- Even Without War, Russia Has Defeated Europe Already
Even Without War, Russia Has Defeated Europe Already
By Jonathan Holslag of EU Observer
Whether or not Vladimir Putin moves his troops into Ukraine, he has once again confronted Europe with a most painful reality: while being too weak to defend itself, it can no longer rely on the United States to come to its rescue.
Vladimir Putin (second left) with senior military officers on Moscow’s Red Square. ‘Washington just cannot afford a war with Russia now that China has become so powerful’ We are facing a reality in which Russia, despite its economy only having the size of Italy’s, can bully and intimidate a continent thanks to its energy reserves and its readiness to project vast military power.
Sure, any Russian invasion of Ukraine would cost Russia a fortune and likely degrade into a grinding war of attrition. Invasion is unlikely to be president Putin’s preferred option. Yet, this game of brinkmanship has another part of the equation. If Russia invades Ukraine, the costs for Europe will be equally devastating.
It will force gas-addicted European countries to find expensive alternatives and to severe billions in infrastructure, from pipelines, over pumping stations, to dedicated storages.
Russia also remains a key export destination and a supplier of other resources than oil and gas. Think of titanium. While the Kremlin has long prepared a gradual decoupling from Europe, the opposite remains unthinkable for most Europeans.
While a sizeable part of the Russian population would support an intervention in the eastern part of Ukraine, citizens in many European countries will find it hard to accept soldiers to die for what they consider a strange, peripheral country: Ukraine.
Countless times, I have heard very senior European business leaders sympathize with the leadership of Putin, to the point that one got the impression that they were more attracted to Russian strong leadership than Western liberalism.
Cannon fodder
Let’s also be fair. If, at this stage, European countries would have to stand up to a large Russian land invasion, many soldiers would end up as cannon fodder.
Western European land forces have decayed into a bulky peace corps, their wheeled armoured vehicles hardly suitable for combat in the muddy battlefields in eastern Europe, their fire power no match for Russia’s, and their command and communication infrastructure highly-vulnerable to Russia’s immense electronic war-fighting capabilities.
Chasing poorly-equipped terrorists is one thing; facing a formidable conventional army, ready for sacrifice yet another.
Many European land forces struggle with a predator complex from the ‘Global War on Terror’. They are used to being superior, at least in terms of technology and fire-power, and have huge difficulties imagining that the hunter of the last decade might become the hunted in a large-scale conflict.
The whole strategic mindset in that regard has become skewed towards defense; tactics towards limited surgical offense, often even from a distance.
Stand-off, it is called. Land powers like Russia have also trained in precision and long-range strikes, yet always combined with blunt power: wearing volleys of missiles and artillery and big division-size units moving in.
Sacrifice and attrition
If everything in Europe is about efficiency; armed forces like Russia still factor in sacrifice, redundancy, and attrition. Clean wars do not exist in the Russian strategic lexicon.
Europe has a lack of everything. Even if it tries to steer clear of frontline involvement, supporting from behind will not be much in evidence either. Many countries lack stand-off missiles or their ammunition stockpiles are dangerously low. Advanced fighter jets, capable of penetrating Russia’s air defence, are still rare. Special forces that would, a crucial asset, are stuck in Africa and struggle to enlist enough quality recruits.
The US is slowly restocking their arsenals, with new long-range precise ammunitions, but will prefer to send them to the Pacific. It preserves a sizeable conventional deterrence in Europe, including 70,000 troops, hundreds of prepositioned armoured vehicles and dozens of fighter jets.
Yet, this is not sufficient to counter a Russian invasion in a country like Ukraine – and Washington just cannot afford a war with Russia now that China has become so powerful.
We can endlessly reflect on what drives Russia in amassing its vast military presence on Ukraine’s border, on how we came to this point, the misgivings and frustrations on both sides.
What is clear, however, is that we enter a new tournament of great power politics and that Europe arrives at the start not as a strong, unified team, but as throng of plump puerile pygmies.
Tyler Durden
Wed, 01/19/2022 – 02:00 - Conspiracies As Realities, Realities As Conspiracies
Conspiracies As Realities, Realities As Conspiracies
Authored by Victor Davis Hanson via AmGreatness.com,
American politics over the last half decade has become immersed in a series of conspiracy charges leveled by Democrats against their opponents that, in fact, are happening because of them and through them.
The consequences of these conspiracies becoming reality and reality revealing itself as conspiracy have been costly to American prestige, honor, and security. As we move away from denouncing realists as conspiracists, and self-pronounced “realists” are revealed as the true conspirators, let’s review a few of the more damaging of these events.
Russians on the Brain
Consider that the Trump election of 2016, the transition, and the first two years of the Trump presidency were undermined by a media-progressive generated hoax of “Russian collusion.”
The “bombshell” and “walls are closing in” mythologies dominated the network news and cable outlets. It took five years to expose them as rank agit-prop.
Robert Mueller and his “dream team” consumed $40 million of Americans’ money and 22 months of our time—to find the nothingburger that most of the country already knew was nothing. Yet the subtext of the 2018 Democratic takeover of the House was the media narrative that Trump, as Hillary Clinton put it, was an “illegitimate” president, due to Russian collusion.
Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper claimed on national television that Trump was a “Russian asset.” Former CIA head John Brennan assured the nation that the president was “treasonous,” due to his supposed “lies to the American people.”
All sorts of politicians, retired military, and news anchors echoed the charges. The lies and myths of has-been British spy Christopher Steele made him a leftist hero. They were repeated ad nauseam as truth.
FBI grandees like James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, Kevin Clinesmith, and others destroyed their careers in their obsessions over Trump. In the process of destroying themselves, they also nearly wrecked the reputation of the FBI. The Pentagon has the lowest popular support in modern memory. The CIA is more feared by millions of Americans than by our enemies.
Steele could not produce any evidence to back up his scurrilous charges. The inspector general of the Department of Justice found little evidence to substantiate any of the charges. James Comey and Robert Mueller under oath both pleaded either memory problems or denied any knowledge about the FBI’s use of Steele and the role his fake dossier played.
Most of the televised accusers, when under oath before Congress, admitted they had no evidence for their flamboyant charges. Representative Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who claimed the dossier was authentic and that Trump was compromised, has repeatedly been revealed as a liar. In various televised House hearings, he kept getting caught either fabricating, misrepresenting, or warping evidence before his own committee.
No matter. Hillary Clinton and the Left kept pounding “collusion.” The more it was proven false, the more they shouted the lie.
Finally, special counsel John Durham’s investigations, some authentic media investigative reporting, and the preponderance of evidence showed not only that Trump did not collude with the Russians, but that the entire charge was a sick sort of projection on the part of Hillary Clinton and her vassals.
Steele concocted the election-cycle fantasy using a former Clintonite totem in Moscow. Another source was the now indicted Igor Danchenko ( a “primary sub-source”), who was working at the leftist Brookings Institution while feeding Steele.
A cynic might look at this sad chapter and conclude that Hillary Clinton sought to destroy her opponent by paying Christopher Steele to manufacture fantasies fabricated from left-wing and former Clinton associates. Then she used the media, the FBI, the CIA, and the Justice Department to seed the farce while hiding her own role behind three firewalls including the DNC, the Perkins Coie law firm, and Glenn Simpson’s Fusion GPS.
The ultimate irony?
Hillary Clinton did collude with those claiming to have Russian connections to warp an election, and she projected her likely illegal activity onto the target of her attacks. No conspiracist could trump such reality. Will Merrick Garland look at her role in this episode as he conducts his insurrectionist investigations concerning efforts to undermine an election?
What was the post facto cost when such former “conspiracies” became realities, and former realities became the true conspiracies? The damage done was considerable.
We once realistically used the Russians to balance the Chinese. But the Left, which appeased Vladimir Putin with “reset,” now flipped to create a climate of hate indiscriminately against all Russians.
In this tortuous process from reset to collusion, we have empowered Putin among Russians as the heroic American resistor. We lost leverage against the Chinese. We ended up in a situation today where we are talking tough but are, in fact, sinking in a quagmire of fake collusion, the Afghanistan debacle, the Biden train wreck of 2021, and the woke hysteria. All that is making the calculating Putin wonder whether U.S. deterrence is now a phantom. In other words, we look ridiculous.
The Lab We Dare Not Speak
Since the outbreak of the COVID-19 epidemic, the level-4 security Wuhan Institute of Virology lab has been central to all narratives about the origins, nature, and spread of the pandemic.
There have been four cycles of these fantasies and realities.
First came the frantic denials of a connection by the Chinese government, most of the Americana media, a consortium of scientists mostly dependent on Drs. Francis Collins and Anthony Fauci for generous support, corporate grandees with lucrative concessions in China, and the federal health apparat itself.
Second, the iron-clad denial of a human-engineered virus waned by the weight of its own contradictions. Evidence, at first circumstantial, later nearly overwhelming, seeped through the Wuhan denial wall of social media, traditional media, the Chinese government, and the U.S. establishment. Those interests all shared a common purpose of seeing Trump, the supposed Sinophobe, gone and the bat/pangolin fiction conspiracy apparently seemed yet one more way to achieve this goal.
A third phase then emerged, as the true role of Peter Daszak’s EcoHealth Alliance was revealed, as the pathetic international and Chinese-fed “investigations” collapsed in conflicts of interests, as interagency emails emerged from the CDC, NIH, and NIAID, and as a hothead Dr. Fauci protested too much in his paranoid denials before the Senate of his own role in any subsidized gain-of-function research. The American people and some media began to resist the intimidation and look at the evidence.
Now we are at the fourth and final stage of the catastrophe. A once esteemed Fauci has been reduced to a cranky apparatchik. At best he will soon retire with some disgrace, and at worst he will be subject to years of investigation and litigation once his left-wing defenders in Congress, who once found him so useful, lose their majority.
Most others who fiercely denied the human genesis of the supposed “bat” virus have either retired or resigned from their posts at the CDC and NIH. Democratic politicos have stopped slandering those who argued there was no natural origin to the pandemic.
Indeed, they are now parroting the once reviled advice of Dr. Scott Atlas. Stanford immunologists and epidemiologists are no longer smeared but quoted with approval. The Left now seeks to ease the lockdowns, to admit that thousands died “with” rather than “because” of the virus, and to concede that natural immunity is valuable. It agrees that there are therapies and carefully targeted quarantines other than just serial booster vaccinations and mass lockdowns to lower the death toll of the COVID strains and the never-ending mass quarantines. That Biden, not Trump, is suffering from the lockdowns offers added incentive to its revisionism.
As the authority, power, and reputation of Fauci, Inc. waned, several scientists and government investigators are now liberated. They are demonstrating why the engineered virus is wholly different from its natural cousins, and why its manufactured nature is so infectious to humankind. We are getting close to learning, despite vestigial Chinese and U.S. government pushback, how SARS-CoV-2 was birthed, why it spread so quickly, and why so many denied its origins and nature.
Pause for a minute and consider: The origins of the greatest pandemic since the 1918-19 flu—one that has killed millions, occurring at the zenith of global scientific progress, world cooperation, and technological achievement—were simply hidden from the global public.
Worse, anyone with legitimate questions about the official Chinese and Fauci narratives of a naturally occurring bat or pangolin virus that leaped over to humankind, one with no relationship to the nearby Wuhan lab and without prior animal infections, was targeted for character assassination.
Again, we are left with the real conspiracy that blamed the realists as conspiracists. The Chinese and Anthony Fauci played the role of Hillary Clinton, in accusing others of anti-scientific conspiracies as they wove scenarios that were dubious but aimed at aligning powerful figures in a conspiracy of sorts to smother the emerging and astounding truth of their own culpability.
The January 6 “Coup”
Finally, we come to the third case of projection, yet another conspiracy to create conspiracists.
The January 6 riot was disgraceful. But it was a one-day spontaneous, chaotic, illegal entrance in and desecration of the Capitol by assorted buffoons.
We now know that even according to the FBI investigation—that was and is eager to prove a coup—January 6 was not a carefully planned putsch as Joe Biden so blatantly lied recently.
New insurrectionist indictments—by Attorney General Merrick Garland in response to left-wing pressures—targeted a disorganized and psychodramatic group of self-important Oath Keepers wannabes and poseurs. In contrast, serious insurrectionists do not leave their guns behind in order to abide by strict D.C. firearms laws. They do not ride to their rendezvous at the Capitol in golf carts. And they do not stage an insurrection by being unarmed as they scatter about, yell, confront police, raise hell, and meander through the Capitol.
If these had been serious insurrectionists, they would have followed the Antifa model: arriving stealthily in the many hundreds if not thousands, melting through crowds to assigned locations, in black with padded body armor, helmets, various clubs, and carefully coordinating their weeks-long and sustained violence on approved social media.
Or if they were serious about using extra-legal means, they would (to take some non-random examples) encourage retired officers to pen a letter calling on the military to use force to remove a president and advocate in national journals that the military plan for a coup against the elected president, or write op-eds suggesting the president leave “the sooner the better,” or brag about a “conspiracy” and a “coup” of CEOs, who coordinate with the rich, with street activists, and with leftists to “stem the flow of information,” to modulate violence in the street, to flood voting precincts with subsidized ballot workers, and to warp the allotment of resources—and post facto brag in TIME magazine about the successful effort. Or finally perhaps they would just do as Hillary Clinton did: advise their preferred candidate (as she did Joe Biden) never to accept a ballot count that goes other than his preferred way.
Then there is the work of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi who created a January 6 investigation committee. In an unprecedented move, she vetoed the House minority leader’s nominations to the committee. She instead picked her own.
Only two Republicans were willing to serve. They apparently had to fulfill her three criteria of voting for the Trump impeachment, of being so unpopular with Republican voters that their congressional futures will end in 2021 and being on record as praising Nancy Pelosi.
The committee has one left-wing agenda: ferreting out any statement by an elected Republican official deemed too ambiguous about the riot being an insurrection. It seeks to cast them as Jefferson Davis-style Confederates, deserving of removal from Congress for plotting “insurrection,” along the Civil War standards of the 1868 14th Amendment.
The committee members are not interested in reopening the investigation of the officer who shot Ashli Babbitt, a man who may not have ever been sufficiently interrogated by investigators.
They seem indifferent to the likely presence and use of FBI informants.
They care not a whit about the treatment of some uncharged suspects in solitary confinement or detained in primitive jail conditions.
Nor are they concerned about the asymmetrical and weaponized federal reaction to January 6 when compared to general government indifference about the summer 2020 planned riots.
As far as entering federal property to do damage to sacred sites, in May 2020 hundreds sought to break into the White House grounds, injured dozens of secret service agents, and posed such a threat that President Trump was removed to a bunker. All that is now forgotten.
Nor is the committee concerned about the role of prominent Americans in encouraging that summer’s violence, looting, arson, and rioting.
Current Vice President Kamala Harris boasted during the summer 2020 riots that such organized violence would go on and on, and would and should not cease:
They’re not going to stop. They’re not going to stop. This is a movement, I’m telling you. They’re not gonna stop. And everyone beware because they’re not gonna stop. They’re not gonna stop before Election Day and they’re not going to stop after Election Day. And everyone should take note of that. They’re not gonna let up and they should not.
Had Trump voiced Harris’ encouragement of street violence, he would now be indicted.
In investigating a supposed conspiracy, why does the committee conspire to ensure that thousands of hours of videos are not released that might give a more accurate picture of the culpable who prompted the Capitol riot, who participated, and the reaction of the Capitol police?
Why conspire not to force the attorney general and FBI director in closed session to list all FBI informants involved in the riot, or any intergovernmental law enforcement communications about their use?
Why not simply have a comprehensive investigation about 2020-21 domestic violence of all sorts, and begin with summer 2020 and continue to January 6?
Why not allow the nominated Republicans skeptical of the official January 6 narrative to vie on the committee in the pursuit of truth with their opponents? Instead of equating the riot with the Civil War, Pearl Harbor, or 9/11, why not issue a report about the long history of violence in the Capitol to adjudicate comparisons with the January 6 riot?
The answers are obvious. A midterm election looms in fewer than 10 months. Given Biden’s current historic unpopularity, given the failure of his policies, given generic anger at the Democratic Party, the campaign talking points are not going to be the border, Afghanistan, inflation, energy, race relations, or the build back better multitrillion dollar fiasco.
Instead, it will be Trump! “Democracy dies in 2022!!” and “January 6!!!”
Ponder the costs of this January 6 exaggerated narrative. The U.S. Army is now running war games designed to defeat fantasy right-wing domestic terrorists. The FBI is monitoring PTAs and schoolchildren’s parents.
As it searches for “white supremacists” and uses indoctrination educational methods to ensure the end of “white privilege” and “white rage,” the military polls record lows in public support. More than half the country distrusts it. Efforts at recruitment are stalling, despite generous bonuses.
Vaccination mandates apply even to those with acquired immunity from past infection and are also winnowing the ranks. The military failure in Afghanistan and its diversity, equity and inclusion cannibalism have stirred China and Russia to recognize an opportunity. In tandem both now increasingly salivate over Taiwan and Ukraine.
January 6 has been used to slander anyone supporting voter IDs, which are common in Europe and most of the states.
Joe Biden—who in his earlier career wished it known that officials like segregationist George Wallace, Fritz Hollings, and James Eastland were friendly to him—has a long history of racist “gaffes.” He knows he will either not be reelected, or will not run again, or he will be removed from office, or resign. For a failing Biden and a soon to be thrown out narrow congressional Democratic majority, it is now or never.
The Costs
The collusion, COVID-19, and January 6 narratives have been terribly costly to the nation.
Conspiracy projection has split apart the country. The Left has fought efforts to learn the full truth, as they project conspiracies to disguise conspirators.
They have grievously weakened the reputation and authority of the U.S. government here and abroad.
We are lectured that “democracy dies” if the Democrats lose elections and “voter suppression” requires drastic counteraction—even as the Left goes after the Electoral College, the nine-justice Supreme Court, the filibuster, the 50-state union, and the constitutional primacy of states to set voting laws.
All this is as pathetic as it is fatal to the survival of the American project.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 23:50 - Russia Launches Snap War Drills In Belarus Aimed At Thwarting 'NATO Aggression'
Russia Launches Snap War Drills In Belarus Aimed At Thwarting ‘NATO Aggression’
There have been two major developments which threaten to further put Russia and NATO on a collision course in Ukraine. First, Russia and Belarus have initiated joint snap military drills on the latter’s soil, with a large contingency of Russian troops arriving Tuesday in the country for a new wave of military exercises.
Second, British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace has unveiled in a speech before UK parliament delivered Monday that Britain will send Ukraine weapons as part of a new defense assistance package in order to help “defend its borders” against Russian aggression.
File image, Belarus-Russia war games, via Reuters. All of this comes the very week following a series of meetings between Kremlin officials and NATO, which failed to produce any results or even an extension of dialogue, for now at least. This also as on Tuesday Germany Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock met Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in Moscow for the first time, as Berlin has vowed to do all it can to “guarantee Ukraine’s security.”
The AFP described that in Belarus, video put out by the Lukashenko government showed “columns of military vehicles including tanks being unloaded from trains blanketed in snow.”
A Russian defense ministry statement specifically informed the West that the fresh drills are aimed presence at NATO, raising tensions higher:
Russian Deputy Defense Minister Alexander Fomin summoned dozens of foreign military diplomats stationed in Moscow — including 16 from NATO member countries — to announce the drills in Belarus, which he said were aimed at “thwarting external aggression.”
Video published by Belarus’ defense ministry:
The Russian official additionally informed NATO diplomats that its “S-400 missile systems, which Russia has controversially sold to NATO member Turkey, would be deployed as part of the exercises in Belarus.”
Western backers of Ukraine are also now busy ramping up support, with the announced UK arms supplies already being flown into Kiev:
“We have taken the decision to supply Ukraine with light anti-armor defensive weapons systems,” Wallace told the Commons on Monday, adding that “a small number” of British troops would provide training to help Kyiv’s forces in using them.
This reportedly includes anti-tanks weapons, but it has remained officially undisclosed how many weapons are being supplied at what type. “Let me be clear: this support is for short-range and clearly defensive weapon capabilities; they are not strategic weapons and pose no threat to Russia; they are to use in self-defense,” Wallace told MPs on Monday.
Of course, this military build-up in the region greatly increases the chances of a ‘provocation’ which could lead to a shooting war at any moment. Washington has already floated the likelihood of a false flag incident, which it accused Moscow of preparing.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 23:30 - COVID Lab-Leak Whitewash Has Been 'The Death Of Science' Says Professor Who Found 'Unique Fingerprints'
COVID Lab-Leak Whitewash Has Been ‘The Death Of Science’ Says Professor Who Found ‘Unique Fingerprints’
University of London professor Angus Dalgleish, who co-authored a paper in summer 2020 after spotting “unique fingerprints” in Covid-19 samples that point to genetic manipulation, says that he’s been the victim of a “disgusting whitewash,” and that anyone suggesting a non-natural origin for Covid-19 has been silenced by peers.
“This goes back to the days of Copernicus and Galileo – it is the death of science,” said the oncologist – who in 1984 discovered how HIV enters and kills cells.
Dalgleish’s work was roundly rejected by a string of journalists before it was eventually published in a ‘watered-down form,’ according to the Express.
In February 2020, the Lancet had published a letter that “strongly condemned conspiracy theories” suggesting that Covid-19 does not have a natural origin. This highly influential letter – subsequently cited in thousands of scientific publications – was signed by 27 experts including Wellcome Trust head and former Sage member Sir Jeremy Farrar.
However, it has since emerged that two weeks before the letter was published, Sir Jeremy stated in private emails that some senior scientists believed a ‘likely explanation’ was that the virus was man-made. -Express
Indeed, Farrar led a February 1, 2020 teleconference (one day after Farrar emailed Anthony Fauci about a Zero Hedge article suggesting Covid may have come from the Wuhan Institute of Virology) – in which one virologist was “80 percent sure this thing had come out of a lab,” with others sharing his view.
Jeremy Farrar Dalgleish is the author of a book on Covid which claims the virus has “no credible natural ancestor.” He says his team found amino acids within the Covid-19 spike protein with a positive charge – allowing the virus to cling to negative parts of the body.
But it was highly unusual to find so many positive charges in a row because they also repel each other, he said.
“We realised when they released the sequence of the virus it broke the laws of physics for a natural virus meaning it was genetically modified.
“At the time my position was supported by Sir Richard Dearlove, the former head of MI6 who now chairs the University of London board of trustees.”
However, when they tried to publish their work they were turned down by numerous papers, including the Lancet.
“My paper was rejected within five hours”, he said. “Normally it takes three weeks before it is even peer reviewed.” -Express
According to Dalgleish, “It was a political decision for this to be suppressed,” adding that after the paper was released, “I was ostracised. I was fearful – really frightened at the way I was being treated.”
“I was told I was not an expert on coronavirus’ and should just shut up. People tried to push us away. We were told our theory had no rationale and it was a conspiracy theory. I am so angry about this. I have more virus papers cited than most virology experts and they tried to push me aside.
“They did not even look at the science. It was obvious it was a gain of function escape from a lab and I say escape, but that is generous. We had this data in late February after the sequences were released.
“This has been a whitewash. This whole thing has killed science. Science is meant to look at evidence. It is truly unbelievable.“
According to Jacques van Helden, a bioinformatics professor at Aix-Marseille University in France, Peter Daszak’s February 2020 Lancet letter effectively shut down debate over the origins of Covid-19.
“By labelling anyone with different views a conspiracy theorist, the Lancet letter was the worst form of bullying in full contravention of the scientific method,” said van Helden,” adding “To say that something has leaked from a lab does not make it a conspiracy theory.”
“Why was that letter signed by so many people? Why can’t we discuss this issue in a scientific journal? I do not want to have to resort to an open exchange on Twitter.”
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 23:10 - As US Homebuilders Crash, China Property Developers Set To Surge As PBOC Sends "Clear Easing Signal"
As US Homebuilders Crash, China Property Developers Set To Surge As PBOC Sends “Clear Easing Signal”
Over the weekend, we said that as a major divergence has emerged between China and the US, where the former is now actively easing – ostensibly to support the country’s reeling property market but also to prevent a complete collapse in GDP, by cutting rates and injecting gobs of new credit – and the former is about to undertake a major tightening cycle, a trade has emerged to capitalize on this divergence whereby one should pair trade a long in beaten down Chinese property developers while shorting US homebuilders…
… this trade is starting to outperform, with US homebuilders tumbling on Tuesday with some builders sinking by the most since May, amid fears of a slowdown in the property market due to higher years. The S&P Supercomposite Homebuilding Index plunged by as much as 5.2% with all members are trading lower on Tuesday. KB Home was down as much as 8.5% for its biggest intraday decline since May 2021, LGI Homes down by as much as 7.8%, Meritage Homes lower by as much as 6.4% for its worst intraday decline since May 2021, and Lennar sliding as much as 6.3% to also notch its sharpest decline since May.
Meanwhile, as Bloomberg’s Wes Goodman writes, China stocks may draw some support amid the global market rout, especially if the yuan slides after the PBOC said it plans to use more monetary policy tools to spur the economy. China bonds jumped on Tuesday prior to the announcement, though still supported by the outlook for more easing. The yuan also weakened as the central bank said it will not allow one-way moves in the currency, while Goldman strategists said that the PBOC press conference sent “clear policy easing signals.”
The larger Asia stock market is starting under a cloud following the U.S. rout, triggered by the relentless advance in Treasury yields and forecasts for Fed tightening, while Asian currencies may lose some appeal as the dollar rises. However, keep an eye on China’s property developers now that Beijing has made it clear it will backstop the housing sector and provide support to prevent China’s largest property developer, Country Garden, from becoming the next Evergrande.
And sure enough, a real-time update of the chart shown above shows that the relationship between easing China and tightening US may have now troughed …
… and may be on its way to becoming what we dubbed the “trade of 2022.”
Will this be the trade of 2022https://t.co/4rH2QdDUv7 pic.twitter.com/dLZO3p0Npp
— zerohedge (@zerohedge) January 9, 2022
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 22:50 - Israel Used Pegasus Spyware Against Own Citizens For Warrantless Surveillance
Israel Used Pegasus Spyware Against Own Citizens For Warrantless Surveillance
Authored by Brett Wilkins via Common Dreams,
Digital privacy advocates were alarmed but not surprised Tuesday by a report alleging that police in Israel used NSO’s Pegasus spyware against Israeli citizens, including opponents of former right-wing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
According to Calcalist, the special operations cyber unit of Israel’s police remotely planted the private company’s spyware on phones belonging to political activists, mayors, former government employees, and others, “taking over their devices and having the ability to listen to all their calls and read all their messages.”
Image via Tech Xplore The reporting indicates that the extrajudicial surveillance occurred without court supervision, and police did not request search or bugging warrants for the targeted individuals—who were suspected of no crimes. “After all the other surveillance scandals have been exposed, the chickens come home to roost,” tweeted Israeli-American journalist Mairav Zonszein. “Not surprising. What will be is if justice is served.”
Those scandals include repeated revelations that NSO’s spyware was surreptitiously installed on the devices of dissidents, human rights defenders, journalists, and others around the world—especially in other Middle Eastern nations—as well as reporting last month that Pegasus was used by an unknown party or parties to hack the iPhones of nearly a dozen U.S. State Department officials.
NSO, an Israeli company, says Pegasus is solely intended for crime and terrorism prevention.
“However,” reports Calcalist, “NSO’s spyware was also used by police for phishing purposes: attempts to phish for information in an intelligence target’s phone without knowing in advance that the target committed any crime. Pegasus was installed in a cellphone of a person close to a senior politician in order to try and find evidence relating to a corruption investigation.”
Roee Neuman, a spokesperson for the Black Flags, a former protest movement that staged weekly anti-Netanyahu demonstrations, demanded Tuesday that Israeli Minister of Public Security Omer Bar-Lev “immediately” release the names of people the police targeted with Pegasus.
There is nothing surprising in the news that the Israeli police has been using NSO’s Pegasus to spy on Bibi’s political opponents among others.
Israel is a surveillance state par excellence, only it manages to cloak itself with a democratic facade. https://t.co/3KLXPtNkxa
— Marwa Fatafta مروة فطافطة (@marwasf) January 18, 2022
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
“This is not the time for silence,” he tweeted. “Now is the time for action.” John Scott-Railton, a senior researcher at the University of Toronto-based Citizen Lab who has been following Pegasus for six years, tweeted in response to the new report: “Let me tell you, this is depressingly familiar. Give authorities secret, unaccountable hacking powers, and abuse is only a matter of time.”
Eric Goldstein, Human Rights Watch’s deputy director for the Middle East and North Africa, asked, “When it comes to [Netanyahu] and NSO’s business model, is any of this surprising?”
Responding to the widespread outrage in Israel over the new revelations, Israeli journalist and +972 executive director Haggai Matar tweeted that criticism of such surveillance must also “extend to all intrusive and oppressive tools used against Palestinians.”
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 22:30 - Olympic Athletes Advised Not To Bring Phones To Beijing Over Spying Concerns
Olympic Athletes Advised Not To Bring Phones To Beijing Over Spying Concerns
Athletes who are preparing to travel to Beijing for the Winter Games next month might want to think about leaving their personal smart phones at home. The reason: a new app developed by Beijing to track Olympic athletes’ health data has been found to have several startling security flaws, according to a group of Canadian researchers called Citizen Lab.
Citizen Lab told the NYT and other news organizations that it had shared its findings with the Beijing Organizing Committee on Dec. 3 but had not received any response. As a result, they’re warning all athletes about the app’s flaws, news that probably shouldn’t come as a surprise given the CCP’s reputation for mass surveillance.
According to the NYT, the app – called MY2022 – is designed to transmit coronavirus test results, travel information and other personal data “failed to verify the signature used in encrypted transfers, or didn’t encrypt the data at all,” according to the report by Citizen Lab.
But the organization also found that the app will actively censor content viewed on users’ phones: a series of political terms have been marked for censorship in the code.
A Canberra-based cybersecurity company even went so far as to advise athletes to leave their phones at home, according to the Financial Review.
The MY2022 app was created by the Beijing Organizing Committee supposedly to track and share COVID-related medical information among athletes during the Games. As for whom these data will be shared with, the app doesn’t make clear.
The researchers also claimed that the app failed to validate SSL certificates, which are needed to authenticate a website’s identity and enable an encrypted connection. This flaw can be exploited by hackers hoping to transmit the data to some other malicious site.
“Such data can be read by any passive eavesdropper, such as someone in range of an unsecured WiFi access point, someone operating a WiFi hotspot, or an Internet Service Provider or other telecommunications company,” the report said.
According to the NYT, the worries about the app’s shortcomings “underscore broader worries about censorship and surveillance during the Games in China, which has one of the world’s most sophisticated surveillance and censorship systems.”
As a sop to the west, the Chinese government has already promised foreign athletes that they would be able to access the open Internet during their time in China.
The Games are slated to begin Feb. 4, but several countries including the US, the UK, Japan and Australia have announced diplomatic boycotts of the Games over concerns about human rights in Xinjiang, a far-flung western province that’s home to most of China’s indigenous Uyghers.
China has entered the final stages of planning for the pandemic. The app, called MY2022, was designed to bolster those precautions, enabling electronic links between the government and participants to contact trace in the event of any outbreaks. It resembles a broader system of app-based health codes used to control population movements in the event of outbreaks.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 22:10 - Round 2? Eastern US Braces For Two Winter Storms
Round 2? Eastern US Braces For Two Winter Storms
A wintry outbreak appears to be ongoing in the eastern US as millions of folks in Mid-Atlantic and Northeast states prepare for two more winter storms expected this week.
AccuWeather forecasters expected a wintry mix Wednesday night into Thursday and a second storm could produce accumulating snow Friday night into Saturday.
“The energy for the first storm is moving onshore along the Pacific coast on Monday, and if that catches up to the front a certain way, there could be a narrow, sneaky zone of 3 inches of snow from parts of the Tennessee Valley to the lower mid-Atlantic coast in the Wednesday night to Thursday time frame,” AccuWeather Chief Meteorologist Bernie Rayno said.
Rayno warned, “this isn’t the only storm we have to watch this week.” He said a larger storm would develop in the Southern states and potentially move northward towards Mid-Atlantic and Northeast states and collide with “another fresh injection of Arctic air” between Friday and early Saturday.
The next round of cold air will keep average temperatures in New York City well below a 30-year average through the end of the month. This means heating demand will rise and put a bid under natural gas prices.
So far this month, natgas prices linked to Henry Hub contracts have jumped as much as 36% on cold weather and snowstorms.
Bloomberg Intelligence’s senior US oil/gas analyst Vincent Piazza was overly bullish on natgas for the remainder of the month. He wrote in a note Tuesday:
Weather across most of the US over the next 8-14 days should be more bullish for Henry Hub prices, yet the rally in natural gas production is pushing them below our bearish view around $4 per million BTUs. Physical-market conditions remain somewhat clouded during heating season, and our confidence in the trajectory of the winter strip persists. Still, levels below $4 seem pessimistic, compared with our negative stance when prices surpassed $6 in 4Q. January and February remain crucial for draws, and operators’ capital discipline in 2022 isn’t likely to drive outsized growth in gas volume.
Last week, natgas prices recorded their largest weekly gains since November. We suspect as temperatures remain frigid and the prospects for additional winter storms to batter the eastern US, a bid will stay under energy prices this month.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 21:50 - Biden's Infrastructure Bill, Now Signed Into Law, Mandates "Vehicle Kill Switches" By 2026
Biden’s Infrastructure Bill, Now Signed Into Law, Mandates “Vehicle Kill Switches” By 2026
The rumors we first reported on back in December have turned out to be true: the United States federal government is apparently in the process of trying to force automakers to install kill switches in their vehicles that authorities can use to shut down any newer vehicle.
The law comes as part of President Biden’s infrastructure bill, which was recently signed into law, according to Yahoo. The government kill switch is – like all good thefts of civil liberties – being positioned as a “safety measure”. The mandate needs to be put into effect by 2026, Muscle Cars & Trucks reported.
We noted last month that former Rep. Bob Barr, writing for The Daily Caller, called the measure included in the bill “disturbingly short on details”, but for the fact that the proposed device must “passively monitor the performance of a driver of a motor vehicle to accurately identify whether that driver may be impaired.”
Which, of course, is code for some kind of device that is constantly on and monitoring your vehicle – and will likely have the power to shut down your vehicle anytime it wants.
“This is a privacy disaster in the making, and the fact that the provision made it through the Congress reveals — yet again — how little its members care about the privacy of their constituents,” The Daily Caller wrote.
It appears that in President Biden’s future, not only will you not be in charge of your own personal health decisions, but you also won’t be in charge of whether or not you can fire up your car, which you bought with your hard-earned money, to drive it somewhere, when you deem fit.
That decision will now “rest in the hands of an algorithm”, the report said. Similar monitoring and control devices have faced constitutional opposition, the report notes, “notably with the 5th Amendment’s right to not self-incriminate, and the 6th Amendment’s right to face one’s accuser.”
Barr concluded: “Unless this regulatory mandate is not quickly removed or defanged by way of an appropriations rider preventing its implementation, the freedom of the open road that individual car ownership brought to the American Dream, will be but another vague memory of an era no longer to be enjoyed by future generations.”
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 21:30 - Man Suffers "Agonizing" Penile Blood Clot Caused By COVID
Man Suffers “Agonizing” Penile Blood Clot Caused By COVID
As it turns out, one man’s bodily reaction to COVID has proven that the virus truly isn’t confined to the throat and upper respiratory tract.
According to a foreign medical journal, an Iranian man has drawn the interest of doctors after reporting “agonizing” pain in his penis that turned out to have been caused by blood clots that seriously threatened the man’s sexual health.
The man, who wasn’t named in the news reports about the incident, had suffered penile pain for three days before being seen by a urologist in Iran, who referred him for tests. Keep in mind: one of the side effects of mRNA COVID jabs is they cause blood clots in the heart.
The patient’s discomfort began following an erection while having sex, according to the 41-year-old married man, who had not experienced any trauma to his pelvic area that might explain his behavior.
Scientists have learned over the course of the pandemic that COVID doesn’t just cause respiratory symptoms: One of its other features is to increase the tendency of blood to clot. In fact, this is often the cause of death.
“Roughly, 20% to 50% of hospitalized patients with COVID infection have abnormal coagulation tests,” Morteza Bagheri wrote.
“Searching the literature showed no previously published similar case of deep dorsal penile vein thrombosis following COVID infection and our patient is the first reported case,” Bagheri continued.
Penile complications have occurred in the US, too. A 69-year-old man in Ohio suffered a three-hour erection – a condition called priapism – due to blood clotting problems in his penis.
Writing in the American Journal of American Medicine, a team of medics said that they believed COVID had caused clots to form in his penis, trapping blood in the erection chambers. Doctors had to drain blood from the penis using a needle because ice packs didn’t work to bring the stiffness down.
Over in France, another man in his 60s had to go through the same procedure after COVID left him with an erection that lasted for four hours.
However, the damage caused to the man’s blood vessels during this episode could make it more difficult for him to get future erections.
None of this is news, of course: As we reported last year, one study established a link between erectile dysfunction and COVID.
“In our pilot study, we found that men who previously did not complain of erectile dysfunction developed pretty severe erectile dysfunction after the onset of COVID-19 infection,” the study’s authors wrote.
This doesn’t bode well for birth rates, which have fallen substantially in recent years in the West, as Tesla CEO Elon Musk pointed out in a series of tweets earlier this week.
We should be much more worried about population collapse
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 18, 2022
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 21:10 - Israel Offers UAE 'Intelligence & Security' Help After Deadly Houthi Drone Attack
Israel Offers UAE ‘Intelligence & Security’ Help After Deadly Houthi Drone Attack
Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels have claimed responsibility for a deadly drone and ballistic missile attack which rocked the United Arab Emirates’ capital of Abu Dhabi on Monday. The strike, which demonstrated an increasingly sophisticated capability among the Houthis, hit an oil facility owned by the Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. A Houthi military spokesman said that the group “carried out… a successful military operation” against “important and sensitive Emirati sites and installations.”
“The attack killed two Indian nationals and one Pakistani as three tankers at the site exploded, police said,” The Associated Press reports. “Six people were also wounded at the facility, which is near Al-Dhafra Air Base, a massive Emirati installation also home to American and French forces.”
Screenshot purporting to show Monday attack aftermath, via Times of Israel. The AP also suggested a possible attack during the same aerial offensive which hit Abu Dhabi International Airport, given a fire broke out there. Subsequent satellite images which emerged showed significant damage at the Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. facility, which is the state-owned energy firm providing much of the Arab Gulf country’s national oil wealth.
On Tuesday, there was a surprise offer of intelligence assistance from Israel, which follows the September 2020 signing of normalization between the UAE and Israel under the Abraham Accords.
Prime Minister Naftali Bennett wrote a letter to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed saying that he “ordered the Israeli security establishment to provide their counterparts in the UAE with any assistance” in order to defend against future potential attacks.
The Times of Israel reports that PM Bennett said the following:
“Israel stands with the UAE. I stand with [Crown Prince] Mohammed bin Zayed. The world should stand against terror.”
In a letter to bin Zayed, Bennett said Jerusalem was committed to working with Abu Dhabi “in the ongoing battle against extremist forces in the region, and we will continue to partner with you to defeat our common enemies.”
The UAE has vowed revenge, with the UAE-Saudi coalition have already launched fresh strikes “targeting Houthi camps and headquarters” in Sanaa, according to Gulf media.
VIA @Quicktake: Satellite photos show the aftermath of a deadly drone strike on an oil facility in Abu Dhabi.Yemen’s Houthi rebels claimed responsibility for Monday’s attack https://t.co/OcACrqqyi3 pic.twitter.com/8SvKsGNnwG
— Traffic Updates + Useful Info (@trafficbutter) January 18, 2022
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At the same time UAE Foreign Minister Abdullah bin Zayed Al-Nahyan announced that “We condemn the Houthi terrorist militia’s targeting of civilian areas and facilities on UAE soil today… this sinful targeting will not go unpunished.” A UAE statement further dubbed it a “heinous criminal escalation.”
The timing of this increased security partnership between Israel and the UAE – which up until the tail-end of the Trump administration didn’t even have official relations – is further interesting given the ongoing diplomatic talks between the Saudis and Iranians which strive to mutually reopen embassies. Certainly Israel getting deeper into assisting the coalition in the Yemen conflict will be alarming for Tehran, pitting archenemies Israel and Iran on opposite sides of another regional war in a more direct way.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 20:50 - WHO Crushes Biden COVID Plan, Says "No Evidence At All" That Healthy Kids Needs 'Booster' Jabs
WHO Crushes Biden COVID Plan, Says “No Evidence At All” That Healthy Kids Needs ‘Booster’ Jabs
The Chief Scientist of the World Health Organization has just crushed what little credibility the Biden administration’s COVID response team had by confirming what most parents’ common-sense already told them – that there is no evidence that healthy children need booster doses of COVID-19 vaccine.
WHO Chief Scientist Dr. Soumya Swaminathan said Tuesday that “there is no evidence right now that healthy children or adolescents need boosters. No evidence at all.”
“The aim is to protect the most vulnerable, to protect those at highest risk of severe disease and dying. Those are our elderly populations, immuno-compromised people with underlying conditions, but also healthcare workers,” she said.
Watch her full statement here:
Swaminathan’s comments come roughly two weeks after the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) approved booster shots for adolescents aged 12 to 17 amid the current surge in coronavirus cases due to the highly contagious omicron variant.
Israel has begun offering boosters to children as young as 12, Hungary has also done so, and Germany became the latest country to recommend that all children between ages of 12 and 17 receive a COVID-19 booster shot.
Swaminathan said the agency’s advisory group, called Sage, or the Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization, will meet later this week to consider how countries should think about giving booster shots.
The initial jabs have proven ineffective and dangerous, contrary to the insistence of politicians, big money media, and college administrators.
The case for boosters of more-of-the-same across many schools and college campuses has now become ludicrous.
In fact, very recently, two Ivy League parents Joni McGary and Dr. Alison Pretti have decided up to stand-up to colleges determined to impose the experimental vaccine booster jab on students. Watch:
Science is now on their side (well WHO “science” that is).
However, we are sure Fauci, Walensky, and Biden will be full-court-press tomorrow to continue to pressure parents to get their kids (enter ‘whisper mode’) patriotically boosted… because of the science (as long as it’s not the WHO Chief Scientist’s “science”.)
We give none other than Rand Paul the last word, since he has been among the most outspoken against Fauci’s (and Birx’s before him) so-called “science”…
[why is the goverment] pushing booster vaccines on kids for a disease is that is less deadly in children than the season flu.”
A good question Senator Paul.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 20:30 - Supreme Court To Hear Appeal By Christian High School Football Coach Fired For Praying On The Field
Supreme Court To Hear Appeal By Christian High School Football Coach Fired For Praying On The Field
Having obviously solved all of the rest of the world’s problems, the U.S. Supreme Court has decided it is going to hear an appeal by a Christian former high school football coach who was suspended for refusing to stop praying on the football field.
A decision on the case “could expand the religious rights of employees of public institutions,” according to Reuters.
The coach, Joseph Kennedy, served as assistant coach in Bremerton, Washington. Lower courts threw out his claims that the school district was violating his free speech and religious rights afforded to him by the U.S. Constitution.
Last year, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against Kennedy, who had been an assistant coach at Bremerton High School from 2008 to 2015.
As Reuters notes, the heart of the issue relies in whether, as a public employee, the coach’s religious devotion among players is government speech, which can be regulated under Supreme Court precedents or a private act, which can’t.
Kennedy has argued his prayers and speeches were private in nature and “not part of his official duties as coach”. The school district disagreed and said such speeches and prayers could be coercive. Some parents argued their children were feeling “forced” to participate when they may not have wanted to.
Rachel Laser, president of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, said: “No child attending public school should have to pray to play school sports.”
Kelly Shackelford, president and CEO of First Liberty Institute, a conservative religious rights group helping to represent Kennedy, retorted: “No teacher or coach should lose their job for simply expressing their faith while in public. By taking this important case, the Supreme Court can protect the right of every American to engage in private religious expression, including praying in public, without fear of punishment.”
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 20:10 - Eisenhower's Warning About The Military-Industrial Complex Is Still Valid
Eisenhower’s Warning About The Military-Industrial Complex Is Still Valid
With people profiting from armaments and their development, there will inevitably be the push for more weapons…
President Dwight Eisenhower’s farewell address of Jan. 17, 1961, is just as relevant today as back then. Ike warned American citizens of the “military-industrial complex” and the dangers it presented to our nation and the world.
Eisenhower was rightly wary of the armaments industry, which at that time was relatively new. Ike knew that such a massive arms industry could dominate the nation.
Eisenhower said in his speech, “This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence – economic, political, even spiritual – is felt in every city, every state house, every office of the federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.”
Resources for this arms industry would come from the American people. And if the arms industry is large, that burden becomes substantial. The more you finance the military, the less money you have for other priorities.
With people profiting from armaments and their development, there will inevitably be the push for more weapons. Any arms buildup will encourage other nations to build up their weapons. Arms races remain a continuing danger.
Eisenhower further warned:
“In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.”
Ike believed the American people needed to be politically active when it came to regulating the arms industry. He said:
“Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.”
We need to question military spending, especially when it comes at the expense of social programs. For example, the Build Back Better legislation is being rejected by many senators complaining about its costs. This means important social programs, such as the Child Tax Credit, free school meals and summer feeding for impoverished children won’t get passed because they claim they’re too expensive.
Yet those same senators are not questioning a nearly $2 trillion program of nuclear weapons modernization. Spending on nuclear weapons simply encourages arms races with Russia and China.
Eisenhower warned against such reckless military spending that comes at the expense of the American people.
Ike said, “As we peer into society’s future, we — you and I, and our government — must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow.”
Eisenhower emphasized in his speech the need for diplomacy and peacemaking. He said:
“Disarmament, with mutual honor and confidence, is a continuing imperative. Together we must learn how to compose differences, not with arms, but with intellect and decent purpose.”
It is dangerous enough to spend so much on weapons, but to disregard diplomacy makes it worse. We have seen treaties rejected in recent years and no new ones being developed. The U.S. withdrew from the Open Skies Treaty and has failed to ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. These are both initiatives Eisenhower originally proposed with the idea of helping to move us away from expensive arms races.
We should expect our leaders to be mindful of Eisenhower’s military-industrial complex warning. As citizens we must watch closely to ensure we don’t become captive to a giant arms industry at the expense of all other aspects of life.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 19:50 - Oil Spikes To Fresh 7-Year High After Key Iraq-Turkey Pipeline Explosion
Oil Spikes To Fresh 7-Year High After Key Iraq-Turkey Pipeline Explosion
Despite dollar strength today (and more worrisome ZeroCOVID actions from China), oil prices continued to rise but news after-hours that an explosion knocked out a major pipeline sparked more upside.
OIL MARKET: Iraq-Turkey oil pipeline halted after explosion and fire, says a Turkish state-owned operator Botas. The line usually carries >450kb/d from northern Iraq into the Mediterranean port of Ceyhan | #OOTT Botas statement: https://t.co/kmwppy0yWJpic.twitter.com/GCOZFxb2rF
— Javier Blas (@JavierBlas) January 18, 2022
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Little is known about the cause, but the explosion at a pipeline connecting Northern Iraq and the port of Ceyhan in the Mediterranean has taken 450kb/d of supply offline in an already very tight crude oil market.
The pipelines have been halted before: Back in 2012 blasts blamed on saboteurs halted the link for several months.
The headlines sent oil prices spiking with WTI topping $86 for the first time since Oct 2014 (Brent neared $89)…
This news follows a ballistic missile attack over the weekend, where Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen targeted oil infrastructure in the UAE.
Pipeline operator Botas said the fire has been brought under control and cooling operations were under way.
Botas said the it would reopen once the “necessary measures” had been taken, but gave no indication of timing.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 19:30 - MIT-Educated Doctor Ordered To Undergo Psych Evaluation After Prescribing Ivermectin
MIT-Educated Doctor Ordered To Undergo Psych Evaluation After Prescribing Ivermectin
Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Summit News,
An MIT-educated doctor who prescribed COVID patients Ivermectin and Hydroxychloroquine had her medical license suspended and was ordered to undergo a psychiatric evaluation.
Maine’s Board of Licensure in Medicine voted to pull Dr Meryl Nass’ medical license for 30 days after accusing her of circulating “misinformation” about COVID-19.
Health officials asserted that Nass “constitutes an immediate jeopardy to the health and physical safety of the public who might receive her medical services” as a result of her procuring anti-viral drugs to treat COVID.
The medical board voted to suspend Nass after receiving just two complaints that she was posting false information on her blog and on Twitter.
A doctor informed the Maine board of how he was contacted by the son of a patient who claimed his father was “borderline delirious” and “not doing well” after being prescribed Ivermectin by Nass.
Nass also self-reported to the medical board when she admitted obtaining Hydroxychloroquine by falsely claiming her COVID patient was suffering from Lyme disease.
“This was the only way to get a potentially life-saving drug for my patient,” said Ness.
This is why so few doctors are willing to speak up. In this crazy world, they are risking everything for not toeing the line. This is someone who showed actual courage. https://t.co/YaX5zHgUGL
— DMChowdhs (@DChowdhs) January 18, 2022
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In her blog posts, Ness has questioned the efficacy and safety of COVID-19 vaccines, asserting that they are associated with reproductive harm.
Ivermectin and Hydroxychloroquine have proven controversial because they are not officially authorized by the FDA to treat COVID, but some doctors and prominent public figures have asserted that they work well against the virus.
The media has also engaged in misinformation surrounding Ivermectin, with the Associated Press having to apologize for falsely claiming that 70 per cent of calls to the Mississippi Poison Control Center were about people ingesting ivermectin to treat COVID-19.
CNN refused to apologize to Joe Rogan after falsely claiming the podcast host took “horse dewormer,” despite Rogan having been given Ivermectin, a drug routinely used to treat humans, by a licensed doctor.
“They shouldn’t have said it was horse dewormer,” acknowledged CNN’s Dr. Sanjay Gupta during an appearance on Rogan’s show.
Last week, Rogan accused CNN of doctoring a video of himself from last year in which the host announced that he had COVID.
Joe Rogan asks Sanjay Gupta if it bothers him that CNN outright lied about Rogan taking horse dewormer to recover from covid. This is fantastic: pic.twitter.com/PEgJqIXhSD
— Clay Travis (@ClayTravis) October 14, 2021
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Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 19:10 - World Anti-Doping Agency Warns Athletes Over Contaminated Chinese Meat Ahead Of Beijing 2022
World Anti-Doping Agency Warns Athletes Over Contaminated Chinese Meat Ahead Of Beijing 2022
Authored by Rita Li via The Epoch Times,
Olympic athletes must “exercise extreme caution” as they eat Chinese meat, which can be contaminated with the prohibited substance clenbuterol, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) warned last week.
A WADA spokesperson said its guidelines for traveling athletes “only to eat at places given the all-clear by event organizers” in countries such as China remained in place, Olympic news website Inside the Games reported.
It came after the German Anti-Doping Agency alerted its athletes to avoid Chinese meat at all cost and to seek an alternative over possible clenbuterol contamination.
Concerns over contaminated Chinese meat have existed for decades, although China banned farmers in 1997 from using clenbuterol, also known as “lean meat powder,” to feed livestock such as swine and calves. The illegal food additive was designed to produce leaner meat by speeding up muscle-building and the burning of fat.
Competitors of the upcoming Games are unlikely to have their meals outside the Athletes’ Village where they could eat such performance-enhancing foods, as Beijing started operating a closed-loop system two weeks ago. Athletes will enter the Olympic bubble upon their arrival or after 21 days in quarantine if not fully vaccinated.
According to the report, WADA said it was the “responsibility of event organizers and governments to ensure the meat available to athletes is not contaminated,” including at the Village.
Athletes could test positive in drug tests for “very low levels” of clenbuterol, the spokesperson added.
Clenbuterol, which was banned by the European Union in 1988 and the United States in 1991, can also cause serious health problems in humans including tremors, nausea, and headaches.
Yet scandals in the industry led to waves of domestic and foreign skepticism with Chinese authorities’ capacity to properly regulate food safety.
In March 2011, hundreds of Chinese people became sick from consuming pork contaminated with clenbuterol, according to the National Center for Biotechnology Information, as some pig farmers continued to illegally use the drug for profit.
In 2012, China’s General Administration of Sports issued an urgent demand telling Chinese Olympic athletes not to eat meat, over fears that they would consume clenbuterol. The announcement came after Chinese Olympic judo champion Tong Wen was banned for two years for having traces of clenbuterol in her bloodstream.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 18:30 - US Gov't Probes Alibaba's Cloud Unit For National Security Risks
US Gov’t Probes Alibaba’s Cloud Unit For National Security Risks
Reuters reports the U.S. Commerce Department’s Office of Intelligence and Security is reviewing e-commerce giant Alibaba Group’s cloud business to decide whether U.S. citizens’ and businesses’ most sensitive personal information stored on a foreign adversary’s cloud network is a national security risk.
Three people briefed on the matter told Reuters the Office of Intelligence and Security launched a probe on how U.S. citizens and companies store personal information and intellectual property abroad and whether the Chinese government could access the cloud to steal the sensitive information.
Findings from the probe could eventually influence how personal information and intellectual property are stored abroad. According to one of the sources, there’s the very real possibility that Americans could be prohibited from using the service.
Alibaba’s U.S. cloud business is tiny and wouldn’t significantly impact U.S. citizens and companies if there was a ban. The company’s U.S. cloud business only generates $50 million in revenue per year.
Concern about Alibaba stemmed from former President Trump. The Office of Intelligence and Security was created under the Trump administration to investigate U.S. firms and the internet, telecom, and tech companies from doing business with foreign adversaries like China and Russia. The office has been concentrated on Chinese cloud providers, said one of the sources, because Beijing’s data theft is a real threat.
Months before President Trump left office. He issued a warning against Chinese cloud providers “to prevent U.S. citizens’ most sensitive personal information and our businesses’ most valuable intellectual property…from being stored and processed on cloud-based systems accessible to our foreign adversaries.”
Alibaba’s US ADR shares slid Tuesday morning on a combination of the Reuters’ report and a jump in Treasury yields.
Tech tensions between the U.S. and China have been ongoing as both superpowers are on a course for a ‘soft’ technological decoupling.
In recent years, Washington has raised many concerns about China’s technological advancements and has deemed it a national security risk.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 18:10 - Experts Are Warning That Empty Shelves And Food Shortages Are Going To Continue For Many Weeks To Come
Experts Are Warning That Empty Shelves And Food Shortages Are Going To Continue For Many Weeks To Come
Authored by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse,
The term “return to normal” is being thrown around a lot these days, but will things ever truly return to the way that they were before the pandemic came along? I don’t think so.
From an economic standpoint, an extraordinary amount of lasting damage has been done over the past two years. A seemingly endless list of major problems has thrown thousands upon thousands of critical supply chains into a complete and utter state of chaos, and this has resulted in some very painful shortages. For quite a while, the mainstream media kept insisting that the shortages would soon be gone, but now they are being forced to admit the truth. If you can believe it, NPR has even published a major story about the growing shortages in this country…
No, you’re not imagining it. Some grocery store shelves are bare again, conjuring bad memories of spring 2020 for many.
Social media is rife with images of empty supermarket aisles and signs explaining the lack of available food and other items. Stores such as Aldi have apologized to customers for the shortages.
Nobody in the mainstream media ever imagined that the shortages would last this long.
For certain items such as computer chips, the duration of the shortages is now approaching two full years.
Of course fear of Omicron has made things even worse, and one expert interviewed by NPR suggested that supermarkets in the U.S. are now facing a “perfect storm”…
“We’re really seeing the perfect storm,” Phil Lempert, editor of the website SupermarketGuru.com, told NPR.
Isn’t it strange how that term just seems to keep popping up all over the place?
One of the major issues that supermarkets on the east coast are currently facing is greatly increased shipping costs.
Many Americans don’t realize this, but much of the fresh produce that we enjoy is actually grown in a handful of western states. In fact, “99 percent of walnuts, 97 percent of kiwis, 97 percent of plums, 95 percent of celery, 95 percent of garlic, 89 percent of cauliflower, 71 percent of spinach, and 69 percent of carrots” grown in the United States come from the state of California. To get all of that produce to stores in the east has always been a major production, but today it has also become exceedingly expensive…
Growers of perishable produce across the West Coast are paying nearly triple pre-pandemic trucking rates to ship things like lettuce and berries before they spoil. Shay Myers, CEO of Owyhee Produce, which grows onions, watermelons and asparagus along the border of Idaho and Oregon, said he has been holding off shipping onions to retail distributors until freight costs go down.
Myers said transportation disruptions in the last three weeks, caused by a lack of truck drivers and recent highway-blocking storms, have led to a doubling of freight costs for fruit and vegetable producers, on top of already-elevated pandemic prices. “We typically will ship, East Coast to West Coast – we used to do it for about $7,000,” he said. “Today it’s somewhere between $18,000 and $22,000.”
Unfortunately, the issues that are plaguing the industry are not going to be cleared up any time soon.
According to the CEO of Conagra Brands, supply chain issues will continue to be a huge headache for his company for at least the next month…
Birds Eye frozen vegetables maker Conagra Brands’ CEO Sean Connolly told investors last week that supplies from its U.S. plants could be constrained for at least the next month due to Omicron-related absences.
And the CEO of Albertson’s is anticipating continued supply chain woes “over the next four to six weeks”…
Vivek Sankaran, CEO of the grocery store chain Albertson’s, said in an earnings call that the company had been hoping to recover from recent supply issues but omicron “put a dent in that.”
“There are more supply challenges, and we would expect more supply challenges over the next four to six weeks,” Sankaran said on Tuesday.
Of course these corporate leaders are anticipating that the Omicron wave will eventually fade and operations will start getting back to normal as warmer weather comes along.
But in order to do that, they are going to have to find a lot more workers from somewhere.
According to another industry expert, the consumer-packaged goods industry in the United States “is missing around 120,000 workers” right now…
The situation is not expected to abate for at least a few more weeks, Katie Denis, vice president of communications and research at the Consumer Brands Association said, blaming the shortages on a scarcity of labor.
The consumer-packaged goods industry is missing around 120,000 workers out of which only 1,500 jobs were added last month, she said, while the National Grocer’s Association said that many of its grocery store members were operating with less than 50% of their workforce capacity.
So where are they going to find enough people to restore service to normal levels?
They can’t exactly resurrect those that have died over the past year.
Now that millions of workers have seemingly “disappeared” from the system, companies all over America are fiercely competing with one another for anyone that still has a pulse and is available.
So if the food industry wants to hire thousands upon thousands of new workers, they are going to have to radically raise wages.
And if they do that, we will be paying even more to fill up our carts at the grocery store.
Today, a full shopping cart full of food can run more than 300 dollars in many areas.
Will that figure soon reach 400 or 500 dollars?
And what happens if our supply chain problems persist for many months to come like analysts at Deutsche Bank are now projecting…
‘For 2022, we expect supply pressures to likely linger for longer, perhaps until the second half of next year before gradually unwinding,’ Deutsche Bank analysts wrote in a note last Tuesday.
But just like everyone else, the analysts at Deutsche Bank are also assuming that conditions will “return to normal” eventually.
It would be really nice if that actually happened, but as Wolf Richter has pointed out, grocery stores have desperately been trying to “return to normal” for 20 months…
Grocery stores have been trying to stock up for 20 months now, to fill the holes and catch up with this historic surge in demand, but every time they make a little headway, new constraints and problems emerge, and they still don’t have enough inventory on hand to get over the hump, and they temporarily and sporadically run out of some items.
The elephant in the room that nobody really wants to talk about is the fact that our supply chains will never fully return to the way they were in 2019.
Too much has changed.
Yes, there will be a lot of ups and downs, but I actually believe that many of the problems that we are facing today will actually grow over time.
It took decades of incredibly bad decisions to get us to this point, and the gross incompetence being displayed by our leaders in Washington does not give me confidence that things will turn around any time soon.
The years ahead are not going to be pretty, and I would advise you to prepare accordingly.
* * *
It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/18/2022 – 17:50
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