Today’s News 7th November 2024

• German Government Collapses As Mass Strikes Grind Economy To A Halt
  German Government Collapses As Mass Strikes Grind Economy To A Halt

  It’s not a good day for the establishment. Just hours after Kamala Harris – and the Democrats – staggering loss which ushered in Trump as president for the third time and gave Republicans a sweep of Congress, Germany’s three-party ruling coalition which had been on the verge of collapse for months, imploded on Wednesday evening after Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced he will fire Finance Minister Christian Lindner over persistent rifts on spending and economic reforms, a move that paves the way for a snap election at the end of March.

  

  The firing ejects Lindner’s fiscally conservative Free Democratic Party  (FDP) from the troubled coalition, forcing Scholz to call for a confidence vote that he said would take place on January 15. If Scholz loses that vote, which is virtually certain, a snap election is set to take place by March.

  The collapse of Germany’s government came just hours after Donald Trump’s clear win in the U.S. election, a result that stunned German political leaders, who depend on American military might for their country’s defense and fear Trump’s tariff policies will hobble German industry.

  “Dear fellow citizens, I would have liked to have spared you this difficult decision, especially in times like these, when uncertainty is growing,” said Scholz – viewed as the weakest German chancellor in decades – in a statement at the chancellery.

  But the rifts inside the coalition proved too great to overcome. Caught in the middle of an impossible battle, Lindner and his conservative FDP insisted that the German government stick to strict spending rules and cut taxes, even as his left-wing coalition partners wanted to maintain social spending and boost German industry through economic stimulus.

  “All too often, Minister Lindner has blocked laws in an inappropriate manner,” said Scholz in a statement. “Too often he has engaged in petty party-political tactics. Too often he has broken my trust.”

  Scholz said he had offered Lindner a deal to create an emergency fund to aid Ukraine that would exist outside Germany’s regular budget, but Lindner refused to participate in such fiscal gimmicks that saw the UK recently redefine the nature of “debt.”

  “Olaf Scholz has long failed to recognize the need for a new economic awakening in our country,” said Lindner. “He has long played down the economic concerns of our citizens.”

  As Politico reports, the FDP is the smallest party in the coalition and is now polling at only four percent — below the threshold needed to make it into the German parliament — meaning its leaders have been mulling a coalition break in order to save their political futures.

  Crisis talks in the coalition of Scholz’s Social Democratic Party, the Greens and Lindner’s Free Democratic Party had come to a head after the FDP issued a paper with demands for liberal economic reforms that were difficult for the other two parties to accept.

  Lindner’s recent policy paper, leaked to the media last week, called for tax cuts and a scaling back of climate policies in order to stimulate economic growth — both positions that put the party at odds with his coalition partners.

  Central to the coalition disagreements was the adoption of the 2025 budget by parliament in which a gap of at least €2.4 billion, and potentially far more, needs to be filled, as well as an agreement on measures to revamp the country’s ailing economy.

  The government crisis comes at the worst possible time: Trump’s victory, which anticipates imposing significant tariffs on German exports, is expected to put heavy pressure on Europe’s largest economy. An analysis from the German Economic Institute (IW) estimates that a new trade war could cost Germany €180 billion over Trump’s four years in office.

  Many in Germany had hoped that the victory of Donald Trump in the U.S. election earlier in the day would force the coalition to hold together over fears that the incoming president would give Europe’s biggest economy a hard ride, targeting its all-important car industry in a trade war.

  Ultimately, however, not even the looming threat of Trump proved enough for the fractious parties to put aside their differences.

  Sensing that the economy is about to go from bad to much worse, last Tuesday – amid mounting concern about the imminent collapse of the EU’s largest manufacturing economy – Germany’s giant trade union IG Metall launched strikes in the nation’s metal and electrical industries in an attempt to win higher wages. According to the tabloid Bild, employees began walking off the job during the night shift, including at Volkswagen’s plant in the city of Osnabruck, where workers worry the plant may be closed.

  Elsewhere, around 200 employees of the battery manufacturer Clarios went on strike in Hanover, Lower Saxony, carrying torches and union flags, the outlet wrote.

  Meanwhile, in Hildesheim, Lower Saxony, around 400 employees, including those at Jensen GmbH, KSM Castings Group, Robert Bosch, Waggonbau Graaff and ZF CV Systems Hannover, have reportedly halted operations.

  Protests are also expected at BMW and Audi plants in Bavaria. Work is to be stopped nationwide during the course of the day, the tabloid wrote.

  ”The fact that production lines are now at a standstill and offices are empty is the responsibility of the employers,” IG Metall’s negotiator and district manager Thorsten Groger stated, as quoted by Deutsche Welle.

  IG Metall is demanding a 7% pay raise compared to the 3.6% raise over a period of 27 months offered by employers’ associations, due to soaring inflation. The companies call such demands unrealistic.

  The mass strikes come as Volkswagen announced on Monday it would close “at least” three of its ten plants in Germany, lay off tens of thousands of staff and downsize remaining plants in the country. The measures are part of a cost-cutting drive, the conglomerate said earlier. Oliver Blume, chief executive of the VW Group, has cited a “difficult economic environment” and “failing competitiveness of the German economy” as factors behind the decision.

  The German Association of the Automotive Industry warned last year that the country was “dramatically losing its international competitiveness” due to soaring energy costs.

  A recent survey by the VDA auto industry association suggested that the reshuffling of the German car industry could lead to 186,000 job losses by 2035, roughly a quarter of which have already occurred.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 23:25

• Cutting Sugar In First 1,000 Days Of Life Reduces Late-Adulthood Disease Risk
  Cutting Sugar In First 1,000 Days Of Life Reduces Late-Adulthood Disease Risk

  Authored by Rachel Ann T. Melegrito via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  A low-sugar diet in utero and within the first two years of life can meaningfully reduce the risk of chronic diseases in adulthood, a new study finds.

  

  Researchers determined that a low-sugar diet during the first 1,000 days after conception lowered the child’s risk of diabetes and hypertension in adulthood by 35 percent and 20 percent, respectively, and delayed disease onset by four and two years. Eating sugar in the first two years of one’s life directly shapes a person’s long-term health risks, the findings suggest.

  “We all want to improve our health and give our children the best start in life, and reducing added sugar early is a powerful step in that direction,” Tadeja Gracner, corresponding author and senior economist at the University of Southern California (USC) Dornsife Center for Economic and Social Research, told The Epoch Times.

  Dietary Experiences From Rationing: A Natural Scientific Experiment

  Researchers from USC, McGill University, and the University of California–Berkeley studied how early-life sugar restrictions affect the risk of diabetes and hypertension later in life by comparing people conceived before and after the United Kingdom’s WWII food rationing program, which limited sugar intake from 1942 to 1953. The rationing program controlled the distribution of essential goods to ensure fair access for everyone during wartime shortages.

  Those conceived shortly before rationing ended had mothers and early-life diets with low sugar intake, while those conceived after had more sugar in their early environment.

  During the rationing period, people only consumed about 8 teaspoons (40 grams) of sugar daily, which falls within today’s dietary guidelines.

  However, as soon as rationing ended, people’s sugar and sweets intake immediately shot up to almost 16 teaspoons (80 grams) per day. This increase is partly attributed to a rise in canned and dried fruit intake and a surge in sugar and sweets sales during the post-rationing period.

  Early Life Nutrition Affects Adult Health

  The study found that children exposed to rationing, both after conception and in early life, had a one-third reduced risk of developing Type 2 diabetes and hypertension when compared to those with little or no exposure to rationing.

  Previous research has shown that the first 1,000 days from conception, including pregnancy (270 days) and the first two years of life, represent a critical window for fetal development.

  “This period has been extensively studied and been shown as one of the most important developmental periods for several long-term outcomes,” said Gracner in an email.

  The study references the “fetal origins hypothesis,” which suggests that a person’s risk of disease later in life is influenced by their experience inside the womb. When a fetus detects cues from the mother’s health—like poor nutrition—it makes adjustments to help it survive, such as changing how it uses energy and responds to hormones.

  These adaptations can form “set points” that continue into adulthood. For example, if a fetus adapts to poor nutrition by slowing its metabolism, this slower metabolic rate can become a lasting set point, influencing how efficiently the body uses energy throughout life.

  Additionally, infancy and toddlerhood are identified as “crucial periods for developing a taste for sweets (or even addiction) that can elevate sugar consumption throughout life,” the authors wrote.

  “While humans generally like sweet taste, significant sugar exposure in early life can strengthen this preference,” Gracner said.

  In their current work, her team finds supporting evidence of this pattern. “We found that adults who experienced sugar rationing consume less added sugar into their midlife compared to those who never experienced rationing,” she added.

  While a mother’s low-sugar diet offered some protection, the reduced risk of development and delayed onset of chronic diseases were most pronounced when babies continued to experience a low-sugar environment beyond six months, typically when solid foods are introduced.

  While maternal nutrition during pregnancy contributed one-third of the risk reduction, adding postnatal exposure to sugar rationing (up to one year) led to significantly greater reductions in disease risk. This effect was even more pronounced when rationing continued for over a year, especially for females. This may be because, as animal studies suggest, females are more likely to develop sugar addiction and poor glucose control in high-sugar environments, both of which increase the risk of Type 2 diabetes.

  For those whose sugar exposure was restricted only in utero, Type 2 diabetes onset in older adulthood was delayed by about 1.5 years, and hypertension by half a year. However, people restricted both in utero and beyond one year postnatally had much longer delays: around four years for Type 2 diabetes and two years for hypertension.

  This suggests that an infant’s early solid-food diet may have an even more significant impact on health outcomes than maternal nutrition during pregnancy. However, this hypothesis could not be thoroughly tested due to insufficient data regarding early-life and maternal diets in the UK Biobank, Gracner noted.

  Read the rest here…

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 23:00

• Florida Rejects Measure To Make Abortion A Right
  Florida Rejects Measure To Make Abortion A Right

  Authored by Samantha Flom via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  A fierce battle over the legality of abortion in Florida came to a head on Nov. 5, when the state’s voters became the first in the nation to reject a push to enshrine abortion in the state’s constitution since the U.S. Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision.

  

  After overcoming multiple legal challenges to secure its spot on Florida’s general election ballot, Amendment 4 failed to clear the final obstacle to its passage: the voters.

  A 60 percent majority was required for the measure’s adoption. At 9 p.m. on election night with 91 percent of the vote in, the measure had received 57 percent of the vote.

  The amendment sought to establish a right to abortion until fetal viability—the point at which a baby can survive outside the womb—or at any time if deemed necessary to protect the mother’s health by a “healthcare provider.”

  Its adoption would have nullified the state’s six-week abortion law, which took effect in May. That law states that abortion is illegal once a pregnancy passes the six-week mark. The law includes limited exceptions for situations involving rape, incest, human trafficking, or a serious threat to the mother’s physical health.

  Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America President Marjorie Dannenfelser celebrated the voters’ decision in a statement.

  “The demise of pro-abortion Amendment 4 is a momentous victory for life in Florida and for our entire country,” Dannenfelser said. “Thanks to Gov. Ron DeSantis, when we wake up tomorrow, babies with beating hearts will still be protected in the free state of Florida.”

  DeSantis fought hard against the ballot amendment, arguing that its broad language failed to define the specific conditions under which an abortion could be performed, and by whom.

  He also held that the law would undo existing parental consent requirements for minors seeking abortions, bar the state from enacting regulations to protect pregnant women, and effectively allow for abortion up until the moment of birth.

  “This Amendment 4, this is an intentional deception on the public,” DeSantis said at an Oct. 30 press conference in Clearwater, surrounded by a group of doctors who opposed the amendment.

  Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody made the same arguments in challenging the amendment’s validity before the state’s Supreme Court. The court found those arguments unconvincing and approved the measure for the ballot.

  Floridians Protecting Freedom, the yes campaign for the amendment, sued the Florida Health Department over its attempts to stop TV stations from airing ads supporting the measure that state officials said misrepresented the state’s current law.

  A ruling has yet to be issued in the case.

  Yes on 4 Campaign Director Lauren Brenzel criticized the state’s opposition to Amendment 4 in an Oct. 16 statement.

  “The State cannot coerce television stations into removing political speech from the airwaves in an attempt to keep their abortion ban in place,” Brenzel said.

  The amendment faced another obstacle in the final weeks of the election: allegations of fraud.

  The state’s Office of Election Crimes and Security alleged that the petition’s circulators forged signatures to secure the amendment’s placement on the ballot. Law enforcement is reportedly investigating 60 individuals in connection with the case.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 22:35

• Trump Has Sweeping Plans For His 2nd Administration: Here's What He Has Proposed
  Trump Has Sweeping Plans For His 2nd Administration: Here’s What He Has Proposed

  Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  Projected President-elect Donald Trump has made a number of sweeping proposals for a second term in office, outlining a wide-ranging agenda that targets federal regulations, taxes, immigration, and social issues.

  

  As of Wednesday morning, The Associated Press projected that Trump is the winner of the election after securing enough electoral votes over his opponent Vice President Kamala Harris.

  Early Wednesday, the former president and president-elect claimed victory in the 2024 presidential contest, telling supporters that voters had given him an “unprecedented and powerful mandate.” Early projections show that Trump may win not only the Electoral College but also the popular vote, something he’s never done in his previous two campaigns.

  Immigration

  Since 2015, Trump has made curbing illegal immigration a cornerstone of his campaigns. As president, he built or reconstructed about 400 miles of border barrier along the U.S.–Mexico border and implemented a number of rules curbing illegal migration into the country.

  During the campaign, Trump often said that he would initiate the largest “mass deportation” effort in U.S. history if elected. Recently, he also warned Mexico that he would impose a 25 percent tariff targeting the country if it fails to curb illegal immigration and that he would raise that tariff if Mexico doesn’t comply.

  Also, he’s suggested more enhanced screenings for immigrants, ending birthright citizenship—which may require a constitutional amendment—and reimposing certain policies enacted during his first term such as the “remain in Mexico” protocol.

  Tom Homan, a former acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) who is expected to join the new administration, told media outlets last year that the scale of deportations depends on what resources are available.

  During a “60 Minutes” interview in October, Homan was asked about whether families would be separated. Homan responded, “Families can be deported together.”

  Vice President-elect JD Vance said in his debate with Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz on Oct. 1 that deporting criminals would be a second Trump administration’s initial focus.

  “You’ve got to reimplement Donald Trump’s border policies, build the wall, reimplement deportations,” Vance said, adding that the United States has 20 to 25 million illegal immigrants in the country.

  “What do we do with them? I think the first thing that we do is we start with the criminal migrants.”

  Taxes and Regulations

  Throughout the 2024 campaign, Trump has promised to curb federal regulations that he said would limit the creation of new U.S. jobs. He also has pledged to keep intact a 2017 tax cut that he supported and signed while in office.

  His team has also proposed a further round of individual and corporate tax cuts beyond those initiated in his first term.

  Trump has pledged to reduce the corporate tax rate from 21 percent to 15 percent for companies that make their products in the United States. In a bid to win Nevada, Trump earlier this year pledged to end the taxation of tips and overtime wages to aid some service workers and waiters.

  He has pledged not to tax or cut Social Security benefits. Trump also has said that as president, he would pressure the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates but wouldn’t make any demands on the central bank.

  Some of his proposals would require congressional action. As of Wednesday morning, the GOP is projected to retake the Senate, but the picture around the House is murkier.

  Tariffs

  In multiple campaign stops this year, Trump floated the idea of a 10 percent or more tariff on all goods imported into the United States, which he said would eliminate the country’s trade deficit.

  He has also said he should have the authority to set higher tariffs on countries that have put tariffs on U.S. imports. He has threatened to impose a 200 percent tariff on some imported cars, saying he is determined in particular to keep cars from Mexico from coming into the country.

  Trump has targeted China in particular. He proposes phasing out Chinese imports of goods such as electronics, steel, and pharmaceuticals over four years. He seeks to prohibit Chinese companies from owning U.S. real estate and infrastructure in the energy and tech sectors.

  “To me, the most beautiful word in the dictionary is ‘tariffs,’” Trump said in an interview with John Micklethwait, editor-in-chief of Bloomberg News, in October. “It’s my favorite word.”

  He added at the time, “You see these empty, old, beautiful steel mills and factories that are empty and falling down,” referring to facilities that used to make goods in the United States.

  “We’re going to bring the companies back. We’re going to lower taxes for companies that are going to make their products in the USA. And we’re going to protect those companies with strong tariffs,” Trump said.

  Micklethwait said that some economists have projected that the former president’s economic policies, including tariffs, could add trillions to the U.S. deficit. But Trump said that a number of countries, including “allies” have “taken advantage of us, more so than our enemies. ”

  More Drilling

  The former president said that he wants to cut federal regulations on drilling for oil and natural gas, a move that he says would lower energy costs and inflation. In multiple instances, Trump said he would reauthorize drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska, which was suspended under the Biden administration.

  Meanwhile, he would pull the United States out of the Paris Climate Accords, a worldwide plan that claims to reduce carbon emissions. Trump also said he would roll back some federal policies around electric vehicles.

  In his campaign, Trump has often said that gas prices were much lower under his administration than they have been under the Biden administration. He has suggested that prices would again fall when he takes office.

  “When I left office … gasoline had reached $1.87 a gallon. We actually had many months where it was lower than that,” Trump told reporters over the summer. “But we hit $1.87, which was a perfect place, an absolutely beautiful number.”

  According to AAA, the average price for a gallon of regular gasoline stands at around $3.10. The highest recorded average price for a gallon was on June 14, 2022, when it reached $5.01, AAA figures show.

  The federal Energy Information Administration’s data show that the average annual price for a gallon of gasoline did not exceed $3 under the first Trump administration.

  Social Policies

  Trump has pledged to require U.S. colleges and universities to “defend American tradition and Western civilization” and to purge them of diversity and inclusion programs, which he and Republicans have said are leftist in nature.

  He said he would direct the Justice Department to pursue civil rights cases against schools that engage in racial discrimination. At K–12 schools, Trump would support programs allowing parents to use public funds for private or religious instruction. Trump also wants to abolish the federal Department of Education and leave states in control of schooling.

  Regarding abortion, Trump has said that a federal ban on abortion is not needed and that the issue should be resolved by states. He’s also said he backs rules that advance in vitro fertilization, birth control, and prenatal care.

  In campaign events and interviews, Trump has been critical of schools allowing transgender individuals to compete in women’s sports, saying that he would impose a ban on such practices.

  “It’s a man playing in the game,” Trump said at an October town hall event. “Look at what’s happened in swimming. Look at the records that are being broken.”

  Reuters contributed to this report.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 21:45

• Toyota To Make Additional Investments In Hybrid EVs In The U.S.
  Toyota To Make Additional Investments In Hybrid EVs In The U.S.

  While the push toward EV mandates has likely taken a massive detour thanks to the election of President Trump, it still doesn’t mean hybrid vehicles (as opposed to totally battery operated vehicles) won’t continue their popularity.

  Hybrids have emerged over the last few years as the obvious choice for auto buyers looking for the benefits of EV range with the reliability that comes from traditional ICE vehicles.

  And the proof of hybrid adoption is clear. While EV investment has been cut by major legacy automakers, companies like Toyota are working on investing in and expanding their hybrid production in the U.S.

  In fact, Toyota Motor is considering further investments in North America for EV and hybrid battery production, potentially including a new factory, to strengthen its local supply chain for increased electrified vehicle output, according to Nikkei.

  

  Sean Suggs, president of Toyota Battery Manufacturing North Carolina, said that if demand persists, “we may need to consider building more [production capacity], and that may include a different site.”

  “We are going to let the customer drive how much we go forward with,” he added.

  Toyota is already investing $13.9 billion in its North Carolina plant, now under construction. Suggs added that future investments depend on customer demand and industry trends over the next five to ten years.

  Nikkei reports that Toyota aims to raise the share of electrified vehicle sales in North America from 50% to 80% by 2030, with local battery production helping reduce costs. Production of hybrid batteries at Toyota’s North Carolina plant is set for early 2025, with trial production for EV and plug-in hybrid batteries following in late 2025 and 2026, respectively.

  Despite an 11% rise in U.S. EV sales in recent months, they still make up less than 10% of new-car sales. Toyota’s first U.S. EV plant in Kentucky is likely delayed from 2025 to early 2026.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 21:20

• Restoring The Warrior Ethos To The Trump Military
  Restoring The Warrior Ethos To The Trump Military

  Authored by ‘Cynical Publius’ via American Greatness,

  As a second Trump term becomes possible (or even likely), the literary world of military pundits is ablaze with articles, recommendations, and ideas on how to reform the Department of Defense (DoD) in a second Trump Administration.

  As a retired U.S. Army colonel, I am encouraged to see such thoughtful analyses and deeply hope a new Trump Administration takes heed of these many excellent recommendations. However, one area of concern for which I have seen little commentary is how to halt the deep institutional rot associated with what I call the “civilianization” of America’s military. The military forces of the United States of America exist first and foremost to kill the nation’s armed adversaries.

  Historically, this understanding has underpinned the “Warrior Ethos” that has made our military so great, but somewhere along the way, we lost this ethos in favor of a politicized, more civilian approach to warfare. I believe this is due to certain dysfunctional and deeply ingrained institutional processes and structures that must be fully and radically reformed in order to restore our military to one that defends the nation effectively and does not merely defend its own budget.

  

  There are four fundamental areas for institutional reform, and all involve the “de-civilianization” of warrior institutions:

  1. The “interagency” process in the DoD. After 9/11, the DoD (and the federal government more broadly) placed a significant emphasis on better coordination between the DoD and other federal departments like the State Department and the CIA. The idea was simple and appealing enough: to produce better coordination across domains. Nowhere was this more important than in the intelligence community, where failure to crosstalk between agencies led to startling intelligence failures like 9/11. However, this “interagency” approach became unfocused across all of the DoD and all agencies and became a priority in and of itself, whether it related to, for example, supposed climate change, government acquisition, federal land and water management, or leader professional development. While the goal of burgeoning interagency processes was to improve efficiency, the actual and unfortunate effect it had on the senior officer warriors of the DoD was to civilianize their mindsets. Instead of the State Department becoming more like the DoD, the DoD started thinking like the State Department. Historically, there was a healthy tension between the State Department and the DoD. The new interagency emphasis made former warriors think the goal was to be like diplomats, and it turned too many of our senior officers into wannabe State Department grandees who get invited to the best Georgetown cocktail parties. That former healthy tension between State and Defense was destroyed, and the warrior ethos of so many officers with it. We see this today in the form of the many retired and political admirals and generals who view their devotion to the D.C. bureaucracy to be more important than their oath to the Constitution, and nowhere has this phenomenon been more apparent than the nefarious shenanigans of the infamous Lieutenant Colonel (Retired) Alexander Vindman, who deemed his allegiance to the interagency to be more important than the judgment of his Commander-in-Chief.

  2. Civilian degree-producing programs for line officers. All of the military services send their promising O-4s, O-5s, and O-6s to advanced degree-producing programs at civilian universities, with the choicest schooling opportunities happening at Ivy League universities. (David Petraeus and H.R. McMaster are two well-known products of this process.) The idea of the “warrior scholar” is nice in the abstract, but in reality, what we did was infect our senior military leaders with DEI sensibilities and the same woke mind virus that has nearly destroyed America’s institutions of higher learning. While advanced civilian degrees are necessary for officer specialists like physicians, dentists, attorneys, chaplains, and officers serving in science and engineering fields, they do nothing but diminish the warfighting capabilities of line officers in tactical units, nor do they enhance the strategic abilities of our most senior officers. Even worse, we made possession of these degrees a positive criterion for promotion. The other negative consequence of this woke mind virus infestation is that it flows downhill—junior officers and NCOs emulate the successful senior officers above them, and the civilianization runs rampant, reducing combat effectiveness and focusing troops on all the wrong priorities.

  3. Service academies and War Colleges emulating Ivy League universities. The institutional learning processes of our nation’s military are built upon a foundation of prestigious uniformed learning institutions. You probably know the service academies (West Point, Annapolis, and the Air Force Academy), but the service and joint service “War Colleges” (schools for O-5s and O-6s who are marked as having flag officer potential) are equally important in building military culture and skills. All of these once purely military schools now have large numbers of civilian faculty members, many of whom seek the “publish or perish” route so they can ultimately join the Ivies they so eagerly and enviously emulate. With this preponderance of civilian faculty come the civilian dogmas—DEI, the joys of the interagency, and the cancer of courses and majors that end in “studies.” When I attended the National Defense University as a promotable O-5, we even had a choice in uniforms—our usual duty uniform or a civilian coat and tie. That War College’s quest to look and feel like a civilian Ivy was palpable and very real.

  4. Career SES civilians actually control the nuts and bolts of the military. The Senior Executive Service (“SES”) represents the senior ranks of civilian federal employees. There are “career” SES members and “non-career” SES members. The non-career SES ranks generally represent political appointees, and the career SES ranks serve and keep serving regardless of who holds the presidency. In the DoD, career SES members sit in some of the highest and most influential offices in the Pentagon and the military agencies, wielding enormous power over defense budgets, material acquisition, warfighting doctrine, personnel policies, and force structure. As their military bosses come and go every two years or so, they stay. If they don’t like what their military boss tells them to do, they can obfuscate, delay, bluster, and just generally wait until a new military boss shows up, then the cycle can start again. What’s worse is that most career SES billets are filled via the Senior Executive Service Candidate Development Program, which generally includes sponsorship and mentorship components that allow serving SES bureaucrats to ensure that their vision of how the bureaucracy should run will endure for decades. This bloated, careerist system of never-changing bureaucracy contributes immeasurably to the civilianization of the military and the diminishment of the Warrior Ethos and is a great inhibitor to meaningful structural change.

  So how to fix these Four Horsemen of the Civilianization Apocalypse?

  It won’t be easy, but here are some ideas:

  • Dramatically cut back on interagency activities except for strict intelligence functions. Greatly reduce officer billets in interagency positions. Make service in a non-intelligence interagency position a hindrance to promotion. Eliminate cross-agency attendance at agency professional education programs.

  • Eliminate advanced degrees as promotion criteria for line officers. Stellar service in combat and line units/ships/planes will be the overwhelming consideration for promotion.

  • Eliminate all DEI programs of every kind at all levels. Demonstrated adherence to DEI principles will be a “do not promote” criterion for officers and NCOs alike.

  • Cease all advanced degree-producing programs at civilian universities for line officers (but doctors, lawyers, chaplains, and scientists can still go).

  • Except for essential scientific and engineering faculty, fire 100% of the civilian faculty at the service academies and the War Colleges. Screen the scientific and engineering faculty for retention to ensure that their subject areas cannot be taught by rotating uniformed personnel.

  • Greatly reduce permanent military faculty at the service academies and War Colleges and limit those billets to only very specialized areas.

  • Rotate accomplished line officers through these schools as instructors. Such instructor duty will be after successful command and will signal a “must promote” officer.

  • Refocus the service academies on disciplines related to warfighting, pure science, and engineering. Eliminate any and all courses and majors that end in “studies.”

  • Completely revamp the curriculums at all War Colleges so there is a laser focus on strategy at the national and theater levels. The uniform at these schools must be military attire only.

  • Mirror all of the above in junior officer and NCO professional development programs.

  • Eliminate all career SES positions in the DoD. Let non-career (i.e., political appointee) SES members handle the arcane stuff of navigating Congress. If the flag officers commanding Army and Marine divisions, Navy carrier battle groups, and Air Force MAJCOMs (and whatever it is generals do in the Space Force) can change out every two years, the SES running the Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Organizational Entropy can be replaced too.

  I am entirely confident that the above recommendations can halt the civilianization of our military and serve as a great start to restoring an essential warfighting focus. I am also entirely confident that the DoD bureaucracy will fight every recommendation I made above tooth and nail and will in fact have a host of somewhat persuasive arguments as to why I am wrong. But here is the thing: this is like chemotherapy. Our military has a cancer, and drastic actions must be taken to cure it. Yes, some healthy tissue may get destroyed, but so will the cancer itself, and the patient will live.

  Let’s build back an effective, lethal, efficient military that wins its wars for a change and leaves us all proud once again.

  * * *

  Cynical Publius is the nom de plume of a retired U.S. Army colonel, veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan, and reformed denizen of the Pentagon who is now a practicing corporate law attorney. You can follow Cynical Publius on X at @CynicalPublius.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 20:55

• Thousands Of Californians Lose Power After PG&E Protects Grid As Wildfire Risks Soar 
  Thousands Of Californians Lose Power After PG&E Protects Grid As Wildfire Risks Soar 

  Pacific Gas & Electric Company has shut off power to thousands of commercial and residential customers in some areas of the Bay Area due to high winds that have increased the risk of fire. 

  “Due to changing weather conditions, PG&E has increased the estimated number of customers that could be impacted by a PSPS event. Currently, 22,000 customers are in scope in 17 counties and four tribal areas. Most of these customers are in the Western Sacramento Valley, the North Bay and in the elevated terrain of the East Bay,” PG&E wrote in a statement. 

  PG&E meteorologists warned: 

  • Above 50 mph over elevated terrain in the North and East Bay

  • Near or above 70 mph in the Geysers, Mt. St. Helena and Mt. Diablo.

  As of early Wednesday, here’s the list of the number of customers without power in Bay Area counties:

  • Napa County: 4,326

  • Solano County: 4,060

  • Alameda County: 3,554

  • Sonoma County: 2,555

  • Santa Clara County: 1,947

  Full map:

  

  SFGATE explained:

  Power shutoffs are a way to de-energize equipment and power lines that can get damaged in strong winds and send off sparks that ignite wildfires. While Tuesday’s blackouts could be a huge inconvenience for thousands of residents, the scope is much smaller than the power shutoffs that occurred in 2018 and 2019, when hundreds of thousands of households across the state were in the dark during blustery conditions. Sarkissian said that the shut-offs aren’t as widespread and large in 2024 because the utility has strengthened its equipment, including undergrounding and coating lines.

  The National Weather Service issued red flag warnings for much of the Bay Area through Thursday.

  🚩It’s about to get very dry and windy, as a result – a Red Flag Warning is now in effect for critical fire weather conditions through 7 AM Thursday for the majority of the Bay Area and the Central Coast. #CAwx #OneLessSpark 🔥 pic.twitter.com/Djsq7YhJ6b

  — NWS Bay Area 🌉 (@NWSBayArea) November 5, 2024

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

  PG&E is being extra cautious since its equipment was blamed for sparking wildfires that ultimately forced the power company into bankruptcy in 2019. 

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 20:30

• Did Government-Sponsored Disinformation Worsen COVID-19?
  Did Government-Sponsored Disinformation Worsen COVID-19?

  Authored by Robert Malone via The Brownstone Institute,

  Highlights

  • Political disinformation was positively associated with respiratory infection incidence.

  • Government-sponsored disinformation was positively associated with the incidence of Covid-19.

  • Internet censorship led to underreporting of the incidence of respiratory infections.

  • Governments must stop sponsoring disinformation to avoid blame or gain a political advantage.

  The recent report from the US House Energy and Commerce Committee titled “We Can Do This: An Assessment of the Department of Health and Human Services’ COVID-19 Public Health Campaign” provides detailed, documented information concerning the public Covid-19 PsyWar/Propaganda disinformation campaign delivered by the “Fors Marsh Group” corporation for the US Department of Health and Human Services. This was previously discussed in this Substack essay. 

  

  According to the documentation provided, the principal HHS partner cooperating with Fors Marsh to provide content and messaging guidance regarding approved Covid-19 interventions was the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The report conclusions and appendix include data summaries implying that this nearly one billion dollar campaign ($911,174,285) contributed to the development of widespread US citizen resistance to Covid-19 “vaccine” uptake, and was associated with deterioration in confidence concerning the CDC, the public health enterprise, and vaccines. 

  The Fors Marsh campaign specifically and intentionally deployed fear-based messaging to influence public behavior to comply with CDC and other USG recommendations. The intentional promotion of fear of death from an infectious disease disproportionate to actual risk of death is psychological bioterrorism and is associated with significantly greater social, political, and economic damage than that associated with known actual bioterror events such as the US Anthrax spore letter distribution campaign.

  The weaponization of fear of death from an infectious disease as a component of an intentional propaganda campaign designed to modify human behavior is morally abhorrent, and is associated with a wide range of direct economic and mental health harms. These harms were never considered during the development and deployment of this HHS-sponsored psychological warfare technology-based propaganda campaign. This type of messaging and propaganda meets the criteria of State-sponsored disinformation.

  In contrast to misinformation, which refers to simply false information, disinformation refers to false information that is spread deliberately to deceive people. Unsurprisingly, political leaders, especially those who have undermined democratic institutions, adopt disinformation as an instrument for gaining support and reducing resistance, especially during crucial political moments such as elections and wars (Guriev and Treisman, 2019).

  From the Energy and Commerce Committee report page 42:

  The CDC’s disregard for emerging evidence that contradicted its own preferred policy outcomes demonstrates an insular culture unable—and unwilling—to change course with evolving science. By November 10, 2021, in line with ACIP’s recommendation, the Campaign began airing ads targeting parents of children aged 5-11 years. These ads inaccurately suggested children were at high risk of severe illness or death from COVID-19. Many ads were emotionally manipulative and sought to incite fear by exaggerating the risk of severe illness and death among low-risk populations, such as children. This was especially true of ads that targeted parents. At the same time, the ads played down vaccine associated risks. 

  From pages 45-46:

  Nine months later, faced with a surge driven by the Delta variant, the Biden-Harris administration reneged on its pledge and announced, in a nationwide primetime address, that it would impose Covid-19 vaccine mandates. President Biden stated that “in total, the vaccine requirements in my plan will affect about 100 million Americans.” He ominously warned unvaccinated Americans or those who had only received a single dose, that “[w]e’ve been patient, but our patience is wearing thin.” The mandates were presented as a way to protect higher-risk vaccinated workers and those too young to be vaccinated from catching Covid-19 spread by unvaccinated individuals.

  At the time of the announcement, over 175 million Americans were vaccinated with about 80 million Americans remaining unvaccinated. The vast majority of unvaccinated individuals were under the age of 50 and at comparatively low risk of severe illness and death. More importantly, at that time, over 85 percent of people over 65 years old had received one dose, and around 78 percent had completed the two-shot primary series. Similarly, over 75 percent of people 50-64 years old had received at least one dose. Thus, the age groups at highest risk of severe illness or death were largely already vaccinated by the time the mandates were announced.

  From page 62:

  The fact that HHS’s COVID-19 pandemic policies, guidance, and recommendations, including Campaign messaging, were grounded in incorrect data generated by a faulty algorithm that had inflated the number of COVID-19 deaths shattered HHS’s remaining credibility. The CDC’s admission to overcounting deaths undermined the Campaign’s promotional materials. The Campaign’s messaging pressured parents to believe their children were facing life-or-death scenarios. By using artificially inflated child mortality rates, the Campaign greatly overstated the threat facing children and struck unnecessary fear into households everywhere. Parents felt betrayed, and those who resisted or tuned out the warnings felt vindicated. 

  Quoting for the report appendix:

  Over and over, the Campaign’s survey findings showed little to no change in vaccine uptake or readiness among the public. In spite of heavy promotion, findings reveal vaccine uptake remained unchanged for nearly a year between August 2021 and June 2022. 

  By April 2022, 76 percent of unvaccinated adults said they would never get a COVID vaccine. 

  Among unvaccinated adults, nearly half of all those surveyed remained unvaccinated due to concerns about the long-term side effects of the vaccines. Others remained concerned about the speed with which the vaccines were developed, their efficacy in preventing COVID infection and transmission, as well as mistrust of government motives in widely encouraging vaccines. 

  Survey findings between January and June 2022 also reveal no significant change in booster uptake among fully vaccinated adults. Notably, survey findings also reveal that while the Campaign was ongoing, booster uptake peaked at 27 percent in November 2021 and gradually declined to 3 percent in March 2022.

  The Campaign closely monitored vaccine hesitancy among the public, including among parents of children under 18 years. A CET survey finding from March 2022 showed between 60 and 76 percent of parents with unvaccinated children under 18 years were concerned about potential vaccine side effects. At the same time, 53 percent of adults agreed that parents should be able to make their own choices about getting their children vaccinated, and as the COVID pandemic lagged, Campaign findings indicated a 20 percent drop in the number of adults who supported mask mandates in schools over a seven-month period. Interestingly, school mask and vaccination mandates for teachers, staff, visitors, and students were most strongly supported by liberal, vaccinated adults, non-parents and those dwelling in urban areas. In contrast, parents were more likely to agree that COVID vaccines for young children, especially those under 5, were unnecessary. 

  By 2022, many Americans had had enough. In April 2022, nearly half of all surveyed adults agreed that vaccination and masking decisions are personal choices and should not be mandated. These statistics reveal how public perception significantly diverged from that of the Biden-Harris administration and the Campaign’s messaging. Demonstratively, when the federal mandate requiring masks in airports and on airplanes, buses, subways, trains, and other forms of public transportation was scheduled to expire on April 18, 2022, the CDC, and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) chose to extend it another two weeks—until May 3. Although major airlines such as Delta and American Airlines called to an end to the requirement, President Biden “promised to veto any legislation overturning it.”

  By April 2022, 58 percent of adults surveyed stated they were tired of worrying about the risk of COVID and 46 percent claimed they tune out COVID related news. Fifty percent stated, “[t]he virus may not be done with us, but we need to be done with it.”

  In short, the campaign failed to achieve the intended objectives and instead was associated with the development of widespread citizen distrust and disillusionment with the State, the CDC, the US Public Health Enterprise, the Medical/Industrial complex, and vaccines in general.

  Not considered and unaddressed in the Energy and Commerce report was whether these types of State-sponsored infectious disease disinformation campaigns positively or negatively influence infectious disease outbreak outcomes. I used the US National Library of Medicine PubMed search engine to investigate this question to discover whether any high-quality peer-reviewed academic research addressing the issue had been published.

  My search revealed a March 2022 study publication by a group of Taiwanese researchers that was published in the Elsevier journal Social Science and Medicine. Is this journal a respected academic publication?

  

  Social Science and Medicine Impact Score (IS) Trend:

  • The Impact Score for Social Science and Medicine has been steadily increasing over the years, with a slight decrease in 2023 to 5.38.

  • The highest Impact Score recorded in the last 10 years is 5.54 (2022), while the lowest is 3.22 (2018).

  • According to SCImago Journal Rank (SJR), Social Science and Medicine is ranked 1.954, indicating a high level of scientific influence.

  Clearly “Social Science and Medicine” is a credible peer-reviewed academic journal.

  The article is titled “Government-sponsored disinformation and the severity of respiratory infection epidemics including COVID-19: A global analysis, 2001–2020”

  This link will take you directly to the publication, which is published as an open source document (no subscription required). But you will need to verify that you are a human. It is not too technical, and I recommend that any readers seeking additional details (such as experimental methods and data) read the primary source.

  Both the background summary and the study findings are prophetic, and almost completely aligned with the Energy and Commerce committee report.

  Abstract

  Internet misinformation and government-sponsored disinformation campaigns have been criticized for their presumed/hypothesized role in worsening the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. We hypothesize that these government-sponsored disinformation campaigns have been positively associated with infectious disease epidemics, including COVID-19, over the last two decades. By integrating global surveys from the Digital Society Project, Global Burden of Disease, and other data sources across 149 countries for the period 2001–2019, we examined the association between government-sponsored disinformation and the spread of respiratory infections before the COVID-19 outbreak. Then, building on those results, we applied a negative binomial regression model to estimate the associations between government-sponsored disinformation and the confirmed cases and deaths related to COVID-19 during the first 300 days of the outbreak in each country and before vaccination began.

  After controlling for climatic, public health, socioeconomic, and political factors, we found that government-sponsored disinformation was significantly associated with the incidence and prevalence percentages of respiratory infections in susceptible populations during the period 2001–2019. The results also show that disinformation is significantly associated with the incidence rate ratio (IRR) of cases of COVID-19. The findings imply that governments may contain the damage associated with pandemics by ending their sponsorship of disinformation campaigns.

  Introduction 

  Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has caused a worldwide medical crisis that began in 2020. As the COVID-19 pandemic has escalated, accurate and inaccurate information has spread on the Internet (Islam et al., 2020). The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned of the risk of an “infodemic” wherein an overwhelming amount of circulating information discredits professional advice and prevents accurate information from reaching its target audience (WHO, 2020). Some studies have found that people’s exposure to misinformation may be associated with their violation of epidemic prevention regulations or resistance to vaccination (Lee et al., 2020; Hornik et al., 2021; Loomba et al., 2021; Prandi and Primiero, 2020), and the sources of this misinformation can be traced back to political leadership in the government. For example, one study found the name of former U.S. president Donald Trump appeared in 37.9% of misinformation conversations about the COVID-19 pandemic (Evanega et al., 2020). These findings imply that attempts to conceal or distort information about the disease may contribute to its spread globally.

  Most public health studies on information issues have emphasized only the spread and effects of misinformation (Roozenbeek et al., 2020) and not considered “disinformation.” In contrast to misinformation, which refers to simply false information, disinformation refers to false information that is spread deliberately to deceive people. Unsurprisingly, political leaders, especially those who have undermined democratic institutions, adopt disinformation as an instrument for gaining support and reducing resistance, especially during crucial political moments such as elections and wars (Guriev and Treisman, 2019). In the digital era, recent studies have uncovered that more than two dozen governments have been deeply involved in disinformation campaigns to pursue their own domestic or international purposes (Bennett and Livingston, 2018; Bradshaw and Howard, 2018). 

  The relationship between such disinformation campaigns and disease spread warrants investigation particularly in the case of the COVID-19 outbreak. Some governments adopt authoritarian strategies including disinformation and censorship to protect against political accountability and criticism over the spread of epidemics. However, the effects of such activities are unclear (Edgell et al., 2021). In this paper, we hypothesize that political disinformation may lead to worse public health outcomes. By examining comprehensive data on respiratory infections from 149 countries from 2001 to 2020, the present study discovered that government-sponsored disinformation is positively associated with the spread of respiratory infections including COVID-19. The findings imply that governments may contain the damage associated with pandemics by ending their sponsorship of disinformation campaigns. 

  Government-Sponsored Disinformation and Epidemics 

  Disinformation is widely understood as being misleading content produced to further political goals, generate profits, or maliciously deceive. It may be utilized by politicians to manipulate public perception and reshape the collective decisions of the majority (Stewart et al., 2019). As an effective political tool in the digital era, one of the major origins of disinformation is a variety of agents sponsored by governments (Bradshaw and Howard, 2018). The actors disseminating government-sponsored disinformation include government-based cyber troops working as civil servants to influence public opinion (King et al., 2017), politicians and parties utilizing social media to reach their political intentions, private contractors hired by the government to promote domestic and international propaganda, volunteers that collaborate with governments, and citizens who have prominent influence on the internet and are paid by governments to spread disinformation (Bennett and Livingston, 2020).

  Accompanied by the development of the internet, government-sponsored disinformation has become a global issue over the last two decades. Comparative political studies have noted that autocracies create more fake news than democracies, while the public in democracies has also severely suffered from it (Bradshaw and Howard, 2018). In contrast to democratic governments that are elected to provide public goods through majority rule, nondemocratic governments have leaders who remain in office by gaining support from a small group of political elites without checks and balances. Autocratic governments, therefore, face the constant threat of mass protests from large numbers of disenfranchised people (De Mesquita and Smith, 2003; Acemoglu and Robinson, 2006). In the digital age, autocracies prefer to use informational instruments such as censorship and disinformation to compromise potential protests, particularly during political crises (Guriev and Treisman, 2019). For example, a recent study revealed that autocracies such as China, Russia, and Iran used internet censorship as a reactive strategy to suppress civil society after the Arab Spring (Chang and Lin, 2020).

  The political effects of government-sponsored disinformation and internet censorship on disease spread, however, remains understudied. As a tool for maintaining political stability in the government’s favor; however, disinformation may lead to dysfunction in public health systems, as well as more infections from disease. In this paper, we highlight some suspected political, informational, and institutional processes to explain the positive association between government-sponsored disinformation and the exacerbation of infectious diseases—measured by the incidence, prevalence, and death percentages of respiratory infection before the COVID-19 pandemic—and how this disinformation was associated with the number of confirmed cases (henceforth, cases) of and deaths due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

  Political Incentives to Spread Disinformation about Epidemics

  As the COVID-19 outbreak has made apparent, some government incumbents accountable for controlling the disease neglected the risk and failed to prevent its spread. The failure of leadership to control the disease stimulated blame avoidance behaviors (Weaver, 1986; Baekkeskov and Rubin, 2017; Zahariadis et al., 2020), which sometimes took the form of internet censorship and government-sponsored disinformation. The Chinese government has been criticized for its alleged ignorance and suppression of information at the beginning of the COVID-19 epidemic (Petersen et al., 2020), while Chinese diplomats have openly accused the United States of spreading the disease, with the Iranian and Russian governments also supporting this conspiracy theory (Whiskeyman and Berger, 2021). In Iran, the government disseminated contradictory information on national COVID-19 fatalities. On February 10, 2020, the Iranian government falsely claimed that the country had no cases of coronavirus, but a 63-year-old woman died of COVID-19 on the same day. Finally, on February 19, the Iranian regime admitted that coronavirus had spread in Iran, 9 days after the first reported death (Dubowitz and Ghasseminejad, 2020). Under the cloud of poor transparency and disinformation regarding the epidemic in Iran, the country saw severe outcomes, with 55,223 deaths as of December 31, 2020.

  Disinformation as blame avoidance behavior by political leaders was exhibited not only in autocratic countries, but also occurred in some democratic countries (Flinders, 2020). For example, during his US presidency, Donald Trump understated the risk of the COVID-19 pandemic by accusing the political opposition of conspiracy and the media of exaggeration (Calvillo et al., 2020). His statements about hydroxychloroquine as a “miracle cure” also misled the public to employ false treatments (Evanega et al., 2020). This misinformation about the disease could directly result in ineffective coping by people and undermine their institutional trust in public health agencies. However, the suspected “disinformation” from democratic leadership, in contrast to autocracies, still encountered effective checks and balances by parliaments, medical professionals, free media, and voters. 

  Disinformation and Ineffective Coping 

  Some case studies have shown that reliable and transparent government-sponsored epidemic information could have alerted public health institutions and susceptible populations early and led them to take effective preventive behaviors before the COVID-19 pandemic. For example, a key lesson learned from the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) experience in Singapore was the importance of rapid and accurate information to support effective decision-making. The innovation of frequent information reviews effectively guided local public health decisions during the H1N1-2009 epidemic (Tan, 2006; Tay et al., 2010).

  In contrast, government-sponsored disinformation disrupts the mechanisms of information exchange among public health institutions and other bodies, which can lead to ineffective coping, such as perceptions of low risk and the slow development of preventive behaviors at both the individual level, and preparedness delays and resource misallocation at the institutional level. COVID-19 studies have demonstrated that people’s belief in misinformation reduced the likelihood that they would take preventive measures such as mask wearing, social distancing, and complying with official guidelines (Lee et al., 2020; Hornik et al., 2021; Pickles et al., 2021). Case studies of Iran have revealed that government-sponsored disinformation typically results in ineffective coping by individuals and public health institutions and that the disinformation can elevate disease incidence and prevalence in an epidemic (e.g., Bastani and Bahrami, 2020).

  In addition, in contrast to democracies, autocracies such as Iran, China, Russia, and North Korea are likely to refuse information sharing and regulations promoted by the global health system during a pandemic (Burkle, 2020). When governments disseminate disinformation or suppress valid information, therefore, we expect that it is difficult for public health institutions and citizens to protect themselves from the spread of the disease. 

  Disinformation and Institutional Distrust 

  Misinformation is likely to trigger institutional distrust in public authorities and thus directs citizens’ attention away from professional advice and instead towards skeptics and harmful treatments (Brainard and Hunter, 2019) harmful treatments (Brainard and Hunter, 2019). Disinformation could be associated even more strongly with dire outcomes. Studies conducted before the COVID-19 pandemic have illustrated that distrust of government or the medical profession creates obstacles to preventing epidemics by reducing people’s compliance with official messages related to disease containment and by engendering inadequate medical service utilization. For example, studies investigating Ebola outbreaks discovered that respondents with misinformation and low trust in the government were less likely to comply with social distancing policies or take precautions against the epidemic (Blair et al., 2017; Vinck et al., 2019).

  Recent global studies on COVID-19 have reported that trust in public institutions, but not general social trust, has a negative association with the disease incidence ratio and deaths related to the pandemic (Elgar et al., 2020). For example, online survey studies confirmed that trust in government amplified compliance with official health guidelines (Pak et al., 2021); evidence from a geographic information system in European countries revealed the same pattern—the higher the political trust, the lower the regional and national human mobility (Bargain and Aminjonov, 2020). Survey studies conducted in both China and Europe have demonstrated that higher political trust before the outbreak was associated with lower incidence and mortality rates (Ye and Lyu, 2020; Oksanen et al., 2020). In addition, studies conducted in the United States have shown a negative relationship between institutional trust in science and the public health system and belief in misinformation (Dhanani and Franz, 2020; Agley and Xiao, 2021) and that both trust and information sources influence the probability that individuals will perform preventive behaviors (Fridman et al., 2020). International comparative studies have also found that distrusting citizens may not comply with regulations because of their underestimation of the risk of non-compliance (Jennings et al., 2021).

  Therefore, government-sponsored disinformation may result in distrust of public health institutions and be positively associated with the incidence and prevalence of disease. In this study, cross-national data on vaccination is not included, although other studies suggest that misinformation could result in the spread of epidemics by reducing the willingness to receive vaccination. Studies before COVID-19 have revealed that vaccination-related information on Twitter is associated with regional vaccination rates in the United States and public confidence in vaccination in Russia (Salath´ e and Khandelwal, 2011; Broniatowski et al., 2018). Based on a global survey, Lunz Trujillo and Motta (2021) found that country-level internet connectivity is associated with individual-level vaccine skepticism. A recent study on the acceptance of COVID-19 vaccines also demonstrated that misinformation exposure significantly reduced the willingness of people to accept a vaccine in the UK and USA (Loomba et al., 2021). As these studies implied, government-sponsored disinformation may reduce the acceptance and coverage of vaccination and thus are likely to be positively associated with the incidence and prevalence of epidemics. To sum up, blame avoidance and other interests of politicians may stimulate government-sponsored disinformation and internet censorship efforts during epidemics.

  The disinformation might be associated with ineffective coping by people and institutions, and contribute to institutional distrust of governments and public health systems. The ineffective coping, and resistance to official guidelines of preventive behaviors and vaccination because of the distrust, might facilitate the spread of disease in epidemics. Accordingly, we expect government-sponsored disinformation to be positively associated with the incidence and prevalence measures of respiratory infections including COVID-19. 

  Conclusion 

  This study hypothesized a positive association between political disinformation and its impacts on epidemics in light of political and institutional processes. The findings reveal that government-sponsored disinformation is associated with the incidence and prevalence of respiratory infections during the period 2001–2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic. Government-sponsored disinformation is also positively associated with the IRR of cases of COVID-19 before vaccination program implementation. In contrast to literature focusing only on the effects of misinformation and preventive behaviors at the individual level during the COVID-19 pandemic, the present study integrated evidence from global surveys and revealed the adverse effects of government-sponsored disinformation on the management of epidemics over the last two decades. We found that disinformation is positively and significantly associated with the incidence and prevalence of respiratory infections including COVID-19, though its positive relationship with mortality of these respiratory infections was not significant. This study has some limitations. First of all, the disinformation index focused on only government sources and not on other disinformation and misinformation sources. Also, the DSP database is expert-rated and inevitably subjective.

  However, it is the only existing global database regarding the interaction between politics and social media. Second, the pooled category of respiratory infections and the percentages of all disease causes could not be directly compared with the IRRs for a single pandemic. Data on both cases and deaths in the GBD and COVID-19 databases might not only present the impacts of the respiratory infections but also reflect differing levels of capacity among various public health systems and transparency among governments. The data on respiratory infections may be censored deliberately or underreported unintentionally by developing countries. For the application of the GBD database, we suggest that adopting the percentages of a specific type of epidemic from all causes might be a relatively more reliable choice than the rates or numbers. However, the database of epidemics might consider some adjustments to address the variation from the different capacity of public health systems.

  Despite these limitations, this study may be the first to present cross-national evidence of the association between political disinformation and the spread of epidemics including COVID-19. Our study also implies that the quality of data during the COVID-19 pandemic is an endogenous factor of informational politics. The internet censorship of autocracies tends to systematically underreport the morbidity and mortality of the pandemic. Iran is a vivid example of intentionally underreporting and also disseminating fake news. There is also evidence of deliberate inaccuracies and concealment of COVID-19 infections in lower- or middle-income countries (Richards, 2020). Rocco et al. (2021) revealed that subnational COVID-19 data quality, including mortality, is associated with media independence. Hansen et al. (2021) pointed out that in the United States, counties were more likely to release information about COVID-19 when there was a stronger opposition (Democrats) before the US presidential election. In our analysis, governments that applied censorship and spread fake news as blame avoidance behaviors may also intentionally underreport the numbers of infected and deaths. After all, concealing the numbers of cases and deaths during the pandemic is also a form of political disinformation. Therefore, we may have underestimated the association between disinformation and the severity of pandemics. The real damage of disinformation may be greater than the current findings show.

  Based on our findings, we suggest countering disinformation during the COVID-19 pandemic. First, we would ask that governments immediately stop sponsoring disinformation for blame avoiding or regarding the disease as a strategy for gaining political advantage in domestic and international conflicts. Also, we would propose that the international community and global civil society act to prevent governments from sponsoring disinformation campaigns and internet censorship. In practice, fact-checking authorities managed by civil associations may be established to efficiently refute fake news. 

  Eliminating fake news in civil society may help curb the spread of infections. In sum, to control the pandemic, fighting disinformation can play a key role. 

  Republished from the author’s Substack

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 20:05

• Big Oil CEOs Say Middle East Conflict, U.S.-China Tension Are Biggest Risks To The Industry
  Big Oil CEOs Say Middle East Conflict, U.S.-China Tension Are Biggest Risks To The Industry

  When it comes to the price of oil, geopolitical volatility is usually a tailwind. However, when it comes to what big oil CEOs worry about the most, these conflicts – including the ongoing ones in the Middle East – are top of the list, according to a new report from Bloomberg.

  Oil executives are meeting at the region’s largest energy conference amid high market volatility, the report says. Rising tensions between Israel and Iran, an OPEC member, have traders wary of possible supply disruptions, while China’s weak economy is slowing oil demand growth.

  Meanwhile, U.S.-China relations remain uncertain, since President-elect Donald Trump has pledged significant tariff hikes on China if elected.

  BP Chief Executive Officer Murray Auchincloss commented: “The conflict in the Middle East is probably the top risk of all right now. We operate across five or six countries in the region — we are worried obviously about the security of our people and the security of energy supplies.”

  

  Shell CEO Wael Sawan added that “what happens on the US-China axis” is also a concern. He added: “We fundamentally believe the world will need more energy and we fundamentally believe it will need different forms of energy.”

  Executives on Monday expressed confidence that oil demand will keep growing, despite Asia’s economic slowdown, necessitating continued investment to meet supply needs even as the world shifts toward cleaner energy.

  Bloomberg reports that CEOs voiced mixed views on demand, with some anticipating strong growth despite a cooling Chinese economy. The International Energy Agency (IEA) expects demand to peak before 2030, while OPEC and Saudi Aramco remain optimistic, especially with recent Chinese stimulus.

  Petronas CEO Muhammad Taufik believes demand will continue beyond 2030, though price volatility hinders investment, potentially pushing futures higher, noted Eni’s CEO Claudio Descalzi. 

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 19:40

• The Worldly Pain Of Young Americans
  The Worldly Pain Of Young Americans

  Commentary by Mark Bauerlein via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  A survey by the Cultural Research Center at Arizona Christian University reported findings that won’t surprise anyone who’s been paying attention. Among Millennials and members of Generation Z, fully one-in-three individuals suffer from some kind of mental disorder. Anxiety, depression, substance abuse, and suicidal thoughts afflict them, and the mental problems frequently manifest in physical symptoms.

  

  That’s not the evidence of the Research Center study, though. The mental health numbers above come from federal government agencies, which the Center cites in order to set up its attachment of these emotional pains to another factor, a cause rarely considered by public officials in charge of data collection and population surveys. Here is how the Center and its staff led by George Barna put it:

  “… Barna and his colleagues suggest that addressing those conditions may not require counseling, hospitalization, drugs, or other common remedies.

  “The research instead indicates that those are often symptoms of an unhealthy worldview …”

  That’s the assumption, a close relationship between a person’s general worldview and a person’s emotional state. A 20-year-old who thinks the world is a cruel habitat, that the world doesn’t care about individual human beings, that people are selfish and life is hard… that 20-year-old will feel the effects of that pessimism. He embraces a nihilism about the world that will recoil upon him and bring him down, that will include him in the negative judgment. If he thinks that climate change will bring devastation to the earth in the next 30 years, he loses hope and wonders what to do with his life. If he doesn’t trust other people, he can’t form solid and affirming relationships. Emotional agonies are inevitable.

  Data that the Center has gathered add support to the assumption. Consider these results:

  • Seven out of ten individuals under 40 years of age who responded to Center questionnaires stated that they “lack a sense of purpose and meaning in life.”
  • Only 13 percent of Generation Z and 22 percent of Millennials believe that “absolute moral truth exists and is an objective reality.”

  Given those dispiriting beliefs, we shouldn’t shake our heads at the malaise and panic of the young. In former times, thinkers such as Friedrich Nietzsche and Martin Heidegger described such regrettable attitudes in terms that combined the philosophical and the psychological, for instance, “ontological insecurity” and “metaphysical discomfort,” which they understood as peculiarly modern diseases. Those traits are still with us, Barna et al. insist, and they run in two directions, outward and inward. That life has no purpose slides smoothly into “I have no purpose.” To think that moral truth is a relative or subjective thing only is to deny oneself a reliable foundation of judgment and conviction. Young Americans are fractious and fragile, and who can avoid that condition in a world so utterly careless and capricious.

  The daily experience of average 16-year-olds only reinforces the negative worldview they bear. The videos they watch, the music they hear, the texts and photos that flood their phones, the movies and TV shows they favor—it’s a wave of entertainment that shows people behaving badly with no moral accounting. These media allow for no transcendence and no organized worship, no prayer or devotion. They are the bricks of youth culture, which doesn’t revere the past or envision a happy future. No deep meanings and profound truths. The producers of it purvey shallow ideas and emotional chaos. We have handed the rising generations an environment hostile to their souls.

  The mental problems of 21st-century youth are real. Our methods of treating them are pharmacological and therapeutic, wholly individualized. These procedures are often incomplete.

  We should add to the mix the exploration of a wayward youth’s worldview, and the modification of it should that worldview prove discouraging and depressing.

  What a teen assumes about human existence at large affects daily mood and will, the head and the heart. It’s a warning to parents. Give your children a stable moral habitat. Teach them a meaningful past and a hopeful future. If they rebel against your vision, so be it, but you will make that rebellion itself meaningful by presenting to them something meaningful to oppose.

  The depression and anxiety, in some cases at least (a not insignificant portion, I believe), are a sane response to bad influences and cynical perceptions. Youth culture is itself unhealthy, and Americans coming-of-age need to be cured of it.

  Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times or ZeroHedge.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 19:15

• The Chinese Tax Noose Is Tightening
  The Chinese Tax Noose Is Tightening

  As the rush to try and save its economy via stimulus continues, China is simultaneously looking to shake down its citizens for unpaid taxes.

  Chinese authorities are urging wealthy individuals and corporations to conduct “self-inspections” to ensure all taxes are paid, as the country seeks to boost revenue, according to an FT report out this week. This push for compliance may further impact investor confidence in China’s economy, the world’s second largest.

  Beijing is set to announce a major fiscal stimulus aimed at stabilizing local government finances, which have been strained by debt and delayed payments, the report notes.

  Economists hope this new phase, building on efforts from September, will boost investor and household confidence after prolonged deflation linked to the property crisis.

  With China’s third-quarter growth falling below the 5% target, recent tax demands have caused concern and even “fear” among wealthy individuals in cities like Beijing, Shanghai, and Shenzhen, according to a local tax advisor.

  

  One China-based tax partner said: “Some of them simply didn’t really know what to declare when they were asked to conduct self-inspections. Many also didn’t realize before . . . [that] their overseas personal gains would be subjected to taxes in China.”

  FT reports that companies completing self-inspections have been instructed to submit stamped confirmations and keep records for potential review, according to a city notice seen by the Financial Times. Authorities are also asking individuals to pay back-taxes on overseas investments, sometimes citing a rarely used 2019 law.

  A lawyer noted that wealthy clients can negotiate with tax officials, allowing some flexibility in tax obligations. This revenue drive, including increased fines on the private sector, comes as local and central governments seek funds amid a three-year property downturn that has strained finances.

  Government land sales fell nearly 25% in the first nine months of this year, and tax revenue dropped 5.3%, leading to a 2.2% decline in fiscal revenue to Rmb16.3tn ($2.3tn).

  Gary Ng, a senior economist at Natixis, concluded: “China’s fiscal deficits have reached a tipping point. There is more urgency to find alternative revenue sources . . . and taxing the wealthy and some companies creates a less direct economic impact on most residents.”

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 18:50

• US Air Force Explores Strategic Overhaul In Pacific To Counter Rising China Challenge
  US Air Force Explores Strategic Overhaul In Pacific To Counter Rising China Challenge

  Authored by Stephen Xia and Sean Tseng via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  The U.S. Air Force is considering revamping its operations in the Pacific to address increasing challenges from communist China. Rather than focusing solely on expensive fighter jets, it is shifting toward cost-effective technologies such as drones and hypersonic missiles and adopting dispersed operational tactics to maintain an advantage.

  

  A recent report from the U.S. Air Force’s China Aerospace Studies Institute highlights the need to update equipment priorities to counter China’s military expansion. Lessons from the Russia–Ukraine war have shown that modern conflicts consume resources rapidly, making reliance on a limited number of costly weapons impractical. To prepare for prolonged engagements, developing advanced yet affordable weapons is crucial.

  Long-range precision strikes and the use of drones have emerged as game-changers, allowing forces to remain effective while avoiding heavy enemy fire. Dispersed operational tactics have also proven advantageous, helping forces preserve strength and counterattack effectively. With these insights, the U.S. Air Force is preparing for potential conflicts in the Indo-Pacific, which could be more extensive and intense than the Russia–Ukraine war.

  China seeks to alter the global power balance and push U.S. forces out of the Indo-Pacific using anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) strategies. These involve the use of missiles, aircraft, and naval defenses to block access, making it costly or difficult for opponents to access contested regions.

  To counter this, the Air Force think tank recommends focusing on inexpensive, easily replaceable weapons capable of penetrating defenses, such as low-cost drones and hypersonic missiles. While advanced aircraft such as the B-21 bomber and next-generation fighter jets remain important, there is increasing emphasis on survivable, high-tech weapons and expendable platforms.

  Air Base Defense

  A significant concern is the vulnerability of U.S. air bases in the region, particularly in Japan, which Chinese missiles, drones, and hypersonic weapons could target. The Department of Defense (DOD) noted in its 2023 China Military Power Report that the People’s Liberation Army has consistently expanded its long- and mid-range ballistic missile capacity, enabling it to target critical U.S. military installations throughout the Indo-Pacific, including key bases on Guam.

  Additionally, the DOD estimates that as of May 2023, Beijing possessed more than 500 operational nuclear warheads, with numbers growing. Given China’s expanding missile capabilities, strengthening base defenses alone is insufficient. Therefore, the United States is adopting a new strategy: spreading out deployments to reduce risk.

  The U.S. military is repositioning its forces across multiple locations to reduce the risk of being targeted. This strategy involves identifying, upgrading, and restoring airfields throughout the Pacific, including old World War II sites, under an initiative known as Agile Combat Employment. This includes redeveloping airfields like the one on Tinian, a small island near Guam that was a strategic location during World War II.

  The airfields in Tinian are being expanded for the first time in decades. By positioning aircraft across a range of bases—including allied bases, remote islands, and civilian runways—the Air Force aims to increase flexibility and survivability.

  Michael P. Winkler, the Pacific Air Force’s deputy director for air and cyberspace operations, emphasized the need to avoid putting all aircraft in one place to prevent creating a “big, juicy target” for adversaries. This strategy requires access to more airfields during crises, necessitating coordination with regional allies like Japan and the Philippines.

  Operational Resiliency

  Securing access agreements with regional allies is crucial, as they are in a position to offer numerous military and civilian runways, although not all meet the Air Force’s requirements. U.S. pilots are visiting potential locations like Basa Air Base in the Philippines and airfields in Tinian, Guam, Saipan, and Palau to familiarize themselves and prepare for future operations. Upgrades are underway at several sites to enhance facilities and train personnel.

  While the Second Island Chain, which includes some U.S.-controlled areas, is easier to access and upgrade, the First Island Chain is strategically more important due to its proximity to China. This chain includes Japan, the Philippines, and Taiwan. Operating there requires cooperation with regional partners, whose political situations can be unpredictable. Despite these challenges, the United States currently maintains strong partnerships in the region.

  Recent military exercises have tested this dispersed approach. In February, U.S. and allied aircraft operated from multiple airfields on Guam, Saipan, and Tinian. During the U.S.-led Valiant Shield exercises in June, U.S. fighter jets used Japan’s Matsushima and Hachinohe bases for the first time. Under the U.S.–Japan alliance agreement, Japanese bases can serve as evacuation sites for U.S. aircraft in emergencies.

  However, spreading out forces presents challenges, particularly in logistics. In a conflict, the United States must deliver equipment, spare parts, fuel, munitions, and support personnel to scattered and potentially contested locations or pre-position supplies there. This is complex, and the strategy’s effectiveness depends on reliable support. The Air Force must balance the benefits of dispersion with logistical practicalities.

  On a similar note, Stacie Pettyjohn, a senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security, a Washington-based think tank, said operating from more locations with smaller units reduces the chance of a successful large-scale attack by the Chinese regime, adding a layer of deterrence.

  This strategic shift reflects a broader recognition that the nature of warfare is changing. The Air Force is adapting by embracing new technologies and tactics, prioritizing flexibility, resilience, and cost-effectiveness. By dispersing forces and investing in advanced yet affordable weapons, the Air Force aims to maintain its edge in a rapidly evolving security environment.

  Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times or ZeroHedge.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 18:25

• Dave Smith: Will Trump Be Able To End The War In Ukraine?
  Dave Smith: Will Trump Be Able To End The War In Ukraine?

  At a recent pre-election speaking and podcast event, comedian and Libertarian political commentator Dave Smith expressed his view that it is very realistic that the next President Donald Trump could successfully negotiate an end to the Ukraine war. 

  Smith’s view is optimistic, as he articulated that he believes Trump’s expressed desire to end wars in Ukraine and Gaza is genuine. But Smith also laid out that much depends on who Trump puts around him in top national security positions. Below is the hard-hitting segment featuring the prominent commentator addressing the question: will Trump be able to end the war in Ukraine?

  PBD: Will Trump be able to end the war in Ukraine?

  Dave Smith: Yes, If he listens to Tucker Carlson, Bobby Kennedy, and Vivek Ramaswamy, but not if he picks Mike Pompeo, Liz Cheney’s pick for Defense Secretary, or John Bolton, Hillary Clinton’s pick for National Security Advisor pic.twitter.com/1f5kQZQEW4

  — Liam McCollum (@MLiamMcCollum) November 6, 2024

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

  Below are Dave Smith’s words from the segment on Trump and Ukraine below [emphasis ZH]…

  “Why the hell are we even expanding our military alliance to Ukraine? And listen, Donald Trump always says that the war ‘never would have happened if I was president, and I would negotiate an end to this.’

  And I gotta say I think he’s right about that. I don’t think the war would have happened if he was president – I think he will negotiate an end to it.

  I don’t think he’s right that Hamas wouldn’t have attacked Israel if he was president – that seems kind of ridiculous to me. But he’s right: the Ukraine war could be over tomorrow if American wanted to negotiated a peace to it.

  Vladimir Putin has been trying to the entire time… 

  Well the question becomes who does Donald Trump put around him? If Donald Trump puts Mike Pompeo, aka Liz Cheney’s pick for Defense Secretary… if he puts John Bolton, aka Hillary Clinton’s pick for national security adviser – then maybe not, maybe it doesn’t happen.

  But if he listens to Tucker Carlson, and ‘Bobby’ Kennedy, and Vivek Ramaswamy, and all the smart people around him – then yes, he could negotiate an end to that war.”

  

  * * *

  Indeed, the question ultimately becomes: will Trump really keep the ‘swamp’ out of his administration this time around? We hope so.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 18:00

• "These Are Not Good People" – Trump Derangement Is The Stupidest Political Phenomenon Of Our Lifetime
  “These Are Not Good People” – Trump Derangement Is The Stupidest Political Phenomenon Of Our Lifetime

  Authored by Chris Bray via ‘Tell Me How This Ends’ substack,

  Trump Derangement is the Stupidest Political Phenomenon of My Lifetime, and Its Idiot Propagators Need to be Shoved Into a Forgotten Corner of the Culture Forever

  Spare a thought for them, America.

  Liz Cheney is probably being executed by that firing squad as you read this, and Molly Jong-Fast is undoubtedly already on her way to the camps, and the cities are emptying as the brave survivors sew diamonds into the lining of their coats and set off on foot for political asylum in Canada. What time do we get the first delivery of handmaids, Vladimir?

  So.

  The dismal cabal of hysterical adult children that makes up the alleged American cultural “mainstream,” the responsible people you see on television and in the op-ed pages — Anne Applebaum, Tom Nichols, Ruth Ben-Ghiat, Adam Kinzinger, Liz Cheney, Joe Scarborough and his idiot wife, Jonathan Capehart, Max Boot, Jen Rubin, David French, Bill Kristol, Ruth Marcus, Nicolle Wallace, Dana Bash, and on and on, all of them completely interchangeable, one set of asinine talking points with a series of different faces sewn on the front — has spent the last year or ten descending into a urine-soaked psychotic tantrum. They don’t know anything, they don’t understand anything, they don’t say anything of value, they don’t contribute anything, ever, and their voices are ubiquitous. Living in this media environment is like living in a place where the air is made of manure.

  They have absorbed no lesson. This morning, the media is full of warnings about fascism and white nationalism and VLADIMIR PUTIN!!!!!!!, a wall of empty noise in response to the rejection of a wall of empty noise. Ruth Ben-Ghiat is still the Dumbest Professor in America™, by the way, and just a profoundly indecent human being:

  

  The lesson of last night is that Trump “has declared war on the US.” You disgusting braindead pig.

  The unifying reality about these soulless, mindless, worthless people is that they have no history to them, and that goes double for the history professors. How many times have you heard, for example, that the January 6 insurrection was the worst act of political violence in America since the Civil War, and how many times have you heard any of the people who made that ritual claim deal with any of the obvious examples that disprove the claim — the Colfax Massacre, the Ludlow Massacre, the bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building, the bombing campaigns of the Weatherman and other radical groups in the early 1970s, the wave of political assassinations in the late-1960s, and on and on — in any way?

  Related, all of their history is LITERALLY ADOLF HITLER, but you have to eventually notice that their constant demands for guardrails on the discourse and rules for social media never deal with any American history, any history of the place they think they’re talking about: the Adams administration and the Sedition Act, the military arrest of Clement Vallandigham for an anti-war speech, the Wilson administration’s arrest of anti-war activists, and so on. People who have no history but Hitler have no history.

  So in the end, they say things, but they don’t think about the things they say. At all. Their very loud voices aren’t attached to any form of cognition. The Potemkin village of our media-academic-political class barely sustains the facade. It’s nothing. They have nothing, they are nothing, the offer nothing.

  The New Republic, November 1:

  

  Here’s the lede: “Donald Trump doubled down Friday on his disturbing comments about placing Liz Cheney in front of a firing squad.”

  

  Chevy Chase, Maryland, Nov. 6

  Here’s the part of the story that describes the terrifying threat to murder an opponent with a firing squad:

  “She’s a war hawk. She kills people. She wanted uh, even in my administration, she was pushing that we go to war with everybody,” Trump said.

  “And I said that if you ever gave her a rifle, [indistinguishable] if you ever do that, she wouldn’t be doing too well.”

  “If she had to do it herself, and she had to face the consequences of battle, she wouldn’t be doing it. So it’s easy for her to talk, but she wouldn’t be doing it,” Trump continued. “She’s actually a disgrace.”

  You see, people are handed rifles when they’re shoved up against the wall to be executed by a firing squad, and being killed by a firing squad is an example of facing the consequences of battle. Makes total sense.

  These are not good people. They’re stupid, dangerous, empty, and a threat to any form of public knowledge. They deserve to have derision howled in their ugly faces for the rest of their worthless lives.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 17:40

• Hurricane Rafael Revs Up To Cat. 2 As Gulf Oil Rigs In Crosshairs 
  Hurricane Rafael Revs Up To Cat. 2 As Gulf Oil Rigs In Crosshairs 

  Hurricane Rafael intensified to a Category 2 storm on Wednesday morning and may reach Cat. 3 strength on the five-step Saffir-Simpson scale by evening. Rafael’s cone of uncertainty shifted further west than previous forecasts (read: here & here), putting offshore oil/gas rigs at increased risk across the Gulf of Mexico. 

  The National Hurricane Center in the US said Rafael was just southeast of Havana and packing winds around 100 mph, making it a Cat. 2 storm. The storm is expected to strengthen into a Cat. 3 storm, unleashing “life-threatening storm surge, damaging hurricane-force winds, and flash flooding” across west and central Cuba. 

  “Rafael is likely to remain a hurricane over the southeastern and southern Gulf of Mexico during the next few days,” NHC’s Dan Brown wrote in a forecast. 

  The current trajectory of the storm puts about 1.55m b/d of oil production at risk, according to Bloomberg calculations of data from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and the NHC.

  

  More from Bloomberg about potential storm impacts on US Gulf area oil/gas assets:

  • Rafael also threatens to cross leases that produced 1.59b cf/d of gas, 29k b/d of condensate

  • Rafael direction has shifted eastward

  • US oil production could be cut by 3.1 million to 4.9 million barrels if hurricane reaches Category 2 status: Mansfield Energy

  Oil and gas platforms that are within the cone of the storm include:

  • 

  Once Rafael arrives in the southeastern and southern Gulf of Mexico, computer models do not clearly agree on trajectory. 

  Global + Hurricane Models

  

  GFS Ensembles

  

  GEPS Ensembles

  

  “It is too soon to determine what, if any, impacts Rafael could bring to portions of the northern Gulf Coast,” NHC noted. 

  For now, Rafael’s trajectory and intensity should be closely monitored as computer models are still subject to change. 

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 17:20

• Goodbye Middle Class: Half Of All American Workers Make Less Than $43,222.81 A Year
  Goodbye Middle Class: Half Of All American Workers Make Less Than $43,222.81 A Year

  Authored by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse blog,

  It is that time of the year again.  

  The Social Security Administration has finally released the final wage statistics for 2023, and they are quite sobering.  

  According to the report, last year the “median wage” in this country was just $43,222.81.  In other words, half of all American workers made less than $43,222.81, and half of all American workers made more than $43,222.81.

   That is terrible news, because the cost of living has been rising much faster than paycheck have.  More people are being squeezed out of the middle class with each passing day, but most Americans don’t even realize that this is happening because the media isn’t really talking about it.

  Poverty, homelessness and hunger are all growing all around us, and if we stay on the path that we are on the middle class will continue to be systematically eviscerated.

  

  Once upon a time, the vast majority of the country could afford to live a middle class lifestyle.

  But now those days are long gone.

  A study that was recently released found that it now takes more than $100,000 a year for a typical U.S. household to live “the American Dream” in all 50 states, and in 29 U.S. states it takes more than $150,000 a year…

  A household would have to spend more than $150,000 a year to live the dream in 29 of the 50 states, according to an analysis published in April by the personal finance site GOBankingRates.

  According to the report, the optimal American lifestyle would cost $137,842 a year in Ohio, $147,535 in Texas, $159,932 in Florida, $194,067 in New York and $245,723 in California.

  The state that has the lowest cost of living is Mississippi.

  Living the American Dream only costs $109,516 a year in that state.

  Needless to say, someone earning $43,222.81 a year is not going to be able to live the American Dream anywhere in the nation.

  Even if there are two people earning $43,222.81 a year in the same household, that still isn’t going to get you anywhere close to living the American Dream.

  When I was growing up, my father worked and my mother stayed home with the kids, and we were still able to live a middle class lifestyle.

  But now most households cannot afford to live a middle class lifestyle even if both parents are working.

  After reading that, is there anyone out there that would like to disagree with me about the fact that we have been experiencing a long-term economic decline?

  What I have been warning about all these years has been slowly but steadily playing out right in front of our eyes.

  Not too long ago, a Wall Street Journal/NORC poll found that only about one-third of the entire U.S. population actually believes that the American Dream “is still alive”…

  Only about a third of U.S. adults believe the American dream is still alive, a Wall Street Journal/NORC poll published Wednesday found.

  A survey of 2,501 people conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute twelve years ago found more than half of respondents believed the American dream “still holds true,” but now only a third feel that way, according to a recent WSJ/NORC poll of 1,502 adults. The study also found an increasingly large gap between people’s economic goals and what they think is actually attainable — a trend that was consistent across gender and party lines, but was especially common amongst younger generations.

  Nobody out there can deny what is happening.

  This is our country now, and conditions are getting worse with each passing day.

  One of the biggest reasons why the American Dream is out of reach for most of the population is because home prices have gone absolutely haywire over the last four years…

  Twenty-four percent of likely voters who rent their homes said that “the cost of housing” is the most important economic issue they’re considering as they decide their vote, according to a CNN poll conducted by SSRS between September 19 and 22.

  That’s no surprise: The US is facing a once-in-a-generation housing affordability crisis. In the four years through August 2024, national home prices have risen 45%, according to the S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller Home Price Index. According to the National Association of Realtors, the median sales price of a home in the US hit a record high this summer and now hovers just below that level.

  Renting used to be an affordable alternative for many people, but these days close to half of all renters in this country “spend more than 30% of their income on housing”…

  Nor has renting become any easier than buying. Nearly half of US renters spend more than 30% of their income on housing, qualifying them as “cost-burdened,” according to US Census data from September.

  In September 2024, the median rent in the U.S. was $2,050 a month.

  How are you supposed to be able to afford that if you are making just $43,222.81 a year?

  Increasingly, America is being divided into the “haves” and the “have nots”.

  If you don’t know which group you belong to, let me clue you in.  If you are not making more than $100,000 a year, you are definitely among the “have nots”.

  Unfortunately, economic conditions are rapidly getting worse, and we are seeing high profile bankruptcies happen at a pace that we haven’t seen since the global financial crisis.  For example, one of the largest crafting chains in the U.S. just filed for bankruptcy…

  Joann — the craft store chain formerly known as Jo-Ann Fabrics — has filed for bankruptcy amid ongoing financial troubles.

  But DIYers need not worry just yet: The company’s more than 800 stores nationwide will remain open and its website will stay active as the Hudson, Ohio-based company restructures its finances.

  As hordes of businesses fail all over the nation, our historic commercial real estate crisis just continues to intensify.

  If you doubt this, just check out these numbers…

  The delinquency rate of office mortgages backing commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) spiked to 9.4% in October, up a full percentage point from September, and the highest since the worst months of the meltdown that followed the Financial Crisis. The delinquency rate has doubled since June 2023 (4.5%), according to data by Trepp, which tracks and analyzes CMBS.

  I don’t even have to tell many of you what those numbers mean.

  We are headed for a historic meltdown, and it is going to absolutely devastate small to mid-size banks from coast to coast.

  Meanwhile, most Americans are just barely scraping by from month to month as our standard of living steadily deteriorates.

  We are in far more trouble than most people realize, and the months ahead are going to be extremely challenging.

  *  *  *

  Michael’s new book entitled “Why” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 17:00

• Middle East At War: How Are Regional Leaders Reacting To Trump's Victory?
  Middle East At War: How Are Regional Leaders Reacting To Trump’s Victory?

  The Middle East remains on edge, and Israel is still at war on multiple fronts – in Gaza, and in Lebanon, and with the Houthis in the Red Sea region and Yemen. Iran is still threatening to retaliate against Israel, and Iraqi paramilitaries supported from Tehran are reportedly readying for battle. Israeli airstrikes on Syria have been ongoing for days. US assets from warships to long-range bombers are also parked in the region, ready for anything.

  The region could explode into bigger escalation at any moment, and tit-for-tat big attacks between Hezbollah and Israel’s military will likely persist through January, when Trump steps into the oval office. Hezbollah’s attacks on northern Israel have not relented, and neither have massive Israeli strikes on Beirut and eastern and southern Lebanon.

  In his victory speech, Trump acknowledged the regional hot wars playing out in various parts of the globe, two of which have involved US participation by proxy. “They said ‘He will start a war,’ I’m not going to start a war. I’m going to stop wars,” Trump said.

  

  Below are the reactions of various Middle East leaders to the Trump victory…

  Israel

  To the surprise of no one, Israel is overjoyed that Donald Trump will be the next president of the United States. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was actually the very first world leader to issue a hearty congratulations to Trump. 

  “Congratulations on history’s greatest comeback!” he said in an English-language statement. “Your historic return to the White House offers a new beginning for America and a powerful recommitment to the great alliance between Israel and America. This is a huge victory!” he said.

  Netanyahu’s hardline and hawkish National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir simply wrote on social meda “Yesssss”.

  Yesssss 💪🏻🇮🇱🇺🇸 https://t.co/kPqkYI3PDP

  — איתמר בן גביר (@itamarbengvir) November 6, 2024

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

  Turkey

  “I congratulate my friend Donald Trump, who won the presidential election in the US after a great struggle and was re-elected as the President,” said Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan via X.

  “In this new period that will begin with the elections of the American people, I hope that Turkiye-US relations will strengthen, that regional and global crises and wars, especially the Palestinian issue and the Russia-Ukraine war, will come to an end; I believe that more efforts will be made for a more just world,” Erdogan added. 

  He declared his hope that “the elections will be beneficial for our friendly and allied people in the US and for all of humanity.”

  Iran

  Iranian government spokesperson, Fatemeh Mohajerani, said “US elections are not really our business. Our policies are steady and don’t change based on individuals. We made the necessary predictions before, and there will not be a change in people’s livelihoods,” in reference to US sanctions on Iran.

  Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Deputy Commander in Chief Ali Fadavi on Wednesday repeated that Tehran is ready for a confrontation with Israel.

  Hamas

  Senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri said “We urge Trump to learn from [US President Joe] Biden’s mistakes” and said that the new president will be “tested” on his statements about being able to end the war in Gaza.

  He also pointed out past statements of Trump and/or his campaign officials about US support to Israel not being endless. Interestingly Trump had received record Arab-American support in swing states like Michigan, amid anger at the Biden-Harris administration for its blank check support to Israel even as tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians die.

  “Our position regarding the new US administration will depend on its stances and practical actions towards our Palestinian people, their legitimate rights, and their just cause,” the group, designated by the US as a terror organization, additionally said.

  “The elected US President is urged to heed the voices that have risen from within American society itself for more than a year since the Zionist aggression on Gaza, rejecting occupation and genocide, and objecting to support and bias toward [Israel].”

  It’ll be interesting to watch the immediate foreign policy shifts following the Trump victory. Especially in the Middle East.

  Remember, the Abraham Accords were signed under President Trump in 2020. Israel/Saudi Arabia normalization is likely under the new administration.

  — Trey Yingst (@TreyYingst) November 6, 2024

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  Palestinian Authority

  Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas congratulated Trump and expressed hope for regional peace and stability based on the future declaration of a Palestinian state and equal right and freedoms.

  “We will remain steadfast in our commitment to peace, and we are confident that the United States will support, under your leadership, the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people,” Abbas said.

  Saudi Arabia

  King Salman and MBS sent issued separate formal diplomatic cables congratulating Trump. MbS and Trump have long been close, despite during Trump’s first term the Jamal Khashoggi murder creating tensions and some distance between Riyadh and Washington.

  King Salman also praised the “historically close [bilateral] relations that everyone seeks to strengthen and develop in all fields.”

  Iraq

  Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani formally congratulated Trump. “We affirm Iraq’s firm commitment to strengthening bilateral relations with the United States on the basis of mutual respect and common interests,” he said.

  “We look forward to this new phase being the beginning of deepening cooperation between our two countries in various fields, which will contribute to achieving sustainable development and benefit the two friendly peoples.”

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 16:40

• Watch: Kamala Harris Gives Concession Speech
  Watch: Kamala Harris Gives Concession Speech

  After speaking with President-Elect Donald Trump earlier in the day, and after ghosting thousands of supporters last night who showed up for her at Howard, Kamala Harris is giving a concession speech.

  Watch:

  *  *  *

  Vice President Kamala Harris has called President-Elect Donald Trump to concede the election and congratulate him on beating her like Doug Emhoff’s ex-girlfriend.

  

  A crestfallen Wolf Blitzer delivers the news:

  JUST IN: Kamala Harris has called President Donald Trump to congratulate him and concede the 2024 election.

  “We are told she talked about the importance of the transfer of power…” pic.twitter.com/AuprXkAgxr

  — Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) November 6, 2024

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

  Harris campaign manager, meanwhile, sent a letter to staff in which she said “losing is unfathomably painful. It is hard. This will take a long time to process. But the work of protecting America from the impacts of a Trump Presidency starts now.”

  

  The media cope, meanwhile, continues…

  Pure, perfect projection. The lack of self-awareness is awe-inspiring. pic.twitter.com/CQrrJFJMs6

  — Michael Shellenberger (@shellenberger) November 6, 2024

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

  Check back for updates…

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 16:24

• How The Democrats And Media Finally Went Too Far
  How The Democrats And Media Finally Went Too Far

  Authored by Frank Meile via RealClearPolitics.com,

  The reelection of Donald Trump represents, if not the single greatest comeback in political history, certainly the largest middle finger ever shown to the smug, self-centered, superior-minded elitists who think the rest of us are garbage.

  

  Of course, we didn’t need President Biden to call us “garbage” for everyday Americans to know that what we care about means nothing to the establishment. But Biden obliged anyway, and put an exclamation point to the final sorry week of Kamala Harris’ galling campaign.

  You just can’t get any worse than “garbage” – or can you? Isn’t Nazi worse? After all, the Nazis killed 17 million people. If you include all the victims of fascism, you can get that number up to 20 million. But for some reason, the legacy media didn’t care when Harris and her surrogates repeatedly called Trump and his supporters Nazis or fascists.

  You almost get the feeling that the left-leaning press despises Republicans as much as Biden, Harris, and the rest of the Democrats do. If you had any doubt, the totally bogus claim that Trump said he wanted to execute Liz Cheney was the last straw. He was making a perfectly valid argument that the former congresswoman would be less inclined to support wars if she had to fight in them. But apparently that was too sophisticated an attack for the news professionals who decided to lie about it. Instead, they maliciously claimed that Trump literally wanted to put Cheney in front of a firing squad.

  Overall, the past three weeks have been instructive in just how little the nation’s elites in the media and politics respect average citizens, and just how much they think they can manipulate us into believing their lies.

  It’s nothing new, but the latest iteration started on Oct. 13 when Kamala Harris began peddling the “enemy within” hoax, which would have voters believe that Trump had said he planned to use the military against his political opponents.

  In fact, that never happened. Fox News host Maria Bartiromo interviewed Trump and said that Joe Biden doesn’t expect a peaceful Election Day. She asked Trump if he was expecting chaos that day, but she specifically asked about the impact of outside agitators, bringing up the case of an Afghan who was charged with a terror plot, and also mentioning Chinese nationals and criminals who had crossed the border illegally.

  It was in this context that Trump said he wasn’t worried about outside agitators, but rather “the enemy from within,” meaning American citizens who might riot following the election, just as happened in 2016. He continued:

  I think the bigger problem are the people from within. We have some very bad people. We have some sick people, radical left lunatics, and … it should be very easily handled by, if necessary, by the National Guard, or if really necessary by the military, because they can’t let that happen.

  This turned into the closing argument of the Harris campaign, claiming that Trump had promised to unleash the military on his political opponents. It was yet another hoax by Democrats and the media, which is either incredibly stupid or incredibly dishonest. CNN’s headline was typical: “Trump suggests using military against ‘enemy from within’ on Election Day.”

  Notice that Trump didn’t “suggest” using the military; he said that chaos could be averted “if necessary” by the National Guard or “if really necessary” by the military. He never suggested this was his plan.

  The most obvious part of the lies told by CNN, Harris, and all the Democratic Party machinery was that Trump could do anything, anything at all, about Election Day violence. NOTE TO CNN: On Election Day, Joe Biden will be the president, not Donald Trump. In saying that “they can’t let that happen,” Trump was actually crediting Biden with the common sense not to let violence disrupt our most sacred democratic ritual of voting.

  Yet for more than a week, Harris and her allies peddled this nonsense to convince voters that Trump is “unhinged, unstable and unchecked.”

  Then, almost as though on cue, just over one week later on Oct. 22, Atlantic magazine editor Jeffrey Goldberg wrote a scandalous article that quoted anonymous sources as saying Trump had insulted the family of Vanessa Guillén, a Mexican-American soldier who was murdered in Texas. The article included a quote from Guillén’s sister praising President Trump for his kindness to the family, but Goldberg essentially pretended the quote didn’t exist. Instead he smeared Trump as a heartless exploiter.

  Later in the same article, Goldberg quoted Gen. John Kelly, Trump’s disgruntled former White House chief of staff, as saying Trump had told him, “I need the kind of generals that Hitler had.”

  This dubious old quote was dusted off and included in the article for only one reason – to give Kamala Harris and the Democrats and the talking heads on CNN and MSNBC more fodder for their “Trump is a fascist” narrative. Lots of White House staffers were ready to deny the Kelly story, but that didn’t matter to Goldberg. Let ’er rip.

  And as further evidence of media collusion with the Harris campaign, the New York Times on the same day, Oct. 22, revealed an interview with Gen. Kelly in which he said that Trump “falls into the general definition of fascist” and “certainly prefers the dictator approach to government.”

  This double whammy of remarks by Kelly gave Harris permission to expand her attack on Trump as a fascist, and it quickly became apparent that her campaign was going to replace “joy” with “fear” as the closing argument.

  The media ran with this as a willing partner in the attempt to keep Trump out of the White House. And even before Trump held a historic rally at Madison Square Garden on Oct. 27, many news outlets drew bizarre comparisons to a 1939 pro-Nazi rally held by the German American Bund in an earlier iteration of the world-famous arena. Yes, that 1939 rally was an offensive anti-American gathering, but it had nothing to do with Trump’s rally in a different building 85 years later.

  Moreover, the Fake News historians somehow missed the fact that in 1933, shortly after Adolf Hitler was named chancellor of Germany, the American Jewish Congress held a National Day of Protest in the same venue. The National Park Service, in its history of Madison Square Garden, writes that “After a day of fasting and prayer, more than 55,000 people flooded MSG III and the streets surrounding it for the largest rally. Jewish leaders, union presidents, politicians, and Christian clergy addressed the crowd. They denounced the Nazis and compared the persecution of European Jews to the terror of the Ku Klux Klan.”

  The media somehow also missed the fact that there were Israeli flags and Orthodox Jews at Trump’s rally, along with two former Democratic presidential candidates, the richest man in America, a black congressman, and a variety of Jewish advisers. All that mattered in the long run was that rally organizers had invited an obscure insult comedian named Tony Hinchcliffe to open the show. Turned out Hinchcliffe lived up to his title and insulted a variety of people and ethnic groups, including Puerto Ricans.

  “I don’t know if you guys know this, but there’s literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now. I think it’s called Puerto Rico,” he joked.

  The media went nuts, claiming that Trump was racist because the comedian had insulted Puerto Rico. But that never made any sense.

  Yes, it was an uncomfortable joke, one that seemed inappropriate in the middle of a political campaign where former President Trump has been working hard to build up his share of the Hispanic vote. But it was a joke, and though most in the audience had no idea, it wasn’t a random insult, but a topical one. 

  Puerto Rico has a trash problem  thanks to a variety of causes, and it’s something a future president of the United States should help to resolve.

  But the current president can’t be bothered. Instead of using the tasteless joke to bring attention to the plight of our fellow citizens in Puerto Rico, President Biden deflected attention away from the island and provocatively said “The only garbage I see floating out there is his [Trump’s] supporters.”

  Which brings us full circle to the disastrous last week of the Harris campaign. As she lectured her would-be constituents during a speech on the Ellipse in D.C., preaching peace, brotherhood, and unity, her boss Joe Biden was in the White House behind her, telling a Zoom call that Trump supporters are “garbage.” You can’t make this stuff up.

  The Democratic Party has been unmasked once again as the party of hypocrisy, insincerity, and smugness. Just as in 2016 when the MAGA base embraced Hillary Clinton’s description of them as “deplorables,” so too did the Trump faithful now begin to greet each other as pieces of garbage. When Trump descended from his jet in Green Bay and entered a garbage truck wearing a sanitation worker’s orange vest, he closed the deal with millions of voters who are tired of being ignored.

  Don’t ever underestimate how much the establishment hates Donald Trump, but also, don’t ever underestimate how much everyday Americans hate the establishment. End of story.

  *  *  *

  Frank Miele, the retired editor of the Daily Inter Lake in Kalispell, Mont., is a columnist for RealClearPolitics. His book “The Media Matrix: What If Everything You Know Is Fake” is available from his Amazon author page. Visit him at HeartlandDiaryUSA.com or follow him on Facebook @HeartlandDiaryUSA and on X/Gettr @HeartlandDiary.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 11/06/2024 – 16:20

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