- Needed: A 'Made In The USA' Policy Plus Energy Independence To Counter Inflation & The Rising National Debt
Needed: A ‘Made In The USA’ Policy Plus Energy Independence To Counter Inflation & The Rising National Debt
Authored by Lawrence Kadish via The Gatestone Institute,
Sad but true, history is now all but a forgotten subject in our schools.
But economic history?
With luck, you may find the topic in some esoteric book written by a professor and hidden on some dusty library shelf.
Yet it is there, within those pages, that you will find the history of nations who harnessed the power of a balanced budget and assumed global dominance.
Of equal importance will be the parallel lesson of those that failed to appreciate that the most sophisticated military in the world can win a war only to come home to a nation that will eventually fall because of a mismanaged economy.
Without an appreciation of that history a nation’s leaders can easily pursue a disastrous course of pork spending that can destroy the promise of the future.
Which is why Americans should be deeply concerned about this Administration and its reign of spending and resultant increased debt, that will be burdening us, and future citizens, far into the future.
That kind of debt is a silent nation-killer.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 23:30 - Banks Or Buddies – Where Do People Borrow Money From?
Banks Or Buddies – Where Do People Borrow Money From?
When making the decision to borrow money, do you turn to friends and family for financial help, or do you go to a financial institution like a bank or credit card company?
On a country-to-country basis, this choice often depends on a mix of various factors, including the availability of financial services, financial literacy, and the cultural approach to the very concept of lending itself.
In these graphics, Visual Capitalist’s Richie Lionell sheds some light on where people borrow money from, using the 2021 Global Findex Database published by the World Bank.
Borrowing From Financial Institutions
To compare borrowing practices across both location and income level, the dataset features survey results from respondents aged 15+ and groups countries by region except for high-income countries, which are grouped together.
In 2021, most individuals in high income economies borrowed money from formal financial institutions.
Country Region Borrowed from a financial institution Canada High income 81.01% Israel High income 79.52% Iceland High income 73.36% Hong Kong SAR, China High income 70.01% Korea, Rep. High income 68.64% Norway High income 66.82% United States High income 66.21% Taiwan, China High income 61.95% Switzerland High income 61.40% Japan High income 61.19% New Zealand High income 60.38% Australia High income 57.29% Austria High income 56.52% Italy High income 55.01% United Kingdom High income 54.98% Germany High income 54.68% Ireland High income 54.11% Denmark High income 53.16% Finland High income 52.98% Spain High income 51.92% Sweden High income 48.69% Belgium High income 47.98% France High income 44.37% Singapore High income 42.82% Slovenia High income 42.36% Uruguay High income 42.01% Brazil Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 40.75% China East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 39.19% Malta High income 38.95% Türkiye Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 37.84% Netherlands High income 34.45% Slovak Republic High income 34.41% Mongolia East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 34.39% Ukraine Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 34.13% Estonia High income 33.64% Croatia High income 33.03% Saudi Arabia High income 32.38% Poland High income 31.92% Czech Republic High income 31.33% Cyprus High income 31.25% Cambodia East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 30.89% Argentina Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 30.81% Portugal High income 30.44% Kazakhstan Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 29.76% Russian Federation Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 29.75% Thailand East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 28.26% Bulgaria Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 26.36% Armenia Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 26.17% Iran, Islamic Rep. Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 25.11% Chile High income 24.20% Georgia Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 23.89% Ecuador Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 23.23% Latvia High income 22.74% United Arab Emirates High income 22.46% Kenya Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 22.18% North Macedonia Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 22.10% Peru Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 21.95% Dominican Republic Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 21.65% Bosnia and Herzegovina Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 21.30% Sri Lanka South Asia 21.29% Namibia Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 20.97% Serbia Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 20.65% Greece High income 20.11% Mauritius Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 20.09% Bolivia Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 19.30% Romania Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 19.14% Hungary High income 18.93% Uganda Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 18.62% South Africa Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 18.22% Colombia Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 18.10% Kyrgyz Republic Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 17.73% Kosovo Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 17.61% Costa Rica Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 17.46% Philippines East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 17.45% Liberia Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 15.42% Bangladesh South Asia 14.22% Nepal South Asia 14.11% Malaysia East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 13.48% Albania Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 13.39% Moldova Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 13.18% Indonesia East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 12.86% Tajikistan Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 12.43% Paraguay Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 12.39% Nicaragua Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 12.19% Jamaica Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 12.04% Lithuania High income 11.95% India South Asia 11.79% Mali Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 10.99% El Salvador Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 10.56% Panama Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 10.39% Honduras Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 10.32% Mozambique Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 10.27% Senegal Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 9.98% Tunisia Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 9.89% Jordan Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 9.86% Lao PDR East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 9.15% Venezuela, RB Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 8.83% Benin Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 8.21% Malawi Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 7.99% Uzbekistan Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 7.50% Togo Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 7.42% Ghana Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 7.40% Egypt, Arab Rep. Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 7.30% Myanmar East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 7.06% Cameroon Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 6.99% Zambia Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 6.76% Burkina Faso Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 6.66% Nigeria Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 6.40% Congo, Rep. Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 6.19% Guinea Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 6.11% Gabon Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 5.48% Morocco Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 4.99% West Bank and Gaza Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 4.94% Tanzania Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 4.45% Sierra Leone Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 4.29% Cote d’Ivoire Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 4.10% Algeria Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 3.80% Iraq Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 3.64% Pakistan South Asia 3.51% Lebanon Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 3.31% Zimbabwe Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 2.89% South Sudan Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 2.48% Afghanistan South Asia 2.05% With 81% of respondents borrowing from financial institutions, Canada tops this list. Meanwhile, Israel (80%), Iceland (73%), Hong Kong (70%), and South Korea (69%) are not far behind.
This is not surprising for richer nations, as financial services in these countries are more available and accessible. This, coupled with higher financial literacy, including a general understanding of interest rates and credit-building opportunities, contribute to the popularity of financial institutions.
Also, it’s worth noting that some countries have cultural practices that factor in. For example, 61% of respondents in Japan used formal financial institutions, which are a more socially acceptable option than asking to borrow money from friends and family (just 6% of people in Japan).
Borrowing from Friends and Family
In contrast, more individuals in lower income economies approached family and friends in order to borrow money.
Afghanistan tops this list with 60% of respondents relying on friends and family, compared to only 2% borrowing money from formal financial institutions.
Country Region Borrowed from family or friends Afghanistan South Asia 60.18% Uganda Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 57.45% Kenya Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 54.40% Namibia Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 50.25% Morocco Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 48.73% Nigeria Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 44.71% South Africa Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 44.54% Iraq Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 44.10% Cameroon Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 43.49% Zambia Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 43.08% Zimbabwe Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 42.34% Guinea Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 42.04% Nepal South Asia 41.79% Jordan Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 41.76% Gabon Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 41.41% Liberia Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 41.37% Tunisia Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 41.05% Philippines East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 40.82% Türkiye Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 40.80% Iran, Islamic Rep. Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 39.80% Sierra Leone Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 39.02% Ghana Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 38.58% Egypt, Arab Rep. Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 37.75% Saudi Arabia High income 35.76% Bangladesh South Asia 35.49% Mali Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 35.15% Burkina Faso Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 35.14% Cambodia East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 34.85% Venezuela, RB Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 34.81% Togo Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 33.99% West Bank and Gaza Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 33.93% Thailand East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 32.83% Lao PDR East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 32.36% Moldova Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 32.18% Ukraine Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 32.17% Senegal Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 31.30% Armenia Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 31.29% India South Asia 31.02% Bolivia Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 30.69% Algeria Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 30.52% Cote d’Ivoire Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 30.20% Albania Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 30.00% Bulgaria Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 29.99% Benin Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 29.33% Mozambique Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 29.33% Tanzania Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 29.24% Colombia Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 29.08% Indonesia East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 28.85% South Sudan Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 28.84% Ecuador Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 28.79% Serbia Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 28.49% Russian Federation Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 28.40% Mongolia East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 27.01% Kyrgyz Republic Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 27.01% China East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 26.43% Honduras Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 26.07% Greece High income 25.94% Kosovo Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 25.86% Argentina Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 25.72% Kazakhstan Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 25.64% Romania Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 25.58% Malawi Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 25.24% North Macedonia Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 25.14% Dominican Republic Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 24.70% Brazil Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 24.66% Congo, Rep. Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 24.40% Lebanon Middle East & North Africa (excluding high income) 24.26% Nicaragua Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 23.75% Iceland High income 23.63% Peru Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 23.34% United Arab Emirates High income 23.04% Myanmar East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 23.03% Sri Lanka South Asia 22.53% Paraguay Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 22.20% Pakistan South Asia 21.87% Uzbekistan Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 21.53% Cyprus High income 20.95% Bosnia and Herzegovina Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 20.94% Chile High income 20.72% Georgia Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 20.61% Mauritius Sub-Saharan Africa (excluding high income) 20.48% Costa Rica Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 20.29% Jamaica Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 20.02% Tajikistan Europe & Central Asia (excluding high income) 19.86% Poland High income 19.34% Norway High income 19.29% United States High income 18.09% Uruguay High income 17.60% Panama Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 17.54% Denmark High income 17.51% Croatia High income 17.09% El Salvador Latin America & Caribbean (excluding high income) 16.78% Slovenia High income 16.77% Latvia High income 16.57% Australia High income 16.44% Estonia High income 15.74% Malaysia East Asia & Pacific (excluding high income) 15.44% Israel High income 15.43% New Zealand High income 15.19% Slovak Republic High income 15.02% Germany High income 15.01% Austria High income 14.41% Canada High income 14.00% Finland High income 13.43% Czech Republic High income 13.41% Korea, Rep. High income 13.16% Malta High income 12.99% Belgium High income 12.13% Sweden High income 11.79% Hungary High income 11.15% Lithuania High income 10.65% Spain High income 10.44% France High income 10.42% Netherlands High income 10.24% Ireland High income 9.84% Taiwan, China High income 9.70% Portugal High income 8.22% Hong Kong SAR, China High income 7.59% Japan High income 6.43% Switzerland High income 6.10% United Kingdom High income 5.24% Italy High income 5.06% Singapore High income 1.89% Many individuals in African countries including Uganda (57%), Kenya (54%), Namibia (50%), and Morocco (49%) also are choosing to borrow money from friends and family over financial institutions.
These preferences can be attributed to various factors including a lack of trust in banking and financial institutions, lacking access to such services, or the lack of information about such services if they are available.
And in some societies, borrowing from friends and family can be seen as a cultural norm, especially in places where mutual support and solidarity play a strong role.
What’s Next?
As viewed by the World Bank, financial inclusion is an important foundation of any nation’s development, and it’s also one of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. Increasing levels of financial inclusion helps give people access to services like savings plans, credit avenues, and online payments and transactions.
And thanks to commitments from countries and financial systems, global ownership of banking accounts has increased significantly (and been further spurred by the COVID-19 pandemic). According to the Global Findex Database, bank account ownership has risen to 76% in 2021, up from just 51% a decade prior.
However, access to these services is still rife with gaps when it comes to low income nations, low income individuals, and unequal access based on gender. The future of borrowing now relies on how nations deal with these challenges.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 23:00 - Gun-Free Zones, Red Flag Laws Only Make Gun Crime Worse: Economist
Gun-Free Zones, Red Flag Laws Only Make Gun Crime Worse: Economist
Authored by Michael Clements via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
Two of the most popular gun control proposals have little to no effect on gun crime and actually exacerbate the problem for the people they’re supposed to protect, according to economist, researcher, and author John Lott.
“Those are the people who are harmed,” Lott told seminar participants at the National Rifle Association’s Annual Meetings and Exhibits in Indianapolis.
Police tape at Geneva Presbyterian Church after a shooting left one dead and five injured in Laguna Woods, Calif., on May 15, 2022. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times) Lott is considered an authority on guns and crime, having authored more than 100 peer-reviewed articles and 10 books on the subject. He led two seminars discussing the effectiveness of gun-free zones, red-flag laws, and other gun control measures.
He said the story of Nikki Goeser encapsulates the shortcomings of these laws.
Goeser is the author of “Stalked and Defenseless: How Gun Control Helped My Stalker Murder My Husband in Front of Me.” She’s also the executive director of the Crime Prevention Research Center (CPRC), of which Lott is the president.
People walk past a “Gun Free Zone” sign posted on 40th Street and 7th Avenue in New York on Aug. 31, 2022. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images) Goeser was scheduled to speak at the event but couldn’t attend because of family obligations.
Fourteen years ago, Goeser and her late husband, Ben, operated a karaoke business. A man the couple had met became infatuated with her and began stalking her.
While Goeser had a license to carry a concealed pistol, at the time, it was illegal in her home state of Tennessee to carry a firearm in any business that served alcohol.
One night, while running their karaoke business, Goeser’s stalker showed up and shot her husband seven times in front of her. Goeser’s situation was known to the police, but the stalker had been undeterred.
Lott said Goeser has stated that she isn’t sure she could have stopped the crime if she had had her pistol. But she’s confident that complying with the law ensured that she couldn’t protect her husband or herself.
“As the title of her book says, she was denied the chance,” he said.
Buffalo supermarket shooting suspect Payton Gendron in a jail booking photograph. (Erie County District Attorney’s Office via AP) Lott told the gathering that Goeser’s story is a perfect example of the problems with gun-free zones.
According to statistics from the CPRC, 94 percent of mass shootings since 1950 have occurred in gun-free zones.
Lott said one well-known mass killer explained his reasoning in a manifesto written the year before he struck.
The 19-year-old man who killed 10 people in a Buffalo, New York, grocery store on May 14, 2022, has been described as a right-wing racist, Lott said. But, while he was an avowed racist, Lott said the shooter described himself as an environmentalist and eco-terrorist.
In his manifesto, the shooter claimed that minorities were damaging the environment by having too many children, and that’s why he decided to attack black people.
“Attacking in a weapon-restricted area may decrease the chance of civilian backlash,” Lott quoted from the shooter’s writings. “… ‘areas where CCW [concealed weapons] are outlawed or prohibited may be good areas of attack,’ and ‘areas with strict gun laws are also great places of attack.’”
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 22:30 - Japan Readies Missile Interceptors To Shoot Down North Korea Spy Satellite Debris
Japan Readies Missile Interceptors To Shoot Down North Korea Spy Satellite Debris
Japan is preparing its armed forces to shoot down potential North Korean satellite debris as Pyongyang prepares yet another provocative rocket launch, which could again bring Japan under threat.
This time Kim Jong Un is saying the country will soon launch its first military spy satellite into orbit, at an unspecified date. On Tuesday Kim previewed that he will soon deploy an operational military reconnaissance satellite, necessary to effectively the DPRK’s nuclear-capable missiles.
KCNA/AP file: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un visits the Sohae Satellite Launching Ground in Tongchang in March 2022. Kim said further that it is necessary in thwarting the serious security threats posed by “the most hostile rhetoric and explicit action” of the US and South Korea.
In response Japan, which has already seen North Korean missiles recently fly over the island or into waters close to the country, is putting its missile interceptor units on high alert, in the scenario of spy satellite fragments from a possible failed launch or failed orbit falling down into Japanese territory.
According to details in The Associated Press:
Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada on Saturday instructed troops to ready PAC-3 surface-to-air missiles in southwestern Japan, including Okinawa and nearby islands, in an area believed to be under a flight path of a North Korean rocket that will carry the satellite.
He also ordered the deployment of destroyers equipped with SM-3 ship-to-air missiles to coastal waters, according to a ministry statement.
The ministry confirmed that “We are making the necessary preparation because of a possibility of issuing an order to destroy ballistic missiles and other objects.”
North Korea says its latest spate of missile tests, which included the test-firing of a solid-fueled intercontinental ballistic missile for the first time last week, is in response to major joint US-South Korean drills which threaten the peace and stability of the region.
Given the current tensions, Japan is leaving nothing to chance, and preparing for more unpredictable rocket launches out of North Korea at any moment.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 22:00 - US Tries To Blame Russia For Sudan "Deep State" War
US Tries To Blame Russia For Sudan “Deep State” War
Authored by Andrew Korybko via The Automatic Earth blog,
Debunking The Latest Fake News Narrative
CNN published an exclusive piece on Thursday alleging that “Evidence emerges of Russia’s Wagner arming militia leader battling Sudan’s army”. They claim that satellite imagery shows increased Russian military transport activity between Libya and Syria in the run-up to Sudan’s “deep state” war. According to CNN, this confirms rumors that General Haftar is supplying Rapid Support Forces’ (RSF) leader General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo (“Hamedti”) with surface-to-air missiles (SAM) on behalf of Wagner.
The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) published their own exclusive piece the day prior on Wednesday alleging that “Libyan Militia and Egypt’s Military Back Opposite Sides in Sudan Conflict”, so these two stories complement one another. Both Hamedti and Wagner have denied these claims, however. The Sudanese Ambassador to Russia also confirmed that “Russia is a friendly country to us so we have been in direct contact with [the] Russian Foreign Ministry since the very beginning of those events last Saturday.”
That diplomat’s reaffirmation of Sudan’s close ties with Russia is especially important since he represents the government that’s internationally recognized as being led by Chief General Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan, who commands the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and is one of the two figures vying for power. At present, Khartoum therefore doesn’t extend credence to the emerging US-led Western Mainstream Media (MSM) narrative that Russia is arming the RSF via Haftar-Wagner, but that could soon change.
Preconditioning The Public For Another Proxy War
Unless the present three-day Eid ceasefire holds and leads to the start of peace talks that ultimately end this “deep state” war, which is unlikely since both sides made clear their intent to completely destroy the other, then this conflict is expected to resume in the near future. Should the SAF fail to defeat the RSF and possibly even be placed on the backfoot, then Burhan might gamble that it’s in his best interests to parrot the MSM’s anti-Russian accusations in an attempt to receive direct Western military support.
That scenario isn’t all that far-fetched either considering that the Associated Press and Politico both cited unnamed officials on Thursday to report that the US is assembling additional troops in nearby Djibouti to prepare for the possible evacuation of Americans from Sudan. This pretext could easily be exploited to arm the SAF and/or attack the RSF, especially if the Pentagon claims that the latter tried stopping its operation by building upon last week’s claim that its forces shot at an armored US diplomatic vehicle.
In the event that Burhan repeats the MSM’s emerging anti-Russian narrative and promises to rubbish Sudan’s naval base deal with Moscow upon defeating the RSF, then the Biden Administration can “justify” its military intervention on the basis of “defending Sudanese democracy from a Kremlin coup”. The public would then be told that the latest conflict was sparked by Russia’s support for the “insurgent” RSF, which the MSM would attribute to its interests in defending Wagner’s mining operations there.
American Meddling In Russian-Egyptian Relations
This would predictably precede an unprecedented but preplanned information warfare campaign painting Russia as a “destabilizing” force in Africa, which would be aimed at counteracting its hitherto highly successful efforts at presenting itself as a force of stability in support of legitimate governments. The purpose of this aforesaid operation would be to erode Russia’s newfound “Democratic Security” appeal across the continent with a view towards reversing the decline of Western influence there.
Furthermore, Burhan’s potentially opportunistic piggybacking on the earlier described emerging anti-Russian narrative could have serous implications for Moscow’s ties with Cairo due to the perception of them backing opposite sides in Sudan’s “deep state” war. Russian-Egyptian relations have recently been beset by scandal upon the latest Pentagon leaks alleging that Cairo abandoned its supposedly secret plan to supply rockets to Moscow under pressure from Washington and agreed to arm Kiev instead.
Considering this context, the scenario of Egyptian-backed Burhan blaming Russia for sparking the latest conflict could therefore lead to the rapid deterioration of Russian-Egyptian ties, especially if Cairo decides to indirectly retaliate against Moscow by curtailing its investment rights in Port Said. Those two signed an additional agreement on this industrial zone last month, which was first approved in 2018 and is supposed to help Russia expand its economic engagement with the broader region.
Punishing The Emirates For Its Close Relations With Russia
That goal could be jeopardized if Egypt decides to punish Russia through these means in response to Burhan opportunistically piggybacking on the MSM narrative in an attempt to obtain direct Western military support against the RSF. Furthermore, the UAE’s ties with Egypt and the US could also become much more complicated in that event too since Abu Dhabi is accused of backing reportedly RSF-allied Haftar, being favorable disposed to that armed Sudanese group, and secretly allying with Russia.
The last-mentioned accusation was brought to the public’s attentions as a result of the previously mentioned Pentagon leaks, which were denied by the UAE but coincided with the weakening of its ties with Washington that are partially over that Gulf country’s growing ones with Moscow. There are more factors at play than just the Russian-Emirati relationship, but the point is that the UAE’s problems with the US could be amplified by the MSM if Burhan accuses Russia of arming the RSF via Haftar-Wagner.
It also deserves mentioning that America’s other ulterior interest in its incipient propaganda campaign against Russia in Sudan is to complicate its geopolitical opponent’s logistical connections with the Central African Republic (CAR), which owes its continued existence as a state to Moscow’s military support. The Kremlin largely relies on transit across Sudan in order to supply its forces and its ally’s there, but this could be cut off if Burhan jumps on the anti-Russian bandwagon and revokes Moscow’s privileges.
The Chadian Connection
Lastly, another strategic factor behind this latest information warfare offensive against Russia is that it could ruin that country’s surprisingly solid relations with regional military heavyweight Chad. As explained in this recent analysis here, N’Djamena ended up expelling the German Ambassador earlier this month for meddling instead of the Russian one despite the US telling its counterparts in late February that Moscow is using Wagner in the CAR and Libya to arm anti-government rebels against it.
The Associated Press cited an African analyst from a Western risk assessment firm in their article on Thursday about 320 SAF troops fleeing to Chad to claim that this development could prompt N’Djamena into taking those forces’ side in Sudan’s “deep state” war. According to Benjamin Hunter, “N’Djamena is likely to oppose (Dagalo) due to fears that RSF dominance in Darfur could empower Chadian Arabs to unseat the (president’s) regime. Many within (Dagalo’s) Rizeigat tribe live across the border in Chad.”
If Chad becomes embroiled in Sudan’s “deep state” war on Burhan’s side, then it might be susceptible to Western suggestions that jumping on the anti-Russian bandwagon like he would have already done in this scenario could lead to them suspending their regime change campaign against N’Djamena. Should that happen, then this regional military heavyweight might also support any potentially forthcoming rebel/terrorist offensive that its historical French partner could soon plot against Russia in the CAR.
Concluding Thoughts
Putting everything together, the US plans to achieve the following strategic objectives by introducing the narrative that Russia is arming the RSF:
-
Entice Burhan to extend credence to these claims in exchange for US military support;
-
Demand that he also rescinds Russia’s naval base rights and cuts off its overflight access to the CAR;
-
Consider direct support to the SAF on the pretext of commencing an “evacuation operation” in Sudan;
-
Discredit Russia and the UAE’s African engagement policies by framing both as “destabilizing forces”;
-
Attempt to provoke a crisis in Russia’s relations with Sudan’s Chadian and Egyptian neighbors;
-
Exploit the above scenario to assemble a regional coalition for pushing back against Russia in Africa;
-
Encourage Chad to support a French-backed rebel/terrorist offensive in the Russian-allied CAR;
-
Plot a copycat proxy war in Russian-allied Mali in order to crush the Kremlin’s influence in the Sahel;
-
Perfect this new Hybrid War method prior to employing it all across the continent;
-
And thus turn Africa into the top proxy war battleground of the New Cold War.
The US therefore has many reasons to push this fake news campaign, though it’s unclear whether it’ll ultimately achieve any of its envisaged objectives or not.
* * *
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 21:30 -
- "Entire Downtown Is Effectively Dead:" Baltimore City Descends Further Into Turmoil
“Entire Downtown Is Effectively Dead:” Baltimore City Descends Further Into Turmoil
Downtown Baltimore is plagued with shootings, carjackings, muggings, and out-of-control packs of teenagers wreaking havoc. Baltimore residents can thank five decades of Democrat politicians for mismanaging this once-thriving town.
Earlier this month, the Inner Harbor district was overrun by hundreds of teenagers that resembled an apocalyptic scene from a Hollywood or Netflix movie. The video below might provide some insight into why people are shunning the area, which caused a plunge in foot traffic, making it difficult for retail stores to survive.
Just a late night run at the great Baltimore City’s #InnerHarbor #SpringBreak vibes #SpringBreak2023 #Baltimore #Maryland #น้องวินอยากเป็นพี่วิน #TAEHYUNGxCELINE #SuccessionHBO #Succession #ChaguoSmartNaAirtel #Maryland #Taiwan #TikTok #SummerMMFF2023 #INVASION #Russia… pic.twitter.com/X36btbT65g
— Daniel Barahona (@GlobalSETT) April 10, 2023
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
This leaves us with local media outlet Baltimore Brew’s reporting about a mall situated on the waterfront, once popular with tourists and residents, had lots of activity, and is now nothing more than a ghost town.
“I knew this place had gone down. But I didn’t know it was this bad!” exclaimed Patel, a California software engineer who recalled eating at a restaurant in the waterfront mall about a decade ago. He said, “I remember it being pretty nice back then.”
All that’s left of the mall is a Hooters restaurant. Baltimore Brew’s pictures show almost every other store has moved out.
… and now, as the media outlet explains, what to do with this prized piece of commercial real estate?
That’s the question before Mayor Brandon Scott and other city leaders, who yesterday gave Harborplace’s new owner, MCB Real Estate, three years to figure out a plan.
Among the other terms of the amended lease that the Board of Estimates approved were three years of rent abatement and up to $1 million for future planning and other costs.
MCB co-founder P. David Bramble says he needs more time to devise a turnaround strategy. The board members who approved the deal did so without questions or comments. (Scott himself was absent from the meeting, attending an African American Mayors Association conference in Washington instead.)
“The entire downtown area is effectively dead,” one person said who commented on Baltimore Brew’s article. They pointed out:
“Who in their right mind would want to risk coming downtown when the news out of Baltimore is all about shootings, carjackings, mugging, and out-of-control packs of teenagers milling about on a semi-regular basis?”
Democrats and progressive leadership in the city have done a wonderful job of taking something nice and destroying it with terrible policy. The consequence is an exodus of businesses, and it’s not just a Baltimore problem. Metro areas with progressive leadership, like Chicago, San Francisco, and Portland, are finding businesses are leaving in droves.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 21:00 - First Smart Gun With Fingerprint Unlocking Hits The Market
First Smart Gun With Fingerprint Unlocking Hits The Market
Authored by Emily Miller via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
The first so-called “smart gun” that uses biometrics to unlock for shooting will hit the market at the end of the year.
Biofire Technologies announced this month that it is taking pre-orders for its home defense gun that is intended to prevent unwanted access to children and criminals. This is either a big step forward in gun safety or a gimmick with unreliable technology, depending on who you ask.
A gun salesman holds a Walther PDP Pro 9mm handgun at Lawful Defense in Gainesville, Fla., on April 19, 2023. (Nanette Holt/The Epoch Times) Futuristic Gun
Smart guns, otherwise known as personalized handguns, have been in development for many years. The CEO and Founder of Biofire Technologies, Kai Kloepfer, told The Epoch Times in an interview that this is the first “major innovation in how a handgun has been designed or manufactured in 50 years.”
Kloepfer, 26, has been working on designing a smart gun since he was a teenager. “This is a new option for gun owners to give them peace of mind that their children or criminals won’t get their hands on it.”
The Biofire Smart Gun is a handgun that can be stored with fingerprints and 3D facial recognition to unlock it to shoot. The company says unlocking works in the dark. The data is stored in the gun in encrypted form. The gun can have biometrics for up to five total authorized users.
The Biofire gun has integrated infrared sensors in the grip to keep it armed while the user is holding it. As soon as the grip is released, the gun locks. It is powered by a rechargeable lithium-ion battery that Biofire says lasts several months with average use and can fire continuously for several hours. The firearm only comes in 9mm caliber, but buyers are given multiple choices for color and style and left- or right-handed.
Kloepfer, who said he owns a lot of regular guns, said his product gives people an option for a “new and better choice.”
Reliable Technology?
Gun rights groups have been leery that biometrics can function perfectly in self-defense scenarios. The National Shootings Sports Foundation (NSSF) represents gun manufacturers. Biofire is a member.
“Firearms are tools that individuals rely upon to save their lives and the lives of their loved ones. That necessitates a firearm to work, as designed, each and every time,” Mark Oliva, NSSF’s director of public affairs, told The Epoch Times. “Additional points of failure, including authorized-user technology, are concerns for gun owners. If that technology fails, that could be catastrophic for an individual depending upon it to save his or her life.”
The National Rifle Association (NRA) warns the stress of real life is different than product testing.
Read more here…
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 20:30 - Anti-CRT Measures Adopted By 28 US States
Anti-CRT Measures Adopted By 28 US States
More than half of U.S. states have passed measures against the teaching of critical race theory – for example in schools or government employee trainings. Another dozen have seen successful initiatives on a smaller scale, with single cities, counties or school districts (or both) establishing such laws and directives. This is according to a tracking project at the University of California Los Angeles law school.
You will find more infographics at Statista
Additionally, as Statista’s Katharina Buchholz reports, almost all states that haven’t yet passed any such measures have seen them proposed on the state level, the exceptions being California, Vermont and Delaware.
In California, however, several school districts have already decided to prohibit or limit the teaching of critical race theory, including in Orange county and Paso Robles.
A few states with no finalized laws or directives on any level remain: They are Illinois, Nevada, Vermont, Delaware, Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey and Hawaii.
The newly released report State of Black America by the National Urban League identifies 567 anti-CRT laws introduced in the U.S.
In the opinion of the report, the limitation on CRT are limiting the civil rights of Americans, including Black Americans.
Critical Race Theory is a framework that sees race not mainly as a biological factor, but as a social construct and sees racism not only as an individual’s biases but as embedded in society.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 20:00 - Feds Have No Data On How Regulations Reduce Emissions: Audit Finds
Feds Have No Data On How Regulations Reduce Emissions: Audit Finds
Authored by Marnie Cashcart via The Epoch Times,
The federal government does not know the extent that regulations are reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, despite committing $200 billion towards the issue.
Jerry DeMarco, commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, holds a press conference in Ottawa on April 20, 2023. (The Canadian Press/Sean Kilpatrick)
An April 20 report released by the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Jerry DeMarco, indicates that Environment and Climate Change Canada does not attribute emission results to specific regulations.
The federal department does not measure, or report on, the contributions of each regulation toward meeting the set target for 2030. An audit by the commissioner concluded that Environment Canada “used modelling approaches to estimate greenhouse gas emission reductions.”
The federal government does not know if regulations to limit methane emissions are achieving their target, said the report. The audit found that large sources of methane emissions were unaccounted for in inventories and not covered by any existing regulations.
The audit considered five regulations with the stated intent to reduce emissions from vehicles on the road, power plants, and oil and gas production.
DeMarco concluded, “Without comprehensive impact information, the federal government does not know whether it is using the right tools to sufficiently reduce emissions to meet its target.”
The audit suggested some regulations, targeted at reducing emissions from power generation, achieved the targeted level, while regulations intended to reduce vehicle emissions failed to meet their target.
“Although greenhouse gas emissions from passenger cars decreased, this was offset by even larger increases in emissions for light trucks and heavy-duty vehicles, such as school and transit buses and freight, delivery, garbage, and dump trucks,” said the report.
The audit also said the government took “too long to develop regulations given the urgency of the climate crisis.” The report was critical that it took more than five years to develop the Clean Fuel Regulations, which was double the initial plan.
The Liberals first promised to plant 2 billion trees by 2031 on the campaign trail in 2019, and said the country would cut emissions from 42 to 45 percent lower than 2005 levels. The country only cut 8.4 percent of emissions between 2005 and 2021, according to the most recent national greenhouse gas inventory report.
The audit found the country isn’t on track to plant even one-tenth of the promised trees by the deadline, despite a $3.2 billion allocation in the 2020 fall economic statement.
“There is no solution to climate change and terrestrial biodiversity loss that does not include forests,” DeMarco’s report said.
“It is unlikely that the two billion trees program will meet its objectives unless significant changes are made.”
On the emissions front, the audit indicates the federal government committed to eliminating 2 million tonnes of greenhouse-gas emissions yearly, by 2030. Now the Liberal government said it will not start reducing emissions until 2031, at the earliest.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 19:30 - New York's Democrat Mayor Says Migrant Crisis Has 'Destroyed' The City, Biden Admin Has 'Turned Back'
New York’s Democrat Mayor Says Migrant Crisis Has ‘Destroyed’ The City, Biden Admin Has ‘Turned Back’
The Mayor of New York City says that the illegal immigration crisis has ‘destroyed’ his city, and noted that the Biden administration has done nothing to help deal with the problem they created.
“The city is being destroyed by the migrant crisis,” said Mayor Eric Adams (D) in a Friday panel discussion hosted by the African American Mayors Association in Washington D.C.
Adams’ comments came one day after he signed an executive order which extended the state of emergency in NYC over the influx of illegal immigrants.
“The City now faces an unprecedented humanitarian crisis that requires it to take extraordinary measures,” reads the order.
According to city Comptroller Brad Lander in an April 7 report, the city has had to ramp up its provisions for shelter by over 75% due to the influx of more than 55,000 foreigners claiming to be seeking asylum over the past year.
Meanwhile, the Mayor’s Office of Management and Budget says that the full cost of providing shelter and other services to refugees is around $1.4 billion this year, and will be $2.8 billion in 2024.
“New York State and (to a lesser extent) the federal government have begun to offer some assistance, though less than their appropriate share. But even with federal and state support, the current approach is beyond what the City of New York can reasonably sustain,” wrote Lander.
Adams on Wednesday slammed the Biden administration for leaving New York City high and dry when it comes to the influx of illegals.
“The national government has turned its back on New York City,” Adams said during a City Hall press conference. “We’re here today telling the White House we have been extremely patient. We’ve allowed the coordination of all of our agencies to come together to deal with this response.”
“This is in the lap of the president of the United States.“
Adams also expressed concern over the Biden administration trying to get rid of Title 42, a Trump-era policy that allows the US to rapidly expel migrants who have entered the country illegally, warning that “52,000 [asylum seekers] could jump to 100,000 if we don’t get this under control.”
Adams’ administration has proposed measures that include providing access to humanitarian parole for illegal immigrants, including expediting work authorization.
New York officials have said that they’ve received around $8 million from state and federal sources, which pales in comparison to the over $4 billion in related expenses the city is expected to incur through 2024 due to the migrant influx. -Epoch Times
In his April 20 executive order, Adams said that the thousands of illegals which have flooded New York City have created an “unprecedented humanitarian crisis.”
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 19:00 - Bragg Drops Case Against Jordan, Allowing House GOP To Depose Ex-Manhattan Prosecutor
Bragg Drops Case Against Jordan, Allowing House GOP To Depose Ex-Manhattan Prosecutor
Authored by Gary Bai via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg has dropped his effort to quash a congressional subpoena to a former prosecutor who worked in his office, a congressional aide told The Epoch Times in a statement on Friday.
“This evening, the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office withdrew its appeal in Bragg v. Jordan. Mr. Pomerantz’s deposition will go forward on May 12, and we look forward to his appearance,” Russel Dye, spokesperson for Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), chair of the House Judiciary Committee, wrote to The Epoch Times in a statement.
“Bragg caved. Jim Jordan won,” the House Judiciary Committee wrote in a statement on Twitter Friday.
L: Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg outside the Manhattan Federal Court in New York, April 4, 2023. (Angela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images) R: Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) in Washington, on July 21, 2021. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images) The development wrapped up a legal clash between Bragg and House Judiciary Republicans, whereby Bragg had attempted to stop the lawmakers from requesting testimony from Mark Pomerantz, a former prosecutor who investigated former President Donald Trump’s finances. Pomerantz left Bragg’s office in February 2022 in protest of Bragg’s initial unwillingness to bring an indictment against Trump.
A grand jury, encouraged by Bragg, brought an indictment against Trump in late March, prompting Jordan to initiate a probe into what he calls a “politically motivated” prosecution against a former president. Jordan subpoenaed Pomerantz to seek his testimony as a part of that probe. In response, Bragg sued the House Judiciary Committee and Pomerantz to prevent Pomerantz from testifying.
That lawsuit led to a hearing on Wednesday in the Southern District Court of New York, and a subsequent decision by District Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil, a Trump appointee, ordered that the congressional panel has the authority to become involved in the investigation of Trump and declined Bragg’s request for a court injunction on the congressional subpoena.
Bragg wrote in a court filing that he intended to appeal the lower court’s decision to the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals on April 19. On the same day, the court issued a temporary administrative hold on the return date of the House Judiciary Committee’s congressional subpoena of Pomerantz. This administrative hold did not reflect the court’s opinion on the merit of Bragg’s case, the court indicated in an April 19 filing, but serves as a short pause as the court considers whether to extend the freeze on the subpoena as Bragg appeals the case.
A three-judge panel was originally scheduled to decide early next week on this matter.
Bragg on Friday dropped the appeal, wrapping up the legal contention between him and the House lawmakers.
“Our successful stay of this subpoena blocked the immediate deposition and afforded us the time necessary to coordinate with the House Judiciary Committee on an agreement that protects the District Attorney’s privileges and interests. We are pleased with this resolution, which ensures any questioning of our former employee will take place in the presence of our General Counsel on a reasonable, agreed upon timeframe. We are gratified that the Second Circuit’s ruling provided us with the opportunity to successfully revolve this dispute,” Bragg’s office wrote in a statement on Friday on Twitter.
Judge’s Comments
During the district court hearing on Wednesday, the court affirmed the congressional lawmakers’ position that requesting Pomerantz’s testimony serves a valid legislative interest and that Pomerantz, due to his own conduct, is not protected by confidentiality privileges.
In her order, Vyskocil agreed with the congressional lawmakers’ reasoning that testimony by Pomerantz can help inform current and pending legislation. This includes a bill that, if enacted into law, would bar the use of federal funds to investigate a sitting or former president (the Accountability for Lawless Violence In our Neighborhoods, or ALVIN, Act) and another that would allow Congress to remove an action or prosecution against a former president (H.R. 2553).
“It is not the role of the federal judiciary to dictate what legislation Congress may consider or how it should conduct its deliberations in that connection,” the judge wrote, adding that the U.S. Constitution protects lawmakers from litigation when their actions serve a valid legislative interest.
Read more here…
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 18:30 - A Pyrrhic End To 130 Years Of Vicious Bad Money And Banking Crises
A Pyrrhic End To 130 Years Of Vicious Bad Money And Banking Crises
Authored by Brendan Brown via The Mises Institute,
The original vicious circle starts with inflationary interventions in an up-to-then well-anchored monetary regime.
Consequent asset inflation spawns a banking crisis. That leads to the installation of anticrisis safety structures (one illustration is a novel or enhanced lender of last resort). Alongside a possible monetary regime shift, these damage the money’s anchoring system. A great asset inflation emerges and leads on to an eruption of another banking crisis, devastating in comparison with the first.
An array of additional safety structures is put in place which makes the now-bad money worse than before. After a long and variable lag, a long and violent monetary storm means the safety structures fail, a banking crisis again erupts but this time milder than the previous.
Then a further tinkering with the safety structures causes money to deteriorate even more in quality. Another shift in monetary regime coincidentally does much additional damage. Consequently, in time, a new crisis erupts much worse than the last one.
The safety engineers do more work, causing yet more damage to the mechanisms essential to sound money. But now the safety structures are so pervasive and strong across the banking industry that there is widespread belief that bank crisis eruptions will be smaller or, more likely, totally repressed.
Subsequent events demonstrate those beliefs to be hollow. There is a new round of safety structure elaboration leading to further monetary deterioration. Regime officials declare the end of bank crises.
The cumulative economic cost of this vaunted triumph over bank crisis is an advance of monopoly capitalism and monetary statism that throttles the essential dynamism of free market capitalism. Malinvestment becomes cumulatively larger. Living standards in general suffer. The severely ailing money which subsists is beyond any cure except the most radical.
Let’s fit the above abstract series of vicious bad money–bank crisis cycles to the most recent 130-year history of US money.
At the start there were the inflationary interventions by US administrations in the two penultimate decades of the international gold standard, overpowering for sustained periods the “checks and balances” of that regime.
Murray Rothbard highlights these interventions in his US monetary history book – the first intervention under the “Billion Dollar Congress” of 1889–91 and the second from 1902–7 under Secretary Leslie Shaw who aimed to create a virtual central bank within the Treasury by deploying the huge cash balances of the federal government. The results were the Panic of 1893 and then the epic crash of 1907 followed by a recession.
These financial system convulsions and the related economic slumps were decisive events behind the creation of the Federal Reserve in 1913. Its advocates promised that an elastic currency, a state-run clearing house, and a monopoly of note issuance would mean the end of episodic banking crises.
The true source of these crises, however, were the preceding episodes of monetary inflation, and the scope for this crisis just got a lot worse. The international gold standard disintegrated at the outbreak of World War One. Demand for monetary gold in the belligerent European countries collapsed as governments there sequestered the yellow metal to pay for imports.
Beyond that wartime experience, the launch of the Fed destabilized the demand for monetary base. The novel provision of lenders of last-resort facilities and, more generally, discount window-access to member banks diluted the perceived special qualities of the monetary base (as means of payment and store of value) essential to its enjoying strong, broad, and stable demand despite its constituents bearing no interest. These “super money” qualities are crucial to monetary base’s role in the solid anchoring of money.
In the wake of the immediate postwar depression in 1920, during which no banking crisis erupted, opinion was prevalent that the institution of the Federal Reserve meant no more systemic bank runs and panics. Correspondingly, individuals saw less reason to hold large amounts of cash or types of deposits that were backed by large amounts of cash, gold, or reserve deposits. Hence, though monetary base growth seemed low and stable through what Milton Friedman misleadingly describes as “the high tide of the Federal Reserve” in 1922–27, monetary conditions were, in fact, highly inflationary. This did not show up in average consumer prices in that the economic miracle of the second industrial revolution meant there was a powerful natural rhythm downward of costs in tune with rapid productivity growth.
The result: a great asset inflation and then a subsequent bust, featuring three back-to-back recessions which together formed the so-called Great Depression; the last two of these were marked by convulsive waves of bank failures. This culminated in the New Deal shift of monetary regime, including exit from gold, deposit insurance, and swathes of new bank regulations. The bad money of the 1920s got a lot worse – amidst further dilution of its base’s qualities and a vast expansion of the US monetary base from 1934 to early 1936.
The interlude of wartime inflation and subsequent economic miracle in the US, Europe, and Japan for long stages meant that the vicious bad money–bank crisis circle was in suspense until well on into the “greatest peacetime inflation” (from the mid-1960s to the start of the 1980s). Fast-forward to the eruption of the US banking crisis at the start of the 1980s as the bubble in lending to Latin America (a key symptom from the mid-1970s’ asset inflation) burst. The Fed’s and Treasury’s rescue of large US banks ended the brief US monetarist experiment of targeting the monetary base. Dollar devaluation fueled by Fed inflation following the Plaza Accord in 1985 spawned an asset inflation culminating in the savings and loan debacle and banking crisis in Japan, France, and Scandinavia.
By the early- to mid-1990s, recent examples of the Fed and US government assisting banks in crisis had further diluted the perceived qualities of the monetary base. In consequence, sound money, which depends on a functional monetary base whose supply is highly restricted, had become even more remote. Coincidentally, a shift in US (and European) monetary regime was under way, to the so-called 2 percent inflation standard, with the Fed abandoning any remnants of money supply targeting.
All this led on to a virulent episode of monetary inflation, featuring most directly asset inflation which became the source of the next great banking crisis in 2008–12. A swathe of new banking regulations followed. These came in combination with “monetary reforms”—crucially including interest paid on reserve and quantitative easing—which though ostensibly designed to fortify the banking system, in fact, caused already bad money to become even more unsound. Hence, the reforms laid the foundation for further banking crises which erupted in the aftermath of the great monetary inflation during the pandemic and the onset of the Russia-Ukraine war.
The response to this most recent banking crisis: “too big to fail” extended to deposits of all banks, at least those deemed by highly politicized opinion to be of “systemic relevance”; speculation about vastly increased deposit insurance; and promised new regulations across medium and small banks. The net consequence: a further dilution of any remaining special qualities of reserve deposits.
Reconstituting a functional monetary base as essential to a sound money system would now require radical reform. Money is set to deteriorate in quality yet again—more statist, more regulation, less competition amongst the institutions which produce it in its various forms for the public.
Could state-administered safety structures in the banking system now become so omnipresent that the next asset inflation would not culminate in crisis?
Essential flaws of regulation and the likely virulence of future asset inflations make that outcome unlikely.
Meanwhile, expect official silence about the cumulative costs of the anticrisis “infrastructure” whether in the form of advancing monopoly capitalism, reducing economic dynamism, ever-worse malinvestment, bigger government, and ever-more pervasive crony capitalism.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 17:30 - Airman's Leaks Started Just 48 Hours After Russia Invaded Ukraine
Airman’s Leaks Started Just 48 Hours After Russia Invaded Ukraine
The Pentagon’s humiliation just grew deeper, as it turns out National Guard Airman Jack Teixeira’s leaks of classified documents started far earlier than has previously been reported.
Tipped off about a second, 600-member Discord chat group where Teixeira also posted, the New York Times found the Massachusetts Air National Guard information technology specialist started sharing information about the war in Ukraine within 48 hours of Russia’s February 2022 invasion. In contrast to the previously reported chat group, this one was far larger and was publicly listed on a YouTube channel.
This development makes the intelligence community’s failure to discover the posts all the more embarrassing: The document used to criminally charge Teixeira says he started posting in December 2022, but it turns out his stream of leaks spanned 13 months.
The Times matched Teixeira to the account in the newly-publicized chat room by a variety of means, including the user name, photos he posted that match known photos of his family home’s interior, a reference to his birthday, and, not least, the user’s declaration that he worked in an Air Force intelligence unit.
Teixeria’s senior quote in the 2020 high school yearbook at Dighton-Rehoboth Regional High School in Massachusetts (Taunton Daily Gazette) The posts reviewed by the Times were detailed descriptions of classified documents, with the user believed to have also posted photos of documents that have since been deleted.
Teixeira jumped into leak mode just two days after the Russian invasion, posting, “Saw a pentagon report saying that ⅓rd of the force is being used to invade.” When others in the chat room questioned his information, he wrote, “I have a little more than open source info. Perks of being in a USAF intel unit.”
In a March 27, 2022 post in which he said he was citing “an NSA site,” Teixeira told the group Russian forces were about to pull back from Kiev: “Some ‘big’ news. There may be a planned withdrawal of the troops west of Kiev, as in all of them.” Two days later, Russia announced it was doing just that.
“The job I have lets me get privilege’s above most intel guys,” he boasted with imperfect punctuation. When another chat participant cautioned him not to abuse those privileges, Teixeira fittingly replied, “Too late.”
Teixeira was arrested on April 13 at his mother’s North Dighton MA home Teixeira appears to have made some posts while on duty at the 102nd Intelligence Wing, the unit he was assigned to at Otis Air National Guard Base on Cape Cod. Once, he told the chat room he was about to enter a SCIF, or Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility. In the aftermath of the leaks’ discovery, the Air Force temporarily stripped the 102nd of its intelligence mission — (which is pretty bad when “intelligence” is in your unit’s name).
In the larger chat group that’s been previously reported, Teixeira announced the end of his information-sharing services on March 19: “I was very happy and willing and enthusiastic to have covered this event for the past year and share with all of you something that not many people get to see. I’ve decided to stop with the updates.”
The national security division of the New York Times continues to outdo the FBI. Their new cyber sleuth from Bellingcat helped the NYT uncover a chat group where Jack Teixeira was allegedly posting material since February 2022. The FBI should consider hiring them. pic.twitter.com/Fl7rm7qWQy
— Kevin Gosztola (@kgosztola) April 22, 2023
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
While establishment newspapers are eagerly beating the government to the punch at every turn in this case, the next significant drop of government information could come at a pretrial detention hearing, which on Wednesday was postponed for two weeks to May 3, at defense counsel’s request.
So far, Teixeira’s been charged with unlawful retention and transmission of national defense information and unauthorized removal and retention of classified documents. Two guilty verdicts could put him in prison for up to 15 years.
In what sounds like it might just be a comically absurd attempt to portray Teixeira as a Russian asset, prosecutors this filed new information with the court, noting that he once shot a vintage Soviet pistol.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 17:00 - The Real Reason Behind China’s $10 Billion Offer To Taliban For Lithium
The Real Reason Behind China’s $10 Billion Offer To Taliban For Lithium
Authored by Venus Upadhayaya via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
A Chinese company has offered the Taliban $10 billion and a proposal to build key strategic infrastructure connecting north-south Afghanistan in exchange for access to the country’s lithium reserves. Some experts raised concerns that the offer would allow the Chinese regime to expand its influence in the region.
Afghanistan’s acting first deputy prime minister Abdul Ghani Baradar (L) and China’s ambassador to Afghanistan Wang Yu in Kabul on Jan. 5, 2023. (Ahmad Sahel Arman/AFP via Getty Images) The proposal was discussed between a representative of Gochin and the acting minister of the Taliban’s Ministry of Mines and Petroleum, Sheikh Hadith Shahabuddin Delawar, in his office on April 13. The talks happened just a few months after the Taliban arrested two Chinese nationals trying to smuggle 1,000 metric tons of lithium-bearing rocks out of the country.
Experts said it needs to be seen if the deal is feasible, but once signed, it will have diplomatic and political ramifications, and the proposed infrastructure development will likely have a long-term strategic impact.
“Geopolitically, this deal could give China a significant advantage and influence in the region, as it secures a supply of critical resources and strengthens its presence in Afghanistan,” Maher Saadat, an exiled activist and Afghan affairs analyst, told The Epoch Times in an email.
Afghanistan’s lithium reserves potentially rival those of Bolivia, which has the world’s most significant amount of lithium resources. The Taliban’s Ministry of Mines and Petroleum said in a press release that the deal, once executed, will provide direct employment to 120,000 people and indirectly to 1 million.
Abhishek Darbey, a research associate of the Chinese Research Program at the New Delhi-based Center for China Analysis and Strategy (CCAS), pointed out to The Epoch Times in an email that China is among the first countries that supported the Taliban to form a government in Kabul following the withdrawal of the United States from the country. He believes the Chinese regime wants to control the region.
“In the case of Afghanistan, the country is important for China because the land domain of the Belt and Road Initiative will pass through this region, and a peaceful Afghanistan will create favorable conditions for the BRI to grow and progress,” he said.
“Also, China considers itself to be a major power of the region and, therefore, it wants to be a participant in [the] decision-making of the region or wants to be a power with a capacity to influence the regional politics,” he added.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi meets with Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, political chief of Afghanistan’s Taliban, in Tianjin, China, on July 28, 2021. (Li Ran/Xinhua via Reuters) Lithium for the Taliban
Afghanistan’s lithium reserves are a quick source of money for the Taliban, but they don’t have a long-term strategic goal for it, according to the experts.
“They may view it as an opportunity to generate immediate revenue to fund their activities and consolidate their power, given their history of relying on various sources of illicit financings, such as drug trafficking and extortion,” Saadat said.
The Taliban’s focus on immediate financial gains—without considering the long-term implications and sustainable development of the lithium deposits—is likely to limit the potential benefits of the reserves for Afghanistan and its people, he said.
“[It] will not contribute to the overall socio-economic development and stability of the country with certainty,” he said.
The first lithium mine was discovered in Ghazni city in 2013. These rare mineral mines are located in five areas in Afghanistan: Herat, Shuryak Valley, Tagab District in Kapisa Province, Nawur District in Ghazni Province, and Badakhshan.
Darbey said the Chinese interest in the region is not new—in 2021, two Chinese companies were sent to Ghazni to conduct technical research and inspect lithium and goldmines.
While China’s lithium reserves are depleting, the Afghan deposits are unexploited. Five Chinese companies have set up their representative offices in Afghanistan, and around 20 Chinese companies have made inquiries about lithium projects, according to Darbey.
Delawar said that the contract of the mines in Afghanistan would be given according to the Taliban’s law.
Darbey pointed out that the Taliban government is already supporting Chinese investment in its wider mining sector, and China’s two largest lithium miners—Tianqi and Ganfeng—have already examined the lithium mines in Afghanistan.
Read more here…
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 16:30 - FBI Blocking Release Of Nashville Trans Shooter's Manifesto
FBI Blocking Release Of Nashville Trans Shooter’s Manifesto
If the Nashville shooter had been a straight constitutional conservative would the FBI be blocking the killer’s manifesto, or would it be scrutinized for months on every mainstream media platform from day one?
The question is important because it illustrates the discomforting double standards in play whenever a mass murder is committed by a person on the political left (and there have been many lately). If the manifesto outlines ideologically motivated intent then the actions of Audrey Hale, a biological woman identifying as male, could be labeled a terrorist act. However, if the manifesto stays locked away from the public then there will always be suspicions but never any confirmation. Certain political groups and activist groups benefit greatly from the suppression of Hale’s motives.
Rep. Tim Burchett, (R-Tenn.) told The New York Post he knew the FBI was behind the delay of the manifesto’s release, saying the news was “disappointing.”
Twenty journals, five laptops, a suicide note and various other notes written by Hale were seized from the house she shared with her parents as well as two memoirs, five Covenant School yearbooks and seven cellphones, according to a search warrant.
Metro Nashville Council Member Courtney Johnston states that the FBI has ruled out releasing the manifesto anytime soon.
“What I was told is, her manifesto was a blueprint on total destruction, and it was so detailed at the level of what she had planned…that document in the wrong person’s hands would be astronomically dangerous…”
She added: “I personally don’t want to know the depths to which her psychosis reached…When I’m told by an MNPD high-ranking official that it keeps him up at night, I’m going to defer to that person in that agency that I don’t need to read that.”
Tennessee Bureau of Investigation Director David Rausch described the writings he had seen during a meeting with the Tennessee Sheriffs’ Association, saying: “The documents that we have, and I have viewed those, you know, one is specifically a plan and the other is some journal-type rantings.”
Was Audrey Hale a criminal mastermind? It’s highly unlikely given she was taken down by police within moments of the officers arriving on scene. It is more probable that the FBI is following orders from political leadership to hide any documents that might embarrass Democrats, who are now closely aligned with trans activist groups and social justice organizations. Democrats have effectively shifted the debate on the Nashville shooting over to gun control and trans rights, and have avoided discussing the potential ideological causes of the attack.
Would such documents inspire further violence from the political left on a scale similar to what happened at Covenant School? It’s hard to say, but it doesn’t seem as though activists need much encouragement these days. The first and most obvious conclusion one can draw from the FBI’s refusal to make Hale’s writings public is that they are incredibly damaging to the trans movement, a class of people now protected by government officials and the corporate establishment.
In other words, a message is being sent by federal agencies, the White House and others that if you are a trans person and you commit mass murder, you will enjoy special treatment. The consequences of such a message are obvious.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 16:00 - Senator Demands Answers From Government On COVID-19 Vaccine Injury Compensation
Senator Demands Answers From Government On COVID-19 Vaccine Injury Compensation
Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
A U.S. senator is demanding answers from U.S. officials on compensation to people who were injured by COVID-19 vaccines.
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) in Washington on Feb. 9, 2021. (Ting Shen/Pool/AFP via Getty Images) Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), ranking member of the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, asked for key details on the U.S. compensation scheme, including how much each person who has been compensated requested.
The government recently paid three people who were injured by the vaccines, marking the first time payments were rendered for the COVID vaccines. But the highest payout was just $2,019.
Johnson is also asking whether the government has advertised the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program (CICP), the only venue for federal compensation; whether officials expect an increase in claims in light of how many injury reports have been logged with the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, and how much money injured people are eligible for under the program.
The Republican outlined the requested information in a letter to Xavier Becerra, the secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and Carole Johnson, the administrator of the Health and Resources Administration (HRSA).
HHS and HRSA did not respond to requests for comment.
“Although the government appears to be providing very limited compensation to individuals who have filed COVID-19 vaccine injury claims, the process by which HHS evaluates these claims or even advertises the existence of this compensation program remains opaque,” Johnson told The Epoch Times in an emailed statement.
“HHS owes the American people a complete explanation of its administration of the compensation program for individuals who have suffered COVID-19 vaccine injuries,” he added.
Read more here…
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 15:30 - Biden Impeachment? Top Republican Says IRS Whistleblower, Chinese 'Collusion' And Hunter Laptop Letter Hoax "Tip Of The Iceberg"
Biden Impeachment? Top Republican Says IRS Whistleblower, Chinese ‘Collusion’ And Hunter Laptop Letter Hoax “Tip Of The Iceberg”
A Republican member of the House Oversight Committee thinks a flurry of recent corruption scandals could lead to the impeachment of President Joe Biden.
Between the revelation that the ‘Hunter laptop letter hoax‘ signed by 51 current and former intelligence officials was created at the best of Antony Blinken during the 2020 US election, the obvious implications of CCP leverage over the Biden family, and information presented by an IRS whistleblower regarding the Hunter Biden probe, things may get interesting according to Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN).
When asked about China’s influence over the Biden family, Burchett told Fox News‘ Maria Bartiromo on Friday: “We know of at least eight Biden family members who have profited from dealings overseas,” adding “I think if you delve into it deep enough, there’s prostitution rings involved in this, human trafficking has been rumored to be part of some of this. These so-called companies that have allowed the Biden family to profit. It is gross, and it is disgusting.”
“If I was those 51 people, I’d be lawyering up right now because they’re going to be asked in public at some point what they knew and if they knew that all this other stuff was going on, because it is very damning Maria. This is just the very tip of the iceberg,” he continued.
“This very brave IRS agent coming forward, I think, will just start it,” Burchett said, referring to the senior agent in charge of the Hunter Biden investigation who came forward earlier this week in a letter to lawmakers, accusing the DOJ of ‘mishandling’ the Hunter Biden case, and that his client had information that would contradict sworn testimony from a senior political appointee.
Rep. Tim Burchett rips Biden WH over influence peddling: ‘Corruption goes straight to the top’ pic.twitter.com/02eyPaysHW
— Mornings with Maria (@MorningsMaria) April 21, 2023
When asked if that might lead to an impeachment, Burchett said: “If this coverup shows what’s going on, what we assume is going on, and that the 51 folks were basically lied to and showed false documentation, how can you not…“
The lawyer for the whistleblower joined “Special Report with Bret Baier” Thursday night claiming his client is “not a political person” and does not have a “political agenda,” but does have documents to support his allegations that he hopes to bring to both congressional Democrats and Republicans.
“If you delve into it deep enough, there’s prostitution rings involved in this. Human trafficking has been rumored to be a part of some of these so-called companies that have allowed the Biden family to profit. It is gross and it is disgusting about what has been allowed to go on,” Burchett said. –Fox News
“I cannot imagine how the Justice Department allowed this to go on, if not for corruption at the highest level. And they are in some serious trouble right now. I think they know it,” Burchett continued.
🚨 The walls are closing in on the Biden family.
It’s clear Hunter & other members of the Biden family benefited from shady business schemes.
Now it appears the Biden Admin is working overtime to protect the Biden family.@GOPoversight will ensure accountability. @seanhannity pic.twitter.com/IUH1fJGNUR
— Rep. James Comer (@RepJamesComer) April 20, 2023
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
When it comes to China, Burchett said: [China has] so much invested in this White House now, that their cover-up upon cover-ups will continue. But I can assure you that the American people understand what’s going on,” adding “And I can assure you that [Oversight] Chairman Comer and Chairman Jordan are steering this in the right direction. As I stated before, this is complete collusion with the communist Chinese. They bought and sold this White House.”
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 15:00 - Ukraine Planned Attacks On Russian Forces In Syria
Ukraine Planned Attacks On Russian Forces In Syria
Authored by Kyle Anzalone via AntiWar.com,
Kiev’s military intelligence agency believed it could carry out attacks on Russian soldiers and Wagner Group forces in Syria, forcing Moscow to redeploy military assets from Ukraine. The story was reported by the Washington Post using documents released by Jack Teixeira.
The Ukrainian defense officials believed they could use Kurdish forces to wage a proxy war against Russia in Syria. According to the Post, the plan never materialized as President Volodymyr Zelensky ordered an end to the planning in December.
It appears that Ukrainian officials engaged in some discussions with the Syrian Democratic Forces, a Kurdish militia backed by the US. The documents said the Kurdish officials requested training on drones and air defenses. Additionally, the Kurds said they would not attack Russian positions in areas held by the SDF, and requested their role in the operations be kept secret.
Ukraine declined to respond to questions about the document. A Kurdish official claimed the information was false.
Russian forces have been in Syria since 2015. President Vladimir Putin ordered his soldiers to aid the Syrian government led by Bashar al-Assad. At the time of Russian intervention, both al-Qaeda in Syria and ISIS were threatening to topple Damascus. The Russian soldiers helped Syrian forces turn back the advance of the jihadist groups.
While Moscow continues military operations in Syria, the Kremlin is attempting to end the conflict through diplomatic means. Putin is attempting to broker a deal to normalize relations between Syria and Saudi Arabia. Riyadh has been a primary backer of the anti-Assad militants in Syria and has received pressure from Washington to continue to isolate Damascus.
The document says Zelensky could allow the operations to proceed, but would likely require assistance from the US and Turkey. Ankara may be unwilling to support the covert proxy warfare as it views the SDF as a terrorist organization, and has long protested Washington arming the Syrian Kurds.
Additionally, the operations could inflame the war in Syria. The decade-long war has seen a dip in violence in recent years as Assad and his allies have consolidated control over most of Syria. The US and SDF occupy the eastern third of the country.
Getty Images However, the SDF leadership has shown a willingness to work with Moscow. If Kurdish forces allow themselves to become a proxy force for Kiev, Moscow will likely aggressively target SDF positions in eastern Syria.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 14:30 - Civil Rights Complaint Filed Against Anheuser-Busch For Racist And Sexist Hiring
Civil Rights Complaint Filed Against Anheuser-Busch For Racist And Sexist Hiring
Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
The makers of Bud Light, who are facing a nationwide public backlash over promoting trans-activism in the name of diversity, have found themselves amid a civil rights complaint for racist and sexist hiring practices.
“The evidence is that Anheuser-Busch is knowingly, intentionally, and unlawfully discriminating based on race, color, national origin, and sex with respect to employment and job training opportunities,” said the April 17 complaint (pdf) filed by public charity America First Legal (AFL) with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) against beverage manufacturer Anheuser-Busch.
Bud Light beer cans sit on a table at Camden Yards in Baltimore, Md., on Sept. 19, 2019. (Rob Carr/Getty Images) AFL pointed to the Missouri-based company’s 2023 Leadership Accelerator Program, which provides leadership-development programs for individuals who identify as historically underrepresented groups as they join the company in a full-time capacity.
“We encourage candidates who identify as Black, Latinx, and Native American to apply, as well as those who identify with a historically underrepresented group,” according to the program’s job profile. The company insists that it is an “equal opportunity employer.”
AFL slammed such tactics, pointing out that the Leadership Accelerator Program notably excludes white and Asian-American citizens.
In a recent post, the nonprofit accuses the company of discriminating based on race, color, national origin, and sex in their employment practices under the cloak of equity.
“It is a fast-track program to executive leadership positions at Anheuser-Busch, and it is limited to candidates based on race. The proforma Equal Opportunity Employer language at the end of the posting does mask the company’s discriminatory intent and purpose,” the letter states.
In addition, Anheuser-Busch’s diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) strategy also boosted the presence of women in the company’s senior leadership team, the organization said.
Exclusionary Practices?
AFL points out that federal law forbids an employer from discriminating against an existing or potential employee due to the person’s race, color, national origin, sex, or religion. In addition, employers are also forbidden from limiting, segregating, or classifying employees or applicants in such a discriminatory manner that would affect the individual’s employment opportunities.
“A commissioner’s charge is particularly appropriate here because there is ample reason to believe that Anheuser-Busch has knowingly and intentionally violated federal law and will continue to do so,” the letter said.
“The corporation has chosen to promote and use employment practices that are both patently illegal and deeply harmful.”
Anheuser-Busch recently attracted criticism after it sent custom beer cans to trans-activist Dylan Mulvaney featuring the person’s face. Critics had slammed the move as pushing a transgender agenda. The can was created to celebrate Mulvaney’s apparently one year of transitioning into womanhood.
Read more here…
Tyler Durden
Sat, 04/22/2023 – 13:30
Digest powered by RSS Digest
Saving...
