Today’s News 17th January 2024

• RFK Jr. Says "There Was Good Reason" For His Father To Authorize FBI Wiretaps Of Martin Luther King Jr.
  RFK Jr. Says “There Was Good Reason” For His Father To Authorize FBI Wiretaps Of Martin Luther King Jr.

  Authored by Jeff Louderbeck via The Epoch Times,

  While in Atlanta for a voter rally on the eve of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. talked about his family’s relationship with the civil rights leader and said that “there was good reason” for his father, Robert F. Kennedy, to authorize FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover’s to wiretap Dr. King when John F. Kennedy was president.

  Before delivering a speech at the event, where he collected signatures to get on the Georgia presidential general election ballot, Mr. Kennedy told Politico that his father, who was attorney general, granted permission for Mr. Hoover to electronically monitor Dr. King’s conversations “because J. Edgar Hoover was out to destroy Martin Luther King and the civil rights movement and Hoover said to them that Martin Luther King’s chief was a communist.”

  “My father gave permission to Hoover to wiretap them so he could prove that his suspicions about King were either right or wrong. I think, politically, they had to do it,” Mr. Kennedy said.

  

  Mr. Kennedy noted that his father and his uncle knew that Mr. Hoover was “a racist” and “left no doubt where he stood on those issues” regarding civil rights organizations.

  If President Kennedy had been elected to a second term, he would have fired Mr. Hoover, the 2024 independent presidential candidate said, adding that be believes his uncle alerted Dr. King of Mr. Hoover’s wiretaps in a private conversation.

  President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963.

  Dr. King, who was born and raised in Atlanta, was shot and killed by James Earl Ray in Memphis, Tenn. on April 4, 1968.

  After speaking at a campaign event in Los Angeles during his bid to secure the Democrat Party’s presidential nomination, Robert F. Kennedy was shot on June 5, 1968. He died the next day.

  On Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Mr. Kennedy posted a video on X, formerly Twitter, sharing stories about the relationship between his father and Dr. King.

  In 1967, Dr. King delivered a speech “in which he came out against the Vietnam War,” Mr. Kennedy said in the video.

  It was an unpopular stance among other civil rights leaders who thought Dr. King should focus solely on the civil rights movement, Mr. Kennedy explained.

  Dr. King noted that black soldiers represented “half of the paratrooper units in Vietnam” and black soldiers were dying for freedoms in Vietnam that they did not have in their own country,” Mr. Kennedy said.

  “He also said that the poverty program which Lyndon Johnson and my uncle had launched was being impoverished itself because of the cause of the Vietnam War.”

  

  President Lyndon B. Johnson shakes the hand of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. at the signing of the Civil Rights Act while officials look on in Washington on July 2, 1964. (Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

  A year after delivering that address, Dr. King was murdered, and Mr. Kennedy said his father broke the news to a crowd in Indianapolis.

  “My father was running against the Vietnam War at that time and was going into a ghetto in Indianapolis, Indiana. The sheriff warned him that he shouldn’t go because people didn’t know that Martin Luther King Jr. was dead, and the sheriff and the local police believed they would lose control of the city when the black population learned about his death,” Mr. Kennedy said.

  Robert F. Kennedy ignored the sheriff’s warning and climbed on a flatbed truck to deliver an impromptu speech that his son calls one of the best addresses he had delivered.

  After telling the audience that Dr. King was shot and killed, Mr. Kennedy “did something that he never had done before, which is he talked publicly about his brother’s death.,” his son said in the video.

  “He reminded the crowd that his brother was killed by white men as well. And he called on the crowd to do something that was counterintuitive, which was to react peacefully. Quoting the Greek poet Aeschylus, he said that our job now as Americans was to “tame the savageness of men and make gentle the life of this world.”

  More than 100 cities were ravaged by riots that night, but not Indianapolis.

  “It was the only major city that avoided rioting that night. People have attributed that to my dad’s speech,” Mr. Kennedy said.

  “When my dad died in 1968, two months later, after Dr. King, Coretta King was in the hospital with me and my siblings, [in] Good Samaritan Hospital in Los Angeles. And my father died. And then she was on the airplane with us, which took my father’s casket back to New York, and she was on the train with us when we brought his body on a seven-and-a-half-hour train ride with two and a half million people on the track to Washington DC.”

  At the Atlanta voter rally on Jan. 14, Mr. Kennedy was joined by Angela Stanton-King, the goddaughter of Alveda King, who is Dr. King’s niece.

  Ms. Stanton-King, who works for Mr. Kennedy’s campaign, was pardoned by President Donald Trump after a conviction in 2006 for conspiracy to defraud the government in connection with a luxury car theft operation.

  In 2020, she registered as a Republican and unsuccessfully ran against civil rights leader and incumbent Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.).

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 23:40

• Increasing Psychopathic Behavior Is A Sign That Society Is On The Verge Of Breaking Down
  Increasing Psychopathic Behavior Is A Sign That Society Is On The Verge Of Breaking Down

  Discussions on collapse often turn to signs and signals – The economy, politics and social tensions have become increasingly unstable for many years now, and much like adding more and more weight to a man standing on a frozen lake, eventually the ice is going to break.  The question is, how do we know when that moment will be?   

  As cultural systems begins to dissolve due to political clashes and economic decline the real evil tends to slither out of the woodwork.  It happens slowly at first, then all at once.  A sure sign of accelerating collapse is the growing prevalence of psychopaths and psychopathic behavior in the open.

  The US appears to have entered the middle stages of such a collapse with many sociopaths and psychopaths beginning to feel that they might be able to act out their worst impulses without consequences.  They are beginning to test the waters to see what they can get away with.

  In the past ten years there has been a dramatic uptick in mass violence and theft.  With the advent of social media it is now easier than ever for spontaneously planned riots to form with little warning, and in most cases these mobs are random in who and what they attack.  They might organize in the name of politics or activism, but they tend to lash out at whatever targets are closest or easiest rather than the people they blame for their travails.

    

  In most cases these events result in simple property destruction in urban areas, but more and more there has been an underlying and aggressive impulse to hurt people.  There will come a time very soon when the the goal is not just to steal or vandalize, but to use instability as a smokescreen; a distraction the provides opportunities to harm others.

  Psychopaths like to exploit the chaos of political turmoil to indulge their violent tendencies, or to convince others to do the same.  If no one acts to eliminate the first wave of criminal actions during a social breakdown, then thousands of other criminals will also move to take advantage.  The first wave becomes an avalanche, all because the system no longer provides sufficient incentives to behave.

  The root psychology is hard to explain, but look at it this way – Imagine a spoiled toddler is kept in check by his parents in the pristine halls of a delicate museum.  The toddler might throw fits, screaming and shouting because he wants to touch the many fragile items around him, but at least his parents are there to hold him back.  He has not yet learned the responsibility and maturity necessary to have access to these treasures.  Now imagine removing the parents entirely and telling the toddler there are no rules anymore?

  The rush of joy he experiences is exhilarating; it is the feeling of sudden and unearned power.  No one is around to stop him, therefore, he is going to test his own limits.  He sees the ordered environment around him and he becomes frustrated.  How dare this place restrict him with boundaries and structure.  His first inclination is to destroy anything that he can get his hands on.  

  Now understand that there is a portion of any given adult population that has these same tendencies.  They never grew up.  They want to take or destroy what they cannot have; they are only waiting for the opportunity to do so without repercussions.     

  At this phase of a breakdown when the dominoes begin to topple, law enforcement generally folds and retreats, leaving the public with no first line of defense.  Gangs and looters organize quickly and take territory rather than just taking people’s possessions.  Organized crime at the local level leads to large scale death and minimal opposition.  People are so isolated and busy trying to scrape together a meager economic lifeline that they have no time or motivation to fight back.  

  The point of no return comes when regular people are afraid to leave their homes.  Organization at the neighborhood level with an aggressive posture must be enacted or the most vicious attacks will be visited on the population.  

  Sometimes, though, the psychopaths we have to deal with during a collapse are within the very government that is supposed to protect our liberties.  This is a situation in which the criminals are given license to use violence against the citizenry through the illusion of law.  The populace is then confronted with the inevitable question – Are laws worth following when psychopaths write them?

  When corrupt people run government, good becomes evil and evil becomes good.  Consider the extreme double standards in place between the treatment of leftist activist mobs and conservative protesters.  Look at the government and media response to the BLM riots versus their response to the Jan 6 event.  In the case of the capitol “riots”, police fired rubber bullets and tear gas into the otherwise peaceful crowd, then when the protesters reacted violently, they were accused of “insurrection.”  

  Is there any example of this kind of setup used against the political left?  No.  Instead, the media and public officials describe the destructive mobs as “fiery but mostly peaceful.”

  The double standard is absurd, but then again, it’s meant to be.  Why?  Because the psychopaths among the political left were being rewarded and encouraged.  Conservatives and moderates are supposed to feel defeated, making them unwilling to fight back any longer.  These are the kinds of conditions that fuel unhinged and predatory people, unleashing them on the population.  

  When psychopaths feel protected, total upheaval quickly follows. 

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 23:20

• Americans Warned About Dating Apps After 8 Suspicious Deaths In Colombia
  Americans Warned About Dating Apps After 8 Suspicious Deaths In Colombia

  Authored by Tom Ozimek via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  The State Department has issued a warning to American travelers, urging them not to use dating apps while in Colombia after reports of multiple “suspicious deaths” of U.S. citizens in the South American country.

  

  Colombia has been marked as a “reconsider travel” destination for Americans since Jan. 2, with the State Department citing concerns about crime, terrorism, civil unrest, and kidnapping risks.

  “Violent crime, such as homicide, assault, and armed robbery, is widespread,” the State Department states in the advisory. “Organized criminal activities, such as extortion, robbery, and kidnapping, are common in some areas.”

  More recently, the State Department issued a warning of a new threat—with the use of dating apps being a common denominator.

  Suspicious Deaths

  The U.S. Embassy in Bogota, the capital of Colombia, was made aware of eight “suspicious deaths” of private U.S. citizens in Medellín between Nov. 1 and Dec. 31, 2023, according to a Jan. 10 advisory.

  “The deaths appear to involve either involuntary drugging overdose or are suspected homicides,” the advisory states.

  While it’s not believed that the deaths are directly linked as each involved “distinct circumstances,” a number of them involved the use of online dating apps, along with possible drugging, overdose, and robbery.

  Disturbing Trends in Crime Against Foreign Visitors

  Local authorities in Medellín have noted a significant increase in crimes against foreign visitors.

  Observatory of the District Personnel of Medellín reports that the number of thefts committed against foreigners (with the exception of Venezuelans) jumped 200 percent in the latter part of last year.

  Additionally, violent deaths of visitors from other countries have jumped 29 percent—with a notable majority of the victims being U.S. citizens.

  Dating Apps as Tools for Criminal Activities

  Criminals in Colombia are reportedly using dating apps to lure victims, particularly foreigners, to meet them in places like hotels, restaurants, and bars—with the aim of robbing them.

  “Numerous U.S. citizens in Colombia have been drugged, robbed, and even killed by their Colombian dates,” the advisory warns.

  The U.S. Embassy notes that these incidents are on the rise, with major cities like Medellín, Cartagena, and Bogotá being hotspots for such crimes.

  While such incidents are reported regularly to the U.S. Embassy in Colombia, it’s likely that the scale of the problem is greater than it seems as these types of crimes “routinely go underreported” because victims are often embarrassed and reluctant to pursue legal action.

  Precautionary Measures

  Some key actions to take include being cautious when using online dating apps and meeting strangers only in public places.

  Travelers to Colombia are also advised to avoid isolated locations when meeting people who they found through dating apps, and informing friends or family members about plans for the meeting.

  The advisory also suggests taking extra security measures when meeting new acquaintances and not physically resisting any robbery attempt.

  “Victims of crime who resist robbery are more likely to be killed,” the advisory states.

  The Colombia travel advisory—and the warning about criminals using dating apps to lure victims—comes after the State Department issued a worldwide caution alert for Americans traveling abroad after the outbreak of the Israel–Hamas war last October.

  Worldwide Caution Alert

  The State Department’s worldwide caution alert cites increased tensions globally and the potential for terrorist attacks, demonstrations, or violent actions against U.S. citizens and interests.

  The latest alert was prompted by the ongoing conflict in the Middle East, which came after Hamas (a designated terror group) attacked parts of Israel, killing hundreds of civilians and leading to an extensive Israeli bombing campaign targeting Gaza, the area Hamas controls.

  This caution alert comes after the last worldwide advisory in 2022, which followed a U.S. strike that killed al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 23:00

• How Many People Are Killed By Police In The US?
  How Many People Are Killed By Police In The US?

  The Washington Post counted 1,153 people in the U.S. who were shot and killed by police in 2023.

  In previous years, about as many people – around 1,000 annually – have died this way.

  As Statista’s Katharina Buchholz shows in the infographic below, most of those killed by police were male and armed.

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  While the race of more than a third of those killed by police in 2023 is not known, 372 of the deceased were white, while 213 were Black. This equals 53 percent and 30 percent, respectively, of those for whom a race is known. The share of Black people is elevated here, keeping in mind that only close to 14 percent of Americans belong to that race group.

  Around 60 percent of those shot and killed by police carried a gun themselves.

  But in the case of more than 180 people, they were either unarmed or it is unknown whether they carried a weapon.

  In 27 cases, the deceased had been seen with a replica weapon that was mistaken for the real thing.

  Out of the 1,153 killed, 147 were listed as having shown signs of mental illness.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 22:40

• This Hamlet Looks Like Tolkien's Shire, Believed 5,000 Years Old – And People Still Live Here Off-Grid
  This Hamlet Looks Like Tolkien’s Shire, Believed 5,000 Years Old – And People Still Live Here Off-Grid

  Authored by Michael Wing via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  There are no iPhone chargers plugged into the stone walls, no microwave ovens, or light switches in the hamlets of Bavona Valley.

  

  It is, and for centuries has been, a daunting lifestyle for those inhabiting a string of lost homes in this Italian-speaking region, here in the southern Swiss Alps. Akin to hobbit dwellings from a Tolkien book or a fairytale town, cave-like abodes permeate under and in between gargantuan stones. Scattered everywhere are the remnants of earth-trembling rockslides.

  Harshness aside, the scenery is gorgeous—bordering on magical. How surprising is it anyone would want to live here?

  “These days, we just blow up boulders that are in the way,” Flavio Zappa told Houses of Switzerland. “But that wasn’t possible before. So people built their homes underneath them, above them, anywhere they could.”

  A historian and medievalist, Mr. Zappa, with his little round glasses and rugged features, has conducted extensive excavations and mapped most of these distinctive rock homes—called splüi by locals—throughout the valley.

  

  

  

  Nested in a pretty trough valley with sheer cliff walls on either side and debris on the valley floor covered in blankets of moss and encroaching woodland, less than 2% of this land is arable. Agriculture had to be introduced in novel ways by resourceful folks, making use of plots as little as 1 square meter; terraced gardens were dug into the sides of cliffs, some at dizzying heights, to grow food; while soil-covered rocks, called balòi, allowed small kitchen gardens to be planted.

  “It’s rocky, steep, and unforgiving,” Mr. Zappa said. “But if all the other good land has been taken, you’ve no choice but to look elsewhere.”

  But despite the harsh, rugged conditions, the inhabitants of Bavona Valley live here by choice—albeit mostly in summer—because living off-grid plugs them into their roots. Life without electricity isn’t seen as a disadvantage, Mr. Zappa said. They are accustomed to using wood for warmth and candles when it gets dark. The region’s sometimes sunless days make an ample store of candlesticks essential, yet the cooler weather allays the need for refrigeration.

  

  

  While people living in hamlets like Foroglio and Sonlerto once stayed year-round, today, and for several centuries, most spend winters down the pass in towns like Cavergno and Bignasco, where there are more comforts and amenities. In summer, they drive livestock up to graze in the cooler, higher pastures of Bavona Valley again, adopting a practice called transhumance.

  Both man and animal must cope with precious little space for living. While livestock find shelter under massive stones in excavated stables, humans have built up—erecting high-rise stone structures to increase real estate. There are houses, medieval churches, blacksmith shops, and whatnot. Amid the stone buildings, tight laneways navigate the unforgiving boulder-strewn environment.

  Evidence of settlements in Bavona Valley is believed to trace back 5,000 years, though a Roman necropolis toward the south shows that ancient European empire visited as early as the first century B.C.

  

  

  A pastoral economy with herds of goats produced hard cheese and modest farming practices. The region’s now famous terraced “hanging meadows” helped inhabitants win back land to grow rye, millet, potatoes, onions, and hemp.

  Eventually, the Little Ice Age around 1500 A.D. began unraveling their modest way of life. Winters got longer and summers wetter, with rain causing hundreds of waterfalls to overflow rivers, taking away already scarce farmland. The people of Bavona Valley lost all hope of staying, and a mass exodus down the mountain pass soon followed.

  There were also landslides. These “dropped an incredible amount of rock down on the valley floor,” Rachel Gadea Martini, coordinator of the Bavona Valley Foundation, told Swiss Info. “The locals no longer felt safe there and start to move away from the valley.”

  

  

  Coupled with the fact that no roads reached here until 1955, this exodus left settlements looking lost in time. Locals would return only during the summer to lead their rustic way of life—as they preferred.

  Even as late as the 1950s, when hydroelectric power arrived in Bavona Valley, the vast majority living in the towns were happy to remain off-grid. Talks were held but amounted to nothing; the valley’s 12 hamlets gathered for a vote and 11 out of 12 chose to stay unplugged, preferring to live more simply.

  

  

  

  

  Today, you can hike Bavona Valley on day trips from the nearby cities of Lugano and Locarno or stay in picturesque accommodations in Bignasco; the cheese gnocchi in butter sage sauce is a local specialty. A ride to the top in San Carlo’s cable cars offers an awe-inspiring panorama.

  By most accounts, the inhabitants of Bavona Valley are just fine with their candles and no power. Other than the odd rooftop solar panel, providing a few watts for a freezer, most enjoy making do with less. Phone chargers and microwaves be darned.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 22:20

• Fire Federal Employees Who Walk Out Over Gaza Policies: Speaker Johnson
  Fire Federal Employees Who Walk Out Over Gaza Policies: Speaker Johnson

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

  House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) criticized federal employees reportedly planning a walkout over America’s support for Israel in its war against Hamas and called for terminating their employment.

  “Any government worker who walks off the job to protest U.S. support for our ally Israel is ignoring their responsibility and abusing the trust of taxpayers. They deserve to be fired,” Mr. Johnson said in a Jan. 14 post on X (formerly Twiter). “Oversight Chairman Comer and I will be working together to ensure that each federal agency initiates appropriate disciplinary proceedings against any person who walks out on their job,” he added, referring to Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.).

  

  The House Speaker’s comments came in response to a tweet by Joyce Karam, the senior news editor at Al-Monitor, saying that “hundreds of U.S. gov. employees plan walkout on Tuesday over Biden’s Gaza policies.” In total, workers from 22 government agencies are expected to be involved in the walkout, she said in a Jan. 13 post.

  A list obtained by Al-Monitor showed that departments involved in the walkout include the National Security Agency, the Executive Office of the President, the Naval Research Laboratory, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, and the Departments of State, Defense, Homeland Security, and Veterans Affairs.

  A walkout by federal employees could count as a strike, which is prohibited per law.

  Title 5 Section 7311 of the U.S. Code states: “An individual may not accept or hold a position in the Government of the United States or the government of the District of Columbia if he … participates in a strike, or asserts the right to strike, against the Government of the United States or the government of the District of Columbia.”

  Further, Title 18 Section 1918 prescribes the punishment for such an action. Violators of Section 7311 “shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year and a day, or both.”

  A major strike by federal employees over four decades ago triggered government action. In 1981, around 13,000 air traffic controllers took part in a strike over pay and work schedules.

  At the time, President Reagan declared the strike to be a “peril to national safety,” fired 11,000 workers, and barred them from ever joining the federal government again.

  ‘Day of Mourning’

  The walkout is being organized by a group called “Feds United for Peace” who claim that they will mark 100 days of Israel’s operations in Gaza by observing a “day of mourning.” The organizers remained anonymous.

  One of the organizers of the walkout told Al-Monitor that their initiative “grew out of a collective desire to do what we could to influence the Biden administration’s policy on this issue … What you’re seeing with this effort is something very unusual, and that is for dissent to be manifested via a physical act.”

  Hamas’ attack in Israel on Oct. 7 had killed around 1,200 individuals and led to the kidnapping of roughly 240 people. It is this attack that triggered the current Israel-Gaza conflict. In October, Israel launched a ground offensive in Gaza.

  South Africa has accused Israel of committing state-led genocide against Palestinians, claiming at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) that the offensive has led to the deaths of almost 24,000 people.

  In a Jan. 11 X post, Lior Haiat, a spokesperson for the Israeli Foreign Ministry, called South Africa’s claims “one of the greatest shows of hypocrisy in history, compounded by a series of false and baseless claims.”

  South Africa “completely ignored the fact that Hamas terrorists infiltrated Israel, murdered, executed, massacred, raped, and abducted Israeli citizens, simply because they were Israelis, in an attempt to carry out genocide,” he wrote.

  “Hamas’ representatives in the court, the South African lawyers, are also ignoring the fact that Hamas uses the civilian population in Gaza as human shields and operates from within hospitals, schools, UN shelters, mosques, and churches with the intention of endangering the lives of the residents of the Gaza Strip.”

  Pro-Hamas Stance

  This isn’t the first time that federal employees have been entangled in a controversy over the Israel-Hamas conflict.

  On Nov. 28, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) wrote a letter to cabinet-level inspector generals asking for a full investigation into reports that over 500 federal employees representing the Biden administration signed an open letter asking the president to demand a ceasefire.

  Such a demand “only stands to benefit Hamas,” Mr. Rubio argued. As the letter claimed to have been signed by workers from several government agencies and political appointees who were confirmed by the Senate, there is “ample opportunity for the signers to abuse their positions to carry out their self-declared goal,” he warned.

  “These range from officials at the U.S. Department of State insisting on prolonging the review periods of arms sales to Israel to supervisors denying promotion and salary increases to employees that support Israel.”

  “Therefore, I urge you to conduct a full investigation to determine which employees signed the letter, publicize their names, and assess to what extent they have used their positions to work counter to the policies of the president,” Mr. Rubio said.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 21:40

• China Population Plunges With Lowest Birth Rate In 74 Years As GDP Miraculously Tops Target Amid Strong Data Dump
  China Population Plunges With Lowest Birth Rate In 74 Years As GDP Miraculously Tops Target Amid Strong Data Dump

  Confirming Premier Li’s earlier leak, China’s economy grew at 5.2% YoY – comfortably and miraculously beating the all-knowing official target of ‘around 5%’ (which is the lowest target in decades), as industrial production and investment climbed in the final stretch of the year.

  However, thew GDP print at +5.2% was weaker than the +5.3% consensus estimate.

  

  While GDP accelerated, other indicators were mixed in the final month of 2023:

  • Industrial output rose 6.8% in December from a year ago, better than a 6.6% increase projected by economists

  • Retail sales grew 7.4%, weaker/worse than the forecast for an 8% gain

  • Fixed-asset investment climbed 3% in the year, slightly better than a predicted 2.9% rise

  • The urban jobless rate was 5.1% last month, up/worse from 5% in November

  

  “China’s economy withstood external pressures and overcame domestic challenges to rebound and improve in 2023,” the NBS said in a statement accompanying the data.

  The agency warned, though, that economic development “still faces some difficulties and challenges.”

  China released its jobless rate among young people (which it decided to stop issuing once it hit a record high above 20%) – but in the wonderfully Chinese way, the new series (at 14.9%) is entirely incomparable as it ‘excludes students’.

  A bigger problem for liquidity-hypers was that Li explicitly pointed out that China’s growth rate last year – a rise from the figure of 3% in 2022 when the country was hit by its arcane Zero-COVID policies – was achieved without resorting to “massive stimulus” and the economy was making “steady progress”.

  “We did not seek short-term growth while accumulating long-term risks, rather we focused on strengthening the internal drivers,” he said.

  “Just as a healthy person often has a strong immune system, the Chinese economy can handle ups and downs in its performance. The overall trend of long-term growth will not change.”

  The biggest threat to the economy remains the housing sector and China’s property crisis is not getting any better at all as the number of cities seeing home price increases continues to collapse…

  

  Finally, China’s population shrank faster last year, falling by 2 million people.

  

  The 9 million births was the lowest total since at least the start of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, and 11 million people died.

  That number was probably boosted by the COVID pandemic, but there’s no detail in today’s data about cause of death.

  And that’s a big problem – because you can’t print people… and dependents are soaring.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 21:22

• Chicago Public Schools: Hundreds Of New Sexual Abuse Allegations Should Get All The Attention
  Chicago Public Schools: Hundreds Of New Sexual Abuse Allegations Should Get All The Attention

  By Ted Dabrowski and John Klingner of Wirepoints

  A glance at the news coverage of the recent Inspector General report on financial and sexual misconduct at Chicago Public Schools shows it’s the fiscal mismanagement that’s getting all the attention. The media is highlighting more than $23 million in missing laptops among other material fraud.

  But it’s the more urgent issue of sexual abuse in CPS that should dominate the headlines. The IG reported a total of 446 sexual allegations made in 2023, ranging from misconduct and sexual harassment to nonsexual conduct that raises “the appearance of impropriety or possible grooming concerns.” That’s similar to 2022’s 470 allegations.

  

  The IG also substantiated eight cases of adult-on-student sexual abuse.

  Instances of abuse continue despite the Chicago Tribune’s exposure in 2018 of the school district’s sexual abuse crisis, when the newspaper found police had investigated more than 520 cases of juvenile sexual assault and abuse in Chicago’s public schools from 2008 to 2017.

  Some things have improved since the publication, like the passage of Faith’s Law and the creation of the OIG’s Sexual Allegations Unit, but until CPS is subject to massive outside scrutiny and public outcry – much like the Catholic Church rightfully received for its own abuse scandals – count on cases of abuse to continue.

  A lack of management and accountability

  The problem at CPS is a lack of control and oversight, something the OIG office openly admits:

  “Among cases closed by the agency’s general investigations unit from July 2022 through June 2023, Inspector General Will Fletcher said there’s a consistent theme: ‘Where you find vulnerabilities in management controls (and) exercising oversight — you will find fraud.’”

  Those same vulnerabilities allow for continued instances of sexual abuse. 

  What’s worse, sexual abuse is harder to detect than stolen laptops or missing funds. There’s nothing “missing” for a manager to notice. The prevalence of texting and video also makes abuse easier to perpetrate and harder to detect.

  There are also likely many cases that go unreported and undiscovered due to shame or fear of retribution. That was certainly the case for the Catholic Church, which saw most accusations take years or decades to emerge.

  And then there’s the CTU and its collective bargaining agreement. Their “myriad” and “tedious” rules are more about protecting the union and its members than they are about protecting children.

  In sum, the deck is already stacked against parents and their children when it comes to abuse. The system’s continued mismanagement only makes things worse.

  Needed reforms

  The Chicago Tribune’s “Betrayed” series should have opened the door to massive changes and extreme transparency. It should have spurred the creation policies mirroring the Catholic Church’s own reforms, including:

  • A strict “one strike and you’re out” zero tolerance policy, as established in the Church’s Dallas Charter.

  • Removal of accused employees from school until an investigation is completed.

  • A public and easily accessible website that lists all offenders, their histories and their whereabouts, so these teachers don’t become tutors or get hired by another school system.

  • A rigorous screening process obsessed with a hiree’s character.

  • Robust and mandatory “safe environment” training for all employees and vendors.

  And it should have spurred State Attorney General Kwame Raoul to open an investigation of his own. 

  

  Instead, Raoul’s office dedicated itself to a multi-year reinvestigation of the Catholic Archdiocese, decades after the Church’s strict controls and safety processes had already been put in place.

  Bureaucratic blocking

  Not only has CPS failed to implement best practices for its own investigations, but its processes make it nearly impossible for private groups and citizens to conduct their own inquiries.

  A report by KidsToo, a Chicago-based nonprofit dedicated to child protection, recently outlined its attempt at investigative reporting needed to get to the truth about the depths of sexual abuse at CPS.

  

  It’s vital work because the OIG is always overwhelmed: “Every year, the OIG receives more credible allegations than it has the resources to investigate, so the investigations that are opened are the result of an assessment of the severity of the allegations and the potential impact or deterrent effect of investigating certain subject matter.”

  Unsurprisingly, KidsToo’s efforts were often thwarted for a host of reasons, which they laid out in detail in their “In Loco Parentis” report, including:

  • A FOIA process designed to “limit and filter information” rather than freely provide it.

  • Difficulty in gaining access to appropriate teacher data, including license information.

  • The teachers’ collective bargaining agreement allows CTU representatives to be part of the investigative process, creating a “myriad of steps” and “tedious” processes.

  • Other contract rules, including “grievance” and “mediation” processes, create even more investigative delays.

  • The revocation or suspension of teaching licenses is hampered by the State Superintendent having ultimate control over the process.

  To be clear, these investigations involve serious allegations and so should be treated seriously, but the process should not be so labyrinthine for those trying to gather information.

  *  *  *

  That CPS is such a poor steward of taxpayer dollars is bad enough, but the failure to catch fraud and theft pales in comparison to the continual harm done to Chicago’s children. Not only are a vast number pushed out of the system without the basic skills they need to succeed in life, but some also end up victims of sexual abuse.

  It’s a sad reminder of how inept, corrupt and morally bankrupt CPS really is.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 21:00

• US To Relist Yemen's Houthis As Designated Global Terrorists After Biden Removed Them In 2021
  US To Relist Yemen’s Houthis As Designated Global Terrorists After Biden Removed Them In 2021

  It’s about time? Late in the day Tuesday the Wall Street Journal is reporting that the Biden administration is belatedly moving to put Yemen’s Houthi rebels back on the terrorist list.

  Ironically it was Biden that removed the Houthis in the first place, as WSJ highlights: “The designation as a foreign terrorist organization, which the U.S. plans to formally announce on Wednesday, reverses a decision taken early in President Biden’s term to remove the Houthis from the list over concerns it hurt the prospects for peace talks and further crippled the economy of an impoverished nation at risk of famine.”

  The Houthis were removed from the list in 2021 after they were first designated previously under the Trump administration, also given they have long been armed and backed financially by the Islamic Republic of Iran.

  

  Since last week, the US and UK-led coalition which also includes Australia, Bahrain, Canada and the Netherlands have conducted several rounds of airstrikes and missile attacks against Houthi positions in Yemen.

  The repeat Houthi attacks, which are now almost daily, have threatened to completely shut out commercial vessels from the vital Red Sea transitway. 

  The Houthis have claimed this is all part of the war against Palestinians, and their military operations are meant as retaliation against Israel and its most powerful backer the US. 

  “The international coalition that America announced under the pretext of protecting maritime navigation in the Red Sea is an alliance to protect the Israeli entity and to protect Israeli ships. It is an integral part of the aggression against the Palestinian people, Gaza, and the Arab and Islamic nations,” the group previously said in a statement.

  The Saudi-UAE-US coalition has waged a brutal air war against Yemen and the rebel Houthis going back to 2015, unleashing a dire humanitarian crisis. It was during that time, especially when Washington was more deeply involved in helping Saudi pilots with targeting information, that the Houthis were first placed on the US terror list.

  In light of everything that has happened over the past couple months regarding Houthi attacks on civilian vessels, it’s interesting to revisit Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s words in February of 2021:

  Effective February 16, I am revoking the designations of Ansarallah, sometimes referred to as the Houthis, as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) under the Immigration and Nationality Act and as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist (SDGT) pursuant to Executive Order (E.O.) 13224, as amended.

  This decision is a recognition of the dire humanitarian situation in Yemen. We have listened to warnings from the United Nations, humanitarian groups, and bipartisan members of Congress, among others, that the designations could have a devastating impact on Yemenis’ access to basic commodities like food and fuel.

  If the fresh WSJ reporting is confirmed, this will mark a somewhat unprecedented reversal which will see the same group go from a terror listing to being de-listed to being listed again—all within a matter of a few years.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 20:40

• Retirement Savers Are Putting More Money Into Stocks
  Retirement Savers Are Putting More Money Into Stocks

  Authored by Simon White, Bloomberg macro strategist,

  Retirement savers want more stocks in their portfolios as a hedge against inflation, potentially offering a long-term tailwind for equities as societies age, according to the latest Bloomberg Markets Live Pulse survey.

  Almost half of the 252 respondents said they were putting more funds into stocks as a response to rising prices – far eclipsing the 6% who said they’d be adding the traditional inflation hedge, gold.

  

  After the biggest jump in consumer prices for a generation, the survey highlights the range of strategies that pension investors have turned to as a counter. Real estate and commodities – also assets that historically have weathered inflation fairly well – were among the other choices. But shares of companies, whose earnings are expected to rise with prices, were clearly the preferred option.

  That doesn’t make them the right one, of course – in the inflationary 1970s, stocks were the worst-performing asset in real terms.

  There’s a fierce academic argument over the likely effects of demographic trends on economies and markets – and over one issue in particular: Will aging populations tend to push bond yields up, or down?

  In the MLIV survey, that’s the question that provoked the most individual responses. Reflecting the wider debate, the findings were exactly split down the middle.

  For those who expect yields to rise as societies age, the focus is on the mounting fiscal expense – and the knock-on inflationary effect – of supporting populations with a longer life expectancy when there are fewer workers.

  As one respondent put it: Medical and health costs grow faster than what the government can finance through tax, hence more debt must be issued.

  Among those making the opposite case – that yields will trend down – the most common argument was that there’ll be higher demand for fixed income from those close to or in retirement.

  Several respondents mentioned Japan, the country that is furthest along the aging track. It already has about 66 dependents for every 100 people of working age, while yields on Japan’s government debt have been below 2% for almost all of this century.

  

  One thing that could determine how yields behave as populations age is simply whether politicians are willing to push them down via what’s known as “financial repression” – essentially, government action that directs private capital flows into public debt markets. There are many ways to achieve this. One example is rules that require pension funds to own government debt to match their liabilities.

  One MLIV survey participant suggested that financial repression is exactly what will happen as states aren’t able to sell enough debt.

  All of this means that anyone shifting funds from bonds to stocks as a hedge against inflation may find that they’re jumping from the frying pan into the fire.

  Nonetheless, that’s the direction suggested by responses to the MLIV question on which asset class will see the biggest positive impact from aging societies.

  Stocks and real estate were the two most popular answers. The latter is a more proven inflation hedge. Land is in finite supply while typically demand for housing rises as populations age and the average household size falls.

  

  Around a quarter of respondents chose bonds, while some of the other answers given included healthcare stocks, gold, and Bitcoin.

  Another finding to emerge from the survey was a strong belief that the retirees of today and tomorrow will take a different approach to their pension portfolio compared to the baby boomers. Almost 60% of respondents took this view.

  Gen Z and millennials are set to have lower incomes and less wealth than their parents.

  That doesn’t mean they will mimic traditional approaches to pension investing by increasing bond allocations the closer they get to retirement age – which in any case may not be the most prudent strategy if elevated inflation turns out to be a feature rather than a bug.

  That not only has implications for current generations when they retire, but for the whole structure of the market that’s been in place for most of the past three decades.

  It’s too early to say exactly what that means for investing – but one thing is clear: aging populations mean the rules have changed.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 20:20

• John Deere Partners With Elon Musk's Starlink To Unlock "Vast Opportunities"
  John Deere Partners With Elon Musk’s Starlink To Unlock “Vast Opportunities”

  Deere & Company, the world’s largest tractor maker, announced Tuesday morning it “entered into an agreement” with Elon Musk’s SpaceX company to provide high-speed satellite internet to farmers across the US and Brazil in the second half of this year. 

  “Utilizing the industry-leading Starlink network, this solution will allow farmers facing rural connectivity challenges to fully leverage precision agriculture technologies,” Deere wrote in a press release. 

  This will allow “John Deere customers to be more productive, profitable, and sustainable in their operations as they continue to provide food, fuel, and fiber for their communities and a growing global population,” the company continued. 

  Starlink is ideal for rural locations. Later this year, @JohnDeere will begin equipping new and existing machines across the United States and Brazil with Starlink to help connect farmers with high-speed internet so they can fully leverage precision agriculture technologies… pic.twitter.com/Jr36oTvGa4

  — Starlink (@Starlink) January 15, 2024

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  “The value of connectivity to farmers is broader than any single task or action. Connectivity unlocks vast opportunities that were previously limited or unavailable,” said Aaron Wetzel, Vice President of Production and Precision Ag Production Systems at John Deere.

  According to all-things ag website Precision Farming Dealer, only 30% of the largest US farms have “high quality” internet.

  While Starlink supplies rural America with high-speed internet, the Federal Communications Commission, weaponized by the Biden administration, recently rejected Musk’s company from receiving $885.5 million in rural broadband subsidies.

  SpaceX said it was “deeply disappointed and perplexed” by the FCC decision, adding Starlink “is demonstrably one of the best options – likely the best option” to achieve the goals of the rural internet program.

  “Last year, after Elon Musk acquired Twitter, President Biden gave federal agencies the green light to go after him,” FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr wrote in an X post last month. 

  Last year, after Elon Musk acquired Twitter, President Biden gave federal agencies the green light to go after him.

  And they have.

  Today, the FCC adds itself to the growing list of federal agencies engaging in the regulatory harassment of Elon Musk.

  I dissent. pic.twitter.com/1zEoGCwiNk

  — Brendan Carr (@BrendanCarrFCC) December 12, 2023

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  We suspect many more partnerships are coming down the pipe as Starlink gears up for an IPO, with some reports indicating as early as the end of this year.

  Musk is the ‘uncancellable’ billionaire, and the Biden administration hates this.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 20:00

• "2025 Is When The World Will Be Short Of Oil": Occidental CEO Warns Oil Supply Crunch Begins Next Year
  “2025 Is When The World Will Be Short Of Oil”: Occidental CEO Warns Oil Supply Crunch Begins Next Year

  By Charles Kennedy of OilPrice.com

  • The ratio of discovered resources versus demand has dropped in recent decades and is now at around 25%.
  • Oxy CEO Hollub: “2025 and beyond is when the world is going to be short of oil.”.
  • Oil industry executives have been warning that new resources, new investments, and new supply will be needed just to maintain the current supply levels as older fields mature.

  The world would find itself short of oil from 2025 onwards as exploration for longer-producing crude reserves is set to lag demand growth, Vicki Hollub, chief executive of Occidental Petroleum, said at the Davos forum on Tuesday.  

  For most of the second half of the 20th century, oil companies were finding more crude than global consumption, around five times the demand volumes, Hollub said, as carried by Reuters.

  

  The ratio of discovered resources versus demand has dropped in recent decades and is now at around 25%.

  “In the near term, the markets are not balanced; supply, demand is not balanced,” Oxy’s CEO said.  

  “2025 and beyond is when the world is going to be short of oil.”

  According to the executive, the oil market will find itself moving from an oversupply in the near term to a long period of supply shortages.

  Oil industry executives have been warning that new resources, new investments, and new supply will be needed just to maintain the current supply levels as older fields mature.

  One of the most persistent warnings has come for years from Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest crude oil exporter, and its state oil giant Aramco.

  The Kingdom and Aramco have repeatedly said that the focus of the energy sector and the debates on the energy transition should be on how to cut emissions, not on reducing oil and gas production. 

  Speaking at the Energy Intelligence Forum in October, Aramco’s chief executive Amin Nasser said that the Saudi oil giant is working on renewables, e-fuels, hydrogen, and carbon capture and storage (CCS). But the world will need oil and gas for decades and renewables won’t meet this need for decades, he added.

  The additional oil and gas demand over the coming decade needs new upstream investments to offset the 5-7% annual decline rates, Nasser noted.  

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 19:40

• COVID-19 May Have Come From Chinese Laboratory, Dr. Fauci’s Former Boss Says
  COVID-19 May Have Come From Chinese Laboratory, Dr. Fauci’s Former Boss Says

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

  COVID-19 may have come from a laboratory in China, a former National Institutes of Health (NIH) director said in recent closed-door testimony.

  

  Dr. Francis Collins, the NIH director until late 2021, said that the theory that COVID-19 came from a lab in Wuhan “is not a conspiracy theory,” according to the U.S. House of Representatives Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic.

  The panel has released a summary of Dr. Collins’ transcribed interview since it took place on Jan. 12.

  Dr. Collins, 73, who is still President Joe Biden’s science adviser, was director of the NIH from 2009 to 2021. He was the boss of Dr. Anthony Fauci, who helped craft the U.S. pandemic response.

  Dr. Fauci, 83, who left the government in 2022, also told members in recent closed-door testimony that the lab leak hypothesis is not a conspiracy theory, according to the subcommittee.

  The former officials were brought in as the panel investigates how the government responded to the pandemic.

  Dr. Collins and Dr. Fauci “prompted” the drafting of a paper called “Proximal Origins” that was published in early 2020 and claimed to disprove the lab leak theory, according to an email from one of the authors. Neither Dr. Collins nor Dr. Fauci were named in the acknowledgements or listed as a co-author of the paper.

  Two months after the paper was published, Dr. Collins wrote to Dr. Fauci about public discussions about the origins of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.

  “I hoped the Nature Medicine article on the genomic sequence of SARS-CoV-2 would settle this… Wondering if there is something NIH can do to help put down this very destructive conspiracy … Anything more we can do?” Dr. Collins wrote at the time.

  Dr. Fauci, meanwhile, promoted “Proximal Origins” from the White House podium before alleging he could not recall the names of the authors.

  A number of experts and outlets have backtracked on their earlier position that COVID-19 did not come from a lab, including The Washington Post and the U.N.’s World Health Organization.

  Dr. Collins told the subcommittee that Dr. Fauci invited him to attend a Feb. 1, 2020, conference call that featured scientists who went on to write “Proximal Origins,” according to the subcommittee.

  “This testimony directly contradicts Dr. Fauci’s previous statements and raises further concerns about the U.S. government’s role in suppressing and vilifying the lab-leak hypothesis,” said the panel, which is chaired by Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-Ohio).

  Other Statements

  Dr. Fauci said that social distancing, or rules that required or advised people to maintain six feet of distance from others, was likely not based on any data.

  “It just sort of appeared,” Dr. Fauci was quoted as saying.

  Dr. Collins also said that social distancing “was likely not based on any science or data,” according to the subcommittee. Social distancing underpinned a range of measures, including forcing children to stay home from school on some days after schools reopened.

  Dr. Collins also reiterated attacks he’s made against the Great Barrington Declaration, which called for protecting vulnerable people like the elderly and letting younger, healthy people live largely without restrictions, the subcommittee said.

  Dr. Collins told Dr. Fauci via email on Oct. 8, 2020, that the declaration was written by “three fringe epidemiologists,” even though the authors included professors from Harvard Medical School and Stanford Medical School, and that “there needs to be a quick and devastating published take down of its premises.”

  “You have a federal government figure abusing his power,” Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, one of the authors, told The Epoch Times previously. “Why? Because he couldn’t stand the idea that there were prominent scientists that disagreed with him about pandemic policy.”

  Transcripts of the testimony from Dr. Collins and Dr. Fauci have not yet been released, though members of the subcommittee say they will be disclosed at some point.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 19:00

• Conservative Billionaire Buys Baltimore Sun Newspaper
  Conservative Billionaire Buys Baltimore Sun Newspaper

  Maryland’s largest daily newspaper, the Baltimore Sun, has been acquired by a conservative billionaire who is the biggest owner of local television stations in the US and has provided favorable coverage for former President Donald Trump. 

  Axios reports David D. Smith, the executive chairman of Sinclair, has acquired The Sun in a private deal from Alden Global Capital. This investment firm is one of the country’s largest newspaper operators. 

  

  The purchase returns The Sun to local ownership. It is unclear how much Smith paid for the newspaper. 

  “I’m in the news business because I believe … we have an absolute responsibility to serve the public interest,” Smith told The Washington Post. 

  He continued: “I think the paper can be hugely profitable and successful and serve a greater public interest over time.” 

  So what could Smith mean when he stated “greater public interest over time”? 

  Well, firstly, the purchase of the newspaper comes as the 2024 presidential election cycle has kicked off. The paper has been analyzed by various media bias websites, such as Media Bias Fact Check, and found “slight to moderate liberal bias” in news reporting. 

  

  Under new ownership, the paper could be shifted from supporting leftist causes to more of a center-conservative bias. 

  At Smith’s flagship WBFF TV station in Baltimore, investigative reporters like Chris Papst have made considerable efforts to uncover corruption in Maryland. Taking the TV station as a guide, this might only suggest that Smith’s newspaper venture could begin a new focus on exposing corrupt Democrats who have controlled Baltimore City for more than half a century, as well as radical progressives in Annapolis. 

  Triffon G. Alatzas, the publisher and editor-in-chief of the newspaper, told the newsroom on Monday that Smith had bought The Sun “to support his hometown newspaper.”

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 18:40

• Art Dealer Testifies That Hunter Expressly Asked For Buyer Information
  Art Dealer Testifies That Hunter Expressly Asked For Buyer Information

  Authored by Jonathan Turley,

  More details are emerging from the recent testimony of Hunter Biden’s art dealer, George Bergès.

  We previously discussed how Bergès confirmed that the accounts of buyers flocking to buy Hunter’s art was false and that most of the art was purchased by his Democratic donor patron, Kevin Morris.

  Not only did Bergès shatter White House claims of a carefully constructed ethical system to keep Hunter from knowing the identity of purchasers, Bergès testified that Hunter expressly demanded to know the identity.

  Various experts objected to the sales as a serious ethical problem of donors using the purchases to assist President Biden and his family.

  The media dutifully reported at the time how the White House was grappling with the ethical questions and, according to the Washington Post, “the White House officials have helped craft an agreement.”

  It was portrayed as unprecedented and unyielding.

  The White House continued to swat down questions by citing an ethical plan created for the sales. Andrew Bates, a spokesperson for the White House, said in a statement that “the President has established the highest ethical standards of any administration in American history, and his family’s commitment to rigorous processes like this is a prime example.”

  Then White House spokesperson (and now MSNBC host) Jennifer Psaki stated:

  “Well, I can tell you that after careful consideration, a system has been established that allows for Hunter Biden to work in his profession within reasonable safeguards […] But all interactions regarding the selling of art and the setting of prices will be handled by a professional gallerist, adhering to the highest industry standards. And any offer out of the normal course would be rejected out of hand. And the gallerist will not share information about buyers or prospective buyers, including their identities, with Hunter Biden or the administration, which provides quite a level of protection and transparency.”

  

  Yet, Bergès reportedly testified that he had no contacts with the White House and Hunter knew the identity of the purchasers of most of the art.

  Notably, Bergès was reading these same reports in the news but never objected to the alleged misrepresentation.

  He admitted that he read of those reports and was confused.

  A staffer asked:

  “When you’re seeing in the press that the White House is putting in certain safeguards regarding an ethics agreement but you’ve had no conversations with [the] White House, I mean, did you ever say to Hunter Biden, ‘Hey, where’s this coming from?’”

  Bergès responded:

  “I might have. I probably did, yeah.”

  He admitted that he was surprised by the coverage “[b]ecause I hadn’t had any communication with the White House about an agreement.”

  That, of course, was never reported. Instead, the media dutifully reported how there was this comprehensive ethical plan in place.

  What was particularly notable is that, despite the false White House claims and extensive coverage, Hunter appears to have discarded any such limits.

  Berges testified that artists usually do not know who buys their art.  So not only did Hunter not comply with the agreement with the first, this was a departure from standard operating procedure to let him know about the purchasers: “…I don’t know how it was phrased or—but I remember that there—that that was the difference…That part was different. Normally, the gallerist does not let the artist know who the collectors are…The first one was that I was required to disclose who the buyers were. In the second one, I was required to not disclose the buyers.”

  The most important testimony, in my view, is still the massive purchase by Morris. This Democratic donor was introduced to Hunter at a Democratic fundraiser for the first time not long before reportedly giving him millions to pay off his taxes and support his lavish lifestyle. He then reportedly purchased most of the art as the media was reporting how hot Hunter was as a new emerging artist. The claims of walling off the identity of purchasers and the high demand for his art proved to be false.

  For his part, Bergès says that he no longer carries Hunter’s art.

  He did confirm that he previously did speak with President Biden in person and on the phone during the period when he was selling his son’s art.

  The media, however, now appears to be, again, largely ignoring the story and what it says about not just the ethical questions but its own prior coverage.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 18:20

• NYC Ends 701-Day Snow Drought As Old Man Winter Returns
  NYC Ends 701-Day Snow Drought As Old Man Winter Returns

  An El Niño winter and a split in the polar vortex have created the perfect weather conditions for New York City to break its 701-day streak without significant snowfall. 

  “It’s been 701 days since Central Park last recorded an inch of snow on a calendar day,” the National Weather Service of New York wrote in a post on social media platform X. They said Central Park received 1.4″, which was enough to break the snow drought. 

  It’s been 701 days since Central Park last recorded an inch of snow on a calendar day.

  Latest totals as of 7 am:

  ❄️Since midnight — 1.0″
  ❄️Storm total — 1.4″

  The streak has ended! #NYwx

  — NWS New York NY (@NWSNewYorkNY) January 16, 2024

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

  The longest snow drought on record for the metro area ends. 

  

  Scenes from NYC. 

  NYC SNOWLESS STREAK ENDS: Inch of snow at Central Park ends 701-day snowless streak in America’s largest city.

  FOX Weather Correspondent @RobertRayWx reports on the latest. #nywx pic.twitter.com/tt3Br2jCxZ

  — FOX Weather (@foxweather) January 16, 2024

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

  Snow has just changed to SLEET in Brooklyn 🧊⚠️

  Just measured 1.7” — snowless streak over! ❄️ @NWSNewYorkNY pic.twitter.com/d2YgMqzlG6

  — Allan Nosoff (@AWxNYC) January 16, 2024

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  It’s been more than 700 days since NYC had more than an inch of snow. Sidewalks are slippery this morning. Be careful. pic.twitter.com/ku5sYiQEtL

  — ☀️🌦 Jason Frazer ⚡️❄️ (@JasonFrazerTV) January 16, 2024

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

  Washington, DC, and Baltimore also ended a snow drought. 

  Washington D.C. officially recorded its first inch of snow since January 16, 2022! How will you spend your snow day?

  Share your photos and videos with us at: https://t.co/4CsumCwMMi

  (Credit: Diego Sanchez) pic.twitter.com/C0cQotLIst

  — 7News DC (@7NewsDC) January 16, 2024

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  With snow on the ground and teeth-chattering cold plaguing the eastern half of the US, we wonder how sanctuary cities will fare with millions of new illegals from areas of the world that are in the tropics. 

  NYC in the snow is a dream pic.twitter.com/3LCVpLRn0m

  — Alexandra Semenova (@alexandraandnyc) January 16, 2024

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  Democrats better keep praying for global warming. 

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 18:00

• Recession Signal: Private-Sector Job Growth Is Being Replaced By Gov't-Sector Job Growth
  Recession Signal: Private-Sector Job Growth Is Being Replaced By Gov’t-Sector Job Growth

  Authored by Ryan McMaken via The Mises Institute,

  Over the past two years, the Biden administration has repeatedly insisted that job growth is amazing, and that the administration has “created” millions of jobs.

  In reality, of course, much of the job growth that did exist was the predictable job growth that came with the end of forced business closures and lockdowns. Job growth was also fueled by rising aggregate demand fueled by runaway growth in government spending. After all, during 2020 and 2021, the regime’s easy money policies meant that the central bank and private banks created approximately seven trillion dollars during that period. 

  Since early 2021, however, the job growth we’re seeing has been increasingly fueled by growth in government-sector jobs. In other words, the job growth we do see in the government sector does not represent the result of private investment, saving, or demand. It’s not organic economic growth. Rather, these government positions are positions that only exist as the result of wealth transferred from the private sector to the government sector.  

  Government-funded jobs are not drivers of growth. They are obstacles to growth, as stated by Ludwig von Mises: 

  …there is need to emphasize the truism that a government can spend or invest only what it takes away from its citizens and that its additional spending and investment curtails the citizens’ spending and investment to the full extent of its quantity.

  Looking at month-to-month job growth since 2021, the graph shows government jobs as a percentage of all new job growth (according to the establishment survey.) This has accelerated over the past six months as government job growth has comprised from 21 percent to 58 percent over that period. Indeed, over the past year, from December 2022 to December 2023, private sector jobs grew at half the pace of government jobs, with private sector payrolls rising 1.5%. During that time, government payrolls increased 3 percent. 

  

  The relationship between government jobs and private sector jobs also can also indicate approaching recessions in many cases.

  Here is a graph that shows year-over-year growth in private sector jobs (gray) and government jobs (red), each as a proportion of all job growth. We can see how in numerous cases, the portion of all jobs that is private tends to deteriorate as recessions approach. For example, as the 1991-1992 recession, approached, we see that new government jobs became a larger and larger share of all new jobs during 1990 and 1991.

  Government jobs made up about 20 percent of all new job growth in early 1990, but by December of that year, government jobs has provided about half of all new job growth. We can clearly see a similar trend with the lead up to the great recession: private-sector jobs began to collapse as early as late 2006 even though government job creation continued to buoy overall job growth in that period.  

  

  During times of strong economic growth, we find that government jobs rarely comprise more than twenty percent of all new jobs.

  Since September of this year, however, government jobs has taken up more than twenty percent of all new jobs in each month. In December, government jobs reached 24.9 percent of all new jobs.

  That’s the largest proportion since the covid panic in March 2020. 

  

  Daniel Lacalle has said that the United States is in the midst of a “private sector recession.” What he means is aggregate numbers can still show good economic trends—such as job growth—while the private sector is stagnating or shrinking. That is, if government spending and government job creation is robust enough, it will mask private sector weakness in the aggregate statistics. 

  That may be the trend we are facing right now. The job growth we do see is increasingly being driven by government spending, and not by private investment. Even worse, the government spending we see is largely deficit spending, meaning the economic “good news” is reliant on massive amounts of new government debt. 

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 17:40

• US Conducts New 'Preemptive Strikes' On Houthi Launch Sites
  US Conducts New ‘Preemptive Strikes’ On Houthi Launch Sites

  On Tuesday US forces carried out another round of strikes on Houthi sites in Yemen, but this time the operation is being dubbed a “pre-emptive” attack that came in response to militants preparing missile launches on the ground in real time.

  “US forces struck and destroyed four Houthi anti-ship ballistic missiles,” a Central Command (CENTCOM) statement saud. “These missiles were prepared to launch from Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen and presented an imminent threat to both merchant and US Navy ships in the region.”

  

  Over the course of the prior day, two commercial ships were hit by Houthi missiles, including the Zografia, in an incident we detailed earlier.

  US defense officials explained of this third significant wave of American strikes against the Houthis, per Politico: 

  The Tuesday attacks were on a much smaller scale and “dynamic” in nature, meaning they were not pre-planned and rather taken in self-defense against missiles that presented an imminent threat to international shipping, one of the officials said. All of the officials were granted anonymity to speak about a sensitive operation before an official announcement.

  These Houthi launches targeting Red Sea transit are coming daily at this point, and so it’s very likely there will be many more counter-attacks to come from the Operation Prosperity Guardian coalition patrolling off Yemen. CENTCOM has has also continued upping its counter-Iran operations in regional waters, also as Tehran is believed to be supplying the Yemeni rebel group with weapons.

  Shell plc multinational oil and gas company has been the latest to suspend tanker operations through the Red Sea. 

  In earlier analysis we explained how the number of commercial vessels that have transited the Red Sea/Suez Canal route has more than halved over the past month amid rising tensions off Yemen, but more than 100 ships, including oil tankers, have crossed the water lane since the US and UK navies advised operators on Friday to steer clear of the route.

  A total of 114 commercial vessels — including oil tankers, bulk carriers, and container ships — have continued with their routes and transited into or out of the Red Sea through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, according to vessel-tracking data monitored by Bloomberg.

  The Houthis have declared war on Red Sea shipping in connection with Israel’s ongoing operation in Gaza. The White House has so far backed away from calling for permanent ceasefire, also as over 100 Israeli hostages remain in Hamas captivity…

  🇺🇸🇮🇱BLINKEN TO STAFF: WE HEAR YOUR CONCERNS ABOUT GAZA – GET BACK TO WORK

  “We’ve had a number of people in the department since Oct, raised questions, concerns, criticisms of policies, policies that Israel pursuing, policies that we are pursuing. Ultimately they have to be on… pic.twitter.com/G4mQzqtIvS

  — Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) January 16, 2024

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

  While attending the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, national security adviser Jake Sullivan strongly suggested the region will soon see more US offensive strikes in Yemen. “We did not say when we launched our attacks, they’re gonna end once and for all,” he warned in the fresh remarks.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 17:20

• Progressive Lawmakers Line Up Behind Costly Fix For Error They Made In Renewable Energy Plan
  Progressive Lawmakers Line Up Behind Costly Fix For Error They Made In Renewable Energy Plan

  By Mark Glennon of Wirepoints

  Oopsie.

  When Congress voted to spend hundreds of billions to switch electricity production to solar and wind, it forgot something: transmission lines. New ones will be needed going to the locations of the new power sources, but nobody bothered to figure out who will pay for it or how much it will cost.

  

  Congressmen Sean Casten (D-IL) and Mike Levin (D-CA) introduced a bill last month to fix their omission, largely at your expense. The bill has already picked up 76 co-sponsors, including eight from Illinois.

  Grab your wallet. Here are the details:

  In 2022, Congress passed the mislabeled Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which will cost an estimated $1.2 trillion, far exceeding initial claims. The IRA actually was the largest energy bill in U.S. history. Tax credits for renewable energy production, among the biggest elements of the law, are estimated to cost $263 billion.

  No cap was placed on those tax credits and they were generous – 30% of project costs. That’s part of the reason for the cost overrun but it also means that new solar and wind production projects are underway. All the better, say IRA supporters.

  Now, however, there’s widespread, bipartisan recognition that those projects are futile without transmission linking them into the electrical grid. Progressive economist Paul Krugman, for example, cheered the IRA but wrote despairingly in the New York Times that “we may need a third, bureaucratic miracle to fix the electricity grid and make this whole thing work.”

  Casten, also an avid IRA supporter, now admits to the gravity of the problem saying that “80% of the clean energy progress we made with the Inflation Reduction Act will be lost unless we reform transmission and permitting.”

  Enter Casten and Levin with their solution, the Clean Electricity and Transmission Acceleration Act (CETA), which they introduced in the House last month.

  What’s in it?

  More tax credits, which is to say more subsidies by taxpayers. A 30% tax credit would go toward qualifying new transmission lines going to renewable sources. The total amount of credits available is again uncapped.

  That’s just part of the 210-page bill. It would also amend the IRA to let the Department of Energy finance transmission facilities designated by DOE as “national interest.”

  It would give the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission exclusive siting authority for “national interest” transmission lines, directing FERC to base its decision to exercise such authority on factors that include enabling the use of renewable energy. That’s important because it appears to be an attempt to override growing roadblocks local citizens have been putting up to new renewable projects on their landscape.

  The bill also contains a range of provisions under the label of “empowerment.” It would, among many other things, establish an Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights; codify the Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights in the EPA; codify the White House Environmental Justice Interagency Council; provide for development an Interagency Federal Environmental Justice Strategy to address “current and historical environmental injustice,” and designate “Tribal Community Engagement Officers” in each agency.

  The bill has 76 House co-sponsors and counting, all Democrats, in addition to Casten and Levin, including Illinoisans Jan Schakowsky, Nicole Budzinski, Jonathan Jackson, Eric Sorensen, Bill Foster, Brad Schneider, Raja Krishnamoorthi and Mike Quigley.

  What will all this cost?

  So far, I have seen nothing at all from bill sponsors or in the press. As always, cost matters little if the results are green.

  But lots of evidence suggests that the cost would certainly be many tens of billions and perhaps hundreds of billions of dollars. For example, interconnection costs sometimes 10 times higher than projects that ultimately got built. Earlier this year, a renewable executive told The New York Times that interconnection costs have become the “no. 1 project killer.” For Texas alone, according to one study, extending the reach of transmission lines to connect more zero-carbon power sources would cost $11 billion by 2035.

  And stories abound about individual projects facing huge interconnection problems. CNBC devoted a three-part series to it.

  Remember that the cost to the government from tax credits or grants to fix the problem is just the start. Utilities would bear a large part of the remaining cost which gets passed through to consumers in rate increases. Insofar as other private sector investors fund the rest of the price, there’s an opportunity cost of capital that might have been invested elsewhere.

  The bill has no chance of passing in its current form in the Republican-majority House. It’s important nevertheless because it represents the progressive starting point of negotiations on a massive problem that both parties recognize. Republicans unanimously opposed the IRA in the House and Senate, but may negotiate a bill to address the problem in order to salvage something of value from what’s already been spent.

  The new bill is also important because it reflects the thinking of progressives and what they’d like to do if they regain full control of Congress. “While acknowledging that the bill stood little chance of passage in the current House,” The Hill reported, “Casten said it would serve as an ‘anchor of democratic energy policy when a window opens up to have that conversation again.”

  Is the public ready to pay up once again for renewable electricity? Most Americans support renewable sources but want a balance with traditional, fossil fuel sources. Good. That’s sensible. But where’s the balance?

  There’s a final, huge kicker near the end of the bill that has nothing to do with energy or transmission lines: It would amend the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to prohibit disparate impact discrimination.

  I found the buried section by chance when going through the bill. No bill sponsor or reporter has mentioned it. “Disparate impact” is a critical issue in discrimination cases. It’s about whether the mere fact of unequal outcomes proves illegal discrimination and what excuses there may be for it. It’s complicated, and Supreme Court rulings depend on who is getting sued, among other variables.

  Suffice it to say, however, that Section 603 of CETA would vastly expand the scope of what would constitute illegal discrimination under the Civil Rights Act, making it easier to sue based on unequal outcomes.

  Why did they hide this proposal in an energy bill. Afraid of what voters would think it they put it up straight as a standalone bill?

  Getting back to the main thrust of CETA, when Paul Krugman wrote that it would take a “bureaucratic miracle to fix the electricity grid and make this whole thing work,” he must have been fantasizing about CETA.

  CETA is that fantasy and more.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 01/16/2024 – 17:00

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