- A Bitcoiner's Reflection On 2021: A Year Of Awareness
A Bitcoiner’s Reflection On 2021: A Year Of Awareness
Authored by Shawn Amick via BitcoinMagazine.com,
Was 2021 a good year? Depends, as most things do, on perspective. As I sat writing the first line of this article, I asked myself this question. Now, this article might sound harsh at times, and I just ask that you stick with me. There’s a method to my madness.
As we progress through the months of this year, keep in mind that I could not address every event that happened, and each event spoken to is purposefully chosen to illustrate a larger narrative.
To describe this year, I’m met with the conflict of state failure and burdening regulations stifling societal livelihoods and businesses, but also with the substantial growth and prosperity I’ve personally experienced, as well as the enduring betterment of and growth of Bitcoiners, and let’s not forget, Bitcoin itself. So, how best can we answer this question of whether or not this was a good year? Let’s take a review.
JANUARY AND CENSORSHIP
January 6, to be precise. The attack on the capitol (call it what you want, that’s not the point) was a culmination of a bull-headed figure dead-set on his reelection, a disenfranchised society, polarity at its most extreme, misinformation, and a myriad of other factors. Why is this relevant to Bitcoin?
The President of the United States was censored and removed from Twitter and Facebook. I’ll refrain from being political here. Absent opinion of Trump, this was a clear message from Big Tech that they are the ones in control. They control, and allow the dispersion of information, and misinformation.
Bitcoin doesn’t allow that sort of centralized control, and we started the year off being reminded just how not in control we really are of our current system.
FEBRUARY AND “INFLUENCERS”
February seemed to have better connotations looming about. Elon publicly got excited about Bitcoin towards the end of January, and into February, then saying he was “late to the party,” but that he was a supporter.
And of course, the Bitcoin community got excited. But then the Dogecoin tweets started, and suddenly there were people all throughout the community trying to figure out if he was serious, as his interest seemed to affect short-term price action with his massive Tesla buy and their acceptance of bitcoin as a payment. This started us down a dangerous road of influencers.
MARCH AND $60,000
The good news is pouring in, Tesla is up big on their investment, Saylor is putting out his usual updates of purchases, bitcoin is mooning! Eventually we broke the $60,000 mark! WOOO!!!! Where is all of this good news heading?
APRIL AND POLITICS
New all-time high? Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy says the government can no longer ignore Bitcoin. The state is starting to take notice.
While the state begins to open their eyes, Coinbase goes public. A cryptocurrency exchange is suddenly in everyone’s ear. Will the listing affect price action, the young Bitcoiner asks? But, how now shall the government regulate this, and what are these ICOs that are popping about?
Turkey panics over its failing currency and institutes a ban on crypto on its Official Gazette to take place at the end of April. We enter May with a crisp $53,000 value on bitcoin. Nation-states are taking notice, and whispers begin to fill the air.
MAY AND FEAR
The Internal Revenue Service says it will seize assets from those violating tax regulations. The hero found in Elon Musk earlier this year has now lived long enough to see himself become Bitcoin’s villain. Citing environmental concerns, Elon’s FUD (fear, uncertainty, and doubt) spreads like wildfire.
But it didn’t stop there. A meltdown instigated by one of the many “influencers” of bitcoin sent Musk on a DOGE shilling tirade, further dampening the support previously made.
China came out and warned investors they would have no protection in crypto markets.
May 20, and suddenly we are back to $37,000. The fighting continued, Bitcoin “toxic maximalism” became the forefront of the discussion as others witnessed the attack on Musk from the sidelines.
JUNE AND JACK AND EL SALVADOR
Bitcoin Conference 2021! People had a blast (so I’m told). Jack Dorsey, CEO of Twitter is interviewed and gives great insight into Bitcoin, and now Twitter is becoming a much larger part of the conversation. Suddenly, laser eyes are popping up all over the place (profile pictures on Twitter with red laser eyes), and everyone takes particular notice when Nayib Bukele, the President of El Salvador, dons laser eyes.
The President of El Salvador announces he will be making bitcoin legal tender. Within 90 days, it is accomplished. Now, I want to take a short minute on this one.
I want to start by saying that I personally attended the Twitter Space when President Bukele passed the legislation to make bitcoin legal tender, and I had the great experience of hearing their chamber erupt with cheers. Twitter, Spaces, Jack Dorsey, and Jack Mallers, all had a hand in changing the world that night. This cannot be understated. The world has become widely more accessible, in a way that allows anyone willing to attend a historic event for the people of El Salvador.
Do I think forced merchant adoption by legal definition of tender is how we want bitcoin to be adopted? No. Do I think government-owned wallets are how we want bitcoin to be transacted with? No. Do I think everything is good for Bitcoin? No. I still haven’t fully made up an opinion here, and I hope I never do. But what I do know … is that the world has changed.
But that’s not all that happened in June. China returned to tell banks and payment platforms to stop facilitating crypto transactions and issued a mining ban. The great mining migration began and the hashrate plummeted overnight.
JULY AND THE FALL TO $29,000
The hype from El Salvador didn’t cause the momentum push Bitcoiners were desperately hoping for. For all that talk of low time preference, patience was running thin. The hype needed to return. Interviews with a political leader of Tonga on Bitcoin were had. An Argentinian bill to pay people in bitcoin was introduced. Suddenly, we fall below $30,000 for a short time, the support level is taken back and maintained, and a slow reversal begins. The space quickly becomes aggressive and defensive.
I mention this need and focus on price action for one reason. The narrative of hyperbitcoinization has left the tips of many tongues in the Bitcoin space. It’s dangerous. We must, at all times, be presently focused on low time preference. If we fail to do so, those new to the space are led to false expectations, which inevitably creates weak hands that are more damaging to adoption than anything. These narratives burn newcomers.
AUGUST: THE STATE STRIKES BACK
Late on August 1, hidden within an infrastructure bill, the state seeks to attack cryptocurrency. Bitcoiners become widely political at an impressively quick rate. Soon, many are trying to figure out the legal definitions and meanings behind these impending tax regulations, and what these implications hold for those who maintain the network.
Suddenly, Bitcoin “influencers” are ramping up their politics. If you’d like to read an article about influencers in Bitcoin, see here.
It was a call-to-arms. Automatic directories where you simply needed to dial a number would send you directly to your representative to voice your discontent with the bill. It was on every Bitcoin podcast and newsletter. Anger was setting in, and for the first time it became abundantly clear that this would be a fight.
The absence of physical violence does not imply peace. This is not a peaceful revolution.
August ended back at $47,000.
WAKE ME UP WHEN SEPTEMBER ENDS
The psychology of support/resistance levels drives people insane, and sadly Bitcoiners are rarely different in that regard. As I type this article on December 2, 2021, I have a Twitter space in the background full of people losing their minds at the $44,000 dip and trying to figure out if we will lose the support of $42,000.
I mention this because at the start of September, Bitcoiners started simping for $50,000 and for anything they could get their hands on to provide hope, like getting excited that Starbucks was accepting bitcoin in El Salvador. Being made legal tender in that country, of course this was going to happen.
We all clearly understand that bitcoin functions as a medium of exchange, but this was being shouted from the heavens and stuffed down anyone’s throat willing, or unwilling, to listen. The need for hyperbitcoinization was mounting again.
Robinhood announced a DCA (dollar cost average) product which got the same people criticizing Robinhood earlier this year for turning off the “buy” button, sharing that all over the place. The mayor of Miami stated we needed a “pro Bitcoin President” in the U.S. But I’m sure this had nothing to do with his own future ambitions.
September 7 comes and the $50,000 price is reclaimed.
After that, The People’s Bank of China reiterates their ban and declares participation in the financial revolution as “illegal activity.”
But, at least El Salvador started working on a volcano mine, so that was cool. We ended September at $41,000.
OCTOBER BELONGS TO THE BULLS
El Salvador onboards 3 million people with the Chivo wallet. Criticism aside, this is a notable achievement for a largely unbanked nation. With a nation of almost 6.5 million people, this is an achievement of almost half of the population. Previously, statistics floated around that in 2017, less than 30% of the total citizenry even had a bank account. Yet, almost half of them have a Chivo wallet within months.
Tesla is up $1 billion on their bitcoin investment. Square doubles their money on their investment into bitcoin. September closes over $60,000 on the month with all of this bullish news, and let’s not forget the most important thing that happened in October … I started writing for Bitcoin Magazine! That’s right, you can thank me for $60,000!
November And Taproot
I won’t rehash what Taproot is in totality, but the link will take you to a breakdown. Simply put, Taproot allows for a greater level of security, privacy, and scalability, and it went live in November.
This resulted in greater privacy and security with a new form of digital signatures, and options within processing, as well as scalability with aggregation tools that can save the network time and effort.
Smart contracts have always been on Bitcoin, but Tapscript was an addition within Taproot that allows more flexibility within these contracts and provides attraction for developers to create. This was needed. This was necessary. This was, in my opinion, the single largest event of the year for Bitcoin, and I am not discussing any other event for this month because everything else this month was irrelevant, comparatively. November ends at $57,000.
DECEMBER’S CLEANSE
Remember the dip I mentioned earlier in the article? Well, it’s still happening. It’s December 4, and liquidations across the market ran rampant. Bitcoin and cryptocurrency markets bled tonight, and that’s okay.
My tone has been marginally sarcastic and mocking through some of this article, mostly because that’s my attitude towards price action. Bitcoin is the world’s greatest asset. I know this. I don’t need a price or market cap to confirm that for me. You shouldn’t need anyone to confirm that for you.
This may seem dark and dreary, and maybe it’s because I’m a fan of Edgar Allen Poe. Most of these year-end reviews will shine happy lights on many of the accomplishments of the year, as there are many. Much like technical analysis, if all we do is focus on bullish information, then we miss the larger picture. However, we are here to ask a simple question:
Was 2021 a good year for Bitcoin?
Yes. The protocol received a well-deserved and absolutely necessary upgrade that provides greater levels of privacy and security, and allows a clear path to further scalability.
But let’s ask a second question. Was 2021 a good year for Bitcoiners?
Yes. Because we all had to learn some hard lessons about dangerous narratives, and trusting the wrong people.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 23:40 - US B-2 Bomber Caught Mid-Flight On Google Earth
US B-2 Bomber Caught Mid-Flight On Google Earth
A Redditor has revealed a Google maps image that shows a Northrop Grumman B-2 Spirit stealth bomber mid-flight over farm fields in the US Midwest.
The image was recently published on Reddit and had more than 111 thousand upvotes.
Thousands of Redditors commented on the image. Some said the $2 billion price tag per bomber is outrages considering it can’t hide from Google Earth.
The three-decade-old bomber maintains an impressive lethal record. We were able to pinpoint where the bomber was caught on satellite footage near Whiteman Air Force Base (current home of the B-2 fleet).
Here’s what some Redditors had to say about the B-2 in action.
“More like a photo bomber,” said user RandyGareth.
ZebrasFuckedMyWife said, “Not so stealthy now, are ya?”
“That stealth tech is overrated. I can totally see it,” another user said.
Netizens and air observers should be on the lookout for the B-21 Raider, a new long-range stealth bomber that is expected to debut in early 2022 and replace the B-2.
If you want to review the B-2 on Google Earth, enter coordinates 39 01 18.5N 93 35 40.5W.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 23:20 - Banning Russia From SWIFT Would Drive It Closer To China
Banning Russia From SWIFT Would Drive It Closer To China
Authored by Antonio Graceffo via The Epoch Times,
The United States has threatened to cut Russia off from the SWIFT banking system, to prevent it from invading Ukraine. This would wreck Russia’s economy, driving the country closer to China.
The Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT), established in 1973, is a communication platform that is used by banks, brokerages, and financial institutions to process payments across countries. Each year, SWIFT transmits roughly 10 billion messages between 11,000 financial institutions in more than 200 countries and dependencies, processing trillions of dollars in payments.
The SWIFT system is governed by Belgian and European law, and is overseen by the G10 central banks. Therefore, SWIFT would not be obligated to meet U.S. demands. But Washington could pressure the platform to comply, as it did in 2012, when the United States wanted Iranian banks removed due to economic sanctions.
The United States has tremendous influence over SWIFT because nearly 80 percent of global trade is transacted in dollars and most of those dollars pass through SWIFT, to be cleared in U.S. banks. In order to convince SWIFT to comply, the United States need only threaten to remove its own banks from the system.
The United States is not the only country that has asked to have Russia removed. In 2014, the United Kingdom proposed to European leaders to exclude Russia from SWIFT. And in April 2021, the European Parliament passed a resolution to shut down Russia’s access to SWIFT should its troops invade the Ukraine.
When Russia faced being cut from SWIFT in 2014, then-Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev threatened that it would be “a declaration of war.” The reason he took such a harsh stance is because Russia’s economy would be devastated if it no longer had access to the international financial platform. It would be nearly impossible for Russia to conduct international business because there would be no way of transmitting across borders.
When Iran was removed from SWIFT, the country experienced difficulty, but not a catastrophe, because it was only somewhat involved with the global economy.
Russia, on the other hand, would feel the effects more strongly as a result of its greater integration with the system. Russia would essentially be unable to sell its exports of oil and natural gas. The ruble would fall and the country would suffer massive capital outflows. Former Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin forecasts that losing access to SWIFT could cut Russia’s GDP by 5 percent.
Russia’s former finance minister Alexei Kudrin speaks during the Gaidar Forum in Moscow, Russia, on Jan. 14, 2015. (Pavel Golovkin/AP Photo)
Although dependent on SWIFT, Russia does have a few options to soften the blow if it was banned from the system. When Russia invaded the Ukraine in 2014, the United States threatened to cut it off from SWIFT. Consequently, the Kremlin called for the development of a domestic financial-communications platform. The System for Transfer of Financial Messages (SPFS), the Russian equivalent of SWIFT, has over 400 member banks across former Soviet republics, handling more than 20 percent of domestic transactions.
The Russian system is far from a replacement for SWIFT. Where SWIFT operates 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, SPFS only works Monday through Friday, during normal Russian business hours. Additionally, the message size is much smaller. Theoretically, SPFS could be expanded and additional foreign countries could be invited to join. But that would take years, and Russia could experience a tremendous economic disruption in the meantime.
Since 2015, China has also been developing a SWIFT alternative, called the Cross-Border Interbank Payment System (CIPS), which it had hoped would help internationalize the yuan.
CIPS may be another possibility for Russia. Due to China’s greater economic importance, the yuan may be a more viable option than the ruble for cross-border trade. However, at present the yuan only accounts for 2 percent of international financial transactions. And CIPS is only 0.3 percent the size of SWIFT. It is possible that the two systems could collaborate; but, so far, 23 Russian banks have joined CIPS, whereas only one Chinese bank has joined SPSF.
This aerial photo shows the logo (L) of China’s pioneering digital payments firm Alipay on the office block of its parent company Ant Group in Shanghai on Nov. 4, 2020. (Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images)
Another possibility for Russia is the digital ruble, which is meant to be launched in 2022. This option is also flawed, because, although the currency could easily flow across borders, it will be equally as weak and unstable as the physical ruble. Countries that are outside of the U.S. sphere, such as Iran or Venezuela, may accept some payment in currencies other than dollars, but even these countries would not want the risk of transacting in an unstable currency. Additionally, U.S. law does not differentiate between physical currencies and digital currencies, when it comes to sanctions.
According to Dmitry Dolgin, ING Bank’s chief economist for Russia, “any wire transaction that takes place in the world involving U.S. dollars is at some point cleared through a U.S. bank.” In 2019, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese leader Xi Jinping agreed to find a way around both the U.S. dollar and the U.S.-dominated SWIFT system. The options that the two countries have discussed include de-dollarization, yuan digitalization, and alternative financial settlement and messaging systems, like CIPS.
By 2019, Russia had dumped about half of its dollars, and increased its yuan holdings to 15 percent of its reserves. Working to eliminate the dollar from their bilateral trade, the two countries have managed to get the number down to 46 percent in 2020. Russia increased its euro holdings and is expanding its use of euros for international trade transactions.
Even the euro, however, cannot replace the dollar as the primary international currency, as there are three benefits to the dollar that no other currency offers. First, the dollar generally remains stable in the face of inflation. Next, no country can match the sheer size of the U.S. market or the volume of the U.S. currency. And finally, U.S. financial markets are deep, liquid, and transparent.
The problem for China and Russia is that the U.S. government can deny any entity’s ability to access dollar clearing and dollar settlement. The United States could blacklist large Russian banks and Russian sovereign wealth funds, essentially making it impossible for Russia to transact business in dollars. Russia could begin using euros, but even euro-denominated transactions have to go through SWIFT. And, again, the United States has considerable influence over SWIFT because U.S. dollar clearances account for 79.5 percent of inter-regional currency transactions.
If the United States could convince the Europeans to cut Russia out of SWIFT, the effects on Russia would be devastating. Aside from potentially triggering a war, there would be major collateral damage. Germany would suffer economic loss because of the amount of business they do with Russia. U.S. banks would also take a large hit, as they process the bulk of SWIFT transactions. Europe would also suffer because it is dependent on oil and natural gas from Russia.
Russia is China’s number two supplier of oil, and also a major supplier of natural gas and coal. Even if Russia is removed from SWIFT, the two countries will most likely find a way to continue to trade. This will make Russia even more economically dependent on China, pushing it deeper into the Chinese orbit.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 23:00 - "Hello World" – Paralyzed Man With Brain Implant Composes First-Ever Tweet With Mind
“Hello World” – Paralyzed Man With Brain Implant Composes First-Ever Tweet With Mind
An Australian man with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is the first person to tweet a message to the world using only his thought with no other muscles.
On Thursday, Australian brain computer interface company Synchron published a press release detailing how one of its patients, Philip O’Keefe, 62yo man with ALS, is the first person to tweet directly through thought using an implantable brain-computer interface. O’Keefe’s ALS has left him in paralysis.
“Hello, world!” tweeted O’Keefe from Synchron CEO Thomas Oxley’s Twitter account. “Short tweet. Monumental progress.”
hello, world! Short tweet. Monumental progress.
— Thomas Oxley (@tomoxl) December 23, 2021
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
“My hope is that I’m paving the way for people to tweet through thoughts,” he tweeted in a follow-up message.
my hope is that I’m paving the way for people to tweet through thoughts phil
— Thomas Oxley (@tomoxl) December 23, 2021
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
According to Synchron, O’Keefe received the Stentrode brain-computer interface in April 2020. ALS has left him unable to communicate with his family or friends. However, the new small stent-mounted electrode array implanted in his brain through the jugular has allowed him to reconnect with the world.
“When I first heard about this technology, I knew how much independence it could give back to me. The system is astonishing, it’s like learning to ride a bike – it takes practice, but once you’re rolling, it becomes natural.
“Now, I just think about where on the computer I want to click, and I can email, bank, shop, and now message the world via Twitter,” O’Keefe said in a statement.
Synchron claims O’Keefe is reconnecting with the world.
“These fun holiday tweets are actually an important moment for the field of implantable brain computer interfaces,” Oxley said in the statement. “They highlight the connection, hope and freedom that BCIs give to people like Phil who have had so much of their functional independence taken away due to debilitating paralysis.”
Synchron’s implantable brain-computer interface is similar to Elon Musk’s mind-machine interface company, Neuralink, which alleges it can “enable someone with paralysis to use a smartphone with their mind faster than someone using thumbs.”
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 22:40 - It's Madness What Is Happening To College Kids
It’s Madness What Is Happening To College Kids
Authored by Vinay Prasad via The Brownstone Institute,
This is a post about the absolutely insane, crushing restrictions being imposed on young, healthy vaccinated (often booster and often naturally immune) people by institutions of knowledge. In order to prove my thesis that these policies are misguided, let me start with some basics.
When it comes to COVID19, there are only 3 things any of us can do:
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We can lower the risk of bad outcomes when we encounter the virus.
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We can delay the time to meet the virus
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We can engage in theater which does not delay the time to meet the virus
What goes in these buckets?
Category 1 (risk reduction) is easy. You can’t modify your age, a huge risk favor, but you can modify your vaccination status, and you can modify your weight and general health.
Category 2 (delay time to virus) is harder. We don’t have many well done studies, but theoretically if you sealed yourself in a bunker and ate canned food, you would do this. Wearing a snug n95 might also delay the time to meeting the virus. The challenge with these interventions is they are not sustainable by most people, and may lead to fatigue or backsliding, and thus the effect is transient.
Delaying serves two purposes:
- For the individual, it makes sense if, by delaying, you can do something for category 1 that you cannot do today. If you are waiting for your vaccine, for instance, by all means delay.
- For the community it makes sense, if, by some delaying, the pandemic trajectory is bent and hospitals are less likely to be overwhelmed.
Delaying also has a downside. It may hurt your mental health, particularly when you do it effectively. If you need evidence of this damage: please see twitter.
Category 3 (useless, virtue signaling theater) is the most common. Wearing your mask when you enter a restaurant and walk to your table, but not when you sit there for two hours laughing and drinking is one example. The fact this policy exists reflects serious impairment in thinking and total failure of policy makers.
Making a 2-4 year old wear a cloth mask in day care (which the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends against the advice of the World Health Organization), but, of course, kids take the cloth mask off to nap next to each other for 4 hours in the same room! Theater.
Closing beaches and other outdoor activities. Wearing a mask outside. The list goes on and on, and most things we did fit in this category. On a side note: Here we review all data on masking.
Enter young, healthy college kids.
The vast majority are either double vaxxed or have natural immunity or both, and some are also boosted. They are young (lucky them!), and the majority are healthy. What more can such students do for Category 1? Nothing.
What about category 2? It appears that many universities are making college kids wear masks, restricting their movement, banning gatherings etc. Here is just one example of how extreme they are:
Emerson College in Boston has issued a “stay in room directive” for returning students next month — the same students already required to get “boosted” and tested twice a week. Sounds like fun pic.twitter.com/F5mUYZtDKP
— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) December 23, 2021
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
These severe restrictions might actually delay the time till college kids meet the virus! But it does so with a huge disruption to their lives. All the wonderful things of being young require being very close to other people. Many simply cannot occur with a mask on.
Will these restrictions benefit the college kids? Absolutely not. When they eventually meet the virus— and they will— on vacation or next semester— they will just be a little older, but have similar great chances of doing well.
Will the restrictions benefit society? Doubtful. After all, everyone not on a college campus is not following any of these ridiculous rules, and the pandemic trajectory will be dictated by those (aka 99.9% ) of places.
It will likely not even to protect the faculty and staff on campus, who will largely face risks when they leave work and go home and on vacation, and again, if these folks have already optimized Category 1, delay makes little sense.
Will it harm the college kids? Absolutely, it will. Their mental health will surely suffer from this isolation. It has already. I will say again: all of the joys of youth require being close to other people.
What is the net balance? The net balance is these policies are catastrophically detrimental to them. Moreover, there is no countervailing benefit to staff or society to justify the huge imposition. It is morally and scientifically bankrupt.
Truly, I can’t even understand how anyone thinks these policies are justified. I am also surprised college students have accepted them with scant protest. I can only surmise that many have been mislead into thinking this sacrifice serves a broader interest (i.e. believe they are being altruistic), or that the incentives on their lives and career for conformity are so great they are afraid to speak up.
I suspect the strong link between restrictions and political party may also affect them. After all, the youth most strongly leans left (full disclosure: as do it!), and thus adheres to the identify badges of the left (but in my case, sadly, I spent too many years studying & publishing on scientific evidence to turn my brain off).
In short, draconian restrictions on vaccinated young people or those with natural immunity living in tiny pockets of college campus makes no sense, and is a policy that contributes to a harm in societal well-being. The policy is unethical and illogical.
To young people: I am personally sorry that those of us who recognized the futility and harm of these policies could not have done more to shield you from the anxieties and risk aversion of the irrational.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 22:20 -
- China Says US Officials Applied For Visas To Attend Olympics In 'Double Faced' Move
China Says US Officials Applied For Visas To Attend Olympics In ‘Double Faced’ Move
Weeks after the Biden administration announced a diplomatic boycott of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, China reported that it received multiple visa applications from U.S. officials expected to attend the Games.
Bloomberg reports Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told reporters at a regular press meeting on Monday that China received three-month visa applications from the State Department and other government departments.
“Previously out of political manipulation, the U.S. without any invitation has put on a show of so-called not sending diplomats or officials to the Beijing 2022 Games,” Zhao said
According to China’s state-run tabloid Global Times, a total of 18 personnel, including 15 personnel working for the State Department, have applied for visas to attend the Games.
Hong Kong-based English-language newspaper South China Morning Post quoted “two sources and a document” as saying, “Of the 18 names on the list, 15 of the U.S. personnel work for the State Department and one works for the Pentagon,” and “The U.S. indicated to Chinese officials it might submit applications for 40 more officials in the coming months.”
The move is in sharp contrast from the Biden administration’s diplomatic boycott announcement on Dec. 6, which criticized Beijing for torturing Uyghurs in Xinjiang camps. “We are determined to put human rights at the center of our foreign policy, and we reaffirm this commitment by using appropriate tools and authorities to draw attention to and promote accountability for human rights violations and abuses, no matter where they occur,” U.S. State Secretary Antony Blinken said at the time.
Li Haidong, a professor at the Institute of International Relations of the China Foreign Affairs University, told the Global Times that the U.S.’ double-faced move would embarrass its allies and show growing divergences within the Biden administration about China.
Haidong pointed out the Biden administration is entangled in confusion when managing issues related to China.
Meanwhile, U.S. allies, such as Britain, Lithuania, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan, will be caught off guard by the new announcement because they also declared a diplomatic boycott of the Games.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 22:00 - A Strategy To Promote Sound Money: Decentralize The State
A Strategy To Promote Sound Money: Decentralize The State
Authored by Matt Ray via The Mises Institute,
For more than a century, an inflationary monetary policy has plagued the United States. Most recently, price inflation has become the most obvious consequence of the Federal Reserve’s actions to the public. Other effects, while less visible, have been no less pernicious. Indeed, inflation is particularly insidious because rising prices can mask a transfer of wealth. Additionally, the Fed’s policies of artificially low interest rates and quantitative easing have discouraged savings and fueled boom-bust cycles.
As these monetary issues have continued to intensify, the need for solutions has become more urgent. The purpose of this article is to demonstrate the ways in which paper money and centralization reinforce each other, and to explore how political decentralization can promote sound money.
One of the more obvious ways fiat money enables centralization is by removing the limitations on the power of the government to inflate the currency that exist under a commodity money standard. Under a system of unbacked fiat money, there are fewer limitations the ability of the regime to increase government spending by inflating the money supply.
Still, the central government risks the depreciation of its own currency in terms of harder currencies. As a territorial monopolist of compulsion, however, a state can compel the acceptance of its currency through legal tender laws and by taxing or even prohibiting alternatives within its jurisdiction. From this it follows that as a state expands the territory under its control, it can compel more people to accept its currency—for example by requiring the payment of taxes in the government’s official currency. To illustrate this, we will review some of the ways the United States government has reinforced its currency.
In 1865, the federal government imposed a tax on state banknotes to limit their circulation. However, Franklin Roosevelt went even further by prohibiting American citizens from owning more than a small amount of monetary gold. While this prohibition has since been repealed, capital gains taxes still limit the use of gold. Internationally, military dominance has helped the United States secure the dollar’s status as reserve currency through international monetary agreements and supranational organizations like the International Monetary Fund, which allow for coordinated inflation. These are some of the ways in which centralization has enabled the US’s fiat money.
In distinct contrast, decentralization would weaken the current monetary system. Indeed, taken to its logical conclusion, decentralization would eventually require the abandonment of the current system and the restoration of sound money. Hans-Hermann Hoppe explains:
Yet if one then imagines a proliferation of ever smaller national territories, ultimately to the point where each household forms its own country, [Milton] Friedman’s proposal is revealed for what it is—an outright absurdity. For if every household were to issue its own paper currency, the world would be right back at barter. No one would accept anyone else’s paper, economic calculation would be impossible, and trade would come to a virtual standstill. It is only due to centuries of political centralization and the fact that only a relatively small number of countries and national currencies remain, and hence that the disintegrative consequences and calculational difficulties are far less severe, that this could have been overlooked. From this theoretical insight it follows that secession, provided it proceeds far enough, will actually promote monetary integration. In a world of hundreds of thousands of independent political units, each country would have to abandon the current fiat money system which has been responsible for the greatest worldwide inflation in all of human history and once again adopt an international commodity money system such as the gold standard.
As we have seen, the current system of freely fluctuating paper currencies with the US dollar as reserve currency would not have been possible without political centralization. Put differently, the system of multiple paper currencies hinders exchange. At the same time, the further decentralization proceeds, the more difficult it becomes to maintain a relatively high standard of living under a policy of autarky. Thus, as decentralization proceeds and the pressure for free trade increases, it becomes increasingly necessary to adopt an international currency outside the control of any government.
To be sure, there are more direct ways to restore sound money. Ludwig von Mises has explained how this could be accomplished. However, we should not expect policymakers to embrace Mises’s proposal any time soon. In the short term, the nullification or repeal of all taxes on alternatives to fiat money—such as gold and bitcoin—is a reasonable goal for a decentralist strategy.
Decentralization is not a panacea that will cure our monetary ills overnight. But it would represent an important first step toward the restoration of sound money.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 21:40 - China Creates AI Prosecutor That Can Identify Crimes And Press Charges
China Creates AI Prosecutor That Can Identify Crimes And Press Charges
Unfortunately, this isn’t a joke.
China’s Communist-controlled government has reportedly developed an artificial intelligence program that can automatically prosecute crimes committed in the People’s Republic, according to a report in the state-friendly South China Morning Post, an English-language, Hong Kong-based newspaper.
The machine can reliably identify eight common crimes such as fraud, gambling, dangerous driving and “picking quarrels”, according to researchers cited by the paper.
The AI “prosecutor” can file a charge with more than 97% accuracy based on a verbal description of the case alone.
To be sure, that’s not exactly a testament to the algorithm’s complexity or quality: China’s criminal justice system is notoriously opaque, with courts that have been criticized for being hopelessly slanted in favor of the government. The country’s prosecutors have also been criticized for charging those suspected of political disloyalty with criminal offenses like tax evasion.
Recently, China kicked off a transnational dispute with Canada after it arrested two Canadian nationals (a diplomat and a businessman) and sentenced them to lengthy prison sentences over charges that the Canadian government alleges were trumped-up – before being abruptly released once Ottawa had freed the CFO of Huawei after she reached a deal with the American Justice Department.
The prosecution machine was built and tested by the Shanghai Pudong People’s Procuratorate, the country’s largest, and busiest, district prosecution office.
“The system can replace prosecutors in the decision-making process to a certain extent,” said Shi and his colleagues in a paper published this month in the domestic peer-reviewed journal Management Review.
According to the SCMP, China isn’t the first country to automate some aspects of prosecution.
The application of AI technology in law enforcement has been increasing around the world.
Some German prosecutors have used AI technology such as image recognition and digital forensics to increase case processing speed and accuracy.
China’s legal system was an “early adopter”.
The application of AI technology in law enforcement has been increasing around the world.
Some German prosecutors have used AI technology such as image recognition and digital forensics to increase case processing speed and accuracy.
China was an early adopter of AI in its legal system, beginning in 2016. Many prosecutors now use an AI tool called “System 206”. The tool can purportedly evaluate the strength of evidence, as well as conditions for an arrest – while also assessing the subject’s danger to the public. But all existing AI tools have a limited role, because “they do not participate in the decision-making process of filing charges and [suggesting] sentences.”
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 21:20 - Lockdown Policies And Mask Mandates Linked With Lower IQ In Children
Lockdown Policies And Mask Mandates Linked With Lower IQ In Children
Authored by Tommy Hung via The Epoch Times,
The nation’s recent lockdown policies and mask mandates will create a generation of children who exhibit lower IQs and signs of social brain damage, according to a clinical psychiatrist for children and adolescents.
Dr. Mark McDonald cited an Aug. 11 study by Brown University (pdf) that found that “children born during the pandemic have significantly reduced verbal, motor, and overall cognitive performance compared to children born pre-pandemic,” during an interview with host Cindy Drukier on a Dec. 25 episode of NTD’s “The Nation Speaks.” NTD is a sister media outlet of The Epoch Times.
The masks, “Zoom schools,” and lockdown mandates have led to “deprivation overall, of social contact, [of] not being able to see faces, being stuck at home all day long, [and this] has actually caused brain damage to the youngsters,” he said.
In another interview in the episode, professor Carl Heneghan, the director of Oxford University’s Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine, cited evidence that pandemic restrictions and the “fear we instill into children” has led to the worsening of psychological problems.
Heneghan cited his Oct. 2 study, which concluded that “eight out of 10 children and adolescents report worsening of behavior or any psychological symptoms or an increase in negative feelings due to the COVID-19 pandemic.”
“School closures contributed to increased anxiety, loneliness and stress; negative feelings due to COVID-19 increased with the duration of school closures,” the study reports.
“Deteriorating mental health was found to be worse in females and older adolescents.”
Adolescents above the age of 12 also did worse than children under 12, as adolescents face increasing peer pressure, social pressure, and are more aware of messages being delivered globally, according to Heneghan.
“The first thing is to deescalate any fear and anxiety around COVID for children,” Heneghan said.
“For children, [COVID] is actually a very safe disease” and children shouldn’t be worried about the impact of COVID “on themselves or their future health.”
He said that “shutting areas like schools was a mistake,” as keeping them open is good for education, “social connectedness, and well-being.”
“We should really prioritize education and those interventions that are in children’s best interest,” he said.
According to a Dec. 20 study, data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also showed that mental health-related visits in 2020, when pandemic restrictions were first imposed, increased by 24 percent in 5- to 11-year-olds and 31 percent in 12- to 17-year-olds, compared to 2019 data.
Anecdotally, McDonald noted that he’s seen children who “refuse to make eye contact, who are wetting their pants or wetting the bed at night, cannot go to sleepovers—being away from their mother for extended periods of time.”
Teenagers, on the other hand, come out of lockdown restrictions being “so wrapped up in social media and phones and Zoom school because they’ve been trained for the last year and a half, that they do not even want to go out anymore,” he said.
McDonald called the government and media corporations out for creating a “behavioral conditioning program,” in which children are subjected to “irrational, ridiculous” situations such as eating outside on a 40-degree day and having to run marathons or play sports with masks on.
As of Dec. 27, the Biden administration is recommending that children “too young to be vaccinated” should be “surrounded by vaccinated people and mask in public indoor spaces, including schools,” according to the COVID plan on the White House website. “For those adolescents aged 12 and above who are eligible for vaccination, the most important step parents can take is to get them vaccinated.”
As of Dec. 27, the website states that “over half of the nation’s adolescents have been vaccinated.”
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 21:00 - Starlink Speeds Are Getting Worse, Not Better
Starlink Speeds Are Getting Worse, Not Better
SpaceX’s Starlink satellite internet service is expanding coverage across the US and elsewhere. According to a new report, internet speeds are slowing as Starlink adds new customers.
Data collected by Ookla, which runs speed tests, noticed median download speeds in the US fell from 97.23Mbps to 87.25Mbps between Q2 and Q3. Even though these speeds are much faster than satellite competitors HughesNet and Viasat, the noticeable slowdown is concerning as more users are added to the space internet.
Advertised on Starlink’s website, “Users can expect to see download speeds between 100 Mb/s and 200 Mb/s and latency as low as 20ms in most locations.” However, Ookla’s clocked median Starlink speeds fall well short of what is advertised by the company.
Elon Musk’s SpaceX promised in February 2021 that “speed will double to ~300Mb/s & latency will drop to ~20ms later this year.”
Speed will double to ~300Mb/s & latency will drop to ~20ms later this year
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 22, 2021
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
It’s the end of the year, and those speeds have yet to be seen.
Another disappointment is that Musk’s timeline on the availability of Starlink was significantly off. He promised a “nationwide rollout” of the internet service by the end of October, but that was delayed and left thousands of people who put down a $100 deposit to secure a dish furious.
Musk appears to have over-promised Starlink’s capabilities. None of this comes as a surprise, considering it’s Elon Musk: the greatest salesman of all times. Whatever happened to those million robotaxis that musk promised to be on the road by the end of 2020?
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 20:40 - Lessons From An Underground Economy
Lessons From An Underground Economy
Authored by J.G.Martinez via The Organic Prepper blog,
How is it possible to survive a nation with inflation rates of 20%/month and 1700%/year? The answer? The underground economy. This is the level of hyperinflation we have found ourselves with here in Venezuela, and considering the spread of inflation worldwide, it would be well worth the prepper’s time to glean what we can learn here.
Virtually everything you read dictates inflation on this scale necessitates civil war.
Yet Venezuela hasn’t seen this. Why not? Why are the streets not being taken by armed civilians?
While the main reason revolves around 20 years of disarmament and anti-self-defense teachings, I would argue that there is a second reason we haven’t delved into full on anarchy as well: our underground economy.
Underground economies keep people fed.
I’ve lived in four different and fallen South American countries, and it’s been the underground economy which has kept people going in each case.
When I used to work in the Venezuelan oil industry, our salary was taxed heavily just like everyone else’s. As expected, these taxes can quickly make it hard for a family to pay its bills.
But the underground economy? It’s completely unregulated.
I know guys with a hot dog cart who make much more money than engineers down here. And this isn’t new – our world has been like this for many years now. The guy working with the hot dog cart doesn’t pay taxes. He doesn’t pay rent. And usually, (and this is a now an “accepted” practice) these street vendors will run a wire from some nearby pole for their music and lights.
This man is a member of the underground economy. And he is just one of many.
Our stated hot dog vendor is not an isolated case either. He is part of what is keeping this country alive. In all probability, it is the men of this underground economy who likely comprise over half of our GDP here in Venezuela.
More than half of the money generated here is a result of men such as our hot dog vendor. Of course, much of this money also comes from the cartel and Russian mafia, but the point remains: it is the underground economy which is keeping the people of Venezuela (somewhat) fed.
More overreach, more underground.
One thing is for sure. The larger and more bloated the government control is, the greater the underground activity. “Irregular” business is the answer to these controls. It’s simply to be expected – especially in Latin American countries.
I believe I don’t need to explain why.
The government has seized the right to own foreign currency, trapping you in your hyper-inflated national fiat currency? A booming forex black market will spring up, regardless of how hard one attempts to stamp it out.
Store shelves are empty? Well, I know a guy who knows a guy that can get you a 20 kilo pack of cornmeal flour for a bit of arepas (a Venezuelan bread). (You should also check out our FREE Quickstart Guide to help you figure out how to keep a properly stocked larder to help your family ride out troubled times…)
Corruption and trafficking of certain items was already a way of life here. These statist thugs just came into the equation to incorporate it further as a part of our lifestyle. How else do you explain that a simple Venezuelan pilot of a former State President can buy himself a 200 million dollar yatch? Unless this guy works for pleasure and his surname is Onassis, I find that highly suspicious.
Need further proof? The rumor in Caracas is that Ferraris, Lamborghinis and other luxury cars are being brought in for the corrupt elite. And all paid for by our tax dollars.
You can still prepare for this though.
Yes, rampant corruption and government overreach is bad, but it doesn’t have to hit your family as hard as it could if you’ve made some preparations beforehand.
For Venezuelan preppers, getting rid of these insane controls actually worked. It kept us alive.
I sold the inflated money I earned and then bought food, and everything else we needed in the black market. It was the only way we could make it.
But one thing I’ve realized is that there are some underground services which are more profitable than others (outside of the truly criminal). For the prepper considering how he is to survive an underground economy during an economic crisis, one may want to consider the following list of occupations I’ve seen perform well here in Venezuela…
Fumigation
One of the most attractive business you can develop in an underground economy is fumigation. Sure, you need a machine and chemicals, and unless you really know what you’re doing, you can face problems, but this is something most don’t like to mess with. The end result? A lot of potential.
Local regulations do impact some of the people down here with this job, however.
Fast Food
I’m astonished about how extensive this income source is for families all throughout Venezuela. Yes, I do know we Venezuelans love hot dogs, hamburgers, shawarmas, and the like, but it’s simply ridiculous to see the excessive amount of fast food businesses flourishing near my home.
I can’t figure it out, and neither can anyone else.
The best I can figure is this: people like to eat.
In the Venezuelan underground economy, almost every business related to food is going to put food on your table as well. Honestly, these people do so well (such as our previously mentioned hot dog man) that I’m to get my own deep fryer to delve into the market on fried chicken.
Machine Repairs
It doesn’t matter the machine here. If you’re skilled enough to repair it, congrats. You’ve the makings of an incredible underground business. I’ve written about this extensively in the past, but whether it’s HVAC, small engines, cars, sewing machines, farm equipment, or anything else, you will never be short on business in an underground economy.
A prepper should seriously consider becoming knowledgeable in at least some aspect of machine repairs.
House Repairs
Every single house owner will sooner or later need to repair something that is outside of their range of experience. I’ve found here that if your fees are reasonable, you work fast, you do good work, and you arrive on time (a rare combination for a contractor, I know), you will get multiple jobs from the same customer.
I’ve also discovered that the suburbs seem to have more money in their pockets than do many of the other neighborhoods in Venezuela. If you’re going to delve into the world of underground house repairs, that may be a profitable market to dive into.
When the normal economy dies, the underground economy thrives.
The Venezuelan people have been through a lot. Hyperinflation, famine, rampant corruption and crime – we’re not new to any of it. Yet despite all this, people still had to find a way to keep bread on the table and in their family’s tummies. And the underground economy was the way we did it.
That’s the way things have played out here (and are continuing to play out), and will be the way things happen in other collapsing nations as well. The prepper needs to not only be prepared for disaster, but prepared for this form of black market as well.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 20:20 - Israel Starts 4th Covid Dose Trial While Pushing Booster On Children 12 & Up
Israel Starts 4th Covid Dose Trial While Pushing Booster On Children 12 & Up
Israel has been at the forefront of countries speedily rolling out Covid-19 vaccines for its population of just over 9 million, earlier in the fall becoming the first nation to initiate a widespread booster program. Recently a government advisory panel went so far as to recommend a booster shot for children ages 12 to 15.
On Monday Israel has initiated trials of a fourth Covid-19 vaccine dose, or its second round of a booster, which is being conducted on 150 medical workers who took their third booster shot of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine in August, according to The Associated Press. Israel is believed to be the first country in the world to initiate such a program as a second booster.
AFP via Getty Images: Israel’s Prime Minister Naftali Bennett receiving a COVID-19 vaccine booster shot The country is already considered the world’s leader in administering a booster dose to the population, with 4.2 million of the total population having received one. This as it is continually updating the requirements of what it means to be “fully vaccinated” – which impacts citizens’ ability to use the so-called Green Pass for access to restaurants, bars, gyms, and other public venues.
The trial is expected to take six months, so it’s unlikely that all Israelis will be forced to roll up their sleeves for yet a fourth shot until after this period:
Gili Regev-Yochay, the director of Infectious Disease Epidemiology Unit at Sheba, explained that the study will assess the antibody boost from a fourth shot and monitor any potential adverse reactions, and if the second boost reduces the risk of infection from omicron, according to CBS News.
The participants will be monitored for six months after receiving their fourth dose.
However, a fourth shot is already set to be offered to people over the age of 60 or anyone with a compromised immune system, including also frontline health care workers. People will be advised to wait four months after they receive their third shot to get the fourth one.
CNBC reports, “A Health Ministry expert panel last week recommended that Israel become the first country to offer a fourth vaccine dose – also known as a second booster – to those aged over 60, those suffering from compromised immune systems, and medical workers.”
All of this begs the question: does the third shot work? if not, then will a fourth? After all, Israelis like much of the rest of the world are wondering ‘when will it all end?’… An important weekend development widely reported in Israeli media is illustrative:
Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s daughter tested positive for the coronavirus, and will enter quarantine, a spokesman for the prime minister said Sunday afternoon.
The prime minister left Sunday’s cabinet meeting on the Golan Heights after receiving news of his daughter’s positive test and was also self-isolating, according to the spokesperson. Bennett took a rapid antigen test before attending the meeting and tested negative.
The daughter, who is 14 years old, was vaccinated against COVID-19 in June.
Via The Times of Israel: Prime Minister Naftali Bennett with his family, in the Knesset in Jerusalem So the leader of one of the most highly vaccinated countries on the earth had to run out of an important cabinet meeting due to exposure to Covid-19. Bennett reportedly later tested negative.
One would think that after himself being triple-vaxxed, he would have had a little more confidence in the vaccine and stayed in the cabinet meeting. But it seems the PM’s “faith” in the “trust the science” mantra is waning.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 20:00 - Former Boston College Student Pleads Guilty To Manslaughter After Encouraging Boyfriend To Commit Suicide
Former Boston College Student Pleads Guilty To Manslaughter After Encouraging Boyfriend To Commit Suicide
Over the years, we have discussed the prosecution of people who encourage friends or strangers to commit suicide. I have raised free speech concerns over prior prosecutions in the ambiguous line often drawn by prosecutors. The most recent case of Inyoung You, who pleaded guilty to manslaughter last week after repeatedly telling her boyfriend, Alexander Urtula, to kill himself. Both were students at Boston College and had a tumultuous 18 month relationship.
The couple met at Boston College and police say that You was highly abusive to Urtule. Her calls for his suicide reportedly began after she learned that he had met with his former girlfriend.
In a case similar to that of the Michele Carter prosecution in Massachusetts, You encouraged Urtula to kill himself. This case, however, is even worse with You sending a “barrage” of more than 75,000 text messages, including repeated calls for him to kill himself. In one text to the 22-year-old, she told him “do everyone a favor and go f**king kill yourself, you’re such a f**king stupid ass worthless s**t.” Urtule proceeded to jump off the top of a building just hours before his graduation with his family from New Jersey waiting to watch him walk across the stage.
Suffolk County District Attorney Rachael Rollins said that You was “physically, verbally, and psychologically abusive” toward Urtula and the “abuse became more frequent and more powerful, and more demeaning, in the days and hours leading up to” his death. She stressed that she was “aware of his spiraling depression and suicidal thoughts brought on by her abuse. Yet, she persisted.”
Caitlin Grasso, an assistant district attorney, said that You used her iPhone to track Urtula’s location and was on the roof when he jumped around 8:30 a.m. He was scheduled to graduate at 10:00 a.m.
You later fled to her native South Korea and reportedly maintained that she was on the roof to try to stop him.
You’s guilty plea comes with an agreement that she will undergo mental health treatment and do community service. In addition, she may not profit from any portrayal of the case over the next 10 years.
You’s conduct is clearly disgusting and reprehensible. My concern in these cases is how such prosecutions could be used to criminalize speech related to suicide. Many advocate for the right to die and often share information on ways to killing oneself with the least amount of pain. Moreover, there are concerns about people who engage in reckless or hyperbolic speech. There has been a long debate over the culpability of people who routinely yell up to people on ledges or bridges to jump. Historically, such horrific conduct has been treated as an exercise of free speech or at least not criminally culpable in any subsequent suicide. The problem is that free speech demands “bright lines” and this standard could not be more murky.
It is hard to raise such concerns in the context of this type of case. The loss to the Urtula family is unimaginable. The trauma of learning of Alexander’s suicide as they waited to watch him graduate must have been overwhelming. One would hope that this plea could bring even a small degree of solace for the family. However, we need to address the implications of these prosecutions and how to define this crime to avoid a broader criminalization of speech.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 19:40 - Scientists Expect Omicron Wave Will Peak In January
Scientists Expect Omicron Wave Will Peak In January
African countries like the Democratic Republic of Congo are struggling with an influx of hospitalizations as the omicron-driven 4th wave of the global pandemic environment hammers the country, which boasts one of the world’s lowest vaccination rates. But Congo isn’t alone; over the weekend, American media reported that, after nearly two years of seeing surprisingly low COVID levels, sub-Saharan Africa is finally seeing a big enough wave of infections to pose a serious threat to its health-care system.
Experts in the US are projecting that the latest COVID wave will worsen before it gets better, according to the following chart from Fundstrat, which features projections and data from the CDC as well as various state-level public health departments.
As it shows, the peak should arrive around Jan. 9, with the number of new daily cases declining swiftly after that, tumbling to just under 40K new cases/day by Feb. 9.
Researchers at a university in Texas estimated that the peak of the omicron wave would likely land somewhere between Jan. 13 and Feb. 3, according to CNBC.
Last year’s peak arrived on Jan. 11, according to data from Johns Hopkins.
And the number of deaths peaked on Jan. 13.
Even as hospitals across the US see the number of available beds fill up, deaths remain far lower than last year, a clear sign that Americans’ levels of ‘herd immunity’ (a concept we haven’t heard much about lately ever since scientists declared that COVID is likely now an endemic disease) have continued to improve, despite the virus’s shifting nature.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 19:20 - Cocaine, Guns, & Gushers: Colombia's Oil Industry Struggles To Reactivate
Cocaine, Guns, & Gushers: Colombia’s Oil Industry Struggles To Reactivate
Authored by Matthew Smith via OilPrice.com,
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Rising security risk and rural violence, which is mostly fueled by the vast profits generated by the cocaine trade, is a key deterrent to attracting onshore oil investment in Colombia.
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According to the UN, Colombia’s cocaine production during 2020 increased by 8% compared to a year earlier, despite a 7% decrease in the volume of land used for coca cropping.
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Despite the risks associated with operating in onshore Colombia, the Andean country’s 2021 bid round found some success.
Despite the groundbreaking 2016 peace deal between the Colombian government and the largest guerilla group the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC – Spanish initials) there are fears that conflict is escalating once again. Colombia, which is Latin America’s third-largest petroleum producer and the world’s largest manufacturer of cocaine for nearly a century, has been caught in a simmering low-intensity asymmetric conflict that reached boiling point during the 1980s.
The primary flashpoint for the civil conflict, which currently engulfs Colombia and failed to end with the 2016 FARC peace accord was the April 1948 assassination of Liberal Party leader Jorge Gaitan in Bogota. That sparked the Bogotazo, days of violent rioting that swept across Bogota resulting in up to 3,000 deaths, which eventually evolved into a vicious 10-year civil war between the Colombian Liberal and Conservative parties known as La Violencia. While that brutal struggle ended in a 1958 power-sharing agreement between Colombia’s leading political parties, it sowed the seeds for the current low-intensity multiparty asymmetric conflict. In 1964 the Colombian Communist Party formed the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC – Spanish initials) after a military attack on the community of Marquetalia, a Communist peasant enclave established during the of La Violencia. That event saw the communist FARC emerge as the most powerful left-wing anti-government armed group during the conflict. The guerillas eventually cut ties with the Colombian Communist Party and increasingly relied upon kidnapping, extortion, and cocaine trafficking to fund their operations. Prior to these events, which cast Colombia into what appears to be a never-ending low-intensity asymmetric multiparty civil conflict, oil was discovered in 1918 at the La Cira-Infantas field in the Middle Magdalena Basin near the city of Barrancabermeja. Even after additional petroleum discoveries in the Middle Magdalena Basin, it was not until the giant Caño Limon, Cusiana, and Cupiagua oilfields were discovered between 1983 and 1993 that Colombia embarked on becoming a major oil producer. Those mega discoveries and a notable increase in foreign energy investment, as well as petroleum production, occurred despite violence surging because of the tremendous influx of profits from the booming cocaine trade.
Even the tremendous escalation of violence, homicides, kidnappings, and attacks on energy infrastructure which escalated in the late-1980s, lasting well into the early 21st century, had little material impact on Colombia’s hydrocarbon sector. By 1991 Colombia was pumping over 400,000 barrels per day, more than double its output in 1985, despite becoming the world’s murder capital with a homicide rate of 84 intentional killings per 100,000 people. That was more than eight times greater than the U.S. which reported 9.8 homicides per 100,000 head of population, 7-times higher than neighboring Venezuela’s murder rate of 12 and 8-times larger than Ecuador’s 11 homicides per 100,000 people.
Heightened insecurity and violence remained a persistent problem in Colombia, even after the collapse of the Medellin and Cali cartels, as the FARC and National Liberation Army ELN (Spanish initials) ramped-up operations as vast revenue flowed in from the drug trade. By 2000, after President Andres Pastrana’s peace negotiations with the FARC had failed, the leftist guerillas controlled a 42,000 square mile territory in southeastern Colombia and kidnappings had surged to a record high of 3,500 for the year. Even those events failed to have any material impact on Colombia’s oil boom. A combination of soaring oil prices and rapidly improving internal security during the early 2000s, because of Plan Colombia and President Alvaro Uribe’s military campaign against the FARC, saw foreign energy investment and hence crude oil production growth.
During 2003 when Brent averaged $28.83 per barrel, a 15% increase over 2002, Colombia pumped an average of 550,000 barrels of crude oil per day. When Brent had soared to over $140 per barrel during 2008, annual petroleum production averaged 600,000 barrels daily and kept growing to peak at a yearly record of just over 1 million barrels per day by 2013. Since 2016 Colombia’s petroleum output has been in terminal decline impacted at first by the late-2014 oil price crash, sharply rising violence, and finally because of the fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic. Even the 2017 demobilization of the largest leftist guerilla group the FARC, after a 2016 peace agreement was struck with the government of President Juan Manuel Santos, has done little if anything to arrest Colombia’s production decline. That in part can be blamed on current President Ivan Duque’s reluctance to fully implement the peace deal, contributing to an increase in violence and civil unrest in regional Colombia.
During 2020, the crisis-driven Andean nation only pumped on average 781,300 barrels of crude oil per day as the COVID-19 pandemic, related national quarantine lockdown and sharply weaker oil prices impacted investment as well as production. More worrying, is that despite the pandemic lockdown ending by September 2020 and energy investment increasing, average petroleum output only reached 734,231 barrels per day for the first 10 months of 2021 which is 6% less than the full year 2020. That disappointing decline occurred because of heightened civil unrest with anti-government protests sweeping across Colombia during late- April 2021 lasting into May and early-June 2021. Falling crude oil output can also be attributed to rising insecurity in regional areas, where petroleum industry operations are concentrated, fueled by a marked uptick in violence related to the activities of illegal armed groups and cocaine production.
It is the cocaine trade that is an enduring problem for Colombia. The tremendous profits that the trade generates are responsible for fueling what is a near-perpetual low-level asymmetric conflict where only the illegal armed actors change as the various groups fragment and reform. Estimates vary, but Colombia’s government believes the civil conflict has claimed up to 260,000 lives and displaced at least 9 million people. According to the UN Colombia’s cocaine production during 2020 increased by 8% compared to a year earlier, despite a 7% decrease in the volume of land used for coca cropping and an 18% increase in seizures. The scale of massive profits generated by cocaine is highlighted by former finance minister Juan Carlos Echeverry’s estimate (Spanish) that the drug trade generates $8 to $12 billion annually, which is equivalent to 5 to 4% of Colombia’s gross domestic product. Using Echeverry’s numbers the cocaine trade is contributing the same amount, if not more, to Colombia’s GDP than the oil industry which based on DANE data (Spanish) for the first 3 quarters of 2021 was responsible for 3% of GDP.
Rising security risk and rural violence, which is mostly fueled by the vast profits generated by the cocaine trade, is a key deterrent to attracting onshore oil investment in Colombia. A combination of security risks and mature assets saw Occidental Petroleum, in October 2020, sell its Colombian onshore petroleum assets in an $825 million deal, although the company retained its offshore exploration blocks. Despite the risks associated with operating in onshore Colombia, the Andean country’s 2021 bid round found some success. Seven companies made offers for 30 of the 53 blocks (Spanish) on offer with initial investment expected to exceed $148 million. Five of the offers came from national oil company Ecopetrol or its subsidiaries and 21 from intermediate energy companies with existing operational presence in Colombia, Parex Resources, Frontera Energy, and Canacol Energy. This indicates that Colombia is struggling to attract foreign onshore energy investment because of the heightened security risks coupled with high breakeven prices and elevated carbon content of the sour heavy crude oil produced.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 19:00 -
- Protests Erupt In South Korea Over Vaccination Deaths
Protests Erupt In South Korea Over Vaccination Deaths
Americans and Europeans aren’t the only people to express skepticism of the COVID jabs produced by a handful of pharmaceutical giants, most notably Pfizer and Moderna. As reports of deaths and other ‘adverse health events’ suspected of being triggered by vaccines mount, South Koreans are reportedly taking to the streets to protest their governments’ refusal to acknowledge thousands of deaths that many believe were caused by vaccines.
As we said above, more than 10K people have died under murky circumstances shortly after being vaccinated in South Korea. The government has only reported a connection in a handful of serious cases. But it has also moved to recognize and compensate victims: for example, a nursing assistant was recognized in August as a victim of an industrial accident and awarded government benefits after suffering paralysis in the wake of receiving AstraZeneca’s COVID shot.
Back in August, the government investigated after a teenager with no underlying health conditions died following inoculation with the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID jab.
But in the absence of more concrete answers, thousands of South Koreans are taking to the streets to protest the vaccine mandate in one of the world’s most heavily vaccinated countries.
According to RT, an association called the COVID Vaccine Victims and Families Council has held rallies in several South Korean cities. Demonstrators on Sunday marched from Busan City Hall to Busan National University of Education in a large demonstration held in the country’s second city.
There’s even a chance that vaccine skepticism might become an issue in SK’s upcoming presidential election. Last week, the opposition People’s Power Party held a public hearing on vaccine sideeffects, inviting purported victims and their families to suggest support new strategies for confronting the epidemic that may be adopted by presidential candidate Yoon Seok-yeol.
Kim Jong-in, the party’s campaign chairman, has accused sitting SK President Moon Jae-in and his administration of being indifferent to damages caused by vaccines.
“I think the people have reached a point where they can’t trust the government,” Kim said.
The government promised to compensate victims of vaccine side effects before the first jabs arrived. But it’s also responsible for determining which cases merit compensation, a fact that has rankled some purported victims, who feel they have been shafted.
Roughly 83% of South Koreans have been vaccinated against Covid-19, easily the highest rate among G20 nations.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 18:40 - The Scientific Blunder At The Core Of 'The Matrix'
The Scientific Blunder At The Core Of ‘The Matrix’
Authored by Ross Pomeroy via RealClearScience.com,
The Matrix is one of the greatest works of science fiction ever devised, but it also features one of the most glaring scientific plot holes. With the fourth installment of The Matrix movies currently in theaters, it seems a fitting time to review it.
Before we get nit-picky, let us first acknowledge that science fiction creators are allowed to take liberties with scientific fact if it serves the story (provided it’s a good one, at least). Warp drive and transporters in Star Trek, wormholes in Interstellar, time travel in Back to the Future – these unlikely plot devices are totally fine.
The Matrix‘s scientific blunder is particularly terrible, however. In the movie, the entire reason for the Matrix – a simulated dreamworld to which almost all human beings are connected – is so artificially intelligent robot overlords can keep humanity controlled while they use humans as an energy source on a barren, hellish, futuristic Earth where the Sun is completely blocked.
As Morpheus, one of the main characters, describes, “The human body generates more bio-electricity than a 120-volt battery and over 25,000 BTUs of body heat. Combined with a form of fusion, the machines had found all the energy they would ever need.”
This, however, doesn’t make any sense! The highly educated writers of the science fiction comedy Futurama – with numerous Ph.Ds in mathematics, computer science, and chemistry between them – playfully skewered the notion in one episode.
“But wouldn’t almost anything make a better battery than a human body?” one of the show’s characters, Bender, asks. “Like a potato? Or a battery?”
“Plus no matter how much energy they produce, it would take more energy than that to keep them alive!” another character, Fry, chimes in.
Futurama’s televised chiding was echoed by Robert Hurt, a Caltech-based visualization scientist who has worked on many NASA projects, in a 2019 interview with Esquire.
Humans consume quite a lot of high-energy products (food, oxygen) and the only thing they produce that could count as ‘energy’ would be basically heat. But if you took all the food and just burned it you’d get WAY more heat out of it. You can chalk it up to thermodynamics and entropy; some systems just don’t process efficiently and basically you can count on getting less energy out than you put in.
Reportedly, this ‘battery’ explanation for The Matrix was not the Wachowskis’ original intent.
In earlier versions of the script, the writer-director sister duo conceived of the Matrix as a simulation collectively produced by the brains of humans hooked into it. The malevolent machines needed humanity enslaved because they were dependent upon the massive processing power of billions of human brains. Apparently, studio executives thought this was a little too complex for 1999 audiences to grasp, so they urged the nonsensical ‘battery’ alternative. In the end, it’s just an annoying pockmark on a darn near perfect flick.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 18:20 - CDC Makes Major Changes To Covid Isolation Recos, Treats Unboosted As Unvaxxed For Quarantines
CDC Makes Major Changes To Covid Isolation Recos, Treats Unboosted As Unvaxxed For Quarantines
And so, the “scientific” goal posts move again.
With even Biden this close to admitting defeat over covid, admitting today that “there is no Federal solution” before quietly getting out of Dodge, the CDC announced late on Monday that is slashing its previous self-isolation recommended period in half, and telling people who have Covid-19 to isolate themselves from others for 5 days if they aren’t experiencing symptoms, down from 10 days previously.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also said in a statement Monday that following the 5-day isolation period, people with Covid-19 should wear a mask for 5 days when they are around other people. The new guidance supplants previous recommendations that said people who have tested positive for the virus should isolate for 10 days.
While Omicron has been documented to be far more mild than prior versions of covid, cases are still expected to surge in the U.S. following the holidays, threatening confusion and chaos among who are infected or exposed to the virus. The shorter isolation and quarantine periods will allow people to return to work or school sooner than previously permitted.
The CDC said in its statement that the shift in guidance was motivated by scienceTM showing the majority of coronavirus transmission occurs early in the course of the illness, in the first day or two before the onset of symptoms and the two to three days that follow.
The CDC also updated its recommended quarantine period for people who have been exposed to Covid-19. For those who are unvaccinated or who are eligible for a booster shot but haven’t yet received one, the agency recommends a five-day quarantine, followed by strict use of a mask for five more days despite copious research demonstrating that masks have little impact on virus spread, and despite the fact that the cities with the most aggressive mask requirements have emerged as the biggest covid epicenters.
Cases in New York State are now higher than they’ve ever been in Florida, despite all of New York’s mask mandates, vaccine passports and media praise
And yes, of course, New York’s collapse is also entirely the fault of Ron DeSantis pic.twitter.com/R28T9pv1t9
— IM (@ianmSC) December 27, 2021
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
If a five-day quarantine isn’t feasible, an exposed person should wear a well-fitting mask, such as an N95, at all times when around others for 10 days after exposure, the CDC recommended.
Meanwhile, individuals who have received a booster shot don’t need to quarantine following an exposure, but should wear a mask for 10 days, the CDC said. If symptoms occur, individuals should quarantine until a negative test confirms that they don’t have Covid-19. Then again, if symptoms occur after taking a booster shot, perhaps it is time to realize that something is very wrong with the “expert” recommendations…
In other words, in a remarkable departure meant to stigmatize not just the unvaxxed but those without a booster shot, vaccinated but unboosted people are will now treated as “unvaccinated” when it comes to close contact quarantines. This, as a social worker noted on Twitter….
“would wreak havoc on school attendance for unboosted kids and teachers! I can’t emphasize enough how this would totally derail the school year. All unboosted teachers would miss 5 days of school EVERY TIME one of their students test positive. And 12-15 year olds who are >6mo out from their 2nd dose aren’t even booster eligible!”
According to Bloomberg, the new guidance “could entice more Americans to seek another dose of a vaccine”, although with millions of “breakthrough” cases amid residual concerns about vaccine side-effects, it’s unclear just how the billionaire’s media empire came to this profound conclusion. Just under one-third of fully vaccinated people in the U.S. have received a booster, according to the CDC. We don’t expect this number to rise substantially.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 18:01 - Daily Briefing: Following the Money as End of Holidays Nears
Daily Briefing: Following the Money as End of Holidays Nears
What put a floor under global markets last week may not be what you think. Weston Nakamura provides an overview of the global and cross-asset markets in the last week of the year. Nakamura explains that regional market holiday schedules matter because they determine the makeup of active market participants. He then talks about the unprecedented volatility in the Turkish Lira having rallied 50% from all time lows after President Erdogan unveiled his controversial new economic policy to protect depositors against FX risk. He also makes the case that the upside in global macro risk assets could have been driven by the breakneck reversal in the Lira, following up on his recently released video, “How Policy Changes Created Turkish Lira Volatility”. Link to Weston’s video on the Turkish Dollar from Dec 25th 2021: https://youtu.be/WnDiFCWgBDQ
Tyler Durden
Mon, 12/27/2021 – 17:45
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