on the results of the 2020 election by name.

    “In Florida, Alex Jones, Roger Stone, and Mike Lindell spread conspiracy theories about one election official for responding to false allegations of fraud,” they wrote in an effort to bolster their claim that conservatives are largely responsible for issues experienced by election officials.

    ‘Fraudulent’ Audits

    Democrats in the report targeted two election audits that took place in Arizona and New Mexico in the aftermath of the 2020 election. Despite being approved by relevant elected officials in the state, Democrats claimed these audits were “fraudulent.”

    The most important audit in the aftermath of the 2020 election took place in Maricopa County, Arizona—a blue stronghold in the state, which President Joe Biden reportedly won. Maricopa County was at the center of electoral controversies, spurring Republicans in the Arizona State House to order a full audit of the county’s results.

    The other prime audit targeted by Democrats in the report took place in Otero County, New Mexico.

    These audits, Democrats said, were “partisan” and “highlight the grave harm that could result from such efforts.”

    Committee Democrats said that the audits in Arizona and New Mexico were the result of “a network of malicious actors … encouraging elected officials across the country to undermine the integrity of their election systems.”

    “The audit [in Maricopa County],” Democrats claimed, “undermined public confidence in elections and fostered efforts across the country to suppress votes and subvert elections.”

    These “fraudulent” audits, Democrats said, “generate a feedback loop of more misinformation, increased pressure on election officials, and disruptive legislation, paving the way for bad actors to overturn valid election results.”

    They warned of the possibility of such audits increasing after the 2022 elections, which they said could further damage trust in the electoral process.

    “Fraudulent audits and unfounded refusals to certify election results may multiply during the 2022 midterms, further damaging trust in the electoral process.”

    ‘Strong Federal Action Is Needed’

    In concluding their report, Democrats argued that “strong federal action is needed” to counter these alleged threats to the democratic process they say is caused by misinformation.

    “The threat posed to American democracy by election misinformation has changed and increased dramatically in the past two years,” they wrote. “The Committee’s investigations make clear that the greatest current threat to democratic legitimacy now comes from lies by domestic actors who seek to convince Americans that their election systems are fraudulent, corrupt, or insecure.”

    They describe the “urgent need to implement a federal whole-of-government plan to support local and state election officials as they respond to misinformation and share accurate information with voters. This response must also include vigorous law enforcement efforts to protect election officials from harassment and violence.”

    Democrats then laid out a litany of suggestions for actions by both the president and Congress.

    “The President should designate a lead federal agency or office to support state and local efforts to counter election misinformation,” they wrote, in a plan reminiscent of the now-defunct Department of Homeland Security Disinformation Governance Board, which was shut down after critics blasted the planned body as reminiscent of George Orwell’s “thought police” in the novel, “1984.”

    “[The president] should direct relevant agencies to coordinate with the lead agency on overall approaches, chains of communication, and best practices for advancing accurate information about the election process.”

    The report continues with the suggestion that “all relevant federal agencies should use their authorities in coordination with the lead agency to support state and local election officials’ efforts to counter misinformation during and after elections.”

    Oversight Democrats also recommended the continuation and expansion of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s (CISA) “rumor control” webpage.

    “During the 2020 election, the [CISA webpage] sought to counter election misinformation,” they wrote. “CISA should continue to update this site to respond to national misinformation narratives. Trusted local voices, however, are the most effective messengers against misinformation.”

    The report went on to say that CISA’s misinformation team should coordinate with state authorities to create state-level “rumor control” websites.

    Further, Oversight Democrats demanded that the DOJ “aggressively pursue criminal and civil enforcement against those who threaten or harass election administrators.”

    To aid in this, Democrats recommended the creation of a DOJ task force that would aid local officials in determining which federal charges they can bring against those who threaten or harass election workers.

    Finally, on a congressional front, Oversight Democrats called for expanding funding allocations to election offices across the country, in addition to strengthening already-existing laws against threatening, harassing, or harming election officials.

    “To counter malicious actors threatening violence against election officials, Congress should also enact meaningful statutory penalties for anyone who threatens election officials and administrators,” the report said.

    Failed Efforts to Change Election Law

    The items targeted by the report—allegations of misinformation, attacks on legally ordered election audits, and on election integrity legislation passed in state legislatures across the United States—fit into the larger context of a string of failed efforts by Democrats during the 117th Congress to strengthen federal control over elections.

    Election integrity bills have been a focal point for attacks by Democrats, who have said that the legislation constitutes a “new Jim Crow.”

    Over the summer and early fall of 2021, when many legislatures were considering and passing such legislation for the first time, Democrats put forward a litany of bills designed to counter this alleged threat.

    The most ambitious of these, the For the People Act, would have rendered the federal government more control over elections than it has ever had.

    Among many other provisions, that bill would declare Congress has unilateral authority over the conducting of elections in any areas where state and federal prerogatives clashed.

    The bill also would have forbidden illegal aliens from facing legal consequences for efforts to vote illegally, allowed for election day voter registration, and permitted convicted felons to vote.

    This bill, by far the most expansive piece of election legislation put forward by Democrats, passed the House along party lines but failed in the Senate after Manchin refused to lend it his support.

    Other bills, including the House-created “John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act” and a compromise bill created by Manchin, would have gone substantially less far—largely reinstating parts of the 1965 Voting Rights Act that were struck down in 2013 as unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in Shelby County v. Holder.

    Like the For the People Act, these too failed to win enough support in the Senate to overcome the 60-vote filibuster threshold.

    Republicans have been almost unilaterally opposed to Democrats’ election schemes, which they have said are an effort at “federalizing” elections.

    Thus, even if Congress were to move ahead with a legislative response to Oversight Democrats’ claims, it is unclear whether the bill would get very far in the upper chamber.

    Because of GOP opposition, it is likely that any such effort by Democrats will fail for the foreseeable future, short of the party gaining a 60-vote supermajority in the Senate.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 19:40

  • Adderall Supply Crunch Reported At Hundreds Of US Pharmacies
    Adderall Supply Crunch Reported At Hundreds Of US Pharmacies

    Wall Street’s favorite drug of choice is cocaine Adderall, a stimulant that allows traders, analysts, and bankers, working long hours to power through the day with maximum productivity, faces a critical “supply disruption.” 

    Bloomberg reported the National Community Pharmacists Association surveyed 358 store owners and managers about purchasing Adderall and generic versions of the brand between July 25 and Aug. 5, which revealed that 64% said the amphetamine is on backorder. 

    In late July, Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd., the largest seller of Adderall in the US, said it encountered “supply disruptions” of the drug, though expected the situation to be resolved in the near term. 

    Symphony Health has stunning data that shows the massive rise in prescriptions filled for Adderall, nearly quadrupling over the last decade. As of 2021, more than 41 million prescriptions were filled, up 10% from a year ago — perhaps the latest increase has to do with remote work trends post-Covid. 

    Bloomberg noted the FDA has yet to report an overall shortage of the amphetamine, though the federal agency said it’s aware of Teva’s delays. 

    For the cubicle junkies on Wall Street that consume copious amounts of legal drugs, such as Adderall, you might want to pay attention to Teva’s supply crunch. 

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 19:20

  • Saudi Aramco Is Taking A Page Out Of The U.S. Shale Playbook
    Saudi Aramco Is Taking A Page Out Of The U.S. Shale Playbook

    By David Messler of OilPrice.com

    Saudi Aramco reported Q-2, 2022 earnings this week and set tongues wagging with the sheer amount of cash being generated in its daily operations. Net income of $48.4 bn, Free Cash Flow of $34.6 bn for the quarter, and $65 bn for the first half, substantially eclipsed year-ago numbers of $22.6 bn and $40.9 bn for the same period. All of this was driven by price realizations for crude topping the $113.00/bbl mark for the quarter, exceeding year-ago prices ($67.90) by ~66%.

    What was noteworthy, and documented in a recent Wall Street Journal article, was the company’s capital allocation budget toward increasing production remained largely unchanged at the lower end of its previously announced range of $40-50 bn for 2022. The Journal article went on to note-

    “To be fair, $40 billion is a lot, much more than in 2021, but Aramco is very flush. It earned more than $65 billion in free cash flow in the first half of this year. That spending also includes diversifying into natural gas, wind, solar and blue hydrogen. And while capital discipline is laudable, surely if management really believes that oil demand is growing for the next decade, it should at the very least accelerate plans to expand its maximum sustainable oil capacity to 13.0 million barrels a day, currently set for 2027.”

    Where the Saudi mindset appears to depart from their oil-producing cousins on the other side of the planet, is what is to be done with the excess cash now being realized. While U.S. shale producers are raining wealth on their shareholders, in the form of stock buybacks and special dividends, KSA-94% owner of ARAMCO, has focused on paying down debt, and diversifying its energy portfolio. In some ways mimicking the actions of the mega oil producers like ExxonMobil, (NYSE:XOM) Chevron (NYSE:CVX) and BP (NYSE:BP), by delving into alternative energy forms. 

    The supermajors, tired of being clubbed by the climate alarmists, and having totally bought into the Paris Accord Net Zero by 2030 dictums, have been diverting capital away from legacy sources and toward cleaner energy forms that raise their ESG scores. Author of, The End of Fossil Fuel Insanity, Terry Etam, summarized their plight in an article carried in the BOE Report discussing the coming gap between supply and demand-

    “There is little producers can do to help out. Their ‘inventory’ – oil and gas reserves – is in incredibly high demand, and is being bid up in price. What would help alleviate this situation is to find and develop more reserves, but the world’s cultural elite, the group that dominates western political schools of thought, has ‘scientifically’ linked any weather event – anything at all – with climate change, which is linked to ‘fossil fuel combustion’, which is therefore bad, and the mere suggestion of increasing production is unacceptable.”

    In this regard, the supermajors have been “Greenwashing” their portfolios in some cases and beginning to transition them in others. Here they depart from the Saudis who intend to straddle the gap between petroleum and green energy into the foreseeable future.

    In spite of a publically asserted view by Aramco CEO, Amin Nasser that oil demand will grow for the rest of this decade, KSA appears to be in no hurry to accelerate the timetable for achieving the 13 mm BOPD upper threshold set for 2027. Instead, KSA has embarked on an ambitious decade-long quest to diversify its economy away from its sole reliance on oil and gas, choosing a multi-pronged approach that includes hydrogen, wind, and solar. 

    One area where they are focusing their efforts is in the production of hydrogen-H2. A Financial Times-FT article notes that the Saudis plan to dominate the production of H2, a few years hence. With its abundant supplies of gas nearby the City of Neom, a Blue-H2 plant is being built with $110 bn of capital. This plant is planned to take 2.2 bn cubic feet of gas daily from the supergiant Jafurrah gas field, for processing Blue H2. It is forecast to come on line in 2026.

    Another massive hydrogen project will produce Green H-2, with power supplied by a 99-turbine wind farm. SP Global discusses this in an article focusing on Acwa Power’s 240K mt/ton per year, green hydrogen project that will make 1.2 mm MT of ammonia. It also is expected to start production in 2026.

    Finally, solar is thought to have unlimited potential in the Kingdom. It makes sense as the sun shines brightly there more than 300 days per year. Accordingly, KSA is fielding a number of new solar farm projects getting underway. The sovereign wealth fund of the Kingdom just this year let two awards for a total of 1 GW IPP One went to Acwa Power for a 700 MW farm at Al-Rass and a second smaller, 300 MW farm at Saad. The Kingdom has a goal of installing 54 GW of solar generation by 2030.

    Solar is also finding industrial uses as the Glass Point complex takes shape. This 1.5 GW project, the biggest solar farm in the world will power an aluminum smelting plant designed to use the solar mirrors on water-filled pipes to produce solar steam. This will save approximately 600K tons of carbon annually. 

    Your takeaway

    It is fairly clear from the decisions that KSA is making about the capital allocation for renewable forms of energy that their feet are firmly planted in both camps. The higher price regime that has settled on the oil market since 2021 has provided the cash to fund the projects we have discussed, that will fuel the Saudi Vision 2030 initiative.

    At the same time, like their shale counterparts in the U.S., they are committed to an orderly development of their legacy oil reserves in a way that will preserve value as far into the future as possible. That’s just good stewardship.

    What this means is that in spite of entreaties by world leaders including the American president to produce more oil to lower prices, oil producers in the U.S. and in Saudi Arabia are seemingly determined to hold the line on capital spending. This will have the effect of keeping supplies tight and prices higher than they otherwise would be.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 19:00

  • China's Endless COVID Hysteria Is A Dark Experiment In Social Conditioning
    China’s Endless COVID Hysteria Is A Dark Experiment In Social Conditioning

    There are many people that will say that Americans “rolled over” in the face of covid restrictions and vaccine pressures despite extensive evidence that neither of these things had any effect on stopping or stalling the pandemic.  But the notion of American pacifism is simply not true.  If it were then the US would be looking a lot more like China right now.  

    Growing opposition to meaningless covid lockdowns and the vaccine passports was a mainstay in the US that made government enforcement impossible.  Joe Biden’s attempt to introduce federal vax passport rules for businesses failed miserably, red states defied the lockdowns within a few months of the start of the pandemic and the states that kept restrictions in place had HIGHER rates of infection while their economies sank.  When it became clear to the establishment that millions of Americans were not going to comply, they had to back off.

    Even blue states and cities have been forced to acknowledge that the farce is over; Los Angeles County tried to reintroduce mask mandates recently and the measure collapsed in failure as many municipalities said they planned to ignore any new ordnance.  Covid’s median Infection Fatality Rate of 0.23% was not enough of a threat to convince the public to abandon their constitutional rights. 

    Without the millions of courageous people that refused to comply our country might look very different today.  The CCP has faced little public opposition over their draconian covid rules, and when they do, they don’t worry much because the population is completely disarmed.  This has resulted in a veritable nightmare world for the citizenry.  In fact, it almost seems like an experiment to find out how much psychological torture and oppression human beings are willing to endure.    

    Mandate cheerleaders boasted endlessly about how China effectively stopped the spread and was ready to reopen while the western world floundered because we refused to submit and accept medical tyranny “for the greater good.”  Now these same people are silent as China goes though an array of outbreaks and lockdowns that cycle perpetually.  In the meantime, most of the west has reopened and some places (like dozens of conservative states) have been open well over two years.  Remember when leftists and foreign governments said we would be dying off in the streets and ruing our decision to follow the science rather than the hysteria?  Yeah, the great cleansing of conservatives they were hoping for never happened.    

    Open authoritarian systems require dramatic participation by the people being controlled.  They have to want to be locked down, otherwise the system cannot continue and it will eventually be toppled.  One has to wonder, do the Chinese people even remember anymore why they are locking down?  Or, have they just accepted the mandates as the new normal?  

    Currently, mass covid testing is a regular practice in most major population centers in China.  Almost every large indoor business or government building requires proof of a negative covid test.  This incessant testing is part of China’s “zero covid” policy, and has led to testing booths in almost every neighborhood. 

    China has been perfecting the use of QR codes and tracking apps to keep the public cataloged; without these apps and codes a Chinese citizen would find it impossible to get a job or participate in the economy.  They would die from starvation first; the minuscule chance of dying from covid would be the furthest thing from their mind.

    Though PCR testing often reads asymptomatic cases as exactly the same as full blown infections, the CCP does not recognize the difference and treats every case as if each person is Patient Zero in a zombie apocalypse.  For example, a six-year-old boy with asymptomatic covid tested positive and was found through tracking apps to have visited an IKEA store in Shanghai a couple of days earlier.  So, rather than admitting that the testing and tracking is a failed system that does nothing to prevent covid spread, CCP authorities instead tried to lockdown the IKEA building with hundreds of people inside for a week.  Here was the result:

    Testing madness has even spread to the animals.  The government is now requiring testing for 5 million fisherman as well as testing of the FISH being delivered by commercial fishing vessels to Chinese ports. 

    The image of a fish being swabbed for covid is rather hilarious, but it’s important to note that the CCP probably isn’t stupid enough to believe that covid is transmitted through seafood.  More likely what this is about is initiating a firestorm of public conditioning to convince the population that covid is around every corner and under every bed forever.  The goal here is to engage in a constant fear campaign to make the people more compliant.  It is an assessment to see what the government can get away with.  And, in China at least, they can get away with quite a lot.  

    The Orwellian horror that China represents has essentially killed their tourist industry.  Millions of potential foreign visitors now fear that they could be trapped within China’s borders if they time their visit to coincide with another surprise mass lockdown.  China’s economy suffers extensively from their lockdown culture, but the CCP does not care.  The experiment is more important than anything else.

    This will never end.  Once a government obtains this kind of all pervasive power they will stop at nothing to keep it.  While the US has many problems to deal with and many elitists in positions of authority to unseat, at least we have a chance.  Some places, like China, are so poisoned by complacency that they can’t escape the boot; it has already landed on them.   

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 18:40

  • Georgia Governor Files Motion To Quash Grand Jury Subpoena In State’s Election Probe
    Georgia Governor Files Motion To Quash Grand Jury Subpoena In State’s Election Probe

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

    Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp on Wednesday filed a motion to quash a grand jury subpoena requiring him to testify as part of an investigation into the actions of former President Donald Trump after official results in the 2020 presidential election showed that then-Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden had won.

    Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp during a dinner reception in Atlanta, Georgia, on June 6, 2022. (Laurie Dieffembacq/Belga Mag/AFP via Getty Images)

    Kemp had received a subpoena on Aug. 4 after a voluntary interview scheduled for late July was canceled.

    “[T]he Governor agreed to a voluntary interview to be held on July 25, 2022, but when counsel for the Governor asked reasonable questions of the [District Attorney’s] Office regarding the scope of that interview, the DA’s Office unilaterally canceled the interview and issued the Subpoena,” attorneys for Kemp said in the motion (pdf) filed on Aug. 17 in Fulton County Superior Court. “Why the DA’s Office acted so abruptly is unclear.”

    According to an exhibit in the motion, Kemp has been asked to testify before the grand jury at 9 a.m. on Aug. 18.

    Kemp’s lawyers argued the subpoena should be quashed because it is “barred by sovereign immunity.” The subpoena also “improperly seeks to invade established common law executive and attorney-client privileges,” and is “being pursued at this time for improper political purposes,” they wrote.

    “Georgia courts have no authority to compel a sitting Governor to provide testimony about matters involving his official duties due to sovereign immunity,” the motion reads. “Even if that were not the centuries-old law of this State, the Subpoena at issue is improper, and due to be quashed, because its timing is neither driven by a genuine investigative need for information nor compliant with the established ethical rules governing prosecutors and election cycle investigations.”

    Chief Judge Christopher Brasher of the Fulton County Superior Court in January authorized a special purpose grand jury, as requested by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, “for the purpose of investigating the facts and circumstances relating directly or indirectly to possible attempts to disrupt the lawful administration of the 2020 elections in the State of Georgia.” The grand jury was authorized to begin on May 2.

    The DA’s Office back in April 2021 had “informed counsel that the DA’s Office was interested in meeting with Governor Kemp to discuss a telephone call between the Governor and former President Donald Trump,” Kemp’s legal team noted.

    The team provided a timeline outlining the correspondence that took place between Kemp’s counsel, Brian McEvoy, and a number of aides to Willis.

    “While the special purpose grand jury was only recently authorized, the DA’s Office has been investigating the events surrounding the 2020 Presidential election for at least a year and a half,” Kemp’s lawyers said in the motion. “During that time, and well before the Subpoena was issued, Governor Kemp consistently attempted to engage with DA’s Office and to voluntarily provide it with relevant and appropriate information regarding its investigation … the DA’s Office ignored, denied, or otherwise frustrated these attempts time and time again.”

    Kemp’s lawyers alleged that the Fulton County DA’s Office “through delay and artificial deadlines … has engineered the Governor’s interaction with the investigation to reach a crescendo in the middle of an election cycle.”

    “This timing cannot be ignored given the Governor’s repeated efforts to engage with the DA’s Office prior to 2022 and even before announcing his re-election campaign,” they said in the Aug. 17 motion.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 18:20

  • China Jails Billionaire Xiao Jianhua For 13 Years, Slaps Unprecedented $8.1 Billion Fine
    China Jails Billionaire Xiao Jianhua For 13 Years, Slaps Unprecedented $8.1 Billion Fine

    In the most glaring lesson yet to the country’s upstart nouveau-riche oligarchs, a Chinese court has sentenced Xiao Jianhua, the billionaire founder of Tomorrow Group known for managing assets for descendants of prominent Chinese leaders, to 13 years in prison, and slapped the conglomerate with an unprecedented fine of 55 billion yuan ($8.1 billion), culminating the dramatic break-up of China’s largest privately owned financial empire after a five-year investigation.

    The Canadian-Chinese tycoon, who disappeared from a luxury hotel in Hong Kong in 2017, was found guilty of illegally collecting public deposits, using entrusted assets in breach of trust, illegally using funds and bribery, according to a statement by the Shanghai No 1 Intermediate People’s Court on Friday, the SCMP reported. Xiao was also personally fined 6.5 million yuan.

    “Tomorrow Group and Xiao Jianhua’s criminal acts severely damaged the financial management order, which severely risked the national financial safety, and severely encroached the professional integrity of public servants,” said the Shanghai court in its ruling on Friday. “They should be strictly punished based on the law.”

    The sentencing closed the clean-up of Xiao’s financial empire comprising assets worth 3 trillion yuan, and is part of Beijing’s ramped-up efforts to control financial risks in recent years.

    Tomorrow Group and Xiao illegally used client funds and entrusted assets of 148.6 billion yuan via Baoshang Bank, the Shanghai court said on July 4. The bank entered the annals of Chinese history in May 2019 when it became the first ever insolvent bank taken over by the government and was placed into bankruptcy a year later.

    The company illegally borrowed these funds from Baoshang Bank over the course of 14 years, and it also interfered with the bank’s daily business operations, according to the central bank in 2020.

    From 2001 to 2021 – during which Xiao was incarcerated in an unknown location in China for four years – the company and Xiao had given bribes worth 680 million yuan to a number of public servants in the form of stakes in unspecified companies, property and cash, the court said according to the SCMP. The bribes were used to circumvent financial regulation or seek illegal favors.

    When asked about Xiao’s right to consular access as a Canadian citizen during a regular briefing on Friday, China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Xiao does not have the right to consular protection of other countries as Beijing does not recognize dual nationality.

    Xiao, 50, was born in Shandong, and began his career in business by selling IBM and Dell computers near the Peking University campus in the 1990s. Within a few years, he was worth an estimated $150 million. Surely, there was no crime there.

    Xiao is the owner of Tomorrow Holding (trading as Tomorrow Group), a diversified investment company involved with banking, insurance, real estate development, coal, cement and rare earth minerals.He owns non-controlling stakes in Ping An Insurance, Harbin Bank, Huaxia Bank and the Industrial Bank through a series of other investment vehicles, in addition to being the major shareholder in Baotou Tomorrow Technology.

    Xiao reportedly, “worked on behalf of a number of powerful families,” in China over the course of his career, and he has been described by The New York Times as “a banker for the ruling class.” By 2016, he was worth an estimated $6 billion. Xiao’s connections with relatives of China’s government leaders were demonstrated by his purchase of a 50% stake in CCB International Yuanwei Fund Management, an investment management company owned by Qi Qiaoqiao, Xi Jinping’s sister. According to news reports, Xiao was also involved with the business Pacific Securities, a company later accused of facilitating money laundering.

    He has Canadian citizenship and reportedly held a diplomatic passport from Antigua and Barbuda.

    He ranked 32nd on the Hurun China Rich List in 2016 and his net worth was estimated at US$6 billion before his Tomorrow Group financial empire was dismantled by Beijing following his downfall five years ago.

    He went missing from the Four Seasons Hotel in Hong Kong in January 2017. In the small hours of January 27, two vans arrived at the luxurious Four Seasons, where Xiao was staying in one of his several rented serviced flats. At about 1am, five men emerged from the vans and knocked on the door of Xiao’s 28th-floor flat before emerging two hours later with him. Almost 12 hours later, Xiao passed through border controls at the Lok Ma Chau crossing between Hong Kong and Shenzhen, and disappeared in the mainland Chinese city, the SCMP reported.

    Although a low profile figure, Xiao was well-known for his connections with China’s political elite. His businesses ranged from insurance to mining.

    The tycoon and the company had illegally collected deposits of 311.6 billion yuan by selling trust, insurance and wealth management products, which were against regulations, the court said. They also had used illegal insurance funds of close to 191 billion yuan from connected insurers including Huaxia Insurance, Tian’an Life Insurance and Yi’an Property Insurance, the court added.

    Tomorrow Group used the illegal funds to acquire financial institutions and for securities trading and overseas investment. The company had returned some of the illegal funds by selling assets and transferring capital from overseas after the government intervened.

    In 2020, Beijing took control of some of the associated companies, including Huaxia Life, Tian’an Life and Tian’an Property Insurance. Privately owned Huaxia Life, founded in 2006, was the flagship of Xiao’s conglomerate. It had 182.8 billion yuan of insurance premium in 2019, ranking it fourth among China’s life insurers. The crackdown that started in 2017 also placed half a dozen of China’s biggest global asset buyers under regulatory scrutiny to prevent their debt-fuelled acquisitions from harming the nation’s financial system.

    Xiao’s arrest was among a series of crackdowns on high-profile Chinese businessmen, including Wu Xiaohui, the former chairman of beleaguered insurance giant Anbang Group, and hedge fund guru Xu Xiang, following a stock market rout in 2015.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 18:00

  • The Satanic Verses Sells In Droves After Salman Rushdie Attack
    The Satanic Verses Sells In Droves After Salman Rushdie Attack

    Authored by Steve Watson via Summit News,

    Sales of Salaman Rushdie’s infamous novel The Satanic Verses have skyrocketed following the horrific attack on the author last week, in a show of strength for free speech over Islamic extremism.

    The New York Post reports that Rushdie’s 1988 novel, for which he has received death threats ever since, soared to the top of multiple Amazon bestseller lists.

    The book hit number one in Contemporary Literature & Fiction, Fiction Satire and Humorous Literary Fiction.

    The audiobook version became the seventh best-seller in Amazon’s Audible store.

    The novel was also second bestseller in both the Politics & Social Science and the Self-Help & Psychology Humor categories on Tuesday, and the 26th best-selling book overall on Amazon’s US site.

    Rushdie’s other novels also saw a jump in sales.

    The Satanic Verses was deplored by extremists and declared blasphemous concerning its depiction of the Prophet Muhammad.

    One reviewer wrote “Hope this book becomes #1 bestseller again just as a big F*** you to religious extremists and sympathizers,” adding “I didn’t even know about this book before. So if the idea was to spread the author’s message in modern times, then they succeeded!”

    “I just bought this book in response to extremists who try to silence people. You will not win,” another reviewer added.

    A further reviewer wrote “Dear Mr. would-be assassin, this book is now back on the bestseller lists. You did that. You tried to silence Salman Rushdie for writing something you found offensive, and now that very work is going to be in more homes, read by more people than ever before.”

    The post continues, “This is what you have accomplished. This is the only thing you have ever accomplished, and the only thing you will ever accomplish.”

    “Funny thing, if there had never been a fatwa on Mr. Rushdie in the first place, how many people do you suppose would have ever even heard of this book? Now a whole new generation will read it, all because you didn’t want it to be read by anyone,” the reviewer concludes.

    *  *  *

    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
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 17:40

  • BloodBath & Bankuptcy? BBBY Suppliers Halt Shipments Due To Unpaid Bills
    BloodBath & Bankuptcy? BBBY Suppliers Halt Shipments Due To Unpaid Bills

    Update (1725ET): Following its worst day on record after Ryan Cohen dumped all his shares (and sold all his calls), Bed Bath & Beyond was battered by more bad news after hours after Bloomberg reports that, according to people familiar with the matter, some suppliers are restricting or halting shipments altogether after the home-goods retailer fell behind on payments.

    The retailer has previously said it is struggling with cash and inventory optimization, and ordering missteps appear to have left it with a glut of goods that will have to be sold at markdowns. 

    Several of the firms that provide credit insurance or short-term financing to vendors have revoked coverage of Bed Bath & Beyond, drastically complicating the company’s scramble for liquidity. 

    BBBY shares are down a further 4-5% after-hours on the news…

    But still have a long way to go to catch up with the reality that bonds have been pricing-in for a while…

    As far as stocks go – “mark it zero” comes to mind.

    Bonds knew… but the question is – did Ryan Cohen know?

    *  *  *

    It is only fitting that on the day Blood, Bath and Bankruptcy Bed Bath & Beyond suffered a historic crash in its stock price, we learn from Bloomberg that the quasi-insolvent retailer hired law firm Kirkland & Ellis to help it address a debt load that’s become unmanageable amid a sales slump.

    Kirkland, best known for its legal advice in restructuring and bankruptcy situations, was tapped to help the retailer navigate options for raising new money, refinancing existing debt, or both, according to the report. Translation: from $30 yesterday, BBBY stock will be worthless in a few days (just in case there is confusion why Ryan Cohen pulled the plug).

    None of this will come as a shock to debt investors, usually far, far smarter then their equity peers, and is why much of Bed Bath & Beyond’s bonds and loans are already trading at distressed levels, even as its stock climbed as high as $30 per share earlier this week.

    The share price however tumbled back to $10 after hours on Thursday, after activist shareholder Ryan Cohen dumped his entire stake making $68 million in the process, while costing a similar amount to the thousands of retail investors who followed him into this melting ice cube.

    Alas, the stock is going much lower – in fact, $0.00 sounds like support – as the trading prices of the retailer’s debt, have plunged to half their face value or less this year, with the sharpest drop coming after the company announced dismal quarterly earnings June 29. And since the unsecured debt will be impaired, this implies there is zero value for the equity in the upcoming bankruptcy.

    If only BBBY had sold stock in an ATM offering at the grotesquely inflated price from earlier this week, to hapless retail investors. That way RC Ventures pump and dump would have been complete.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/19/2022 – 17:34

Digest powered by RSS Digest

Aug 19

Today’s News 19th August 2022

  • Cadillac's $300,000 EV Prototype Spotted On Road For First Time
    Cadillac’s $300,000 EV Prototype Spotted On Road For First Time

    GM released a series of images showing the Cadillac Celestiq prototype, with a mystical blue and white camouflage wrap, undergoing on-road testing around the company’s facilities in Michigan, according to autoblog GM Authority. 

    The Celestiq is Cadillac’s new EV flagship model that costs a whopping $300,000. Even though the sedan has stylish lines and looks like a Lucid Motors Air (from the front), it’s still a Cadillac, and the price seems ridiculous. 

    The electric hatchback is set to reach customers sometime in 2024 and should be equipped with an all-wheel-drive electric powertrain capable of a +300-mile driving range and packed with groundbreaking technologies (including a hands-free assisted-driving system). 

    Reading through the comments of autoblog Car and Driver‘s take on the new Cadillac — commenters had mixed feelings about the luxury EV sedan. 

    One commenter said: “It’s ugly and over price, and will never compete with Bentley, Mercedes, Or BMW.” 

    “It looks great, but 2x the price of a Model S or Lucid?” someone said. 

    Another person said: “Ugly, bad name, overpriced, have to remember to plug it in. No thanks.” 

    But not all comments were negative: “The most beautiful EV ever built! Hope to see it in production,” someone else said. 

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 23:00

  • China’s Trillion-Dollar Research Funds Squandered On Travel and Leisure
    China’s Trillion-Dollar Research Funds Squandered On Travel and Leisure

    Authored by Jessica Mao via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    In the past four years, many Chinese IC stars that emerged from the CCP’s “rapid chip-making” campaign have gone awry or ended in a disastrous failure. ( NICOLAS ASFOURI/AFP via Getty Images)

    Chinese authorities had high hopes for China’s chip industry, expecting to see a “semiconductor miracle,” which would then affirm the “advantage of China’s whole nation system,” as well as overcome technology sanctions imposed by the United States.

    However, eight years into establishment of China Integrated Circuit Industry Investment Fund, also known as the “Big Fund,” trillions of yuan have been exhausted with little success in tech innovation.

    China’s anti-corruption watchdog launched an investigation into the former and current executives of the “Big Fund” in July, and seven senior officials linked to the “Big Fund” have demoted since.

    In fact, misusing government research and development (R&D) subsidies and grants is common within China’s scientific community.

    Where Did China’s Trillions in Research Funding Go

    In April 2018, Chinese state media Sina Finance published an article, asking the question, “China has long been spending trillions of yuan in the field of semiconductors every year, but where did the huge amount of funds go?”

    The article went on to say that in the past several years, roughly only 40 percent of the country’s research funding was actually spent on science and technology research and development, and 60 percent was spent on meetings and business trips.

    “Whenever there are chances of business meetings, one can reimburse travel expenses, gasoline cost, and the travel cost can be huge when people go abroad to attend meetings. Even researchers at Tsinghua University and Peking University are no exception,” it said. “Anhui University of Engineering has also found that research funds are used to reimburse entertainment, foot spa, HOA cost and other expenses unrelated to the project. Moreover, the university noted a drastic increase of business trips abroad in recent years.”

    A researcher revealed to Sina Finance that usually for the so-called inspection trips in foreign countries, the researchers simply made a brief appearance at their targeted inspection sites, and the rest of the time was spent on travel, leisure, and sightseeing.

    In addition to holding or attending business meetings, Chinese research institutions are also obsessed with buying equipment, according to the article.

    “Every year, when the funding is allocated, the first thing they do is to update all the laptops, scanners, cell phones, and other resources in the team, and sometimes a mentor with several topics in hand can get himself several of the latest laptops,” it said.

    R&D Fraud

    Many researchers are very skillful at selling an idea—hyping up a concept, sometimes to the point of committing R&D fraud, in order to apply for a hefty amount of funding. “Some key projects can get several millions or even several tens of millions of yuan as research grant. These people’s desire for capital is greater than getting down-to-earth with scientific research,” the article said.

    Citing the Wuhan Hongxin scandal as an example, the article recounted that in August 2002, Chen Jin, then dean of the microelectronics school of Shanghai Jiaotong University, bought a Motorola chip from the United States, and hired a few migrant workers to polish off the MOTO logo from the chip with sandpaper. He then paid a small company to put a “Hanxin One” trademark on polished surface of the chip. Through layers of his personal connections, he was able to obtain various certifications, claiming that it was China’s first high-end DSP chip with independent intellectual property rights.

    “As the whole nation was thrilled at his claim, Chen applied for dozens of research projects in one shot, and even deceived the General Armament Department of China’s military into filing a Weapons and Equipment Technology Innovation Project. No one noticed any problems before or afterwards. So he succeeded in defrauding over 100 million yuan of scientific research funds,” the article said.

    In an interview with The Epoch Times on Aug. 12, overseas China expert Lu Tianming pointed out that China’s ambition of rapid chip R&D itself is a good goal to set, but the thing is, the Chinese Communist Party is rotten to the core.

    “It can be said that every single communist official is corrupt,” Lu said. “Actually, it would be abnormal if any official or supervisor involved would not embezzle from the funds. They all wish to line their own pockets when given such an opportunity.”

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 22:00

  • Drought Is Driving European Energy Markets Toward Disaster
    Drought Is Driving European Energy Markets Toward Disaster

    By Irina Slav of OilPrice.com

    Energy markets and nature seem to have it in for Europe. Record-breaking gas prices, rising coal prices, and droughts that interfere with electricity generation in some key markets have combined to push electricity contracts in the EU to record highs as uncertainty about the coming winter deepens.

    Reuters reported earlier this week that a number of power forward contracts traded in the EU hit highs because of what increasingly looks like a perfect energy storm, affecting every energy source in one way or another.

    “A number of factors are adding up: The market is uncertain about whether (French utility) EDF will increase nuclear availability enough for winter, which explains the price differences between the two countries [France and Germany],” Rystad Energy analyst Fabian Ronningen told Reuters.

    EDF has had to significantly reduce the capacity utilization rate of its nuclear power plants because droughts in France have reduced water availability for cooling the reactors. But the drought came on top of earlier problems: reactor corrosion that prompted the utility to close some of them earlier this year, effectively reducing the supply of electricity available for sale on the domestic or regional market.

    Meanwhile, in Germany, wind output is low, and so is the water level of the Rhine—a key transport route for things like coal, for example. Germany’s economy is quite dependent on this crucial shipping corridor, but when the water level is critically low, shippers simply cannot load the usual volume of cargo, meaning that coal and other commodities are reaching their destinations in smaller mounts and more slowly.

    The drought is also affecting hydropower output, adding to worries about future supply. Because of the drought, Norway, which generates more than two-thirds of its electricity from hydropower, announced it would curb electricity exports, threatening supply for other European countries at the worst possible time. In the UK, there’s talk about blackouts.

    Meanwhile, Gazprom’s gas flows to Europe remain much lower than usual, with the Russian state major warning this week that gas prices on the spot European market could top $4,000 per 1,000 cubic meters. Recently, spot prices broke the $2,500 barrier.

    “European spot gas prices have reached $2,500 (per 1,000 cubic meters). According to conservative estimates, if such a tendency persists, prices will exceed $4,000 per 1,000 cubic meters this winter,” Gazprom said.

    The European Union has been quick in switching from Russian gas to U.S. LNG amid the Ukraine crisis, but speed has not been enough: U.S. LNG export capacity is not limitless, and producers also have other clients, in Asia. As the winter season approaches, Asian buyers have become more willing to pay hefty premiums for any LNG, which has intensified competition for a limited number of LNG tankers.

    No wonder, then, that electricity prices in some parts of Europe have hit records. Even less wonder that industries are beginning to buckle, per a recent Bloomberg report. The report noted that Germany’s year-ahead electricity contract rose to more than 530 euros per MWh earlier this week, which constituted a 500-percent increase over the past 12 months. No industry can absorb such a price shock unscathed, and German industry didn’t.

    Germany had to pay the equivalent of more than $15 billion to bail out one of its biggest gas utilities, Uniper, earlier this year. Chemicals giant BASF warned that a gas shortage could wreak havoc on the industry. Aluminum and zinc smelters are closing, and so are fertilizer plants, all because of record gas and electricity prices.

    Relief is not in sight unless one considers the filling up of gas storage caverns in Europe a form of relief. The EC had set a target of 80 percent for storage fill rates by October 1. Member-states are on track to hit this target ahead of schedule, but this has come at a cost: the EU’s gas bill this year is ten times higher than it normally is, at over $51 billion.

    What’s more, storage alone will not be enough to keep European economies going through the winter months. The EU will need more gas as regular supply. Besides the U.S., there are few other places it can get it. It could be why the head of the German energy regulator warned the EU’s biggest economy would need to reduce gas consumption by a fifth to avoid shortages and rationing in the winter.

    “The longer these price rises go up, the more this will be felt across the economy,” Daniel Kral, senior economist at Oxford Economics, told Bloomberg this week. “The magnitude of the increase and magnitude of the crisis isn’t comparable to anything in the past few decades.”

    It is unfortunate that Europe is experiencing one unprecedented crisis after another. And it could yet get worse as the oil embargo against Russia kicks in at the end of the year.

    Analysts have warned that this could lead to higher prices for oil. This will, in turn, add to upward electricity price pressure due to the switch from gas to oil some utilities in Europe have implemented to shield themselves from prohibitive gas prices.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 21:30

  • Putin Will Attend G20 Summit In Indonesia, Despite US Demands To Exclude Russian Leader
    Putin Will Attend G20 Summit In Indonesia, Despite US Demands To Exclude Russian Leader

    The western world is about to stop waging some bizarro war against Vladimir Putin that has sparked loathed energy hyperinflation across most of Europe, and is about to embrace the Russian leader, behind closed doors of course, even if it means a terribly vexxed Zelenskyy and US deep state.

    Why? Because “pariah” Vladimir Putin is about to re-emerge on the G20 scene again, this time courtesy of Indonesian President Joko Widodo, who today said that both Putin and China’s president Xi both plan to attend the G20 summit in the resort island of Bali later this year.

    “Xi Jinping will come. President Putin has also told me he will come,” Jokowi, as the president is known, said in an interview with Bloomberg News Editor-in-Chief John Micklethwait on Thursday. It was the first time the leader of the world’s fourth-most populous nation confirmed both of them were planning to show up at the November summit, according to Bloomberg.

    Needless to say, the presence of Xi and Putin at the meeting will set up a showdown with the deep state handlers who control Joe Biden’s teleprompter and other, less senile “western” leaders, all of whom are set to meet in person for the first time since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The attack has left the G-20 divided over whether to place sanctions on Russia, because while a handful of G-20 countries are relatively self reliant, most are desperate for Russia’s commodity exports, whose lack has sent European energy prices to… well, just look for yourselves.

    Putin and Jokowi discussed preparations for the G-20 summit in Bali in a phone call Thursday, the Kremlin said in a statement that didn’t mention whether the Russian leader will attend. Putin’s attendance will also likely bring him face to face with Volodymyr Zelenskiy for the first time since Russia’s invasion because for some odd reason the Ukrainian president – who also doubles as a Vogue model – is also slated to be in Bali.

    Showing just how inconsequential the Biden White House has become in global affairs, Putin’s presence will take place even though Biden had called for Russia to be removed from the G-20, and US officials had earlier been pressuring Indonesia to exclude Putin from the Bali summit.

    It’s almost as if when it comes to the world deciding between Putin’s nat gas exports and the deep state’s wishes, the world chooses the former. To make that point, Indonesia’s leader explained that as the new global axis lines are drawn, Asia stands with China and Russia.

    “The rivalry of the big countries is indeed worrying,” Jokowi, 61, said in the interview. “What we want is for this region is to be stable, peaceful, so that we can build economic growth. And I think not only Indonesia: Asian countries also want the same thing.”

    “Indonesia wants to be friends with everyone,” he said. “We don’t have problems with any country. Each country will have their own approach. Each leader has their own approach. But what’s needed by Indonesia is investment, technology that will change our society.”

    Jokes aside, however, as Bear Traps report author Larry McDonald notes, we are likely just months away from quietly shelving western sanctions on Russia.

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

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 21:20

  • Lowe’s To Give $55 Million In Bonuses For Hourly Workers To Fight Inflation
    Lowe’s To Give $55 Million In Bonuses For Hourly Workers To Fight Inflation

    Authored by Katabella Roberts via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    A Lowe’s store in Philadelphia in a file photo. (The Canadian Press/AP/Matt Rourke)

    American retail company Lowe’s is handing out $55 million in bonuses to its front-line hourly employees in an effort to help combat the increasing cost of living.

    Lowe’s Chief Executive Marvin R. Ellison announced the bonus scheme during the company’s second-quarter earnings call on Wednesday.

    “I would like to personally thank our associates for their hard work and dedication. In recognition of some of the cost pressures they are facing due to high inflation, we are providing an incremental $55 million in bonuses to our hourly front-line associates this quarter,” Ellison said on the call.

    “These associates have the most important jobs in our company, and we deeply appreciate everything they do to serve our customers to deliver a best-in-class experience,” Ellison added.

    For a designated time period, the company is also providing workers with an additional 10 percent discount on everyday household and cleaning items, meaning they can now purchase those products at a 20 percent discount.

    Executive Vice President Joe McFarland said he hopes the added discounts will also help to “ease the burden of inflation impacting many of these items.”

    “We will continue to look for meaningful ways to improve our associates’ work-life balance while providing them with the tools to build a career at Lowe’s,” McFarland said.

    Steve Salazar, a spokesperson for Lowe’s, confirmed to The Washington Post that employees at the company will see the bonus on Sept. 9, and it will be taxed.

    Households Feeling the Strain

    Lowe’s operates or services 2,200 home improvement and hardware stores and employs approximately 300,000 people, according to its official website.

    The $55 million in bonuses shared among the 300,000 employees would amount to an average bonus of roughly $183 per employee.

    Lowe’s announcement comes as inflation has rocketed in the United States, prompting a string of businesses, including Microsoft, ExxonMobil, and Walmart, to offer worker bonuses, discounts, and gift cards in an effort to offset soaring prices, although it is unclear just how helpful the one-time lump sumps will be as the cost of living steadily increases.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 21:00

  • Blood, Bath And Bankrupt? BBBY Hires Restructuring Advisor
    Blood, Bath And Bankrupt? BBBY Hires Restructuring Advisor

    It is only fitting that on the day Blood, Bath and Bankruptcy Bed Bath & Beyond suffered a historic crash in its stock price, we learn from Bloomberg that the quasi-insolvent retailer hired law firm Kirkland & Ellis to help it address a debt load that’s become unmanageable amid a sales slump.

    Kirkland, best known for its legal advice in restructuring and bankruptcy situations, was tapped to help the retailer navigate options for raising new money, refinancing existing debt, or both, according to the report. Translation: from $30 yesterday, BBBY stock will be worthless in a few days (just in case there is confusion why Ryan Cohen pulled the plug).

    None of this will come as a shock to debt investors, usually far, far smarter then their equity peers, and is why much of Bed Bath & Beyond’s bonds and loans are already trading at distressed levels, even as its stock climbed as high as $30 per share earlier this week.

    The share price however tumbled back to $10 after hours on Thursday, after activist shareholder Ryan Cohen dumped his entire stake making $68 million in the process, while costing a similar amount to the thousands of retail investors who followed him into this melting ice cube.

    Alas, the stock is going much lower – in fact, $0.00 sounds like support – as the trading prices of the retailer’s debt, have plunged to half their face value or less this year, with the sharpest drop coming after the company announced dismal quarterly earnings June 29. And since the unsecured debt will be impaired, this implies there is zero value for the equity in the upcoming bankruptcy.

    If only BBBY had sold stock in an ATM offering at the grotesquely inflated price from earlier this week, to hapless retail investors. That way RC Ventures pump and dump would have been complete.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 20:36

  • Russians Scramble For Visas As EU Urges "Coordinated Approach" On Travel Bans
    Russians Scramble For Visas As EU Urges “Coordinated Approach” On Travel Bans

    The European Commission has said it is still weighing a travel ban for all Russian nationals, but stressed in a Thursday statement that some member states have individually begun to impose restrictions on visas, but that none has ceased issuing them completely. 

    Commission spokesperson Anitta Hipper called for a “coordinated approach” among EU countries, saying in a Thursday press briefing in Brussels that “visa activities have not stopped completely and in particular the humanitarian cases are catered for.”

    She said that Russia’s ongoing assault on Ukraine had created “unprecedented challenges” for the entirety of the EU, and for that reason had “acted immediately” to suspend a visa facilitation agreement with Moscow on February 25, the day after the invasion. 

    EU foreign ministers are set to meet later in August, and the proposed travel ban will be on on the agenda, she said. Ukrainian government under President Zelensky has been lobbying hard for the European Union as well as the United States to shut their borders to any and all Russian travelers for a period of at least one year.

    “The most important sanctions are to close the borders — because the Russians are taking away someone else’s land,” Zelensky told The Washington Post in an interview published over a week ago. He stressed that as punishment Russian citizens should “live in their own world until they change their philosophy” – before being allowed to travel in the West. “They’ll understand then,” he said.

    Estonia and Finland were among the first European countries to back the call, and took steps to impose their own restrictions for Russian travel. 

    The Moscow Times reports that Russians seeking to travel abroad are now racing against the clock ahead of proposed tighter travel restrictions especially to the Baltics:

    Finland said Tuesday it will reduce the number of visas issued to Russians by 90% starting next month and Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia have recently also announced restrictions on tourist visas for Russians. 

    The three Baltic states and Finland, which share land borders with Russia, have reported an increase in the numbers of Russians using their airports to transit further into the EU as a workaround to the bloc’s ban on Russian airlines.

    Further the report underscores that “The number of applications for Schengen visas — which give access to most EU countries — submitted by Russians has risen rapidly in recent weeks, according to tour agencies contacted by The Moscow Times.”

    One major Russian tour and travel industry insider was quoted as saying the number Schengen visa applications made by Russian citizens has doubled in only two weeks.

    Last week the Kremlin blasted the proposal as “irrational” and painted it as racist and xenophobic. It remains that the EU were to tell 145 million Russians they can no longer travel to Europe for any reason in a sweeping ban, it goes without saying that this would be unlikely to impact Putin’s war-time decision making in any way. Instead, it would only serve to punish common people, who also have a wide range of views regarding the war in Ukraine. 

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 20:00

  • Buchanan: How, When, Or Will We Ever Come Together Again?
    Buchanan: How, When, Or Will We Ever Come Together Again?

    Authored by Pat Buchanan,

    When 30 FBI agents showed up at Mar-a-Lago to cart off boxes of documents, it was an authorized, legitimate and justified procedure to retrieve national security secrets being illegally kept there.

    Or it was an unprecedented regime raid on the home and office of the foremost political rival of President Joe Biden that called to mind a “Third World country,” the East German “Stasi,” the KGB or the Gestapo.

    And Jan. 6, 2021?

    That was a riot, a disgraceful breach of the Capitol, involving assaults on Capitol cops that deserved to be and are being punished.

    No, it was more than that. Far more. It was an “insurrection,” a “fascist coup,” an act of treason led by far-right extremists to abort the transfer of power from the winner of the election of 2020 to the loser. It ranks right up there with the 1814 burning of the Capitol by the British.

    Such is the magnitude of the divide in America, a divide that extends far beyond our clashing views of Jan. 6 and the Mar-a-Lago raid.

    Consider abortion. Before the 1960s, abortion was almost universally regarded as a shameful and criminal act. Doctors who performed abortions were disgraced and sometimes sent to prison.

    But after the Dobbs decision by the Supreme Court declared that Roe v. Wade in 1973 was wrongly decided, restoration of women’s right to an abortion is being championed by half the nation.

    The other half of America yet believes abortion involves the killing of an unborn innocent child.

    Part of America celebrates the Supreme Court’s decision to declare marriage equality for homosexuals. Yet, a traditionalist minority believes such a mandate imposes on the nation a secularist morality contradicted by the tenets of the Christian faith that was the basis of laws for our first two centuries as a nation.

    Nor is it only clashing morality that divides us.

    For a nation, a country, a people, a democracy to endure, there needs be a broad consensus of belief, culture, custom and politics.

    On the issue of law and order, without which a republic cannot stand, there is now disagreement over the role and conduct of our police.

    During the George Floyd summer of 2020, “Defund the Police!” was the clamor of the left, and among the street chants of Black Lives Matter was, “Pigs in a Blanket, Fry ‘Em Like Bacon.”

    Only a stunning political recoil caused its abandonment.

    For a nation, especially a great world power like the United States, some things are indispensable to its preservation.

    A democratic republic needs to preserve the value of its currency, to defend its borders against illegal mass migrations and invasions, to preserve law and order, especially in its great cities.

    Which of these requisites exist today when the nation suffers 8% inflation; 250,000 illegal aliens cross our southern border every month; and “mass shootings” occur daily in our cities during which at least four victims are gunned down, wounded or killed?

    The preservation of a democracy also requires the confidence of its people in its defining institutions.

    Yet, since the Reagan era, Americans’ collective confidence in our major institutions has fallen from one-half of the nation to one-fourth.

    In 2022, confidence in the Supreme Court fell by a third to 25%. Only a fourth of the country retained high confidence in the presidency; and confidence in Congress plummeted to 7%, or one in every 14 Americans.

    One in 6 Americans had great confidence in our newspapers, with only 1 in 9 citizens saying the same about television news.

    In summary, we are a country whose people have a diminishing confidence in almost all of its institutions, from big business to the churches, universities and media. Only small business and the U.S. military enjoy the confidence of the American people.

    Public approval of Biden’s performance is at the lowest level ever recorded for a president at this point in his first term.

    True, we have been through and recovered from divisive times.

    In the 1860s, 11 of the 33 states seceded and fought for four years to gain their independence of the Union.

    The 1960s were divisive, but the left, with Sen. George McGovern its political expression, captured less than 40% of the vote against Richard Nixon in 1972. Ronald Reagan ran up two landslides in the 1980s.

    Those days are long gone.

    The left today dominates the academic community and culture to a greater degree than it once did and is further removed from the heart of the country in Middle America than it has ever been.

    When, how, does America ever unite again?

    And what unites us, other than an external attack on the country, like Pearl Harbor or 9/11?

    Where is the common ground on which to stand?

    Does such ground even exist, given the divisions in religion, race and ethnicity, and the seemingly irreconcilable disagreements over morality, ideology, culture and politics?

    Has the great experiment run its course?

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 19:00

  • Amazon Accuses FTC Of Issuing 'Unfair, Unreasonable' Demands As Part Of Probe Into Prime
    Amazon Accuses FTC Of Issuing ‘Unfair, Unreasonable’ Demands As Part Of Probe Into Prime

    Authored by Katabella Roberts via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Amazon founder Jeff Bezos in New York City on Sept. 20, 2021. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)

    Amazon has accused the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) of making unreasonable and unfair demands as part of the agency’s probe into the company’s Prime membership program, according to a new legal filing.

    The Jeff Bezos-founded company has been under investigation by the regulator since March 2021 regarding whether or not it makes it difficult for customers who want to end their membership with Amazon Prime, the subscription service that costs $139 per year or $14.99 per month and allows users to take advantage of additional services that are otherwise unavailable to other Amazon customers.

    However, Amazon said in the Aug. 5 legal filing (pdf) that the investigation had become “unworkable and unfair, reflecting less of a responsible effort to collect the facts about a variety of longstanding and highly popular subscription programs than a one-sided effort to force Amazon to meet impossible-to-satisfy demands.”

    Nearly 20 current and former Amazon employees and executives, including founder Jeff Bezos and CEO Andy Jassy, as well as former retail executive boss Dave Clark and his successor Doug Herrington, SVP of international Russ Grandinetti, and former head of Prime, Greg Greeley, were served subpoenas to give evidence as part of the agency’s investigation into the e-commerce giant.

    The subpoenas are officially known as Civil Investigative Demands (CID).

    Andy Jassy, CEO of Amazon Web Services, speaks at the WSJD Live conference in Laguna Beach, Calif., on Oct. 25, 2016. (Mike Blake/Reuters)

    ‘Unworkable and Unfair’

    In the filing, Amazon asked that the FTC “quash or limit” the subpoenas, while certain current and former Amazon employees also petitioned to quash or limit the subpoenas served on them individually because they are “unworkable and unfair.”

    Specifically for founder Bezos and CEO Jassy, lawyers state that the two are petitioning for the CID’s to be “quashed” because “staff has identified no legitimate reason for needing their testimony when it can obtain the same information, and more, from other witnesses and documents.”

    Amazon claims that it has worked “diligently and cooperatively with FTC staff to provide information relevant to the FTC’s investigation” for over a year and has produced 37,000 pages of documents relating to the probe, and provided “dozens of pages of interrogatory responses,” among other things.

    It also claims that it has “proactively followed up with staff to ensure it had the materials it needed” but that FTC staff had become “inexplicably disengaged,” and by February 2022 had not communicated with Amazon about the Prime investigation for almost four months.

    The company claims that in April 2022, after roughly six months of alleged silence from the FTC, Amazon was “abruptly notified … that a new attorney would be taking over and that staff was under ‘tremendous pressure’ to conclude the investigation,” and gave the company and its executives just a few weeks to comply.

    “Staff’s handling of this investigation has been unusual and perplexing,” Amazon wrote in the petition. “The current impasse has been brought about by unexplained pressure placed on staff to complete the investigation hastily, by an arbitrarily chosen deadline.”

    “But staff’s own behavior has exacerbated the breakdown in this investigation, with the most recent incident being the most egregious: staff has attempted to restrict, contrary to law and FTC practice, counsel’s ability to jointly represent Amazon and the Individual CID recipients. Staff has gone so far as to demand that counsel leave a hearing for the first individual witness for failing to abide by this improper restriction. The Commission must step in.”

    Amazon’s website on Prime Day in a stock photo. (Dennizn/Shutterstock)

    Investigation Expanded

    Amazon claimed that the FTC’s scope of the investigation has been extended to include additional non-Prime subscription programs, such as Audible, Amazon Music, Kindle Unlimited, and Subscribe & Save.

    Lawyers for the company claimed that the FTC had “refused to provide the Individual CIDs to Amazon’s counsel when requested and informed counsel that they would not be permitted to jointly represent Amazon and any of the individual employees,” which it described as “plainly contrary to law.”

    At the very least, Amazon asks that the deadline to provide the information should be extended.

    “At a minimum, Amazon needs staff to further clarify its vague and argumentative requests and grant more time to comply with them, something staff has refused to do without explanation,” lawyers noted.

    The FTC, which is headed by Lina Khan, pledged in 2020 to look more closely into the power of America’s five biggest tech companies: Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, and Alphabet (including Google).

    Amazon has raised concerns over Khan’s stance on antitrust law and her previous criticism of the company and its market dominance, stating that it would make her impartial in her role as chair.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 18:30

  • China Condemns Newly Announced Formal US-Taiwan Trade Talks
    China Condemns Newly Announced Formal US-Taiwan Trade Talks

    A major Thursday announcement from the Office of the US Trade Representative is sure to continue pitting Beijing and Washington on a path of escalation and collision course over Taiwan, as the US and Taipei have agreed to begin formal talks on a trade pact. 

    The Taiwan side has also confirmed that negotiations will start early this fall, with the areas to be covered including trade facilitation, regulatory practices, anticorruption, agriculture, environmental standards, and other area, according to the US executive agency’s website. 

    Deputy U.S. Trade Representative Sarah Bianchi said the formal talks will aim to “deepen our trade and investment relationship, advance mutual trade priorities based on shared values, and promote innovation and inclusive economic growth for our workers and businesses.”

    In addition to seeking to bolster Taiwan’s economic strength, Taiwan’s Office of Trade Negotiations has spelled out that a future trade pact would increase the self-ruled island’s participation in international pacts. China, however, has rejected this as a violation of ‘One China’ and its sovereignty.

    File image: ZUMA Press/DW

    Taiwan’s trade minister John Deng in a Thursday press briefing also said that high on the agenda will be strategies for standing up to China’s “economic coercion”. Naturally increase in economic formalization would further inch Taiwan and US toward formal diplomatic relations, which Beijing sees as a further erosion and abandonment of the ‘One China’ status quo.

    Deng told the briefing of China’s interference, “Its economic coercion targets are not just the United States or Taiwan, it’s done to a lot of countries,” adding that “Its harm to the global economic and trade order is great.”

    One recent example of the reference is blocking trade with countries in dispute with Beijing such as Lithuania for allowing Taiwan to establish a de facto embassy in the capital of Vilnius.

    Additionally China and Australia have been locked in a trade war for more than a year after Beijing rolled out a series of punitive measures on key Australian agriculture and other exports to China, including sanctions on certain products, special taxes, and draconian inspection procedures – all of which started after Beijing was incensed that Australian leaders called for an independent inquiry into the origins of Covid-19.

    Predictably, an initial reaction out of China’s commerce ministry stressed it “opposes” US-Taiwan trade talks and that it will take “all necessary measures to firmly safeguard its sovereignty, security and development interests,” according to a Thursday statement. Further according to Reuters:

    “One China” policy is a prerequisite for Taiwan’s participation in economic cooperation with foreign countries, Shu Jueting, spokeswoman of the ministry, said at a regular press conference.

    Military tensions continue to be on edge in waters surrounding Taiwan as the Eastern Theater Command continues ‘shows of force’…

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    There continues to be the backdrop of Chinese PLA military pressure on the democratic island, with groups of fighter jets said to now be buzzing the median line in the Taiwan Strait on a daily bases, following the Aug.2nd visit of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to Taipei. 

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 17:30

  • Data Shows Number Of Low-Income Audits Could Triple As IRS Grows
    Data Shows Number Of Low-Income Audits Could Triple As IRS Grows

    Authored by Darlene McCormick Sanchez via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    The Internal Revenue Service Headquarters Building in Washington on Sept. 19, 2018. (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times)

    The IRS audited 197 low-income families for every high-wealth family in 2019, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO)—a number that some experts expected to climb under an IRS turbocharged with more money and manpower.

    Over the next decade, the Democrat’s new “Inflation Reduction Act” will provide the IRS with 87,000 new agents and $80 billion in funding, with nearly $46 billion earmarked for enforcement.

    According to the Congressional Budget Office, the tax and spend bill is projected to bring in $203.7 billion in revenue from 2022 to 2031.

    President Joe Biden’s administration has promised no new taxes or audits on households making less than $400,000 per year.

    But experts say that promise may be hard to keep.

    A previous CBO analysis using a similar funding plan featured in the Inflation Reduction Act found audit rates would be restored to levels around 10 years ago. The analysis showed the audit rates would rise for all taxpayers, but the ones with higher incomes would face the biggest increase.

    The oldest data available in the 2022 Government Accountability Office report released this year was for 2010. That’s when the IRS was better funded and staffed with some 95,000 full time employees.

    From 2010-2019, the IRS audited 0.9 percent across all income groups compared to 0.25 percent now.

    Rachel Greszler, a budget and entitlements senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told The Epoch Times that even returning to the 2010 audit levels for those making more than $400,000 per year, would still fall short of the IRS’s revenue goal.

    “My rough estimate shows that returning to the 2010 audit levels for all income groups would only generate a little over 20 percent of the bills’ estimated enforcement revenues in 2031,” she said.

    In her commentary on the Heritage Foundation’s website Aug. 12, Greszler wrote the numbers don’t add up using 2019 data either without the lower- and middle-class.

    Even increasing recent audit rates 30-fold for taxpayers making over $400,000—including 100 percent audit rates on taxpayers with incomes over $10 million—still would fall more than 20 percent short of raising the estimated $35.3 billion in new revenues by 2031, she wrote.

    So it stands to reason that taxpayers can expect audit rates more like those about a decade ago.

    GAO statistics show a larger number of audits in 2010 for taxpayers in the $0-$24,999 tax bracket than the high wealth households. About 579,000 audits were performed on the lowest tax bracket in 2010, compared to 197,000 in 2019.

    Yet for the wealthy, high wealth audits of $10 million or more stood at 2,800 in 2010, dipping to 1,000 in 2019.

    While a higher percentage of high wealthy households is audited more than poor ones, the lower class sees more audits overall.

    A better-funded IRS in 2010 audited the poor much more aggressively than the super wealthy—at a rate of 207 to 1.

    In recent years, the IRS audited taxpayers with incomes below $25,000 and those with incomes of $500,000 or more at higher-than-average rates. But, audit rates have dropped for all income levels—with audit rates falling the most for taxpayers with incomes of $200,000 or more, according to the GAO report.

    The Inflation Reduction Act, which is a scaled-down version of Build Back Better negotiated by Democrats Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), took Republicans by surprise. The measure passed the Democratic-controlled Senate and Congress last week through a reconciliation process.

    President Joe Biden (C) signs the Inflation Reduction Act with (L-R) Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.), Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) and Rep. Kathy Castor (D-Fla.) in the State Dining Room of the White House in Washington on Aug. 16, 2022. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

    Alarm bells sounded for Republicans after Democrats shot down an amendment to the bill proposed by Sen. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) to protect the working class from more audits. Crapo’s amendment stipulated that none of the funds from the Inflation Reduction Act could be used to audit taxpayers making under $400,000 a year. Still, all 50 Democrats in the Senate voted against it.

    Republicans on the House Ways and Means Committee said CBO calculated the monetary impact of Crapo’s amendment. Calculations confirmed that had lower- and middle-income taxpayers been protected by the amendment, revenue in the Democrats’ bill would have been reduced by at least $20 billion.

    Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen attempted to clear up “misinformation” about the bill in a letter to IRS Commissioner Charles P. Rettig. She wrote new resources allocated to the IRS “shall not be used to increase the share of small business or households below the $400,000 threshold that are audited relative to historical levels.”

    Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen testifies before the Senate Finance Committee in Washington, on June 7, 2022. (Nicholas Kamm/AFP via Getty Images)

    However, her directive isn’t included in the bill, meaning it won’t have the power of law. Tax experts and analysis from the nonpartisan scorekeeper at the CBO indicate Yellen’s promise will likely be broken if the IRS sticks to its income expectations.

    “Again, this has no teeth behind it,” said Preston Brashers, a senior tax policy analyst with the Heritage Foundation.

    Brashers said it would take time for the audits to start rolling, increasing as the tax agency adds tens of thousands of new agents. Proponents of the bill say a large number of those 87,000 employees will fill jobs lost through attrition, but Brashers said it appears that the agency will almost double in size.

    In a press release, Rep. Kevin Brady (R-Texas) estimated that the Democrats’ bill would amount to 1.2 million new audits of taxpayers per year. Over 710,000 of these audits would fall on Americans who earn $75,000 a year or less.

    House Ways and Means Minority Leader Kevin Brady (R-Texas) speaks during a hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, on May 13, 2021. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

    “If you’re an American worker making $75,000 a year, you are 4x more likely to see a tax hike from this bill than any tax relief at all. You’re hitting middle class families directly and through higher energy prices as well,” Brady wrote on the Ways and Means GOP Twitter feed.

    Audits of Least Resistance

    Another taxpayer category likely to be audited more is rural, low-income households claiming an Earned Income Tax Credit, according to the IRS.

    Those who claim the EITC credits often make mistakes or don’t understand the rules, which makes auditing these returns low-hanging fruit for the IRS because they don’t require many man hours. The opposite is true of audits of wealthy families who can afford accountants and lawyers.

    A much larger number of returns claiming EITC credits are audited compared to the wealthiest households. In 2019, the number of audits of low-income families claiming the EITC credit compared to high wealth audits of $10 million or more was 205 to 1.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 17:00

  • Ryan Cohen Dumps Entire BBBY Stake, Makes $68 Million As Apes Crushed
    Ryan Cohen Dumps Entire BBBY Stake, Makes $68 Million As Apes Crushed

    Update 7:45pm: not everyone lost money in this post-modern, gammafied pump and dump which culminated with BBBY losing more than half of its value today: according to Bloomberg calculations Billionaire Ryan Cohen – who apparently was not rich enough – pocketed at least a $68 million profit from the sale of his stake in Bed Bath & Beyond, scoring a 56% gain on an investment he held for roughly seven months. Some math:

    Cohen’s RC Ventures paid $121.2 million between mid-January and early March to acquire 7.78 million shares and options to purchase another 1.67 million shares, a regulatory filing shows. He unloaded all of them this week for a combined $189.3 million, according to a filing on Thursday after the US market close.

    On the other hand, retail traders – especially those who were late to the trade – and who poured millions of dollars into the insolvent retailer’s stock, may be just starting to feel the pain.

    According to Vanda research, retail traders poured a torrent of cash into Bed Bath & Beyond’s shares in recent weeks, even with the company’s financial situation collapsing. They bought $58.2 million of the stock on Wednesday, a day after snapping up a record $73.2 million. Net purchases over three weeks totaled $229.1 million an amount which just may wake the Suck Elon’s Cock commission from its perpetual hibernation.

    The worst part for the Reddit crowd in this entire fiasco: It was billionaire Cohen’s very involvement in the stock that fueled their enthusiasm. The price at one point this week more than quadrupled from a recent low in July, with at least some pointing to a disclosure that showed the GameStop chairman still was holding onto his stake, which at that point exceeded 10% of the firm. It included call options that would only be in-the-money if the stock continued to soar.

    It did not, because – drumroll – Cohen used that disclosure to spark a meltup in the stock which he then sold into.

    The rest is now known.

    * * *

    We tried – we really tried – to warn millions of retail traders, from the reddit apes, to the mom and pops, to the basement dwellers, to the Robinhood fanatics – that their idol “Papa Ryan” Cohen, aka “Diamondhands” was about to rugpull them.

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    Instead, our warning was met with idiotic accusations of being everything from Citadel shills (even though they threatened to sue us for correctly accusing them of frontrunning retail investors), to being Wall Street sellouts.

    Well less than 24 hours later we were proven right when Papa Ryan dumped his entire 9.5 million share-equivalent stake in BBBY just one day after the 144 filing…

    … or rather before, because what is most remarkable about the one-day liquidation is that RC Ventures, Ryan Cohen’s market manipulation fund, was actually dumping the shares on Wednesday morning, long before he even filed the 13G.

    Now that there is no pied piper to lead the rats apes to their destruction, BBBY stock is crashing…

    … and dragging GME – where Papa Cohen has yet to sell – with it.

    As for Cohen, we can’t help but be touched by his nobility and generosity, when just a few weeks ago he was so concerned about bagholders…

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    … before himself leaving thousands of bagholders nursing millions of losses.

    We can only hope that the outcry from this latest glaring manipulation will finally prompt the absolute morons at the SEC to finally do something about this kind of manipulative, management-driven gamma squeeze…

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    … but with the unprecedented amount of corruption in this administration, we are not holding our breath.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 16:44

  • Brace For Even Higher Beef Prices As Texas Cattle Industry Faces Historic Drought Crisis
    Brace For Even Higher Beef Prices As Texas Cattle Industry Faces Historic Drought Crisis

    Ranchers across Texas continue to panic sell cattle herds as the worst megadrought in 1,200 years makes it too expensive to sustain operations. 

    “We’ll keep selling cows till it rains,” Texas High Plains rancher Jim Ferguson told Amarillo station KAMR, which collaborated with The Hill on the expanding cattle crisis in the state. 

    America’s cattle heartland has seen pastures turn to dust, and costs for feed, fertilizer, and diesel skyrocket, threatening an entire industry that is essential to the nation’s beef supply. 

    The Hill said that the devastating drought and higher cattle operation costs would result in higher beef prices for at least the next two years. And we agree with that assessment as the latest data via USDA shows supermarket prices surged to record highs earlier this year and are quickly approaching the $5 handle. 

    “The lack of water in general, it’s hurting us all the way around. Any way you can think of,” cattle buyer Josh Sturgeon said. 

    Sturgeon said ranchers are liquidating herds at auction because of the lack of water and soaring costs. 

    But “you’re almost afraid to buy. Cattle drink a lot of water, especially this time of year. With this drought, they’re drinking a lot of water. Cattle are dying because of this. Even the best of cattle are struggling,” he noted.

    Walter Kunisch of consultant group Hilltop Securities said increased cattle liquidations at auctions due to worsening drought is “nothing like we’ve seen in the last 15 years.” 

    Kunisch pointed out that farmers are selling off their breeding stock, which they rely on to produce the next generation of cows. 

    “That’s a big signal to me that, you know, that future supplies at some point are going to run tight,” Kunsich warned. 

    USDA’s latest cattle report found herds are down 2.4% nationwide since last year — a decrease of 750,000 cows — and a decline of 2 million since the national herd peaked in 2018. 

    The biggest takeaway is cattle herds moving forward are expected to shrink, meaning tight supplies and higher prices. 

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 16:30

  • Multiple Explosions Rock Russia's Crimean Port City Of Sevastopol
    Multiple Explosions Rock Russia’s Crimean Port City Of Sevastopol

    Update(1617ET): There are breaking unconfirmed reports that another Russian airfield near Crimea’s Sevastopol naval base is under attack. According to Reuters Belbek air base may have come under attack:

    • AT LEAST FOUR EXPLOSIONS ROCK CITY OF SEVASTOPOL IN RUSSIAN-ANNEXED CRIMEA – LOCAL SOURCES
    • CRIMEAN SOURCES SAY BLASTS TOOK PLACE IN THE VICINITY OF THE BELBEK MILITARY AIRPORT NORTH OF SEVASTOPOL 

    This comes after reports that Russian anti-air defenses were activated over the region. There are also unconfirmed reports circulating that a Ukrainian drone may have been engaged by Russian defenses. 

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    Little is confirmed at this early point, but it follows a string of blasts inside Crimea over the past week, some of which were admitted by the Kremlin to be Ukrainian “sabotage” operations. 

    To recap, reports of the Sevastopol blasts come just after an ammo depot was reported on fire within Russia’s Belgorod Oblast near the Ukrainian border.

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    Russian state media has confirmed another large blaze is engulfing an ammunition depot within its territory on Thursday, with social media videos capturing the incident, following a string of prior blasts, amid growing reports Ukraine is launching ‘sabotage operations’ deep within Russian territory, particularly in Crimea over the past week.

    “An ammunition depot in Russia’s Belgorod Region caught fire on Thursday, regional Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said, adding that no casualties had been reported,” according to TASS.

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    “The district’s head ordered the residents of the Timonovo and Soloti settlements to be evacuated to a safe distance. Response teams are working on the scene, efforts are underway to establish the cause of the fire,” the governor wrote further on Telegram of ongoing emergency efforts to control the blaze. 

    The area referenced merely a little over 5 kilometers from the Ukrainian border, where on the other side Russian strikes are pounding away on the major northeast city of Kharkiv. The two Russian villages have a combined population of a little over 1,000 residents. 

    ABC News recounts of events in Crimea over the past week:

    But in recent days, explosions have destroyed several Russian planes at an air base in Crimea, and munitions blew up Tuesday.

    Ukrainian authorities have stopped short of publicly claiming responsibility, but President Volodymyr Zelenskyy alluded to Ukrainian attacks behind enemy lines after the most recent blasts Tuesday while Russia blamed “sabotage.”

    People in the Timonova area are reportedly being told to evacuate, as the fire continued into the night hours…

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    Amid speculation that US-supplied weaponry could be used for these longer-range attacks and operations Ukrainian Defense Minister Aleksey Reznikov told US state-funded Voice of America this week, “We have an agreement with the US that we will not use weapons provided by the US and partners against the territory of the Russian Federation. But if we discuss de-occupying… Ukrainian land where the enemy is now, there are no such restrictions.”

    The Kremlin has stated that such long-range attacks with American weaponry would mark a severe “red line” and that it would hold external powers backing Ukraine responsible. 

    Meanwhile, it looks like things are continuing to heat up over Crimea, after Ukraine’s President Zelensky earlier this month vowed to “liberate” the Russian-controlled peninsula…

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    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 16:17

  • Stocks Stumble, Memes Mauled In Sleepy Session Fit For Sandman
    Stocks Stumble, Memes Mauled In Sleepy Session Fit For Sandman

    If one had to describe today’s session with one word it would be “sleepy.”

    After yesterday’s early selloff, driven by sharply higher rates, the 2pm FOMC failed to provide traders any clear direction on what the Fed plans to do, and an early dovish read of the minutes fizzled quickly, ending any upward momentum. Fast forward to today when stocks traded in a narrow range bound by the pre-FOMC lows and post-FOMC highs (yet one which nonetheless makes the Fed nervous as it is far too high to constrict financial conditions).

    While most sectors were in the green – though energy led the pack thanks to a surge in oil prices…

    …  volumes were dismal (to be expected with more than half of traders out on vacation) and liquidity was non-existent …

    … and what little action there was, was in “meme stonks” where recent insolvent, multi-bagging superstars like BBBY crumbled after even the apes were forced to accept that it’s just a matter of time before “papa Cohen” and his diamondhands dump their BBBY stake (and who knows what else).

    The news sent BBBY stock plunging more than 20% and almost half off yesterday’s $30 high….

    … AMC hit ten-day lows…

    … and GME was also hammered…

    … as the broader basement trader space got deflated now that the Fed has made it clear it will likely hike another 75bps in September.

    And speaking of September rate hikes, after odds of a 75bps hike post yesterday’s FOMC from 70% to 40%, we got the usual confusion today when former uber-hawk Esther George came out dovish today while recent uber-dove Bullard James Bullard said he backs a 75bps rate hike.

    However, since not even the algos care about Fed forecasts any more, there was little impact on either the Euro$ market or risk assets.

    The rest of today’s session was, as noted, boring: the dollar rose, rates went nowhere, the VIX crunch resumed, pushing it back below 20…

    … gold went nowhere, same as bitcoin, while ETH saw a stead trickle of inflows as traders continue to expect outperformance from the token before (and after) the merge.

    Crude was probably the only other interesting move besides memes, as it was finally able to rally out of its previous rut due to Wednesday’s EIA report, which showed that markets are still very tight and gasoline soared. Along with multiple stockpile draws, the report revealed that recessionary risks haven’t trickled over to crude consumption just yet as demand remains high. Bolstering gains were Xi’s comments about Chinese reopening (even though the comments appeared to reference globalization rather than the country’s Covid-zero policy, but whateves), as well as continued geopolitical risk with Bloomberg noting that talks between Ukrainian President Zelenskiy and Turkey’s President Erdogan didn’t prove fruitful, as Zelenskiy says he sees no end to the war without troop withdrawals. Finally, Goldman said that an Iran nuclear deal is actually not going to happen and will instead be an extended “stalemate”, which however won’t help the supply picture. As a result, WTI crude briefly rallied above $91 on Thursday after previously dropping to a seven-month low earlier in the week.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 16:06

  • Russia Shows Off Robo-Dog With RPG At Military Convention
    Russia Shows Off Robo-Dog With RPG At Military Convention

    Russia displayed new and experimental technologies at its annual defense convention at the Patriot Center near Moscow. 

    Russian President Vladimir Putin delivered an opening speech at the Military and Technical Forum ARMY 2022 on Tuesday, organized by the Russian Ministry of Defense, and said that over “28,000 modern samples of military and dual-use products” are being showcased by approximately 1,500 Russian manufacturers to defense officials from 72 countries. 

    In the speech, Putin continued:

    “We are ready to offer our allies and partners the most modern types of weapons, from small arms to armored vehicles and artillery, from warplanes to drones. These guns are in demand among military professionals all over the world for their reliability, quality, and most importantly, their high efficiency. Almost all of them have been used many times in real military operations.”

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    One of the most modern types of weapons that Putin was referring to appears to be an intelligent four-legged robo-dog wielding an RPG-26 rocket launcher on its back. 

    Videos of Russian engineering company Intellect Machine’s M-81 robotic system roaming the convention center floors with a rocket launcher went viral on social media. 

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    This would not be the first time the West’s adversaries have displayed a robo-dog for war. Last month, a video surfaced on social media of a Chinese robot dog by Hangzhou-based company Unitree Robotics with a machine gun mounted on its back. 

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    Here are the other weapons displayed at the defense convention that wraps up on Sunday:

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    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 15:20

  • Trump CFO Allen Weisselberg Pleads Guilty To Tax Scheme, Will Testify Against Trump Org
    Trump CFO Allen Weisselberg Pleads Guilty To Tax Scheme, Will Testify Against Trump Org

    Trump Org CFO Allen Weisselberg has pleaded guilty to 15 felonies – admitting that he conspired with other Trump Organization executives to carry out a tax-avoidance scheme connected to lavish corporate benefits – including lease payments for a luxury car, rent for a Manhattan apartment and private tuition for his grandchildren.

    As part of the deal, he has agreed to testify against the Trump Organization in an October trial – however he has refused to implicate Donald Trump in any wrongdoing. The company is accused of helping Weisselberg and other executives dodge taxes by failing to accurately report their full compensation to the IRS.

    As Bloomberg notes, “Trump hasn’t been charged in the case and, according to a person familiar with the matter, Weisselberg won’t implicate his boss as part of his plea. But because Weisselberg’s deal requires him to testify against his employer, an admission of criminal conduct could mean trouble for the Trump Organization, experts say.”

    If convicted, the Trump Organization could face fines or potentially be placed on probation.

    Weisselberg, the only person to face criminal charges so far in the Manhattan DA’s case against Trump’s business empire, will receive a five-month jail term at Rikers Island and five years of probation, however time credited for good behavior he’s likely to serve around 100 days, according to the NY Times. He also has to pay nearly $2 million in taxes, penalties and interest.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 15:03

  • Trump Spox Calls For 'No Redactions' Of FBI Trump Raid Affidavit After Judge Orders DOJ To Unseal 'Portions'
    Trump Spox Calls For ‘No Redactions’ Of FBI Trump Raid Affidavit After Judge Orders DOJ To Unseal ‘Portions’

    Update (1550ET): In response to Judge Reinhart ordering the DOJ to release a redacted version of the Trump raid affidavit, Trump spokesman Taylor Budowich called for no redactions,” citing “Democrats’ penchant for using redactions to hide government corruption.”

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    The Trump-hating judge who signed off on the FBI warrant to raid Mar-a-Lago has ordered the DOJ to unseal portions of the underlying affidavit, after several media outlets and activist groups made the case that it was in the public interest to see it.

    “I’m not prepared to find that the affidavit should be fully sealed,” said Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart following a hearing in which a top government lawyer argued that releasing the document could “severely compromise” an ongoing investigation that’s in its “early stages,” adding that a line-by-line redaction of the document was unrealistic.

    “On my initial careful review … there are portions of it that can be unsealed.”

    Reinhart said he would “give the government a full and fair opportunity” to make redactions, according to Bloomberg, setting a deadline of next Thursday – after which he will review it and release it if he agrees with the redactions.

    *  *  *

    Several media organizations have urged a Florida judge to release most of an FBI affidavit which was used to justify the DOJ’s search warrant for last week’s raid on former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence.

    A Palm Beach Police officer at the entrance of former US President Donald Trump’s house at Mar-A-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, on Aug. 9.Photographer: Eva Marie Uzcategui/Bloomberg

    According to a filing by the group, which includes the New York Times, AP and CNN, the public has a “clear and powerful interest” in what led to the unprecedented action by the DOJ against the sitting president’s top political opponent.

    While the group says that the document should be released “with only those redactions that are necessary to protect a compelling interest articulated by the government,” the Justice Department says that such a redacted version of the affidavit would leave the document so devoid of content that it wouldn’t provide any insight.

    The government has given “little explanation as to how release would harm the ongoing investigation” even though many details of the probe are already public, the group said in the filing in federal court in West Palm Beach, where US District Judge Bruce Reinhart will hold a hearing on the matter Thursday.

    The affidavit provides the basis on which the judge authorized the search of Trump’s estate. The dispute over its release is the latest fallout from the Aug. 8 search, which culminated in FBI agents carting away 11 sets of classified documents in about 20 boxes. Threats against the FBI — and the judge — have jumped since then. –Bloomberg

    “The secrecy surrounding the search warrant, and the affidavit that led to its issuance, has caused the nation to convulse with intrigue and harmful speculation that will only increase the longer the truth is kept from the public,” said Judicial Watch in a statement. “The heat must be replaced with light, and soon.”

    Trump has also called for the document to be publicly released, though he hasn’t filed anything in court to back that up.

    The request comes as Newsweek reports that the FBI raid was specifically intended to recover Trump’s personal “stash” of hidden documents – which reportedly deal with a “variety of intelligence matters of interest to the former president, the officials suggest—including material that Trump apparently thought would exonerate him of any claims of Russian collusion in 2016 or any other election-related charges.”

    When Trump left the White House in January 2021, many of the normal processes of transition were not followed, especially because the president would not admit that he had lost the election or that he would be leaving office. As a result, we now know, some 42 boxes of documents were shipped to Mar-a-Lago by mistake: officials papers under U.S. law, which the National Archives is supposed to take custody of and catalog.

    Over the past 18 months, the Trump camp and the Archives were engaged in a back-and-forth which resulted in the return of 15 boxes (and some additional documents). As late as June 3, when officials from the FBI and Justice visited Mar-a-Lago to serve a Grand Jury subpoena for specific documents, these negotiations were largely cordial. -Newsweek

    Meanwhile, as Jack Phillips of the Epoch Times notes, a lawyer representing Trump, and a former FBI official, both expressed doubts that the affidavit used to seek an FBI search warrant for last week’s Mar-a-Lago raid will be unsealed by a judge on Thursday.

    “I don’t think anybody wants to unseal this thing inside the government,” Chris Swecker, a former assistant director of the FBI, told Fox News on Wednesday, adding that he doubts “very seriously you’re going to see this unsealed tomorrow.”

    The former official was making reference to a hearing that was scheduled by U.S. Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart for Thursday about whether the affidavit should be unsealed. The Department of Justice on Monday filed court papers arguing that it should not because releasing it to the public will damage their investigation.

    But former Trump and other Republicans argue it should be released because it would show why the FBI took the unprecedented and extraordinary step of raiding the home of a former president and possible 2024 candidate.

    Revealing the affidavit, they argue, would provide more insight into what the Department of Justice is trying to investigate and lay out reasons for why the raid was carried out. On Aug. 12, Reinhart issued an order to unseal the FBI search warrant and property receipt.

    Lawyer’s Response

    A lawyer for Trump, Alina Habba, echoed Swecker’s assertion that it appears unlikely the judge will unseal the affidavit on Thursday during a recent Fox News interview.

    “Judge Reinhart is the same magistrate judge that recused himself from my Hillary [Clinton] case about a month ago. He is definitely not going to be a friendly judge necessarily. I would say it was highly unlikely,” Habba said, noting that the “DOJ is already saying that they do not want us to see what was in the affidavit.”

    “Usually, that’s to protect witnesses and other things that have been cooperating with the justice system. So while I would love to see it and understand why you would ask for a raid with a cooperating president, do I believe that this judge is going to reveal it? No, I do not,” she said.

    The Justice Department and the FBI have remained mostly silent regarding the raid, with Attorney General Merrick Garland issuing a statement during a news conference on Aug. 11. Garland said he personally authorized the warrant for the FBI raid but provided little to no insight about why it was carried out or what was taken from Trump’s home.

    In statements posted on Truth Social, Trump wrote that FBI agents took three of his passports and demanded their return. A spokesperson for the former president confirmed on social media this week that the travel documents were handed back.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 14:57

  • Bullard Backs 75bps Hike As George Says Fed Has "Already Done A Lot"
    Bullard Backs 75bps Hike As George Says Fed Has “Already Done A Lot”

    Market odds for 75bps rate hike next month jumped from 42% to 50% this afternoon after St. Louis Fed president James Bullard backed another 75 basis-point move next month, which if effectuated would be the third consecutive 75bps rate hike, something the Fed has never done in its modern history.

    Bullard, a voting member of the FOMC and one of the biggest hawks at the US central bank, told the Wall Street Journal in an interview published Thursday that he backed another 75 basis-point increase in September, arguing “we should continue to move expeditiously to a level of the policy rate that will put significant downward pressure on inflation.”

    Ironically, Kansas City Fed President Esther George, who until not too long ago was the biggest hawk at the Fed (and is now more dovish than Bullard who a few years ago was the biggest Fed dove), said the US central bank had already “done a lot” on raising interest rates.

    George backed the July hike but dissented in June in favor of a smaller half-point increase, citing concern the larger move could stoke policy uncertainty. Her remarks Thursday continued to to tilt dovish.

    “I think the case for continuing to raise rates remains strong. The question of how fast that has to happen is something my colleagues and I will continue to debate, but I think the direction is pretty clear,” she said in Independence, Missouri, on Thursday.

    “We have done a lot, and I think we have to be very mindful that our policy decisions often operate on a lag. We have to watch carefully how that’s coming through.”

    Policy makers saw the federal funds rate reaching a range of 3.25% to 3.5% this year, according to the median estimate of their June projections. The forecasts will be updated in September when the Fed next meets.

    Earlier on Thursday, San Francisco Fed President Mary Daly told CNN that she was open to raising rates by 50 or 75 basis points next month and that officials would be in no hurry to reverse course next year. That pushes back against investor bets that the Fed will cut rates before the end of 2023.

    The Fed officials spoke a day after the release of minutes from the July Fed policy meeting, which showed officials judged it would eventually be appropriate to slow the pace of interest-rate increases, with some advocating the Fed keep them at elevated levels for some time after increases concluded while others said a time will come to start easing (obviously).

    In reaction to Bullard’s comments stocks initially dipped but have since rebounded and are again solidly in the green as the market clearly no longer cares about anything the Fed has to say.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/18/2022 – 14:40

Digest powered by RSS Digest

Aug 18

Today’s News 18th August 2022

  • Israel & Turkey Announce Full Normalization Of Ties
    Israel & Turkey Announce Full Normalization Of Ties

    Via The Cradle,

    On Wednesday, Israel and Turkey announced their official normalization of ties and full restoration of diplomatic relations, returning their ambassadors to Tel Aviv and Ankara. This comes after several years of tension and a gradual reconciliation over the past several months.

    “It was decided to once again upgrade the level of the relations between the two countries to that of full diplomatic ties and to return ambassadors and consuls general from the two countries,” a statement from the office of interim Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid said.

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    “Upgrading relations will contribute to deepening ties between the two peoples, expanding economic trade, and cultural ties, and strengthening regional stability,” the statement added. The move to normalize ties was also praised by Israeli President Isaac Herzog as “an important development” that will “encourage greater economic relations” between Israel and Turkey.

    Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu confirmed the decision and stated: “Appointment of ambassadors was one of the steps for the normalization of ties. Such a positive step came from Israel as a result of these efforts, and as Turkey, we also decided to appoint an ambassador to Israel, to Tel Aviv.”

    The Turkish Foreign Minister clarified, however, that the restoration of ties does not mean that his country will abandon what he referred to as its “support” for the Palestinian people.

    “We are not giving up on the Palestinian cause… It is important for our messages to be conveyed directly through the ambassador (on the Palestinian issue),” Cavusoglu asserted.

    The strain in relations initially began in 2010, when a Turkish-sponsored fleet of humanitarian ships bound for Gaza was attacked in the Mediterranean by the Israeli navy, resulting in the deaths of six Turkish activists.

    In 2018, both governments expelled each other’s ambassadors, with Turkey criticizing Tel Aviv for its abuse of Palestinian human rights. A year later, the two states scaled back their economic cooperation. By 2021, however, economic relations had rekindled, as bilateral trade between Israel and Turkey reached around $7.7 billion.

    Since then, Tel Aviv and Ankara have been involved in efforts to reach a full normalization of ties. On  July 7, the two states signed their first aviation agreement since 1951. On March 9, Herzog visited Turkey, marking the first visit by an Israeli leader to the country since 2008.

    During his visit to Tel Aviv on 25 May, Cavusoglu said that a normalization of ties between Turkey and Israel would have a “positive impact” that would result in a “peaceful” solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Despite Turkey’s purported support for the Palestinians, however, Ankara has been deporting members of the Hamas resistance group from the country at Tel Aviv’s request.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 23:55

  • 'Sustainable' Supersonic Plane Already Has Dozens Of Pre-Orders From Airlines, Government
    ‘Sustainable’ Supersonic Plane Already Has Dozens Of Pre-Orders From Airlines, Government

    In the nearly 20 years since the supersonic Concorde was retired, a new aeronautics company has developed a “sustainable” new airplane, that will shuttle between 60 and 80 passengers up to nearly 5,000 miles at a time, flying at Mach 1.7.

    Denver-based Boom Supersonic has developed the “Overture,” which will run on “100% sustainable aviation fuel” (SAF), powering four smaller wing-mounted engines to keep weight and temperature balanced. It will also incorporate carbon composite materials for a lightweight, yet robust air frame.

    The company has already scored contracts from the US Air Force and two airlines – with United Airlines committing to 15 aircraft once safety requirements are met, as well as an option to purchase 35 more. Japan Airlines has also pre-ordered 20 of them, while the company is creating custom applications for the government.

    SAF uses different types of waste products, such as used cooking oil to animal fat, to deliver the same performance as conventional jet fuel – just with a (claimed) reduced carbon footprint.

    “Environmental performance is being considered in all aspects of Overture, from design and production to flight and end-of-life recycling,” reads Boom’s website. “The engineering team prioritizes circularity by repurposing used tooling, recycling components on the shop floor and leveraging additive manufacturing techniques that result in less manufacturing waste and lighter, more fuel-efficient products.”

    As the NY Post notes, the plane will reach various destinations much faster than conventional airliners.

    New York City to London:

    • Current travel time: Approximately 7 hours
    • Overture travel time: 3 hours 30 minutes

    Los Angeles to Sydney:

    • Current travel time: Approximately 15 hours
    • Overture travel time: 8 hours

    Tokyo to Seattle:

    • Current travel time: Approximately 9 hours
    • Overture travel time: 4 hours 30 minutes

    “With no afterburners and buzz-free engines, Overture’s takeoffs will blend in with existing long-haul fleets, resulting in a quieter experience for both passengers and airport communities,” reads Boom’s site, which notes that the signature sonic boom created when an aircraft exceeds the speed of sound will happen over the ocean so as not to disturb people on the ground.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 23:30

  • In Sureal Story, 20-Year-Old Student Acquires 6% Of Bed Bath & Beyond, Makes $110 Million In 3 Weeks
    In Sureal Story, 20-Year-Old Student Acquires 6% Of Bed Bath & Beyond, Makes $110 Million In 3 Weeks

    We thought that today’s story about Ryan Cohen filing to dump his entire stake in Bed Bath & Beyond after sparking a massive gamma squeeze using deep OTM call options would be the most absurd meme-related story of the day. Boy, were we wrong.

    In a late Wednesday article published on the FT which at first (and second, and third) read comes across as a cross between absurdist satire and a PR puff piece, we read the day’s feel-good “riches to riches” story in which a 20-year-old university student, Jake Freeman, who is an applied mathematics and economics major at the University of Southern California, managed to accumulate 6.2% of the entire outstanding stock of Bed Bath & Beyond at under $5.50 share (did we mention he is a 20-year-old university student) amounting to $27 million, which he announced in an activist 13-G letter to BBBY Management on July 21, 2022, and less than a month later sold out of his entire stake – thanks to the insane gamma squeeze in the stock – not through some prime broker but through his TD Ameritrade and Interactive Brokers accounts, making $110 million in the process!

    For the sake of simplicity, here is what happened summarized in one chart.

    First things first – how the FT got the idea for the story in the first place was rather inspired: they looked at the HDS page of BBBY and found that the 4th largest holder of BBBY is a completely unknown entity called Freeman Capital, which alongside only Ken Griffen’s Citadel and Federated Hermes, were the only three Top 20 holders to build out their entire stakes in the second quarter (as a reminder, shortly before the close we learned that the 2nd largest holder, Ryan Cohen’s RC Ventures, filed a 144 to dump its entire 9.450MM share-equivalent stake). And while we wait for RC Ventures to liquidate its stake, we now know for a fact that the #4 top BBBY holder already sold to unwitting retail investors.

    What is remarkable is that at the same time Freeman disclosed its 6.21% (or 4,968,000) stake, the 20-year-old also sent out a 9 page activist letter (hardly the stuff 20-year-old college math majors write) to BBBY management explaining that the company is “facing an existential crisis for its survival” and that the company “needs to cut its cash-burn rates, drastically improve its capital structure and raise cash.” The first page of the letter is below (link to the full letter here). In it…

    … Jake Freeman writes that his “plan for the realignment of BBBY consists of two crucial legs: cutting debt and raising capital.” He proceeds to detail his proposal for both legs, which would culminate in reducing the company’s senior debt from $1.2 billion to $500 million (through an exchange offer of the current discounted debt into far less par debt), and the issuance of converts to somehow raise $1 billion in the market (how this would have worked when the stock was trading around $5 with imploding EBITDA is anyone’s guess). But what was most remarkable is what Freeman said in the highlighted section: namely that the “US options market is pricing in high implied volatility for BBBY derivatives which can be leveraged and capitalized on in order to effect a realignment of BBBY’s debt”, in other words a debt reduction using… a gamma squeeze?

    Perhaps. We don’t know who on the board (or management team) read Freeman’s letter, or what they did next, but less than ten days after the recent teenager shipped out his “activist letter” to BBBY, the stock doubled, then tripled, quadrupled and so on, from his cost basis… at which point Freeman, quite content with the 6x return he made on his initial investment of $27 million, sold his BBBY stake north of $130 million, making more than $100 million in less than a month!

    By this point, readers should have some questions, like for example how did a 20-year-old get $27 million in cash to buy 6.2% of the outstanding shares of Bed Bath & Beyond, and become the 4th largest shareholder? Here, the FT comes to the rescue:

    Freeman’s initial stake cost about $25mn, which he said was mostly raised from friends and family. He has invested for years with his uncle, Dr Scott Freeman, a former pharmaceutical executive. The two recently built an activist stake in a publicly traded pharmaceutical company called Mind Medicine.

    There’s more:

    Freeman also said he had interned for years at a New Jersey hedge fund, Volaris Capital. Just before his 17th birthday, Freeman and its founder, Vivek Kapoor, a former Credit Suisse executive, published a paper titled “Irreducible Risks of Hedging a Bond with a Default Swap”.

    But we digress: let’s get this straight: “friends and family” handed a tiny $25 million (really, $27 million) to a 20-year-old math major at USC, whose extensive financial background is co-investing with his uncle “a former pharma executive” and interning at a hedge fund located above a Starbucks office in Milburn, NJ, yet which oddly enough is primarily focused on various options trading strategies.

    … $25 million which he invested, through his hedge fund Freeman Capital Managent, LLC, which doesn’t really exist except through a Sheridan, Wyoming-based commercial registered agent at 30 N Gould St. (where more than one registration scam has been discovered recently) and which was “founded” in May 2022 …

    …. into just one high-beta, practically bankrupt stock just weeks after the company reported dismal earnings report according to which BBBY sales plunged by 25% in Q2 while its net loss widened to $358mn from $51mn, and its cash position had dwindled to just $107 million from $1 billion at the start of the year, or just a few weeks from insolvency, culminating a catastrophic trend of disappearing EBITDA.

    Surely such a concentrated, undiversified investment by a young “hedge fund” guru who doesn’t even have an active Bloomberg account…

    … screams “fiduciary duty”, and we can only applaud the “friends and family” who handed their $25 million to this young investing wizard, who were surely expecting a few percent returns here and there, instead of a 5x return in 3 weeks. Surely.

    According to the FT, Freeman himself quite shocked by the outcome: “I certainly did not expect such a vicious rally upwards,” Freeman told the Financial Times in an interview on Wednesday. “I thought this was going to be a six months plus play . . . I was really shocked that it went up so fast.”

    So young Master Freeman was expecting the 5x return to take place in “six months” but was “really shocked” it took just 24 calendar days. Come to think of it, we would be too (or maybe not, especially since the entire idea was that of Jake’s uncle Scott, M.D…. but more on that in a subsequent post. But here one additional thing is worth noting, between July 13 (when FCM BBBY HOLDINGS, LLC was registered in Wyoming by Jake Spencer Freeman) and July 20 when the 13G was filed disclosing the 5 million share stake, just 41.9 million shares traded, which means that young Master Jake was in quite a rush to build up his stake: as JC Oviedo pointed out, “to amass its stake in this time period, FCM BBBY HOLDINGS, LLC would have had to be over 11% of the average daily volume!”

    That’s not only a ton of conviction where to put in every last penny of your “friends and family” money but one hell of a rush too.

    Finally, what did Freeman do after making $100 million in what may be the luckiest investment ever made by a 20-year-old?

    After selling the shares, Freeman went for dinner with his parents in the suburb of New York City where they live and on Wednesday he flew to Los Angeles to return to campus, he said.

    We, for one, can’t wait to see how Freeman Capital Management makes its next 5x return in under a month next (actually we know how, and we will reveal it tomorrow).

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 23:01

  • Feds Cut Water Deliveries To Arizona And Nevada, May Impact Food Production
    Feds Cut Water Deliveries To Arizona And Nevada, May Impact Food Production

    Arizona and Nevada face deeper cuts on the amount of water they can draw from the drought-stricken Colorado River, the Interior Department’s Bureau of Reclamation said Tuesday. 

    The agency responsible for managing water and power in the western US said “urgent action” is needed as water levels in the Colorado River’s two largest reservoirs — Lake Mead and Lake Powell — continue to drop. Under the new conservation efforts, 21% of Arizona’s annual water allocation from the river system will be reduced in 2023. 

    Nevada will see 8% of water deliveries reduced, and Mexico’s share will be cut by 7%. California will be spared from the new measures that begin next year. 

    The reductions could be the beginning of a water crisis for the 40 million Americans in seven states (Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming, Arizona, California, and Nevada) that heavily rely on the river for freshwater and power. 

    The move comes as the western US faces the worst megadrought in 1,200 years that has decreased levels in Lake Mead, the largest reservoir in the US, to lows not seen in eight decades. 

    Lake Powell, meanwhile, could face hydropower production disruptions as soon as next year, The Guardian said. 

    “Every sector in every state has a responsibility to ensure that water is used with maximum efficiency. To avoid a catastrophic collapse of the Colorado river system and a future of uncertainty and conflict, water use in the basin must be reduced,” said Tanya Trujillo, assistant secretary of the Interior Department for water and science. 

    In Arizona, the cuts will impact water flow to farmland responsible for 90% of US lettuce production. 

    Farmers in Arizona, who provide more than 90% of the US’s leafy greens each November through March, have already borne the brunt of prior cuts, along with those who make a living from the state’s $23.3 billion agriculture industry. Pinal County, between Phoenix and Tucson, is likely to be hit especially hard since the area known for cotton and livestock has already seen about half its farmland go idle due to prior water reductions. – Bloomberg 

    Bureau of Reclamation Commissioner Camille Calimlim Touton summed up the situation along the Colorado River: 

    “The system is approaching a tipping point and without action, we can’t protect the system and the millions of Americans who rely on this critical resource.” 

    Readers may recall that we noted taps in northern Mexico have run dry for several months as a water crisis looms. 

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 22:40

  • Moderna To Commence Construction Of World’s First mRNA Factory On Australian College Campus
    Moderna To Commence Construction Of World’s First mRNA Factory On Australian College Campus

    Authored by Jessie Zhang via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    The U.S. pharmaceutical giant Moderna has finalised arrangements with the Australian and Victorian governments to build the world’s first mRNA production facility located on a university campus.

    An aerial view of Monash University in Melbourne, Australia on Oct. 21, 2002. (Getty Images)

    The construction at Melbourne’s Monash University is expected to commence at the end of 2022, with production anticipated to begin by the end of 2024.

    The company said that the facility is expected to produce up to 100 million mRNA respiratory vaccine doses annually, targeting respiratory viruses, including COVID-19, seasonal influenza, respiratory syncytial virus, “and other potential respiratory viruses, pending licensure.”

    Moderna CEO Stephane Bancel speaks at the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos on May 23, 2022. (Fabrice Coffrini/Getty Images)

    “We look forward to being a part of the Monash Clayton precinct and contributing to the R&D ecosystem in Melbourne and across Australia,” Moderna General Manager Michael Azrak said in a statement on Aug. 15.

    The prime minister of Australia and the premier of Victoria said that the plan for the ten-year partnership to create a “homegrown” mRNA ecosystem has been completed.

    It is designed to reduce Australia’s dependence on imported mRNA vaccines, vulnerability to supply disruptions, and delays, according to the Australian ministers.

    Premier of Victoria Daniel Andrews said that this agreement means that Australia will be home to Moderna’s only mRNA manufacturing centre in the Southern Hemisphere.

    “We’re not wasting a second in making sure we have access to the vaccines we need to keep Victorians safe,” Andrews said.

    Vaccine Development Rushed

    However, a professor of medicine at Australia’s Flinders University has said that, in his opinion, the mRNA development was rushed, and that this may have contributed to issues with adverse reactions.

    “I think there was early leadership by Oxford University [AstraZeneca] with the adenovirus viral vector being put into human trials very quickly, you saw that similarly with Moderna and its mRNA approach,” Nikolai Petrovsky told The Epoch Times previously.

    “This created a ‘follow the leader’-type mentality with (manufacturers) Sputnik and Johnson and Johnson copying the Oxford approach and Pfizer following Moderna with the mRNA approach.”

    Last year, the Victorian government made a significant $50 million (US$35 million) investment to establish “mRNA Victoria,” an initiative responsible for leading the mRNA vaccine industry for future generations.

    As part of this initiative, they granted Monash University $5.4 million to create the mRNA production facility on its campus.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 22:15

  • Watch: Shoppers At Shanghai Ikea Flee Sudden COVID Lockdown
    Watch: Shoppers At Shanghai Ikea Flee Sudden COVID Lockdown

    Though America’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) took a turn toward Covid rationality last week, “Zero-Covid” madness is still raging in China.

    Just ask the poor people who were at a Shanghai Ikea on Saturday evening. One minute they’re innocently eyeing furniture and appliances, the next they’re being told they can’t leave the store or go home. 

    An announcement was made over the store’s public address system, notifying shoppers the store had been ordered to close and to prevent anyone from leaving, due to contact tracing. Shocked by suddenly being condemned to quarantine, many opted to make a run for it.

    Video captured a dystopian scene in which guards attempt to close doors on the escapees, some of whom are screaming in their panic. The guards were overpowered, but it’s not clear what happened to the fleeing shoppers next. 

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

    Those who were trapped in the store had to first linger there for four hours — from 8pm til midnight — before being transported to quarantine hotels, reports Bloomberg. Then they faced quarantine for two days followed by five days of monitoring. 

    The mass-detention was triggered merely because a close contact of a six-year-old boy who tested positive had visited the store. It’s not clear if that individual was in the store at the time. What’s more, the 6-year old wasn’t even symptomatic. 

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

    While the video of the incident is dramatic, it’s hardly the first such episode, as Chinese citizens continue to live in a dark game of contact-tracing roulette. Others have been suddenly detained while working in offices, exercising at gyms or dining in restaurants. 

    Of China’s major cities, Shanghai has been hit hardest. Between March 10 and July 31 of this year alone, the city endured 92 days of full or partial lockdown. This spring, it got to the point where apartment-dwellers were screaming in unison from their balconies: 

    Last week, the CDC updated its guidelines, with one of the bureaucracy’s epidemiologists saying “we know that Covid-19 is here to stay.” Two proclamations were particularly welcome, even if they were terribly overdue: 

    • “It’s no longer recommended to screen those without symptoms.”
    • “Unvaccinated people now have the same guidance as vaccinated people.” 

    In China, however, there’s no sign that the Zero-Covid regime will be relaxed anytime soon, despite mounting damage to China’s economy, and despite growing Chinese discontent.  

    Workers carry food to Shanghai residents confined to their homes in March (Wang Yanting/Xinhua via AP) 

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 21:50

  • De-Dollarization In Progress Could "Vaporize" Stocks, Bonds And Real Estate
    De-Dollarization In Progress Could “Vaporize” Stocks, Bonds And Real Estate

    Submitted by QTR’s Fringe Finance

    A couple of days ago, I had the chance to interview my good friend Andy Schectman, President & Owner of Miles Franklin Precious Metals, a company that has done more than $5 billion in sales.

    Andy is a world-renowned expert in the field of precious metals and took the time to answer some pressing questions I had about about the state of energy markets in the U.S. and the quickly shifting landscape that the global economy sits on, with the BRIC nations banding together and collectively laughing at the West since the sanctions on Russia went into effect several months ago.

    In what can only be described as an extremely disturbing interview that left my jaw agape by the end of it, Andy and I have a frank discussion about:

    • The price of oil and the country’s response to higher prices

    • How the Fed is trapped between a rock and a hard place, between inflation and recession right now

    • The BRIC nations banding together economically and challenging the U.S. dollar as global reserve currency

    • Andy’s thoughts on how nearly all traditional assets – including stocks, bonds a real estate and the dollar, may wind up “vaporized”

    “Inflation is everywhere and gas is just one of the places,” Andy says. “Inflation is rampant. They’ve been pointing to the prices of certain things, but inflation is always a monetary phenomenon. We have not seek peak inflation, but bringing down the price of gas $0.30 or $0.40 is encouraging, but I don’t think it’s anything substantive at all.”

    When I asked about how the Biden administration was dealing with the issue, Andy said: “I think the strategic oil supply is supposed to be strategic, yet why were they selling so much oil from it to China and Pakistan?”

    He continued about inflation: “I don’t think the 9.1% is the peak – not even close to it. I think the 9.1% is bullshit as well.”

    Speaking about what course of action the Fed is going to wind up taking, Andy makes its clear he’s in the camp that the Central Bank is definitely going to pivot.

    “I don’t think that the Fed has any intention of doing what they say, I do believe it’s a sideshow,” Andy says. “Raising [rates] to 2.25% and not doing anything in terms of QT – I think they’re showing us that they’re jawboning, they don’t want to go down in history as blowing up the whole system.”

    “They just can’t do it. The minute they start to raise rates high enough, they will blow up the system. The Fed is impotent. They are damned if they do, damned if they don’t,” he continued.

    Andy criticized the Fed’s inability to see what they were doing, as they were doing it, stating: “When you take a step back and realize that there has to be someone with enough sense to realize that when you blow asset prices up to all time highs factored against the lowest interest rates in human history, at some point that bar tab has to be paid.”

    He summed up: “We’ve milked as much from the system as humanly possible.”

    Andy also thinks that global de-dollarization is on its way: “I do think the whole system could blow up with the loss of the dollar’s petro-reserve status.”

    “There are certain signposts along the way, that when you see, it becomes clear we are on a path to de-dollarization,” he says. “The dollar hegemony is right about ready to break when you realize that Saudi Arabia is about to join the BRIC nations. Do you think Biden is going to fly there to ask for more oil? He went there to beg them not to join BRIC.”

    “The dollar was made reserve currency only because of our protection of the Saudi kingdom,” Andy continues. He then notes that Saudi Arabia has signed new protection agreements with Russia.

    “All of the Eastern European countries that have repatriated their gold. They’re all part of the EU but they all trade their own currency. They’re all going to break away from the Western system!”

    If you’re not yet a subscriber of my blog, Fringe Finance, I’d be humbled to have you join and can offer you 50% off for life by using this coupon: Get 50% off forever

    Finally, you can listen to my full interview here:

    QTR’s Fringe Finance is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber: Subscribe now

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 21:25

  • Russia, China And India To Hold Massive "Vostok" War Games In Two Weeks
    Russia, China And India To Hold Massive “Vostok” War Games In Two Weeks

    Chinese troops will travel to Russia to take part in war games along with India, Belarus, Mongolia, Tajikistan and other largely anti-Western countries, China’s defense ministry said on Wednesday, adding redundantly that China’s participation in the joint exercises was “unrelated to the current international and regional situation.” (Narrator: it is related.)

    Last month, Moscow announced plans to hold “Vostok” (East) exercises from Aug. 30 to Sept. 5, even as it wages war in Ukraine. It said at the time that some foreign forces would participate, without naming them. It turns out that the “foreign forces” account for just under half of the world’s population.

    China’s defence ministry said its participation in the exercises was part of an ongoing bilateral annual cooperation agreement with Russia, Reuters reported.

    “The aim is to deepen practical and friendly cooperation with the armies of participating countries, enhance the level of strategic collaboration among the participating parties, and strengthen the ability to respond to various security threats,” the statement said.

    What is perhaps most interesting about the news is that the war games will see India and China participate together, although as the Hindu times notes, it remains unclear if Indian and Chinese troops – hardly the closest of friends – will be present together or if they will participate in different drills, which will be spread across 13 different training grounds.

    Indian and Chinese troops have remained in a stand-off that has lasted for more than two years along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in Eastern Ladakh following the transgressions by the PLA in April 2020. Disengagement has taken place in some areas along the LAC but talks to restore the status quo in the remaining friction areas such as Hot Springs, Demchok, and Depsang have been slow moving.

    Under Chinese President Xi Jinping and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, Beijing and Moscow have grown increasingly close especially following the start of the Ukraine war which Xi sees as a grand rehearsal for the invasion of Taiwan. Last August, Russia and China held joint military exercises in north-central China involving more than 10,000 troops. Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu praised the Sibu/Cooperation-2021 drills in China’s Ningxia and suggested they could be developed further.

    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
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 21:04

  • There Is No Climate Crisis: History Shows Us That The Earth Has Seen Far Worse
    There Is No Climate Crisis: History Shows Us That The Earth Has Seen Far Worse

    Climate science has been so suffocated by ideological zealotry it’s becoming difficult just to find normal objective analysis these days.  Any piece of data that contradicts the man-made climate change narrative is surrounding by a spin machine that either dismisses the information or obscures it in a deluge of global warming propaganda, inoculating the reader well before they get a chance to digest the news that maybe climate change is not all it’s cracked up to be.

    Whenever high temperatures are reported in the US or Europe the news is hyperinflated into wild theories of climate Apocalypse by the media, but weather history suggests that the panic is fabricated rather than justified.  In fact, any hot weather event you can pick out in recent years is likely overshadowed by a much worse event decades or centuries before “man-made carbon pollution” was ever a thing.    

    For example, the media is frantic over the current drought and “record temps” in Europe this summer, warning that it could become the “worst drought” in 500 years.  Of course, this claim opens the door to a question that climate scientists and propagandists don’t want to answer:  What happened 500 years ago? 

    A similar level of global warming hysteria was present during a heat wave in Europe in 2003, as well as in 2018.  The few climate scientists still not bought and paid for by governments and the UN have had to point out that these droughts are nothing compared to the living hell that was the drought of 1540.  This event is often termed a “mega-drought” because the region suffered historically hot temps while receiving almost no rain for a year.

    Temperatures that year averaged 5°C to 7° C  above average temperatures in Europe in the 20th century.   In US terms, that means daily summer temps of around 104° F.  Hundreds of historic accounts written at the time describe around half a million deaths, along with vast wildfires and a winter in Italy that “felt like July.”  Keep in mind that carbon levels in Europe in 1540 were 30% LOWER than they are today, yet, the region suffered perhaps the worst warming event in its recorded history. 

    Today’s climate data is based on records held by the NOAA and other institutions, and these records only go back to 1880.  So, whenever you hear the mainstream media rant about record temperatures, they are using a tiny sliver of global weather history going back a little over a century.  Any honest scientist in this field will tell you that the Earth’s climate record is vast compared to the limited data used by global warming ideologues, and the majority of destructive weather crises have occurred well before man-made carbon emissions.   

    It certainly wasn’t carbon pollution from cars, farming and industry that caused the crisis in 1540.

    Try doing any research on the 1540 event and you will be buried in a pile of mainstream articles that acknowledge the disaster but then try to use it as an example of why we must comply with carbon restrictions and climate authoritarianism in 2022.  They say “Look at what happened to Europe in 1540.  You don’t want that to happen again, do you?”  

    Of course, humanity had no say or control over the weather in 1540, just as we have no say or control over the weather today.  There was no carbon based global warming back then, and there is no carbon based global warming now.  

    Scientists still have no idea what caused many of the warming events of the past including the crisis of 1540, so why should we have blind faith in their claims that carbon is the cause of warming in recent years?  In fact, the NOAA and other climate research institutions still offer no concrete proof of a relationship between carbon emissions and rising temperatures.  Their argument is that they have excluded all other possible causes, leaving only carbon as the remainder.  This is not science, this is haphazard guesswork.  

    If there was ever a field that defies the logic, reason and analysis commonly associated with the scientific method, it is climate science.   

    Set aside the fact that billions of dollars in funding are paid out to climate scientists every year, but only those scientists that operate from the assumption that climate change is caused by human beings.  That is to say, there are numerous incentives for scientists to discount other causes for global warming.  They are not scientists, they are paid political activists.  Luckily, temperatures are not that high.  The NOAA’s own data shows that the average temperature of the Earth has risen less than 1°C in the past century.  This is nothing, so why all the panic?

    Let’s just say that carbon controls are a powerful tool for micromanaging the population and justifying authoritarianism in the name of the “greater good.”  If the public is convinced to accept false climate change narratives, then government would have the ability to control every aspect of daily life, from the amount of electricity we use, to the food we eat, to the businesses we can run, to the level of production and the size of the population.  This is not fiction this is reality, and it is happening much faster than many people realize, all in the name of saving the planet from a threat that doesn’t exist.    

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 21:00

  • UCLA Creates Database To 'Track Attacks On Critical Race Theory'
    UCLA Creates Database To ‘Track Attacks On Critical Race Theory’

    Authored by Carol Cassis via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Faculty at the University of California–Los Angeles (UCLA) School of Law have created a database to identify and record efforts to block critical race theory (CRT) being taught in schools across the country.

    A woman holds a sign against critical race theory in Los Alamitos, Calif., on May 11, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

    The database, called the CRT Forward Tracking Project, allows users to “track attacks on critical race theory” and filter the information as part of an effort to “support anti-racist education, training and research,” according to the school.

    The project was created by UCLA’s Critical Race Studies Program, founded in 2000 as the first law school program in the nation dedicated to critical race theory.

    CRT, according to the school, is “the study of systemic racism in law, policy and society,” and suggests efforts need to be made to fix these alleged injustices.

    Parents concerned about Critical Race Theory took home these buttons from a school board activist training Jan. 19, 2022 in Sarasota, Florida. (Alexis Spiegelman)

    Meanwhile, critics say CRT pushes a controversial worldview related to Marxism that analyzes all aspects of life through a racial lens instead of through the concept of class struggle.

    UCLA Law announced earlier this month it would track anti-CRT activity through the database at all levels of government across the nation.

    “The project was created to help people understand the breadth of the attacks on the ability to speak truthfully about race and racism through the campaigns against CRT,” said Taifha Natalee Alexander, project director of CRT Forward, in a statement.

    The database analyzes these efforts to determine where the activity is happening and how opponents are taking action, such as protesting curriculum at the school board level.

    It also includes the type of CRT content being restricted, such as a course being taught at a public school, as well as the institution or group being targeted and enforcement mechanisms being used to regulate the content.

    For example, the Placentia-Yorba Linda School Board voted to ban the teaching of CRT in classrooms this past April, ending months of debate in the Orange County district.

    Prior to the narrow 3-2 vote, supporters for the ban asserted CRT is a divisive ideology that pushes a political narrative. Other trustees at the April 5 school board meeting, however, claimed such efforts amounted to censorship, according to public comments.

    The UCLA program claims that many of those who are against these concepts being taught in K-12 schools are using the term CRT “incorrectly,” and have “affected plans to include ethnic studies more broadly for students before they get to college.”

    Chinese-American parents in California rally against Assembly Bill 101, which was later signed into law to make ethnic studies a high school graduation requirement, in Los Angeles on April 26, 2020. (Linda Jiang/The Epoch Times)

    In 2021, California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed legislation making ethnic studies a statewide requirement for high school graduation starting in the 2029–30 school year, amid debate among parents and teachers about whether ethnic studies curriculum includes elements of CRT.

    Tracking Results

    As of Aug. 2, the UCLA database has screened nearly 24,000 media articles and identified 479 instances of anti-CRT activity since August 2021.

    The database team found this activity is “much more pervasive and extensive than generally reported,” according to the school, with such policies either proposed or enacted in 49 states.

    The project also found that most anti-CRT proposals have occurred in Florida, Virginia, Missouri, and the U.S. Congress, while local school board measures make up more than 20 percent of the activity in the database.

    Signs against critical race theory in front of the Loudoun County School Administration building in Virginia on Nov. 9, 2021. (Terri Wu/The Epoch Times)

    Most such measures at the school board level have been introduced in California, North Carolina, Florida, Pennsylvania, and Virginia, with Californians enacting five out of the eight proposed measures.

    The study also found the most common anti-CRT enforcement measures include withholding funding or issuing fines against individual teachers, administrators, schools, and districts for engaging in “prohibited conduct,” the school says.

    CRT Controversy

    Noah Zatz, faculty director of the UCLA Law’s Critical Race Studies Program, is helping to spearhead the tracking project. CRT Forward staff also include law librarians and undergraduate and law school research assistants.

    “We need critical race theory to understand this assault on racial justice, where even naming structural racism gets portrayed as unfair to white people. And we need CRT to develop legal theories of education and free speech that not only blunt these attacks but place anti-racism at the center of a democratic society,” said Zatz in a statement.

    However, opponents contend that CRT is not needed and does not teach hard history, but is instead an approach to analyzing that history with the intent to dismantle modern systems that proponents claim are white supremacist.

    A man holds up a sign against Critical Race Theory during a protest outside a Washoe County School District board meeting in Reno, Nev., on May 25, 2021. (Andy Barron/Reno Gazette-Journal via AP)

    “Those that are upset about proposed bans on CRT in our schools have been misled to think that states that have banned CRT from being taught will no longer teach about Jim Crow Laws, the displacement of Native Americans, or even slavery in America. This is simply not true,” according to a CRT guide written by former California teacher Kali Fontanilla. “On the contrary, banning CRT will remove a dangerous twisting and rewriting of American history.”

    The UCLA project is funded by a $400,000 grant from the Lumina Foundation, a private, Indianapolis-based foundation with about $1.4 billion in assets, according to the nonprofit’s website.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 20:35

  • Pelosi's Taiwan Visit Was A "Carefully Planned Provocation" To "Destabilize": Putin
    Pelosi’s Taiwan Visit Was A “Carefully Planned Provocation” To “Destabilize”: Putin

    On Tuesday Russian President Vladimir Putin weighed on on major security issues ranging from the ongoing war in Ukraine to China-US tensions over Taiwan in a televised speech. Speaking before defense officials and regional think tank analysts at the Tenth Moscow Conference on International Security, among the most notable assertion of his is that NATO is moving “further east”.

    Within days prior to launching the Feb.24 invasion of Ukraine, he gave what was essentially a war speech emphasizing that urgent military action was needed to prevent NATO’s further expansion into Ukraine. But it seems that in his latest comments Tuesday, he sees the threat of NATO influence at work as far as southeast Asia as well.

    Via Reuters

    In the fresh remarks, Putin continued his prior theme of a turn from unipolar to multi-polar world order, based on the decline of the United States and West. He said as translated in state media: 

    “Western globalist elites are provoking chaos by rekindling old and inciting new conflicts, implementing a policy of so-called containment, while undermining any alternative, sovereign paths of development. Thus, they are desperately trying to preserve the hegemony and power that are slipping out of their grasp, trying to keep countries and peoples in the grip of a neo-colonial order.”

    He blasted this Western “hegemony” as what in the end will result in global stagnation. Further he said:

    “NATO’s war machine is moving, approaching Russia’s borders closely… Russia has been trying for 30 years to negotiate NATO non-expansion to the east…”

    The Russian leader continued, “Any means are used. The United States and its vassals rudely interfere in the internal affairs of sovereign states by organizing provocations, coups d’état and civil wars. Threats, blackmail and pressure are resorted to in a bid to force independent states to submit to their will.”

    The Kremlin has long emphasized that the 2014 overthrow of pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych was the real start of hostilities in Ukraine, and that it was fundamentally Washington and its EU allies behind it. The West, however, has rejected this narrative – emphasizing the Maidan events as a spontaneous democratic uprising. 

    On expanding East, he said of NATO:

    “The so-called collective West is deliberately destroying the European security system, putting together new military alliances. The NATO bloc is expanding East, building up its military infrastructure, deploying missile defense systems and increasing the strike capabilities of its offensive forces.”

    In this context he again stressed that just before Russia’s “special operation” in Ukraine, Moscow repeatedly submitted requests for security ‘guarantees’ to NATO, but that this was ignored. He said this is what has damaged European security. He also charged that the West in the end sees the Ukrainian people as “cannon fodder” for its proxy war.

    Putin’s defense minister has also of late been stressing the role of the West in planning and executing Ukrainian military actions, also as Crimea has recently come under rare attack…

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    Interestingly, in the speech he turned his attention to rising China tensions, charging that the US is still trying to add “fuel to the fire” over the Taiwan issue. This echoes precisely Beijing’s own line, as the two countries continue to grow lockstep while under the crosshairs of Washington. He called Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan a “carefully planned provocation” meant to whip up tensions.

    China will without doubt applaud Putin’s fierce defense of Beijing’s point of view: 

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    “The American reckless gamble in relation to Taiwan is not just a visit by an individual irresponsible politician, but part of a purposeful, conscious US strategy to destabilize… the situation in the region and the world, a brazen demonstration of disrespect for the sovereignty of other countries and for its international obligations. We see this as a carefully planned provocation,” Putin said.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 20:10

  • Lindsey Graham Calls For Release Of Trump Affidavit: 'We’re Flying Blind'
    Lindsey Graham Calls For Release Of Trump Affidavit: ‘We’re Flying Blind’

    Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Tuesday called for the release of the FBI affidavit that was used to justify the raid of former President Donald Trump’s Florida home.

    “We need the affidavit, show your cards, Merrick Garland can’t have it both ways, he can’t give us the inventory of the warrant without telling us why it was necessary … without the affidavit, we’re flying blind in the dark,” Graham said, adding, “The American people are going through too much pain, too much heartache on this endless effort to destroy Donald Trump.”

    (L-R) Then-President Donald Trump looks on as Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) speaks during an event about judicial confirmations in the East Room of the White House on Nov. 6, 2019. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

    Graham’s comment came a day after Department of Justice lawyers argued in court that the affidavit should be sealed, including redacted versions of the document, because it would harm the agency’s investigation.

    An affidavit would provide more details about the investigation and would provide insight into why the federal government is investigating Trump, including what triggered last week’s raid on Mar-a-Lago.

    So far, a U.S. magistrate judge in the case authorized the unsealing of an FBI warrant and property receipt, which showed that agents took materials there were allegedly considered top secret or classified from Trump’s home. The judge, Bruce Reinhart, who in 2008 represented individuals associated with infamous sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, scheduled a 1 p.m. Thursday hearing on whether the affidavit and other related documents should be unsealed.

    But Trump on Monday accused FBI agents of taking three passports from him, suggesting that the raid went too far. Department of Justice officials confirmed Monday evening that the passports would be returned, according to a screenshot of emails posted by a Trump spokesman.

    Like Graham, Trump on Truth Social called on the federal government to release the affidavit. Judicial Watch, media outlets, the Florida Center for Governmental Accountability, and other groups have filed motions to unseal the affidavit and other related documents.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 19:45

  • Tomato Shortage Emerges In Drought-Stricken Californian As Ketchup Prices Soar
    Tomato Shortage Emerges In Drought-Stricken Californian As Ketchup Prices Soar

    Days ago, we said the next food insecurity problem that may impact Americans’ eating habits could be an emerging potato shortage. Now there appears to be another issue: Tomatoes are getting squeezed, and risks of a ketchup shortage rise as a severe drought batter California’s farmland.

    California accounts for a quarter of the world’s tomato output. The worst drought in 1,200 years has forced farmers to abandon fields as crops turn to dust amid a water crisis. 

    “We desperately need rain … and are getting to a point where we don’t have inventory left to keep fulfilling the market demand,” Mike Montna, head of the California Tomato Growers Association, told Bloomberg.

    “It’s real tough to grow a tomato crop right now,” Montna continued, adding, “on one side you have the drought impacting costs because you don’t have enough water to grow all your acres, and then you have the farm inflation side of it with fuel and fertilizer costs shooting up.” 

    The lack of water and the soaring cost of farming appears to be a ‘perfect storm’ in the making that could result in a shortage of all sorts of tomato-based products, including ketchup, salsa, and spaghetti sauce. 

    Rick Blankenship, Chairman of the Board at California Tomato Research Institute, warned crop yields are “way off this year … and coupled with drought, we’ve had high temperatures and that in itself creates an issue where the tomatoes are so hot that they just don’t size properly — so you have a lot of tomatoes on a plant, but they are smaller.” 

    Bloomberg said the value for a ton of tomatoes reached an all-time high this year of $105 due to higher input prices, such as diesel and fertilizer, compounded with the drought. 

    “You would think that it was a home run for growers, but in reality the input costs have gone up so much that the potential profit was all gobbled up,” Blankenship said.

    R. Greg Pruett, sales and energy manager for Ingomar Packing Co., one of the world’s largest tomato processors, said not all customers will get their processed products. The company sells to some of the largest food brands. He said inventories are plunging to critically low levels. 

    “If you are looking for a significant amount of tomato paste and you haven’t already contracted it then you aren’t going to get it no matter what the price is,” Pruett said, adding, “it’s just not there.”

    Market research firm IRI shows the price of tomato sauce in the last four weeks ended July 10 surged 17% from a year ago, while ketchup jumped 23%.

    Besides tomatoes, french fries could be in short supply as the potato crop has suffered from a heatwave. And worse, most of the US beer imports come from northern Mexico, where the region is running out of water. 

    Ketchup, french fries, and beer could soon be in short supply or experience price hikes due to tightening supply. 

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 19:20

  • Judge Blocks Texas Restrictions On Using P.O. Boxes For Voter Registration
    Judge Blocks Texas Restrictions On Using P.O. Boxes For Voter Registration

    Authored by Darlene McCormick Sanchez via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Some 5,000 Texans who used a P.O. box as a voter registration address will likely be able to cast a ballot in the state’s midterm elections after a federal judge blocked a 2021 state election law.

    A voter exits a polling location in Fort Worth, Texas, on Nov. 03, 2020. (Tom Pennington/Getty Images)

    Senate Bill 1111 attempted to tighten residency guidelines for Texas voters, but was struck down this month by U.S. District Court Judge Lee Yeakel, an appointee under former president George W. Bush.

    Yeakel, who presides over the Austin Division for the Western District of Texas, found in a summary judgement that the state used vague language in the election law and parts of it failed constitutional scrutiny.

    Texas’ Attorney General Ken Paxton appealed the decision last week to the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, according to State Sen. Paul Bettencourt (R-Houston), who authored the election bill.

    Texas’ Attorney General Ken Paxton speaks at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Dallas at the Hilton Anatole Aug. 5, 2022. (Bobby Sanchez/The Epoch Times)

    “There is no one that can live inside a P.O. box,” Bettencourt pointed out in a statement earlier this month.

    Bettencourt told The Epoch Times he was disappointed in the decision against a “common-sense voter integrity bill.”

    The bill required people registering to vote with a P.O. box to show proof of address such as a driver’s license or utility bill.

    Some 5,000 people were registered to vote in Harris County alone using a P.O. box in 2020, Bettencourt said.

    As of this month, the number is around 4,800 because some of the records were processed before the law was blocked.

    The actual number using P.O. boxes to register statewide would make the total higher, he added, saying he expects the number could climb before voter registration ends in October without the law.

    Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (3R) signs Senate Bill 1, also known as the election integrity bill into law with others clapping and looking on in Tyler, Texas, on Sept. 7, 2021. (Marina Fatina/NTD)

    The Republican-led Texas Legislature passed the bill along with others in an attempt to guard against election fraud after the 2020 election.

    The lawsuit filed by the Texas chapter of the League of United Latin American Citizens and Voto Latino, a nonprofit that seeks to mobilize voters, called those requirements in SB 1111 an unnecessary burden on voters.

    The Latino groups claimed voter suppression against six large counties controlled by Democrats: Travis, Bexas, Harris, Hidalgo, Dallas, and El Paso.

    “This measure imposes vague, onerous restrictions on the voter registration process, chilling political participation and further burdening the abilities of lawful voters to cast their ballots and make their voices heard.” Texas LULAC state director Rodolfo Rosales said in a statement after filing the suit.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 18:55

  • Apple Reportedly Shifting Watch And MacBook Production To Vietnam
    Apple Reportedly Shifting Watch And MacBook Production To Vietnam

    Wary of soaring tensions surrounding out-of-favor countries like China, multinational corporations such as Apple are diversifying production to places with less geopolitical risk.

    Nikkei Asia spoke to three sources with direct knowledge of Apple’s plans to shift Watch and MacBook production out of China to Vietnam for the first time. 

    Apple suppliers Luxshare Precision Industry and Foxconn have already piloted a production run of the Watch in northern Vietnam. 

    The move by Apple is a further win for the Southeast Asian country as it already produces iPads and AirPods. 

    Two sources told Nikkei Asia that Apple had requested suppliers to set up a MacBook test production line in Vietnam. They said progress in constructing laptop production in the country has been “slow, partly due to pandemic-related disruptions but also because notebook computer production involves a larger supply chain.”  

    “AirPods, Apple Watch, HomePod and more … Apple has big plans in Vietnam, apart from iPhone manufacturing,” one of the people with direct knowledge of Apple’s plans said. “The components for MacBooks have become more modularized than in the past, which makes it easier to produce the laptops outside of China. But how to make it cost-competitive is another challenge.”

    This trend is called “friendshoring.” While it’s a play on “offshoring,” this isn’t about companies moving operations back to the US and Europe, but rather seeking foreign alternatives that retain the benefit of low labor costs but with less international controversy. 

    Apple’s production diversification comes as the US and China already had an increasingly adversarial relationship before House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan sparked anger with Beijing. The fact is, geopolitical and trade war tensions aren’t going away anytime soon and will only push Apple further away from China. Though reshoring production to the US is unfeasible because of labor costs, maybe robotics can offset some of those costs or perhaps set up shop in Mexico, where there’s abundant cheap labor and healthy demographics. 

    A recent Rabobank analysis of friendshoring showed that chief beneficiaries would include countries like Vietnam, India, Brazil, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Mexico, Turkey, Egypt, and South Africa.

    Apple’s Tim Cook appears to have learned a valuable lesson this year that high exposure of supply chains to China during Beijing’s zero-Covid policies and worsening geopolitical tensions with the West is a dangerous cocktail, and the need to diversify production in a trend dubbed friendshoring is essential for survival in a multi-polar world. 

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 18:30

  • The Incredible Shrinking Merrick Garland
    The Incredible Shrinking Merrick Garland

    Authored by Jonathan Turley,

    Below is my column in USA Today on the diminishing role of Attorney General Merrick Garland at the Justice Department after a series of controversies.

    As a well-known moderate, many of us had hoped that Garland could be a unifying presence at the Department; assuring a divided nation that justice would be pursued in an even-handed and apolitical fashion.

    Yet, in controversy after controversy, Garland has failed to take modest steps to make such assurances.

    After well documented cases of bias and false statements by FBI and DOJ officials in past investigations, there was a clear need for greater transparency and independence in investigations. Garland has consistently swatted away such options. This week, Garland stayed on that path and refused to release any part of the affidavit used as the basis for the search of Mar-a-Lago. This included the possible issuance of a redacted copy or even responses to specific concerns over the timing or basis for the search. While Trump has called for the release of the affidavit, Garland will not even release those sections dealing with the account of the prior discussions and agreements with the Team Trump. There is little proactive effort to anticipate or address such concerns as vividly shown in the last week.

    Here is the column:

    In the cult classic, “The Incredible Shrinking Man,” the character Scott Stuart is caught in a thick fog that causes him to gradually shrink to the point that he lives in a doll house and fights off the house cat. At one point, Stuart delivers a strikingly profound line: “The unbelievably small and the unbelievably vast eventually meet — like the closing of a gigantic circle.”

    If one image sums up the incredibly shrinking stature of Attorney General Merrick Garland, it is that line in the aftermath of the Mar-a-Lago search.

    Two years ago, I was one of many who supported Garland when he was nominated for attorney general. While his personality seemed a better fit for the courts than the Cabinet, he is a person with unimpeachable integrity and ethics.

    If there are now doubts, it is not about his character but his personality in dealing with political controversies. Those concerns have grown in the past week.

    In the aftermath of the FBI’s search of former President Donald Trump’s home in Florida, much remains unclear. The inventory list confirms that there were documents marked TS (Top Secret) and SCI (Sensitive Compartmented Information) —two of the highest classification levels for materials. The former president’s retention of such documents would appear to be a very serious violation.

    However, the status of the documents is uncertain after Trump insisted that he declassified the material and was handling the records in accordance with prior discussions with the FBI. While the declassified status of these documents would not bar charges under the cited criminal provisions, it could have a significant impact on the viability of any prosecution.

    I have not assumed that the search of Mar-a-Lago was unwarranted given that we have not seen the underlying affidavit. Yet in another controversy, Garland seemed largely reactive and rote in dealing with questions over bias or abuse in his department.

    In his confirmation hearing, Garland repeatedly pledged that political considerations would hold no sway with him as attorney general. Yet, in just two years, the Justice Department has careened from one political controversy to another without any sign that Garland is firmly in control of the department. Last year, for example, Garland was heavily criticized for his rapid deployment of a task force to investigate parents and others challenging school boards.

    When Garland has faced clear demands for independent action, he has folded. For example, Garland has refused to appoint a special counsel in the investigation of Hunter Biden. But there is no way to investigate Hunter Biden without running over continual references to President Biden.

    By refusing a special counsel, Garland has removed the president’s greatest threat. Unlike the U.S. Attorney investigating Hunter Biden, a special counsel would be expected to publish a report that would detail the scope of the Biden family’s alleged influence peddling and foreign contacts.

    Likewise, the Justice Department is conducting a grand jury investigation that is aggressively pursuing Trump associates and Republican figures, including seizing the telephones of members of Congress. That investigation has bearing on the integrity and the status of Biden’s potential opponent in 2024.

    The investigation also has triggered concerns over the party in power investigating the opposing political party. It is breathtaking that Garland would see no need for an independent or special counsel given this country’s continued deep divisions and mistrust.

    Democrats often compare the January 6 investigation to Watergate but fail to note that the Watergate investigation was led by an independent counsel precisely because of these inherent political conflicts.

    Then came the raid. While Garland said he personally approved the operation, he did little to help mitigate the inevitable political explosion. This country is a powder keg and the FBI has a documented history of false statements to courts and falsified evidence in support of a previous Trump investigation.

    Yet, there was no prepared statement or response for days, which allowed speculation and rage to grow. When Garland did respond, he offered a boilerplate defense of the department and sought only the release of the warrant and inventory list.

    If there was one occasion for total transparency, including the release of the FBI affidavit, this was that moment. Yet, Garland refused to act further. He declined to seek the release even as news media reported an array of leaks from the Justice Department, including the allegation that Trump took nuclear weapon secrets to Mar-a-Lago. As his department leaked like a sieve, Garland withheld the document that would set the record straight. 

    The Justice Department also reportedly refused to allow a special master to review the seized material after alleged attorney-client material was taken — a move that would have addressed concerns that the search was “pretextual” to seize January 6th evidence.

    Despite this record, I do not view Garland as inherently political in contrast to predecessors like Eric Holder. Garland’s judicial temperament may be ill-suited to the demands of this office.

    Garland sometimes looks more like a pedestrian than a driver on decisions in his own department. Top positions were given to figures denounced as far-left advocates on issues from defunding the police to racial justice. For the moderate Garland, these did not seem like natural choices. Neither did the department’s recent controversial move to effectively circumvent a Trump pardon to prosecute a Florida nursing home operator.

    And Garland has not responded to new allegations of bias at the FBI and Justice involving the downplaying of evidence involving the Hunter Biden laptop controversy.

    Concerns also have been raised about the decision to appoint the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Detroit office to lead the Washington, D.C., office. The agent, Steven M. D’Antuono, led the disastrous investigation of the alleged plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. Many observers viewed that case as clear entrapment and abuse by the FBI. Given the importance of the January 6 investigation, it is baffling that the Department of Justice would make this controversial transfer at this time.

    An attorney general should not be motivated by optics in his decisions, but he also cannot ignore optics when they undermine the integrity of his department. The search of Mar-a-Lago was a historic raid with sweeping political implications, including on the approaching midterm elections. Garland must have known that it would be viewed by many as an “insurance policy” taken out against a Trump presidential run.

    Yet, with leaks coming out of his department undermining Trump’s claims, Garland merely offered “trust us we’re the government” assurances while resisting the release of the affidavit.

    When Scott Stuart faced his diminished stature, he asked, “I was continuing to shrink, to become… what? The infinitesimal? What was I?” That is a debilitating question for any person, but it is disastrous in an attorney general.

    It is not that Merrick Garland is absent but that his presence often seems immaterial.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 18:05

  • An Earthbound 'Cannibal Coronal Mass Ejection' Event Could Be Imminent
    An Earthbound ‘Cannibal Coronal Mass Ejection’ Event Could Be Imminent

    A minor earthward-directed Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) already hit Earth’s magnetic field on Wednesday. NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) expects a more powerful earthbound CME to strike Thursday-Friday. 

    SWPC has already issued geomagnetic storm watches for a minor geomagnetic storm today, a strong geomagnetic storm on Thursday, and a moderate one on Friday.

    The impacts will be insignificant now, but that could change tomorrow as a strong geomagnetic storm can spark power grid fluctuations, create satellite irregularities, and degrade radio and GPS signals. SWPC’s storm severity scale is 1-5. 

    A visual of the CME impacts on modern society. 

    Here’s more from spaceweather: 

    On Aug. 14th, a dark plasma eruption hurled one CME toward Earth. On Aug. 15th, an exploding magnetic filament launched another CME right behind it. The two CMEs will arrive together on Aug.18th, according to the latest forecast model from NOAA:

    This could be a “Cannibal CME” event. In other words, the second CME might overtake and gobble up the first, creating a mish-mash of the two. Cannibal CMEs contain tangled magnetic fields and compressed plasmas that sometimes spark strong geomagnetic storms.

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

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

    Geomagnetic Storms will be visible to the naked eye in the US as far as Illinois and Oregon (geomagnetic latitude 50 degrees).

    The sun is in a very active 11-year solar cycle called Solar Cycle 25, which began in December 2019.

    The solar cycle peak is expected in 2025, but even before that, its presence will be felt on and around Earth via CMEs disrupting modern life. 

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 17:40

  • Many Casualties After Bombing Targets Taliban Mosque In Kabul
    Many Casualties After Bombing Targets Taliban Mosque In Kabul

    On Wednesday a large blast ripped through a centrally located mosque during evening prayers in the Afghan capital of Kabul, with a huge casualty count feared. One or more suicide bombers were reportedly behind the attack.

    Within the initial hours following the explosion, at least 10 have been reported dead, including a prominent cleric, according to regional reports. While there was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, ISIS-K has recently stepped up bombings against Taliban targets over the summer, and now reaching a year after the final US military exit from the war-torn country.

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

    CNN cited a top health official for Afghanistan who said, “Following today’s explosion, we admitted 27 patients to our Surgical Centre for War Victims in Kabul, including five minors, one of them a seven-year-old boy.” The official noted that “Two patients arrived dead, one died in the emergency room.”

    Underscoring the growing seriousness and frequency of ISIS-K terror attacks, the official described multiple mass casualty events this month alone:

    “In the month of August alone, we managed six mass casualties in our hospital, with a total of almost 80 patients. Throughout the year, we have continued to receive gunshot injuries, shrapnel injuries, stabbing injuries, and victims of mine and IED explosions on a daily basis. The country is suffering the consequences of a very long conflict that has undermined its future.”

    With emergency crews and police still on the scene, Taliban’s deputy spokesman Bilal Karimi vowed vengeance for the attack. “The murderers of civilians and perpetrators of similar crimes will soon be caught and punished for their actions, God willing,” he said in a statement.

    ABC News reports of some of the details which emerged late in the day:

    According to the eyewitness, a resident of the city’s Kher Khanna neighborhood where the Siddiquiya Mosque was targeted, the explosion was carried out by a suicide bomber. The slain cleric was Mullah Amir Mohammad Kabuli, the eyewitness said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media.

    He added that more than 30 other people were wounded. The Italian Emergency hospital in Kabul said that at least 27 wounded civilians, including five children, were brought there from the site of the bomb blast.

    The casualty count is expected to mount, given a police spokesman said of the blast’s high casualties, “the numbers are not clear yet.”

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 17:30

  • Is A Chinese Devaluation Imminent?
    Is A Chinese Devaluation Imminent?

    Authored by Steven Vannelli via Knowledge Leaders Capital blog,

    Over the weekend, we got a slew of data showing a generally weak economy. Below are the actual data compared with the expectations from Bloomberg.

    Of course, the headline grabber was the -31.4% drop in residential property sales, but across the board, from industrial production to retail sales to investment came in shy of estimates.

    This makes it incredibly unlikely that China is going to hit its growth target this year when all the components are running below estimates. Retail sales are currently running 0.5% behind calendar year estimates, while industrial production is running 0.7% behind and fixed asset investment is 0.3% behind.

    Really the only thing working in China right now is exports.

    While it is leading to a growing trade surplus.

    And, exports are again growing as a percent of GDP.

    Despite the clear evidence of weak economic growth, China is not launching a huge stimulus program like it did after the Great Financial Crisis.

    Instead they are tinkering around the edges. For example, yesterday China cut the medium-term lending facility by a token 10bps. They cut the 7-day repurchase rate by 10bps too.

    And, they are preparing the banking system for a more difficult liquidity environment by dropping the required reserve ratio.

    This last chart leads us to the real variable of interest: the CNY level. It looks like the Chinese Yuan is about to break out on the downside.

    Looking at interest rate differentials with the US illustrates this point well. For short rates, I compare the upper bound of the US fed funds to overnight SHIBOR. This relationship suggests a CNY with a 7-handle.

    Next, looking at medium-term rates, the picture is the same.

    And finally, longer-term rates tell the same story.

    China’s export dependence and falling global growth expectations are one more reason to expect a weaker CNY.

    A weaker CNY will be a tailwind for lower inflation in the US. If the CNY exceeds 7.0, this should correspond to 10-year breakeven inflation around 1%.

    With inflation in the US already coming down, a further weakening of the CNY will simply accelerate that process, taking the heat off the Fed to raise rates well into restrictive territory.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 08/17/2022 – 17:15

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Aug 17

Today’s News 17th August 2022

  • Every Mission To Mars In One Visualization
    Every Mission To Mars In One Visualization

    Within our Solar System, Mars is one of the most similar planets to Earth—both have rocky landscapes, solid outer crusts, and cores made of molten rock.

    Because of its similarities to Earth and proximity, humanity has been fascinated by Mars for centuries. In fact, it’s one of the most explored objects in our Solar System.

    But just how many missions to Mars have we embarked on, and which of these journeys have been successful? This graphic by Jonathan Letourneau shows a timeline of every mission to Mars since 1960 using NASA’s historical data.

    A Timeline of Mars Explorations

    According to a historical log from NASA, there have been 48 missions to Mars over the last 60 years. Here’s a breakdown of each mission, and whether or not they were successful:

    The first mission to Mars was attempted by the Soviets in 1960, with the launch of Korabl 4, also known as Mars 1960A.

    As the table above shows, the voyage was unsuccessful. The spacecraft made it 120 km into the air, but its third-stage pumps didn’t generate enough momentum for it to stay in Earth’s orbit.

    For the next few years, several more unsuccessful Mars missions were attempted by the USSR and then NASA. Then, in 1964, history was made when NASA launched the Mariner 4 and completed the first-ever successful trip to Mars.

    The Mariner 4 didn’t actually land on the planet, but the spacecraft flew by Mars and was able to capture photos, which gave us an up-close glimpse at the planet’s rocky surface.

    Then on July 20, 1976, NASA made history again when its spacecraft called Viking 1 touched down on Mars’ surface, making it the first space agency to complete a successful Mars landing. Viking 1 captured panoramic images of the planet’s terrain, and also enabled scientists to monitor the planet’s weather.

    Vacation to Mars, Anyone?

    To date, all Mars landings have been done without crews, but NASA is planning to send humans to Mars by the late 2030s.

    And it’s not just government agencies that are planning missions to Mars—a number of private companies are getting involved, too. Elon Musk’s aerospace company SpaceX has a long-term plan to build an entire city on Mars.

    Two other aerospace startups, Impulse and Relativity, also announced an unmanned joint mission to Mars in July 2022, with hopes it could be ready as soon as 2024.

    As more players are added to the mix, the pressure is on to be the first company or agency to truly make it to Mars. If (or when) we reach that point, what’s next is anyone’s guess.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 23:55

  • Elon Musk Says He's "Buying Manchester United"
    Elon Musk Says He’s “Buying Manchester United”

    In a tweet thread tonight talking about his political leanings, Elon Musk casually dropped a Tweet proclaiming he was buying Manchester United.

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    Many news outlets were quick to point out what Reuters said, namely that Musk has a history of “irreverent Tweets” – which is a nice way of saying potentially committing securities fraud via his Twitter account in a multitude of ways. 

    But the purchase of the well known English football club doesn’t seem too far out of reach for Musk, should he really want to buy it.

    The club, which is publicly traded (although Elon may not know that) and has been underperforming badly over the last year, only has a market cap of about $2 billion. This means Musk could easily offer a heavy premium, in cash, to try and get the deal pushed through.

    It could be even easier now that Musk has sold tens of billions of dollars worth Tesla stock over the last 2 weeks. Many people assumed that these sales were going to be used to settle his lawsuit with Twitter. Several billion dollars in cash for the purchase of Manchester United could have easily been part of Musk’s planned sales. 

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    Additionally, it was noted that 30,000 $14 call options with September expiration mysteriously went off last week ahead of the rumor.

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    On the other hand, it would probably take Elon about one month to demand any contract be voided after he discovers that all 11 ManU players on the field are merely bots.

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    Of course, when it’s all said and done, it’s all just another “pun” by the world’s richest man, but if anyone else of his standing, not to mention financial wherewithall, had said the same thing – whether seriously or in jest – there would be consequences. For Elon, however, there never are.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 23:20

  • Former IRS Whistleblower Says Middle Class Americans Will Be Targeted Under Inflation Reduction Act
    Former IRS Whistleblower Says Middle Class Americans Will Be Targeted Under Inflation Reduction Act

    Authored by Katabella Roberts via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    A detail of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) headquarters building is seen in the Federal Triangle section of Washington, on April 27, 2020. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

    A former Internal Revenue Service (IRS) whistleblower has said that the Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) will see the government target middle-income Americans with increased scrutiny and audits.

    William Henck previously worked as a lawyer for the IRS for 20 years until 2017, when he was terminated for allegedly revealing sensitive information to the media about how the IRS had reportedly failed to identify a multi-billion-dollar corporate tax credit scheme involving a source of energy known as burning pulp byproducts, or black liquor.

    Speaking to Fox Business, Henck disputed claims by the IRS and other officials who have said that increased funding for the agency under the IRA, which is set to be signed into law by President Joe Biden this week, would only lead to more audits for wealthy millionaires and billionaires and large corporations.

    “The idea that they’re going to open things up and go after these big billionaires and large corporations is quite frankly [expletive],” Henck said in the interview on Aug. 15. “It’s not going to happen. They’re going to give themselves bonuses and promotions and really nice conferences.”

    “The big corporations and the billionaires are probably sitting back laughing right now,” he said, adding that it was “insane” to double the IRS budget.

    Henck also said he believes that the agency will go after businesses that don’t have enough money to hire Washington lobbyists.

    (L-R) Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) leave the Senate Chamber after final passage of the Inflation Reduction Act at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Aug. 7, 2022. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

    ‘Absolutely Not’ Being Used to Target Middle-Income Americans

    The Democrat-controlled House passed the IRA in a strictly party-line vote on Aug. 12. It includes nearly $80 billion in IRS funding, including $45.6 billion for “enforcement.”

    A Treasury Department report from May 2021 (pdf) estimated that such an investment would enable the agency to hire roughly 87,000 employees by 2031.

    Amid mounting fears, the IRS has said it will “absolutely not” be using the extra money to increase audit scrutiny on small businesses or middle-income Americans.

    IRS Commissioner Charles Rettig stated in a letter to members of the Senate on Aug. 4 that the extra resources will instead serve to help the agency in “challenging” areas such as audits of large corporate and global high-net-worth taxpayers.

    “These resources are absolutely not about increasing audit scrutiny on small businesses or middle-income Americans,” Rettig wrote in the letter. “As we’ve been planning, our investment of these enforcement resources is designed around the Department of the Treasury’s directive that audit rates will not rise relative to recent years for households making under $400,000.”

    Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre have also doubled down on their rhetoric regarding reports about the extra funding being utilized to target middle-income Americans, stating that there would be no new audits for individuals earning less than $400,000 per year.

    Henck disagrees.

    ‘Unlimited Resources And No Accountability’

    “There will be considerable incentive to basically to shake down taxpayers, and the advantage the IRS has is they have basically unlimited resources and no accountability, whereas a taxpayer has to weigh the cost of accountants, tax lawyers—fighting something in tax court,” he told Fox Business.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 23:05

  • Biden Admin Refuses Release Of $7BN In Frozen Afghanistan Funds After Zawahiri Strike
    Biden Admin Refuses Release Of $7BN In Frozen Afghanistan Funds After Zawahiri Strike

    With this week marking a grim one-year anniversary of the Taliban takeover of Kabul, ending more than two decades of US and coalition occupation of the country in (now failed) attempts to prop up a national government, The Wall Street Journal reported Monday the White House will not release any of the $7 billion in Afghan central bank reserves still being held by the US.

    Prior talks with Taliban officials who sought to get the funds released as the population faces hunger and a post-war collapsed economy have also been suspended. Biden administration officials cited that a key factor in the decision to block funds indefinitely was that al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri was found to be living safely in Kabul. That is, until a CIA drone strike which reportedly killed the notorious al-Qaeda leader on July 31. 

    Afghans in food assistance line, via Yahoo News.

    However, it was revealed in the aftermath that the US has no DNA evidence or body proving that it was Zawahiri that was killed in the strike. The strong suggestion is of course that the Taliban allowed the AQ leader to take up residence in the Afghan capital soon after the US force withdrawal. 

    US Special Representative for Afghanistan Thomas West told the WSJ: “Needless to say, the Taliban’s sheltering of Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri reinforces deep concerns we have regarding diversion of funds to terrorist groups.”

    On the question of the Taliban accessing humanitarian aid for the population, West said, “We do not see recapitalization of the Afghan central bank as a near-term option,” adding that: “We do not have confidence that that institution has the safeguards and monitoring in place to manage assets responsibly.”

    Previously Biden has said he plans to give half of the $7 billion in seized Afghan assets to families of 9/11 victims, with the other half going to a trust fund for future humanitarian aid to the Afghan people. But with this latest announcement, even that option appears to be off the table given it would of necessity be the Taliban distributing the aid as the de facto authority should the funds ever be unblocked. 

    Months ago a United Nations statement warned that a dire food shortage crisis now threatens an “entire generation of Afghans” – with a report warning that up to 95% of the population is not getting enough to eat. Critics have decried the Biden admin’s decision as “theft” and unjust collective punishment: 

    “It is both morally condemnable and politically and economically reckless to impose collective punishment on an entire people for the actions of a government they did not choose,” reads a letter drafted by 70 economists and experts which was delivered to the White House last week.

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    The Taliban remains an internationally sanctioned entity, with an additional some $2 billion of Afghanistan’s funds having been frozen by other countries, following Washington’s lead.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 22:40

  • Neogone: Liz Cheney Voted Out Of Congress, Trump Takes Victory Lap
    Neogone: Liz Cheney Voted Out Of Congress, Trump Takes Victory Lap

    Update 2020ET: In a widely expected outcome, former President Donald Trump’s highest-profile GOP critic, Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming, has been voted out of Congress.

    Her challenger, Harriet Hageman, was ahead by more than 30% with 13% of the votes counted – enough for NBC News to call it for her.

    Wyoming Republican Harriet Hageman

    Cheney, the daughter of former vice president Dick Cheney, had been the #3 ranked Republican in the House – easily winning her last election in 2020. Things changed, however, when she became one of 10 Republicans that voted to impeach Trump – who Democrats accused of inciting the January 6th riot. She later joined the January 6th committee, on which she currently services as Vice Chair.

    And look at what happened to the rest of the anti-Trump Republicans who voted to impeach:

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    “Congratulations to Harriet Hageman on her great and very decisive WIN in Wyoming,” Trump said in a statement on Truth Social. “This is a wonderful result for America, and a complete rebuke of the Unselect Committee of political Hacks and Thugs. Liz Cheney should be ashamed of herself, the way she acted, and her spiteful, sanctimonious words and actions towards others. Now she can finally disappear into the depths of political oblivion where, I am sure, she will be much happier than she is right now. Thank you WYOMING!”

    *  *  *

    If recent polls are any indication, neocon Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) is about to lose her seat in today’s primaries, after going on a poorly-received crusade against former President Donald Trump.

    In one recent poll, Cheney challenger Harriet Hageman – who disputed the legitimacy of the 2020 US election – was leading Cheney by nearly 30 points. Of note, 70% of Wyoming voters chose Trump in 2020 – the highest percentage of any state in the nation.

    Cheney, 56, sparked conservative backlash against her by choosing to die on hill of election fraud and the January 6th committee, of which she’s the vice chair. Unsurprisingly, her warmongering father’s laughable campaign ad  in which he said there’s ‘never been a greater threat to our republic than Donald Trump’ didn’t do Liz any favors.

    “She’s almost certainly toast,” said American University political scientist, David Barker. “My guess is that she knew that the second she decided to really join the Jan. 6 committee and pursue the president in that way.”

    “She hasn’t just been kind of a passive member of the committee,” he added. “She’s been really leading the whole charge and doing so in the most provocative and high-profile ways.”

    Cheney doesn’t care

    “America cannot remain free if we abandon the truth. The lie that the 2020 presidential election was stolen is insidious — it preys on those who love their country,” she said in a closing argument campaign video released Thursday. “It is a door Donald Trump opened to manipulate Americans to abandon their principles, to sacrifice their freedom, to justify violence, to ignore the rulings of our courts and the rule of law.”

    “This is Donald Trump’s legacy, but it cannot be the future of our nation.”

    At least one supporter held out hope, according to the Associated Press.

    “I’m still hopeful that the polling numbers are wrong,” said Landon Brown, a Wyoming state representative and vocal Cheney ally. “It’ll be a crying shame really if she does lose. It shows just how much of a stranglehold that Donald Trump has on the Republican Party.”

    Her likely defeat on Tuesday has raised speculation over her next move – including a potential run for president in 2024, which she hasn’t ruled out.

    If one simply reads the room, however, it’s clear that Cheney would be up against a tide of Trump supporters, who largely view her as a traitor.

    “My sense is that if it is [her plan], she’s going to have a long wait,” said Bill Galston, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. “I don’t think that Donald Trump supporters will ever forgive her, nor do I think they’re going away.”

    “Where else would they go?”

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    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 22:24

  • 14 FBI Whistleblowers Have Come Forward: Rep. Jordan
    14 FBI Whistleblowers Have Come Forward: Rep. Jordan

    Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) speaks during the House Judiciary Committee oversight hearing on Policing Practices and Law Enforcement Accountability at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on June 10, 2020. (Michael Reynolds/Pool/Getty Images)

    Fourteen FBI whistleblowers have come forward to provide information to Republican congressional investigations, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) said on Aug. 14, about a week after the FBI raided former President Donald Trump’s Florida home.

    “Fourteen FBI agents have come to our office as whistleblowers, and they are good people,” Jordan told Fox News. “There are lots of good people in the FBI. It’s the top that is the problem.”

    “Some of these good agents are coming to us, telling us … what’s going on—the political nature now of the Justice Department … talking about the school board issue, about a whole host of issues,” he added.

    Two months ago, Jordan said that six FBI whistleblowers approached the committee. Two came forward about a memo related to alleged violence and intimidation at school board meetings and four in connection to the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol breach. In the Senate, meanwhile, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said in July that whistleblowers had come to his office to provide information, including disclosures relating to investigations into Hunter Biden’s overseas business dealings.

    “It’s becoming a well-worn trail of agents who say this has got to stop, and thank goodness for them and that American people recognize it, and I believe they’re going to make a big change on Nov. 8,” Jordan said, referring to the midterm elections.

    In June, Jordan sent a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray warning that several former FBI officials were coming forward, while alleging the agency is “purging” employees who have conservative views.

    “In one such example, the FBI targeted and suspended the security clearance of a retired war servicemember who had disclosed personal views that the FBI was not being entirely forthcoming about the events of January 6,” Jordan wrote in a statement. “The FBI questioned the whistleblower’s allegiance to the United States despite the fact that the whistleblower honorably served in the United States military for several years—including deployments in Kuwait and Iraq—valiantly earning multiple military commendation medals.”

    It comes as Republicans stepped up calls on Aug. 14 for the release of an FBI affidavit showing the justification for its seizure of documents at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 22:15

  • Smith & Wesson's CEO Blames Progressive Lawmakers "For Surge In Violence And Lawlessness" In US Cities
    Smith & Wesson’s CEO Blames Progressive Lawmakers “For Surge In Violence And Lawlessness” In US Cities

    Smith & Wesson CEO Mark Smith fired off a statement Monday, blaming “a number of politicians” for “the surge in violence and lawlessness” in US cities. 

    Smith blamed “politicians and their lobbying partners in the media” for pushing failed progressive policies that have contributed to the recent rise in violence.

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    He said, “some [lawmakers] have had the audacity to suggest that after they have vilified, undermined and defunded law enforcement for years, supported prosecutors who refuse to hold criminals accountable for their actions, overseen the decay of our country’s mental health infrastructure, and generally promoted a culture of lawlessness, Smith & Wesson and other firearm manufacturers are somehow responsible for the crime wave that has predictably resulted from these destructive policies.”

    “But they [lawmakers] are the ones to blame for the surge in violence and lawlessness, and they seek to avoid any responsibility for the crisis of violence they have created by attempting to shift the blame to Smith & Wesson, other firearm manufacturers and law-abiding gun owners,” Smith continued. 

    He said it was “no surprise that the cities suffering most from violent crime are the very same cities that have promoted irresponsible, soft-on-crime policies that often treat criminals as victims and victims as criminals. Many of these same cities also maintain the strictest gun laws in the nation.”

    Smith said politicians who push failed progressive policies scapegoat gun manufacturers: 

    “But rather than confront the failure of their policies, certain politicians have sought more laws restricting the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens…” 

    Smith made it clear that no Smith & Wesson firearm has broken into a home, assaulted a woman out for a late-night run in the city, and or carjacked an unsuspecting driver stopped at a traffic light. “Instead, Smith & Wesson provides these citizens with the means to protect themselves and their families,” he added.

    Smith’s statement comes two weeks after the US House Oversight Committee subpoenaed the 170-year company for data on the manufacture and sale of AR-15-style assault rifles. 

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 21:50

  • Toyota And World's Top Battery Maker Halt Factories In China Amid Drought-Induced Power Crisis
    Toyota And World’s Top Battery Maker Halt Factories In China Amid Drought-Induced Power Crisis

    Update (2130ET): Add Toyota Motor Corp. and Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., the world’s largest battery maker, to the growing list of companies shutting down factories in China’s Sichuan province as a drought-induced power crisis worsens, according to Bloomberg. 

    Toyota closed its plant in the provincial capital of Chengdu until Saturday, a company spokesperson said, while Contemporary Amperex halted operations at its lithium battery factory in Yibin. 

    Sichuan is one of China’s most populated provinces, with 80 million inhabitants, and is home to a major manufacturing hub heavily reliant on hydropower. 

    However, a heatwave and drought have caused reservoir levels to drop, resulting in declining power generation and forcing local authorities to ration power for factories. 

    The shutdowns add to a growing number in industries stemming from solar panels to aluminum smelting. Volkswagen AG said on Monday that its factory in Chengdu is affected by power shortages, but that it was only expecting slight delays in deliveries to customers. Foxconn Technology Co. also makes Apple iPads in the province, but said it was seeing only limited impact from the drought so far. -Bloomberg 

    The drought-induced power crisis is another excuse Beijing can use to explain why its economy falters. 

    * * * 

    China’s worst heatwave in decades is curbing hydropower generation in one of the country’s most populous provinces. Local authorities requested some factories in southwestern China to halt production to conserve electricity, adding to the financial pressures of an already rapidly slowing economy. 

    Workers at a factory in Chongqing last month. (AFP/Getty Images)

    Sichuan province has more than 80 million inhabitants and is home to a major manufacturing hub. The Washington Post said some factories had suspended production on request by the government due to high temperatures and drought, leading to declining water flows through local hydropower reservoirs. 

    Jin Xiandong, a spokesman for the National Development and Reform Commission, said on Tuesday that China has to increase coal-fired power output because of waning hydropower output. 

    China’s inland Sichuan province is a major manufacturing hub that produces consumer goods from electronics, furniture, and food. Also, it’s home to the world’s largest crystalline silicon solar cell producer.

    China Securities Journal said Foxconn’s plant in Sichuan that produces Apple products, such as iPads and Macs, wouldn’t be significantly impacted by power rationings. 

    The province is highly dependent on hydropower, and high temperatures that could last through the end of this month might indicate more power restrictions for manufacturing plants. 

    Fu Linghui, China’s National Bureau of Statistics spokesman, said the heatwave has sparked “adverse effects on economic operations,” adding that the economic recovery “has slowed down marginally.” 

    On Sunday, we noted that China’s central bank unexpectedly cut its key interest rates in a feeble attempt to prop up the failing economy weighed by Covid lockdowns, property downturn, and a crippling heatwave. The cut comes after July’s economic data was awful, pointing to an economic slowdown gaining momentum. 

    Further power cuts in Sichuan will result in more production suspension and dampen the country’s souring economic outlook.  

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 21:31

  • Eric Trump Says He’ll Release FBI Raid Surveillance Tape
    Eric Trump Says He’ll Release FBI Raid Surveillance Tape

    Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Donald Trump arrives at Trump Tower in N.Y. on Aug. 9, 2022, the day after FBI agents raided his Mar-a-Lago Palm Beach home, in Fla. (David ‘Dee’ Delgado/Reuters)

    Former President Donald Trump’s son Eric revealed that the family will release surveillance tapes that show FBI agents raiding his Mar-a-Lago property last week.

    “Will you—you still have the surveillance tape, is that correct? Will you—are you allowed to share that with the country?” Fox News host Sean Hannity asked Eric Trump on Monday night.

    The younger Trump replied, “Absolutely, Sean,” adding that the video will be released “at the right time.” He said that law enforcement officers, including FBI agents, should wear body cameras for total transparency.

    “That’s why cops wear body cams. They don’t tell you to turn off cameras—they want transparency, and that’s not what happened here,” Trump said, referring to the raid.

    In an interview with the Daily Mail last week, Eric Trump said that lawyers were told by FBI agents to turn off security cameras in Mar-a-Lago. But they didn’t, and a lawyer for Donald Trump, Alina Habba, later revealed that the former president and family watched the FBI raid via CCTV cameras last week.

    Another lawyer, Christina Bobb, told Real America’s Voice last week that surveillance cameras were turned off for a short period of time while the FBI agents spoke with the former president’s lawyers. However, she said the family saw “the whole thing,” referring to the raid, while they were in New York.

    Meanwhile, Bobb recalled to the outlet that she was “stuck in the parking lot” of Mar-a-Lago and was “there to collect paper and answer questions.”

    “The FBI and others from the Federal Government would not let anyone, including my lawyers, be anywhere near the areas that were rummaged and otherwise looked at during the raid on Mar-a-Lago,” former President Trump wrote on Truth Social last week.

    Unsealed Documents

    Following the raid, the Department of Justice and FBI have remained relatively tight-lipped about why the agents searched Mar-a-Lago or what they were investigating. Three days after the raid, Attorney General Merrick Garland told a news conference that he personally signed off on the FBI’s attempt to obtain a warrant, which was approved by U.S. Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart.

    Republicans and Trump have called on the agencies to unseal an affidavit in the case. The move would show why the FBI launched the raid.

    The warrant and property receipt were unsealed a day after Garland’s news conference, showing that FBI agents recovered several boxes of allegedly classified or top-secret documents and other material. It’s not clear what the documents entailed.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 21:25

  • Los Angeles 'Soros' DA Gascón Recall Fails
    Los Angeles ‘Soros’ DA Gascón Recall Fails

    Authored by Jack Bradley via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascon speaks at a press conference in Los Angeles on Dec. 8, 2021. (Robyn Beck/AFP via Getty Images)

    The effort to recall Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón failed to gather enough valid petition signatures, the county registrar’s office announced Aug. 15.

    The county Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk’s office counted 520,050 valid signatures, falling short of the required 566,857.

    Recall spokesman Tim Lineberger called the results “surprising and disappointing,” in a statement sent to The Epoch Times.

    [ZH: As noted two weeks ago, election observers weren’t allowed to view the count]

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    For the over half a million residents that placed valid signatures, Lineberger said, “To deprive them of the opportunity to restore public safety in their own communities is heartbreaking. And to interpret this in any other way other than a wholesale rejection of Gascon’s dangerous polices would be disingenuous, or naive at best.”

    Gascón’s campaign spokeswoman Elise Moore told The Epoch Times they were “glad to move forward from this attempted political power grab.”

    “The DA’s primary focus is and has always been keeping us safe and creating a more equitable justice system for all. Today’s announcement does not change that,” she said.

    Gascón wrote on Twitter Monday, “Rest assured LA County, the work hasn’t stopped. My primary focus has been & will always be keeping us safe & creating a more equitable justice system for all. I remain strongly committed to that work & to you.”

    Recall organizers submitted 715,833 signatures last month to the registrar’s office to force Gascón into a recall election. The county announced Monday that 195,783 of the signatures were invalid.

    Over 88,000 were invalidated because the person signing the petition was not a registered voter, and there were nearly 44,000 duplicate signatures, according to the county.

    The county’s former district attorney Steve Cooley sent a letter on Aug. 8 to the Los Angeles Board of Supervisors, alleging that the registrar’s office did not follow proper guidelines when verifying signatures for the campaign during the random sampling last month.

    In a random sampling of about 5 percent, or 35,793, of the signatures, the clerk validated about 27,983, which was less than 31,179, the minimum for the recall petition to be automatically validated without full verification.

    One of the guidelines, Cooley said, is ensuring that voters’ signatures on the recall petitions match their signatures on file with the registrar’s office.

    He said the recall campaign has “strong evidence” to believe the office didn’t follow state guidelines during the random sampling because of “the shockingly large rejection rate,” which was around 22 percent. In the general election in November 2018, the rejection rate of vote-by-mail ballots for non-matching signatures was 2 percent, he said.

    Under California law, he said, it is presumed that signatures on election petitions and ballots are matching and valid unless there is a “reasonable doubt” to believe otherwise.

    According to Dean Logan, who oversees the county elections office, the verification process is “highly regulated” and follows state guidelines and regulations.

    Monday marked the second failure of an effort to recall Gascón. A separate attempt last year was halted by organizers, who blamed poor timing and COVID-19 lockdowns.

    Gascón has been under fire since taking office in December 2020, when he issued a series of directives critics blasted as being soft on crime. The directives include a rule against seeking the death penalty, a ban on transferring juvenile defendants to adult court, and prohibitions on filing sentencing enhancements in most cases.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 20:35

  • Journalists File Lawsuit Against CIA Over Alleged Spying While They Met With Julian Assange
    Journalists File Lawsuit Against CIA Over Alleged Spying While They Met With Julian Assange

    A group of journalists and lawyers that previously worked with Julian Assange and WikiLeaks who say they were illegally spied on by US intelligence are suing the CIA and its former head Mike Pompeo. “The United States Constitution shields American citizens from U.S. government overreach even when the activities take place in a foreign embassy in a foreign country,” lead attorney for the plaintiffs, Richard Roth, said Monday in filing the lawsuit.

    “The lawsuit said that CIA under Pompeo violated the privacy rights of those American journalists and lawyers by allegedly spying on them,” Reuters reports of the legal action. “The plaintiffs include journalists Charles Glass and John Goetz and attorneys Margaret Kunstler and Deborah Hrbek, who have represented Assange.”

    Then CIA director under President Trump, Mike Pompeo, is at the center of the legal action and allegations. As is their normative practice, the CIA isn’t commenting publicly on the lawsuit – but it’s widely known and established that the CIA is barred by US laws from spying domestically or on US citizens.

    The CIA’s mandate, along with the rest of the US intelligence community, or IC, is exclusively foreign, with multiple scandals uncovered by 1970s into 1980s Congressional hearings (the Church Committee being foremost), resulting in attempts at greater legal safeguards to protect Americans as well as reign in major unapproved clandestine operations. 

    Monday’s lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, as Reuters details: 

    The filing said the journalists and lawyers were required to surrender their electronic devices to Undercover Global S.L., a private security company which at the time provided security to the embassy, before their visits to Assange. The lawsuit alleged the company copied that information and provided it to the CIA, which was then headed by Pompeo.

    This period in question was from Assange’s seven-year asylum stay at the Ecuadorian Embassy. In July of 2020 it was revealed in testimony at the Spanish National Court,  Audiencia Nacional, by at least four former employees Undercover Global SL that the security firm was spying on Assange and those who would come visit him, including his legal team. 

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    Multiple in-depth reports by investigative journalists subsequently exposed the outfit as essentially a front for the CIA, or essentially was secretly being contracted by the intelligence agency, to keep taps on Assange and his lawyers’ strategy for securing his release. This even included collecting surveillance footage of Assange and his family members from inside the embassy at that time, with bizarre efforts to collect DNA, including from his child’s diaper. 

    Spain’s El Pais for example detailed in 2020 that “David Morales, a former military official who owns the security firm Undercover Global SL, is under investigation by Spain’s High Court, the Audiencia Nacional, for spying on Assange’s meetings with his lawyers and allegedly handing information to the CIA.”

    “Morales suspected that a baby who was repeatedly brought into the embassy by Stephen Hoo, an actor friend of Assange’s who paid him regular visits, might really be the cyberactivist’s own child, and these visits were recorded.”

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    The report resulted in a major public scandal and outrage, with an outpouring of support from WikiLeaks, given “Morales even issued orders to steal the baby’s diapers to analyze the contents for DNA, although the task was never carried out.”

    “Reports were drawn up about Stella Morris and about Stephen Hoo, according to video and documentary material to which EL PAÍS has had access.” El Pais wrote further.

    Julian Assange in a still from one of the videos recorded inside the Ecuadorian embassy in London. via El Pais

    There have also been more recent revelations that Pompeo or other US officials may have greenlighted a ‘kidnap of kill’ mission if US operatives abroad ever got the chance to take out the WikiLeaks founder. Earlier this year a Spanish Court examining the allegations summoned Pompeo to explain and be questioned over the alleged plot; however, he refused the summons.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 20:10

  • Oberlin Faces New Controversy Over Islamic Scholar's Support Of The Rushdie Fatwa
    Oberlin Faces New Controversy Over Islamic Scholar’s Support Of The Rushdie Fatwa

    Authored by Jonathan Turley,

    It appears that Oberlin has another major controversy on its hand. For the last couple years, Oberlin has been embroiled in a fight with a small family-owned grocery that it defamed over a shoplifting case involving black students. Oberlin lost $25 million in a record verdict but Oberlin President Carmen Twillie Ambar continued to refuse to apologize. In the meantime, the school seems intent on running the 137-year-old grocery into insolvency as it delays paying on the judgment. Now the school is under fire over a faculty member, Mohammad Jafar Mahallati, who supported the fatwa against Salman Rushdie. The author of Satanic Verses is recovering from a savage knife attack. Hadi Matar, 24, is accused of carrying out the stabbing attack and has expressed support for Iran in the past. The campaign to have Mahallati fired could present some difficult free speech and academic freedom questions.

    Mahallati is a professor of religion and Islamic Studies and once served as the Islamic Republic’s ambassador at the United Nations.

    According to Fox News.com, Mahallati was asked in 1989 about the “right to put a bounty on someone’s head” and responded “I think all Islamic countries agree with Iran. All Islamic nations and countries agree with Iran that any blasphemous statement against sacred figures should be condemned.” He then added insult to injury:

    “I think if Western countries really believe and respect freedom of speech, therefore they should also respect our freedom of speech. We certainly use that right in order to express ourselves, our religious belief, in the case of any blasphemous statement against sacred Islamic figures.”

    It was a familiar misrepresentation of free speech values. Islamic countries have long claimed that banning speech or killing those who engage in blasphemous speech is a form of free speech.

    The Iranian view of free speech shows the extreme end of the slippery slope of relativism in free speech. We have been debating this increasingly common claim that shutting down speech is free speech. At the University of California campus, professors actually rallied around a professor who physically assaulted pro-life advocates and tore down their display.  When conservative law professor Josh Blackman was stopped from speaking about “the importance of free speech,”  CUNY Law Dean Mary Lu Bilek insisted that disrupting the speech on free speech was free speech. (Bilek later cancelled herself and resigned after an inappropriate comment in a faculty meeting).

    In this case, Iran issued a fatwa supporting the killing of Rushdie and offering a huge reward. Ultimately, two of his translators were knifed, one fatally.  Supporting a fatwa is an exercise of free speech. Acting on a fatwa to harm someone is a crime.

    Critics, however, insist that Mahallati was a high-ranking official supporting this state action.  Nevertheless, I still believe that a professor has the right to voice unpopular and frankly shocking positions in such controversies. I have defended faculty who have made similarly disturbing comments “detonating white people,” denouncing police, calling for Republicans to suffer,  strangling police officers, celebrating the death of conservatives, calling for the killing of Trump supporters, supporting the murder of conservative protesters and other outrageous statements. I also defended the free speech rights of University of Rhode Island professor Erik Loomis, who defended the murder of a conservative protester and said that he saw “nothing wrong” with such acts of violence.

    A more serious allegation has surfaced over a 2018 Amnesty International report accusing Mahallati of carrying out “crimes against humanity” for covering up the massacre of at least 5,000 Iranian dissidents in 1988. That is conduct or action by Mahallati that would raise grounds over his fitness as a member of a faculty. Yet, he has denied that allegation and Oberlin said that it has investigated and rejected it.

    If the school has previously investigated the matter, it should be treated as closed absent new evidence. We recently saw the reopening of an investigation at Princeton as a pretext to fire a controversial faculty member.

    On what we know, it would seem that Mahallati would be protected under free speech and academic principles despite his reported anti-free speech views.

    Of course, it does not take away from the grotesque position that he has taken. Ironically, his faculty page discusses how he “developed innovative courses with interdisciplinary approach to friendship and forgiveness studies and also initiated the Oberlin annual Friendship Day Festival.” His personal website further states his research is “focused on the ethics of peacemaking in Islam in the context of comparative religions.”

    Nothing says ethics and peace more than a lethal fatwa targeting dissenting authors.

    As for Iran, it denies any involvement in the attack but added its own sense of offense at being criticized. Instead, it again attacked Rushdie.

    Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani said “We, in the incident of the attack on Salman Rushdie in the U.S., do not consider that anyone deserves blame and accusations except him and his supporters.” He added that the West “condemning the actions of the attacker and in return glorifying the actions of the insulter to Islamic beliefs is a contradictory attitude.”

    It is strikingly similar to Mahallati’s statement back in 1989. Only in the most twisted view of free speech (and logic) would there be a contradiction in condemning the attempted murder of an author while supporting the author’s right to express his views.

    Few academics would support Iran’s blood-soaked interpretation of free speech. However, we need to address the creeping relativism that is sweeping across our campus. A recent poll was released by 2021 College Free Speech Rankings after questioning a huge body of 37,000 students at 159 top-ranked U.S. colleges and universities. It found that sixty-six percent of college students think shouting down a speaker to stop them from speaking is a legitimate form of free speech.  Another 23 percent believe violence can be used to cancel a speech. That is roughly one out of four supporting violence.

    Faculty and editors are now actively supporting modern versions of book-burning with blacklists and bans for those with opposing political views. Others are supporting actual book burning. Columbia Journalism School Dean Steve Coll has denounced the “weaponization” of free speech, which appears to be the use of free speech by those on the right. As millions of students are taught that free speech is a threat and that “China is right” about censorship, these figures are shaping a new society in their own intolerant images.

    It is the subject of my recent publication in the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy. The article entitled “Harm and Hegemony: The Decline of Free Speech in the United States.”

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 19:45

  • Record Number Of Homebuyers Walk Away From Contracts As Builders Reel Amid Glut Of Unsold Houses
    Record Number Of Homebuyers Walk Away From Contracts As Builders Reel Amid Glut Of Unsold Houses

    Between cratering homebuilder and homerbuyer confidence…

    … record low home affordability…

    … a record number of new listing with price cuts (amid the collapse in demand).

    … plunging housing starts…

    … and so on, as the recent surge in mortgage rates has effectively pushed the housing market into a recession, which is now so widespread that 63,000 home-purchase agreements were called off in July, equal to 16% of homes that went under contract that month. According to Redfin, that’s the highest percentage on record, and only the brief spike during the covid crash – which the promptly reversed – was worse. It’s up from a revised rate of 15% one month earlier and 12.5% one year earlier.

    The housing market is slowing as higher mortgage rates sideline many prospective homebuyers. With competition declining, the house hunters who are still in the market are enjoying newfound bargaining power, a striking contrast from just a few months ago, when buyers often had to pull out every stop in order to win. Today’s buyers are more likely to utilize contract contingencies that allow them to back out without financial penalty if something goes wrong. And with an increasing number of homes to choose from, they’re also more likely to call a deal off if a seller refuses to bring the price down or make requested repairs—a situation that has become increasingly common given that sellers are still adjusting to the cooling market.

    “Homes are sitting on the market longer now, so buyers realize they have more options and more room to negotiate. They’re asking for repairs, concessions and contingencies, and if sellers say no, they’re backing out and moving on because they’re confident they can find something better,” said Heather Kruayai, a Redfin real estate agent in Jacksonville, FL. “Buyers are also skittish because they’re afraid a potential recession could cause home prices to drop. They don’t want to end up in a situation where they purchase a home and it’s worth $200,000 less in two years, so some are opting to wait in hopes of buying when prices are lower.”

    Alexis Malin, another Redfin agent in Jacksonville, warns that there’s no guarantee buyers will be able to find better deals in the future. Annual home-price growth has started to slow—to 8% today from 17% a year ago—but prices are still on the rise and Redfin economists don’t expect them to crash.

    “Some buyers who are backing out of deals have this mindset that the market is crashing and they’ll be able to get a home for $100,000 less in six months. That’s not necessarily the case,” she said. “Homes in many parts of Florida are still selling for a pretty penny, so I warn my buyers that the grass might not actually be greener on the other side.”

    Some buyers may also be backing out due to 5%-plus mortgage rates. Those who started their search months ago, when rates were closer to 3%, may be realizing the type of home they wanted before is now out of budget since monthly mortgage payments have soared nearly 40% year over year.

    “Home-purchase cancellations may begin to taper off as sellers get used to a slower-paced market,” said Redfin Deputy Chief Economist Taylor Marr. “Sellers have already begun to lower their prices after putting their homes on the market. They’ll likely start pricing their properties lower from the get-go and become increasingly open to negotiations.”

    And just to confirm how bad the US housing market is, even the morbidly slow rating agency Fitch Ratings said the likelihood of a severe downturn in US housing has increased (although since rating agencies are never allowed to rock the boat, it said that its rating case scenario provides for a more moderate pullback that includes a mid-single-digit decline in housing activity in 2023, and further pressure in 2024.) Fitch also notes that although it recently affirmed the ratings and Stable Outlooks for our US homebuilder portfolio, “ratings could face pressure under a more pronounced downturn scenario that would likely include housing activity falling roughly 30%, or more, over a multi-year period and 10% to 15% declines in home prices.”

    * *  *

    The biggest losers from the latest housing crash aren’t sellers however, but rather homebuilders, who are suddenly finding themselves with a glut of unsold houses.

    As Bloomberg notes, with this year’s surge in mortgage rates tossing buyers to the sidelines, the waitlists for new houses are gone  and new-home sellers – such as Kevin Brown, who works just south of Houston, are on the front lines of a massive shift. While Brown used to have back-to-back appointments, buyers now just trickle in to his Saratoga Homes sales office. Meanwhile, he’s got 55 houses under construction and five that are complete, all without deals.

    “There’s a bit of pressure on us,” Brown said. “Builders have got to hit goals and make their profit, and they don’t like inventory just sitting on the ground.”

    An abrupt halt to the pandemic housing boom has left builders that started construction months ago scrambling to adapt. The US supply of new homes relative to sales in June was the highest since the midst of the last crash in 2010. And by early July, buyer traffic to homebuilder websites and sales offices had plunged to the lowest level for the month since 2012, according to a survey of builder sentiment from the National Association of Home Builders.

    New Homes sales signs line a road near Rosharon, Texas/BBG

    The new-home pile up underscores a broader shift that’s wreaking havoc in the market. A national housing shortage contributed to years of bidding wars and desperation among buyers who bid up prices to record levels for fear of missing out. But this year’s surge in borrowing costs has now pushed affordability to a breaking point and eased some of the scarcity.

    At the same time, the stage is set for longer-term supply constraints as builders pull back. A decade of underbuilding and a bulging population of young people aging into homeownership threatens to prolong the affordability squeeze.

    “Despite the fact that there aren’t enough housing units in the country, builders are not willing to take the gamble that’s required to build them,” said Jerry Howard, chief executive officer of the homebuilders group. “They’re afraid that, in a recessionary environment, they won’t be able to sell them.”

    In June, 824,000 single-family homes were under construction in the US, more than at any time since October 2006, according to an NAHB analysis of government data. Unsold inventory has ballooned in part because of supply-chain disruptions and labor constraints that created bottlenecks in the production pipeline.

    Now, with the economy entering a recession, or already in one, builders are cutting back on starts, trying to avoid having too many completed homes sitting empty. They’re also applying for fewer building permits, which for single-family homes fell in June to a two-year low, according to data from the government.

    Not every market is cooling fast. But the change is stark in the pandemic boomtowns where builders piled in to meet demand for out-of-state arrivals, who often bid up prices beyond the reach of locals.

    “It has become a very competitive market for builders where they are trying to offload any standing inventory,” said Ali Wolf, chief economist for Zonda, which tracks new-home production. “We may see a period where supply may actually exceed demand for a while in some of the markets that were the most feverish over the past two years.”

    Boise, Idaho, is one of those areas where a pandemic bubble is bursting. Remote workers arrived from pricier states such as California, seeking open spaces and fewer virus restrictions. But now Covid restlessness is giving way to fears that the Federal Reserve’s cure for inflation — higher rates — will tip the US into a recession.

    Idaho’s biggest builder, CBH Homes, has had about a third of buyers cancel contracts in the past few months, nearly twice the level at the start of the year, according to Corey Barton, the company’s president. He’s got 200 unsold finished homes, compared with 75 at the end of last year, and said he’ll probably surpass the 350 he was left with after the last crash 15 years ago. In a sense the inventory was there all along — it was just hidden, he says.

    Builders had been deliberately holding back houses, waiting until they were a couple months from completion before releasing them for sale. That’s because they couldn’t build fast enough to meet sky-high demand. By waiting, they could charge the current market price as materials costs climbed.

    But now, the market is getting flooded with listings, Barton said. Homes are finishing or are getting listed earlier in the construction process.

    Meanwhile, CBH has cut starts by about half. Subcontractors involved in the early stages of construction, digging out basements or pouring foundations are already feeling it, he said.

    “The movement from out of state caused a false market,” Barton said. “We have to accept things for the way they are. It’s going to get tough.”

    Builders of new homes find themselves in an especially trick spot, because while most traditional sellers can afford to wait or even postpone a sale if conditions deteriorate, builders will have to discount until they find the market-clearing price, said Benjamin Keys, a real estate professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School.

    “The homebuilders have an understandable incentive to pull back right now and Americans need more affordable housing,” Keys said.

    At Saratoga Homes’s Glendale Lakes sales office, marketing director Christina Nuon said she’s making cold calls to agents and hosting happy hour events to boost sales. The company has a menu of incentives to bring down costs for its entry-level buyers, from $12,000 toward closing costs to a subsidized 30-year mortgage rate of just under 4%.

    “Buying down rates, it’s kind of going to be our incentive probably from now on out,” Nuon said. “Just because that’s the only way we can help buyers. We can’t reduce the price any lower.”  

    Brown, the sales consultant, says the incentives have helped put a dent in inventory: “I am trying to find one buyer at a time,” he said, “and not get overwhelmed by what I have coming up.”

    He worries that at the end of a potential recession, continued underbuilding will help keep prices elevated.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 18:55

  • Minneapolis Public Schools Promise To Layoff White Teachers Before Cutting "Educators Of Color"
    Minneapolis Public Schools Promise To Layoff White Teachers Before Cutting “Educators Of Color”

    A good teacher is a good teacher, regardless of skin color.  That said, by extension, a bad teacher is also still a bad teacher regardless of skin color.  If you want to find true racism in the western world, remove all questions of meritocracy and seek out people who promote “equity”- They are the real racists.  

    According to a new report, a deal struck between MPS and the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT) to end a two-week strike includes a provision that requires schools to lay off or reassign white teachers before taking the same action with “educators of color.”  The provisions were labeled “educator of color protections.”

    The report said that if a non-white teacher is the subject of “excess” (a term used to describe cutting a position) school districts must instead lay off the least senior white teacher. The proposal will go into effect next spring.

    Here we see the true nature of “equity and diversity” in action – It’s not about equality, it’s about special treatment and privileges based on skin color.  It’s the exact opposite of what the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s called for.  Imagine if today a teacher’s union demanded that a school district fire all black and brown teachers before firing white teachers, regardless of performance?  There would be riots in the streets.  

    The ignorance of equity is not limited to Minneapolis, it is widespread and flowing like a poison into every corner of our society.  It’s important to keep in mind also that the teachers unions making these demands are made up of the same people that are likely in charge of educating your children.  What kind of lessons do you think they are providing to all those young and easily influenced minds?

    Should people of color be conditioned to expect special treatment?  Are they entitled to it because of the the unfairness of the world a century or more ago?  It’s a world they never lived, and a world that was unfair to many white people as well, so how do we divvy up reparations and privileges when there is no way to account for who deserves them?

    The only legitimate form of fairness is merit.  It’s the only system that works.  Minneapolis teachers should be judged based on performance, not the supposed crimes against their ancestors.  The equity ideology is utterly insane when we consider the level of future pain caused by keeping the worst people in the best positions based on skin color alone.  The decline in work ethic and productivity will be staggering unless diversity quotas are ignored and only one factor is taken into account:  Can they do their job well – Are they the best at their job, or are they the worst?  Nothing else matters.         

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 18:30

  • Congressman: "Tyranny" Is Coming "Right Into Everyone's Living Room Very Very Shortly"
    Congressman: “Tyranny” Is Coming “Right Into Everyone’s Living Room Very Very Shortly”

    Authored by Steve Watson via Summit News,

    GOP Pennsylvania Representative Scott Perry warned Sunday that everyday Americans should now plan for “tyranny” to enter their homes in the form of federal agents if they refuse to play nice with the authorities.

    Perry, the House Freedom Caucus chair, revealed how the FBI recently seized his phone, just hours after the feds raided President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago complex.

    “A day after the raid on the president’s home FBI agents showed up when I was traveling with my family, my wife and our two small children, my in-laws, extended family,” Perry stated in an appearance on Fox News.

    The Congressman related how the feds “showed up and demanded my cell phone they said they were going to image it they were not going to search it and and then they eventually did return it.” 

    Perry, who sits on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, further declared to “have always supported law enforcement. I always have, we have revered the FBI, but this is an abuse of power.”

    “There’s been no accountability,” Perry continued, explaining that “James Comey, the director of the FBI used classified information improperly to get a second special counsel, no, no, no accountability for that.”

    “Whether it’s John Eastman, whether it’s Scott Perry, whether it’s President Trump, and with passing a bill that will pay for hiring of 87,000 IRS agents, tyranny is going to come right into everyone’s living room very, very shortly,” Perry proclaimed.

    While the 87,000 figure is disputed, the Senate last week approved nearly $80 billion in IRS funding, with $45.6 billion for “enforcement”.

    “This is about intimidating anyone who refuses to bend the knee to the narrative,” the Congressman further warned.

    “This is an abuse of power,” Perry claimed, “and of course they’re using these taxes tactics to intimidate people to coerce people.”

    Referring to Hillary Clinton, Perry said “People that BleachBit their their phones and hit him with hammers, smash them with hammers and those types of things have something to hide. People that keep the same phone a year and a half after the election aren’t worried about what’s on their phone, and so that’s me, but apparently they want to destroy me politically.”

    “Anybody that doesn’t bend the knee, that isn’t intimidated, that isn’t parroting the narrative is now subject to these kind of third world Banana Republic tactics politically,” Perry stressed.

    Elsewhere during the interview, Perry told viewers that “It should be pretty apparent to anybody that’s been alive for the past 5 years that the Biden family is completely compromised by the Communist Party of China.”

    * * *

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    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 18:05

  • 72% Of Millennials Have Regrets About Homes They Overpaid Or Settled For In 2021 And 2022
    72% Of Millennials Have Regrets About Homes They Overpaid Or Settled For In 2021 And 2022

    As new inventory is finally starting to hit the market and demand has temporarily slowed down thanks to rising rates, the housing expansion between March 2020 and now is still very likely to go down in history as blowing unprecedented amounts of air into an unprecedented bubble.

    And now we have the data to show it. A new online survey commissioned by Anytime Estimate and Clever Real Estate has shed light on how much millennials paid for homes during this period, and the answer likely isn’t going to surprise you: more than any other generation, ever. 

    This is why it is no surprise to hear that more than 70% of millennials have regrets about their purchases. 

    1,001 total people who reported having bought a home in 2021 or 2022 were surveyed between July 6th and 9th this year, answering up to 21 questions about their buying experience. 

    The study found that few millennials actually came away with their dream homes, especially first time buyers, who made up 70% of all buyers in 2021 and 2022. First-timers paid a median of $510,000 for a home in 2021 and 2022 — about 13% more than the $450,000 that repeat buyers paid, the report found. 

    Here are some of the additional statistics the study returned (emphasis ours):

    • 70% of buyers in 2021–2022 bought a home for the first time. Among new buyers, one-third (33%) thought the process was more difficult than expected.
    • Nearly 1 in 4 buyers (22%) were not satisfied with their home-buying experience.
    • Survey respondents paid a median amount of $495,000 for their home — about 15% more than the national median of $428,700.
    • Almost one-third of buyers (31%) paid over asking price. The median amount buyers paid over the listing price was $65,000.
    • 80% of buyers made more than one offer, with 41% making five or more.
    • More than 1 in 3 buyers (36%) made an offer on a home sight unseen.
    • 1 in 3 buyers spent three months looking for a home, while 1 in 8 spent six months or more.
    • 80% of home buyers had to compromise on their priorities.
    • The No. 1 priority for half of buyers (50%) was finding a home in a good neighborhood, but 1 in 5 (20%) settled for a home in a worse location.
    • Three-fourths of home buyers (72%) have regrets about their home purchase, with 1 in 3 (30%) saying they spent too much money.
    • More than half of buyers (55%) bought a fixer-upper, but 1 in 4 (24%) regret it.
    • 1 in 10 buyers paid for their home in cash, with nearly half of all-cash buyers (43%) saying they make enough money to afford it.
    • But 29% of all-cash buyers had to withdraw money from savings, and 27% had to borrow funds from their investments.
    • Of those who financed, 40% of buyers put down less than or equal to 20% on their home.

    And perhaps most notably, 3 in 4 homebuyers (72%) have regrets about their purchase, the survey found.

    When we see a statistic like that we can’t help but that 3 in 4 people will likely be eager to turn around and put their house on the market quicker than normal when the tide in the market starts to go out. 

    You can read Anytime Estimate’s full survey results here. 

    Research by Anytime Estimate’s Data Center has been cited by The New York Times, CNBC, MarketWatch, NPR, Apartment Therapy, Yahoo Finance, Black Enterprise, and more.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 17:40

  • Musk Among Guests At McCarthy Fundraiser For Challenger To "Pariah" Liz Cheney
    Musk Among Guests At McCarthy Fundraiser For Challenger To “Pariah” Liz Cheney

    Elon Musk is on the guest list for a Wyoming event hosted by Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) for “members, donors and candidates,” though the GOP leader wouldn’t confirm or deny Musk’s attendance.

    “I’m not going to talk about that,” he told Bloomberg in a telephone interview from his Teton Village, WY hotel room.

    McCarthy notably threw support behind Liz Cheney challenger Harriet Hageman early in the conservative lawyer’s campaign. The two face a primary election today.

    Musk, whose SpaceX has operations in McCarthy’s Bakersfield, California-area district, has donated to Republican and Democratic candidates and campaign committees since making his first contribution in 2003. His biggest investment, some $128,900, has been in committees connected with McCarthy. He’s also become increasingly vocal on political issues.

    The event at a resort in Teton Village, not far from Cheney’s home, is another illustration of how much of a pariah the state’s lone House representative has become within the Republican Party because of her vocal and persistent criticism of former President Donald Trump over his role in the insurrection at the US Capitol. -Bloomberg

    As Bloomberg notes, it’s unusual for a party leader to actively campaign against an incumbent, highlighting how much of a pariah Cheney has become since taking up the mantle against former President Trump while on the January 6th committee.

    McCarthy, meanwhile, hopes to become Speaker of the House if the GOP retake the chamber in November midterms.

    In an interview, he said that he’s confident Hageman will defeat Cheney, and “is going to be a great representative” for Wyoming. He’s already carved out a position for Hageman on the Natural Resources Committee, according to the report.

    Hageman also has the support of former President Donald Trump – after stepping up verbal attacks of Cheney and her prominent role on the House committee investigating the January 6th riot.

    Cheney has also accused Trump of trying to “steal the last election using lies and violence to keep himself in power.”

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 17:15

  • WTI Rises After API Shows Huge Gasoline Draw
    WTI Rises After API Shows Huge Gasoline Draw

    Speaking on CNBC, Goldman’s head of commodity strategy, Jeff Currie explained why the lower the price of oil drops, the higher it will jump because – all else equal – as demand for oil rises thanks to lower prices without enough supply to match, inventories will shrink far faster and tank bottom will be hit well before the NBER admits a recession has arrived. A similar development took place in Jan 2007 more than a year before the 2008 recession… but not before oil soared to an all time high. This time won’t be any different, and an early glimpse of how the spike in demand will translate into lower inventories came moments ago from the American Petroleum Institute (API) which reported a draw this week for crude oil of 448,000 barrels, while analysts predicted a far smaller draw of 117,000 barrels.

    • Crude: -448K, Exp. -117K
    • Gasoline: -4.480MM, Exp. -1.1MM
    • Distillates: -759K
    • Cushing:  +250K

    In the week prior, OilPrice reminds us that the API reported a surprise build in crude oil inventories of 2.156 million barrels after analysts had predicted a draw of 400,000 barrels. Of course, a big part of the delta is the continued drain of the Biden Strategic Midterm Reserve: the latest draw comes as the Department of Energy released another 3.4 million barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserves in week ending August 12, to 461.2 million barrels.

    US crude inventories have shed some 61 million barrels since the start of 2021, with a 1.7 million barrel gain since the start of 2020, according to API data.  US crude oil production data for the week ending August 5 rose 100,000 bpd to 12.2 million bpd, according to the latest weekly EIA data.  

    WTI was trading down on Tuesday on disappointing economic data out of China and the improving prospects of reaching a nuclear deal with Iran.

    The API also reported a draw in gasoline inventories this week of 4.480 million barrels for the week ending Aug 12, compared to the previous week’s 627,000-barrel draw. Distillate stocks saw a draw of 759,000 barrels for the week, compared to last week’s 1.376-million-barrel increase. Cushing inventories rose by 250,000 barrels this week. Last week, the API saw a build of 910,000 barrels. Official EIA Cushing inventories for week ending August 5 was 25.189 million barrels, up from 24.466 million barrels in the prior week.

    At 5:00 pm ET, WTI was trading down at $87.13 (-2.55%), with Brent trading down at $92.71. In a few weeks, both will be trading far higher.

     

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 17:12

  • He's Baaack: Andreessen Horowitz Backs WeWork Founder Adam Neumann's Latest Real Estate Project
    He’s Baaack: Andreessen Horowitz Backs WeWork Founder Adam Neumann’s Latest Real Estate Project

    In case you’re wondering if the bubble has finally “burst” enough to remove detritus like Adam Neumann from the investing atmosphere, the answer appears to be a resounding “no”.

    That’s because Neumann – famous for taking hundreds of millions in compensation, a botched IPO and overseeing more than $10 billion in WeWork valuation disappear into thin air – is now once again being enabled invested in by Andreessen Horowitz.

    And guess what? Neumann’s latest venture just happens to be in residential real estate.

    The company, called Flow, comes in the wake of WeWork’s IPO attempt nearly marking the market top prior to Covid. Andreessen Horowitz stood up for Neumann in a blog post this week, calling his efforts at WeWork “often under appreciated”. It said it loves “seeing repeat-founders build on past successes by growing from lessons learned,” according to CNBC. 

    The details on the company are few and far between, other than it is supposed to launch in 2023. The New York Times described the company as “effectively a service that landlords can team up with for their properties, somewhat similar to the way an owner of a hotel might contract with a branded hotel chain to operate the property.”

    “Exact details of the business plan could not be learned,” the New York Times wrote. What could go wrong?

    Andreessen Horowitz co-founder and general partner Marc Andreessen wrote on a blog post this week: “In a world where limited access to home ownership continues to be a driving force behind inequality and anxiety, giving renters a sense of security, community, and genuine ownership has transformative power for our society.”

    He continued: “We think it is natural that for his first venture since WeWork, Adam returns to the theme of connecting people through transforming their physical spaces and building communities where people spend the most time: their homes.”

    “We are thrilled by the scope and aspiration of this project,” Andreessen said. “It is not lacking in vision or ambition, but only projects with such lofty goals have a chance at changing the world.”

    Sure, that sounds nice. So did the idea of shared office space. We can’t wait to see the financial reality of this project, not to mention in 2023, when rates will have been their highest in nearly a decade. 

    Here’s a preview of the pitch deck…

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

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 16:50

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Aug 16

Today’s News 16th August 2022

  • Nuclear Deal Increasingly Unlikely As Iran Strengthens Ties With Russia
    Nuclear Deal Increasingly Unlikely As Iran Strengthens Ties With Russia

    By Simon Watkins of OilPrice.com

    There are several reasons to be short crude oil currently – economic recession in the U.S. and looming recessions in Europe, ongoing lockdowns in China, the vested interest of the U.S. in keeping oil below US$75 per barrel of Brent, to name but three – but the prospect of an imminent new ‘nuclear deal’ between the West and Iran is not one of them.

    It is true that the European Union (EU) last week tabled a ‘final text’ of a new iteration of the nuclear deal – the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) – to Washington and Tehran. However, it is equally true, as conveyed at length and exclusively to OilPrice.com last week by several senior political and oil industry sources close to proceedings, that there is virtually no chance of such a deal being done without a massive concession coming from Iran that it is impossible to see the current regime making.

    “Nothing has changed in the past few months from when the U.S. decided that Iran was just trying to buy time for its nuclear weapons development program by continuing to submit new clauses to the text of the new version of the JCPOA agreement,” a senior energy source who worked closely with Iran’s Petroleum Ministry, told OilPrice.com.

    “And Washington has told everyone else in the P5+1 group [the U.S., the U.K., France, China, and Russia ‘plus’ Germany] that it will not budge from its position on the IRGC, which is aimed – as Iran knows – at destroying the IRGC’s influence, and by extension Iran’s influence – in the world,” he said.

    “As far as the U.S. is concerned, everything is now focused on ensuring that Iran does not get the three months it needs to finish the guidance systems it requires, with the help of Russia, to deliver weapons-grade nuclear material in the missiles it already has,” he added.

    A cementing of the U.S. view that “we are not going to change a single word or add a single comma in the current draft [of the new version of the JCPOA] on the table” – as a senior European Union energy source told OilPrice.com last week – came on 9 August with the launch of Iran’s ‘Khayyam’ satellite, built almost entirely by Russia and powered into orbit from the Russia-controlled Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. According to Iran, the satellite will be “used to monitor Iran’s borders and improve the country’s capabilities in management and planning in the fields of agriculture, natural resources, environment, mining, and natural disasters.” According to the U.S., the satellite is to be used for spying on its neighbors. Neither statement is entirely true, although the U.S. did hint at how serious it is when a State Department spokesman said last week of the Khayyam launch: “Russia deepening an alliance with Iran is something that the whole world should look at and see as a profound threat.”

    What the Khayyam satellite was launched for is to provide the final piece of the missile guidance systems that Russia and Iran have been working on for years – this one relating to improving the accuracy of missiles (by up to 25 percent for short- and medium-range missiles and by up to 70 percent for long-range missiles) according to the Iranian source. During those past few years, Iran has sent several very small (50 kilograms or less) satellites of its own making into orbit, although none of them had the relative operational sophistication of the Russian-made Khayyam satellite (which weighs over half a tonne) launched last week. Prior to the launch of the Khayyam, there were five failed launches in a row for the ‘Simorgh’ program, which involved the same type of array as the Khayyam – a rocket launched that also carries a satellite (Khayyam was launched using a Russian Soyuz-2.1b rocket booster). Attempts by Iran to lunch more larger and more operationally sophisticated satellites – like Khayyam – have previously met with ‘unexplained’ setbacks, including most notably in recent times a massive fire at the Imam Khomeini Spaceport in February 2019 that also killed three key Iranian figures in its ‘satellite’ program. 

    This latest advance by Iran in its quest to be able to deliver a fully functioning nuclear warhead to anywhere within a few-thousand-mile radius should come as no surprise, given that the same sponsor for North Korea’s nuclear program – China – is the key state sponsor of Iran, as analyzed in depth in my latest book on the global oil markets. After the landmark 25-year deal was struck in August 2019 between Iran and China – a story exclusively broken by me in September 2019, nearly two years before it was officially announced or reported on by anyone else – China (and Russia) gradually and quietly began to increase their cooperation on key elements of Iran’s nuclear weapons development program. In China’s case, the level of intermediation between middle-men connected to it and to North Korea and Iran was stepped up using a triangular system of technology supplies (from China to North Korea via middlemen, and then from North Korea to Iran), and payment principally in oil (from Iran to North Korea, with some also sent from Iran to China directly). Russia had agreed to take a back seat to China in Iran’s nuclear weapons program in the year or two after the 25-year China-Iran deal had actually been made (in August 2019), but shifted back to a front seat position from September 2021 (when it began to activate its plan to invade Ukraine), as China remains wary of overtly challenging the U.S. outside its own perceived area of influence in the Taiwan Strait.

    Iran and Russia still need “two to three months to finalise its overall missile guidance system,” according to the sources spoken to by OilPrice.com last week, although it already has a vast array of missiles already in place with varying range applications. This leaves the nuclear material itself for the warheads as the third element it needs to line up before it rates as a clear and present nuclear threat. According to the 30 May 2022 report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA): “Due to the growth of Iran’s 60 percent enriched uranium stocks, Iran has crossed a dangerous new threshold: its breakout timeline is now at zero. It has enough 60 percent enriched uranium, or highly enriched uranium [HEU] in the form of uranium hexafluoride [UF6] to be assured it could fashion directly a nuclear explosive. If Iran wanted to further enrich its 60 percent HEU up to 90 percent HEU, typically called weapon-grade uranium [WGU], used in Iran’s known nuclear weapons designs, it could do so within weeks utilizing only a few advanced centrifuge cascades.”

    Given this, it could be argued that bringing Iran back into the fold of global diplomatic relations by agreeing to a new iteration of the nuclear deal might be the way forward. However, for Washington, it appears that an inflection point has been reached in the Oval Office over the JCPOA in which, as OilPrice.com has been told: “We are not going to change a single word or add a single comma in the current draft [of the new version of the JCPOA] on the table.” The only thing that the U.S. will now accept from Iran is – in essence – the neutering of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), which it is seeking to do via Iran signing up to the regulations of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) and then to becoming a fully-regulated and constantly-monitored FATF member. 

    With its 40 active criteria and mechanisms in place to prevent money laundering (an activity that is vital to the IRGC’s activities across the world) and nine criteria and mechanisms in place to do the same for the financing of terrorism and related activities (a core of the IRGC’s role in promoting Iran’s brand of Islam around the globe), the FATF has swingeing powers to wield against individuals, companies, or countries who transgress any of its standards and is extremely aggressive in using them by degrees, depending on whether the sanctioned entity is on its ‘grey’ or ‘black’ list. A sure sign of the U.S. has reached the end of the line regarding Iran is that – as of now – even if Iran does sign up to the FATF, Washington will not remove the designation of the IRGC as a ‘Foreign Terrorist Organisation’ (FTO) immediately, as it had promised a while ago, but will keep the damaging designation in place for at least two years, whereupon it will be reviewed, a senior source close to Iran’s Petroleum Ministry told OilPrice.com exclusively last week. “This review,” he concluded, “will also assess whether all Iranian military and intelligence elements of influence have been removed from several countries, including Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, or Iran fails the review anyway.”

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/16/2022 – 02:00

  • WEF's "Global Intelligence Collecting AI" To Erase Ideas From The Internet
    WEF’s “Global Intelligence Collecting AI” To Erase Ideas From The Internet

    Via ‘2nd Smartest Guy in the World’ Substack,

    The World Economic Forum is becoming a little concerned. Unapproved opinions are becoming more popular, and online censors cannot keep up with millions of people becoming more aware and more vocal. The censorship engines employed by Internet platforms, turned out to be quite stupid and incapable. People are even daring to complain about the World Economic Forum, which is obviously completely unacceptable.

    So, WEF author Inbal Goldberger came up with a solution: she proposes to collect off-platform intelligence from “millions of sources” to spy on people and new ideas, and then merge this information together for “content removal decisions” sent down to “Internet platforms”.

    To overcome the barriers of traditional detection methodologies, we propose a new framework: rather than relying on AI to detect at scale and humans to review edge cases, an intelligence-based approach is crucial.

    By bringing human-curated, multi-language, off-platform intelligence into learning sets, AI will then be able to detect nuanced, novel abuses at scale, before they reach mainstream platforms. Supplementing this smarter automated detection with human expertise to review edge cases and identify false positives and negatives and then feeding those findings back into training sets will allow us to create AI with human intelligence baked in. This more intelligent AI gets more sophisticated with each moderation decision, eventually allowing near-perfect detection, at scale.

    What is this about? What’s new?

    The way censorship is done these days is that each Internet platform, such as Twitter, has its own moderation team and a decision making engine. Twitter would only look at tweets by any specific twitter user, when deciding on whether to delete any tweets or suspend their authors. Twitter moderators do NOT look at Gettr or other external websites.

    So, for example, user @JohnSmith12345 may have a Twitter account and narrowly abide by Twitter rules, but at the same time have a Gettr account where he would publish anti-vaccine messages. Twitter would not be able to suspend @JohnSmith12345’s account. That is no longer acceptable to the WEF because they want to silence people and ideas, not individual messages or accounts.

    This explains why the WEF needs to move beyond the major Internet platforms, in order to collect intelligence about people and ideas everywhere else. Such an approach would allow them to know better what person or idea to censor — on all major platforms at once.

    They want to collect intelligence from “millions of sources”, and train their “AI systems” to detect thoughts that they do not like, to make content removal decisions handed down to the likes of Twitter, Facebook, and so on. This is a major change from the status quo of each platform deciding what to do based on messages posted to that specific platform only.

    For example, in addition to looking at my Twitter profile, WEF’s proposed AI would also look at my Gettr profile, and then it would make an “intelligent decision” to remove me from the Internet at once. It is somewhat of a simplification because they also want to look for ideas and not only individuals but, nevertheless, the search for wrongthink becomes globalized.

    This sounds like an insane conspiracy theory from hell: WEF collecting information on everyone everywhere, and then telling all platforms what posts to remove, based on a global decision-making AI engine that sees everything and can identify individual people and ideas beyond any given platform.

    If someone ever said that it would be contemplated, I would probably think that this person is insane. It sounds like a sick technological fantasy. Unfortunately, this crazy stuff is real, is in a WEF agenda proposal that is officially posted on their website’s “WEF Agenda” section. And WEF is not messing around.

    You will have no voice and you will be happy!

    Of course, this AI content moderation slots straight into the AI social credit score system. And if your social credit score dips below whichever technocommunist AI thresholds as set by the elites, then all kinds of punishments will be meted out, from slashed UBI credits to bug-food rationing to an early granting of the “freedom” to be euthanized.

    Do NOT comply.

    *  *  *

    Become a paid subscriber: support the “Do NOT comply.” It’s 8 cents a day.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 23:55

  • Monsoon Rainfall Waterlogs Vegas, While Pacific Northwest Braces For Heat Dome
    Monsoon Rainfall Waterlogs Vegas, While Pacific Northwest Braces For Heat Dome

    Wild weather across the western part of the US has sparked one of the worst monsoon seasons in Las Vegas in a decade, while California and parts of the Pacific Northwest brace for a heat dome that could push power grids to the max.

    Late last week, intense thunderstorms flooded parts of southern Nevada, including Vegas. Videos on social media show floodwater pouring into at least one casino while parking garages were transformed into rivers. This comes two weeks after another storm wreaked havoc on Sin City.  

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    Clark County officials report the latest series of storms in the Vegas metro area has meant the wettest monsoon season in a decade. Besides the flooding, this is good news for the region suffering from extreme drought. 

    “That makes this the wettest monsoon season in ten years,” the National Weather Service tweeted. 

    Meanwhile, near-record heat is expected this week in California’s Central Valley and parts of the Pacific Northwest as a heat dome builds across the region, worsening the drought-stricken area and pushing power grids to critical levels. 

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    California’s Central Valley could record temperatures as high as 109 degrees Fahrenheit. Another pocket of heat will scorch western Washington. 

    Bob Oravec, a senior branch forecaster with the Weather Prediction Center, said Sacramento could hit 105 Fahrenheit by mid-week, and Redding could record 109 Fahrenheit. 

    “It is going to be well above average,” Oravec said. “The heat will also eventually spread to the Northwest and Northern Plains.” 

    A linger heat dome over California could stress power grids. Demand is expected to peak Monday at around 43.8 gigawatts and could even jump to 45.2 gigawatts by mid-week, said grid operator California Independent System Operator. 

    In anticipation of increasing cooling demand, Southern California’s SP15 hub’s on-peak power prices soared 29% to $149.70 a megawatt for Monday, the highest in nearly a year. 

    Gary Ackerman, an independent energy consultant who founded the Western Power Trading Forum, told Bloomberg that power-supply shortfalls are unlikely at this point. 

    However, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation, a regulatory body that manages grid stability, recently warned before the summer that power supplies in the Western US could be overwhelmed by soaring demand due to extreme heat. We might add decarbonization efforts of grids have made things worse. 

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 23:30

  • Private Jet Usage "Flies" To Record Highs, Even Among Climate Outrage
    Private Jet Usage “Flies” To Record Highs, Even Among Climate Outrage

    As concern about the climate, or at least virtue signaling about the climate, ramps higher each day, so does private jet use. Especially among celebrities. 

    Funny how that happens, right?

    And now thanks to the Twitter accounts over at @CelebJets and @ElonJet, we are well aware when people like Kylie Jenner, Taylor Swift or Elon Musk take flight in their private jets. Such was the topic of a new Wall Street Journal report out over the weekend that looked at the backlash to private jet use. 

    The Twitter accounts make the world privy to each flight, even ones like the 17 minute flight Jenner took in July, resulting in her being branded a “climate criminal”. Jokes about Taylor Swift’s jet usage resulted in memes of her using her jet to go to Starbucks and her refridgerator. 

    “Taylor’s jet is loaned out regularly to other individuals. To attribute most or all of these trips to her is blatantly incorrect,” Taylor Swift’s spokesperson told the Wall Street Journal. 

    The owner of the Twitter accounts, 20 year old Jack Sweeney, says he is hoping the data being public will force private fliers “to be more efficient”. 

    As the WSJ notes, so far the data has only caused climate outrage. But this hasn’t stopped private flights from rising 30% since 2019, the report says. The industry has seen “record growth” since the beginning of the pandemic. 

    Darren Banham, chief executive of Discovery Jets, a charter and jet management company, told WSJ: “I’ve been in the private jet market for the last 10 years, and on the aviation commercial side for 22, and I’ve never seen the private-jet business like this.” 

    New customers, including those interested in shared planes and on-demand charter services, are turning up. In fact, 75% of clients at one popular private jet firm, JB Jets, are first time fliers. Every time a celebrity posts about flying private, in addition to fueling outrage, it offers a “tailwind” to the industry. Sometimes people even rent the jets by the hour because of how easy they are to navigate and schedule.

    JB Jets founder Ben Parker said: “You can show up 15 minutes before, five minutes before. You can show up late, and the plane will wait for you.”

    Clients are interested in basic amenities, for the most part, Parker says. “People believe our clients want caviar and Champagne, but believe it or not, they usually want McDonald’s or Burger King. But we usually hear about it if the water is Essentia and not Fiji.”

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 22:40

  • Escobar: The Second Coming Of The Heartland
    Escobar: The Second Coming Of The Heartland

    Authored by Pepe Escobar,

    It’s tempting to visualize the overwhelming collective West debacle as a rocket, faster than free fall, plunging into the black void maelstrom of complete socio-political breakdown.

    The End of (Their) History turns out to be a fast-forward historical process bearing staggering ramifications: way more profound than mere self-appointed “elites” – via their messenger boys/girls – dictating a Dystopia engineered by austerity and financialization: what they chose to brand as a Great Reset and then, major fail intervening, The Great Narrative.

    Financialization of everything means total marketization of Life itself. In his latest book, No-Cosas: Quiebras del Mundo de Hoy (in Spanish, no English translation yet), the foremost German contemporary philosopher (Byung-Chul Han, who happens to be Korean), analyzes how Information Capitalism, unlike industrial capitalism, converts also the immaterial into merchandise: “Life itself acquires the form of merchandise (…) the difference between culture and commerce disappears. Institutions of culture are presented as profitable brands.”

    The most toxic consequence is that “total commercialization and mercantilization of culture had the effect of destroying the community (…) Community as merchandise is the end of community.”

    China’s foreign policy under Xi Jinping proposes the idea of a community of shared future for mankind, essentially a geopolitical and geoeconomic project. Yet China still has not amassed enough soft power to translate that culturally, and seduce vast swathes of the world into it: that especially concerns the West, for which Chinese culture, history and philosophies are virtually incomprehensible.

    In Inner Asia, where I am now, a revived glorious past may offer other instances of “shared community”. A glittering example is the Shaki Zinda necropolis in Samarkand.

    Afrasiab – the ancient settlement, pre-Samarkand – had been destroyed by the Genghis Khan hordes in 1221. The only building that was preserved was the city’s main shrine: Shaki Zinda.

    Much later, in the mid-15th century, star astronomer Ulugh Beg, himself the grandson of Turkic-Mongol “Conqueror of the World” Timur, unleashed no less than a Cultural Renaissance: he summoned architects and craftsmen from all corners of the Timurid empire and the Islamic world to work into what became a de facto creative artistic lab.

    The Avenue of 44 Tombs at Shaki Zinda represents the masters of different schools harmoniously creating a unique synthesis of styles in Islamic architecture.

    The most remarkable décor at Shaki Zinda are stalactites, hung in clusters in the upper parts of portal niches. An early 18th century traveler described them as “magnificent stalactites, hanging like stars above the mausoleum, make it clear about the eternity of the sky and our frailty.” Stalactites in the 15th century were called “muqarnas”: that means, figuratively, “starry sky”.

    The Sheltering (Community) Sky

    The Shaki Zinda complex is now at the center of a willful push by the Uzbekistan government to restore Samarkand to its former glory. The centerpiece, trans-historical concepts are “harmony” and “community” – and that reaches way beyond Islam.

    As a sharp contrast, the inestimable Alastair Crooke has illustrated the death of Eurocentrism alluding to Lewis Carroll and Yeats: only through the looking glass we can see the full contours of the tawdry spectacle of narcissistic self-obsession and self-justification offered by “the worst”, still so “full of passionate intensity”, as depicted by Yeats.

    And yet, unlike Yeats, the best now do not “lack all conviction”. They may be few, ostracized by cancel culture, but they do see the “rough beast, its hour come out at last, slouching towards…” Brussels (not Jerusalem) “to be born”.

    This unelected gaggle of insufferable mediocrities – from von der Leyden and Borrell to that piece of Norwegian wood Stoltenberg – may dream they live in the pre-1914 era, when Europe was at the political center. Yet now not only “the center cannot hold” (Yeats) but Eurocrat-infested Europe has been definitely engulfed by the maelstrom, an irrelevant political backwater seriously flirting with reversion to 12th century status.

    The physical aspects of the Fall – austerity, inflation, no hot showers, freezing to death to support neo-Nazis in Kiev – has been preceded, and no Christianized imagery need apply, by the fires of sulphur and brimstone of a Spiritual Fall. The transatlantic masters of those parrots posing as “elites” could never come up with any idea to sell to the Global South centered on harmony and much less “community”.

    What they sell, via their Unanimous Narrative, actually their take on “We Are the World”, is variations of “you will own nothing and be happy”. Worse: you will have to pay for it – dearly. And you have no right to dream of any transcendence – irrespective if you’re a follower of Rumi, the Tao, shamanism or Prophet Muhammad.

    The most visible shock troops of this reductionist Western neo-nihilism – obscured by the fog of “equality”, “human rights” and “democracy” – are the thugs being swiftly denazified in Ukraine, sporting their tattoos and pentagrams.

    The dawn of a new Enlightenment

    The Collective West Self-Justification Show staged to obliterate its ritualized suicide offers no hint of transcending sacrifice implied in a ceremonial seppuku. All they do is to wallow in the adamant refusal to admit they could be seriously mistaken.

    How would anyone dare to deride the set of “values” derived from the Enlightenment? If you don’t prostrate yourself in front of this glittering cultural altar, you’re just a barbarian set to be slandered, law-fared, canceled, persecuted, sanctioned and – HIMARS to the rescue – bombed.

    We still do not have a post-Tik Tok Tintoretto to depict the collective West’s multi-wallowing in Dante-esque chambers of pop Hell. What we do have, and must endure, day after day, is the kinetic battle between their “Great Narrative”, or narratives, and pure and simple reality. Their obsession with the need for virtual reality to always “win” is pathological: after all the only activity they excel in is manufacturing fake reality. Such a pity that Baudrillard and Umberto Eco are not among us anymore to unmask their tawdry shenanigans.

    Does that make any difference across vast swathes of Eurasia? Of course not. We just need to keep up with the dizzying succession of bilateral meetings, deals, and progressive interaction of BRI, SCO, EAEU, BRICS+ and other multilateral organizations to get a glimpse of how the new world-system is being configured.

    In Samarkand, surrounded by mesmerizing instances of Timurid art coupled with a development boom that brings to mind the East Asian miracle of the early 1990s, it’s plain to see how the heart of the Heartland is back with a vengeance – and is bound to dispatch the pleonexia-afflicted West to the swamp of Irrelevancy.

    I leave you with a psychedelic sunset facing the Registan, at the razor’s edge of a new sort of Enlightenment that is leading the Heartland towards a reality-based version of Shangri-La, privileging harmony, tolerance and most of all, the sense of community.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 22:15

  • The "Big Short" Michael Burry Liquidates Entire Portfolio, Holds Just One Stock At End Of Q2
    The “Big Short” Michael Burry Liquidates Entire Portfolio, Holds Just One Stock At End Of Q2

    At least the Big Short puts his money where his mouth is… or rather pulls his money as the case may be.

    After blasting the latest stock market meltup as “silliness” and claiming – correctly – that the US economy is facing a gruesome crash in tweets which he then promptly deletes (conveinetly, another accounts snapshots his tweets for posterity)…

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    … Michael Burry – who runs the smallish Scion Capital hedge fund – has done something few of his peers would consider doing: he has traded in line with his statement, and according to his just released 13F, the famed investor has liquidated his entire portfolio which as of March 31, had a notional value of just over $200 million (including $35 million in AAPL put notional), and instead held on to just one stock: private jail operator GEO Group, which he had previously invested in but had dumped all of his holdings at the end of 2021 only to sport a modest $3.3 million, or 501K share position, as of June 30. More notably, and as shown in the chart below, this was the only security he held on to as of the end of Q2.

    The news that Burry’s Scion only held shares of the Boca Raton, Florida-based Geo Group, sent its stock surging 12% to $7.68 extending its gain since the end of the second quarter to 14%.

    Among others, the hedge fund exited positions including Alphabet, Facebook parent Meta Platforms, Bristol-Myers, and also unwound Apple puts tracking some $36 million in notional value.

    To be sure, Scion’s 13F disclosure, which is required for all money managers overseeing more than $100 million in US stocks, only shows holdings in stocks that trade on the nation’s exchanges. It doesn’t reveal non-US traded securities or short positions. Such filings are also historical, providing a snapshot of a fund’s holdings at the end of a quarter which ended 45 days ago, and may not reflect current investments.

    It’s unclear when during Q2 Burry liquidated his entire portfolio. The 51-year-old investor rose to prominence after a winning wager against mortgages in the run-up to the 2008 financial crisis; the outspoken anti-liberal has since become a cult figure on social media, with ominous predictions of a looming downturn. In a May tweet, he raised the specter of a crash similar to the one 14 years ago.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 22:11

  • Alec Baldwin Pulled The Trigger Of Gun That Killed On-Set Cinematographer, FBI Analysis Concludes
    Alec Baldwin Pulled The Trigger Of Gun That Killed On-Set Cinematographer, FBI Analysis Concludes

    Now we officially all know what we did back in October 2021 when Alec Baldwin mistakenly shot a cinematographer on the set of the movie “Rust”: guns do not fire unless a person pulls the trigger.

    That was the conclusion of an FBI analysis, released days ago, that found that Baldwin “pulled the trigger of the gun that killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins and wounded director Joel Souza,” according to the Post Millennial. 

    Baldwin had previously claimed that he thought the weapon was a “cold gun” and had also claimed that he never pulled the trigger.

    FBI analysis found that the .45 Colt single action revolver “could not have been fired without pulling the trigger, according to an FBI forensic report.”

    The report further went on to show that the hammer of the gun would have “had to have been fully cocked” instead of in a quarter or half cocked position. The analysis also showed that the gun “could not be made to fire without a pull of the trigger while the working internal components were intact and functional.”

    Recall, back in December 2021, Baldwin swore to George Stephanopolous during an interview that he didn’t pull the trigger. 

    “Well, the trigger wasn’t pulled. I didn’t pull the trigger,” he said. 

    He was then asked: “So you never pulled the trigger?”

    To which he replied: “No, no. I would never point a gun and pull that trigger at them. Never.”

    Baldwin said after the shooting: “There are no words to convey my shock and sadness regarding the tragic accident that took the life of Halyna Hutchins, a wife, mother and deeply admired colleague of ours.”

    Baldwin claimed that a 24 year old armorer had handed him the gun and that he thought it was “prepared properly”.

    “I feel that someone is responsible for what happened, and I can’t say who that is, but I know it’s not me,” he said shortly after the shooting. 

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 21:50

  • Air Force F-35 Stealth Jets Return To Service After Groundings
    Air Force F-35 Stealth Jets Return To Service After Groundings

    At the end of July, the US Air Force grounded its fleet of Lockheed Martin F-35 stealth fighter jets over concerns of a faulty component in the ejection seat that could endanger pilots during emergencies. Now Bloomberg reports most of the F-35s have returned to normal operational status after weeks of inspections.

    Air Combat Command spokesperson Alexis Worley said in a statement Monday that USAF’s 349-jet inventory returned to service after two weeks of groundings to inspect 706 explosive cartridges inside ejection seats that propel the seat — and the pilot — from the fighter jet during an emergency. 

    Worley said four cartridges were found defective, which could’ve led to a malfunction during an ejection. She said those cartridges were replaced and will “undergo further inspection.” 

    The issue began in April at Hill Air Force Base in northern Utah when ground crews found an “anomaly” with one of the Seat Cartridge Actuated Devices in an F-35. The issue was immediately traced back to a problem in the manufacturing process by defense company Martin-Baker Aircraft Company Ltd. 

    USAF has incrementally returned the stealth fighters to service in the US, Europe, and the Pacific. Other jets were affected by faulty ejection seats, including training ones that were grounded. We also noted United Kingdom’s Eurofighter Typhoons had similar problems with ‘non-essential’ flights grounded last month. 

    So far, Lockheed Martin has built 820 F-35s and strategically placed them in partner nations around Russia and China. Lockheed plans to produce 3,000 F-35s in the coming years, though the stealth jets have been fraught with problems and over budget. 

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 21:25

  • Roy Moore Awarded Over $8 Million In Defamation Case
    Roy Moore Awarded Over $8 Million In Defamation Case

    Roy Moore, a former Republican sheriff and US Senate candidate, has been awarded $8.2 million in a defamation case against a super political action committee (PAC) during his failed 2017 US Senate bid in Alabama.

    In a 30-second advertisement that ran nearly 1,000 times on local television networks, the ‘Senate Majority PAC’ accused Moore of “soliciting sex from young girls” at a mall, based on a report from the New American Journal – which cited anonymous sources – and later admitted that it was inaccurately reported.

    Moore won the 2017 Republican primary runoff election to replace Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), who then-President Donald Trump had tapped to be attorney general.

    Ahead of the general election, a group linked to the Senate Majority PAC ran a 30-second advertisement nearly 1,000 times on television networks in Alabama that accused Moore of “soliciting sex from young girls” at a mall, according to the complaint. The claim was based on a report from The New American Journal, which cited anonymous sources and later said was inaccurately reported.

    The ad also included quotes from news articles, such as “one he approached ‘was 14 and working as Santa’s helper.’” But those articles were not talking about soliciting sex.

    The juxtaposition of the quotes were meant “to create the false impression that Judge Moore solicited sex from a 14-year-old Santa’s helper at the mall. The very source they cite in the ad refutes that statement,” the complaint stated. –Epoch Times

    “I feel this is vindication and I give thanks to Almighty God and the jurors in this case for a great victory over our corrupt political system,” Moore said in a statement.

    Moore was accused of sexually abusing four girls 40 years ago – one of whom, Debbie Gibson, worked as a sign language interpreter for Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, and actively campaigned for Moore’s Democrat opponent, Doug Jones.

    Another Moore accuser, Leigh Corfman, claimed “several pastors at various churches made sexual advances at her.” This 3x divorcee who has also filed for bankruptcy three times.

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    Moore lost his bid for the Senate by around 21,000 votes.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 21:00

  • Sen. Chuck Grassley: Senate Will Investigate FBI Trump Raid If GOP Takes Majority
    Sen. Chuck Grassley: Senate Will Investigate FBI Trump Raid If GOP Takes Majority

    Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said he intends to investigate the FBI’s raid of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort if Republicans take back the Senate during the 2022 midterms.

    Senate Judiciary Ranking Member Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) speaks at a hearing with the Senate Judiciary Committee in the Dirksen Senate Office Building in Washington on July 12, 2022. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

    In an interview on Saturday, Grassley said that with Trump, “the FBI over a long period of time has kind of a double standard. You know, you can go back to the Steele Dossier.”

    “And it just seems to me like they there’s political bias in the FBI,” he told Breitbart News. “And then I have recently—you’ve heard me give evidence of political bias of starting a Trump investigation and then quitting a Hunter Biden investigation. So it’s legitimate to raise the question about the extent to which there’s still political bias and what we’re doing now.”

    Grassley then took issue with Attorney General Merrick Garland’s comments on transparency, saying that “he should make sure that the affidavits follow up on the warrant.”

    So far, the Department of Justice has not released the affidavit that would explain why the FBI needed to obtain a warrant to search Trump’s property. Garland and the FBI have remained mostly silent on the raid, with Garland issuing a brief statement during a news conference on Aug. 11.

    On Aug. 12, a judge in the case unsealed part of the warrant the FBI used to search Trump’s property. A property receipt said the FBI seized classified documents, although it’s not clear what they were.

    The search and seizure warrant shows FBI agents targeted “the ’45 Office,’ all storage rooms, and all other rooms or areas within the premises used or available to be used by FPOTUS (former president of the United States) and his staff and in which boxes or documents could be stored, including all structures or buildings on the estate.”

    Agents were granted authority to seize “all physical documents and records constituting evidence, contraband, fruits of crime, or other items illegally possessed,” according to the warrant. That includes documents with classification markings and presidential records that were drafted between Jan. 20, 2017, and Jan. 20, 2021—the entire time Trump was in office.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 20:35

  • Giuliani Told He's A 'Target' Of Georgia Election Probe
    Giuliani Told He’s A ‘Target’ Of Georgia Election Probe

    Rudy Giuliani, former President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, was told on Monday that he’s a target of a “wide-ranging criminal investigation into election interference in Georgia,” according to the New York Times, which notes that the notification came on the same day that a federal judge rejected attempts by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) won’t be able to duck giving testimony before the Atlanta special grand jury hearing evidence in the case.

    Giuliani, the former Mayor of New York City, was instrumental in attempts to keep Trump in power following the 2020 election – and has emerged in recent weeks as a central figure in the inquiry, which is being conducted by Fulton County District Attorney, Fani T. Willis.

    One of Giuliani’s lawyers, Robert Costello, told the Times that he was notified his client was a target – suggesting that prosecutors believe an indictment is at least possible (though not guaranteed) based on evidence they’ve seen up to that point.

    Earlier this summer, prosecutors questioned witnesses before the special grand jury about Mr. Giuliani’s appearances before state legislative panels in December 2020, when he spent hours peddling false conspiracy theories about secret suitcases of Democratic ballots and corrupted voting machines.

    For Mr. Giuliani, the former mayor of New York, the developments are the latest in a widening swath of trouble, though he got some good news recently when it emerged that he was unlikely to face charges in a federal criminal inquiry into his ties to Ukraine during the 2020 presidential campaign. -NY Times

    Giuliani is scheduled to make an appearance before the grand jury on Wednesday at a downtown Atlanta courthouse – during which he’s expected to invoke attorney-client privilege if asked questions about Trump.

    “If these people think he’s going to talk about conversations between him and President Trump, they’re delusional,” said Costello.

    Lindsey Graham, meanwhile, is now set to testify on Aug. 23, after a judge found there was a “special need for Mr. Graham’s testimony on issues relating to alleged attempts to influence or disrupt the lawful administration of Georgia’s 2022 elections.”

    According to lawyers for Graham, he’s a ‘witness’ – as opposed to Giuliani, who’s a ‘target.’

    Graham reportedly placed two calls just after the 2020 election to Georgia Secretary of State, Brad Raffensperger, during which the Senator reportedly inquired about ways to help Trump by invalidating specific categories of mail-in ballots suspected of being fraudulent.

    Curious timing – right after the raid on Mar-a-Lago, and leading up to midterms.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 20:10

  • Nurses Describe 'Brutal' COVID-19 Treatment Protocols
    Nurses Describe ‘Brutal’ COVID-19 Treatment Protocols

    Authored by Matt McGregor via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Nurses who witnessed “brutal” hospital COVID-19 treatment protocols kill patients paint a bleak picture of what is taking place in state and federally funded health care systems.

    “They’re horrific, and they’re all in lockstep,” Staci Kay, a nurse practitioner with the North Carolina Physicians for Freedom who left the hospital system to start her own early treatment private practice, told The Epoch Times. “They will not consider protocols outside of what’s given to them by the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) and the NIH (National Institute of Health). And nobody is asking why.”

    Staci Kay, nurse practitioner with North Carolina Physicians for Freedom. (Courtesy of Staci Kay)

    Fueled by cognitive dissonance amid an array of red flags, Kay said hospital staff is ignoring blatantly problematic treatments that performed poorly in clinical trials, such as remdesivir, and protocols such as keeping the patient isolated, just to adhere to the federal canon.

    “I’ve seen people die with their family watching via iPad on Facetime,” Kay said. “It was brutal.”

    As a former nurse in intensive care, Kay said she had seen her share of tragedy, but how she saw COVID patients being treated “had me waking up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat with chest pains.”

    “I hated my job,” Kay said. “I hated going to work. I was stressed in a way I’ve never been before in my entire life.”

    Keeping families isolated was especially difficult, she said, because people couldn’t come to say goodbye to their loved ones.

    ‘We Can Do Better’

    Kay was looking for other options when she found an inpatient protocol designed Dr. Paul Marik, founding member of Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance, which purported to have a 94 percent success rate.

    However, after Kay pitched it to the head of the pulmonary critical care department, she was dismissed, and the physician boasted that the hospital had a 66 percent survival rate at the time.

    “I told him, ‘I feel like we can do better,’ but I was very quickly shut down,” Kay said. “I became very angry because I’m watching people die and I knew we could have been doing better.”

    It was as if formerly smart people had become brainwashed, “and then just dumb,” Kay said, lacking the mental wherewithal to discern true from false.

    This led Kay to begin treating patients in the outpatient setting to prevent their admission into the hospital system, which is now her full-time job after being fired for not submitting to what she described as illogical testing requirements for those who weren’t vaccinated.

    At her telemedicine business, Kay said she’s seeing multiple cases of people suffering from COVID-19 vaccine injuries.

    “I saw things on the inpatient side, too, that I suspected were vaccine injuries that went unacknowledged by our physicians,” Kay said. “I saw brain bleeds, seizures out of nowhere, cancer that just spread like wildfire, ischemic strokes, and I saw one person die horrifically from myocarditis.”

    On the outpatient side, she said she’s seen conditions resulting from the COVID-19 vaccine such as brain fog, cognitive decline, joint pain, gastrointestinal dysfunctions, and neuropathy, which is numbness and tingling in hands, feet, and extremities.

    ‘The Old School Becomes The New School’

    Kay’s business, Sophelina Counseling, provides telemedicine, mobile urgent care, and mobile IV therapies. It’s independent of corporate, federal, and state control, which she said is a solution to a health care system paralyzed with oppressive requirements.

    “As long as there’s corporate control over medicine, whether it’s Medicare or private insurance companies, you’re always going to have providers who are forced, pressured, and coerced to do things that they wouldn’t normally do,” she said. “Physicians don’t have the treatment they used to have.”

    Because of this corporate control, Kay said the list of boxes they must check takes time away from the actual patient.

    “Getting away from this corporate structure is going to be a game changer,” she said.

    Kay advocated for returning to the “old school” way, which is the direct, primary care model, in which the patient pays a monthly or annual fee to have access to the provider without the interference of a traditional insurance company that requires “too many hoops to jump through, headaches, and checkboxes.”

    Kay points to a health care model called GoldCare, designed by Dr. Simone Gold, founder of America’s Frontline Doctors.

    Gold, who was sentenced to two months in prison for her alleged involvement in the Jan. 6 breach of the Capitol, created GoldCare as a private membership association (PMA).

    Because much of what insurance companies do revolves around potential lawsuits, to be a member of the PMA, one must sign a clause, agreeing that they won’t sue.

    “What that does for us is we don’t have to order unnecessary testing or consults just to cover our back end because that’s most of what corporate medicine does,” she said.

    As a result, Kay said, both the patient and the physician are happier because the treatment process hasn’t been weighted down with bloated insurance requirements.

    For Kay, this model—an evocation of a simpler time in medical care when doctors were more connected with their patients—is key.

    “The old school is going to have to become the new school,” Kay said.

    NIH and the CDC did not respond to The Epoch Times’ request for comment on COVID-19 treatment protocols.

    Boycotting the System

    Having taken salmon, eggs, and honey for payment, a nurse in Washington state who wished to remain anonymous shares Kay’s more traditional vision for the future of health care.

    She told The Epoch Times that people “need to boycott their health insurance.”

    “I think people who don’t need surgery to save their life should not go to the hospital,” the nurse said. “I think people need to find doctors who are private pay and pay for only what they need to be done.”

    The federal government must be removed from the health care equation, she added.

    “I especially don’t think any children should be going to these practitioners who are accepting state funding or Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements,” the nurse said

    The nurse requested anonymity because—in addition to being unvaccinated—in Washington and Oregon state, she said the government has made it possible for the public to submit anonymous complaints, “devoid of evidence,” against health care workers who promote treatments that deviate from the official protocols.

    After the nurse was fired for not complying with the vaccine mandate, she started her own private care business that offers monoclonal antibodies, L-lysine and vitamin C infusions, infrared red light therapy, and nebulizer machines as treatments as needed and when indicated.

    ‘Widespread Data Suppression’

    With her newly launched business, she performed the early interventions that she said hospitals should be doing, “but refuse to do because they say there’s no evidence for it.”

    The nurse works with a growing network of physicians and providers that function as a “total parallel society” existing in the shadows beside the “crooked” health care system, she said.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 19:45

  • Former White House Chief-Of-Staff Never Witnessed 'Intentional Destruction Of Important Papers'
    Former White House Chief-Of-Staff Never Witnessed ‘Intentional Destruction Of Important Papers’

    President Trump’s former chief-of-staff Mick Mulvaney said during an Aug 11 interview with CNN that he never witnessed the “intentional destruction of important papers” during his 15-month stint in the White House.

    “I never saw the intentional destruction of documents for the purpose of keeping anything from the National Archives or the public in the future,” Mulvaney told host Brianna Keilar.

    “We knew the rules, we taped them back together, and we made copies. As long as copies are preserved, you can pretty much do whatever you want to with the other document,” he added.

     As the Epoch Times‘ Hannah Ng notes:

    Grilled by Keilar if he had ever seen Trump rip documents, Mulvaney said he had, but asserted that documents were all handled “in the ordinary course of business.”

    “The flushing,” the host said, referring to claims made by New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman. “You never heard about him flushing documents?”

    “Not a single time,” he said.

    Denied Report

    Mulvaney’s account contradicts Haberman’s report claiming, “White House staffers regularly found ripped-up printing paper in the toilet of the presidential residence during Trump’s term in office.”

    The statement came with a pair of photos from an anonymous source purporting to show notes written by Trump in a toilet allegedly at the White House.

    Trump swiftly denied her account, calling it “another fake story” when it first emerged back in February.

    “Also, another fake story, that I flushed papers and documents down a White House toilet, is categorically untrue and simply made up by a reporter in order to get publicity for a mostly fictitious book,” Trump said in an emailed statement to the New York Post.

    Haberman doubled down on her claim in an interview with CNN on Aug. 8, the same day that the FBI conducted a search at Trump Mar a Lago residence and just ahead of the October publication of her book on Trump, “Confidence Man.”

    Her account this time was again dismissed by a spokesman for the former president.

    “You have to be pretty desperate to sell books if pictures of paper in a toilet bowl is part of your promotional plan,” Taylor Budowich told Axios, referring to Haberman, adding that there are “enough people willing to fabricate stories like this in order to impress the media class—a media class who is willing to run with anything, as long as it’s anti-Trump.”

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    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 19:20

  • The FBI Is Now The Federal Bureau Of Intimidation
    The FBI Is Now The Federal Bureau Of Intimidation

    Authored by Frank Miele via RealClearPolitics.com,

    Nothing symbolizes the decline of the American republic better than the weaponization of justice that we saw last week when the FBI raided the home of former President Trump.

    And nothing better represents the divide that now exists between Democrats and Republicans than the fact that some people still have faith in the FBI.

    Aren’t they paying attention? Heck, that’s like a citizen of the old Soviet Union saying they had faith in the KGB – yeah, to crush dissent and lock up opponents of the regime in a Siberian gulag.

    The evidence is overwhelming. The Federal Bureau of Investigation is now the Federal Bureau of Intimidation. Or more appropriately, the Federal Intimidation Bureau, whose acronym would spell out FIB, as in the Big Lie. Face it, nothing the FBI has said for the last six years since they joined with the Democratic Party to invent the Russia collusion hoax can be taken seriously.

    Is there any need to go through the whole laundry list of lies and fabrications that the FBI, with the aid and comfort of the Justice Department, has foisted on the American public?

    You can start with the extraordinary 2016 press conference when FBI Director James Comey detailed crimes committed by presidential candidate Hillary Clinton related to her improper use of a private email account to store classified material. Moments after saying she had broken the law, Comey announced with a straight face that “no reasonable prosecutor” would ever bring a case against her. Yeah, because she was a Democrat!

    A couple months later, Comey set up President Trump’s National Security adviser, Gen. Michael Flynn, by sending agents to interview him about his supposed contacts with Russians.

    “What’s our goal? Truth/Admission or to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired?” wrote Bill Priestap in a memo before the interview. Priestap was counterintelligence director at the FBI, and it became evident later that the agency’s goal was indeed to get him fired – and more importantly to get Trump impeached, fired, humiliated, you name it.

    Comey himself admitted that the FBI targeted Flynn and chose not to approach him through the White House legal counsel, but informally with a direct phone call to arrange an interview. As Comey later told a reporter, it was “something I probably wouldn’t have done or maybe gotten away with in a more … organized administration.”

    What about the FBI’s abuse of Carter Page and George Papadopoulos? The agency made up evidence in support of subpoenas, FISA warrants, whatever it took to get the desired result. What about the FBI and Department of Justice targeting parents at school boards as “domestic terrorists” because they demanded that their elected representatives actually represent them? What about the unilateral rescission of executive privilege and attorney-client privilege wherever it would have protected President Trump and his advisers?

    The purpose of all of this activity, along with the raid at Mar-a-Lago, was to intimidate not just Trump, but also his supporters. Anyone other than Donald Trump would have given up long ago. Who could possibly withstand the power of the state marshaled against you for six long years – through multiple FBI investigations, through two impeachments, through relentless persecution of your children and your friends and family?

    Finally, what about the double standard that allows Democrats and their government allies to go unpunished for a multitude of sins? Notwithstanding Attorney General Merrick Garland’s feigned indignation on behalf of the bureau, what about the FBI agents who lied repeatedly during the Trump-Russia investigation, sometimes under oath. Even more stunning has been the FBI’s monumental failure to investigate presidential son Hunter Biden, even though it received his laptop with extensive incriminating evidence of criminal activity in 2019.

    Even when the laptop was made public during the 2020 presidential election, the FBI stood silent and thus gave tacit approval to the cynical Democratic Party talking point that the laptop was somehow a GOP dirty trick. It would be interesting to know if the FBI had anything to do with the letter signed by 51 national security experts, falsely claiming that the laptop was “Russian disinformation”! Maybe, like Comey before him, FBI Director Chris Wray thought he could “get away with it.”

    That is certainly the only explanation for the raid on the president’s personal residence. It was not appropriate. It was not reasonable. It had no precedent. The FBI claims that the pre-dawn raid by more than 30 armed agents was for the purpose of collecting presidential papers that the National Archive wanted. The Washington Post says that Trump reportedly had documents with nuclear secrets on them, and the legacy media went ballistic with the story. But wait a minute, isn’t that the same Washington Post that won a Pulitzer Prize for collaborating with the FBI to invent the Russia collusion hoax?

    Don’t believe a word from either the Washington Post or the FBI. Trump had been cooperating with the National Archive and had already turned over 15 boxes of documents, all of which he could have made a claim to legally possess. If they wanted papers turned over, they could have gone through Trump’s lawyers. No, they wanted the spectacle. They wanted the sizzle. They wanted the headlines.

    This wasn’t about the rule of law; it was about the rule of the schoolyard. Bullies get what they want through force and intimidation, and there is no reason for any of us to believe that the raid had any purpose other than to intimidate Donald Trump into backing down from his plans to run for president in 2024.

    Essentially what the FBI was saying is “We know where you live, and we aren’t afraid to come for you.” They even rifled through Melania Trump’s closet, as if she might have been hiding top-secret documents in her hat box. When do we find out they also spent an hour sorting through her lingerie?

    This is sickening, no matter how much MSNBC and the Washington Post want you to think you can still trust the FBI. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me over and over and over again, and I must be a Democrat.

    *  *  *

    Frank Miele, the retired editor of the Daily Inter Lake in Kalispell Mont., is a columnist for RealClearPolitics. His new book, “What Matters Most: God, Country, Family and Friends,” is available from his Amazon author page. Visit him at HeartlandDiaryUSA.com or follow him on Facebook @HeartlandDiaryUSA or on Twitter or Gettr @HeartlandDiary.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 18:55

  • Putin & Kim As Leaders Of World's "Most Sanctioned Countries" Pledge Deeper Ties Against "Hostile" US
    Putin & Kim As Leaders Of World’s “Most Sanctioned Countries” Pledge Deeper Ties Against “Hostile” US

    The state medias of Russia and North Korea are reporting that leaders Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un have communicated mutual messages pledging deeper ties between the two nations, at a moment both find themselves heavily sanctioned by the United States and its allies.

    The pledge came in the form of an exchange of official diplomatic notes in which Putin wished Kim “good health and success” – and spelled out a desire for closer cooperation, coming at a key moment where Moscow has been on the offensive in trying to strengthen strategic alliances with non-Western countries, notably China and India also among them, as the Ukraine invasion has blown past six months.

    A 2019 visit between the two leaders, KCNA via KNS/AFP

    Putin’s message to Kim further expressed hope that deepened Moscow-Pyongyang ties “would entirely conform with the interests of the peoples of the two countries,” according to a translation.

    Kim, responded by highlighting the special friendship has led to…

    “The strategic and tactical cooperation, support, and solidarity between the two countries have put on a new high stage in the common front for frustrating the hostile forces’ military threat and provocation, and high-handed and arbitrary practices,” Kim wrote, according to KCNA.

    Without doubt, Kim’s reference to “hostile forces” has Washington in mind as topping the list. Starting in March as the Ukraine war continued to intensify following the Putin-ordered Feb.24 invasion, Russia became the “world’s most sanctioned country” – even surpassing Iran and North Korea.

    Pyongyang, similar to China’s government, has issued statements actively defending Russia’s ability to respond militarily to threats to its national security interests.

    Currently, there’s a European push – also based on repeat requests by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky – to have Western countries designate Russia a “state sponsor of terror” – which would require sanctions to be ratcheted even further, and the severing of Russia’s participation in additional international institutions (such as cooperative anti-crime agencies like Interpol).

    Moscow has signaled that such a move by Washington would effectively mean the end of diplomatic relations altogether, as Rabobank explains: 

    Russia – which is deepening ties with North Korea and Iran (whom the West wants to get closer to again) – warns that if it is designated as a being a state sponsor of terrorism it will mean the complete end of diplomatic relations with the US.

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    As for ties with the DPRK in particular, earlier this month there widespread reports of a highly unusual offer: that North Kore said it is willing to send 100,000 “volunteer” troops to help Putin execute the ongoing war in Ukraine. While the Kremlin has apparently declined the offer given the immense logistical challenge that such an immense foreign force would present, it was widely perceived as symbolic of the deepening relations between the two militaries and governments.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 18:30

  • Here Is What Warren Buffett Bought And Sold In Q2
    Here Is What Warren Buffett Bought And Sold In Q2

    Ahead of this quarter’s 13F filing from Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, we already knew it was going to be far less exciting than the last one we got. As the company recently reported, Berskhire racked up $3.8 billion in net stock purchases in the second quarter, far short of the $41 billion it bought up in the first quarter of this year (it also spent far less on stock buybacks during Q2).

    Additionally, some of the positions that aren’t being disclosed today include the company’s stake in Occidental Petroleum, even though we already are aware of these thanks to recent filings. Still, as Bloomberg notes, investors are always keen to see what the Oracle of Omaha is thinking, and this will provide a little more insight into the situation.

    With that in mind, here is what Berkshire did in Q2 (we warned you, it would be a dud):

    • Exited Verizon Communications and Royalty Pharma
    • Added to holdings in top position Apple (a very modest 0.4%), Chevron (1.4%), Occidental Petroleum (16.3%) Activision Blizzard (a merger arb which increased by 6.4% to $5.3BN in Q2) Paramount Global (13.75%) Ally Financial (234.5%) as well as Celanese, McKesson and Markel.
    • Decreased its stakes in U.S. Bancorp (-5.2%), General Motors (-14.8%) Kroger (-9.6%) and Store Capital (-53%)

    Apple remains Berkshire’s largest holding, representing 41% of total disclosed assets. And speaking of total assets, the fund disclosed just over $300BN in long, US positions as of June 30, a notable decline from the $363BN as of March 31.

    Overall, a very boring quarter for the world’s biggest non-central bank portfolio.

    Full details of all Berkshire Q2 moves can be found in the table below.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 18:10

  • CBO: Actually, The "Inflation Reduction Act" Will Cause More Audits For Working Class
    CBO: Actually, The “Inflation Reduction Act” Will Cause More Audits For Working Class

    Authored by Jazz Shaw via HotAir (emphasis ours),

    A disturbing pattern has emerged when it comes to the messaging we’re seeing out of the White House in general and the Press Secretary in particular. They seem to believe that if you keep saying something that’s wrong over and over again, it will eventually either become true, or at least people will start to believe it.

    AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin

    That’s truly been the case with the so-called “Inflation Reduction Act” that just passed in the House on a party-line vote. ‘This bill will lower inflation.’ (No, it will probably increase inflation or possibly not affect it.) ‘The bill will reduce the deficit.’ (Nope. That’s not what the models show.) ‘This bill will raise GDP.’ (Care to try again?) And then there’s the latest claim that the massive army of new IRS agents, many of them heavily armed but not trained in firearms handling very well, will not result in more audits of working-class people and will only impact those making more than $400k. They’ve said it over and over again. But the Congressional Budget Office begs to differ. (Free Beacon)

    A Congressional Budget Office report found that the Internal Revenue Service will collect billions of dollars from auditing low- and middle-income Americans under the White House-backed “Inflation Reduction Act,” contradicting Biden administration claims, according to Republicans on the House Ways and Means Committee.

    Fox News confirmed the report, finding the CBO informed congressional Republicans that, under the act, audits of taxpayers making under $400,000 will account for about $20 billion in additional revenue.

    The news comes after high-ranking Biden administration officials, including Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, assured Americans that the IRS would not increase audits of people earning under $400,000.

    There was a time when the members of Congress didn’t generally make too many claims about the fiscal impact of new legislation until the CBO had scored it. Apparently, that quaint practice is no longer part of the day-to-day routine on the Hill. The CBO estimates that audits of people making less than Joe Biden’s claimed minimum income will produce an additional $20 billion in revenue for Uncle Sam. That’s a lot of money even in these days of freewheeling deficit spending. And it directly contradicts what the White House has been telling us. Of course, it’s too late now.

    I will agree that there have been some inaccurate claims about this bill making the rounds, particularly in conservative circles. The nearly 90,000 new IRS workers will not be hired all at once, for example. They will be hired over a period of ten years and some of them will replace current agents who will retire. But there will still be tens of thousands of new workers and many will come in the door very soon.

    The climate portion of the bill isn’t 100% hot garbage, though at least 90% of it certainly is. There will be some funding for improvements to the energy grid infrastructure and the easing of some regulatory hurdles for the construction of nuclear power plants. But most of those positive aspects of the plan will be effectively wiped out by all of the green energy subsidies and new fees imposed on the fossil fuel industry.

    But at the end of the day, the claimed purpose of this legislation is little more than a bad joke being played on the taxpayers. The supposed “inflation reduction” claims have already been fully debunked. The Wharton School of Business concluded that the bill’s impact on inflation will be “statistically indistinguishable from zero.” And it will actually have a negative impact on GDP for many years to come.

    These people in Congress and the White House are standing there on the world stage and lying to your faces in broad daylight. Yes, I realize that a story about politicians lying is generally a “dog bites man” type of report. But they could at least try a little harder to fool us, couldn’t they?

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 18:05

  • Foreigners Sold A Record Amount Of US Stocks In The Last 12 Months, China Dumped More USTs In June
    Foreigners Sold A Record Amount Of US Stocks In The Last 12 Months, China Dumped More USTs In June

    According to the latest data on Treasury International Capital flows, foreigners sold $231.5BN in US stocks in the past 12 months – the biggest trailing-twelve-month sales on record…

    Foreigners have sold US stocks for 6 consecutive months (that is the 2nd longest stretch on record with only the non-stop selling in mid-2018/early-2019 was longer)…

    Aside for stocks, which saw $25.4BN in sales in June, every other asset class was bought: TSYs +$58.9BN, Agencies +$23.7BN, Corporate Bonds +$14.BN

    That is 6 consecutive months of corporate bond purchases and 16 of the past 18 months…

    Meanwhile US Treasuries were bought 7 of past 8 months and 11 of past 13, even though China dumped US Treasuries for the 7th straight month – the longest stretch of selling on record – to its lowest level of holdings since June 2010…

    Overall, Treasury holdings continue to trend lower as gold holdings increase…

    …as de-dollarization continues.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 17:45

  • Turley: Why The Case Against Donald Trump Remains Incomplete
    Turley: Why The Case Against Donald Trump Remains Incomplete

    Authored by Jonathan Turley,

    Below is my column in the Hill on the lingering questions concerning any prosecution of former President Donald Trump for the retention of classified or sensitive material. As previously discussed, the three referenced criminal provisions do not require classified status of documents to be the basis for prosecution. However, if the documents were declassified, it would make any prosecution very difficult, if not untenable, though the obstruction count could be based on affirmative false representations made to the government.

    The point is only that we still do not have sufficient information to judge the basis for the raid or the prospects for prosecution despite the often breathless coverage. 

    The affidavit remains key to ending this speculation and quelling conspiracy theories. That is why Attorney General Merrick Garland should call for its unsealing.

    Nevertheless, figures like John Dean are saying that defenders of the former president will “have egg on their faces” when this case is done and presumably Trump is prosecuted. Perhaps, but what is clear is that there is no such risk in others claiming an array of proven crimes for six years that were never charged. Figures who pushed the debunked Russian collusion, incitement, or bizarre attempted murder claims are now claiming with the same certainty that conviction is finally at hand.

    Once again, before the eggs fly, the release of actual evidence would be useful.

    Here is the column:

    The FBI’s raid on former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence was received by many with joy bordering on ecstasy. Comedian Stephen Colbert declared the raid to be Christmas come early, while others joked about the possibility of executing Trump as a spy. Yet the celebration may be another triumph of hope over experience, with pundits again declaring an open-and-shut case without seeing the actual evidence.

    The problem is that much in this investigation remains unknown and much of the analysis seems more visceral than legal. While details may be forthcoming that will fill in the glaring gaps, any prosecution on the record we know today would face novel — and potentially insurmountable — questions.

    At the risk of being a killjoy, here is what we know and don’t know about these charges.

    We know at least one set of the documents recovered from Trump’s home was marked as “classified/TS/SCI” or “top secret/sensitive compartmentalized information.” There were four sets of top-secret documents, three sets marked “secret” and three marked “confidential.” Trump has no right to retain classified information after leaving office, particularly information classified at the high TS/SCI level.

    The warrant used by the FBI in its search expressly allowed the gathering of “all physical documents and records constituting evidence, contraband, fruits of crime or other items illegally possessed in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 793, 2071, or 1519.”

    The inclusion of an alleged violation of the Espionage Act (Section 793) lit up the internet. It seemingly doesn’t matter that the Espionage Act has long been denounced by civil libertarians as a vehicle for political abuse by the Justice Department. It also doesn’t matter that a charge under the act does not mean there is actual espionage or foreign intelligence involved in the case. Rather, it addresses alleged acts of unlawfully “gathering, transmitting or losing … defense information.”

    Surprisingly, the warrant did not specify which section of law might be the basis for a criminal charge. One possible provision is Subsection (d) covering those who lawfully possess documents but had “reason to believe [the information] could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation.” This subsection allows for a charge of willfully retaining or failing to deliver such material “on demand” to an officer or “employee of the United States entitled to receive it.”

    Subsection (f) is even more generous to prosecutors. It allows a criminal charge for “gross negligence” leading to protected information being “removed from its proper place of custody or delivered to anyone in violation of his trust, or to be lost, stolen, abstracted, or destroyed.”

    Section 793 was cited as the basis for the 2016 investigation of Hillary Clinton in her email scandal. Clinton gathered and transmitted classified (including “top secret”) information as secretary of State. She and her staff also were criticized for failing to promptly supply evidence. Nevertheless, then-FBI Director James Comey declared that “although there is evidence of potential violations of the statutes regarding the handling of classified information, our judgment is that no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case.”

    The Justice Department explained in an Aug. 16, 2016, letter to Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) on the Clinton investigation that, although the statute allows for gross negligence charges, prosecutors have long balked at the “constitutional implications of criminalizing such conduct without requiring the government to prove that the person knew he or she was doing something wrong.” The Justice Department said it also rejected 18 U.S.C. § 2071 with regard to Clinton — the same section referenced in the Trump warrant in willfully and unlawfully concealing, removing or destroying federal records.

    The final provision mentioned in the Trump warrant, 18 U.S.C. 1519, concerns destruction, alteration or falsification of records in federal investigations. This charge could be based not just on government documents in Trump’s possession but on allegedly false inventories or lists given to federal officials during months of discussion about the documents.

    These crimes still require intentional or knowing acts. (They do not require classified status as an element). With Trump lawyers negotiating the status of the documents and previously turning over some material under subpoena, there is a plausible defense based on Trump’s belief that the material was no longer classified and that his team was cooperating with officials in trying to resolve any disputes. If Trump believed the material was declassified and relied on legal advice to resolve any disagreements, then prosecutors would combine an unprecedented legal case with a heavily contested factual record.

    At the heart of such a case would be a very novel legal question. While many legal experts have cited the detailed, demanding process for declassification, some fail to note that presidents have long exempted themselves from declassification procedures. Indeed, Trump claimed the right to declassify material unilaterally and orally at the start of his term.

    Other presidents have asserted exemptions from declassification authority. An order by former President George W. Bush stated such an exemption for “information originated” by a president. That order was reaffirmed by former President Obama in Executive Order 13526 in 2009 and expressly exempts presidents, vice presidents, their staffs and “other entities within the Executive Office of the President.”

    Trump also reportedly had a standing order that declassified any material he removed from the White House to take to Mar-a-Lago or other locations. We have not seen that order, and it is not clear if such an order was shown to the FBI.

    If that standing declassification order existed, it ended with his presidency, of course. However, it still existed when these boxes were taken to the resort. There may also be complicating logistics for investigators: If the documents were taken out of the White House on the last day of his presidency, the classification markings on the cover pages and internal headings might not have been crossed out.

    There has never been litigation on the scope of this exemption or a president’s declassification authority. Nor is it clear whether any standing order was disclosed to the judge who approved the FBI’s warrant — but it could create a threshold legal challenge to a criminal charge.

    The Trump team insists this defense was raised when an earlier subpoena was served at Mar-a-Lago in June. Nevertheless, it reportedly turned over 15 boxes of material, including classified documents, and replaced a lock on the storage area for enhanced security. But it is not clear whether the FBI raised concerns over the remaining material or sought its return before this week’s raid.

    In asking the judge to unseal the warrant and the list of documents seized, Attorney General Merrick Garland declared that “the Department of Justice will speak through its court filings.” But he omitted the key filing that would speak to these issues: the underlying FBI affidavit.

    In the meantime, pundits are discussing Trump’s disqualification from future public office based on his expected conviction. Even if convicted, such a disqualification would be flagrantly unconstitutional — but, when it comes to Trump, neither the law nor the evidence ever seems particularly important to the analysis.

    However, a judge may have slightly greater expectations before these charges ever see a day in court.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 17:25

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Aug 15

Today’s News 15th August 2022

  • How Your Carbon Footprint And Your Carbon Wallet Are Really Going To Work In The Dystopian World That WEF Has Planned?
    How Your Carbon Footprint And Your Carbon Wallet Are Really Going To Work In The Dystopian World That WEF Has Planned?

    Via ‘threadsbyirish’ Substack,

    Let me introduce you to Barbara Baarsma. Barbara is the CEO of Rabo Carbon Bank. Yes, you read that right. Not Rabo Bank but Rabo Carbon Bank. In this 53 second video interview below she is advocating for a “Personal Carbon Wallet”. That may not seem like a big deal but when you hear what she has to say you should be concerned, very concerned in fact.

    I’ve transcribed the interview as it is in Dutch. It contains critical information. If you prefer to watch the video with subtitles by all means please do so.

    “Let’s ensure that every household or every citizen of the Netherlands receives a certain amount of carbon emission rights. This way we can ensure that we do not emit more than our yearly limit. Your emission rights will be stored in a carbon wallet. So if I wanted to fly, I would buy some carbon emission rights from someone who can’t afford to fly. For example this way this poor person can earn some extra money.

    Or if someone lives in a small house, he can sell his emission rights to someone who lives in a big house, this way poor people can benefit from the green economy”

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

    Wow. Quite something isn’t it. Let’s pick it apart and then look at how they are probably going to implement it.

    You could argue that it’s just another level of taxation which the globalists will take. I think it runs far deeper. When Bankers start using expressions like rights, poor people and green economy you can be sure that they are envisaging a world for the elite. They don’t give a fig about anyone else.

    So in its most basic form, you’ll have no fun and won’t be allowed to travel anywhere. But don’t worry the elites will have the fun for you.

    This is nothing more than Totalitarianism.

    Did I forget to mention that Rabobank and Baarsma are both in the World Economic Forum.

    https://www.weforum.org/organizations/rabobank-group

    https://www.weforum.org/agenda/authors/barbara-baarsma

    When most people think of carbon emissions and carbon footprints they think it only refers to travel, fuel, gas and electricity all under the guise of emissions. I hate to break it to you but it runs far deeper than that.

    Let me now introduce you to Doc Ono, a company you may never have heard of.

    Doconomy is a “credit card” endorsed by Klaus Schwab’s World Economic Forum.

    In May 2019 an article appeared on the WEF site called

    “This credit card has a carbon-emission spending limit”

    In the article it says

    “Swedish fintech company Doconomy has launched a new credit card that monitors the carbon footprint of its customers – and cuts off their spending when they hit their carbon max”

    Yikes, cuts off their spending.

    It continues

    “The DO card tracks the CO2 emissions linked to purchases to calculate the carbon impact of every transaction. The aim is to encourage people to actively reduce their carbon footprint and demonstrate the impact that small changes can have on the environment.

    The card uses the Aland Index as the basis on which it calculates the carbon footprint of each product purchased. Users can set a maximum value for their carbon spend and learn how to compensate for their carbon footprint by contributing towards schemes to reduce or remove greenhouse gas emissions”

    Now we are getting closer to the truth of how this is going to operate. It isn’t just travel, it will be for everything.

    https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/05/this-credit-card-has-a-carbon-emission-spending-limit/

    In February 2019 Mastercard published an article called

    Mastercard and Doconomy Launch the Future of Sustainable Payments

    where they say

    “Doconomy and Mastercard announce their joint effort to combat climate change by enabling DO – a free and easy-to-use mobile banking service that lets users track, understand and reduce their CO2 footprints through carbon offsetting”

    https://www.mastercard.com/news/press/2019/february/mastercard-and-doconomy-launch-the-future-of-sustainable-payments/

    Isn’t it fascinating that they emphasise it will allow the users to track everything. It would never be used for nefarious purposes such as banks and governments tracking everything. Of course not 🙄

    Mastercard is also a WEF partner.

    https://www.weforum.org/organizations/mastercard

    The United Nations also got on board in May 2019. They published an article called

    Innovative Climate Action – New Credit Card Limits Climate Impact of Users

    https://unfccc.int/news/innovative-climate-action-new-credit-card-limits-climate-impact-of-users

    Patrica Espinosa, the UN Climate Change Executive Secretary couldn’t get enough of the concept, singing its praises.

    And yes, you guessed it, Espinosa and UN are also WEF partners. We are beginning to see a trend here yet again, aren’t we.

    https://www.weforum.org/people/patricia-espinosa-cantellano

    https://www.weforum.org/organizations/united-nations

    The big banks also see this as a massive opportunity. In 2021 Barclays hopped into bed with MasterCard and Doconomy.

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

    Seems like full on surveillance and socialism to me. And you probably don’t need me to tell you by this stage that Barclays is also a WEF member.

    https://www.weforum.org/organizations/barclays

    But that’s not even close to what the WEF, Mastercard, UN and all these globalist bodies have planned. You are only being told a fraction of the story.

    Let me paint you a picture of how this might play out. In Ireland, back in March of this year, Marc Ó Cathasaigh who is a Green Party TD (MP) paid a visit to a pub called Brew Dog in Dublin. He showed an image of the menu which had CO2 (carbon dioxide) labelling beside every food item on the menu and asked the question

    Would this influence what you would order?

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

    On the left side of the menu is your standard chicken, beef, lamb etc whilst on the right is your ‘plant-based’ food including the lab processed ‘Beyond Meat’. Bill Gates is also an investor in ‘Beyond Meat’

    https://www.beefcentral.com/news/synthetic-meat-investor-bill-gates-calls-for-rich-countries-to-eat-only-synthetic-meat/

    There isn’t much difference in the outrageous Dublin prices between the two food types. There is however a massive difference in the CO2 levels.

    The other point which is important to mention is that a seed is being planted in people’s minds about the different CO2 levels. They are trying to influence people into the hands of plant based foods and Beyond Meats. There is no doubt about it that there is an agenda at play.

    I have no idea what the criteria was that they used for measuring the CO2 levels but the point is restaurants are beginning to trial this. I read all the comments below the thread with some saying it was a good idea and some said it wasn’t. The problem though was that everyone responding totally missed the point.

    Here is what is probably going to happen. When you go out to a restaurant depending on what your “carbon footprint” has been, will determine what you can and cannot order off the menu.

    Sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it ? Depending on how many points you have left for that month will determine whether you are allowed to eat “proper food” or “lab food”.

    If you’ve been a bold boy or girl you’ll only be allowed to eat the lab grown plant-based food so you don’t surpass your carbon quota. If you try to order beef which apparently has high CO2 levels you won’t be allowed to.

    This will also be the case when you go to supermarkets to do your weekly shop. Every item you buy will be assigned a CO2 number.

    It gets even more ridiculous though. Within the last month Eamonn Ryan who is a WEF member and leader of the Green Party in Ireland has advocated for the reduction in the numbers of Irish cattle. Instead we will import cattle from Brazil. I like to call this the work of the “Ruminati” 😉 If you know, you know.

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

    How do you think the carbon footprint of importing beef from Brazil would look like on a menu now. It would be off the charts. Do you see what they are trying to achieve and where this is going ?

    The whole thing sounds ridiculously Dystopian, doesn’t it ? That would never happen. It’s so 1984, I hear you shout. If you have been paying attention to the last 2.5 years then you will realise it’s not remotely far-fetched at all.

    We are being told how this is going to pan out. All you have to do is watch an episode of Black Mirror called Nosedive where the topic is social credit scores. Just substitute social credit score with carbon footprints and you will understand. Digital IDs and Currency, Social Credit Scores and Carbon Footprints will all work in tandem in the future.

    I mentioned earlier Doc Ono. On their own site they give another example of how this would work for clothing. Let’s say you wanted to buy a pair of jeans 👖

    On their web site they say

    “Consumers could cut their carbon footprint in half by choosing lower impact products”

    https://doconomy.com/consumers-could-cut-their-carbon-footprint-in-half-by-choosing-lower-impact-products/

    Imagine going shopping and having to whip out your “carbon calculator” and realise you only have 10 points to play with. You won’t be able to buy the 21.45 CO2 jeans, you’ll have to plump for the 8.98 CO2 jeans. After all, you won’t be allowed to go over your quota or your card will stop working and your digital payment will be declined.

    I just mentioned a “carbon calculator”. It just so happens that Mastercard have already developed it.

    In a 2021 press release on their site they say

    Mastercard unveils new Carbon Calculator tool for banks globally, as consumer passion for the environment grows.

    Guess who they have collaborated with. Doconomy. Go Figure.

    https://www.mastercard.com/news/press/2021/april/mastercard-unveils-new-carbon-calculator-tool/

    This will be rolled out in the shape of an app so you can check your carbon footprint which will determine what you can and can’t buy.

    https://www.2030calculator.com

    But it isn’t just any old “carbon calculator” it’s a 2030 carbon calculator, as in Agenda 2030. If you look closely enough at the top left hand corner of the image you can see the transition from 2020 to 2030.

    It will eventually take the shape of an app that covers all the bases of Digital ID, Digital currency, social credit score etc. Basically a total control and surveillance grid which there will be no escape from. Welcome to Aldous Huxley’s “Brave New World” and George Orwell’s “1984” rolled into one.

    Now whether this happens in reality or not is another story entirely. These are not the rantings of some mad, conspiracy theorist. I’ve tried to provide proof of what is going on in the real world. It’s up to you whether you want to believe it or not and whether we let it happen….

    *  *  *

    Thanks for reading threadsirish! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/15/2022 – 02:00

  • Modern US Warmongering Is Scaring Henry Kissinger
    Modern US Warmongering Is Scaring Henry Kissinger

    Authored by Caitlin Johnstone via Medium.com,

    In a new interview with The Wall Street Journal, immortal Hague fugitive Henry Kissinger says the US is acting in a crazy and irrational way that has brought it to the edge of war with Russia and China:

    Mr. Kissinger sees today’s world as verging on a dangerous disequilibrium. “We are at the edge of war with Russia and China on issues which we partly created, without any concept of how this is going to end or what it’s supposed to lead to,” he says. Could the U.S. manage the two adversaries by triangulating between them, as during the Nixon years? He offers no simple prescription. “You can’t just now say we’re going to split them off and turn them against each other. All you can do is not to accelerate the tensions and to create options, and for that you have to have some purpose.”

    On the question of Taiwan, Mr. Kissinger worries that the U.S. and China are maneuvering toward a crisis, and he counsels steadiness on Washington’s part. “The policy that was carried out by both parties has produced and allowed the progress of Taiwan into an autonomous democratic entity and has preserved peace between China and the U.S. for 50 years,” he says. “One should be very careful, therefore, in measures that seem to change the basic structure.”

    Mr. Kissinger courted controversy earlier this year by suggesting that incautious policies on the part of the U.S. and NATO may have touched off the crisis in Ukraine. He sees no choice but to take Vladimir Putin’s stated security concerns seriously and believes that it was a mistake for NATO to signal to Ukraine that it might eventually join the alliance: “I thought that Poland — all the traditional Western countries that have been part of Western history — were logical members of NATO,” he says. But Ukraine, in his view, is a collection of territories once appended to Russia, which Russians see as their own, even though “some Ukrainians” do not. Stability would be better served by its acting as a buffer between Russia and the West: “I was in favor of the full independence of Ukraine, but I thought its best role was something like Finland.”

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

    I don’t know about you, but to me this warning is much, much more ominous coming from a bloodsoaked swamp monster than it would be from some anti-imperialist peace activist who was speaking from outside the belly of the imperial machine. This man is a literal war criminal who, as a leading empire manager, helped to unleash unfathomable horrors all around the world the consequences of which are still being felt today.

    And as far as you can tell from his own comments, he remains completely unreformed.

    “Looking back over his long and often controversial career, however, he is not given to self-criticism,” The Wall Street Journal’s Laura Secor writes.

    “I do not torture myself with things we might have done differently,” Kissinger tells her.

    So Kissinger remains an unapologetic warmongering psychopath. But if he hasn’t changed as a person, what has? Why is he now cautioning against US aggression and warning that the empire has taken things too far?

    Well, if Kissinger hasn’t changed, we can only surmise that it is the US empire itself that has changed. Its behavior is now so insane and illogical that it is making a 99 year-old Henry Kissinger nervous.

    Which, if you really think about it, is one of the scariest things you could possibly imagine.

    The empire’s departure from the Henry Kissinger iteration of murderous madness to its new form of insanity appears to have begun around the turn of the century, when the influx of neoconservatives into the White House combined with the jingoism which followed 9/11 to usher in an era of interventionism and military expansionism of such brazenness and recklessness that many from the old guard balked.

    Kissinger was supportive of the 2003 Iraq invasion, but well before it began he was already saying that he had serious misgivings about the lack of clear thinking and forward planning he was seeing on that front. The neoconservative goal of US planetary hegemony at any cost which led to that invasion (and the planning of many more) has since become the mainstream Beltway consensus perspective on US foreign policy, and it is responsible for the escalations that Kissinger is now warning about.

    “The PNAC plan envisions a strategic confrontation with China, and a still greater permanent military presence in every corner of the world,” wrote Michael Parenti in his 2004 book Superpatriotism. “The objective is not just power for its own sake but power to control the world’s natural resources and markets, power to privatize and deregulate the economies of every nation in the world, and power to hoist upon the backs of peoples everywhere — including North America — the blessings of an untrammeled global ‘free market.’ The end goal is to ensure not merely the supremacy of global capitalism as such, but the supremacy of American global capitalism by preventing the emergence of any other potentially competing superpower.”

    By “PNAC plan” Parenti means the plans of the neoconservatives behind the notorious Project for the New American Century think tank, whose unipolarist militaristic agendas they explicitly advocated.

    Henry Kissinger is warning about the dangers of US warmongering not because he has gotten saner, but because the US war machine has gotten crazier. That we are now hurtling toward confrontations that don’t appear rational to someone who has spent the majority of his life watching the mechanics of empire from inside its inner chambers should concern us all. When you are talking about brinkmanship between major world powers, especially nuclear brinkmanship, the last thing you need is for one of the parties involved to be acting erratically and nonsensically.

    We need de-escalation and detente, and we need it yesterday. If you’re too hawkish for Henry Kissinger, you’re too motherfucking hawkish.

    *  *  *

    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
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 23:30

  • China Unexpectedly Cuts Rates As Terrible Econ Data Confirms "Alarming" Slowdown, Yields Plunge
    China Unexpectedly Cuts Rates As Terrible Econ Data Confirms “Alarming” Slowdown, Yields Plunge

    Has Beijing finally realized it will need to step in aggressively if it wants to avoid an economic collapse?

    Moments ago, and just days after the release of China’s dismal woeful new credit data, the National Bureau of Statistics reported the July data dump which was just awful. Among the latest monthly data:

    • Industrial production rose 3.8% from a year ago, lower than June’s 3.9% and missing economists’ forecast of a 4.3% increase
    • Retail sales grew at a 2.7% annual pace, also lower than June’s 3.1%, and badly missing the consensus estimate of 5.0%
    • Fixed-asset investment gained 5.7% in the first seven months of the year, which however was also below the June YTD number of 6.1%, and also missed the 6.2% projected by economists
    • The silver lining is that just as in the US, the worse the economy founders, the lower the jobless rate which in July fell to 5.4% from 5.5%

    “July’s economic data is very alarming,” said Raymond Yeung, Greater China economist at Australia & New Zealand Banking Group Ltd. “The Covid Zero policy continues to hit the service sector and dampen household consumption.”

    It’s not just Covid Zero: the “alarming” collapse in China’s economy was strongly hinted last Friday when Beijing reported that July credit growth, in the form of total social financing and RMB loans, came in well below the already-low market expectations.

    According to Goldman, the detailed breakdown of the July loan data pointed to weaker credit demand: household and corporate loans both slowed in July from June, and interbank rates declined to very low levels in recent weeks. Smaller government bond net issuance also contributed to the lower TSF. That said, local government officials are working on preparing the pipeline for additional infrastructure investment projects, and the July Politburo meeting pointed to likely additional local government special bond issuance beyond this year’s budget in the next few months.

    However, Beijing appears to finally realize that at a time when China’s housing is crashing (with residential property sales plunging 28.6% in July, it’s no surprise the WSJ last week wrote that “The Bursting Chinese Housing Bubble Compounds Beijing’s Economic Woes“), it will have to do something at the national level, as the latest credit figures clearly raise the risks of a liquidity trap where monetary easing is failing to spur lending in the economy.

    As such, moments before the latest horrific data dump, China’s central bank unexpectedly cut its key interest rates in a feeble attempt to prop up the failing economy weighed by Covid lockdowns and a deepening property downturn.

    The PBOC cut the rate on its one-year policy loans by 10 basis points to 2.75% and the seven-day reverse repo rate to 2% from 2.1%, surprising China watchers with all 20 economists polled forecasting the rate on the one-year medium-term lending facility would be left unchanged. Expect all other key reference rates to follow a similar 10bps rate cut in the coming days.

    While the rate cut was small, “it’s more of a signaling effect” showing authorities are prepared to act, said Zhang Zhiwei, chief economist at Pinpoint Asset Management Ltd. “In terms of the size of this action, it’s quite limited. In order to turn around the market expectation and break the downward spiral, they need to do a lot more.“

    And they will… eventually.

    And with China once again dovishly diverging aggressively from the rest of the Developed world which is hiking at every opportunity, it’s no surprise that as the PBOC confirms the economy is rapidly slowing, that Chinese bond yields slumped after the rate cuts: China’s 10-year government bond yield slid five basis points to 2.675%, the lowest level since May 2020, while the offshore yuan extended losses, falling 0.3% to 6.7607 per dollar. Stocks were also volatile in the morning session, with the benchmark CSI 300 Index was little changed after rising as much as 0.7% following the PBOC’s rate cuts.

    Beijing’s commitment to Covid Zero – which has emerged as a convenient smokescreen for Xi Jinping who can blame all of China’s ills on his own failed response to the Wu Flu – has made it impossible to sustain any hard-won economic progress, as the threat of repeated restrictions and re-openings continues to loom. As Bloomberg notes, August saw a surge in cases in the resort island of Hainan, where authorities have locked down holidaymakers, suspended flights and shut businesses to contain infections.

    Yet even today, the PBOC decided to confound China watchers, as the central bank withdrew liquidity from the banking system (by issuing 400 billion yuan of MLF funds, only partially rolling over the 600 billion yuan of loans maturing this week) at the same time as it cut rates.

    “The dominating downside risk for growth and weak credit data prompted the PBOC to lower the policy rates,” said Ken Cheung, chief Asian FX strategist at Mizuho Bank. The cut widens the divergence between the PBOC’s easing stance and other major central banks that are tightening monetary policy to curb soaring inflation. That’s raising risks for the yuan as capital outflow pressures increase. It also comes a surprise as the PBOC recently warned against the risk of rising inflation, even though domestic demand still remains soft, keeping overall price pressures in check for now.

    The rate reduction underscores the severity of growth challenges. China’s top leaders vowed last month to achieve “the best outcome” possible for economic growth this year while sticking to a strict Covid Zero policy, and downplayedthe official target of around 5.5% growth. Economists polled by Bloomberg forecast the economy to expand only 3.8% this year.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 22:58

  • Brother Of Marine Killed In Botched Afghan Pullout Commits Suicide At 1-Year Memorial Service
    Brother Of Marine Killed In Botched Afghan Pullout Commits Suicide At 1-Year Memorial Service

    Monday August 15 marks the one year anniversary since the Taliban takeover of Kabul, Afghanistan – which kicked off weeks of a botched US scramble to evacuate the remaining military, State Department, and US civilians from the Afghan capital. Tens of thousands of translators and other Afghans arrived at the airport in waves, desperate to get out amid the Taliban onslaught. 

    As the US-propped up president Ashraf Ghani was among the first officials to flee the country, reportedly with some $169 million raided from state coffers, local Afghan troops also melted away, allowing the Taliban to march into Kabul with ease. From there a chain of events saw what was then known as Hamid Karzai International Airport descend into chaos as a poorly prepared US and international coalition security perimeter struggled to prevent the flood of people desperate to escape the war-torn country from overwhelming the runways. 

    Scene of the aftermath of the ISIS-K suicide attack, via AFP/Getty Images

    On August 26, 2021, a suicide bomber attacked a crowded airport entry checkpoint, killing scores of Afghan civilians and 13 American troops, mostly Marines. An estimated 45 additional US troops had been wounded in the blast, considered among the greatest US military disasters in over two decades of occupation since 2001. 

    In the months following, not only was the Biden administration under fire for what was clearly a woefully ill-prepared and disorganized pullout of the country (importantly which also reportedly left thousands of dual citizens behind, in addition to tens of thousands of local Afghan translators and coalition partners), but the Pentagon came under scrutiny as well for positioning Marines on extremely exposed perimeters and checkpoints as “sitting ducks” for potential terror attacks. 

    Following a Pentagon investigation of the events leading to the deadly suicide attack, not a single American general, officer, or Biden administration was ever disciplined or so much as blamed. Instead, they had the gall to declare the pullout a “success”. Multiple US agencies on the ground had also failed to assess what they’d be facing amid the rapid US pullout, with one subsequent review finding the following: 

    The report calls out the State Department, which had been in charge of evacuation plans and timelines, for deeply underestimating the number of refugees they would be sending to American bases.

    “For example, on August 18, 2021, Ramstein Air Base leadership was informed they had to prepare to receive 2,500 evacuees,” according to the report. “Less than 2 weeks later, 28,517 evacuees had arrived at Ramstein Air Base.”

    And one year on, tragedy continues to be compounded for those still mourning the 13 US personnel killed on Aug.26. 

    AFP/Getty Images/FOX: A military honor guard carries the flag-draped casket of Marine Lance Cpl. Kareem Grant Nikoui at Harvest Christian Fellowship Church on Sept. 18, 2021, in Riverside, California. 

    Fox News is reporting Sunday that the brother of one of the slain Marines took his own life at a one-year memorial service: 

    The brother of a young Marine killed during the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan reportedly died by suicide a year later during a recent memorial service for the fallen service member.

    Lance Cpl. Kareem Nikoui, 20, from Norco, California, was one of 13 American troops killed on Aug. 26, 2021, when a suicide bomber detonated an explosive outside the Kabul airport as crowds of Americans and Afghan allies sought to flee Taliban fighters taking over control of the capital city.

    Nearly a year later, Nikoui’s older brother, 28-year-old Dakota Halverson, died on Aug. 9, a press release from the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department in California confirmed, though offering few details.

    “The older brother of one of the 13 KIA in Kabul recently killed himself at his little brother’s memorial,” Rep. Mike Waltz, of Florida announced Saturday on Twitter. “Please pray for his family. There MUST be accountability for this continued carnage.”

    Fox underscores while referring to Shana Chappell, mother of two deceased sons, “Chappell and the fallen Marine’s father, Steve Nikoui, have been vocal critics of President Biden’s principal military officer, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark A. Milley, regarding the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan last August following a 20-year conflict.”

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

    But if there’s been one constant to come out of the disastrous Afghan war and botched pullout – it’s the complete lack of any accountability spanning multiple administrations and military commands. The same trend has been seen in Iraq, with lower-ranking US troops as well as untold numbers of local civilians bearing the brunt of the follies of US politicians and generals. 

    It also seems that all the Washington war machine and neocon architects of the so-called Global War on Terror have to show for two decades of military interventionism is a Middle East in flames, instability, and continued economic unraveling. Syria too, is still directly occupied by US troops in its oil-rich northeast region.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 22:55

  • Missouri AG Questions Need For Potentially Armed IRS Army
    Missouri AG Questions Need For Potentially Armed IRS Army

    Authored by Darlene McCormick Sanchez via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt wants answers from the IRS commissioner on why the IRS needs an army of potentially armed new agents.

    State Attorney General Eric Schmitt speaks at an election-night gathering after winning the Republican primary for U.S. Senate at the Sheraton in Westport Plaza in St Louis, Mo., on Aug. 2, 2022. (Kyle Rivas/Getty Images)

    Schmitt, who is a Republican Senatorial Candidate, sent a letter to IRS Commissioner Charles P. Rettig on Aug. 11,questioning the agency’s massive expansion plans that include hiring 87,000 more IRS employees over the next 10 years.

    The IRS has stockpiled 5 million rounds of ammunition and spent $750,000 this year to buy more, according to Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz, who introduced a bill to block future purchases by the agency.

    Concurrently, social media was set ablaze this week by an IRS job post for Criminal Investigation Special Agents that would require them to “carry a firearm and be willing to use deadly force.”  https://www.jobs.irs.gov/resources/job-descriptions/irs-criminal-investigation-special-agent

    “This arsenal makes a recent IRS job advertisement downright frightening,” Schmitt wrote.

    On Aug 12, the Democrat-led Congress was poised to pass the so-called Inflation Reduction Act, giving the IRS $80 billion, with $45.6 billion for “enforcement.”

    Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) speaks during a news conference about the Inflation Reduction Act outside the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Aug. 4, 2022. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

    “The people of Missouri love our country,” Schmitt wrote. “But, with every passing day, we find more reasons to fear our government.”

    Public concern has built over what some call the militarization of the IRS, and many Republicans fear increased audits on lower and middle-class taxpayers.

    “To put this in perspective, the IRS will be larger than the FBI, the Pentagon, the State Department, and the Border Patrol combined,” Schmitt wrote. “The thought of 87,000 new IRS agents terrorizing Missourians is disturbing, to say the least.”

    Even more troubling to Schmitt is the militarization of the IRS. In the most recent public accounting five years ago, the tax agency had more than 5 million rounds of ammunition to use in rifles, shotguns, pistols, and submachine guns.

    Schmitt pointed out that the federal government wants to limit law-abiding citizens’ Second Amendment rights, while the IRS continues to buy ammunition.

    Proponents of a well-funded, well-staffed, potentially armed IRS say the agency has lost thousands of employees through attrition since 2010, and the 87,000 new employees will not double the agency’s numbers. Both Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and Rettig have assured the public that the IRS won’t target those making less than $400,000.

    However, experts such as Preston Brashers, a senior tax policy analyst for the Heritage Foundation, told The Epoch Times those assurances are meaningless because they are not in the law that Congress passed.

    Schmitt’s letter noted that FBI agents brandishing automatic weapons “invaded” the Florida home of former President Donald Trump, whose attorneys were blocked from observing the “unprecedented and intrusive raid.”

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 22:20

  • 400 Square Foot Nantucket Cottages Are Selling For Millions
    400 Square Foot Nantucket Cottages Are Selling For Millions

    Just in case you were wondering whether or not the real estate market is still mired in a bubble, just remember there are 350 square foot cottages in Nantucket that are selling for millions of dollars.

    Several cottages in the area were assessed at $10,000 per square foot, according to the Wall Street Journal. It makes Nantucket some of the “most expensive real estate in the world,” according to the report. 

    Henry Sanford, who has owned property in Nantucket for decades, said: “You can’t make sense of it mathematically. I don’t even know anywhere else in the world where you can find that.”

    About 25 cottages on Old North Wharf have become “trophy properties”, according to the report, highly sought after by sailing enthusiasts and wealthy homeowners. Each cottage comes with its own boat slip and their owners include people like Google CEO Eric Schmidt and his wife, Wendy Schmidt, billionaire businessman Charles Johnson, and Charles Schwab.

    Joe Farrell Jr. commented: “There’s half a dozen billionaires on this wharf. I’d have been self-conscious walking down here when I barely had two nickels to rub together.” 

    Susan Burke didn’t know her husband bought an 889 square foot cottage for $5.8 million, she read about it in the local press first.  “I just said, ‘Can you imagine anyone stupid enough to pay that price for this tiny little place?’” she said.

    Her husband told her two weeks later: “It’s yours.”

    The Old North Wharf properties are generally purchased for their private waterfront access on an island with “only a limited number of docks”, the report says. Few people rarely sleep in the them. They are part of a 99 year old cooperative that is responsible for common areas, like landscaping, the gravel road, parking lot and weekend security. 

    Co-op president Christopher Quick told WSJ: “It’s a pretty private little place. A lot of people use them as a little getaway from the madness. They’re all sort of playhouses.” 

    The co-op also manages three deep water docks, which also go for millions each. One sold for $4.75 million in 2016 while others sold for $2.1 million in 2002 and 2003. 

    “I really was just looking for access to the water and the lifestyle on the wharf,” said Harvey Jones, who paid $1.6 million for a 375 square foot cottage. He then collaborated with a neighbor to build a shared dock to accommodate his 36 foot yacht. 

    The cottages on the Wharf rarely turn over and the board of the Old North Wharf Cooperative has to vet new buyers. 

    “People want to get in here in the worst way,” Quick concluded. 

    You can read the full WSJ article on the Wharf here.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 20:35

  • Congressman Perry Gets Phone Back From FBI, Unclear About Motives Behind Seizure
    Congressman Perry Gets Phone Back From FBI, Unclear About Motives Behind Seizure

    Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times,

    House Freedom Caucus Chairman Scott Perry (R-Pa.) confirmed that he has received his cell phone back from the FBI after the agency had seized it a few days back.

    Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.), joined by members of the House Freedom Caucus, speaks at a news conference on the infrastructure bill outside the Capitol Building in Washington, on Aug. 23, 2021. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

    On Aug. 9, a day after raiding former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home in Florida, FBI agents had taken Perry’s phone as part of a separate investigation. At the time, Perry was traveling with his family. Speaking to “Capitol Report” on NTD News, the GOP member confirmed that he has received his phone.

    He is still uninformed as to why the phone was confiscated by the FBI. However, Perry was informed by his attorneys that he was not a target of the FBI’s investigation.

    After the seizure, Perry had blasted FBI agents for making no attempt to contact his lawyer who would have made arrangements to submit the phone if needed by the agency.

    In a statement, Perry said that though he was outraged, he was “not surprised” that the FBI under the direction of Attorney General Merrick Garland’s Department of Justice would seize the phone of a sitting member of Congress.

    Perry claimed that his phone contains information about political and legislative activities as well as private conversations with his family members, friends, and constituents, none of which is the “government’s business.”

    “DOJ chose this unnecessary and aggressive action instead of simply contacting my attorneys,” the statement said. “These kinds of banana republic tactics should concern every citizen.”

    Unprecedented Move

    In an interview with NTD, Greg Shaffer, a retired FBI agent for the elite hostage rescue team, said that the FBI needs to have special permission to seize any property belonging to members of Congress, members of the clergy, attorneys, or other individuals who deal with privileged information. Seizing Perry’s phone was a “show of force” by the Biden administration.

    “For an FBI agent to go walk up to a sitting congressman and take his cell phone … that had to be approved at the highest level at the FBI and DOJ,” Shaffer said. “That is very, very difficult to do. Unprecedented.”

    It is unclear whether there is a link between Perry’s phone seizure and the raid on Trump’s home. Speaking to The Epoch Times, Perry pointed out that the separation of powers is a firewall that keeps the three branches of government in check.

    By taking control of a phone belonging to a sitting member of Congress, the DOJ, “for maybe the first time in history, is preparing to pierce that veil.”

    Darlene McCormick contributed to the report.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 20:00

  • "They Can Do Audio, Video, & Physical Surveillance On You 24H/365D A Year": Rex Lee On Intrusive Apps
    “They Can Do Audio, Video, & Physical Surveillance On You 24H/365D A Year”: Rex Lee On Intrusive Apps

    In this special episode, The Epoch Times’ Tiffany Meier sat down with Rex M. Lee, cybersecurity adviser at My Smart Privacy. He helps shed light on China’s cyberattacks on America, how they affect us in our daily lives, and what can be done to stop them.

    Lee notes one way adversarial countries can get in is through invasive apps:

    “You have to look at an app as legal malware. And that’s the best way you can describe apps today. An app—whether it’s a social media app developed by Bytedance, such as TikTok, or Facebook, or Instagram—any of these apps, they are basically legal malware that enable the developer to monitor, track, and data mine the end user for financial gain 24 by seven, 365 days a year.

    “A single intrusive app enables the developer to collect over 5,000 highly confidential data points associated with the end user’s personal information, business information, medical information, legal information, and employment information because the surveillance and data mining done by these companies is indiscriminate, meaning that they’re not only collecting consumer information, they’re collecting every bit of information from the end user, including text messages, email, email attachments, calendar events, and so forth,” he added.

    As to just how invasive these are, Lee said:

    “What an app will do is it will interlink with all of the hardware on the device and the sensors on the device, such as camera and microphone, as well as sensors, such as the accelerometer. So they can do audio, video and physical surveillance on you 24 hours, 365 days a year while collecting those 5,000 highly confidential data points on the end user. What they’re doing is they package that and they monetize it. But also, as we’re seeing in the news, is that these tech companies are aligned with governments. So the information a lot of times is ending up in the hands of the government.”

    Meier also sat down with Greg Copley, president of the International Strategic Studies Association and author of “The New Total War.” He touches on the recent buzz over House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan and what that means for this November, both in terms of our midterm elections and Chinese leader Xi Jinping seeking an unprecedented third term.

    Copley said:

    “We’re now getting a better idea as to how the People’s Liberation Army [PLA] would fight a war against Taiwan, if it came to that. And if they in fact allowed the General Secretary Xi to make them go to war on the Taiwan issue, Japan has made it clear, and it repeated that declaration during Speaker Pelosi’s visit, that Japan would support Taiwan in the event of a military attack by the People’s Republic of China. Certainly, the U.S. will be drawn into it one way or another. Yes, it would involve high risks and the potential for many casualties. But it would also involve higher risks for the People’s Republic of China, not just in the direct conflict between the PLA and the Republic of China armed forces and the United States armed forces and the Japanese self-defense forces, but also there are other forces who would become engaged automatically.

    “That probably would include Australia, but it would certainly include India, and the Indian factor is one which Beijing does not wish to discuss openly. Even in the current war game posture against Taiwan, the PLA started moving additional forces down into the Tibetan plateau to be ready for an Indian response there. The Indian response would be massive. India has a similar force capability in many respects to the People’s Republic of China, and could move the entirety of its forces against the PRC, both on the Tibetan plateau and in the Eurasian context, but also in the Indian Ocean in a naval context,” he added.

    Watch the full interview below:

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 19:25

  • Time To Take A Stand
    Time To Take A Stand

    Submitted by QTR’s Fringe Finance

    “I’m not going to sit on my ass as the events that affect me unfold to determine the course of my life. I’m going to take a stand. I’m going to defend it, right or wrong, I’m going to defend it.”

    – Cameron Frye

    My paid subscribers know we were pretty much spot on in predicting that the 9.1% CPI print from last month (1) marked the short term CPI peak and that (2) equity markets would rally in the short to mid-term as a result. I predicted it would happen in my July 2022 portfolio update:

    I think it’s likely the 9.1% print is the peak, for a little while at least, based on current spot prices. Used cars are down, new cars are down, home prices are starting to come down as more inventory comes on the market, oil has sold off over the last 2 weeks, etc. This doesn’t mean inflation is over, not does it mean stocks won’t still move lower in the longer term once the effect of rate hikes put into place in 1H 2022 finally surface in credit markets, but it means we could be at a lull for the time being (1-2 quarters).

    I think equities are going to rally on this sentiment (the fact that stocks didn’t crash spectacularly in the last 48 hours on that 9.1% print says something to me). The market is forward looking and the inflation numbers are backward looking, as much as I absolutely hate to admit it.

    And while I’m happy to take a victory lap on that prediction (Disclaimer: I never predict anything correctly, so don’t get used to it), I want to now also lay out seperate game theory for the Fed going forward.

    Not unlike Cameron at the very end of the movie Ferris Bueller’s Day off, when he finally decides to stand up to his father and show backbone for the first time in his life, the Fed has reached a similar opportunistic inflection point.

    Given this week’s “good” (read: still absolutely dogshit 8.5% YOY) inflation print, markets have moved higher under the assumption that the Fed is going to use the data as an excuse to pivot. I think there’s an opportunity being presented to the Fed that’s profoundly different, and wanted to discuss it.

    A couple of questions to ponder.

    What has the Fed been desperately trying to do over the last six months?

    In my opinion, it has been trying to regain its credibility with the American public, consumers and the market.

    And why is gaining credibility important at this juncture?

    Because part of inflation is a psychological game, and if the Fed can show the public that it has inflation under control, or at least has the means to contain it, it may help alter consumer behavior and quell inflation even further. At the very least, it will prevent panic and will appease politicians.

    On an even broader scale, there are many who think that the Fed has lost significant credibility over the last couple of decades. If I were Jerome Powell, I would be keen to the idea of being able to claw back some of that credibility.

    And now there’s a way that the Fed can do it. They can hold steady and continue to hike rates, as planned, despite the fact that inflation has “peaked”. Everyone is assuming the Fed is going to use the first bit of good news as a reason to pivot – hell, I have even suggested this – but they also have a very unique opportunity in the sense that they can do what is now the “unexpected” and show some backbone going forward.

    Continuing to hike aggressively despite the fact that inflation is coming down would be a giant step in the Fed creating a new image for itself.

    Of course, this would also exacerbate what I think is a coming trainwreck in credit markets. I described my thoughts about this in a recent piece when I noted that this year’s hikes are occurring far quicker than they did in 2018, when the market crashed in December.

    For comparison, I noted in my recent piece calling out the Biden administration’s lies about the economy that the Fed hiked at nowhere near the current pace leading up to 2018. The hikes leading up to 2018 took almost 3 years to reach 2.25-2.5%.

    Meanwhile, we have hiked to 2.25%-2.5% this time in just five months.

    One way or another, whether the Fed hikes or decides to start pivoting soon, I still believe there’s going to be a trainwreck coming in credit markets once the aftershocks of the rate hikes that have already taken place start to make their way through the system.

    At this point, the best the Fed can do is make it seem like a willing mess of their own making.

    By embracing more hikes, it’ll come off as though the coming crash of the economy is what the Fed was planning for, even if it wasn’t. Last week’s job numbers, no matter how fudged they may have been, could be seen as enabling the Fed to embrace the course they are already on. In other words, the Fed may think that there have so far been no consequences of their rate hike actions.

    However, the truth is that there are consequences, we just haven’t seen them yet.

    I’m predicting we will feel the full force of them in the second half of this year and, as a result, markets are going to move lower from where they are rallying to this week. As such, personally, I have increased some short exposure to index ETFs to try and balance both my long and short book in my personal portfolio.

    But the key takeaway from this piece is that the Fed has a chance to scrape back some of its long lost credibility given the circumstances of this past week. Whether or not they are able to find their spine for the first time since I can remember remains an entirely different question.

    “When Morris comes home, he and I’ll just have a little chat.”

    Disclaimer: I am an idiot and often get things wrong and lose money. I own/owned positions as disclosed above and in linked pieces. This is not a recommendation to buy or sell any stocks or securities. I own or may own all crypto/stocks I mentioned or linked to in this piece. I often lose money on positions I trade/invest in. I may add any name mentioned in this article and sell any name mentioned in this piece at any time, without further warning. None of this is a solicitation to buy or sell securities. These positions can change immediately as soon as I publish this, with or without notice. You are on your own. Do not make decisions based on my blog. I exist on the fringe. The publisher does not guarantee the accuracy or completeness of the information provided in this page. These are not the opinions of any of my employers, partners, or associates. I did my best to be honest about my disclosures but can’t guarantee I am right; I write these posts after a couple beers sometimes. Also, I just straight up get shit wrong a lot. I mention it twice because it’s that important.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 18:50

  • Former National Intelligence Director: Trump Has 'Ultimate Declassification Authority'
    Former National Intelligence Director: Trump Has ‘Ultimate Declassification Authority’

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

    A former director of national intelligence said Aug. 12 that it is “virtually impossible” to prosecute people for mishandling classified documents, and asserted that former President Donald Trump has the “ultimately declassification authority” in terms of such documents.

    “The president does have ultimate declassification authority. He can literally declassify—and President Trump had that authority, and could declassify anything you want while he was president,” John Ratcliffe, a Republican congressman before Trump appointed him to be director of national intelligence, said on Fox News.

    Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe looks on as President Donald Trump presents the Presidential Medal of Freedom to former football coach Lou Holtz, in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington on Dec. 3, 2020. (Evan Vucci/AP Photo)

    According to documents unsealed earlier Friday, Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home was raided by FBI agents on Aug. 8 because of potential violations of several laws, including the Espionage Act, which some legal experts say relates to possessing classified defense information.

    An inventory showed that agents seized what they listed as classified, secret, and top secret documents.

    Ratcliffe said on Fox that before the search warrant materials were made public, he didn’t believe the raid was about classified materials.

    “It has to be more than that because the Department of Justice and the FBI have already set a standard that makes it virtually impossible to prosecute a case like that,” he said, pointing to how former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s possession of classified documents was handled by the FBI, including then-Director James Comey.

    “As people talk about Espionage Act and classified documents and all of that, the standard was set in 2016. Remember the Department of Justice and the FBI took the official position that Hillary Clinton, who was in possession of classified documents … that [being] in possession of that, that wasn’t enough, and that being grossly negligent and being careless, Jim Comey told us, that’s not enough under the Espionage Act. You have to know you’re violating the law,” Ratcliffe said.

    “Even if you assume the worst case scenario for President Trump, that there were classified documents in his possession at Mar-a-Lago, that only puts him where Hillary Clinton was. And what the FBI and the Department of Justice would have to show is that he knew the documents were there and he didn’t think they were declassified,” he added.

    Trump wrote on Truth Social that all the documents seized from Mar-a-Lago were declassified.

    “He had a standing order that documents removed from the Oval Office and taken into the residence were deemed to be declassified,” a Trump spokesperson told Just the News. “The power to classify and declassify documents rests solely with the President of the United States. The idea that some paper-pushing bureaucrat, with classification authority delegated BY THE PRESIDENT, needs to approve of declassification is absurd.”

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 18:15

  • "He's Not Running Again": Top Democrat Lawmaker Predicts One Term For Biden
    “He’s Not Running Again”: Top Democrat Lawmaker Predicts One Term For Biden

    Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY), who chairs the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, told the NY Times Editorial Board in a weekend interview that President Joe Biden won’t run for office a second time.

    “Off the record, he’s not running again,” Maloney said, when asked – to which the Times responded, “Not off the record. On the record.”

    “On the record?” She replied. “No, he should not run again.“

    Earlier this month, Maloney said during a debate against Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY) that she doesn’t think Biden will run again – a comment she walked back the next day.

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

    “Mr. President, I apologize,” she said on CNN, adding “I want you to run. I happen to think you won’t be running, but when you run or if you run, I will be there 100%. You have deserved it.”

    “You are a great president, and thank you for everything you’ve done for my state and all the states and all the cities in America,” she continued.

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

    Maloney’s latest comments come as recent polling shows that a majority of Americans are worried about Biden’s mental health.

    Maloney’s comments are in stark contrast to the Biden camp – with Bloomberg reporting earlier in the week that the president is planning to launch his re-election campaign shortly after midterms (despite the fact that 75% of Democrats want another candidate to run).

    Mean while, in an appearance on ABC‘s “The View,” White House spox Karine Jean-Pierre insisted the president is running.

    “So let me just say this and the president has been asked this question multiple times. So have I,” she said, adding “The president intends to run in 2024. That is something that he’s, again, has said multiple times. It is so far away right now. It is a long time away and what we are going to focus on, on how do we continue to deliver for the American public today, and the next day and has we have been doing the past 18 months. I will say this from that same poll that you are reading off of, is that in a head-to-head, the president beats Donald Trump.”

     

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 17:40

  • Hedge Fund CIO: Here's Why Trading Often Destroys People, Devouring Them From Within
    Hedge Fund CIO: Here’s Why Trading Often Destroys People, Devouring Them From Within

    By Eric Peters, CIO of One River Asset Management

    Losing money sucks. Lots of other things do too. Most of us hate being wrong. We go to extraordinary lengths to protect our egos. Which is absurd of course, but we are curious little creatures, taught as children to aim for 100% on each test, to win every ball game.

    At some point in a trading career, we either learn to deal with the humiliation of making mistakes or we fail. And the way karma works, the harder we deny our errors the more public the ultimate humiliation.

    Lots of investors target longer time horizons so that they make infrequent predictions, which means fewer possible mistakes to confront. Traders on the other hand, make lots of smaller bets, which guarantees frequent winners and losers. But for some odd reason, victories are less pleasurable than defeats are painful, so on balance, trading depletes us. Which is why it often destroys people, slowly devouring them from within.

    Survivors develop ways to inoculate themselves from the pain, humiliation, defeats, losses. Some train their minds to reverse decisions in an instant. They can appear confused, confusing, contradicting themselves in the same sentence. Such people are masters at self-preservation.

    The greatest traders and investors eventually build firms around themselves. Team efforts yield psychic benefits that help restore balance to the emotionally drained. Being surrounded by a group of fellow risk takers and business builders allows you to refocus your efforts when you feel you’re probably wrong. Uncertain. Or when you simply lack conviction.

    And a team gives you leverage to press hard when you feel you’re right and the risk reward is compelling. Because after years of focused effort, introspection, you gain a good feel for when you’re likely right or wrong.

    And you begin to see the same in others. Better yet, you can sometimes sense when others are wrong and stubbornly unwilling to yet admit it. Large groups of such people present the greatest trading opportunities. And as awful as it all sounds, the truth is, there is nobility in this struggle. Joy in the pursuit.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 17:05

  • Ray Epps Told FBI He Expected Bomb Attack Near The Capitol On January 6, Documents Show
    Ray Epps Told FBI He Expected Bomb Attack Near The Capitol On January 6, Documents Show

    Authored by Joseph M. Hanneman via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    When James Ray Epps Sr. first called the FBI regarding his January 2021 activities in Washington D.C., he didn’t mention how he implored protesters in several locations to go inside the Capitol, but he later told an agent that he expected a bomb would detonate on a side street near the Capitol.

    Ray Epps encourages protesters to go into the Capitol the night before the siege of January 6, 2021. (Villain Report/Screenshot via The Epoch Times)

    Those are just two of the revelations in a collection of Epps-related material obtained by The Epoch Times, including FBI interview summaries, FBI audio recordings, transcripts, videos, and photographs.

    In two interviews with the FBI in 2021, Epps explained his actions on Jan. 5 and Jan. 6. He admitted he was guilty of trespassing on restricted Capitol grounds and confessed to urging protesters to go to—and into—the Capitol on Jan. 6.

    Despite the admissions, the FBI never arrested Epps and he was not charged by the U.S. Department of Justice with any Jan. 6 crimes. The non-action has fueled a crop of theories that he might have been working for the FBI or another agency.

    Epps, 61, has repeatedly denied those suggestions through his attorney.

    Epps recently sold his house and land in Queen Creek, Ariz., because of threats and harassment and moved to Colorado, he told the New York Times in July. According to online records, the Arizona property sold for $2.2 million on April 28, 2022.

    Epps at one time was No. 16 on the FBI’s Jan. 6 most-wanted page. His entry was later scrubbed from the list without explanation. He is among a handful of persons of interest to have their photos deleted from the FBI site.

    ‘Like a Terrorist Act’

    In an interview with FBI agents on March 3, 2021, Epps said he brought a first-aid kit in his backpack to Washington because he expected a terror attack.

    “Yeah, I thought there might be a problem. That’s why I was there,” Epps told an FBI agent and an FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force officer in a meeting at the Phoenix office of Epps’s attorney, John Blischak.

    Blischak told The Epoch Times he would comment after reviewing the FBI interview summary, but had not done so by press time.

    “I was afraid they were going to set off an explosion on one of the side streets,” Epps said, according to a recording of the interview obtained by The Epoch Times. “So we tried to stay in the middle, tried to get there early, tried to stay away from the sides. And if something like that happened, I had a first-aid kit. I could help out.”

    Epps told the agents the possibility of violence weighed heavily on his mind and he originally did not plan to travel to Washington. It was only when learning that his son, James Epps Jr., was going to the Trump rally that the senior Epps decided to go and keep an eye on his son, he said.

    Ray Epps is shown at the lower left on an early FBI “wanted” poster. His photo has since been scrubbed from the FBI website. (FBI.gov/Wayback Machine)

    Ray Epps is shown at the lower left on an early FBI “wanted” poster. His photo has since been scrubbed from the FBI website. (FBI.gov/Wayback Machine)

    “As time went on, I started getting a bad feeling like something’s gonna happen,” said Epps, a U.S. Marine Corps veteran and former Oath Keepers leader in Arizona. “There’s a lot of wackies out there. I thought something would happen in D.C. I thought there might be, what do they call them, EOD, something like that?”

    Epps might have been referring to an improvised explosive device (IED), which is a homemade bomb that was a favorite weapon of insurgents in Afghanistan during the United States’ long war there. In military parlance, an EOD refers to an explosive ordnance disposal specialist—someone who defuses and destroys explosives.

    An agent asked for clarification: “Oh, you mean like a terrorist act?”

    “Right, like a terrorist act,” Epps said.

    The agents did not press Epps on what led him to believe there would be an explosion, nor did they ask about the two alleged pipe bombs found outside the Republican and Democrat party headquarters, each just blocks from the Capitol. The RNC pipe bomb was placed near the corner of the Capitol Hill Club facing a side street, similar to the description Epps offered.

    The devices did not detonate and the FBI has not arrested anyone in those cases.

    Epps told the FBI he regretted the things he said in downtown D.C. the night of Jan. 5, 2021. He spoke to internet personality Baked Alaska and video podcaster Villain Report, both of whom recorded their exchanges.

    “In fact tomorrow, I don’t even like to say it because I’ll be arrested. …I’ll say it. We need to go into the Capitol,” Epps told Baked Alaska, whose legal name is Anthime Gionet.

    Epps shouted a similar theme to the crowd at large: “Tomorrow, we need to go into the Capitol. Into the Capitol. Peacefully,” he said. The crowd then started chanting, “Fed! Fed! Fed! Fed!”

    The FBI agents told Epps that his statements on Jan. 5 were problematic. They said they found him often on video and in photographs from Jan. 5 and 6.

    Epps replied: “I’m the tallest guy in the crowd, and I stick out, man. They followed me.” Then he joked, “I could never be a bank robber.”

    “We said that the same way,” one of the agents said. “We said, ‘It’s a big guy and every photo we find, he’s in it.’ The night before, that video didn’t help.

    “…And the video the night before, what you said basically predicted what happened,” the agent said.

    “I wish I could take that back,” Epps replied. He called the statements “really stupid.”

    On Jan. 6, Epps was filmed near the Washington Monument imploring the crowd, “We are going to the Capitol, where our problems are. It’s that direction. Please spread the word.”

    When speaking to a young man in a red and black mackinaw jacket, Epps said, “When we go in, leave this here [pointing to something]. You don’t need to get shot,” according to a video of the exchange.

    First Call to FBI on Jan. 8

    Epps first called the FBI on Jan. 8, 2021, after his brother-in-law notified Epps’s wife that a photograph of Epps was on the FBI website. That call to the National Threat Operations Center (NTOC) lasted about 27 minutes, according to an audio file of the call obtained by The Epoch Times.

    In describing his activities, Epps never mentioned that he urged the crowds on Jan. 5 to go into the Capitol the next day. He said he went down to Black Lives Matter plaza to try to calm things down after people he suspected were Antifa activists were harassing police.

    “I tried to calm them down,” Epps told the FBI operator. “I tried to let them know that, you know, that this is not what we’re here for. We’re here because of the Constitution, not the police. Police are on our side.”

    Nor did Epps mention getting on a bullhorn on Jan. 6 and encouraging people to go to the Capitol as soon as President Donald Trump was finished speaking. He would comment on those topics nearly two months later when interviewed by FBI agents.

    On the January call, Epps insisted his presence on Capitol grounds was to de-escalate when things got violent.

    “I am guilty of being there and probably trespassing,” he said. “But I had a reason. I was trying to calm ’em down. I wanted to be there, but I’m trying to calm ’em down. Anything I can do to help. There’s no call for that kind of behavior. I will be your witness.”

    Ray Epps at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, shortly before pepper gas is shot into the crowd. “Been a long time,” he said. “Aah, I love it!” (Screen Capture/Rumble)

    Ray Epps at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, shortly before pepper gas is shot into the crowd. “Been a long time,” he said. “Aah, I love it!” (Screen Capture/Rumble)

    Epps told the agents he came to Washington to express his concerns about the 2020 presidential election. He said he received five ballots at his Queen Creek address: one each for him and his wife, and three with names he did not recognize.

    “We’ve owned the property for 11 years now. I’ve never heard of those three people that came there. I didn’t recognize the names,” he said. “And then when the election went the way it did, I was a little concerned. I mean, how many apartments are there in Arizona, 3 million? And if they’re sending all these ballots to these different apartments. I mean, you know, that’s a concern.”

    Epps said he also went to support Trump, although he did not stay at the Ellipse for all of  Trump’s speech. He said he followed crowds that left the speech early and walked toward the Capitol.

    “People started leaving early after President Trump started speaking. So they were running and it was the same people that was, ‘F Antifa,’ and this and that and the other,” Epps said.

    “I believe, just my belief, they were Antifa, the ones that were saying that stuff,” he said. “And they were like running that way and I’m like, ‘Maybe I can calm this down.’ So I went with them.”

    Epps said it was his original intention to stay for all of the speeches at the Ellipse.

    “I planned on being and word was being passed around that right after he gets done speaking, we’re gonna go to the Capitol. And it was a given,” Epps said. “So spread the word spread the word. So I started spreading the word and I said that to a lot of people there: ‘We’re going to the Capitol right after the president speaks.’”

    Perhaps the scene that drew the most attention and speculation about Epps on January 6 was when he appeared at the first breach point of police lines. Some 20 minutes before Trump finished speaking at the Ellipse, an aggressive crowd gathered at a lightly defended barrier on a sidewalk not far from the Peace Monument.

    As rioters began yanking at the bicycle-rack barriers, Epps pulled Ryan Samsel back from the front line and spoke in his ear. Seconds after that exchange, Samsel and others knocked down the barrier, causing one officer to fall back and hit her head on the concrete.

    “I walked up to him, and I put my arm on him and said, ‘Hey, that’s not why we’re here. Don’t be doing that,’ you know.

    “I don’t know who he was. No clue,” Epps said. “I just tried to talk him out of doing what he was doing. And then all of a sudden, it blew up.”

    When interviewed by an FBI special agent and a detective on Jan. 30, 2021, Samsel corroborated Epps’s description of their brief verbal exchange, according to a transcript of the session obtained by The Epoch Times. Samsel faces nearly a dozen January 6-related charges in U.S. District Court in Washington.

    “Now that guy I talked to,” Samsel said, pointing to a photograph of Epps. “He came up to me and he says, ‘Dude,’ his exact words were, ‘Relax,’ he says, ‘The cops are doing their job.’ That’s exactly what he says to me right there in that picture.”

    Inconsistencies in Interviews

    Epps’s two interviews with the FBI included some inconsistencies and changed details, according to the recordings and FBI summary documents.

    Epps told the FBI on Jan. 8 that his brother-in-law called him to notify him his picture was on the FBI’s January 6 website. During his March 3 interview with FBI agents, Epps said, “Someone contacted me and said, ‘Hey, your picture’s up.’”

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 16:30

  • "You Are Next": JK Rowling Receives Death Threat In Wake Of Salman Rushdie Attack
    “You Are Next”: JK Rowling Receives Death Threat In Wake Of Salman Rushdie Attack

    Popular author JK Rowling, who wrote the famous Harry Potter series, has become the latest high profile writer to face a public death threat after the horrific Friday knife attack on Salman Rushdie at a New York speaking event, which has left the 75-year old on a ventilator fighting for this life. 

    Rowling had issued a tweet expressing solidarity with Rushdie as the world received news of the assassination attempt. “Horrifying news. Feeling very sick right now. Let him be ok,” she had posted. But quickly after, an account identified as “Meer Asif Aziz” responded to Rowling: “Don’t worry you are next.”

    Aziz’s account had previously expressed support for Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Additionally when Rushdie’s attacker was identified as 24-year-old Hadi Matar of New Jersey, the Aziz Twitter account hailed Matar as a “revolutionary Shia fighter”.

    Police are currently investigating any possible ties between the Iranian government or foreign entities and the knife attack on Rushdie, given especially the well-known decades long fatwa in place by the Ayatollah calling for his killing.

    Rowling reached out to Twitter Support and soon after acknowledged that the police have become involved. Initially, she had received a message from Twitter saying the Aziz threat “did not violate the community guidelines.” But later the account was frozen.

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

    So it appears Twitter only took action after Rowling and her followers kept up the pressure: 

    The email from Twitter read: ‘After reviewing the available information, we determined that there were no violations of the Twitter rules in the content you reported. We appreciate your help and encourage you to reach out again in the future if you see any potential violations.’ 

    The 57-year-old posted a screenshot of the response, commenting: ‘These are your guidelines, right? “Violence: You may not threaten violence against an individual or a group of people. We also prohibit the glorification of violence… “Terrorism/violent extremism: You may not threaten or promote terrorism”…’

    Authors JK Rowling and Salman Rushdie

    As for Rushdie, it’s being reported that he’s now able to speak, but could lose and eye and has suffered serious liver damage as well as nerve damage to his arm, after being stabbed up to ten times. His agent said Sunday he’s been taken off the ventilator as the “road to recovery” begins.

    Hadi Matar entered a plea of non-guilty during court proceedings on Saturday. Authorities have said he’s been cooperative during questioning, but still haven’t detailed the precise motive or if there were external terrorism links.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 15:55

  • Damning FBI Report Concludes Alec Baldwin Pulled Trigger In 'Rust' Shooting
    Damning FBI Report Concludes Alec Baldwin Pulled Trigger In ‘Rust’ Shooting

    Authored by Katie Hudson via The Mind Unleashed (emphasis ours),

    In spite of Alec Baldwin’s repeated denials that he pulled the trigger of the gun that killed his film’s cinematographer, the FBI has concluded in a damning new report that he did, in fact, pull the trigger of that gun.

    On the set of Baldwin’s film “Rust” in October 2021, the 64-year-old actor unexpectedly shot and killed his cinematographer, Halyna Hutchins, who was 42 years old. Baldwin also injured his director, Joel Souza, during the shooting, which took place at Bonanza Creek Ranch in Santa Fe, New Mexico on October 21, 2021.

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

    Baldwin has always maintained that he did not pull the trigger of the gun that killed Hutchins, which was only intended to be loaded with blanks. However, a new report has determined that the gun could not have been discharged unless the trigger was pulled first.

    This indicates that Baldwin may still be held accountable for the incident in the form of criminal charges, as the Santa Fe Sheriff’s department has confirmed that the investigation would be handed over to the District Attorney.

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

    On Friday (August 12), authorities stated that they are waiting for the actor’s phone records, which the District Attorney has been working with Suffolk County Police Department in New York and Baldwin’s attorneys to acquire them.

    Detectives will examine the documents, and then a case file will be delivered to the district attorney so that she can decide whether or not any criminal charges will be filed.

    The FBI’s new forensic report examines all aspects of the shooting as part of a larger investigation to determine whether or not any criminal charges can be filed.

    The investigation concluded that the revolver, which was a single-action F.lli Pietta in.45 Colt caliber, was simply not capable of being fired unless someone pulled the trigger.

    According to ABC News, they arrived at their conclusion after carrying out an accidental discharge test; however, it is not apparent whether the test was carried out using the exact same gun or an identical clone.

    It states that even if someone messes around with the hammer, the gun will not fire a bullet and a primer at the same time when it is operating normally.

    During interviews with investigators, Baldwin said that he was informed the weapon he was holding was a “cold gun,” which meant the revolver was loaded with blank cartridges.

    Baldwin claimed that the weapon fired without him pulling the trigger when he pulled back the hammer and posed for Halyna’s camera, with the actor adding: “I did not pull the trigger.”

    According to the FBI, it is theoretically possible for the device to produce the sound of a gunshot without actually firing a bullet; however, it is abundantly clear that this was not what happened in Baldwin’s case.

    The damning FBI report may result in criminal charges being brought against Alec Baldwin and potentially others involved in the shooting as well, with the Santa Fe Police Department still investigating the circumstances surrounding Halyna’s death.

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

    The forensic analysis was immediately sent to the New Mexico Office of the Medical Investigator as soon as it was received, which was then forwarded to the Sheriff’s Office.

    Police also released several new videos of Baldwin being interviewed about the shooting.

    Speaking earlier this year, Santa Fe County Sheriff Adan Mendoza said that criminal charges should not be ruled out.

    “It’s too early to rule anything out right now, I don’t think anybody’s off the hook when it comes to criminal charges,” Mendoza said.

    “I’ve said this before: I think there was complacency on the set. There was disorganization and a degree of negligence—whether that rises to a criminal level, that will be up to the district attorney,” he added.

    Although no one has been charged with a crime in connection to the shooting, Baldwin is being sued by Hutchins family.

    Like this article? Get the latest from The Mind Unleashed in your inbox. Sign up right here.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 15:20

  • "Supply, Commodity, And Dollar Shocks": Morgan Stanley Sees Gathering Storm Clouds Of A Global Recession
    “Supply, Commodity, And Dollar Shocks”: Morgan Stanley Sees Gathering Storm Clouds Of A Global Recession

    By Seth Carpenter, chief global economist at Morgan Stanley

    The clouds of recession are gathering globally. The Chinese economy contracted in 2Q. The US notched a “technical recession.” The flow of natural gas to Western Europe is restricted. In the past three months, we have revised down our forecast for global growth to 2.5%Y in 2022, which is about 50bp below consensus and 40bp lower than in May. We are edging closer to the bear scenario from our May Mid-year Outlook. Is a global recession upon us?

    Recession is our baseline view for the euro area. The flow of natural gas from Russia has been restricted, prices have surged, and we see weak growth through the end of the year. We expect a recession by 4Q, but the data will be noisy. While 2Q GDP surprised to the upside because of the timing of the European post-Covid rebound, PMIs were already negative for July. A complete gas cut-off is the worst-case scenario and remains possible, but normalization of gas flows would bring only modest relief. Winter price levels are already partially baked in. And with the ECB almost single-mindedly focused on inflation, more hikes are likely until there are hard data that show economic contraction or normalized inflation. Inflation and rate headwinds are not dissipating any time soon.

    I am only slightly more optimistic about growth in the US. The negative GDP prints in the first two quarters clearly cast a pall, but those readings are misleading. To be sure, the weakness in residential and business investment will not be reversing course with monetary policy continuing to tighten. But consumption spending was slammed by surging food and energy prices, a pullback from a year of goods overconsumption, and the rollover of the housing market. Nevertheless, household spending – the key driver of the economy averaged 1.4% at an annual rate in the first half. Indeed, the bright side of the negative 2Q print was the whopping 2 percentage point drag from inventories, correcting an overbuild. The inventory drag is now in the rearview mirror, and the July jobs report printed a massive 528k jobs. That pace of job creation almost certainly cannot last, however, and the Fed’s drag on the economy – and therefore jobs – is both substantial and intentional. But since the 1970s the US has never had a recession within a year of printing so many jobs. So what is the plan? As Chair Powell noted at the July press conference (and as we have repeatedly argued), the Fed’s strategy is to slow the economy enough that inflation pressures abate, but then to pivot. To be “nimble,” as Powell has said. A soft landing is by no means assured – again, we are only slightly more optimistic on the US than we are on Europe – but with the help of some good luck, the Fed’s plan has a chance.

    China’s situation is completely different. The economy contracted in 2Q amid stringent Covid controls, but real-time data show that we have now bottomed. The question is no longer whether we get a rebound, but how much of one. Covid-zero policies are slowly easing and we think more relaxation will follow the Party Congress in October. But will freedom of mobility be enough to reverse the challenges of the housing market? Recent policy action to address the housing crisis will help, but I fully expect that a much larger package will be needed. Ultimately consumer and property confidence will need to make a rapid recovery if the rebound can take shape.

    The world has been simultaneously hit by supply, commodity, and dollar shocks. Central banks are pulling back on demand to contain inflation. But even as we start to glimpse the other side of the inflation peak, the full effects of rate hikes are not yet manifest in the economy. Even if we avoid a global recession, it is hard to see economic activity getting back to its pre-Covid trend. I hope it is sunny where you are…you can worry about this storm tomorrow.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 14:45

  • Delaware Man Crashes Car Into US Capitol Barricade, Opens Fire And Kills Himself
    Delaware Man Crashes Car Into US Capitol Barricade, Opens Fire And Kills Himself

    Update(1632 ET): Police have identified the man who crashed into a Capitol barricade and killed himself as Richard Aaron York III, a 29-year old from Dagsboro, Delaware. “It’s still not clear why he chose to drive to the Capitol Complex,” the US Capitol Police said in a statement.  According to Yahoo, police say York was believed to have recently lived in Pennsylvania. 

    * * *

    A man drove his car into a barricade at the US Capitol early Sunday morning and, as it burst into flame, he exited the vehicle and began “indiscriminately” shooting a handgun. As US Capitol police approached him, he fatally shot himself in the head. 

    The car that crashed into the US Capitol barricade is carried away on Sunday morning (AP Photos)

    According to a statement issued by Capitol Police:

    Just after 4:00 a.m., a man drove his car into the vehicle barricade at East Capitol Street and Second Street. While the man was getting out of the car, it became engulfed in flames.

    The man then fired several shots into the air along East Capitol Street. When our officers heard the sound of gunfire, they immediately responded and were approaching the man when he shot himself.

    A police officer examines the charred street where the assailant’s vehicle struck the Capitol barricade and burst into flame (Daniel Slim/AFP via Fox5 NY)

    “It appears that the individual may have started the fire himself as he was getting out of the car,” said Capitol Police chief Tom Manger at a Sunday morning press conference. He described the attacker as firing a handgun “indiscriminately.”

    With the man’s identity not yet revealed, there’s no indication of motive thus far. Police are reviewing his social media accounts for any indications of his intent.

    “We do know that the subject has a criminal history over the past ten years or so, but nothing that at this point would link him to anything here at the Capitol,” said Manger. 

    The charred vehicle where it struck the Capitol security barricade and burst into flame (Erik Cox Photography via WTOP)

    No police fired their weapons, and no one else was hurt in the attack. Congress is currently in recess.  The death investigation will be managed by the DC Metropolitan Police Department.

    Though not directly declaring a motive, some major media stories on the incident are already putting it in the context of right-wing anger over the FBI’s Aug 8 search for classified documents at former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence.

    “US law enforcement agencies have faced a wave of threats and political discord ahead of the 2022 midterm elections and after an FBI search of former President Donald Trump’s home in Florida last week,” writes Bloomberg‘s Victoria Cavaliere. 

    The last vehicular attack on the Capitol didn’t come from the right wing. In April 2021, black Nation of Islam disciple Noah Green killed one Capitol police officer and badly injured another one. Green struck the officers with his vehicle, leapt from his car with a knife and was shot and killed by Capitol police. 

    Referencing that incident in coverage of this morning’s attack, Reuters describes Green only as a “25-year-old motorist.” 

    The aftermath of the April 2021 attack on a Capitol police barricade (Oliver Contreras/The New York Times)

     

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 13:33

  • Former FBI Agent Says Mar-a-Lago Raid Was Government’s Attempt To 'Embarrass' Trump
    Former FBI Agent Says Mar-a-Lago Raid Was Government’s Attempt To ‘Embarrass’ Trump

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

    Greg Shaffer, a retired FBI agent for the elite hostage rescue team, said that the agency’s raid on former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida on Aug. 8 was “completely and totally unprecedented.”

    “I don’t know what the FBI, Department of Justice, or this administration was thinking by doing this,” Shaffer said in an Aug. 10 interview with NTD. “It was an overt act meant to embarrass the former president. It just shows the total lack of optics on their end. The rule of law obviously does not play equal on both sides anymore.”

    Local law enforcement officers in front of the home of former U.S. President Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Fla., on Aug. 9, 2022. (Giorgio Viera/AFP via Getty Images)

    During the raid, Trump’s attorneys on the site were not allowed to watch what the FBI agents were doing, which Shaffer said was also unprecedented.

    Shaffer said that during most of the search warrants he executed as an FBI agent, the owner of the property usually watched over the agents to monitor what they were doing as they looked for the items included in the warrant.

    The ex-FBI agent said that a subpoena, which could have been done behind the scenes without embarrassing the Trump family or the Trump organization, would have been a “much better course of action.”

    Shaffer said he’s concerned about the heavy-handed way the raid was conducted, and that it was an intentional decision of the Biden administration as a “show of force,” he added.

    Government Reacts to Public Outrage

    On Aug. 11, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) asked a federal court to make the materials of the search warrant public.

    Speaking to The Epoch Times, John Malcolm, director of the Meese Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at The Heritage Foundation, said the government’s move to unseal the documents might be a response to public outrage.

    “I think that this is an attempt by the Department of Justice—who may have underestimated the reaction to this through this raid—to try to get out a little bit ahead of it by saying, ‘Oh, see, what we did here was perfectly on the up and up,’” Malcolm said.

    Following the raid at Trump’s home, the FBI also seized the cellphone of Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.) on Aug. 9. The circumstances surrounding the seizure are not known. In a statement, Perry called the action “banana republic tactics.”

    In the NTD interview, Shaffer said the FBI must have special permission to seize the property of members of Congress, members of the clergy, attorneys, and other individuals who deal with privileged information.

    “For an FBI agent to go walk up to a sitting congressman and take his cell phone … that had to be approved at the highest level at the FBI and DOJ,” Shaffer said. “That is very, very difficult to do. Unprecedented.”

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 13:30

  • High Prices, Range Anxiety Holding Back EV Adoption
    High Prices, Range Anxiety Holding Back EV Adoption

    While the tax credits for new and used electric vehicles included in the Inflation Reduction Act will do its part in making electric cars more attractive to American consumers, Statista’s Felix Richter notes that there’s more than just the high purchase price keeping Americans from buying electric.

    According to a recent survey conducted by AAA, one quarter of Americans say that they would be likely to buy an electric vehicle (excluding hybrids) as their next car. That leaves three quarters who don’t see themselves plugging in instead of filling up just yet.

    And the reasons for that hesitancy are mainly threefold. As the following chart shows, it all comes down to three factors: high prices, range anxiety and charging challenges.

    Infographic: High Prices, Range Anxiety Holding Back EV Adoption | Statista

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    But hey, if you’re not re-mortgaging the house to buy that EV, you are a climate-change-denying nazi, right?

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 08/14/2022 – 13:00

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Today’s News 14th August 2022

  • Brandon Smith: Artificial Intelligence – A Secular Look At The Digital Antichrist
    Brandon Smith: Artificial Intelligence – A Secular Look At The Digital Antichrist

    Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.us,

    Why do globalists have a deep rooted obsession with Artificial Intelligence (AI)? What is it about the fervent quest for an autonomous digitized brain that sends them into fits of ecstasy? Is it all about what AI can do for them and their agenda, or, is there also a darker “occult” element to the concept that is so appealing?

    The World Economic Forum, an organization dedicated to the globalist “Great Reset” agenda, the Fourth Industrial Revolution and the “Shared Economy,” dedicates a large portion of every annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland to discussion on AI and the expansion of its influence over daily life.

    The United Nations holds extensive policy sessions on AI and has been spending a considerable amount of energy to establish “ethics rules” for the development and use of Artificial Intelligence. At the core of the UN’s efforts is the assertion that only the UN is qualified to dictate and control AI technologies; for the good of all mankind, of course. AI governance is slated to go into full effect by 2030 according to the UN’s own white papers (All globalist institutions have set 2030 as the target date for all of their projects).

    Another lesser known but substantial organization is the World Government Summit held every year in Dubai. These summits are attended by many national leaders and representatives as well as corporate CEOs and celebrities. The primary subjects of focus at the WGS are usually climate change propaganda, centralization of the global economy, Transhumanism and AI.

    Most of the public discussions on AI revolve around positive narratives; we are meant to be convinced on the many great advancements that AI technology will provide. Some of the “advantages” include transhumanist health modifications, computer implants in the body or brain, and even nanobots which may one day be advanced enough to change our very cells. In other words, in order to benefit from AI we must become less human and more machine.

    Other supposed benefits require a vast array of new systems (some of them are being built now) that would allow algorithms to monitor every facet of our lives. Globalists often refer to these systems as the “internet of things” – Every appliance you own, the car you drive, every computer, every cell phone, every surveillance camera, every stop light, everything would be centralized into a single AI network within a city, and each city would be connected in a great spider’s web to a national AI database.

    The Internet of Things is regularly mentioned in conjunction with climate change governance and carbon restrictions. The purpose is crystal clear – Governments and corporate elites want the ability to monitor every watt of energy you use everyday. This kind of full spectrum information makes it easier to dictate our decisions and our access to goods and services. They would have total control of anyone living within these “Smart Cities.” Your entire life, every second, would be watched and scrutinized.

    But how could this be made possible? Millions upon millions of people living day-to-day; that’s a LOT of data to sift through to find anyone not following the rules. This is one of the reasons why the globalists are salivating over AI technologies – It’s the only tool available to collect and delineate mass data collection in real time.

    Already, there are efforts to use AI systems to predict crime before it happens (pre-crime). These experiments are rather overhyped as they don’t actually predict specific crimes or identify specific criminals. Rather, they use statistical analysis to predict which areas of a city certain crimes are most likely to occur. You don’t need AI for this, any cop that’s worked in a city long enough can tell you when and where certain crimes are most likely to happen.

    Hilariously, AI algorithms have recently been accused of “racial bias” when it comes to the areas they select for predictive crime, because often these areas tend to be in predominantly black neighborhoods and the most predicted criminals tend to be young black men. So, the computers have been accused of racial profiling just as many cops are accused of racial profiling.

    Just another classic contradiction of the political left: They love the idea of climate change restrictions, transhumanism, and even AI surveillance when it suits them, but a computer does not care about your feelings and it doesn’t care about social taboos. It only cares about the numbers.

    And this is where we get into the greater dangers inherent in AI. Imagine a world micro-managed by a cold dead algorithm that views you as only one of two things: A resource or a threat.

    Prediction of pre-crime is nonsense; algorithms monitor habits and patterns and human beings tend to break patterns abruptly. People are affected by crisis events in different ways that are impossible to portend. There are far too many variables and there will never be a system that is able to predict the future, but that’s not going to stop the globalists from trying to force the issue.

    AI governance is an inevitability according to globalist institutions – They claim that one day Artificial Intelligence will be used to govern whole societies and dole out punishment based on scientifically efficient models. They act as if this is just the natural path of mankind and one we cannot avoid, but in reality it is a self-fulfilling prophesy. It’s not necessarily meant to happen, it is being engineered to happen.

    AI proponents argue that the algorithms cannot act with the same bias that humans do, therefore, they would be the best possible judges of human behavior. Every decision from production to distribution to healthcare to schooling to law and order would be managed by AI as a means to achieve ultimate “equity.”

    As noted above, they’ve already run into the road block of statistical probability and the fact that even if AI is left to autonomously make decisions devoid of emotion, millions of people will still see those decisions as biased. And, in some ways they would be right.

    The most logical decision is not always the most moral decision. Furthermore, an AI is programmed by its creator and can be engineered to make decisions with the creator’s biases in mind. Who gets to program the AI? Who gets to dictate its coding? Global elitists?

    And here is where we get to the more “spiritual” element of the AI issue in relation to the globalists.

    A couple years back I wrote an article titled ‘Luciferianism: A Secular Look At A Destructive Globalist Belief System.’ My goal in that piece was to outlined the large amount of evidence that globalists are in fact a kind of cult of organized psychopaths (people without empathy that take joy in destruction for the sake of personal gain). I concluded that globalists do indeed have a religion, and their root belief system according to the evidence is Luciferianism.

    Yes, I’m sure there will be naysayers out there that will scoff at this notion, but the facts are undeniable. There is a distinct occult element to globalism, and Luciferianism pops up consistently as the root philosophy. I think I broke this down rather effectively in the article and I won’t rehash all the evidence here; people are welcome to read it if they wish.

    I wrote from a secular standpoint because Luciferianism is an inherently destructive ideology even when viewed outside of the lens of Christian belief. Beyond that, there are psychological elements that need to be addressed that Christianity often ignores. Luciferian philosophy is tailor made for narcissistic and sociopathic people. The root of the cult is about “special” human beings that are not hindered by the boundaries of conscience, morals or ethics. Lack of empathy is seen as an advantage to progress and the ultimate goal of Luciferianism is godhood – A person becoming like a god, whether through being worshiped by others, the power of influence or by technological methods of extending life and abilities.

    But what does this have to do with AI?

    I believe that globalists view AI with such reverence because they think it is a new form of life, or an ultimate form of life – A life that they are creating (as gods create life). And, if you think about it symbolically, this new “life” is actually made in the image of its creators: It has no empathy, no remorse, no guilt, no love. For lack of a better word, it is soulless, much like globalist psychopaths are soulless.

    If we are to look at AI in religious terms for a moment – AI is a kind of antithesis to the figure of Christ. Christ represents an all-knowing form of ultimate love and ultimate self sacrifice according to Christian doctrine. I don’t think there is a word for what AI ultimately represents. The only term that seems to fit is “Antichrist”: The all seeing eye. A rulership of a super-intelligence devoid of humanity.

    To be clear, I DO NOT believe in end-of-the-world concepts portrayed by those that adhere to more popular interpretations of Revelations. I think the world changes. I think empires rise and fall and this can often be seen as the “end of the world” when it’s really just the end of an epoch. That said, I wholeheartedly believe in the existence of evil; evil being defined as willfully deceitful or destructive actions for purely personal or organizational benefit, such as murder or enslavement. Evil does indeed exist and is an observable element of human life.

    There are also traits of humanity that lead to good, that prevent us from self destruction when we listen to them. Conscience, reason, wisdom and often faith can provide a shield against evil actions for the majority of us. If we didn’t have these pillars within our psyches we would have annihilated ourselves long ago. But, there are some who do not have conscience, that do not have empathy and they despise these traits as “limiting.”

    AI is being designed by these kinds of people. And maybe they won’t cause the “end of the world” in terms we commonly understand (or in biblical terms), but over time they could take away everything that makes humanity worthy of the world. In a way, this would be an Apocalypse. It would be a living nightmare run by psychopathic people using sociopathic artificial intelligence, actively encouraging and enabling the masses to abandon their human bodies to become digital monstrosities and technological chimera.

    If successful, it really would be the ultimate defilement of nature, or of God’s design if that is what you believe in. The pursuit of godhood is not worth it for most of us, but for the globalists it is the dream of an age, and they will do ANYTHING to achieve it.

    *  *  *

    If you would like to support the work that Alt-Market does while also receiving content on advanced tactics for defeating the globalist agenda, subscribe to our exclusive newsletter The Wild Bunch Dispatch.  Learn more about it HERE.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 23:30

  • Does The US Have An Appetite For Third-Party Candidates?
    Does The US Have An Appetite For Third-Party Candidates?

    Anyone running as a third-party candidate or Independent for federal office in the U.S., let alone the presidency, is certainly facing long odds.

    Still, as Statista’s Katharina Buchholz details below, generations of Americans have not tired of trying.

    This includes Andrew Yang, who announced his new party, Forward, at the end of July and is tipped to launch a presidential campaign as well. The run would be his second after an unsuccessful attempt at the Democratic nomination in 2020. Last year, Yang also dropped out of the New York City mayoral race after six months. According to Axios, the Forward Party is attempting to appear on 15 state-wide ballots in 2022 and expand that to ballots in all 50 states by 2024.

    Yang’s decision to form a third party was widely condemned as anything from divisive to illusionary, but how far have third-party candidates come in the history of the United States?

    Their success has varied widely as has their ability to win electoral college votes.

    In the American statewide winner-takes-all system, the latter factor has often depended on whether candidates could mobilize voters regionally. More recent third-party candidates especially have faced this issue.

    Infographic: Does the U.S. Have an Appetite for Third-Party Candidates? | Statista

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    In 1992, Independent Ross Perot received a whopping 18.9 percent of the popular vote, which translated into a resounding zero votes from electors. Perot won no state and came second in only two, Maine and Utah.

    Earlier third-party candidates were somewhat better at garnering electoral college votes when their platforms aligned with regional – read: Southern – issues.

    George Wallace of the American Independent party won 13.5 percent of the popular vote and 46 electors (8.6 percent) in 1968 after campaigning against desegregation. He won five states – Arkansas, Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi and Georgia – as well as one electoral college vote from North Carolina. In 1948, “Dixiecrat” Strom Thurmond had been even more efficient at turning ballots into electors, winning 7.3 percent of the electoral college (39 votes) with a share of the popular vote of just 2.4 percent, as his supporters were concentrated in Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi and South Carolina. Officially named the States’ Rights Democratic Party, the “Dixiecrats” also opposed racial integration.

    The most successful presidential third-party candidate of the last century was actually Teddy Roosevelt for the Progressive party in 1912. After having completed two presidential terms between 1901 and 1909 for the Republicans, he came second after election winner, Democrat Woodrow Wilson, and won more than 27 percent of the popular vote as well as 88 electors (16.6 percent). In a time before presidential term limits, Roosevelt sought a third term over a feud with his successor, Republican William Howard Taft, and an increasingly likely Democratic victory. However, in 1916, Roosevelt had reconsidered splitting the conservative vote and turned down the Progressive nomination.

    The Progressive Party made a reappearance in 1924 when Robert La Follette won almost 17 percent of voters and 13 electors from his home state of Wisconsin – still fewer than the 15 electors Independent Harry F. Byrd earned in 1960 despite not having been on the ballot and having received no votes from the public. 14 unpledged and one unfaithful elector voted for him in yet another protest of desegregation.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 23:00

  • Special Ops Veteran Cancels Plans For Sunday Protest At FBI Headquarters After 'Trap' Warnings
    Special Ops Veteran Cancels Plans For Sunday Protest At FBI Headquarters After ‘Trap’ Warnings

    Authored by Patricia Tolson via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    In the wake of the unexpected fallout sparked by an Aug. 8 media pitch, a military veteran has revised his plans to hold a protest at the FBI headquarters in Washington on Sunday, Aug. 14.

    Adam Hardage, veteran and CEO of Remote Health Solutions, calling for a protest at the FBI headquarters in Washington on Aug. 14, 2022. (Courtesy of Adam Hardage)

    Following the unprecedented raid on the Mar-a-Lago residence of former President Donald Trump, an Aug. 8 media pitch announced that a 20-year military and former Special Ops veteran named Adam Hardage was “calling on fellow veterans and Americans of all walks to join him Sunday 8/14 at the FBI HQ in Washington DC to protest the out of control FBI and its actions against President Trump.”

    Adam Hardage, military and Special Operations veteran, pictured here in Kandahar, Afghanistan. (Courtesy of Adam Hardage)

    However, the unexpected fallout that quickly ensued caused Hardage to revise his plans.

    It all started with an Aug. 9 report about the proposed protest mentioned in the Aug. 8 media pitch.

    Screenshot of the Aug. 8, 2022 media pitch sent out to numerous news outlets regarding a protest proposed at the FBI headquarters in Washington. (With permission from the media relations company)

    The contact information was included in the media pitch for those who wanted to interview Hardage. While Hardage did receive requests for radio and podcast spots, the media relations company that sent out the media pitch confirmed that The Epoch Times was the only print/web news outlet to actually request and receive an interview with Hardage about his proposed protest.

    The Best Laid Plans

    There has been much speculation that Jan. 6, 2021 was a setup, a coordinated campaign to use the anger of those who believe the 2020 election was stolen against them in order to take down former President Donald Trump and arrest and incarcerate his supporters, with the goal of ultimately destroying the entire MAGA movement.

    As The Epoch Times reported, evidence has emerged that proves protesters were peaceful until Capitol Police began lobbing tear gas and flashbangs into the crowd, shooting them with rubber bullets and spraying them in the face with pepper gel. Experts say a “cadre of provocateurs” then instigated fights, broke through bike rack barricades and encouraged protesters to storm the Capitol. Members of a secret, plainclothes Electronic Surveillance Unit were even embedded into the crowd, recognized to Capitol Police by a special multi-colored bracelet worn on their left wrist, for the express purpose of filming the ensuing confrontations between protesters and law enforcement for the purposes of entrapment.

    It wasn’t long before speculation grew that the proposed protest at the FBI headquarters on Aug. 14, 2022 could be staged as a trap to ensnare protesters just like those who attended the protest at the Capitol on Jan. 6. 2021.

    ‘It’s a Trap’

    In response to the Aug. 9 report, chatter on social media and right-wing blogs ranged from support to warnings the proposed protest could be “a trap.” Other comments on social media posts suggest everything from the inevitable win of Trump in 2024 because of the raid to suggestions that the FBI planted evidence at the former president’s Mar-a-Lago residence. An Aug. 11 report said Trump’s supporters were warning people to “beware of possible FBI agents urging rebellion.”

    Another social media post warned of the FBI saying, “We advise individuals taking part in protest activities to remain aware of their immediate surroundings and to report any suspicious activity to local law enforcement.”

    Warnings of entrapment were followed by misinformation. The host of one social media video wrongfully attributed a quote from “another concerned veteran,” mentioned at the end of one report, to Hardage, inaccurately insisting Hardage said he wasn’t even planning on attending his own protest.

    “I am a 20-year retired navy commander and J6 attendee,” the unnamed “concerned veteran” said in the Aug. 9 story. “I am incensed by the FBI raid on DJT’s home yesterday. I will be protesting an end to the FBI on the busiest intersection in my town of Kingwood, TX in full uniform Saturday.”

    Hardage lives in Virginia with his wife and two children.

    According to Dave Scarlett, a Marine and pastor of His Glory ministries, the proposed Aug. 14 protest would “most definitely” wind up being another Jan. 6 “trap.”

    “If you’re in the Washington, D.C. area, there go your rights,” Scarlett told The Epoch Times. “Do not go into Washington. D.C. If you want a peaceful protest, do it outside of Washington. D.C.

    “If you are truly representing the nation, patriots, Christians, and the military in this country, that is not the place to do it,” Scarlett said.

    “It’s a trap. Stay out of it. Do not go there,” Scarlett warned. “I have many military intel sources who are former generals and they said exactly that. Do not go into Washington D.C., because it’s a trap.”

    ‘Overreach and Abuse’

    Hardage believes “the raid on Mar-a-Lago was a massive governmental overreach.”

    He is not alone.

    Even multiple high-profile Democrat politicians and liberal media outlets are calling the raid an unprecedented overreach that will require a lot of explaining.

    While he also knows the Mar-a-Lago raid “was intended to scare Americans and to intimidate people,” Hardage believes the only thing it really accomplished was to “energize Trump’s base and the MAGA crowd.”

    Former President Donald Trump speaks to supporters during a rally at the Lorain County Fairgrounds in Wellington, Ohio, on June 26, 2021. (Scott Olson/Getty Images)

    “I’m excited to see MAGA 2.0, because I think it’s going to be absolutely epic,” Hardage said. “It’s going to make the original Trump Train and Trump Wave look like a snooze fest.”

    Scarlett agrees.

    “The FBI and tyrants in Washington have overplayed their hand by desecrating the home of the People’s President and the most influential Leader of the Free World—a cowardly act previously only seen in Third-World countries,” Scarlett said in a statement issued after the raid. “They have not just attacked the rightful President, but every freedom-loving American Patriot in this country. This disgusting overreach of power and display of lawlessness will go down in history as the exact moment they sealed their fate. I foresee a fully committed and united MAGA party, the likes of which has never been seen in this great nation. Christians, Patriots, Military, and every freedom-loving citizen will now unite. They have awakened a sleeping giant. We will once again be One Nation Under God, where justice, truth, and light prevails.”

    It’s a sentiment echoed by Rick Green, Founder of Patriot Academy.

    “The FBI raid on President Trump’s home will go down in infamy as the turning point for a generation,” Green told The Epoch Times, adding that “the unknown is whether the turn will be towards complete tyranny or a turn back to liberty and the answer depends on whether we average Americans say enough is enough.”

    “The church-going, hard-working, family and community-focused people that make up the backbone of America are not normally the type to protest,” Green said further. “They vote, they donate, they might write a letter of concern. None of that is enough anymore. Saving America from these Marxists will require a civically active, vocal, consistent citizenship and we’re about to find out if enough Americans are up to the challenge.”

    Recent surveys appear to show that the rise of the “civically active” and “vocal” citizenry is already happening.

    The Surveys

    In the wake of the Jan. 6 protests, the government has done much to use the event against Donald Trump and anyone who supports him. The arrest, incarceration, and abuse of the protesters; the ongoing efforts of the Select Committee to convict Trump of insurrection and render him ineligible to ever run for office again; and the raid on Mar-a-Lago, some, like Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas), believe “it’s about vengeance. It’s about intimidation.” Still, the silver lining behind these dark clouds is revealed through a string of recent surveys, which show a simultaneous frustration with growing government overreach, a spike in the number of Americans who believe the nation has a two-tiered justice system and an increase in the number of Americans becoming tangibly involved in civic activism.

    An online survey by Daily Mail shows over 70 percent of their readers disapprove of the Mar-a-Lago raid. The Nationwide Issues Survey (pdf) conducted between July 24–28 by the Trafalgar Group with Convention of States Action found that 79 percent of 1,080 likely U.S. voters interviewed believe “there are two tiers of justice: one set of laws for politicians and Washington D.C. insiders vs one set of laws for everyday Americans.”

    According to a national survey of general election likely voters conducted by McLaughlin & Associated for Summit Ministries from July 21–25, while 48 percent of American voters say their level of civic engagement has remained the same in recent years, nearly 30 percent said they have gotten more involved in the civic process within the last two years. Of those, 81 percent say they are civically engaged because they believe their activism is making a difference.

    The first national survey taken after the FBI raid on Trump at Mar-a-Lago shows 83 percent of Republicans, 72 percent of independents, and 55.2 percent of Democrats are now more likely to vote in the 2022 Midterm Elections as a result of the raid. While only 11.9 percent of Democrats believe Trump’s political enemies are behind the FBI raid on the former president’s private home, 53.9 percent of Independent voters and 76.7 percent of Republican voters believe they are. More striking is that a majority of independents and Republicans believe the raid was unreasonable and that the raid is moving America closer to becoming a police state. Democrats, on the other hand, think such an invasion is completely reasonable.

    A Change of Plans

    “After the politically-motivated raid on President Trump’s residence at Mar-a-Lago, I initially called for a rally in the Northern Virginia/DC area,” Hardage told The Epoch Times amid the fallout from the Aug. 9 report. “My intent was to show solidarity and support for freedom, for the U.S. Constitution, and for President Trump. After receiving thousands of online comments and emails from across this nation from veterans on all sides of politics, I have decided to make a change to our plans to peacefully protest the FBI.”

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 22:30

  • Brand Loyalty Is Declining For Most Luxury Automakers
    Brand Loyalty Is Declining For Most Luxury Automakers

    New research conducted by S&P Global Mobility has found that brand loyalty – measured as the percentage of buyers that go back to the same brand for their next vehicle – is falling across the luxury segment.

    This infographic from Visual Capitalist’s Marcus Lu visualized the results of this research, which spans from January 2020 to April 2022.

    Brand Loyalty Losers

    The following brands have all experienced a drop in brand loyalty over the time period.

    For additional context, we’ve also included each brand’s score in the J.D. Power 2022 Initial Quality Study. This is measured based on the number of problems experienced per 100 vehicles (PP100) in the first 90 days of ownership.

     

    Land Rover experienced the biggest drop in loyalty, despite a better than average PP100 rating. One potential reason is timing⁠—the brand’s premier model, the Range Rover, has been in its fourth generation since 2012. The SUV has become relatively dated, though a new fifth generation was recently revealed for the 2022 model year.

    Two Volkswagen Group brands, Audi and Porsche, also fared poorly in terms of loyalty. This is somewhat surprising, as both brands offer a portfolio of both gasoline and electric models. Many competitors, such as Acura, Lexus, and Maserati, have yet to release an EV.

    Brand Loyalty Winners

    Three brands have managed to buck the trend, as shown below.

     

    We can draw parallels between Tesla and Apple, in that both have incredibly loyal followers.

    For instance, between March 2021 to April 2022, 62% of buyers/households who returned to market and previously owned a Model 3 purchased a new Tesla. That’s an impressive statistic, especially when we consider Tesla’s history of build quality issues.

    Maserati appears to be in the same boat. The Italian automaker has strengthened its brand loyalty by 4.3 percentage points, despite having the luxury segment’s worst PP100. Perhaps build quality matters less than we think.

    Another Factor to Consider

    Ongoing supply chain issues could also be contributing to wide-spread declines in loyalty. Rather than waiting several months (or in the case of EVs, years), buyers may switch to a different brand that has cars in stock.

    We are still monitoring it week to week, but up to now basically worldwide, we had no issues running production.

    – JOERG BURZER, MERCEDES-BENZ

    Many automakers have reported that their supply issues are diminishing, though new economic challenges have risen. For example, surging inflation has pushed the price of a new car to record highs. Combined with rising interest rates (cost of borrowing), this could negatively impact the demand for new cars.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 22:00

  • Pro-Antifa California Teacher Who Vowed To Turn Students Into 'Revolutionaries' Is Paid To Resign
    Pro-Antifa California Teacher Who Vowed To Turn Students Into ‘Revolutionaries’ Is Paid To Resign

    Authored by Bill Pan via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    A California teacher who bragged about using his position to radicalize students into far-left “revolutionaries” has been given three years of pay by his school district to resign, according to a report.

    People hold Antifa flags in a file photo. (David Dee Delgado/Getty Images)

    Gabriel Gipe, a teacher of Advanced Placement government at Inderkum High School, agreed in January to leave his post with a $190,000 payout from the Natomas Unified School District, according to The Sacramento Bee, citing district records.

    Gipe, whose annual base salary is about $60,000, received a final paycheck of about $100,000 after taxes were withheld, according to the newspaper.

    The teacher drew outrage from the school district community last year after he was featured in a video by undercover news organization Project Veritas.

    In the video footage, Gipe says he gave students extra credit for them to attend left-wing events, including counter-protests to the “right-wing rallies.” He also allegedly kept track of his students’ political inclinations to make sure they drifted further left as time went on.

    “So, they take an ideology quiz and I put [the results] on the [classroom] wall. Every year, they get further and further left,” he tells the undercover journalist, who was posing as a left-wing sympathizer.

    “I’m like, ‘These ideologies are considered extreme, right? Extreme times breed extreme ideologies.’ Right? There is a reason why Generation Z, these kids, are becoming further and further left.”

    Gipe says he displayed on his classroom wall an Antifa flag, which he claimed was “meant to make fascists feel uncomfortable.” The video footage also shows a poster of Chinese Communist Party leader Mao Zedong on a wall in the teacher’s classroom.

    When asked about his views on the Chinese Communist Party, Gipe says in the video footage that Mao’s Cultural Revolution, which took place after a disastrous economic campaign that triggered mass starvation and famine, provides lessons for how socialism can take root inside the United States.

    “You need propaganda of the deed—your economics—and cultural propaganda as well. You need to retrain the way people think,” he says. “We have to hit both fronts. We have to convince people that this [socialism] is what we actually need.”

    Later, when a Project Veritas reporter confronted Gipe on the street, the teacher was wearing a T-shirt with a hammer and sickle on the front. Gipe didn’t respond to the reporter’s questions regarding his persuading of students to adopt far-left ideologies.

    Following parents’ outrage, the school district placed Gipe on unpaid leave pending an investigation, acknowledging that Gipe’s “educational approach” was “disturbing and [undermined] the public’s trust.”

    An administrative judge later ordered that Gipe be put on paid leave as the district’s investigation continued.

    The report of the investigation revealed more details about Gipe’s problematic conduct, including replacing typical AP government curriculum with lectures about communism and pinning photos of students who expressed conservative ideas on a wall next to a swastika.

    “You used your position of authority with a captive audience of impressionable teenagers to promote your own political ideology, including advocating or teaching communism with the intent to indoctrinate or inculcate in the mind of any pupil a preference for communism,” the district report reads, according to The Sacramento Bee.

    In response to a request for additional information, the Natomas Unified School District officials said in a statement that they have put the matter behind them.

    “We have put this behind us and have moved forward,” the statement reads. “What’s most important right now is welcoming our students back to the start of a new school year.”

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 21:30

  • "I'd Vote For You, If You Had A Penis": Senator Who Lied About Heritage Claims Random People Made Sexist Comments
    “I’d Vote For You, If You Had A Penis”: Senator Who Lied About Heritage Claims Random People Made Sexist Comments

    Elizabeth Warren, whose career was built on a lie about her heritage, allegedly claimed that people would “come up to her” and tell her that she’d have their vote if only she was equipped with a penis.

    “Everyone comes up to me and says, ‘I would vote for you, if you had a penis’,” Warren reportedly told NBC Capitol Hill correspondent Ali Vitali, who wrote about the comment in her new book “Electable: Why America Hasn’t Put a Woman in the White House … Yet,” Politico reports.

    The story was greeted with widespread derision on social media. “[Warren] should name a single person that has ever said this to her,” said Washington Free Beacon Executive Editor Brent Scher.

    The popular account NumbersMuncher, meanwhile, jokingly pointed out: “So people took the time to go to Warren’s events and spent hours there… only to take the time to tell her they would vote for her ‘if you had a penis’?” –Just the News

    Warren notably claimed for years that she was a Native American. After former President Donald Trump offered her $1 million to prove it in July 2019, Warren took a DNA test – she hilariously tried to trot out the results as evidence of her claim…

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

    …except that due to a math error by the Boston Globe, the test actually showed she could be 1/1024th Native American – resulting in mass ridicule.

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

    Five months later Warren apologized to the Cherokee Nation for claiming American Indian heritage.

    Maybe she should simply start claiming to have a penis to score more votes, since lying comes so easily to her?

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 21:00

  • NARA Responds To Trump's Remarks On Obama's Classified Documents
    NARA Responds To Trump’s Remarks On Obama’s Classified Documents

    Authored by Caden Pearson via The Epoch Times,

    The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) responded Friday to former President Donald Trump’s statements that former President Barrack Obama took classified records from the White House when his term ended in 2016.

    “President Barack Hussein Obama kept 33 million pages of documents, much of them classified. How many of them pertained to nuclear? Word is, lots!” Trump said in a statement on Friday.

    Trump repeated his assertion about Obama’s presidential records in a post on Truth Social after the FBI conducted its unprecedented raid of his Florida property to search for classified presidential documents.

    NARA released a statement in refute of Trump’s claims, saying they exclusively maintain Obama’s presidential records according to the Presidential Records Act (PRA).

    “NARA moved approximately 30 million pages of unclassified records to a NARA facility in the Chicago area where they are maintained exclusively by NARA,” NARA said in a statement.

    “Additionally, NARA maintains the classified Obama Presidential records in a NARA facility in the Washington, D.C., area. As required by the PRA, former President Obama has no control over where and how NARA stores the Presidential records of his Administration.”

    The Epoch Times contacted Obama’s office for comment.

    NARA’s Pursuit of Trump’s Records

    It is unclear why an FBI warrant and subsequent raid was needed given Trump’s cooperation with NARA to return presidential documents.

    Throughout 2022, NARA has released a series of statements about Trump’s presidential records, starting in January, when it spoke about receiving some “paper records that had been torn up by former President Trump.”

    In one of the statements, NARA said Trump’s presidential records “should have been transferred to NARA from the White House at the end of the Trump Administration in January 2021.”

    In February, NARA noted that Trump and his representatives had been cooperating with NARA to transfer boxes of records from the Mar-a-Lago property to the National Archives.

    NARA official David Ferriero said in February regarding Trump’s records that NARA “pursues the return of records whenever we learn that records have been improperly removed or have not been appropriately transferred to official accounts.”

    Five months later, on Aug. 8, the FBI carried out a raid of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach in search of presidential documents.

    After pushback, the Department of Justice asked the court to unseal the warrant, which revealed that Trump is under investigation for alleged violations of 18 USC 2071—concealment, removal, or mutilation; 18 USC 793 of the Espionage Act—gathering, transmitting, or losing defense information; and 18 USC 1519—destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in federal investigations.

    “Number one, it was all declassified,” Trump said in a statement.

    “Number two, they didn’t need to ‘seize’ anything. They could have had it anytime they wanted to without playing politics and breaking into Mar-a-Lago.”

    Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) has called on the DOJ to “release the information as to why a warrant was necessary” saying the “DOJ must lay their cards on the table.”

    Trump and Republicans have said the raid is an example of the “weaponization of the justice system” against a political opponent of the sitting president who is mulling running against President Joe Biden in 2024.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 20:30

  • Masa Is Down $4 Billion On His SoftBank Side Hustle Set Up To Boost His Compensation
    Masa Is Down $4 Billion On His SoftBank Side Hustle Set Up To Boost His Compensation

    It turns out it isn’t just Softbank that’s getting creamed on its investments, billion head of the company Masayoshi Son is also personally feeling the  pain of the poor performance in the technology market. And, on a side note, we may have finally found an “investor” whose acumen rivals Cathie Wood!

    He has lost more than $4 billion “on a series of side deals he set up at SoftBank Group Corp. to boost his compensation,” according to a new Bloomberg report.

    Son had established personal stakes in many of SoftBank’s ventures over the last few years. The thought process was that when the investments outperformed, it would act as a compensation kicker for Son, who currently draws a salary of about $740,000 per year.

    Personally, Son holds a 17.25% interest in a vehicle belonging to SoftBank’s Vision Fund 2 for its unlisted holdings, and a 17.25% interest in part of its Latin America fund. He also has a 33% stake in a vehicle SoftBank set up to trade stocks and derivatives. 

    From these interests, he has racked up losses of $2.1 billion, $205 million and $2 billion, respectively, the report says. The amount Son owes his own company from the Vision Fund 2 and the Latam fund was up about $1.9 billion over the last quarter, the report says. 

    Marvin Lo, an analyst with Bloomberg Intelligence, said: “It is controversial for a business leader to mix his personal financial interests with corporate responsibilities. But Son explained before that he wanted to use co-investment to provide financial benefits to managers, similar to venture capital firm partners getting a 20% to 30% performance fees, but with a downside too.”

    Son has deposited 8.9 million of his own shares as collateral for the Vision Fund 2 and 2.2 million shares as collateral for the LatAm fund. 

    Meanwhile SoftBank posted a glaring $23.4 billion loss for the June quarter last week. 

    Son said in a press conference: “We really believed we could do it and we had our heads in the clouds. Of course, the market was bad, there was a war, and there was the coronavirus. We can point to a lot of reasons, but these are all excuses. We have to self-reflect about the fact that if we’d been more selective and had invested more properly, it wouldn’t come to this.”

    A SoftBank spokesperson said the money should be called a “net payable” instead of a loss by Son.

    Because when it doubt, change the terminology or the definition – just ask the Biden administration!

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 20:00

  • Washington, DC Mayor Asks US Military For 90 Days Of Help With Illegal Immigrants
    Washington, DC Mayor Asks US Military For 90 Days Of Help With Illegal Immigrants

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

    Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser on Aug. 11 renewed her call for U.S. military assistance to deal with the surge of illegal immigrants the nation’s capital has encountered after governors of border states began busing the immigrants to the city.

    Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser attends March for Our Lives 2022 in Washington on June 11, 2022. (Paul Morigi/Getty Images for March For Our Lives)

    The initial request for National Guard assistance from Bowser, a Democrat, was rejected by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, a Biden appointee, earlier in August.

    Instead of asking for an open-ended deployment, Bowser in the new request asked for 90 days of help, with a proposed reevaluation of the mission on Dec. 1.

    If approved, Guard personnel would provide logistical support to the Washington government, helping establish and manage new sites to house and feed the illegal immigrants.

    “The Guard is uniquely resourced to provide emergency logistical support,” Bowser wrote.

    Bowser also wants the government to make the D.C. Armory or another federal site available as a “respite center” for the aliens, and to treat the immigrants like war refugees, referring to how the Biden administration has supported refugees from Afghanistan and Ukraine in recent months.

    “We can confirm that the Secretary of Defense received a request from the office of the Mayor of DC, but as this is a pending request, we are not prepared to comment on the specifics of the request at this time. The Secretary takes this request for assistance very seriously. He and his team are working through the details, and will respond to the mayor’s office as soon as a decision has been reached,” a spokesman for Austin told The Epoch Times in an email.

    The spokesman said on Aug. 5 that the initial request was rejected because “we have determined providing this support would negatively impact the readiness of the DCNG and have negative effects on the organization and members.”

    DCNG stands for D.C. National Guard.

    Washington’s mayor cannot deploy the guard, but can ask the federal government to deploy personnel.

    Grant Program

    Washington Attorney General Karl Racine on Thursday said his office would start offering grants to local groups providing humanitarian assistance to the illegal immigrants, who are being transported to the District of Columbia by Texas and Arizona officials who are fed up with the surge in illegal immigration that has occurred under President Joe Biden.

    “The decision by the Governors of Texas and Arizona to bus asylum-seeking migrants to the District is causing a humanitarian crisis. The organizations and individuals who have shouldered the burden of providing basic needs and services—including housing, food, transportation, and legal assistance—are understandably strained and simply cannot be expected to carry this responsibility alone,” Racine, a Democrat, said in a statement.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 19:30

  • Potato Shortage Emerges In Idaho As Prices Surge At Supermarkets
    Potato Shortage Emerges In Idaho As Prices Surge At Supermarkets

    The next food insecurity problem that may impact the way Americans eat could be an emerging potato shortage that began last year when yields were depressed due to a heatwave, according to Boise State Public Radio. 

    “I’m not sure if you remember last June, but we had some just unbelievably hot temperatures here in Idaho. It did a number on our potato crop,” Jamey Higham, president and CEO of the Idaho Potato Commission, told the Idaho-based media outlet. “And so, our yields were significantly down last year.”

    Boise State Public Radio pointed out that last year’s potato crop cycle should last through August, though the lack of the starchy vegetable has already presented consumers with higher prices at the supermarket.

    “There is not a gap. There are just less potatoes being shipped right now than there normally are this time of year because of the shorter supply that we started the season with,” said Higham.

    He said Idaho produced the most potatoes in the county last year, and what happens to crop yields in the state will influence prices across the country. 

    “As the fresh market goes, the grocery stores – your Albertsons, Walmart, WinCo, that stuff – it is not just Idaho that’s having high prices right now. It’s the other states as well.”

    Higham expects potato prices to remain high through the rest of the year. 

    “I don’t anticipate these prices staying high long term. And once harvest gets underway, it’ll get back down into a better spot. But I do expect prices to be strong all year this year.”

    The local media outlet noted: “But it is still rather bizarre to be in Idaho of all places, and there’s a shortage of potatoes.”

    … and all this means is more pressure on consumers’ pocketbooks who’ve seen grocery inflation hit the highest levels since 1979. 

    Another shortage that could potentially emerge is beer as northern Mexico runs out of water. If you didn’t know, Mexico is responsible for 76% of all the beer imported by the US last year (most of it’s produced in the northern part of the country).

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 19:00

  • NJ Vows To Fight NYC Congestion Pricing Proposal
    NJ Vows To Fight NYC Congestion Pricing Proposal

    By Larry Higgs of Mass Transit Mag

    New Jersey’s reaction to New York’s congestion pricing plan to charge tolls to drive south of 60th Street in Manhattan was predictable – the proposed tolls are too high and public officials vowed to fight it.

    An environmental assessment on the plan released Wednesday by the MTA came with seven toll scenarios, including one that gives drivers using the George Washington Bridge, and Lincoln and Holland tunnels credit for those tolls toward the peak period congestion pricing fee of $23 for non-commercial passenger vehicles.

    A base plan would charge $9 with no credit given for Hudson or East River tolls for non-commercial passenger vehicles.

    Congestion pricing could cost New Jersey workers who commute by car at least an extra $5,000 annually, said Ron Simoncini, Executive Director of the Fair Congestion Pricing Alliance.

    “New Jersey commuters are sitting ducks for whatever New York wants to do,” he said. “No way New Jerseyans can spend an extra 7% to 12% of their income to get back and forth to New York.”

    Many of those affected commuters don’t have an alternative to driving, he said.

    “if you could bring them all in on mass transit, it would be another thing. But there is no alternative for most of these people,” Simoncini said. “They’re trapped.”

    Congestion pricing, now in its third iteration, accomplishes several goals: to reduce traffic and gridlock, cut air pollution and provide at least $1 billion annually in additional revenue for major MTA bus, subway and commuter rail projects, the study determined.

    But that doesn’t help Jersey drivers, Simoncini said. The law that created congestion price sends all revenue to the MTA, despite calls for sharing funding with NJ Transit and PATH to compensate for added riders that could switch from cars to those systems.

    “The New Jersey auto commuter bears the cost,” he said. “So New Jersey auto commuters pay for New York commuters to get to work.”

    A spokesman for Gov. Phil Murphy , who is out of the country, reiterated a comment he made to U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg about commuters not receiving credit for GWB tolls toward the congestion pricing toll.

    “While the environmental assessment is under review by New Jersey state agencies and comments will be submitted where necessary and appropriate, the Murphy Administration will not support a double tax of New Jerseyans that provides no direct relief for our state’s commuters,” said Bailey Lawrence, a governor’s spokesman.

    U.S. Rep. Josh Gottheimer, D-5th Dist., called the toll proposals “worse than we expected.”

    “In every scenario, Jersey drivers will end up paying thousands of dollars more on top of the tolls they already pay to go over the George Washington Bridge on their way to work in New York,” he said. “In every single scenario, Jersey commuters get hosed.”

    The release of the massive Congestion pricing environmental analysis Wednesday starts the clock on a public comment period that ends on Sept. 9 and includes six virtual on line public hearings from Aug. 25 to 31. A schedule and sign up instruction are on the MTA congestion pricing website at https://new.mta.info/project/CBDTP.

    “I plan to take part in the public virtual hearings and encourage all Jersey drivers to join and let their voices be heard in response to the Congestion Tax,” Gottheimer said.

    Simoncini said he plans to speak at all six hearings.

    The National Motorists Association urged the Federal Highway Administration to take the No Action Alternative and not implement congestion pricing, said Steve Carrellas, NMA New Jersey policy director.

    “The calculated costs of time and money of congestion to businesses, commuters, and residents are some of the supposed justifications for the program,“ he said.

    What drivers prefer are the broader benefits that driving or sharing a vehicle provides over public transit – “that has its own growing problems and contributions to lost time and money,” he said.

    The anger wasn’t confined to New Jersey. Officials in Rockland County, New York and other west of the Hudson river communities also blasted the plan for similar reasons – no benefit to their commuters, said a trio of public officials at a press conference in Nanuet Wednesday.

    Assemblyman Mike Lawler of Pearl River, Rockland County Executive Ed Day and MTA Board Member Frank Borelli all sounded like honorary New Jerseyans.

    “We’re already getting the short-end of the stick with regards to services and funding, so it is patently absurd that the cost of maintaining and improving New York City’s transit system is being placed on Rockland, Westchester, Putnam, and Dutchess County residents,” said Lawler, who introduced a bill in the New York legislature to repeal congestion pricing.

    Gottheimer echoed a sentiment mentioned by the New York officials, questioning the financial management of the MTA and the $15 billion received in federal COVID aid.

    “The MTA should take a hard look in the mirror and improve their failing systems that are costing them millions,” he said.

    One solution is to act on the “Stay in Jersey” concept, Simoncini said. Gottheimer proposed it in May to provide tax incentives to attract New York businesses to open satellite offices in New Jersey and to encourage Jersey commuters to work from home as long as they can, to avoid commuting costs.

    On Tuesday, three Bergen County state legislators said they plan to introduce bills offering $15 million in tax credits through the state Economic Development Authority to New York business that open facilities in New Jersey.

    State Senator Joe Lagana, and Assemblymembers Chris Tully and Lisa Swain, D-Bergen, referred to congestion price at a Fair Lawn press conference Tuesday, announcing the proposed legislation.

    “Scaling back our environmental footprint and cutting commuting costs and travel time are objectives we proudly support,” Tully said. “New Jersey residents should not be picking up the tab for New York’s failure to invest in their own infrastructure.”

    By incentivizing New York based employers to open remote offices in New Jersey and attracting new business along with them, “our “Stay in Jersey” legislation will significantly reduce traffic congestion and air pollution without financially targeting in-state commuters,” he said.

    Supporters of congestion pricing said the plan would have a neutral effect on most Jersey drivers.

    The Regional Plan Association said the benefits are an estimated 20% decrease in traffic and “significant time savings” for everyone driving into the Manhattan, said Brian Fritsch, an RPA spokesman.

    “Having even tolls for all drivers into Manhattan, including credits for the GWB, RFK, and Henry Hudson (bridges) is the right approach to reduce toll shopping and its related congestion,” he said. “Drivers (traveling) through the Holland and Lincoln Tunnels would see a relatively small change in fees while those that currently use free crossings would see a bigger increase.”

    “Less than roughly 3% of N.J. workers commuting to the Manhattan central business district get there by car,” said Liam Blank, Tri-State Transportation Campaign policy manager, citing an analysis by the group.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 18:30

  • Wokepox: The WHO Is Asking For The Public's Help In Re-Naming Monkeypox
    Wokepox: The WHO Is Asking For The Public’s Help In Re-Naming Monkeypox

    Further proving that the World Health Organization is misguided at best, useless at worst, the agency is out asking “for the public’s help” in…not combating monkeypox…but re-naming it.

    At least we know the agency has its priorities in order…

    The WHO was out this past week asking for new names for monkeypox “part of an ongoing effort to discourage harmful misconceptions associated with the current name,” according to Bloomberg. 

    “WHO is holding an open consultation for a new disease name for monkeypox. Anyone wishing to propose new names can do so,” the agency said in an actual statement that was drafted up by someone who could have been allocating their energy to actually fighting the virus. 

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

    And the excellent use of resources doesn’t stop there. The WHO has also set up an online portal for people to submit ideas. The renaming of the virus follows “demands from international scientists” and “public health officials” who have claimed that the current name encourages a harmful stigma.

    The same web programmers that have set up the online naming portal have also apparently decided to leave the name “MONKEYPOX” scattered across the WHO’s website:

    And if you think the name is bad, wait until you actually get the virus. 

    The outbreak now stands at more than 31,000 cases since May, with the most coming from the U.S. The virus has been disproportionately spread by men who have sex with men, Bloomberg noted. 

    The virus was discovered in 1958 before “best practices” for naming diseases and viruses were adopted. 

    We’ll open up the submitting just to get everyone started. How about the “Poo Flu”? 

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 18:00

  • Why Labor Productivity Has Collapsed
    Why Labor Productivity Has Collapsed

    Authored by MN Gordon via EconomicPrism.com,

    Recession.  Raging consumer price inflation.  A Presidential administration that seeks to confuse and obfuscate what’s really going on.  These are the realities facing American workers in the dog days of August circa 2022.

    For example, this week the Bureau of Labor Statistics released the Consumer Price Index results for July.  According to the government number crunchers, the CPI decelerated from an annualized rate of 9.1 percent reported for June to an annualized rate of 8.5 percent in July.

    Gas prices fell 7.7 percent from one month ago.  But are still up 44 percent over one year ago.  Food prices rose 1.1 percent on the month and are up 10.9 percent over the past 12 months.  Rents also rose 0.7 percent in July.

    President Biden, a man who alternates between being a world class liar and a world class moron, took the opportunity to tell an untruth the American people:

    “I just want to say a number: zero.  Today, we received news that our economy had 0 percent inflation in the month of July – 0 percent.  Here’s what that means: while the price of some things go up – went up last month, the price of other things went down by the same amount.  The result?: Zero inflation last month.”

    With Biden, you’re never certain if he believes his own lies.  Thus, we’ll make it real clear for the big guy just how the numbers work.

    Price is the numerical value.  Inflation is the first derivative.  The monthly increase/decrease in inflation is the second derivative.  The second derivative was reported as zero.  But inflation itself is still off the charts.

    In this respect, should you be happy that your money is only eroding at an annual rate of 8.5 percent instead of 9.1 percent?  Does this mean the Federal Reserve’s rate hikes are working?  Is the much anticipated pivot within sight?

    These questions are important.  But if you really care about wealth and prosperity there are much more important questions to be asking.  Here’s why…

    Money, Production, and Consumption

    Money acts as a claim that its owner has to a certain portion of all market goods and services.  It is, in essence, the means by which all market goods and services are distributed among people.  The more money one has, the greater claims to goods and services they possess.

    However, the creation of greater quantities of money by central planners does not magically increase the quantity of goods and services.  The addition of new, freshly created money does not readily get matched by a corresponding increase in production.

    New production may be stimulated by artificial increases to the money supply.  But it is only to address false demand created by the resulting price distortions.  These price distortions lead to excess production to meet the false demand.  This excess production ultimately leads to supply gluts and economic pain.

    Similarly, new, freshly created money does not 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 is then expressed in 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.

    Most academic economists naively believe that lack of money is the source of economic stagnation.  They advocate credit creation and money printing as a means to increase consumption.  These policies generally lead to higher debt levels and higher asset and consumer prices.

    Why price is important…

    Why Price is Important

    The primary regulator for how money is spent is price.  The price of goods and services is what attracts or repels money.  Generally, if two goods have equivalent utility and quality, money will be attracted to the lower cost item and repelled by the higher cost item.

    Price also conveys information.  Rising prices signal to business owners to increase production.  Falling prices signal to reduce production.

    When central planners monkey with the quantity of money in circulation they monkey with the price of goods and services.  Moreover, when they monkey with the price of credit – the rate of interest – they disfigure the entire economy.

    Artificially low interest rates stimulate false demand up and down the supply chain.  In addition, pumping fabricated credit into financial markets for decades on end pushes the economy to a perilous and unstable state.

    Wealth disparities become ever more extreme, as financial assets, which are largely owned by the wealthy, become inflated.  Governments – federal, state, and local – use the cheap credit to become bigger, and more interventionist.  Consumer price inflation then takes hold.

    The Fed’s attempts to smooth out the peaks and valleys of the business cycle have actually magnified them.  The consequences to workers, savers, and retirees alike are remarkably harmful.

    Eventually the damage is too great for even the Fed to ignore and they must reverse course.  After letting credit run wild for over a decade, and making everyone dependent upon it, the Fed then reels it back.  This tightening of credit markets has the effect of pulling the rug out from under financial markets and the economy.

    Right now, for example, the Fed is operating within the rug yank phase of its monetary policy.  As the Fed simultaneously raises the federal funds rate and reduces its balance sheet, credit markets are slipping and tripping all over themselves.

    Yet all these money games are based on a flawed understanding of how the world and the economy works…

    Why Labor Productivity Has Collapsed

    The prerequisite for more consumption is not more money.  It’s more production.  The faster and more goods and services the economy produces, the faster and more each individual can consume.  Production determines consumption.

    This is a critical point.  And it’s one the President failed to mention this week.  Just one day prior to this week’s CPI report, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released its second quarter labor productivity report.  The results were about as bad as they could possibly be.

    In short, labor productivity decreased 4.6 percent in the second quarter of 2022.  Output decreased 2.1 percent while hours worked increased 2.6 percent.  This marked the sharpest decline in labor productivity since 1948 – roughly 74 years ago.

    What this means is that people are working more and producing less.  They are, in essence, working in reverse.  Hence, there will be less goods and services to consume, which will further drive consumer price inflation.

    Why has labor productivity collapsed?

    This, no doubt, is an important question.  It is especially important if you care about wealth and prosperity.

    The push for productive activity is provided by the mental and physical ability of workers to produce new goods and services with the least expenditure of energy and material possible.  That is to say, to produce more at a lower cost.  The ability to cheapen production leads to economic growth.

    Alas, labor productivity has collapsed.  The reasons range far and wide.  But they all come back to a few critical things.  Over regulation, over taxation, money printing, credit market manipulation, and, in summary, a near total intervention of economic and business life by a grossly out of control state.

    Remember, production determines consumption.  Production has collapsed.  An extended period of economic decline will follow.

    *  *  *

    The Biden administration is doing everything it can to ruin your life.  Quite frankly, it’s maddening.  But I’m not going to stand by and let a bunch of evil clowns in Washington destroy everything I’ve worked so hard for.  For this reason, I’ve dedicated the past 6-months to researching and identifying simple, practical steps everyday Americans can take to protect their wealth and financial privacy.  The findings of my work are documented in the Financial First Aid Kit.  If you’d like to find out more about this important and unique publication, and how to acquire a copy, stop by here today!

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 17:30

  • Ken Griffin Deploys More Than $1 Billion On Florida Real Estate After Leaving Chicago
    Ken Griffin Deploys More Than $1 Billion On Florida Real Estate After Leaving Chicago

    How finished with Chicago – and how optimistic on Florida – is Citadel’s Ken Griffin? He’s $1 billion sure. 

    Griffin has already spent over $1 billion on real estate recently, but CNBC noted on Friday that he was putting even more cash to work in Florida.

    CNBC was on location  in Florida noting two properties – one for $75 million and another for $100 million. He spent about $175 million on 5 acres on Star Island near Miami Beach.

    Meanwhile, Citadel has spent over $600 million on a new vacant lot in Florida, the report says, where it is going to be placing its new headquarters. It’ll also be building apartments and temporary office space. 

    He’s also spent $450 million “just on land” to build a new home north of Palm Beach. CNBC noted that the land is bigger than Mar-A-Lago.

    Altogether, Griffin and Citadel have spent more than $1 billion on Florida real estate. Griffin has said he likes to buy “iconic” and “rare” properties that his family can live in for years. He also told CNBC they are going to break ground in late 2023/early 2024. CNBC says the location and the new headquarters could turn into a “competitive advantage” for hiring new talent.

    “He’s really doubling down” on Florida, one CNBC contributor said. 

    Recall, we noted when Griffin decided to move from Chicago to Miami. 

    In a letter to employees sent earlier this summer, Griffin said he had personally moved to Florida and that his market-making business, Citadel Securities, would also transfer. He wrote he views Florida as a better corporate environment and though he didn’t specifically cite crime as a factor, company officials said it was a consideration, the WSJ reported. Which reminds us: where is the Netflix special on inner city black-on-black crime in general, and Chicago’s weekly murder spree in particular? Oh, it’s not there… what a shocker.

    The relocation will affect both hedge fund Citadel and Citadel Securities, the market making business, firm spokesman Zia Ahmed said Thursday according to Bloomberg, and marks the first step in a multi-year process that will involve the firm building a new office in Miami, which will serve as its global headquarters, and where a few hundred people will be based as soon as next year.

    “Chicago will continue to be important to the future of Citadel, as many of our colleagues have deep ties to Illinois,” Griffin wrote, before explaining that the ties will not be that deep. “Over the past year, however, many of our Chicago teams have asked to relocate to Miami, New York and our other offices around the world.”

    Griffin, 53, said just last month that he was reaching a tipping point with Chicago. The hedge fund and market maker, both of which he founded, combined employ more than 1,000 people in the city and pay hundreds of millions in taxes to liberal mecca that will now find itself in even more dire financial straits.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 17:00

  • Former FBI Assistant Director Says 'Handful In Leadership' Are Politicizing Bureau, Following Mar-a-Lago Raid
    Former FBI Assistant Director Says ‘Handful In Leadership’ Are Politicizing Bureau, Following Mar-a-Lago Raid

    Authored by Scott Wheeler via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Years of investigations have led to claims by Republicans of partisan political power plays at the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Department of Justice.

    Former FBI Assistant Director for Intelligence Kevin R. Brock testifies before the Senate Homeland Security Committee about the Crossfire Hurricane investigation in the Dirksen Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill Dec. 3, 2020 in Washington (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

    A raid on former President Donald Trump’s home on Aug. 8 has sharpened the nation’s focus on what many Republicans have been raising alarms about for years—the politicization of the Justice Department (DOJ) and its law enforcement arm, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Republican U.S. Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa has been demanding answers about alleged politicization well before the raid.

    “Unfortunately, a growing number of Americans have lost confidence in the bureau based on its inconsistent handling of politically sensitive investigations, its lack of cooperation with legitimate congressional oversight inquiries, and its failure to hold its own people accountable for their misconduct,” Grassley told The Epoch Times.

    Late in July, Grassley sent a searing letter (pdf) to Attorney General Merrick Garland and FBI Director Christopher Wray that stated that if allegations the senator has received from FBI whistleblowers are true, “The Justice Department and the FBI are–and have been—institutionally corrupted to their very core”.

    But not all agree. In an exclusive interview with The Epoch Times, former Assistant Director for Intelligence of the FBI Kevin Brock said Grassley’s statement didn’t “fit the facts” and that “it is dangerous to plant seeds in the minds of the American people that the FBI is corrupt.”

    Attorney General Merrick Garland delivers a statement at the Department of Justice in Washington on Aug. 11, 2022. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

    Partisanship at the Top

    While Brock said that Grassley’s claims about the FBI went too far, he is also highly critical of the actions of what he refers to as a “handful in leadership” who he said are politicizing the bureau and doing damage to its image.

    In response to the raid on former Trump’s residence at Mar-A-Lago, Brock told Epoch Times: “The use of armed agents to execute an invasive search warrant does not match up with the relatively low-level offense—for anyone—let alone a former and possible future president. Most Americans recognize this extraordinary search for what it is: an attempt by one political party that temporarily controls the DOJ to eliminate an adversary from the other party.”

    When asked how the FBI and DOJ could become politicized, Brock said, “When justice is captured by the Democrat Party, it seeks to find criminality on the right,” while “Republicans have less of an appetite” to reciprocate.

    At a press briefing about the raid on Aug. 11, Attorney General Merrick Garland confirmed that he had approved the search warrant and further stated, that the DOJ had filed a motion in the Southern District of Florida to unseal the search warrant that was executed. Garland added that the department did not take the decision to seek a search warrant lightly.

    FBI Director Christopher Wray testifies during a hearing before Senate Judiciary Committee at Hart Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill in Washington on Aug. 4, 2022. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)

    Similar Cases Involving Democrats

    The raid at Trump’s home in search of classified documents reveals what some consider a clear example of that which Grassley and Brock are referring—a heavy Democrat Party influence at the DOJ. To some, the raid at Trump’s quarters is reminiscent of a similar case.

    In 2015, former Secretary of State and presidential candidate Hillary Clinton came under FBI investigation for concealing classified information on an unauthorized email server she kept at her home. During that investigation, Clinton deleted emails that were under subpoena. The FBI, which was in charge of the investigation of Clinton, did not conduct raids at any time and allowed Clinton and her attorneys to negotiate what evidence Clinton would turn over to the bureau and dictate the terms in which Clinton would be interviewed.

    Just prior to the conclusion of that investigation labeled “Midyear Exam,” then-Attorney General Lorretta Lynch announced, after it had been revealed that former president Bill Clinton had met with her in secret, that she had appointed a “career prosecutor” to make the decision as to whether Hillary Clinton would be charged with a crime.

    The Epoch Times has learned that the career prosecutor who made that decision was Richard Scott, then Deputy Chief of Counterintelligence, who had previously been an associate at the law firm of Williams and Connelly, the same firm that was representing Hillary Clinton in the matter. In 2018 former FBI attorney Lisa Page testified to the House Judiciary Committee that the FBI was inclined to prosecute Clinton for “gross negligence” in handling classified information on her private email server.

    Former FBI Director James Comey. (REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst)

    “Separately, you know, we had multiple conversations with the Justice Department about bringing a gross negligence charge,” Page told the committee in July 2018. Page went on to testify that it was Richard Scott who made the decision not to charge Clinton with a crime. Scott left the DOJ in 2018 and could not be reached for comment.

    About the same time the DOJ decided not to pursue charges against Clinton, the now infamous “Crossfire Hurricane” probe was being opened against then-candidate Trump. While the predicate for that investigation has been debunked, the claim that Russian President Vladimir Putin preferred Trump over Clinton is frequently referenced as fact by Democrats and some in the news media. Former Assistant FBI Director Brock disagrees with that conclusion, citing eight years of Obama and four years of Secretary of State Clinton’s appeasement of Putin.

    “If Putin preferred Trump over Clinton he’s a bigger idiot than anyone thought,” Brock said, referring to a list of things the Obama Administration did to appease Putin and Russia. The list included Clinton’s “reset” with Russia, withdrawing missile defense systems from strategic allies Poland and Czech Republic, the return of ten Russian spies in 2010 before the FBI could interrogate the sleeper cell, and being conciliatory following Russia’s 2014 invasion of Crimea.

    Brock says “it is in the face of all that it is beyond the scope of imagination” that Putin would have preferred Trump.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 16:30

  • US Postal Service Implementing "Temporary" Price Hikes For The Holiday Season
    US Postal Service Implementing “Temporary” Price Hikes For The Holiday Season

    Not even the U.S. Postal Service is immune to the effects of inflation.

    The consistently under-funded and mis-managed government-run service filed a notice of a “temporary” price hike for this year’s holiday season.

    We’d be willing to bet whatever we can get our hands on that this “temporary” hike very quickly becomes a “permanent” hike. 

    The Postal Service said the hikes were approved by its board of governors and are now pending review by the Postal Regulatory Commission, according to a write-up by CNBC. 

    The adjustment is “similar to past years”, the agency said. Sure, except CPI wasn’t coming in at 8.5% at any point in “past years”. The agency claims it will help it remain competitive during the holiday season. 

    The plan would be for the changes to go into effect October 2, 2022 and remain in place until January 22, 2023. 

    Price increases will be commensurate with package weights and distance of delivery. Commercial priority mail packages will see $0.75 hikes in prices, while heavy long distance deliveries could see increases of up to $6.50, the report says. 

    The hikes also come shortly after the agency announced its intention to buy 25,000 electric delivery vehicles. 

    In justifying its reasoning the constantly cash-hemmhoraging agency said it “relies on postage, product and service sales” to fund operations.

    Yeah, that and the Fed’s cash printer. 

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 16:00

  • Long Term Returns Are Unsustainable
    Long Term Returns Are Unsustainable

    Authored by Lance Roberts via RealInvestmentAdvice.com,

    Long-term returns are unsustainable.

    I realize that is a bold statement that flies in the face of mainstream analysis. How often have you seen the following chart presented by an advisor suggesting if you had invested 120 years ago, you would have obtained a 10% annualized return?

    It is a true statement that over the very long term, stocks have returned roughly 6% from capital appreciation and 4% from dividends on a nominal basis. However, since inflation has averaged approximately 2.3% over the same period, real returns are closer to 8% annually on average.

    The chart below shows the average annual inflation-adjusted total returns (dividends included) since 1928. I used the total return data from Aswath Damodaran, a Stern School of Business professor at New York University. The chart shows that from 1928 to 2021, the market returned 8.48% after inflation. However, notice that after the financial crisis in 2008, returns jumped by an average of four percentage points for the various periods.

    After more than a decade, many investors have become complacent in expecting elevated rates of return from the financial markets. However, can those expectations continue to get met in the future?

    The Fed Did It

    It is likely no surprise that the surge in returns following the “Financial Crisis” resulted from the Fed’s repeated monetary interventions and zero interest rate policy.

    As discussed, those actions and fiscal interventions from the government created the most significant financial bubble in history.

    (Usually, when charting long-term stock market prices, I would use a log-scale to minimize the impact of large numbers on the whole. However, in this instance, such is not appropriate as we examine the historical deviations from the underlying growth trend.)

    The fiscal policies implemented post the pandemic-driven economic shutdown created a surge in demand that further exacerbated an already extended market. As shown, those fiscal interventions led to an unprecedented surge in earnings.

    Here is the problem. As shown below, the surge in the M2 money supply is now over. Without further stimulus, earnings must eventually revert to economically sustainable levels.

    While the media often states that “stocks are not the economy,” it is economic activity that creates corporate revenues and earnings. As such, stocks can not indefinitely grow faster than the economy over long periods.

    The Relationship Between The Economy And Earnings

    When stocks deviate from the underlying economy, the eventual resolution is lower stock prices. Over time, there is a close relationship between the economy, earnings, and asset prices. For example, the chart below compares the three from 1947 through 2021.

    Since 1947, earnings per share have grown at 7.72%, while the economy has expanded by 6.35% annually. That close relationship in growth rates is logical given the significant role that consumer spending has in the GDP equation.

    The slight difference is due to periods where earnings can grow faster than the economy when coming out of recession. However, while nominal stock prices have averaged 9.35% (including dividends), reversions to actual economic growth eventually occur. Such is because corporate earnings are a function of consumptive spending, corporate investments, imports, and exports. 

    The market disconnect from underlying economic activity is due to psychology. As noted above, such has been the case over the last decade, as successive rounds of monetary interventions led investors to believe “this time is different.” 

    Unfortunately, it never is.

    Stocks Or The Economy, Which Is Right?

    While not precise, there is a correlation between economic activity and the rise and fall of equity prices. For example, in 2000 and again in 2008, earnings contracted by 54% and 88%, respectively, as economic growth declined. Such was despite calls of never-ending earnings growth before both previous contractions.

    (Chart below are annual data through 2021)

    As earnings disappointed, stock prices adjusted by nearly 50% to realign valuations with weaker than expected current earnings and slower future earnings growth. So while the stock market is once again detached from reality, looking at past earnings contractions suggests it won’t be the case for long.

    The relationship becomes more evident when looking at the annual change in stock prices relative to the yearly GDP change.

    Again, since stock prices get driven by the “psychology” of market participants, there can be periods when markets disconnect from fundamentals. 

    However, most important to investors is that fundamentals never play “catch up” to stock prices.

    “The conclusion is clear: this is not sustainable. The market has outperformed historical returns by a wide margin since 2009. Much of this outsized performance came in the 2017 – 2021 period when returns were 2x higher than long-term historical average.” – Kailash Concepts

    The market risk of overly optimistic earnings estimates is high, as are the long-term above-trend returns.

    Mean Reversions Are The Biggest Risk

    Earlier this year, Jeremy Grantham made headlines with his market outlook titled “Let The Wild Rumpus Begin.” The crux of the article gets summed up in the following paragraph.

    “All 2-sigma equity bubbles in developed countries have broken back to trend. But before they did, a handful went on to become superbubbles of 3-sigma or greater: in the U.S. in 1929 and 2000 and in Japan in 1989. There were also superbubbles in housing in the U.S. in 2006 and Japan in 1989. All five of these superbubbles corrected all the way back to trend with much greater and longer pain than average.

    Today in the U.S. we are in the fourth superbubble of the last hundred years.”

    As noted above, the deviation from long-term growth trends is unsustainable. Such was caused by repeated financial interventions by the Federal Reserve. Therefore, unless the Federal Reverse is committed to a never-ending program of zero interest rates and quantitative easing, the eventual reversion of returns to their long-term means is inevitable.

    Such will solely result in profit margins and earnings returning to levels that align with actual economic activity. As Jeremy Grantham once noted:

    “Profit margins are probably the most mean-reverting series in finance. And if profit margins do not mean-revert, then something has gone badly wrong with capitalism. If high profits do not attract competition, there is something wrong with the system, and it is not functioning properly.” – Jeremy Grantham

    Many things can go wrong in the months ahead.

    While investors cling to the “hope” the Fed has everything under control, there is a reasonable chance they don’t.

    The next decade could be a disappointment to overly optimistic expectations.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 15:30

  • "Tijuana Under Attack!": Sudden Eruption Of Cartel Violence Leaves Cars Burned Across Border City
    “Tijuana Under Attack!”: Sudden Eruption Of Cartel Violence Leaves Cars Burned Across Border City

    The U.S. Consulate in Tijuana has requested all American government employees to shelter in place until further notice after cartel violence erupted in parts of northern Mexico. 

    The violence began in Ciudad Juarez, a Mexican city on the Rio Grande, just south of El Paso, Texas, with a prison battle between two rival cartels that left eleven people dead — then the chaos spread outside into the streets of the city, according to the Times of San Diego.

    By the weekend, the violence moved west, warranting the U.S. Consulate in Tijuana to advise Americans to shelter in place after a sudden eruption of violence. 

    “The U.S. Consulate General Tijuana is aware of reports of multiple vehicle fires, roadblocks and heavy police activity in Tijuana, Mexicali, Rosarito, Ensenada and Tecate,” the consulate said. “U.S. government employees have been instructed to shelter in place until further notice.”

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    San Deigo County Vice Chair Nora Vargas warned all “binational residents to be cautious and follow the recommendations from government officials and avoid unnecessary travel to allow authorities to do their work and maintain safety. My thoughts are with those impacted by the incidents.”

    Here’s footage of the chaos spreading through Tijuana as cartels duke it out. 

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    The San Diego Union-Tribune noted parts of Tijuana have gone into lockdown.

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    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 15:00

  • Small Businesses' Big Message For The Markets
    Small Businesses’ Big Message For The Markets

    Authored by Jesse Felder via TheFelderReport.com,

    Back in December, I wrote,

    “Considering the fact that the majority of investors are still betting on a transitory outcome, there could be some fireworks in the asset markets should they eventually be forced into an inflationary epiphany. Furthermore, what may exacerbate those fireworks, particularly in the stock market, is an earnings recession amid the most extreme valuations in history.”

    And that actually sounds like a pretty fair assessment of 2022 so far even though these trends continue to unfold.

    The data that led me to the conclusion that inflation would surprise on the upside and corporate earnings would surprise on the downside this year was provided by the NFIB survey of Small Business Economic Trends. Back in December, the number of business owners planning on raising prices had been soaring for some time, indicating inflation would follow. That indicator peaked a while back, suggesting inflation could plateau or over reverse to some degree which we began to see in the July CPI report released today.

    What may be precipitating this relative moderation in price pressures, however, is a slowdown in demand as indicated by falling optimism (and sales expectations) in the survey.

    At the same time, compensation plans remain elevated due to a persistently tight labor market. The result is that the recent reversal in the growth of profit margins is likely only getting started.

    In fact, this indicator suggests the decline in corporate profitability as a result of stagflationary pressures over the next few quarters could be historically deep.

    So while equity investors may be correct in their assessment of the cyclical trend in inflation, they may not want to celebrate it in such ebullient fashion.

    Because any moderation in inflationary pressures is unlikely to be driven by the sort of benign economic factors that would support equity prices.

    On the contrary, the risk of the current slowdown in the economy, which has enabled inflationary pressures to abate even to a small degree, evolving into a full-blown recession ahead appears significant.

    Tyler Durden
    Sat, 08/13/2022 – 14:30

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