- Bovard: Afghanistan & The Sham Of Democracy Promotion
Bovard: Afghanistan & The Sham Of Democracy Promotion
Americans finally recognize the military lies that pervaded the success claims of the 20-year war in Afghanistan. But democracy promotion was an even bigger sham. Afghanistan was Exhibit A for the triumphal crusade to spread freedom and democracy.
After the U.S. invasion in 2001, the U.S. government spent more than $600 million to support elections and democratic procedures in Afghanistan (part of the $143 billion the U.S. spent there for relief and reconstruction). Washington bragging points were always more important than Afghan preferences. “In 2002 and 2003, when Afghan tribal councils gathered to write a new constitution, the U.S. government gave [bribes] to delegates who supported Washington’s preferred stance on human rights and women’s rights,” the Washington Post reported in 2019. President George W. Bush boasted in 2004: “Afghanistan has now got a constitution which talks about freedom of religion and talks about women’s rights…Democracy is flourishing.” Though Bush’s reelection campaign speeches were larded with such lines, women in many parts of Afghanistan continued to be oppressed even worse than characters in American country music songs. One international aid worker commented that during the Taliban era “if a woman went to market and showed an inch of flesh she would have been flogged—now she’s raped.”
Hamid Karzai, the slick operator who the Bush administration installed to rule Afghanistan after 9/11, won a rigged 2004 presidential election. Karzai approved a law that entitled a husband to starve his wife if she refused his sexual demands.
During his 2008 presidential campaign, Obama labeled the conflict in Afghanistan the “right war.” By the time Obama took office, the Taliban were vigorously reviving and Afghans were shunning the corrupt puppet regime the U.S. installed in 2002.
President Obama justified his 2009 troop surge in Afghanistan to bolster its democracy. When Obama spoke to the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention in August 2009, he boasted that “our troops are helping to secure polling places for this week’s election so that Afghans can choose the future that they want.” In reality, Obama effectively sent American soldiers to serve as bodyguards for Karzai’s minions to steal the election. At first glance, Karzai won a narrow victory. But two weeks after the election, the New York Times reported that Karzai’s operatives set up as many as 800 fictitious polling sites “where no one voted but where hundreds of thousands of ballots were still recorded toward the president’s re-election.” In some Afghan provinces, pro-Karzai ballots outnumbered actual voters by tenfold. Peter Galbraith, a senior United Nations official in Afghanistan, was fired after he estimated that a third of Karzai’s votes were bogus. Galbraith wrote, “No amount of spin can obscure the fact that we spent upwards of $200 million on an election that has been a total fiasco” which “handed the Taliban its greatest strategic victory.”
Despite the shenanigans, the Obama administration praised Karzai as if he had won fair and square. The Obama administration told Congress that the decision to send far more U.S. troops to Afghanistan depended on the Afghan government’s “ability to hold credible elections,” among other tests. After the 2009 Afghan election turned into a sham, Obama decided it was “close enough for government work” to democracy. Thanks to Obama’s surge, 1,400 American soldiers died in part to propagate the mirage of Afghan democracy.
Afghan officials conspired for more than 15 years to both multiply and ignore election fraud. As early as 2009, U.S. Admiral Mike Mullen, then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned that the result was that the Afghan government’s legitimacy “is, at best, in question right now and, at worst, doesn’t exist.” An analysis by the U.S. Agency for International Development of the 2014 Afghan election noted that “several prominent election officials associated with fraud during past elections were promoted or given ministerial appointments.”
Behind closed door, D.C. poohbahs admitted their Afghan charade. At a confidential 2015 National Security Council meeting, President Obama admitted that the U.S. would never “transform Afghanistan into a semblance of a democracy able to defend itself,” the New York Times reported. But that didn’t deter Obama from publicly bragging the following year that U.S. troops and diplomats had helped Afghanistan “establish a democratic government.”
To buttress the new democracy, the U.S. government spent a billion dollars to promote the “rule of law” and justice reform in Afghanistan. But such programs were as wasteful as the rest of the U.S. dollar deluge on that nation. As the Christian Science Monitor noted in mid-2010, the Obama administration’s Agency for International Development “created an atmosphere of frantic urgency about the ‘burn rate’—a measure of how quickly money is spent. Emphasis gets put on spending fast to make room for the next batch from Congress.”
One American contractor received $35 million to promote the rule of law in Afghanistan in part by distributing kites and comic books to kids. The New York Times reported that the contractor “arranged an event to hand out kites and comic books to children. The kites were festooned with slogans about gender equality and rule of law that most of the attendees could not read. Police officers guarding the event stole many of the kites, beating some of the children, while fathers snatched kites from their girls to give to the boys.” A 2015 report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) report found that the Afghan “rule of law” spending had been a dismal failure.
Afghan democracy was a bigger fraud than almost anyone wanted in D.C. would admit. One of the best demolitions can be found in a February 2021 report, “Elections: Lessons from the U.S. Experience in Afghanistan,” produced by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR). After more than 15 years of pro-democracy “assistance,” Afghanistan’s 2019 presidential election was “the most corrupt the country had ever held,” according to expert consulted by SIGAR.
U.S. tax dollars poured into the coffers of Afghanistan’s Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) to safeguard voting. Alas—that agency was a prime source of the most brazen vote stealing. ECC bosses were careful not to hire almost anyone with electoral experience since such folks might raise troubling questions. A former top ECC official told SIGAR that “one criterion for chief electoral officer applicants in 2018 was how well the candidates were dressed. He said this category was used as a pretext to reduce the scores of less pliable candidates.” It is unknown whether this villainy character test was inspired by Washington’s K Street lobbyists.
Afghan elections were institutionalized racketeering because the rules were always in flux. SIGAR noted, “Only one of the country’s election laws has ever been passed by parliament; the rest were presidential decrees that were never referred to the parliament for consideration.” The SIGAR report quoted election experts: “The likelihood of a credible election is inversely proportional to the degree to which the ruling regime directly controls the election management body.” Afghan voting records were a total mess, making it easy for politicians to fabricate claims about the “will of the people.” SIGAR concluded, “Afghanistan’s national voter registry and the voter registration process are exceptionally vulnerable to manipulation and mismanagement.”
It is tricky to build a viable democracy when elected officials receive a license to steal. After noting the hefty bribes that politicians pay to election officials, SIGAR explained: “One reason candidates may be willing to pay such high prices for seats in parliament is to protect ill-gotten fortunes…By becoming members of parliament, they can gain access to new sources of illicit revenue and immunity from prosecution.” That parliament was the last place on earth to seek support for honest elections.
Afghan experiences also offer lessons for Americans confounded by disputes regarding the 2020 U.S. election, including the controversies surrounding computer voting. As one election expert told SIGAR, “There is no difference between stuffing 100 ballots and pressing a button on an electronic voting machine 100 times.” Afghan President Ashraf Ghani decreed that the 2019 election must rely on electronic voting. But SIGAR noted that electronic voting “did not reduce fraud overall; it just displaced it to other parts of the electoral cycle.” Confidence in Afghan electronic voting was not assisted by the secrecy surrounding the software and equipment. After the 2019 presidential election, Afghanistan’s Independent Election Commission declared that it could not “share information” about how votes were being reconciled because “the contractor, Dermalog, controlled that process.” SIGAR quoted experts who warned that “because governments often control electoral commissions and the procurement of election technology, they are well placed to use it to commit fraud.” SIGAR ruefully noted, “The true purpose of adopting election technologies may not be to actually reduce fraud, but to create the illusion of doing so.”
Afghan debacles are a reminder that there is no “guardian angel of democracy.” Politicians permitting citizens to vote does not assure that election results will receive even a whiff of legitimacy. Once fraud or suspicions of fraud reach a certain level, any election winners will be suspected scoundrels. A U.S. Army colonel who deployed several times to Afghanistan told SIGAR that as early as 2006, the Afghan government had “self-organized into a kleptocracy.” Officials who were stealing everything else never hesitated to steal votes.
Biden, like Obama and George W. Bush, is seeking to make “democracy promotion” a redeeming theme for his presidency. But no Washington pundit, politician, or “expert” who vouched for Afghan democracy should ever be trusted again. The U.S. government will continue meddling in foreign elections as long as American politicians think they can gain influence—or perhaps contracts for their friends or family members. There is no reason to expect Biden’s “democracy promotion” to be any cleaner than his Ukraine policy during the Obama administration.
The collapse of the Afghan government settled any doubts about whether intellectuals are some of Washington’s biggest con artists. They profited mightily by pirouetting as experts with lavish government contracts that produced nothing except windfall profits for overpriced D.C. restaurants. Any think tank or research institute or Beltway Bandit that was honest about Afghanistan being a quagmire for democracy would have been banned from future contracting.
Americans also need to take lessons from the endless lies that Washington told about Afghan democracy. Are U.S. government officials more honest when they talk about American democracy than when they praise sham democracies abroad? Unfortunately, no one is talking of the peril of the “Afghanization” of American democracy.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 23:30 - "Backdoor Gun Control" – How Biden Banning Russian Ammo Will Make Range Ammo "Hard To Come By"
“Backdoor Gun Control” – How Biden Banning Russian Ammo Will Make Range Ammo “Hard To Come By”
The folks at Baltimore-based The Machine Gun Nest (TMGN) explained how the latest Russian-made ammo ban is likely a “backdoor gun control” measure by the Biden administration to make it more difficult for Americans to procure cheap ammo.
TMGN published a video Friday describing the Russian ammo ban actually began with the poisoning of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny in 2020. He made a full recovery, but it was found in medical reports that a chemical nerve agent poisoned him.
Fast forward to Aug. 20, the U.S. Department of State slapped Russia with firearms and ammunition importation bans for 12 months because of the poisoning.
TMGN explained the ban could be devastating for gun owners because 40% of the U.S. market is comprised of cheap Russian ammo.
If you shoot Wolf Brown Bear, and TulAmmo, this will drastically affect the cost of using the ammo at the range. This ammo is great for practice and cheap, but the ban will likely lead to shortages and send prices higher, compounding the already shortage of ammo from supply chain woes produced by COVID.
TMGN said range ammo is going to be harder to find until more US-based manufactures scale up production.
So what is the sanction really about?
Is it about Navalny, or as TMGN suggested, a “backdoor” gun control measure by the Biden administration to make it more difficult for Americans to procure ammo by driving prices higher?
TMGN has already outlined how the Biden administration wants to classify semi-automatic rifles, such as the AR-15, as a “machine gun,” effectively banning the weapon.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 23:00 - What The Polio Vaccines Can Teach Us About The COVID Ones
What The Polio Vaccines Can Teach Us About The COVID Ones
Authored by Peter Surkiss via American Thinker (emphasis ours),
Prior to the 1950s, paralytic polio was a scourge. FDR was crippled from it while in his 30s, the March of Dimes was started to combat it, and photos of rows and rows of children in iron lungs were common in the media. From this situation, vaccines were developed to combat the disease.
Iron Lung (Image: Library of Congress via Picryl, public domain) Polio is caused by one of three types of poliovirus that can cause paralysis and death. In the 1950s, two vaccines were independently developed to combat it, one by Jonas Salk and the other by Albert Sabin. Polio was eradicated, and today those vaccines are thought of as miracle drugs. But were they?
In the early 1950s, Salk was the first to come out with a vaccine. His was designed to treat all three polio viruses at once. His approach seemed basic enough. It was to grow polioviruses in the lab, kill them, and then inject healthy children with the dead viruses. The idea was that the dead viruses could not reproduce, so they could not harm the children. The children’s immune system, however, would detect the injected viruses and produce effective antibodies against them, thus creating immunity against polio.
Just prior to beginning mass inoculations, samples of the Salk vaccine were sent to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for safety testing.
There, when bacteriologist Dr. Bernice Eddy injected the vaccine into her monkeys, some of them fell down paralyzed. She concluded that the virus was not entirely dead as promised. Instead, the virus was active and could reproduce in its host. Eddy sounded the alarm and presented her findings. A debate ensued in the corridors of power. Advocates for caution were overruled, and the mass inoculation proceeded on schedule.
The inoculation of children began in 1955. Within days, some injected children were coming down with polio. Some were even spreading the disease to family members. Subsequent investigations determined that the vaccine had caused 40,000 cases of polio, leaving 200 children with varying degrees of paralysis and ten dead. Alton Ochsner, a professor of surgery at Tulane Medical School, was such a strong proponent of proceeding with the inoculation program that he gave vaccine injections to his grandchildren to prove that it was safe. Ochsner’s grandson died from polio a few months later, and his granddaughter contracted polio but survived.
This fiasco has become known as the Cutter incident. It’s named after the manufacturer of the vaccine. The vaccine was recalled and retested for safety, but the damage had already been done in the mind of the public.
Let’s continue to the second version of the polio vaccine, the Sabin.
In 1957, inactivated poliovirus vaccine (IPV) and live but weakened oral poliovirus vaccines (OPV) were prepared in primary cell cultures derived from rhesus monkey kidneys.
According to the American Association for Cancer Research, it was later determined that the vaccines made from these cultures were contaminated with the infectious cancer-causing virus SV40. The Centers for Disease Control & Prevention estimates that up to 30 percent of the polio vaccines administered from 1957 to 1963 contained this cancer-causing monkey virus. Dr. Eddy was involved in the discovery of that, too, despite being shunted off to other research after her first discovery.
Did this result in a cancer epidemic? Some believe that it did, as there was a sharp rise in soft tissue cancer in the following decades. The medical establishment disagrees, saying only a “small” number of cancer cases can be traced to the polio vaccines. In any event, it was a fact that a cancer-causing virus was present in the polio vaccines and that the government kept the public in the dark. This was done to avoid mass hysteria and to prevent the wrecking of the public’s confidence in medicine and vaccines in particular.
One result of the damage caused by these initial polio vaccines is that strict new safety regulations and procedures were instituted. Also, legislation was passed to exempt vaccine manufacturers from civil damages due to the side-effects of their vaccines. 42 U.S. Code 300aa-22 — Standard of responsibility states: “No vaccine manufacturer shall be liable in a civil action for damages arising from a vaccine-related injury or death associated with the administration of a vaccine after October 1, 1988.”
Polio is practically unknown today. But is that because of the vaccines or other factors? Note, polio is spread by contact with infected feces, which often happens from poor hand-washing. It can be spread from eating or drinking contaminated food or water. In some cases, it can be spread when an infected person coughs or sneezes infected droplets into the air. It would seem that as hygiene improved and sanitation got better, polio would diminish. This was all known in the 1950s.
Whatever the case, a takeaway lesson from the early polio vaccines is that haste makes waste. Back then, those vaccines were rushed out to the public without being adequately tested due to panic over the disease. One has to wonder if the same sort of thing isn’t happening today with the COVID vaccines. There are similarities between what happened then and what’s unfolding now, chief among them political pressure for a magic-bullet cure. Is it possible or even likely that political pressure has compromised the safety protocols and standard procedures at the FDA and Big Pharma which are there to ensure only safe vaccines are issued for public use? Time will tell.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 22:30 - China Blacklists Billionaire Actress, Cracks Down On 'Unruly' Internet Fan Culture
China Blacklists Billionaire Actress, Cracks Down On ‘Unruly’ Internet Fan Culture
While Fed Chairman Jerome Powell’s comments at Jackson Hole dominated headlines in the US Friday, news out of China detailed new efforts by Beijing to hinder domestic firms from going public in the US and other foreign markets, while also exposing the target of Beijing’s latest crackdown: entertainers and the online communities where their most rabid fans bond over their fandome.
According to the SCMP, Beijing abruptly blacklisted one of China’s most popular (and wealthiest) actresses, Zhao Wei. Her entire internet presence was scrubbed for unknown reasons on Thursday evening. Her name was removed from all television series, films, short videos and promotional materials from platforms including Tencent Video, iQiyi and Youku.
Per SCMP, Zhao shot to fame for her role in My Fair Princess, one of the most successful Chinese television shows of all time. It ran from 1998 to 1999.
Weibo’s equivalent of a hashtag – called a Chaohua – was also censored to bar information about Zhao.
So far, there has been no official explanation as to why Beijing targeted Zhao, though the move has sparked online speculation about possible motives..
Besides acting, Zhao is a businesswoman, film director and pop singer – this versatility is the true source of her massive wealth, and she’s known as one of China’s wealthiest entertainers and one of the only billionaire actors.
Outside of show business, the actress became an early investor in Alibaba Pictures. Her husband partnered with Jack Ma, the founder of Alibaba, in a 2015 private equity deal.
At times, her loyalty to Beijing has been questioned, like in 2016, when a film she directed called “No Other Love” was attacked for inviting Taiwanese actor Leon Dai to be a leading character. Chinese Internet users accused Dai of being an advocate of Taiwanese independence. Zhao was ultimately pressured to change him.
Zhao isn’t the only actress to be targeted by Beijing lately: Chinese actress Zheng Shuang, who was embroiled in a tax evasion scandal earlier this year, was ordered to pay $46.1MM in unpaid taxes, overdue fees and fines this week. It ends an investigation into her finances that reportedly began this spring. Several male Chinese celebrities have also been accused of rape in recent months.
In addition to this censorship, the CCP has issued a new directive attempting to rein in an increasingly unruly fan culture that has created a permissive atmosphere where extreme stalking, leaking of personal information and cyberbullying have become increasingly commonplace. The new regulations would punish platforms that fail to quickly delete verbal attacks directed at fans of different pop stars. The restrictions aim to maintain “political and ideological safety in the cyberspace as well as creating a ‘clean’ Internet.”
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 22:00 - Foreign Syndicates May Have Stolen Up To $400 Billion In COVID Benefits
Foreign Syndicates May Have Stolen Up To $400 Billion In COVID Benefits
Authored by Charles Benavidez via SafeHaven.com,
The now infamous “Nigerian Prince” was never a “prince” and was never royalty of any kind. Instead, he was a suspended advisor to the local governor in one of Nigeria’s states. He didn’t stop at sending you messages with promises of untold riches in return for your bank account information. More recently, he’s been scamming the U.S. federal government’s jobless benefits.
For the “Nigerian Prince”, COVID-19 has been a windfall. But he’s not alone.
As much as $400 billion dollars in unemployment benefits may have fallen, or could fall, into foreign hands, according to some estimates. And it’s been “easy money”.
The “Nigerian Prince” is now known as Abidemi Rufai, and he’s been in US custody since his arrest in May at the JFK International Airport in New York as he prepared to fly first class back to Nigeria.
He is accused of using the identities of more than 100 Washington residents to steal more than $350,000 in unemployment benefits from the Washington State Employment Security Department (ESD) during the COVID-19 pandemic last year.
The Department of Justice document shows that the Nigerian allegedly carried out the fraud by using the stolen identities of American workers.
“In so doing, Rufai caused and attempted to cause the Employment Security Department to pay out federal and other unemployment benefits in excess of $350,000, and fraudulently caused other states to pay out additional benefit payments,” Department of Justice document said.
Rufai is also charged with trying to defraud the Internal Revenue Service of nearly $1.6 million.
According to the IRS, Rufai filed 652 fraudulent tax returns on behalf of taxpayers whose identities he had stolen. The agency’s investigation showed the scheme netted Rufai nearly $900,000, since many of the returns were rejected by the IRS, who had Rufai under investigation for years.
Wire fraud is punishable by up to 30 years in prison, when it relates to benefits paid in connection with a presidentially declared disaster or emergency, such as the COVID-19 pandemic.
Since early last year, the vultures have been descending on the easy money opportunity provided by the pandemic.
The coronavirus pandemic has caused a 4,800% increase in unemployment fraud cases.
According to the Labor Department estimates, in 2020 the federal government lost at least $60 billion on fraudulent or improper unemployment payments.
Yet, according to an estimate by ID.me fraud-detection service, unemployment benefits fraud could easily reach $400 billion. That enormous figure represents nearly half of stimulus unemployment payments. And they claim that most of it ends up in the hands of foreign crime syndicates.
Haywood Talcove, the CEO of LexisNexis Risk Solutions, told Axios that at least 70% of the money stolen ended up in China, Nigeria, Russia and elsewhere.
Some of these syndicates have organized low-wage teams to file phony claims, while others have been able to access the money by stealing personal information or buying it on the dark web.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC), a consumer protection agency, received 1.4 million identity theft reports last year, more than double compared to 2019. Nearly half million people reported that their information was misused to apply for a government benefit, such as unemployment insurance. A year prior, that number was 20,000.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 21:30 - Taiwan Reports Zero COVID Cases For First Time Since Outbreak Began In May
Taiwan Reports Zero COVID Cases For First Time Since Outbreak Began In May
As COVID cases surge in Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia and other countries across East Asia, Taiwan on Saturday achieved another milestone in its battle with COVID: zero new cases were reported for the first time since the biggest outbreak to rock the island first emerged in May. The outbreak has killed 800 people so far.
Taiwan’s strategy for fighting COVID has helped it cement its reputation as a global success story. Recently, the country became one of the first to roll out a home-brewed vaccine to reduce its reliance on foreign companies. Taiwan’s top public health official said the island still has “a long way to go” in its battle, but that the epidemic is now “relatively stable.”
“The local confirmed case today is zero, it was not easy,” the head of the Central Epidemic Command Center, Chen Shih-chung, said on Wednesday. “I believe everyone is happy about this zero, but it doesn’t mean that the Covid-19 is completely cleared in Taiwan. There is still a long way to go, but this zero means that the epidemic is relatively stable.”
The island’s ability to keep COVID out allowed residents to live a mostly normal life for most of 2020 and part of 2021. But an outbreak of the alpha strain in May – believed to have been introduced via airline crews – took root and spread across every county in Taiwan. In response, the government imposed lockdown measures. Some criticized it for not acting quickly enough, but the success of the strategy quickly became evidence.
The lockdown, when it finally came, was pretty strict: the population was forced to live under level three restrictions – out of a 4-tier system – for almost three months. Most of the island dialed back restrictions to level 2 in late July.
During the peak of the alpha-driven outbreak, Taiwan was reporting more than 500 cases a day. The outbreak also caused 818 of Taiwan’s total 830 recorded Covid-19 deaths, including one woman in her 70s who was reported dead on Wednesday.
Source: Worldometer
Chen said this is “just the start of hope”, and authorities would observe the situation for a while as they scramble to get vaccination numbers up.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 21:00 - Health Care Costs For America's Veterans Are Skyrocketing: Report
Health Care Costs For America’s Veterans Are Skyrocketing: Report
Authored by Ken Silva via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
A new study projects that cumulative health care costs for U.S. military veterans will reach as much as $2.5 trillion by 2050—a figure that nearly doubles previous forecasts—raising concern about whether the government will take care of its war vets in the coming decades.
Veterans salute during the singing of the National Anthem in the Oakmont-Verona Cemetery during a memorial service at the 2021 Oakmont-Verona Memorial Day Parade in Oakmont, Penn. on May 31, 2021. (Jeff Swensen/Getty Images) According to research from Brown University’s Costs of War Project, the total costs of caring for post-9/11 war veterans will reach $2.2 trillion to $2.5 trillion from 2001 to 2050. This includes the amount already paid in medical care and benefits, as well as the projected future costs already “baked” into the system, the Aug. 18 report shows.
The study notes that federal expenditures for veteran care have doubled over the past two decades, to 4.9 percent of the U.S. budget in 2020 from 2.4 percent in 2001—even as the total number of living war vets declined to 18.5 million from 25.3 million during that time.
Harvard University professor Linda Bilmes, who authored the study, pointed to several factors that led to the skyrocketing costs.
“Compared to those who served in earlier wars, the post-9/11 troops experienced more frequent and longer deployments, higher levels of exposure to combat, higher rates of survival from injuries, higher incidence of serious disability, and more complex medical treatments,” said Bilmes, the Daniel Patrick Moynihan senior lecturer in public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School.
“Veterans of these conflicts have had access to a broader range of government benefits, improved systems for submitting and appealing disability and healthcare claims, and expanded post-military transition services such as re-entry and employment training.
“Long after the post-9/11 wars end, the largest single long-term cost of these wars will be benefits and medical care for the men and women who served in Afghanistan, Iraq, and related theatres since 2001, and their dependents.”
The Costs of War Project released similar cost projections in 2011 and 2013. Bilmes said her forecast nearly doubles the estimates of the earlier research, attributing this increase to higher-than-expected disabilities and expenditures.
Citing Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data, Bilmes said that more than 40 percent of those who have served in the post-9/11 era have already been certified as having a “service-connected disability,” compared to fewer than 25 percent of veterans from World War II, Korea, Vietnam, and the first Gulf War.
Bilmes also said that more than 20 percent of all post-9/11 era veterans have serious disabilities, compared with fewer than 10 percent of veterans from previous U.S. wars.
The Harvard researcher noted that the post-9/11 veterans have an outsized impact on the health care system, while making up less than a quarter of total living U.S. vets.
“Although this cohort makes up only 24 percent of all living veterans, it accounts for more than half of the severely disabled veteran population in America,” she said. “Over 1 million post-9/11 veterans have significant disabilities.”
Annual health care costs will continue to skyrocket in the coming decades, as the cohort of post-9/11 war vets ages and increases in size, the paper said, pointing to the more than 40 percent of veterans that have already been approved for lifetime disability benefits.
Bilmes raised concerns that the U.S. government could default on its obligations to its veterans. Even though the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) budgets for disability benefits to increase as claims rise over time, “there are always political pressures to cut unfunded entitlements,” she said.
And while cutting veterans’ benefits may seem unconscionable to voters today, the political landscape could look much different in 2050, Bilmes warned. The number of American men who are veterans has halved to one in eight in 2021 from one in four in 2001, and will further decline to one in 14 men by 2040, according to her research.
“By 2050, when the costs of providing medical care and benefits for veterans of the post-9/11 wars reach their peak, few Americans alive will have direct relatives who were involved in these conflicts,” Bilmes said.
Bilmes suggested that veterans should work to guarantee their benefits now, while they still have relatively more political power.
“Postponing this discussion may eventually put veterans’ funding in competition with all the other future claims on federal tax dollars—including paying back the trillions of dollars of debt we incurred to finance the wars in the first place,” Blimes said.
The research paper concluded by recommending a Veterans Trust Fund, which would earmark funds for disability benefits and create awareness of the magnitude of the problem.
“A Veterans Trust Fund would only begin the process of setting aside money for the long-term costs of war, but it would establish the right framework,” Bilmes said. “It would also begin to introduce better financial management into the system.”
The research from the Costs of War Project follows a June 21 report finding that U.S. veterans are committing suicide at record rates. The combined analysis suggests that even though health care costs are skyrocketing, war vets still aren’t having their needs met.
According to the June report, the VA has failed to spend “millions” of dollars set aside for suicide prevention outreach.
“Worse, 31 percent of ‘denied or rejected non-VA emergency care claims were inappropriately processed’ in 2017, meaning veterans had to take on the financial burden of health care for an incredible sum of $716 million,” the June report reads, citing internal VA audits.
“Unless the U.S. government and U.S. society make significant changes in the ways we manage the mental health crisis among our service members and veterans, suicide rates will continue to climb.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 20:30 - Brazilian President Tells Supporters "Buy A Gun, Damn It" Amid Impending Chaos
Brazilian President Tells Supporters “Buy A Gun, Damn It” Amid Impending Chaos
Why on Earth would Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro tell supporters on Friday that “everyone should buy a rifle”? Is the unstable South American emerging economy, suffering from the virus pandemic, rapid food inflation, and out-of-control poverty about to stumble into further socio-economic chaos?
“Everybody has to buy a rifle, damn it! The armed people will never be enslaved. I know it costs a lot. An idiot says: ‘Ah, what you have to buy is beans,’ if you don’t want to, don’t buy the rifle, but do not come to disturb whoever wants to buy it,” Bolsonaro told reporters.
Latin American Telesur’s Nacho Lemus recorded video of the president telling supporters that “in a country with more than half of the population under food insecurity and in the midst of a new increase in the price of food, gasoline, gas, and electricity” now is the time to buy a gun.
En un país con más de la mitad de la población bajo inseguridad alimentaria y en medio de un nuevo aumento en el precio de alimentos, gasolina, gas y energía eléctrica; Bolsonaro: pic.twitter.com/RnVGUJbpUi
— Nacho Lemus (@LemusteleSUR) August 27, 2021
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
Both murders and killings are on the rise in the country, exacerbated by the virus pandemic. A socio-economic economic collapse could be in the making.
Brazilian Real has lost half its value in the past decade. The decline accelerated during the virus pandemic.
While the currency is collapsing, food prices in the country are hyperinflating. Recall what everyone’s favorite permabear, SocGen’s Albert Edwards said in late 2020 that rising food prices will trigger social chaos in emerging market economies first.
The country’s economy is spiraling out of control as Bolsonaro has already threatened to reject the 2022 presidential election’s outcome because he claims it will be rigged.
Bolsonaro promised supporters he would ease gun laws and that’s what he’s done since 2019. The president appears to be preparing supporters for further impending socio-economic chaos or political crisis.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 20:00 - Escobar: 'Forever War' Benefiting Afghans? Follow The Money
Escobar: ‘Forever War’ Benefiting Afghans? Follow The Money
Authored by Pepe Escobar via The Asia Times,
After 20 years and a staggering $2.23 trillion spent in a “forever war” persistently spun as promoting democracy and benefiting the “Afghan people,” it’s legitimate to ask what the Empire of Chaos has to show for it.
The numbers are dire. Afghanistan remains the world’s seventh poorest nation: 47 percent of the population lives below the poverty line, according to the Asian Development Bank. No less than 75 percent of the — dissolved — Kabul government’s budget was coming from international aid. According to the World Bank, that aid was responsible for the turnover of 43 percent of the economy — one that was mired in massive government corruption.
According to the terms of the Washington-Taliban agreement signed in Doha in February 2020, the U.S. should continue to fund Afghanistan during and after its withdrawal.
Now, with the Fall of Kabul and the imminent return of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, it’s becoming clear that applying financial soft power tactics may be even more deadly than a mere NATO occupation.
Washington has frozen $9.5 billion in Afghan Central Bank reserves and the International Monetary Fund has canceled its lending to Afghanistan, including $460 million that’s part of a Covid-19 relief program.
These dollars pay for government salaries and imports. Their absence will lead to the “Afghan people” hurting even more, a direct consequence of inevitable currency depreciation, rising food prices and inflation.
A corollary to this economic tragedy is a classic “take the money and run” caper: Former President Ashraf Ghani fled the country after allegedly packing four cars with $169 million in cash, and leaving $5 million on the tarmac of Kabul airport.
That’s according to two witnesses: one of his own bodyguards and the Afghan ambassador in Tajikistan; Ghani has denied the looting allegations.
Ghani’s plane was denied landing in Tajikistan and also Uzbekistan, proceeding to Oman until Ghani was welcomed in the UAE — very close to Dubai, a global Mecca of smuggling, money laundering and racketeering.
The Taliban have already stated that a new government and a new political and economic framework will be announced only after NATO troops are definitively out of the country next month.
The complex negotiations to form an “inclusive” government, as repeatedly promised by Taliban spokesmen, are de facto led on the non-Taliban side by two members of a council of three: former President Hamid Karzai and Ghani’s eternal rival, the leader of the High Council for National Reconciliation, Abdullah Abdullah. The third member, acting in the shadows, is warlord-turned-politician and two-time prime minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar.
Karzai and Abdullah, both vastly experienced, are regarded by the Americans as “acceptable,” so that may go a long way in terms of facilitating future, official Western recognition of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan and restored multilateral institution funding.
Yet there are myriad problems including the very active role of Khalil Haqqani, who leads the Taliban Peace Council Commission while on a “terror watch list” and under UN sanctions. Not only is Haqqani in charge of Kabul’s security; he’s also side by side with Karzai and Abdullah in the discussions to form an inclusive government.
What Makes the Taliban Run
The Taliban have been operating outside of the Western banking system for two decades now. The bulk of their income comes from transit tax on trade routes (for instance, from Iran) and fuel levies. Profits from opium and heroin exports (domestic consumption not permitted) reportedly account for less than 10 percent of their income.
In countless villages across the deep Afghan countryside, the economy revolves around petty cash transactions and barter.
I received a copy of a high-level Pakistani academia-intelligence paper examining the challenges facing the new Afghan government.
The paper notes that “the standard route of development to be followed will be very pro-people. Taliban’s Islam is socialist. It has an aversion towards wealth being accumulated in fewer hands” — and, crucially, also an aversion to usury.
On the initial steps towards development projects, the paper expects them to come from Russian, Chinese, Turkish, Iranian and Pakistani companies — as well as a few government sectors. The Islamic Emirate “expects infrastructure development packages” at costs that are “affordable by the country’s existing GDP.”
Afghanistan’s nominal GDP in 2020 was $19.8 billion, according to World Bank figures.
New aid and investment packages are expected to come from some Shanghai Cooperation Organization member nations (Russia, China, Pakistan) or SCO observers (Turkey and currently Iran – scheduled to become a full member at the SCO summit next month in Tajikistan). Inbuilt is the notion that Western recognition will be a Sisyphean task.
The paper admits that the Taliban have not had time to evaluate how the economy will be the key vector deciding Afghanistan’s future independence.
But this passage of the paper may hold the key:
“In their consultations with the Chinese, they were advised to go slow and not rock the boat of the Western world system by talking too soon about state control of capitalism, interest-free economy, and de-linking from the IMF-based financial system. However, since the West has pulled back all the money from the Afghan exchequer, Afghanistan is likely to apply for short-term aid packages against their resource base.”
IMF-NATO as Brothers in Arms
I asked Michael Hudson, an economics professor at the University of Missouri Kansas City and Peking University, how he would recommend the new government to act. He answered, “For one thing, embarrass the hell out of the IMF for acting as an arm of NATO.”
Hudson referred to a Wall Street Journal article written by a former IMF advisor now with the Atlantic Council as saying that “now, since recognition is frozen, banks all over the world will hesitate to do business with Kabul. This move provides the U.S. with leverage to negotiate with the Taliban.”
So, this may be going the Venezuela way – with the IMF not “recognizing” a new government for months and even years. And on the seizure of Afghan gold by the New York Fed – actually a collection of private banks – we see echoes of the looting of Libya’s and seizure of Venezuela’s gold.
Hudson sees all of the above as “an abuse of the international monetary system – which is supposed to be a public utility — as an arm of NATO run by the U.S. IMF behavior, especially regarding the new drawing rights, should be presented as a litmus test” for the viability of a Taliban-led Afghanistan.
Hudson is now working on a book about the collapse of antiquity. His research led him to find Cicero, in In Favor of the Manilian Law (Pro Lege Manilia), writing about Pompeus’ military campaign in Asia and its effects on the provinces in a passage that perfectly applies to the “forever war” in Afghanistan:
“Words cannot express, gentlemen, how bitterly hated we are among foreign nations because of the wanton and outrageous conduct of the men whom in recent years we have sent to govern them. For, in those countries, what temple do you suppose had been held sacred by our officers, what state inviolable, what home sufficiently guarded by its closed doors? Why, they look about for rich and flourishing cities that they may find an occasion for a war against them to satisfy their lust for plunder.”
Switching from the classics to a more pedestrian level, WikiLeaks has been replaying a sort of Afghanistan Greatest Hits, reminding public opinion, for instance, that as far back as 2008 there was already “no pre-defined end date” for the “forever war.”
Yet the most concise assessment may have come from Julian Assange himself:
“The goal is to use Afghanistan to wash money out of the tax bases of the U.S. and Europe through Afghanistan and back into the hands of a transnational security elite. The goal is an endless war, not a successful war.”
The “forever war” may have been a disaster for the bombed, invaded and impoverished “Afghan people,” but it was an unmitigated success for what Ray McGovern so memorably defines as the MICIMATT (Military-Industrial-Counter-Intelligence-Media-Academia-Think Tank) complex. Anyone who bought stocks of Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon and the rest of that crowd made —literally — a killing.
Facts are indeed dire. Barack Obama – who presided over a hefty Afghan “kill list” – throws a birthday party and invites the woke nouveaux riches. Julian Assange suffers psychological torture imprisoned in Belmarsh. And Ashraf Ghani mulls how to spend $169 million in the Dubai rackets, funds some say were duly stolen from the “Afghan people.”
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 19:30 - Holy Cow – Australian Beef Prices Hit Record High As Food Inflation Concerns Persist
Holy Cow – Australian Beef Prices Hit Record High As Food Inflation Concerns Persist
After decades of low inflation and relatively cheap food prices, those days appear over as food inflation soars worldwide. The latest observation that food prices are out of control is in Australia.
Australian cattle futures are at record-highs as farm operators hold back livestock from slaughterhouses to rebuild herds after years of drought forced many cattle operators to cull herds. Supply disruptions have resulted in the benchmark Eastern Young Cattle Index soaring to A$10.082 ($7.26) a kilogram. From the 2020 low, prices have more than doubled in a year.
A$10.082 ($7.26) per kilogram is the highest price paid back to 1997 when the contracts began trading. Bloomberg notes the high prices “has raised the risks that the nation’s steaks will slip off global menus — while worldwide demand for beef is robust in many markets.”
The surge in prices could mean the nation’s beef producers, number two in the world behind Brazil, might lose that spot as exports slump. This means Australian global importers will go elsewhere for cheaper meat. In the first six months, beef exports slumped 24% versus the same period last year.
Soaring beef prices means exports drop as global importers look elsewhere for affordable meat. Reminder, exports are inverted on the chart below.
The fact that food prices continue to rise undercuts the transitory inflation narrative that the Federal Reserve and mainstream media have been brainwashing everyone with for nearly a year.
In the States, major meat producer Tyson Foods Inc. warned in their latest conference call to investors that higher costs are hitting the firm faster than the company can lift prices, and retail prices are set to rise on Sept. 5.
The inflation shock is underway as food inflation is at record highs, and supermarket prices are expected to rise 10-14% later this fall.
Food inflation has become such a problem for the working poor and unemployed that the Biden administration has raised food stamp allocations.
Get used to elevated food prices. It appears they will be sticking around through at least 2022.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 19:00 - Another National-Headline Hate Crime That Wasn't
Another National-Headline Hate Crime That Wasn’t
Authored by Brian McGlinchey via Stark Realities,
In mid-May, news broke of a disturbing incident at Bucknell University: Outlets across the country reported that, on the eve of final exams, a mob of 15 to 20 intolerant male students had victimized the school’s LGBTQ community via an attack on a residence hall established as a “safe space” for community members.
The intruders were members of a former Tau Kappa Epsilon (TKE) fraternity chapter that was shut down in 2019 over hazing violations. Before hosting the “Fran’s House” LGBTQ residential group, the building at the center of the disturbance was TKE’s decades-long home at Bucknell. Students living in the house said the TKE brothers banged on doors and windows, yelling, “Let us in…this isn’t your home…this is our home.” One apparently exposed himself; someone allegedly urinated on the porch.
Bucknell University – Lewisburg, Pennsylvania That same evening, the house’s residential advisor published a lengthy and emotionally-charged open letter to Bucknell President John Bravman, recounting how the experience of “20 inebriated former fraternity members harass(ing) the LGBTQ+ community” left his “legs shaking with adrenaline.”
On the morning after the disturbance, Bucknell raced to issue a statement condemning what it called a “horrific incident.” In a fateful contradiction, the university simultaneously promised an independent investigation to ascertain the facts while embracing the assumption that this was an attack on the LGBTQ community.
“We cannot erase the ugliness and subsequent trauma of last night’s transgression against the students of Fran’s House and, implicitly, many others, but we can commit to addressing it in a way that protects LGBTQ Bucknellians and better ensures their safety in the future,” said the statement issued by Bravman along with the school’s provost and its associate provost for equity and inclusive excellence.
Bucknell’s dramatically-worded embrace of the hate crime narrative poured gasoline on the public relations fire. By characterizing the episode as a “horrific incident” against LGBTQ students that left administrators “sorrowful,” the university handed journalists and editors just what they needed for sensational, click-inducing coverage.
Stories erupted at the nation’s most prominent outlets, with headlines describing a shocking hate crime at the highly selective Pennsylvania school:
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The New York Times: Bucknell Investigating “Horrific” Harassment of LGBTQ Students
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USA Today: Bucknell University Condemns “Horrific” Attack on LGBTQ Residence: “We Are Outraged and Sorrowful”
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The Washington Post: “Horrific” Attack on LGBTQ House Sparks University Investigation
Social media lit up with indignation. A professor arranged for people to take shifts standing guard outside the house. Students organized a “solidarity march against toxic masculinity.” TKE’s national office condemned the incident as an “act of intolerance.”
And then, two months after the school’s nationwide hate-crime humiliation, Bucknell announced that a university-commissioned independent investigation by law firm Cozen O’Connor “found no evidence that the students outside of Fran’s House on May 13 were motivated by bias against the residents and their affinity as an LGBTQ+ community.”
Good luck finding that news at the Washington Post, New York Times, USA Today, NBC News, CNN, Fox News, New York Post, The Hill, Boston Globe, The Advocate, New York Daily News, Insider Higher Ed, Los Angeles Blade, Yahoo News, Buzzfeed, Seattle Times and countless other outlets that pushed the false, Bucknell-encouraged hate crime angle.
Hate Motive Doubtful from the Start
I took special interest in this incident: I graduated from Bucknell and I’ve been an enthusiastic booster of my alma mater.
When I first saw the headlines, I was embarrassed that such an ugly event happened at Bucknell. As I read the details, however, I immediately grew skeptical about the hate crime narrative and troubled by the university’s official statement.
From all accounts, it sounded like drunk senior-class TKEs—still deeply resentful of the university’s closure of their chapter—took a final trip to their cherished former home and obnoxiously took out their lingering anger at the expense of whomever was unlucky enough to be occupying it.
Consistent with that, something was conspicuously absent from the witness accounts: any claim that homophobic, transphobic or similar slurs were directed at them. Rather, the TKEs yelled, “This isn’t your home…it’s our home.”
As supposed evidence of an anti-LGBTQ motive, the residential advisor said the TKEs “(swung) a metal bar at our flag pole that displays our pride flag.” However, it seems plausible the inebriated intruders would have taken a swat at any flag on “their” house other than a TKE flag.
I wasn’t the only doubter of the hate crime narrative. Days after the incident, freelance journalist and self-described former “gay frat boy” Skylar Baker-Jordan, writing at Medium, said his initial reaction was “outrage.” After diving into the details, though, he concluded “there is nothing in this reporting to suggest what happened was a targeted attack on the LGBT community.”
It’s one thing for the occupants of the LGBTQ house—rattled by a jarring disturbance—to leap to the conclusion they were targeted because of their LGBTQ status. It’s another for the university to embrace that assumption in a message to the campus community and the media.
Reacting to a CNN story, a Bucknell classmate texted me his own thoughts, which concisely summed up the situation: “Don’t think it was quite an intentional LGBTQ hate crime, but it is now.”
Officials at Bucknell University, located in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania, condemned a “horrific” incident in which LGBTQ students were harassed at an affinity house last week, according to a statement released by the school. https://t.co/H7KCHThiuS
— NBC News (@NBCNews) May 17, 2021
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
Hate Crime Assumption a Recurring Phenomenon
In Bucknell administration offices, in newsrooms, dorm rooms and across social media, the fact that LGBTQ students lived in the house was enough to trigger firm convictions that the fraternity brothers’ trespassing was motivated by anti-LGBTQ bias.
Had a different special interest group happened to live in the former TKE house, we’d likely have seen headlines decrying a racist, xenophobic or anti-semitic attack at Bucknell. On the other hand, as Baker-Jordan wrote in May, “Had (this) been a regular dorm, this never would have made national news.”
The Bucknell incident exemplifies a broader phenomenon in which aggression directed at people who are members of a minority group is assumed to be motivated by the victims’ status. Of many examples of this national syndrome, two stand out as particularly illustrative.
In March, a white man attacked three massage parlors in Atlanta, killing eight workers. The killer’s whiteness and the fact that six of the dead were Asian women was enough to ignite a media, government official and public uproar characterizing the attack as a racist, anti-Asian hate crime.
In the immediate aftermath, the Washington Post alone published sixteen articles framing the attacks as racially motivated. Then we learned the killer had patronized some of the parlors he attacked. He told police he’d battled sex addiction and lashed out at the parlors because he viewed them as a source of temptation—not because of the heavily Asian demographic profile of their employees.
In 2016, Omar Mateen murdered 49 people and wounded 53 others at Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando. Five years later, politicians and activists continue to promote the fiction that Mateen was driven by anti-LGBTQ bias. There is absolutely no evidence to substantiate that assumption and plenty to contradict it.
Clinging to hate crime mythology about the Pulse attack isn’t just a dishonest means of advancing the LGBTQ cause, it also does harm by hiding Mateen’s real motive: He made it emphatically clear he killed in retaliation for the U.S. bombing of Muslims in the Middle East. Burying that motive diminishes Americans’ ability to weigh the domestic costs of their government’s foreign interventions.
As if baseless assumptions about real events weren’t enough to thwart Americans’ ability to gauge actual levels of intolerance in the country, the picture is further muddied by outright hate crime hoaxes, such as a black student writing racist graffiti at Albion College in April.
Kentucky State University criminal justice and political science professor Wilfred Reilly has created a database of hundreds of such hate crime hoaxes and written a book about the phenomenon.
Bucknell’s Reaction a Disservice to the University and LGBTQ People Everywhere
Particularly where college administrators are concerned, the urge to overreact and baselessly authenticate the hate-victim claims of aggrieved parties is, to some extent, understandable.
After all, in a woke culture that declares “silence is violence,” administrators who fail to immediately embrace the victims’ narrative run the risk that an activist mob will turn its wrath on school officials, accusing them of being “part of the problem.”
On top of the danger to reputations and job security, there’s the chance they could find themselves, like the president of Evergreen State College, who was essentially taken prisoner in his own office. Of course, however imperative it may seem while under duress, abandoning reason, respect for facts and due process has its own costs.
Given Bucknell’s subsequent investigation found no evidence that the TKEs’ hooliganism was motivated by anti-LGBTQ bias, the university’s statement implicitly endorsing the bias-motive claim fed a media misinformation frenzy that baselessly bruised the school’s reputation. Needlessly embarrassing alumni, students and faculty wasn’t the only bad outcome: The university’s approach surely stoked undue anxiety among LGBTQ people across the country.
“Stories like this, framed in a way to suggest there was some concerted attack on the LGBT community…help perpetuate an unwarranted climate of fear on our campuses,” wrote Baker-Jordan, who noted that support for gay and lesbian people has doubled over the last 30 years. “This was not a targeted attack on the LGBT community, rather a fraternity party gone too far. That distinction matters, because I do not want LGBT students feeling any less safe than they need to feel.”
By cultivating excessive fear via a false account of what happened at Bucknell, the nationwide mischaracterization of the incident feeds a cycle where subsequent incidents in other places will be more prone to misinterpretation too. It should be also be noted, that, while some of the TKE brothers who descended on their former house were apparently guilty of harsh, intrusive and lewd behavior that frightened members of Fran’s House, the university’s May 14 implication that the TKEs had carried out an anti-LGBTQ attack was inconsistent with the ideals of due process and fair treatment of the accused.
I asked Bucknell if President Bravman regretted the May 14 statement language, or if the university wished to acknowledge any lessons learned from the barrage of bad publicity invited by Bucknell’s dramatically-worded embrace of a false narrative.
A university spokesperson referred me to Bravman’s July 12 statement that “summarizes findings of the investigation and represents Bucknell’s final position on the incident.” However, that statement lacks any evaluation of the administration’s handling of the episode.
Meanwhile, since there’s been essentially no follow-up reporting that an outside investigation contradicted the school’s initial stance, for too many people, their “final position” is that Bucknell had a “horrific” anti-LGBTQ incident in May.
Bucknell Grants LGBTQ Group’s Request
In an open letter posted shortly after the incident, Bucknell’s LGBTQ residential affinity group requested it be assigned a permanent residence: “Under no circumstances should Fran’s House be in jeopardy of losing their physical space due to the requirements Bucknell enforces to fill roster spots as opposed to creating inclusive living spaces.”
In July, when Bravman announced the findings of the investigation, he declared the former TKE house would become “the permanent campus affinity house for LGBTQ+ students and their allies.” When it made its plea for a permanent space, the LGBTQ residential affinity group said, “Never again should someone feel entitled to come to our home and say it’s ‘their house and not ours’.”
At the same time, let’s hope Bucknell University will never again undermine its own reputation by impulsively endorsing a false narrative.
* * *
Stark Realities undermines official narratives, demolishes conventional wisdom and exposes fundamental myths across the political spectrum. Read more and subscribe at starkrealities.substack.com
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 18:30 -
- The Bear Case In 12 "Charts Of Darkness"
The Bear Case In 12 “Charts Of Darkness”
While most sellside analysts and strategists are throwing in the towel as the market continues its relentless meltup (one which according to Goldman is becoming increasingly “painful” for the bank’s institutional clients most of whom have taken the other side of the trade), there are still a handful of hold outs who refuse to chase the price action and instead have made a stand of sorts, predicting that it’s just a matter of time before stocks reverse much of their 2021 gains.
One such stubborn holdout is BofA whose Chief Investment Strategist, Michael Hartnett has for much of the past six months been warning that a stagflationary bust in the economy is coming, in keeping with BofA’s year-end target of 3,800.
Last Friday, in his weekly Flow Show notes, Hartnett went so far as to put a tentative time for when he expects stocks to reverse. Pointing out that the annual change in stocks closely tracks that of the ISM/PMIs with a slight lag, Hartnett said that October is when the chickens will come home to roost as that’s when the .average ISM PMI will turn negative, with stocks set to follow.
It’s not just the correlation: in keeping with his favorite 3Ps – Policy, Prices and Profits – Hartnett lays out several other reasons why the 4th P, the party, can’t keep going on forever. Here are some of his observations in the context of the 3Ps:
- On policy: investors have zero fear of central banks…NZRB baulked at raising rates this week despite NZ house prices up 30%; Fed has bought $4tn bonds past 18 months (2X amount US spent on War in Afghanistan past 20 years), global central banks have spent $834mn every hour buying bonds since COVID, US government spending $875mn every hour in ’21…little wonder everyone believes in TINA & BTD.
- On prices: stimulus has caused immense inflation of Wall St assets; more recently inflation on Main St…July 6-month annualized US CPI 7.8%, core US CPI 6.8%, US house prices (May) 19.7%; Canada CPI @ 20-year high; UK/Canada/NZ/Australia real estate surging; “pipeline inflation” PPI’s popping in US/China/Japan; secular themes of geopolitical risk and nationalism crushing globalization remain inflationary.
- On profits: V-shape recovery was v strong but inflation now inducing stagflation; economic surprise indices -ve in US/China/Japan, auto production plummeting in US/Germany/Japan, US consumer confidence smacked to 10-year lows, US home sales – 13% from peak; China growth wobbling, US consumer has peaked, US fiscal optimism fading, Fed potential “policy mistake”…rising risk of autumn “flash recession” (likely revealed via sharp dip in global PMI’s).
Hartnett concluded by predicting “negative returns stocks & credit in H2”, but one week later, both stocks and credit keep rising, with the S&P closing above 4,500 for the first time.
So fast forward one week when in his latest Friday Flow Show, Hartnett – getting more and more gloomy as a result of the meltup that just one stop – published a note titled Charts of Darkness, which recaps his pent-up disillusionment with the market in the form of a thematic “dirty dozen” charts on the pandemic, the macro dislocations, wealth inequality caused by the central bank liquidity supernova, coming stagflation & the H2 EPS risks from the US consumer, China & credit markets.
So without further ado, let’s go down the list of charts starting with…
Pandemic: COVID-19 pandemic by the numbers…5.1 billion vaccinations, 214 million cases, 4.5 million deaths (Chart 3); the policy reaction…$32 trillion of monetary and fiscal stimulus; the Wall St reaction…global stock market capitalization up $57 trillion in 18 months; despite >5bn vaccines, societies & economies remain hostage to the pandemic, allowing Wall St to discount endless stimulus to the benefit of asset prices; the “end” of the pandemic will be very negative for Wall St, but few think it “ends” soon.
Pandemic & Wall St: the battle between lockdown & reopening battle has caused significant relative asset price movements; the performance of reopening vs lockdown baskets is highly correlated with bond yields (Chart 4) as well as the relative performance of HY bonds vs IG bonds, small cap stocks vs large cap, value vs growth and so on (see last week’s Flow Show); the Delta variant in the past two months has caused “lockdown” to outperform “reopening”.
Pandemic & Main St: pandemic and emergency support for the economy has also led to massive dislocations in the economy, most evident in massive supply disruptions to goods, services & labor markets, which in combination with a “transitory” surge in consumer spending, has led to a significant inflation of goods, services & wages; note US retail sales (which have peaked) are roughly 20% above pre-COVID levels, while US payrolls are 7 million below their pre-COVID levels, despite record levels of job offers (see Chart 5); the pandemic has not only dislocated local labor markets, it is also accelerating the trend away from globalization toward isolationism; local and global supply chains are unlikely to mend anytime soon…stagflation the new investment backdrop to markets.
The Fed & Inequality: the central bank response to COVID-19 has “accelerated” inequality; between 1950 and the late-90s tech bubble, the ratio of US private sector financials assets (Wall Street proxy) vs the GDP of the US (Main Street proxy) oscillated between 2.5x and 3.5x; the radical interventionist policy of Quantitative Easing since the GFC has seen global central banks buy $22.4tn of financial assets (Fed & ECB have launched 7 QE programs – Chart 6), boosting the valuation of financial assets in the US to 6.4x the size of GDP.
The Fed & Tech: Fed’s determination to stoke Wall St exuberance & Main St inequality has been particularly positive to the US tech sector; the market cap of FAAMG + Netflix & Tesla equates to the 3rd largest country in the world in GDP terms; the Fed has been tech’s best friend for the past 10 years (Chart 7)…it’s no coincidence that since the outbreak of COVID-19 global central banks have bought $834mn of financial assets every 60 minutes…and every 60 minutes the market cap of global tech stocks has risen $780mn.
The Fed & the BoJ & the ECB: BoJ has operated a zero interest rate policy for over 20 years, the ECB for almost 10 years, neither have been able normalize monetary policy, and both remain the “cement in the Fed’s shoes” (Chart 8); note zero rates in Europe & Japan in recent decades have not been asset positive; the US is different with a housing market that still is rate-sensitive, and a behemoth tech sector within the domestic equity market.
Monetary tightening: the V-shape economy recovery since Q1’20 (Chart 9) & the inflation of asset prices, housing prices, commodity prices, consumer prices, is causing a very slow & protracted turn in monetary policy; for example, in 2021 there have been 41 rate hikes and 11 cuts (c/o 5 rate hikes & 95 cuts in 2020); the most important central bank in the world, the Fed, has thus far remained steadfastly against a tightening of monetary policy; but the inflation of asset prices, housing prices, commodity prices, consumer prices means the Fed’s liquidity tailwind is likely to weaken dramatically in coming quarters.
Inflation: inflation has soared in 2021 and it is highly unlikely to vanish as quickly as it appeared given the structural changes (War against Inequality) and pandemic unintended consequences (supply chain dislocation); in the past 6 months the annualized rate of CPI inflation was 7.8%, of core inflation was 6.8% (Chart 10), US house prices was 19.7% (May) and “pipeline inflation” PPI’s are popping higher in US/China/Japan.
Inflation vs deflation: investors are structurally positioned for deflation; as cyclical bears we think H2’21 will see outperformance of high quality defensives; but we continue to argue that longer-term the inflation theme will win and the US dollar will lose; note YTD in 2021 inflation assets are outperforming deflation assets (see Chart 11 for definitions) for the 1st time since 2016.
Peak profits: the BofA Global EPS model says global EPS peak was ≈ 40% in April (model driven by China FCI, Asia exports, global PMI, US yield curve); global EPS is projected to decelerate very sharply to 9% by November (Chart 12); this will be driven by inflation, supply bottlenecks, unwillingness of companies to increase inventories given Delta, peak US consumption, China economic weakness, fiscal cliffs and geopolitical risks; decelerating profit growth means quality>junk, defensives>cyclicals tactically.
China: EM stocks are approaching 20-year low versus S&P500 (Chart 13); big lows in EM are normally triggered by cathartic events (LTCM, 9/11, Lehman) but EM unambiguously where the secular value is, e.g. EM bonds cheapest relative to US high yield in 20 years; China has been the lead indicator for the virus, the lockdown, the reopening, the tech boom, the tapering, the tightening; China HY spreads have risen sharply to 1277bps, as investors fret about a “credit event” in China.
Credit: credit leads stocks and financial repression continues to keep spreads low (excluding China); but note the relative underperformance of HY bonds vs IG bonds, not a good leading indicator for stocks (Chart 14).
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 18:00 - Do National COVID Mandates Fulfill The Public Good?
Do National COVID Mandates Fulfill The Public Good?
Authored by Scott Mason via The Epoch Times,
A crisis has now darkened Western democracies just as surely as long-benighted dictatorships.
Wherein does it lie? In the disdain with which its proud technocrats dismiss conscience. Conscience is no quantifiable thing; it has no weight or measure, and it cannot be listed among a nation’s assets. Science can’t prove it exists.
Yet conscience is no mere trifle. Conscience distinguishes humanity from the brutes of creation. It is the little spark of celestial fire that motivated the obedience of our nations’ greatest heroes in their darkest hour. It is the voice of God in the soul.
Over the past 18 months, our fundamental freedoms have all been assaulted by a virus. The public incursions against freedom have been protested, but the small private matter of conscience has received scant attention.
Why? Because it is the casualty of “friendly fire”—by friends who never acknowledged it.
Conscience was caught in the politicians’ war on COVID-19 and its variants. They confessed their faith in science to defeat it. Progress demanded it. Computer models predicted the threat to the control of “the system” of public health to be so terrible that to defend their Technopoly, as coined by Neil Postman in his book of the same name, politicians seized extraordinary emergency powers to aid science in its certain victory.
This unwavering faith in science was completely irrational, if not unscientific. Science itself tells us that viruses are not living organisms. They cannot be killed. They also mutate. All the gains from rushing the slow safety protocols of science to contain last year’s virus were swiftly lost in subsequent variants.
As the unflagging determination to win the war continues, the illogic of the position grows. That is because it never was a fight about science—it was a fight to defend the pride of the idol of technocracy and extend its dominance. That means more control for the technocrats.
The Pfizer vaccine now fully approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is a marvel of speed and deployment. But its success rate of 39 percent against the dominant Delta variant would have never got it to trial a year ago. The FDA’s Aug. 23 approval seems more a participation trophy for “speed and application” than for actual success.
But my concern is not to observe this evident absurdity. It is to note the moral consequence of fighting an extended, vain war against an immortal and invisible enemy, with no defined exit strategy.
For it is now abundantly clear. Approving a failed vaccine while mandating passports allows for a permanent group of second-class citizens even after a state of emergency has ended. And it normalizes mandatory vaccinations for everyone, even when they are not useful.
In September, Quebec and B.C. will require vaccination passports for non-essential activities, and some other provinces are considering following suit, while the federal government is planning to mandate vaccinations for commercial air, train, and cruise ship passengers as well as for all federal employees. We’d be naive to think it’ll stop there.
Consciences are being crushed in the mission creep. Why do I cite conscience as a problem?
When politicians waived the legal liability of the vaccine manufacturers, they also demanded the medical community set aside its ethics, first through a sustained “campaign” of pressure to “take the shot” and now through mandates. If the campaign of pressure defied the bedrock ethical principle of informed consent established in the Nuremberg Code, then the mob’s call for mandates on doctors and patients to defend our idol of technocracy is in defiance of our very essence as human beings.
Martin Luther once noted that “to go against conscience is neither right nor safe.” The great civil rights activist Martin Luther King Jr. echoed his words. In his autobiography, he writes:
“On some positions, Cowardice asks the question, ‘Is it safe?’ Expedience asks the question, ‘Is it politic?’ And Vanity comes along and asks the question ‘Is it popular?’ But Conscience asks the question, ‘Is it right?’ … The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of convenience, but where he stands in moments of challenge, moments of great crisis and controversy.”
The worth of individual conscience is the great legacy of the West, and its blessings have spread with the Nuremberg Code, and in political defences of conscience.
But we are on the eve of its eclipse.
We are rejecting the lesson of history. Individuals ignore their conscience at the peril of their own souls, and when technocratic science is given the lead over the conscience of the nation, so much greater is the ruin. This can however be avoided.
English playwright George Bernard Shaw described a Native American elder’s account of his own struggles with conscience: “Inside of me there are two dogs. One of the dogs is mean and evil. The other dog is good. The mean dog fights the good dog all the time. When asked which dog wins, he reflected for a moment and replied, ‘the one I feed the most.’”
The moral goodness of the freedom of association, the freedom of peaceful assembly, the freedom of thought and expression, and the freedom of conscience and religion are enshrined as fundamental rights in Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms. They have been set aside these last 18 months under the auspices of an emergency. The good dog has been deprived of his food.
The question I would ask Canadians and our politicians is: What sort of nation is being preserved when fundamental civil liberties have been cast aside and the inviolability of conscience has been despoiled as a medical necessity, a casualty of war? What sort of country will we return to, and what will our children inherit when the freedoms our Charter calls “fundamental” give way to appeals to what is safe, or politic, or popular, rather than what is right?
It is indeed a time of crisis.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 17:30 - Kabul Attack Biden's "Worst Nightmare", He'll "Have To Go Back In" – Says Obama's CIA Director
Kabul Attack Biden’s “Worst Nightmare”, He’ll “Have To Go Back In” – Says Obama’s CIA Director
Having beheld a disastrous two-decade long failed war and occupation, with immense US blood and treasure lost, and over $2.3 trillion spent and counting – and now with horrific suicide blasts killing over 100 people including 13 US troops during the chaotic exit – the national security state hawks are already pushing for Washington to get straight back into the fight.
Former CIA chief and ex-Defense Secretary under Obama, Leon Panetta, is urging just that. On the day of the twin suicide attacks at Kabul airport he went on CNN to say President Biden will have to “go back in” if he wants to avenge the deaths of Americans on Thursday.
Getty Images “I understand that we’re trying to get our troops out of there. But the bottom line is we can leave a battlefield, but we can’t leave the war on terrorism, which still is a threat to our security,” he said on CNN’s OutFront news show. This after the Afghan Islamic State group known as ISIS-K took responsibility for the attacks, which had also reportedly taken out dozens of Taliban members.
Panetta was CIA Director at the height of the so-called ‘global war on terror’ – from 2009 through 2011 – and then became Obama’s Secretary of Defense through 2013.
Here’s more of what he had to say on the Kabul attacks in context:
“We’re going to have to go back in to get ISIS,” Panetta told CNN, calling Thursday’s twin suicide blasts by the reinvigorated terrorist group “Joe Biden’s worst nightmare.”
“We’re probably going to have to go back in when al Qaeda resurrects itself, as they will, with this Taliban,” he predicted.
“They gave safe haven to al Qaeda before, they’ll probably do it again,” predicted Panetta, who was the director of the CIA and oversaw the US operation that killed the terror group’s leader, Osama bin Laden.
“I understand that we’re trying to get our troops out of there, but the bottom line is, we can leave a battlefield, but we can’t leave the War on Terrorism, which still is a threat to our security,” he told CNN.
Panetta specifically referenced Biden’s promise to “hunt down” the terrorists responsible to make them pay the price.
Former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta on the Kabul airport attack.
“It’s probably Joe Biden’s worst nightmare to lose 13 marines as a result of what’s happened here. This has got to be the worst day of his administration.” pic.twitter.com/3TGMihGskn
— CNN Early Start (@EarlyStart) August 27, 2021
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He also underscored that “This has got to be the worst day in his administration.”
Foreign Interventions always look easier to rationalize going in
— EHSANI22 (@EHSANI221) August 26, 2021
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Like other hawks that are former defense and intelligence officials who make frequent appearances in the media, it’s clear Panetta is deeply unhappy with the move to pull completely out of Afghanistan in the first place. Typically there’s isn’t a US military intervention they aren’t in favor of.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 17:00 - Israel to "Accelerate" Covert Action Against Iran, Black Budget "Earmarked": IDF Chief
Israel to “Accelerate” Covert Action Against Iran, Black Budget “Earmarked”: IDF Chief
Just on the heels of Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s remarks to The New York Times this week wherein he openly acknowledged plans to continue covert attacks on Iran, the Chief of Staff of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), Lt.-Gen. Aviv Kohavi, has followed with his own threat.
“The progress of the Iranian nuclear program has led the IDF to accelerate its operational plans and the recently approved defense budget is earmarked for that,” Kohavi said according to a Jerusalem Post report published Wednesday.
IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Aviv Kochavi, Wikimedia Commons The IDF chief weighing in to confirm Bennet’s words reveal that the Israeli PM’s comments to the Times this week were not mere political rhetoric or mere posturing. “Kohavi has made it clear that he views the JCPOA as dangerous, saying publicly that he has directed the IDF to prepare fresh operational plans to strike Iran to stop its nuclear program if necessary,” Jerusalem Post continues.
PM Bennett and his top General Kohavi now openly declaring Israel’s intent to step up covert sabotage and espionage attacks against the Iranians is somewhat unprecedented, given that in prior years it remained Israel’s policy to not comment on clandestine intelligence operations. It remains rare if not unheard of for any country to publicly announce plans for covert aggression against sovereign states.
Ahead of his expected visit to the White House to meet with President Biden which was originally planned for Thursday, but delayed to Friday due to the blasts at Kabul airport which killed American soldiers and many more Afghan civilians, PM Bennett spoke of plans for “clandestine attacks” and espionage targeting the Islamic Republic and its nuclear program. He also made reference to what he called “the gray-area stuff”.
This new approach of brazenly declaring intent to mount “gray-area” attacks appears directed not just at Tehran, but toward putting pressure on the Biden administration to halt its pursuit of a restored Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) nuclear deal.
It suggests Israel is ready to resort to extreme measures as it attempts to press the White House to abandon Vienna talks. The Jerusalem Post underscores that “With no diplomatic options likely to push Tehran to stop its nuclear program, Israel’s military believes that the Islamic Republic needs to be aware that should it continue with its program, it will face harsher sanctions and a true military option to stop it.”
Bennett is expected to brief Biden on a plan to continue covert attacks on Iran’s nuclear program while aligning a group of like-minded Arab nations to counter Iran’s regional influence. https://t.co/gtwEB2r7n5
— William Domoney (@Panzerfrank) August 26, 2021
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A couple of the most notable major clandestine operations widely blamed on Israel, and which Israeli officials themselves later appeared to own up to, include the Natanz centrifuge assembly facility explosion in July 2020, and the assassination of Iran’s top nuclear scientist outside of Tehran in November 2020.
Israel has also conducted hundreds of airstrikes in Syria in recent years, which Israeli officials have claimed are primarily aimed at disrupting Iranian and Hezbollah operations, despite both being there at the invitation of the Syrian government under Bashar al-Assad.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 16:30 - Chicago Judge Strips Mother Of Parental Rights For Being Unvaccinated
Chicago Judge Strips Mother Of Parental Rights For Being Unvaccinated
A few weeks ago, we shared the story of a 21-year-old man from Ohio who, after being arrested for fentanyl possession, was legally required by the judge overseeing his case to get vaccinated as a condition of his probation.
Now, in a terrifying glimpse of what might be in store for parents who refuse to vaccinate their kids, a judge in Cook County Illinois (which includes Chicago and some of the surrounding area) has taken away the parental rights of a woman due to her refusal to get vaccinated.
In what all parties agree is a very unusual and perhaps unprecedented step, a judge at Chicago’s Daley Center has stripped Rebecca Firlit of custody due to her refusal to get vaccinated.
“I miss my son more than anything. It’s been very difficult. I haven’t seen him since Aug. 10,” Firlit told a local Fox affiliate station in an interview.
That’s the day Firlit appeared in court via Zoom, accompanied by her ex-husband, for a child support hearing involving her 11-year-old son. The two have been divorced for seven years and share custody and parenting time. Out of the blue, Cook County Judge James Shapiro asked her whether she had been vaccinated. Firlit told Shapiro she didn’t get vaccinated because she has had bad reactions to vaccines in the past.
Shapiro then ordered that Firlit be prevented from spending parenting time with her son until she gets vaccinated. Over the past two weeks, Firlit has been able to talk to her son on the phone and through video calls, but has been unable to see him in person.
“I think that it’s wrong. I think that it’s dividing families. And I think it’s not in my son’s best interest to be away from his mother,” Firlit said.
Firlit is now appealing the court order, saying the judge has no authority to take away her parenting rights over her vaccination status.
“It had nothing to do with what we were talking about. He was placing his views on me. And taking my son away from me,” Firlit said.
Her attorney, Annette Fernholz, claimed the judge has overstepped his authority.
“In this case you have a judge, without any matter before him regarding the parenting time with the child deciding ‘Oh, you’re not vaccinated. You don’t get to see your child until you are vaccinated.’ That kind of exceeds his jurisdiction,” Fernholz said.
As she explained, the judge is acting completely on his own: Firlit’s former husband didn’t bring the issue before the court.
“You have to understand the father did not even bring this issue before the court. So it’s the judge on his own and making this decision that you can’t see your child until you’re vaccinated,” Fernholz added.
However, the attorney representing Firlit’s ex-husband, Jeffrey Leving, says they were also surprised by the judge’s decision, but they support the ruling saying that given the pandemic, the child should be protected from an unvaccinated mother.
“There are children who have died because of COVID. I think every child should be safe. And I agree that the mother should be vaccinated,” Leving said.
Since the start of the pandemic, fewer than 400 children in the US have died from COVID. In every case, the child had some kind of co-morbidity that dramatically complicated the situation.
The judge didn’t respond to a request for comment. But it’s worth noting that judges have broad authority, and this likely won’t be the first time an American judge brings vaccination issues up during cases where it’s not exactly relevant.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 16:00 - "He's Failed": Students Disown Joe Biden After Endless "Disaster"
“He’s Failed”: Students Disown Joe Biden After Endless “Disaster”
Authored by Addison Smith via Campus Reform (emphasis ours),
As the Biden administration attempts to reconcile rising inflation, the crisis at the Southern Border, and the death of American citizens in now Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, Campus Reform’s Addison Smith went to George Mason University to ask students how they feel about Biden’s presidency.
The vast majority of students who said they voted for or supported Biden’s nomination expressed regret for supporting him.
One student said, “He’s failed a lot on a lot of his promises”.
Another, speaking on Biden’s withdrawal from Afghanistan, called it a “disaster.”
When asked about Biden’s “Build Back Better” campaign slogan, students were not convinced he had done so.
“If you’re looking at the straight facts, it’s apparent that he’s not [building back better],” one student said.
Students then told Campus Reform they were not likely to support Biden for a second term.
“I’m excited to see who [else] is going to run, actually,” another student said. “As of right now, no”, another expressed.
Watch the full video below…
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 15:30 - US Forces Begin Leaving Kabul Airport Amid Final Stages of Afghanistan Withdrawal
US Forces Begin Leaving Kabul Airport Amid Final Stages of Afghanistan Withdrawal
Following the successful Friday night announcement of the drone attack on an ‘ISIS-K planner’ who was plotting ‘future attacks’ on US forces in Kabul, according to the Pentagon announcement, defense officials followed up on Saturday by confirming the American troops guarding Kabul international airport have begun to be flown out. President Biden has also as of Saturday afternoon issued a statement telling the US public to brace for the likelihood of more attacks to come:
“The situation on the ground continues to be extremely dangerous, and the threat of terrorist attacks on the airport remains high. Our commanders informed me that an attack is highly likely in the next 24-36 hours. I directed them to take every possible measure to prioritize force protection,” Biden said in a statement posted to WhiteHouse.gov.
Regarding that prior strike on ‘high-profile’ ISIS planners, the operation appeared but the Biden administration’s symbolic attempt to claim some level of “revenge” – despite it being anything but clear at this point that the targets were actually “ISIS-K” (or some other terrorist or jihadist group), or whether those struck had anything to do with planning the deadly airport attack. Regardless, it seems some level of minimal ‘vengeance’ was declared, and now it’s official: US forces have begun the pullout.
“US troops have begun their withdrawal from Kabul airport, the Pentagon said on Saturday, following a two-week scramble by Washington and its allies to fly out their nationals and Afghans at risk of reprisals under Afghanistan’s new Taliban rulers,” Reuters reports.
Illustrative file image: AP The US will attempt to pull the multiple thousands of troops and supporting US personnel – including State Department staff who were the last to man the relocated temporary embassy – by Tuesday. If not, it’s likely all hell will break loose… even more so than what’s already happened.
A mere three days from deadline, US officials are now warning we’re entering the ‘highest risk’ moment for the evacuation and pullout operation.
“American officials also warned of a high risk of further attacks by the group – enemies of both the West and the Taliban – as it winds up its mission,” Reuters continues, following the Thursday suicide bombing which was by far the most lethal single attack incident on Americans in Afghanistan in a decade.
Meanwhile it appears the security situation at the perimeter of the airport is worsening, as the Taliban is taking increased control of some sectors, along with reports of a deal for Turkish and Qatari troops to maintain a security presence…
•Kabul Airport gates are almost sealed. Zero access to Afghan visa/permit holders since yesterday.
•Aid groups are now looking for road travel options for the evacuation which is not safe. Lots of Taliban checkpoints.•Reports of Taliban shooting randomly into the crowds.
— Nafiseh Kohnavard (@nafisehkBBC) August 28, 2021
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JUST IN – Turkey and Qatar will jointly operate the #Kabul airport, according to a draft deal with the Taliban in Afghanistan, two sources familiar with the issue told Middle East Eye (MEE)
— Disclose.tv (@disclosetv) August 28, 2021
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Middle East Eye is the first to report on the deal Saturday, said to still be in the final phases:
Turkey and Qatar will jointly operate the Kabul international airport, with Ankara providing security through a private firm, according to a draft deal with the Taliban in Afghanistan, two sources familiar with the issue told Middle East Eye (MEE) on Saturday.
The draft deal will be finalized after the US withdrawal is completed next week.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan still needs to approve the deal. He is expected to hold consultations on the matter with his Nato allies, chiefly the United States.
Despite the coalition of Western troops, including the British forces also targeted in the prior blast, now constantly warning people not to congregate at the heavily fortified airport entrances, footage on Friday showed that throngs continued to crush against the entrance areas, with thousands of Afghans still clinging to desperate hopes of catching a final airlift out of the country and outside the reach of the Taliban.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 15:00 - Fed Policy Continues to Support Cyclical Stocks
Fed Policy Continues to Support Cyclical Stocks
Authored by Bryce Coward via Knowledge Leaders Capital blog,
Yesterday at the annual Jackson Hole Economic Symposium, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell reiterated that the Fed is in no hurry to either taper asset purchases immediately or aggressively. Additionally he made crystal clear that even when the Fed does eventually start tapering asset purchases (likely November or December), it should not be taken as signaling interest rate hikes will follow on some preset course. Indeed, Fed Chairman Powell continues to lean into the idea that inflation is will prove to be transitory and so there is no rush to tighten policy, especially with the employment part of the mandate still far from being achieved.
This strong dovish guidance flies in the face of what many investors have been expecting, which was for the Fed to commence asset tapering sooner rather than later and for rate hikes to potentially commence in 2022 rather than the middle of 2023 or later. The reiteration of the more dovish Fed stance opens the door inflation expectations to turn back up, since the Fed is not so eager to front run rises in inflation with more restrictive policy. And, if inflation expectations turn back up (blue line), we could see a re-steepening of the yield curve (red line).
The shape of the yield curve has been highly influential recently in relative performance trends between various areas of the market. From last summer through May of this year, the steepening of the yield curve coincided with healthy outperformance of cyclical stocks. Since May, the flattening of the curve has coincided with more defensive (or at least high quality) leadership out of the tech and health care sectors. The logic goes, therefore, that a re-steepening of the curve should coincide with a shift back to cyclicals. Indeed, that shift may be in the early innings.
For example, the the more cyclical and smaller skewed S&P 500 equal weight index has started to outperform the S&P 500 again, right on queue with the yield curve re-steepening.
Same goes for industrial stocks.
Same goes for materials stocks.
And, same goes for financial stocks.
So, our take is a relatively simple one. If dovish Fed policy continues to look past “transitory” inflation and remains in no hurry to tighten policy, we may very well witness an un-rotation out of technology and back into cyclicals in the back half of 2021…and wouldn’t that be painful for those who chased tech late into its recent rally?
* * *
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/28/2021 – 14:30
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