Today’s News 4th August 2022

• France To "Reduce Or Halt Nuclear Output" As Heatwave Restricts Ability To Cool Plants
  France To “Reduce Or Halt Nuclear Output” As Heatwave Restricts Ability To Cool Plants

  Forecast models indicate that high temperatures will persist across France in early August. Europe’s second-largest economy has endured record-breaking heat this summer that has curbed nuclear power production. We detailed last month, “France Cuts Nuclear Power Generation Amid Record-Breaking Heatwave,” and now, more reductions are planned amid an energy crisis. 

  Bloomberg reported French utility Electricite de France SA (EDF) said nuclear power stations on the Rhone and Garonne rivers will reduce power generation because a persistent heatwave is increasing water temperatures too hot to circulate through condensers and discharge back into waterways. 

  Under French rules, EDF must reduce or halt nuclear output when river temperatures reach certain thresholds to ensure the water used to cool the plants won’t harm the environment when put back into waterways.

  Restrictions have been in place at various times during the summer already. The latest warnings include curbs at the St. Alban plant from Saturday, according to a filing. The facility will operate at a minimum of 700 megawatts, compared with a total capacity of about 2,600 megawatts. Reductions are also likely at the Tricastin plant, where two units will maintain at least 400 megawatts. -Bloomberg

  France is the continent’s largest producer of atomic energy, usually a net exporter of power across EU member states but is now importing electricity since the output this summer will be the lowest in more than three decades. The cause of declining nuclear power output is plants shut for maintenance and or inspection checks. 

  

  France’s nuclear reactor capacity was around 44% on Monday. Bloomberg data showed that two reactors restarted earlier this week, which boosted nuclear capacity to 49% on Wednesday. 

  The reductions in nuclear power output have helped push power prices to near record levels in France and neighboring countries, such as the UK and Germany. France’s power generation problem comes as Europe faces the worst energy supply crunch in decades. Russia reduced natural gas flows via Nord Stream 1 pipeline to just 20% capacity the other week, causing fear of a prolonged energy crisis through 2023. 

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 08/04/2022 – 02:45

• Russia Has Exported $1 Billion In Fossil Fuels Per Day Since The Ukraine War Despite Sanctions And Boycotts
  Russia Has Exported $1 Billion In Fossil Fuels Per Day Since The Ukraine War Despite Sanctions And Boycotts

  By Alex Kimani of OilPrice.com

  Despite wide-ranging sanctions and import bans, Russia’s vast energy sector continues to thrive, with the country managing to export nearly a billion dollars worth of fossil fuels per day in the first 100 days since its invasion of Ukraine. Indeed, higher crude oil and fuel prices have allowed Russian oil and gas revenues to climb even after the sanctions forced export volumes to dip.

  

  Ultimately, there is no shortage of willing buyers lining up for cheap Russian Urals, nor is there a dearth of middlemen connecting them with Russian energy companies.

  Lurking behind the scenes are Switzerland’s giant trading houses Vitol, Glencore, and Gunvor as well as Singapore’s Trafigura, all of which have continued lifting large volumes of Russian crude and products, including diesel, amid wide-ranging Western Sanctions on Russia.

  Vitol has pledged to stop buying Russian crude by the end of this year, but that’s still a long way from today. Trafigura promised it would stop buying crude from Russia’s state-run Rosneft by May 15th but is free to buy cargoes of Russian crude from other suppliers. Glencore has promised it wouldn’t enter any “new” trading business with Russia, but appears willing to maintain previous deals.

  Meanwhile, India and China have been making up for much of the lost markets for Russian fuels.

  

  Surging Imports From Russia

  India has never been a big buyer of Russian crude despite having to import 80% of its needs. In a typical year, India imports just 2-5% of its crude from Russia, roughly the same proportion as the United States did before it announced a 100% ban on Russian energy commodities.  Indeed, India imported only 12 million barrels of Russian crude in 2021, with the majority of its oil sourced from Iraq, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Nigeria.

  But back in May, reports emerged of a “significant uptick” in Russian oil deliveries bound for India.

  According to a Bloomberg report, India spent a good $5.1 billion on Russian oil, gas, and coal in the first three months after the invasion, more than five times the value of a year ago. However, China remains the biggest buyer of Russian energy commodities, spending $18.9 billion in the three months to the end of May, almost double the amount a year earlier.

  And, it’s all about the money.

  According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), Urals crude from Russia has been offered at record discounts. Ellen Wald, president of Transversal Consulting, has told CNBC that a couple of commodity trading firms–such as Glencore and Vitol–were offering discounts of $30 and $25 per barrel, respectively, for the Urals blend. Urals is the main blend exported by Russia.

  The experts say simple economics is the biggest reason why White House pressure to curb purchases of crude oil from Russia have fallen on deaf ears in Delhi.

  “Today, the Government of India’s motivations are economic, not political. India will always look for a deal in their oil import strategy. It’s hard not to take a 20% discount on crude when you import 80-85% of your oil, particularly on the heels of the pandemic and global growth slowdown,” Samir N. Kapadia, head of trade at government relations consulting firm Vogel Group, has told CNBC via email.

  Still, it will not be lost on many readers that India has maintained a cozy relationship with Russia over the years, with Russia supplying the Asian nation with as much as 60% of its military and defense-related equipment. Russia has also been a key ally on crucial issues such as India’s dispute with China and Pakistan surrounding the territory of Kashmir.

  

  Source: Bloomberg

  Smaller trading firms

  India’s energy business with Russia has been booming, so much so that dozens of middlemen are muscling in, hoping to profit from the rapidly growing sector.

  However, it’s not the Trafiguras, Glencores, and Gunvors of this world doing the work; this time around, it’s smaller, less well-known trading houses cutting supply deals with Indian refineries.

  Bloomberg has reported that numerous mid-level commodity trading and energy firms, including Dubai’s Wellbred and Coral Energy, as well as Singapore’s Montfort and U.S.’ Everest Energy, have entered the race to market Russian oil to Indian buyers.

  And Indian oil buyers are loving it.

  Bloomberg says that state-run refiners such as Indian Oil Corp. are warming to the idea of buying from lesser-known traders, while refinery officials say they are easier to work with due to less bureaucracy that slows negotiations with energy firms such as Rosneft PJSC. Trading houses usually serve the function of middlemen by bridging differences between sellers and buyers, and even offer different payment terms to assist in the movement of funds.

  Switzerland’s Golden Calf

  That said, a lot of the companies helping finance Putin’s war are based in Switzerland, with the lion’s share of Russian raw materials traded via Switzerland and its nearly 1,000 commodity firms.

  Switzerland is an important global financial hub with a thriving commodities sector, despite the fact that it is far from all the global trade routes and has no access to the sea, no former colonial territories, and no significant raw materials of its own. 

  Oliver Classen, media officer at the Swiss NGO Public Eye, says that “this sector accounts for a much larger part of the GDP in Switzerland than tourism or the machinery industry”. According to a 2018 Swiss government report, commodity trading volume reaches almost $1 trillion ($903.8 billion). 

  Deutsche Welle has reported that 80% of Russian raw materials are traded via Switzerland, according to a report by the Swiss embassy in Moscow. About a third of those materials are oil and gas, while two-thirds are base metals such as zinc, copper, and aluminum. In other words, deals signed on Swiss desks are directly facilitating Russian oil and gas to continue flowing freely.

  With gas and oil exports coming in as the main source of income for Russia, accounting for 30 to 40% of the Russian budget, Switzerland’s role cannot be overlooked in this war-time equation.  In 2021, Russian state corporations earned around $180 billion (€163 billion) from oil exports alone.

  Again, unfortunately, Switzerland has been handling its commodities trade with kid gloves.

  According to DW, raw materials are often traded directly between governments and via commodities exchanges. However, they can also be traded freely, and Swiss companies have specialized in direct sales thanks to an abundance of capital.

  In raw materials transactions, Swiss commodity traders have adopted letters of credits or L/Cs as their preferred instruments. A bank will give a loan to a trader and as collateral, receive a document making it the owner of the commodity. As soon as the buyer pays the bank, the document (and ownership of the commodity) is transferred to the trader. The system gives traders more credit lines without their creditworthiness having to be checked, and the bank has the value of the commodity as security.

  This is a prime example of transit trade, where only the money flows through Switzerland, but actual raw materials usually do not touch Swiss soil. Thus, no details about the magnitude of the transaction land on the desk of the Swiss customs authorities leading to highly imprecise information about the flow volumes of raw materials. 

  “The whole commodities trade is under-recorded and underregulated. You have to dig around to collect data and not all information is available,” Elisabeth Bürgi Bonanomi, a senior lecturer in law and sustainability at Bern University, has told DW.

  Obviously, the lack of regulation is very appealing to commodity traders – especially those that deal with raw materials mined in non-democratic countries such as the DRC.

   “Unlike the financial market, where there are rules for tackling money laundering and illegal or illegitimate financial flows, and a financial market supervisory authority, there is currently no such thing for commodity trading,” financial and legal expert at Public Eye David Mühlemann told the German broadcaster ARD.

  But don’t expect things to change any time soon.

  Calls for a supervisory body for the commodities sector based on the model of the one for the financial market by the likes of Swiss NGO Public Eye and Swiss Green Party proposal have so far failed to bear fruit. Thomas Mattern from the Swiss People’s Party (SVP) has spoken out against such a move, insisting that Switzerland should retain its neutrality, “We do not need even more regulation, and not in the commodities sector either.”

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 08/04/2022 – 02:00

• The Three I's Of A Police-State Education: Indoctrination, Intimidation, & Intolerance
  The Three I’s Of A Police-State Education: Indoctrination, Intimidation, & Intolerance

  Authored by John & Nisha Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,

  “Every day in communities across the United States, children and adolescents spend the majority of their waking hours in schools that have increasingly come to resemble places of detention more than places of learning.”

   – Investigative journalist Annette Fuentes

  This is what it means to go back-to-school in America today.

  Instead of making the schools safer, government officials are making them more authoritarian.

  

  Instead of raising up a generation of civic-minded citizens with critical thinking skills, government officials are churning out compliant drones who know little to nothing about their history or their freedoms.

  And instead of being taught the three R’s of education (reading, writing and arithmetic), young people are being drilled in the three I’s of life in the American police state: indoctrination, intimidation and intolerance.

  From the moment a child enters one of the nation’s 98,000 public schools to the moment he or she graduates, they will be exposed to a steady diet of:

  • draconian zero tolerance policies that criminalize childish behavior,

  • overreaching anti-bullying statutes that criminalize speech,

  • school resource officers (police) tasked with disciplining and/or arresting so-called “disorderly” students,

  • standardized testing that emphasizes rote answers over critical thinking,

  • politically correct mindsets that teach young people to censor themselves and those around them,

  • and extensive biometric and surveillance systems that, coupled with the rest, acclimate young people to a world in which they have no freedom of thought, speech or movement.

  Roped into the government’s profit-driven campaign to keep the nation “safe” from drugs, disease, and weapons, the schools have transformed themselves into quasi-prisons, complete with surveillance cameras, metal detectors, police patrols, zero tolerance policies, lock downs, drug sniffing dogs, strip searches and active shooter drills.

  Young people in America are now first in line to be searched, surveilled, spied on, threatened, tied up, locked down, treated like criminals for non-criminal behavior, tasered and in some cases shot.

  Students are not only punished for minor transgressions such as playing cops and robbers on the playground, bringing LEGOs to school, or having a food fight, but the punishments have become far more severe, shifting from detention and visits to the principal’s office into misdemeanor tickets, juvenile court, handcuffs, tasers and even prison terms.

  Students have been suspended under school zero tolerance policies for bringing to school “look alike substances” such as oregano, breath mints, birth control pills and powdered sugar.

  Look-alike weapons (toy guns—even Lego-sized ones, hand-drawn pictures of guns, pencils twirled in a “threatening” manner, imaginary bows and arrows, fingers positioned like guns) can also land a student in hot water, in some cases getting them expelled from school or charged with a crime.

  Not even good deeds go unpunished.

  One 13-year-old was given detention for exposing the school to “liability” by sharing his lunch with a hungry friend. A third grader was suspended for shaving her head in sympathy for a friend who had lost her hair to chemotherapy. And then there was the high school senior who was suspended for saying “bless you” after a fellow classmate sneezed.

  Having police in the schools only adds to the danger.

  Thanks to a combination of media hype, political pandering and financial incentives, the use of armed police officers (a.k.a. school resource officers) to patrol school hallways has risen dramatically in the years since the Columbine school shooting.

  Indeed, the growing presence of police in the nation’s schools is resulting in greater police “involvement in routine discipline matters that principals and parents used to address without involvement from law enforcement officers.”

  Funded by the U.S. Department of Justice, these school resource officers have become de facto wardens in elementary, middle and high schools, doling out their own brand of justice to the so-called “criminals” in their midst with the help of tasers, pepper spray, batons and brute force.

  In the absence of school-appropriate guidelines, police are more and more “stepping in to deal with minor rulebreaking: sagging pants, disrespectful comments, brief physical skirmishes. What previously might have resulted in a detention or a visit to the principal’s office was replaced with excruciating pain and temporary blindness, often followed by a trip to the courthouse.”

  Not even the younger, elementary school-aged kids are being spared these “hardening” tactics.

  On any given day when school is in session, kids who “act up” in class are pinned facedown on the floor, locked in dark closets, tied up with straps, bungee cords and duct tape, handcuffed, leg shackled, tasered or otherwise restrained, immobilized or placed in solitary confinement in order to bring them under “control.”

  In almost every case, these undeniably harsh methods are used to punish kids—some as young as 4 and 5 years old—for simply failing to follow directions or throwing tantrums.

  Very rarely do the kids pose any credible danger to themselves or others.

  Unbelievably, these tactics are all legal, at least when employed by school officials or school resource officers in the nation’s public schools.

  This is what happens when you introduce police and police tactics into the schools.

  Paradoxically, by the time you add in the lockdowns and active shooter drills, instead of making the schools safer, school officials have succeeded in creating an environment in which children are so traumatized that they suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, nightmares, anxiety, mistrust of adults in authority, as well as feelings of anger, depression, humiliation, despair and delusion.

  For example, a middle school in Washington State went on lockdown after a student brought a toy gun to class. A Boston high school went into lockdown for four hours after a bullet was discovered in a classroom. A North Carolina elementary school locked down and called in police after a fifth grader reported seeing an unfamiliar man in the school (it turned out to be a parent).

  Police officers at a Florida middle school carried out an active shooter drill in an effort to educate students about how to respond in the event of an actual shooting crisis. Two armed officers, guns loaded and drawn, burst into classrooms, terrorizing the students and placing the school into lockdown mode.

  These police state tactics have not made the schools any safer.

  The fallout has been what you’d expect, with the nation’s young people treated like hardened criminals: handcuffed, arrested, tasered, tackled and taught the painful lesson that the Constitution (especially the Fourth Amendment) doesn’t mean much in the American police state.

  So what’s the answer, not only for the here-and-now—the children growing up in these quasi-prisons—but for the future of this country?

  How do you convince a child who has been routinely handcuffed, shackled, tied down, locked up, and immobilized by government officials—all before he reaches the age of adulthood—that he has any rights at all, let alone the right to challenge wrongdoing, resist oppression and defend himself against injustice?

  Most of all, how do you persuade a fellow American that the government works for him when, for most of his young life, he has been incarcerated in an institution that teaches young people to be obedient and compliant citizens who don’t talk back, don’t question and don’t challenge authority?

  As we’ve seen with other issues, any significant reforms will have to start locally and trickle upwards.

  For starters, parents need to be vocal, visible and organized and demand that school officials 1) adopt a policy of positive reinforcement in dealing with behavior issues; 2) minimize the presence in the schools of police officers and cease involving them in student discipline; and 3) insist that all behavioral issues be addressed first and foremost with a child’s parents, before any other disciplinary tactics are attempted.

  As I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, if we want to raise up a generation of freedom fighters who will actually operate with justice, fairness, accountability and equality towards each other and their government, we must start by running the schools like freedom forums.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 23:40

• FBI Whistleblower Leaks "Internal Use Only" Document Of 'How To Spot A Domestic Terrorist'
  FBI Whistleblower Leaks “Internal Use Only” Document Of ‘How To Spot A Domestic Terrorist’

  The FBI’s alliance with the Democratic Party has reached absurd new heights with a newly leaked document revealed by Project Veritas classifying what the agency believes are “Militia Violent Extremists” (MVEs). 

  The “Unclassified/Law Enforcement Sensitive” document for “FBI Internal Use Only” outlines symbols, images, phrases, events, and individuals that special agents should look for when identifying alleged domestic terrorists. 

  Under the “Symbols” section, the document claims MVEs “justify their existence with the Second Amendment, due to the mention of a ‘well-regulated militia,’ as well as the right to bear arms.”

  Below that, under the “Commonly Referenced Historical Imagery and Quotes” section, Revolutionary War images such as the Gadsden Flag and the Betsy Ross Flag are listed as signs of violent extremism. 

  

  In the “Common Phrases and References” section, veteran Ashli Babbitt, who was killed inside the Capitol Building on January 6, 2021, was mentioned as a person that MVEs consider a “martyr.” 

  The document lists Ruby Ridge, Waco, and the Oklahoma City bombing as radical and/or violent events in the past. 

  

  Project Veritas noted an FBI whistleblower leaked the document to them. The bureau’s elitist left-wing officials made no attempt to list symbols, images, phrases, events, and individuals of radical left groups, such as Antifa, who flies a red and black flag, the anarchy flag, the anarcho-socialism flag, and or a Black Lives Matter flag during demonstrations, some of which have been extremely violent and burnt down entire city blocks.  

  

  

  

  

  What’s curious is why the FBI did not bother to summarize symbols and such of radical left groups. It’s another agency the Biden administration has weaponized to target their political opposition. 

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 23:20

• The Art Of Scandal Implosion: The Political & Media Elite Prepare To Drop Hunter Biden In A "Controlled Demolition"
  The Art Of Scandal Implosion: The Political & Media Elite Prepare To Drop Hunter Biden In A “Controlled Demolition”

  Authored by Jonathan Turley,

  Below is my column in Fox News on the status of the Hunter Biden investigation and how it presents a challenge for many in Washington. Due to the continued work of a small number of media outlets like the New York Post, it is no longer possible to bury the story or continue the false claim that it is “Russian disinformation.”

  The hope now appears to be a “controlled demolition” where Hunter is indicted on limited grounds without causing collateral damage to the political and media establishment.

  Scandal implosion is as much an art as it is a science and could be the most brilliant achievement in this ongoing scandal.

  

  Here is the column:

  For news junkies, there has been a remarkable and sudden shift in the media in the coverage of the Hunter Biden scandal. The shift is the very fact that there is suddenly coverage of the Hunter Biden scandal. From CNN to NPR, reporters are now acknowledging that the infamous laptop is not “Russian disinformation” as was widely claimed before the 2020 election. After years of burying the story, the media is now attempting an even more precarious exercise.

  It is called controlled demolition: the implosion of a scandal to limit any blast effect on nearby structures or individuals. Like those buildings dropped between other structures, it takes precision and, most importantly, cooperation to pull off.  Specifically, this controlled demolition will require the perfect timing of the media, Democratic politicians, and most importantly, the Justice Department.

  That was the same alliance that successfully killed the story before the election despite evidence of a multimillion dollar influence peddling scheme by the Biden family. The media eagerly spread the false claim of 51 intelligence experts who declared that the laptop was likely “Russian disinformation.” Twitter and social media companies imposed a news blackout before the election. Recently, GOP senators also accused the Justice Department of effectively spiking the investigation — displaying the same bias documented in the Russian collusion investigation.

  For his part, Attorney General Merrick Garland has refused to appoint a special counsel despite the overwhelming need for such an appointment. Even former Attorney General Bill Barr recently said that new evidence makes such an appointment essential ( a reversal of his initial position in giving the case to United States Attorney David Weiss in Delaware).

  I previously wrote a column on the one year anniversary of the Hunter Biden laptop story that marveled at the success of the Biden family in making the scandal vanish before that 2020 election. It was analogized to Houdini making his 10,000-pound elephant Jennie disappear in his act. With the help of the media, the Biden trick occurred live before an audience of millions.

  The problem is the public can now see the elephant.

  That is why the media is now recalibrating. That was most evident in the recent statement of New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman that “I know The New York Times felt it didn’t pursue it originally as much as it wanted to; then it followed up, as I recall.” Friedman does not explain what overrode that journalistic interest in the story or why the “follow up” came a year after the election of Joe Biden.

  It appears that President Biden is no longer seen as a political asset with most Democrats refusing to publicly support him in his promised reelection bid. Biden now  could endanger Democratic control of Congress. The question is how to drop Hunter (and even his father) without causing damage to the media, the Democrats, or others in Washington. It requires a controlled demolition.

  The most important thing is to control the blast. By refusing to appoint a special counsel, Merrick Garland has effectively blocked the risk of a report on the extensive influence peddling, including the repeated references to President Biden. the “Big Guy” is discussed in emails as the potential recipient of a 10 percent cut on a deal with a Chinese energy firm as well as other benefits. Emails also refer to Hunter Biden paying portions of his father’s expenses and taxes. Recently, there was additional support showing that “the Big Guy” was indeed Joe Biden.

  The problem is that embarrassing evidence is mounting by the day. That includes the recent disclosure new open influence peddling by Hunter, referencing access to his father.  Some emails show Hunter using trips with his Dad to arrange meetings with business associates like Magnani. Indeed, in one exchange with Magnani, Hunter complains that he is not getting responses on his business dealings, objecting

  “I have brought every single person you have ever asked me to bring to the F’ing White House and the Vice President’s house and the inauguration and then you go completely silent,. I don’t know what it is that I did but I’d like to know why I’ve delivered on every single thing you’ve ever asked – and you make me feel like I’ve done something to offend you.”

  The cringeworthy email only adds to the embarrassment not of Hunter Biden but the media struggling to control the damage from the scandal.

  Yet, none of that would be the focus of coverage if the case can be ended on narrow criminal charges.

  In other words, the case can then be collapsed by triggering a smaller explosion. Rather than pursue wider conspiracies connected to the influence peddling, Hunter could be indicted on a few tax or lobbying counts. That would allow for a plea bargain that would allow the media to focus narrowly on those counts and not the broader influence peddling by the Biden family.

  Of course, controlled demolition can at times take an unexpected turn. The greatest danger is that either house of Congress could flip to GOP control. That would open up the entire matter to congressional investigation. Yet, if a plea has already closed the case, the legal blowback could be confined.

  The key to political controlled demolitions “to ‘implode’ the building, that is, make it collapse down into its footprint.” The footprint is now Hunter Biden, confining the implosion to him while leaving the media and establishment untouched.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 23:00

• Did Tiger Dump Its Tech Stocks: Fund Up Just 0.4% In July Despite Nasdaq Surge, Still Down 50% YTD
  Did Tiger Dump Its Tech Stocks: Fund Up Just 0.4% In July Despite Nasdaq Surge, Still Down 50% YTD

  The last time we discussed Tiger Global’s catastrophic performance was exactly two months ago when we found the formerly iconic hedge fund reeling in the post-tech crash wasteland of 2022, down a whopping 52% through June having lost money every single month in 2022…

  

  … putting it on track for what Bloomberg called a “Terrible year” and with good reason: 2022 has been its worst annual performance. It also means that the fund, which not too long ago had an AUM of $100 billion and was now a fraction of that, has to make more than 100% just to get back to its high water mark!

  Paradoxically, that’s precisely what investors in Chase Coleman’s fund were expecting it to do, because as of June we found that there was no shortage of idiots out there and Tiger had seen five times more inflows than the amount of redemptions requests, according to Bloolmberg sources. Inflows have come from both firm employees and external clients, all of whom clearly hoping that having come down to the ground so blazingly fast, the fund would also recover its historical performance just as fast.

  And why not: after all, all Coleman needed was for the Fed to pivot dovishly which would unleash a buying frenzy among the GAMMA/tech universe and lead to quick recoveries for the hedge fund.

  Well, perhaps in theory, because in practice things ended up a little different, and according to a Bloomberg report Tiger Global’s hedge fund made just 0.4% in July, bringing its loss this year to 49.8%, despite the frenzied meltup in both the S&P which was up nearly 10% as well as the Nasdaq, which soared 12.3% in July.

  Last month’s disastrous return follows a modest 3.4% rise in June, and can only be explained if one assumes the fund sold most its former tech losers, which would have been blowout winners in July… only they were no longer there.

  A spokesperson for New York-based Tiger declined comment to Bloomberg, because after all what can they say: “yeah, we suck now.”

  And speaking of Tiger’s 50 biggest equity longs, here they are again as of March 31: with the Q2 updated due mid-month, we wouldn’t be surprised to find many of the top tech names slashed to almost zero.

  

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 23:00

• Hurricane Drones Head To Gulf Of Mexico For First Time
  Hurricane Drones Head To Gulf Of Mexico For First Time

  Saildrone Inc. and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) are set to launch a fleet of hurricane monitoring drones into the Atlantic Ocean, and for the first time, in the Gulf of Mexico. 

  (1/2) Saildrone 1032 being added to the autonomous armada of ocean drones to help better 4cast hurricanes. This one has the eastern Gulf of Mexico as it’s mission responsibility for the next 90 days. SD1032 is one of 7 responsible for the Atlantic development basin. pic.twitter.com/ZitWY7AFfg

  — Jim Cantore (@JimCantore) August 2, 2022

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

  A total of seven Saildrone uncrewed surface vehicles (USVs) are heading out for deployment, stationed in areas with a high probability of intercepting a hurricane. Five USVs will sail around the Atlantic and two in the Gulf of Mexico. 

  

  The 23-foot-long USVs captured a stunning video of “where no research vessel has ever ventured” before, the eye of a major storm during the last hurricane season. The vessel sailed through the eye of Category 4 Hurricane Sam in September, battling massive 100-foot waves and roaring 140 mph winds. 

  Saildrone USVs will collect real-time observations from hurricanes that will help forecasters improve storm prediction modeling. 

  “Storms that intensify rapidly can cause extensive damage and loss of life and real-time observing systems are crucial to better understanding the atmospheric and oceanic processes that lead to the formation and intensification of these hurricanes,” said John Cortinas, Director of NOAA’s Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory. 

  NOAA predicts an above-average 2022 hurricane season, with up to 21 named storms and three to six major hurricanes. Even though the season’s first two months have been uneventful, peak season has just begun, as illustrated in the graph below. 

  

  The seven saildrones will join a fleet of underwater gliders, surface drifters, profiling floats, and aerial assets to monitor storms. 

  “Uncrewed marine and aircraft systems have the potential to transform how NOAA meets its mission to better understand the environment.

  “These exciting emerging technologies provide NOAA with another valuable tool that can collect data in places we can’t get to with other observing systems,” said Capt. Philip Hall, director of NOAA’s Uncrewed Systems Operations Center.

  New data from saildrones and other uncrewed systems will help guide NOAA in better forecasting hurricanes.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 22:40

• MSNBC Remains Silent After Elie Mystal Unleashes Racist Attack On Herschel Walker
  MSNBC Remains Silent After Elie Mystal Unleashes Racist Attack On Herschel Walker

  Authored by Jonathan Turley,

  One of the long-standing complaints of media critics has been the double standard applied to liberal and conservative figures voicing controversial viewpoints.

  For example, columnists celebrated the firing of former Sen. Rick Santorum at CNN for making insensitive or false comments about the influence of Native American culture on the United States. When racist statements, however, are made by those on the left, there is no such hue and cry.

  The latest example is MSNBC regular Elie Mystal, who launched into a racist diatribe against Republican Georgia Senate candidate Herschel Walker who is African American.

  

  During a segment on “The Cross Connection,” Mystal suggested Walker was supported because he does what Republicans “want from their Negroes.”

  “You ask why are Republicans backing this man who’s so clearly unintelligent, who so clearly doesn’t have independent thoughts, but that’s actually the reason. Walker is going to do what he’s told, and that is what Republicans like. That’s what Republicans want from their Negroes: to do what they were told. And Walker presents exactly as a person who lacks independent thoughts, lacks an independent agenda, lacks an independent ability to grasp policies, and he’s just going to go in there and vote like Mitch McConnell tells them to vote.”

  Mystal has previously caused uproars for controversial claims from accusing a senator of wanting to murder Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson to his continued attacks on a high school student even after he was cleared of a false race-based story. He has called the Constitution “trash” and previously stated that white, non-college-educated voters supported Republicans because they care about “using their guns on Black people and getting away with it.” He has also lashed out at “white society” and explained how he strived to maintain a “whiteness free” life in the pandemic.

  Many clearly relish Mystal’s race-baiting takes on issues on MSNBC. The issue, in my view, is not why Mystal is allowed to continue to make such comments on a network but the clear double standard applied to such commentators.

  We have seen the same double standard at universities. For example, Women’s Studies Professor Donna Hughes was publicly condemned by the University of Rhode Island for writing an op-ed that criticized what she called the LGBTQ ideology.  Yet, the university has largely remain silent on the writings of Director of Graduate Studies of History Erik Loomis, who has defended the murder of a conservative protester and said that he saw “nothing wrong” with such acts of violence. Loomis also declared that “Science, statistics, and technology are all inherently racist because they are developed by racists who live in a racist society, whether they identify as racists or not.”

  I have defended faculty who have made an array of disturbing comments about “detonating white people,” denouncing police, calling for Republicans to suffer,  strangling police officers, celebrating the death of conservatives, calling for the killing of Trump supporters, supporting the murder of conservative protesters and other outrageous statements.

  Yet, liberal professors continue to enjoy the full protection of academic freedom and free speech. Indeed, at the University of California campus, professors actually rallied around a professor who physically assaulted pro-life advocates and tore down their display.

  The fact is that most faculty hold liberal views and do not feel threatened by such biased, content-based approaches to free speech and academic freedom. Others remain silent to avoid being the next tagged in the next campaign.

  The support enjoyed by faculty on the far left is in sharp contrast to the treatment given faculty with moderate, conservative or libertarian views. Anyone who raises such dissenting views is immediately set upon by a mob demanding their investigation or termination. This includes blocking academics from speaking on campuses like a recent Classics professor due to their political views. Conservatives and libertarians understand that they have no cushion or protection in any controversy, even if it involves a single, later deleted tweet. At the University of North Carolina (Wilmington) one such campaign led to a professor killing himself a few days before his final day as a professor.

  Mystal knows that he has a license to speak that is denied to those on the right on platforms like MSNBC. He wrote an April column calling Walker’s campaign a “political minstrel show.” He later attacked New York mayor Eric Adams bizarrely as a “conservative”  and then added “these tokens who are out here right now shucking and jiving for their White handlers.”

  Obviously, such attacks on liberal black figures would not be tolerated by the media and a commentator would be barred by many platforms as persona non grata. Again, I believe that we all benefit from having an array of different views, including controversial views like those of Mystal and Santorum. The worst approach is to maintain a double standard where racist or controversial commentary is celebrated from the left while condemned on the right.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 22:20

• Visualizing America's Brewery Boom
  Visualizing America’s Brewery Boom

  Like many other businesses, America’s breweries were desperately trying to stay afloat in the sea of economic devastation brought along by the Covid-19 pandemic.

  Shuttered restaurants and pubs hit sales hard, taproom transactions evaporated and the distribution of kegs ceased. A Daily Beast article from May 2020 warned that 3,600 of America’s breweries could go out of business and that coronavirus could kill craft beer.

  However, as Statista’s Martin Armstrong reports, fast-forward to 2021 though, and it seems reports of craft beer’s demise have been greatly exaggerated.

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  While the Brewers Association’s midyear report for 2020 did indeed show that the U.S. beer scene was facing an unprecedented challenge, it certainly wasn’t the doomsday scenario some were expecting. Volumes declined 10 percent during the first six months of the year compared to 2019 while the brewery count grew by 737. That is slower than the 1,000 new breweries added by mid-year 2019 but still an impressive performance given the situation. The latest figures, for 2021, reveal a more subdued but still healthy rate of growth: “Overall U.S. beer volume sales were up 1 percent in 2021, while craft brewer volume sales grew 8 percent, raising small and independent brewers’ share of the U.S. beer market by volume to 13.1 percent”.

  This International Beer Day, brewers can surely take heart from the incredibly successful decade they have behind them. Historically, the U.S boasted 4,144 breweries in 1873, a number that fell drastically by the middle of the 20th century. After Prohibition, the brewery count grew extremely slowly and as recently as the 1970s, the country had fewer than 100 functional breweries. 1978 was particularly poor with the count falling to just 89. Amid the craft beer explosion, such a low number is now unthinkable.

  Up until the pandemic, the biggest problem thirsty revelers was the near infinite number of beers to choose from. According to the Brewers Association, the brewery count has grown spectacularly over the past 10+ years. In 2006, the U.S. had 1,460 of them and by 2019, the count had skyrocketed to 8,530. In 2021, that figure rose to 9,247.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 22:00

• Subpoenas To Return 'Treasure Trove' Of Documents From Biden Administration: Louisiana AG
  Subpoenas To Return ‘Treasure Trove’ Of Documents From Biden Administration: Louisiana AG

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

  The subpoenas and discovery requests sent out as part of a lawsuit against the federal government are going to bring back reams of information, Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry says.

  

  Landry and Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, both Republicans, sued the Biden administration in May, arguing the government colluded with Big tech companies to violate the constitutional rights of Americans.

  U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty, a Trump appointee, recently ruled in favor of the plaintiffs. Government officials like Dr. Anthony Fauci and companies including Facebook were served soon after.

  “We’ve got a treasure trove of information that we think are going to come to us here shortly,” Landry said on EpochTV’s “American Thought Leaders.”

  “The subpoenas have gone out. They’re being served. I think Dr. Fauci got served, and he and other members of the president’s Cabinet, and they’re gonna have to send us communications between them and the platforms. And what we believe we’ll find is communications between them telling them what they should and shouldn’t put out or what they should suppress, and what they should amplify,” he added.

  Government officials have said they have not acted improperly.

  Officials have for years commented on how social media platforms operate, and the federal government is not responsible for how platforms moderate content, U.S. lawyers said in a filing in the case, Missouri and Louisiana v. President Biden et al.

  “Those companies independently chose to combat misinformation years ago, before this administration took office, and before the federal officials sued here made the comments at issue. Indeed, although the Complaint cites numerous statements by government officials, it does not identify how those statements are connected to the moderation decisions that purportedly harmed their resident,” they said.

  The government is seeking to dismiss the case.

  Violating Rights

  Landry said that the government is violating citizens’ rights by pressuring companies to ban or take other punitive action against users. In a separate case, documents released this month showed U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention officials highlighting specific posts in messages to Twitter executives while complaining about alleged misinformation from those users. Whistleblower documents released by two U.S. senators in June, meanwhile, showed that U.S. officials had been in touch with Twitter over purported disinformation.

  “I think what we found, and what the whistleblowers put out, was that the government was actually engaged, and the White House, in directly communicating with Big Tech on stories and information that they either wanted suppressed or put out,” Landry said.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 21:40

• Which States Allow The Permitless Carry Of Guns?
  Which States Allow The Permitless Carry Of Guns?

  In January of 2023, Alabama will become the 25th state in the U.S. that isn’t requiring any permits to carry a gun in public.

  As Statista’s Katharina Buchholz notes, in recent years, more and more states have enacted similar legislation. Indiana, together with Georgia and Ohio, did so this year.

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  The change made headlines as it occurred just two weeks before a deadly mass shooting at a mall in an Indianapolis suburb, where a gunman killed three and wounded two more before being shot dead by a bystander who also carried a gun.

  In 2021, as many as six states enacted so-called constitutional carry laws – Utah, Montana, Iowa, Tennessee, Arkansas and Texas. For many decades, Vermont was the only state with these types of laws, which is why the practice is sometimes also referred to as “Vermont carry”. In 2011, Wyoming was the first state to enact or re-introduce similar laws.

  Throughout the U.S., there are eight states requiring permits for open and concealed carry. Another four (plus Washington D.C.) require permits for concealed carry and prohibit the open carry of most guns. 13 states allow the open carry of guns without a permit while requiring one for concealed carry (no states do it the other way around).

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 21:20

• 10 Promising Signs That The Insidious Mind-Control-Matrix The Elite Have Created Is Starting To Crumble
  10 Promising Signs That The Insidious Mind-Control-Matrix The Elite Have Created Is Starting To Crumble

  Authored by Michael Snyder via TheMostImportantNews.com,

  Are we witnessing the start of some sort of a mass awakening in the western world?  For years, I have been writing about the extremely complex systems that are designed to shape and control what we think.  Today, the vast majority of the “news” and “entertainment” that most of us consume is controlled by just a very small handful of immensely powerful corporations.  And of course those corporations are ultimately owned and controlled by the elite of the world.  To a very large degree, the elite have been able to determine what we focus on, what we think about current events, and how we feel about the world around us.  For such a long time, most of the population would take whatever narratives that were pushed upon them by their corporate overlords as the gospel truth, and that always greatly frustrated me.  Fortunately, there are indications that times are changing.

  

  In order for any society to function effectively, there must be a high level of trust.

  Unfortunately for the elite, we simply do not trust them anymore.

  Trust in our politicians has fallen to an all-time low.

  Trust in the media has fallen to an all-time low.

  Trust in our corporations has fallen to an all-time low.

  Trust in our health care system has fallen to an all-time low.

  Trust in our education system has fallen to an all-time low.

  Trust in the tech industry has fallen to an all-time low.

  We no longer are buying into the crap that they keep shoveling our way.

  And that is a really, really good thing.

  It is morally wrong for them to try to control what we think.  It is absolutely imperative that we all learn to think for ourselves, because that is the only way that we will ever be truly free.

  I have been writing about this stuff for years and years, and a number of recent trends have given me hope that people are starting to wake up on a widespread basis.  The following are 10 promising signs that the insidious mind control matrix the elite have created is starting to crumble…

  #1 According to a recent Gallup survey, only 16 percent of U.S. adults have “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in newspapers and only 11 percent of U.S. adults have “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in television news.

  #2 All over the Internet I am seeing article after article speaking out against the World Economic Forum.  That is an incredibly hopeful sign.

  #3 In the Netherlands, a new government plan would “cut fertilizer use and reduce livestock numbers so drastically that it will force many farms out of business”.  This plan is deeply evil, but the massive farmer protests that have been sparked as a result are a really beautiful thing.

  #4 After being arrested, a British man was told this: “Someone has been caused anxiety based on your social media post. And that is why you’re being arrested”.  But the good news is that there has been a tremendous backlash on social media and so far the video of his arrest has already been viewed more than 2 million times.

  #5 As more people on the west coast wake up, the exodus out of the state of California is rapidly becoming a stampede.

  #6 Despite all of the spin from the Biden administration, 66 percent of Americans say that they believe that we are either in a recession or a depression right now.

  #7 Joe Biden’s overall approval rating has fallen to an all-time low of 36 percent.

  #8 Joe Biden’s economic approval rating has fallen to an all-time low of 30 percent.

  #9 A recent CNN poll discovered that a whopping 75 percent of Democratic and Democratic-leaning voters actually want their party to nominate someone other than Biden in 2024.

  #10 According to a recent Pew Research survey, only 24 percent of U.S. adults are satisfied with the current state of the country.

  Almost all of us can see that our society is on the wrong track, and that is the first step in getting back on the right track.

  As time rolls along, I believe that more and more of us will wake up.

  And in the end I believe that the current “world order” that the western elite have tried so hard to establish will fall.

  That process will be incredibly chaotic, but the end result will be worth it.

  Before I end this article, there is one more thing that I wanted to mention.

  According to scientists, we just experienced the shortest day ever recorded…

  The shortest day on record has been broken by the planet Earth. On June 29, 2022, the planet completed its entire rotation in just 1.59 milliseconds, or slightly more than one thousandth of a second, less time than it typically takes for a 24-hour rotation.

  Recently, the Earth has been moving quicker. Since the 1960s, 2020 marked the shortest month on record for the planet. On July 19 of that year, 1.47 milliseconds shorter than a typical 24-hour day, scientists recorded the shortest day so far.

  Are the days being shortened?

  I often tell people that it feels like the days are going by faster than ever, but I thought that it was just my imagination.

  I have been told that as we get older it can seem like time is passing more quickly, and without a doubt 2022 seems like it is the fastest year yet.

  It is hard to believe that the beginning of August is already here.

  2023 will arrive before we know it, and I believe that 2023 will be a year that changes everything.

  I know that there are a lot of bad things that are happening right now, and a lot of my articles tend to focus on those bad things.

  But the truth is that there are a lot of good things happening too.

  In fact, there is no other time in all of human history that I would have rather lived than right now.

  It is when times are the darkest that the greatest heroes are needed, and the years ahead will provide plenty of opportunities for you to be the kind of hero that you were always meant to be.

  *  *  *

  It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 21:00

• These Are The World Airports To Avoid This Summer
  These Are The World Airports To Avoid This Summer

  Although international air travel has bounced back faster than expected from the pandemic, Statista’s Anna Fleck notes that the industry is still yet to fully recover following all of the staffing shortages and surge in demand this vacation season.

  Airports have had exceptionally long queues this summer, with London’s Heathrow seeing luggage pile ups and even telling its airlines to stop selling summer flights. If you’re thinking of planning a trip away, it may be worth picking your departure and arrivals locations wisely, as some airports have been worse than others, as our infographic based on FlightAware data shows.

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  Canada’s Toronto Pearson International Airport topped the list as the worst airport to fly out of between May 26 – July 19 this year, with more than half of its flights being delayed.

  

  Frankfurt Airport in Germany fared little better, with 45.4 percent of its flights seeing setbacks.

  The UK is the only country to have two airports make it onto the list in this time period, both of which – Gatwick and Heathrow – are based in London.

  Meanwhile, Australia’s Sydney Kingsford Smith Airport placed ninth (34.2 percent) and the U.S. Orlando International Airport tenth (33.4 percent).

  The list of airports with the highest rate of cancellations paints a slightly different picture, with two Chinese airports (Shenzhen Bao’an International Airport with 7.9 percent; Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport with 5.2 percent) and three U.S. airports (Newark Liberty International Airport 7.4 percent; LaGuardia Airport 7 percent; Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport at 5 percent) making the top 10 roundup. Amsterdam’s Schiphol is Europe’s worst offender for cancellations, with 3.9 percent of all flights having been called off.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 20:40

• Walmart Lays Off Hundreds Of Corporate Workers
  Walmart Lays Off Hundreds Of Corporate Workers

  Amid the silly debate whether 2 consecutive quarters of negative GDP are enough to trigger a recession, or we have to wait for a 3rd, 4th, 5th and so, on if the president is a Democrat before the NBER will starts paying attention, today Walmart – which recently reported horrific earnings when it warned that low-income America is careening into the abyss, decided to take a shortcut to the promised recession land after the WSJ reported that the giant US retailer was cutting hundreds of corporate roles in a restructuring effort one week after it warned of falling profits.

  The retailer began notifying employees in its Bentonville, Ark., headquarters and other corporate offices of the restructuring, which affects various departments including merchandising, global technology and real-estate teams, the people said. Around 200 jobs in total are being cut, said one of these people.

  To mitigate the media fallout, a Walmart spokeswoman confirmed to the WSJ that there were roles being eliminated as the company updated its structure, but said that the company was also investing in other areas and creating some new roles.

  Last week, Walmart stunned investors when it slashed guidance again and warned that its profit would decline in the current quarter and fiscal year because it was having to mark down apparel and other merchandise that has piled up in its stores. The retailer said higher prices for food and fuel were causing U.S. shoppers to pull back on other categories that are more profitable for it. In response its stock price suffered its biggest one day drop in decades.

  As we had warned two months ago, Walmart ended up being one of several retailers caught off guard by the “reverse bull whip” effect this spring as shoppers shifted their spending away from products that have been in high demand throughout much of the pandemic. In addition, some products arrived late due to supply-chain snarls, causing oversupply as shopper interest waned. Similar to Walmart, Target issued a profit warning in June after it reported quarterly results that showed a surge in inventory levels. And last week, Best Buy crashed after it cut its sales and profit goals, saying consumers had pulled back on electronics.

  Walmart is the largest private employer in the U.S. and while much of its workers are hourly staff, it has thousands of people in corporate roles. Walmart employed 2.3 million worldwide, including 1.7 million in the U.S., as of Jan. 31. If corporate – i.e., muscle – is being cut, expect stealthy mass layoffs among the fat in the coming weeks.

  While the overall U.S. job market has been seen as strong – even if erroneously because as we first explained last month the Household survey has been a disaster…

  

  …. a handful of major US employers have pulled back on hiring or are outright cutting jobs. Ford is preparing to cut thousands of white-collar workers, while technology giants such as Microsoft and Facebook parent Meta Platforms, and many others have pulled back.

  

  And while the ADP is busy fudging its numbers and did not publish a monthly private payrolls report this month, investors get another update on the health of the U.S. job market on Friday when the government releases data for July. Economists expect only 250,000 to be added in July, compared with 372,000 in June. We expect a huge miss.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 20:20

• Here's How Much You Need To Earn To Afford A Home In 50 US Cities
  Here’s How Much You Need To Earn To Afford A Home In 50 US Cities

  Depending on where you live, owning a home may seem like a far off dream or it could be fairly realistic. As Visual Capitalist’s Avery Koop details below, in New York City, for example, a person needs to be making at least six figures to buy a home, but in Cleveland you could do it with just over $45,000 a year.

  This visual, using data from Home Sweet Home, maps out the annual salary you’d need for home ownership in 50 different U.S. cities.

  

  Note: The map above refers to entire metro areas and uses Q1 2022 data on median home prices. The necessary salary was calculated by the source, looking at the base cost of principal, interest, property tax, and homeowner’s insurance.

  Home Ownership Across the U.S.

  San Jose is by far the most expensive city when it comes to purchasing a home. A person would need to earn over $330,000 annually to pay off the mortgage at a monthly rate of $7,718.

  Here’s a closer look at the numbers. These are the Top 10 most expensive cities…

  

  And the Bottom 10 least expensive cities…

  

   

  Perhaps surprisingly, Boston residents need slightly higher earnings than New Yorkers to buy a home. The same is also true in Seattle and Los Angeles. Meanwhile, some of the cheapest cities to start buying up real estate in are Oklahoma City and Cleveland.

   

  As of April, the rate of home ownership in the U.S. is 65%. This number represents the share of homes that are occupied by the owner, rather than rented out or vacant.

  The American Dream Home

  As of the time of this data (Q1 2022), the national yearly fixed mortgage rate sat at 4% and median home price at $368,200. This put the salary needed to buy a home at almost $76,000⁠—the median national household income falls almost $9,000 below that.

  But what kind of homes are people looking to purchase? Depending on where you live the type of home and square footage you can get will be very different.

  In New York City, for example, there are fairly few stand-alone, single-family houses in the traditional sense⁠—only around 4,000 are ever on the market. People in the Big Apple tend to buy condominiums or multi-family units.

  Additionally, if you’re looking for luxury, not even seven figures will get you much in the big cities. In Miami, a million dollars will only buy you 833 square feet of prime real estate.

  One thing is for sure: the typical American dream home of the big house with a yard and white picket fence is more attainable in smaller metro areas with ample suburbs.

  Buying vs. Renting

  The U.S. median household income is $67,500, meaning that today the typical family could only afford a home in about 15 of the 50 metro areas highlighted above, including New Orleans, Buffalo, and Indianapolis.

  With the income gap widening in the U.S., the rental market remains a more attractive option for many, especially as prices are finally tapering off. The national median rent price was down nearly 3% from June to July for two-bedroom apartments.

  At the end of the day, buying a home can be an important investment and may provide a sense of security, but it will be much easier to do in certain types of cities.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 20:00

• Leaked Email Shows NYC Struggling To Cope With 'Drastic Influx' Of Illegal Aliens Amid Border Crisis
  Leaked Email Shows NYC Struggling To Cope With ‘Drastic Influx’ Of Illegal Aliens Amid Border Crisis

  Authored by Michael Washburn via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  An email recently sent from New York City’s Human Resources Administration (HRA) to all names on its distribution list, and obtained by The Epoch Times, urged all staff who can work overtime to do so, to deal with a “drastic influx of asylum seekers” in Manhattan and the outer boroughs.

  

  The internal request came about a week after the city’s Mayor Eric Adams described the growing stream of illegal aliens coming into the Big Apple as a “real burden on New Yorkers,” adding that the city already had “an overburdened shelter system.”

  Dated July 28, the email stated: “Dear DSS/HRA Leadership and Staff, In recent weeks, we have seen a drastic influx of asylum seekers coming to our shelter intake sites. As a result, DHS is standing up several emergency shelters to ensure we have the capacity for these individuals.”

  The Department of Social Services (DSS) is charged with administering public assistance programs in the city, and is composed of the HRA and the Department of Homeless Services (DHS).

  The email showed urgent internal efforts by social services agencies to grapple with the surge in illegal aliens arriving in New York City amid an ongoing border crisis that is vexing the Biden administration.

  It continues with a plea for staff of the agency to commit to working overtime in order to help deal with the massive influx. “While we implement a longer term solution, there is a critical immediate need for Agency staff members to volunteer to work overtime to help manage these sites. Eligible employees who volunteer for this opportunity may earn cash overtime in accordance with contractual guidelines,” it stated.

  “If you have availability to assist outside of your regularly scheduled hours, please speak with your supervisor to confirm and then enter your information via the link below. Participation is subject to final approval by Agency senior staff,” the email continued.

  On July 29, the day after the email, the HSA and DSS declared an emergency, noting in a letter (pdf) to Comptroller Brad Lander and the city’s top lawyer Sylvia Hinds-Radix that as of July 28, some 4,000 asylum seekers had entered New York’s shelter system in the past three months, driving up the DHS census by roughly 10 percent.

  

  Influx

  For some experts and advocates, the developments suggest that not even recent public statements by Adams, in which the mayor acknowledged the problems resulting from the huge influx of asylum seekers south of the border, have provided a full and accurate measure of the strain that local authorities are experiencing.

  On July 19, the mayor’s office issued a plea for federal help, issuing a statement that read: “New York has experienced a sharp increase in asylum seekers from Latin America and other regions, with more than 2,800 individuals entering New York City’s shelter system.”

  “In some instances, families are arriving on buses sent by the Texas and Arizona governments, while in other cases, it appears that individuals are being sent by the federal government,” Adams said in the statement.

  The mayor then issued an urgent plea: “In order to meet both the legal mandate as a right-to-shelter city and provide high-quality shelter and services for those who enter our system, New York City needs additional federal resources immediately. If we do not get these urgently needed resources, we may struggle to provide the proper level of support our clients deserve.”

  

  Criticism

  Adam’s response has not satisfied some local advocacy and social services organizations, who have sharply criticized the mayor for what they characterize as his lack of preparedness and for trying to deflect blame for the situation to the federal level.

  The Legal Aid Society and the Coalition for the Homeless released a joint statement on July 21 addressing what they called Adams’s “misleading and problematic comments” on the surge.

  “The Mayor isn’t speaking the whole truth. We spoke to eight families with children this morning who slept on the floor last night at the City’s shelter intake center in the Bronx, in addition to the four families the Mayor acknowledged who had slept there Sunday night. This humanitarian crisis shows no sign of abating anytime soon regardless of how many press conferences the Mayor holds to conceal this reality.”

  The mayor and his officials knew what was brewing on the southern border and could have taken action months ago to avert the crisis, the advocates alleged.

  “As City officials just acknowledged, they have known about this influx of families, a portion attributable to those seeking asylum, for months. But, despite this knowledge, the Administration still lacks a plan to ensure safe shelter placement, and officials failed to detail any specifics for a viable path forward at today’s press conference, opting instead to heap praise on each other,” the statement continued.

  “The City is also failing to use its resources to move people into permanent housing,” it added.

  Conflicting Priorities

  Stephen Eide, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute think tank who studies the homelessness issue, told the Epoch Times that the Adams administration has struggled to fulfill the terms of the right-to-shelter mandate in the midst of the unexpected arrivals.

  Read more here…

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 19:40

• US Approves Massive Patriot Missile Deal With Saudis After Biden 'Rehabilitates' MbS
  US Approves Massive Patriot Missile Deal With Saudis After Biden ‘Rehabilitates’ MbS

  On Tuesday while media headlines and the world’s attention was largely focused on Nancy Pelosi’s provocative Taiwan visit, the Biden administration quietly unveiled a massive new arms deal for Saudi Arabia and the UAE – described as the United States’ close “Middle East partners”. 

  “The US State Department today approved more than $5 billion in arms deals for key Middle East partners, including $3.05 billion in Patriot missiles for Saudi Arabia and $2.25 billion in THAAD systems for the United Arab Emirates,” Breaking Defense wrote of the approval.

  

  Likely the deal was under preparation for a long time, given its size, with President Biden’s July 15 visit to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia – where he had his infamous fist-bump greeting and meeting with a grinning crown prince Mohammed bin Salman – having sealed it. Essentially this was the Biden administration bestowing ‘forgiveness’ for the Saudi state murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018.

  MbS even went on what was widely dubbed a “rehabilitation tour” of Europe, with official state visits to Greece and France, at a moment the West is badly in need of more oil supplies as it attempts to punish Vladimir Putin’s Russia for the ongoing Ukraine war.

  So now it can be the return of “business as usual” – with the US also as usual placing emphasis on ‘countering Iran’ by supplying Gulf partners with anti-air defenses, which Riyadh has asked for amid increased long-range rocket fire from Yemen’s Houthi rebels.

  “These missiles are used to defend the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s borders against persistent Houthi cross-border unmanned aerial system and ballistic missile attacks on civilian sites and critical infrastructure in Saudi Arabia,” a statement by the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) reads. “These attacks threaten the well-being of Saudi, International, and U.S. citizens (approximately 70,000) residing in the Kingdom. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia will have no difficulty absorbing these missiles into its armed forces.”

  Despite the ‘countering Iran’ rhetoric… well, there’s also other reasons.

  The US approves two massive arms sales to Saudi Arabia and the UAE to help them defend against Iran. The deal comes just weeks after Biden’s Middle East visit. The new sales includes $3 billion for Patriot missiles for Saudi Arabia and $2.2 billion for the UAE pic.twitter.com/BS1DUnHdko

  — breaking news 🇷🇺🇷🇺🇮🇱 (@1ghostofKiev) August 3, 2022

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

  The DSCA further indicated the deal will cover 300 PATRIOT MIM-104E Guidance Enhanced Missile-Tactical Ballistic missiles (GEM-T) and support equipment primarily from Raytheon, with an aim toward replenishing the kingdom’s “dwindling” stockpile of Patriot missiles.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 19:20

• DOD "Wiped" Phones Of Senior Trump Officials – Jan. 6 Communications No Longer Accessible
  DOD “Wiped” Phones Of Senior Trump Officials – Jan. 6 Communications No Longer Accessible

  Authored by Katabella Roberts via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  Some senior Trump administration officials had their phones “wiped” by the Department of Defense (DOD) and the U.S. Army after the former president left office, meaning messages that were sent around the time of the Jan. 6 Capitol breach are no longer accessible, court filings show.

  

  The DOD acknowledged that the phones belonging to former Pentagon officials had been wiped as part of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit filed by American Oversight, a non-profit watchdog organization.

  American Oversight had sought the communications that those officials had with Trump, former Vice President Pence, Trump White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, or anyone communicating on their behalf on Jan. 6.

  The watchdog group submitted the FOIA requests pertaining to the records on Jan. 12, 2021, six days after the breach of the Capitol building.

  Specifically, FOIA requests sought communications from former acting Secretary of Defense Chris Miller, former chief of staff Kash Patel, and former Secretary of the Army Ryan McCarthy, Paul Ney, the Defense Department’s general counsel; and James E. McPherson, the Army’s general counsel.

  However, in a court filing roughly a year after the request, the Army stated that “when an employee separates from DOD or Army he or she turns in the government issued phone, and the phone is wiped” and that “for those custodians no longer with the agency, the text messages were not preserved and therefore could not be searched.”

  The court filing noted, however, that “it is possible that particular text messages could have been saved into other records systems such as email.”

  Secret Service Swipe

  The DOD’s admission in the filings creates further transparency issues regarding the Jan. 6 select committee’s investigation into the events of that day in 2021 and how the government responded.

  It also comes shortly after it was revealed that U.S. Secret Service text messages sent on the day the breach had also been deleted.

  A number of texts from secret service members from Jan. 5 and Jan. 6, “were erased as part of a device-replacement program,” Joseph Cuffari, the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general, told lawmakers in a July letter.

  Last week, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) wrote to Attorney General Merrick Garland and asked him to take control of the investigation into the missing DHS and Secret Service messages.

  “It’s just astounding to believe that the agency did not understand the importance of preserving its records—particularly [with regards] to the top officials that might have captured: what they were doing when they were doing it, why they were doing, it on that day,” Heather Sawyer, executive director of American Oversight, told CNN.

  The U.S. Army Public Affairs media relations chief, Col. Cathy Wilkinson, said in a statement to the news outlet: “It is our policy not to comment on ongoing litigation.”

  In a statement to The Epoch Times, the Defense Department also declined to comment “on pending litigation.”

  American Oversight is now calling for an investigation into the DOD’s failure to preserve text messages and other communications from Jan. 6.

  ‘Cross-Agency Investigation’ Needed

  In a letter (pdf) sent to Attorney General Garland on Tuesday, Sawyer said the alleged deletion of the records of communication by multiple agencies “bolsters the need for a cross-agency investigation into the possible destruction of federal records” adding that the communications “could have shed light on the actions of top Trump administration officials on the day of the failed insurrection.”

  The letter also stated that Patel, Ney, and Miller had all departed from their roles “after American Oversight had submitted FOIA requests specifically seeking text messages and requesting that the agencies take steps to prevent the deletion of potentially responsive records.”

  “American Oversight accordingly urges you to investigate DOD’s actions in allowing the destruction of records potentially relevant to this significant matter of national attention and historical importance,” the letter said.

  Additionally, American Oversight has also requested the communications of Army Chief of Staff Gen. James McConville and Director of Army Staff Lt. Gen. Walter E. Piatt.

  The Army told the watchdog group that it has initiated a search for records held by McConville and Piatt, and estimates that the search will be completed by the end of September.

  The Epoch Times has contacted the DOD and the Justice Department for comment.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 19:00

• Warehouse Space Is All Of A Sudden In High Demand As A Looming "Reverse Bullwhip" Inventory Glut Looms
  Warehouse Space Is All Of A Sudden In High Demand As A Looming “Reverse Bullwhip” Inventory Glut Looms

  Tell us there’s an inventory glut swelling without telling us that there’s an inventory glut swelling…

  We have been writing over the last couple months about the coming reverse bullwhip effect – most recently noting inventory of semiconductor chips that is piling up in South Korea – and this week it is being reported that companies are seeking new warehouse space just to keep up with growth in inventories.

  Retailers are “struggling to find space,” the Wall Street Journal reported this week, stating that Prologis expects an additional 800 million square feet of warehouse space to be needed beyond earlier projections to handle the excess inventories”. 

  

  Chris Caton, managing director of global strategy and analytics at Prologis, told the Journal: “We have specifically heard from customers who are looking at carrying more inventories and are leasing space.”

  Names like Walmart and Best Buy have reported they are dealing with inventory gluts, including in clothes, kitchen appliances and electronics. The gluts are a result of consumers spending less as inflation continues to put pressure on the middle and lower class in the country. 

  Supply chain bottlenecks have also prompted retailers to make sure they have more goods on hand to prevent empty store shelves. Some retailers are bulking up orders just to be safe, and the excess inventory isn’t just jamming up warehouses, it’s also clogging seaports and distribution networks, the report says.

  

  Prologis predicts that “across the company’s some 5,800 customers, the increased demand amounts to an average of about 138,000 square feet per client,” WSJ wrote. 

  Chris Caplice, executive director of Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Center for Transportation and Logistics, is cautious, however. He said: “I don’t think it’s going to be like, we need to double the amount of warehouse space” and predicts that forecasts for more capacity may be overblown. 

  But Karl Siebrecht, chief executive of Seattle-based Flexe Inc., which connects businesses to warehouses with shared space, confirmed the trend to the WSJ: “We do see this dynamic happening across many of our customers. When you increase inventory, you must increase the capacity of warehouses to hold that inventory.”

  Recall, in the last two months we have talked about the reverse bullwhip effect many times:

  • Semiconductor Inventories In South Korea Surge To Most In 6 Years 

  • Bullwhip Effect Will Force Powell To Pivot

  • Bullwhip Effect Ends With A Bang: Why Prices Are About To Fall Off A Cliff

  • Deflationary Tsunami On Deck: A “Tidal Wave” Of Discounts And Crashing Prices

  In these pieces we talked about the coming “bullwhip” effect and when formerly a scarcity of inventory becomes a glut, with inventory to sales ratios exploding higher (and in some cases reaching two-decade highs)…

  

  … assuring inventory liquidations across the retail sector, resulting in a “deflationary tsunami” and “prices falling off a cliff“, forcing the Fed to eventually pivot on its hiking plans and even restart easing.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/03/2022 – 18:40

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