- Virus Unrest Turns Violent As Serbs Protest Being "Lied To For Political Ends"
Virus Unrest Turns Violent As Serbs Protest Being “Lied To For Political Ends”
Tyler Durden
Fri, 07/10/2020 – 02:45Social unrest has rocked Belgrade and other cities in Serbia this week in response to President Aleksandar Vucic’s reintroduction of government-curfews over surging coronavirus cases.
Serbian police fired tear gas and were dressed head to toe in riot gear, as demonstrators, mostly young people, assaulted police on Tuesday and Wednesday. The New York Times said the unrest was some of the first in Europe since the pandemic began – also indicating the severity of the unrest was worst since the rule of Slobodan Milosevic in the 1990s.
July 8 Belgrade riot chaos. h/t Reuters Young Serbs quickly took the streets on Tuesday after Vucic announced Belgrade would be placed under a new order restricting movement in the region for three days to mitigate the spread of the second coronavirus wave. Many were infuriated by the re-implementation of the lockdown after coming out of some of the strictest ones in Europe to allow the general election last week.
“We don’t mind staying home for another three days — that wasn’t the problem,” said Dragana Grncarski, 45, who has been protesting this week.
“However, they’re playing with our minds and with the truth,” Grncarski added. “When it suits them to do elections, there is no corona. They organized football matches and tennis matches, and because of that we have a situation where the hospitals are full.”
“Citizens have been constantly deceived and lied to for political ends,” said Tena Prelec, a political expert on Southeast Europe at the University of Oxford.
BREAKING – All hell breaking loose in Serbia’s Belgrade amid protests over the government’s handling of #COVID19 for the second day.pic.twitter.com/3JnxJG3BiJ
— Disclose.tv 🚨 (@disclosetv) July 8, 2020
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Jelena Vasiljevic, an expert on Balkan unrest at the University of Belgrade, said the expiration of the lockdowns for election purposes – then re-implementation of the lockdowns took the population “from one extreme to another.”
Vasiljevic said the “excessive use of force” by the government to combat rioters hasn’t been seen since the days of “Milosevic in 1996 or 1997.” Milosevic led Serbia through the Balkan Wars and was later charged for war crimes.
Demonstrators stormed the Serbian parliament building in Belgrade after President Aleksandar Vucic announced stricter measures, including the lockdown of the capital, over the weekend to halt the spread of the coronavirus https://t.co/dFlIVgyOkG pic.twitter.com/3E24L77ftv
— Reuters (@Reuters) July 8, 2020
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Serbian Defense Minister Aleksandar Vulin was convinced the demonstration against the re-implementation of the lockdowns in Belgrade and other cities were “carefully planned” – and aimed at igniting a civil war.
“We have terrible violence on the streets, we have an attempt at a coup, we have an attempt to seize power by force and an attempt to provoke a civil war in Serbia. It cannot be described and explained differently. There is no reason, there is no reason to set fire to the Assembly, to set fire to the City Hall in Novi Sad, to attack the police, to beat people on the streets, to endanger life and to endanger the property of Serbian citizens ,” said Vulin, a guest on the show Novo jutro on TV Pink, was asked to comment on the events in the previous two evenings.
Russian Times caught some of the unrest on video earlier this week. Young Serbs can be seen clashing with riot police in front of government buildings.
“There were indications of foreign involvement, and some criminal faces were there, too,” Vucic said on Wednesday afternoon. He added that virus cases will likely flare-up because of the mass unrest.
“I wonder who will be responsible for the fact that hundreds and thousands of people became infected yesterday and the day before yesterday,” he said
Vucic has also backtracked on the curfew after several days of unrest – instead, the government is expected to impose restrictions on public spaces and possibly limit business hours. There’s also talk of fining people for not wearing masks.
When it comes to outside forces meddling in Serb domestic affairs, Russia came out on Thursday, denying it had any involvement.
- UK Commits "Highway Robbery" Of Venezuelan Gold, Says Academic
UK Commits “Highway Robbery” Of Venezuelan Gold, Says Academic
Tyler Durden
Fri, 07/10/2020 – 02:00Authored by Johanna Ross via InfoBrics.org,
When it comes to Venezuela, Britain is suffering from split personality disorder. While the UK Foreign Office reportedly maintains ‘full, normal and reciprocal diplomatic relations’ with legitimately elected President Maduro’s government, and with Maduro’s UK ambassador, the British government has been actively supporting the self-appointed US-backed ‘leader’ Juan Guaido, who led the coup against Maduro in 2019.
Last week the High Court in London ruled that Juan Guaido was ‘unequivocally’ recognised as the President of Venezuela.
There’s just one problem with the ruling however: Juan Guaido isn’t the President.
He may have tried hard; he talked the talk, and walked the walk (clearly modelling himself on a cross between Justin Trudeau and Emmanuel Macron, with sleeves rolled up like Barack Obama). He had just the right youthful, liberal image to front the US led regime change campaign in the South American nation. But last year’s coup, supported by the US and Colombia, dramatically backfired after the Venezuelan military refused to back him.
Nevertheless, it has been in the British government’s interest to prop up the would-be Venezuelan leader. The High Court’s verdict was in a case brought to the court by Maduro’s government, which is trying to access $1bn of its gold currently held by the Bank of England. It’s pretty straightforward – the bank doesn’t want to pay out, and is using Maduro’s ‘contested’ leadership as a reason not to do so. Suddenly it matters that Maduro’s presidency is questionable, never mind the fact that he was democratically re-elected in 2018.
Juan Guaido claims that the funds from the Bank of England gold would be used to ‘prop up the regime’, while the Venezuelan government has insisted that the money would go towards managing the coronavirus pandemic. Maduro has even said that once the gold is sold the money will be transferred to the UN Development Programme. In any case, the reason seems irrelevant; when was the last time you or I had to justify a withdrawal from our own bank accounts?
I spoke recently to the National Secretary of the Venezuela Solidarity Campaign and senior lecturer at the University of Middlesex, Dr Francisco Dominguez, who said to me that the move by the High Court to block the transfer of Venezuelan gold constituted nothing more than ‘highway robbery’ and he condemned the UK’s use of Guaido in this case as a ‘legal device to steal Venezuela’s assets’. He stated:
“It is abundantly clear the UK’s recognition of Guaido’s farcical ‘interim presidency’ has nothing to do with ‘democracy’ or ‘human rights’ but with ‘colonial pillage’.
After all, there is nothing democratic or decent about Guaido: he colludes with Colombian narco-traffickers; he attempted a violent coup d’etat’; contracted US mercenaries to assassinate President Maduro and several Venezulean government high officials, vigorously promotes sanctions and aggression against his own nation, and he reeks of corruption.”
Dr Dominguez also pointed to direct collusion of the UK government with Guaido, as was recently uncovered by a British journalist. Newly obtained documents, exposed by John McEvoy, have recently shed light on the murky connection between the British government and the aspiring Venezuelan president. It was uncovered that a Foreign & Commonwealth Office (FCO) Unit named the Venezuela Reconstruction Unit has been created which has not been officially acknowledged by either country. In the documents it was revealed that Juan Guaidó’s representative in the UK, Vanessa Neumann, had spoken with FCO officials about the sustenance of British business interests in Venezuela’s ‘reconstruction’. A conversation of this nature obviously stinks of regime change, given the fact Venezuela sits on the largest proven oil reserves in the world, and that Neumann has previously links to oil companies. Britain is placing its stake in Venezuela’s demise.
Formally the UK government has a different position. In relation to Venezuela’s gold, former Treasury Minister Robert Jenrick said back in 2019 in response to the parliamentary question ‘what the legal basis was for the Bank of England’s decision to freeze approximately 1125 gold bars stored by the Venezuelan central bank in November 2018.’, that it was a ‘matter for the Bank of England’. Jenrick maintained that HM Treasury only has direct control over the UK government’s own holdings of gold within its official reserves, which are held at the Bank of England.’
However the facts paint a different picture.
John Bolton’s White House memoir The Room Where It Happened’ reveals that UK Foreign Secretary at the time, Jeremy Hunt ‘was delighted to freeze Venezuelan gold deposits in the Bank of England so the regime could not sell the gold to keep itself going.’
As Bolton unashamedly admitted:
“These were the sort of steps we were already applying to pressure Maduro financially.”
The former National Security Advisor relates in his book how proud he was to have been the driving force behind the 2019 power grab:
“I was heartened that Maduro’s government promptly accused me of leading a coup.”
Bolton openly describes how they discussed ways of delegitimizing the Venezuelan government as Trump reportedly said “Maybe it’s time to put Maduro out of business.”
The evidence suggests that the UK complied fully in Bolton’s masterplan to unseat Maduro, and is continuing to work with the US to undermine the Venezuelan leadership; only in truly subtle British fashion, surreptitiously, hoping no-one would notice. Who knows, when, if ever, the Venezuelans will see their gold. But you can be sure they won’t be investing with the Bank of England any time soon.
- Tyranny Without A Tyrant: The Deep State's Divide-And-Conquer Strategy Is Working
Tyranny Without A Tyrant: The Deep State’s Divide-And-Conquer Strategy Is Working
Tyler Durden
Fri, 07/10/2020 – 00:00Authored by John Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,
“In a fully developed bureaucracy there is nobody left with whom one can argue, to whom one can present grievances, on whom the pressures of power can be exerted. Bureaucracy is the form of government in which everybody is deprived of political freedom, of the power to act; for the rule by Nobody is not no-rule, and where all are equally powerless, we have a tyranny without a tyrant.”
– Hannah Arendt, On Violence
What exactly is going on?
Is this revolution? Is this anarchy? Is this a spectacle engineered to distract us from the machinations of the police state? Is this a sociological means of re-setting our national equilibrium? Is this a Machiavellian scheme designed to further polarize the populace and undermine our efforts to stand unified against government tyranny? Is this so-called populist uprising actually a manufactured race war and election-year referendum on who should occupy the White House?
Whatever it is, this – the racial hypersensitivity without racial justice, the kowtowing to politically correct bullies with no regard for anyone else’s free speech rights, the violent blowback after years of government-sanctioned brutality, the mob mindset that is overwhelming the rights of the individual, the oppressive glowering of the Nanny State, the seemingly righteous indignation full of sound and fury that in the end signifies nothing, the partisan divide that grows more impassable with every passing day – is not leading us anywhere good.
Certainly it’s not leading to more freedom.
This draconian exercise in how to divide, conquer and subdue a nation is succeeding.
It must be said: the Black Lives Matter protests have not helped. Inadvertently or intentionally, these protests—tinged with mob violence, rampant incivility, intolerance, and an arrogant disdain for how an open marketplace of ideas can advance freedom—have politicized what should never have been politicized: police brutality and the government’s ongoing assaults on our freedoms.
For one brief moment in the wake of George Floyd’s death, it seemed as if finally “we the people” might put aside our differences long enough to stand united in outrage over the government’s brutality.
That sliver of unity didn’t last.
We may be worse off now than we were before.
Suddenly, no one seems to be talking about any of the egregious governmental abuses that are still wreaking havoc on our freedoms: police shootings of unarmed individuals, invasive surveillance, roadside blood draws, roadside strip searches, SWAT team raids gone awry, the military industrial complex’s costly wars, pork barrel spending, pre-crime laws, civil asset forfeiture, fusion centers, militarization, armed drones, smart policing carried out by AI robots, courts that march in lockstep with the police state, schools that function as indoctrination centers, bureaucrats that keep the Deep State in power.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
How do you persuade a populace to embrace totalitarianism, that goose-stepping form of tyranny in which the government has all of the power and “we the people” have none?
You persuade the people that the menace they face (imaginary or not) is so sinister, so overwhelming, so fearsome that the only way to surmount the danger is by empowering the government to take all necessary steps to quash it, even if that means allowing government jackboots to trample all over the Constitution.
This is how you use the politics of fear to persuade a freedom-endowed people to shackle themselves to a dictatorship.
It works the same way every time.
The government’s overblown, extended wars on terrorism, drugs, violence, illegal immigration, and so-called domestic extremism have been convenient ruses used to terrorize the populace into relinquishing more of their freedoms in exchange for elusive promises of security.
Having allowed our fears to be codified and our actions criminalized, we now find ourselves in a strange new world where just about everything we do is criminalized, even our ability to choose whether or not to wear a mask in public during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Strangely enough, in the face of outright corruption and incompetency on the part of our elected officials, Americans in general remain relatively gullible, eager to be persuaded that the government can solve the problems that plague us, whether it be terrorism, an economic depression, an environmental disaster, or a global pandemic.
We have relinquished control over the most intimate aspects of our lives to government officials who, while they may occupy seats of authority, are neither wiser, smarter, more in tune with our needs, more knowledgeable about our problems, nor more aware of what is really in our best interests. Yet having bought into the false notion that the government does indeed know what’s best for us and can ensure not only our safety but our happiness and will take care of us from cradle to grave—that is, from daycare centers to nursing homes—we have in actuality allowed ourselves to be bridled and turned into slaves at the bidding of a government that cares little for our freedoms or our happiness.
The lesson is this: once a free people allows the government inroads into their freedoms or uses those same freedoms as bargaining chips for security, it quickly becomes a slippery slope to outright tyranny.
Nor does it seem to matter whether it’s a Democrat or a Republican at the helm anymore. Indeed, the bureaucratic mindset on both sides of the aisle now seems to embody the same philosophy of authoritarian government, whose priorities are to milk “we the people” of our hard-earned money (by way of taxes, fines and fees) and remain in control and in power.
Modern government in general—ranging from the militarized police in SWAT team gear crashing through our doors to the rash of innocent citizens being gunned down by police to the invasive spying on everything we do—is acting illogically, even psychopathically. (The characteristics of a psychopath include a “lack of remorse and empathy, a sense of grandiosity, superficial charm, conning and manipulative behavior, and refusal to take responsibility for one’s actions, among others.”)
When our own government no longer sees us as human beings with dignity and worth but as things to be manipulated, maneuvered, mined for data, manhandled by police, conned into believing it has our best interests at heart, mistreated, and then jails us if we dare step out of line, punishes us unjustly without remorse, and refuses to own up to its failings, we are no longer operating under a constitutional republic. Instead, what we are experiencing is a pathocracy: tyranny at the hands of a psychopathic government, which “operates against the interests of its own people except for favoring certain groups.”
So where does that leave us?
Having allowed the government to expand and exceed our reach, we find ourselves on the losing end of a tug-of-war over control of our country and our lives. And for as long as we let them, government officials will continue to trample on our rights, always justifying their actions as being for the good of the people.
Yet the government can only go as far as “we the people” allow. Therein lies the problem.
The pickle we find ourselves in speaks volumes about the nature of the government beast we have been saddled with and how it views the rights and sovereignty of “we the people.”
Now you don’t hear a lot about sovereignty anymore. Sovereignty is a dusty, antiquated term that harkens back to an age when kings and emperors ruled with absolute power over a populace that had no rights. Americans turned the idea of sovereignty on its head when they declared their independence from Great Britain and rejected the absolute authority of King George III. In doing so, Americans claimed for themselves the right to self-government and established themselves as the ultimate authority and power.
In other words, in America, “we the people”— sovereign citizens—call the shots.
So when the government acts, it is supposed to do so at our bidding and on our behalf, because we are the rulers.
That’s not exactly how it turned out, though, is it?
In the 200-plus years since we boldly embarked on this experiment in self-government, we have been steadily losing ground to the government’s brazen power grabs, foisted upon us in the so-called name of national security.
The government has knocked us off our rightful throne. It has usurped our rightful authority. It has staged the ultimate coup. Its agents no longer even pretend that they answer to “we the people.” Worst of all, “we the people” have become desensitized to this constant undermining of our freedoms.
How do we reconcile the Founders’ vision of the government as an entity whose only purpose is to serve the people with the police state’s insistence that the government is the supreme authority, that its power trumps that of the people themselves, and that it may exercise that power in any way it sees fit (that includes government agents crashing through doors, mass arrests, ethnic cleansing, racial profiling, indefinite detentions without due process, and internment camps)?
They cannot be reconciled. They are polar opposites.
We are fast approaching a moment of reckoning where we will be forced to choose between the vision of what America was intended to be (a model for self-governance where power is vested in the people) and the reality of what it has become (a police state where power is vested in the government).
This slide into totalitarianism—helped along by overcriminalization, government surveillance, militarized police, neighbors turning in neighbors, privatized prisons, and forced labor camps, to name just a few similarities—is tracking very closely with what happened in Germany in the years leading up to Hitler’s rise to power.
We are walking a dangerous path right now.
No matter who wins the presidential election come November, it’s a sure bet that the losers will be the American people.
Despite what is taught in school and the propaganda that is peddled by the media, the 2020 presidential election is not a populist election for a representative. Rather, it’s a gathering of shareholders to select the next CEO, a fact reinforced by the nation’s archaic electoral college system.
Anyone who believes that this election will bring about any real change in how the American government does business is either incredibly naïve, woefully out-of-touch, or oblivious to the fact that as an in-depth Princeton University study shows, we now live in an oligarchy that is “of the rich, by the rich and for the rich.”
When a country spends close to $10 billion on elections to select what is, for all intents and purposes, a glorified homecoming king or queen to occupy the White House and fill other government seats, while more than 40 million of its people live in poverty, more than 40 million Americans are on unemployment, more than 500,000 Americans are homeless, and analysts forecast it will take a decade to work our way out of the current COVID-induced recession, that’s a country whose priorities are out of step with the needs of its people.
Be warned, however: the Establishment—the Deep State and its corporate partners that really run the show, pull the strings and dictate the policies, no matter who occupies the Oval Office—is not going to allow anyone to take office who will unravel their power structures. Those who have attempted to do so in the past have been effectively put out of commission.
Voting sustains the illusion that we have a democratic republic, but it is merely a dictatorship in disguise, or what political scientists Martin Gilens and Benjamin Page more accurately refer to as an “economic élite domination.”
In such an environment, the economic elite (lobbyists, corporations, monied special interest groups) dictate national policy. As the Princeton University oligarchy study indicates, our elected officials, especially those in the nation’s capital, represent the interests of the rich and powerful rather than the average citizen. As such, the citizenry has little if any impact on the policies of government.
We have been saddled with a two-party system and fooled into believing that there’s a difference between the Republicans and Democrats, when in fact, the two parties are exactly the same. As one commentator noted, both parties support endless war, engage in out-of-control spending, ignore the citizenry’s basic rights, have no respect for the rule of law, are bought and paid for by Big Business, care most about their own power, and have a long record of expanding government and shrinking liberty
We’re drowning under the weight of too much debt, too many wars, too much power in the hands of a centralized government run by a corporate elite, too many militarized police, too many laws, too many lobbyists, and generally too much bad news.
The powers-that-be want us to believe that our job as citizens begins and ends on Election Day. They want us to believe that we have no right to complain about the state of the nation unless we’ve cast our vote one way or the other. They want us to remain divided over politics, hostile to those with whom we disagree politically, and intolerant of anyone or anything whose solutions to what ails this country differ from our own.
What they don’t want us talking about is the fact that the government is corrupt, the system is rigged, the politicians don’t represent us, the electoral college is a joke, most of the candidates are frauds, and, as I point out in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People, we as a nation are repeating the mistakes of history—namely, allowing a totalitarian state to reign over us.
Former concentration camp inmate Hannah Arendt warned against this when she wrote, “Never has our future been more unpredictable, never have we depended so much on political forces that cannot be trusted to follow the rules of common sense and self-interest—forces that look like sheer insanity, if judged by the standards of other centuries.”
As we once again find ourselves faced with the prospect of voting for the lesser of two evils, “we the people” have a decision to make: do we simply participate in the collapse of the American republic as it degenerates toward a totalitarian regime, or do we take a stand and reject the pathetic excuse for government that is being fobbed off on us?
Never forget that the lesser of two evils is still evil.
- This Is How Propaganda's Supposed To Work: 60% In US Believe Fake Russia Bounty Story
This Is How Propaganda’s Supposed To Work: 60% In US Believe Fake Russia Bounty Story
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 23:40It’s the same Russiagate playbook that’s sadly been the norm for years: breathless headlines are issued, the “walls are closing in”, then officials and media begin slowly walking back key aspects, and said walk-backs are buried in back sections of the Times, the substance of the story is memory-holed, while the vague imprint of the headline remains on the American consciousness.
A who’s who of top intelligence and military officials have now denied the the Russian bounties to kill American troops in Afghanistan story which originated in The New York Times weeks ago. The outlets behind the initial reporting themselves have been slowly forced to qualify the story into oblivion.
And yet a new Reuters/Ipsos polls finds that 60% of Americans view that allegation as “believable.”
Appears in print on June 27, 2020, Section A, Page 1 Reuters describes of the poll:
A majority of Americans believe that Russia paid the Taliban to kill U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan last year amid negotiations to end the war, and more than half want to respond with new economic sanctions against Moscow, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Wednesday.
As an example of how some of the very outlets which pushed the story hard have since walked back many of the central claims, consider the following line from The Washington Post last week, which was certainly awkward for them and the Times:
The Washington Post reported on Tuesday that White House officials were first informed in early 2019 of intelligence reports that Russia was offering the bounties to kill U.S. and coalition military personnel, but the information was deemed sketchy and in need of additional confirmation, according to people familiar with the matter.
“Sketchy” and yet the avalanche of headlines are still out there. The Pentagon has flatly denied its accuracy many times over to boot.
Yes, this is how propaganda is supposed to work. When the ‘Russia boogeyman’ is invoked, especially related to Trump, the threshhold for evidence is low to non-existent.
Hey, remember that whole Russian Bounty thing about Putin paying for the scalps of US soldiers? This Friday night news dump from NYT suggests it’s — shockingly — the latest Russiagate BOMBSHELL to fizzle out. One hint is where NYT placed it: page A19. https://t.co/LWX3Bq6MH0 pic.twitter.com/Yo8BqT2Fgr
— Aaron Maté (@aaronjmate) July 6, 2020
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Reuters continues:
Overall, 60% of Americans said they found reports of Russian bounties on American soldiers to be “very” or “somewhat” believable, while 21% said they were not credible and the rest were unsure.
Thirty-nine percent said they thought Trump “did know” about Russia’s targeting of the U.S. military before reports surfaced in the news media last month, while 26% said the president “did nsot know.”
As AntiWar.com points out, such fake stories and the American public’s gullibility has real-world and potentially very dangerous consequences: “The poll shows that they view Russian President Vladimir Putin as a ‘threat,’ and support a new round of US sanctions against Russia. Alarmingly, 9% even supported attacking Russia outright.”
“This is undercut by the strong evidence that this plot isn’t true, and never was. The danger is, the US could escalate hostilities and the majority of the public is fine with it,” AntiWar aptly concludes.
- Congratulations, You've Been Accepted! Now Stay Home
Congratulations, You’ve Been Accepted! Now Stay Home
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 23:20Authored by Elisabeth Wolf via RealClearPolitics.com,
I have two kids who are supposed to be in college. Home since March, they pushed through quarantine and Zoom spring believing they would return to campuses in the fall. Like thousands of other students, they were recently informed that their colleges are not welcoming them back.
After four months of committee meetings and emails, colleges and universities across America made the weak decision not to be bold. Rather than showing America how to move forward in a murky moment, institutions of higher education took the low road. Schools announcing partial openings or continuing online demonstrate glaring faults in their mission. They abdicate teaching students maturity, independence, and the ability to care for others in addition to or above themselves.
Of course, young people can contract COVID-19. The current spike in cases is attributed to young people, and yet young people are not filling up ICUs. According to the Centers for Disease Control, the rate of hospitalization for people who test positive for the coronavirus in their 20s is under 4%. To put this in perspective, the American Psychological Association states that one in three college freshmen worldwide report a mental health disorder. According to Alcohol.org, nearly 2,000 young adults aged 18-24 die each year from alcohol and related accidents. Colleges, unfortunately, are seeing way too many students who are very ill and need extreme medical treatment.
Since last March, doctors and researchers have confirmed that wearing face masks greatly slows Covid-19 transmission. Physical distancing, testing, isolation of symptomatic cases, and contact tracing are all effective means of slowing and reducing the spread of Coronavirus (see New Zealand and South Korea). Colleges, which operate as autonomous villages or towns, could implement all the recommended tools. Students have identification and are directly connected to school by text and college email accounts. Before Coronavirus, colleges regularly deployed their security teams to break up parties and cite those under 21 for being in a room where there was drinking. Surely, schools can apply these same resources to identifying anyone refusing a mask or overfilling a dorm room or other space.
Students not complying with rules laid down by the college should be asked to leave. No debate. No hearing. No calls from parents to the dean of students. Students who cannot abide by the straightforward rules should stay home or go home. Wearing masks, keeping respectable distance, handwashing, and sanitizing can keep your roommate, classmates, professors, dean, and dining hall staff safe. Time to learn: Modify your behavior to protect others.
Schools should have figured this out. Spend some dough. Teach kids more than reading, writing, mathematics, and sharp elbows. Teach kids resilience. Colleges like Colby did. They altered their school calendar, procured 85,000 COVID-19 tests, took over their college-owned inn for additional space, laid down rules, and said: Let’s do this. Colby didn’t pull this off just because they’re small and in Maine; they planned, organized and acted.
But other schools are taking a patchwork approach. Bowdoin College, 50 miles south of Colby, is only opening for first years and select others. University of Pennsylvania has decided to open to all enrolled students. Tiny Swarthmore College, 20 miles away, is only allowing first years and sophomores. The California State University schools remain online experiences. Clemson will do a three-phase approach to getting students on campus. Why couldn’t colleges and universities do what they ask students to do to prepare them for the world: work together. Coordinate getting all students back. With this random approach, educational experiences will be vastly different for students even at the same school. Will students sitting at a kitchen table be evaluated the same as a student in a classroom? How can these students compete against each other for jobs or graduate schools? Schools’ scattershot approach guarantees additional and deeper inequities in education among young people.
Students not allowed to return to campus are considering other options, but few exist. Many cannot afford a “gap” year because of student loan commitments, as well as the absence of many job opportunities in a COVID-19-crippled America. Moreover, more than ever, students should congregate to discuss social injustice and racial inequality. Looking into other students’ eyes (over their masks) is more meaningful and requires more patience, thoughtfulness, and confidence than hitting a “delete” button. What a time to leave young people stuck in their childhood homes when they have adult ideas, dreams, and impetus to bring change!
Instead, thousands of young people are dealing with U-turns, off ramps, and stop signs on the road to adulthood. They have no map. Federal, state, and local leadership has not given clear and consistent messages and, now, neither have colleges. Certainly, schools have to provide safe working conditions for professors, particularly those over 65. Yet, in addition to Zoom and other technology, can’t schools’ engineering professors develop portable plexiglass barriers? Can professors conduct class outside buildings? Could science departments share laboratory protective gear with other professors? Young people are naturally creative thinkers. Those who administer their campuses should be too. At least they should embrace the same standards to which the students are held. Colleges faced the problem of how to manage their students, campus housing, and classrooms with the variable of COVID-19. Instead of solving the equation, many colleges just slashed the numbers. I asked my daughter, a math major, what would happen if she had a complex problem but couldn’t solve it right away. Could she ask the professor for simpler numbers? Her answer, “Not if I wanted to pass the class.”
Further by-products of colleges not welcoming back students include depressing local economies, laying off or reducing pay for college employees, and preventing students from voting in November in towns and states where their votes could have an impact. In a blind abdication of their responsibility to students, schools not completely opening have ignored the mental health implication of their decision. According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, this pandemic has worsened student mental health. Those sitting at home or whatever safe space they can find this coming semester will be deprived of friendships, mentors, counseling, and many of the coping strategies developed when they leapt to new lives.
At the beginning of the COVID-19 shutdowns, farmers had to dump or destroy fresh milk, eggs and produce at the same time thousands needed food. I wondered why, in the greatest, most technologically advanced democracy, we could not coordinate getting this food to the hungry. I assumed it was a timing issue. There was just not enough time to coordinate and make the arrangements. Colleges and universities not welcoming back all students are doing the equivalent of dumping this crop of students. However, they do not have the excuse of not enough time. They have had months. They have had the benefit of knowing what can work to slow the virus.
Instead, they gave up.
As for the millions of students left off campus, whether or not you have an American passport, your chance to change the world may be delayed or just take another direction. It’s not gone. My favorite college counselor in the world, now retired in his late 80s, Mr. James Richardson, had a sign hanging in his office that read, “Grow where you are planted.” Without the help of colleges or universities, your resilience will blossom.
- Hong Kong Banks Conducting "Emergency Audits" Of Clients For Exposure To US Sanctions
Hong Kong Banks Conducting “Emergency Audits” Of Clients For Exposure To US Sanctions
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 23:00Shortly after we reported that in anticipation of soon-to-be-enacted US sanctions – dubbed the Hong Kong autonomy act – which will penalize Chinese banks for serving officials who implement the new National Security Law in Hong Kong, Chinese commercial megabanks such as Bank of China and Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) were looking at the possibility of being cut off from U.S. dollars or losing access to U.S. dollar settlements, as well as planning for a run on Hong Kong branches if customers feared these could run out of U.S. currency, the FT reports that US and European banks in Hong Kong are conducting emergency audits of their clients to identify Chinese and Hong Kong officials and corporates that could face US sanctions over a new national security law.
According to the report, at least two large international banks in Hong Kong were studying which of their clients and partners might be exposed to sanctions under the Autonomy act and with which they might have to terminate their business relationships.
A person at one of the banks said that cutting off the clients could hit revenues from Chinese banks and the country’s state-owned enterprises, but that could not be helped. “If they are sanctioned [we] can’t touch them,” the FT source said.
To be sure, there are plenty of banks that don’t want to jeopardize their goodwill with SWIFT: foreign banks such as HSBC, Standard Chartered and Citibank have retail outlets in Hong Kong, while global investment banks JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, UBS and others have offices in the Asian financial hub. Large Chinese banks with international operations, such as Bank of China (Hong Kong), are also dominant in the city. In addition, the sanctions could hit the territory’s international fund managers and insurers.
“Some of them are going through that exercise of looking at their existing client base and seeing where the risks are,” said Chen Zhu, a lawyer at Davis Polk who advises institutions on the impact of economic sanctions.
While it remains unclear just how forcefully US would pursue its sanctions in Hong Kong, these could range from freezing the property of individuals and companies to cutting them out of the US financial system. They could also stop banks from conducting foreign exchange transactions over which the US has jurisdiction, implying that Washington could try to curb their access to dollars, a move which is seen by many as a nuclear option.
The act could force financial institutions to choose between doing business with the US or China, lawyers said. Hong Kong’s national security law makes it illegal to comply with US sanctions against Hong Kong and China.
Another person at a bank who was familiar with the matter said: “I think at this stage everyone sensible is taking a look through their client lists and mapping out the various different scenarios.”
“It’s speculative because the list isn’t out yet and our assumption is that it may not be that long. But the situation at the moment means you also have to consider worse scenarios where it does have an impact on your business and you need to plan how to react,” the person said.
US officials are expected to unveil details of the list in the months following the introduction of the act.
Meanwhile, Hong Kong’s financial industry discussed the potential conflict between the Chinese and US laws at a meeting with the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, the territory’s central bank, this week. But few expect firm advice on how business and banks can ensure compliance with the national security law, which outlaws subversion, secession, terrorism and colluding with foreign forces but has been criticized for being vaguely defined. “Who is going to tell [Chinese president] Xi Jinping your law needs a bit more clarity,” said one person at a bank who was familiar with the matter.
Kher Sheng Lee, head of Hong Kong’s Alternative Investment Management Association, said hedge funds typically outsourced sanctions compliance to fund administrators. But some of the “more proactive” funds would also be examining how exposed they were to potentially sanctioned individuals and companies under the act.
Mr Lee said these funds were expecting the impact to be “quite minimal”.
“If the name is caught up on the list they would have to explore appropriate steps, including effecting a compulsory redemption and expelling that investor out of the fund. Unless there are major investors on the list, I expect this is something they will be able to manage,” he said.
Most, however, appear to be in denial: as the FT concludes, many bankers in the city argued that there was a lot of “bluff and bluster” from the US on Hong Kong. They said the implementation of the act could be much less severe than expected, especially as the timeframe for the implementation of the sanctions could stretch beyond the US election.
“Financial institutions are concerned as there is uncertainty and they are looking for additional guidance from US agencies,” said Nicholas Turner of Steptoe, who advises financial institutions on sanctions compliance.
It is this belief that Trump is ultimately bluffing and merely posturing in his hardline stance toward China that has resulted in virtually no impact on risk assets. Some, however, like Rabobank’s Michael Hartnett, believe that once the laws have been passed, it is largely out of the hands of both Xi and Trump, as the escalation is now out of both their hands, and it is only a matter of time before global stock markets realize that the world’s two biggest superpowers are now in a state of cold war.
- Iran To Help Syria With Air Defense To Repel US, Israeli Attacks
Iran To Help Syria With Air Defense To Repel US, Israeli Attacks
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 22:40Submitted by South Front,
Iran will help to strengthen Syrian air defense capabilities as part of a wider military security agreement between the two countries, Chairman of the Chiefs of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces Major General Mohammad Baqeri said on July 8. The statement was made after the signing of a new military cooperation agreement in Damascus.
The agreement provides for the expansion of military and security cooperation and the continuation of coordination between the Armed Forces of the two countries. Major General Baqeri said that the signed deal “increases our will to work together in the face of US pressure.”
“If the American administrations had been able to subjugate Syria, Iran and the axis of resistance, they would not have hesitated for a moment,” he said.
The major general emphasized that Israel is a “powerful partner” of the US in the war against Syria, claiming that terrorist groups constituted part of the Israeli aggression.
In their turn, the United States and Israel insist that Iran and Hezbollah are responsible for the destabilization of Syria and prepare what they call ‘terrorist attacks’ against the US and Israel. In the framework of this approach, Israel, with direct and indirect help from the US, regularly conducts strikes on various supposedly ‘Iranian targets’ across Syria. Often these strikes concur with large-scale attacks of al-Qaeda-linked groups and ISIS on positions of the Syrian Army and its allies. One of the main points of Israeli concern is the growing military infrastructure of pro-Iranian forces near al-Bukamal, on the Syrian-Iraqi border. Therefore, the announced move by Iran to boost Syrian air defenses, including possible deployment of additional air defense systems, is a logical step for them to take to protect their own interests.
Clashes between the Syrian Army and Turkish-backed militants were ongoing in western Aleppo late on July 8 and early on July 9. According to pro-militant sources, the army destroyed at least one bulldozer and killed 2 members of the National Front for Liberation. Turkish proxies insist that their mortar strikes on army positions also led to casualties.
In southern Idlib, the Syrian Army shelled positions of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham near Ruwaihah after the terrorist group sent additional reinforcements there under the cover of the ceasefire regime. On the morning of July 9th, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham units continued their deployment in the area. Since the signing of the March 5 ceasefire agreement between Turkey and Russia, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham has been openly working to strengthen its positions in southern Idlib. Despite the successes in the conducting of joint Russian-Turkish patrols along the M4 highway, which even reached Jisr al-Shughur, the highway itself and the agreed security zone area along it in fact remain in the hands of Idlib militants.
Pro-ISIS sources claimed that the terrorist group’s cells have ambushed a unit of pro-government forces in the Homs-Deir Ezzor desert destroying at least one vehicle. These claims have yet to be confirmed. However, the situation in central Syria has recently deteriorated due to the increase in ISIS attacks and government forces are now conducting active security operations there.
- Manhattan Rental Market Implodes: Median Rent Plunges Most Ever As Vacancies Hit Record High
Manhattan Rental Market Implodes: Median Rent Plunges Most Ever As Vacancies Hit Record High
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 22:20It’s nost just Manhattan’s housing market that is getting crushed in recent weeks: the city’s rental market is also starting to show the damage from a pandemic-fueled exodus. According to Douglas Elliman Real Estate and appraiser Miller Samuel, the borough’s apartment-vacancy rate in June rose to the highest on record. Available listings surged 85% from a year earlier to 10,789, an all-time high for a single month.
Predictably, all that excess inventory has put a dent in pricing with the median rent tumbling 6.6% to $3,242, the first decline in 18 months and the biggest in data going back to October 2011, according to Jonathan Miller, president of Miller Samuel.
“It does give context to the scale of the movement out of Manhattan during the crisis,” Miller said in an interview with Bloomberg, which notes that “many New Yorkers have lost their taste for dense city living while the coronavirus raged, shuttering office buildings and giving people few reasons to stick around.”
The delayed response is because apartments vacated during the three-month lockdown were heaped onto the market at the end of June, when the state lifted the ban on in-person real estate showings.
New lease signings jumped 45% last month from May, with 3,171 apartments finding takers, Miller Samuel and Douglas Elliman said. To get those tenants, landlords had to offer average rent discounts of 2%, more than double what they were giving last year. They also piled on sweeteners, such as free months and payment of broker fees, in 45% of deals.
Even with all that, the vacancy rate still climbed to 3.67%, a record in data going back to August 2006. The rate had never before topped 3%, according to Miller.
“We’re in for a summer season that is going to be all about supply,” he said.
- Trump Reaps The Whirlwind With China/Iran Mega Deal
Trump Reaps The Whirlwind With China/Iran Mega Deal
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 22:00Authored by Tom Luongo via Gold, Goats, ‘n Guns blog,
For more than three years I’ve tried to explain that President Trump’s foreign policy was having the exact opposite effect of its intended purpose.
Trump, under the advice of people like John Bolton, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) has pursued a maximum pressure campaign against Iran in the hopes of the regime either crumbling or suing for peace.
Trump was warned by both Chinese Premier Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin that Iran would ‘rather eat dirt’ than submit to him on nuclear weapons, support for Hezbollah, Iraq and President Bashar al-Assad in Syria.
In effect, Trump and Pompeo have argued for Iran to give up its sovereignty to appease the fears of Netanyahu in Israel, and they have steadfastly told Bibi and The Donald to go pound sand.
Every six months or so, depending on the state of domestic affairs, tensions with Iran ratchet up another notch. Over the past couple of weeks a series of explosions at key Iranian military facilities occurred with fingerprints of Israel striking deep into Iran to cripple strategic targets.
Trump, distracted by the domestic insurrection against him, has left foreign policy strictly to Pompeo who is avidly pursuing a ‘have his cake and eat it too moment,’ trying to extend the weapons embargo against Iran at the United Nations while still claiming the unilateral right to leave the JCPOA without further consequences.
In a word, Russia, China and Europe are telling him, “No.”
And now we know why. China and Iran just inked a 25-year, game-changing strategic deal covering everything from oil sales, contract bids and massive upgrades to Iran’s anti-air capabilities as well as its domestic air force.
This deal was in the air over the weekend when Iranian Foriegn Minister Javad Zarif briefed Iranian lawmakers on the pending deal.
From Simon Watkins at Oilprice.com via Zerohedge who is arguing the deal was actually inked last year:
One of the secret elements of the deal signed last year is that China will invest US$280 billion in developing Iran’s oil, gas, and petrochemicals sectors. This amount will be front-loaded into the first five-year period of the new 25-year deal, and the understanding is that further amounts will be available in each subsequent five year period, provided that both parties agree. There will be another US$120 billion of investment, which again can be front-loaded into the first five-year period, for upgrading Iran’s transport and manufacturing infrastructure, and again subject to increase in each subsequent period should both parties agree. In exchange for this, to begin with, Chinese companies will be given the first option to bid on any new – or stalled or uncompleted – oil, gas, and petrochemicals projects in Iran. China will also be able to buy any and all oil, gas, and petchems products at a minimum guaranteed discount of 12 per cent to the six-month rolling mean average price of comparable benchmark products, plus another 6 to 8 per cent of that metric for risk-adjusted compensation. Additionally, China will be granted the right to delay payment for up to two years and, significantly, it will be able to pay in soft currencies that it has accrued from doing business in Africa and the Former Soviet Union states.
You can almost hear MBS’ sobs from here. Because there is no way the Saudis can compete with this. This is a strategic move by Iran to ensure that
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Iran has guaranteed oil exports despite U.S. sanctions
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The Iranian economy de-dollarizes faster
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Iran and Iraq, by extension, integrate into China’s One Belt, One Road project.
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Saudi Arabia’s position as the leader of the Arab oil-producing world is destroyed.
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Iran’s ability to withstand U.S. sanctions pressure rises dramatically
This also dovetails with China’s eschewing Saudi oil for Russian Urals grade. At the same time China is working on putting a buyer’s group together to further marginalize Saudi oil pricing policy of setting tenders on a monthly basis.
Moreover, China wants its oil futures contract in Shanghai more dominant in the global market. That contract is a key piece to deepening Yuan liquidity.
Shifting the oil trade where it can trade in real time versus would be a boon to the market. Most of the Arab states set their tender prices at the beginning of the month and they don’t change.
Now let’s tie this into what’s happening in Hong Kong, where President Trump is threatening the Hong Kong Dollar’s peg to the U.S. dollar to try and cause China economic pain.
But China wants this to happen. It obviously doesn’t want Hong Kong to continue being the source of China’s international liquidity which is also retarding the internationalization of the yuan as a trade settlement currency.
I’ve been steadfast in my belief that China is ready to let Hong Kong go as a financial center. It is getting prepared to move its financial center to Shanghai, where its oil and gold futures contracts trade, the latter also convertible into gold.
The folly of all of this bluff and bluster is that Trump never wanted a war with Iran as the dramatic events from last year made clear. He simply wanted to force everyone to the bargaining table and renegotiate the JCPOA on Israel’s terms.
But the means and manner in which he went about this was both deeply insulting and demeaning.
Proud people like Iranians don’t respond to those kinds of cheap, gangster-like tactics and Trump has found out the hard way that treating international politics like negotiating a real estate deal doesn’t work.
There’s always someone else willing to come in and find their comparative advantage. So, this deal with China was always on the table, lurking in the background.
Israel pushed Trump to ditch the JCPOA to escalate the situation to their advantage. It gives Netanyahu every justification to send his air force around bombing targets in not just Syria, but now Iraq and Iran, increasing the likelihood of bringing Russia and China deeper into the region to defend its ally.
Every argument made to me over the past four years on this point has downplayed the idea that Russia and China would not come to Iran’s aid.
And yet it has steadily occurred.
All Trump did was help China get better terms on this deal with Iran than it would have gotten had he not gone full bull in an open-air marketplace.
Now that this deal has leaked out into the world we can see why Mike Pompeo is so desperately trying to re-impose the weapons embargo against Iran per the snap-back provisions of the JCPOA.
Because part of this deal is for China and Russia to sell Iran massive upgrades to both their anti-air defenses, namely Russian S-400’s, and to its air force.
Again from Watkins at Oilprice:
OilPrice.com understands from the Iranian sources that the bombers to be deployed will be China-modified versions of the long-range Russian Tupolev Tu-22M3s, with a manufacturing specification range of 6,800 kilometres (2,410 km with a typical weapons load), and the fighters will be the all-weather supersonic medium-range fighter bomber/strike Sukhoi Su-34, plus the newer single-seat stealth attack Sukhoi-57. It is apposite to note that in August 2016, Russia used the Hamedan airbase to launch attacks on targets in Syria using both Tupolev-22M3 long-range bombers and Sukhoi-34 strike fighters. At the same time, Chinese and Russian military vessels will be able to use newly-created dual-use facilities at Iran’s key ports at Chabahar, Bandar-e-Bushehr, and Bandar Abbas, constructed by Chinese companies.
Moreover, Iran’s military will further integrate Russian Electronic Warfare (EW) protocols into its structures. Remember Russia treats EW as a vital and integral part of its military capabilities. It isn’t an add-on or adjunct to core military operations.
EW is integrated into Russian military operations down to the squad level.
The bottom line is that this deal cements the Russian/Chinese/Iranian axis as an unbreakable thing. For nearly four years Trump’s team has pushed him to try and break this alliance up, but did so with tactics which only pushed them closer together.
All stick and no carrot after decades of the same treatment while showing no capability of abiding by any deal struck was never a recipe for driving a wedge between these people.
So, we’re left with the following situation which, actually, is quite dangerous. The U.S.’s position in Iraq is ultimately tenuous, like it is in Syria. Iran will now be flush with Chinese money to rebuild not only its oil and gas export business but better support its allies in Lebanon, Syria and Yemen.
Those same men pushed Trump to the brink of war in the end are still in his ear. And they are pushing a scorched earth policy of economic privation effecting social and political unrest.
But all that does is create the opportunity for China to step out from behind the curtain and into the spotlight.
And for the sin on not going to war with Iran he’s being roasted by neoconservatives at home who have openly now joined forces with the Democrats to campaign against him.
If he wants to stay in power he may have to appease them one last time, as his anti-China, anti-EU campaign strategy comes to a head in October when the arms embargo against Iran expires.
In article after article I patiently explained how and why Trump and the U.S. had no real leverage over Iran short of bombing the country back to the stone age. That would never happen on Trump’s watch because Iran’s leadership would never do anything so overt as to invite that response.
Even the attack on the U.S. bases in Iraq in January in response to Trump’s miscalculated assassination of General Qassem Soleimani was measured, precise and, officially, without U.S. casualties. If there was ever a moment for the Iranians to make a strategic mistake that invited Trump’s wrath, it was that.
And once his bluff was called there, that was the end of Energy Dominance and the entire strategy of isolating Iran.
At the same time those strikes demonstrated an ability to deliver blows far ahead of anything Trump had been briefed on by his advisers.
And the consequences would be catastrophic, especially for not only Saudi Arabia, which got a small taste of what could come their way, but also Israel.
Back then we were all worried about what would happen if Iran attacked oil tankers in the Persian Gulf sending oil to $200 per barrel. The financial derivative meltdown and subsequent supply chain disruptions would have been existential.
Today we’re living through what happens when the opposite occurs and oil plunges to $18 per barrel, thanks to Vladimir Putin finally telling both OPEC+ and the U.S., “No.”
The outcome is pretty much the same, a meltdown of Western markets financialized to the point of self-destruction which has now plunged both the U.S. and Europe into political chaos.
Into that vacuum China and Russia can now move openly into central Asia, and impose their will over the future of the region without having to fight anything more dangerous than skirmishes.
China secures its future energy needs and the supply lines for cross-continental trade. It establishes itself as the new power broker in the region alongside Russia who supplies the military prowess and a broke and battered U.S. can only fight rearguard actions while its allies there sink further into irrelevancy.
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- UN Report "Whitewashing" Terrorists As Soleimani Was "Bloodiest Terrorist In The World": State Dept
UN Report “Whitewashing” Terrorists As Soleimani Was “Bloodiest Terrorist In The World”: State Dept
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 21:40Washington has lashed out at a new United Nations report which was the result of a months-long investigation into the Jan. 3rd killing by US drone strike of Iran’s IRGC General Qassem Soleimani and his entourage.
UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions Agnes Callamard is due to submit the report to a UN Human Rights session Thursday. It calls the Soleimani assassination “unlawful” and deems it an “arbitrary killing” — especially given, according to the UN findings, there exists no evidence that Soleimani was planning an imminent attack on the United States or its personnel.
The US State Department blasted the report and denied the killing of the late Quds Force commander violated international law. Spokesperson Morgan Ortagus in Wednesday comments addressing the report called Soleimani “the bloodiest terrorist in the world”.
She further said the UN is essentially “whitewashing” crimes and giving a pass to terrorists:
“It takes a special kind of intellectual dishonesty to issue a report condemning the United States for acting in self-defense while whitewashing General Soleimani’s notorious past as one of the world’s deadliest terrorists,” Ortagus said on Wednesday.
“This tendentious and tedious report undermines human rights by giving a pass to terrorists and it proves once again why America was right to leave” the UN Human Rights Council in 2018, she added.
She asserted that Soleimani had been “committing terrorist acts to destabilize the Middle East over the past twenty years.”
“Soleimani and his Quds Force are responsible for killing hundreds of American and coalition forces and wounding thousands of others,” she added. Deputy Head of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Units, Abu Mahdi Al-Mohandis, was also killed in the strike, which the US also accused of killing Americans at Tehran’s bidding.
“The course of action taken by the U.S. was unlawful,” Callamard wrote in the report.
U.N. expert deems U.S. drone strike on Iran’s Soleimani an ‘unlawful’ killing https://t.co/X5F1hfByV7
— Edmund Kagire (@kagire) July 6, 2020
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
Recall that in first announcing the January assassination to the US public, which put the Mideast region on war footing, also resulting in an Iranian cruise missile strike on bases in Iraq where US personnel are present, President Trump said the targeted killing prevented more American deaths.
“Soleimani was plotting imminent and sinister attacks on American diplomats and military personnel, but we caught him in the act and terminated him,” Trump said at the time.
The US has taken issue from the start over Soleimani being considered by many European countries as a ‘state official’. Washington has instead deemed he and the elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as terrorists, and thus legitimate targets of US military action.
However, the new UN report has highlighted that never before has a member nation claimed ‘right to self-defense’ as rationale for killing a state official in a third country.
- Remember The Red Guards Before You Cheer The Woke Mobs
Remember The Red Guards Before You Cheer The Woke Mobs
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 21:20Authored by Peter Van Buren via TheAmericanConservative.com,
Today statues, tomorrow mass firings… or even worse. There’s a history here.
I’m ambivalent about statues and J.K. Rowling being torn down, but terrified of the thought process behind the destruction. Decisions should never be made by mobs.
Is America on the edge of a cultural revolution?
The historical namesake and obvious parallel is the Cultural Revolution in China, which lasted from 1966 to 1976. Its stated goal was to purge capitalist and traditional elements from society, and to substitute a new way of thinking based on Mao’s own beliefs. The epic struggle for control and power waged war against anybody on the wrong side of an idea.
To set the mobs on somebody, one needed only to tie him to an official blacklist like the Four Olds (old customs, culture, habits, and ideas). China’s young people and urban workers formed Red Guard units to go after whomever was outed. Violence? Yes, please. When Mao launched the movement in May 1966, he told his mobs to “bombard the headquarters” and made clear that “to rebel is justified.” He said “revisionists should be removed through violent class struggle.” The old thinkers were everywhere and were systematically trying to preserve their power and subjugate the people.
Whetted, the mobs took the task to heart: Red Guards destroyed historical relics, statues, and artifacts, and ransacked cultural and religious sites. Libraries were burned. Religion was considered a tool of capitalists and so churches were destroyed—even the Temple of Confucius was wrecked. Eventually the Red Guards moved on to openly killing people who did not think as they did. Where were the police? The cops were told not to intervene in Red Guard activities, and if they did, the national police chief pardoned the Guards for any crimes.
Education was singled out, as it was the way the old values were preserved and transmitted. Teachers, particularly those at universities, were considered the “Stinking Old Ninth” and were widely persecuted. The lucky ones just suffered the public humiliation of shaved heads, while others were tortured. Many were slaughtered or harassed into suicide. Schools and universities eventually closed down and over 10 million former students were sent to the countryside to labor under the Down to the Countryside Movement. A lost generation was abandoned to fester, uneducated. Red Guard pogroms eventually came to include the cannibalization of revisionists. After all, as Mao said, a revolution is not a dinner party.
The Cultural Revolution destroyed China’s economy and traditional culture, leaving behind a possible death toll ranging from one to 20 million. Nobody really knows. It was a war on the way people think. And it failed. One immediate consequence of the Revolution’s failure was the rise in power of the military after regular people decided they’d had enough and wanted order restored. China then became even more of a capitalist society than it had ever imagined in pre-Revolution days. Oh well.
I spoke with an elderly Chinese academic who had been forced from her classroom and made to sleep outside with the animals during the Revolution. She recalled forced self-criticism sessions that required her to guess at her crimes, as she’d done nothing more than teach literature, a kind of systematic revisionism in that it espoused beliefs her tormentors thought contributed to the rotten society. She also had to write out long apologies for being who she was. She was personally held responsible for 4,000 years of oppression of the masses. Our meeting was last year, before white guilt became a whole category on Netflix, but I wonder if she’d see now how similar it all is.
That’s probably a longer version of events than a column like this would usually feature. A tragedy on the scale of the Holocaust in terms of human lives, an attempt to destroy culture on a level that would embarrass the Taliban—this topic is not widely taught in American colleges, never mind in China.
It should be taught, because history rhymes. Chinese students are again outing teachers, sometimes via cellphone videos, for “improper speech,” teaching hurtful things from the past using the wrong vocabulary. Other Chinese intellectuals are harassed online for holding outlier positions, or lose their jobs for teaching novels with the wrong values. Once abhorred as anti-free speech, most UC Berkeley students would likely now agree that such steps are proper. In Minnesota, To Kill A Mockingbird and Huckleberry Finn are banned because fictional characters use a racial slur.
There are no statues to the Cultural Revolution here or in China. Nobody builds monuments to chaos. But it’s never really about the statues anyway. In America, we moved quickly from demands to tear down the statues of Robert E. Lee to Thomas Jefferson to basically any Caucasian, including “White Jesus.“
Of course, it was never going to stop with Confederate generals because it was not really about racism any more than the Cultural Revolution was really about capitalism. This is about rewriting history for political ends, both short-term power grabs (Not Trump 2020!) and longer term societal changes that one critic calls the “successor ideology,” the melange of academic radicalism now seeking hegemony throughout American institutions. Douglas Murray is more succinct. The purpose “is to embed a new metaphysics into our societies: a new religion.” The ideas—centered on there being only one accepted way of thought—are a tool of control.
It remains to be seen where America goes next in its own nascent cultural revolution. Like slow dancing in eighth grade, maybe nothing will come of it. These early stages, where the victims are Uncle Ben, Aunt Jemima, someone losing her temper while walking a dog in Central Park, and canceled celebrities, are a far cry from the millions murdered for the same goals in China. Much of what appears revolutionary is just Internet pranking and common looting amplified by an agendaized media. One writer sees “cancel culture as a game, the point of which is to impose unemployment on people as a form of recreation.” B-list celebs and Karens in the parking lot are easy enough targets. Ask the Red Guards: it’s fun to break things.
Still, the intellectual roots of our revolution and China’s seem similar: the hate of the old, the need for unacceptable ideas to be disappeared in the name of social progress, intolerance toward dissent, violence to enforce conformity.
In America these are spreading outward from our universities so that everywhere today—movies, TV, publishing, news, ads, sports—is an Oberlin where in the name of free speech “hate speech” is banned, and in the name of safety dangerous ideas and the people who hold them are not only not discussed but canceled, shot down via the projectile of the heckler’s veto, unfriended, demonetized, deleted, de-platformed, demeaned, chased after by mobs both real and online in a horrible blend of self-righteousness and cyber bullying. They don’t believe in a marketplace of ideas. Ideas to the mob are either right or wrong and the “wrong” ones must be banished. The choices to survive the mobs are conformity or silence. In China, you showed conformity by carrying around Mao’s Little Red Book. In America, you wear a soiled surgical mask to the supermarket.
The philosophical spadework for an American Cultural Revolution is done. Switch the terms capitalism and revisionism with racism and white supremacy in some of Mao’s speeches and you have a decent speech draft for a Black Lives Matter rally. Actually, you can keep Mao’s references to destroying capitalism, as they track pretty closely with progressive thought in 2020 America.
History is not there to make anyone feel safe or justify current theories about policing. History exists so we can learn from it, and for us to learn from it, it has to exist for us to study it, to be offended and uncomfortable with it, to bathe in it, to taste it bitter or sweet. When you wash your hands of an idea, you lose all the other ideas that grew to challenge it. Think of those as antibodies fighting a disease. What happens when they are no longer at the ready? What happens when a body forgets how to fight an illness? What happens when a society forgets how to challenge a bad idea with a better one?
- Top Communist Party Official: China, US Headed For "Complete Economic Decoupling"
Top Communist Party Official: China, US Headed For “Complete Economic Decoupling”
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 21:00It’s fair to say that tensions between the US and China have escalated to levels unseen since the days of the Nixon Administration, when the bilateral relationship between the two countries finally began as the Communists abandoned their commitment to isolation and insulation from the capitalist west.
Though it has never garnered much attention in the headines, the US Navy has increasingly flexed its military muscle in the contested South China Sea, which Beijing claims as sovereign Chinese territory, despite an ICC ruling repudiating China’s claims to some of these reefs and islands in the south and east china seas.
Over the past week, the Navy sent two aircraft carriers to begin some of the largest military exercises that US forces have ever hosted in the South China Sea, a show of strength with a clear message: That the US stands ready to counter China’s military ambitions in the Pacific.
A reporter for the Nikkei Asian Review noted Thursday that a former high-ranking CCP official this week published an editorial in a key academic journal that appears to cut against the Party line, and suggest an even more radical solution: complete economic decoupling from the US.
The author is careful to address the fact that isolationism has a bad history in the 20th Century in China: Instead of China going it alone, Zhou Li, a 65-year-old former deputy head of the Chinese Communist Party’s International Liaison Department, argues that a competing “yuan-based” economic bloc must emerge to rival the dollar-based financial system.
In a commentary piece, a writer for Nikkei breaks down Zhou’s argument:
It has been a tense first week of July in the seas of Asia.
While two U.S. aircraft carriers, the USS Ronald Reagan and the USS Nimitz, launched hundreds of aircraft daily into the skies above the South China Sea, China was conducting naval exercises in the same sea. In a rare and symbolic move, the People’s Liberation Army Navy also carried out live-fire drills in the East China Sea and the Yellow Sea.
Amid the tensions, one published article has been the talk of the town in many Chinese circles. Written on the assumption that the novel coronavirus will disrupt China and the world for an extended period, the content is highly controversial.
The article predicts industrial supply chains being torn up, a China-U.S. decoupling and a world split into dollar and yuan economic blocs.
The author is Zhou Li, a 65-year-old former deputy head of the Chinese Communist Party’s International Liaison Department, a division in charge of party-led diplomacy. His views notably differ from the official Chinese government line; they are also radical.
Zhou says Chinese must prepare:
- For the deterioration of Sino-U.S. relations and the full escalation of the struggle.
- To cope with shrinking external demand and a disruption of supply chains.
- For a new normal of coexisting with the novel coronavirus pandemic over the long term.
- To leave the dollar hegemony and gradually realize the decoupling of the yuan from the dollar.
- For the outbreak of a global food crisis.
- For a resurgence of international terrorism.
Zhou does not shy from painting a grim picture of the Chinese economy, and his wording clearly differs from that of official documents prepared by government bureaucrats.
“Many international economic organizations such as the International Monetary Fund have issued reports downgrading global economic growth this year to as much as minus 4.9%, the worst economic recession since the Great Depression in the 1930s,” Zhou wrote.
The article goes on: “The order log at our exporters has been greatly reduced. Production at enterprises upstream and downstream has stalled. International transportation logistics have been blocked. Raw materials are lacking and plants are unable to deliver their products.
This phenomenon is putting huge pressure on our stable growth and job security.”
While not spelling it out, Zhou was hinting that China’s current economic situation is so harsh that it too could post zero or negative growth.
It is precisely the “black swan” – a serious incident that defies conventional wisdom and is unforeseen – that President Xi Jinping has been warning about.
Furthermore, Zhou indicated that the yuan bloc is on its back foot. “The U.S. controls the main channel for international payment and clearing, namely through SWIFT,” he wrote, noting that the international payment information of Chinese, Russian and Iranian companies is in Washington’s hands.
Disrupted supply chains would inevitably deliver a blow to the 5G strategy of Chinese telecoms equipment maker Huawei.
If Zhou’s predictions are correct, various future plans of Xi’s would crumble.
But there is an even bigger problem.
If China barrels ahead to go beyond building an economic bloc and chooses to isolate itself, it will no doubt revert to the world before its accession to the World Trade Organization at the end of 2001, a stepping stone for the high economic growth that followed.
Worse, China may travel back in time to before it established diplomatic ties with the U.S. in 1979, during the Cold War.
China’s historic rapprochement with the U.S. came a few years after the end of the 1966-1976 Cultural Revolution, a political campaign launched by Mao Zedong, during which numerous innocent people became victims after being stigmatized as counterrevolutionaries.
The Cultural Revolution followed the 1958-1961 Great Leap Forward, a reckless campaign also launched at the behest of Mao to pursue a big increase in agricultural and industrial production. The campaign failed, and a huge number of people starved to death.
To be sure, Xi has recently issued an order to prepare for the worst, including in China’s relations with the U.S., using the expression “bottom-line thinking,” or assuming the worst.
But until now, it had been taboo in China to refer to just how far the situation surrounding China might deteriorate due to the “new Cold War.”
“In the six months since the outbreak, the US ruling authorities – including the Trump administration and the U.S. Congress – have continued to strengthen their pressure on China,” Zhou wrote, citing examples such as canceling preferential treatment for Hong Kong and sending warships to the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea.
He said the U.S. attempted to write “China “Virus” into U.N. Security Council resolutions and that it was trying to seize U.S. Treasury bonds purchased by China as compensation for the pandemic.
Zhou is not a mere scholar. He is a figure who was close to the center of the party’s diplomatic nerve center.
Furthermore, his article appeared in a newspaper published by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, a government-affiliated think tank. It appeared as part of a special feature about “a community with a shared future for humanity.”
Amid a compilation of articles praising Xi’s concept of a “community with a shared future for humanity,” Zhou’s article oddly stands out. It was as if to say that the “community” Xi envisions is that of an economic bloc.
The article has sparked a torrent of interpretations and speculation as to why China dared to reveal a doomsday scenario.
In a straightforward interpretation, Zhou’s article could be an attempt at preemptive-damage control ahead of a sudden move toward decoupling, which would rattle the Chinese people and could lead to social unrest.
The article has left Chinese readers with a sense of resolve. “China will never lose,” and, “Beat the U.S.” are frequent comments left by those who read it.
Some Chinese have reacted coolly to the article. “U.S.-China decoupling is a pipe dream,” one reader said. “There is no way that we can get along through such a method.” This view is shared by other skeptical readers.
Others say it could be in line with the traditional way of expressing views euphemistically. While seeming to be loyal to the party, these euphemistic articles often level criticism or give advice to the party.
In the second half of his article, Zhou touched on higher food prices, which have already been laid bare, and the possible coming of a global food crisis.
In the past, China, the world’s biggest importer of soybeans, gave up on food self-sufficiency as it pursued industrialization. Without an international environment that helps the global economy to thrive, China could not feed its people.
Some say Zhou’s article could be an indirect expression of dissatisfaction toward a current leadership team that is running out of control.
It is of great interest how Zhou, a former diplomat stationed in Moscow, analyzed the self-destruction of the Soviet Union after it was driven into an economic corner.
The demise of the Soviet Union is a topic in which Xi himself has been interested. He sees it as a bad example that China must avoid.
He once said, “Why did the Soviet Union disintegrate? Why did the Soviet Communist Party collapse? An important reason was that their ideals and convictions wavered.”
“Finally, all it took was one careless word from Mikhail Gorbachev to dissolve the Soviet Communist Party, and a great party was gone,” he said.
Xi made the remarks in Guangdong Province in December 2012, shortly after taking the helm of the Chinese Communist Party as its general secretary.
Xi is firmly determined to protect his communist rule at any cost and prevent any moves that could lead to “color revolutions.”
The introduction of the highly controversial national security law in Hong Kong is one piece in this puzzle.
In mid-June, Chinese Vice Premier Liu He, who signed the “phase one” trade deal with the U.S. in January as Xi’s economic advisor, hinted at another piece of the puzzle — an economy mainly based on domestic circulation.
That smacks of the Mao Zedong-style “self reliance” policy Xi mentioned shortly after the U.S-China trade war erupted.
What is Zhou’s true motive for laying out the worst-case scenario? Will China indeed decouple from U.S.?
Is it really possible for the powers to avoid a military clash?
The article has raised more questions than answers.
* * *
Source: Nikkei Asian Review
- Russia Eyes Another Massive Gas Pipeline To China
Russia Eyes Another Massive Gas Pipeline To China
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 20:40Authored by Vanand Meliksetian via OilPrice.com,
The Chinese and Russian leadership have over the years intensified political and economic collaboration. Troubling relations with the West in general and the U.S. in particular are increasingly driving Beijing and Moscow into each other’s arms. The countries’ economies are highly complementary, which is an opportunity for further integration. While China has become the world’s factory and an important technological powerhouse, Russia is extremely wealthy in terms of energy and minerals.
The obvious advantages have led to the landmark $400 billion ‘Power of Siberia pipeline’ agreement for the export of natural gas from Russia’s far east to northern China. On top of this success, Gazprom and Moscow have been pushing for the ‘Power of Siberia-2 pipeline’ from Western Siberia to China’s Xinjiang region. The proposal has been met with a lukewarm response from Beijing because the region is already well-supplied with Central Asian gas. However, due to the Coronavirus pandemic and Gazprom’s adjusted plan, the Power of Siberia-2 project is gaining momentum.
Russia’s motives
Russia’s relations with the West nosedived after the Ukraine crisis and the annexation of Crimea. Ever since Moscow has been reaffirming that it’s not politically isolated by increasingly engaging with its giant Asian neighbor. The problem, however, is that the majority of Gazprom’s export capabilities end in Europe. Pivoting to China, therefore, was essential to lessen dependence.
Gazprom’s initial proposal through the Altai region and into Western China has been replaced with the ‘Mongolia alternative’ with an annual capacity of 50 bcm. The recent Russian assertiveness comes from Moscow’s assertion that its position in key market Europe is under threat. The Corona pandemic has increased the pressure even further. According to Alexander Gabuev, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Moscow Center, “Gazprom sees that its position in the European market is eroding over the long run because of growing competition and a push by some countries to reduce dependence on Russia. Gazprom has to market gas from fields in Yamal and Western Siberia, and China is the big market next door.”
China is essential for Russia which can be seen in Gazprom’s fast-tracking of investments concerning the enlargement of Power of Siberia-1 pipeline. Despite quarantine measures, some 3,000 laborers were infected with Corona who were drilling new wells and constructing power and compressor stations.
China’s motives
Of the two parties, Russia is more inclined to strike a deal. Beijing, in theory, has more options due to its relative proximity to large natural gas producers and the size and potential of the Chinese market. However, since Donald Trump’s presidency relations between the U.S. and China have deteriorated strongly which is pushing Beijing and Moscow towards each other.
Economic relations between Russia and China were already poised to grow due to the complementarity of their economies. The pandemic has exacerbated both the upward and downward trends of relations with Russia and the U.S.
According to Lin Boqiang, dean of the China Institute for Studies in Energy Policy at Xiamen University, ”before the current situation between China and the United States, China was planning to buy a lot of energy from the U.S. because of the trade agreement. But now the situation looks uncertain, and that will certainly encourage China to cooperate more with Russia.”
The alternatives for Bejing are increasing imports from Central Asia and LNG. Both are not appealing due to different reasons. LNG is either shipped from politically unfriendly nations, e.g. the U.S. and Australia, or cargoes need to travel through bottlenecks such as the strait of Malacca. Concerning Central Asia, imports from the region dwarf Russia’s meaning a choice for the latter would improve energy security through diversification. Furthermore, Siberian natural gas is very competitive due to the favorable price difference.
Striking a deal
Despite the favorable environment, it is yet to be seen whether a deal can be struck. In the case of Power of Siberia-1, it took four years to sign a contract from the moment terms and conditions were agreed. Furthermore, construction took five years after the long-term contract agreement was signed. Power of Siberia-2 could take a similar amount of time meaning it could be operational around 2030.
Gazprom’s flexibility in considering the Mongolia route offers an additional advantage. Russian gas could be supplied to the heavily polluted capital city Ulan Bator which ranks among the most polluted cities in the world. Poverty and a relatively small state budget rule out big energy projects that would bring cleaner fuels to Mongolia’s cities. The Power of Siberia-2 pipeline, therefore, is a unique opportunity.
However, the biggest beneficiaries would be China and Russia because the pipeline could further solidify the political and economic integration of the world’s second-biggest economy with the world’s largest energy producer.
- Doug Casey On COVID Brainwashing: "Look, Hysteria Is The Problem; Not The Flu Itself"
Doug Casey On COVID Brainwashing: “Look, Hysteria Is The Problem; Not The Flu Itself”
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 20:20Authored by Mac Slavo via SHTFplan.com,
Recently, gold bug and investor Doug Casey sat down with Kenneth Ameduri of Crush the Street. Casey jumped right in saying the breakdown of the United States under the boot of tyranny is “actually predictable.”
Casey says Western civilization peaked around World War 1, just after the Federal Reserve took over the monetary supply. Yet at the same time, technology improved. So in some ways, things have gotten better, but in the ways that matter, things have gotten worse. Now, people are easily programmed to believe what the TV tells them to, thanks to technological advancement. Yet, both global warming and COVID are “phony” as far as Casey is concerned.
Casey then discusses more in detail the COVID hoax. When Ameduri asks about the cases going up, but fatalities going down, Casey says the case numbers are meaningless. He says we should focus on the deaths, which are being “greatly overreported.”
In fact, we showed documents from the government back in April that prove they need the death toll to be as high as possible to exact tyranny on people through fear.
“Look, hysteria is the problem; not the flu itself.”
He adds, “this is hysteria comparable to the witch trials of the late 17th century.”
Casey says this whole situation was done as a form of “people control.” The government, who will issue your immunity passport, will decide what you can and cannot do based on whether or not you’ve gotten the mandatory vaccine. He says it’s possible to experience even more tyranny as the vaccine is rolled out.
“The worst people, not the best people, get into government.”
It’s all predictable he says.
We’ve all heard the saying: “power corrupts, and ultimate power corrupts ultimately.” That saying has always been true.
The best way to protect yourself is by buying physical gold or silver. Casey is betting on economic and financial chaos more than inflation or deflation. The whole system is set to absolutely self-destruct.
Casey says that there’s a good chance the Democrats will win the White House in 2020. He says there are two reasons.
One, Democrats are promising a lot more free stuff.
And two, they are much better at stuffing the ballot boxes.
I personally, disagree with Casey on this one. I think the winner will be whoever the New World Order, aka, the International Banking Cartel, chooses to win. Presidents are selected, not elected, especially now when we have no semblance of a government “by the people.”
“Look, it’s gonna end very badly,” Casey says of the government’s management of the economy.
- Is China's Stock Market Bubble Simply A Massive Reverse-Robin-Hood Scheme To Bail Out The Rich?
Is China’s Stock Market Bubble Simply A Massive Reverse-Robin-Hood Scheme To Bail Out The Rich?
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 20:00Without a doubt, the Chinese investor is “all-in” again. As we detailed earlier, there has been a massive surge in retail accounts opening margin accounts with margin-trading account balances rising at a faster pace than at the peak of speculative frenzy in 2014/2015…
Source: Bloomberg
Five years on from that euphoria, it’s deja vu all over again as millions of ‘home-gamers’ turn back to the markets, under the umbrella of government suggestions to do so… this won’t end well (again).
“Right now, I’m feeling invincible,” says one 36-year-old who works at a tech startup.
“There’s no way I can lose!”
From everything the state-owned media is telling mom-and-pop Chinese investors, this is all a great opportunity to create wealth and lift up the masses (via mass speculation).
However, as a new research paper publish on VoxChina details, this government-sponsored buying frenzy in stocks is anything but a path to prosperity for the vast majority of China’s citizenry.
Using comprehensive administrative data from China, we document a substantial increase in inequality of wealth held in risky assets by Chinese households in the 2014–2015 bubble-crash episode: the top 0.5% households in the equity market gained, while the bottom 85% lost, 250B RMB through active trading in this period, equating to 30% of each group’s initial equity wealth.
In comparison, the return differential between the top and bottom groups in periods of a relatively calm stock market is an order of magnitude smaller.
In other words, during the period when the Shanghai Composite Index climbed more than 150% before crashing 40%, the three academics found that the rich ended up richer and the poor poorer as an approximately equal RMB250 billion was redistributed from the lower wealth cohorts to the higher wealth cohorts – dramatically widening inequality.
The researchers broke the investors down into four groups based on the value of their accounts, ranging from below 500,000 yuan to over 10 million yuan.
The bottom wealth group accounted for 85% of all individual accounts, while the top wealth group made up 0.5%. Households altogether accounted for 87% of trading volume, confirming the notion that China is largely a retail market.
Wealthy investors seems to be fairly good at timing the market, while the poor are suckers. The top 0.5% households added to their exposure during the rally, while the bottom 85% cut their holdings. Shortly after the peak, the wealthy quickly exited the market, selling their shares to smaller households and corporations.
The bottom 85% of households lose 250B RMB from July 2014 to December 2015, while the top 0.5% gain 254B RMB in this 18-month period.
In stark contrast, the study finds that wealth redistribution in calm market conditions is an order of magnitude smaller than that in the bubble-crash episode.
Their key finding then is as follows:
The key takeaway from our study is that the heterogeneity in market timing and stock selection ability between the poor and the ultra-wealthy, while also present in calm periods, is greatly amplified in bubble-crash episodes, when both volatilities and trading volume spike.
In other words – officially-sanctioned (central bank or otherwise) bubbles in stock markets amplify inequality and crush the relative household wealth of the average joe far more than in a more ‘normal’ market environment.
The findings suggest some rather uncomfortable implications for the world’s central planners (especially if the hordes find out about this reverse-Robin-Hood scheme)…
It is often believed that greater stock market participation (or participation in any other risky financial market) is a path to prosperity and equality, especially in developing countries where financial literacy and market participation are generally low. However, if the poor, less financially sophisticated invest actively in financial markets that are prone to bubbles and crashes, such participation can be detrimental to their wealth.
This is particularly concerning given the recent finding that salient early life experiences have long-lasting impacts on individuals’ economic decisions decades later.
Consequently, policymakers and academics must emphasize that while greater stock market participation can be welfare-improving – especially for the poor – active investment by the poor will likely result in the exact opposite.
And, just in case you thought smugly that “us Americans know far better than those silly speculative muppets in China,” think again (even though retail accounts represent a far greater aspect of Chinese markets than in the US)…
As we detailed previously, the exact same pattern of reverse-Robin-Hood-ism is occurring in US equity markets. The two following charts indicate that as recessions begin, the top 1% begins to sell their holdings, while the bottom 90% continues to try and “buy the dip”.
The first chart shows the top 1% dumping as the market falls entering recession. Of late, we can see that selling has happened in spurts by the top 1%:
For the bottom 90% it’s just the opposite: the vast majority of unsophisticated retail investor start to chase momentum at the worst possible time, as they buy stocks en masse just as a recession begins, which in turn craters the market. In the Goldman chart below, we can see that the share of equities owned by the 90% jumps just as recession begin.
And no – you’re not the one buying at the lows.
In laymens terms, the rich dump their stock to the poor just before the market crashes.
The technical term is “distribution.”
As Bloomberg’s Ye Xie noted so eloquently, “it appears that the boom-bust was one effective way for the poor to be robbed by the rich.”
- What If A COVID-19 Wave 2 Happens During A Natural Disaster?
What If A COVID-19 Wave 2 Happens During A Natural Disaster?
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 19:40Authored by Adam Taggart via PeakProsperity.com,
It’s hard to think about a second wave of covid-19 infections when countries are still wrestling with Wave 1. We don’t even know if one will occur.
But history shows it’s a possibility we have to be on guard for. The Great Influenza of 1918 had three waves, with the second being by far the deadliest.
If covid-19 turns out to indeed have a second wave, will it be more deadly, too? No way to know at this time. But again, that’s a potential outcome we need to be aware of.
Yet one other important question we don’t have the answer (yet) to: If a second wave does occur, what would happen if the timing coincides with another crisis?
This question is timely, as most predictable natural disasters tend to happen in the second half of the year. And we’re entering that period now.
The east coast’s hurricane season runs June 1 through November 30. Already there have been four named storms (out of 13 to 19 predicted), and more hurricanes than normal are expected this year. Peak activity should happen between late August and early October:
In the west, fires have been getting worse for years; and this year’s season is predicted to be “above normal”:
And if Wave 2 were to hit in late winter/early Spring 2021, these are the US regions at greatest risk of experiencing floods during that time:
So, what would happen if a covid-19 Wave 2 requiring a serious lockdown gets disrupted by one or more of these natural disasters? Where hundreds of thousands to millions of people suddenly have to evacuate to parts unknown when a health quarantine is supposed to be in place?
The short answer is: Nothing good.
Evacuees will have to jettison much of their covid defense preparations in the scramble. And hygiene discipline around social distancing/etc will likely be seriously compromised as so many weary families arrive at locations unprepared for them. It’s hard to imagine how infections won’t skyrocket.
Ugh.
While there’s no way to predict with certainty when or even if this will happen, we can improve our individual odds for safety by planning today for such an outcome.
First, identify your bug-out destination should you be forced to relocate under these conditions. Contact the folks there now and game-plan with them what would happen if you had to show up there during a Wave 2. Would they be willing to welcome you? What would the pre-arranged safety protocols be while you stayed there? What resources would they depend on you to bring with you?
Second, prepare your bug-out checklist and make sure you maintain all needed supplies in reserve should you need to leave home in a hurry. If low, head out now to fill any gaps.
And third, make sure you’re as prepared as possible for successfully dealing with a second covid-19 wave.
A growing chorus of readers have been asking my co-founder Chris Martenson and me for a covid-19 Wave 2 prep guide that builds upon the recommendations made in the earlier guides we published back in February and March. Now that we’ve been through Wave 1, what new preparations would we emphasize?
Given the high degree of reader interest as well as our strong belief that the time to prepare for adversity is well before it arrives, we’ve just compiled our critical insights.
In Part 2: The Covid-19 Wave 2 Preparation Guide, Chris and I put on our Monday Morning quarterback helmets and reveal what we assess are the most important Wave 1 lessons to bring with us in anticipation of Wave 2.
Treatment protocols, meds, key supplies, food, money, social strategies — we detail out what everyone now needs to integrate into their future covid planning. The prudent move here is to hope for the best but prepare for the worst.
Click here to read Part 2 of this report (free executive summary, enrollment required for full access)
- Chinese Banks Preparing For "Worst Case" Scenario: Being Cut Off From SWIFT, Hong Kong Bank Runs
Chinese Banks Preparing For “Worst Case” Scenario: Being Cut Off From SWIFT, Hong Kong Bank Runs
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 19:20In the latest escalation over China’s de facto annexation of Hong Kong, Reuters reports that Chinese state lenders are “revamping contingency plans” in anticipation of the soon to be enacted U.S. legislation (just waiting for Trump’s signature) that would penalize banks for serving officials who implement the new national security law for Hong Kong.
In a “worst-case scenario” under consideration by Chinese commercial megabanks Bank of China and Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC), the lenders are said to be looking at the possibility of being cut off from U.S. dollars or losing access to U.S. dollar settlements, two Reuters sources said.
The worst-case scenario also envisions what would happen in the event of a run on its branches in Hong Kong if customers feared that it would run out of U.S. currency, one of the sources said (this is the scenario discussed in “If 500,000 Rich Hong Kongers Leave The City, The HKD Peg Would Surely Collapse“). The scenario was also looking at the experience of banks in Iran, the same person said. Iranian banks have been hit from time to time by U.S. sanctions dating back to the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
“We are hoping for the best, but preparing for the worst. You never know how things will turn out,” one of the sources said.
In a milder scenario being looked at by the Agricultural Bank of China (AgBank), lenders would need to find ways to address the problem of clients blacklisted by the United States, especially those who might face a sudden loss of liquidity.
As Reuters adds, the contingency planning has been initiated by the banks themselves, who have the most to lose should the US effectively trigger a massive dollar bank run.
As Reuters calculates, Bank of China, the country’s most international lender, had the biggest exposure of the country’s big four lenders to the greenback at the end of 2019, with about $433 billion in liabilities. China’s top four banks, which also include ICBC, China Construction Bank and AgBank, had a combined 7.5 trillion yuan ($1 trillion) in U.S. dollar liabilities at the end of 2019, annual reports show.
According to the report, at least three state-run leasing firms, including an ICBC unit and CSIC Leasing, are also making contingency plans. Leasing firms are often heavily reliant on dollar borrowing to fund purchases of aircraft, machinery and facilities.
China’s contingency plans are in response to the unanimous passage in the House and Senate of a bill last week which seeks to impose financial sanctions on Chinese banks in response to the National Security Law. It has yet to be signed into law by President Donald Trump. The bill calls for sanctions on Chinese officials and others who help violate Hong Kong’s autonomy and on financial institutions that do business with them. But it does not spell out what the sanctions would look like.
“There are sanctions in this bill which could be interpreted to prevent a bank from clearing some dollar transactions via U.S. institutions, but unlike other congressional sanctions bills there are not specific provisions mandating it,” said Nick Turner, a lawyer specialising in sanctions and anti-money laundering at Steptoe & Johnson in Hong Kong.
Aside from its contingency planning, China has said it would “launch a counterattack against US hegemony” if Trump was to block access of Chinese banks to dollar funding and the SWIFT payment system
SGH Macro have noted that countermeasures from China could include a speeding up of the use of the Renminbi for China’s own parallel Cross-border Interbank Payment System (CIPS), a surge in issuance of RMB denominated loans to Belt and Road Initiative countries, a push for greater RMB use through the Shanghai International Energy Exchange (INE) crude oil futures, and an acceleration of the implementation of China’s Digital Currency Electronics Payment (DCEP), the first digital currency issued by a central bank.
- US Reports Another Record Single-Day Jump In COVID-19 Infections: Live Updates
US Reports Another Record Single-Day Jump In COVID-19 Infections: Live Updates
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 19:03Summary:
- US reports 60k+ new cases for first time, per JHU & BBG
- DeSantis says schools will reopen safely in August
- NYC mayor cancels all big public events
- Texas reports 3rd straight record death
- Wisconsin sees biggest daily jump
- South Africa sees another record jump
- California reports record jump in deaths
- Cali Gov holds press briefing
- WHO begins ‘independent’ review of COVID-19 response
- Italy bars travelers from 13 countries as cases creep higher
- Arizona reports new cases
- NYT names Arizona “world’s worst COVID-19 hotspot”
- Florida reports record jump in deaths, hospitalizations
- Goldman: 40% of US population lives in states where reopening has been rolled back or delayed
- US single-day tally tops 60k again
- At least 5 states reported record single-day cases on Wednesday
- Global total tops 12 million
- 7-day average death rate creeps higher
- Tokyo, Hong Kong report single-day highs of new cases
- India reported 22.7k new cases
- Victoria reports another 165 new cases
- Beijing slams US over WHO pullout
* * *
Update (1850ET): Preliminary counts of new cases reported in the US on Thursday shows the US on track for another record jump, at least the second in the past week, though the exact numbers vary between sources. Global deaths, meanwhile, just passed 550,000.
Globally, JHU counted 211,878 new cases on Thursday, the second-highest total according to BBG. Though the WHO counted 63k+ cases in the US earlier this week, JHU’s numbers have the US case total for Thursday. Coronavirus cases in the US increased by 61,791 from a day earlier to 3.08 million. The 2% increase was higher than the average daily increase of 1.9% over the past week. Deaths rose 0.7% to 132,803.
* * *
Update (1840ET): After the state of Florida ordered schools to open in August on Monday, Gov DeSantis said during Thursday’s press briefing that if stores like Home Depot and Wal-Mart can open, that the schools can reopen, too.
Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) advocated for the reopening of schools in the fall, despite rising coronavirus case numbers in Florida, comparing classrooms filling with children to businesses that have welcomed back customers.
“If you can do Home Depot, if you can do Walmart, if you can do these things, we absolutely can do the schools,” DeSantis said at a Thursday news briefing in Jacksonville with U.S. Labor Secretary Eugene Scalia.
On Thursday, Florida reported its highest one-day death toll since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, with 120 new deaths. The state tallied 8,935 new cases.
The Florida Department of Education ordered Monday that schools should reopen in August, although it is up to individual school districts to implement public health precautions.
The press is going to love this.
In other news, de Blasio has cancelled all big public events in the city (parades and such) to help out restaurants who need to set up dining in the streets.
Mayor Bill De Blasio ordered large events that typically require a permit to be canceled through Sept. 30. The goal is to ensure room for outdoor restaurant seating and New York’s “Open Streets” program, which expands car-free public spaces for city dwellers.
That is, unless you’re marching for BLM.
* * *
Update (1654ET): Texas reports 9,782 new cases of coronavirus and a record 102 new deaths, the state’s second straight single-day record after Wednesday’s case total. The death toll increased by 102, depending on which source you want to believe. That’s higher than the 98 reported yesterday, and the state’s first triple-digit day for deaths since the outbreak began.
In response, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on Thursday issued a Proclamation suspending elective surgeries in hospitals in all counties located within 11 Trauma Service Areas in Texas.
The positivity rate in the state was around 18% on Thursday, also a new record high.
While NYC’s hospitals remain nearly empty, hospitals across Texas are reporting a massive influx of patients, with the sickest often fighting the virus for weeks, sometimes more than a month, before passing away. CBS News spoke to a team of doctors in McAllen, Texas.
“Knowing how things have progressed, are you worried?” CBS News asked Dr. Osman Khan, an emergency room physician.
“Yeah, I am worried. I feel like it is just the beginning for us. It seems like it’s going to be getting a lot worse,” Khan said.
While we were there, Kahn was treating patients who were developing pneumonia.
“Have you seen your husband?” CBS News asked. “Once,” Prieto replied.
One patient had lost her 35-year-old daughter to the virus the week before.
The state now has 230,346 confirmed cases, with 2,918 deaths.
* * *
Update (1615ET): Wisconsin, a state that hasn’t received too much attention during the outbreak so far, just reported a record jump in new cases even as neighboring Illinois has found success suppressing the virus. The state reported 754 new cases.
The @DHSWI announced 754 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 2 new deaths in Wisconsin on Thursday with 13,158 tests reported and a 5.7% test-positivity rate, making for ongoing confirmed totals of 33,908 cases and 809 deaths, reports @WPR https://t.co/CV2F1T3pxM
— WisContext (@wiscontext) July 9, 2020
July 9 marks the highest single-day COVID-19 case count for Wisconsin so far, following a previous peak of 738 on July 4. The only other day confirmed cases have exceeded 700 was on May 29 when the count was 733, the preceding peak in the pandemic.
— WisContext (@wiscontext) July 9, 2020
The 7-day average for confirmed COVID-19 cases continued to climb on Thursday, and the figure is at its highest point of the pandemic so far, as has been the case over most of the past week. More info is available here: https://t.co/WI5138HEDc
— WisContext (@wiscontext) July 9, 2020
The number of COVID-19 tests reported on July 9 is the fourth highest daily count for this figure so far, only surpassed by those reported on May 29, June 3 and June 9.
— WisContext (@wiscontext) July 9, 2020
The percentage of positive COVID-19 tests reported in Wisconsin continued to hover near the midpoint of its range over the past few weeks. Its 7-day average increased to 7.3%, the highest point for this figure since May 11.
— WisContext (@wiscontext) July 9, 2020
The numbers brought the state’s 7-day average to its highest level yet.
Elsewhere, South Africa just reported another record jump in new cases, and a positivity rate of over 24%.
JUST IN: South Africa reports 13,674 new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours, with daily positivity rate of over 24%.
South Africa’s largest daily increase by far.
— Norbert Elekes (@NorbertElekes) July 9, 2020
* * *
Update (1600ET): Dr. Fauci said Thursday that some states should consider returning to a lockdown scenario to help suppress the virus.
Anthony S. Fauci, the nation’s top infectious-disease official, is advising that some states seriously consider “shutting down” again if they are facing major resurgences of the virus — a warning that conflicts with President Trump’s push to reopen the country as quickly as possible.
“I think any state that is having a serious problem, that state should seriously look at shutting down,” Fauci said Wednesday. “It’s not for me to say, because each state is different.”
Fauci added Thursday that while he hopes there’s no need for new shutdowns, it “would not be viewed very, very favorably,” and urged states to pause their reopening process to slow the spread of the virus.
* * *
Update (1540ET): Newsom’s briefing Thursday focused on wildfire preparations, but data released by state public health officials after he finished speaking shows California reported a record number of single-day deaths, though Newsom claims some of them are part of a “backlog”, which also added 2,000 cases to Thursday’s count of 7,031 new virus cases, which is below the 7-day average (8,043), even more so if one subtracts the 2k.
Yesterday, the state reported 11,694 cases. On Thursday, the state reported 149 new virus deaths, well above the 7-day average of 73.
Fire season takes the spotlight at @CAgovernor‘s daily #COVID19 briefing; CAL FIRE Director Thom Porter says “We need everyone to wear masks” as firefighters respond to wildfires during the #pandemic.
— Lindsay Zuchelli (@lindsayclaireee) July 9, 2020
“Wildfire evacuations will look very different this year.” Firefighters say some evacuees may be sent to hotels, while those who are sent to more traditional evacuation centers will notice major safety modifications to allow for #physicaldistancing
— Lindsay Zuchelli (@lindsayclaireee) July 9, 2020
Latest #COVID19 stats for #California:
-7,031 new cases since yesterday
-7-day average for daily #coronavirus cases is 8,043
-14-day #positivity rate & 7-day positivity rate both at 7.3%
-24% increase in hospitalizations yesterday, ICU down .1%— Lindsay Zuchelli (@lindsayclaireee) July 9, 2020
This helpful chart from CNBC puts the outbreak across the US in perspective.
* * *
Update (1500ET): California Gov Gavin Newsom is holding a press briefing…
Live now: Governor @GavinNewsom provides an update on California’s wildfire preparedness and response efforts amid #COVID19. #YourActionsSaveLives https://t.co/eEj8y4Gc2Q
— Office of the Governor of California (@CAgovernor) July 9, 2020
* * *
Update (1400ET): The WHO named the heads of an independent panel it’s establishing to review its COVID-19 response pandemic that has been criticized by the US.
Helen Clark, former prime minister of New Zealand, and Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, former president of Liberia, were selected as co-chairs, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a meeting with member-states. The panel will present an interim report in November.
WHO has come under fire for its response to the coronavirus outbreak from President Donald Trump who is pulling the U.S. out of the global group, saying that it’s too close to China. Tedros has responded that the agency acted appropriately with the information it had and the rest of the world had plenty of time to prepare to fight the outbreak.
We’re curious to see the report, whenever it’s released.
* * *
Update (1315ET): As Florida officials continue to refuse to offer a breakdown of hospitalization data, localities have been releasing figures like the number of occupied ICU beds on their own. And what they’ve found is that 190 COVID-19 patients are on ventilators throughout the county, which includes the city of Miami.
- MIAMI-DADE HAS 190 COVID-19 PATIENTS ON VENTILATORS; PREV. 184
It’s just another alarming hospital occupancy headline, but the market doesn’t seem to be reacting much.
* * *
Update (1250ET): As COVID-19 cases creep higher in Italy (though deaths continue to slide)…
Italy#coronavirus July 9
More cases, less deaths, less ICU
*Total infected(ex Feb 21): 242,363
*new cases+229 (+119 Lombardy, +28 Lazio)
*W/virus 13,459
(-136 past 24 hrs)
*Cured 193,978(+338 past 24 hrs)
*Total dead 34,926 (+12past 24 hrs )
*ICU 69 (-2)
Civil ProtectionAgency— Gerard O’Connell (@gerryorome) July 9, 2020
…the country just declared travelers from 13 countries barred from Italy. The countries include Brazil. Americans are also barred from traveling to most EU countries, except in special circumstances. Italy announced earlier this week that it would bar travel from Bangladesh after a flight from the country brought many infected travelers to Italy.
Meanwhile, lockdown measures have mostly been lifted across the country.
* * *
Update (1157ET): Arizona has released its latest number. Confirmed cases rose by 4,057 to a total of 112,671, the state Department of Health said Thursday (remember, these figures are reported with a day lag). Further details of the daily update revealed that COVID-19-related hospitalizations increased by 16 to 3,437 as of Wednesday , a 12th straight record high.
75 Arizonans died, pushing the state’s death toll above 2k.
The market didn’t like these numbers, apparently.
Adult intensive care unit beds in use by all patients in the state edged lower from 91% on Tuesday to 89% on Wednesday.
Here’s more from the state’s dashboard:
The positivity rate tumbled to 11.5% on Thursday, well below the nearly 30% rate the state reported yesterday.
As states cleared a rumored weekend backlog yesterday, at least five states – Missouri, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and West Virginia – set single-day records for new infections on Wednesday, per the NYT.
Additionally, the NYT this morning declared Arizona the world’s biggest “hot spot”, claiming the state has the largest infection rate (often represented by the variable “R”) in the world.
The NYT ranked Arizona No. 1, with about 3,300 cases per 1 million in population, with Florida (2,700) and South Carolina (2,300) following. Bahrain (2,200) took the No. 4. spot.
* * *
Update (1040ET): Florida just suffered its deadliest day yet, health officials reported Thursday.
While the state reported 8,935 new cases (+4%) on Thursday, the number of new deaths hit yet another single-day record with 120 new deaths, 7 deaths higher than the prior record of 113 reached back in early May.
The state also added 411 new hospitalizations. The previous high for new hospitalizations was 400 people back in mid-May. About 17,500 people have had to seek hospitalization because of the virus so far.
The positivity rate in the state hit 18.4%, up from 14.1% in the prior day.
Here’s a rundown of the state’s latest totals for cases, deaths, tests and hospitalizations.
* * *
Update (0830ET): A team of analysts from Goldman Sachs wrote in a note sent out to clients that 40% of America’s population lives in a state that has rolled back its reopening plans.
The coronavirus situation in Arizona continues to worsen with new confirmed cases per day continuing to grow on the back of still-growing prevalence of COVID-like symptoms. Hospital capacity in the state is diminishing further. In other states that have high new case counts and fall short on other gating criteria, such as South Carolina, Georgia, and Nevada, hospital and ICU capacity looks slightly better but is still below recommended levels.
More states continue to put their reopening plans on hold. Over the past few days, Connecticut, Ohio, and Washington have delayed reopening plans or placed reopening on hold. States with over 40% of the population have now put reopening on hold, and states with another 30% have already reversed part of their reopening.
Even states that have their outbreaks under control are rolling back measures as a precaution.
States are increasingly putting their reopenings on hold. Over the past few days, state officials in Connecticut, Ohio, and Washington delayed planned reopening measures or explicitly put reopening on hold. States containing over 40% of the population have now put reopening on hold, and states with another 30% have increased restrictions. Several state governors have also issued new executive orders instituting specific social distancing and other requirements. In Washington, these practices are required “until there is an effective vaccine, effective treatment or herd immunity.”
Goldman illustrated the trend of pausing the economic reopening across the country.
The latest state tracker put together by the team reflects all of yesterday’s near-record numbers.
The tracker also reflects the larger numbers of deaths we’ve seen over the last two days.
* * *
Wednesday was another brutal day for the US during the global coronavirus outbreak as all of the worst hit states in the sunbelt produced new single-day records ranging from the highest 7-day positivity rate (Florida) to new records for deaths (Texas), single-day cases (California) and hospitalizations (Arizona, Florida, Texas etc).
After the US reported more than 60k new cases on Tuesday for the first time, the country repeated that feat on Wednesday, essentially tying its record number from the prior day.
Our daily update is published. New records for cases, and a top-5 day for tests. Patients currently hospitalized jumped to over 43,000, about the levels of mid-May.
States reported more than 800 new deaths. The 7-day average is creeping back up. pic.twitter.com/b2IvB4RH7r
— The COVID Tracking Project (@COVID19Tracking) July 8, 2020
But as the COVID tracking project points out, the 7-day average for deaths is “creeping back up” after two days of deaths near 1,000 (on Monday, the US reported fewer than 500 deaths for the entire country).
FUNDSTRAT: “If I had to flag a new ‘source of worry,’ it is that daily deaths in the US have risen in the past 2 days, with deaths of +905 (1D ago) and +819 (today). This is above .. the 550-600 daily deaths seen last week. So we need to keep an eye on this.” @fundstrat pic.twitter.com/036vCSDZoW
— Carl Quintanilla (@carlquintanilla) July 9, 2020
As deaths continue falling in New England, the sun belt has more than compensated for it.
There’s been a lot of discussions about deaths continuing to trend down as cases have surged. This chart provides a partial answer to what’s been happening. The falling numbers in the NE were offsetting rising deaths in AZ, TX, FL. pic.twitter.com/hmZkhZXTPS
— The COVID Tracking Project (@COVID19Tracking) July 8, 2020
As we noted, the US also topped 3 million cases yesterday.
We reached 3 million cumulative cases today, less than a month after reaching 2 million. pic.twitter.com/tNw81l9rDZ
— The COVID Tracking Project (@COVID19Tracking) July 8, 2020
So far on Thursday, the bad news out of the US has apparently carried over to Asia, as Hong Kong and Tokyo both reported new single-day records of new cases, as new outbreaks in both territories have come roaring back in recent weeks. Both areas are closely watched bellwethers of the outbreak in East Asia.
Tokyo confirmed 224 new infections on Thursday, its largest single-day tally yet. While Tokyo has focused its virus suppression efforts on nightlife districts, more mundane places like diners and – of course – nursing homes have seen several outbreaks.
The city’s mayor has said there are no plans to reinstate the state of emergency that was lifted in Tokyo last month.
Hong Kong health officials have warned of a third wave of coronavirus infections after the city recorded 23 new cases in two days. Social distancing measures in HK were largely lifted over the past two months as the city’s cases dwindled. An outbreak at a nursing home in Kowloon has contributed 8 infections to today’s total – four residents and four staff tested positive, on top of one resident who tested positive yesterday.
In response, authorities have reintroduced limits on the size of gatherings, with a maximum of eight people. At bars and restaurants, it’s 4 people per table tops. Catering businesses can only operate at 60 percent of their usual capacity. Gyms and karaoke lounges must have no more than 16 people in each room or facility.
India reported 22,752 new cases, up slightly from 22,252 yesterday, bringing India’s virus total to 742,417. The death toll has jumped to 20,642, up 482.
Meanwhile, as tensions with Beijing intensify, with the White House mulling new retaliatory measures ranging from an assault on the HKD currency peg to barring the popular social media app TikTok, Beijing hurled a few rhetorical rocks Thursday morning when Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian slammed the Trump Administration’s decision to withdraw was “another demonstration of the US pursuing unilateralism, withdrawing from groups and breaking contracts.”
The WHO is “the most authoritative and professional international institution in the field of global public health security,” Zhao said at a briefing Wednesday, adding that the US departure would hurt the developing world, the AP reports – contrasting America’s WHO withdrawal with President Xi’s promises of forgivable or zero-interest loans and bundles while supplying the developing world with the vaccine.
In Australia, Victoria, the worst-hit Australian state, recorded another 165 case, as an outbreak at a Melbourne high school emerged as the largest cluster in the country. Queensland state also closed its border to people fleeing a six-week lockdown in Melbourne. In addition to the lockdown, Victoria has effectively sealed its borders, while neighboring New South Wales has also shut its border with Victoria.
- Venezuelan Fighter Jets "Neutralize" US-Registered Aircraft
Venezuelan Fighter Jets “Neutralize” US-Registered Aircraft
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/09/2020 – 19:00The official Twitter account of the Strategic Operational Command of the Bolivarian National Armed Forces tweeted Thursday it “neutralized” a ‘narco-jet’ that violated Venezuelan airspace late Tuesday night.
“#ULTIMAHORA#CEOFANB reports that the @CODAI_FANB , detected at midnight on #07JUL20 the entry of a Narco-aircraft with registration #EEUU to our airspace and once the Law protocol was applied, it was NEUTRALIZED with aircraft from our Military Aviation,” the Venezuelan military tweeted.
Defense Blog said, “fighter jets of the Bolivarian Venezuelan Military Aviation forced a ‘narco jet’ transporting cocaine to land. After landing in the field, the crew allegedly set fire to the plane to hide all evidence.”
Attached to the Bolivarian National Armed Force’s Twitter post were alleged pictures of the “neutralized” private jet. The tail number reads “N339AV.” After a quick search on Flight Aware, the plane is a 1994 Raytheon Hawker 800 corporate jet owned by KMWFlight LLC, located in Wilmington, Delaware.
N339AV’s latest “registered flight route was in Mexico, from the central Toluca state to Cozumel island in the Caribbean,” said Defense Blog.
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