Today’s News 21st March 2023

Authored by Chris Hedges via Consortium News/ScheerPost.com,

Two decades ago, I sabotaged my career at The New York Times. It was a conscious choice. I had spent seven years in the Middle East, four of them as the Middle East Bureau Chief. I was an Arabic speaker. I believed, like nearly all Arabists, including most of those in the State Department and the C.I.A., that a “preemptive” war against Iraq would be the most costly strategic blunder in American history.

It would also constitute what the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg called the “supreme international crime.” While Arabists in official circles were muzzled, I was not. I was invited by them to speak at The State Department, The United States Military Academy at West Point and to senior Marine Corps officers scheduled to be deployed to Kuwait to prepare for the invasion.

Mine was not a popular view nor one a reporter, rather than an opinion columnist, was permitted to express publicly according to the rules laid down by the newspaper. But I had experience that gave me credibility and a platform. I had reported extensively from Iraq. I had covered numerous armed conflicts, including the first Gulf War and the Shi’ite uprising in southern Iraq where I was taken prisoner by The Iraqi Republican Guard.

I easily dismantled the lunacy and lies used to promote the war, especially as I had reported on the destruction of Iraq’s chemical weapons stockpiles and facilities by the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) inspection teams. I had detailed knowledge of how degraded the Iraqi military had become under U.S. sanctions. Besides, even if Iraq did possess “weapons of mass destruction” that would not have been a legal justification for war.

The death threats towards me exploded when my stance became public in numerous interviews and talks I gave across the country. They were either mailed in by anonymous writers or expressed by irate callers who would daily fill up the message bank on my phone with rage-filled tirades. Right-wing talk shows, including Fox News, pilloried me, especially after I was heckled and booed off a commencement stage at Rockford College for denouncing the war.

The Wall Street Journal wrote an editorial attacking me. Bomb threats were called into venues where I was scheduled to speak. I became a pariah in the newsroom. Reporters and editors I had known for years would lower their heads as I passed, fearful of any career-killing contagion. I was issued a written reprimand by The New York Times to cease speaking publicly against the war. I refused. My tenure was over.

No Accountability

What is disturbing is not the cost to me personally. I was aware of the potential consequences. What is disturbing is that the architects of these debacles have never been held accountable and remain ensconced in power. They continue to promote permanent war, including the ongoing proxy war in Ukraine against Russia, as well as a future war against China.

The politicians who lied to us — George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice, Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden to name but a few — extinguished millions of lives, including thousands of American lives, and left Iraq along with Afghanistan, Syria, Somalia, Libya and Yemen in chaos. They exaggerated or fabricated conclusions from intelligence reports to mislead the public. The big lie is taken from the playbook of totalitarian regimes. 

The cheerleaders in the media for war — Thomas Friedman, David Remnick, Richard Cohen, George Packer, William Kristol, Peter Beinart, Bill Keller, Robert Kaplan, Anne Applebaum, Nicholas Kristof, Jonathan Chait, Fareed Zakaria, David Frum, Jeffrey Goldberg, David Brooks and Michael Ignatieff — were used to amplify the lies and discredit the handful of us, including Michael Moore, Robert Scheer and Phil Donahue, who opposed the war.

The US has engaged in over eight major conflicts since it declared its War on Terror 19 years ago.

Since then, more than 37 million people have been displaced in US-related wars.

We take a look at the impact of the global war against terrorism ⤵️https://t.co/W4j4iyRPfy

— Middle East Eye (@MiddleEastEye) March 20, 2023

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These courtiers were often motivated more by careerism than idealism. They did not lose their megaphones or lucrative speaking fees and book contracts once the lies were exposed, as if their crazed diatribes did not matter. They served the centers of power and were rewarded for it.

Many of these same pundits are pushing further escalation of the war in Ukraine, although most know as little about Ukraine or NATO’s provocative and unnecessary expansion to the borders of Russia as they did about Iraq. 

“I told myself and others that Ukraine is the most important story of our time, that everything we should care about is on the line there,” George Packer writes in The Atlantic magazine. “I believed it then, and I believe it now, but all of this talk put a nice gloss on the simple, unjustifiable desire to be there and see.”

Packer views war as a purgative, a force that will jolt a country, including the U.S., back to the core moral values he supposedly found amongst American volunteers in Ukraine. “I didn’t know what these men thought of American politics, and I didn’t want to know,” he writes of two U.S. volunteers. 

“Back home we might have argued; we might have detested each other. Here, we were joined by a common belief in what the Ukrainians were trying to do and admiration for how they were doing it. Here, all the complex infighting and chronic disappointments and sheer lethargy of any democratic society, but especially ours, dissolved, and the essential things — to be free and live with dignity — became clear. It almost seemed as if the U.S. would have to be attacked or undergo some other catastrophe for Americans to remember what Ukrainians have known from the start.”

The Iraq war cost at least $3 trillion and the 20 years of warfare in the Middle East cost a total of some $8 trillion. The occupation created Shi’ite and Sunni death squads, fueled horrific sectarian violence, gangs of kidnappers, mass killings and torture.

It gave rise to al-Qaeda cells and spawned ISIS which at one point controlled a third of Iraq and Syria. ISIS carried out rape, enslavement and mass executions of Iraqi ethnic and religious minorities such as the Yazidis. It persecuted Chaldean Catholics and other Christians. This mayhem was accompanied by an orgy of killing by U.S. occupation forces, such as as the gang rape and murder of Abeer al-Janabi, a 14-year-old girl and her family by members of the U.S. Army’s 101st Airborne. The U.S. routinely engaged in the torture and execution of detained civilians, including at Abu Ghraib and Camp Bucca. 

There is no accurate count of lives lost, estimates in Iraq alone range from hundreds of thousands to over a million. Some 7,000 U.S. service members died in our post 9/11 wars, with over 30,000 later committing suicide, according to Brown University’s Costs of War project. 

Yes, Saddam Hussein was brutal and murderous, but in terms of a body count, we far outstripped his killings, including his genocidal campaigns against the Kurds. We destroyed Iraq as a unified country, devastated its modern infrastructure, wiped out its thriving and educated middle class, gave birth to rogue militias and installed a kleptocracy that uses the country’s oil revenues to enrich itself.

Ordinary Iraqis are impoverished. Hundreds of Iraqis protesting in the streets against the kleptocracy have been gunned down by police. There are frequent power outages. The Shi’ite majority, closely allied with Iran, dominates the country. 

The occupation of Iraq, beginning 20 years ago today, turned the Muslim world and the Global South against us. The enduring images we left behind from two decades of war include President Bush standing under a “Mission Accomplished” banner onboard the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier barely one month after he invaded Iraq, the bodies of Iraqis in Fallujah that were burned with white phosphorus and the photos of torture by U.S. soldiers. 

To The Hague

The U.S. is desperately attempting to use Ukraine to repair its image. But the rank hypocrisy of calling for “a rules-based international order” to justify the $113 billion in arms and other aid that the U.S. has committed to send to Ukraine, won’t work. It ignores what we did. We might forget, but the victims do not.

The only redemptive path is charging Bush, Cheney and the other architects of the wars in the Middle East, including Joe Biden, as war criminals in the International Criminal Court. Haul Russian President Vladimir Putin off to The Hague, but only if Bush is in the cell next to him. 

Many of the apologists for the war in Iraq seek to justify their support by arguing that “mistakes” were made, that if, for example, the Iraqi civil service and army were not disbanded after the U.S. invaded, the occupation would have worked. They insist that our intentions were honorable. They ignore the hubris and lies that led to the war, the misguided belief that the U.S. could be the sole major power in a unipolar world. They ignore the massive military expenditures spent annually to achieve this fantasy.

They ignore that the war in Iraq was only an episode in this demented quest. 

A national reckoning with the military fiascos in the Middle East would expose the self-delusion of the ruling class. But this reckoning is not taking place. We are trying to wish the nightmares we perpetuated in the Middle East away, burying them in a collective amnesia. “World War III Begins With Forgetting,” warns Stephen Wertheim.

The celebration of our national “virtue” by pumping weapons into Ukraine, by sustaining at least 750 military bases in more than 70 countries and by expanding our naval presence in the South China Sea, is meant to fuel this dream of global dominance.

What the mandarins in Washington fail to grasp is that most of the globe does not believe the lie of American benevolence or support its justifications for U.S. interventions. China and Russia, rather than passively accepting U.S. hegemony, are building up their militaries and strategic alliances.

China Brokers Deal

China, last week, brokered an agreement between Iran and Saudi Arabia to re-establish relations after seven years of hostility, something once expected of U.S. diplomats. The rising influence of China creates a self-fulfilling prophecy for those who call for war with Russia and China, one that will have consequences far more catastrophic than those in the Middle East.

There is a national weariness with permanent war, especially with inflation ravaging family incomes and 57 percent of Americans unable to afford a $1,000 emergency expense. The Democratic Party and the establishment wing of the Republican Party, who peddled the lies about Iraq, are war parties.

Donald Trump’s call to end the war in Ukraine, like his lambasting of the war in Iraq as the “worst decision” in American history, are attractive political stances to Americans struggling to stay afloat. The working poor, even those whose options for education and employment are limited, are no longer as inclined to fill the ranks. They have far more pressing concerns than a unipolar world or war with Russia or China. The isolationism of the far right is a potent political weapon.

The pimps of war, leaping from fiasco to fiasco, cling to the chimera of U.S. global supremacy. The dance macabre will not stop until we publicly hold them accountable for their crimes, ask those we have wronged for forgiveness and give up our lust for uncontested global power.

The day of reckoning, vital if we are to protect what is left of our anemic democracy and curb the appetites of the war machine, will only come when we build mass anti-war organizations that demand an end to the imperial folly threatening to extinguish life on the planet.

North Korean state media has been touting new claims of mass enlistments amid “an atmosphere of war” and urgent defense preparedness in response to ongoing joint US-South Korea drills, which are the largest in five years.

The state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) initially over the weekend cited a figure of 800,000 citizens having newly signed up for military service, most of them young people, while other state-linked sources are saying it’s well over one million enlistees. By Monday the number jumped significantly to claims of around 1.4 million people enlisting. 

“Amidst soaring anger and hostility toward the US imperialists and the South Korean puppet traitors going mad over the reckless nuclear war provocation targeting the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the ranks of hot-blooded youths bravely and vigorously set out to defend the homeland are growing day by day is growing,” a Pyongyang statement said.

The reports follow the North Korean government holding a major new recruiting drive, hosting events across the country while conducting near daily test launches of projectiles – including the latest on Sunday which included a ‘mock nuclear warhead’ as a warning to Seoul and Washington.

State media described that “youth college students from universities in various places as well as high-end middle school students from all over the country” expressed their determination “to join forces in the fight…”

The KCNA report additionally cited citizens’ willingness “mercilessly wipe out the war maniacs” – in what’s also clearly a propaganda blitz and bit of signaling aimed at the south and at the west. Kim Jung Un had promised a fierce response to the major US-South Korean drills which have lately included American B1 bombers and stealth jets joining the drills, dubbed Freedom Shield joint exercise.

North Korea’s state-run television aired a video of citizens signing up to enlist or reenlist in the military to counter the ‘imperialist Americans’ and that about 1.4 million people have expressed a desire to join the army as of March 19th https://t.co/VfGfWHBlBF pic.twitter.com/Y3nArTKI7N

— Reuters (@Reuters) March 20, 2023

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But it seems Kim hasn’t gotten the reaction or attention from Washington that he hoped for, and thus could be daily ramping up the threatening missile launches and rhetoric.

The South Korean military, for its part, promised to continue undeterred with the US drills: “The South Korea-US alliance maintains the best-combined defense posture in the face of North Korea’s continued regional instability,” a press release said. “Going forward, we will realize ‘Peace through Strength’ and enhance the credibility of the US extended deterrence based on the solid capabilities and posture of the alliance,” it added.

Authored by Thomas McArdle via The Epoch Times,

As the old saw goes, a banker is someone who lends you his umbrella when the sun is shining and then wants it back as soon as the first drops of rain fall.

Hostility toward money lenders goes way back. In the Middle Ages in Europe, to deposit your money with one was unlawful, “even as it would be unlawful to deposit one’s sword with a madman, a maiden with a libertine, or food with a glutton.”

Loans may no longer be against the law, but bankers have been, and still are, convenient villains in popular culture.

In the movie “It’s a Wonderful Life,” for example, old man Henry Potter mocked George Bailey’s just-deceased father by remarking that “ideals without common sense can ruin this town.” And he said of George issuing a loan to his friend Ernie, Bedford Falls’s cabby, “You see, if you shoot pool with some employee here, you can come and borrow money.”

Were the now-failed Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank acting sensibly or madly? And did they shoot pool with powerful Washington figures in hopes that they could avoid ruin despite their lack of sense?

How much common sense is there in the “ideals” associated with SVB not having a chief risk officer for most of last year as it hurtled toward collapse, but at the same time employing a chief diversity, equity, and inclusion officer and making a point of focusing on climate change, and social and corporate governance policies? “Issues of inequity in the innovation sector” apparently mattered more to SVB president and CEO Greg Becker than the soundness of his bank’s loans in an environment of rising interest rates amid high inflation.

It’s no shock to find that Joe Biden’s presidential campaign and political action committees were bestowed with at least $11,900 from SVB executives, with SVB managing director Gerald Brady giving $5,600 to Biden’s 2020 campaign, according to the Federal Election Commission. The Democratic National Committee and various party politicians are announcing the return or the money or donating funds received to charities.

Congress early this month moved against a Biden administration rule forcing pension funds holding $12 trillion of 150 million Americans’ savings to include environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) in their investment decisions—in other words, make your retirement finances dependent on the same kind of thinking that led SVB to collapse. ESG equities distinctly underperform the market.

Who can forget Jimmy Stewart as George Bailey scrambling to hand out cash meant for his honeymoon to beleaguered depositors during the run on the Bailey Savings & Loan? But the tone-deaf sixteenth largest bank in the country was handing out company-wide bonuses to its employees for their 2022 work just hours before the government had to take it over.

In the case of Signature Bank, it wasn’t George Bailey shooting pool, it was superstar bankers poached from competitors in at least one case spending “most of his week golfing with prospective clients.” Big Signature Bank customers ultimately included rap superstars. And speaking of Ernie the Bedford Falls cabby, among Signature’s peculiar banking practices was to encourage taking out loans to buy New York City’s infamously expensive taxi medallions—in itself a regulatory shell game—in expectation of Uber and Lyft upending the passenger transport landscape.

Of far more import, however, was Signature’s over-exposure in cryptocurrency, where it placed over a quarter of its $109 billion in deposits before the FTX debacle last year that sent crypto spiraling to earth.

The bailing out of these two boutique, politically fashionable institutions by the “wokest” of woke presidents is for the benefit of the well-to-do; most of the tens of billions of dollars in deposits exceed the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation’s (FDIC) $250,000 ceiling. Would a bank in deep trouble in, say, Roberts County in the Texas panhandle, where the median average family income is $50,400, have received such exceptional treatment from Uncle Sam?

And don’t swallow Treasury Secretary and former Federal Reserve chairwoman Janet Yellen’s claims that the “bank fees”-funded rescues will leave no taxpayers on the hook. Like any other business, banks ultimately pass the taxes and fees imposed upon them by the government down to their customers, whether it happens individually or collectively, conspicuously or in hidden manner. As Fordham University law school professor and bank bailout expert Richard Squire points out, while management at SVB and Signature may be being allowed to save face, “the venture capital firms and the startups are being bailed out. There is no doubt about that.”

The Biden administration’s nearly $5 trillion in spending is the engine behind the inflation that forced the Federal Reserve to embark on an extended policy of raising the interest rates under its direct control—which in turn has put the squeeze on banks, especially those conducting fast and loose financial practices. But as scary as that chain reaction may be, the FDIC’s guarantee to reimburse all the rich uninsured depositors at the two failed institutions, making an exception to its $250,000 cap, and no matter how big the depositors’ accounts, is more alarming.

Such measures take the United States down a road toward total nationalization of the banking system and removes the indispensable elements of accountability and discipline all businesses need: certainty that misjudgment and irresponsibility must come with a cost.

When Washington bails that out, America turns into Potterville.

Move over Tesla: both Ford and GM are also trying to take a page out of the ‘price cut’ playbook that the EV manufacturer has been (successfully) running in China over the last couple months. 

The move is coming after lifting pandemic controls failed to spur significant demand in China, the Wall Street Journal reported this week. Ford and GM will be joined by BMW and Volkswagen in offering the discounts and promotions on EVs, the report says. 

Retail auto sales plunged the first two months of the year and automakers are facing additional challenges in trying to transition their business models to prioritize EVs over conventional internal combustion engine vehicles. 

Ford is offering $6,000 off its Mustang Mach-E, putting the standard version of its EV at just $31,000. Last month, only 84 of the vehicles were sold, compared to 1,500 sales in December. There was some pulling forward of demand due to the phasing out of subsidies heading into the new year, and Ford had also cut prices by about 9% in December. 

A spokesperson for Ford called it a “stock clearance”. 

Discounts at Volkswagen are ranging from around $2,200 to $7,300 a car. The cuts will affect 20 gas powered and electric models. Its electric ID series is seeing price cuts of almost $6,000. The company called the cuts “temporary promotions due to general reluctance among car buyers, the new emissions rule and discounts offered by competitors.”

Even more shocking is Citroën-maker Dongfeng Motor Group, who is offering a 40% discount on its C6 gas-powered sedan, now priced at $18,000. 

Kelvin Lau, an analyst at Daiwa Capital Markets, told the Journal that automakers are also trying to get rid of 500,000 vehicles collectively stored in their inventory, most of which are older vehicles that won’t meet new emissions standards.

David Zhang, a Shanghai-based independent automobile analyst, added: “Some car makers have been seeing very few sales. At this rate, the manufacturers’ production and dealership networks will collapse.”

Hopefully Tesla is paying close attention to the cuts – but perhaps even moreso to their mainland China competition. Domestic-based market leader BYD has only cut prices “a single percentage point”. 

Authored by Petr Svab via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Ordinary Americans can expect their wealth to get repeatedly chipped away as the monetary system degrades and requires progressively more intervention by authorities to perpetuate itself, according to an influential author and economist. It may take “a very long time,” however, for the system to actually break, he told The Epoch Times.

The recent downfall of two sizable American banks, Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and First Republic Bank, rattled the financial markets. Investors are now looking to the Federal Reserve to provide relief and within months reverse its policy of raising interest rates. That’s after the central bank, together with the Treasury and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), already shored up the banking sector, offering special loans and guaranteeing uninsured deposits for the failed banks.

The failures, however, represent a symptom of a broader problem—one the central bank can’t fix, according to Daniel Lacalle, fund manager, economist, and prolific author.

“The problem here is the concept of ‘what can be done?’” he said, arguing central bank market interventions intended to smooth over market perturbations tend to simply redistribute the risk and losses—and at the added cost of making the system more fragile in the long run.

“Every time they try to solve a bubble with more liquidity injections, they create another bubble,” he said. “What you have to do first is not implement crazy monetary policies.”

He was referring to the policy of extremely low interest rates that the Fed maintained for most of the past decade.

Free Money

Lacalle alluded to the Austrian economic theory, which posits that central banks can’t set interest rates correctly. When the economy is not doing well, central banks set the rates artificially low in order to “stimulate” the economy. That allows companies to loosen fiscal discipline and makes credit available to projects that would be otherwise too risky to attract capital. When the economy “overheats”—the availability of credit outstrips the production capacity of the economy, resulting in inflation—the central bank raises rates, tightens credit, and the poorly performing risky projects go under. Because rate hikes take more than a year to fully manifest in the economy, central bankers tend to continue hiking for too long. Excessively high rates then cause the destruction of even viable businesses. Recession ensues. The central bank then tries to cushion the recession blow by dramatically cutting rates, thereby repeating the cycle.

“After a decade of excess, of course, there are going to be episodes like SVB and these other regional banks,” Lacalle said.

SVB was the banker of choice for many Silicon Valley tech startups and their venture capital funders that have benefited from the protracted period of loose credit. In just a few years, it grew into one of the 20 largest banks in the country, with some $200 billion in assets. When its investments started to underperform and its stock dropped, clients got cold feet and many moved their money elsewhere, triggering a bank run.

Regulation

Some economists have argued that the SVB crash was the fault of regulators. The Federal Reserve of San Francisco should have stepped in when it saw warning signs of SVB’s instability, argued the Brookings Institution’s Aaron Klein in a recent commentary.

Lacalle wasn’t convinced. He pointed out that on paper, SVB was following the regulatory mantras.

“You’re hedging your volatile positions in technology and risky ventures, which obviously is your core business—that’s nothing we can do about—and you’re hedging it with long-term treasuries and mortgage-backed securities,” he said.

But it was exactly the large treasuries portfolio, which dropped in value due to the Fed’s rate hikes last year, that pushed SVB over the edge.

Klein also pointed to SVB’s unhedged $100 billion position in mortgage-backed securities. But Lacalle noted that the Fed itself has designated those as low-risk, sitting on $2.6 trillion of them. If the Fed, as a regulator, was to declare mortgage-backed securities as risky, how could the Fed, as a monetary policy setter, declare them low-risk?

Intervention

The Fed’s response to the SVB crisis is a typical example, Klein suggested, of the system’s underlying flaw—a short-term solution with long-term negative implications.

Shortly after regulators took over SVB, the Fed, the Treasury, and the FDIC announced that no depositors in the failed banks will lose money, despite most of the deposits being above the FDIC insurance limit of $250,000 per account. Furthermore, to ensure no other banks hit a liquidity crunch because of the value drop in their treasury holdings, the Fed will allow them one year to borrow against those holdings at “par value”—the Fed will de facto pretend the treasuries are worth more than they currently are.

The Fed’s apparent motivation was to forestall runs on other smaller banks. Yet its actions created “an incentive to take even more risk by the next bank,” Lacalle said.

“The example of SVB is telling everyone that what they should do is exactly what SVB did because nothing’s going to happen. If things go well, you will make a lot of money and if things go badly, bad luck, but nothing’s going to happen. So what is the incentive to be prudent and to have a prudent level of risk management? Zero.”

Read more here…

Surprisingly, out of the 10 most expensive states to retire in the United States, California is conspicuously absent from the list. 

That is according to a new WalletHub piece that dove into the most affordable places for U.S. citizens to settle down in once their work lives are over – which, nowadays, is somewhere between age 90 and 120. 

The study “used data from various agencies such as the U.S. Census Bureau and the Council for Community and Economic Research” and its rankings “looked at adjusted cost of living, general tax-friendliness and annual cost of in-home services, as well as other factors,” CNBC wrote. 

Topping the list, likely without much surprise, was New York, which ranked dead last in affordability, despite coming in 10th in quality of life and 16th in healthcare. It has the 3rd highest tax rate, the article noted. 

$1 million in savings would only cover living costs for about 14 years in New York, the article wrote. Retirement is generally thought to last about 25 years. 

Not in the top 10 most expensive was California, which came in 32nd in affordability.

Alan Castel, a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, and author of “Better with Age: The Psychology of Successful Aging,” is quoted in the report as saying: “Sometimes our spending habits need to be re-evaluated, and many senior discounts can be utilized to lower bills. It may also be useful to consider downsizing or minimizing certain costs that are no longer needed.”

Or, you can work until you’re 95. 

The full list of the 10 most expensive states to retire in is:

1. New York
2. New Jersey
3. Vermont
4. Massachusetts
5. Maryland
6. Washington
7. Connecticut
8. Maine
9. Illinois
10. Oregon

It seems like it was a lifetime ago when, frazzled with the market’s rangebound trade, Wall Street’s biggest bears were coming up with fictitious narratives seeing bogeymen anywhere and everywhere, if it meant convincing their clients to sell. A distant one month ago – because during bank crises time moves in Inception terms – JPMorgan’s permabull-turned-permabear Marko Kolanovic was warning that Wall Street’s trading black box du jour, 0DTE or Zero Days to Expiration options, would somehow lead to “$30 billion in intraday selling” and crash the market. Such fearmongering was, of course, ridiculous – after all if 0DTE didn’t spark a liquidity cascade in the past week when we have seen the worst banking crisis since Lehman it never will – but it highlights a familiar trope among Wall Street strategists: take the latest market-moving bogeyman and make it into a monster, then goalseek the narrative for the highest employer benefit (almost as if the deposit-sucking JPMorgan has had an agenda to freak everyone out in recent weeks… and certainly small bank depositors).

And sure enough, one month later everyone has forgotten about 0DTE (which “shockingly” did not lead to a massive selloff) and instead attention is now occupied with what is a far bigger crisis – the collapse of small and medium regional US banks, and not so small Swiss banks… and until the Fed pivots, cuts rates and reintroduces QE, the contagion will continue because once lost, depositors confidence needs a reboot to the system, one which only a Fed capitulation can provide (the Fed came close by announcing USD swap lines yesterday but much more will be needed to safeguard $18 trillion in US deposits, and the latest step – a proposed guarantee of all US deposits is slowly but surely getting us there).

Enter Marko Kolanovic again, who in his latest note not only quotes Lenin (the infamous “There are-decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen” which pops out like clockwork every time the FRA-OIS spread hits 50bps), but – having completely forgotten about his 0DTE doomsday thesis from just 4 weeks back – has now escalated the doom and gloom rhetoric to conclude that virtually everything that is now happening is bearish and that “the possibility of a Minsky moment in markets and geopolitics has increased.”

Translation: having tried to pinpoint the market’s weakest link one month ago – and failing – and having had nothing at all to say about what would have a fare more devastating impact on market psychology and the economy, the cascading failure of major banks (as described here weeks ago), Marko is now just shotgunning it and hoping that something sticks to the wall, so that he can then point to it and say: “look, I was right.” Here is the choice excerpt from his latest note:

A lot has happened in the past week. The bailout of several US banks did not manage to calm markets, which consumed another large bank in Europe. In a Trichet-like moment, the ECB increased rates by 50bps. The Fed is facing a difficult task on Wednesday, but it is likely already past the point of no return – a soft landing now looks unlikely, with the airplane in a tailspin (lack of market confidence) and engines about to turn off (bank lending). China brokered a Middle East deal, and there is a presidential visit to Russia this week. “There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen”— Lenin.

The possibility of a Minsky moment in markets and geopolitics has increased. Even if central bankers successfully contain contagion, credit conditions look set to tighten more rapidly because of pressure from both markets and regulators. We stay neutral duration in the US and Europe amid cross-winds, favoring 10s/30s steepeners as an asymmetric way to position for an eventual Fed pause.

Cracks are beginning to emerge in US credit fundamentals, and Euro credit spreads will likely continue to widen unless we see meaningful policy intervention. The historical template for FX during widening credit spreads is for USD strength, coupled with relative safe-FX (USD, CHF, JPY) strength vs. highbeta. We see little change in oil fundamentals and keep our price forecasts unchanged for now, while financial stress and macro uncertainty have boosted safe haven demand for gold and silver.

There is a famous saying about a broken clock that is right twice a day… and yet, when it comes to Marko’s track record the past two years don’t even show that: starting in January for all of 2022, the JPM strategist was telling clients to buy the dip, yet every time a new and bigger dip emerged. Marko then flip-flopped in late September, and turned bullish which as we said at the time, marked the market bottom…

Kolanovic turned bearish. Bottom https://t.co/bXVFOHDoRS

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) September 30, 2022

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… which it has been to this day. Meanwhile, stocks have continued to grind upward, reaching as high as 4,200 all the while Kolanovic kept invoking the latest and greatest bogeyman du jour in hopes of convincing JPM’s remaining clients to sell… to JPM of course.

And speaking of clocks, broken or otherwise, JPM is one of the banks that still expects the Fed to hike 25bps even though moments ago Bloomberg reported that the Treasury is now studying how to backstop all $18 trillion in US deposits. Needless to say, trying to destroy your banking system with one hand (small banks can’t match anywhere near 4.75% in deposit rates, surely 5.00% will be a slam dunk) while saving it with the other (and $18 trillion in deposits) is something the US government will excel at… unless of course the Fed isn’t actually advised by Hunter Biden and the Fed does not hike 25bps on Wednesday. Then again, if Powell does go ahead and tighten financial conditions further, the only thing that will follow is an even bigger and faster rate cut, just as Elon Musk suggested on Monday evening.

Fed needs to drop the rate by at least 50bps on Wednesday

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 21, 2023

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What is remarkable is that instead of discounting the future, one where the Fed is about to unleash all liquidity spigots and making it rain sending risk assets to the moon, Marko is doubling down on what has been a wrong call for the past 6 months.

“Use relief bounces to reduce beta and Value factors further. We stick to our call that Q1 will likely end up the high point for stocks this year. This call is predicated on the view that bond yields will move lower along with a likely end of PMI rebound soon, as the impact of past policy tightening starts to take full effect, and the positive offsets (e.g. the cushion of COVID savings and pricing power for corporates) erode,” he said.

Translation: Marko believes that even though the Fed is about to unleash a liquidity bazooka at the relentless bank crisis, the S&P has already seen its highs for the year and will soon take out 2022 lows. We’ll take the other side of that bet.

More in the full JPM note available to pro subs.

Authored by Ovidiu Tanjala via The Mises Institute,

Ludwig von Mises wrote Socialism: An Economic and Sociological Analysis, a small book published in 1922, which demonstrated that economic calculation in a socialist commonwealth is impossible. Of course, Mises assumed that the purpose of an economy, even a socialist one, was supposed to produce goods and services, which determined its success or failure.

Alain Besançon wasn’t an Austrian or a Misesian, but he wrote Anatomie d’un spectre: l’Économie politique du socialisme réel, also a small book the size of Mises’s own Socialism, in which he also observed that the Soviet economy couldn’t perform economic calculation; thus, the Soviet economy performed poorly, very poorly by Western standards.

The Soviet economy was wasteful and chaotic.

Besançon believed that economic planning induced irrationality in the system.

Terrified managers couldn’t report failing the plan, and consequently any subsequent economic planning would be even more divorced from reality than previous planning had been.

Both Besançon and Mises knew that socialism could not discover market prices. Both knew that this would lead to widespread corruption. However, Besançon realized that the state not only tolerated but also used the black market for price discovery in economic sectors critical to the regime, like defense and certain prestigious cultural and sport endeavors (Bolshoi Theatre, gymnastics, eventually hockey, etc.).

However, there is a critical difference between Mises and Besançon. While Mises believed that the goal of the Soviet economy was to produce usable goods and services, Besançon believed otherwise. The Soviet economy, he posited, was never about producing goods and services for consumers, but rather had other goals.

The Soviet economy existed to keep the Communist Party in power, and that was the sole criteria party leaders used to evaluate its performance. The “production” of political power was supreme, and anything else was secondary, subordinated to the main goal for the Soviet economy.

Soviet political leaders did not want an economy that produced goods abundantly because abundance separates the citizen from the state. The state would lose its power over its subjects if they became wealthier. Homo sovieticus—the Soviet man—had to be dependent on the state, barely living from one day to the next on state-issued ration cards.

If a Soviet manager managed by some miracle to produce well-being, despite absurd planning orders and a lack of market prices, he might well have been punished for failing to produce what he really needed to produce: state power over simple people. Abundance and well-being always were and still are the true enemies of socialism; people cannot be able to ignore or to forget the power of the state.

While the Soviet economy is not something people wish to revisit, nonetheless, influential elites are calling for governments to assert power over individuals to restrict consumer choice to achieve political goals benefitting those in power. For example, the World Economic Forum declares that people should start eating insects in the name of “sustainability.” Likewise, in the name of fighting climate change, progressive elites in government and business are attempting to force people to buy electric cars despite their serious drawbacks. While social media outlets like Facebook and Twitter are private companies, they have done the bidding of governments in the name of “fighting disinformation” or trying to preserve a narrative that reflects the governmental message, something especially seen during the government-imposed covid restrictions, by restricting online speech.

For decades Western governments have been spending more than 45 percent of the gross domestic product. Rothbard warned us that every government-owned entity is an island of calculational chaos in the economy. In countries like Finland, France, Germany, Austria, and Belgium the government represents the majority of the economy. In the United States, government spending is nearly 40 percent of GDP and in 2020, it was almost half of GDP.

Hence, we cannot any longer speak of islands of calculational chaos induced by the government. In our day the rule of Western economies is chaos, the exception being the continued existence of market prices. The presence and influence of the environmental, social, and governance (ESG) movement in US corporations and especially financial and capital markets enables socialists to have a huge influence over the US economy, and ordinary people are helpless to stop it. Many economic sectors are enabling socialists to gain political power, and the production of real goods and services has become secondary to the promotion of leftist ideology.

Alain Besançon was right about the real goals of socialists, and while both he and Mises understood the inherent dysfunctionality of a socialist economy, Besançon went one step further in realizing that the chaos the socialism produces worked to the advantage of those in power. The goal of socialists is not a better economy through socialism, but rather the full establishment of socialist power.

After repeated laments by the likes of Bill Ackman, who most recently said that “I continue to believe that the best course of action is a temporary @FDICgov deposit guarantee until an updated insurance regime is introduced” (and who just flip-flopped on his “Fed must hike with shock and awe“ call from 2022 and is now urging for a Fed hiking pause), and following a Bloomberg weekend report that US mid-sized banks demanded a two-year total deposit insurance scheme from the FDIC, and warned if it doesn’t arrive, there may lots more shotgun weddings (or shotguns), moments ago Bloomberg reported that “US officials are studying ways they might temporarily expand Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. coverage to all deposits, a move sought by a coalition of banks arguing that it’s needed to head off a potential financial crisis.” Guess our March 12 tweet was ahead of its time yet again.

FDIC unveils new sign pic.twitter.com/PbYESPaji5

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) March 12, 2023

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The BBG report explains that “Treasury Department staff are reviewing whether federal regulators have enough emergency authority to temporarily insure deposits greater than the current $250,000 cap on most accounts” without formal consent from a deeply divided Congress, and goes on to note that “authorities don’t yet view such a move as necessary, especially after regulators took steps this month to help banks keep up with any demands for withdrawals” which is an important caveat, and is the same one that hawks are using to justify why a Fed pause would be self-defeating (“why is the Fed blowing up their last bit of inflation-fighting credibility; what do they know that we don’t): the same question can be applied to the Treasury: “what does the Treasury know that we don’t.”

Most likely nothing – after all bank crises are non-linear, but as Bloomberg notes, “still, they are developing a strategy out of due diligence in case the situation worsens.”

“We will use the tools we have to support community banks,” White House spokesman Michael Kikukawa said, without directly addressing whether the measure is being studied. “Since our administration and the regulators took decisive action last weekend, we have seen deposits stabilize at regional banks throughout the country and, in some cases, outflows have modestly reversed.”

Still, the report notes, the behind-the-scenes deliberations show there are concerns in Washington’s corridors of power as midsize banks call for broader government intervention after three lenders collapsed this month when uninsured depositors pulled their money, and as a fourth firm strives to avoid a similar fate. Shares of that one, First Republic Bank, tumbled an additional 47% on Monday as industry leaders tried to find a way to bolster the company’s finances.

Ok, that’s the theory. What about the practice? After all, as regular readers know there are $18 trillion in total deposits, all of which will have to be insured…

… and just $125 billion in the FDIC’s Deposit Insurance Fund, which makes an outright guarantee of all deposits just a small mathematical impossibility.

Well, there’s always printing. According to Bloomberg, one legal framework under discussion for expanding FDIC insurance would use the Treasury Department’s authority to take emergency action and lean on the Exchange Stabilization Fund. The same magical Exchange Stabilization Fund which the Treasury is already using to backstop its latest bank bailout facility, the Bank Term Funding Program, or BTFP.

Here too there is a small problem: that ESF pot of money is used to buy or sell currencies and to provide financing to foreign governments. A bigger problem: the ESF only has $25 billion currently in it as parts of its BTFP backstop…. but it has to do, as it is the only pot of money under the full authority of Janet Yellen, with other spending and financing under the jurisdiction of Congress.

Any mechanism using the ESF as a bailout mechanism uses the cash from the fund as a first-loss equity tranche to which the Fed then applies leverage. LOTS of leverage, because if authorities plan on backstopping the $18 trillion in total US deposits, the Fed will need to cover the difference… of some $17.975 trillion (unless Congress reaches a bipartisan deal to infuse more capital in the ESF, the same way the ESF was expanded to $500BN during the covid crisis

Meanwhile, in keeping with the tradition of saying the polar opposite of what it is doing, a Treasury spokeswoman said in a statement that “due to decisive recent actions, the situation has stabilized, deposit flows are improving and Americans can have confidence in the safety of their deposits”

Which of course explains why First Republic is about to join the collapse contagion and why Treasury is planning a full deposit backstop.

Finally, such a program will likely have to also be the result of an executive order since it has little hope of passing in Congress where members of both the left and right will be vehemently against it. 

“Any universal guarantee on all bank deposits, whether implicit or explicit, enshrines a dangerous precedent that simply encourages future irresponsible behavior to be paid for by those not involved who followed the rules,” the House Freedom Caucus said in a statement, and we are confident most of the progressive wing will not be too excited about bailing out billionaires and corporations with orders of magnitude more in the bank than the FDIC limit.

As The Chicago Fed wrote in a paper in 1986 – after the deposit runs at Penn Square National Bank and Continental Illinois Bank – uninsured deposits are a source of market discipline for banks. Herbert Baer and Elijah Brewer go further, warning that doing away with insured deposits (i.e. by insuring every deposit as is being considered currently) would actually increase risk in the banking system.

“While such proposals might reduce the likelihood of bank runs, they would at the same time reduce banks’ incentives to control risk.”

Will US bank regulators learn from the mistakes of the past?

Having earlier issued his first veto since taking office, rejecting a bill that would have reversed a Labor Department rule on ESG investing, President Biden signed a bipartisan bill late on Monday that directs the federal government to declassify as much intelligence as possible about the origins of COVID-19.

His signature follows both the House and Senate unanimously approving of the measure, a rare moment of overwhelming bipartisan consensus.

The vote tallies meant that the measure would likely have survived a presidential veto had Biden opted to withhold his signature.

Biden, in a statement, said he was pleased to sign the legislation.

“My Administration will continue to review all classified information relating to COVID–19’s origins, including potential links to the Wuhan Institute of Virology,” he said.

“In implementing this legislation, my administration will declassify and share as much of that information as possible, consistent with my constitutional authority to protect against the disclosure of information that would harm national security.”

Of particular interest to freedom-loving Americans who were tyrannized, censored, banned, and deplatformed for even daring to mention it, is the small matter of whether the virus leaked from the Level 4 Virus Lab at the Wuhan Institute of Virology (or instead, as The Atlantic proclaimed recently, a sick pangolin fucked a raccoon dog and coughed in someone’s bat soup in a wet market.

The Department of Energy and other federal agents such as the FBI have increasingly backed a lab leak as the likely origin of the virus, while some lawmakers have even suggested Beijing may have deliberately allowed it to spread.

Update(1017ET): What’s being described as an initial, informal meeting between Presidents Xi and Putin is underway at the Kremlin. While the expected cordialities and expressions of closer relations were exchange, among the most notable early statements came from Putin, who said he’s “open” to peace talks with Ukraine and China’s mediation efforts.

“We have a lot of joint tasks, goals,” Putin told his Chinese counterpart while also congratulating him on re-election as the head of the Chinese state for a third 5-year term. Xi in return said “Russia succeeded in promoting prosperity under Putin’s leadership.” Putin further expressed that “we will discuss your initiative [on Ukraine] which we view with respect.”

“We are open for a negotiating process on Ukraine,” the Russian leader added. He noted to Xi that “we have looked at your proposals for the resolution of the Ukraine conflict” and previewed that “we will discuss this question.”

🇨🇳🤝🇷🇺”Welcome to Russia” — Xi Jinping has arrived in the Kremlin, an informal meeting with Vladimir Putin has started pic.twitter.com/BQ4rzfmynT

— AZ 🛰🌏🌍🌎 (@AZgeopolitics) March 20, 2023

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The day prior in media interviews, White House NSC spokesperson John Kirby declared that any “call for a ceasefire” in Ukraine is “unacceptable.”

Likely Moscow will only be satisfied with nothing short of a full Kiev recognition of the Donbass being under Russia; however, this is the very thing Washington will condemn and seek to induce the Zelensky administration to resist.

According to state media commentary (RT), “Moscow has said that it would consider the proposal but has pointed to several factors that stand in the way of a peaceful resolution in Ukraine.” And more of Moscow’s perspective headed into more Xi meetings: “Those include the insistence of Kiev and its Western backers on inflicting a military defeat of Russia, their firm opposition to any sort of ceasefire, as well as a law enacted by Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky that forbids holding negotiations with Russia as long as Putin remains in office.”

Kirby on Xi meeting Putin: “If there’s some sort of call for a ceasefire well that’s just going to be unacceptable.”
-> Only US mediated ceasefires are good! pic.twitter.com/4SrnKLBu3o

— Lord Bebo (@MyLordBebo) March 20, 2023

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* * *

Chinese President Xi Jinping has arrived in Moscow on Monday for what Beijing is calling a “trip for peace” – but at a moment the White House is emphasizing “We don’t support calls for a ceasefire right now,” according to the words of White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby. “We certainly don’t support calls for a ceasefire that would be called for by the PRC in a meeting in Moscow that would simply benefit Russia,” Kirby said.

The three-day trip was kicked off as Xi’s plane touched down at Moscow’s Vnukovo airport, where Russia’s deputy prime minister for tourism, sport, culture and communications, Dmitri N. Chernyshenko, greeted him a red carpet ceremony and military brass band. His first stop was the Kremlin for an initial and informal meeting with President Putin.

“I am very glad, at the invitation of President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, to come back to the land of our close neighbor on a state visit,” Mr. Xi said upon arrival. He added: “China and Russia are good neighbors and reliable partners connected by mountains and rivers.”

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that China’s 12-point peace plan in Ukraine will top the agenda. “One way or another, issues raised in (Beijing’s) plan for Ukraine will be touched upon during the negotiations,” he said. “Comprehensive explanations will be given by President Putin” of the Russian position.”

Just hours ahead of the Chinese presidential plane being en route, both Xi and Putin published separate articles previewing the bilateral summit, with Xi emphasizing China’s push to end the Ukraine crisis reflects global support. Putin for his part wrote that he has “high expectations for the upcoming talks” with his “good old friend”.

Putin said he enjoys the “warmest relationship” with Xi, in a partnership between countries which is “consistently growing stronger” and has reached “the highest level in their history”. Speaking of the talks, the first in-person summit with the Chinese leader since the start of the Ukraine war, Putin stressed, “We have no doubt that they will give a new powerful impetus to our bilateral cooperation in its entirety.” According to more from Putin’s letter, published also in English on state websites:

Yet the main thing has remained unchanged: I am talking of the firm friendship between Russia and China, which is consistently growing stronger for the benefit and in the interest of our countries and peoples. The progress made in the development of bilateral ties is impressive. The Russia-China relations have reached the highest level in their history and are gaining even more strength; they surpass Cold War-time military-political alliances in their quality, with no one to constantly order and no one to constantly obey, without limitations or taboos. We have reached an unprecedented level of trust in our political dialogue, our strategic cooperation has become truly comprehensive in nature and is standing on the brink of a new era.

Putin also at one point took a swipe directly at the United States:

Sticking more stubbornly than ever to its obsolete dogmata and vanishing dominance, the “Collective West” is gambling on the fates of entire states and peoples. The US’s policy of simultaneously deterring Russia and China, as well as all those who do not bend to the American dictation, is getting ever more fierce and aggressive. The international security and cooperation architecture is being dismantled. Russia has been labelled an “immediate threat” and China a “strategic competitor.”

Meanwhile, Washington is watching the Xi trip very closely, also as the Chinese leader is at some point soon expected to hold a phone call with Ukrainian President Zelensky….

Ahead of a meeting between Putin and Xi, White House NSC spokesperson John Kirby declares that any “call for a ceasefire” in Ukraine is “unacceptable.” pic.twitter.com/Z1MUvdlTwS

— Aaron Maté (@aaronjmate) March 20, 2023

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And on China’s mediation efforts in the Ukraine crisis in particular, Putin vowed that efforts to split the major Eurasian allies “won’t work”…

“The crisis in Ukraine, which was provoked and is being diligently fuelled by the West, is the most striking, yet not the only, manifestation of its desire to retain its international dominance and preserve the unipolar world order,” the Russian leader wrote. “It is crystal clear that NATO is striving for a global reach of activities and seeking to penetrate the Asia-Pacific.” He continued:

It obvious that there are forces persistently working to split the common Eurasian space into a network of “exclusive clubs” and military blocs that would serve to contain our countries’ development and harm their interests. This won’t work.

Chinese President Xi arrives in Moscow to meet with the Russian President Putin. pic.twitter.com/4GLcnf3nkt

— Clash Report (@clashreport) March 20, 2023

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Putin concluded near the end of his letter, “We appreciate the well-balanced stance on the events in Ukraine adopted by the PRC, as well as its understanding of their historical background and root causes.” He emphasized: “We welcome China’s readiness to make a meaningful contribution to the settlement of the crisis.”

The NY Times notes based on Chinese state media that Xi as accompanied to Moscow by “senior officials including Wang Yi, China’s highest ranking diplomat; Foreign Minister Qin Gang; and Cai Qi, director of the General Office of the Chinese Communist Party’s Central Committee.” Ukraine at the same time issued a call for Russia to remove all of its troops, saying this is the proper formula for the successful implementation of China’s ‘Peace Plan’.

Authored by Allan Stein via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Declining cattle production and drought contributed to a sizable drop in beef supplies last year, the lowest in nearly a decade, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).

As of Jan. 1, there were 89.3 million head of cattle, down 3 percent from a year ago; and 29 million beef cows bred for slaughter in the United States, down 4 percent from last year.

“Total red meat and poultry production in 2023 is forecast to decrease for the first time in nearly a decade,” the USDA said in its bi-annual livestock, dairy, and poultry outlook released in early March.

“This is due to the 6-percent decline in beef production that more than offsets forecast increases in pork (2 percent), broiler meat (1 percent), and turkey (7 percent) production.”

The report said dwindling cattle production would likely cause a “significant year-over-year decrease in beef production, the first decline since 2015.”

However, the USDA expects pork supplies to increase in 2023 after two consecutive years of decline due to higher carcass weights.

“Broiler meat production is forecast to continue its longstanding upward trends into 2023, increasing marginally over last year’s record production,” the report added.

“Turkey production is expected to increase throughout 2023, under the assumption that the sector recovers from Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza outbreaks.”

Of the 89.3 million head inventory, about 38 million cows and heifers produced calves in 2022, the report said.

According to the USDA, drought conditions contributed to the yearly decline in the beef cow inventory last year.

“While 2019 was the second-wettest year on record for the continental United States, after 1973, dry conditions began to persist in 2020, mostly in the West and Plains farm production regions,” the report noted.

“Overall, drought has contributed to reduced pasture and range conditions, and increased beef and cow slaughter. Any changes to the current drought conditions will likely impact inventory numbers in the coming year.”

The U.S. Drought Monitor reported that 41.5 percent of the continental United States experienced moderate to exceptional drought during the third week of February.

However, the agency’s three-month outlook in February said those conditions could persist in more than 34 percent of the lower 48 states, “with drought development likely in 8.9 percent of the country.

Other report findings showed that the number of milk cows had increased to 9.4 million in 2022, while the calf crop had decreased by 2 percent from 2021 to about 35 million head.

A higher forecast for beef cattle slaughter “more than offsets a decline in expected dressed weights, resulting in projected beef production being raised 165 million pounds to 26.7 billion pounds,” the USDA reported. “Fed cattle prices in 2023 are raised to $162 per hundredweight on firm demand. The trade forecast for 2023 is unchanged.”

Saudi-backed LIV Golf “stripped” broadcast workers of healthcare and other benefits by shifting to a non-union production company and circumventing the need to provide employee benefits. The move is an ominous sign the second season of the golf league, stacked with ex-PGA stars, struggles to garner enough viewership to even compete with the PGA Tour. 

According to a statement from The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE), a labor union representing workers in the entertainment and TV production industries, LIV Golf “shocked” broadcast workers by “pulling the rug out from under them by shifting to a non-union production company and circumventing the need to provide important employee benefits.” 

“As it stands, the technicians behind LIV Golf’s telecasts are some of the few in major sports who do not receive health and retirement benefits when providing world-class coverage,” IATSE wrote. 

The sudden change comes as LIV Golf’s TV ratings cratered for the second time at its latest event in Tucson, Arizona. 

Golf blog No Laying Up’s Kevin Van Valkenburg tweeted that LIV’s Tucson event over the weekend scored a .14 rating in the 18-49 demographic across 33 markets from their event on Saturday. That’s a worse rating than last month’s event which the “World’s Funniest Animals” show had more viewers. 

Have an update on LIV Golf ratings for the Tucson event. According to a source, it scored a 0.14 overnight rating in 33 markets from Saturday. https://t.co/cyFNrDBDIj

— Kevin Van Valkenburg (@KVanValkenburg) March 19, 2023

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LIV suffers not just from dismal viewership but enormous overhead as the season is expected to cost the Saudi Arabian Government’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) a whopping billion dollars.

Even though PIF has tremendous wealth, there’s no telling how long they will continue with this shaky venture. 

Some broadcaster workers told IATSE they gave up stable jobs with good benefits — now LIV’s future is uncertain. 

“I gave up other work last year to commit to LIV because I knew I would receive much-needed healthcare contributions to keep my family in coverage,” said one crewmember. “But now that’s all changed, there seems to be plenty of money to spend on extravagant excess but not to guarantee the crew that puts their product on the air access to healthcare. These are industry standards, and the LIV executives could care less.”

Another broadcast worker said:

“I’m in the twilight of my 30+ plus year career broadcasting golf, and I am losing much-needed retirement contributions, that I was counting on to keep me on track to reach my retirement goals,” said a veteran broadcast technician. “At this phase of my life, I must continue to save as much as possible to retire at an appropriate age.”

One Twitter user said the IATSE statement “sounds like a human rights violation. I’m sure no one expected this from the Saudis.” 

Sounds like a human rights violation. I’m sure no one expected this from the Saudis.

— SportsFanNoypi (@DeyAlcalde) March 20, 2023

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Will LIV make it to a third season? 

Ominous signs after this second tournament; enormous overheads, no one watching and biggest players down the leaderboard.

LIV showing signs it’s going to die – and maybe by end of this season. Second album syndrome may be so bad there isn’t a third.

— Arthur MacMillan (@arthurmacmillan) March 20, 2023

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Authored by Rita Huang, Danny Tang and Nathan Amery via The Epoch Times,

The Hong Kong Consumer Council tested the cyber security of ten home surveillance cameras on the market and found that only one model complied with the European cyber security standard. At the same time, the other nine posed various cyber security concerns, including the transmission of videos and data without encryption and failure to defend against “brute-force attacks” by hackers to crack passwords.

In addition, the security of user data storage could have been improved in many apps, with half of the tested models able to access the user files stored in intelligent devices through Android apps. Some apps even requested excessive permission.

The Council urges manufacturers to improve the cyber security of products, such as introducing anti-brute-force attack designs and data encryption of video and data.

Consumers should also set strong passwords for their surveillance cameras and change them regularly and make good use of firewalls and network monitoring functions.

The ten models of home surveillance cameras tested were priced between $269 and $1,888, all providing two-way audio, motion detection, night vision, Amazon Alexa, and Google Assistant voice control. The models tested were from Arlo, Xiaomi, Imou, TP-Link, BotsLab, Eufy, EZVIZ, SpotCam, D-Link, and Reolink.

In addition, the Council commissioned an independent laboratory to test the cyber security and hardware design of these ten models with reference to the European Standards ETSI EN 303 645 and the industry-standard OWASP MASVS.

Among the ten surveillance cameras, Arlo has the highest total score of four out of five, with five marks for protection against attack, security of data transmission and apps, and hardware design, but three marks for the security of data storage and the highest price of $1,888 in the sample.

The other nine models have a micro-SD memory card slot, which can be inserted to save videos.

5 Models Do Not Have Encrypted Data Transmission

The Council said that live video streaming to mobile devices through the app allows users to keep track of the real-time status.

Four models tested did not use Secure Real-Time Transport Protocol (SRTP) in live streaming, which could provide data encryption and message authentication. Instead, they used the less secure and unencrypted Real-Time Transport Protocol (RTP).

The four models are Imou (Model: IPC-F88FIP-V2), TP-Link (Model: Tapo C210), EZVIZ (Model: CS-C6), and D-Link (Model: DCS-8350LH).

In addition, the Reolink (model: Argus 3 Pro) uses Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) to transmit data when connecting to the user’s Wi-Fi network without encrypting sensitive data so that hackers can find the router’s account information from ordinary text files.

The Consumer Council recommends manufacturers switch to the more secure Hypertext Transfer Security Protocol (HTTPS) to provide excellent user protection.

4 Failed to Defend Against Brute-force Attacks

The test found that three samples could be cracked using automated tools and programs that repeatedly (Brute Force attacks) tested all possible password combinations during live motion picture streaming.

The default passwords of EZVIZ and D-Link are only six digits or letters, which are very low in strength and are easily cracked. The Eufy (model: T8441X) could also be cracked.

The Council mentioned that the sample of SpotCam (model: Solo 2) has no limit on how many times a hacker can log in with a mobile phone application to obtain account information.

The Council recommends that the manufacturers of these four products incorporate anti-brute-force designs, such as multi-factor authentication and limiting the number of password attempts.

Temporary Passwords are Valid When Logging Back Into the Account on 3 Models

Each time the user logged in to connect to the camera, a conversation key equivalent to a temporary password would be used. The conversation key should expire after disconnection, and the user would use a new conversation key when logging in again.

However, the test results showed that when the samples of BootsLab (model: P4 Pro), SpotCam, and Reolink were logged in to connect to the camera again, the conversation key used for the previous connection was still valid. If the hacker steals the old conversation key, he can connect to the camera and see the image.

After logging out of an account or logging in to another account in the same mobile phone application, live images of the surveillance camera can still be seen on Reolink when connecting to the logged-out account, a security vulnerability.

Insufficient Data Security for All Sample Applications Storage

Sensitive information such as email addresses, account names, or passwords was stored in ordinary text files without encryption. The relevant information would only be removed after a certain time, posing risks.

In addition, the embedded browser of the Android version of five samples did not block access to files, including Imou, TP-Link, Eufy, EZVIZ, and D-Link, which allowed hackers to access files in the device by implanting the code. In addition, there are five samples of mobile phone applications with excessive access rights, and the data inside the device may be leaked, including Xiaomi Mi (model: MJSXJ09CM), Imou, BotsLab, Eufy, and EZVIZ.

The Council also pointed out that the Android version of BootsLab uses the obsolete Data Encryption Standard (DES) with a shorter key length of 56 bits.

City University Scholar: Only Rely on Manufacturers to Improve Product Quality

Mr. Tsang Kim Fung, Associate Professor of the Department of Electronic Engineering City the University of Hong Kong, believes that some samples have greater network security issues, such as unauthorized server access, insecure data transmission, and insecure data encryption, which may pose risks such as privacy leakage and mobile phone data leakage.

However, the product design and application of the home surveillance cameras are the manufacturer’s responsibility, and consumers can only rely on the manufacturer to improve the quality of the product.

The Council reminds consumers to be vigilant of the following when choosing and using home surveillance cameras.

Consumers should avoid purchasing products without a brand name or from unknown sources. They should open the app and activate the camera only when monitoring is needed. Also, they should set a strong password with no fewer than eight characters. The password should also contain a combination of upper- and lower-case letters, numbers, and special symbols.

The password should be changed regularly, and if the surveillance camera is installed and set up by someone providing door-to-door service, change the password immediately after installation.

In addition, consumers should never use public devices and those without administrator permission to log into an account and avoid using public Wi-Fi networks for monitoring to prevent account data from being recorded and stolen.

After days of repeat smaller missile tests aimed at sending a message to Washington amid joint US-South Korea military drills, which are the largest in years, North Korea on Monday said it launched a ballistic missile over the weekend as part of a simulated nuclear attack on the south.

State media indicated that Kim Jong Un oversaw the drill which sought to push back “aggression” from enemies. Notably it came the same day that US B-1B strategic bombers joined the aerial exercises with the south’s military.

Pyongyang said of Sunday launch that it was “carried out under the tense situation in which a large-scale war drill is being frantically scaled up by the U.S.-South Korean allied forces to invade the DPRK and U.S. nuclear strategic assets are massively brought to South Korea.”

This appears a reference to the US strategic bombers joining the drills. While there were reports that the north’s provocative Sunday launch involved a projectile tipped with a mock nuclear warhead, Pyongyang still claimed it had “no adverse effect on the security of the neighboring countries.”

It reportedly exploded about 800 meters above targeted waters. According to further details of the launch:

The suspected ballistic missile launched by North Korea on Sunday reached a maximum altitude of approximately 50km (31 miles) and flew a distance of approximately 800km (497 miles), according to Japan’s defense ministry. It was fired from the Dongchang-ri area of North Pyongan province in North Korea and landed in the sea between the Korean Peninsula and Japan, according to the South Korean military.

South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) has meanwhile emphasized is remaining vigilant and prepared for more launches coming out of the north, “while maintaining a full readiness posture through close cooperation with the US.”

Other regional powers are closely monitoring too, especially Japan. Its defense ministry said in a statement that these launches “threaten the peace and security of Japan, the region and the international community.”

The ongoing 11-day Freedom Shield exercises between the United States and South Korea are being widely described as the largest war games among the allies in a half-decade. North Korea earlier warned it is ready to initiate the “toughest counteraction against the most vicious plots of the US and its followers.”

Authored by Matt McGregor via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

For her efforts to report injuries to the Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS) and to educate others in her hospital system on doing the same, Physician Assistant Deborah Conrad said she was labeled an anti-vaxxer and fired from her job.

Today, the New York-based Conrad tells her story at medical freedom conferences throughout the country, the most recent being one in Mississippi where physicians, scientists, and the vaccine injured warned state lawmakers to pull the COVID-19 vaccines from the market.

Conrad told The Epoch Times she began to see early danger signals in 2021 upon the vaccine rollout, and with that, resistance among her colleagues to report on them.

“After the vaccines came out, there was this uptick in unusual symptoms, some of which I had never seen in my 20-year career,” Conrad said. “In every case, it was in somebody who had received the COVID-19 vaccine.”

Conrad said she had never admitted an adult patient with RSV (respiratory syncytial virus) until the COVID-19 vaccines.

“And every patient who came in with RSV was vaccinated for COVID,” Conrad said. “It wasn’t normal.”

Then, there were the adolescents with no previous medical conditions who had gotten the COVID-19 vaccine a week prior and, suddenly, they were struck with pneumonia and not able to function, she said.

“They weren’t able to walk or eat, and they were completely and totally fatigued,” Conrad said.

This was in 2021 before myocarditis was being discussed, so many of those early cases that were probably myocarditis were diagnosed as pneumonia, she said.

“A lot of these myocarditis cases came in with fevers because of this massive inflammatory response that was taking place in the body, so they would be labeled as septic, treated as if we were treating pneumonia or fevers of unknown origin,” Conrad said. “We’d treat them with antibiotics and all sorts of other things, not realizing that they were having heart failure.”

Conrad began reporting to VAERS, which she said was an overwhelming task not made easy by its multiple user-interface complications.

“My entire life had been taken over by doing these VAERS reports by myself,” she said.

In meetings with leadership, she would propose implementing a reporting system and hiring someone to manage the reports, she said.

‘A Hostile Environment’

“They kept telling me we’re looking into it and we’ll get back to you,” Conrad said. “Around April 2021, leadership came back and said no one else is reporting injuries—implying that I was crazy and there was nothing really going on with the vaccines.”

Leadership then audited her reports, she said and concluded that she was overreporting.

“I was then told that by doing VAERS reports and even discussing VAERS that it was an admission that the vaccines were unsafe, so it’s contributing to vaccine hesitancy,” Conrad said.

From there, it became a “very hostile environment” that compelled her to seek legal counsel, who wrote letters to the Department of Health, the CDC, and the FDA.

“No one cared,” Conrad said. “Finally, I had had it. It was so unethical; I couldn’t take it anymore. These VAERS reports are critical to assuring these vaccines are safe for us all. I could no longer be a part of a system that is lying to the American people.”

Conrad decided to become a whistleblower, telling her story on Del Bigtree’s The Highwire, knowing, she said, that it would cost her job.

“I couldn’t remain silent, even if it meant losing my career and everything I worked for,” she said. “I was fired a few weeks later and walked out like a criminal in front of all my peers.”

The initiative and education she had brought forth to report to VAERS were squashed that day, she said.

National Vaccine Injury Act of 1986

According to Barbara Loe Fisher, co-founder and president of the National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC), under the National Vaccine Injury Act of 1986, it’s a federal requirement for health care workers to report vaccine-related adverse events to VAERS.

Fisher, whose son was harmed by the DTP vaccine in 1980, worked with other parents of vaccine-injured children in establishing the NVIC in 1982.

“The 1986 Act was driven by parents of DPT vaccine injured children asking the government to pass legislation to secure vaccine safety informing, recording, reporting, and research provisions in the vaccination system to make it safer, and to create a federal compensation system alternative to a lawsuit against manufacturers of vaccines that injure or kill children,” Fisher told The Epoch Times.

In addition to NVIC arguing that physicians and vaccine manufacturers should be giving informed consent and report injuries, the organization maintained they should also continue to be held accountable in a civil court to serve as an incentive for physicians to administer vaccines responsibly, for manufacturers to produce safer vaccines, and for adequate federal compensation to vaccine-injured children.

Read more here…

On Monday US Secretary of State Antony Blinken once again emphasized that the Biden administration remains ready to support Ukraine “for as long as it takes.”

He also unveiled the latest defense aid package – at $350 million including more missiles and air defense missiles, listed among these more High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS) and howitzers, ammo for Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicles, high-speed anti-radiation missiles, anti-tank weapons as well as and riverine boats, according to The Hill. 

“This week, as Russia’s unconscionable war of aggression against Ukraine continues at great human cost, we are again reminded of the boundless courage and steadfast resolve of the Ukrainian people, and the strong support for Ukraine across the international community,” Blinken said.  

The Hill reviews concerning total defense aid pledged thus far, “With Monday’s announcement, the United States has now committed more than $32 billion in lethal aid to Ukraine through presidential drawdown since Russia first attacked the country more than a year ago.”

Blinken also on Monday condemned the visit of China’s President Xi to Putin to talk Ukraine peace…

“That President Xi is traveling to Russia days after the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for President Putin suggests that China feels no responsibility to hold the Kremlin accountable for the atrocities committed in Ukraine, and instead of even condemning them, it would rather provide diplomatic cover for Russia to continue to commit those very crimes,” Blinken said.

Xi Jinping’s visit “suggests that China feels no responsibility to hold the president accountable for the atrocities committed in Ukraine,” the US top diplomat stated.

#China may not deliver weapons to #Russia but is committed to supporting the Russian economy, which is all that Moscow needs to face US-led (40) nations in #Ukraine.
Today, President Xi Jinping began a 3-day state visit to Russia to meet his “old friend” President Vladimir Putin. pic.twitter.com/Wr2xMWoVcc

— Elijah J. Magnier 🇪🇺 (@ejmalrai) March 20, 2023

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

Blinken described China’s 12-point Ukraine peace plan as essentially nothing but a scheme to provide diplomatic cover to Russia’s war crimes. Despite all of this, Zelensky himself has maintained some degree of openness, and is likely to hold a phone call with Xi in the coming days to explore potential ceasefire options.

Authored by Allan Stein via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Even on a good day, Linda Garinger of Ramona, California, thinks about dying.

Since she went on kidney dialysis two years ago, she’s had a heart attack and a cardiac episode associated with her thrice-weekly treatments.

Her energy is low as her other vital organs slowly fail. Her blood pressure is out of control—hovering at around 200 systolic over “100-something”diastolic whenever she undergoes dialysis.

Garinger feels it’s only a matter of time before her next heart attack, which could prove fatal unless she gets a new kidney.

“The dialysis is very stressful on me. My vision is going. My hair is falling out. I’ve got skin cancer,” said Garinger, 68. “They said it’s from the dialysis not filtering out all the bad stuff.

“My biggest fear is I’ll have a heart attack during dialysis. I’m just going downhill right now.”

In 2022, Garinger was eagerly waiting for a kidney transplant at Sharp Memorial Hospital in San Diego, having found a good organ match in her daughter, the doctors told her.

But, “I needed [the transplant] like two years ago,” Garinger said.

Early last May, Garinger received an unexpected letter from the hospital saying she was no longer on the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) waitlist for a kidney transplant.

“The reason for this status change is you have not had your COVID vaccines,” read the May 6, 2022, letter Garinger shared with The Epoch Times.

“Once this situation is remedied, you will be evaluated for re-activation on the transplant waitlist.”

Garinger did not appeal the hospital’s decision. She knew “in her gut” her unvaccinated status would always be a problem.

Still, she put her faith in Sharp Memorial, only to be put through tests, medical procedures, and consultations at a substantial cost to Medicare.

“The whole time, they knew I wasn’t vaccinated and that [my daughter] wasn’t vaccinated. They would always ask me, ‘Why don’t you want to get a vaccine?’”

“I was pretty adamant,” said Garinger. “I didn’t want to take anything that was still experimental.”

She remembered her good friend who died two weeks after receiving a COVID shot. “She lived right over here, on the other side [of the street],” Garinger said.

Garinger said she was fortunate to find another hospital nearby that would operate without her taking the vaccine.

Starting All Over

The challenge now is the time it will take to complete all the required paperwork and preliminary procedures, the time it will take to get on a waitlist for a kidney donor, and the time it will take to find a donor.

She fears her time will run out before then.

One sympathetic doctor said, ‘Linda, you could drop over dead. Your heart could stop.’ So, I have to watch what I eat, and on the days I don’t do dialysis, I take this powder that tastes like gritty sand” to remove the excess potassium from her body.

Garinger finds herself among many people who need an organ transplant but are up against a medical system still adhering to vaccine protocols in many facilities.

In a 2021 Healio transplantation survey, 60 percent of the 141 transplant centers that responded did not require a COVID-19 injection before surgery. The survey sample represented just over 56 percent of the transplant centers in the United States.

Jeffrey Childers, a commercial attorney based in Gainesville, Florida, served clients facing COVID-19 mandates at hospitals and medical clinics during the pandemic.

He said Garinger’s case reflects the “COVID mania” that permeated the medical establishment beginning in 2020.

“This was an ugly manifestation of the COVID management regime that popped up,” Childers said. “All the cases get a lot of attention because people are horrified. But the transplant people will say they have limited resources, only get so many organs each year, and we have to give them to people with the best survival chances. They’ll hide behind that forever.”

Life-and-Death Decisions

Childers said health care facilities still have tremendous discretionary power to make critical decisions concerning COVID-19 vaccines.

“To see these kinds of life-and-death bureaucratic powers wielded by people who are not motivated by the science but—something else—is horrifying,” Childers said.

“I’ve run into it a handful of times in Florida. The law that applies is state dependent. The folks who manage those donor lists and the assignments have a lot of discretion.

“It’s even more appalling it’s happening now so late in the pandemic when the mandates are gone. You can’t find a single person who says they regret not taking the vaccine. But you can find tons going the other way.”

Childers said pro-vaccine advocates argue that an unvaccinated recipient is much more likely to die from COVID-19 following transplant surgery than a vaccinated patient.

“I don’t know the official line anymore,” he told The Epoch Times. “[The vaccine] doesn’t stop you from dying. It doesn’t stop you from getting sick.”

One study in the November 2022 MDPI, a Switzerland-based publisher of open-access scientific journals, claimed that over 60 days, the death rate among unvaccinated kidney transplant patients was 11.2 percent at the time of COVID-19 infection.

The study found the death rate among the vaccinated was 2.2 percent. More than two-thirds of the 144 patients in the study received a kidney transplant.

By contrast, a study published in the Journal of Clinical Medicine in September 2022 found that some cornea transplant patients rejected the grafts after receiving a COVID-19 vaccine.

In some cases, the rejection took place 20 years after the procedure.

Childers believes the science generally does not support the notion that unvaccinated transplant recipients are at an increased risk of dying from COVID-19.

“The argument is always don’t give an organ to a person who is living some kind of lifestyle that is risky or increases the risk of dying from something else,” Childers told The Epoch Times.

“That’s the logic they’re applying to this. They’re essentially saying by not taking the vaccine, [transplant patients] are at higher risk of dying from COVID. So they don’t want to give an organ to somebody at high risk voluntarily.”

Ohio attorney Warner Mendenhall, representing clients in vaccine mandate cases, said he knows at least 60 organ transplant denial suits working through the medical freedom group Liberty Counsel.

Each case involves a client refusing to take the COVID-19 vaccine required for transplant surgery.

“We’re seeing [transplant denials] at many hospitals across the country,” Mendenhall said.

And while the medical establishment remains split on the safety and effectiveness of COVID-19 injections, some “medical people are concerned about clotting and other issues that occur with the vaccinated.”

“Especially if you’ve got liver and kidney problems and need that type of transfer, you don’t want to be vaccinated before the transplant. That’s my understanding,” Mendenhall said.

A ‘Fiduciary Responsibility’ to Patients

Often, the unvaccinated transplant patient has maintained a longstanding medical relationship with the hospital or clinic without issue before the COVID-19 vaccine rollouts.

For this reason, Mendenhall believes there is a “fiduciary relationship that the hospitals engage in with a transplant patient.” To break that obligation would be “a real breach of that fiduciary responsibility to them.”

According to the Chronic Disease Research Group, an estimated 37 million people in the United States have kidney disease in varying stages.

About 1 million Americans are in the end stages of the disease. At the same time, 550,000 undergo kidney dialysis to remove excess toxins from the blood because their kidneys cannot perform this function.

The average wait time for a kidney transplant in the United States is three to five years at most health facilities, but it’s longer in some parts of the country, according to kidney.org.

“It is best to explore transplant before you need to start dialysis. This way, you might be able to get a transplant ‘preemptively,’ before you need dialysis,” the organization’s website states.

“It takes time to find the right transplant center for you, to complete the transplant evaluation, to get on the transplant waitlist for a deceased donor, or to find a living kidney donor if you can.”

Garinger said she is in terminal Stage 5 of her kidney disease and needs dialysis almost every other day to stay alive.

“I’m pissed off,” said Garinger, who gets short of breath just walking to the kitchen.

“I can’t walk to Costco or a grocery store now. My muscles—I get out of wind so easily. I can’t walk down to my chickens anymore.”

Her daughter Emily Lewis, 35, is a recent medical assistant program graduate and is now her mother’s live-in caretaker as she waits for a kidney transplant.

“I put my life on hold because [of my mother],” Lewis said, although she has no regrets.

With her career in limbo, Lewis said she is angry at the injustice of the COVID-19 mandates while doubting the shots even work.

“Everyone I know who’s COVID vaccinated has had it four or five times. I’ve had it zero,” Lewis told The Epoch Times.

Denied access to the kidney wait list at Sharp Memorial, Garinger found that the University of California San Diego Medical Center was willing to perform the kidney transplant surgery.

But the longer it takes to find a kidney donor, the more likely it is that she won’t make it back to a more normal life.

She characterized her relationship with her doctors at Sharp Memorial as adversarial since she opposed taking the COVID-19 vaccine under any circumstances.

She remembered one doctor in Ramona who kept “pressuring me” about the vaccine.

He said, “What will you do if you get COVID? What if you catch COVID and you have to go to the hospital?’

“Well,” she told him. “I have this protocol on my fridge—vitamins C and D. I have ivermectin. Number one: I won’t go to the hospital. It’s a death sentence there.”

“I guess you know more than me,’” the doctor said as he stood up and left the room.

“I didn’t know I had an adversary” or that “I was an evil person. I just had a gut feeling they would deny me [a kidney] because they kept pressuring me about the shot.”

“They did the same thing with me,” Emily said.

‘Why Aren’t You Vaccinated?’

At one point, Garinger demanded data showing the vaccine’s side effects.

“There was none,” she said. “It came down to the last final interview with the surgeon. All he could ask me was, ‘Why aren’t you vaccinated? Why don’t you want to get vaccinated?’”

“I don’t have COVID,” Garinger said. “[Emily] doesn’t have COVID. Another thing they told me was we were a [donor] match. And then I got to UCSD, and the bloodwork showed she was not a match.”

Sharp Memorial did not respond to a request for comment from The Epoch Times. UCSD Medical Center did not return an email seeking comment.

New Orleans attorney David Dalia said Garinger’s case seems to be medical “discrimination.”

“They are discriminating against her based on her vaccination status,” he said.

During the pandemic, Dalia worked on vaccine mandate cases with Frontline doctors, filing amicus briefs on behalf of 1.5 million federal employees who refused to take a COVID-19 vaccine by order of President Joe Biden.

“The truth is [Garinger] has a lot better chance of living than a vaccinated person. We can back that up. They’re viewing it as sort of a disability.

“Well, that’s a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act. And federal law specifically says all experimental use authorization drugs are strictly voluntary and subject to informed consent.”

Dalia said informed consent is “never coerced.”

As Garinger works through the intake process at UCSD Medical Center, she has good, bad, and “hell” days.

“I sit in a chair all day,” said Garinger, who ran a successful foreclosure business before she retired due to her illness. “[Emily] helps me do cooking. She does all the chopping and stuff. I have a chair in the kitchen. I walk to the kitchen and start cooking. I don’t do much. My gardening is on hold—everything is on hold. My muscles are gone. I use electric carts to go to Costco. I can’t do anything. I’m out of breath. It sucks.”

“Every part of my body is deteriorating. So, I’m on hold until I get a kidney.”

Just as painful are the times people call her “evil ” because she refuses to take an mRNA vaccine for COVID-19.

“You’re going to give [COVID] to everybody,” they tell her. “You’re evil for not getting vaccinated.”

“That’s how I felt,” Garinger told The Epoch Times.

She said another fear is receiving a kidney from a vaccinated donor, with unknown health effects, since there is no way to determine which donor is vaccinated and which one is not.

Feeling her time is growing short, Garinger said she is still determined to keep fighting in the time she has left.

“I’ve got to get this done. Every day there’s something else going wrong with me because my kidneys are gone,” Garinger said.

Authored by Steve Watson via Summit News,

Fresh data from Customs and Border Protection has revealed that sixteen people matched to the FBI’s terrorist watchlist were apprehended by Border Patrol agents in February alone.

As reported by Fox News, the total number of individuals on the watchlist found to be attempting to enter the country so far this fiscal year is now 69.

CBP expects the trend to continue, and to smash last fiscal year’s record 98 encounters.

Between FY17 and FY20 there were only 8 of these terror watchlist arrests, and in 2021 only 15.

NEW: CBP data reveals Border Patrol arrested 16 people on the FBI’s terror watchlist who crossed illegally at the southern border in February, bringing total terror watchlist arrests for FY’23 (so far) to 69.

FY’23 is on pace to beat FY’22, which had 98, an all time record.… https://t.co/k80jfpo2xi

— Bill Melugin (@BillFOXLA) March 16, 2023

Federal Data Quietly Reveals 100 Terror Suspects Caught At Southern Border

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