Today’s News 19th March 2024

• Anti-Semitism As The Harbinger Of Global Chaos
  Anti-Semitism As The Harbinger Of Global Chaos

  Authored by Stephen Soukup via American Greatness,

  On the off chance you hadn’t noticed, the world appears to be at an especially precarious moment presently. Obviously, war continues to rage in Ukraine and Gaza, with no end in sight to either conflict. Great Britain and Japan are currently in recession. Canada’s economy is an absolute disaster, with almost no hope of near-term recovery. Much of continental Europe and China are struggling economically, if not officially contracting. Some experts believe that the global economy more generally is sliding, slowly but surely, into recession. The only economic bright spot in the world is the United States, and even here we have our problems with consumer spending and sentiment, massive credit concerns, and inarguably sticky inflation.

  

  Meanwhile, China is investing in and winning friends, and influencing people in the Global South. U.S.-backed Kurdish leaders are warning that ISIS is resurgent in Syria and Iraq. The Marine general in charge of U.S. Africa Command is warning of Russia’s increasing influence on that continent. Sudan remains mired in civil war. Nigeria is plagued by Islamist terrorism and mass kidnappings. Mexico is in the midst of a full-blown war with the drug cartels, who continue to grow bolder and more militarily sophisticated.

  Everywhere one looks, chaos reigns—or, at the very least, bubbles just below the surface.

  Perhaps most telling among the signs of disarray is the unnerving rise of antisemitism in the United States, Europe, and throughout the world. Antisemitism, in general, has been intensifying, slowly but surely, over the last decade or so. Over the last few months, however, it has emerged fully into the open, undaunted and unembarrassed. What was once considered shameful and disconcerting is now warmly welcomed as a “rational” response to American foreign policy, Israeli war practices, “colonialism,” and “white privilege.”

  All of this is troubling, to put it mildly, both in and of itself and as a harbinger of greater and more deadly global unrest.

  Hatred of and anger toward Jews is not the same as other forms of bigotry.  

  In many ways, the history of Western anti-Jewish hatred mirrors the history of Western political chaos and collapse.  Or, to put it another way, historically, Jews are not only the perennial scapegoats during periods of social upheaval and displacement, but resurgent anti-Semitism serves as the proverbial canary in the coal mine for the rise of revolutionary movements.

  In his classic, The Pursuit of the Millennium, the British historian Norman Cohn argues that the Jewish diaspora generally fit comfortably, if tentatively into European society for most of the first thousand years or so A.D., and only became a hated and perpetually persecuted minority with the rise of utopian Millenarianism that accompanied and then outlived the Crusades.  Beginning then and continuing for the next nearly a thousand years, Europeans came to associate Jews with the antichrist and thus to associate hatred and persecution of Jews with preparing the battlespace for the Second Coming.  Many historians, including Hannah Arendt, believed that the anti-Semitism that was such an integral part of the West’s 20th-century collapse into totalitarianism was relatively new and, in any case, distinct from medieval anti-Semitism.  Cohn’s history suggests otherwise, connecting the religious eschatology of medieval Europe to the quasi-religious eschatology of post-Enlightenment Europe, thereby connecting the persistence of Western anti-Semitism as well.

  Cohn tells us that millenarian moments and the millenarian movements that capitalize on those moments all share a common group of characteristics. They all appear under certain social and economic conditions. They all appeal to a certain segment of the population at large, who then present themselves as economic, spiritual, and political leaders. They all utilize scapegoats, meaning that they all identify a different, usually much smaller segment of the population on whom they can blame all the world’s ills and then set about to cure those ills through the elimination of the scapegoat. And more often than not, that scapegoat tends to be Jewish.

  In the conclusion to the second edition of Pursuit of the Millennium, Cohn notes that the millenarian fervor of the middle ages may have changed, but it never really died, and it maintained its common characteristics even as it became secular or “quasi-religious.” He wrote:

  The story told in Pursuit of the Millennium ended some four centuries ago but is not without relevance to our own times. [I have] shown in another work [Warrant for Genocide: The Myth of the Jewish World Conspiracy and the Protocols of the Elders of Zion] how closely the Nazi phantasy of a world-wide Jewish conspiracy of destruction is related to the phantasies that inspired Emico of Leningrad and the Master of Hungary; and how mass disorientation and insecurity have fostered the demonization of the Jew in this as in much earlier centuries. The parallels and indeed the continuity are incontestable.

  The parallels between the rise of Nazism and the current global unrest and demonization of the Jewish people are also largely incontestable. The election that brought Hitler to power didn’t happen in a vacuum, after all. It happened in the midst of global chaos, namely the Great Depression. It also followed the decadence and distortion of the Weimer Era. As the New York Fed has shown, even a global pandemic—the 1919 Spanish Flu outbreak—contributed to the sense of discomfort and disconnect among the German population, prompting increased support for Hitler and his Nazis.

  The present global chaos doesn’t have to end the same way the chaos of a century ago did. It doesn’t have to result in the ascension of millenarian ideologies and their totalitarian defenders. History has shown that extremism can be short-circuited and radical ideologies undone. The first step in doing so, however, must be to bring an end to the rationalization of the persecution of the world’s Jews. The second step is to end the persecution itself.

  Antisemitism is ugly and shameful, and it must be treated as such. For their sake and ours.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 03/19/2024 – 02:00

• Cereal For The Peasants? How The Elites Use "Skimpflation" To Control Our Eating Habits
  Cereal For The Peasants? How The Elites Use “Skimpflation” To Control Our Eating Habits

  Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.us

  People who have been reading my analysis for a long time are well aware of my expectations on the eventual outcome of the US economic debacle: A stagflationary crisis followed by a massive crash similar to the Great Depression (or worse). I based this prediction on a number of circumstances, but primarily I went back to the history of currency devaluations and central bank policy. These kinds of things have happened before and they tend to follow a pattern that is visible today.

  Specifically, I studied the 1971-1981 stagflation crisis for reference and I found some startling similarities. It was one of the worst economic declines in American history next to the depression, and it’s an event that almost no one talks about. A lot of people (specifically Gen Z) believe that our current era is the worst financial era of all time and that their generation has been shafted by previous generations.

  This is inaccurate; the stagflation disaster of the 1970s was far worse. That said, it shows us where our country is eventually headed and it’s not looking good. What is a manageable economic crunch today has the potential to become a calamity tomorrow.

  One issue that I’m fascinated by that usually isn’t mentioned in mainstream economic discussion is quality degradation – The way in which products, services, construction, manufacturing, style and availability tend to break down when inflation suddenly spikes. This process is known as “skimpflation” and it was rampant in the 1970s and early 1980s. Most Americans today think of the 70s as a happy-go-lucky era of disco, bell bottoms and psychedelics, but in reality it was economically dismal.

  Examining real life images and footage from the decade compared to the 1960s, there was a stark shift in the quality of life. From the quality of cars, to the quality of clothes, to the quality of housing. Some US cities (like New York or Philadelphia) looked like warzones complete with rubble strewn slums. After sky-high inflation for several years causes a doubling and tripling of retail prices along with growing unemployment rates, the environment starts to feel real ugly.

  Skimpflation And The Food Pyramid Agenda

  Another aspect of life that takes a hit is the quality of diet and the ability of families to feed themselves. Most people are familiar with the concept of “shrinkflation” – The habit of companies to shrink portion sizes while keeping their packaging and prices the same in order to offset inflation in production costs without consumers noticing. However, skimpflation is another way in which companies will attempt to avoid raising prices on the shelf, and that’s by lowering the quality of ingredients, along with encouraging the public to eat less nutritious (and less expensive to produce) foods.

  The 1970s was the decade that gave birth to the processed food market and the microwave cuisine, at least on a wider scale. This was the decade when American food truly took a nose dive. The ease of processed foods was offset by the poor nutritional content. They were cheaper, but the quality sucked and we are still living with the repercussions of that trend today.

  There were, of course, counter-culture movements working against the adoption of processed foods, including “know your farmer” type organizations and organic movements. But as we are all well aware, the cheap processed foods eventually won. Society embraced the market because they had to. Prices were so high that it was the only way they could feed their families everyday.

  

  Interestingly, the Food Pyramid that we were all taught about as children in public schools was introduced to the western world in 1972. The pyramid was actually first used by the Swedish government in direct response to inflation and was designed to encourage the populace to eat cheaper food-stuffs (primarily cereals, dairy products, pastas and carbs). Governments have been using subsidies to promote the consumption of low cost and low quality foods ever since.

  I’m recounting these trends from the 1970s because we are seeing a very similar agenda today, though it is far more insidious in nature. Economic decline is a favorite tool for the establishment to control the behavior of populations, including dietary habits.

  Dollar Losing Buying Power? Switch To Lab Grown Meat And Bugs…

  It’s no coincidence, for example, that there has been a massive push by government agencies and corporations to acclimate the public to the idea of fake lab-grown meat products. For now, fake meats are more expensive than real meats so there’s no incentive for the public to consume them, but if inflation continues to drive prices higher eventually real steak will cost far more than artificial steak and people may be convinced that the fake stuff is a viable alternative.

  Then there’s the notion of western consumers eating bugs for protein instead of beef or chicken or pork. Beyond the claims that this will somehow “save the climate” from global warming (which is a complete falsehood backed by zero concrete evidence), the powers-that-be also suggest that bugs will be far more affordable than hamburgers in the near future.

  Bugs are traditionally a starvation food. They are only a staple in countries where famine is common or where governments aggressively restrict normal agriculture. Bug protein also has a habit of giving people parasites. The only way westerners could be convinced to eat bugs as a part of their regular diet is if inflation crushes the regular meat market.

  Let The Peasants Eat Cereal…

  Another form of skimpflation is the shift even further to the bottom of the food pyramid. Recently, Kellogg’s CEO Gary Pilnick suggested in an interview with CNBC that Americans will eventually start ‘eating cereal for dinner’ because the cost is so much cheaper per portion. In other words, cheap processed carbs will become a mainstay of the American diet because a lot of people won’t be able to afford anything else. Pilnick brags that Kellogg’s is well placed for this coming change in the food market…

  The marketing for this idea is already well underway. Various companies are promoting an end to traditional healthy homemade dinner habits and a switch to unconventional and cheaper processed foods. The thrust of the Kellogg’s campaign relies on poverty. Meaning, they are banking on the expectation that Americans will be poorer in the near term and that this condition will continue for years to come.

  Just as we saw during the 1970s stagflation crisis, there is a rush to cut quality in all goods and services, but food is a major target. Today, it’s about convincing the market to consume more carbs and processed foods and less protein.  Tomorrow, it will be about abandoning established agriculture altogether and having all our food manufactured in labs.   The elites seem to be planning for a significant financial crisis beyond what we have already dealt with and this is evident in their efforts to sell the reconstruction of our dietary habits based on poverty rather than prosperity.

  Tyler Durden
  Tue, 03/19/2024 – 00:00

• Bank Of Japan (Finally) Kills The World's Last Negative Interest Rate, Yen Weakens
  Bank Of Japan (Finally) Kills The World’s Last Negative Interest Rate, Yen Weakens

  As has been thoroughly warned, straw-manned, leaked, and hinted at over the past few weeks (here, here, and here for example), The Bank of Japan hiked interest rates tonight for the first time since 2007. This move ends the world’s last negative interest rate policy.

  The vote, at 7-2 to scrap the negative interest rate (setting the policy rate in range between 0% to 0.1%), was closer than many expected with policy board members Nakamura and Noguchi dissented.

  

  Source: Bloomberg

  Additionally, the bank has abandoned its yield curve control policy.

  The BOJ will continue to purchase JGBs with “broadly the same amount as before,” but buying of ETFs and J-REITs has apparently been scrapped (while laying out a plan to scrap corporate debt and commercial paper buying).

  

  Source: BoJ

  In terms of forward guidance, Bloomberg notes that the bank isn’t offering much. It says it will continue to pay attention to developments in financial and FX markets, and their impact on Japan’s economic activity and prices.

  But the previous pledge to “not hesitate to take additional easing measures if necessary” has been removed.

  This was all in line with what had leaked out in domestic media reports over the past week but USDJPY still rose on the news (yen weakness)…

  

  The BOJ actually downgraded its assessment of consumer spending and production, so there’s still a sense of caution.

  The BoJ’s move comes as inflation has gradually returned to the nation with the most immediate catalyst being last week, when Japan’s largest union announced its biggest annual wage hike in three decades.

  Despite the runway having been heavily foamed ahead of tonight’s decision, Veteran market commentator John Authers warns of significant implications for the rest of the world:

  “Waiting over the years for Japan to beat deflation and raise rates has been rather like hoping for Lucy to let Charlie Brown kick the football, but if the BOJ is briefing the press like this, it must be a very real possibility,” he writes.

  “There are implications for carry traders, and for Japan’s giant neighbor, China.”

  Finally, even with the decision to pull the trigger, we note that the debate over whether the BOJ has met the supposedly main condition for raising rates – stable 2% inflation – is hardly over.

  As Bloomberg reports, inflation may slow as the impact of imports-driven price gains wears off, meaning that if officials go ahead and change policy, they could end up facing criticism in the future that they’ve passed a premature judgement on prices, former BOJ board member Takahide Kiuchi recently wrote. “And that in turn could become an obstacle to smooth policy normalization,” he said.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 23:45

• Trump Tells Ramaswamy 'No' For VP, But Leaves Cabinet Door Open
  Trump Tells Ramaswamy ‘No’ For VP, But Leaves Cabinet Door Open

  Donald Trump ‘personally told’ Vivek Ramaswamy that he’s been ruled out as a running mate, however the former president is eyeing a Cabinet job including the Homeland Security secretary, according to Bloomberg, citing people familiar with the matter.

  

  According to the report, “Some Trump allies see Ramaswamy as ideal for the job because they say he excels at public speaking and, as an Indian-American son of an immigrant, could neutralize criticism of sweeping immigration restrictions.“

  Their conversation is just one of many Trump has had recently with allies about administration positions as he seized hold of the Republican nomination. Loyalty, ideological compatibility and perceived electoral power are the metrics by which Trump is evaluating possible picks, according to people familiar with the process who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

  Those who have impressed Trump and his team for possible Cabinet roles include another former GOP primary foe, North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum, as well as Representative Elise Stefanik and former US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer. -Bloomberg

  Trump is apparently looking for a running mate who isn’t “motivated by the limelight,” but who will give the former president a significant edge. According to the report, none of the VP picks circulating have impressed Trump much, and his list of options has only grown longer, instead of shorter.

  Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy is rumored to be a top candidate to serve as Trump’s deep state handler chief of staff.

  That said, after Steve Bannon and Mike Flynn were promptly squeezed out by dark forces the first time around, Trump is looking for a series of top-level aides and Cabinet members who can enable his agenda.

  Jared’s back

  Oh boy! Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law whose bed Bibi Netanyahu slept in one time, “has recently increased his presence in the campaign,” and has been “calling and texting to offer suggestions.”

  Trump Jr., meanwhile, has also expressed interest in a key transition role – in part because he can act as a gatekeeper to block people who are opposed by the MAGA movement.

  Don’t believe the hype?

  In response to an inquiry by Bloomberg, senior Trump campaign adviser Jason Miller said it’s way too early to start speculating about Cabinet or senior roles.

  “Apparently somebody has decided to list out everyone who has ever met President Trump and is now speculating as to their potential participation in a second Trump administration. The truth is that unless you hear it directly from President Trump or his campaign, this is all b.s.,” he said.

  Those who have participated in the discussions describe a quintessentially Trump experience, in which the former president peppers the conversation with political observations and media critiques as a steady stream of food is served, while he keeps an eye on cable news or chooses his favorite musical selections over dinner at his Mar-a-Lago club.

  The former president has repeatedly expressed admiration for Burgum, a billionaire who mounted a short-lived presidential bid. He has been discussed as a good fit to lead a transition – and possibly the Energy Department. Burgum, like Trump, is a supporter of fossil fuels. -Bloomberg

  If we’re still believing the hype, one person who’s been cast out of the Trump tent is Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R), following his failed primary challenge. Trump “regularly vents” about DeSantis in private conversations, however the pair did reportedly have a phone conversation shortly after DeSantis dropped out.

  DOJ?

  One of Trump’s top priorities will be to staff the nation’s top law enforcement agency with an attorney general who isn’t a deep state pawn.

  Senate Republicans Ted Cruz (TX) and Mike Lee (UT) are on the short list, per the report, as “it would likely be easy to secure their confirmation.”

  Former Chuck Grassley lawyer Mike Davis, meanwhile, could potentially serve as acting AG or White House counsel. Another attorney, Mike Purpura – who represented Trump during his first impeachment, is also a ‘strong contender’ for White House counsel.

  If Trump is reelected, FBI Director Christopher Wray’s days will also be numbered.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 23:20

• Report Criticizes 'Catastrophic Errors' Of COVID Lockdowns, Warns Of Repeat
  Report Criticizes ‘Catastrophic Errors’ Of COVID Lockdowns, Warns Of Repeat

  Authored by Kevin Stocklin via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  It was four years ago, in March 2020, that health officials declared COVID-19 a pandemic and America began shutting down schools, closing small businesses, restricting gatherings and travel, and other lockdown measures to “slow the spread” of the virus.

  

  To mark that grim anniversary, a group of medical and policy experts released a report, called “COVID Lessons Learned,” which assesses the government’s response to the pandemic. According to the report, that response included a few notable successes, along with a litany of failures that have taken a severe toll on the population.

  During the pandemic, many governments across the globe acted in lockstep to pursue authoritative policies in response to the disease, locking down populations, closing schools, shutting businesses, sealing borders, banning gatherings, and enforcing various mask and vaccine mandates. What were initially imposed as short-term mandates and emergency powers given to presidents, ministers, governors, and health officials soon became extended into a longer-term expansion of official power.

  “Even though the initial point of temporary lockdowns was to ’slow the spread,’ which meant to allow hospitals to function without being overwhelmed, instead it rapidly turned into stopping COVID cases at all costs,” Dr. Scott Atlas, a physician, former White House Coronavirus Task Force member, and one of the authors of the report, stated at a March 15 press conference.

  Published by the Committee to Unleash Prosperity (CTUP), the report was co-authored by Steve Hanke, economics professor and director of the Johns Hopkins Institute for Applied Economics; Casey Mulligan, former chief economist of the White House Council of Economic Advisors; and CTUP President Philip Kerpen. 

  According to the report, one of the first errors was the unprecedented authority that public officials took upon themselves to enforce health mandates on Americans. 

  “Granting public health agencies extraordinary powers was a major error,” Mr. Hanke told The Epoch Times. “It, in effect, granted these agencies a license to deceive the public.”

  The authors argue that authoritative measures were largely ineffective in fighting the virus, but often proved highly detrimental to public health. 

  The report quantifies the cost of lockdowns, both in terms of economic costs and the number of non-COVID excess deaths that occurred and continue to occur after the pandemic. It estimates that the number of non-COVID excess deaths, defined as deaths in excess of normal rates, at about 100,000 per year in the United States.

  ‘They Will Try to Do This Again’

  “Lockdowns, schools closures, and mandates were catastrophic errors, pushed with remarkable fervor by public health authorities at all levels,” the report states. The authors are skeptical, however, that health authorities will learn from the experience.

  “My worry is that if we have another pandemic or another virus, I think that Washington is still going to try to do these failed policies,” said Steve Moore, a CTUP economist. “We’re not here to say ‘this guy got it wrong’ or ’that guy or got it wrong,’ but we should learn the lessons from these very, very severe mistakes that will have costs for not just years, but decades to come. 

  “I guarantee you, they will try to do this again,” Mr. Moore said. “And what’s really troubling me is the people who made these mistakes still have not really conceded that they were wrong.”

  Mr. Hanke was equally pessimistic.

  “Unfortunately, the public health establishment is in the authoritarian model of the state,” he said. “Their entire edifice is one in which the state, not the individual, should reign supreme.”

  The authors are also critical of what they say was a multifaceted campaign in which public officials, the news media, and social media companies cooperated to frighten the population into compliance with COVID mandates.

  “During COVID, the public health establishment … intentionally stoked and amplified fear, which overlaid enormous economic, social, educational and health harms on top of the harms of the virus itself,” the report states. 

  The authors contrasted the authoritative response of many U.S. states to policies in Sweden, which they say relied more on providing advice and information to the public rather than attempting to force behaviors.

  Sweden’s constitution, called the “Regeringsform,” guarantees the liberty of Swedes to move freely within the realm and prohibits severe lockdowns, Mr. Hanke stated.

  “By following the Regeringsform during COVID, the Swedes ended up with one of the lowest excess death rates in the world,” he said.  

  Because the Swedish government avoided strict mandates and was more forthright in sharing information with its people, many citizens altered their behavior voluntarily to protect themselves.

  “A much wiser strategy than issuing lockdown orders would have been to tell the American people the truth, stick to the facts, educate citizens about the balance of risks, and let individuals make their own decisions about whether to keep their businesses open, whether to socially isolate, attend church, send their children to school, and so on,” the report states.

  ‘A Pretext to Enhance Their Power’

  The CTUP report cites a 2021 study on government power and emergencies by economists Christian Bjornskov and Stefan Voigt, which found that the more emergency power a government accumulates during times of crisis, “the higher the number of people killed as a consequence of a natural disaster, controlling for its severity.

  “As this is an unexpected result, we discuss a number of potential explanations, the most plausible being that governments use natural disasters as a pretext to enhance their power,” the study’s authors state. “Furthermore, the easier it is to call a state of emergency, the larger the negative effects on basic human rights.”

  “All the things that people do in their lives … they have purposes,” Mr. Mulligan said. “And for somebody in Washington D.C. to tell them to stop doing all those things, they can’t even begin to comprehend the disruption and the losses.

  “We see in the death certificates a big elevation in people dying from heart conditions, diabetes conditions, obesity conditions,” he said, while deaths from alcoholism and drug overdoses “skyrocketed and have not come down.”

  The report also challenged the narrative that most hospitals were overrun by the surge of COVID cases.

  “Almost any measure of hospital utilization was very low, historically, throughout the pandemic period, even though we had all these headlines that our hospitals were overwhelmed,” Mr. Kerpen stated. “The truth was actually the opposite, and this was likely the result of public health messaging and political orders, canceling medical procedures and intentionally stoking fear, causing people to cancel their appointments.”

  The effect of this, the authors argue, was a sharp increase in non-COVID deaths because people were avoiding necessary treatments and screenings. 

  “There were actually mass layoffs in this sector at one point,” Mr. Kerpen said, “and even now, total discharges are well below pre-pandemic levels.”

  In addition, as health mandates became more draconian, many people became concerned at the expansion of government power and the loss of civil liberties, particularly when government directives—such as banning outdoor church services but allowing mass social-justice protests—often seemed unreasonable or politicized. 

  The report also criticized the single-minded focus on vaccines and the failure by the NIH and the FDA to do clinical trials on existing drugs that were known to be safe and could have been effective in treating those infected with COVID-19.

  Because so much of the process of approving the vaccines, the risks and benefits, and the reporting of possible side-effects was kept from the public, people were unable to give informed consent to their own health care, Mr. Kerpen said. 

  “And when the Biden administration came in and started mandating them, now you had something that was inherently experimental with some questionable data, and instead of saying, ‘Now you have a choice whether you want it or not,’ in the context of a pandemic they tried to mandate them,” he said.

  Pandemic Censorship

  Tech oligopolies and the corporate media also receive criticism for their collaboration with government to control public messaging and censor dissenting voices. According to the authors, many government and health officials collaborated with tech oligarchs, news media corporations, and even scientific journals to censor critical views on the pandemic.

  The Biden administration is currently defending itself before the Supreme Court against charges brought by Louisiana and Missouri attorneys general, who charged that administration officials pressured tech companies to censor information that contradicted official narratives on COVID-19’s origins, related mandates and treatment, as well as censoring political speech that was critical of President Biden during his 2020 campaign. The case is Murthy v. Missouri.

  Mr. Hanke stated that a previous report he co-authored, titled “Did Lockdowns Work?,” which was critical of lockdowns, was refused by medical journals, even when they published op-eds that criticized it and published numerous pro-lockdown reports. 

  Dr. Vinay Prasad—a physician, epidemiologist, professor at the University of California at San Francisco’s medical school and author of over 350 academic articles and letters—has made similar allegations of censorship by medical journals.

  “Specifically, MedRxiv and SSRN have been reluctant to post articles critical of the CDC, mask and vaccine mandates, and the Biden administration’s health care policies,” Dr. Prasad stated.

  Heightening concerns about medical censorship is the “zero-draft” World Health Organization (WHO) pandemic treaty currently being circulated for approval by member states, including the United States. It commits members to jointly seek out and “tackle” what the WHO deems as “misinformation and disinformation.”

  One of the enduring consequences of the COVID years is a general loss of public trust in public officials, health experts, and official narratives. 

  “Operation Warp Speed was a terrific success with highly unexpected rapidity of development [of vaccines],” Dr. Atlas said. “But the serious flaws centered around not being open with the public about the uncertainties, particularly of the vaccines’ efficacy and safety.” 

  “One result of the government’s error-ridden COVID response was that Americans have justifiably lost faith in public health institutions,” the report states. According to the authors, if health officials want to regain the public’s trust, they should begin with an accurate assessment of their actions during the pandemic.

  “The best way to restore trust is to admit you were wrong,” Dr. Atlas said. “I think we all know that in our personal lives, but here it’s very important because there has been a massive lack of trust now in institutions, in experts, in data, in science itself.

  “I think it’s going to be very difficult to restore that without admission of error,” he said.

  Recommendations for a Future Pandemic

  The CTUP report recommends that Congress and state legislatures set strict limitations on powers conferred to the executive branch, including health officials, and set time limits that would require legislation to be extended. This would give the public a voice in health emergency measures through their elected representatives.

  It further recommends that research grants should be independent of policy positions and that NIH funding should be decentralized or block-granted to states to distribute.

  Congress should mandate public disclosure of all FDA, CDC, and NIH discussions and decisions, including statements of any persons who provide advice to these agencies. Congress should also make explicit that CDC guidance is advisory and does not constitute laws or mandates. 

  The report also recommends that the United States immediately halt negotiations of agreements with the WHO “until satisfactory transparency and accountability is achieved.”

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 23:00

• Yen's Whiplash Day Only Begins With A Rate Hike
  Yen’s Whiplash Day Only Begins With A Rate Hike

  By Mark Cranfield, Bloomberg markets live reporter and strategist

  USD/JPY may be priced for the Bank of Japan to exit negative rates – something which thanks to the non-stop media leaks we know for a fact will happen – but a knee-jerk selloff is still likely when the first headline drops as traders react to the news. And that will only be the start of what could be a series of back-and-forth swings for the yen until Governor Ueda ends his press conference a few hours after the BOJ statement lands.

  While tightening policy is ostensibly a hawkish move, investors won’t be surprised if there are plenty of dovish caveats within the BOJ statement, with at least five things they will be focusing on for a sense of direction:

  • *BOJ MAINTAINS POLICY RATE AT -0.1%

  This is the big one. Will the BOJ finally end negative rates? Although the preamble to next week suggests the decision is too close to call, a move to zero interest rates would still shock the yen into a move higher.

  • *BOJ MAINTAINS 10-YEAR JGB YIELD TARGET AT ABOUT 0%

  In many ways this target is redundant as 10-year yields have been above zero for more than three years. That said, the symbolism of dropping the language would be negative for bonds.

  • *BOJ KEEPS UPPER BOUND REFERENCE ON LONG-TERM YIELDS AT 1%

  In October the BOJ fumbled the message by introducing flexible yield curve control and JGBs skidded lower. Clear communication on ending YCC will be important to avoid a disorderly reaction in debt markets.

  • *BOJ VOTES 9-0 ON RATE DECISION

  Whatever the BOJ decides, investors will want to know how split decision makers remain as a gauge for the pace of interest rate hikes to come.

  • *BOJ WILL ADD TO EASING WITHOUT HESITATION IF NEEDED

  Arguably the most symbolic statement of all, dropping it from the text would be a bearish medium-term signal for JGBs.

  * * *

  And then the fun will really begin when Ueda starts taking questions at the press conference. It’s likely that Ueda will provide dovish forward guidance, but communication in the past hasn’t always run as smoothly as the central bank would like, opening up the risk of more USD/JPY volatility.

  It sets up Tuesday for a head-spinning session…  and there is still the Federal Reserve to come!

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 22:46

• The 4th Bitcoin Halving Explained
  The 4th Bitcoin Halving Explained

  Sometime in April 2024, the reward that cryptocurrency miners receive for mining bitcoin (BTC) will go from ₿6.25 to ₿3.125, with significant consequences for the world’s most valuable digital currency.

  To help understand this quadrennial event, Visual Capitalist’s Chris Dickert teamed up with HIVE Digital to take a deep dive on historical bitcoin data from Coinmetrics to see what the three previous halvings might tell us about the fourth.

  
  

  Bitcoin Explained

  But to understand halvings, we first need to take a step back to talk a bit about how the Bitcoin network works.

  Unlike fiat currencies like the U.S. dollar or the Chinese yuan that are backed by central banks, cryptocurrencies are supported by an underlying blockchain, which contains a record of every single bitcoin transaction in a public decentralized, distributed ledger. 

  When you spend a bitcoin, a digital record of that transaction needs to be validated and added to the blockchain. And this is where miners come in. They legitimize and audit bitcoin transactions, and as a reward, receive bitcoin in payment.

  Halvings Explained

  Now, quantitative easing notwithstanding, you normally can’t keep printing money forever without running into hyperinflation (think 1920s Germany or 1990s Argentina).

  To get around this problem, the Bitcoin network has a pre-programmed upper limit of 21 million, with the reward that miners receive decreasing by half (hence, halving) roughly every four years. 

  

  When the Bitcoin network first launched, the reward was initially set to ₿50, an amount that was high enough to quickly increase the money supply and incentivize miners to participate in the validation process. On November 28, 2012, that reward decreased by half to ₿25, then to ₿12.5 on July 9, 2016, and on May 11, 2020, to ₿6.25.

  The last halving will happen sometime in 2136, with the reward decreasing to ₿0.00000001 or one satoshi, the smallest denomination of bitcoin possible. The last bitcoin will enter circulation four years later, in 2140.

  Halvings and Miner Revenue

  With the fourth halving just around the corner, some have wondered whether mining will still be sustainable. Modern mining operations today are costly endeavors, often with razor-thin margins, and losing half of one’s revenue overnight would be a nightmare for any business. 

  

  And if you look at historical miner revenue in bitcoin, you can see quite clearly, the steep drop in revenue after each halving. But what’s interesting, is that if you compare that against the miner revenue in USD, there is a drop there as well, but it recovers soon thereafter as the cryptocurrency appreciates. In other words, a miner may receive less bitcoin, but that bitcoin is worth more.

  Halvings Compared

  So we know that the network will continue to function after the fourth halving, but what else can we learn from previous halvings? 

  If we look at the percent change in market capitalization post-halvings, we can see a bit of a pattern. After both the second and third halvings, market capitalization peaked at around the year-and-half mark. The second-halving peak occurred on day 526 at around $328 billion, an increase of 3,000%, while the third-halving peak came three weeks later on day 547 at over $1.2 trillion, or an increase of just under 700%. 

  

  The post-first-halving peak happened a bit earlier, at the 372-day mark, but because the peak was so high (over 10,000%!) it is considered an outlier, and omitted to better illustrate the trend.

  The 4th Bitcoin Halving Projected?

  Because we know that halvings occur every 210,000 blocks and that each block takes around 10 minutes to mine, we have a good idea of when the fourth halving should happen: April 21, 2024. If the next halving follows the same pattern as the previous two, then there could be a market-capitalization peak some time during the third week of October 2025.

  And with the price of bitcoin setting new records at time of writing, a lot of people will be watching very closely, indeed.  

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 22:40

• Another Shutdown Averted As Deal Reached
  Another Shutdown Averted As Deal Reached

  Congress has reached a deal to avert yet another shutdown following an agreement to fund the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) through the remainder of FY 2024, according to Punchbowl News’ Jake Sherman.

  🚨BREAKING NEWS — SPENDING DEAL DONE — Congressional negotiators have come to an agreement. on DHS funding, the final piece of the FY2024 spending package

  Aides are working on leg text now, hoping to release in the coming days.

  — Jake Sherman (@JakeSherman) March 18, 2024

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

  

  In a race against time, Congress passed a package of six appropriations bills earlier this month, narrowly avoiding a partial shutdown. The deal revealed by Sherman avoids a Friday, March 22 drop-dead date.

  The text of a minibus combining those bills was widely expected to be released by Sunday, though no such deal emerged.

  As Samantha Flom via The Epoch Times reported earlier, House rules require that members be given at least 72 hours to review legislation before it comes up for a vote. This meant that if a deal was not released on Monday, it could mean another last-minute scramble to get something on President Joe Biden’s desk.

  The delay came amid fierce Republican opposition to the president’s handling of the crisis at the southern border, which more than 7 million illegal immigrants have crossed since he took office.

  Appropriations for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) are included among the mix of remaining spending bills. Those negotiations reportedly derailed over the weekend amid talks of a potential year-long continuing resolution.

  “Republicans want to underfund DHS, which makes the border less secure and the country less safe,” a White House official told Politico on Sunday, asserting that Republicans were trying to “sow chaos on the border ahead of November.”

  But Republicans purportedly pushed back on those claims, holding that the issue was not the amount of funds requested but how they would be used.

  Nonetheless, talks were said to be back on track on Monday. Commenting on the negotiations at a press briefing, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said the administration’s position was that DHS needs more funding to adequately address the border crisis.

  The deal is likely to face pushback from the GOP’s right flank, which continues to push for stronger border reforms.

  “Congress: we are FUNDING a DHS that is MASS RELEASING illegal aliens into our communities, some of whom commit horrific crimes,” wrote Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), a member of the staunchly conservative House Freedom Caucus, in an X post.

  “Republicans MUST NOT vote to keep funding Mayorkas’ DHS at the same level with zero policy changes next week. We have the power to stop this,” he added.

  Thanks to the GOP’s razor-thin majority in the House, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) was forced to ally with Democrats to pass the first appropriations minibus on March 6. A similar partnership may well be in the cards for the second.

  Other remaining bills include funding for the departments of Defense, Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and State, as well as the legislative branch, financial services, and general government.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 22:20

• One Bank Sees Bitcoin At $200,000, While Ether Hits $14,000 As It Becomes JPMorgan's Favorite Crypto
  One Bank Sees Bitcoin At $200,000, While Ether Hits $14,000 As It Becomes JPMorgan’s Favorite Crypto

  Many crypto skeptics laughed over a month ago when, back on February 5, Standard Chartered analyst Geoff Kendrick predicted that Ether (which was then trading in the low $2000s) would hit $4,000 by May, around the time the Ethereum ETF was to be approved.

  

  They weren’t laughing when we got there just one month later, and more than two months ahead of schedule.

  

  They also laughed when back in January, Kendrick laid out his “high” case for bitcoin ETF accumulation – one which would justify a 2024 year-end price of $100,000 – as hitting 400,000 in early April, on their way to 1.32 million “coins” at year-end (or just 437,000 in the low case).

  

  Fast forward to today – it’s not even April yet – and already the nine new ETFs have accumulated a whopping 458,000 bitcoin, after net buying virtually every single day since the SEC authorized bitcoin ETFs.

  

  Bottom line: of all sellside analysts, Kendrick has proven time and again to be one of the most accurate, which is why latest research notes – one on bitcoin, and on ether – published earlier today, should be required reading for anyone following the crypto sector.

  In his first note, available to pro subs in the usual place, the Standard Chartered analyst writes that his latest forecast is for the price of bitcoin – now beyond the upcoming halving – to end 2024 around USD150k (up from a long held USD100k view). Then, “in 2025 bitcoin will overshoot to a cycle high of $250k before ultimately settling around $200k which will then be the new midpoint of a higher trading range. At that time vol will fall, and so will the rate of ascent of bitcoin.”

  How/why will we get there?

  Taking a deserved victory lap, Kendrick writes that “ETF inflows have been almost exactly as I had predicted, huge, but much greater than others had expected.” Indeed, the ytd inflows are bang in the middle of his previous high/low forecast range discussed here, and so suggest we end up somewhere around $75BN of inflows. At that point, the gold ETF story suggests we will be around $200k and that we then trade sideways in a higher trading rage (ie. The ETF inflows are a one-off re-rating higher).

  Kendrick also notes that “a gold v BTC portfolio optimization suggests we should be around 80%/20% rather than the current 91%/9% spilt. Again that points to the USD200k level as being ‘correct’.”  He explains why below:

  The total market cap of all above-ground gold is currently around USD 14.8tn (212,582 tonnes based on World Gold Council data, at the 15 March price of USD 2,160 per ounce). For BTC, the current price gives a market cap of USD 1.4tn – a split of 91% for gold to 9% for BTC. Assuming the gold price stays unchanged, the BTC price would need to increase to USD 190,000 in order for BTC’s share to rise to the 20% indicated by our portfolio optimisation. Again, this is close to our estimated BTC price level of USD 200,000 based on ETF inflows.

  The analysis focuses some more on comps to the gold market, before turning to another potential source of bitcoin price upside: FX reserves, i.e., “another large sticky (potential) cash pool, which could follow in the footsteps of new US pension money.” Specifically, Kendrick says that US and EU sanctions on Russia’s reserves “have structurally increased the appeal of non-standard reserve assets for FX reserve managers. The most obvious beneficiaries of this are gold and the CNY, but digital assets could also benefit” (as they already have in El Salvador where Nayib Bukele has previously purchased over 5,600 bitcoin). If they do, expect the largest and most liquid assets – such as Bitcoin – to receive most of the inflows. Which is why, the Standard Chartered analysts sees “a rising likelihood that large reserve managers (Figure 7) may announce BTC buying in 2024.”

  

  That pretty much covers the bullish bitcoin case; now what about Ethereum?

  Well, a couple points here. First of all, recall that in recent years, Wall Street has traditionally held ethereum, due to its smart contract nature and flexible architecture in much higher regard than bitcoin. None other than Goldman Sachs said, three years ago when it initiated coverage on the crypto sector, that bitcoin is a good asset, and “ironically” will be used as the “scarce resource” to make PoS systems work “instead of natural resources”, but while bitcoin may end up being a one-trick pony (if quite valuable) it is the new blockchain platforms – like Ethereum – that will serve as the basis for a “large market of trusted information“, as Goldman puts it “like Amazon is for consumer goods today” (Pro subscribers can find the full Goldman report can be found in the usual place).

  

  But it’s not just Goldman: none other than the most important man in the world of finance (sorry Jamie Dimon), the head of Blackrock – which buys and sells ETFs, bonds, and any other asset class at the Fed’s bidding – Larry Fink, said he is backing an ether ETF just after the SEC gave approval to Bitcoin. Specifically, the king of Wall Street, said “I see value in having an Ethereum ETF. These are just stepping stones towards tokenization and I really do believe this is where we’re going to be going.”  And whatever Larry sees, and wants, Larry gets.

  Part 2: ETH ETF pic.twitter.com/qnmB7azyQN

  — Cryptik1.eth |🛸 (@Cryptik1E) January 12, 2024

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

  That said, with just 2 months left until the SEC is expected to greenlight Ethereum ETFs, some are skeptical that the regulator will be as “forthcoming” this time as back in January with bitcoin, most notably Bloomberg’s ETF guru Eric Balchunas who gives just 35% odds of an Ethereum ETF being approved in May, as “we’re 73 days from the final deadline, and there’s been no contact or comments from the SEC to the issuers. That’s not a good sign… The SEC has to give comments and the issuers have to work on correcting them. They may have to refile and they might even want to have a couple of meetings — it’s kind of a long process.”

  Needless to say, Standard Chartered’s analyst Geoffrey Kendrick does not agree, and just as he sees much more upside to bitcoin, he sees even more potential gains for ether, which last week quietly and successfully implemented its long-awaited Dencun upgrade, thanks to which ETH is now as competitive as Solana in terms of transaction costs, via layer 2s.

  But that is hardly a value proposition (just don’t tell it to all those who are currently blowing Solana NFT memecoin bubbles which will burst spectacularly in a few days, assuming the centralized database that is Solana doesn’t collapse – as it tends to do every other month – first). What is of potential value, is that ether ETF approval is coming one way or another, and according to Kendrick, the SEC will do so on May 23, the final deadline for the first batch under consideration, and consistent with the timeline for the SEC’s January 2024 approval of Bitcoin ETFs: “Albeit I note this is now a non-consensus view. I think the process should be the same as it was for the BTC ETFs and I don’t see why the SEC would not approve” especially since in the UK, the LSE announced on 11 March that it would accept applications for ETH and BTC ETFs, which Kendrick’s think increases the chances of US approval.

  What happens then? Well, if the ETH ETFs are approved, Doug estimates $15-45BN – or 2.39-9.15 million ETH – in the first 12 months after approval, using the same logic as he applied to the BTC ETF inflows; importantly, he now sees more price upside than he previously did, and believes that ETH would keep pace with BTC, with the current 5.4% price ratio holding for the rest of 2024: “Given that we now see BTC reaching the USD 150,000 level by end-2024, this would imply a level of USD 8,000 for ETH” or just more than double from here.

  

  But the real value of ETH will shine in 2025 when Kendrick expects the ETH-BTC cross to track higher, back to 7%, as real world use cases on ETH – the same ones laid out by Goldman – start to take shape. This, he believes, “will see ETH to USD14k by year-end 2025.” There could be more gains: the report goes on to note borrow heavily from the Goldman ETH initiation report above, and states that…

  “If real-world use cases start to take practical shape before the end of 2025 (we see gaming as the most likely), then we think markets will start to see ETH as the digital assets version of a big tech stock. Indeed, we see several crossovers between tech and ETH, but because tech (most recently via AI) is already visible to end-users, it has taken most of the limelight so far. We expect that to change over time in favour of ETH, which is effectively a behind-the-scenes technology solution. This is because ETH’s smart contract platform enables future applications in much the same that Apple’s iOS system enables the building of apps.

  In that scenario, we see the ETH-BTC price ratio rising back to the 7% level that was in place for 18 months from mid-2021 to end-2022. This would present further upside to our estimated USD 14,000 price level by end-2025.”

  Impossible, you say, no way ETH rises 4x from its current price of $3,500. Perhaps, but consider the potential rise in use cases in the aftermath of the Dencun upgrade which has sent the cost of layer 2 transactions as cheap as Solanas. As a result, Kendrick believes that ETH’s use cases will “evolve towards gaming and tokenization, adding significant demand via the existing NFT and DeFi channels, respectively. Importantly, this should provide ‘proof of concept’ examples in which real-world industries come on-chain to exploit the benefits of Ethereum over their existing setups. We expect significant developments on these fronts by 2025-26.”

  Tokenization of real-world assets has begun, but it is small so far. The largest is stUSDT (staked USDT, Figure 4) on the Tron network. Returns for stUSDT are driven by US Treasury yields. The others, which are primarily built on Ethereum, are shown in Figure 5. These offer investors a mix of exposure ranging from front-end Treasuries (Ondo) to real estate (RealT);

  

  Note, the Standard Chartered analyst is not the first to say the true value of ETH is in tokenization: initially it was Goldman, and most recently it was the king of Wall Street, Blackrock’s Larry Fink, who as we noted above, said “I see value in having an Ethereum ETF. These are just stepping stones towards tokenization and I really do believe this is where we’re going to be going.”

  But while Goldman and Blackrock betting on ETH would be effectively a home run, what would guarantee a trifecta would be the last major holdout joining the bandwagon, and that’s precisely what happened last week when the bank – whose boss has been the most vocally skeptical of bitcoin in recent years – put its chips on ETH.

  In a March 14 note on Coinbase (which hiked the price target from $95 to $150; full note available to pro subs in the usual place) from JPM’s Ken Worthington, the crypto analyst echoed Goldman, Standard Chartered and Blackrock, and said that while “the focus of the cryptocurrency marketplace has been the net new money going into U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs and the positive impact on Bitcoin token prices” it is “ethereum and its native token Ether as a substantial contributor to the cryptocurrency ecosystem, and developer of blockchain technology.”

  Specifically, JPM writes that “it sees see the progression along the Ethereum roadmap, including the Dancun upgrade, which occurred this week on March 13, as driving crypto development, which is a longer-term positive and discuss this further in this research.”

  Compare and contrast that with, well, anything that Jamie Dimon has said about Bitcoin.

  There is much more in the full report, including a full fawning section on ETH (that appears to have been taken almost verbatim from the Goldman initiating coverage report)…

  

  … but the bottom line is that while Bitcoin was the pioneer in Wall Street’s institutionalization race, having seen the startling success of bitcoin ETF adoption, the financial titans including Goldman, Blackrock – and now – JPM, have set their sights on what comes next, which is something near and dear to the people who manage trillions: the fastest, cheapest and most effective way to tokenize everything, from information, to data, to money itself. And they have picked the token to do it with.

  So keep a close eye on what happens on May 23 when the SEC is reportedly pushing hard against ETF approval for the second biggest digital asset: with all three of the largest US financial institutions pushing hard, any resistance will die a quick and painless death.

  More in the full notes from JPM, Std Chartered and Goldman

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 22:00

• Illegal Immigrant Can Carry Guns: Federal Judge
  Illegal Immigrant Can Carry Guns: Federal Judge

  Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times,

  An illegal immigrant was wrongly banned from possessing guns, according to a recent ruling.

  

  A federal law, Section 922 of Title 18 of the U.S. Code, bars illegal immigrants from carrying guns or ammunition. Prosecutors charged Heriberto Carbajal-Flores, the illegal alien, in 2020 after he was found in Chicago carrying a semi-automatic pistol despite “knowing he was an alien illegally and unlawfully in the United States.”

  U.S. District Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman rejected two motions to dismiss, but the third motion, based on a 2022 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, triggered the dismissal of the case on March 8.

  “The noncitizen possession statute, 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(5), violates the Second Amendment as applied to Carbajal-Flores,” Judge Coleman, appointed under President Barack Obama, wrote in her 8-page ruling.

  “Thus, the court grants Carbajal-Flores’ motion to dismiss.”

  Lawyers for Mr. Carbajal-Flores had argued in the most recent motion to dismiss that the government could not show that the law in question was “part of the historical tradition that delimits the outer bounds of the right to keep and bear arms.”

  In 2022, the Supreme Court determined that the U.S. Constitution’s Second Amendment “presumptively protects” conduct that is covered by the amendment’s “plain text.”

  To justify regulations, governments must show that each regulation “is consistent with this nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation,” the high court said at the time. “Only if a firearm regulation is consistent with this nation’s historical tradition may a court conclude that the individual’s conduct falls outside the Second Amendment’s ‘unqualified command,’” it said.

  “Lifetime disarmament of an individual based on alienage or nationality alone does not have roots in the history and tradition of the United States,” Mr. Carbajal-Flores’s lawyers argued.

  They pointed to several rulings interpreting the Supreme Court’s decision, including an appeals court ruling that declared stripping a man convicted of a nonviolent crime of his gun rights was unconstitutional.

  The government opposed the motion, noting that neither of the cited decisions applied to illegal immigrants and that the defendant ignored other rulings that did, including a 2023 ruling that found that Second Amendment rights aren’t afforded to illegal immigrants. The government also offered examples of laws that prohibited certain categories of people from carrying guns, including “individuals who threatened the social order through their untrustworthy adherence to the rule of law.”

  But Judge Coleman ruled for the defendant, finding that the laws against untrustworthy people contained exceptions for people who signed loyalty oaths and were deemed nonviolent.

  “The government argues that Carbajal-Flores is a noncitizen who is unlawfully present in this country. The court notes, however, that Carbajal-Flores has never been convicted of a felony, a violent crime, or a crime involving the use of a weapon. Even in the present case, Carbajal-Flores contends that he received and used the handgun solely for self-protection and protection of property during a time of documented civil unrest in the Spring of 2020,” she wrote.

  “Additionally, Pretrial Service has confirmed that Carbajal-Flores has consistently adhered to and fulfilled all the stipulated conditions of his release, is gainfully employed, and has no new arrests or outstanding warrants. The court finds that Carbajal-Flores’ criminal record, containing no improper use of a weapon, as well as the non-violent circumstances of his arrest do not support a finding that he poses a risk to public safety such that he cannot be trusted to use a weapon responsibly and should be deprived of his Second Amendment right to bear arms in self-defense.”

  An attorney representing Mr. Carbajal-Flores declined to comment. Federal prosecutors didn’t respond to a request for comment.

  Reactions

  The ruling drew a range of reactions from people in the legal community.

  “Supreme Court has said the ‘people’ are members of the political community,” Larry Keane, a lawyer for the National Shooting Sports Foundation, wrote on X.

  “Illegal aliens in US are not part of the political community and thus do not have 2A rights.”

  Kostas Moros, a lawyer who represents the California Rifle and Pistol Association, said that he also saw the issue that way.

  “Bruen asks for a historical tradition of modern regulation that justifies the modern law, and one plainly exists here,” he wrote, noting that groups that have been disarmed in the past, including loyalists, have the common thread of being “outside of the political community.”

  Matthew Larosiere, another lawyer, disagreed, writing in an analysis that all immigrants, even ones in the country illegally, are part of “the people” in the Second Amendment. His argument rested in part on the 14th Amendment, which applies to “any person within” the country.

  “To find that illegal immigrants are outside of ’the people‘ protected by the Second Amendment, you must believe that the Framers were talking about a different ’people’ in the First, Fourth, Ninth, and Tenth Amendments,” he wrote, adding later that he sided with the court in finding differences between historical laws such as the one that barred loyalists from owning guns and the law that applies to illegal immigrants.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 21:40

• Trust In Flying Still High, But Passengers Take More Precautions
  Trust In Flying Still High, But Passengers Take More Precautions

  The Department of Justice has opened a criminal investigation into the panel blow out of a Boeing 737 MAX operated by Alaska Airlines in January, according to the Wall Street Journal. The incident was the first in a chain of events reported this year, which have led to increased scrutiny of the company and heightened media attention over such incidents.

  Despite the string of faults that have been publicized, the chances of being killed on a flight are extremely low.

  This knowledge is well ingrained in many, as Statista’s Anna Fleck notes one study, carried out by The Harris Poll on behalf of Fast Company, shows: 69 percent of respondents agreed that flying is safer than other means of long-distance transportation.

  At the same time, 86 percent of adults agreed that they would trust flight teams (such as air hostesses and pilots) to keep passengers safe during flights, while 73 percent said that they trust passenger planes are thoroughly inspected before flying.

  Yet, it appears that the high-profile safety incidents documented of late are having at least some impact on flyers’ behaviors: 48 percent of respondents said that they would now be more likely to pay attention to safety materials on an upcoming flight, 47 percent said that they would now be more likely to wear a seatbelt when not required and 45 percent said that they would now be more likely pay attention to pre-takeoff activities. At the same time, between 30-40 percent said that they would be more likely to consider the row their seat is located on the plane, the airline they book with and the type of plane they will be flying on.

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  Against a backdrop of questions over what’s going on with Boeing, Morning Consult carried out a survey on how public trust in the aircraft giant has changed with the new developments.

  It found that between Q4 of last year and January 1-February 28 of 2024, net trust had dipped among respondents by 14 percentage points. Net trust is defined as the share of respondents who trust a brand minus the share who distrust a brand.

  As the following chart shows, the biggest change was among business travelers, with a 26 percentage point difference between the two survey waves. According to the online polling company, this is partly due to business flyers having historically had more trust in Boeing than other groups, which means there was more room to fall.

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  Nicki Zink, an analyst at Morning Consult, adds that while Boeing’s reputation has dipped, this has not spread to the wider airline industry and that net trust in airlines has even seen an uptick as the spring break season approaches.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 21:20

• Queenpin Of Guatemalan Drug Cartel Sentenced Over International Trafficking Conspiracy
  Queenpin Of Guatemalan Drug Cartel Sentenced Over International Trafficking Conspiracy

  Authored by Stephen Katte via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  A Queenpin of the Lorenzana drug trafficking network has been sentenced to 33 years in prison and forced to forfeit $27 million for charges related to international drug trafficking.

  

  According to the Department of Justice, Queenpin Marta Julia Lorenzana-Cordon from Zacapa, Guatemala, was a leader in one of the largest and most influential drug cartels in Guatemala. Guatemala is a Central American country south of Mexico, with a population of over 17 million people.

  During their reign, the Lorenzana criminal group was described by authorities as one of the most brutal and destructive drug trafficking organizations in the world.

  Julia Lorenzana-Cordon was extradited to the United States in December of 2021, after Guatemalan authorities took her into custody at the behest of the U.S. government in May 2021. She subsequently pleaded guilty in May of 2023 to conspiring to distribute five kilograms or more of cocaine, and knowing and intending for the drug to be unlawfully imported to America.

  According to the Department of Justice, Julia Lorenzana-Cordon, also known as Yulie, began operating within the criminal enterprise around 2008 and continued until at least 2019. The organization itself began operating in 1996. The patriarchal criminal group comprised primarily of family members and had the goal of distributing multi-ton quantities of cocaine from Colombia to Central America and Mexico for eventual distribution into the United States.

  The investigation into Julia Lorenzana-Cordon was part of Operation Slipknot and conducted by the DEA’s Bilateral Investigations Unit, with assistance from the DEA Guatemala City Country Office and the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces. Investigators found the Lorenzana drug trafficking organization transported tonnage quantities of cocaine from Colombia into Guatemala, where the cocaine was stored on properties owned by the crime organization.

  After the cocaine was processed, the drug was transported by the Sinaloa Cartel, among other organizations, into Mexico, through Central America, and eventually, into the United States.

  Along with Julia Lorenzana-Cordon, her siblings, Eliu Elixander Lorenzana-Cordon and Waldemar Lorenzana-Cordon have also been hit with lengthy prison sentences. Both were convicted in 2019 on international narcotics trafficking charges in the District of Columbia and sentenced to life in prison.

  At the same time, the father of the siblings, Waldemar Lorenzana-Lima Sr., pleaded guilty in August 2014 to international narcotics trafficking charges in the District of Columbia, receiving 23 years in prison. He has since passed away.

  According to authorities, the family was deeply dysfunctional, and Julia Lorenzana-Cordon had separate drug trafficking networks different to those of her brothers and father, which allowed her to continue operating for a few years after the rest of her family was convicted.

  Julia Lorenzana-Cordon was also reportedly married to Jairo Estuardo Orellana Morales, a Guatemalan narcotics trafficker and accused murderer who was arrested in May 2014. His status since being detained is unknown.

  

  The Department of the Treasury designated the couple as Specially Designated Narcotics Traffickers (SDNT) under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act (Kingpin Act). Under the act, U.S. persons and entities are prohibited from conducting financial or commercial transactions with anyone designated as a SDNT. The act also freezes any assets a SDNT may have under U.S. jurisdiction.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 21:00

• More & More Americans Turn To TikTok For News
  More & More Americans Turn To TikTok For News

  The House of Representatives passed a bill last week that could lead to a nationwide ban of the social media platform TikTok in the United States, unless its Chinese owner Byte Dance sells its stake in the company within 165 days.

  U.S. lawmakers had raised concerns over the question of data and national security risks of the app, fearing potential links to China’s government. TikTok, which is headquartered outside of China, says it has never been asked by the Chinese government to provide them with U.S. data and has been actively trying to distance itself from Beijing.

  The short form video app is particularly beloved by teenagers and young people around the world.

  Now, as Statista’s Anna Fleck reports, nearly one in three (32 percent) young adults aged 18-29 even say that they turn to TikTok regularly for news. This is up from just nine percent who said the same in 2020.

  While still low, the overall share of adults in the United States who say they regularly get news on TikTok has more than quadrupled between 2020 and 2024.

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  According to a survey by Pew Research Center of over 8,800 adults, where only 3 percent said they regularly get their news from the social media platform four years ago, this had climbed to 14 percent between September 25 and October 1, 2023, when the survey was last fielded.

  In order for the bill to come into action, it first needs to see through the legislative process and would then need to pass the Senate.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 20:40

• Trump Reveals Plan To Impose 100 Percent Tariffs On Chinese Cars Made In Mexico
  Trump Reveals Plan To Impose 100 Percent Tariffs On Chinese Cars Made In Mexico

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

  Former President Donald Trump threatened to impose 100 percent tariffs on Chinese cars made in Mexico once reelected, double the 50 percent he stated earlier.

  

  “Mexico has taken, over a period of thirty years, 34 percent of the automobile manufacturing business in our country,” President Trump said during a rally in Ohio on Saturday. China is building massive plants in Mexico where they plan on building the cars and selling them in the United States, paying no tax at the border, he said, adding that the plan will not work under his presidency.

  “Let me tell you something to China, if you’re listening President Xi … those big monster car manufacturing plants that you’re building in Mexico right now, and you think you’re going to get that, you’re going to not hire Americans, and you’re going to sell the cars to us, no, we’re going to put a 100 percent tariff on every single car that comes across the line, and you’re not going to be able to sell those cars if I get elected,” he said.

  🇺🇸 Trump: Mexico and China are taking over our auto industry

  “Those big monster car manufacturing plants that you’re building in Mexico right now. You think you’re going to get that, not hire Americans.

  We’re going to put a 100% tariff on all those cars.”

  Source: C-Span pic.twitter.com/cC7FUAzB6c

  — Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) March 17, 2024

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

  In an interview with CNBC on March 11, President Trump said he would put a 50 percent tariff on all cars China builds in Mexico and sells in the United States. Such a move will force them to stop building the plants, he claimed. “But we don’t do that. We have stupid people running our government, to be honest,” he said.

  Chinese Threat

  A Feb. 20 report by the Alliance for American Manufacturing warned that China posed an “existential threat” to the American auto industry if it uses the Mexico route to sell vehicles. Manufacturing in Mexico will grant Chinese automakers “more favorable tariffs” under the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA).

  This essentially hands over Chinese auto companies “backdoor access” to American consumers, allowing them to circumvent current U.S. policies that are keeping them away from the American market. “This is an auto industry backed by the Chinese state. It has invested heavily in foreign markets in order to access more of them,” the report stated.

  “And there is cause for alarm that Chinese vehicles and parts will only increase their access to the U.S. market, overcoming existing tariffs and evading existing trade enforcement measures, to directly challenge domestic automakers and threaten the jobs of millions of American manufacturing workers.”

  The report called on the United States to adopt a more “proactive and evolving” strategy to counter the Chinese agenda. It recommended that Washington raise tariffs on any Made in China vehicle and tighten USMCA regulations.

  In January last year, a dispute panel of the USMCA ruled in favor of Canada and Mexico against the United States in their interpretation of rules for the production of automobiles.

  The dispute was regarding the United States allegedly having a stricter interpretation of rules that a minimum of 75 percent regional parts is necessary for a car to be considered as made in North America. The rule is crucial to qualify for duty-free treatment under USMCA.

  Canada and Mexico argued that if the core part of the vehicle, like the transmission or engine, has 75 percent regional content, then the number can be rounded up to 100 percent for calculating the overall regional content of the product. The United States disagreed against rounding up the numbers.

  The panel sided with Canada and Mexico. The United States Trade Representative called the ruling “disappointing.” The panel’s interpretation “could result in less North American content in automobiles, less investment across the region, and fewer American jobs.”

  Michael Stumo, from the Coalition for a Prosperous America, said that the judgment “is another reason to not outsource our trade policy, or any part of our sovereignty, to global tribunals. The USMCA was approved in large part because of strong regional auto content. Free traders on an international tribunal just changed that deal.”

  Back in September, President Trump warned in a Truth Social post that the Biden administration’s EV program will end up benefiting China and the “Auto Industry in America will cease to exist!”

  “Vote for TRUMP, and I will stop this Madness, IMMEDIATELY! Mexico & Canada LOVE Biden’s idiotic policy,” he said.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 20:20

• US Confirms Israel Killed Hamas No. 3, But Biden Calls Rafah Ground Op 'A Mistake'
  US Confirms Israel Killed Hamas No. 3, But Biden Calls Rafah Ground Op ‘A Mistake’

  On Monday the White House confirmed that Israel killed Hamas number three Marwan Issa in an operation on March 11. Israeli military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari had initially announced the likelihood of his death, but said the military is still awaiting confirmation. Some international reports have described Issa as the number two most important leader.

  But what is clear is that Issa’s death marks the highest-ranking official of Hamas to be taken out during Israel’s war with Hamas began on Oct. 7. White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan confirmed the news in a Monday afternoon press briefing.

  

  YNet wrote that “Marwan Issa holds powerful position in the terror group as coordinator between military wing and the political leadership; reports of his death come after massive airstrikes on Nuseirat camp in central Gaza where he is believed to be hiding.”

  Sullivan during the White House press briefing also answered questions over President Biden having held his first phone call in a month with his Israeli counterpart, PM Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday.

  Sullivan said that Biden told Netanyahu that Israel has the “right to go after Hamas” – but still stressed that the impending ground operation on refugee-packed Rafah is a “mistake”. 

  A call readout indicted the two leaders focused on discussing “the latest developments in Israel and Gaza, including the situation in Rafah and efforts to surge humanitarian assistance to Gaza.” The readout from the Israeli side stressed “Israel’s commitment to achieving all the goals” of its operation, including “making sure Gaza is not a threat” alongside ensuring the continued supply of humanitarian aid.

  But the division between Washington and Tel Aviv policy visions for Gaza continues to play out publicly. Sullivan said that Israel still doesn’t have an adequate plan for the safe evacuation of Rafah’s over one million civilians. But Israel has stressed repeatedly in the last several days that it does have a plan in place.

  Watch the respective contrary positions in the below statements…

  🚨🇺🇸WHITE HOUSE: “ISRAEL HAS NO PLAN FOR RAFAH CIVILIANS”

  “More than a million people have taken refuge in Rafah.

  Israel has not presented us or the world with a plan for how we’re where they can safely move those civilians – let alone feed and house them.”

  Source: White… https://t.co/dFToUGCMtc pic.twitter.com/sQMLv5pCEk

  — Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) March 18, 2024

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

  Israeli media took notice too:

  The White House on Monday sharply rejected the “straw man” argument adopted by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that opposing a major Israeli military operation in Rafah is akin to opposing the total defeat of Hamas.

  Netanyahu also on Monday told a gathering of AIPAC representatives (American Israel Public Affairs Committee) in Jerusalem that accusations coming out of Washington that he’s beholden to extremists in his government are “deliberate lies”. He was responding to the scathing criticisms issued last week Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, who also called for new elections in Israel and accused Netanyahu of looking out for his own political future first.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 20:00

• High-Schoolers Are Losing Confidence In The Benefits Of A College Degree
  High-Schoolers Are Losing Confidence In The Benefits Of A College Degree

  Via Campus Reform,

  A recently released study that involved focus groups and a national study explores how high school students and non-enrolled adults ages 18-30 view the prospects of a college degree.

  

  New data suggests that prospective college students are finding fewer and fewer reasons to obtain a degree.

  Inside Higher Ed recently highlighted a new report by the Gates Foundation-funded HCM Strategists and Edge Research revealing that high school students and young adults have a declining view of the benefits of a college degree.

  The study, ”Continuing to Explore the Exodus from Higher Education,”compares the results of focus groups and a national survey conducted in 2023 to findings from a 2022 Gates Foundation report titled, “Where are the students?.”

  Researchers found that high schoolers and non-enrolled adults ages 18-30 still associate some benefits with attending college, but those perceived benefits were in decline compared to findings from 2022.

  The percentage of non-enrolled adults surveyed who consider reasons to go to college, such as to gain more money or get a better job, as important or very important has also dropped from the year before.

  At the same time, however, non-enrolled adults continue to perceive an increasing benefit to other options such as licenses, certificates, and trade schools.

  In conclusion, the study’s researchers write that, “Despite our understanding of the value of higher education, perceptions among these high school students and non-enrolled audiences make it clear that institutions need to prove their value to them.”

  ”In particular, why does the value of a 2-year or 4-year degree outweigh the value of credentials and job training programs?,” the researchers write.

  “Both High Schoolers and Non-Enrollees see and select other paths that are shorter, cheaper, and/or more directly linked to specific job opportunities.”

  “At the end of the day, higher education has a lot of work to do to convince these audiences of its value,” HCM consultant Terrell Dunn told Inside Higher Ed. 

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 19:40

• Google Denies Election Interference After Report Cites Dozens Of Instances Helping Dems, Censoring Republicans
  Google Denies Election Interference After Report Cites Dozens Of Instances Helping Dems, Censoring Republicans

  Google has denied a new report by the right-leaning Media Research Center (MRC) alleging 41 instances of “election interference” since 2008.

  

  According to the report, Google has “utilized its power to help push to electoral victory the most liberal candidates…while targeting their opponents for censorship.”

  This article understates the magnitude of the problem – Google interferes to help Democrats thousands of times every election season!

  This is to be expected when their censorship (aka “Trust & Safety”) teams are have far left political views. https://t.co/y36yzdzIUQ

  — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 18, 2024

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

  MRC also claims that Google “targeted support for Hillary Clinton for censorship” by “suspending the accounts of writers who wrote blogs critical of Obama during his primary race against Clinton.”

  In 2008, MRC alleged that Google threw its support behind then-Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) as he faced off against Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination. –NY Post

  Four years later, Google – which “once again favored Obama over Mitt Romney,” refused to correct a “Google bomb” that smeared GOP primary candidate Rick Santorum, the report reads.

  In 2019, 950 pages of Google’s internal documents were leaked, revealing evidence of Google utilizing blacklists and machine learning algorithms to censor Republicans, conservatives, and populists.https://t.co/AAbichiMpg

  — KanekoaTheGreat (@KanekoaTheGreat) March 18, 2024

  https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsAccording to Dr. Robert Epstein, who is cited in MRC’s report and has conducted “dozens of controlled experiments” to uncover bias, Google’s search algorithm “shifted at least 2.5 million votes” to Hillary Clinton in the 2016 US election.

  In 2018, President Donald Trump accused the search giant of rigging search results to display only left-wing and negative stories about him.

  “Google search results for ‘Trump News’ shows only the viewing/reporting of Fake New Media. In other words, they have it RIGGED, for me & others, so that almost all stories & news is BAD, Fake CNN is prominent. Republican/Conservative & Fair Media is shut out. Illegal,” Trump said in a now-deleted post on X.

  In response, Google claimed “Search is not used to set a political agenda and we don’t bias our results toward any political ideology.”

  Google denies

  A company source told the NY Post that Epstein’s claims have been “widely debunked.” In one instance cited by the MRC report, Google is alleged to have “targeted” then-Democratic Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard (HI), by “disabling Gabbard’s Ads account just as she became the most searched candidate following the first Democratic Party primary debate.”

  Google’s source told the Post that the company’s automated systems flagged ‘unusual activity’ due to large spending changes in an effort to prevent fraud – and the issue was resolved within six hours, per the source, who noted that Gabbard’s subsequent lawsuit against the company was dismissed.

  The MRC also alleged that Google’s left-leaning bias impacted the 2022 Georgia Senate race between former football great and Republican Herschel Walker and the eventual winner, the Democrat Raphael Warnock.

  According to the report, Google’s search results “favored [the] incumbent” Warnock “in the swing precinct where greater proportions of undecided voters likely reside.”

  A source close to Google told The Post that third parties who have looked at our results and “found no evidence to support claims of political bias.” -NY Post

  “There is absolutely nothing new here — just a recycled list of baseless, inaccurate complaints that have been debunked by third parties and many that failed in the courts,” a Google spokesperson told the outlet.

  Of course, one can’t help but be skeptical considering that just before the 2016 presidential election, among the many leaks published by Wikileaks as part of its Podesta email leak was Google’s “strategic plan” to help democrats win the election and track voters.

  Google head Eric Schmidt’s secret strategic plan for the US election #PodestaEmails https://t.co/LskJODXyXn

  More: https://t.co/ZUfh7WDAT5 pic.twitter.com/llq5G9kp5V

  — WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) October 31, 2016

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

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 19:20

• Biden Wants To Hike Taxes By $7 Trillion Dollars
  Biden Wants To Hike Taxes By $7 Trillion Dollars

  Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk.com,

  If Democrats win the trifecta with a clean sweep of the Senate, House, and White House in November, taxes would rise by $7 trillion over 10 years.

  The House Ways and Means Committee reports The Biden Tax Hike Will Likely Exceed $7 Trillion.

  I believe they mean would not will.

  

  Tax Details

  • President Biden Quietly Pledges to Let Trump Tax Cuts Expire

  • Sending Jobs and Companies Overseas with Higher Business Taxes than China

  • Global Tax Surrender Allows Foreign Governments to Take American Tax Dollars

  • President Biden’s proposal to raise the top rate to 39.6 percent goes after small business owners who pay their business taxes via their individual tax return – despite his pledge not to raise taxes on small businesses.

  • A Tax on Wealth You Haven’t Even Earned Yet.

  • Higher Prices for Energy Bills and an Energy Insecure America.

  • An IRS That Would Terrify Godzilla

  A friend of mine asked when will the tax hikes cause a recession. I replied never. I suspect my friend was confused over the title that said “will” it should say “would”.

  I did not total up all of those details because I don’t believe it’s going to happen. However, It is a warning shot as to what would happen if Democrats did win the trifecta.

  Biden’s Populist Budget

  The Hill comments Biden’s populist budget marks the overdue end of trickle-down economics

  Trickle-down refers to the idea that tax cuts for the wealthiest “trickle down” to the rest of us. It’s long been a popular idea in Washington, but it’s just not true. A few years ago, the London School of Economics studied 50 years of such “trickle-down” policies in 18 industrialized nations, including the U.S., and found that their only result was increasing the wealth of the already wealthy.

  So how do we get prosperity for the rest of us? By taxing extreme wealth and investing those revenues in social goods like education, housing, food and health care. President Biden’s recently released federal budget plan follows that blueprint, putting the value of investing in American families and communities ahead of slashing taxes for the rich.

  The budget for the fiscal year 2025 would generate about $5.3 trillion in revenues over the next decade. That’s a $388 billion boost compared to last year’s budget — and it all comes from fairer tax policies targeting wealthy individuals and large corporations. Households earning less than $400,000 would see no tax increases, with many seeing reductions.

  The proposed budget invests $2.3 trillion towards essential public services for hard-working families while reducing the national debt by almost $3 trillion. That’s a great start toward filling critical investment gaps for families and communities.

  Take housing. The National Low Income Housing Coalition reports a shortfall of more than 7 million affordable housing units for poor and low-income Americans. Biden is requesting $33 billion for the Housing Choice Voucher program, which currently helps over 2 million households afford housing and would expand access to homeownership for first-time homebuyers. His request will help to support the existing vouchers and add about 20,000 more.

  Though much more is needed, this effort to reduce homelessness by providing access to safe affordable housing in a tight housing market — with high rent prices and often insufficient wages — is a step in the right direction.

  Normally writers for The Hill are not nutzoid liberal like the above article.

  But it’s not going to happen unless you think Democrats can pull off a trifecta.

  Nonetheless, the budget is instructive as are CBO and Fed projections. I will have some comments on those projections Sunday or Monday.

  Optimism reins supreme, and it won’t happen.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 19:00

• Russia Mulls Security Buffer Zone As Ukraine Drones Shut Down 600,000 Barrels Of Daily Refining
  Russia Mulls Security Buffer Zone As Ukraine Drones Shut Down 600,000 Barrels Of Daily Refining

  After Russian President Vladimir Putin’s post-election victory speech and Q&A with the press wherein he first unveiled the possibility of creating a buffer zone between Ukrainian land and Russian border regions, the Kremlin has issued more details of the plan being mulled. 

  Putin had initially described Sunday, “I do not exclude that, bearing in mind the tragic events taking place today, we will be forced at some point, when we deem it appropriate, to create a certain ‘sanitary zone’ in the territories today under the Kyiv regime.” He referenced the “tragic events” of cross-border attacks in regions bordering Ukraine which have left scores of civilians dead and wounded over the past several months.

  Putin described without elaborating further that the security zone “would be quite difficult for the adversary to overcome with its weapons, primarily of foreign origin.”

  

  On Monday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that as part of the plan Russia “would take measures to safeguard [its] territories” from Ukrainian drone and artillery attacks on critical infrastructure and civilian areas and residences. These areas can be made safe, he explained in follow-up to Putin’s words, “some kind of corridor, some kind of… buffer zone that [would put] out of reach any means that the enemy might use to launch strikes.”

  From Moscow’s perspective, this is laying the foundation and likely even ‘legal framework’ for seizing and solidifying hold over border territories inside Ukraine for the purpose of creating this proposed buffer. In many cases thus far throughout the war, Ukraine forces have been able to send drones hundreds of kilometers inside Russia, reaching even Moscow and St. Petersburg in rare instances.

  Oil refineries have been especially targeted, with a dozen or more instances in merely the last few months alone. Crimea too has come under increased drone swarm attack.

  The attacks on energy are clearly beginning to have significant impact on a chief source of revenue, part of which no doubt goes to fund the Russian war machine in Ukraine.

  “Gunvor Group Ltd. Chief Executive Officer Torbjörn Törnqvist estimates about 600,000 barrels of Russia’s daily oil-refining capacity has been knocked out by Ukrainian drone strikes,” Bloomberg reports based on a Monday report. According to some key quotes:

  “It is significant because obviously this is gonna hit the distillate exports straight away,” Törnqvist said during an interview at the CERAWeek by S&P Global conference in Houston on Monday. “So that will probably take down exports by a couple of hundred thousand barrels, so to me it’s a distillate problem.”

  …Broadly writ, crude oil markets are mostly in balance and fairly valued, Törnqvist said, adding that US supplies are likely to grow this year by about half the rate of 2023’s 700,000-to-800,000 barrel-a-day pace. Still, non-OPEC supply growth overall is likely to be flat this year, he said. 

  *GUNVOR ESTIMATES DRONES SHUT 600,000 BARRELS OF RUSSIA REFININGhttps://t.co/jCsNCOmSdu

  — zerohedge (@zerohedge) March 18, 2024

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

  The past week has seen consecutive days of drone strikes on oil facilities inside Russia, with a noticeable uptick in attacks confirmed over the weekend, as Russians went to the polls to vote in the presidential election. Just before the three-day election period began, there was an attack on Rosneft’s largest refinery:

  Russia’s Ryazan oil refinery, controlled by Rosneft, was set ablaze after a drone attack, a regional governor said on Wednesday.

  The plant, with installed capacity of around 350,000 barrels per day, refines about 12.7 million metric tons of Russian crude a year (around 317,000 barrels per day), or 5.8% of total refined crude, according to industry sources.

  On Sunday alone, 35 drones were launched on Russia, disrupting electricity in a number of border regions, including resulting at another fire at an oil refinery. One drone made to Moscow, and was shot down as it flew near Domodedovo airport.

  Tyler Durden
  Mon, 03/18/2024 – 18:40

Digest powered by RSS Digest