- Zuesse: Why A Second American Revolution Is Necessary For The Entire World
Zuesse: Why A Second American Revolution Is Necessary For The Entire World
Authored by Eric Zuesse via The Strategic Culture Foundation,
On November 11th, the very disturbing but clearly true “Lessons To Learn From The Coup In Bolivia” was posted to the Web. That anonymous author (a German intelligence analyst) documented the evilness of the overthrow of Evo Morales in Bolivia, and the threat now clearly posed to the world by the US regime — a spreading cancer of expansionist fascism, led from Washington. But, even more than this, he indicated that unless the individuals who are responsible for the advancing fascism are executed, there won’t be any real hope for democracy anywhere in the world.
Either this impunity will stop, or else the spread of the US international dictatorship — not only by CIA coups such as this, but by illegal international invasions such as of Iraq 2003, Libya 2011, Syria 2012-, and Yemen 2015-, — will continue and will engulf in misery ultimately the entire world. He makes clear the complicity of US ‘news’-media in the lies that ‘justify’ this coup (and ‘justified’ those invasions). It’s, by now, clearly the way the US regime functions. Of course, none of those media will publish any such truth; they all cover-up constantly for the regime, because they actually are an essential part of it. (All of these invasions and coups are based on nothing but lies, and the media are a necessary part of that.) Censorship in America is thus actually extreme, and constant.
For example: how many US-and-allied media have even reported that fascists took over in Bolivia?
Instead, we’ve got newspaper editorials such as the New York Times blaming the extraordinarily successful and popular democratically elected President of Bolivia for the coup which overthrew him and replaced him by fascists (and never using the word “coup,” except once derisively, by saying that “British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, cried ‘coup’” — as if it weren’t a coup — and making no mention whatsoever that it had been done by committed fascists). This ‘news’-paper’s ‘news’-report the prior day had been headlined with the ridiculously anodyne “Bolivian Leader Evo Morales Steps Down”, and it asserted that “Mr. Morales was once widely popular,” as if he weren’t still so, and as if all of the polling as well as the last Presidential election showed him still to be “widely popular”, but the CIA-and-oligarchs’ organized fascist mob hated him, and brought him down.
Will the CIA and generals, and Bolivia’s oligarchs, be executed for that? Of course, they should be. If they aren’t, then how can democracy ever be restored there? It’s one, or the other — it’s continuation of the dictatorship, or else it will be restoration of the democracy — at this stage. There can be no ‘reconciliation’, now. This is an irreconcilable state of war that exists between the coupsters and the Bolivian people. There will be bloodshed — and the more so as the coupsters remain in power and Morales not be quickly restored fully to the powers to which he had repeatedly been popularly elected. However, he won’t be able safely to return to his home and his homeland, unless and until the coupsters are executed, because, otherwise, they certainly would execute him first, and he would never be able to feel safe there.
Because of what the coupsters did, this will inevitably be a war to the death — and not only for the principal persons on each side, but for hundreds, or probably thousands, of their followers. What the coupsters did has thus precipitated, inevitably, massive future bloodshed in Bolivia. And yet the US regime’s lying press supports what was done. The truths that they know they hide from the public. This constant lying will be necessary in order for the US regime’s extensions such as the OAS and the IMF to provide the coupsters the public support that will enable the Bolivian coup-regime to be granted international ‘legitimacy’, which will be necessary in order for that regime’s actions to be treated as legally valid and binding in international business.
Another recent example of this spreading cancer of the US regime’s fascism was the US coup that installed a rabidly fascist regime in Ukraine during February 2014. Even today, the US-and-allied ‘news’-media cover that coup up, too, as having been a ‘democratic revolution.’ (How much of what is shown on that linked video was reported honestly in media such as the New York Times and Fox News?) Furthermore, when the EU learned, after the coup was over, that it had been a coup (instead of the democratic revolution they had thought it to have been), they were shocked, but plodded on to take Ukraine into the EU because they mistakenly thought that this would be of benefit to the EU nations, and not recognizing that it would turn out to be instead an albatross, which, even today, is nowhere closer to meeting EU standards than it had been on the day of the coup, and is actually far less so than it was even back before the coup occurred.
How can the public, in any country, possibly control the Government if they are being so viciously and routinely lied-to by the Government and by its ‘news’-media? Democracy is impossible in such a country as this. It is a sham. Multiple political parties don’t mean that they’re not all controlled by the 607 US billionaires — some who are Democrats, and others who are Republicans, but all of whom are actually lying fascists. Clearly, dishonesty rules, and it’s bought by the few individuals who control most of the nation’s wealth (and ‘news’-media). Here is an example within the US itself: the 2016 US Presidential ‘election’, which was actually a Presidential selection, by the billionaires.
Even decades after the entirely illegal tortures that the CIA perpetrated after 9/11 and which produced no usable information, the CIA officials and George W. Bush are not prosecuted for having broken both American and international laws, and the mere fact of that illegality has made impossible any court-trial anywhere of the alleged terrorists who remain at Guantanamo. The US regime is rampant and unrestrained illegality, lying, and it’s even blatant violence, and injustice, all with no accountability whatsoever.
Unfortunately, the only global solution would be a second American Revolution, but, this time, the news-media are far less honest, and so almost no support exists amongst the US population for doing that.
Consequently, the outlook for the future, worldwide, is grim.
If the warning (hidden by the media as it is), this time from Bolivia, is not heeded, how can this cancer ever be stopped from engulfing the entire world?
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 23:30 - Russia Air Launches Hypersonic Missile In Arctic As Tensions Surge
Russia Air Launches Hypersonic Missile In Arctic As Tensions Surge
Reuters is reporting that Russian state-owned TASS is making big claims this weekend that a Russian military jet has air-launched a hypersonic missile in the Arctic.
TASS cites several Russian military sources, who said a Mikoyan MiG-31 interceptor jet air-launched a Kinjal (Dagger) hypersonic missile over Russia’s part of the Arctic earlier this month.
As we’ve recently noted, Russia has been aggressively expanding its military presence in the Arctic. It has also been increasing exploration activities in the region, such as oil and gas and mineral extraction.
TASS quoted one of the sources in saying, “the tests took place in mid-November.”
The MiG-31K took off from the Olenegorsk airfield in the northern Murmansk region. It fired the hypersonic missile at a ground target located at the Pemboi training ground in Russia’s Arctic Komi region.
Last month, we mentioned that Russia has been installing early warning radar systems across the Komi Republic and the Murmansk region in northern Russia. The radar systems are expected to become operational by 2022, will monitor Arctic airspace for ballistic missile attacks, and monitor aircraft in the region.
In Septemeber, Russia deployed S-400 Triumph systems on the Novaya Zemlya archipelago in the Arctic.
The Danish Defence Intelligence Service published a report last week that said, “a great power play is shaping up” between Russia, the US, and China, which has undoubtedly increased tensions in the Arctic region. The reason for the elevated tension is that $35 trillion worth of natural resources could be hiding underneath the Arctic Ocean floor.
Russia’s militarization of the Arctic is to also defend its “Polar Silk Road” as warming temperatures give way to new shipping lanes and economic opportunities.
Washington has widely criticized Moscow for its increased presence in the Arctic.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov recently responded to US criticism, indicating that Moscow isn’t intimidating anyone in the Arctic, noting that increased defense capabilities in the region are to protect its assets.
The Arctic’s vast amount of resources will be a significant topic of the 2020s, and beyond, the first country to secure the region with military force could be the next superpower of the world.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 23:00 - A Wicked Cocktail Of Corporate Greed, Social Media, & Opioids Is Slashing US Life Expectancy Rates
A Wicked Cocktail Of Corporate Greed, Social Media, & Opioids Is Slashing US Life Expectancy Rates
Authored by Robert Bridge via The Strategic Culture Foundation,
Following decades of increased life expectancy rates, Americans have been dying earlier for three consecutive years since 2014, turning the elusive quest for the ‘American Dream’ into a real-life nightmare for many. Corporate America must accept some portion of the blame for the looming disaster.
Something is killing Americans and researchers have yet to find the culprit. But we can risk some intuitive guesses.
According to researchers from the Center on Society and Health, Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine, American life expectancy has not kept pace with that of other wealthy countries and is now in fact decreasing.
The National Center for Health Statistics reported that life expectancy in the United States peaked (78.9 years) in 2014 and subsequently dropped for 3 consecutive years, hitting 78.6 years in 2017. The decrease was most significant among men (0.4 years) than women (0.2 years) and happened across racial-ethnic lines: between 2014 and 2016, life expectancy decreased among non-Hispanic white populations (from 78.8 to 78.5 years), non-Hispanic black populations (from 75.3 years to 74.8 years), and Hispanic populations (82.1 to 81.8 years).
“By 2014, midlife mortality was increasing across all racial groups, caused by drug overdoses, alcohol abuse, suicides, and a diverse list of organ system diseases,” wrote researchers Steven H. Woolf and Heidi Schoomaker in a study that appears in the latest issue of the prestigious Journal of the American Medical Association.
At the very beginning of the report, Woolf and Schoomaker reveal that the geographical area with the largest relative increases occurred “in the Ohio Valley and New England.”
“The implications for public health and the economy are substantial,” they added, “making it vital to understand the underlying causes.”
Incidentally, it would be difficult for any observer of the U.S. political scene to read that passage without immediately connecting it to the 2016 presidential election between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.
Taking advantage of the deep industrial decline that has long plagued the Ohio Valley, made up of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Kentucky, Trump successfully tapped into a very real social illness, at least partially connected to economic stagnation, which helped propel him into the White House.
Significantly, thirty-seven states witnessed significant jumps in midlife mortality in the years leading up to 2017. As the researchers pointed out, however, the trend was concentrated in certain states, many of which, for example in New England, did not support Trump in 2016.
“Between 2010 and 2017, the largest relative increases in mortality occurred in New England (New Hampshire, 23.3%; Maine, 20.7%; Vermont, 19.9%, Massachusetts 12.1%) and the Ohio Valley (West Virginia, 23.0%; Ohio, 21.6%; Indiana, 14.8%; Kentucky, 14.7%), as well as in New Mexico (17.5%), South Dakota (15.5%), Pennsylvania (14.4%), North Dakota (12.7%), Alaska (12.0%), and Maryland (11.0%). In contrast, the nation’s most populous states (California, Texas, and New York) experienced relatively small increases in midlife mortality.
Eight of the 10 states with the highest number of excess deaths were in the industrial Midwest or Appalachia, whereas rural US counties experienced greater increases in midlife mortality than did urban counties.
A tragic irony of the study suggests that greater access to healthcare, notably among the more affluent white population, actually correlates to an increase in higher mortality rates. The reason is connected to the out-of-control prescription of opioid drugs to combat pain and depression.
“The sharp increase in overdose deaths that began in the 1990s primarily affected white populations and came in 3 waves,” the report explained: (1) the introduction of OxyContin in 1996 and overuse of prescription opioids, followed by (2) increased heroin use, often by patients who had become addicted to prescription opioids, and (3) the subsequent emergence of potent synthetic opioids (eg, fentanyl analogues)—the latter triggering a large post-2013 increase in overdose deaths.
“That white populations first experienced a larger increase in overdose deaths than nonwhite populations may reflect their greater access to health care (and thus prescription drugs).”
In September, Purdue Pharma, the manufacturer of OxyContin, reached a tentative settlement with 23 states and more than 2,000 cities and counties that sued the company, owned by the Sackler family, over its role in the opioid crisis
Other factors also helped to drive up the U.S. mortality rate, including alcoholic liver disease and suicides, 85% of which occurred with a firearm or other method.
The United States spends more on health care than any other country, yet its overall health report card fares worse than those of other wealthy countries. Americans experience higher rates of illness and injury and die earlier than people in other high-income nations.
Researchers were perplexed but not surprised by the data as there existed clear signs back in the 1980s that the United States was heading for a cliff as far as longevity rates go.
So what is it that’s claiming the life of Americans, many at the prime of their life, at a faster pace than in the past? The reality is that it is likely to be an accumulation of negative factors that are finally beginning to take a toll. For example, apart from the opioid crisis, there has also been an almost total collapse of union representation across Corporate America, which has essentially crushed any form of workplace democracy. This author, a former member of three worker unions, witnessed this egregious abuse of corporate power firsthand, which is apparent by the total stagnation of wages for many decades.
Today’s real average wage – that is, after accounting for inflation – has about the same purchasing power it did about half a century ago. Meanwhile, in the majority of cases, increases in salary have a marked tendency to go to the highest-paid tier of executives.
In a report by Pew Research, “real terms average hourly earnings peaked more than 45 years ago: The $4.03-an-hour rate recorded in January 1973 had the same purchasing power that $23.68 would today.”
One needs only consider the growing mountain of tuition debt now consuming the paychecks of many university graduates, many of whom have yet to land their dream 6-figure job from their relatively worthless liberal education, to better understand the quiet desperation that exists across the country.
At the same time, the exponential rise in the use of social media, which has been proven to trigger depression and loneliness in users, also deserves serious consideration. What society is experiencing with its massive online presence is a total overhaul as to the way human beings relate to each other. Presently, it would be very difficult to argue that the changes have been positive; in fact, they seem to be contributing to the early demise of millions of Americans in the prime of life.
Taken together, abusive labor practices that ignores workplace democracy, the epidemic of opioid usage, compounded by the anti-social features of ‘social media’ suggests a perfect storm of factors precipitating the rise of early deaths in the United States. Since all of these areas fall in one way or another under the control of corporate power, this powerful agency must find ways to help address the problem. The future success of America depends upon it.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 22:30 - Macau Casino Revenue Plunges Amid Chinese Slowdown
Macau Casino Revenue Plunges Amid Chinese Slowdown
When the Chinese economy is booming, Mainlanders head to Macau to wager some of their disposable income at casinos. When the economy decelerates, sort of like what’s happening at the moment, gamblers stay home because of economic pessimism.
New data from the Gaming Inspection & Coordination Bureau, first reported by Bloomberg, shows gross gaming revenue for Nov. was $2.8 billion, down 8.5% YoY.
Year to date, gross gaming revenue sagged 2.4%, comes at a time when the Chinese government has told its citizens to embrace lower-economic growth.
Macau’s gross gaming revenue is expected to record its first yearly decline since 2016, as several headwinds have developed.
Several months ago, JP Morgan analyst DS Kim told Reuters that the casino slump in Macau is due to “social unrest in Hong Kong, tough year-on-year comparison, negative headlines around junkets, and macro headwinds.”
Credit Suisse Group analyst Kenneth Fong said Visa policies to Macau had been tightened ahead of President Xi Jinping’s visit this month. These restrictions, Fong said, are hurting visitation numbers into the late year.
The Bloomberg Intelligence index of Macau casino operators slipped 3.4% in November. Though the index is still up for the year, it has dropped 20% from a peak in Apr.
Wynn Macau Ltd.HK is down more than 42% since 2Q18 highs.
With no turn up in the China Momentum Indicator, there’s a high probability that Macau’s gaming industry will continue decelerating into 2020.
World stocks are ignoring the slowdown in China and in the Macau gaming industry.
Gaming industries in Macau and the US appear to exhibit signs of weakness.
The global gaming industry appears weak, as well. Maybe highlights how consumers across the world are pulling back on casino spending as the global trade recession is imminent.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 22:00 - Sea-Change For Canada Foreign Policy As Freeland Replaced By Pro-Chinese Politico
Sea-Change For Canada Foreign Policy As Freeland Replaced By Pro-Chinese Politico
Authored by Matthew Ehret via The Strategic Culture Foundation,
In Chrystia Freeland’s 2012 book Plutocrats, Canada’s leading Rhodes Scholar laid out a surprisingly clear analysis of the two camps of elites who she explained would, by their very nature, battle for control of the newly emerging system as the old paradigm collapsed.
In her book and article series, she described the “practical populist politician” which has tended to be adherent to business interests and personal gain during past decades vs the new breed of “technocrat” which has an enlightened non-practical (ie: Malthusian) worldview, willing to make monetary sacrifices for the “greater good”.
She further defined the “good Plutocrats” vs “bad Plutocrats”.
Good Plutocrats included the likes of George Soros, Warren Buffet, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos who made their billions under the free-for-all epoch of globalization, but who were willing to adapt to the new rules of the post-globalization game. This was a game which she defined in an absurd 2013 TED Talk as a “green New Deal” of global regulation under a de-carbonized (and depopulated) green economy.
For those “bad plutocrats” unwilling to play by the new rules (ie: the Trumps, Putins or any industrialist who refused to commit seppuku on the altar of Gaia), they would simply go extinct. This threat was re-packaged by Canada’s “other” globalist puppet Mark Carney, who recently said “If some companies and industries fail to adjust to this new world, they will fail to exist.”
Of course, when Freeland formulated these threats in 2011, China’s Belt and Road had not yet existed, nor had the Russia-China alliance which together are now challenging the regime-change driven world order in remarkably successful strides. The thought that nationalism could possibly make a comeback in the west was as unthinkable as the failure of free trade deals like NAFTA or the TPP.
As of November 18, 2019, Freeland has found herself cut down a notch by the “plutocrats” that she has worked so assiduously to destroy since becoming Canada’s Foreign Minister in 2017 when she ousted a Foreign Minister (Stephane Dion) who had called for a renewed cooperation with Russia on space, counter-terrorism and arctic development with Sergei Lavrov. Freeland’s unrepentant support for Ukrainian Nazis and NATO encirclement of Russia resulted in a total alienation of Russia. Her alienation of China was so successful that the Chinese government removed their ambassador in the summer of 2019. Freeland’s work in organizing the failed coup in Venezuela and supporting the MI6-Soros White Helmets in Syria became so well known that she became known as the Canadian queen of regime change.
Other pro-Chinese “bad plutocratic” companies which have been targeted for destruction under Freeland’s watch have included the beleaguered construction giant Aecon Inc. who’s board voted in favor of being sold to China in March 2018 in order to play a role in Belt and Road Projects (a decision vetoed by the Federal Government in May 2018), as well as Quebec-based SNC Lavalin which has had major deals with both Russia and China on nuclear power and major infrastructure projects and which now faces being shut down in Canada for having bribed politicians in Libya when it built Qadaffi’s Great Manmade River (destroyed by NATO in 2011).
Former Liberal Minister of Infrastructure from Shawinigan Quebec, Francois-Philippe Champagne has taken over Freeland’s portfolio and with him it appears a new pro-Eurasian policy may be emerging in Canada much more conducive to the long term survival (and strategic relevance) of Canada. This shift has already been noted by China which has responded by sending a new Ambassador to Ottawa, while a new Canadian Ambassador with a long history of working towards positive Chinese relations in the private sector (Dominic Barton) has just begun working in Beijing. Barton was the first Ambassador to China since “old guard” politician John McCallum was fired in January 2019 for defending Huawei’s Meng Wanzhou to a group of Chinese journalists.
In opposition to the cacophonic voice of Freeland, Champagne had spoken positively of China in 2017 saying:
“In a world of uncertainty, of unpredictability, of questioning about the rules that have been established to govern our trading relationship, Canada, and I would say China, stand out as [a] beacon of stability, predictability, a rule-based system, a very inclusive society.”
Champagne is a long-standing protégé of former Prime Minister Jean Chretien and world travelled businessman who has worked in the European nuclear sector and has promoted industrial development with China for years. Jean Chretien, who campaigned for Champagne’s recent re-election, represents everything Freeland hates: A “practical” old school politician who recognizes that World War III and alienating Eurasian nations who are shaping the future is bad for business. In 2014, Chretien was given the “Friend of Russia” award and has played a major role in the private sector working with Quebec-based Power Corporation which runs the Canada-China Business Council (CCBC) and has brokered major contracts throughout China since ending his term as PM in 2003. Chretien is also the father in-law of current CCBC chair Paul Desmarais Jr. who is the heir to the PowerCorp dynasty. While these are not groups that in any way exemplify morality, they are practical industrialists who know depopulation and world war are bad for business and would prefer to adapt to a China-led BRI system over a “green technocratic dictatorship”.
Since December 2018, Chretien has attacked Freeland’s decision to support Meng Wanzhou’s extradiction to the USA, and has volunteered to lead a delegation to China in order to smooth tensions.
So while the “bad plutocrats” appear to have taken an important step forward though the debris of the recent near failure of the Liberal Party which narrowly kept a minority government after the October 21 Federal Elections, the ideologically driven technocrats led by Queen Freeland shouldn’t be discounted, as her new position as Deputy Prime Minister puts her in a position to possibly take control of Canada as 2nd in command of a highly fragmented nation which is now hearing renewed calls for separation in Alberta, and Quebec.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 21:30 - Elon Musk Admits To Doing "Zero Market Research Whatsoever" Before Unveiling Cybertruck
Elon Musk Admits To Doing “Zero Market Research Whatsoever” Before Unveiling Cybertruck
It was only about 10 days ago that Elon Musk revealed Tesla’s new Cybertruck to legions of adoring sycophants and – well, the rest of the world who laughed at him and ridiculed the truck’s design. Even Denny’s took shots at Musk.
And why wouldn’t they? The unveiling of the truck was a full scale disaster, complete with two broken windows and a passenger side back wheel that looked like it was about to fall off from underneath the truck. So, naturally, Musk claims that the cult of Tesla has already pre-ordered 250,000 of them. We documented the full unveiling circus in a writeup here.
Now, we’re starting to get a glance into why the truck and its unveiling looked like such a poorly planned concept: because they were.
Musk said in early November, just several weeks before the unveiling, that the company does “zero market research whatsoever” when designing a new product, according to a new article from the Wall Street Journal.
In other words, Musk wants to enter the best segment of the auto industry: the highly profitable, billion dollar pickup truck segment, and he has done no research as to how best to meet the needs of potential customers.
Is it any wonder the company is losing close to $1 billion per year?
And how does Musk defend the strategy of doing no research? The idea seems “seems especially reckless in the age of Big Data,” the WSJ says. Especially while companies like Google, Apple and Facebook have based their success by doing nothing but harvesting and analyzing data. In other words, they don’t make blind bets, like Musk is doing.
In a forthcoming book, “The Power of Experiments: Decision-Making in a Data-Driven World,” Harvard professors Michael Luca and Max Bazerman show how such experiments have helped organizations from eBay to the U.K. tax authority make better decisions. By testing different strategies on a limited pool of unwitting customers before implementing them, they say, companies can eliminate guesswork and intuition and build products and processes “that better account for the many quirks of human behavior.”
But Musk isn’t interested in that; rather, he seems interested only in what Elon Musk wants.
The Tesla CEO said at a November 5th event, about 16 days before the Cybertruck unveiling: “A lot of times people try to make products that they think others would love but they don’t love them themselves. Tesla’s approach is to start by imagining the platonic ideal of a car. I find that if you do that, people will want to buy it. If it’s compelling to you it will be compelling to others.”
Musk called the truck an “an armored personnel carrier from the future” on November 5th before stating at the unveiling: “Trucks have been the same for a very long time, like 100 years. We wanted to try something different.”
One thing is for sure: if the truck’s specs as listed survive to production at the same price point that Musk pitched ($39,900), the styling of the truck may not be an issue with customers. However, based on Musk’s inability to deliver at the price ranges he has pitched in the past Model 3 , we find it highly unlikely the Cybertruck, as shown, will be sold at the $39,900 price point.
But it’s Musk’s method of “shooting first and asking questions later” that the WSJ takes exception with. “Put simply, today’s geniuses study problems. Only suckers make bets,” the piece concludes.
Perhaps Musk doesn’t understand that as a public company you can’t be all visionary (if you even want to call him that). Unicorns and rainbows will only hold the stock up for so long, until such time as investors demand the company turns a profit. Musk has been, and continues to skate on thin ice by wholly ignoring this reality and its an inevitability that could come at anytime. Burning billions of dollars is not a business plan – it only works until it doesn’t.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 21:00 - How Inflation, Prudence, And Fundamentals Are Setting Up Gold To Soar
How Inflation, Prudence, And Fundamentals Are Setting Up Gold To Soar
Authored by Dave Forest via InternationalMan.com,
International Man: Governments around the world, including the United States, are printing trillions of currency units. This will continue to significantly devalue these paper currencies and create inflation.
Doug Casey recently said:
With all the money that’s been created by governments and central banks, the chances are excellent we’re going to have a gigantic bull market. Maybe the last one, since I expect the world is going back to using gold as money—at which point we’ll have a stable gold price.
In the meantime, I think mining stocks could go absolutely insane. The prices will have no relation to fundamentals, because everybody will want to own them.
How do you think the situation is going to play out for gold and precious metals?
Dave Forest: Inflation is a given. I see it every day in commodities, although many mainstream investors don’t recognize it. Yet.
In the 2000s, investors were over the moon when gold broke above $1,000 per ounce and copper passed $1.50 per pound. During the previous commodities bear market, those levels were unthinkable.
But now, $1,000 gold is peanuts. Hardcore bullion investors were distraught in 2016 when gold “plunged” close to $1,000. That’s seen as a depressed and unsustainable price.
Same with copper. That sector’s been in the doldrums, because the price fell below $2.50 per pound. If you’d told a copper miner in 1999 they’d have $2.50 copper, they would have popped the champagne! Today, it’s seen as scraping the bottom of the barrel.
The thing is, back in the “old” days, you could mine and process an ounce of gold for $100. Today, production costs are more like $600 per ounce. Closer to $1,000 per ounce if you add in sustaining and expansion capital.
That’s the real reason metals, including gold, have to go higher. The gold price isn’t arbitrary. The price must exceed production costs—or mines will shut down and supply will run out.
The massive inflation in production costs is driven by lots of things: rising fuel prices, increasing wages and benefits for workers, and higher steel prices. Barrick Gold, the world’s largest public gold miner, saw costs for one of its new mines, Pascua Lama, rise by billions of dollars within just a few months!
Politicians can’t sleight-of-hand those costs away—they’re real. So, the only conclusion is gold—and all metals—need higher prices in order to keep supply coming.
International Man: What other factors are affecting gold right now?
Dave Forest: We think of gold as a “safe haven”: Break glass and use when things really fall apart.
But many players in the financial sector are already using gold day-to-day, as a financial instrument.
In China, for example, many exporters don’t have access to currency hedging. They’re exposed to fluctuations in the exchange rate between the dollar and yuan while they’re waiting for dollar-denominated payments to come in.
If you can’t hedge currency rates through the banks, what do you do? Chinese firms found an alternative: Buy gold. The idea is, if the US dollar depreciates, the value of gold holdings will go up, because gold is globally sold in US currency.
In effect, these firms hold gold as a short-term hedging instrument. They could actually do the same thing with sheets of copper cathode or barrels of oil, but gold is the easiest major commodity to purchase, hold, and eventually sell once currency has been converted.
Of course, the root cause here is currency instability: people fearing a breakdown in the US dollar. So, it’s not far off the reasons doom-and-gloomers buy gold. Just that Chinese buyers are doing it in the short term, for purely commercial reasons.
International Man: The mining business is extremely volatile and risky. There are thousands of mining companies out there, and most of them are junk. What is your approach to separating the winners from the losers?
Dave Forest: First off, recognize that “junk,” in terms of mining stocks, comes in several forms.
There are of course, outright scams. That ranges from full-on fraud (not that common) to huckster promoters who legitimately take people’s money but then use it to pay themselves huge salaries while doing little or no technical work (much more common).
Looking at salaries is a good way to spot those latter cases. Public companies in Canada disclose their officers’ wages. It’s not uncommon to see CEOs of a company with $1 million in the bank making $400,000 per year. When 40% of your firm’s budget is going to pay one person, there’s not a chance the company is going to perform. Never mind that these people generally would be unemployable, even for $1 yearly, in any other industry.
A much more subtle form of junk is the “hobby farm” company. You know how people, often older, will buy a farm for the fun of being outdoors? They’ll putter around doing a little work here and there, but the whole thing is mainly for enjoyment rather than serious commercial endeavor.
A significant number of junior mining stocks are like this. Exploration companies, after all, are just a couple of guys with a pickup or maybe a helicopter walking around picking up rocks.
Older geologists will often do this for the fun of it. It’s nice to have shareholders pay for your summer fishing trip up north. While there, these “execs” might walk into the bush and grab a few samples, but they’re not pushing to run a real business. Those companies go absolutely nowhere, very slowly.
You have to really watch out for those, because the people will seem sincere and often credible. But their heart isn’t in it, so they never accomplish much.
Once you weed out those, you’re left with a small group of more-interesting stocks. These are the companies that have good ideas about where new mineral discoveries might be made. They’re motivated and hungry; they usually have their own money invested in the hunt.
They run the company like a business. That means they consider whether the cash they’re spending will add value to a project. It also means they know what value looks like in a mineral property!
International Man: As a geologist, you’re on the ground in obscure places like Colombia, Russia, Mongolia, etc., searching for new deposits and breakthroughs. What are some of the most interesting places on your radar right now and why?
Dave Forest: North America, minus Mexico. As you say, I’ve spent a lot of my career in obscure places. Ten years ago, you would go abroad, because it was tough to break into established spots like Ontario or Nevada.
But the recent downturn in exploration’s changed all that. I spend a lot of my time in Nevada now, and it’s astounding how little exploration work is going on, despite the state being ranked number one in the world for mining.
Today, you can get acreage and try new ideas. I’ve even seen companies stake out whole districts that were abandoned during the downturn.
Building a mine anywhere is tough these days. Environmental activism (or commercial interests masquerading as such) and “not in my backyard” (NIMBY) concerns are rising everywhere. Places like Nevada or northern Saskatchewan have the advantages of having established mining sectors, relatively stable governments, and—most importantly—very few people. No backyards, no NIMBY.
That said, I still love travel. And I do keep an eye out for emerging opportunities abroad—they just have to be big opportunities to make up for the increased political risk.
One spot I checked out recently was Uzbekistan. The country has the world’s largest gold mine, called Muruntau, which has something like 200 million ounces.
Uzbekistan’s dictator died in 2016, and the new prime minister seems very sincere in accelerating free-market reforms. That includes opening the mining sector to foreign exploration and development.
I visited last summer and couldn’t believe what’s happening. Government officials couldn’t meet until 10 PM, because they were too busy working at the office to get the prime minister’s orders done. There have been reported cases of government staff dying from overwork! These people are serious. It’s one to watch.
International Man: You recently came across a new technology that could change the way mining companies find gold deposits. What exactly is this and what is the potential?
Dave Forest: A few years ago, I was introduced to a PhD mathematician. He’d been an executive consultant for 25 years to one of the world’s largest mining companies. He had a corner office and a green light for three-hour, two-bottles-of-wine lunches whenever he wanted.
Why?
Because he could do something I’ve never seen before (and apparently this mega-mining firm never had either).
He could use satellite data to find gold, copper, or zinc.
Now, there are lots of geologists who try to use satellite data to pinpoint ore deposits. This “remote sensing” has been in use since the 1980s.
I’ve always been a skeptic. Most times, satellite geologists just torture the data until it fits their preconception of the target. I never saw a convincing case where satellite imaging revealed a new discovery.
But when I met this PhD, I was intrigued. It wasn’t just his impeccable credentials in the industry—his approach is elegantly simple in a mathematical sense. He didn’t torture the data with interpretations. He just ran his algorithm and let the results speak for themselves.
I wanted to find out more. So, I gave him a test. It was a gold project in dense jungle in eastern Myanmar. I knew the gold mines are there, only because I’d been on the ground, under the tree canopy. But from the satellite view, you couldn’t see anything. There was no way to cheat.
He used his techniques and sent me a “heat map” that pinpointed the mine locations almost exactly. I was floored.
Since then, we’ve used this “digital treasure map” in Mongolia, Colombia, Nevada, and eastern Canada. The results, when field checked, have been excellent.
We started thinking about how this could benefit investors. What if you knew about a big mineral find on a company’s property before the company did? That’s what we can do with this satellite system. We can scan anyone’s property, almost anywhere on Earth.
Using the system, we recommended three stocks to International Speculator readers. One stock was bought out by a larger gold company within months of our recommendation, for a 219% profit. Another stock has risen more than 200% since our recommendation, on excellent gold drill results.
The last stock is still moving toward drilling. I think we knew they had a potentially major discovery before they did!
This also shows why now’s the perfect time to invest in mineral exploration. Why was this PhD genius available and not squirreled away in the bowels of a major mining firm? Only because the company he was working for laid off their entire exploration department during the most recent industry downturn. Crisis = opportunity.
* * *
Dave has just deployed this satellite technology to pinpoint gold mining deposits and identify a speculative opportunity with enormous upside. That’s exactly why, he released this new video where he shares all the details for how you could get in on the ground floor. Click here to watch it now.
* * *
Dave Forest is a geologist who has worked professionally in mining and petroleum over a 20-year career. He has also bridged his technical expertise into the finance and investment sector, originally joining Doug Casey in 2004 when he founded an advisory dedicated to finding high-potential investment opportunities in oil, natural gas, uranium and renewables globally.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 20:30 - India In "Very Deep Crisis," Witnessing "Death Of Demand," Warns Former Indian FM
India In “Very Deep Crisis,” Witnessing “Death Of Demand,” Warns Former Indian FM
Former Indian Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha said India’s economy is in a “very deep crisis,” witnessing “death of demand,” and the government is “befooling people” with its economic distortions of how growth is around the corner, reported India Today.
“No matter what the powers that be say, the fact is that we are in a very deep crisis,” warned Sinha.
India’s GDP has been rapidly slowing since peaking in 2016. Official data shows Q3 growth slumped to 4.5%, the lowest since 1Q13.
Sinha was speaking to an audience at the Times Litfest 2019 conference, located at Habitat World Center in Delhi, India, on Sunday.
#Yashwant Sinha #TimesLitFestDelhi2019 pic.twitter.com/aKJjPPH1Mc
— Dr. Gaurav Sood, PhD (@imgauravsood) December 1, 2019
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.jshttps://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
He warned that President Narendra Modi’s government is attempting to deceive everyone about how growth is coming in the next quarter or the quarter after but cautioned there’s only a crisis ahead.
“They (the government) are trying to fool the people by saying the next quarter will be better…This type of crisis takes a long time like three to four or even five years (to subside). It cannot be resolved at the drop of a hat or by wielding a magic stick,” he said.
He said the economy is experiencing what is called the “death of demand,” and the epicenter of it is the agriculture and rural sector.
“There is no demand in the economy, and that is the starting point of the crisis. They (government of the day) are least bothered about what is happening to our farmers, people living in rural areas, now that is where the death of demand started. The demand first dried up in agriculture and rural sector, then it dried up in the informal or unorganized sector, and ultimately it traveled to the corporate sector,” he said.
Sinha said he’s been warning the government of the crisis that is coming down the pipe.
“In fact, this was something I had done after already warning them (people in the government) personally through letters, personal meetings… it is only when the party’s doors were closed on me that I had to start speaking publicly,” he added.
Though there’s no recession in India at the moment, the warning signs are showing up. Private consumption has plunged, both public and private investments have fallen, exports have dropped in the past quarter, the economy has been decelerating for several years, and there’s zero evidence that the economy has bottomed out.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 20:00 - Acceptable Discrimination: Political Affiliation Bias
Acceptable Discrimination: Political Affiliation Bias
Authored by Mac Slavo via SHTFplan.com,
The bias against those who are not politically affiliated similarily is the last acceptable form of discrimination. It’s now okay and accepted by the masses, to treat other human beings as less than if they disagree with you on politics.
One new study is showing that most are embracing this type of discrimination with extreme fervor. This study shows discriminatory behavior thrives in the one area where it remains socially acceptable to judge people based on shared attributes: political affiliation. Politics remains one of the few personal characteristics not protected by equal opportunity hiring laws, and if this study is any indication, lawmakers will want to get on top of that quickly.
Belief in certain political values is akin to belief in a religion. It’s all based on opinion and discrimination is still discrimination, even if you label it “politics.” We all know the media has been trying to brainwash us with government-approved opinions for years now, and those who don’t accept their brainwashing willingly are being discriminated against.
Shared political ideology outweighs seemingly more important factors like professional qualifications in hiring decisions, researchers from Clemson University and the University of Kansas confirmed in a study published this month in the Journal of Applied Psychology. Unchecked, this kind of discrimination is liable to produce powerful echo chambers, in which groupthink eventually becomes a prerequisite for employment.
Study participants readily picked a job candidate with whom they shared a political affiliation over a more qualified candidate without that affiliation when presented with Facebook profiles containing clear indicators of the prospective hire’s political alignment. These might include statements about leading a campus Democrat or Republican group, or party symbols like the Democratic donkey or GOP elephant. The closer the participant, acting as a recruiter, identified with a party, the higher ratings they gave to candidates who touted their membership in that party – qualifications were nigh on irrelevant.-RT
There is real irony in the mainstream media’s role in pushing for this discrimination too. The media environment has actively encouraged this polarization. It gets clicks as it drives destructive wedges into society while at the same time condemning any other form of attribute-based preference as “unthinkable bigotry.” In other words, while discriminating against different opinions, the media calls those opinions “bigotry” and says that those are the discriminating opinions.
Welcome to the U.S.S.A. Where groupthink is our future.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 19:30 - This Is The Chart Albert Edwards Is Watching To Decide When The US Becomes "Japanified"
This Is The Chart Albert Edwards Is Watching To Decide When The US Becomes “Japanified”
Last week, in order to help the Fed find some of that oh so “mysterious” inflation it has been so powerless in tracking down for the past decade, we showed a chart of healthcare inflation which is now soaring at a record 20% (for a complete discussion of soaring US healthcare costs, see here).
healthcare inflation pic.twitter.com/pioYdZ9eZH
— zerohedge (@zerohedge) November 26, 2019
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
At least one person was not impressed, however.
Commenting on this particular surge in health insurance premiums, SocGen’s restless permabear said that such inflation “proves temporary.” Which, coming from Albert, is to be expected: while some say the world will end in fire, to Edwards it will be ice as far as the eye can see – after all, it was Edwards who first coined the term “ice age” some two decades ago to explain the deflationary singularity that will consume everything, and as such it is understandably why to him any surge in inflation is a one-time event.
There is another reason why Edwards dismisses any incipient signs of inflation in the US: his latest piece is titled “Japanification of the US beckons”, in which he writes that despite the Fed’s recent announcement of a halt to further rate cuts, “GDP growth looks fragile and there is good evidence to suggest that core CPI inflation is set to collapse towards zero. In fact, a resumption of Fed easing on the back of recessionary data and sliding inflation is likely to accelerate the convergence of US yields towards negative eurozone and Japanese yields.”
Hence, the Japanification of the US, and as he further notes, if the US economy slides into recession, it is clear that “inflation will likely fall ever closer toward Japanese-style deflation. But a rapid decline in key inflation measures, like core CPI, may be beginning to unfold already, irrespective of whether a recession is about to start or not.”
To make his point, Edwards points out the October CPI data which “shocked” him, but not for the surprisingly high 0.4% headline rise M/M, but because of a specific data set that he will now be watching very closely to determine if US inflation is indeed converging with that of Japan: shelter CPI.
it was this key component of the CPI basket that last month collapsed to almost zero. And since shelter has a very heavy 33% weighting in the overall CPI and an overwhelmingly dominant 42% weighting in the closely watched core CPI (ie ex food and energy), it’s only a matter of time before the decline in shelter hits the broader inflation basket.
There is another reason why Shelter is such a key inflationary metric: as the next chart shows, inflation for core CPI has exceeded the Fed’s preferred inflation measure, the core PCE deflator, since 2014, largely because the dominant shelter component has been running around 3½%, pulling up core CPI sharply. Without shelter, core, core CPI has been running just above 1% (blue line in chart below)
The SocGen strategist then notes that if, as he believes, the recent burst of rapid shelter inflation is ending, this will reveal core, core CPI inflation only just above 1%, especially if and when the abovementioned burst in healthcare inflation fades.
Finally, to determine in which direction shelter inflation is headed in the future, Edwards looks at the price of new homes, which suggests that shelter and rent inflation may now be falling away rapidly: “This will come as a surprise to investors, as even without a recession, core CPI could quickly head towards zero. The markets will then embrace the Japanification theme in the US, just as they have done in Europe.”
Putting it all together, Edwards concludes that “I had been waiting for a while for the shoe to drop and now it has started to fall towards the floor, revealing that core CPI inflation in the US is closer to zero than many assumed. And the obvious question arises that if this is all the consumer price inflation that the US economy can produce at the end of the longest cycle in history, what will happen when it falls into recession?”
His rhetorical answer: “The Japanification of the US awaits”, but just in case he is wrong – something even Edwards admits to being more often than not – keep an eye on that shelter inflation chart…
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 19:00 - Hitchens: "If Bodies Like OPCW Cannot Be Trusted… World War 3 Could Be Started By A Falsehood"
Hitchens: “If Bodies Like OPCW Cannot Be Trusted… World War 3 Could Be Started By A Falsehood”
Authored by Peter Hitchens via The Mail On Sunday blog,
I stood outside the safe house, in a road I cannot name, in a major European city I cannot identify, not sure what I might find inside. I had no way of being sure.
I had travelled a long distance by train to an address I had been given over an encrypted email.
I was nervous that the meeting might be some sort of trap. Leaks from inside arms verification organisations are very sensitive matters. Powerful people mind about them.
I wasn’t sure whether to be afraid of being followed, or to be worried about who might be waiting behind the anonymous door on a dark afternoon, far from home. I took all the amateurish precautions that I could think of.
As it happened, it was not a trap. Now, on carefully selected neutral ground, I was to meet a person who would confirm suspicions that had been growing in my mind over several years – that there is something rotten in the way that chemical weapons inspections are being conducted and reported. And that the world could be hurried into war on the basis of such inspections.
Inside the safe house, I was greeted by a serious, patient expert, a non-political scientist whose priority had until now always been to do the hard, gritty work of verification – travelling to the scenes of alleged horrors, sifting and searching for hard evidence of what had really happened. But this entirely honourable occupation had slowly turned sour.
The whiff of political interference had begun as a faint unpleasant smell in the air and grown until it was an intolerable stench. Formerly easy-going superiors had turned into tricky bureaucrats.
The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) had become so important that it could no longer be allowed to do its job properly.
Too many of the big powers that sponsor and finance it were breathing down its neck, wanting certain results, whether the facts justified them or not.
My source calmly showed me various pieces of evidence that they were who they said they were, and knew what they claimed to know, making it clear that they worked for the OPCW and knew its inner workings. They then revealed a document to me.
This was the email of protest, sent to senior OPCW officials, saying that a report on the alleged Syrian poison gas attack in Douma, in April 2018, had been savagely censored so as to alter its meaning.
In decades of journalism I have received quite a few leaks: leaks over luxurious, expensive lunches with Cabinet Ministers, anonymous leaks that just turned up in envelopes, leaks from union officials and employers, diplomats and academics.
But I’ve never seen one like this. It scared me. If it was true, then something hugely dishonest and dangerous was going on, in a place where absolute integrity was vital.
If bodies such as the OPCW cannot be trusted, then World War Three could one day be started by a falsehood.
Last week I reported on the first episode in this story. Within days the OPCW had confirmed that the email I leaked was authentic.
Nobody followed me home or threatened me. A few silly people on social media told blatant lies about me, insinuating that I was somehow a Russian patsy or a defender of the disgusting Syrian regime that I have been attacking in print for nearly 20 years. That was what I had expected.
But there is much more to come. And, as it grows harder for everyone to ignore this enormous, dangerous story, I suspect I shall be looking over my shoulder rather more than usual.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 18:30 - Gloves Come Off: China "Insists" Existing Tariffs Must Be Scrapped For "Phase 1" Trade Deal
Gloves Come Off: China “Insists” Existing Tariffs Must Be Scrapped For “Phase 1” Trade Deal
Until now, China had largely kept the key hurdles in the ongoing US-China trade talks close to the vest, fearful that “breaking the embargo” so to speak on what have been confidential talks so far, could anger the US side. Now in a surprise diplomatic reversal, one which has the intent of signaling to the world that China will no longer play by Washington’s unspoken if assumed rules, overnight China’s nationalistic Global Times tabloid reported that Beijing now “insists” that existing tariffs must be removed as part of a “Phase 1” trade deal, well beyond the US “ask” of merely scrapping those tariffs which are set to kick in on December 15.
“Sources with direct knowledge of the trade talks told the Global Times on Saturday that the U.S. must remove existing tariffs, not planned tariffs, as part of the deal,” said the report.
Global Times, which is published by the official People’s Daily newspaper of China’s ruling Communist Party, also cited another unidentified source close to the talks as saying U.S. officials had been resisting such a demand because the tariffs were their only weapon in the trade war and giving up that weapon meant “surrender.”
Which is precisely what we said last night, when we noted that by going public with its demands, it would make Trump look even weaker, as the US president can no longer spin the outcome of negotiations as one where he proposed the removal of existing tariffs, but rather such an act would be seen as caving to China.
Here we go: China breaks the negotiation embargo and goes public with its deal demands, insisting rollback of existing tariffs. Trump now can’t concede or will be seen as caving to China https://t.co/h4ZnFa8Q0Q
— zerohedge (@zerohedge) December 1, 2019
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
Of course, by eliminating existing tariffs, the US would lose any leverage it currently has as it is only the current tariffs squeezing Chinese exporters that make the current situation unpalatable for Beijing, and any roll back to a status quo would mean that China can now indefinitely delay any further concessions toward a bigger trade deal.
Needless to say, should Trump agree, he would be squeezed by both parties as having capitulated to Beijing after a year and a half, with absolutely nothing to show for it besides the S&P at all time highs, of course, which however is not his but rather the Fed’s doing.
On Tuesday, Trump said Washington was in the “final throes” of a deal aimed at defusing a 16-month trade war with China, a few days after Chinese President Xi Jinping had expressed his desire for a trade agreement. Top trade negotiators for both countries also spoke again and agreed to continue working on the remaining issues.
Trade experts and people close to the White House told Reuters last month, however, that signing a phase one agreement may not take place until the new year as China pressed for more extensive rollbacks of tariffs, with US trade hawks led by Peter Navarro, refusing to concede realizing well that such an act would be a surrender by the US.
Last Tuesday, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley told reporters that Beijing invited U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin for in-person talks in Beijing. Grassley said Lighthizer and Mnuchin were willing to go if they saw “a real chance of getting a final agreement.
A source familiar with the trade talks also told Reuters that U.S. officials could travel to China after Thursday’s Thanksgiving holiday in the United States.
It is unclear if Trump will comply with China’s demands and roll back all existing tariffs just to avoid any market turbulence in the critical, for his re-election, year 2020.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 18:06 - Between Black Friday and Cyber Monday, Pope Francis Warns "Consumerism Is A Virus That Corrodes Faith"
Between Black Friday and Cyber Monday, Pope Francis Warns “Consumerism Is A Virus That Corrodes Faith”
During Sunday Mass, Pope Francis bashed Black Friday and Cyber Monday and urged people to resist consumerism leading up to the Christmas holiday season. The Pope called consumerism a virus and said it hurts the poor, Reuters reported.
This isn’t the first time Pope Francis spoke negatively of the biggest shopping holidays of the year. Last year he delivered a message on the dangers of consumerism.
In 2015, Pope Francis warned the world’s 1.2 billion Roman Catholics not to be “intoxicated by consumerism.”
He has also warned about the “throwaway culture” and the “dictatorship of an impersonal economy.”
This holiday season, he said: “When you live for things, things are never enough, greed grows, other people become obstacles in a race,” he said at a Sunday Mass, criticizing the West where “consumerism reigns supreme.”
The Pope added, “consumerism is a virus that corrodes faith” because it clouds the minds of many who forget “the brother who knocks at your door.”
He urged people this Sunday to “resist the blinding lights of consumerism, which will shine everywhere this month,” leading up to Christmas.
The Pope has pointed out before, the abusive advertising and consumer brainwashing techniques by mega-corporations have become very sophisticated. Advanced marketing techniques have sucked in broke consumers, buying products they can’t afford, nor do they need with credit card rates at 25-year highs.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 18:00 - Does Mike Bloomberg's Presidential Run Raise Questions About Democracy & A Free Press?
Does Mike Bloomberg’s Presidential Run Raise Questions About Democracy & A Free Press?
Authored by Alan Macleod via MintPressNews.com,
After months of speculation, former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg formally announced a high-profile, big-money campaign to become the Democratic Presidential nominee on November 24.
The 77-year-old former Republican has decided that he is the perfect candidate to prevent the president from achieving a second term. Bloomberg has a long history of support for conservative positions, including endorsing George W. Bush’s War on Terror and defending Israel’s 2014 assault on Gaza.
In 2014, Michael Bloomberg went so violently right wing, that the White House’s Valerie Jarrett had to stop him and say that Israel’s bombing of 500 sleeping Palestinian children was inexcusable. He defended it.
More by @mehdirhasan at @theintercept here: https://t.co/qrfFPnKLPH pic.twitter.com/P5hLoiBQ6C
— rafael (@rafaelshimunov) November 26, 2019
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
The primary reason why the self-described conservative has the ability to credibly enter the race at such a late date is his financial clout. Bloomberg is the world’s ninth richest individual, enjoying a net worth of nearly $55 billion and he owns a huge eponymous media network, one of the largest in the world.
His recent entry into the ring has proven controversial with many who see the plutocrat’s power and influence as an unfair advantage. Sawyer Hackett, the National Press Secretary for his Democratic nomination opponent Julian Castro noted that if someone had made half a million dollars per day since the United States’ founding in 1776, they would still be far poorer than Bloomberg himself is. Hackett concluded, “that kind of wealth shouldn’t be allowed to leverage success in our primaries.”
Writer and former New York Times columnist Anand Giridharadas pointed out that Bloomberg’s pitch to the American people, that his wealth makes him incorruptible and therefore more trustworthy, was illogical, given that the Democratic Party is currently attempting to impeach a billionaire president on corruption charges, arguing that “being very rich gives you more interests, not less.”
It is for this reason that Elizabeth Warren has accused him of trying to essentially “buy the nomination.”
“Someone who can’t be bought.”@MikeBloomberg is running on the idea of the ultra-rich being especially incorruptible — at the moment we are impeaching a rich president, who said he’d be incorruptible, for corruption. Turns out being very rich gives you more interests, not less. https://t.co/mKPHYhKLSi
— Anand Giridharadas (@AnandWrites) November 26, 2019
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
Yet Bloomberg’s run for President highlights another danger: that of freedom of the press. As the New Republic warned, the 2,700 journalists working directly under him in his extensive media network are in an impossible position. Can they truly report fairly and in an unbiased manner on the presidential race when their owner has such an obvious and important stake in its proceedings? If history is any judge, the answer to that will be “no.” Silvio Berlusconi, for instance, used his vast media empire to propel him and keep him in power as the Prime Minister of Italy for nine years.
Bloomberg Editor in Chief John Micklethwait announced a series of top-down measures attempting to head off this problem, instructing the company to simply not cover their boss or any of the other candidates in the Democratic primaries. How a major news outlet is going to ignore such an important ongoing process was not explained.
Yet the company appears to already be breaking this promise. The organization ran three negative stories on Elizabeth Warren in a 24-hour period earlier this week. Was this as a response to her criticism of his actions or an attempt to undermine one of the most popular rival candidates’ chances? That is a question that arises uniquely in a situation where a politician owns the means of communication.
Bloomberg the billionaire has muddied the waters between his political interests and his media empire even further by hiring David Shipley and Tim O’Brien, Executive Editors from his news outlet, to key positions in his presidential campaign.
Yet another important danger to media freedom is the fact that Bloomberg is promising to lavish enormous amounts of money to corporate media outlets in the form of political advertising. Even before he had officially announced his candidacy, he already spent $33 million in television advertising alone, beaming his message nationally and in 98 local markets. With the prospect of a bonanza of a seemingly bottomless pile of advertising money, will corporate media outlets, under intense financial pressure, be influenced in their coverage of the billionaire’s activities? There is always a quid pro quo when one accepts funding from any powerful person or organization.
The billionaire already has a list of ringing media endorsements from some of America’s most influential media figures. The New York Times’ Thomas Friedman claimed as President he would “forcefully put a Democratic pro-growth, pro-innovation, pro-business agenda on the table” in a column entitled “Why I like Mike.” His colleague Bret Stephens cheered him on. His article “Run, Mike Run!” argued that the wonderful thing in choosing a conservative Republican as Democratic candidate was that all the usual Republican talking points about the Democrats being too liberal would not work on Bloomberg. Meanwhile, one New York Post commentator said he was “delighted” that the plutocrat was “saving the party” from out-of-touch socialists like Warren.
The uber-conservative Bret Stephens came out to bat for Bloomberg in the New York Times
Can we be sure that these are genuine expressions of support, or merely a calculated quid pro quo? This is again a question that only arises in a corporate, advertiser-dominated media ecosystem. Corporate media have every reason to prop up the multi-billionaire’s campaign, keeping him in the race as long as possible, knowing that the money will continue to flow, as long as they do not portray him poorly. (Rest assured that MintPress News has not been approached to carry water for his campaign).
The New Yorker’s presidential bid highlights the contradictions between both extreme wealth and a for-profit, corporate advertiser-driven media landscape and democracy and freedom of expression. Any expansion of democracy and solution to these dilemmas requires seriously questioning whether either of the first two are legitimate. As Bernie Sanders said, “Billionaires shouldn’t exist.”
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 17:30 - Why The US Job Market Is About To Crack In 8 Charts
Why The US Job Market Is About To Crack In 8 Charts
With the US economy once again rolling over, as various Fed nowcasts see a sharp slump in Q4 GDP and the Citi economic surprise index slumping from a nearly two year high hit at the start of September…
… while real GDP growth is tracking the ISM lower month after month…
… the one part of the US economy that has proven remarkably resilient to the US-China trade war, now in its 553rd day, has been the US jobs market; so resilient in fact, it was an embarrassment to the Fed to have to explain why it is cutting rates with US unemployment at 50 year lows (we will have more to say on the quality vs quantity of US jobs in a subsequent post).
So as we await this Friday’s jobs report where consensus expects another solid 188K job gains for the month of November, it appears that the US labor market is finally starting to crack. Below we present some recent empirical evidence that confirms the growing downside risks to US employment, starting with the recent plunge in percentage of firms who are planning to increase their employment according to NFIB. As this is a leading indicator to nonfarm payrolls, it suggests that the US may be facing a -100K print in the near future – if confirmed, it would be the worst number since the financial crisis.
It’s not just the NFIB: the drop in the ISM employment similarly has held a strong correlation to payrolls. Unless this series stages a powerful rebound in the coming months, it is only a matter of time before the US job market dives.
There has been recent notable weakness in the BLS’ other key labor market metric, the JOLTS job openings, long a favorite of Janet Yellen. Here, too, we find an ominous sign as the 3 month moving average in job openings has posted the most negative print since the financial crisis. This, too, leads broader payrolls data:
But it is probably the composite PMI employment index, which recently suffered its biggest drop since the financial crisis, that offers the most ominous picture yet:
For those asking what may catalyze this coming swoon in the jobs market, blame US companies’ eagerness to repurchase their stock (boosting management comp and stock prices) instead of investing in growth: as the next chart shows, rising capex tends to lead hiring, and by extension, a drop in capex would lead to job cuts.
But the biggest red flag comes from the unprecedented divergence between CEO/corporate confidence and consumer confidence. While the latter is no doubt a function of the record highs in the stock market and the historical near record unemployment prints, when it comes to the future, it is what CEOs think that matters, and according to the chart below, they are only seeing red.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 17:00 - Is Lebanon's Central Bank A Ponzi Scheme?
Is Lebanon’s Central Bank A Ponzi Scheme?
The situation in Lebanon is deteriorating.
Traffic lanes have all been reopened, but a rift has emerged between those who favour the free flow of traffic and the road blockers.
-
The Free Patriotic Movement of President Michel Aoun, the Shiite Amal Movement of parliament speaker Nabih Berri and the Hezbollah condemn road closures;
-
while the Future Movement led by Saad Hariri, a Sunni, the Lebanese Forces of the Maronite Samir Geagea and the Progressive Socialist Party of Walid Jumblatt, leader of Lebanon’s Druze, have attempted to reintroduce the roadblocks.
In the current political landscape, pursuing a simultaneous fight against corruption does not seem possible. Gebran Bassil (Free Patriotic Movement) announced that all the leading members of his party would make public their bank accounts. He also tabled a bill aimed at verifying the assets of civil servants. However, several hurdles would render such measures unworkable (the waiver of bank secrecy being prohibited by law in these circumstances; nothing has been said about the bank accounts belonging to the family members of political leaders; etc.).
Actually, corruption in Lebanon is not a violation of the law; it is the law itself that generates it. For example, there are import taxes, which nobody pays since the law grants an exemption to the 17 recognized religious communities. It is therefore sufficient to have the import declared by a person from one of these communities to avoid paying the tax. Thus, the port of Beirut loses out on US$ 3 billion every year.
The liquidity crisis, which sparked the 17 October protest movement, has worsened. Banks only allow cash withdrawals in Lebanese pounds up to a maximum amount equivalent to US$ 500 per week. All the rating agencies (Fitch, Moody’s and Standard & Poor’s) have downgraded Lebanon’s credit rating. Lebanon’s Central Bank Governor, Riad Salamé, maintains that the country holds US$ 38 billion in foreign currency reserves, but according to Moody’s they do not exceed 5 to 10 billion. On 28 November, Lebanon paid off a Eurobond of US$ 1.5 billion but may be unable to cover the next payment. The possibility of a bail-in targeting all Lebanese bank accounts is increasingly being brought up.
The personal fortune of the Prime Minister, Saad Hariri, has come under scrutiny. As was previously reported by the Saudi press, Mr. Hariri had to reimburse astronomical sums to the Saudi state. No one seems to know what has become of that unfathomable amount of debt. A lawsuit was filed against Hariri’s personal bank to constrain it to return one billion dollars to one of its clients.
The Lebanese think tank “Triangle” regards the entire Lebanese financial system as a scam devised by the Central Bank Governor, Riad Salamé, to emulate the Ponzi scheme investment fraud. According to Sami Halabi and Jacob Boswall, the attractiveness of Lebanese banks stems from the high interest rate they offer on dollar deposits. But this rate can only be honoured provided there is a continuous flow of new deposits (see the full note below for details). A close confidant of deceased president Rafic Hariri, Riad Salamé has been at the helm of Lebanon’s Central Bank since 1993, and is universally celebrated as one of the best central bank directors. His system only works because it benefits the country’s historic warlords.
Such a system has never been observed in any other country since the Second World War, except in Albania in the 1990s. However, the scam in Albania consisted of a misappropriation of funds that benefited private companies, while in Lebanon it was designed to favour political leaders, to the detriment of taxpayers.
* * *
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 16:30 -
- Adam Schiff In Crosshairs As Republicans Seek Impeachment Witnesses
Adam Schiff In Crosshairs As Republicans Seek Impeachment Witnesses
As the impeachment inquiry moves from the House Intelligence Committee chaired by Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) to the House Judiciary Committee chaired by Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY), top House Judiciary Republican Rep. Doug Collins (GA) says Schiff is the most important witness the GOP wants to interview – after the whistleblower who sparked the entire affair approached Schiff’s committee before filing an official complaint.
“My first and foremost witness is Adam Schiff,” Collins told “Fox News Sunday,” adding that Schiff had “compared himself in the past to a special counsel,” while noting that former special prosecutor Kenn Starr testified during the GOP-controlled House’s impeachment of President Clinton, according to The Hill.
The top Republican on the House Judiciary committee Rep Doug Collins joined FOX News Sunday. Collins reacts to a letter from Jerry Nadler asking whether or not Republicans want to subpoena witnesses to testify on behalf of the president. #FNS #FoxNews #Impeachment pic.twitter.com/TajnwAsM6X
— FoxNewsSunday (@FoxNewsSunday) December 1, 2019
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
“[Schiff] has put himself into that position,” added Collins. “If he chooses not to [testify], then I really have to question his veracity in what he’s putting in his report.”
“Why are they hiding the stuff from us? If they think they have such a case, give us all the materials and don’t let Jerry Nadler write a crazy letter that says on the 6th, let us know who your witnesses are. We don’t even have the information from the Intel Committee yet. This is why this is a problematic exercise and simply a made-for-TV event coming on Wednesday.“
According to Politico, Schiff will begin circulating a report on Monday within the House Intelligence Committee which will contain the conclusions of his panel’s investigation of President Trump’s request that Ukraine investigate Joe Biden and his son Hunter.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 16:00 - World's First Human Composting Facility Is Coming To Seattle In 2021
World’s First Human Composting Facility Is Coming To Seattle In 2021
Authored by Emma Fiala via TheMindUnleashed.com,
In a move hailed as a positive step by environmentalists, Washington became the first U.S. state to legalize the composting of human bodies in May of this year.
And now, the Evergreen State will become home to the world’s first human composting facility in 2021 thanks to Katrina Spade, founder and CEO of Recompose, after the legislation she helped enact goes into effect in May 2020.
According to its website, Spade founded the revolutionary company with the goal of offering “natural organic reduction to the public,” a system that converts human remains into soil as an alternative to cremation or burial.
Recompose’s website explains the benefits of natural organic reduction:
“By converting human remains into soil, we minimize waste, avoid polluting groundwater with embalming fluid, and prevent the emissions of CO2 from cremation and from the manufacturing of caskets, headstones, and grave liners.
By allowing organic processes to transform our bodies and those of our loved ones into a useful soil amendment, we help to strengthen our relationship to the natural cycles while enriching the earth.”
In November, around 75 people attended what was described by the Seattle Times as “a housewarming party for a funeral home where bodies would not be burned or buried, but laid in individual vessels to become clean, usable compost.”
Spade told the crowd, made up of investors, doctors, architects, funeral directors, legislators, and lawyers:
“You are all members of the death-care revolution.”
When all is said and done, the process will yield about a cubic yard of soil per person. The soil can be taken home by friends or family and used to grow a tree or a garden. Remaining soil will be used on 640 acres of conservation land in southern Washington that will one day become an ecologically sustainable village.
In contrast, those who have opted to be cremated as a means to save money or take up less space geographically, have inadvertently left a burden on their family members. Spade explained:
“These days, some families regard even ashes from cremation as a burden, not a joy. As in, ‘we’ve had these ashes in the garage for six years.’ And we’re creating a cubic yard of soil.”
While Recompose is not yet up and running, the company is aiming for a $5,500 price tag for its natural organic reduction services while a green burial in the state of Washington averages around $6,000, cremation can range anywhere from $1,000-$7,000, and a conventional burial in a cemetery can set you back at least $8,000.
The idea may seem outlandish or uncomfortable to some, but Recompose is more than just a pipe dream. As an architecture student, Spade first became interested in the funeral industry back in 2012. She quickly delved into the idea of “environmentally sustainable, urban-focused method of disposition of the dead,” after seeing a lack of environmental ethic in both the cremation and burial industries.
In 2014 Spade’s idea took a turn toward reality when she received the Echoing Green Climate Fellowship. With the funding that followed she founded the non-profit Urban Death Project (UDP) and began working with soil science researchers, law professionals, and those in the funeral industry to lay the groundwork for a revolutionary system of death care the world had never seen.
Over the next few years Spade continued to work on UDP before securing over $90,000 via a Kickstarter campaign. Her idea also reached wide audiences through worldwide media coverage.
Then in 2017 Space founded Recompose, a public benefit corporation, to bring her idea to reality—a reality now taking shape in a warehouse in SoDo, where the company is ready to live out their mission to “offer a new form of death care that honors both our loved ones and the planet earth.”
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 15:30 - Two Storms One Weekend: 50 Million Under Winter Alerts As Travelers Return From Thanksgiving
Two Storms One Weekend: 50 Million Under Winter Alerts As Travelers Return From Thanksgiving
Two significant weather disturbances are causing headaches for holiday travelers, including one moving inland on the West Coast and another traversing from Upper Midwest to the Northeast, reported NPR News. More than 50 million people across the country are under winter weather alerts as the holiday shopping weekend comes to an end.
The first storm is expected to impact Seattle to Los Angeles, dumping feet of snow across higher elevations, and heavy rain and gusty wind to coasts and valley regions.
There are already flight delays for Seattle, San Francisco, and Los Angeles airports on Sunday morning.
The National Weather Service (NWS) warns “travel is highly discouraged” between Saturday morning and Monday evening across portions of Northern California and Nevada, where winter storm watches or warnings have been posted. The Sierra Nevada region could expect several feet of snow at higher elevations.
Snow forecast for I-80 & HWY 50. Heaviest snow amounts expected Saturday evening into Sunday. Up to 2-3 feet of snow are possible at pass levels. Snow decreases Monday night, with lighter snow accumulations continuing into Tuesday. Avoid travel by Saturday afternoon! #cawx pic.twitter.com/adotwjm2sf
— NWS Sacramento (@NWSSacramento) November 29, 2019
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
Heavy rain and gusty winds are forecasted for the coasts and valleys through Monday with rainfall totals 2 to 4 inches. Mudslides and flooded roadways are likely for parts of Northern California.
NWS meteorologist Lara Pagano said the second storm has already created a nightmare for travelers in the Upper Midwest into the Great Lakes from Friday through Sunday. The storm is then expected to dump a mix of wintery precipitation across the Northeast from Sunday into Monday.
“We’re seeing travel impacts for the Upper Midwest into the Great Lakes, and then that’s going to transition into portions of the Northeast for wintry precipitation as we get through the remainder of Sunday, Sunday night and then getting into Monday as well,” says Pagano. The Great Lakes region is going to see “significant snow and blizzard conditions that will continue into early tomorrow.”
Traveling north and west of Sioux Falls today? That may not be very easy, or even possible in some cases. A major winter storm will continue to take shape today and come to an end through the day on Sunday. pic.twitter.com/upbfUO7xAj
— NWS Sioux Falls (@NWSSiouxFalls) November 30, 2019
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
The storm is expected to arrive in the Northeast by late Sunday afternoon. New York, Connecticut, and Massachusetts could be setting up for a “nasty evening…complete with snow, sleet, freezing rain, and rain. 8 pm radar shown below,” tweeted Ed Vallee, head meteorologist at Empire Weather.
He said, “We continue to be concerned for very heavy snowfall in the southern Green Mountains, Berkshires, and Monadnocks, where we expect 8-16″ of accumulation by Tuesday, varying with elevation.”
NWS tweeted that the winter storm could create “difficult travel conditions across parts of the Eastern US Sunday & Monday. The big storm that moved onto the west Coast last Tue will reach the Eastern US this weekend, redeveloping off the Delmarva coast Sun evening & moving Northeast on Monday.”
Wintry weather will produce some difficult travel conditions across parts of the Eastern US Sunday & Monday. The big storm that moved onto the west Coast last Tue will reach the Eastern US this weekend, redeveloping off the Delmarva coast Sun evening & moving northeast on Monday. pic.twitter.com/TqhkWvBNSu
— NWS Eastern Region (@NWSEastern) November 29, 2019
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
NYC Sanitation Department Commissioner Kathryn Garcia told reporters at a Saturday press conference that 705 storm spreaders are “loaded” and ready to combat the winter storm. The city could see 1 to 4 inches, Garcia said.
Airports from Philadelphia, New York, and Boston are expected to be hit with delays through Monday.
From start to finish, this Thanksgiving holiday season has been a nightmare for travelers on both coasts.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2019 – 15:00
Digest powered by RSS Digest
Saving...