Sep 01

Today’s News 1st September 2018

  • Vigilantes With A Badge: Warrior Cops Endanger Our Lives And Freedoms

    Authored by John Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,

    “There are always risks in challenging excessive police power, but the risks of not challenging it are more dangerous, even fatal.”

    – Hunter S. Thompson, Kingdom of Fear: Loathsome Secrets of a Star-Crossed Child in the Final Days of the American Century

    I have known a lot of good cops, I have defended a lot of good cops, and I have been fortunate to call a number of good cops friends.

    So when I say that warrior cops – hyped up on their own authority and the power of the badge – have not made America any safer or freer, I am not disrespecting any of the fine, decent, lawful police officers who take seriously their oath of office to serve and protect their fellow citizens, uphold the Constitution, and maintain the peace.

    My beef is with the growing squads of warrior cops who have been given the green light to kill, shoot, taser, abuse and steal from American citizens in the so-called name of law and order. 

    These cops are little more than vigilantes with a badge.

    Indeed, it is increasingly evident that militarized police armed with weapons of war who are allowed to operate above the law and break the laws with impunity have not made America any safer or freer.

    Don’t take my word for it.

    A new study by a political scientist at Princeton University concludes that militarizing police and SWAT teams “provide no detectable benefits in terms of officer safety or violent crime reduction.”

    In fact, according to researcher Jonathan Mummolo, if police in America are feeling less safe, it’s because the process of transforming them into extensions of the military makes them less safe, less popular and less trust-worthy.

    The study, the first systematic analysis on the use and consequences of militarized force, reveals that “police militarization neither reduces rates of violent crime nor changes the number of officers assaulted or killed.”

    In other words, warrior cops aren’t making us or themselves any safer.

    Consider that not a day goes by without reports of police officers overstepping the bounds of the Constitution and brutalizing, terrorizing and killing the citizenry. Indeed, the list of incidents in which unaccountable police abuse their power, betray their oath of office and leave taxpayers bruised, broken and/or killed grows longer and more tragic by the day.

    Americans are now eight times more likely to die in a police confrontation than they are to be killed by a terrorist.

    The problem, as one reporter rightly concluded, is “not that life has gotten that much more dangerous, it’s that authorities have chosen to respond to even innocent situations as if they were in a warzone.”

    This battlefield mindset has gone hand in hand with the rise of militarized SWAT (“special weapons and tactics”) teams.

    Frequently justified as vital tools necessary to combat terrorism and deal with rare but extremely dangerous criminal situations, such as those involving hostages, SWAT teams—which first appeared on the scene in California in the 1960s—have now become intrinsic parts of local law enforcement operations, thanks in large part to substantial federal assistance and the Pentagon’s military surplus recycling program, which allows the transfer of military equipment, weapons and training to local police for free or at sharp discounts.

    Ponder this: In 1980, there were roughly 3,000 SWAT team-style raids in the US.

    Incredibly, that number has since grown to more than 80,000 SWAT team raids per year.

    There are few communities without a SWAT team today.

    Where this becomes a problem of life and death for Americans is when these SWAT teams dressed, armed and trained in military tactics are assigned to carry out routine law enforcement tasks, such as serving a search warrant.

    No longer reserved exclusively for deadly situations, SWAT teams are now increasingly being deployed for relatively routine police matters, with some SWAT teams being sent out as much as five times a day. In the state of Maryland alone, 92 percent of 8200 SWAT missions were used to execute search or arrest warrants.

    For example, police in both Baltimore and Dallas have used SWAT teams to bust up poker games.

    A Connecticut SWAT team swarmed a bar suspected of serving alcohol to underage individuals.

    In Arizona, a SWAT team was used to break up an alleged cockfighting ring.

    An Atlanta SWAT team raided a music studio, allegedly out of a concern that it might have been involved in illegal music piracy.

    A Minnesota SWAT team raided the wrong house in the middle of the night, handcuffed the three young children, held the mother on the floor at gunpoint, shot the family dog, and then “forced the handcuffed children to sit next to the carcass of their dead pet and bloody pet for more than an hour” while they searched the home.

    A California SWAT team drove an armored Lenco Bearcat into Roger Serrato’s yard, surrounded his home with paramilitary troops wearing face masks, threw a fire-starting flashbang grenade into the house in order, then when Serrato appeared at a window, unarmed and wearing only his shorts, held him at bay with rifles. Serrato died of asphyxiation from being trapped in the flame-filled house. Incredibly, the father of four had done nothing wrong. The SWAT team had misidentified him as someone involved in a shooting.

    And then there was the police officer who tripped and “accidentally” shot and killed Eurie Stamps, an unarmed grandfather of 12, who had been forced to lie facedown on the floor of his home at gunpoint while a SWAT team attempted to execute a search warrant against his stepson.

    Equally outrageous was the four-hour SWAT team raid on a California high school, where students were locked down in classrooms, forced to urinate in overturned desks and generally terrorized by heavily armed, masked gunmen searching for possible weapons that were never found.

    These incidents are just the tip of the iceberg.

    Nationwide, SWAT teams have been employed to address an astonishingly trivial array of criminal activity or mere community nuisances: angry dogs, domestic disputes, improper paperwork filed by an orchid farmer, and misdemeanor marijuana possession, to give a brief sampling.

    If these raids are becoming increasingly common and widespread, you can chalk it up to the “make-work” philosophy, in which you assign at-times unnecessary jobs to individuals to keep them busy or employed. In this case, however, the make-work principle is being used to justify the use of sophisticated military equipment and, in the process, qualify for federal funding.

    Remember, SWAT teams originated as specialized units dedicated to defusing extremely sensitive, dangerous situations. They were never meant to be used for routine police work such as serving a warrant.

    As the role of paramilitary forces has expanded, however, to include involvement in nondescript police work targeting nonviolent suspects, the mere presence of SWAT units has actually injected a level of danger and violence into police-citizen interactions that was not present as long as these interactions were handled by traditional civilian officers. 

    What we are witnessing is an inversion of the police-civilian relationship.

    Rather than compelling police officers to remain within constitutional bounds as servants of the people, ordinary Americans are being placed at the mercy of militarized police units. 

    This is what happens when paramilitary forces are used to conduct ordinary policing operations, such as executing warrants on nonviolent defendants.

    Moreover, general incompetence, collateral damage (fatalities, property damage, etc.) and botched raids tend to go hand in hand with an overuse of paramilitary forces.

    In some cases, officers misread the address on the warrant.

    In others, they simply barge into the wrong house or even the wrong building.

    In another subset of cases (such as the Department of Education raid on Anthony Wright’s home), police conduct a search of a building where the suspect no longer resides.

    SWAT teams have even on occasion conducted multiple, sequential raids on wrong addresses or executed search warrants despite the fact that the suspect is already in police custody. Police have also raided homes on the basis of mistaking the presence or scent of legal substances for drugs. Incredibly, these substances have included tomatoes, sunflowers, fish, elderberry bushes, kenaf plants, hibiscus, and ragweed.

    As you can see, all too often, botched SWAT team raids have resulted in one tragedy after another for the residents with little consequences for law enforcement.

    Unfortunately, judges tend to afford extreme levels of deference to police officers who have mistakenly killed innocent civilians but do not afford similar leniency to civilians who have injured police officers in acts of self-defense. 

    Even homeowners who mistake officers for robbers can be sentenced for assault or murder if they take defensive actions resulting in harm to police.

    And as journalist Radley Balko shows in his in-depth study of police militarization, the shock-and-awe tactics utilized by many SWAT teams only increases the likelihood that someone will get hurt. 

    Drug warrants, for instance, are typically served by paramilitary units late at night or shortly before dawn. Unfortunately, to the unsuspecting homeowner—especially in cases involving mistaken identities or wrong addresses—a raid can appear to be nothing less than a violent home invasion, with armed intruders crashing through their door. The natural reaction would be to engage in self-defense. Yet such a defensive reaction on the part of a homeowner, particularly a gun owner, will spur officers to employ lethal force.

    That’s exactly what happened to Jose Guerena, the young ex-Marine who was killed after a SWAT team kicked open the door of his Arizona home during a drug raid and opened fire. According to news reports, Guerena, 26 years old and the father of two young children, grabbed a gun in response to the forced invasion but never fired. In fact, the safety was still on his gun when he was killed. Police officers were not as restrained. The young Iraqi war veteran was allegedly fired upon 71 times. Guerena had no prior criminal record, and the police found nothing illegal in his home.

    The problems inherent in these situations are further compounded by the fact that SWAT teams are granted “no-knock” warrants at high rates such that the warrants themselves are rendered practically meaningless. 

    This sorry state of affairs is made even worse by U.S. Supreme Court rulings that have essentiallydone away with the need for a “no-knock” warrant altogether, giving the police authority to disregard the protections afforded American citizens by the Fourth Amendment.

    In the process, Americans are rendered altogether helpless and terror-stricken as a result of these confrontations with the police.

    Indeed, “terrorizing” is a mild term to describe the effect on those who survive such vigilante tactics. “It was terrible. It was the most frightening experience of my life. I thought it was a terrorist attack,” said 84-year-old Leona Goldberg, a victim of such a raid. 

    Yet this type of “terrorizing” activity is characteristic of the culture that we have created.

    If ever there were a time to de-militarize and de-weaponize local police forces, it’s now.

    While we are now grappling with a power-hungry police state at the federal level, the militarization of domestic American law enforcement is largely the result of the militarization of local police forces, which are increasingly militaristic in their uniforms, weaponry, language, training, and tactics and have come to rely on SWAT teams in matters that once could have been satisfactorily performed by traditional civilian officers.

    Yet American police forces were never supposed to be a branch of the military, nor were they meant to be private security forces for the reigning political faction.

    Instead, they were intended to be an aggregation of countless local police units, composed of citizens like you and me that exist for a sole purpose: to serve and protect the citizens of each and every American community.

    As a result of the increasing militarization of the police in recent years, however, the police now not only look like the military—with their foreboding uniforms and phalanx of lethal weapons—but they function like them, as well. 

    Thus, no more do we have a civilian force of peace officers entrusted with serving and protecting the American people.  Instead, today’s militarized law enforcement officials have shifted their allegiance from the citizenry to the state, acting preemptively to ward off any possible challenges to the government’s power, unrestrained by the boundaries of the Fourth Amendment.

    As journalist Herman Schwartz observed, “The Fourth Amendment was designed to stand between us and arbitrary governmental authority. For all practical purposes, that shield has been shattered, leaving our liberty and personal integrity subject to the whim of every cop on the beat, trooper on the highway and jail official.”

    Armed police officers, the end product of the government—federal, local and state—and law enforcement agencies having merged, have become a “standing” or permanent army, composed of full-time professional soldiers who do not disband. 

    Yet these permanent armies are exactly what those who drafted the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights feared as tools used by despotic governments to wage war against its citizens.

    This phenomenon we are experiencing with the police is what philosopher Abraham Kaplan referred to as the law of the instrument, which essentially says that to a hammer, everything looks like a nail. 

    In the scenario that has been playing out in recent years, we the citizenry have become the nails to be hammered by the government’s henchmen, a.k.a. its guns for hire, a.k.a. its standing army, a.k.a. the nation’s law enforcement agencies.

    Yet the tension inherent in most civilian-police encounter these days can’t be blamed exclusively on law enforcement’s growing reliance on SWAT teams and donated military equipment.

    It goes far deeper, to a transformation in the way police view themselves and their line of duty.

    Specifically, what we’re dealing with today is a skewed shoot-to-kill mindset in which police, trained to view themselves as warriors or soldiers in a war, whether against drugs, or terror, or crime, must “get” the bad guys—i.e., anyone who is a potential target—before the bad guys get them.

    The result is a spike in the number of incidents in which police shoot first, and ask questions later.

    Making matters worse, when these officers, who have long since ceased to be peace officers, violate their oaths by bullying, beating, tasering, shooting and killing their employers—the taxpayers to whom they owe their allegiance—they are rarely given more than a slap on the hands before resuming their patrols.

    As I document in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People, this lawlessness on the part of law enforcement, an unmistakable characteristic of a police state, is made possible in large part by police unions which routinely oppose civilian review boards and resist the placement of names and badge numbers on officer uniforms; police agencies that abide by the Blue Code of Silence, the quiet understanding among police that they should not implicate their colleagues for their crimes and misconduct; prosecutors who treat police offenses with greater leniency than civilian offenses; courts that sanction police wrongdoing in the name of security; and legislatures that enhance the power, reach and arsenal of the police, and a citizenry that fails to hold its government accountable to the rule of law.

    Clearly, it’s time for a reality check, for both the police and the citizens of this nation.

  • FedEx'd Diamonds Fueled India's Largest Bank Fraud

    Three bankrupt US firms with “direct” links to the Indian billionaire Nirav Modi were involved in transactions related to an alleged multibillion-dollar international scheme for which Modi has been charged by Indian authorities, according to Bloomberg. The firms sought protection from creditors earlier this year as the celebrity jeweler’s empire quickly unraveled. In February, the Punjab National Bank, India’s second-largest state lender, reported that the Indian billionaire had siphoned billions of dollars from its coffers.

    John J. Carney, an examiner appointed by the US bankruptcy court, found “substantial evidence” that officers at Firestar Diamond Inc., A. Jaffe Inc., and Fantasy Inc., knew about the scheme alleged by Indian officials, according to the report filed Saturday. The Examiner uncovered millions of dollars of diamond transactions by various shadow entities owned by Modi, where payment can be traced to proceeds from the alleged bank fraud, the report said.

    According to Carney, a three-carat gem was FedEx’d around the world between shadowy entities allegedly controlled by the Indian billionaire in 2011. The accounting practice of round-tripping, also known as round-trip transactions or “Lazy Susans,” was paramount to the biggest bank fraud in Indian history and charges by the Indian government against the celebrity jeweler.

    During the course of the fraud, Modi “fraudulently borrowed approximately $4 billion over a period of years by manufacturing sham transactions purportedly to ‘import’ diamonds and other gems into India using a web of more than 20 secretly controlled shell entities,” Carney said in the report.

    Bloomberg provides a summary of how Modi roundtripped diamonds through his various companies:

    “The “fancy vivid yellow orange cushion cut” diamond was first sold by Firestar Diamond Inc., a U.S. company indirectly owned by Modi, and shipped to Fancy Creations Company Ltd., a foreign shell company in Hong Kong also allegedly controlled by Modi, in August 2011, the report says. The price was almost $1.1 million.

    The colorful stone was then shipped out two weeks later by Solar Export, a partnership formed by the Nirav Modi family trust, back to Firestar Diamond in the U.S., for closer to what it was really worth: $183,000, the examiner wrote.

    Less than a week later, Firestar, which has offices on Fifth Avenue in New York City, shipped the diamond back to Fancy Creations in Hong Kong, this time for $1.16 million, the report asserts.

    And two weeks after that, A. Jaffe, the New York City-based diamond company owned by Modi, sold the diamond to World Diamond Distribution, which the report describes as a Modi shell company in the United Arab Emirates, this time for more than $1.2 million.”

    According to Carney, the practice of round-tripping totaled $213.8 million between 2011 and 2017, which shipping invoices were then sent to the Indian state-owned Punjab National Bank to obtain short-term loans.

    Bloomberg explains the proceeds were then used to fund Modi’s extravagant lifestyle and business entities. Modi even used the funds to pay off old debts, as what some would call a classic Ponzi scheme.

    Carney specified in the report that shipments were so large and high-priced “that the packing slips alone should have raised suspicion.”

    In another instance, the Modi-owned US firms exported diamonds via FedEx instead of with a bonded courier, including a 17-carat diamond sold for $1.7 million and transferred from New York City to Hong Kong. Carney wrote in the report that FedEx only insures packages up to $150,000.

    “There is no legitimate business reason to ship diamonds worth millions of dollars without obtaining appropriate insurance,” Carney wrote, citing a jewelry specialist retained by the bankruptcy trustee.

    Modi has previously denied wrongdoing, and a lawyer representing him declined to comment Monday when Bloomberg asked about the examiner’s report.

    As for Modi’s location, Republic TV claims to have narrowed it down to the UK, though, he has two luxury apartments in Westminister and London, where he has been served his extradition notices.

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    Nirav Modi is wanted by the Indian law enforcement authorities for the billion dollar scam. The Interpol had also issued a red corner notice on him in July. As the Indian government’s attempt to extradite him from the UK, it seems as the celebrity jeweler has finally met his fate. Stay tuned because this type of fraud generally becomes discovered at the end of an economic cycle.

  • Earth's "Big Freeze" Looms As Sun Remains Devoid Of Sunspots For Most Of 2018

    Authored by Mac Slavo via SHTFplan.com,

    Scientists believe that Earth could experience a “big freeze” as the sun goes through what’s known as “solar minimum.” During this time, sunspots are minimal and the globe could be in for a wicked cold snap.

    Scientists are reporting that the sun has been free of sunspots for a total of 133 days this year, according to The Express UK. With only 241 days of 2018 passing, that means the sun has been blank for the majority of the year. Experts continue to warn that this is a sign that the solar minimum is on its way.

     “The sun is spotless again. For the 133rd day this year, the face of the sun is blank,” wrote the website Space Weather.

    “Solar minimum has returned, bringing extra cosmic rays, long-lasting holes in the sun’s atmosphere, and strangely pink auroras,” the website continued.

    The sun follows a cycle of roughly 11 years where it reaches a solar maximum and then a solar minimum.

    During a solar maximum, the sun gives off more heat and solar particles and is littered with sunspots. Less heat in a solar minimum is due to a decrease in the sun’s magnetic waves.  Our sun was not expected to head into a solar minimum until around 2020, but it appears to be heading in that direction a little early which could prove to be bad news for warm weather lovers.

    But a prolonged solar minimum could mean a “mini ice age.” The last time there was a prolonged solar minimum, it did, in fact, lead to a mini ice-age which was scientifically known as the Maunder minimum.  That little cold snap lasted for 70 years between the years 1645 and 1715. During this period, temperatures dropped globally by 1.3 degrees Celsius leading to shorter seasons and ultimately food shortages.

    “Low solar activity is known to have consequences on Earth’s weather and climate and it also is well correlated with an increase in cosmic rays that reach the upper part of the atmosphere. The blank sun is a sign that the next solar minimum is approaching and there will be an increasing number of spotless days over the next few years,” wrote a meteorological website called Vencore Weather.

  • Israeli Reports Claim New Images Confirm Iranian Surface-to-Surface Missile Facility In Syria

    At the end of a week where tensions with Iran and Syria have reached a high point of late, and as the final showdown between the Syrian Army and al-Qaeda insurgents in Idlib looms, multiple Israeli media reports claim Iran is constructing new surface-to-surface ballistic missile factories in Syria.

    What’s more, the reports claim, Iran’s military is taking advantage of Russia’s sophisticated antiaircraft defense missile systems in Syria to build the sites within range of the their protective defense umbrella. 

    The Jerusalem Post, for example, echoing other Israeli outlets, relies on the open-source satellite image analysis site ImageSat to claim Iran is taking advantage of Russian defenses to avoid Israeli retaliation.

    According to the Jerusalem Post report:

    According to ImageSat, both the facility in Masyaf and the one in Wadi Jahannam are located within the operational range of a Russian S-400 deployment, showing that Iran is “utilizing or exploiting the defense abilities of Russia.”

    Russia deployed the advanced mobile S-300 and S-400 anti-aircraft batteries to Syria in October 2017. The batteries are capable of engaging multiple aircraft and ballistic missiles at a distance of up to 380 kilometers, covering virtually all of Syria as well as significant parts of Israel and neighboring countries such as Turkey and Jordan.

    Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has on multiple occasions over the past year warned that Iranian missiles in Syria would constitute a “red line” for which Israel would act militarily.

    Over a dozen Israeli strikes have occurred at different locations in Syria recently — mostly in the south and central parts of the country, ostensibly aimed at curtailing the establishment of any permanent Iranian troop or weapons deployment presence. 

    As lately as Wednesday Netanyahu warned that Israeli would continue being proactive against its enemies and that it “has the means to destroy them”.

    The Israeli prime minister said during a ceremony: “Those who threaten to wipe us out put themselves in a similar danger, and in any event will not achieve their goal.”

    Israeli officials and military officials have lately tried to claim Iran “is taking over” Syria, though Syrian war analysts have by and large dismissed the claims. 

    In a similar vein, the Jerusalem Post provides the following commentary on supposed Iranian expansion right up to Israel’s border:

    In the past year, the IDF noticed that Iranian efforts in Syria have been increasing, with Soleimani sending from Iran advanced air defense systems with a range of up to 110 kilometers that could threaten Israel’s freedom of action in Syria. 

    The satellite images, provided by ImageSat as part of a lengthy formal report, purport to show at least one Iranian missile production site under construction which the unconfirmed report notes is in “its final stages of construction and will likely be completed by early 2019”.

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    While we don’t know the accuracy of such claims, and it appears the threshold of “proof” ought to be much higher (and more than mere visual comparisons of buildings between Iran and Syria based on remote viewed satellite images), it seems that Israeli government and media sources begin circulating such claims every time Washington or Tel Aviv ramps up threats, or are preparing for military strike on targets in Syria. 

    Meanwhile, Iran has owned up to placing long-range ballistic missiles inside Iraqi territory, under the control of Iraqi Shia paramilitary units (PMF) being trained by the IRGC, according to a Reuters report out Friday. 

    As we warned previously this week, it appears that something big is coming in Syria. 

  • Jim Rogers: "Before This Is Over, Gold Might Turn Into A Bubble"

    Authored by Umair Tariq via ValueWalk.com,

    Famed investor Jim Rogers, chairman of Rogers Holdings, told Kitco News that while he is not yet buying gold at current levels, a rebound in the yellow metal could cause it to overheat.

    “Before this is over, gold could turn into a very overpriced asset, it might even turn into a bubble,” he said. Rogers noted that while he holds physical gold, he would not buy more until prices drop below $1,000 an ounce. “I’m still waiting for $950 an ounce, or something like that,” he said.

    On U.S. equities, Rogers said that current valuations are overstretched, although stock prices could still climb higher on good news. He added that the next bear market could be “the worst in my lifetime,” and that instead of U.S. stocks, he is looking at investing in Zimbabwe, an emerging market.

    “I’m buying Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe was ruined for 40 years by a crazy dictator. There’s a new guy, he may be worse, he may be better, but he’s certainly different, so you should think about Zimbabwe,” he said.

    Jim Rogers: “Before This Is Over, Gold Might Turn Into A Bubble”

    Transcript

    Joining me today is Jim Rogers chairman of Rogers Holdings. Jim good to see you again. Thank you for joining us. I’m delighted to be here. How are you. I’m doing great.

    And since about last time we spoke you said that if gold doesn’t rally when bad things are happening then the correction isn’t over.

    Now we’re up a little bit this Thursday. But what’s keeping gold from really taking off here.

    Jim: Daniela as I’ve said to you several times before I’m still not a buyer until gold goes under a thousand U.S. dollars an ounce. I own gold. I hope I’m smart enough to buy a lot of gold when it gets there. But you know we had a huge blow off back in 2011. And I’ve been around long enough to know the huge blow offs usually take a long time to correct. In my view that’s what’s going on. I mean I’m not a very good trader but that’s how I see the world.

    Daniela: So with the tough summer it’s been for gold, I know you’ve said in the past many times that you buy when gold is down. Was that a good time for you.

    Jim: Not yet. I’m still waiting for U.S. dollars an ounce or something like that. It may not get there if it doesn’t. It’s ok I’ll own a lot of gold but that’s not what I plan to do Daniela. If it gets there I hope I’m smart enough and brave enough to buy a lot of gold because before this is over before this is over any gold is going to turn into a very overpriced asset. It might even turn into a bubble.

    Daniela: Let’s move onto equities now and my stock markets as you know have climbed even higher since the last time we spoke. Our valuations just over stretched here. It is now a risk-on or risk-off period.

    Jim: But Danielle you say markets… in many markets in the world that have collapsed that are down a lot. You’re talking about United States stock market. Let’s look at the U.S. believe it or not that’s not the only market in the world. Yeah the U.S. markets making all time highs. I’m not interested in buying any market making all time highs. And it looks like it might well go higher. You know if Trump comes up with some good news for a while instead of all this bad news you could have a blow off in the U.S. stock market right. Never. One final move. But I don’t I’m not smart enough to buy blow offs. I can’t I I don’t know how to do that.

    Daniela: I know we also spoke about how you for Sa’ar could easily see an over 50 percent correction happening in the U.S. stock market. Are you sticking to that.

    Jim: Oh yes going to be worse than that Daniella. When the next time we have a bear market and I wish I were smart enough to know when it’s going to be the worst in my lifetime and 2008 we had a problem because of too much debt. And you know the debt has gone through the roof since 2008. The Federal Reserve in America alone has increased its balance sheet by 500 percent in 10 years. I mean that’s unheard of that has never nothing like that has ever happened in history. And these are crazy things going on.

    Daniela: Jim I’d love to get your thoughts now on the Nafta deal and unfold Lee unfolding and dismantling here you have a risk with that pose to someone’s portfolio.

    Jim: Well if it turns into a trade war and Mr. Trump keeps saying he wants trade wars it’s not good for anybody nobody’s ever won a trade war and trade wars have never been good for anybody. We saw that the Mexicans and the Americans did something recently. But I look at that what details we have and I see what’s going on here. This is bad for America. It means that prices are going to go up in the United States how is that good for anybody at all. Maybe there are the details I don’t know about. But so far what’s being negotiated Mr. Trump keeps saying it is a triumph. But I’m an American citizen and at 325 million of us. It’s doesn’t look good for us. From what I can see.

  • Iran Stuns Enemies By Moving Ballistic Missiles To Iraq – Within Easy Striking Distance of Tel Aviv

    In what is sure to be a realization of one of Netanyahu’s worst nightmares, and deeply awkward for US advisers to Baghdad, Iran has transferred ballistic missiles to Shia proxy forces in Iraq, according to Western and Iraqi intelligence sources cited in a new Reuters report. 

    The revelation comes as tensions between Washington and Tehran are already at their highest point in years as aggressive sanctions continue crippling Iran’s economy, and after threats and counter-threats over Tehran laying claim to the vital Strait of Hormuz oil waterway over the past weeks, through which some one-third of the world’s oil passes. 

    The Reuters report cites multiple officials and intelligence sources, including Iranian officials who seem willing to inform the world of the provocative move:

    According to three Iranian officials, two Iraqi intelligence sources and two Western intelligence sources, Iran has transferred short-range ballistic missiles to allies in Iraq over the last few months. Five of the officials said it was helping those groups to start making their own.

    “The logic was to have a backup plan if Iran was attacked,” one senior Iranian official told Reuters. “The number of missiles is not high, just a couple of dozen, but it can be increased if necessary.”

    Via Israel national news Arutz Sheva

    The news is sure to cause a stir for European signatories to the 2015 nuclear deal (JCPOA) like Germany, the UK, and France, who are still trying to salvage it, as it is a clear sign that the deal which the Trump White House pulled out of is in tatters. 

    Reuters identifies the Zelzal, Fateh-110 and Zolfaqar missile systems as among those transferred — with ranges of between 200 and 700km, which puts “Saudi Arabia’s capital Riyadh or the Israeli city of Tel Aviv within striking distance if the weapons were deployed in southern or western Iraq”.

    And notably the elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds force head, Gen. Qassem Soleimani, is overseeing the missile transfers and their operation in what regional foes Saudi Arabia and Israel are sure to interpret as the most provocative and escalatory move by its archenemy in recent years. 

    Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has consistently lobbied the White House for more aggressive action against Iran, and speaking last week along side US National Security Advisor John Bolton, affirmed Bolton’s call for both to weaken Iran’s regional presence in places like Syria.

    Bolton had praised Israel’s repeat attacks on Iranian targets inside Syria, saying “every time Iran has brought missiles or other threatening weapons” into the country, Israel hasn’t hesitated to act. Bolton hailed those strikes as “a legitimate act of self-defense”.

    However, the case of Iraq is clearly a more delicate situation, as the pro-Shia government in Baghdad is propped up by the United States, and Baghdad in turn facilitates the operation of Tehran-aligned militias who act in concert with Iraqi military forces. Of course, in an irony that won’t be lost on future historians, it was the United States and its allies that installed a Shia government in Baghdad in the first place by toppling Saddam Hussein in its 2003 invasion, which Netanyahu had given loud and consistent support for. 

    One Western source cited by Reuters says the missile transfer is clearly intended as a “warning” to both the US and Israel. “It seems Iran has been turning Iraq into its forward missile base,” the source said.

    The so-called “Shia land bridge” extends from Iran to allies Iraq, Syria, and to Lebanese Hezbollah. 

    The sources also pointed out that elite Iranian IRGC forces have already trained Iraqi personnel to operate its sophisticated missiles, and that Iran has already long established forward bases in parts of Iraq. 

    One senior IRGC commander confirmed this to Reuters, saying: “We have bases like that in many places and Iraq is one of them. If America attacks us, our friends will attack America’s interests and its allies in the region.” 

    Western and Iraqi sources identified that missile producing factories overseen by Iranians are present in al-Zafaraniya, east of Baghdad, and Jurf al-Sakhar, north of Kerbala. And further there is said to be a site under the operation of Kata’ib Hezbollah, which is considered one of Iran’s closest proxy paramilitary forces. 

    Though the Iraqi government didn’t comment on an official level, Reuters cites the following alarming words from an Iraqi government source: 

    The Iraqi source said it was difficult for the Iraqi government to stop or persuade the groups to go against Tehran.

    “We can’t restrain militias from firing Iranian rockets because simply the firing button is not in our hands, it’s with Iranians who control the push button,” he said.

    The Iraqi official continued, “Iran will definitely use the missiles it handed over to Iraqi militia it supports to send a strong message to its foes in the region and the United States that it has the ability to use Iraqi territories as a launch pad for its missiles to strike anywhere and anytime it decides.”

    And meanwhile, hours after the Reuters story broke early Friday, Iran’s Tasnim news agency reported the country’s domestically produced long-range ballistic missiles will be ready for use by the Spring of 2019, according to a commander that oversees Iran’s Air Defense. 

    Surely, Israel will respond at some point to what Netanyahu has long ago identified as a “red line” concerning Israel’s security interests in the region. The only question is how and when, and how awkward will in be for US officials in Baghdad? 

  • China Moves Into Afghanistan As Part Of Its Global Expansion Mission

    Authored by Retired Colonel Lawrence Sellin, op-ed via The Daily Caller,

    For many, it was a stunning development. China will build a brigade-size military training facility in the strategic Wakhan Corridor, the land bridge between Tajikistan and Pakistan, which is located in Afghanistan’s northeast Badakhshan province and borders China.

    Although Beijing denied the claim that hundreds of Chinese soldiers will be deployed to Afghanistan, a source close to the Chinese military stated, “Construction of the base has started, and China will send at least one battalion of troops, along with weapons and equipment, to be stationed there and provide training to their Afghan counterparts.”

    For those who have been closely following growing Chinese influence in Afghanistan, the above report comes as no surprise.

    A year earlier on August 14, 2017, Spogmai radio quoted the spokesman for the Afghan Ministry of Defense (translation): “A brigade base will be built to maintain the security of Badakhshan, which will be funded by China.”

    The spokesman stated that China has steadily increased its military cooperation with Afghanistan and had, at that point, already provided $73 million in military aid.

    Beyond the enormous geopolitical implications of a Chinese military base inside Afghanistan, the Badakhshan installation is the final security link between Tajikistan, vital to China’s commercial interests in Afghanistan, and Pakistan, China’s “all-weather” ally in South Asia.

    It was largely unreported that China financed border outposts and deployed troops to Tajikistan’s eastern Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Region, which borders Afghanistan’s Badakhshan province and is part of the Wakhan Corridor.

    Consolidating a Chinese presence in Badakhshan province, the Afghan Ministry of Information and Technology has discussed signing a contract with China Telecom for a fiber optic network connecting China to the Wakhan Corridor. No doubt, the intention is to couple that system to the larger network linking China with Pakistan, the Middle East and Africa.

    China is already Afghanistan’s biggest investor. In 2007 it took a $3 billion, 30-year lease for the Aynak copper mine. China and Pakistan have offered to extend the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) to Afghanistan. Some have concluded that the CPEC invitation is a prelude to positioning China as a mediator to end the Afghan conflict.

    In the June meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Group (SCO) held in Beijing, Chinese President Xi Jinping said in order to “facilitate peace and reconstruction in Afghanistan, we need to give full play to the role of the SCO-Afghanistan Contact Group,” which includes Russia, India, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, China, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Afghanistan. The SCO-Afghanistan Contact Group may become a vehicle to remove the U.S. from Afghanistan.

    Underlying the soft power component represented by China’s commercial Belt and Road Initiative is a hard power plan for global military expansion.

    A Chinese military base in Badakhshan will be the second overseas military base joining the Djibouti naval facility inaugurated in 2017, allegedly to protect China’s interests in Africa, but conveniently located at a strategic choke point near the sea route to the Suez Canal. A similar Chinese naval facility is reportedly planned for Pakistan’s Jiwani Peninsula within reach of the strategically important Strait of Hormuz.

    Control of Afghanistan will allow China to complete transportation corridors, power grids and oil and gas pipelines throughout Central and South Asia. China can then begin to exploit Afghanistan’s estimated $3 trillion in untapped mineral resources, in addition to Balochistan’s $1 trillion in gold, copper, oil, precious stones, coal, chromite and natural gas.

    China cannot achieve its regional ambitions while the United States maintains a presence in Afghanistan. Both Pakistan and China know that, militarily, American policy in Afghanistan is untenable and the U.S. has few diplomatic cards to play in a negotiated settlement.  With the encouragement of China, Pakistan, through its Taliban proxy, will always do just enough to prevent us from achieving our goals in Afghanistan. Clearly, China is winning in South Asia.

    The United States needs to look beyond the current strategic conditions, to create leverage, where we currently don’t have any. Forget the Taliban. Once China achieves its aim of an American withdrawal, the Taliban will eventually be thrown under the bus with the help of the Taliban’s sponsor, Pakistan.

    CPEC is the center of gravity and Balochistan is CPEC’s pain point.

  • Flesh-Eating Genital Infections Caused By Common Diabetes Drugs

    The FDA has issued a warning over a rare form of flesh-eating bacteria which targets the genitals, caused by several widely-used diabetes medications, reports Bloomberg‘s Michelle Cortez. 

    The condition, known as “necrotizing fasciitis of the perineum,” or Fournier’s gangrene, has only affected 12 diabetes patients over a five-year span (seven men and five women), one of whom died – so if you come down with it the support group is going to be small. Also, if you’d like to never eat again, click here (don’t do it). 

    The drugs covered by the warning include Johnson & Johnson’s Invokana, AstraZeneca Plc’s Farxiga and Eli Lilly & Co.’s Jardiance. Known as SGLT2 inhibitors, they were approved in 2013, 2013 and 2016, respectively. The drugs help the body lower blood-sugar levels via the kidneys, and excess sugar is excreted in a patient’s urine. Urinary tract infections are a known side effect. –Bloomberg

    Cortez notes that in the past three decades, the FDA only found six other cases of the condition – all men, while reviewing all other diabetes drug classes. 

    The FDA estimates apprximately 1.7 million patients were prescribed one of the affected medications from a retail pharmacy in 2017, while Bloomberg Intelligence believes the drugs are anticipated to generate as much as $7.1 billion in sales by 2020.

    All of the drugs in the class except Merck & Co.’s Steglujan, the most recently approved, have been linked to the condition. The manufacturers must add information about the risk to the prescribing information and medicine guides given to patients. AstraZeneca said it is working with the agency on updating the label and noted that it hadn’t seen any cases of the condition during the development of Farxiga.  –Bloomberg

    And now for the fine print from the FDA: 

    • Patients should seek medical attention immediately if you experience any symptoms of tenderness, redness, or swelling of the genitals or the area from the genitals back to the rectum, and have a fever above 100.4 F or a general feeling of being unwell. These symptoms can worsen quickly, so it is important to seek treatment right away.
    • Health care professionals should assess patients for Fournier’s gangrene if they present with the symptoms described above. If suspected, start treatment immediately with broad-spectrum antibiotics and surgical debridement if necessary. Discontinue the SGLT2 inhibitor, closely monitor blood glucose levels, and provide appropriate alternative therapy for glycemic control.
    • Publications report that Fournier’s gangrene occurs in 1.6 out of 100,000 males annually in the U.S., and most frequently occurs in males 50-79 years (3.3 out of 100,000).1-3 In our case series, however, we observed events in both women and men.

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  • FBI Arrests All Five New Mexico "Jihad Compound" Suspects

    Five suspects who were arrested in a raid on a northern New Mexico compound have been taken into custody by the FBI after local prosecutors botched their case, resulting in the release of three of the individuals. 

    The defendants, Jany Leveille, 35, a Haitian national illegally present in the United States, Siraj Ibn Wahhaj, 40, Hujrah Wahhaj, 37, Subhanah Wahhaj, 35, and Lucas Morton, 40, are charged in a criminal complaint that was filed earlier today in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Mexico. The criminal complaint charges Jany Leveille with being an alien unlawfully in possession of firearms and ammunition in the District of New Mexico from Nov. 2017 through Aug. 2018. The criminal complaint charges the other four defendants with aiding and abetting Leveille in committing the offense, and with conspiring with Leveille to commit the offense. –KRWG

    In other words, the feds have pinned firearms offenses on one of the women arrested at the compound – Jany Leveille, while the other four defendants – one of whom Police believe abducted and then ritualistically murdered his 4-year-old son on the property (and happens to be the son of a famous New York Imam), are charged with helping her. We didn’t note any charges connected to the dead child, Abdul-ghani Wahha. If convicted of all charges, each defendant faces a maximum of ten years in prison. 

    So according to the FBI: 

    Eleven children were found on the property in a state of malnourishment and squalor, who local authorities say were being trained to commit acts of terrorism. Children from the compound told police that Jany Leveille, 35 – the partner of the dead boy’s father, Siraj Wahhaj, 40, “intended to confront ‘corrupt’ institutions or individuals, such as the military, big businesses, CIA, teachers/schools and reveal the ‘truth’ to these corrupt institutions or individuals.” 

    Police also found a “terrorist training manual” on the property: 

    The handwritten document contained “instructions for ‘The one-time terrorist,‘ instructions on the use of a ‘choke point,’ a location ‘called the ideal attack site,’ the ‘ability to defend the safe haven,’ the ‘ability to escape-perimeter rings,’ and ‘sniper position detection procedure,'” according to the court filing.

    Some of the children at the compound told police that Morten allegedly “stated he wished to die in Jihad, as a martyr,” prosecutors said in the motion.

    “At times, Jany Leveille would laugh and joke about dying in Jihad as would Subhanna Wahhaj,” according to the court document. –CNN

    The FBI had been surveilling the compound for several months prior to the August 3 raid by the Taos County Sheriff’s Office – however they must not have been watching when the child was allegedly murdered. 

    Twe weeks after the raid, the compound was mysteriously destroyed by authorities with no explanation, while an RV central to the property in which the suspects and the children were living was seized. 

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    The last time the FBI was found to have been surveilling radical Islamic terrorists in the Southwest was May 2015, when an undercover FBI agent was caught driving behind two armed Jihadis, filming them as they pulled up to a “Draw Muhammad” exhibit in Garland, Texas – ostensibly to attack the event. The would-be terrorists were shot dead on the spot by security guards, while the FBI agent – who encouraged one of the terrorists to “tear up Texas” in a text message, was arrested at gunpoint and later released. 

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