Jul 31

Today’s News 31st July 2023

  • Should America Dominate The World?
    Should America Dominate The World?

    Authored by Edward Ring via American Greatness,

    Forty years ago, during the final decade of the Cold War, nobody had any illusions about America being perfect. Without wallowing in the topic, we all knew our nation had ongoing social and economic problems, and that our history was filled with examples of oppression. But for most Americans, understanding the grim reality of life for people living in the Soviet Union provided clarity. It was understood that no country is perfect, and compared to the USSR, living in America was paradise.

    The argument that America, by a wide margin, is the lesser of two evils, does not get the traction today that it got during the Cold War. But there is no justification for its diminished relevance. Despite alarming new challenges to the rights and freedoms of American citizens, the gap between America and its contemporary rivals, Russia and China, is as wide as it’s ever been. And in the case of China, the magnitude of the threat they now pose to American global leadership is far more than anything the USSR could have once posed.

    These considerations give rise to a pair of sobering questions:

    First, is China an expansionist nation, committed to growing powerful enough to dominate the world and impose its vision of human rights onto all of humanity?

    Second, before we level well deserved criticisms on American foreign and domestic policies, shouldn’t we compare these policies to those practiced by the Chinese government?

    Forty years ago, those questions mattered. Today, we need to revisit these questions.

    Does China Intend to Dominate the World?

    China is committed to an expansionist strategy. In just the last century, an era during which Western powers were relinquishing their claims to foreign colonies, China has annexed Inner Mongolia, Tibet, and Xinjiang. The Chinese have absorbed Hong Kong, cracking down on human rights they had pledged to uphold. They have lopped off chunks of Indian Kashmir as well as the northern portion of Indian state of Assam. The Chinese openly declare their intention to absorb the independent nation of Taiwan. They’re even claiming virtually all of the South China Sea, in defiance of every other bordering nation.

    China’s expansionist tensions with neighboring nations and Borg like assimilation of the occupied nations within its borders should provide clues to how it treats all its citizens. China’s population is more than 90 percent comprised of the Han ethnic group, and they are probably the most surveilled, micromanaged population on earth. Any dissent that deviates from the collective is immediately suppressed.

    One may go on endlessly about allegedly parallel encroachments on the rights of Americans to express dissent, but it isn’t remotely comparable to what Chinese people go through. The regime of Xi Jinping has turned China into the world’s biggest prison camp, with nearly 1.4 billion inmates. Law enforcement extends well beyond criminal behavior to “social behavior,” where not just what you do, but what you say, what you think, and how you worship are all strictly regulated.

    China’s economic aggression is well documented and points to an unavoidable conclusion; nations that do business with China are going to be systematically robbed of their technological edge and their financial stability. According to Fortune, one in five corporations say China has stolen their intellectual property in the past year. Estimates of how much this costs the U.S. economy range as high as $600 billion per year.

    China’s economic war with the United States has been unrelenting. Over the past 25 years the cumulative U.S. trade deficit with China is nearly $6 trillion. China retains some of its trade surplus with the U.S. in the form of debt, currently an estimated $1.6 trillion.

    Another way China is expanding its economic reach and influence in the world is through the “Belt and Road Initiative,” a modern version of the ancient Silk Road connecting East to West. In theory this is a laudable series of infrastructure projects linking China with trading partners across Asia, Europe, Africa and beyond with a series of highways, railroads, and modernized seaports. But participating nations are realizing that Chinese investment carries a high price.

    The way China intends to control the railroads and seaports being built across this new Silk Road is by using the so-called debt trap. This is a practice whereby China lends billions of dollars to an economically weaker country for them to construct infrastructure. Chinese firms then pour in materials and labor to build the project, which means the Chinese loan funds are repatriated right back into Chinese hands. Then when the debtor nation can’t afford to pay back the loan, the Chinese seize ownership of the project as collateral.

    An article published by the Washington Post provides an extensive list of nations already victimized by China’s infrastructure debt trap. They include Malaysia, Laos, Cambodia, Sri Lanka, Montenegro, Myanmar, Nepal and Pakistan. Some of these projects involve debt nearly equal to the entire GDP of the host nations. In many cases, Chinese-only gated communities are constructed, sometimes entire cities, swarming with Chinese security forces.

    China’s economic imperialism is also reflected in its global buying binge. Using the savings generated from their huge trade surplus, China is buying companies and real estate all over the world. The United States is one of the only nations in the world that allows foreign companies to purchase controlling interests in U.S. companies, and China has taken full advantage of that. Michele Nash-Hoff, writing for Industry Week, posed this question: “Did we let the USSR buy our companies during the Cold War? No, we didn’t! We realized that we would be helping our enemy. This was pretty simple, common sense, but we don’t seem to have this same common sense when dealing with China.”

    American Globalism – The Alternative to China

    The evidence that China is an expansionist nation is overwhelming. In addition to China’s territorial aggression and predatory economic policies, there are the precedents of history. Throughout recorded history, expansionist empires have risen and fallen. Across all continents and through the millennia, regardless of geography or ethnicity, empires have fought wars of conquest. Today is no different. America will rise to the challenge of China, or China will dominate the world. And this gives rise to the second question: How do America’s foreign and domestic policies compare to China’s, and how can they be better calibrated to unite Americans and set an attractive example for people in the rest of the world?

    Only in this context can the American government’s current cultural priorities and globalist ambitions be fairly evaluated. Most American conservatives will agree that a month-long display of gay pride flags in front of every government building in America and every embassy America has in foreign nations, is pushing the woke narrative to ridiculous extremes. But compared to what? Compared to the Iranian regime hanging homosexuals from construction cranes? The Ugandans making homosexual acts subject to the death penalty?

    Conservative Americans have ample reason to criticize the way establishment institutions, certainly including the federal government, have pandered to the extremist wing of the LGBTQ+ lobby. That the cultural pendulum will swing back to some more universally tolerable position is quite likely, and soon would be better. But which is worse? Nations where homosexuals are executed, or nations where activist gender extremists are overly indulged?

    America’s Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, meeting with Chinese diplomats in Alaska two years ago, was criticized for acknowledging American imperfections, saying “we have the humility to know that we are a country eternally striving to become a more perfect union.”

    Blinken, and his boss, Joe Biden, may be leading America down a perilous path. But Blinken was right to acknowledge that America is “eternally striving to become a more perfect union.” The debates we are having in America over identity and equity may be tedious and threatening, and with good reason, but it’s a process at work in American society today that is unthinkable in China. America’s rival in the world is a fascist police state. For all of its flaws, and for all of its dangerous drift into decadence, America is a better place to live than China. The existential importance of that fact should not be lost on anyone, whether they are woke malcontents or appalled conservatives.

    Moving towards a more perfect union will not be easy. Restoring colorblind meritocracy and reestablishing reasonable gender norms will take time, but is probably inevitable. The woke have simply gone too far. An even greater threat to a desirable Pax Americana, however, concerns how America’s establishment is responding to the “climate crisis.” Current policies, designed to stifle development of hydroelectric, nuclear, and natural gas sources of energy, are guaranteed to weaken America and alienate the world. They will impose a tyranny of surveillance and rationing in developed nations, and they will cause chaos, poverty, and endless war in developing nations. They are outrageous and will drive nonaligned nations into alliances with China.

    It may be that the greatest test of American democracy in the 21st century will be whether or not the cabal of oligarchs that have hijacked America’s energy policy can be overcome by a media that has finally come to its senses and a population that awakens from its brainwashed stupor. Without adequate supplies of energy, civilization will falter and individual freedom will die. Claiming that adequate energy can be delivered worldwide exclusively via wind and solar power, without also relying on hydro, nuclear, and natural gas is a blatant, misanthropic, opportunistic lie. This lie, unchallenged, will fatally undermine the credibility of American leadership in the world.

    Answering the question “should America dominate the world” requires recognition of an immutable prerequisite: If America does not, someone else will. And for all of its many flaws, some of them horrifically and even murderously misguided, when compared to empires of the past and rivals in the present, America’s empire is remarkably benevolent. That fact used to matter, and it still does. We would do well to embrace it, even as we work towards something better.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 23:30

  • China Leads The Way In Electrifying The Road
    China Leads The Way In Electrifying The Road

    Over the last ten years, China has become the global battery electric vehicle (BEV) forerunner, increasing its annual sales of fully-electric cars from roughly 10,000 in 2012 to 4.4 million in 2022.

    As Statista’s Florian Zandt shows in the chart below, based on data from the Global EV Data Explorer maintained by the International Energy Agency, three out of the five countries with the most BEVs sold last year have been part of the top 5 ever since e-mobility turned from a marketing buzzword to a tangible effort towards reducing CO2 production in transport.

    Infographic: China Leads the Way in Electrifying the Road | Statista

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    Apart from China, which jumped from third place in terms of BEV sales in 2012 to the uncontested number one spot in 2017, the United States and France have also been at the forefront of electrifying their passenger car fleets.

    Since 2017, Germany has also become a serious contender in this area, registering around half a million new fully-electric cars in 2022.

    When it comes to growth, China again can’t be beaten, increasing its annual sales by 44,000 percent from 2012 to 2022.

    This drive towards electric mobility coincides with the People’s Republic’s efforts in the energy sector.

    The country is expected to reach its goals in energy production via wind and solar five years earlier than planned and will produce 1,200 gigawatts through the aforementioned renewables by 2025 according to media reports. Renewable energy made up 45 percent of China’s total energy capacity in 2022, up from 26 percent in 2011.

    With a buzzworthy topic like e-mobility, it helps to put the numbers in perspective though.

    Last year, total sales of passenger cars in China amounted to 23.6 million, which means only about 19 percent of new cars were BEVs. However, the second biggest market for BEVs fares far worse.

    In the U.S., 13.8 million light vehicles, which include the most popular segment for U.S. car buyers, light trucks, were sold, of which 800,000 or roughly six percent were BEVs.

    Germany, the United Kingdom and France, on the other hand, are hot on the heels of the People’s Republic with BEVs market shares in new cars sold ranging from 13 to 18 percent.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 23:00

  • Beijing Signals It's Not Just All Talk This Time
    Beijing Signals It’s Not Just All Talk This Time

    By Charlie Zhu and Helen Sun, Bloomberg Markets Live reporters and strategists

    Three things we learned last week:

    1. It looks like China’s markets may be on an inflection point, finally. The mainland stock benchmark CSI 300 Index gained 4.5% last week, marking its best performance since November. A gauge of tech shares in Hong Kong entered a bull market.

    Chinese shares surged Tuesday after senior leaders vowed again to shore up economic growth, before paring the gains in the following two sessions due to skepticism about a dearth of detailed measures. The rally resumed Friday as signs emerged that policymakers aren’t just paying lip service to their support pledges.

    “The recognition of a new supply-demand paradigm in real estate helped to open policy space,” Citigroup strategists led by Gaurav Garg wrote in a note, adding the reference to a holistic resolution to local debt issues also helped contain fears of a blowout.

    2. With signs of stress plaguing some developers once considered safe, investors may need to brace for more volatility in credit markets. A local risk assessor put bonds issued by Country Garden’s onshore unit on its watch list, and the major builder’s dollar notes slumped as JPMorgan downgraded the firm’s stock rating to underweight.

    Meantime, state-backed Sino-Ocean Group is seeking investor approval to extend three dollar-note coupons by two months
    “Constraints on the actions that China can undertake may not be well appreciated,” Chang Wei Liang, a strategist at DBS Bank, wrote in a note. “A nuanced view to Chinese credit is still warranted.”

    3. There are growing indications that authorities are taking concrete action to address some of the biggest market concerns. Among the catalysts for Friday’s stock gains was news that signaled regulators’ intention to support tech investments. A separate report on the possibility of a cut in stamp duties helped too.

    The housing minister urged regulators and lenders to strengthen efforts to revive the ailing property sector, calling for homebuyers who had paid off previous mortgages to be considered first-time purchasers.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 22:30

  • DOJ Denies Trying To Jail Hunter Biden Witness Before Tomorrow's Testimony
    DOJ Denies Trying To Jail Hunter Biden Witness Before Tomorrow’s Testimony

    Update (2030ET): The DOJ has responded to allegations that they want Hunter Biden witness Devon Archer arrested before tomorrow’s testimony, saying in a statement:

    “To be clear, the Government does not request (and has never requested) that the defendant surrender before his Congressional testimony,” reads a Sunday night filing. “For the avoidance of all doubt, the Government requests that any surrender date, should the Court order one, be scheduled to occur after the defendant’s Congressional testimony is completed.”

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    The Department of Justice is pushing a federal judge to jail former Hunter Biden witness Devon Archer just days ahead of his hotly anticipated congressional testimony, court documents reveal.

    On Saturday, Manhattan federal prosecutors filed a letter asking a judge to set a date for Archer to begin his one-year sentence in a fraud case which is unrelated to Hunter’s various scandals. The request came less than a week after the Second Court of Appeals upheld Archer’s 2018 conviction on two felony charges for his role in a conspiracy to defraud a Native American tribe.

    Archer is scheduled to testify on Monday in front of the House Oversight Committee.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsAs the NY Post notes;

    Archer — who is set to deliver closed-door testimony to the House Oversight Committee on Monday about Biden — had been challenging the conviction.

    His attorney, Matthew Schwartz, said he would be filing a formal response to the request from the US Attorney’s Office by Wednesday — and noted that his client would still testify as planned despite allegations the DOJ letter was an intimidation tactic.

    …

    Back in 2009, Archer, Biden, and Christopher Heinz co-founded investment and advisory firm Rosemont Seneca Partners, which the first son used as a vehicle for many of his overseas business endeavors.

    Archer is expected to testify that Hunter Biden would dial-in his father, then-Vice President Joe Biden during various meetings with overseas partners, as The Post exclusively reported.

    “We are aware of speculation that the Department of Justice’s weekend request to have Mr. Archer report to prison is an attempt by the Biden administration to intimidate him in advance of his meeting with the House Oversight Committee,” said Archer’s attorney, Matthew Schwartz, adding that his client will testify as planned despite allegations that the DOJ letter was an intimidation tactic.

    “To be clear, Mr. Archer does not agree with that speculation,” Schwartz added. “In any case, Mr. Archer will do what he has planned to do all along, which is to show up on Monday and to honestly answer the questions that are put to him by the Congressional investigators.”

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    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 22:23

  • Russia 'Ready' For Clash With US Over Syrian Skies, Putin Says
    Russia ‘Ready’ For Clash With US Over Syrian Skies, Putin Says

    President Putin in a Saturday statement given to the press significantly ramped up his rhetoric regarding a potential clash with the United States over Syria.

    TASS media quoted him as saying that “Russia is ready for any scenario” if it comes to that, but still “does not want a direct military clash with the US.” 

    This summer has seen a series of near-miss incidents between Russian fighter jets and American MQ-9 Reaper drones. In two incidents this month, the US drones were actually damaged from the encounters, which has reportedly involved the Russian warplanes shooting flares or else possibly dumping fuel. 

    The US drones can be damaged by these flares, which according to the Pentagon has happened. When asked about this, Putin stressed in the new comments that “we are always ready for any scenario, but no one wants this.”

    “On an American initiative, we once created a special mechanism to prevent these conflicts; we have department heads that communicate directly with each other, and consult on any crisis situation,” he said of a military-to-military contact hotline intended to avoid inadvertent clash. “This shows that no one wants clashes.”

    Both sides have blamed the other for ‘unsafe’ and ‘irresponsible’ aerial operations over Syria. Russia’s RT has tallied the following, from Moscow’s perspective:

    The Russian military has reported a total of 23 dangerous incidents involving its aircraft and those of the US-led coalition since early 2023, said Admiral Oleg Gurinov, the head of the Russian Reconciliation Center for Syria. Most incidents took place in July, he added. 

    In 11 cases, Russian pilots recorded being targeted by Western weapon systems. Such provocations by the US-led coalition led to the automatic engagement of onboard defense systems which released decoy flares, the admiral told journalists.

    Just last week, a US Reaper drone was said to be “severely damaged” after a high-risk intercept by a Russian Su-35 fighter. 

    These near-misses over Syrian skies also come amid the backdrop of the Ukraine war, where the nuclear-armed superpower rivals keep inching toward potential direct conflict. Russian media has framed Putin’s new comments as also a warning directed against NATO broadly, in the contexts of both Syria and Ukraine.

    Previously, we’ve pointed out that In Syria, successive US administrations going back to Obama have justified any and all US military actions as based on “countering ISIS” – even though at this point the Islamic State has long been driven underground and was defeated. Russia and Syria have charged that the US really just wants to steal Syria’s oil and gas resources, as part of the continued economic war against Damascus.

    Days ago, The Wall Street Journal appeared to agree with this assessment, in a rare and surprise admission…

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    Where are the terrorists vs. where is the American troop occupation located? WSJ belatedly concedes the following…

    “The U.S. still has about 900 troops in Syria that are assisting a local partner, the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, in combating the remnants of Islamic State,” the report acknowledges. “But those U.S. troops are operating in the east, far from the northwest enclave where suspected Islamic State and al Qaeda leaders have been operating.” 

    This mainstream media admission concerning jihadist-infested Idlib province in Syria’s northwest, while good, comes many years late, as is typical of belatedly acknowledged inconvenient truths.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 22:00

  • Pediatrician Fired After Raising Alarm On COVID Vaccines During US Senate Event
    Pediatrician Fired After Raising Alarm On COVID Vaccines During US Senate Event

    Authored by Zachary Stieber and Jan Jekielek via The Epoch Times,

    A medical expert was terminated by one of her employers after raising concerns about the safety of COVID-19 vaccines during an event held by a U.S. senator, according to newly disclosed documents.

    Dr. Renata Moon, a pediatrician, poses for a picture in Washington on July 28, 2023. (Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times)

    After Dr. Renata Moon (who will appear on “American Thought Leaders” premiering Mon. Aug. 30, 7:30pm ET) testified during the December 2022 event on Capitol Hill, Washington State University officials told her that they were alerting a state medical commission because she allegedly promoted misinformation, one of the documents shows.

    The Washington Medical Commission (WMC) has said that doctors who offer misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines, treatments, and preventative measures “erode the public trust in the medical profession and endanger patients,” that people should lodge complaints against doctors who allegedly provide misinformation, and that it may revoke the licenses of doctors who are found to have spread misinformation.

    Drs. Jeff Haney and James Record, Washington State University officials, referenced the commission in a letter to Dr. Moon dated March 3, 2023.

    “The WMC has asked the public and practitioners to report possible spread of misinformation. There are components of your presentation that could be interpreted as a possible spread,” they wrote. “As such, we are ethically obligated to make a report to the WMC to investigate possible breach of this expectation.”

    The university informed Dr. Moon in June 2023 that it was effectively firing her by not renewing her appointment as a clinical associate professor of medicine, according to other documents reviewed by The Epoch Times.

    “At this time, the needs of the college are moving in a different direction and your participation is no longer required,” Drs. Haney and Record wrote.

    More detailed reasoning was not provided.

    “This is not about my personal situation with the school. This is about freedom of speech for all Americans,” Dr. Moon told The Epoch Times in an email.

    “We must create an ethical healthcare system that is concerned only with the well being of individual patients and not the financial interests of massive corporations. We are dealing with conflicts of interest that are larger than any of us ever imagined.”

    Testimony

    Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) convened Dr. Moon and other experts, including Drs. Peter McCullough and Robert Malone, to talk about COVID-19 vaccines. The event was titled, “COVID-19 Vaccines: What They Are, How They Work, and Possible Causes of Injuries.”

    Dr. Moon testified that she had only seen two or three cases of myocarditis, a form of heart inflammation, while practicing for more than 20 years. But after the COVID-19 vaccines were rolled out, she said, she has been seeing more cases, and heard about others from fellow doctors.

    “There’s clearly been a massive increase,” Dr. Moon said.

    Dr. Moon also pulled out the package insert for the vaccines, or a piece of paper that typically outlines warnings, ingredients, and other information for a vaccine. The insert for the COVID-19 vaccines has no information and says, “intentionally blank,” the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has acknowledged.

    “How am I to give informed consent to parents when this is what I have?” Dr. Moon said.

    Regulators say people can access the information that is usually on the paper on the administration’s website. One of the vaccine manufacturers has said that the COVID-19 vaccine inserts were left blank because the information was being updated during the COVID-19 pandemic.

    “I have a government telling me that I have to say ‘safe and effective’ and if I don’t, my license is at threat. We’re seeing an uptick in myocarditis. We’re seeing an uptick in adverse reactions. We have trusted these regulatory agencies—I have—for my entire career up until now,” Dr. Moon testified.

    “Something is extremely wrong, and that is the anecdotal story that I have.”

    Myocarditis is caused by the COVID-19 vaccines, U.S. officials have confirmed. The heart inflammation primarily affects younger males and can cause death.

    “It’s my obligation to speak out. It’s the obligation of any physician who thinks that there is a problem with a product to speak about that product, whether, honestly, whether they’re right or wrong,” Dr. Moon said on EpochTV’s “ATL: Now.”

    “And in this case, everything I said was completely factual.”

    Other Concerns

    Drs. Haney and Record claimed Dr. Moon failed to request and report an absence in order to travel to Washington and testify on the panel, which would violate faculty rules.

    They also said that Dr. Moon did not make clear she was not speaking on behalf of Washington State University, another possible rule violation, and that other parts of the roundtable were “inconsistent with expectations of the evidence-based medical education expected in developing a future generation of physicians.”

    They added, “The expressed views will require us to review your teaching assignments in the frame of the education of our students.”

    Emails reviewed by The Epoch Times show Dr. Moon did not list the university in a bio she provided Mr. Johnson’s office. The bio stated that her views were her own and that she was not speaking on behalf of any institutions with which she has or is affiliated.

    Mr. Johnson, in introducing Dr. Moon, did not mention any institution but also did not mention the latter part of the bio.

    Dr. Moon’s placard did not list an institution. One of the video streams of the panel listed Washington State University. A university investigator noted that in one email.

    “I was unaware of this happening and did everything in my power to prevent it by sending the press release and making sure not to mention the name of any employer either with my words or on the cardboard placard in front of me,” Dr. Moon told The Epoch Times.

    According to other emails, Dr. Moon requested substitutes for Dec. 6, 2021, and Dec. 8, 2021, the days before and after the panel. She was not scheduled to teach on the day of the panel. University employees responded to the messages by saying they were looking for or had found substitutes, and the university investigator confirmed that substitutes were ultimately found for both days.

    “I did it the way we’ve always done it. My senior physicians approved it; we had substitutes for my classes,” Dr. Moon told The Epoch Times.

    A university spokesman declined to comment on the situation.

    “As a matter of policy WSU does not comment on personnel matters,” the spokesman told The Epoch Times via email.

    It’s unclear if the university ultimately referred Dr. Moon to the medical commission. Dr. Moon is part of a lawsuit against the commission for enforcing its misinformation statement without proper adoption. She says the threat of having her license revoked caused her to not renew her license and has impacted her constitutional right to free speech.

    Trend?

    Dr. Moon said she’s concerned about medical schools no longer serving as venues for discussion and critical thinking.

    She recalled being called into the office of a superior over student complaints. She learned that the students complained about Dr. Moon noting correctly that some information about the COVID-19 vaccines was unknown, such as where in the body the ingredients were distributed and whether they would cause certain health problems.

    “I just engaged in some critical thinking with my students. I thought it was something that we’re supposed to do in discussion groups, and they had asked me, right?” Dr. Moon said.

    “They said that I had caused them trauma and harm by telling them that the vaccines might not be 100 percent safe. Again, these are medical students. This is a medical school. Nothing is 100 percent safe, not even aspirin is 100 percent safe. Everything has the potential for a reaction. So to have that be a complaint against me really surprised me and it really concerned me.”

    Another complaint related to how Dr. Moon, after students asked how her week in the clinic had gone, relayed how she had seen anxious and depressed children.

    Dr. Moon attributed the problems to the harsh lockdowns imposed in Washington state, like much of the country, and questioned why those policies were put into place when children face little risk from COVID-19.

    “I just said to my students, I think we need to rethink this masking that we’re doing and the social distancing and isolating, I wonder if CDC has considered that we need to think about isolating our more vulnerable in our communities and keeping them more safe and keeping them at home but letting our kids go out there,” Dr. Moon said, referring to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

    “My students again stated that they were traumatized and harmed by that discussion, in a discussion group in a graduate-level medical school,” Dr. Moon said. “This is happening nationwide. Our students have lost that ability, I think, to tolerate critical thinking, and to hear perspectives that are different than the main narrative or the main party line that is being pushed.”

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 21:30

  • Watch: G7 Vs BRICS By GDP (1992-2028)
    Watch: G7 Vs BRICS By GDP (1992-2028)

    Fifty years ago, the government finance heads from the UK, West Germany, France, and the U.S. met informally in the White House’s ground-floor library to discuss the international monetary situation at the time. This is the origin story of the G7.

    This initial group quickly expanded, adding Japan, Italy, and Canada, to solidify a bloc of the biggest non-communist economies at the time. As industrialized countries that were reaping the benefits of the post-war productivity boom, they were economic juggernauts, with G7 economic output historically contributing around 40% of global GDP.

    However, as Visual Capiutalist’s Pallavi Rao details below, the more recent emergence of another international group, BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa), has been carving out its own section of the global economic order.

    This animation from James Eagle uses data from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and charts the percentage contribution of the G7 and BRICS members to the world economy.

    Specifically it uses GDP adjusted for purchasing power parity (PPP) using international dollars.

    Charting the Rise of BRICS vs. G7

    The acronym “BRIC”, developed by Goldman Sachs economist Jim O’Neill in 2001, was used to identify four fast-growing economies in similar stages of development. It wasn’t until 2009 that their leaders met and formalized their relationship, later inviting South Africa to join in 2010.

    ℹ️ Russia was at the time also a member of the G7, then the G8. It was invited to join in 1997 but was expelled in 2014 following the annexation of Crimea.

    While initially banded together for investment opportunities, in the last decade, BRICS has become an economic rival to G7. Several of their initiatives include building an alternate global bank, with dialogue underway for a payment system and new reserve currency.

    Below is a quick look at both groups’ contribution to the world economy in PPP-adjusted terms.

    A major contributing factor to BRICS’ rise is Chinese and Indian economic growth.

    After a period of rapid industrialization in the 1980s and 1990s, China’s exports got a significant boost after it joined the World Trade Organization in 2001. This helped China become the world’s second largest economy by 2010.

    India’s economic rise has not been quite as swift as China’s, but by 2022, the country ranked third with a gross domestic product (PPP) of $12 trillion. Together the two countries make up nearly one-fourth of the PPP-adjusted $164 trillion world economy.

    The consequence of using the PPP metric—which better reflects the strengths of local currencies and local prices—is that it has an outsized multiplier effect on the GDPs of developing countries, where the prices of domestic goods and services tend to be cheaper.

    Below, we can see both the nominal and PPP-adjusted GDP of each G7 and BRICS country in 2023. Nominal GDP is measured in USD with market-rate currency conversion, while the adjusted GDP uses international dollars (using the U.S. as a base country for calculations) which better account for cost of living and inflation.

    By the IMF’s projections, BRICS countries will constitute more of the world economy in 2023 ($56 trillion) than the G7 ($52 trillion) using PPP-adjusted GDPs.

    How Will BRICS and G7 Compare in the Future?

    China and India are in a stage of economic development marked by increasing productivity, wages and consumption, which most countries in the G7 had previously enjoyed in the three decades after World War II.

    By 2028, the IMF projects BRICS countries to make up one-third of the global economy (PPP):

    BRICS vs. the World?

    The economic rise of BRICS carries geopolitical implications as well.

    Alongside different political ideals, BRICS’ increasing power gives its member countries financial muscle to back them up. This was put into sharp perspective after the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, when both China and India abstained from condemning the war at the United Nations and continued to buy Russian oil.

    While this is likely concerning for G7 countries, the group of developed countries still wields unparalleled influence on the global stage. Nominally the G7 still commands a larger share of the global economy ($46 trillion) than BRICS ($27.7 trillion). And from the coordination of sanctions on Russia to sending military aid to Ukraine, the G7 still wields significant influence financially and politically.

    In the next few decades, especially as China and India are earmarked to lead global growth while simultaneously grappling with their own internal demographic issues, the world order is only set to become more complex and nuanced as these international blocs vie for power.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 21:00

  • Power Companies Could Remotely Switch Off EV Chargers To Reduce Grid Stress
    Power Companies Could Remotely Switch Off EV Chargers To Reduce Grid Stress

    Authored by Daniel Yeng via The Epoch Times,

    Energy providers could have the option to switch off home EV charging stations remotely to reduce pressure on Queensland’s electricity grid.

    The proposal is part of the Australian state’s Queensland Electricity Connection Manual (QECM), which provides a framework for the grid’s operation.

    Section 8 of the QECM proposes that EV charging equipment may be limited or switched off by operators Ergon Energy and Energex (distributed network service providers or DNSPs) if it has an output of more than 20 amps—a standard domestic single-phase EV charger uses 32 amps.

    The use of such “demand management” schemes is largely unique to Queensland and is also used on residential pool cleaning machines, hot water systems, and air conditioning units under the Peaksmart program.

    Peaksmart gives households a cash rebate; in return, the operator can turn off air conditioners remotely during peak operating times (summer) to reduce pressure on the energy grid.

    The large-scale roll-out of such programs has been earmarked as a potential catalyst to close down coal-fired power stations faster—amid the net zero push—and to, instead, adopt more intermittent renewable energy sources like wind, solar, and battery.

    Confidence Towards Net Zero’s Viability is Low: MP

    Federal Nationals MP Keith Pitt, himself an electrical engineer, says a proposal to use demand management on EV charging reveals that operators have little confidence the grid can handle the uptake of electric cars expected in the push towards net zero.

    “EV take-up could increase peak demand by as much as 60 percent right across the National Electricity Market,” Mr. Pitt told The Epoch Times.

    “That would mean you need a 60 percent increase in generating electricity capacity, transmission, and distribution. So that’s every substation, every cable, every supply point, every house—it will cost an absolute fortune.”

    The federal Labor government has set a lofty goal of having 3.8 million EVs on the road by 2030—there are currently 83,000 in use.

    Further, the government is also pushing to expand the charging network, aiming for 100,000 for businesses, 3.8 million chargers in households, and 1,800 publicly available fast chargers.

    The initiative comes as part of a wider push towards net zero by 2050 and to reduce emissions by 43 percent by 2030. Further, the Labor government hopes to have 82 percent of the National Electricity Market powered by renewables.

    Advocacy Groups Push Back Against Proposal

    Advocacy groups have argued against a demand management system saying it will dampen enthusiasm for EVs.

    “We know from surveys that average consumers aren’t particularly keen on mandated orchestration of their appliances,” says the Electric Vehicle Council in its submission on the QECM (pdf).

    “The Peaksmart program enlists between 10,000 and 15,000 air conditioning units for orchestration each year … out of a total of about 300,000 that get installed. About 95 percent of consumers prefer retaining control of their air conditioning, overtaking the financial incentives on offer.”

    Meanwhile, Melissa McAuliffe, acting director of energy services at Energy Consumers Australia, says it would erode consumer trust that the “energy system is working for them.”

    “Our 2023 Energy Consumer Sentiment Survey finds that only 35 percent of households are confident that the energy industry and regulators are working in their long-term interests now,” she wrote in a submission (pdf).

    “Further, such measures are unlikely to be completely effective for consumers or the system, as consumers may look to workarounds that circumvent giving DNSPs control. For example, through disincentivising the use of EV chargers, consumers may just use regular power points.”

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 20:30

  • Zelensky Says War 'Returning' To Russian Territory After Moscow Drone Attack
    Zelensky Says War ‘Returning’ To Russian Territory After Moscow Drone Attack

    On Sunday, the day following a major drone attack on Moscow’s financial district, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has announced that he is ready to “return” war to Russia’s own territory, emphasizing that this is “inevitable”.

    “Today is the 522nd day of the so-called ‘Special Military Operation’, which the Russian leadership thought would last a couple of weeks,” he said in a new video message. “Gradually, the war is returning to the territory of Russia – to its symbolic centers and military bases, and this is an inevitable, natural and absolutely fair process.” 

    He described these increasing attacks Russian territory as an “inevitable, natural and absolutely fair process” of the war between the two nations.

    Reuters image of damage in aftermath of Saturday’s drone attack on Moscow City financial district in the capital. 

    It seemed a rare moment of Ukraine’s leadership owning up to a brazen cross-border attack deep in Russian territory. Throughout most of the war, Kiev officials have tended to stay silent on claiming responsibility specific attacks like this.

    BBC noted of Zelensky’s words that “It may be far from a confession, but President Zelensky clearly feels confident enough to pile on the pressure, and not just on the Kremlin.”

    Ukraine’s most powerful military backer, the United States, early in the conflict urged restraint when it comes to the prospect of attacking Russian territory—and has even long been resistant to providing Kiev with long-range missiles.

    And yet, there’s mounting testimony and evidence that strongly suggests US support for certain major attacks on Russian territory, especially in the Crimean peninsula. Arguably the biggest and most devastating attacks were the two bombings of the Crimean Bridge (which Russia alleges Ukrainian forces had US or NATO assistance with in both cases).

    It seems Zelensky now has greater willingness to be “open” in his intent to keep hitting Russian territory, which in turn raises to pressure on President Putin to respond with military escalation.

    Indeed Putin is now signaling he’s ready to do just that. While addressing the following remarks specifically in reference to the potential for a US-Russia clash over the skies of Syria, the issues at play certainly intersect with the Ukraine crisis as well:

    Russia is “always ready for any scenario,” President Vladimir Putin told journalists on Saturday, commenting on a potential direct confrontation between the Russian and NATO militaries. The president was responding to a question about recent near-collisions involving Russian and American aircraft in Syria. 

    “No one wants that,” the president added, pointing to the existing conflict-prevention lines that allow Russian and US officers to talk directly about “any crisis situation.” That fact that these lines still work shows that no side is interested in a conflict, he added. “If someone wants it – and that’s not us – then we’re ready,” Putin added.

    In Ukraine, there have been reports that intelligence and military command centers are being hit with Russian missiles at greater regularity.

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

    Some analysts have speculated that should the Ukrainian counteroffensive keep sliding toward failure and eventual defeat, Kiev will grow more desperate. Ukraine’s government might also be desperate enough to orchestrate an intentionally escalatory situation which would “ensure” the West gets more directly dragged into the war. This also at a moment Kiev officials continue to be frustrated at lack of air superiority, given the lag over the timeframe of receiving F-16 jets.

    Meanwhile…

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

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 20:00

  • CNN Still Pushing COVID Fear In 2023
    CNN Still Pushing COVID Fear In 2023

    Authored by Ben Bartee via PJMedia.com,

    Imagine being so soulless as to be a CNN editor still pushing COVID fear in this, the Year of Our Lord 2023.

    Imagine being gullible enough, as a non-ironic consumer of corporate state media, to take it all in.

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

    Via CNN (emphasis added):

    It’s time to stock up on tissues, bingeable TV options and Covid-19 tests. Yes, many signs are pointing to a Covid-19 summer surge – although one that’s far less intense than what emerged the past few summers.

    Experts say they do not expect that cases will be severe or that the uptick will be prolonged, and there are early signs from wastewater data that this wavelet may already be leveling out.

    “Experts say” lots of things: that masks don’t work and then they magically do; that COVID injections stop transmission; that something called “herd immunity” is going to end the spread of a virus that constantly mutates; etc.

    If we’re keeping score, the “conspiracy theorists” have outperformed the “experts” in every way possible since the start of the pandemic. I put more stock in what my trusted colleague on Substack, with no institutional support and no budget for research, has to say about COVID than CNN.

    Continuing via CNN:

    But data posted this week by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that many Covid-19 indicators, including hospital admissions, emergency department visits and test positivity, are once again on the rise.

    Independent commercial laboratories are also noting the increase.

    “When we look at our data, we have noticed that since late June to the beginning of July and probably through now, there has been a mild uptick in cases and these are based on samples sourced from pharmacy-based testing and also from health system-based testing,” said Shishi Luo, associate director of bioinformatics at Helix, a gene sequencing company which has been assisting the CDC with tracking the gene changes of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19…

    As testing data has become more limited, wastewater surveillance can offer a more consistent view of transmission trends over time. Data from Biobot Analytics, a biotechnology firm that has partnered with the CDC, shows that the concentration of coronavirus particles in sewage samples is about a third of what it was at this time last year.

    Here’s the thing, Jack: if COVID-19 is so like a common cold as to be indistinguishable in terms of symptoms, and therefore the only way to confirm whether there’s a “surge” in cases is through testing the wastewater, what’s the point of all of this fearmongering? No one ever reports on a rise in common colds among the population because it’s irrelevant to the vast majority of people with decent immune systems. Then again, Pfizer doesn’t have any injections to sell that ostensibly inoculate against a common cold.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 19:30

  • How The World Economy Is Expected To Grow
    How The World Economy Is Expected To Grow

    The latest estimates from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) indicate that globally, economic growth is expected to slow to the end of 2024.

    As Statista’s Martin Armstrong reports, representing a slightly more optimistic view than that offered in April – plus 0.2 points for 2023 – the IMF expects global real GDP to grow by 3.0 percent in both 2023 and 2024 after an estimated increase of 3.5 percent in 2022.

    Looking at the picture regionally, the highest growth rates are forecast for emerging and developing Asia, where output is expected to go up by 5.3 percent and 5.0 percent in 2023 and 2024, respectively.

    Infographic: How the World Economy is Expected to Grow | Statista

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    The United States, on the other hand, is projected to see faster declining growth over this period, going from 2.1 percent in 2022 to just 1.0 percent in 2024 .

    That is a pattern mirrored in advanced economies generally, where the rate is expected to go from 2.7 percent in 2022, down to 1.4 percent in 2024.

    Contributing to this slowing growth is Germany, where a decline in GDP of 0.3 percent is forecast for 2023.

    According to the IMF, this contraction is due to “weakness in manufacturing output and economic contraction in the first quarter of 2023”.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 19:00

  • 'Questionable Political Prosecutions': House Republicans Ask Garland To Release Jack Smith Conflict-Of-Interest Documents
    ‘Questionable Political Prosecutions’: House Republicans Ask Garland To Release Jack Smith Conflict-Of-Interest Documents

    Authored by Catharine Yang via The Epoch Times,

    Republican members of Congress have sent a letter asking Attorney General Merrick Garland to release the conflict-of-interest review of special counsel Jack Smith.

    “Mr. Smith has a history of questionable political prosecutions,” wrote Rep. Eric Burlison (R-Mo.) in the Wednesday letter signed by eight other representatives.

    Mr. Smith was appointed special counsel last November to investigate former President Donald Trump, and is heading both the Mar-a-Lago case in which Mr. Trump has been indicted, and the probe into the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol breach and surrounding events.

    Mr. Trump last week announced he’d received a letter informing him he was a target of this Jan. 6 investigation that has already resulted in more than 1,000 charged, and just today wrote on social media that his lawyers have met with Department of Justice (DOJ) investigators and that, contrary to many news reports, he was not told to expect an indictment. The grand jury reportedly convened this morning.

    Prior to Mr. Smith’s appointment, it would have been standard procedure to do a background check and review of the special counsel’s “ethics and conflicts of interest,” the letter states, citing a statute.

    “We request that you provide us with unredacted copies of all documents related to the conflicts of interest review that was conducted prior to Smith’s appointment, including any reports that were prepared as a part of the review by Friday, August 4, 2023,” reads the letter, which was first obtained by The Daily Caller.

    Special counsel Jack Smith delivers remarks on a recently unsealed indictment against former President Donald Trump, in Washington on June 9, 2023. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

    The letter goes on to call into question Mr. Smith’s prosecution former Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell, “which was unanimously overturned by the Supreme Court.”

    Mr. McDonnell had been sentenced to two years in prison for accepting bribes in 2015. In 2016 the Supreme Court overturned the conviction, ruling that the prosecutors used a “boundless interpretation of the federal bribery statute.”

    “A more limited interpretation of the term ‘official act’ leaves ample room for prosecuting corruption, while comporting with the text of the statute and the precedent of this Court,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the majority opinion. “Setting up a meeting, calling another public official, or hosting an event does not, standing alone, qualify as an ‘official act.’”

    “Conscientious public officials arrange meetings for constituents, contact other officials on their behalf, and include them in events all the time. The basic compact underlying representative government assumes that public officials will hear from their constituents and act appropriately on their concerns—whether it is the union official worried about a plant closing or the homeowners who wonder why it took five days to restore power to their neighborhood after a storm,” Roberts wrote.

    The letter also points out that Mr. Smith’s wife, Katy Chevigny, “produced a documentary about former First Lady Michelle Obama and donated to President [Joe] Biden’s 2020 campaign, raising concerns about potential conflicts of interest for Mr. Smith.” Ms. Chevigny had donated $1,000 twice to Mr. Biden’s campaign in 2020.

    “We hope that you, in compliance with DOJ regulations, conducted the required review of potential conflicts of interest prior to Mr. Smith’s appointment. In order for the American people to have confidence in Mr. Smith’s investigation, it is vital that you release the information associated with the investigation of Mr. Smith’s potential conflicts of interest,” the letter reads.

    Reps. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), Bill Posey (R-Fla.), Andy Ogles (R-Tenn.), Josh Brecheen (R-Okla.), Matthew Rosendale Sr. (R-Mont.), Andrew Clyde (R-Ga.), Alex Mooney (R-W. Va.), and Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) joined Mr. Burlison in signing the letter.

    Supreme Court Justice John Roberts (2L) administers the oath of office to U.S. President Donald Trump as his wife Melania Trump holds the Bible and son Barron Trump looks on, at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Jan. 20, 2017. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

    Third Indictment?

    Reports of the Jan. 6 grand jury meeting emerged Thursday morning as jurors were seen entering a courthouse, and news reports of Mr. Trump’s lawyers being informed of an indictment that could come as soon as that day followed. The lawyers were seen leaving before noon, and by around 1 p.m. Mr. Trump had taken to social media to dispell the rumors.

    “My attorneys had a productive meeting with the DOJ this morning, explaining in detail that I did nothing wrong, was advised by many lawyers, and that an Indictment of me would only further destroy our Country. No indication of notice was given during the meeting—Do not trust the Fake News on anything!” he wrote.

    Mr. Trump has claimed the latest investigation is “election interference” on the part of the Biden administration, which has stayed quiet on the topic. When he announced the letter stating he was a target of this latest investigation, he wrote that a grand jury “almost always means an Arrest and Indictment.” He has already pleaded not guilty in one case related to falsifying business records, and another related to classified documents.

    “We’ll have fun on the stand with all of these people that say the Presidential Election wasn’t Rigged and Stollen. THE TRIAL OF THE CENTURY!!!” Mr. Trump wrote.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 18:30

  • CDC At 'Precipice' Of Recommending Annual Covid-19 Shots
    CDC At ‘Precipice’ Of Recommending Annual Covid-19 Shots

    The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is on track to recommend annual COVID-19 shots for Americans, according to the agency’s new director, Dr. Mandy Cohen.

    “We’re just on the precipice of that, so I don’t want to get ahead of where our scientists are here and doing that evaluation work, but yes we anticipate that COVID will become similar to flu shots, where it is going to be you get your annual flu shot and you get your annual COVID shot,” Cohen told Spectrum News, adding “We’re not quite there yet, but stay tuned. I think within the next couple of weeks, month we’re going to hear more from our experts on COVID shot.”

    The proposal, which would make COVID-19 shots akin to the flu vaccine, is expected to be finalized and announced in September despite concerns raised by critics regarding the lack of clinical trial data supporting the vaccines and the efficacy of the boosters.

    In April the CDC scaled back recommendations for people of all ages to receive a primary vaccine series and at least one booster – while countries such as England have stopped recommending or allowing certain people to get boosters, period. According to critics, the CDC should further scale back recommendations – particularly for those who are young and/or healthy until more data is available from trials and studies.

    “When you look at tracking data for the young, the rates of either infection or vaccination—in other words, the rate at which people have some level of circulating immunity—is quite high. And so the idea that that group needs to have a vaccination series now, without current research in that particular population, I don’t think is scientifically valid,” said Dr. David McCune, an oncologist, in a statement to the Epoch Times.

    The CDC’s plan ignores the fact that the vaccines have ‘faced challenges’ against the newer COVID-19 variants, while clinical data for newer, reformulated shots has yet to be made public. The updated shots which are supposed to target the XBB.1.5 variant are expected to be rolled out around September, and will exclude components of the original shot designed for the Wuhan variant.

    “Immunity from both vaccines and infection wanes over time. The only way to stay ahead of the virus is to continue to update the composition of our vaccines and administer them in a regular cadence. Although this strategy is critical, with our current generation of vaccines, it also requires immense resources for mounting frequent vaccination campaigns—at a time when antivaccination sentiment continues to grow and the public’s appetite for regular vaccinations has waned,” Health Secretary Xavier Becerra and former White House official Dr. Ashish Jha wrote in an editorial.

    “Next-generation vaccines and treatments are needed if we are to break the cycle of responding to new variants as they appear: we need tools that can improve our bodies’ ability to stop infections, reduce transmission, build longer-lasting immunity, and target parts of the virus that are less likely to evolve. Ideally, such vaccines and treatments would provide better protection, enabling us to avoid disruptions of our lives and continue to enjoy the activities we value.”

    Pharmaceutical companies are also developing combination vaccines to handle both COVID-19 and influenza.

    “The companies need a new market for the COVID product and they can get that by combining it with the influenza vaccine and making sure the CDC recommends that everyone get a COVID booster annually,” said Barbara Loe Fisher, co-founder and president of the National Vaccine Information Center, in an email to the Epoch Times.

    “If CDC officials recommend that everyone get an annual COVID booster shot,” she added, “it will only further increase public distrust in vaccines and call into question the scientific and moral integrity of public health policy.”

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 18:00

  • Inflation Is Dead… Long Live Inflation
    Inflation Is Dead… Long Live Inflation

    Submitted by Sebastian Bea of One River Asset Management

    60 years. That’s the median age of FOMC members. It puts their prime college learning years from 1983 to 1988, a period of exciting change in economics. Policy was attentive to taming inflation and shrinking the role of the government. Academicians calibrated how to keep future policy from cheating once price stability was achieved. And the world settled on inflation targeting, with New Zealand the first responder.

    “It was a bit of a shock to everyone, I think,” offered Roger Douglas, New Zealand’s finance minister in the late 1980s. “I just announced it was gonna be 2%, and it sort of stuck.” Global monetary policy can credit its current north star to “Rogernomics” – 2% became the global norm, agreeing with the direction of the wind. It was low enough to make inflation irrelevant and high enough to give policy a margin of error, greasing the wheels of an economy.

    But inflation targeting failed to achieve its objective. And for predictable reasons.

    “When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure,” Charles Goodhart quipped in 1975 at a time when statistical techniques were on the rise. Models that looked useful when fitted to the past would become useless once policy used them, as everyone would anticipate their effects. And despite the vintage of policymakers learned in this era of thought, the lessons were brushed aside. The consequences cannot be. The amplitudes of financial asset prices have never been greater than in the era of “price stability.”

    And so, the pattern continues. Today, the global goods sector is in a deep recession. Industrial powerhouses of Europe’s north have become the weakest links in the global economy. Downward pressure on inflation from these sources is welcomed in overheated economies, like the US where nominal GDP is 14% above its 2010-2020 trend. One-year US inflation swaps have collapsed to 2%, a Pavlovian green light to be long growth equities. Only, that’s not really the story.

    Last year was a deflationary board, not an inflationary one. Yes, global CPI inflation rocketed to 9%, the highest in nearly two decades. But from any other vantage point, 2022 was deflationary. The US dollar rose. Equities evaporated. Bonds busted. Crypto cratered. Commodities collapsed. These are not outcomes of a world seeking inflation protection. There was a strongly held belief that inflation would be contained by rate hikes. And we got a lot of them. Cash was king.

    Now, the board is inflationary in the face of declining consumer price growth. Weak growth and low inflation in China open the door for aggressive easing, executing targeted stimulus to boost the consumer. Inflationary. Global equity gains are multiple expansion, discounting higher nominal GDP. Also, inflationary. Financial markets are internalizing the other lesson of the 1970s – monetary policy can’t do it alone in taming inflation, a fiscal anchor is needed. It isn’t there.

    Growth assets are leading performers this year with all eyes on scalable virtual worlds. Artificial intelligence. The Metaverse. Virtual currencies. Investors are enamored by scale. And like macro models, the past 20 years of scaling solutions are not the right guide to the future. Scaling the new generation of technologies will require enormous resources at a time when they are in sparse supply. A commodity supercycle will focus investors back to the need for physical investment.

    Signs are already there. Despite higher-for-longer policy rates, inflation commodities are firming. Gold is approaching cycle highs. Its correlation to bitcoin has averaged 65% this year (Bloomberg, CBAM calculations). The levels look nothing alike – bitcoin is still 57% from all-time highs. But there are two distinct patterns in the relationship between gold and bitcoin. One where bitcoin follows gold in a low-beta manner, and the other where digital gold surges in the phase of speculative excess (Figure 1).

    Source: Bloomberg LP. Bitcoin Price represented by CME Bitcoin Reference Rate (BRR). November 2016 to July 26, 2023.

    We have yet to see the unabashed speculative excess that derailed past cycles – crypto-asset markets are avoiding past mistakes. It’s a disciplined rally. Digital Financial Conditions are tight. Capital is available, but only for those with strong projects anchored to conservative planning. Even where momentum and speculation show signs of building, it is localized. Figure 2 makes the point with a scatter of one-month price changes against the year-to-date.

    Source: Crypto Compare. CBAM Calculations. Data year-to-date as of July 26, 2023.

    The upward-sloping line is indicative of momentum. Those winning for the month are now winning for the year. Narrow momentum is the story of July, a bet on previously lagging assets racing ahead, like Stellar, Ripple, and Solana. This cycle’s early movers, dominated by Bitcoin and Ethereum, delivered mostly nothing in July despite an inflationary board in traditional markets. The gift of nothing is welcomed. Durable trends are built on discipline. It’s the prevailing theme in crypto-asset markets.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 17:30

  • Summer Blockbuster 'Sound Of Freedom' To Hit Movie Screens "Around The World"
    Summer Blockbuster ‘Sound Of Freedom’ To Hit Movie Screens “Around The World”

    Despite a wave of negative criticism from mainstream outlets like (Rolling Stone and Bloomberg) targeting the anti-child trafficking movie “Sound of Freedom,” the independent film is defying expectations by increasing its nationwide screening count. The film’s earnings have exceeded $140 million, and there are plans to expand its reach to over 20 countries in Central and South America, the United Kingdom and Ireland, Australia, and South Africa. 

    The film’s production company Angel Studios tweeted, “Sound of Freedom is on its way around the world.” 

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

    On Friday, Angel Studios released a statement, “SOUND OF FREEDOM enters its fourth-weekend screening in 3,411 theaters, and is crossing the total booking threshold of over 4,000 screens and topping $130M in box office revenue.” 

    “Everyone in the industry knows that films are generally supposed to lose screens week-over-week, not add them. And yet, the incredible word-of-mouth driving SOUND OF FREEDOM continues to spread. In response, we are continuing to expand our offering in theaters this weekend,” said Brandon Purdie, Angel Studios Head of Theatrical. 

    According to Box Office Mojo, the movie that only had a budget of $14.5 million has earned $140 million as of Friday since being released on July 4 — and remains in the top five hottest movies at theaters. 

    Geesey told Newsweek, “Since Sound of Freedom launched in the U.S., demand has been building around the world in dozens of regions and languages. Child trafficking is a global issue, and we hope to build on the incredible momentum here in the States and share the film’s powerful message worldwide.”

    He told Variety: “Sound of Freedom has become the people’s movie. This is the opposite of the top down system developed by Hollywood gatekeepers. We are empowering people to be part of choosing, funding, and sharing stories that amplify light and impact culture.”

    The film, which stars Jim Caviezel, is based on the true story of Tim Ballard, a former Homeland Security agent who battles against human trafficking. 

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    At the end of the film, a message reads, “Human trafficking is a 150 billion-dollar-a-year business. The United States is one of the top destinations for human trafficking and is among the largest consumers of child sex. There are more humans trapped in slavery today than [at] any other time in history—including when slavery was legal. Millions of these slaves are children.” 

    No matter how much corporate media bashes the movie as nothing more than ‘QAnon conspiracy theories,’ the horrors of child trafficking are very real, and the popularity of it continues to expand worldwide. 

     

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 16:33

  • "Everything Is Changing" – Californians Struggling With High Rent Prices, End Of Eviction Moratoriums
    “Everything Is Changing” – Californians Struggling With High Rent Prices, End Of Eviction Moratoriums

    Authored by Travis Gillmore via The Epoch Times,

    With some of the most expensive rent prices in the nation, Californians pay a disproportionate share of income for housing, and with evictions now returning after nearly three years of moratoriums in certain locations, some property owners and renters are finding themselves in difficult predicaments.

    More than 768,000 households are behind on rent in the Golden State, with debts totaling more than $5 billion, putting approximately 721,000 children at risk of eviction, according to the National Equity Atlas—a collaborative data and analytics tool founded by Oakland-based Policy Link and the University of Southern California Equity Research Institute.

    Residents in the City of Los Angeles are facing a deadline of Aug. 1 to repay all rental debt accrued between March 2020 and September 2021, with that from October 2021 to January 31, 2023, due by February 2024.

    With the first deadline imminent, Mayor Karen Bass and the city council are working to assist overburdened renters with a series of programs allowing applicants to request financial aid.

    Renters and housing advocates attend a protest to cancel rent and avoid evictions amid the Coronavirus pandemic in Los Angeles on Aug. 21, 2020. (Valerie Macon/AFP via Getty Images)

    Renters make up nearly half of the state’s population, with an estimated 17 million people leasing their homes out of 39.5 million residents, and rising prices are impacting their ability to make ends meet, according to Legislative analyses.

    Average rent prices in California are $2,902 across all sizes and property types, according to online real estate listing company Zillow as of July 21.

    Based on current listings in many areas like Orange, San Diego, Santa Clara, or San Francisco counties, homes with three bedrooms and space to accommodate a family cost at least $4,000 a month to rent.

    Supply and demand are to blame, with less housing available than is needed fueling a progressive increase in rental prices, according to economists.

    Rent increase limits for existing tenants were established with the passage in 2019 of Assembly Bill 1482, known as the California Tenant Protection Act, setting a 5 percent plus the cost of inflation or 10 percent, whichever is lower, as the highest adjustment allowed.

    New leases are not subject to the same protection, thus further incentivizing landlords to evict slow or non-paying and at-fault tenants, according to experts.

    A “For Lease” sign is posted in front of a house available for rent in Los Angeles on March 15, 2022. (Mario Tama/Getty Images)

    Meanwhile, stakeholders on both sides of the rental equation have raised questions about various regulations instituted during the pandemic.

    Some landlords report dealing with stressful moments when renters were not paying, and they had no legal recourse to evict for non-payment, yet their mortgage payments continued to be due monthly.

    “It put all the headache on the property owner,” John Morgan, owner of multiple rental properties in Northern California, told The Epoch Times.

    “I understand some tenants were unable to pay. But some of these situations we saw across the state were people taking advantage of the moratorium. They just stopped paying and used the money to fund a better lifestyle.”

    The California Apartment Association has brought attention to the matter by filing lawsuits to limit renter protection mandates, lobbying lawmakers, and presenting stories of landlords that were owed significant sums—one more than $108,000—in back rent from families that simply chose to stop paying because they could not be evicted.

    Now with the state COVID moratoriums rescinded in June 2022 and municipal protections slowly coming to a close—with the exception of San Francisco, which is extending its policies for some low-income residents—evictions are starting to climb.

    “We don’t ever want to evict anyone, but we have bills to pay, and when they’re mounting up, it weighs on our family,” Mr. Morgan said.

    “If I can’t pay the mortgage, I don’t have a house to offer for rent.”

    Dozens of people hold up signs protesting against an eviction moratorium while a property owner sitting in a wheelchair continues his hunger strike in Oakland, Calif., on Feb. 26, 2023. (Xue Mingzhu/The Epoch Times)

    On the other hand, renters are faced with inflationary pressures and an uncertain economic future, with layoffs occurring in high-paying technology and finance fields in the state this year, and some rural areas experiencing economic upheaval with mounting losses reported by many businesses involved in the cannabis industry.

    “It’s been tougher to find a job and steady income this year than at any time since I moved here in 2009,” Maria Aguilera, a restaurant employee and mother of two living in Mendocino County, told The Epoch Times.

    “Everything is changing, people have less money to spend, so we’re making less in tips. Most of my money goes to rent and utilities because housing is so expensive.”

    Recognizing the issues facing renters in the state, a group of lawmakers—themselves renters—formed the Renters Caucus, a bicameral group of five Democrats dedicated to addressing rental-related housing concerns.

    Chaired by Assemblyman Matt Haney (D-San Francisco), the caucus includes fellow Assemblymembers Alex Lee (D-Milpitas), Isaac Bryan (D-Culver City), Tasha Boerner (D-Carlsbad), and Sen. Aisha Wahab (D-Fremont).

    Several proposals were introduced this year to strengthen renters’ protection, with one such measure, Senate Bill 567—authored by Sen. María Elena Durazo (D-Los Angeles) and designed to limit rent increases to 5 percent annually—finding itself watered down in the legislative process. With price caps now stripped from its text, the bill will next be considered by the Assembly Appropriations Committee.

    Apartments in Santa Ana, Calif., on Feb. 10, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

    Assembly Bill 12, introduced by Mr. Haney, the renters’ caucus chair, would reduce the amount of security deposit allowable from two months’ rent for an unfurnished dwelling and three months’ for furnished to the amount equal to one month’s rent for any new residential lease.

    The bill passed the Assembly and all Senate committees and will be debated on the Senate floor once legislative meetings resume in August following the summer recess.

    The author notes the importance of the bill in the analysis provided to the Legislature, as high up-front costs prevent some residents from obtaining housing, citing statistics that show average deposits of $8,000 in Los Angeles and $10,000 in San Francisco. Most landlords require first and last month along with a deposit when securing a lease.

    “While many families are able to afford their monthly rent, the requirement for two or three months’ rent solely for a security deposit places a financial burden on many who cannot afford it,” Mr. Haney argued in support of the bill in the Assembly’s analysis. “As a result, many families have to choose between acquiring more debt to afford their security deposit or not being approved for their much-needed housing.”

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 16:30

  • "Like Organized Crime" – Multiple Banks Filed Over 170 'Suspicious Activity' Reports On The Bidens
    “Like Organized Crime” – Multiple Banks Filed Over 170 ‘Suspicious Activity’ Reports On The Bidens

    As the evidence for at least an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden mounts, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and co-host Ben Ferguson discussed the latest bombshell – 170 suspicious activity reports (SARs) from six banks over the past few years – on their podcast with House Oversight Chairman James Comer (R-KY).

    As Townhall reports, these SARs are submitted and sent to the Treasury Department when banks “have a strong suspicion” that a crime has been committed, so as to protect the bank.

    As Comer emphasized, these are submitted “very seldom.”

    If someone were to have two, the chairman explained, it would be hard for that person to open up a bank account.

    Submitting an SAR, Comer added, also is “inviting the regulators to come in and regulate,” which is the last thing banks want.

    The 170 reports are thus quite significant. 

    To paint the scene here, Comer explained that what might trigger an SAR is “a large transaction that comes out of the blue.”

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

    As @KanekoaTheGreat lays out in his detailed tweet: (emphasis ours)

    BREAKING🚨 Rep. James Comer says six banks, including JP Morgan, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo, submitted over 170 suspicious activity reports to the Treasury Department regarding the Biden family, alleging their involvement in money laundering, human trafficking, and tax fraud.

    The American banks also raised concerns about wire transfers received by the Bidens from foreign state-owned entities, notably from the Chinese government, allegedly for the purpose of money laundering and tax evasion.

    The foreign wires were found to be directed towards Biden’s business associates before being funneled through 20 shell companies associated with the Bidens. Subsequently, the funds were distributed among various Biden family members.

    SARs are vital documents that financial institutions must file with the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) when they suspect any cases of money laundering or fraudulent activities.

    Rep. Comer highlighted one specific SAR linked to a $3 million wire from China to Biden’s business partner, Rob Walker.

    This money was received in an inactive account that had maintained a $50,000 balance for ten years before the significant wire transaction from China.

    Within just 24 hours of receiving the wire, Walker initiated incremental payments to several Biden shell companies, eventually disbursing funds to four different Biden family members.

    Comer explained that concealing the source of money through the use of shell companies to deceive the IRS is considered money laundering and racketeering. 

    He noted that if the funds were intended for legitimate purposes, they could have been wired directly to Hunter Biden, but instead, they were routed through business partners and various companies with no clear legitimate purpose.

    Senator Ted Cruz asked, “So the Chinese Communist government was sending the money?”

    Rep. Comer replied, “Yes.”

    “If Hunter Biden was doing something legitimate for China, they could have just wired the money to Hunter Biden, but they didn’t,” he explained. 

    “They sent it to a company called Robinson Walker. Then they wired it to a company called Owasco. Then they wired it to another company called Bohai. These companies don’t do anything with the money.”

    Senator Cruz responded, “It’s just a bucket to pour the water in, then a bucket to pour it into somewhere else?” 

    Rep Comer said, “That’s exactly what it is and it was organized. This is like organized crime.”

    When the corporate media foolishly asks where is the evidence that the Bidens committed crimes?

    American banks have submitted hundreds of suspicious activity reports on the Biden family, alleging their involvement in human trafficking, money laundering, and tax fraud. 

    Congressional investigators have obtained bank account records and wire transfer statements on twenty shell companies owned by the Bidens, which were allegedly used for laundering illegally obtained money from China, Russia, Ukraine, Romania, and Kazakhstan as unregistered foreign agents. 

    This evidence is supported by hundreds of thousands of emails, tens of thousands of text messages, photographs, audio recordings, calendar statements, and ten years of data from Hunter Biden’s laptop, which the FBI took into its possession in 2019. @MarcoPolo501c3 published a comprehensive “Report on the Biden Laptop,” documenting 459 alleged crimes involving the Biden family and their associates, including 140 business crimes, 191 sex crimes, and 128 drug crimes.

    A $1,000 reward is offered for any verifiable corrections, but thus far, no crimes have been disputed.

    In addition, credible IRS whistleblowers have accused the Justice Department of obstructing the Hunter Biden investigation by blocking felony charges, search warrants, and interviews while preventing any investigation of the President and his family.

    Furthermore, just yesterday, a judge highlighted an unprecedented lenient deal offered by the Justice Department to Hunter Biden, which would result in no felony charges or jail time for tax fraud and lying on a gun form.

    This DOJ deal would have also granted protection to the First Son from any future prosecution related to illegally obtained money from foreign nations as an unregistered foreign agent.

    What is more corrosive and destructive to our nation than a politicized Justice Department that applies different legal standards depending on whether one’s last name is Trump or Biden?

    With Hunter Biden’s sweetheart plea-deal now eviscerated, will the mainstream media find any of this “suspicious activity”, suspicious enough to warrant a report?

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 16:00

  • DoJ Wants SBF's Bail Revoked Over Witness-Tampering, Diary Leak Allegations
    DoJ Wants SBF’s Bail Revoked Over Witness-Tampering, Diary Leak Allegations

    Authored by Amaka Nwaokocha via CoinTelegraph.com,

    According to a July 28 court filing, the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) is seeking the revocation of Sam Bankman-Fried’s (SBF) bail, accusing him of attempting to tamper with witnesses and leaking Caroline Ellison’s diary to The New York Times.

    The DOJ notes that SBF was released on a bond on Dec. 22, 2022, but later requested multiple bail modifications. According to the filing, on Jan. 15, 2023, the defendant reached out to the current general counsel of FTX US via email and the encrypted messaging application, Signal.

    In the communication, SBF expressed a desire to reconnect and explore the possibility of establishing a constructive relationship.

    He inquired about the potential of using each other as resources or providing mutual input on various matters.

    Screenshot of the DOJ’s filing. Source: CourtListener.

    SBF also allegedly used Signal for obstructive purposes, with the app’s auto-deletion feature complicating the investigation. The court expressed concerns regarding the potential risk of witness tampering in light of the defendant’s behavior.

    According to John Reed Stark, former U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s Office of Internet Enforcement chief, Judge Lewis Kaplan has several options. He could view SBF’s actions as an effort to improperly influence witnesses and choose to either make further modifications to his bail conditions or revoke his bail entirely.

    He argued that Kaplan would face a tough decision in this case. If SBF is permitted to stay free, the judge will likely reiterate his previous warnings.

    The written submission comes after a July 26 hearing in a Manhattan court. U.S. Attorney Danielle Sassoon requested the revocation of SBF’s bail based on allegations he used his freedom to intimidate Ellison, his former romantic partner and colleague. Sassoon informed the judge that SBF attempted to “intimidate” Ellison and made around 100 calls to an NYT reporter.

    In a July 20 complaint, the DOJ also leveled accusations against SBF for leaking Ellison’s diary, accusing him of trying to publicly discredit a government witness by sharing her personal writings with a reporter.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 15:30

  • A Silent Threat To The Energy Transition: America's Broken Infrastructure Policy
    A Silent Threat To The Energy Transition: America’s Broken Infrastructure Policy

    Authroed by Joshua Trott via RealClear Wire,

    On paper, the Inflation Reduction Act was a big win for America’s infrastructure and energy future: $550 billion in federal spending, with nearly $400 billion earmarked for energy projects aimed at reducing our carbon emissions by the end of the decade. But money alone, even half a trillion dollars in federal funding, can’t solve the biggest problems facing the energy industry as it works to meet global demand today while building toward a more sustainable tomorrow. 

    So much of the conversation focuses on the tired and misleading narrative about Oil & Gas villains vs. Renewable heroes. The true enemy of our sustainable energy future is the nation’s broken infrastructure policy. We could greenlight every renewable project in development today and innovate every piece of technology needed to meet our climate goals, and it wouldn’t matter because we lack the ability to utilize and store the energy we create.

    Take the West Virginia pipeline finally approved after years of stalled progress. It’s getting done not because of new funding or policy innovation, but thanks to pork barrel politics in Capitol Hill’s debt ceiling negotiations. The Mountain Valley Pipeline highlights the shortcomings of our fragmented infrastructure policy, which threatens to derail even the costliest, best-executed, and most well-intentioned energy transition plans. The stakes have never been higher, and the situation is growing more precarious by the day. 

    A Broken System

    There’s a massive gap between our efforts to transition to sustainable energy and our ability to make it happen. Countless examples and data points bear this out. Here are just a few:

    • At the end of 2022, there were over 10,000 projects in the U.S., most of them wind, solar, and batteries, waiting for permission to connect to the grid, up from 8,100 the year before, according to researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. In 2021, backlogged projects sitting in the queue represented 1,300 gigawatts of solar, wind, and battery projects – technically enough to supply about 80% of the country’s electricity demand. 

    • Most energy storage projects never get built. A Clean Energy Group report found that “lengthening wait times and rising interconnection costs dramatically restrict the rate at which renewable generation and energy storage resources are installed.” This creates obstacles to hitting so many goals, including emissions reduction targets, renewable generation and energy storage procurement targets, and grid modernization plans.

    • California’s big three utilities may need to invest up to $50 billion by 2035 to upgrade their grids in order to meet the state’s ambitious electric vehicle goals. That’s a staggering sum, what is arguably the greenest and most forward-looking state regarding renewables, and it highlights the needs every state will face when tackling energy infrastructure investment.

    • The IR Act included hundreds of billions of dollars for solar panels, wind turbines, electric vehicles, and other technologies to tackle climate change. Yet if we can’t build new transmission at a faster pace, around 80% of the emissions reductions expected from that bill might not happen, according to researchers at Princeton University’s REPEAT Project.

    Infrastructure isn’t top of mind for most people, but it has gotten more attention in recent years, particularly after Congress passed the massive $1 trillion infrastructure bill in 2021. The legislation included funding for everything from airport repairs to clean drinking water. It also contained the largest investment in clean energy transmission and the electric grid in U.S. history – $65 billion – to be used for new transmission lines for renewable energy, advanced transmission and distribution technologies, and research hubs for next-generation technologies, including carbon capture and clean hydrogen.

    But what good are new transmission lines and next-gen technologies if they never make it past the black hole of red tape, interminable delays, supply-chain problems, and exploding costs that derail so many energy projects? 

    The Interconnection Crisis

    The demand for investment far outpaces the industry’s speed and capacity to build. In the past decade, only about 23% of all projects in interconnection queues have ultimately been able to plug into the grid and start operations. The total capacity of energy projects in the nation’s queues is growing fast and increased by 40% year-over-year in 2022, according to a recent report from the Berkeley Lab.  

    This surge of development, largely a response to government climate resilience incentives, is good news for the energy transition – in theory. But to be able to build the infrastructure needed to meet our targets, development and construction timelines must be radically shortened.

    Some more sobering statistics: The combined solar and wind capacity currently actively seeking grid interconnection roughly equals the installed capacity of the entire U.S. power plant fleet. And just 21% of projects (and 14% of capacity) seeking connection from 2000 to 2017 had been built as of the end of 2022.

    Not surprisingly, bad wait times are only getting worse. The typical duration from connection request to commercial operation increased from less than two years for projects built from 2000 to 2007 to nearly four years for those built from 2018 to 2022. When companies do finally get projects reviewed, they often face another hurdle: Local grids are at capacity, so they are required to spend much more than they planned for new transmission lines and other upgrades.

    The mission-critical priority is not the ability to build energy resources. It’s the infrastructure and ability to absorb and leverage those energy resources. Forget about politics, policy, and money – if you don’t have the infrastructure to support the new technology, nothing else matters.

    Aging Grid, Growing Problems 

    This New York Times headline from February sums up the issue well: “The U.S. Has Billions for Wind and Solar Projects. Good Luck Plugging Them In.”

    Much of the U.S. grid was built in the 1960s and 1970s, and over 70% of it is currently more than a quarter-century old. But age isn’t the grid’s only problem. The U.S. power infrastructure was built to bring energy from where fossil fuels are burned to where the energy will be used. The nation’s electricity industry, meanwhile, grew via a patchwork of local utility companies whose targets were to meet local demand and maintain grid reliability.

    Emissions-free energy sources like sun and wind are, by nature, intermittent. They’re abundant only in places where the sun is shining or the wind is blowing, and therefore need to be stored and transmitted to other locations where there is demand for power. 

    Along with the need for new ways to transmit and store sustainable energy, the existing grid will need a major upgrade as demand for electricity rises to meet the needs of electric vehicles, heat pumps, and other replacements for conventional energy sources. A modernized and expanded grid “will be the backbone of the energy transition – and a requirement of any realistic decarbonization pathway,” according to a 2022 report by McKinsey & Company.

    A recent Department of Energy draft analysis cited “a pressing need for additional electric transmission,” especially between different regions. The McKinsey study framed it more dramatically: The U.S. grid will need to expand by 60% by 2030, and doing so would require “a mind-boggling acceleration of the typical ten-year capital project timeline. It is, arguably, a century of work to do in less than a decade.” 

    So far, that expedited timeline looks like a pipe dream. PJM Interconnection, the largest electrical grid operator in the U.S., has been so inundated by connection requests that last year, it announced a freeze on new applications so it can work through a backlog of thousands of interconnection requests, mostly for renewable energy.

    Upgrading the grid is the single most important thing we must do to enable a successful energy transition. Without policy change, this problem won’t get solved. 

    Washington: We Need Action Now 

    There is no silver bullet to fix this complex set of issues. But it’s clear we need a strategic approach to infrastructure investment, and fast. Part of that investment needs to come from Washington in the form of comprehensive policy and regulatory reform, which is the single biggest blocker to private investment and healthy competition in the energy sector. 

    Simply put, building energy projects is complicated. Who pays for what is even more complicated, as processes, permitting, payment, and incentivization are all misaligned. Current policy doesn’t support the buildout we need; in fact, it slows it down and exacerbates the problem. Without policy and regulatory reform, we’ll continue to pay more and more to maintain our quality of life. Even worse, we’ll never reach the finish line in the race to a sustainable energy future.

    If we want such a future, we must completely retool our approach to building infrastructure. We must support the resourcing we need in ways that maintain reliability while also furthering our climate goals. We need improved processes for addressing state and federal permitting, with a focus on timely conflict resolution. And we need incentive structures that promote large-scale infrastructure investment and improve cross-sector collaboration.

    Pitting Oil & Gas vs. Renewables is a false choice that ignores the perilous state of our country’s infrastructure policy and sidesteps the sizable obstacles to overhauling it. Solving these issues should galvanize everyone who cares about the transition to a sustainable energy future. It also should unite the energy industry behind a clear and urgent mission: to understand the challenges posed by our grids and infrastructure, to intelligently invest in solutions that are both profitable and deliver results for society, and to ring the bell loudly about the regulatory reform that is needed to deliver on our goals.

    Tyler Durden
    Sun, 07/30/2023 – 14:30

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