Today’s News 21st August 2018

• As Lira Collapses, Turks Are Piling Into Cryptocurrency

  The hype is dead, long live the hype.

  2017 was a breakthrough year for cryptocurrency. Its combined market cap soared to unprecedented heights, leading to lots of media attention and celebrity endorsements, such as Paris Hilton and Floyd Mayweather, for Bitcoin and other similar currencies.

  In 2018, however, the skyrocketing ascent began to turn around. In December 2017, one Bitcoin was valued at almost 20,000 U.S. dollars. By the the end of July 2018, the digital currency’s price was just above 8,000 U.S. dollars. Now, in the middle of August, the blockchain-driven coin is worth around 6,500 U.S. dollars.

  However, as Statista’s Raynor de Best notes, this price drop could present new investors with an opportunity to enter the market. The latest results of the ING International Survey show that relatively few consumers have invested in Bitcoin or other virtual currencies.

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  Nine percent of European consumers indicate they own a type of cryptocurrency in 2018, compared to eight percent in the United States and seven percent in Australia.

  According to the source, many respondents worry about the risks in investing in the currencies. In the Netherlands, the leading reason not to own cryptocurrencies was that people were not interested in it.

  Luxembourg and Belgium reached the lowest percentage within Europe, whereas 18 percent in Turkey say they own a digital currency… and as the Lira collapses, we suspect even more.

  

• The Swedish Welfare State Leads To Poor Immigrant Assimilation

  Authored by José Niño via The Mises Institute,

  Are cracks emerging in the Swedish welfare state?

  

  Leftist experts routinely praise the country for its generous welfare state, and cast shame on countries in the Anglo sphere, such as the United States, for not adopting Nordic style welfare systems.

  Although Scandinavian countries feature sizeable welfare states, they are far from socialist. However, the presence of welfare mechanisms in an economy can still be problematic.

  At the moment, Sweden is experiencing trouble in assimilating its immigrant population. Recent reports reveal a rising number of violent crimes in immigrant suburbs. Although Sweden’s overall crime rates are low, the country is experiencing increasing levels of gang violence and shootings, and the emergence of immigrant ghettoes.

  This is not exclusive to Sweden, as other European countries like France, have had numerous issues with immigrant assimilation. Such troubles from new arrivals has spurred a populist uprising across Europe, with Sweden joining in the mix. In Sweden, the Sweden Democrats, an anti-immigration party, has gained steam campaigning on immigration.

  The topic of immigration is nuanced, and both sides of the debate (closed vs. open borders) raise valid concerns. But there might be something more to this immigration assimilation conundrum than meets the eye.

  Sweden Is not so Exceptional

  Sweden’s vaunted welfare state could be the very culprit behind the recent wave of immigrant unrest. Since the publication of Nina Sanandaji’s Scandinavian Unexceptionalism, a growing number of intellectuals have started to remove the magical aura of the Scandinavian welfare model.

  Scandinavian Unexceptionalism sheds light, however, on one overlooked development – immigration and assimilation. Sanandaji argues that the welfare state has impaired immigrants’ when it comes to integrating into, and contributing to, the Swedish economy.

  Providing a balanced approach to the topic, Sanandaji offers a positive portrayal of immigration trends in the mid-twentieth century, highlighting how “the rate of employment for foreign-born residents was 20 per cent higher than that for the average citizen” in 1950s.

  But as Sweden’s welfare state grew and its labor policies tightened, Sweden’s once rosy immigration story started to produce several worrisome trends, which Sanandaji covers in detail:

  By 2000, however, the rate of employment was 30 per cent lower for the foreign-born residents. Another comparison shows that, in 1968, foreign-born individuals had 22 per cent higher income from work compared with those born in Sweden. In 1999, the average income of foreign-born residents was 45 per cent lower than that of those born in Sweden.

  Middle Eastern immigrants, in particular, have bared the brunt of this integration dilemma.

  Since the 1970s, Sweden has attracted immigrants from Middle Eastern countries such as Iraq, Iran, and Turkey — the author of Scandinavian Unexceptionialism himself is a Swede of Iranian origin. Initially, these immigrants were able to assimilate without issue.

  However, in present times, Middle Eastern immigrants in Sweden are not reaping the same benefits as their counterparts in more labor-friendly countries such as the United States. Sanandaji’s shares how Iranian and Turkish immigrants’ work income stacks up against native Swedes:

  Between 1993 and 2000, the income from work for the average Iranian immigrant was only 61 per cent, and for the average Turkish immigrant 74 per cent, of the average income of a native Swede.

  In contrast, Iranian and Turkish immigrants to the United States have fared better:

  According to the US Census for 2000, those born in Iran had an income that was 136 per cent of the average for native-born US residents. Those born in Turkey had an income of 114 per cent of the average for native-born residents.

  Sanandaji concedes that differences exist between Iranian and Turkish migrants to the United States and those who migrated to Sweden. Nevertheless, Sanandaji contends that the differences alone cannot explain the huge gap in economic outcomes between the immigrant groups, since “many of those who left for Sweden had belonged to the Turkish or Iranian middle classes.”

  Coming to Grips with the Toxicity of the Welfare State

  So there may be overlooked institutional factors at play when analyzing Sweden’s immigrant dilemma. This is part of a systemic problem sweeping across Europe since bureaucratic entities like the European Commission have sponsored generous refugee programs.

  These programs’ perverse incentives have created a form of “asylum shopping” where refugees bounce from one country that grants them asylum to another one with more generous welfare benefits.

  A more sensible solution to this problem would be for private organizations to sponsor immigrants and refugees without having the state involved in any form of welfare provision. Ideally, there would be free movement of people to whichever location aligns with their interests.

  But due to the welfare state creating distortions and questionable incentives, an open border system, as currently constructed, would not send out accurate market signals of economic opportunity.

  It may be time for mainstream pundits to admit that the Nordic model of generous welfare states comes with significant costs. Although Nordic countries still enjoy high levels of economic freedom, their creeping levels of welfare socialism can still present problems.

  Government’s natural tendency to grow and the presence of welfare states allow for politicians to buy votes and pursue myopic policies for the sake of political expediency. But like all government intervention, welfare policies comes with a cost — both economically and socially.

  Recognizing this uncomfortable truth will bring us closer to understanding that free markets are the solution to the current problems. Flirting with another variant of statism — social democracy in this case — needs to be completely discarded just like other statist systems that have come before it.

  

• World Population Growth Visualized (1950-2100)

  In any large set of data, there are bound to be some interesting outliers.

  Today’s data visualization comes to us from Reddit user /r/mythicquale and it shows the population growth of every country using data and projections from the United Nations population division.

  The graph is on a logarithmic scale, which ultimately groups together most growth rates even though they would be much further apart on a linear scale. This means the places outside of the middle range are the true outliers, gaining or losing many multiples of their original populations.

  

  Courtesy of: Visual Capitalist

  Visual Capitalist’s Jeff Desrjardins details the stories that are worth looking at in more depth.

  WORLD POPULATION GROWTH OUTLIERS

  How the population grows in any particular country is a function of fertility, mortality, and migration rates, and these outliers each have something anomalous happening at least one of these factors.

  Montserrat

  In 1995, a previously dormant volcano erupted in this British Overseas Territory in the Caribbean, destroying the island’s capital city of Plymouth. People evacuated, mostly fleeing to the United Kingdom, and the population of the island dropped by two-thirds over the period of five years.

  Interestingly, Plymouth is still listed as the territory’s capital city today, making it the only capital city of a political jurisdiction that is completely abandoned.

  U.A.E.

  Dubai was once a fishing village, but now it’s an international real estate hub. Abu Dhabi had just 25,000 people in 1960, and today it’s a metropolis of almost 2 million people.

  Oil wealth and significant investment is one side of the story, but the influx of foreign workers is an even bigger one. In fact, U.A.E. citizens only make up 11.5% of the population, and the rest (88.5%) is made of workers mostly from South Asia.

  It’s also worth mentioning that immigrant labor in the U.A.E. has been the subject of scrutiny internationally, as there have been instances of human rights violations and accusations of forced labor.

  Qatar

  Qatar is another Middle Eastern country that has shot up in population, and it carries a similar story to the United Arab Emirates. Only about 12% of the population is Qatari, and the rest consists of migrant works mostly from South Asia. Qatar, which has the highest GDP per capita in the world, also has faced similar allegations as the U.A.E. regarding the use of forced labor.

  Back in 1950, Qatar’s population was just 50,000, but today the country boasts 2.6 million people.

  

• Former MI6 Spy Alastair Crooke: The Metaphysics To Our Present Global Anguish

  Authored by former MI6 spy and EU diplomat Alastair Crooke via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

  James Jatras, a former US diplomat poses a highly pertinent question in his piece Lenin Updated: Firstly, he says, President Trump meets with President Putin and appears to make some progress in easing bilateral tensions. “Immediately all hell breaks loose: Trump is called a traitor. The ‘sanctions bill from hell’ is introduced in the Senate, and Trump is forced onto the defensive”.

  Next, Senator Rand Paul goes to meet with Putin in Moscow, Jatras notes. Paul hands over a letter from the US President proposing moderate steps towards détente. Rand Paul then meets with, and invites Russian Senators to Washington, to continue the dialogue: “Immediately all hell breaks loose. Paul is called a traitor. The state Department ‘finds’ the Russians guilty of using illegal chemical weapons (in UK) … and imposes sanctions. Trump is forced even more on the defensive.”

  Clearly, from the very outset, Trump has been “perceived by the globalist neo-liberal order as a mortal danger to the system which has enriched them” Jatras observes. The big question that Jatras poses in the wake of these events, is how could such collective hysteria have blossomed in to such visceral hostility, that parts of the ‘Anglo’ establishment are ready to intensify hostilities toward Russia – even to the point of risking “a catastrophic, uncontainable [nuclear] conflict”. How is it that the élite’s passion ‘to save globalism’ is so completely overwhelming that it demands their risking human extinction? Jatras suggests that we are dealing here with hugely powerful psychic impulses.

  

  Jatras answers by evoking the zeitgeist of Lenin, when, in 1915, he made his infamous turn towards civil war inside Russia. That is, a war versus ‘Russia’ – in and of itself – its history, its culture, its religion, and its intellectual and political legacy. With up to 10 million Russians left dead by his cleansing, Lenin said “I spit on Russia. [The slaughter is but] only one stage we have to pass through, on our way to world revolution [i.e. to his vision of a universal Communism].

  Professor John Gray, writing in his book, Black Mass, notes that “the world in which we find ourselves … is littered with the debris of utopian projects which – though they were framed in secular terms that denied the truth of religion – were in fact, vehicles for religious myth”. The Jacobin revolutionaries launched the Terror as a violent retribution for élite repression – inspired by Rousseau’s Enlightenment humanism; the Trotskyite Bolsheviks murdered millions in the name of reforming humanity through Scientific Empiricism; the Nazis did similar, in the name of pursuing ‘Scientific (Darwinian) Racism’.

  All these utopian, (murderous) projects effectively flowed from a style of mechanical, single-track, thinking that had evolved in Europe, over the centuries, and which seated the unshakeable sense of one’s own certainty and conviction — in the West European thinker, at least.

  These supposedly empirically-arrived-at certitudes — seated now in the human ego  — triggered a re-awakening precisely to those early Judeo-Christian, apocalyptic notions: That history, somehow, was on a convergent course towards some human transformation, and an ‘End’, with fearful retribution for the corrupt, and a radically, redeemed, new world, for the elect. No longer (in today’s world), triggered through an act of God, but ‘engineered’ by the act of Enlightenment man.

  World redemption from its state of corruption was to be brought into being through Enlightenment principles of rationality and science. Peace was expected to ensue, after the End Time.

  These millenarian revolutionaries – exponents of the new Scientism, who hoped to force a shattering discontinuity in history (through which the flaws of human society would be excised from the body politic) – were, in the last resort, nothing other than secular representatives of the apocalyptic Judaic and Christian myth.

  The American millenarian ‘myth’, then and now, was (and is), rooted in the fervent belief in the Manifest Destiny of the United States, ‘the New Jerusalem’, to represent humanity’s best hope for a utopian future. This belief in a special destiny has been reflected in a conviction that the United States must lead – or more properly, has the duty to coerce – mankind toward that future.

  Some might argue, however, that early Enlightenment ‘liberal’ humanism, with its ‘good intentions’, has no connection to Jacobinism or Trotskyite Bolshevism. But, in practice, both are crucially similar: They are secular versions of progress towards a utopian, redemption of a flawed humanity: One strand aims to reclaim humanity through the revolutionary destruction of the irredeemable parts of society. And the other strand roots its redemption in a teleological process of ‘melting’ away cultural identity. It also seeks to weaken the sense of linkage through shared ‘blood’ and territory (place) – in order to create a tabula rasa on which a new homogenised non-national, cosmopolitan identity can be writ, that will be both peaceful and democratic.

  The aim is a global, cosmopolitan society disembarrassed of religion, national culture and community, gender and social class. Processes of toleration that, formerly, were construed as essential to freedom have undergone an Orwellian metamorphosis to emerge as their antonyms: as instruments, rather, of repression. Any national leader standing against this project, any contrary national culture, or national pride displayed in a nation’s achievements, plainly constitutes an obstacle to this prospective universal realm – and must be destroyed. In other words, today’s millenarians may eschew the guillotine, but they are explicitly coercive – albeit, in a different manner – through the progressive ‘capture’ of narrative, and of state institutions.

  

  In short, a global space is being sought that would recognize only an international global humanity — much as the Trotskyites wanted. 

  So, how is it, precisely, that Russia and Mr Putin has come to constitute the antithesis to the utopian project, and the trigger to such fear and hysteria amongst the globalist élites?

  It springs, I suggest, from a percolating awareness amongst western élites that formal (Latin) Judeo-Christian monotheism – which gave western Europe its insistence on singularity of meaning, its linear itinerary, and its partner ideology of secular millenarianism – both find themselves increasingly questioned, and in decline.

  Henry Kissinger says the mistake the West (and NATO) is making “is to think that there is a sort of historic evolution that will march across Eurasia – and not to understand that somewhere on that march it will encounter something – very different to a Westphalian [western idea of a liberal democratic and market orientated state] entity.” It is time to relinquish ‘old pretenses’, Kissinger emphasizes – for, “we are in a very, very grave period for the world”.

  No doubt linked to this alienation from both revealed religion, and its secular utopian counterpart, is the general collapse in the optimistic certitudes connected with the idea of linear ‘progress’ – in which many (particularly the young), no longer believe (seeing the evidence of the world about them).

  But what really riles the globalists is the contemporary trend, manifested most particularly, by Russia, towards a pluralism which privileges one’s culture, history, religiosity and ties of blood, land and language – and which sees in this re-appropriation of traditional values, the path to the re-sovereigntisation of a particular people. The Russian ‘Eurasian’ notion is one of different cultures, autonomous, and sovereign, which, at least implicitly, constitutes a rejection of the Latin theology of equality, and reductive universalism (i.e. achieved through Redemption.)

  The idea rather, is of a grouping of ‘nations’, each reaching back to its primordial cultures and identities – i.e. Russia being ‘Russian’ in its own ‘Russian cultural way’ – and not permitting itself to be coerced into mimicking the westernisation impulse. What makes a wider grouping of Eurasian nations feasible is that cultural identities are complex and storied: It escapes the prevailing obsession to reduce every nation to a singularity in value, and to a singularity of ‘meaning’. The ground for collaboration and conversation thus widens beyond ‘the either-or’, to the differing strata of complex identities – and interests.

  Why should this seem so ‘diabolical’ to the western global élites? Why all the hysteria? Well … they ‘scent’ in Russian Eurasianism (and so-called populism, more generally) a stealth reversion to the old, pre-Socratic values: For the Ancients, as just one example, the very notion of ‘man’, in that way, did not exist. There were only men: Greeks, Romans, barbarians, Syrians, and so on. This stands in obvious opposition to universal, cosmopolitan ‘man’.

  Once the Roman Empire took over Christianity as a ‘westernised’ dissident form of Judaism, neither Europe nor Christianity conformed any longer to their origins, or somehow to their own ‘natures’. Absolute monotheism, in its dualistic form, was profoundly foreign to the European mind. Latin Christianity first tried (not very successfully) to repress the Ancient values, before deciding it was better to try to assimilate them into Christianity. Russian Orthodoxy however managed to retain its itinerary: whereas the Latin Church suffered multiple crises – not the least being that of the Enlightenment and the Protestant dissidence flooding across western Europe.

  The fearful élites, in fact, are right: The disappearance in modernity of any external norm, beyond civic conformity, which might guide the individual in his or her life and actions, and the enforced eviction of the individual from any form of structure (social classes, Church, family, society and gender), has made a ‘turning back’ to what was always latent, if half forgotten, somehow inevitable.

  

  It represents a ‘reaching back’ to an old ‘storehouse’ of values – a silent religiosity; a ‘turn back’ to being again ‘in, and of’ the world. A storehouse that has in fact remained unchanged (albeit clothed in Christianity), with its foundational myths, and notion of cosmic ‘order’ (maat) still swirling in the deeper levels of the collective unconscious. Of course, ‘the Ancient’ cannot be an ad integrum return. It cannot be the simple restoration of what once was. It has to be brought forward as if ‘youth’ come back again – the eternal return – out of our own decomposition.

  Henri Corbin, the scholar of Islam, once noting a panel in Iran in which the shapes of vases of various shapes were cut out from wooden back panel of a cupboard, suggested that, as with these vases whose solid forms no longer existed, somehow the space that that they once occupied still remains – if only as a void, marked by outline. So too, old notions and values somehow have left behind their outlines, too. And this, maybe, is what is driving the globalist élite to their medications: 500 years ago, the Enlightenment crushed the brief impulse from the Ancient world in Europe, known as the Renaissance. Now the shoe is on the other foot, and it is the world of today’s élites which is imploding. What had been imagined as defeated, beyond recovery, is cautiously arising out from our crumbled ruins. The wheel of time turns, and comes around, again. It may all fare badly – the mode of linear one-track thinking implanted in the West does have an inbuilt propensity towards totalitarianism. We shall see. 

  Just as then, when the tide of the Enlightenment bulldozed through old beliefs, hauling everything that was Delphic and unfathomable, out into the laser gaze of radical scepticism – causing terrible psychic tensions (more than 10,000 Europeans were burnt alive during the Great Witch hysteria) – so, today, we have a wave of still inchoate ‘otherness’ emerging from the deepest levels of human psyche to hurl itself onto the rocks of Enlightenment self-certainty. The tensions and the hysteria, follow in a similar way.

  Its ‘return’ is driving men and woman literally mad – mad enough, even to risk a catastrophic war, rather than to relinquish the myth of America’s Manifest Destiny, or even to acknowledge the flaws to their radically disjunctive way of thinking about a world that must be brought to some global convergence.

  

• Majority Americans Want Diplomacy With Russia Over Sanctions: Gallup

  A Monday Gallup poll reveals that most Americans feel it is more important for the United States to work towards improving relations with Russia, as opposed to sanctions. 

  

  Of those surveyed, 58% say it’s “more important to improve relations with Russia,” while 36% say “strong diplomatic steps against Russia” are a priority. 

  

  The poll, which took place between Aug. 1-12, comes after nearly two years of constant media bombardment over Russian hacking, invasive DOJ investigations which Trump refers to as a “witch hunt,” and an admission by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein that alleged hacking and social media influence campaigns by Russia had no effect on the 2016 US election. 

  That said, 75% of those surveyed by Gallup believe Russia interfered in the election, while 16% say they did not. Of those who say Russia interfered, 36% said it didn’t change the outcome, while 39% say it did. 

  Opionions over whether Russia actually influenced the election were also highly partisan – with 78% if Democrats saying that Russian interference affected the outcome of the election, and just 9% of Republicans who believe that Russia both hacked – and changed the outcome, of the election. The vast majority of Republicans (58%) think Russia did interfere, but it didn’t affect the outcome. 

  

  Earlier this month, the Trump administration announced a new round of sanctions against Russia in response to allegations that the Kremlin was behind an attack against former Russia double-agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia. 

  Gallup’s conclusion: “Although U.S.-Russian tensions continue to simmer, more Americans are inclined to believe the U.S. is better off trying to improve relations with Russia. Americans are largely convinced that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election but are divided, largely along party lines, as to whether that country’s involvement changed the outcome.”

  

• Geoengineering Could Lead To Lower Crop Yields: New Study

  Authored by Derrick Broze via The Conscious Resistance,

  A new study has determined that spraying the skies with chemicals to combat global warming will likely come with the unintended side-effect of reducing crop yields.

  

  Researchers with the University of California, Berkeley, have published a new study which calls into question the scientific efforts to block sunlight via climate engineering, also known as geoengineering. Geoengineering is the deliberate and large-scale manipulation of the weather and climate using a variety of technologies. One popular form of geoengineering being explored by scientists is known as Solar Radiation Management (SRM), a process which involves spraying aerosols from planes equipped with particulates designed to reflect sunlight in an effort to combat “anthropogenic global warming.”

  However, the UC Berkeley team has found new evidence that sun-blocking material will likely also reduce the yields of certain crops. The researchers came to this conclusion by studying previous volcanic eruptions in Mexico and the Philippines. The 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines and El Chichon in Mexico in 1982 caused a decrease in wheat, soy, and rice production due to the volcanic ash blocking sun light.

  “Here we use the volcanic eruptions that inspired modern solar radiation management proposals as natural experiments to provide the first estimates, to our knowledge, of how the stratospheric sulfate aerosols created by the eruptions of El Chichón and Mount Pinatubo altered the quantity and quality of global sunlight, and how these changes in sunlight affected global crop yields,” the researchers wrote.

  The researchers concluded that “projected mid-twenty-first century damages due to scattering sunlight caused by solar radiation management are roughly equal in magnitude to benefits from cooling”. The team calls for more studies on the effects of solar radiation management on other global systems, including human health. The research team published their study, Estimating global agricultural effects of geoengineering using volcanic eruptions,  in the journal Nature.

  “If we think of geoengineering as an experimental surgery, our findings suggest that the side effects of the treatment are just as bad as the original disease,” author Jonathan Proctor of the University of California, Berkeley, told Reuters UK during a telephone news conference.

  Unfortunately, the UC Berkeley study is only the latest in a long line of research pointing to the dangerous outcomes involved with the implementation of geoengineering technology.

  On April 6, Janos Pasztor, former United Nations assistant secretary-general on climate change, spoke at Arizona State University regarding the dangers of solar geoengineering and the need for international rules to regulate the controversial technology. During his speech Pasztor discussed the potential dangers of geoengineering, including the upcoming experiment being conducted by Harvard University in Arizona.

  “Some time within the next year, we may see the world’s first outdoor experiment on stratospheric aerosol injection take place here in the skies above Arizona, yet for the most part governments are not aware of, nor addressing, the profound governance issues this poses,” Mr Pasztor said. “We urgently need an open, inclusive discussion on how the world will research and govern solar geoengineering. Otherwise we could be in danger of events overtaking society’s capacity to respond prudently and effectively.”

  Pasztor is referencing Harvard engineer (and consistent proponent of climate engineering) David Keith and his plan for a new project, SCoPEx (Stratospheric Controlled Perturbation Experiment), which will assess the risks and benefits of deploying geoengineering on a large public scale. Keith and fellow engineer, Frank Keutsch, will research the benefits and risks by spraying particles such as sulfur dioxide, alumina, or calcium carbonate from a high-altitude balloon over Arizona during 2018.

  Pasztor currently serves as the head of the Carnegie Climate Geoengineering Governance Initiative (C2G2), an initiative launched by the Carnegie Council in order to “bring the profoundly complex issues of geoengineering governance and ethics to a much wider audience.” The Carnegie Council has previously called for global governance structures to regulate the use of geoengineering.

  In late January, researchers with Yale University, Rutgers University and the University of Maryland offered a warning against the sudden starting or stopping of controversial geoengineering programs. The researchers warn that efforts to inject aerosols into the atmosphere to combat climate change may end up causing more harm to wildlife, the environment, and humanity. The study, “Potentially dangerous consequences for biodiversity of solar geoengineering implementation and termination,” was published in the journal Nature.

  This study is not the first one to draw attention to the dangers of beginning geoengineering programs. According to a 2013 study published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, if geoengineering programs were started and then suddenly halted, the planet could see an immediate rise in temperatures, particularly over land. Another study published in February 2015 by an international committee of scientists stated that geoengineering techniques are not a viable alternative to reducing greenhouse gas emissions to combat the effects of climate change. The committee report called for further research and understanding of various geoengineering techniques, including carbon dioxide removal schemes and solar-radiation management before implementation. The scientists found that SRM techniques are likely to present “serious known and possible unknown environmental, social, and political risks, including the possibility of being deployed unilaterally.”

  In addition, in late October 2016, the United Nations’ Convention on Biological Diversity released a report examining the problems of geoengineering and whether or not humanity will be forced to employ the practice in an attempt to halt climate change. The report, Update On Climate Geoengineering In relation to the Convention on Biological Diversity: Potential Impacts and Regulatory Framework, found that geoengineering “would reduce the impacts of climate change on biodiversity at the global level,” but also cause unpredictable rain and temperature distribution on the local level.

  In addition, back in January a leaked draft report from the U.N. panel of climate experts called geoengineering “economically, socially and institutionally infeasible.” The U.N. once again recognized that geoengineering could disrupt weather patterns.

  With all of this evidence indicating disruption of global weather patterns, loss of blue skies, and reduction in crop yields, one has to ask, why is the scientific establishment still pushing such a dangerous idea?

  

• Chinese Oil Imports From Iran Surge As Beijing Shifts To Iran Tankers To Bypass Sanctions

  One month ago, when discussing the shift in Iran’s oil customer base as a result of Trump’s withdrawal from the 2015 Nuclear treaty and the potential blowback from China, we noted that in a harbinger of what’s to come, an executive from China’s Dongming Petrochemical Group, an independent refiner from Shandong province, said his refinery had already cancelled U.S. crude orders. “We expect the Chinese government to impose tariffs on (U.S.) crude,” the unnamed executive said. “We will switch to either Middle East or West African supplies,” he said. We also said that China may even replace most if not all American oil with crude from Iran: “Chinese importers are not going to be intimidated, or swayed by U.S. sanctions.”

  And sure enough, today Reuters reported that Chinese buyers of Iranian oil are starting to shift their cargoes to vessels owned by National Iranian Tanker Co (NITC) for nearly all of their imports to keep supply flowing amid the re-imposition of economic sanctions by the United States.

  To safeguard their supplies, state oil trader Zhuhai Zhenrong Corp and Sinopec Group, Asia’s biggest refiner, have activated a clause in its long-term supply agreements with National Iranian Oil Corp (NIOC) that allows them to use NITC-operated tankers, according to four sources with direct knowledge of the matter.

  The expected shift demonstrates that China – Iran’s biggest oil customer with India and the EU in 2nd and 3rd spot –  will keep buying Iranian crude despite the US sanctions .

  

  It also means that NITC will be shipping the oil to Chinese shores direct, keeping its customers’ information secret to avoid US retaliation although it would be pretty simple to track where the bulk of Iran’s tanker fleet is going. It was the same tactic used by China before the sanctions on Iran were lifted in 2016.

  According to the report, in July all 17 tankers chartered to carry oil from Iran to China are operated by NITC. In June, 8 of 19 vessels chartered were Chinese operated.

  Furthermore, China appears to also be importing more product: in July, those tankers were loaded about 23.8 million barrels of crude oil and condensate destined for China, or about 767,000 barrels per day (bpd) a 20% surge  from June, when the loadings were a more modest 19.8 million barrels, or 660,000 bpd. Both month were higher than China’s 2017 numbers when it imported an average of 623,000 bpd from Iran.

  With the new shipping arrangement, Iranian oil cargoes to China are expected to stay at recent levels through October, said Reuters sources.

  However, there is a problem: insurers, which are mainly U.S. or European based, and which are complying with the US sanctions, have already begun winding down their Iranian business to comply with the sanctions. This is also why the price for the oil under the long-term deals was changed to a delivered ex-ship basis from the previous free-on-board terms, meaning that Iran will cover all the costs and risks of delivering the crude as well as handling the insurance, the sources said.

  But, as Reuters notes, it was not immediately clear how Iran would provide insurance for the Chinese oil purchases, worth some $1.5 billion a month. Insurance usually includes cover for the oil cargoes, third-party liability and pollution.

  “This is not the first time companies exercised the option… Whenever there is a need the buyers can use that,” said a Reuters source, a senior Beijing-based oil executive.

  As for where Iran will get the money, it simply has no choice, unless it is willing to risk losing its biggest customer. This leaves another option: China may simply front the funding needs to Iran in the way it arranged oil deliveries from Venezuela: by arranging a vendor financing in which China gets a steep discount, or is paid in kind, which would mean that even more of Iran’s oil production will be meant for China.

  Finally, there is the question of how the US will respond when Beijing is once again openly flouting – as it did during the last Iran sanctions – Trump’s threats to all Iranian oil customers, and whether China’s oil imports from Iran will be a sensitive issue in the upcoming China-US trade talks.

  

• "We Are Not Going Bankrupt" Musk Vows As Tesla Suppliers Panic Over Stopped Payments

  Less than a month after the WSJ reported first that Tesla was quietly asking suppliers for “cash back” on existing and future projects, describing the request as “essential to Tesla’s continued operation” and characterizing it as an investment in the car company, investors quickly sold off the stock sending it back under $300, amid growing fears of a liquidity crisis at the electric automaker.

  

  And while those fears were forgotten after the company’s “strong earnings” a few days later, and then forgotten even more after the tragicomedy involving the Saudi investment, Elon Musk’s take private tweet (with “funding secured” which we now know it wasn’t), the biggest problem facing Tesla’s ongoing profitability, viability and existence, has been liquidity, or the lack thereof.

  That problem has also just made a triumphal comeback when in a follow up article, the WSJ reports that some of Tesla’s suppliers are increasingly concerned “about the auto maker’s financial strength after production of the Model 3 car drained some of its cash.”

  Specifically, a recent survey sent privately by a well-regarded automotive supplier association to top executives, and seen by the WS , found that 18 of 22 respondents believe that Tesla is now a financial risk to their companies.

  Meanwhile, confirming last month’s report that Tesla is increasingly relying on net working capital, and specifically accounts payable to window dress its liquidity, several suppliers said Tesla has tried to stretch out payments or asked for significant cash back. And in some cases, public records show, small suppliers over the past several months have claimed they failed to get paid for services supplied to Tesla.

  

  In an interview with the WSJ on Friday, Elon Musk said that “we’re not behind because we can’t pay them. It is just because we’re arguing whether the parts are right.”

  Still, while the universe of affected suppliers is small in the context of the entire Tesla supply chain, taken together, the survey, interviews and documents show some suppliers are anxious about Tesla’s ability to pay them back.

  Meanwhile, vendors have finally learned that if Tesla goes bankrupt, their claims will be dumped alongside everyone else in the pre-petition file. And they are not happy.

  “Regarding Tesla, any time there is uncertainty in the marketplace, it causes concerns for suppliers,“ said Julie Fream, the chief executive of the Original Equipment Suppliers Association, which sent the survey in the past few weeks—a period that encompassed Tesla’s second-quarter earnings and Mr. Musk’s announcement on Twitter that Tesla had secured funding for a plan to go private. “The current dialogue about Tesla ’going private,’ the well-publicized Model 3 manufacturing ramp-up challenges, as well as recently reported contentious purchasing tactics raise concerns for our members.”

  In an attempt to regain control of the discussion, and to steer it away far from Tesla’s liquifity, Musk and CFO Deepak Ahuja told the WSJ said Tesla’s financial strength is improving and it remains on track to be cash-flow positive and profitable in the current quarter. They said relations with its suppliers are good.

  “If there was any doubt in our suppliers in the first place that should definitely be strongly extinguished, with our commentary and our results and the ramp-up of our production,” Mr. Ahuja said.

  But what perhaps is most interesting in the article is the update on Tesla’s current cash pile: as a reminder, on June 30, Tesla reported cash of $2.24 billion, down from $3.37 billion at the start of the year. This number has fallen further, and as of August 12, the company now had just $1.69 billion in cash and equivalents, mostly due to repaying $500 million of a revolving credit line in July.

  The good news: the revolver was paid down not because the banks demanded it and according to Tesla, it plans to tap that same amount again later this quarter. Then again, it won’t be the first time the company has lied in recent weeks. That said, it was not clear how high Tesla’s accounts payable had risen in the interim.

  Meanwhile, the cash flow that Tesla hopes to generate from an increase in vehicle deliveries in the second half of the quarter, is expected to leave it with several hundred million dollars more in cash at the end of September compared with three months earlier, according to the records.

  That may be a stretch: to conserve cash, as the WSJ reported last month, Tesla has asked some of its capital-equipment suppliers in recent weeks for cash back ranging from 9% to 20% of what the company paid dating back to 2016. In one email to a supplier reviewed by the Journal, Tesla asked for help to make “an immediate impact” by providing a rebate on products already purchased.

  One parts supplier was asked by Tesla for a 10% reduction on costs across the board going forward, a person familiar with the matter said in an interview. This person said the request was extreme, saying other auto makers typically seek savings of 1% to 2% on individual parts or programs.

  The supplier said Tesla indicated it would ask to extend the payment terms to 120 days from 60 days if it didn’t get the price reduction, a length rarer among auto makers than a 90-day term.

  As a reminder, no healthy company tries to blackmail its suppliers. And yet to Tesla it is perfectly normal: Ahuja said it is normal for auto makers to ask for better terms as the business improves. Tesla has steadily lengthened its payment terms over the past few years, and more U.S. public companies are extending the amount of time they take to pay their bills.

  More troubling is that one of the suppliers said Tesla has stopped making payments to the company since last spring despite numerous promises. This person said he fears insolvency for his own company if he continues to ship products to Tesla and not get paid.

  Furthermore, as has been reported on twitter in recent weeks, public records show 16 companies since October have taken the unusual step of filing mechanic’s liens—or legal claims seeking unpaid compensation—against Tesla claiming bills haven’t been paid for supplies and services. Previously, only four liens had been filed against Tesla in all of 2015 and 2016 combined.

  The liens were mostly filed this year in Alameda County, Calif., by small subcontractors against Tesla and contractors of the auto maker, primarily for providing work at the company’s Fremont factory. Some of the suppliers have since been paid, and the total outstanding dollar amount of claims is relatively small, totaling nearly $8 million, according to the documents.

  Liens filed by suppliers against auto makers are rare, say automotive industry specialists:

  “When a customer is having financial issues…suppliers start filing liens to protect their secured position to ensure they are paid,” said Dan Sharkey, a lawyer at Brooks, Wilkins, Sharkey & Turco PLLC who specializes in supply-chain issues.

  Here too Tesla vehemently denied it was in trouble: Tesla’s CFO “said it would be wrong to see the liens by subcontractors as a sign of financial distress.”

  “It is an issue between the subcontractor and contractor,” he said, adding that it is common practice for subcontractors to name the manufacturer in a lien to create pressure on it.

  What about the dwead B(ankwupt) word?

  The OEM Suppliers Association survey found that eight of 22 respondents said they are worried about the auto maker filing for bankruptcy. It was conducted between July 26 and Aug. 8, the day after Mr. Musk tweeted about a plan to go private. He has since revealed a deal is far from complete.

  In an email on Friday to the Journal, Mr. Musk said, “We are definitely not going bankrupt.”

  Of course, this is the same person how two weeks ago tweeted that a Tesla LBO is virtually assured as the “funding was secured.”

  A few days later it turned out that Musk lied, and his only goal was to “burn the shorts.” So why not lie again, especially as the shorts are increasingly getting the upper hand. That’s another question the SEC should probably once it finally pays Tesla a visit.

  

  

• Pentagon: US Forces To Stay In Iraq "As Long As Needed"

  Via Middle East Eye,

  US forces will stay in Iraq “as long as needed” to help stabilise regions once controlled by the Islamic State (IS) group, a spokesman for the US-led international coalition said on Sunday.

  

  “We’ll keep troops there as long as we think they’re needed … The main reason, after ISIS (IS) is defeated militarily, is the stabilisation efforts and we still need to be there for that, so that’s one of the reasons we’ll maintain a presence,” Colonel Sean Ryan told a news conference in Abu Dhabi.

  The Pentagon said last week that IS appears to be “well-positioned to rebuild and work on enabling its physical caliphate to re-emerge,” Voice of America reported.

  A couple of thoughts on this intriguing statement from the Pentagon: “ISIS probably is still more capable than al-Qaida in Iraq at its peak in 2006-2007, when the group had declared an Islamic State and operated under the name Islamic State of Iraq,” https://t.co/1xjN9dBl1c 1/2

  — Hassan Hassan حَسَنْ حَسَنْ (@hxhassan) August 16, 2018

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

  In its latest intelligence estimates, the Pentagon put the number of IS militants operating in Iraq and Syria at between 28,000 and 32,000, VOA said.

  

  The number of American soldiers may decline, Ryan said, depending on when other forces from NATO deploy to help train the Iraqi army, he said, adding that about 5,200 US troops are currently based in Iraq.

  NATO defence ministers agreed in February to a bigger “train-and-advise” mission in Iraq after a US call for the alliance to help stabilise the country after three years of war against IS.

  “Possibly, there could be a drawdown, it just depends on when NATO comes in and they help train the forces as well,” Ryan said.

  Iraq officially announced victory over the militants last December, five months after capturing their stronghold of Mosul.

  The US also has about 2,000 troops in Syria, assisting the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) clear pockets still under the control of IS along the border with Iraq.

  “We’re starting to see a lot of collaboration between the SDF and ISF (Iraqi Security Forces), because it used to be that they would just come to the coalition, but now, we have them talking to each other as well,” said Ryan.

  The Iraqi military has carried out several air strikes against IS in Syria since last year, the last of which was a few days ago, with the approval of President Bashar al-Assad and the US-led coalition.

  SDF operations to finish off the militants on the Syrian side have been delayed by hundreds of explosive devices planted by IS, according to Ryan.

  

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