Apr 11

Today’s News 11th April 2024

  • "I Am Going To Lecture You On Climate Change": BBC Reporter Gets Schooled For Hypocrisy
    “I Am Going To Lecture You On Climate Change”: BBC Reporter Gets Schooled For Hypocrisy

    Authored by Tilak K. Doshi via RealClear Politics,

    On March 28, President Mohamed Irfaan Ali of the South American country of Guyana became an instant hero to many as he refused to take lectures on climate change from a BBC reporter during an interview. In a two-minute video clip that went viral on X (formerly Twitter) and other social media, President Ali turned the tables on the BBC’s Stephen Sackur when the reporter accused Guyana of worsening the “climate crisis” by allowing the exploitation of its newly found oil and gas reserves.

    “Over the next decade or two, it’s expected that there will be $150 billion worth of oil and gas extracted off your coast,” Sackur told the president. “It’s an extraordinary figure. But think of it in practical terms. That means – according to many experts – two billion tons of carbon emissions will come from your seabed from those reserves and released into the atmosphere.” Guyana’s head of state quickly rebutted: “Let me stop you right there. Did you know that Guyana has a forest that is the size of England and Scotland combined, a forest that stores 19.5 gigatons of carbon, a forest that we have kept alive?”

    When the reporter asked President Ali whether the rainforest gave him the “right” to release the carbon, the Guyanese leader retorted: “Does that give you the right to lecture us on climate change? I’m going to lecture you on climate change.” Being lectured by the BBC on climate change is not a new development; it’s what the state-supported media service often does, and in hectoring tones. But is the BBC correct in its proclamations about what the “climate science” says?

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    Climate Alarmists and Their Detractors

    The BBC seems institutionally committed to an alarmist position in its coverage of climate change issues. Many BBC programs seem driven to inject the “climate catastrophe” narrative into every energy-related news item. Stephen Sakur’s pointed remarks to Guyana’s president on the country’s rapid emergence as an oil and gas exporter were unexceptional in this regard.

    The response on social media to the viral clip is telling. Here is a short selection from X on March 29 and 30:

    Chris Rose (over 130,000 followers): “This is magnificent to watch. The President of Guyana truly put the BBC in its place. When sanctimony and pomposity meets [sic] sense and modesty.”

    Simon Ateba (over 670,000 followers): “EXPLOSIVE: President Mohamed  Irfaan Ali (@presidentaligy) of Guyana obliterates @BBC journalist Stephen Sackur (@stephensackur) over climate change hypocrisy. ‘No, no, I’m not done yet!’ WATCH.”

    Dilly Hussain  (over 110,000 followers): “LET ME STOP YOU RIGHT THERE!” An absolute masterclass shutdown by President Mohamed Irfaan Ali of Guyana when probed by @BBCHARDtalk’s Stephen Sackur on his country’s new found oil and gas fields and the West’s concerns about “carbon emissions”.

    Visegrád 24 (over 970,000 followers): “I am going to lecture you on climate change,” says Guyana President @presidentaligy to BBC journalist Stephen Sackur, as he pushes back against the journalist attempting to lecture the Caribbean leader about oil being bad for the environment.”

    The headlines of leading newspapers on March 30 reflected these social media messages:

    The Telegraph: “Watch: Guyana’s president scolds BBC presenter for climate change ‘lecture.’”

    Times of India: “‘Are you in their pockets?’: Guyanese President calls out reporter for Western hypocrisy.”

    Fox News: “Video of Guyana’s president snapping back at BBC reporter’s climate quiz goes viral: ‘Let me stop you.’”

    Hypocrisy As the Default Option in Climate Change Narratives

    What is of interest here is the inherently hypocritical nature of the interactions between representatives of developed countries and those of developing ones concerning energy and climate policies. Some of the most apparent of such interactions occur during the UN’s annual COP (“Conference of Parties”) climate summits.

    UN Secretary-General António Guterres, never one to shy from hyperbolic pronouncements, warns of a “code red for humanity. The alarm bells are deafening, and the evidence is irrefutable.” Indeed, based on dubious “hockey-stick” global-warming models formulated in the West, the secretary-general proclaims the approach of the “era of global boiling.”

    At COP26, held in 2021 in Glasgow, Western leaders addressed those making up 80% of humanity in speeches that reeked of carbon imperialism (here, here, and here). Their message can be fairly summarized as follows:

    We pledge climate finance to help you. There are promising new energy technologies to achieve our goals of net zero by 2050. The outlook for new jobs and economic growth are limitless with solar and wind power, electric vehicles, green hydrogen and carbon capture and sequestration. However, we must stop all new fossil fuel investments now! You must give up fossil fuels or else the planet is doomed.

    Faced with the increasingly untenable hypocrisy of the Western elites discouraging fossil fuel use in the developing world, the pushback by leaders such as Guyana’s President Ali is no surprise. In 2015, the Indian government’s then-chief economic adviser Arvind Subramaniam spoke in no uncertain terms of a new carbon imperialism: “The rich world’s move against fossil fuels is a disaster for India, and other poorer countries.”

    In the lead-up to COP27 held in Sharm Al Sheikh, Egypt in 2022, Africa’s top energy official, Amani Abou-Zeid, the African Union Commissioner for Infrastructure and Energy, said that African countries will push for “a common energy position that sees fossil fuels as necessary to expanding economies and electricity access.”

    At the COP28 climate summit held in Dubai, UAE, Dr. Sultan Al Jaber, president of the summit and CEO of Abu Dhabi National Oil Company, rebutted questions from Mary Robinson, a former UN special envoy for climate change: “There is no science out there, or no scenario out there, that says that the phase-out of fossil fuel is what’s going to achieve 1.5 C [maximum global temperature increase].” In an interview, he said that “You’re asking for a phase-out of fossil fuels . . . Please, help me, show me the roadmap for a phase-out of fossil fuel that will allow for sustainable socio-economic development, unless you want to take the world back into caves.”

    URL: Cartoons by Josh

    That’s Enough Already!

    Germany, the world leader in green energy ambitions, provides the best lesson of untenable hypocrisy when faced with the real-world constraints of physics and economics. In 2022, the country faced the prospect of entering winter without adequate energy supplies. It had shut down its nuclear power plants and lost access to piped Russian natural gas by imposing sanctions against Moscow (which was then followed by the sabotage of the Nordstream pipeline). In this context, Germany quickly retreated to coal power generation, and it now plans to double its gas-fired power-generating capacity.

    According to Doomberg, an energy and finance consultancy, Germany moved back to coal “with the speed and efficiency of the British evacuation of Dunkirk.” The IEA, the institution most responsible for the West’s clarion calls to stop fossil fuel investments, noted that Germany’s “significant reversal” drove European coal consumption up 9% in 2022. Energy security and the need to heat homes and keep lights on and factories humming trumped virtue-signaling climate goals – and Germany’s abject hypocrisy is obvious to many leaders in the developing world.

    Guyana’s President Irfaan Ali has little to explain, much less apologize for, as his country rapidly emerges as an important South American exporter of hydrocarbons. Let the BBC’s reporters peddle their luxury beliefs to those who think they can afford them.

    Dr. Tilak K. Doshi is an energy economist, independent consultant, and a Forbes contributor based in London.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 04/11/2024 – 02:00

  • Tyranny By The Numbers: The Government Wants Your Money Any Way It Can Get It
    Tyranny By The Numbers: The Government Wants Your Money Any Way It Can Get It

    Authored by John & Nisha Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,

    The government wants your money.

    It will beg, steal or borrow if necessary, but it wants your money any way it can get it.

    This is what comes of those $1.2 trillion spending bills: someone’s got to foot the bill for the government’s fiscal insanity, and that “someone” is the U.S. taxpayer.

    The government’s schemes to swindle, cheat, scam, and generally defraud taxpayers of their hard-earned dollars have run the gamut from wasteful pork barrel legislation, cronyism and graft to asset forfeiture, costly stimulus packages, and a national security complex that continues to undermine our freedoms while failing to making us any safer.

    Americans have also been made to pay through the nose for the government’s endless wars, subsidization of foreign nations, military empire, welfare state, roads to nowhere, bloated workforce, secret agencies, fusion centers, private prisons, biometric databases, invasive technologies, arsenal of weapons, and every other budgetary line item that is contributing to the fast-growing wealth of the corporate elite at the expense of those who are barely making ends meet—that is, we the taxpayers.

    According to the number crunchers with the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, in order to spend money it doesn’t have on programs it can’t afford, the government is borrowing roughly $6 billion a day.

    Basically, the U.S. government is funding its existence with a credit card.

    Let’s talk numbers, shall we?

    The national debt (the amount the federal government has borrowed over the years and must pay back) is more than $34 trillion and will grow another $19 trillion by 2033.

    The bulk of that debt has been amassed over the past two decades, thanks in large part to the fiscal shenanigans of four presidents, 10 sessions of Congress and two wars.

    It’s estimated that the amount this country owes is now 130% greater than its gross domestic product (all the products and services produced in one year by labor and property supplied by the citizens).

    In other words, the government is spending more than it brings in.

    The U.S. ranks as the 12th most indebted nation in the world, with much of that debt owed to the Federal Reserve, large investment funds and foreign governments, namely, Japan and China.

    Interest payments on the national debt are more than $395 billion, which is significantly more than the government spends on veterans’ benefits and services, and according to Pew Research Center, more than it will spend on elementary and secondary education, disaster relief, agriculture, science and space programs, foreign aid, and natural resources and environmental protection combined.

    According to the Committee for a Reasonable Federal Budget, the interest we’ve paid on this borrowed money is “nearly twice what the federal government will spend on transportation infrastructure, over four times as much as it will spend on K-12 education, almost four times what it will spend on housing, and over eight times what it will spend on science, space, and technology.”

    In ten years, those interest payments will exceed our entire military budget.

    This is financial tyranny.

    We’ve been sold a bill of goods by politicians promising to pay down the national debt, jumpstart the economy, rebuild our infrastructure, secure our borders, ensure our security, and make us all healthy, wealthy and happy.

    None of that has come to pass, and yet we’re still being loaded down with debt not of our own making while the government remains unrepentant, unfazed and undeterred in its wanton spending.

    Indeed, the national deficit (the difference between what the government spends and the revenue it takes in) remains at more than $1.5 trillion.

    If Americans managed their personal finances the way the government mismanages the nation’s finances, we’d all be in debtors’ prison by now.

    Despite the government propaganda being peddled by the politicians and news media, however, the government isn’t spending our tax dollars to make our lives better.

    We’re being robbed blind so the governmental elite can get richer.

    In the eyes of the government, “we the people, the voters, the consumers, and the taxpayers” are little more than pocketbooks waiting to be picked.

    “We the people” have become the new, permanent underclass in America.

    Consider: The government can seize your home and your car (which you’ve bought and paid for) over nonpayment of taxes. Government agents can freeze and seize your bank accounts and other valuables if they merely “suspect” wrongdoing. And the IRS insists on getting the first cut of your salary to pay for government programs over which you have no say.

    We have no real say in how the government runs, or how our taxpayer funds are used, but we’re being forced to pay through the nose, anyhow.

    We have no real say, but that doesn’t prevent the government from fleecing us at every turn and forcing us to pay for endless wars that do more to fund the military industrial complex than protect us, pork barrel projects that produce little to nothing, and a police state that serves only to imprison us within its walls.

    If you have no choice, no voice, and no real options when it comes to the government’s claims on your property and your money, you’re not free.

    It wasn’t always this way, of course.

    Early Americans went to war over the inalienable rights described by philosopher John Locke as the natural rights of life, liberty and property.

    It didn’t take long, however—a hundred years, in fact—before the American government was laying claim to the citizenry’s property by levying taxes to pay for the Civil War. As the New York Times reports, “Widespread resistance led to its repeal in 1872.”

    Determined to claim some of the citizenry’s wealth for its own uses, the government reinstituted the income tax in 1894. Charles Pollock challenged the tax as unconstitutional, and the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in his favor. Pollock’s victory was relatively short-lived. Members of Congress—united in their determination to tax the American people’s income—worked together to adopt a constitutional amendment to overrule the Pollock decision.

    On the eve of World War I, in 1913, Congress instituted a permanent income tax by way of the 16th Amendment to the Constitution and the Revenue Act of 1913. Under the Revenue Act, individuals with income exceeding $3,000 could be taxed starting at 1% up to 7% for incomes exceeding $500,000.

    It’s all gone downhill from there.

    Unsurprisingly, the government has used its tax powers to advance its own imperialistic agendas and the courts have repeatedly upheld the government’s power to penalize or jail those who refused to pay their taxes.

    While we’re struggling to get by, and making tough decisions about how to spend what little money actually makes it into our pockets after the federal, state and local governments take their share (this doesn’t include the stealth taxes imposed through tolls, fines and other fiscal penalties), the government continues to do whatever it likes—levy taxes, rack up debt, spend outrageously and irresponsibly—with little thought for the plight of its citizens.

    To top it all off, all of those wars the U.S. is so eager to fight abroad are being waged with borrowed funds. As The Atlantic reports, “U.S. leaders are essentially bankrolling the wars with debt, in the form of purchases of U.S. Treasury bonds by U.S.-based entities like pension funds and state and local governments, and by countries like China and Japan.”

    Of course, we’re the ones who have to repay that borrowed debt.

    For instance, American taxpayers have been forced to shell out more than $5.6 trillion since 9/11 for the military industrial complex’s costly, endless so-called “war on terrorism.” That translates to roughly $23,000 per taxpayer to wage wars abroad, occupy foreign countries, provide financial aid to foreign allies, and fill the pockets of defense contractors and grease the hands of corrupt foreign dignitaries.

    Mind you, that’s only a portion of what the Pentagon spends on America’s military empire.

    The United States also spends more on foreign aid than any other nation, with nearly $300 billion disbursed over a five-year period. More than 150 countries around the world receive U.S. taxpayer-funded assistance, with most of the funds going to the Middle East, Africa and Asia. That price tag keeps growing, too.

    As Forbes reports, “U.S. foreign aid dwarfs the federal funds spent by 48 out of 50 state governments annually. Only the state governments of California and New York spent more federal funds than what the U.S. sent abroad each year to foreign countries.”

    Most recently, the U.S. has allocated nearly $115 billion in emergency military and humanitarian aid for Ukraine since the start of the Russia invasion.

    As Dwight D. Eisenhower warned in a 1953 speech, this is how the military industrial complex continues to get richer, while the American taxpayer is forced to pay for programs that do little to enhance our lives, ensure our happiness and well-being, or secure our freedoms.

    This is no way of life.

    Yet it’s not just the government’s endless wars that are bleeding us dry.

    We’re also being forced to shell out money for surveillance systems to track our movements, money to further militarize our already militarized police, money to allow the government to raid our homes and bank accounts, money to fund schools where our kids learn nothing about freedom and everything about how to comply, and on and on.

    There was a time in our history when our forebears said “enough is enough” and stopped paying their taxes to what they considered an illegitimate government. They stood their ground and refused to support a system that was slowly choking out any attempts at self-governance, and which refused to be held accountable for its crimes against the people. Their resistance sowed the seeds for the revolution that would follow.

    Unfortunately, in the 200-plus years since we established our own government, we’ve let bankers, corporate turncoats and number-crunching bureaucrats muddy the waters and pilfer the accounts to such an extent that we’re back where we started.

    Once again, we’ve got a despotic regime with an imperial ruler doing as they please.

    Once again, we’ve got a judicial system insisting we have no rights under a government which demands that the people march in lockstep with its dictates.

    And once again, we’ve got to decide whether we’ll keep marching or break stride and make a turn toward freedom.

    But what if we didn’t just pull out our pocketbooks and pony up to the federal government’s outrageous demands for more money?

    What if we didn’t just dutifully line up to drop our hard-earned dollars into the collection bucket, no questions asked about how it will be spent?

    What if, instead of quietly sending in our tax checks, hoping vainly for some meager return, we did a little calculating of our own and started deducting from our taxes those programs that we refuse to support?

    As I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, we’re no longer living the American dream.

    We’re living a financial nightmare.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 23:40

  • "We're Going To Lose A Major War": US Navy Deletes Photo Of Ship Commander Shooting Rifle With Backwards Scope 
    “We’re Going To Lose A Major War”: US Navy Deletes Photo Of Ship Commander Shooting Rifle With Backwards Scope 

    Cmdr. Cameron Yaste, the Commanding Officer of the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS John S. McCain (DDG 56), was recently photographed shooting a 5.56×45mm M4 carbine with the optics installed backward. 

    The now-deleted image and press release on the Defense Visual Information Distribution Service website featured Yaste shooting the M4 with the Trijicon VCOG scope installed backward while pointed at a giant target balloon.

    Here’s what the press release said before it was deleted: 

    Cmdr. Cameron Yaste, the Commanding Officer of the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS John S. McCain (DDG 56), fires at the “killer tomato” during a gun shoot. The ship is in US 7th Fleet conducting routine operations. 7th Fleet is the US Navy’s largest forward-deployed numbered fleet, and routinely interacts and operates with Allies and partners in preserving a free and open Indo-Pacific Region.

    Here’s how to properly use the scope…

    The website Internet Archive saved a snapshot of the press release: 

    Netizens mocked the Navy commander, and that’s probably why the service deleted the image and text. 

    Here’s what the internet had to say: 

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    Yaste merely shows how the US Navy is unprepared to fight the next major conflict. Sigh… 

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 23:20

  • The End Of The Neo-Liberal Order
    The End Of The Neo-Liberal Order

    Authored by ‘Dalwhinnie’ via BombThrower.com,

    It’s no longer about markets. It’s about identity.

    The historian Prof. Gary Gerstle maintained that the neo liberal order was coming to an end, that free movement of goods, money, ideas and talent characterized the neo liberal order and that it was in the process of losing ascendancy. Losing ascendancy does not mean disappearing, it means losing ascendancy. Peter Zeihan says much the same and locates the issue in the guarantee offered by the US Navy since WW2 to police the sea lanes of the world. Also large diesel engines and cheap fuel may have as much to do with trade as any deliberate policy measures. I digress.

    Somewhat to my surprise I agreed with the leftist professor of history.

    So far so good. I have ordered his book and will read it skeptically. (The Rise and Fall of the Neo-Liberal Order).

    The neo liberal order got going about the time of Reagan and Thatcher and was characterized by reliance upon, and praise for, the market. In the period under discussion, various US Presidents, of whom Clinton is prominent, also pursued neo liberal promarket policies. This illustrates the tendency for large movements of policy to continue despite changes in the party holding the presidency. Canada obtained free trade with the US, and many liberalizing trade measures were adopted throughout this period roughly 1970-2000.

    The next assertion of the professor was that the dominance of neo liberalism was coming to an end. I also agree with that assertion, perhaps for different reasons than those of the learned professor.

    The effects of the neo liberal order were various and I shall try to point out the major features. This is obviously me talking, not Professor Gerstle.

    • off shoring of domestic North American manufacturing, which led to the gutting of manufacturing towns, increasing despair and drug addictions (viz Angus Deaton on deaths of despair in the working class) and much cheaper goods at the stores

    • Industrialization of much of the rest of the world. When did you first notice that clothing you wore came from Cambodia, Indonesia, or Vietnam?

    • Very significant increase of the national share of wealth to the top 1% and eventually the top 1% of the 1% as the economy became more monetary and intangible and less a matter of things produced. Software firms worth more than Boeing or Ford for instance.

    • Oxycontin plagues and mass drug addictions

    • Very high rates of non white immigration of peoples to Europe and North America. You are not supposed to notice this, by the way. But assimilation is not proceeding too well in many European countries and the same process is well underway in the United States.

    The remainder of Professor Gerstle’s talk concerned Trump, Orban and Bolsonaro and the supposed authoritarianism of same and the threat to democracy. I should say “democracy” because clearly the word has become code for something other than changes of governments in a populist direction. These are held to be threats to “democracy” which seem to consist of changes of history of which leftists disapprove.

    Here is where I depart from Professor Gerstle’s alarmism about populist changes to governments.

    He was also concerned with the January 6th insurrection on the hill and the menace it portended to the continuity of American institutions. I was once very alarmed by January 6th riots until I began to believe the entire event was a police -infiltrated and significantly police-inspired stunt to disgrace Trump. It has worked.

    Prof. Gerstle along with many other Democrats believes that democracy is under attack.

    Let me try to set forth the reasoning of many on the Trumpist right, if “right” is the term to be applied. Here we get to territory that will summon forth political disagreement.

    For many of us, a combination of events has persuaded us that democracy is already in grave danger from the following, which is largely drawn from the US experience.

    • A politicized leftist judiciary and prosecutorial apparatus

    • A politicized federal police

    • A politicized intelligence apparatus

    • An almost certainly manipulated if not stolen presidential election

    • Uncontrolled immigration of people, some of whom are in the United States with subversive intentions

    • The immigration of 20 or 40 millions is not being controlled because the Democrats want to achieve permanent electoral supremacy by endowing the illegals with votes

    • A minor but serious plague has been used as a pretext for a massive repression of personal liberties both of trade and movement on the basis of compulsory vaccination by radical mRNA therapies that have been insufficiently tested, and which appear to be causing a serious increase of deaths in the general population

    • which plague was engineered by experiments in gain of function (increased lethality) research funded by US sources in Chinese laboratories (RFK I pushing these buttons as a central part of his electoral campaign)

    • A push by all global leaders and bureaucracies to reduce energetic throughputs, the basis of wealth creation, in the name of a spurious climate agenda.

    • A fundamental attack on sex roles being carried on as the focus of the next personal liberation struggle.

    So yes, the people, rightly or wrongly, are unhappy with the state of their governments and what these governments have so clearly indicated they wish to do.

    Consequently, as a result of governments being so badly misaligned with their electorates, and so apparently ready to call opposition to their intentions as “far right” “fascist” “transphobic”, and so ready to denigrate the white settler populations of which the electorate is still mostly composed, the neo liberal order is coming to an end. This is occurring not because of trade issues, or income inequality, but because of fundamental challenges posed by left wing governments to the people who still compose the electorates.

    To what do we belong? To the nation, or to various sexual and cultural minorities?

    Trump has a clear answer. Biden, if he has an answer at all, says that most Americans belong to an illegitimate race. And if he cannot say this, his minions state it or insinuate it.

    The neo liberal order is coming to an end because the issues have decisively moved on from trade and markets to identity and belonging.

    *  *  *

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    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 23:00

  • Huge Dovish Bet Loses $50 Million In One Day
    Huge Dovish Bet Loses $50 Million In One Day

    Late on Tuesday, the financial world was swept up by a report from Bloomberg according to which an unknown trader had put on single record-sized trade, betting that today’s CPI print would come in dovish, and forcing the Fed to cut sooner. It did not work out quite as expected.

    For those who missed it, a significant block trade in US short-term interest-rate futures, specifically in December 2024 SOFR futures, took place during market hours on Tuesday, marking the largest trade of its kind. This trade – which was widely publicized by Bloomberg – contributed to driving gains in the Treasury market. After all, nobody would gamble tens of millions if they didn’t know something.

    The trade, likely initiated by a buyer, coincided with expectations of benign March consumer price index data, potentially leading to a revival in expectations for Fed rate cuts. Confidence in this outlook was reinforced by State Street Global Advisors predicting an aggressive half-point Fed rate cut by June and remarks from US President Joe Biden’s economic aide, Lael Brainard. As of the time of the trade, the swaps market was pricing in approximately 65 basis points of Fed rate cuts by year-end. The December 2024 SOFR futures were trading slightly higher than the block trade’s price, indicating continued market activity and investor interest in hedging or speculating on interest rate movements.

    In retrospect, it turned out that the trader really didn’t know anything, and on Wednesday the trade blew up in spectacular fashion after a stronger-than-expected reading triggered a market rout.

    According to Bloomberg calculations, moments after the CPI print, which came in hot on every possible metric, the position was roughly $50 million in the red, based on price moves in the underlying December 2024 futures.

    As duly noted earlier, after Wednesday’s red hot report, expectations for the first full quarter-point rate cut this year wilted and shifted to November from September, with the market now pricing in less than two 25 basis-point moves for all of 2024.

    While it’s not known who placed the record futures bet, or whether it was made in conjunction with other trades, the scale of the block trade — with a $2MM DV01, or $2 million in gains or losses per basis point move — suggests it was made to offset a separate underlying position, possibly a bearish stance although it is unclear. Separate data released Wednesday from the CME suggested the trade was a new wager or hedge, rather than short-covering of an existing position.

    The unknown trader was not the only casualty of today’s red hot inflation number: on Tuesday, State Street predicted a half-point cut as soon as the June meeting; instead swaps are now pricing in just 3 basis points of cuts for the FOMC meeting. If State Street had put money on the trade, it is now gone… all gone.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 22:40

  • California's Latest Hustle: Utility Bills Based On Ratepayers' Income
    California’s Latest Hustle: Utility Bills Based On Ratepayers’ Income

    Authored by Jane L. Johnson via The Mises Institute,

    Utility bills – for electricity, natural gas, water, and garbage – have by long-standing tradition been based on customer usage, measured in kilowatt-hours of electricity, therms or Btu of natural gas, hundred cubic feet of water, or number of garbage cans.

    Every residence and business has electric, gas, and water meters that measure utility usage.

    But changes are afoot in the utility business as federal and state governments urge Americans to convert from fossil fuels to electricity for home heating, appliances, and transportation. From this transition will undoubtedly follow changes in utility rate-setting models.

    Fixed Fees Coupled with Usage-Based Electricity Rates

    Some electric utilities currently charge customers a flat, fixed fee as well as usage-based charges, both on the same monthly bill. The fixed fees, often called “customer charges” or “meter-reading charges,” are imposed irrespective of energy usage. These fees assure revenue stability and offset the overhead expenses of running electric utilities. Energy usage-based charges, which can vary seasonally, are designed (and regulated) to recover the cost of the electricity sold.

    Economists refer to this pricing strategy as a two-part tariff in which the consumer must pay a fixed fee for the right to buy a product or service (energy in the case of electric utilities). This pricing model effectively maximizes revenue for sellers that have some monopoly pricing power in their respective markets because of the way they have structured their businesses. Electric utilities are, of course, regulated monopolies that serve designated geographic areas.

    Other Examples of Two-Part Tariff Pricing Strategy

    • Disneyland charges high entrance fees to its theme parks, but prices for individual rides are just sufficiently high to cover the marginal cost of operating the rides. A family that has traveled from Kansas to California or Florida Disney venues will likely not balk at paying high admission fees combined with low per-ride ticket prices.

    • Popular retailer Costco charges annual membership dues that allow customers to buy large product packages at relatively low unit prices. While Costco isn’t strictly considered a monopoly among warehouse stores, its unique membership and marketing methods effectively give it monopoly status with great cachet.

    • Country clubs typically charge high membership fees that offer members the right to buy greens fees and participate in social activities with other like-minded, equally affluent members.

    • Bars levy admission cover charges combined with fees per drink once patrons are inside.

    The strategy works when sellers can easily identify different buyer groups and prohibit individual buyers from selling to nonmember buyers.

    For example, country club members cannot resell greens fees or social activities to nonmembers. Disneyland visitors cannot resell ride tickets to those who have not paid the entrance fee. And electric utility ratepayers cannot resell to others who don’t have accounts with the utility.

    Income-Based Fixed Charges

    But what if utilities based their fixed fee on customers’ income levels rather than a flat uniform fee for every customer?

    California, home to 10 percent of the total US population and often considered a state laboratory where policies begin before adoption across the nation, offers a glimpse into the future of utility rate setting as the two-part tariff pricing model has now taken on a new wrinkle.

    In 2022 the supermajority Democrat state legislature passed and the governor signed Assembly Bill 205 (AB 205), which ordered the California Public Utilities Commission to authorize a “fixed charge” on residential electric bills by July 2024. Customers of the three large investor-owned utilities (IOUs)—Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Southern California Edison, and San Diego Gas and Electric—would pay this charge regardless of their electricity usage and in addition to that usage. The basis of the fixed charge is to be determined by each IOU utility, subject to approval by the California Public Utilities Commission.

    The legislation also required the utilities to reduce their rates for electricity usage in order to assist low-income customers as electricity prices continue to rise. This represents not only a major shift in the standard rate-setting model from usage orientation to fixed charges but also a new emphasis on income and wealth redistribution from high-income customers to low-income, somewhat akin to a progressive income tax.

    There is no precedent for such redistribution in utility rate regulation.

    AB 205 was intended to ensure that the IOUs’ new two-part pricing strategy be revenue-neutral – that is, continue to make sufficient revenue to invest in needed infrastructure for long-distance transmission (picture large pylons across the landscape) and distribution (local power lines delivering power to retail customers). The three IOUs own the vast majority of California’s energy infrastructure (poles and wires), construction and maintenance of which are so vital to greater electrification of homes and transportation as California focuses on transitioning from fossil fuels to renewable energy.

    A further intent of the legislation, moreover, was to raise additional revenue to pay for burying power lines that might otherwise ignite wildfires and constructing facilities to carry solar and wind-generated energy to large urban areas. Higher-income customers would pay a disproportionately high share of these construction and maintenance costs, even if they don’t use more power.

    It all sounded like a win-win for progressives:

    Rich people pay more for energy, poor people pay less, and everyone makes progress on global warming.

    Until, that is, questions arose on possible fallout from this new rate-setting model:

    How to determine ratepayers’ income levels without invading their privacy?

    How might higher income-based fixed charges, coupled with lower kilowatt-hours usage rates, reduce financial incentives to conserve energy usage?

    How might lower usage rates affect desirable future sales of rooftop solar installation?

    Because of these imponderables and because the California Public Utilities Commission has not approved any of several possible methodologies to implement AB 205, one legislator has now introduced Assembly Bill 1999 to repeal the fixed-charge mandate. Another legislator who voted for AB 205 now confesses that the legislation was long and confusing and was called up for a vote very shortly after its text was available to read.

    Blame is being passed around.

    Is the original AB 205 merely a profit-grab by the three large IOUs? Were legislators remiss in approving it too quickly in their zeal to mandate climate goals? Who originally decided to incorporate the income-based fixed charge into the legislation?

    Addressing these questions may be a challenge, something akin to solving an algebraic problem with more variables than equations, which leaves only an indeterminate solution. Too many conditions must be satisfied: revenue neutrality, protecting customer privacy when determining their income levels, energy usage rates low enough to protect low-income customers, usage rates high enough to encourage energy conservation and future installation of rooftop solar, sufficient revenue to invest in infrastructure for wildfire prevention, and additional grid capacity to support electric vehicle recharging stations and home heat pumps.

    It is possible to solve such problems using linear programming, maximizing a linear function subject to the various constraints. But it is unlikely that California Public Utilities Commission staff could grapple with such a solution in time to approve income-based electric utility two-part tariffs in time for July 2024 implementation.

    Whether this two-part tariff income-based pricing model might migrate to utilities in other states is unclear at this point, but its success or failure in California will probably determine its ultimate fate. In the meantime, perhaps the original legislation AB 205 is so poorly written that it should be repealed outright, consigning another well-intentioned governmental intervention effort to the proverbial dustbin of history.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 22:20

  • 54% Of Americans Think Biden's Open Borders Aimed At Creating Permanent Democrat Majority: Rasmussen
    54% Of Americans Think Biden’s Open Borders Aimed At Creating Permanent Democrat Majority: Rasmussen

    A new poll from Rasmussen finds that 54% of likely voters believe Joe Biden to be “encouraging” illegal aliens to enter the United States in order to “create a permanent majority” for the Democrats, the National Pulse reports.

    According to the poll, 43% “strongly agree” that the border crisis is being facilitated for political advantage, while 14% “somewhat agree.” 29% “strongly disagree,” while 8% “somewhat disagree.”

    Hispanic voters, despite having leaned Democrat in every general and midterm election since 1980, are actually more likely to believe Biden is exploiting illegal immigration than any other ethnic group. Forty-eight percent strongly agree this is what the Democrat leader is doing, and 20 percent somewhat agree for a combined 68 percent. This compares to 17 percent who strongly disagree and seven percent who somewhat disagree.

    A combined 54 percent of white voters agree Biden is trying to create a permanent majority, and a plurality of 47 percent of black voters agree. –National Pulse

    Meanwhile 36% of self-identified moderates believe Biden is trying to create a permanent majority, as do 36% of Democrats.

    In February, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas claimed that the Biden administration doesn’t bear responsibility for the border crisis, despite, among other things:

    • Terminating the National Emergency at the Southwest border
    • Revoking a Trump-era Executive Order that was designed to ensure there was meaningful enforcement of U.S. immigration laws.
    • Issuing an executive order protecting DACA recipients
    • Unveiling the U.S. Citizenship Act, which would provide amnesty to millions of illegal aliens in the U.S., demonstrating intent to reward illegal border crossers with a path to citizenship.
    • Announcing a 100-day moratorium on deportations and immigration enforcement, effectively providing amnesty to criminal and other removable aliens

     (It’s a really long list…)

    And since Biden was sworn in as president in January 2021, there have been at least 10 million illegals who have entered the United States, while the government deals with a backlog of more than 3 million asylum cases in US courts.

    We’re sure Congressional Republicans will have all sort of nice things to say about immigration when we get to the amnesty phase of the operation.

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

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 22:00

  • It’s Time For A U.S. STEM Talent Strategy To Compete With China
    It’s Time For A U.S. STEM Talent Strategy To Compete With China

    Authored by Dan Reed & Dario Gil via RealClear Wire,

    U.S. innovation fuels our economic strength and is vital for our national security. Released last earlier this month, the National Science Board’s congressionally mandated State of U.S. Science and Engineering Indicators report shows that an accelerating science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) talent crisis is imperiling America’s economy and security.

    Let’s start with a bit of perspective. The U.S. STEM workforce is now one quarter of the total U.S. workforce – 38 million people at all degree levels who use STEM skills in their jobs, including 19 million skilled technical workers without a bachelor’s degree. That number will only rise as companies expand their STEM workforce and their R&D investments in response to rising global competition. The CHIPS & Science Act is now funding one response to global competition and national security risk — the reshoring of our semiconductor production.

    Meanwhile, key technological sectors, including semiconductors, artificial intelligence, and cybersecurity, face major challenges in filling urgently needed job openings, and making the promise of economic development a reality. Let’s be clear –China is gaining on us, and it has articulated plans to increase its R&D investment even further. Indicators data show that China recently surpassed the United States in research publications and patent applications, and China’s growth in high impact articles is outpacing its overall growth in publications. These overall trends are also true for the specific field of artificial intelligence – a field that is critical to national security. We cannot risk falling behind.

    We must address this crisis now. How?

    First, we must increase the flow of domestic talent into the STEM workforce. To start, Congress must fully fund the remaining parts of CHIPS & Science Act – investing in developing the STEM workforce, from preK-12 education through skilled technical workers and college STEM graduates to doctoral-level researchers in industry and academia. Sadly, the spending bill that Congress just passed cuts some of our most important science federal agencies, like the National Science Foundation, moving us backwards.

    Second, we need new policies that double-down on one of our nation’s greatest strengths: attracting and retaining top STEM talent from around the world, including from countries that are emerging science partners. We must do more to entice and enable science and engineering students to work in the U.S. after they receive their degrees.

    Third, we need a modern-day National Defense Education Act (NDEA) to spur private and public collaboration and provide the specific skills and talent needed by American industry.

    An NDEA that would: invest in preK-12 STEM education and increase our STEM teacher supply across the country. Build capacity for the gateways into STEM training across the country: community colleges, technical schools, and other geographically and financially accessible institutions. Expand graduate fellowship programs, with a focus on critical and emerging technologies. Create national service programs like the Defense Civilian Training Corps and increase scholarships for low-income individuals. Increase options for foreign-born STEM talent to stay after their education and training and reduce barriers for doing so.

    This is a national call-for-action. We need all-hands on deck – no group alone can solve this problem. Business, government, and academia must come together in a collaborative partnership and commitment far beyond the scale in which we are investing now. Otherwise, we risk ceding U.S. science and engineering leadership to China, with deep and lasting negative effects on our national security and our economic competitiveness.

    Dr. Dan Reed is a former Microsoft Executive and currently serves as the chair of the National Science Board (NSB). Reed previously served as Provost at the University of Utah where he now is Presidential Professor of Computational Science and Professor of Computer Science and Electrical & Computer Engineering.

    Dr. Darío Gil is the IBM Senior Vice President and Director of Research and a member of the NSB.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 21:40

  • Inflation Check: Doctors Making $350,000 Per Year Can't Find Homes In Long Island As Prices Surge 50%
    Inflation Check: Doctors Making $350,000 Per Year Can’t Find Homes In Long Island As Prices Surge 50%

    While every news anchor and talking head in the world of finance continues to congratulate the Fed despite inflation still not being under control, prices are telling another story. 

    Specifically, housing prices. In fact, a new report from Bloomberg is now detailing how even doctors making $350,000 per year are “struggling” to find places to live in locales like Long Island.

    The report cites the region’s “chronic housing shortage” and detailed the story of Paul Connor, who helps run Stony Brook’s Eastern Long Island Hospital. 

    “The single most difficult impediment to get around right now is the housing prices,” he said of the area. 

    Long Island’s North Fork, including Greenport, epitomizes New York’s severe housing crunch, with home prices surging by 50% to nearly $1 million, and available listings plummeting by 60% for its 50,000 residents, the report says.

    This crisis mirrors a broader state issue, characterized by a mismatch of job growth to housing availability, leading to historically low rental vacancies in New York City and skyrocketing rents – and spitting in the face of the narrative that inflation is cooling.  

    Upstate areas like Buffalo and Syracuse also face soaring property prices, compounded by restrictive zoning in the suburbs and mortgage rates nearing 7%, making homeownership increasingly unattainable. Suffolk County’s meager housing growth rate, one of the lowest in the state, further underscores the acute challenge of expanding the housing supply to meet demand.

    Rachel Fee, Executive Director of the New York Housing Conference added: “It’s a huge concern. It’s not just a New York City issue anymore. Affordability is an issue across the state.”

    “Part of the squeeze with the North Fork is the spillover effect from the Hamptons because prices have risen so rapidly that the North Fork became this cheaper alternative — until it wasn’t,” added Jonathan Miller, President of Miller Samuel.

    Connor concluded: “Whether you’re a cardiologist or you work in one of the local restaurants, it’s to the advantage of everyone in our community to have people who live and work locally.”

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 21:20

  • Sean 'Diddy' Combs Loses 18 Brand Partnerships Amid Sexual Assault Allegations
    Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Loses 18 Brand Partnerships Amid Sexual Assault Allegations

    Authored by Jessamyn Dodd via The Epoch Times,

    Amidst a whirlwind of controversy swirling around Sean “Diddy” Combs, the mogul behind the Empower Global project, at least 18 brands have severed ties with his e-commerce platform. Empower Global, which champions black-owned businesses, has faced a significant setback with the departure of notable partners, including Tsuri, Nuudii System, No One Clothiers, Fulaba, and House of Takura., according to a report by Rolling Stone.

    Annette Njau, the force behind House of Takura, cited Cassie Ventura’s lawsuit against Sean Combs as the pivotal moment that guided their decision. Ms. Njau emphasized their stance, stating, “We take the allegations against Mr. Combs very seriously and find such behavior abhorrent and intolerable. We believe in victims’ rights, and support victims in speaking their truth, even against the most powerful of people.”

    In a statement regarding No One Clothiers’ decision to leave the platform, spokesperson Lenard Grier addressed the complexities involved in such a move: “While this decision was difficult due [to] the reverence we once held for Mr. Combs as a leader in business and entertainment, it was clearly the correct choice.”

    Ashli Goudelock, at the helm of skincare brand Tsuri, discussed their impending exit, underscoring an unyielding commitment to gender equality and dignity. Ms. Goudelock remarked: “As a company owned and led by women, we refuse to dwell in ambiguity regarding the mistreatment of our gender.”

    Rebecca Allen, founder of the eponymous shoe brand, said: “We enjoyed working with the team but have not seen meaningful sales, so we were already planning to terminate our relationship at the end of this year. These harrowing allegations have expedited our decision, and we ended our partnership with Empower Global earlier this month.”

    In a bid to salvage his reputation, Mr. Combs took to Instagram on Dec. 6 to assert his innocence and vow to defend his name against what he perceived as baseless attacks. Denying accusations of sexual assault, trafficking, and abuse leveled against him by Cassie Ventura, Mr. Combs declared his unwavering resolve to combat what he views as a concerted effort to besmirch his character and legacy.

    “For the last couple of weeks, I have sat silently and watched people try to assassinate my character, destroy my reputation and my legacy. Sickening allegations have been made against me by individuals looking for a quick payday. Let me be absolutely clear: I did not do any of the awful things being alleged. I will fight for my name, my family and for the truth.”

    Meantime, the company is facing a period of uncertainty as it addresses these challenges. The future of Empower Global remains unclear.

    In November, Mr. Combs temporarily stepped down as a co-chair of Revolt, a music-oriented digital cable television network that he co-founded. The company posted a statement on X reading, “While Mr. Combs previously has previously had no  operational or day-to-day role in the business, this decision helps to ensure that Revolt remains steadfastly focused on our mission to create meaningful content for the culture.”

    Police and media members gather outside the home of U.S. producer and musician Sean “Diddy” Combs in Los Angeles on March 25, 2024. Homes belonging to Sean “Diddy” Combs were being raided by federal agents, media reported on March 25, with the U.S. hip hop mogul at the center of sex trafficking and sex assault lawsuits. (David Swanson/AFP via Getty Images)

    This comes as Mr. Combs has been accused in four separate civil lawsuits of sexual abuse. Legal action began on Nov. 17, 2023, when Casandra Ventura, Mr. Combs’ former girlfriend, filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. The lawsuit alleged rape, sex trafficking, and physical abuse. The parties reached a settlement later that same day for an undisclosed amount.

    Two additional women filed lawsuits alleging sexual abuse against Mr. Combs in late November of that same year. The lawsuits coincided with the expiration of the Adult Survivors Act, a New York law that provided a one-year window for victims of sexual abuse to file civil claims regardless of when the alleged abuse occurred.

    Adding another layer to the legal saga, an unnamed woman lodged another lawsuit against Mr. Combs. This time, the allegations include rape and sex trafficking, with the plaintiff asserting that Mr.Combs and two accomplices gang-raped her when she was just 17 years old.

    In addition, Rodney “Lil Rod” Jones filed a lawsuit against Mr. Combs in February, alleging sexual abuse and harassment.

    In March, federal agents executed search warrants at the Miami and Los Angeles homes of the music mogul. These investigative actions are linked to a federal probe of allegations ranging from sex trafficking and sexual assault to the solicitation and illicit circulation of narcotics and firearms.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 21:00

  • US Deficit Tops $1.1 Trillion For First Six Months Of Fiscal 2024 As Spending Hits 2024 High
    US Deficit Tops $1.1 Trillion For First Six Months Of Fiscal 2024 As Spending Hits 2024 High

    It’s oddly fitting that in a time when the interest on US debt just hit a record $1.1 trillion, that the US deficit for just the first six months of fiscal 2024 is also $1.1 trillion.

    According to the latest Treasury Monthly Statement, in March the US deficit hit $236 billion, some $40 billion more than the $196 billion expected, if below February’s $296 billion…

    … which was the result of $332 billion in govt tax receipts – translating into $4.580 trillion in LTM tax receipts, and which was down 5% compared to a year ago…

    … offset by the now traditional ridiculous monthly outlays, which in March amounted to $568 billion, up from $567 billion in February and the highest monthly spending total in calendar 2024, which translated into a 6 month moving spending average (for smoothing purposes) of $542 billion. Take a wild guess what will happen to the chart below during and after the next recession.

    This, incidentally, is a reminder that the US does not have a tax collection problem – it has a spending problem, and no amount of tax changes will fix it; in fact all higher taxes will do is force more billionaires to move to Dubai where they pay zero taxes.

    Putting the YTD deficit in context, in the first six months of fiscal 2024, the US deficit hit $1.065 trillion, just shy of the $1.1 trillion reached last year, which was the 2nd highest on record and only the post-covid 2021 was worse. Annualized, we expect total deficit to hit $2.2 trillion in fiscal 2024, a year when the US is supposedly “growing” at a nice, brisk ~2.5% pace. One can only imagine what the GDP growth would be if the US wasn’t set to have a wartime/crisis deficit…

    … and we can’t even imagine what US deficit will be after the next recession/depression.

    Meanwhile, as reported previously, total US interest continues to explode, and after surpassing total annual defense spending about a year ago, just the interest on US debt will soon become the single largest government outlay as it surpasses social security by the end of 2024, when according to BofA’s Michael Hartnett it hits $1.6 trillion…

    … and surpasses Social Security spending as the single largest spending category in the US government.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 20:40

  • Democrats Commit Vastly More Dark Money Than Republicans For 2024
    Democrats Commit Vastly More Dark Money Than Republicans For 2024

    Authored by Austin Alonzo via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    (Illustration by The Epoch Times, Shutterstock)

    Democratic dark money groups, megadonors, and unions are funding a massive spending effort aimed at reelecting President Joe Biden and advancing the Democratic Party’s power in Washington.

    So far, nine major outside spending groups say they will together spend nearly $800 million to support the reelection of President Biden. This is in addition to the massive financial resources the Biden campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) will likely pour into the rematch of the 2020 election.

    The progressive organizations—American Bridge 21st Century, Campaign for a Family Friendly Economy, Climate Power, League of Conservation Voters, MoveOn, Republican Voters Against Trump, Service Employees International Union, Unite the Country, and VoteVets— have pledged to spend a total of $792 million on the 2024 election to boost President Biden and the Democratic Party.

    Former President Donald Trump, who is supported by the Republican National Committee (RNC) and its affiliates, is not seeing nearly as many commitments.

    Groups pledging to back President Trump’s campaign or to hinder President Biden add up to less than a quarter of the amount pledged by the Democrat money powerhouse.

    All told, about $160 million has been formally pledged to explicitly help President Trump’s campaign, and Republicans in general. One major group has said it will spend “eight figures” to go against President Biden.

    An Epoch Times analysis of the financial records of the various groups shows many are a combination of federally regulated political action committees (PACs) and 501(c)(4) or 501(c)(3) nonprofits.

    Under federal law, PACs must report regularly to the Federal Election Commission (FEC), disclose their donors, and declare their overall finances.

    The nonprofits, which are classified as charitable organizations and social welfare organizations by the IRS, report much less often and aren’t required to name their donors. For this reason, 501s are frequently called dark money groups.

    PACs that do share donor information are getting money from some of the most prolific donors and organizations in the United States.

    American Bridge

    American Bridge 21st Century, a group specializing in researching and publicizing negative information about opponents of the Democratic Party candidates, said it will spend $200 million on the 2024 election.

    When American Bridge made its announcement in January, it said $85 million was already raised and committed.

    (L–R) Former President Barack Obama, President Joe Biden, and former President Bill Clinton attend a campaign fundraising event at Radio City Music Hall in New York City on March 28, 2024. (Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images)

    American Bridge’s release said $140 million of its 2024 expenditure will go toward television, digital and streaming ads, radio, and direct mail placements in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. It could extend its effort to North Carolina.

    “These ads will feature the true stories of women voters and their families living in these key swing states and will use their voices to expose the truth about Trump’s agenda,” the release said.

    American Bridge is registered with the FEC as AB PAC, a hybrid PAC. According to its latest financial statement filed with the FEC, it had about $5.9 million in cash on hand at the end of February.

    Between January 2023 and the end of February 2024, AB PAC received numerous donations of more than $1 million.

    The most prominent supporter was the super PAC, Democracy PAC, an entity largely financed by George Soros. Between January 2023 and February 2024, Democracy PAC gave about $4 million to AB PAC.

    According to data collected by the watchdog organization OpenSecrets, Mr. Soros was the biggest spender in the 2021 to 2022 election cycle, spending about $178.8 million. Mr. Soros, the founder of the Open Society Foundations, is a prolific donor to Democratic and progressive causes.

    In 2023, according to FEC records, Democracy PAC had only one donor: George Soros. In 2021 and 2022, according to FEC records, DemocracyPAC had two donors: Mr. Soros and the Fund For Policy Reform.

    Fund For Policy Reform sent DemocracyPAC $25 million. Alexander Soros, George Soros’s son and the chair of Open Society Foundations, is a director of the Fund, according to its tax documents.

    Additionally, Michael Moritz, a longtime partner at venture capital firm Sequoia Capital and now a senior advisor at Sequoia Heritage, gave AB PAC $2 million in June 2023, according to FEC records.

    (Left) Billionaire George Soros attends a discussion with Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker and Tunisian President Beji Caid Essebsi and a group of American business leaders at the Blair House in Washington on May 20, 2015. (Right) Alexander Soros, founder of the Alexander Soros Foundation, speaks onstage during a climate event at the Ford Foundation in New York City on April 21, 2016. (Mark Wilson/Getty Images, Dave Kotinsky/Getty Images for Ford Foundation)

    According to donor records maintained by OpenSecrets, Mr. Mortiz has sent $8 million to AB PAC between 2019 and 2023.

    Two other Democratic Party megadonors are bankrolling American Bridge. FEC records indicate Reid Hoffman and Deborah Simon both sent $1 million or more to the hybrid PAC.

    Ms. Simon, an heir to the Simon family real estate fortune, sent $2.5 million in 2023. Mr. Hoffman, the founder of LinkedIn Corp., sent AB PAC $1 million in 2023.

    OpenSecrets ranked Mr. Hoffman and Ms. Simon among the top 25 largest spenders on the 2021–2022 election cycle. Together, they sent $35.7 million to liberal causes in that period.

    American Bridge is also tied to the 501(c)(4) nonprofit American Bridge 21st Century Foundation. According to its most recently filed tax returns, the Foundation had about $1.3 million in net assets at the end of 2022.

    Representatives of American Bridge didn’t respond to a request for comment from The Epoch Times.

    Service Employees International Union

    The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) represents 2 million workers in the United States and Canada, according to the union. Its membership is primarily employed in health care, public services, and property services.

    In a March 13 announcement, the union said it will spend $200 million—its most extensive campaign ever—to reach as many as 6 million voters in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.

    “The union will engage multiracial working-class voters who are less likely to vote or have never voted at all through field programs, relational organizing, earned media, and paid media, partnering with community groups who are trusted messengers in their communities,” an SEIU release said.

    A woman casts her ballot in the state’s primary election in Green Bay, Wis., on April 2, 2024. (Thos Robinson/Getty Images for The Democratic National Committee, Scott Olson/Getty Images)

    The SEIU operates a labor organization political action committee—Service Employees International Union Committee on Political Education (SEIU COPE)—and is linked to the super PAC United We Can.

    According to Federal Election Commission records, both of the groups are financed by SEIU members and the SEIU’s local unions.

    The two funds, led by SEIU COPE, collectively retained about $35.3 million in cash on hand at the end of February, according to their latest FEC disclosures.

    In the 2020 election cycle, covering 2019 and 2020, together, the funds raised about $78.5 million. Those funds, according to the FEC, spent about $7.7 million to support President Biden.

    Representatives of the SEIU didn’t respond to a request for comment from The Epoch Times.

    League of Conservation Voters

    On March 19, the League of Conservation Voters (LCV), an environmental group that typically promotes liberal candidates for federal office, announced its plans to spend $120 million on reelecting President Biden.

    LCV is a complex organization composed of nonprofits and FEC-registered PACs. Its two federal PACs—LCV Victory Fund and LCV Voters Action Fund—had about $14.7 million on hand at the end of February, according to the groups’ FEC filings.

    LCV also includes the League of Conservation Voters Education Fund, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, and the League of Conservation Voters Inc., a 501(c)(4) nonprofit.

    According to the FEC, most of the money raised by the PACs between January 2023 and February 2024 came from the League of Conservation Voters Inc. It sent LCV Victory Fund about $12.7 million during that period.

    LCV has received funding from multiple organizations tied to Arabella Advisors. In 2020, the Sixteen Thirty Fund, one of the most politically active accounts, sent LCV about $3.5 million, according to its IRS records.

    Representatives of LCV didn’t respond to a request for comment from The Epoch Times.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 20:20

  • Radical Left Group Demands Baltimore's Francis Scott Key Bridge To Be Renamed Over Racism Claims 
    Radical Left Group Demands Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge To Be Renamed Over Racism Claims 

    Far-left group Caucus of African American Leaders of Anne Arundel County (CAAL), which has been on a multi-year rampage across Maryland, removing controversial statues (read: here) and pushing reparations resolutions (read: here) in Annapolis, has called on state officials to rename the recently collapsed 1.6-mile Port of Baltimore bridge because the current name “Francis Scott Key Bridge” is racist. 

    The new bridge hasn’t even been built yet and might not even get built for years. Still, CAAL is already arguing that Francis Scott Key, the man behind the lyrics to ‘The Star-Spangled Banner,’ “demeaned black people” with the song’s lyrics and that he enslaved people, according to local newspaper The Baltimore Banner. 

    CAAL called on progressive Gov. Wes Moore and the Maryland General Assembly to rename the bridge after late Rep. Parren J. Mitchell. She was the first African American from Maryland elected to the US House of Representatives. 

    On Monday, reporters asked Gov. Moore about the potential name change of the Key Bridge. He said that’s not even a topic yet, as salvage crews are still trying to reopen the commercial shipping channel. 

    “I think any other conversations along those lines, there will be time for that but now’s not the time,” he told reporters.

    In a lengthy Facebook rant, CAAL claimed that “taxpayer’s dollars were being used to honor racism” and noted that it expected “backlash whenever there is an effort to bring about change in America.” They said that backlash “will see an immediate response from right-wingers.” 

    CAAL’s website says it “fights for the human rights of African-Americans and to create a just society” and is “driven by progressive ideas and bold actions.” However, where are those bold actions while Baltimore City implodes into crime chaos? The leftist organization has been around since 2011, and since then, those bold actions to help blacks has yet to materialize in Baltimore. 

    Some questions we have: 

    Why isn’t CAAL taking bold actions to address rampant black-on-black gang crime in the metro area or address the education scandal in Baltimore City Public Schools that robs black children of their future? What about soaring violent crime, unleashed by failed social justice reforms, has transformed part of the metro area into a warzone? What about defunding the police measures that have collapsed the police force? Or tens of thousands of vacant row homes and a collapsed inner city economy that provides limited opportunity to young black males (some of whom have chosen a life of crime instead). 

    Perhaps the challenges facing Baltimore are to big for the leftist group to tackle. It appears, instead, they focus their agenda on rewriting history… 

    “Why do you always trying to make our history racist ? Good or bad , our history is what made us a great nation. Changing names of bridges, schools, removing statues,etc just promote racism,” one Facebook user wrote on CAAL’s post. 

    The American Historical Association explains why Americans should know their history:

    “Laymen and educators are generally agreed that knowledge of our own history is essential in the making of Americans. The reasons for this belief may be summed up under four main heads. History makes loyal citizens because memories of common experiences and common aspirations are essential ingredients in patriotism. History makes intelligent voters because sound decisions about present problems must be based on knowledge of the past. History makes good neighbors because it teaches tolerance of individual differences and appreciation of varied abilities and interests. History makes stable, well-rounded individuals because it gives them a start toward understanding the pattern of society and toward enjoying the artistic and intellectual productions of the past. It gives long views, a perspective, a measure of what is permanent in a nation’s life. To a people it is what memory is to the individual; and memory, express or unconscious, guides the acts of every sentient being.” 

    Marylanders should demand that CAAL do more in Baltimore City before tearing down any more statues, pushing reparation bills, or trying to rename non-existent bridges.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 20:00

  • How Trump Could Beat The Deep State
    How Trump Could Beat The Deep State

    Authored by James Rickards via DailyReckoning.com,

    Let’s say that Trump wins the November election. What would a second Trump presidency actually look like?

    Today we’re going to investigate that question. Let’s first back up to the 2016 election.

    Trump ran the most incompetent presidential transition process in my lifetime and perhaps the worst in history. The problems began with the fact that none of Trump, his family members and inner circle actually thought he would win the 2016 election with the exception of campaign manager Steve Bannon.

    I predicted Trump would win but I was almost alone in that regard.

    Trump picked Chris Christie as his transition manager, seemingly oblivious to the fact that as a prosecutor, Christie had put Jared Kushner’s father in jail. Given Kushner’s role as Trump’s son-in-law and close adviser, this was a recipe for failure.

    A well-run transition doesn’t start the day after the election. It begins a year or more advance with a list of loyal appointees ready to go. Trump had no preparation and no team. Christie was fired as transition manager and Mike Pence took over, but the entire process was bungled.

    The other problem was that Trump applied the New York real estate developer mentality to his administration. He never worried much about his appointees because if they failed, he could always yell, “You’re fired!”

    That may work in New York, but it doesn’t work in Washington. Appointees are protected by politicians, lobbyists and the media. If you fire someone, you can expect a barrage of leaks, policy paralysis and opposition to any new appointee.

    Even if a bad choice is fired, the lower levels of the deep state take over and run rings around you while waiting for a replacement who will take months to get a handle on the job in a best case.

    Trump never understood any of this.

    Trump also trusted the wrong people. He installed James Mattis as secretary of defense, Rex Tillerson as secretary of state, H.R. McMaster as national security adviser and John Kelly as chief of staff. They were all RINOs from the Bush wing of the party.

    They were brought in as “adult supervision” of the supposedly reckless Trump, but they all stabbed Trump in the back. Meanwhile, loyal supporters like Steve Bannon and K.T. McFarland were shoved aside.

    Trump didn’t learn. He did fire James Comey as head of the FBI (three months too late) but then appointed Christopher Wray as the new FBI director. Wray now works for Biden and puts Trump supporters in jail. But Trump was the one who appointed him.

    Trump should have fired the lying Anthony Fauci after one meeting. Instead, he gave Fauci the keys to the U.S. economy. Fauci then implemented lockdowns, school closings, vaccine mandates, masking and social distancing in ways that ruined the U.S. economy and gave Trump’s enemies an excuse to change election laws to favor mail-in ballots, which permits more widespread cheating.

    The list goes on. The bottom line is no one was worse at transition planning, appointments, endorsements and tolerance of gross incompetence than Trump. He was his own worst enemy and seemed incapable of learning the ropes in how to deal with Washington bureaucracy and the deep state.

    This leaves one overriding question. Has Trump learned anything since leaving office in 2021? Will he have a successful transition this time or simply repeat the blunders of 2017–2021?

    Read on to see how Trump could pull it off…

    How to Take on the Deep State

    Has Trump learned anything since leaving office in 2021? Will he have a successful transition this time or simply repeat the blunders of 2017–2021? To answer those questions, we turn to two books that hold the key to possible success in a new Trump administration. The first is called The Plum Book. The second is called Mandate for Leadership 2025.

    “Plum Book” is a nickname for a publication from the Government Printing Office based on the fact that it has a plum-colored cover. The official title is United States Government Policy and Supporting Positions.

    It’s a 232-page directory of about 8,000 jobs in the U.S. government with an emphasis on the executive branch (controlled by the president) and independent agencies such as the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). It’s literally page after page of job listings by title, department and pay grade.

    What makes the Plum Book special (and indispensable to a presidential transition team) is that the jobs listed in the book are those that are open to political appointment and not subject to a competitive process.

    These are the jobs where the president can just pick the person he wants and install that person in a key policy position without going through normal civil service channels. Some of the positions may be subject to Senate confirmation, but that usually poses no difficulty, especially if the new president’s party also controls the Senate.

    The Plum Book is like a secret guide to understanding the deep state and putting your own people in place to control it.

    Even the most obscure federal agencies have top positions to be filled. They all have a director, one or more deputies, board members, executive assistants, etc. That’s how deep the deep state really is. When Biden calls for an “all of government” approach to climate change or DEI, the Plum Book tells us that means 8,000 hands on deck.

    The executive office of the president involves a lot more than 10 or so close assistants in the West Wing such as counsel to the president, chief of staff and a few special assistants. The Plum Book lists 83 separate jobs (not including clerks, interns and executive assistants).

    These jobs support the president only and do not come close to covering the entire executive branch. Among these positions are “special assistant to the president and assistant communications director for strategic messaging,” and “special assistant to the president and deputy director of White House information technology.” As you can see, even the assistants and deputies have assistants and deputies.

    So if Trump wins the election, the Plum Book will be an important tool to put the right people in place..

    Still, the Plum Book is only the beginning of a successful transition. It tells us what positions need to be filled but does not offer a guide to policy. The selection of individuals for appointments needs to be guided by a set of policies that can act as a filter for choosing the right individuals.

    Who is doing the hard work of outlining policy initiatives for hundreds of agencies, commissions and offices that comprise the executive branch and ultimately the deep state? It’s fine to win an election and use the Plum Book to fill key positions with competent loyalists, but what policies will they actually implement?

    Fortunately for Trump, the Heritage Foundation has done this work. The Heritage Foundation is just one of hundreds of think tanks and policy centers in Washington, D.C. But in 2024 they’ve taken the lead in collecting and publishing policy papers on hundreds of key issues.

    Their work is called Mandate for Leadership 2025. I call it the Trump playbook. It’s available online at the Heritage Foundation website. It’s 887-pages long and every page is filled with technical discussion.

    The content is conservative but not ideological. There is a fair balance and even competing perspectives. In the section on trade, there is “The Case for Fair Trade” by Peter Navarro and “The Case for Free Trade” by Kent Lassman. It’s likely that the best policy includes some content from both perspectives depending on the specific trading partner, reciprocity and the impact on U.S. jobs.

    The Heritage Foundation playbook Mandate for Leadership, combined with the Plum Book and Trump’s apparent willingness to learn from his past mistakes when it comes to appointments completes the Trifecta needed for success in a second Trump administration to destroy the deep state. Investors should hope that Trump stays on that path and listens to the hundreds of experts and institutions that are working hard to make that success a reality.

    The difference for investors between another Biden administration and the return of Trump to the White House could not be more stark. The Biden administration has been characterized by excessive regulation, pointless mandates as part of the Green New Scam, open borders bringing crime, drugs and cartel influence into the United States, disastrous wars in Ukraine, Gaza and now the closing of the Red Sea-Suez Canal passage, increased segregation of Blacks in colleges, the destruction of 50 years of progress in women’s sports by allowing competition by men and a long list of other ruinous policies.

    The first Trump administration was characterized by business and personal tax cuts, reduced regulation, no new wars, outreach to nuclear rivals such as Russia and North Korea, tariffs on unfair trade by China, a concerted effort to bring manufacturing jobs back to the United States, demands that NATO members pay their fair share for mutual defense and a secure southern border with Mexico.

    Trump also made an historic three appointments to the Supreme Court, which has emerged as practically the last bastion of constitutional order and the rule of law. There’s no reason to expect any improvement in another Biden administration. In fact, policies will almost certainly grow worse as Biden fails physically and mentally and opens the door to a possible acting president in the form of Kamala Harris, a known dunce.

    There’s good reason to believe that a second Trump administration will offer the growth-oriented policies of the first administration with a much more effective decision-making apparatus resulting from attention to the Plum Book, the playbook and the transition process.

    A better transition process in a second term means the biggest threat to the deep state in decades.

    And a new team will put us on the road back to sanity. But powerful people won’t go quietly. A more experienced Trump will conduct a second war to destroy them. Unless they destroy him first.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 19:40

  • US 'Considering' Dropping Prosecution Of Assange, Biden Says
    US ‘Considering’ Dropping Prosecution Of Assange, Biden Says

    Wednesday saw a rare and unexpected positive development in the Julian Assange extradition case. President Joe Biden has affirmed the US is “considering” dropping its prosecution of the WikiLeaks founder. 

    Currently, Assange is awaiting a final ruling from the UK high court over his possible extradition to the US, coming at the end of a lengthy appeals process. But the following exchange with President Biden and reporters just happened: 

    When asked about the request by reporters at the White House on Wednesday, President Joe Biden said “we’re considering it” – comments described as “encouraging” by Mr Assange’s lawyer.

    Image: Creative Commons

    Biden issued the response in a press briefing while hosting Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida for an official White House visit, where the two leaders are expended to deepen defense ties.

    It is widely perceived this was all set in motion when in February Assange’s native Australia saw its parliament vote to issue formal request that charges against Julian Assange be dropped by the US. The motion adopted by parliament emphasized “the importance of the UK and USA bringing the matter to a close so that Mr. Assange can return home to his family in Australia.”

    The country’s prime minister Anthony Albanese immediately backed the motion calling for his return to Australia.

    Amnesty International also recently renewed its call to drop the charges against Assange. “The risk to publishers and investigative journalists around the world hangs in the balance. Should Julian Assange be sent to the U.S. and prosecuted there, global media freedoms will be on trial, too,” a statement said.

    We detailed in March that the Biden administration might be looking for a way to bring the 14-year long legal drama to an end. A WSJ report at the time said, “The U.S. Justice Department is considering whether to allow Julian Assange to plead guilty to a reduced charge of mishandling classified information, according to people familiar with the matter, opening the possibility of a deal that would end a lengthy legal saga triggered by one of the biggest classified intelligence leaks in American history.”

    A plea deal means the whole crisis for him and his family could finally come to an acceptable and peaceful end after all of these years. But Assange’s legal team never gave any level of confirmation to the prior WSJ reporting.

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

    However, this fresh Biden statement seems to confirm the reporting that a plea deal could be on the table.

    A May 20 hearing which has been scheduled by the UK High Court and is expected to take up whether the US ‘assurances’ that Assange would not face either the death penalty or torture if transferred to US custody are satisfactory. His lawyers have long argued that confinement in a US federal ‘Supermax’ facility would indeed be torturous and would also severely degrade his mental health.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 19:20

  • Popular Paper On Ivermectin And COVID-19 Contains False Information
    Popular Paper On Ivermectin And COVID-19 Contains False Information

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

    A popular study that claims ivermectin has shown no effectiveness against all-cause mortality contains false information but remains uncorrected.

    The meta-analysis, published in 2021 by the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases, explores how groups in randomized, controlled trials fared after receiving ivermectin compared to control groups.

    Among five trials included for the portion on all-cause mortality, none showed an effect for ivermectin, the authors claimed.

    Ivermectin “did not reduce all-cause mortality,” they wrote.

    But the claim is wrong. One of the five trials was described as finding ivermectin recipients were more likely to die, but actually found that ivermectin recipients were less likely to die. “The risk base estimation … confirmed that the average mortality obtained in all of ivermectin treated arms was 3.3%, while it was about 18.3% in standard care and placebo arms,” the authors of that paper said.

    Dr. Adrian Hernandez, an associate professor at the University of Connecticut’s School of Pharmacy, and other authors of the meta-analysis are aware of the false information. The group released their study as a preprint before the journal published it. The first version included the false information. A corrected version properly portrayed the trial’s results for all-cause mortality in a figure summarizing the results, but still falsely said none of the trials showed a benefit against all-cause mortality.

    Dr. Hernandez and Clinical Infectious Diseases did not respond to requests for comment.

    The lingering false information is in a paper that has attracted numerous citations in other studies, in the press, and on social media. Altmetric, which tracks engagement, scores it at 5,900. A score of 20 or means a paper is doing “far better than most of its contemporaries,” according to the company.

    Morimasa Yagisawa of Kitasato University and other researchers pointed out the issue in a March review of ivermectin trials, saying they were “concerned about the spread of misinformation and/or disinformation” about trial results.

    “The articles on systematic reviews and meta-analyses are often erroneous or misleading. This is perhaps because the authors were not involved in the clinical trials or patient care and only searched for and analyzed articles and databases on clinical trial results,” they wrote. The problems are “particularly serious” in the paper for which Dr. Hernandez was the corresponding author, the researchers said.

    “Although it was a clear error, the wrong content of the preprint was published as a major article in Clinical Infectious Diseases, the official journal of the Infectious Diseases Society of America, without being changed,” they wrote. “Many comments were made questioning the insight of the reviewers and the Editor-in-Chief for publishing a paper with such inconsistencies, but the paper is still published without correction. Since this is a prestigious journal of a prestigious society, an early corrective action is required.”

    “There have been several fraudulent meta-analyses, and this is a striking one,” Dr. Pierre Kory, president and chief officer of the FLCCC Alliance and author of the book The War on Ivermectin, told The Epoch Times in an email.

    “In this meta-analysis, they selected only 10 of the 81 controlled trials, 33 of which were randomized, on ivermectin that were available at the time. Eight of the ten they selected involved mild COVID-19. Typically, mild COVID does not lead to death. And here they were looking at death rates and, as expected, saw very few. The inclusion criteria they used were intended to show no effect. And they succeeded. Conflicted researchers have been doing this to hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin since the beginning of the pandemic,” he added.

    Issues in other meta-analyses include the improper inclusion of papers that did not describe clinical trial results, Mr. Yagisawa and his co-authors said.

    They noted that a number of trials have found ivermectin recipients were better off. That includes trials cited by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in its position that ivermectin is not effective against COVID-19.

    The FDA recently settled a lawsuit over that position, agreeing to take down several web pages and social media posts.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 19:00

  • Bridge Collapse: Moody's Cuts Maryland Transportation Authority's Debt Outlook To Negative
    Bridge Collapse: Moody’s Cuts Maryland Transportation Authority’s Debt Outlook To Negative

    The fallout from the Port of Baltimore bridge collapse has sparked supply chain snarls and economic pains in the Maryland area, forcing Moody’s Ratings to downgrade the outlook of the Maryland Transportation Authority’s debt from “stable” to “negative” because of mounting “uncertainties around the Francis Scott Key Bridge’s replacement project’s costs, including their funding and timing.” 

    “Any negative impact from the replacement project would be on top of financial metrics that were expected to narrow from capital investments prior to the loss of the bridge,” Cintia Nazima, a Moody’s analyst, noted in a report initially mentioned by Bloomberg.

    Moody’s maintained the Aa2 rating for the MTA’s revenue bonds, linked to about $2.2 billion in outstanding debt. Nazima explained that this rating “reflects the essentiality of the authority’s road network, the fundamental strength of the service area, and its history of strong financial and operational management and performance.” 

    The analyst said the 1.6-mile (2.6-kilometer) Key Bridge comprised about 7% of MTA’s total revenue in 2023. They expect traffic to be rerouted on adjacent highways and tunnels, adding the MTA will likely recapture most of the lost toll revenue. 

    The bridge was the primary land feeder into the Port of Baltimore. It connected the port to the I-95 highway network in the Mid-Alantic.

    Source: Bloomberg 

    For more than two weeks (since March 26), container ships, vehicle transport ships, bulk carriers, and other large commercial vessels have been diverted to other East Coast ports. Last week, the US Army Corps of Engineers provided a timeline for reopening the port, potentially at the end of May. However, there is no timeline on when the bridge will be rebuilt, with some figures in the 3-5 years range.

    In a separate note last week, Moody’s warned the bridge collapse “has the potential to hurt the transportation and warehousing sector” in the Baltimore region. 

    How does the MTA recapture the lost toll revenue? Well, higher toll fees, of course. 

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 18:40

  • Biggest Corporate Welfare Scam Of All Time
    Biggest Corporate Welfare Scam Of All Time

    Authored by Stephen Moore via The Epoch Times,

    President Joe Biden keeps lecturing corporate America to “pay your fair share” of taxes.

    It turns out he’s right that some companies really are getting away scot-free from paying taxes.

    But it isn’t Big Tech companies in Silicon Valley or the Wall Street financial company “fat cats” or big banks or Walmart.

    They pay billions in taxes.

    The culprits here are the very companies that President Biden is in bed with: green energy firms.

    It turns out that despite all the promises over the past decade about how renewable energy is the future of power production in America, by far the biggest tax dodgers in the country are the wind and solar power industries.

    Over the past several decades, the green energy lobby—what I call the climate-change-industrial complex—isn’t paying its fair share. That’s because the vast majority of these companies pay nearly ZERO income taxes.

    But they wade in rivers of federal direct and indirect subsidies that keep these zombie companies alive. Over the past two decades, the renewable energy lobby has collected more than one-quarter trillion dollars in subsidies—payments that we’ve been assured over and over would be temporary. The argument for these grants, loans, tax abatements and other sweetheart kisses is that these were “infant industries” in need of a Head Start program for CEOs.

    Except these companies have never even reached puberty after all these years.

    What’s worse is that President Biden keeps spoiling the children with lavish gifts for bad performance.

    A new report by tax expert Adam Michel at the Cato Institute finds the green energy subsidies—mostly created by Biden policies like the so-called Inflation Reduction Act—will drain the Treasury of as much as $1.8 trillion over 10 years.

    The Cato report finds that since its passage, “the estimated cost of the IRA’s new and expanded energy tax credits increased dramatically.”

    These tax shelters are just a form of Aid to Dependent Corporations. They never seem to want to cut the umbilical cord.

    What have we gotten for this mountain of taxpayer-funded green energy largesse?

    Nothing, really.

    Today, we still get 80 percent of our energy in America from fossil fuels and nuclear power. Wind and solar are stuck at less than 10 percent. This is some investment we’re making.

    Meanwhile, President Biden keeps railing against companies that pay no income tax. He’s advocated a mandatory 15 percent minimum corporate tax. But guess what industry is explicitly exempt from the minimum? The green energy lobby.

    It’s just a reminder that a lot of people are getting really, really rich off climate change hysteria.

    The “green” in green energy doesn’t stand for a cleaner environment.

    It stands for the color of money. Yours and mine.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 18:20

  • "Obviously, This Is Very Bad News For Biden": Wall Street Reacts To Today's Red Hot Inflation Print
    “Obviously, This Is Very Bad News For Biden”: Wall Street Reacts To Today’s Red Hot Inflation Print

    Coming into today’s CPI number, which followed three previous red-hot inflation prints, we said that it’s time for a “miss” (the first of 2024) not because the data demands it – on the contrary, prices continue to rise at a frightening pace – but because a dovish CPI print today would be the last opportunity for the Fed to set a timetable for a rate cut calendar ahead of November’s election.

    Well, you can wave goodbye to all that, because we just got the 4th consecutive “inflation beat” in a row…

    … with supercore inflation coming in blazing hot…

    … thanks to a boiling inflation print which saw every single CPI metric coming in hotter than expected – was a shock, not because it reflected reality, but because it effectively sealed Biden’s fate because as Bloomberg’s Chris Antsey writes, “obviously, this is very bad news for Joe Biden… we’re approaching the point where high inflation is bound to still be in voters’ minds when they head to the polls, regardless of how the price figures come in over summer.”

    With that in mind, here is a snapshot of kneejerk reactions by various other Wall Street economists and strategists to today’s print courtesy of Bloomberg.

    Morgan Stanley economist Ellen Zentner is the first sellside to warn her June rate-cut call is in jeopardy:

    “The upside surprise in core CPI is moving the inflation data further away from the convincing evidence the Fed needs to start cutting in June. Dependent on the PPI data tomorrow, this print tilts the Fed toward a later start to the cutting cycle than our current forecast for June.”

    Brian Coulton, chief economist at Fitch:

    “The so-called ‘Super-core’ CPI  measure – services excluding rents – jumped from 3.9% y/y in February to 4.8% in March. This latter metric is heading the wrong way and quite quickly at that.”

    David Kelly, Chief Global Strategist at JPMorgan asset management:

    “I wish the Federal Reserve would pay more attention to what they do to financial markets with their manipulation of interest rates and not worry too much about what they are doing to the economy. Last decade, we mispriced housing terribly and now a large chunk of younger Americans can’t buy a house.”

    Anna Wong, Bloomberg economist:

    “March is a month where the CPI enters a seasonal window that’s favorable for disinflation. The fact that core CPI remained the same in March as February — even if it maps to about 0.3% in core PCE inflation terms – is not a good development. This report, more than February’s, is likely to feed Fed concern that progress on disinflation is stalling — even though the core print for the two months was the same.”

    Marvin Loh, State Street economist:

    “While the rent component shows a strong disinflationary trend, the more important owner’s occupied component is stubbornly unchanged and well above what is needed to get towards a stable 2% level.”

    Ira Jersey, Bloomberg rates strategist:

    “The 3-month annualized core CPI climbing to 4.5% is going to keep early Fed-cut calls muted coming up. 50 bps of cuts in 2024 currently being priced may not occur until later in the year. The yield curve flattening isn’t surprising as we continue to price out early and deep cuts.”

    * * *
    “The timing of 2024 rate-cut expectations are front of mind for market participants, with linear markets pricing just below even odds of a first cut in July. Still, the stickiness of ‘supercore’ inflation, now north of 8% on a 3-month annualized basis, may continue to put upward pressure on expectations of the Fed’s terminal floor.”

    * * *

    “A retest of 4.51% is nearly assured with the higher-than-expected CPI. If that doesn’t hold, 4.7% is the next stopping spot for the 10-year yield.”

    Seema Shah, economist at Principal Asset Management:

    “Today’s print sealed the fate for the June FOMC meeting with a hike now very unlikely. In fact, even if inflation were to cool next month to a more comfortable reading, there is likely sufficient caution within the Fed now to mean that a July cut may also be a stretch, by which point the US election will begin to heavily intrude with Fed decision making.”

    Priya Misra, JPM rates strategist:

    ”This was a pivotal report for the market since the last 2 reports were a little high (0.4% mom) and the Fed viewed those readings as a ‘bump in the road’ rather than a change in the trend towards inflation moderation.Rates have risen in the last few weeks as cuts have been priced out but there is more room to go. I also think risk assets will be sensitive to rates if the 10y moves above 4.5%. So far risk assets could ignore the high inflation prints since the Fed was dismissing it. But I think that changes now… Most of the strength in the core explained by firmer motor vehicle insurance costs and medical care — both of these do not feed into the core PCE deflator in the same way. So incoming Fedspeak will be very important”

    Lindsay Rosner, head of multi-sector fixed income investing at Goldman Asset Management:

    “To be clear, this number did not eclipse the Fed’s confidence; it did, however, cast a shadow on it. When it comes to spread risk, one hotter CPI print does not derail the bigger story which is the economy is strong, defaults remain benign, and the technicals continue to cast sunshine on spreads maintaining this range.”

    Erik Norland, chief economist at the CME Group:

    “Given the recent trend in fuel prices, there’s a risk that headline inflation readings on a year-on-year basis surpass 4%. The narrative up to now has been danger of sticky 3% but few are talking about a reacceleration to the 4s.

    Florian Ielpo at Lombard Odier Asset Management:

    “If the Fed remains committed to its ‘one cut in June’ stance, real interest rates could remain stable while inflation compensation may increase. This would be supportive for equities, as real financing conditions would not tighten further, and profit margins could benefit from higher-than-expected inflation.”

    Torsten Slok of Apollo Global

    “Easy financial conditions continue to provide a significant tailwind to growth and inflation. As a result, the Fed is not done fighting inflation and rates will stay higher for longer.”

    It’s about to get even worse: recall today we have a $39 billion 10-year auction which is already being dubbed “sloppy” and a definitive break of 4.5% could easily extend if underwriting dealers are left holding the bag. As it stands, the 10yr has popped above the 4.5% parapet. Ian Lyngen at BMO Capital Markets says:

    “We expect the setup to the auction will break 4.50% in 10-year yields with ease.”  

    And George Goncalves, head of US macro strategy at MUFG, adds:

    “Price action tells you two things – positioning wasn’t as concentrated or in line with the mini rally we had heading into the number over the last 24hrs and at same time very little in auction setup either.. . Bottomline if no dip buyers show up this morning, and we keep drifting, the risk is a 4.5% this afternoon.”

    * * *

    The bottom line, as Bloomberg’s Sebatian Boyd writes is the following:

    “today’s CPI print adds to the evidence that US monetary policy just isn’t as restrictive as the Federal Reserve thinks it is, and that interest rates will therefore need to stay higher for longer. There are lots of reasons that might be: The great resignation during the pandemic may well have heightened productivity in the US economy as people found new jobs where they’re a better fit. Higher government spending would also push up the neutral rate of interest. But every time we get a hot indicator, the case builds that it has happened and that conventional measures of neutral interest rates are too low. If that is the case, the upshot is higher yields and a flatter curve, because not only would the Fed be able to cut by less than expected in the short term, but yields will need to be higher in the long term too.”

    Finally, we conclude where we started, and echoing what we said in our CPI preview, namely that the BLS had Biden’s fate in its hands, it appears the bureaucrats just voted for Trump. Here is BBG’s Chris Antsey:

    Obviously, this is very bad news for Joe Biden. It’s still only April, and we’ll have another half-a-year’s worth of inflation reports before the election. But we’re approaching the point where high inflation is bound to still be in voters’ minds when they head to the polls, regardless of how the price figures come in over summer.

    To underscore how calamitous today’s data is for Biden, here also is BBG’s Enda Curran:

    Let’s be clear — today’s data has both economic and political implications. The economics are straight forward: It looks unlikely that the Fed will be cutting rates near term (barring a shock). The political implications are less clear but no less meaningful: Poll after poll has found that voters are grumpy on the economy and news that it could be a while yet before the inflation story is over won’t brighten their mood.

    And with Biden’s goose now thoroughly cooked, the next question is how long before somebody raises the possibility of a rate hike.

    Tyler Durden
    Wed, 04/10/2024 – 18:15

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