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Kerry Picket: A Whistleblower Reveals that James Comey Ordered and Directed an "Off-the-Books" Operation, Before Any Official Criminal Investigation, Into Trump, Sending "Honey Pot" Spies Into His Campaign in 2015
Kerry Picket: The House Judiciary Committee is examining a new whistleblower report that the FBI targeted Donald Trump soon after he announced his presidential campaign in June 2015, an off-the-books operation ordered by FBI Director James Comey that predated the...
Published:10/29/2024 12:18:59 PM
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[Artists]
At Opera Gallery, Gustavo Nazareno Bridges Spiritual and Contemporary
Nazareno's artistic journey began with books, but the works in "Orixa´s: Personal Tales on Portraiture" show a range of influences, academic and otherwise.
Published:10/29/2024 10:58:28 AM
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[Markets]
China Planning 10 Trillion Yuan In Extra Debt For Fiscal Stimulus; Oil, Commodities Rebound
China Planning 10 Trillion Yuan In Extra Debt For Fiscal Stimulus; Oil, Commodities Rebound
After suffering its biggest drop in two years after the latest iteration of the performative "war" between Israel and Iran ended with yet another dud, oil has rebounded and is 1.4% higher after a Reuters report that China is considering approving the issuance of over 10 trillion yuan ($1.4 trillion) in extra debt in the next few years to revive its fragile economy, a fiscal package which is expected to be further bolstered if Donald Trump wins the U.S. election.
Citing two sources with knowledge of the matter, Reuters said that China's top legislative body, the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC), is looking to approve the fresh fiscal package, including 6 trillion yuan which would partly be raised via special sovereign bonds, on the last day of a meeting to be held from Nov. 4-8. The 6-trillion-yuan worth of debt would be raised over three years including 2024, said the sources, adding the proceeds would primarily be used to help local governments address off-the-books debt risks.
The planned total amount, to be raised by issuing both special treasury and local government bonds, equates to over 8% of the output of the world's second-largest economy, which has been hit hard by a protracted property sector crisis and ballooning debt of local governments.
Oil prices climbed along with industrial metals on the Reuters report; WTI was up 1% near $68 a barrel while copper rises 0.9%.
The Reuters report was the first confirmation of speculation among financial analysts, who have said in recent weeks they expect Beijing to consider a 10 trillion yuan stimulus.
The spending plans suggest that Beijing has switched into a higher stimulus gear to prop up the economy although it's still not the 2008-like bazooka that some investors have been calling for. That said, after starting with a bang in late September, all subsequent Chinese stimulus reports have been whimper after whimper as Beijing failed to provide much needed details or clarity for what is actually coming, resulting in a sharp unwind of the 30% surge in Chinese stocks observed at the end of Q3.
Which may explain why the Reuters sources cautioned that the plans are not finalized yet and remain subject to changes; i.e., yet another dud may be on deck for a country which desperately needs trillion in stimulus yet has shown unprecedented restraint in actually putting money where its money is.
As part of its latest fiscal package, the NPC Standing Committee is also expected to greenlight all or part of up to 4 trillion yuan worth of special-purpose bonds for idle land and property purchases over the next five years, said the sources. Local governments would be allowed to raise that amount on top of their usual annual issuance quota, which mainly funds infrastructure spending. The quota stood at 3.9 trillion yuan this year and 3.8 trillion in 2023.
The latest move is aimed at enhancing local governments' ability to manage land supply, and alleviate liquidity and debt pressures on both local governments and property developers, they added. Special-purpose bonds are a tool for off-budget debt financing used by Chinese local governments, with the proceeds raised typically earmarked for specific policy objectives, such as infrastructure expenditures.
Should the NPC Standing Committee approve these issuances in full instead of in stages, it could increase the total stimulus size to over 10 trillion yuan, they added. An average of 2 trillion yuan in new central government debt annually underscores an urgency in Beijing to shore up the economy. Late in 2023, China issued 1 trillion yuan in sovereign bonds to bolster flood-prevention infrastructure and meet its roughly 5% economic growth target.
China's top legislative body generally holds its meeting every two months - in the second half of even-numbered months. As per the parliament's 2024 work agenda, released in May, a standing committee session was planned for October. The forthcoming meeting was initially planned for late October before being rescheduled to early November, said one of the sources.
The meeting's timing, which coincides with the week of the U.S. presidential vote on Nov. 5, offers Beijing greater flexibility to adjust the fiscal package including the total size, based on the election outcome, said the sources.
Reuters notes that Beijing may announce a stronger fiscal package if Trump wins a second presidency as his return to the White House is expected intensify the economic headwinds for China. Trump, who has gained in recent polls to erase much of the early advantage of Kamala Harris, has vowed to impose 60% duties on imports from China.
Beijing started this year with plans to issue 1 trillion yuan in special sovereign debt already in place, but that sum is widely expected to be increased as growth has been drifting off target and economists said a longer-term structural slowdown could be in play. All the same, the planned fiscal spending falls short of the firepower deployed in 2008, when Beijing's 4 trillion yuan in fiscal stimulus in response to the global financial crisis accounted for 13% of GDP at the time.
The extra money fueled a property market frenzy and led to unfettered lending to local government financing vehicles, which municipalities used to get around official borrowing restrictions.
As part of the overall fiscal spending, China is also considering approving other stimulus initiatives worth at least one trillion yuan, such as a consumption boost including trade-in and renewal of consumer goods, said the sources. Another trillion yuan could also be raised via special treasury bonds for capital injection into large state banks, said one of the sources and another source with knowledge of the matter.
At the end of the day, however, even the 10 trillion yuan package may be insufficient to kickstart the economy. The reason, as explained in "Why China's Rally Won't Have Legs", is that China's peak credit impulse - the all important reflationary variable that propagates across the global economy - has dwindled, and so has the boost to growth.
In other words, to achieve the same level of stimulus as a % of GDP, China would need to inject tens of trillions more. And since it can't do that, at least not without its middle class kicking and screaming (literally), China's house price will continue to slide, having recently tumbled by a record YoY amount...
... and so on, until one day Beijing will have no choice but to unleash a real bazooka, one which will spark a reflationary tidal wave across the globe.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 10/29/2024 - 09:15
Published:10/29/2024 9:16:25 AM
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[autumn]
10 Romantic Autumn Reads With Plenty of Spice
The books in this roundup will toast your buns, whether you prefer cinnamon or cayenne levels of heat.
Published:10/29/2024 8:18:16 AM
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[]
Daily Tech News 20 October 2024
Top Story AI is 90% marketing and 10% reality says Linus Torvalds, creator of Linux. (Tom's Hardware) And Git, in much the same way Donald Knuth created TeX and Metafont to typeset hos own books. Ever the optimist, is Linus....
Published:10/29/2024 3:07:22 AM
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[Markets]
Will Donald Trump Get His Revenge?
Will Donald Trump Get His Revenge?
Authored by Susan Quinn via AmericanThinker.com,
There’s almost nothing that Donald Trump likes better than throwing his adversaries off their game; he likes to be unpredictable, confusing and in charge. It gives him an edge in achieving his goals.
He's kept his adversaries guessing to the extent that he will pay them back for their lawfare and deep-state machinations, and not surprisingly, they expect the worst. Yet he has said repeatedly that victory in the election will be his revenge. They don't know what to make of it.
A Trump senior advisor made the following observation:
"President Trump has made clear that success will be the best revenge," Trump senior adviser Brian Hughes said.
"When others have weaponized government and legal institutions against him for political interference, he will return these institutions to their constitutional purpose of protecting Americans’ liberty and creating a safe and prosperous nation again."
But since the political Left almost always chooses to see deceit in Trump’s comments, they don’t believe he is sincere.
He made it even more unpredictable for them with this:
"Look when this election is over, based on what they’ve done, I would have every right to go after them," Trump said.
"And it’s easy because it’s Joe Biden, and you see all the criminality, all of the money that’s going into the family and him, all of this money from China, from Russia, from Ukraine."
And then Trump underscored it again, wanting to be sure there was no doubt in the minds of the Left that he could act against them:
When asked during a Fox News interview on Wednesday if he plans to use the justice system to punish his political opponents, Trump said: "When this election is over, based on what they've done, I would have every right to go after them."
Note that in both of the previous quotations, Trump commented on what he could do, not on what he would do.
Given the incidents of lawfare that Trump has had to endure, the hyperbole spouted by the mainstream media and the political Left, it’s no wonder that Trump would want to take revenge against those who have relentlessly criticized and attacked him.
Jonathan Turley, law professor at Georgetown University, has commented several times on the pathetic and weak lawfare attacks that have been launched against Trump from various attorneys and district attorneys.
He made this comment a few months ago about Alvin Bragg, Manhattan District Attorney, who twisted the facts of a Trump misdemeanor to transform them into a felony:
Like his predecessor, Bragg previously scoffed at the case. However, two prosecutors, Carey R. Dunne and Mark F. Pomerantz, then resigned and started a public pressure campaign to get New Yorkers to demand prosecution.
Pomerantz shocked many of us by publishing a book on the case against Trump — who was still under investigation and not charged, let alone convicted, of any crime. He did so despite objections from his former colleague that such a book was grossly improper.
Nevertheless, it worked. Bragg brought a Rube Goldberg case that is so convoluted and counterintuitive that even liberal legal analysts criticized it.
It’s no wonder that Trump is relishing the discomfort and fear that he is eliciting in his opponents. They have spent years trying to ruin his reputation, insulting him, discrediting him and trying to humiliate him.
Meanwhile, in reflecting on the 2016 election, Trump said the following about Hillary Clinton:
“I could have gone after Hillary. I could have gotten Hillary Clinton very easily. And when they say lock her up, whenever they said ‘lock her,’ you know, they’d start, 30,000 people, ‘lock her up, lock her up.’ What did I do? I always say take it easy, just relax. We’re winning. Take it easy. Take it easy.”
He added: “I could have had her put in jail. And I decided I didn’t want to do that. I thought it would look terrible. You had the wife of the president of the United States going to jail. I thought it would be very bad if we did that. And I made sure that didn’t happen, OK? I thought it would be bad.”
But now he has reached the point where striking fear in the hearts of his enemies seems righteous.
Yet the changes he will make will be in the way government operates, not mere petty payback to individual miscreants.
That will be devastating to the Leftist cause.
It will also serve as his retribution.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 10/28/2024 - 12:45
Published:10/28/2024 12:03:41 PM
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[Politics]
What a beloved children’s book series can teach Americans about Tim Walz
Maud Hart Lovelace’s “Betsy-Tacy” books captured Mankato, where Walz lived and taught high school for years, at the turn of the 20th century.
Published:10/27/2024 6:10:37 AM
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[Markets]
Biohacking To Better Health
Biohacking To Better Health
Authored by Isabella Cooper via The Brownstone Institute,
People have always been fascinated with immortality. While great gains in medical care have enabled lifespan extension, this has often come with the price of co-existing with chronic diseases associated with aging, such as cardiovascular diseases, cancer, type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM), hypertension, and dementias such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease.
The true “aim of the game” is to have a long healthspan with negligible senescence. This means the absence of biological aging, such as reducing functional decline in organs and whole-body fitness, delaying loss of reproductive capabilities, and delaying death risk with age progression. What we really want is to extend youth, not aging. In achieving that, we may begin to push the envelope on increasing healthy lifespan.
Aging at the cellular level is determined by the cellular rate of damage versus rate of repair. Accumulation of aging-associated damage manifests as cells no longer “behaving correctly” as part of a collective that make up tissues of an organ, like cancer cells.
In healthy individuals, damage accumulation is managed through apoptosis, which is controlled cell death, and refined cellular housekeeping including autophagy and mitophagy; the “eating up, breaking down, and recycling” of damaged inner-cell (intracellular) components (organelles). The nutrient glucose and the hormone insulin govern cellular quality control. Intracellular housekeeping enables the culling of inefficient and toxic cells from the herd. Over time a cell’s ability to trigger apoptosis becomes impaired, enabling gradual dysfunction to sneak by under the radar. Over time, the accumulation of these dysfunctional cells within an organ promotes development of disease.
Humans are multicellular organisms within which our healthy cells operate collectively. In order to have a long healthy lifespan, our cells must not only live longer, but they must also function correctly. Cancer cells are long-lived and capable of unlimited replication; however, they evade apoptosis, and become selfishly primordial, regressing back to single-cell organism behaviour. Our goal is to maintain optimal organ function, ensuring ourselves a long healthspan with negligible senescence and perhaps a touch of immortality.
Mitochondria are intracellular organelles; these organelles are remnant symbiotic protobacteria, originating from proteobacterium that came to live within an archaeal-derived host cell which was most closely related to Asgard archaea (a recently identified group of ancient single-celled organisms). Put simply, a foreign single-celled ancient bacteria came to live inside the cells that eventually evolved into us. The Asgardian endocytosed proteobacteria evolved into mitochondria; through a process called endosymbiosis the two became interdependent. They now support us and we support them. Our cells, with mitochondria and other organelles within them, are called ‘eukaryotic’ cells.
Mitochondria have their own genome; polycistronic circular DNA, whilst their inner matrix membranes are rich in a phospholipid cardiolipin. Both of these features are common to bacteria and not to the eukaryotic nuclear DNA and other organelles of multicellular animals, other than those digesting mitochondria. Mitochondria produce the majority of our life-sustaining energy whilst also acting as a source of destruction for most of our cells. This occurs due to their use of oxygen to break down nutrients, in order to capture energy and store it in the energy carrier molecule ATP. Their (and so our) need and use of oxygen is both life-giving and corrosive; complete oxidation of glucose produces more oxidative damage than oxidising fatty acids, and in the process produces excess superoxide, a form of oxygen with an added electron which is termed a free radical.
Mitochondria also produce hydrogen peroxide, the same found in your household drain cleaner, albeit at a much lower concentration. Chronic low-grade elevated levels of reactive oxygen species (ROS) harm our cells. Achieving balance between “burning” glucose or fatty acids requiring oxygen to provide energy for our body (good) and producing corrosive substances (bad), is hormesis, like the “Goldilocks zone.” ROS toxicity is a key player in aging, as too much of it will decrease healthspan and lifespan.
The majority of ROS in cells is produced by mitochondria. Some amount is necessary for health, while excess causes damage; again, this requires balance or hormesis. ROS are also mitochondrial-signalling molecules, communicating to the nucleus and altering gene expression. This begs the question; what drives cellular behaviour, genes in the nucleus, or mitochondrial signals? The right amount of ROS causes production of new healthier mitochondria, excessive ROS increases damage over repair, accumulating toxic wayward mitochondria. Cancer cells consistently have damaged mitochondria; the same is also found in cardiovascular disease, Alzheimer’s, and Parkinson’s disease, and many of the diseases that we have just accepted as part of aging.
As mentioned above, we can produce energy from fat or from glucose (a sugar) through our cooperative mitochondria. The amount of glucose exposure (predominantly from dietary sources and also made and secreted into the bloodstream by the liver) is critical in achieving this balance between our mitochondria helping or harming us. Insulin is produced in response to carbohydrate intake (sugars such as glucose, starch, and sucrose), increasing absorption (and use) of glucose by our cells and mitochondria and reducing fat-burning (beta-oxidation and subsequent ketosis).
To simplify, we mostly use either glucose from carbohydrates to produce energy with our mitochondria, or fatty acids from food or our fat cells, or ketones from breakdown of fat, to produce energy through an alternative metabolic pathway, called ketosis.
Calorie restriction (carbohydrate restriction) in yeast, nematode worms, and mice to primates increases lifespan with healthspan by inducing ketosis. It causes insulin to become low enough to allow ketogenesis (a product from beta-oxidation, the burning of fat) to occur. Upregulated fat-burning results in the production of molecules called ketone bodies, mainly by the liver (endogenous synthesis).
One of these ketone bodies is beta-hydroxybutyrate (BHB), derived from fatty acids that come either from our fat cells or from a meal. The ketone BHB is a fuel and signalling molecule, causing mitochondria and nuclei to adapt to metabolic changes. Fasting-mimicking diets such as time-restricted feeding, and very low carbohydrate/healthy fat diets (also known as ketogenic diets) also induce ketosis without the conscious effort of calorie restriction.
These diets high in healthy fats (such as animal fats) and low in sugars/starchy carbohydrates lead to decreased insulin and glucose and increased ketones (BHB) in the bloodstream. Over time this induces intracellular machinery changes, shifting the body’s metabolism to fuelling itself mainly off fat and ketones instead of sugar (glucose). Ketosis increases intracellular housekeeping activity, enabling cells to remove and replace damaged organelles. It also allows more time for DNA to be checked by DNA housekeeping proteins that are able to prevent propagation of DNA duplication errors into daughter cells, thus reducing cancer and other age-related disease development. Ketosis has been shown to hold a hint of an elixir to a healthier if not longer life.
In contrast, high carbohydrate diets, providing glucose through starchy carbohydrates like bread, pasta, rice, corn, and sucrose found in cane sugar, high fructose corn syrup, coconut sugar, fruit, and honey, all stimulate insulin secretion. Prolonged hyperinsulinaemia increases the risk of development of Alzheimer’s disease, malignancies, cardiovascular disease, and T2DM. While insulin is essential to life, excess insulin (due to these high carbohydrate diets) leads to hyperinsulinaemia, which is implicated in chronic diseases and aging. Decreased insulin demand is shown to increase healthspan and lifespan. Insulin also causes cells to replicate faster, decreasing the pauses to check DNA copy quality, telling cells that food is abundant and therefore “there is no need to keep a tight ship.”
Insulin is the aging hormone, and a dietary pattern that regularly triggers too much insulin secretion prevents our ability to produce ketones, including BHB. Insulin suppresses ketogenesis (ketone production), depriving us of BHB’s anti-aging properties. The endogenous production of BHB, a powerful antioxidant that directly neutralises free radicals and ROS, has been shown to improve and prevent chronic diseases associated with aging conditions. So, we can control much of our aging by our dietary choices. Ketones such as BHB are produced when we are not overstimulating insulin secretion and requirement through our dietary choices.
We are often advised to eat to keep up our energy and health. However, perhaps a little less results in a little more with regards to healthspan and lifespan, and instead of calorie restriction, we can bio-hack through either eating as much as we want once a day, or eating non-insulin-stimulating foods. Doing both will further enhance their effects. The results are the same as fasting and calorie restriction, less insulin, and more ketones, in turn translating into healthier cells, a healthy you, and a chance to realise your maximal lifespan potential.
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Link to donate to support Isabella D. Cooper’s research in Ageing Biology, Age-Related Diseases, and Longevity at the University of Westminster, UK. This is one of few academic research groups in the diet and metabolism area free from food industry sponsorship. One hundred percent of donation funds go towards active laboratory-based research, with zero funds lost to administrative costs.
Tyler Durden
Thu, 10/24/2024 - 21:45
Published:10/24/2024 8:58:34 PM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post hardcover bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:10/23/2024 7:14:40 AM
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The Secular Keep Me Religious
Published:10/22/2024 4:53:14 AM
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[Markets]
Gold, Kamala, Trump, Control, Cash, Murder, & Water...
Gold, Kamala, Trump, Control, Cash, Murder, & Water...
Via Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com,
Catherine Austin Fitts (CAF), Publisher of The Solari Report, financial expert and former Assistant Secretary of Housing (Bush 41 Admin.), gives her take on gold, Kamala, Trump, control, cash, murder and water.
On gold’s rocket rise, CAF says, “Gold is very important..."
"We divide gold into two positions: Your ‘core’ position and your ‘investment’ position... Right now, gold looks phenomenally attractive as a core position. It is also attractive as an investment position.”
Why the big move up now?
CAF says, “Part of it is the incredible monetary policies and the monetary inflation coming from the central banks. "
"The other is too many people are watching government implode in a variety of different ways, and people are saying I want a core position in gold...
We are also seeing the BRICs . . . and seeing states in the US move to put gold and silver in a position to be used as a currency.
So, we are watching people put monetary reserves in gold and monetary liquidity in gold.
That is happening steadily, and more and more people are saying they need a percentage of their assets in gold. . . . We are in a long-term bull market in gold.”
On Kamala Harris, the operative word is “meltdown.” CAF says:
“Kamala is in, what we call in a campaign, a ‘meltdown.’ If you look at the current meltdown, I am baffled because why would somebody with her characteristics be made the nominee?
You are talking about major donors putting major money behind her. Why would they spend that much money if there were serious holes in her vetting and she is inclined to melt down this way? It’s kind of baffling.”
On Trump, what is the first thing he should do if re-elected? CAF says:
“He should stop the poisoning of the American people.
This is one of the reasons we did this issue on water. The American people are being poisoned...I travel a lot by car. I see deterioration in the air, in the water, in the food–they are being poisoned. And, of course, the big one is the CV19 vaccines. Vaccines are poisoning Americans.
There was just a big ruling against putting fluoride poison being added to municipal water supplies. One of the things you can do is to march down to your city or county and tell them to stop wasting money on putting poison in your water. If you reverse that, it is one important action you can take.”
The Deep State and central bankers want total control of your money and your life. Fitts says this is why she started pushing the use of cash instead of digital transactions.
She calls it “Make Cash Great Again.”
"If we don’t fix the finances from an actuarial standpoint, they are going to continue to delay benefits or lower life expectancy, and that is what they are doing. They are balancing the books by lowering life expectancy.”
One way to lower life expectancy is to inject people with a so-called vaccine that is really a bioweapon that murders and disables people.
That is exactly what happened with the CV19 vax, and the deaths or murders are still piling up. CAF says,
“You can cut back on the fraudulent rackets, or you can cut back on the people.”
They are cutting back on the people by any measure.
There is much more in the 54-minute interview.
Join Greg Hunter of USAWatchdog.com as he goes One-on-One with the Publisher of The Solari Report, Catherine Austin Fitts, for 10.19.24.
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To Donate to USAWatchdog.com Click Here
There is a lot of free information on Solari.com.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 10/21/2024 - 09:05
Published:10/21/2024 8:13:28 AM
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[Markets]
Kamala's "Opportunity Agenda" Will Be Disastrous For African Americans
Kamala's "Opportunity Agenda" Will Be Disastrous For African Americans
Via SchiffGold.com,
With Kamala Harris rapidly fading in polls among African-Americans, her campaign just released a desperate “Opportunity Agenda” for black men outlining policies that will have disastrous economic consequences. Ironically, the consequences of “forgivable loans” are likely to be the most damaging to the very same groups that she’s claiming to help.
A “forgivable loan” is another way of saying “free money.” Printing $20,000 and handing it out to black entrepreneurs is only going to push prices up for the things those entrepreneurs need. Meanwhile, banks that get to issue the loans do so with no risk, because it’s all backed by the Full Faith and Credit of you, the American taxpayer.
The idea is to get “mission-driven lenders” to issue the loans. This slathers a gloppy layer of do-gooderism over the fact that, most likely, these loans will be issued by the usual State-favored megabanks. After all, they all have “Mission Statements,” so who’s to argue whether they’re “Mission-Driven” or not? They’re all part of a criminal banking cartel that enjoys an incredibly privileged position in terms of being inextricable from the US political structure, first in line at the low interest rate and QE money printer.
Meanwhile, megabanks like Wells Fargo (owned by BlackRock, Fidelity, and Vanguard) have stolen far more houses and cars than any street thief ever could, preyed on Native Americans, opened millions of fraudulent accounts, violated international sanctions, aided money laundering, along with other offenses.
Having some guaranteed loans on the books also incentivizes malinvestment, encouraging banks to dump more money into risky bets in other areas. When you get some free money, you want to play with it. It’s just human nature.
Forgivable loans offered to a specific ethnic group even incentivizes discrimination against them.
If loan officers know that African-Americans are getting forgivable loans courtesy of the federal government, they’re more likely to charge higher interest rates even to black entrepreneurs whose loans aren’t guaranteed.
Meanwhile, the Fed’s inflationary policies cause the most pain to the lowest earners and the middle class.
While bursts of “economic stimulus” like those of the 2008 and 2020 crises juiced the economy in the short or medium-term, we’re feeling the effects today in the form of drastically higher prices and a middle class that continues to vanish.
Federal Reserve Total Assets (Less Eliminations from Consolidation)
It all comes down to less competition in the marketplace, which inevitably leads to higher prices. No matter the context, nature or finance, humans respond to incentives, and markets are no different. That’s why no central authority can overcome the natural will of the market, no matter how hard it tries. In the long run, nature always wins.
Of course, the Harris campaign’s “proposal” is a campaign season prop to buy votes, and wouldn’t be enforceable without an act of Congress. But it’s still a notable sign that the campaign is worried that being a black woman might not be enough for Harris to get back the black vote. While it favored Biden, African-American support faded continuously throughout the course of his administration. For his part, Trump is promising a utopia of his own, and is a fan of the money printer as long as he gets credit, even making a point to ensure his name would appear on the inflationary Covid stimulus checks. As Peter Schiff recently said on Kai Hoffman’s Soar Financially, “Trump is promising immediate results—positive, no pain, just gain.” But inflation is already baked into the cake.
“We have, you know, inflation that masquerades as growth…I think the economy is very weak, that’s why the Fed is cutting rates, and they’re going to cut them even more, and I think they’re going to go back to QE.”
Incumbent administrations love when the Fed juices the economy for them, since they can take the credit.
But Kamala’s campaign season pandering to “help” African American entrepreneurs is going to create more of the inflation and discrimination that holds back disadvantaged groups in the first place.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 10/19/2024 - 12:50
Published:10/19/2024 12:11:59 PM
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[Markets]
For Harris, Pro-Choice Does Not Include Cars And Appliances
For Harris, Pro-Choice Does Not Include Cars And Appliances
Authored by Kenin M. Spivak via RealClearWire,
Kamala Harris wants to deprive Americans of the right to choose cars and household appliances. When she claims, as she did at a rally last week in Michigan, that “I will never tell you what kind of car you have to drive” she is guilty of two of the Democrats’ most reviled offenses, malinformation (failure to contextualize a statement) and misinformation (lying).
Combating climate by changing infrastructure, consumer goods, and lifestyle is one of Harris’s core values. As recently as this year, the Biden-Harris administration continued to issue regulations and battle in court for the right to reduce consumer options for automobiles and home appliances. Harris favors consumers having choices, just so long as those choices are limited to those she pre-approves.
Then Senator Harris co-sponsored the Senate version of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’ Green New Deal. Harris believed that mandating priorities and choices to limit emissions was so important that she advocated ending the filibuster to do so. Harris also co-sponsored the Zero Admissions Vehicles Act to require that all cars be EVs, or otherwise zero-emissions, by 2040. When she ran for president in 2019, she issued a plan to phase out new gas-powered cars even sooner – by 2035.
In April 2023, the Biden-Harris administration proposed rules that would ensure that EVs accounted for about 67 percent of all new car sales by 2032 (just eight years from now). After objections from nearly every sector and region of the country, the EPA issued final rules on March 20 of this year that require from 31 percent to 44 percent of new cars, SUVs, and pickup trucks manufactured in 2027 be EVs, with the final percentage to be based on emissions from other vehicles. The EPA rules require that by 2032, EVs account for at least 56 percent of new car sales, and at least another 13 percent be hybrids, leaving not more than 31% as gas powered.
In 2023, EVs accounted for only 7.6 percent of new car sales. That is because, despite subsidies and massive pressure from government and the Left, consumers dislike EVs. EVs have limited range, particularly in the cold. They take a long time to charge, and it is difficult for those who live in apartments to do so. They are costly. EVs may not even be particularly good for the environment once the electrical grid and generating capacity are expanded to support mandates, and disposal of lithium ion batteries is considered. It also is unlikely the U.S. could have sufficient generating capacity without brownouts, blackouts, and other conservation measures.
EV mandates imperil national security by replacing fossil fuels, in which the U.S. is the world leader, with minerals found in China. China also is the low cost manufacturer of EVs, meaning that EV mandates will send American jobs and profits to China.
Energy expert Mark P. Mills warns that “All the world’s mines, both currently operating and planned, can supply only a small fraction of the… increase in various minerals that will be needed to meet the wildly ambitious EV goals,” while the UN Trade Development Agency advises there will be considerable shortages in lithium, cobalt, and copper if EV requirements are not slowed.
The strong disfavor in which consumers hold EVs is seen in two numbers. As Fortune observed, “no one wants to buy used EVs,” destroying resale value, and second, EVs are the least likely cars to be stolen. Numerous major automobile manufacturers are cutting EV production targets, and earlier this year Hertz announced that it was disposing of a third of its almost new EV fleet. The 2024 Deloitte Global Automotive Consumer Study found that EVs were never very popular among consumers, and familiarity is breeding contempt, with a 9% increase in the popularity of gas powered cars. A Gallup survey in April found that among Democrats who don’t yet own an EV, the percent saying they would never purchase an EV rose 10 points, compared to a year ago.
Harris not only wants to deprive Americans of the opportunity to choose gas-powered cars and most hybrids, but she also supports the Green New Deal’s goal of prohibiting sales of home appliances that do not meet draconian emissions standards. To date, the Biden-Harris administration has sought to take off the market most home dishwashers, heaters, air conditioners, and gas stoves. A federal appeals court struck down the Department of Energy’s action targeting dishwashers.
In May, the House passed the Hands Off Our Home Appliances Act on a bipartisan basis. That bill is intended to restrain the administration from banning home appliances that run on natural gas.
Next time Kamala Harris claims that she won’t tell you what to buy, just keep in mind that she intends to eliminate most options, leaving you with a Hobson’s choice of poorly performing alternatives.
Kenin M. Spivak is founder and chairman of SMI Group LLC, an international consulting firm and investment bank. He is the author of fiction and non-fiction books and a frequent speaker and contributor to media, including The American Mind, National Review, the National Association of Scholars, television, radio, and podcasts.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 10/18/2024 - 19:15
Published:10/18/2024 7:12:21 PM
|
[Markets]
Confiscation Games: Public Expropriation Of Private Assets
Confiscation Games: Public Expropriation Of Private Assets
Submitted by Brent Johnson of Santiago Capital.
Executive Summary
Throughout history, governments around the world have occasionally resorted to confiscating the assets of their citizens in response to economic crises, political purges, or ideological pursuits. These actions, often justified as necessary for the greater good, have frequently resulted in widespread social disruption and significant hardship for the affected populations.
This report delves into four significant historical episodes of asset confiscation, examining the methods used by governments to seize property and the diverse strategies individuals and communities employed to resist or evade these confiscations. Each case provides insight into the complex relationship between state power and personal property rights, as well as the resilience of the human spirit in the face of adversity.
One of the most notorious examples of asset confiscation occurred in the Soviet Union under the leadership of Joseph Stalin.
As part of his larger effort to transform the Soviet economy and eliminate potential opposition, Stalin launched campaigns of collectivization and dekulakization. The government forcibly consolidated individual landholdings into collective farms (kolkhozes) and state farms (sovkhozes), seizing land, livestock, and other assets from the peasantry.
Wealthier farmers, known as kulaks, were particularly targeted as class enemies. The methods of confiscation were harsh and systematic, ranging from forced collectivization to the seizure of grain and livestock.
Despite the brutality of these measures, many peasants engaged in acts of defiance. Resistance took various forms, including hiding grain and livestock, sabotaging government efforts, and fleeing to urban areas in search of refuge.
A parallel can be drawn to the Chinese Cultural Revolution, which took place from 1966 to 1976.
During this period, Chairman Mao Zedong's government sought to enforce radical socialist policies, resulting in widespread confiscation of assets, particularly from intellectuals, landlords, and those accused of harboring bourgeois values. The Cultural Revolution, led in large part by Mao's Red Guards, was a time of immense social upheaval, characterized by public denunciations, property seizures, and the internment of perceived enemies of the state in re-education camps.
Common strategies included hiding valuable possessions, falsifying records to obscure ownership, and relying on informal networks of support to protect assets. Despite the pervasive atmosphere of fear and persecution, these methods allowed some to shield their belongings from the relentless scrutiny of the state.
Another dark chapter in history is found in Nazi Germany's policy of Aryanization, implemented between 1933 and 1945 under Adolf Hitler’s regime. Aryanization was designed to systematically transfer Jewish-owned businesses and property into the hands of "Aryan" citizens, stripping Jews of their economic power and wealth.
The Nazi government employed a range of tactics to facilitate this transfer, including legal decrees that forced the sale of Jewish assets at drastically reduced prices, as well as violent pogroms that terrorized Jewish communities and forced them to flee. In this environment of coercion and violence, many Jewish families sought to protect their assets by transferring funds and property abroad, hiding valuables, or arranging false ownership transfers to trusted non-Jewish individuals.
In the United States, the government’s confiscation of gold in 1933 offers a striking contrast to the more overtly ideological or ethnic-driven confiscations of the Soviet, Chinese, and Nazi regimes.
During the Great Depression, President Franklin D. Roosevelt implemented a series of policies aimed at stabilizing the economy, one of which was the forced conversion of privately held gold into paper currency. This measure was designed to combat deflation and restore public confidence in the banking system, but it also represented a significant intrusion into the personal property rights of American citizens.
Under Executive Order 6102, individuals were required to surrender their gold holdings to the government in exchange for paper money, with financial penalties or even imprisonment for those who failed to comply.
While many citizens adhered to the order, a number of individuals employed various tactics to avoid surrendering their gold. These included hoarding gold in hidden locations, exploiting legal loopholes that allowed for certain exemptions, storing gold in offshore accounts, and participating in black market trading or barter systems.
Each of these historical episodes of asset confiscation underscores the extremes to which governments will go in pursuit of political, economic, or ideological goals.
Whether driven by a need to consolidate political control, redistribute wealth to fulfill ideological aims, or stabilize an economy on the brink of collapse, the actions of these regimes resulted in profound social disruption, economic devastation, and widespread human suffering.
In each case, state intervention—through aggressive asset confiscation—deepened the divide between governments and their citizens, often intensifying resentment and leading to acts of defiance. The human toll was not limited to financial loss; entire communities were destabilized, livelihoods destroyed, and societal structures upended, all in the pursuit of these ambitious governmental agendas.
Yet, amid the harshness of these measures, these episodes also illuminate the extraordinary resilience and resourcefulness of individuals and communities determined to protect their assets and livelihoods. Faced with overwhelming odds and often brutal enforcement, people devised creative methods of resistance. From concealing valuable property and leveraging legal loopholes to forming clandestine networks and escaping oppressive regimes, these acts of defiance highlight a fundamental human instinct for survival.
The capacity to adapt and push back against overwhelming state control demonstrates a profound determination to retain autonomy, even under the most oppressive circumstances.
By reflecting on these historical events, we gain valuable insight into the delicate balance between state authority and individual property rights. These instances of asset confiscation expose the vulnerabilities of ownership during periods of political and economic instability, underscoring the precarious nature of personal wealth when confronted with unchecked governmental power.
More importantly, they serve as enduring reminders of humanity's ability to resist, adapt, and reclaim autonomy in the face of overwhelming adversity. Ultimately, these episodes reinforce the critical importance of safeguarding individual rights and freedoms, even when faced with the seemingly invincible force of state intervention.
The Soviet Collectivization and Dekulakization (1929-1933)
In the late 1920s and early 1930s, the Soviet Union, under the iron-fisted rule of Joseph Stalin, embarked on a colossal and brutal campaign of collectivization. This policy was the cornerstone of Stalin's First Five-Year Plan, designed to transform the Soviet Union from a predominantly agrarian society into an industrial powerhouse. The grand vision involved consolidating individual landholdings and labor into collective farms known as kolkhozes and state farms called sovkhozes. The ambitious goals were to boost agricultural productivity, generate surplus grain for export, and fund rapid industrialization.
Stalin’s ideology painted collectivization as essential to eliminating the Kulaks, the relatively wealthier peasants seen as class enemies obstructing socialist progress. To Stalin, the Kulaks represented a threat to his vision of a socialist utopia. They were perceived as hoarders and exploiters, resisting the equitable distribution of resources. Economically, the Soviet government aimed to extract grain surpluses from the countryside to support urban workers and finance industrial projects. Politically, the consolidation of land and labor into collective farms was a strategic move to exert greater control over the rural population and suppress any potential dissent. By breaking the economic independence of the peasants, Stalin aimed to solidify his control over the countryside.
The methods employed to enforce collectivization and dekulakization were multifaceted and often brutal. The government used a mix of coercion, propaganda, and outright violence. Forced collectivization involved peasants being coerced into surrendering their land, livestock, and equipment to join collective farms. State agents and party activists used threats and intimidation to persuade or force peasants into compliance. These activists, often young and ideologically driven, conducted aggressive campaigns in villages, sometimes going door-to-door to enforce policies.
Kulaks were specifically targeted as class enemies, facing expropriation, arrest, deportation, and even execution. The dekulakization campaign involved identifying, dispossessing, and removing kulaks from their communities in a process that was often arbitrary and brutal. Local officials had quotas to fulfill, leading to widespread abuses and targeting of anyone seen as a threat or simply unfortunate enough to own slightly more property than their neighbors.
The state also requisitioned grain and livestock from peasants, often leaving them with insufficient food and resources to survive. Grain procurement quotas were imposed, and failure to meet these quotas resulted in severe penalties, including the confiscation of all remaining food supplies. These quotas were often unrealistically high, putting immense pressure on peasants to meet demands at the cost of their survival.
Propaganda played a significant role in promoting collectivization, with the government depicting it as a path to prosperity and a socialist utopia. Posters, films, and speeches glorified collective farming and painted a rosy picture of a future where everyone shared in the bounties of the land. Agitation propaganda campaigns involved speeches, pamphlets, and posters aimed at convincing peasants of the benefits of collectivization. Schools and youth organizations were mobilized to spread the message, and dissenting voices were quickly silenced.
The impact on the peasantry was devastating.
Millions of peasants suffered from displacement, famine, and violence, fundamentally altering the social and economic fabric of rural communities. Many kulaks and their families were deported to remote areas such as Siberia and Kazakhstan, where they faced harsh conditions and high mortality rates.
These remote regions were often ill-prepared to receive large numbers of deportees, leading to widespread suffering and death. The requisitioning of grain and livestock led to widespread famine, most notably the Holodomor in Ukraine, where millions of people died of starvation. The Holodomor was a particularly harrowing tragedy, with entire villages wiped out and desperate survivors resorting to eating grass, bark, and, in some cases, even more desperate measures.
Resistance to collectivization was met with brutal repression, including mass arrests, executions, and punitive measures against entire villages. Villages that resisted were labeled as "enemy strongholds" and subjected to collective punishment. This often included increased grain quotas, confiscation of all food supplies, and the arrest of community leaders.
Despite severe repression, many peasants resisted collectivization and employed various strategies to avoid asset confiscation. Peasants hid their produce and livestock in secret caches or remote areas to prevent confiscation. Grain was buried in hidden pits, and livestock was sometimes driven into forests or remote areas to avoid requisition. Acts of sabotage, such as destroying machinery and livestock, were common.
This was a form of resistance intended to undermine the productivity of collective farms. Passive resistance tactics included working slowly, feigning ignorance, or intentionally mismanaging collective farm resources. Some peasants fled to urban areas, seeking jobs in factories and construction projects to escape collectivization. The migration to industrial centers increased as peasants sought to escape the oppressive conditions in the countryside.
Peasants also formed support networks to help each other hide assets and provide mutual aid. Secret meetings and communications were used to coordinate resistance efforts and share information about government actions. These networks provided a lifeline for many, offering support and solidarity in the face of overwhelming oppression.
The Holodomor, also known as the Terror-Famine, was one of the most tragic outcomes of Stalin's collectivization policies. It occurred in Soviet Ukraine from 1932 to 1933, resulting from forced grain requisitions, unrealistic procurement quotas, and harsh punitive measures against those who resisted.
Estimates of the death toll range from 3.5 to 7 million people, with widespread starvation, disease, and death. Despite efforts to conceal the famine, reports from foreign journalists and diplomats brought international attention to the crisis, though the Soviet government denied the existence of the famine and suppressed information.
The Holodomor remains a deeply painful chapter in Ukrainian history and is widely regarded as a genocide orchestrated by the Soviet regime.
The long-term consequences of collectivization and dekulakization were profound and far-reaching. The upheaval in rural areas led to a significant decline in agricultural productivity, with collective farms often inefficient and poorly managed. The mass displacement and deaths of millions of peasants altered the demographic landscape of the Soviet Union.
The trauma of collectivization and the Holodomor left a legacy of mistrust towards the Soviet government, contributing to the eventual collapse of the Soviet Union.
Collectivization succeeded in extending the state's control over the countryside but also entrenched fear and resentment among the rural population. The policies of collectivization and dekulakization did not achieve the intended economic benefits and instead left a legacy of suffering and inefficiency.
The Soviet collectivization and dekulakization campaigns represent one of the most significant and tragic episodes of state-imposed asset confiscation in history. The brutal methods employed by the government, combined with the resilience and ingenuity of the peasantry, highlight the complex dynamics of power, resistance, and survival. Understanding this period is crucial for comprehending the broader history of the Soviet Union and the enduring impact of Stalin's policies on its people.
The resilience of the peasantry in the face of such brutal oppression underscores the human spirit's capacity for resistance and survival against overwhelming odds.
The Chinese Cultural Revolution (1966-1976)
The Chinese Cultural Revolution, initiated by Mao Zedong in 1966, stands as one of the most tumultuous periods in modern Chinese history. This decade-long movement was characterized by widespread social, political, and economic upheaval. Mao's goal was to enforce communism by removing capitalist, traditional, and cultural elements from Chinese society. This ambitious and ruthless campaign led to the persecution of millions and the confiscation of personal and communal assets on an unprecedented scale.
Mao, in his relentless drive to reshape China, called upon the nation's youth. Imagine millions of young people, mostly students, mobilized to form the Red Guards. These enthusiastic, often fanatical, groups were tasked with attacking the "Four Olds": old customs, culture, habits, and ideas. The Red Guards, fuelled by revolutionary fervor, would ransack homes, destroy cultural artifacts, and seize property.
These young revolutionaries, armed with Mao's Little Red Book, stormed through cities and villages alike, determined to purge society of its capitalist and traditionalist elements. Streets that were once vibrant with the rhythm of daily life were now filled with the chaotic energy of the Red Guards. They scoured neighborhoods, hunting for any sign of the "Four Olds." No item was too insignificant; anything from ancient family heirlooms to revered cultural relics became their targets.
Public struggle sessions became a chilling spectacle across China. Individuals identified as counterrevolutionaries, landlords, intellectuals, and others deemed bourgeois were subjected to public humiliation, beatings, and confiscation of their property. Imagine a crowded square where accused individuals were paraded before jeering crowds, forced to confess their "crimes" while enduring physical and verbal abuse.
These sessions were not mere public shaming; they were brutal, often violent displays of power meant to break the spirit of the accused and serve as a warning to others. Their homes and belongings were often seized by the state, leaving families destitute. The trauma of these public humiliations lingered long after the crowds dispersed, marking the psyche of an entire generation.
Those not caught up in struggle sessions might find themselves sent to rural labor camps for re-education. These camps, far from the cities, were places of hard labor and harsh conditions. Imagine being uprooted from urban life and thrust into the backbreaking work of the countryside. People were forced to toil in the fields or work on infrastructure projects, all while being indoctrinated with revolutionary ideology. Life in these camps was gruelling; the combination of physical exhaustion and ideological brainwashing wore down even the most resilient spirits. Their properties were confiscated and redistributed by the state, further dismantling the old social order and creating a new class of disenfranchised citizens.
The impact on society was devastating.
Millions faced persecution, with estimates suggesting up to 1.5 million people were killed and countless others imprisoned, tortured, or displaced. Families were torn apart, and communities shattered as neighbors turned against each other, driven by fear and ideological fervor. The economy suffered as well, as intellectuals and skilled workers were removed from their positions, and resources were diverted to support revolutionary activities. Factories slowed, agricultural production dropped, and the nation struggled to maintain even basic economic stability. The economic infrastructure that had been painstakingly built over decades crumbled under the weight of ideological purges and mismanagement.
The Cultural Revolution also targeted China's rich cultural heritage. Libraries, temples, and monuments were destroyed. Books, paintings, and other cultural artifacts were burned or otherwise eradicated. Picture centuries-old temples reduced to rubble, rare manuscripts turned to ash, and priceless artworks lost forever.
The aim was to break with the past and create a new, ideologically pure culture, but the result was an irreplaceable loss of historical and cultural treasures. The destruction was not just physical; it was an attempt to erase the very memory of China's rich and diverse heritage. The emptiness left by this cultural annihilation was felt deeply by those who understood the value of what was lost.
Despite the atmosphere of fear and repression, many Chinese citizens found ways to resist and protect their assets. People hid valuable items such as jewelry, family heirlooms, and important documents in clever places—buried underground, concealed in walls, or tucked away in hollowed-out furniture. These acts of defiance were often small but significant, providing a lifeline to a past that many were desperate to preserve. Families altered or destroyed official documents to obscure their backgrounds or ownership of property, all in a bid to avoid persecution.
Communities formed clandestine networks to help each other hide assets, provide false testimonies, or even escape to safer areas. Imagine neighbors collaborating to protect a targeted family by hiding their possessions and spreading misinformation about their activities. These networks operated in the shadows, providing a fragile but crucial support system for those targeted by the revolution. Some people outwardly conformed to the demands of the Red Guards while secretly maintaining their old customs and traditions. These acts of defiance, though small, were acts of bravery in a time of widespread terror. In the face of overwhelming oppression, these quiet acts of resistance were a beacon of hope.
The long-term consequences of the Cultural Revolution were profound.
The destruction of cultural artifacts, historical sites, and intellectual works resulted in an irreparable loss to China's cultural heritage. The persecution and violence left deep psychological scars on survivors and their families, affecting subsequent generations. The memories of the brutality, the fear, and the loss were passed down, creating a legacy of trauma that would influence Chinese society for decades to come. And disruption of the education system created a generation with gaps in their formal education, further hindering the nation's progress.
Economically, the upheaval led to stagnation. The persecution of skilled workers and intellectuals hindered technological and industrial progress. Factories and farms, once bustling with activity, were now inefficient and unproductive, unable to meet the demands of the population. The forced redistribution of property and assets, while intended to eliminate class distinctions, often resulted in inefficiencies and further economic disruption. The grand vision of a classless, perfectly equal society clashed with the harsh reality of economic decline and social chaos. The economy was left in tatters, struggling to recover from the damage inflicted during the revolution.
In the end, the Chinese Cultural Revolution serves as a poignant reminder of the devastating impact of ideological extremism and political purges on a society.
Through the detailed examination of government actions and public resistance, we gain a deeper understanding of this historical period. The strategies employed by ordinary people to protect their assets and survive highlight the resilience and ingenuity of the human spirit. These stories of survival and resistance are a testament to the strength and courage of those who lived through this dark chapter in history. As China continues to navigate its complex historical legacy, the lessons of the Cultural Revolution remain relevant for understanding the interplay between state power and individual rights.
The Confiscation of Gold by the United States Government (1933)
The onset of the Great Depression in 1929 plunged the United States into a severe economic crisis unparalleled in its history. The stock market crash not only shattered the financial system but also led to catastrophic levels of unemployment, countless bankruptcies, and widespread despair. As banks collapsed and businesses shuttered, the American public grappled with unprecedented hardship.
By 1933, the economic situation had grown even more dire, with no sector of the economy untouched. Into this bleak landscape stepped Franklin D. Roosevelt, inaugurated as President in March of that year, bringing with him a new vision aimed at rescuing the nation from its economic plight.
Roosevelt’s New Deal was a series of programs and policies designed to revive the economy and restore confidence among the American people.
Among these initiatives, the decision to confiscate gold under Executive Order 6102 in April 1933 stands out as particularly bold and contentious.
This executive order mandated that all persons, businesses, and institutions within the United States surrender their gold coins, bullion, and certificates to the Federal Reserve, receiving in return paper currency valued at $20.67 per troy ounce.
Roosevelt’s rationale for such a drastic measure was rooted in the belief that hoarding gold was exacerbating the economic downturn. By hoarding gold, he believed that individuals were limiting the money supply available, which in turn deepened the deflation that was strangling economic growth.
The move to confiscate gold was aimed directly at undermining the gold standard, a monetary system in which the value of national currencies was directly linked to specific amounts of gold. This standard restricted the Federal Reserve's ability to increase the money supply during economic downturns, thereby limiting its ability to stimulate economic activity. By removing gold from private hands and centralizing it within the Federal Reserve, Roosevelt hoped to expand the money supply and thus combat the crippling deflation.
The following year, Roosevelt pushed forward with the Gold Reserve Act of 1934, which not only reaffirmed the government’s control over all gold but also increased the official price of gold from $20.67 to $35 per ounce. This significant devaluation of the dollar sought to boost economic recovery by making American goods cheaper on the international market, thus increasing exports and reducing the balance of trade deficit. The government enforced these new policies with stringent penalties, threatening violators with hefty fines and imprisonment, signaling a stern commitment to these drastic measures
Public reactions to these gold policies were deeply divided. While many Americans complied with the order, either out of a sense of national duty or resignation to the economic emergency, a significant number resisted, driven by a combination of distrust in the government and a determination to safeguard personal wealth.
Resistance took many forms. Individuals went to great lengths to hide their gold, employing creative methods to evade confiscation. Gold was buried in backyards, secreted away in hidden compartments of homes, or transformed into innocuous items like jewelry or art.
Others exploited loopholes in the legislation, particularly the exemptions that allowed professionals like dentists, jewelers, and artists to retain necessary gold for their work. Some claimed these professional exemptions under dubious pretenses, while others rushed to invest in numismatic coins—rare and collectible coins that were initially exempt from confiscation.
The affluent and certain businesses looked beyond American borders, moving their gold assets to international banks or engaging in elaborate foreign transactions to protect their holdings. As government scrutiny intensified, a black market for gold flourished, allowing covert trading and providing an avenue for transactions that circumvented official channels. In certain areas, barter systems emerged where gold acted as a medium of exchange, further undermining the government’s attempts to control the currency.
The long-term consequences of Roosevelt’s gold policies were profound and multi-faceted.
Economically, these measures provided the necessary liquidity to tackle deflation, facilitating a gradual recovery from the Depression. The increased money supply resulting from the devaluation of the dollar and the abandonment of the gold standard allowed for greater flexibility in monetary policy. This adaptability was crucial not only during the remaining years of the Depression but also in shaping the economic strategies of subsequent decades.
The revaluation of gold and the shift away from a strict gold standard also laid the groundwork for the Bretton Woods system, which established the U.S. dollar as the backbone of the international financial system after World War II. This system played a pivotal role in global economic stabilization until its dissolution in the early 1970s.
Culturally, the legacy of the gold confiscation left an indelible mark on American society, engendering a deep-seated skepticism toward government intervention in personal financial matters. This skepticism fostered a strong libertarian streak in some segments of the population, influencing American attitudes toward economic policy and investment in precious metals for decades.
The episode remains a potent symbol in discussions about government overreach and economic liberty, shaping the ideological debates that continue to influence American political and economic thought.
In retrospect, the U.S. government's intervention in the gold market during the Great Depression was a watershed moment with lasting impacts. While it played a crucial role in addressing the immediate economic crisis and reshaping U.S. monetary policy, it also left a legacy of wariness about government power over personal assets.
These actions and their repercussions continue to echo through the financial markets and shape government policies, reminding us of the delicate balance between necessary economic intervention and the protection of individual freedoms.
Continue reading at the Macro Alchemist.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 10/18/2024 - 12:30
Published:10/18/2024 12:01:07 PM
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[World]
A roundup of crime, spy and military thrillers
I recall Otto Penzler, the owner of The Mysterious Bookshop in New York City, telling me that mystery, crime fiction, and thrillers were the best-selling genres of books today--and that business was good.
Published:10/17/2024 1:56:19 PM
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[Politics]
Massive influx of shadowy get-out-the-vote spending floods swing states
Comic books, paydays, door-knocking, direct mail, giveaways, viral videos and “poll dancer” parties that happen independent of campaigns could be decisive.
Published:10/17/2024 11:02:11 AM
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[Markets]
The US Plans To Let BRICS Fail In A Geopolitically Explosive Environment
The US Plans To Let BRICS Fail In A Geopolitically Explosive Environment
Authored by Peter Hanseler via VoiceFromRussia.ch,
Introduction
In less than two weeks, the 2024 BRICS Summit will take place in Kazan from 22-24 October. Our team will be there to follow and report on what is likely to be the most important geopolitical event of the year.
We are using the summit as an opportunity to publish several articles on this issue of the century. In this first article, we describe the adverse geopolitical environment in which this organisation is developing.
I would like to preface this with the following: Reliable geopolitical statements are based on facts. As the geopolitical facts change almost daily, this fact makes it difficult or impossible to produce analyses that will stand the test of time.
Several key geopolitical parameters are either completely in flux or will not have been decided at the time of the BRICS summit. I consider the following parameters to be crucial for medium-term geopolitical developments: (1) war in the Middle East; (2) war in Ukraine; (3) interest rate developments and the behaviour of the Fed until the end of this year as an indicator of the instability of Western financial markets with the inevitable consequences for the global economy; (4) US presidential elections.
For China and Russia, which play a leading role in BRICS – Russia currently holds the chair – the following questions arise: Should BRICS accept few, no or many new members? Candidates are lining up, but some are under enormous pressure from the US to avoid joining BRICS. Should a new payment mechanism independent of the US dollar be introduced now, further upsetting the balance in already unstable financial markets? Such decisions, or even the mere communication of them, have the potential to significantly alter the entire geopolitical situation within hours – positively or negatively, depending on the observer’s point of view.
This article can therefore be no more than a transcription of thoughts on significant geopolitical developments that are currently taking place simultaneously and unpredictably. A full assessment is impossible. Many factors cannot be reliably assessed – such as developments in Africa, Asia and South America.
The feigned disinterest of the West
For a long time, the Western media maintained an ironclad silence on the subject of BRICS. A glimmer of interest appeared when Turkey expressed interest in joining BRICS. Now there is radio silence again. Alternative media are outdoing each other with predictions that BRICS will change the world tomorrow. The Russian media are holding back in this fireworks of jubilation. But to interpret the silence of the Western media as a lack of interest in BRICS would be more than naive.
The Mainstream Media in the West as Hate Mongers and Warmongers
In retrospect, people are always amazed at how people allowed their leaders to behave so foolishly and against the interests of their own nations on the road to world wars.
The answer is banal: the mainstream media regularly play a devastating role, both on the road to war and during war. The mainstream media allow themselves to be used and wring their hands when those media that report honestly are destroyed. Without journalists who sell their souls and trample on the interests of their own country, there would be no such catastrophes.
A few gallows should be kept ready for the ladies and gentlemen responsible. That would be nothing new, by the way. Julius Streicher, publisher of the Nazi hate newspaper “Der Sturmer”, was hanged in Nuremberg.
Hate propaganda can lead to a broken neck – Julius Streicher, former publisher of the newspaper “Der Stürmer”
This picture is intended to be a visual lesson in how it can end when you throw all journalistic principles overboard for evil.
The population in the West is already powerless
Since the brainwashing is not yet absolute, significant parts of the European population are still far from believing and supporting the madness spread by the media. The closed front of hatred – for example, against Russia – takes place primarily in the media, which are in complete lockstep throughout the West, with a few exceptions.
Significant parts of the population – in France, Germany and Austria, for example – have expressed their disgust with their leaders at the polls, and in a functioning democracy this should have led to political change. The political elites in France and Germany – and recently also in Austria – have used illegal means to prevent the political participation of those parties that advocate peace, for example in Ukraine, accompanied by the media labeling those who advocate peace as “Nazis” or at least “right-wing extremists. I have never heard of Adolf Hitler advocating peace.
There are certainly parallels with those dark times. The actions of the Nazi regime after it seized power in 1933 are virtually identical to those of today’s elites in Europe against dissenters in terms of restricting freedom of expression: inciting the masses against those sections of the population who question the policies of the powerful; bringing the media into line; and – especially in Germany – violating the law beyond recognition. For example, denying the winner of the regional elections in Thuringia the right to participate in the government or to have a blocking minority.
Freedom of expression in the midst of agony
Representative of the trend that freedom of expression in the West is hanging by a thread, here is a quote from John Kerry, on the occasion of a WEF meeting that took place between September 23 and 27.
“Our First Amendment stands as a major block to the ability to be able to hammer [disinformation] out of existence.
What we need is to win…the right to govern by hopefully winning enough votes that you’re free to be able to implement change.
In other words, Kerry qualifies freedom of expression as a problem and announces that this “problem” would be solved by the state if Kamala Harris wins. We leave this thought in the air and refer to our article: “US elections decide on war or peace”.
If it weren’t for the internet and blogs, the powerful would have already achieved their goal, because fortunately it seems practically impossible to silence all voices of reason.
BRICS: From an economic project to a geopolitical force
When representatives from Brazil, Russia, China and India first met formally on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York in 2006, the world looked very different. Even in 2009, when the first formal BRIC summit was held in Yekaterinburg in June 2009, without South Africa – hence “BRIC” instead of “BRICS” – the world was different. The original goals of the BRIC countries were to achieve better economic cooperation between countries that had not yet been openly declared enemies or even sanctioned by the West. There seemed to be no rush (yet).
From 2014, pressure on Russia increased as a result of Maidan and Crimea. Russia was portrayed as the villain and sanctions were imposed. President Putin continued to seek diplomatic solutions for another eight years, welcomed Minsk I and II, but was again deceived. The artillery shelling of civilians in Donetsk by the “peaceful” Ukrainians did not stop, and NATO was building up the Ukrainian army for an attack on Russia.
Russia began to prepare for the foreseeable, especially economically, because militarily it had been doing so with great energy and creativity since the attack on Georgia in 2008. When the situation escalated in February 2022, Russia had apparently done its economic homework and could count on the loyalty of its partners in BRICS and SCO. The US miscalculation can be explained by the fact that Americans are unfamiliar with the concept of loyalty, while the EU miscalculation can be explained by the fact that most of its members are ruled by leaders whose stupidity borders on idiocy.
Russia has weathered the economic war unleashed by the West, despite a storm of sanctions unprecedented in world history. The losers are to be found in the West, with Germany being hit the hardest – also due to a senseless economic policy.
The U.S. did not limit its economic war to Russia, but also began to sanction China in 2014, as always with flimsy arguments. The EU – as a vassal of the US – has willingly gone along with this, and is currently doing so out of its own self-interest, since the industrial pearl that is Germany has already lost out due to misguided economic policies, bad decisions by its automotive industry and suicidal sanctions against Russia. Auto industry experts are speechless and wringing their hands: Since Covid, Mercedes has not managed to get its factories above 50% capacity – a complete collapse is becoming apparent across the board.
Next came the freezing of the reserves of the Russian Central Bank and the expropriation not only of Russians, but of anyone with a “Russian connection”, a term that is not legal in nature and has opened the door for governments and banks in the West to stage a raid.
China, which is only a few steps behind Russia in terms of sanctions, has become a target for the West because of its industrial superiority. It is the great new enemy of the US and Europe.
It would be naive to neglect the South China Sea and Taiwan, which are hot spots along with Ukraine and the Middle East, because what is at stake is nothing less than military domination of the Pacific, which the Americans have held since 1945, and control of one of the world’s most important transportation routes. Once the Americans are somewhere, you can’t get rid of them – even 80 years after a conflict. In Germany, for example, the US still operates 40 military bases. This alone makes it clear that Germany is not even nominally sovereign, but a mere vassal of the US. What “interests” the US “protects” for others around the globe remains in the dark.
Although most people consider military conflicts to be more important than economic wars because they are more bloody and evoke more emotion, history teaches us that the economically stronger ultimately prevails. As a consequence of this thought, it can be argued that the economic war as the decisive part of the 3rd World War is already in full swing.
In addition to many small military conflicts – such as in Africa – two increasingly escalating wars are currently raging: the conflict in Ukraine has been going on for two and a half years, and the latest conflict in the Middle East has been raging for a year.
Military escalation in Ukraine
Since last September, it has been clear who will prevail militarily in Ukraine. The advance of Russian troops across the entire front is accelerating steadily. We regularly recommend a YouTube channel that provides an unemotional daily report in English (“Military Summary”) and Russian (“??????e ??????”) of events at the front and has not made any mistakes: only facts.
Ukraine’s Kursk adventure will end as it was bound to end; the last elite Ukrainian troops that (President) Selenski assembled for this suicide mission and equipped with modern equipment will leave Kursk as prisoners or in body bags. My sources speak of more than 21,000 casualties on the Ukrainian side.
Since the military outcome of the matter was decided – that is, since September 2023 – (President) Selenski, on behalf of his masters in Washington, has been wasting his men – young and old – at an ever-increasing rate. The death rate on the Ukrainian side has doubled from last year to June 2024: 60,000 to 80,000 men lost – per month. The number of Ukrainian prisoners of war is also increasing daily due to military encirclement. The fresh soldiers who have been thrown to the front since the beginning of the year do so after a 10-day quick fix, following a veritable hunt by recruiting troops throughout the territory of western Ukraine. These men do not want to go to the front and flee at the first opportunity. They know the war is lost, and they are not willing to give their lives for a country whose leadership they do not respect and whose fight is hopeless. Even CNN and the New York Times are reporting this.
The latest attempt by the U.S. and Britain to escalate the situation by using NATO’s long-range weapons against Russia failed because of President Putin’s clear response that in this case NATO countries, the U.S. and Europe would be directly involved in the war in Ukraine and that Russia would therefore make appropriate decisions based on the threat, given the changed nature of this conflict. This statement caused President Biden to backtrack within hours. Russia then further tightened its doctrine on the use of nuclear weapons, making it clear that the concept of proxy wars would no longer be tolerated in the future.
It is not possible to say how long these two statements by President Putin will prevent the escalation. On October 3, another attack was carried out against the Kursk nuclear power plant – it is not known whether long-range weapons were used. It was rumored that at the next Ramstein meeting, Germany would authorize the use of long-range weapons despite the warning from the Kremlin. However, President Biden has now announced that he would not be attending this meeting due to the hurricane situation in the US. Shortly afterwards, Anthony Blinken also canceled. Meanwhile, the meeting has been canceled for the time being. Believing in victory looks different.
On October 8, Foreign Minister Lavrov reaffirmed the new doctrine and its automatic application in the event of the use of long-range weapons.
“As soon as this decision is taken [by the West to allow Ukraine to use long-range missiles], if it is taken, we will learn that, and the contingency mentioned by Vladimir Putin will already be in action,”
Sergei Lawrow – 8 Oktober 2024
Selenski’s ‘victory plan’ was rejected in Washington anyway and testifies to the president’s complete loss of touch with reality. Even Czech President Petr Pavel has pointed this out. Although he is a vocal supporter of Ukraine and a former NATO general, he nevertheless expressed the view that parts of Ukraine would probably end up belonging to Russia. He softened this statement by describing this Russian occupation as ‘temporary’. Slovakia’s prime minister, Robert Fico, has also come out strongly against Ukraine joining NATO. Fico has long been a thorn in the side of the hawks, and they will regret that the attempt on his life did not bear fruit. I would not be surprised if a second attempt is made, as has already happened with Donald Trump.
The interim conclusion is that Russia has already won militarily against Ukraine, but the dying goes on without changing the outcome. The only thing left for NATO to do is to use long-range weapons against Russia in order to extend the war to the whole of NATO.
Escalation in the Middle East
The situation in the Middle East is even worse. After the events of 7 October 2023 were portrayed as a massacre of Palestinians, Prime Minister Netanyahu used this event, referred to as the “9/11 moment”, as an opportunity to massacre the population of Gaza. In January 2024, the International Court of Justice ruled unequivocally that this was genocide. To no avail, because since its creation in 1948, Israel has only respected the law that benefits it.
In the months following October 7, it emerged that the vast majority of the deaths that day were at the hands of the Israeli Defense Forces and that the alleged mass rapes and beheadings of children were pure invention. These clear denials of Israeli propaganda were, incidentally, not made by obscure blogs, but by the Israeli daily newspaper “Haaretz”.
The entire Western public has been subjected to an unprecedented brainwashing, which in Germany, for example, has gone so far as to issue a memo to the staff of public television stations dictating the wording and adjectives they should use in their reporting. See our article “ARD–Glossary justifies genocide – Dr. Goebbels would be proud“.
Apart from a few courageous students, who were labeled anti-Semites for protesting against this genocide, no one in the West seems to be bothered by the fact that genocide is becoming fashionable again as a war tactic. After the Israeli military expanded the slaughter to the West Bank, Israel turned its attention to Lebanon. The leader of Hezbollah was eliminated by dropping 86 massive bombs on a residential neighborhood consisting of six buildings. Hundreds of civilians died. Israel uses such barbaric methods to eliminate a few officers of Hezbollah and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. The attacks in Pager are also acts of terrorism and war crimes. Western media celebrate them as ingenious moves by Mossad.
Genocide and terror are “legal” for the US and the entire West. The Holocaust was also legal, as was the slaughter of over 15 million Russian civilians. The Nazi regime provided these “actions” with a “legal basis”. We have thus returned to a time when the terms “legal basis”, “law” and “law” have degenerated into empty phrases to assuage the consciences of those who actually commit these atrocities.
Since 1979, Iran has been described by the West as the epitome of evil and a terrorist state, even though it has not attacked another country in 150 years. That may be about to change. When the political leader of Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, was liquidated by the Israelis in Tehran on July 31, 2024, Iran held back. Iran’s new president, Masoud Pezeshkian, was apparently persuaded by the U.S. not to respond militarily as a cease-fire was being worked out in Gaza. Iran showed its goodwill.
This was followed shortly afterwards by the pager attack, the assassination of Hassan Nasrrallah and the invasion of Lebanon. The Americans have once again pulled the wool over Iran’s eyes and set a trap. The response from Tehran last week was a missile attack with almost 200 missiles. The US and Israel are calling it a failure, but Israel has banned the dissemination of information about the damage. Film footage shows that over 80% of the missiles hit their target and the damage to military infrastructure is considerable. Iran only attacked military targets, not civilian ones. This distinguishes Iran from the real terrorist state, which has probably systematically killed over 100,000 civilians since last October.
Israel and the US should think carefully about whether this is a good idea before launching further attacks on Iran: Russia has equipped Iran with S-400 air defense systems and fighter jets – probably including pilots; at the same time, Moscow is clearly distancing itself from Israel and calling on Russian citizens to leave the country.
The risk of a conflict in which the US and Russia face each other directly in the Middle East has therefore increased noticeably. Neither China nor Russia have the slightest interest in Iran being forced into a war. As a member of the SCO and BRICS, Iran has become an ally of these two major powers and they would therefore have to respond militarily, which would make a direct confrontation between the US and Russia/China de facto inevitable.
I rule out a military victory for Israel and the US over Iran for the following reasons: Firstly, due to its military successes in the 1960s and 1970s, Israel lives from a myth as a military superpower in the Middle East, which is based on conflicts that lasted a few days or weeks against opponents who were inferior to the Israelis in every respect.
In 2006, however, Israel clearly lost against Hezbollah and the ineffectual Israelis had to call off their offensive against Lebanon after a month. The Israelis were also unable to achieve their loudly proclaimed goals against a significantly less powerful Hamas despite their genocidal approach.
Iran is a huge country with an area of 1.6 million square kilometers and a population of 90 million, with an army of just under one million men including reservists. Moreover, Iran is over 1,700 km away from Israel, which rules out a land war. Even the Americans, who cannot even prevail against the Houthis, will have no chance here. Attacking Iran is therefore complete nonsense and madness.
If you listen to experts, even air strikes seem practically impossible and extremely risky for aircraft due to the Russian S-400 defense systems. Iran has hundreds of thousands of state-of-the-art missiles at its disposal and could cover Israel with hundreds of missiles every day for months. The Israelis’ miraculous Iron Dome may be suitable against old Quds missiles, but they are practically ineffective against modern Iranian missiles, as the last attack showed.
Unless the Americans have completely lost their minds, they will not comply with the wishes of the Israeli Mini-Hitler. That would probably also be worse for the Biden-Harris government. If the conflict escalates, Iran will multiply the price of oil through attacks on oil infrastructure and a possible blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, which would mean the end of the Harris campaign.
The third major conflict for supremacy in the South China Sea and over Taiwan is not yet being waged kinetically, but it could just as well start tomorrow or in a year’s time.
The forces that control the USA are the cause of this evil
Overview
It sounds simplistic, but there is actually one party ultimately responsible for all the incidents described: The US. It is – rightly – afraid of losing its role as hegemon after 80 years.
The US’s problem is multifaceted. Firstly, the world’s most indebted country is economically in the doldrums: The published economic figures, which paint a slightly better picture, are sugarcoated. Secondly, society in the US is more divided than ever before: the election campaign between Harris and Trump is hate-filled and this is not about the choice between two people, but about the choice between the deep state and the anti-establishment, which we already described in detail a month ago (US elections decide war or peace) and therefore do not cover this aspect in this article. Thirdly, the strategy of destroying or dismembering Russia implemented after the fall of the Soviet Union has become a distant prospect by conventional means; the war against Russia in Ukraine has failed. Fourthly, over the last 45 years, the US has lost its formerly dominance in the Middle East. The last bastion is Israel, which is being led to its doom by a sociopath under the expert leadership of the US. Fifthly, in my opinion, the biggest problem for the US is the rise of BRICS, as the American empire cannot exist without the supremacy of the US dollar. With the rise of BRICS, this dominance will disappear. For this reason, the US is fighting BRICS with all means at its disposal, be it by exerting pressure on new or potential members (e.g. Saudi Arabia) or through military intervention (e.g. Russia and Iran).
US economy: The world’s richest country driven to the wall
The US took over as hegemon after the Second World War with 22,000 tons of gold, an economy that produced 70% of the world’s industrial goods and a monetary system (Bretton Woods) that was imposed on over forty members and made the US dollar the world currency. In addition, the US was practically spared from the Second World War – as it had been from the First World War. The country and the civilian population suffered no damage whatsoever and compared to the losses suffered by many other warring parties – first and foremost the Soviet Union – the American losses in both world wars can be described as homeopathic.
Despite this “starting capital”, the US as hegemon did not succeed in maintaining this strength over time. The list of coups, military conflicts and major wars launched by the US in the last 80 years is almost endless and has led to millions of civilian deaths, destroyed countries and complete military defeats for the US.
The image that the US paints of itself as a “friendly hegemon” is a complete farce. The US was not only brutal and ruthless towards enemies, but also towards friends. If a friend stepped out of line, it was destroyed militarily (Iraq, Libya), subjected to decades of sanctions (Cuba, Iran) or blackmailed by other means (Switzerland).
The biggest problem for the United States is the fact that it has always lived beyond its means and spent more money than it earned. This led to the collapse of the Bretton Woods system after just 26 years, when President Nixon was forced to close the gold window, which led to them ripping off their partners in the Bretton Woods system. Then the genius Henry Kissinger invented the Petrodollar, which turned the US dollar into the “King Dollar” and gave the US an instrument for unlimited debt, which the Americans also used as a weapon. Anyone who tried to break away and sell raw materials in currencies other than the US dollar was destroyed (Iraq, Libya).
The turning point came at the latest with the freezing of Russian central bank funds, an infringement of assets that was primarily started by the vassals in the EU in 2022, with even “neutral” Switzerland participating in this – until then – unthinkable breach of the law.
In my opinion, this action will go down in the history books as one of the greatest blunders, as it not only heralds the end of the Petrodollar, but also greatly accelerates the coming together of the Global South, which is characterized by the fact that the Chinese and Russians no longer conduct 60%, but only 15% of their transactions in US dollars and the BRICS countries – whenever possible – conduct their trade activities outside the US dollar. This trend is accelerating with each passing year and will sooner or later lead to the collapse of the US budget, as it is dependent on the world holding US dollars, or else the US will collapse.
The stock markets in the West are still close to their highs, but are a miserable measure of the economic health of the Collective West. Most of the countries in this group are effectively bankrupt and are keeping themselves alive by printing money and cutting interest rates. Interest rate cuts that are based on the lie that inflation has been defeated. Every European or American who has to watch their budget has tears in their eyes – from laughter or weeping – when they look at the official inflation figures.
The official figures have nothing in common with reality. It is the West’s last gasp before collapse. Here, too, history is repeating itself. In the 1970s, Americans were also led to believe that inflation was under control and the Fed Chairman at the time, Arthur F. Burns, lowered interest rates. An inflationary storm then broke out, which Burns’ successor, Paul Volcker, finally got under control again by raising the key interest rate to 19.1% (June 1981).
On October 4, ZeroHedge reported that global food prices have risen the most in 18 months. The parallels with the 1970s in terms of inflation are striking and worrying.
This drastic cure would no longer be feasible today. At today’s interest rates, the US is paying over one trillion US dollars in interest per year on its gigantic mountain of debt. That is more than the US spends on its gigantic military apparatus. Very few people can even imagine what a trillion actually means:
Here are some examples of what a trillion actually means:
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One million seconds equals 11.5 days – one trillion seconds equals: 32,000 years.
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If someone were to give away a million every day since the day Christ was born, they would still have enough money today to continue this process for another 715 years – until the year 2,739.
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One trillion grains of rice weigh approximately 30,000 tons.
It is only a matter of time before this house of cards collapses. Whether the catastrophe starts in Europe, the US or Japan is of secondary importance, as this will lead to a domino effect.
Bloodbaths accompany the loss of US supremacy in the Middle East
In our three-part series “Bloodbaths are changing the world”, we have meticulously detailed the rise of the military-industrial complex in the US (Part 1) as the basis for the US’s aggressive foreign policy.
Until the overthrow of the Shah of Persia in 1979, the US dominated the Middle East and thus also controlled a large part of the world’s oil reserves.
In the following maps, the influence of the US is colored red. The coloring in the following maps should not be considered absolute.
Influence of the US (red) in the Middle East until the fall of the Shah of Persia – Source: VoicefromRussia.com
In 2001, the situation looked much worse for the US – its influence was much smaller.
Situation on September 11, 2001 – Source: VoicefromRussia.com
In part 2 of our bloodbath series, we explained how the US used 9/11 as an excuse to plan a huge campaign to conquer Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Somalia, Afghanistan and Iran. A plan that was in no way inferior to Hitler’s megalomania.
Influence US in September 2001: (red) – the plan: (yellow) – Source: VoicefromRussia.com
It turned out differently: all war campaigns led to disaster for the US. Nevertheless, the Americans destroyed the following countries either completely or significantly: Afghanistan (US withdrawal), Iraq (US withdrawal with a small contingent remaining against the will of the government), Libya (no [official] ground troops, country destroyed), Syria (lost, but to this day still some ground troops in the oil-rich part), Sudan (no control), Somalia (no control).
The situation today is as follows: A disaster for the US.
In addition, Iran, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt joined BRICS last summer (Saudi Arabia joined but has not yet signed up). The following countries in the Middle East have also submitted formal applications for membership: Kuwait, Bahrain and Turkey – more on these in our follow-up articles to this report.
The geopolitical reach of the US in the Middle East is therefore extremely limited. Furthermore, anyone who believes that Israel does not do exactly what the US orders is naive.
Israel would not be able to survive a month without US financial and military support. The US has once again found a sociopath (Prime Minister Netanyahu) to do the dirty work for the US, including genocide.
The power of the Zionists
Much more important, however, is the question of who is able to influence the US to such an extent and how this is done. The short answer: the Zionists.
What is Zionism? – “Zionism (from Zion) refers to a political ideology and associated movement aimed at the establishment, justification and preservation of a Jewish nation state in Palestine.”
The Zionists are in charge of the Israeli government today, although they only represent around 10% of the electorate. One of their most extreme representatives is the current Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich.
In our series on Israel, we mentioned the ultimate goal of the Zionists several times and proved this, among other things, with the help of an entry in Ben Gurion’s diary, namely the creation of a Greater Israel that included Israel, Jordan, Iraq, parts of Syria and areas of Saudi Arabia. This also proves that the term “river” in the Israeli saying “From the river to the sea” does not mean the Jordan, but the Euphrates. This ultimate goal is always dismissed in the West as a conspiracy theory, as well as an old hat, since Ben Gurion’s diary entry dates back to 1948. However, the following statement by Smotrich from October of this year confirms the unbelievable:
It is no secret that the American government is riddled with Zionists – such as Blinken and Sullivan. Even Joe Biden describes himself as a Zionist.
The Zionist movement is organized worldwide. By far its most powerful lobbyist is the extremely wealthy AIPAC – The American Israel Public Affairs Committee; in essence a Zionist lobbying organization in the US.
In the US, all lobbying organizations must be registered as such, which is required by law under FARA – the Foreign Agents Registration Act. This has been in place since 1938 to prevent foreign influence on American politics. AIPAC is expressly excluded from this.
AIPAC has unlimited access to members of the US Congress and Senate at all times. There has never been a US president who has dared to go against the express will of AIPAC. And AIPAC is the organization that Netanyahu can fully rely on at all times in his religious war mania and to ensure the supply of weapons and money not only from the US.
This short paragraph should suffice to show that (1) Israel’s goal is not peace, but gigantic expansion at the expense of practically all its Arab neighbors; (2) the question of whether Israel dominates the US or the US dominates Israel is irrelevant: the Zionists are in decisive positions in many countries – including the US and Israel.
As long as the Zionists occupy these positions of power worldwide, there will be no peace in the Middle East.
Priority number 1 for the US: Prevent BRICS!
Whether the US can maintain its hegemony ultimately depends not on military successes, but on economic might, because the US has not won a war since 1945, but has still been able to maintain its world dominance.
Every hegemon that has ever lost its status has lost it because it went broke. Nevertheless, the US’s approach makes perfect sense from its perspective. The weakness of the US can no longer be hidden. They are now trying to weaken their opponents – at least to create a balance on a relative level – by causing wars that are waged by third parties who weaken each other in the process.
This is intended to prevent the “rest of the world” from realigning itself collectively. BRICS stands for precisely this realignment: a realignment through the creation of a multipolar world. If BRICS is successful, the US will disappear as a hegemon and will then be one of many players at the table, with defunct empires regularly acting as if they were playing a major role for centuries to come. Just like President Macron or Boris Johnson, for example, who from a rational point of view are just ridiculous loudmouths with countries that belong on the geopolitical dustbin.
The West’s cast-iron silence on BRICS should therefore by no means be interpreted as a lack of interest. The really important geopolitical developments are known to take place in the background. I personally believe that this organization poses the greatest threat to the US. Russia and China are the two countries that are leading the development of this organization. It therefore makes perfect sense from an American point of view to fight these two countries most aggressively.
The Russians and Chinese are aware of this and are reacting with the discretion and restraint typical of both countries. There have been 200 events on BRICS in Russia this year and not a lot has been heard.
It is a huge challenge for BRICS to develop in a well-structured way in this geopolitical turmoil. Some members are already at war with the Collective West (Russia, Iran), Saudi Arabia may not make up its mind as it is obviously under enormous pressure due to its huge investments in the UK and US. The formal signature for accession is still pending.
The war against Russia in Ukraine has completely failed and has considerably weakened Europe – especially Germany – and exposed NATO as a chatter club. The time will come when even the last naive person in Europe will realize that Europe is once again being used as a blunt and willing instrument of its masters in Washington against Russia. This is a betrayal of national interests. Bought morons in the service of Washington. But how Germany has managed to elect a government whose intellectual abilities are difficult to describe is down to the society that made a choice back in 1933, the consequences of which we all know. The Germans seem to have a special ability to regularly shoot themselves in their own feet – the left and the right.
To date, US efforts to bring down BRICS by weakening Russia and China have failed.
Nevertheless, the geopolitical turmoil that the US has caused in recent years is certainly influencing the development of BRICS – both negatively and positively.
Negatively, as potential members are being bullied, such as Saudi Arabia. Attempts are also being made to influence full BRICS members by luring and threatening them (India, Brazil). Other countries that would like to join BRICS are put under pressure, even if the general public is not aware of this, as this happens in the background or the pressure is exerted for other, pretextual reasons (e.g. Venezuela).
The positive effect of the US’s behavior is that many countries are becoming acutely aware of what could befall them if they are treated in the same way as Russia and China, although many countries in the Global South are mere microcosms compared to these two giants and therefore lack the resilience of Russia and China. Since BRICS sells multipolarity credibly and actually behaves in a spirit of partnership and not hegemonism, the prospect of living under the umbrella of this community is extremely attractive. This is evident from the long list of countries that would like to formally join or have expressed a strong interest.
Looking into the crystal ball
Now one has to ask what the best strategy for BRICS will be: Just grow fast? I do not hold this opinion. Based on conversations with my contacts, BRICS decision-makers seem to think along similar lines. It is possible that no new full members will be admitted at all this year and a status called “ Partner” will be introduced, because the big growth step of last August (increase from 5 to 9 members) must be consolidated and in the current geopolitical environment it is an advantage to be smaller and more flexible.
What can be considered certain: BRICS has evolved from an economic association to a geopolitical entity. In times of conflict, such an economic community must secure itself geopolitically. It is very possible that the SCO, a security policy organization, will move closer to BRICS or even merge with it.
From an economic perspective, the biggest challenge for BRICS is to create an efficient payment or settlement system independent of the US dollar. At present, most trade activities within BRICS are settled in local currencies, but no solution has yet been found for settling trade deficits among the members. A lot is being written and rumored, but the Russians and Chinese are keeping their cards close to their chests on this matter. We will hopefully be able to comment on this before the summit begins.
In the next part, we will provide the latest figures on BRICS. The fact that BRICS is the big economic magnet of the Global South can be anticipated. Over 50 countries want to join and this would create an organization that would outshine everything that has ever existed, because BRICS is already stronger than the G7 in terms of all important parameters.
Conclusion
What the death throes of a hegemon look like is currently being demonstrated to the global public in all its gruesome detail. An unbelievable number of people are dying, genocide is once again considered acceptable in the West, the media are becoming drivers of hatred, concealing objectively important developments and lying through their teeth. “Friends” (better: vassals) are sent into the fire for ‘the good cause’. Their own population is lied to and economically ruined. It is becoming increasingly difficult for the hard-hit empire to credibly convey the noble slogans of “freedom”, “democracy” and “prosperity” to its people.
Being able to develop in an orderly and free manner in such an adverse environment is a huge challenge for an organization like BRICS. This organization, which was launched as a purely economic association, was originally designed to assert itself in free competition. Today, hatred, sanctions and wars are being used as a means to put an end to this organization. A loose economic alliance is becoming a geopolitical alliance and, in the event of further escalation, has every chance of becoming a military alliance.
I am not an augur, but I would not be surprised if BRICS adopts a strategy of resilience rather than growth and flexibility rather than size. We will know more on October 24.
Tyler Durden
Wed, 10/16/2024 - 23:25
Published:10/16/2024 11:18:27 PM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post paperback bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:10/16/2024 7:44:15 AM
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[Markets]
Synthetic Versus Natural Caffeine And How Each May Affect Aging
Synthetic Versus Natural Caffeine And How Each May Affect Aging
Authored by Vance Voetberg via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
From Starbucks to Red Bull to Coke, caffeine has become an energy bump for 75 percent of Americans who consume it on a daily basis. Many count it as the spark that ignites their brains and bodies to get through a long day.
However, not all caffeine presents itself the same, according to emerging research demonstrating that synthetic caffeine may accelerate aging while naturally occurring caffeine could slow age-related decline.
Does Synthetic Caffeine Accelerate Aging?
The type of caffeine in your coffee may play a role in its protective effect against aging.
About 60 percent of the caffeine consumed by Americans is synthesized in a lab, meaning it doesn’t come from natural sources such as coffee beans or tea plants. Synthetic caffeine is what popular companies such as Pepsi, Coke, and Red Bull add to their beverages to give their drinks an extra kick.
In a 2017 study published in Nutrition & Metabolism, higher caffeine intake was associated with shorter telomeres, a marker of cellular aging, in adults. However, increased coffee consumption was linked to longer telomeres. This suggests that compounds beyond caffeine may provide anti-aging effects.
“On the surface, it might be assumed that caffeine intake and coffee consumption are essentially the same variable,” the researchers wrote. “They are not.”
These findings echo earlier ones that greater coffee consumption was associated with longer telomeres among 4,780 female nurses in the United Kingdom.
However, a 2023 study published in Nutrients found instant coffee to be negatively associated with telomere length, potentially because of higher DNA-damaging mineral lead content. Standard filtered coffee showed no adverse effect.
Research also indicates that green tea could protect against telomere shortening, while synthetic caffeine indicated DNA damage. The authors of a study investigating green tea, coffee, and caffeine from soft drinks reported findings that might help inform drink choice.
“We suggest beneficial effects of green tea consumption and potentially disadvantageous effects of soft drink consumption on LTL [leukocyte telomere length] shortening, which may reflect accelerated biological aging,” they wrote.
Coffee and Tea’s Anti-Aging Secrets
Multiple antioxidant compounds present in coffee and tea likely contribute to their anti-aging effects, according to some research.
Studies show that coffee and tea protect DNA integrity and reduce oxidative damage. In one randomized controlled study involving 50 men and 50 women, dark roast coffee reduced DNA damage by 23 percent in just four weeks. Similar results were identified in a separate eight-week interventional study that included 96 adults.
“Caffeine that is found in coffee or tea exists in a matrix of over 1,000 other chemical compounds, most notably polyphenolic compounds that have potent antioxidant effects,” David Wiss, who holds a doctorate in public health and is a registered dietitian nutritionist, told The Epoch Times. Polyphenols are known to reduce oxidative stress by scavenging free radicals that can cause cellular damage, he added. For this reason, he said, both coffee and tea have anti-inflammatory properties that “isolated caffeine does not offer.”
Although coffee and tea have demonstrated protective effects against neurogenerative conditions such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s, some research shows that isolated caffeine fails to protect against neurodegeneration. Coffee may still be the best source of caffeine to protect against Alzheimer’s disease because of a component in it that synergizes with caffeine to enhance protection against disease progression.
How Much Is Too Much Caffeine?
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recommends consuming no more than 400 milligrams of caffeine, the amount in four to five cups of coffee, daily.
Whereas a naturally caffeinated food such as chocolate contains about 12 milligrams of caffeine, and beverages such as coffee and tea contain up to 95 milligrams of natural caffeine per serving, energy drinks can contain as much as 300 grams of synthetic caffeine per serving.
This spike in caffeine content has been associated with heart attacks in young people, but some studies show that coffee and tea have cardioprotective effects.
But even with these reported benefits from coffee and tea, some experts advise caution.
The United States’ dependence on caffeine—both natural and synthetic—reflects an “addiction crisis” that is problematic, according to Mr. Wiss. “Our society is too reliant on caffeine as a stimulant,” he said.
He recommends eating breakfast before ingesting caffeine and waiting 60 to 90 minutes after waking before indulging in caffeinated beverages or other sources of caffeine.
“My other recommendation is to take a three-day (or longer) break from caffeine every three to six months,” he said.
Tyler Durden
Wed, 10/16/2024 - 03:30
Published:10/16/2024 3:09:02 AM
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[Markets]
Autism Spectrum Disorder: Symptoms, Causes, Treatments, And Natural Approaches
Autism Spectrum Disorder: Symptoms, Causes, Treatments, And Natural Approaches
Authored by Mercura Wang via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD), or just autism, is a neurological and developmental condition that affects social interaction, communication, learning, and behavior. It encompasses a range of conditions related to brain development.
Globally, around 1 percent of children have autism. In the United States, however, one in 36 children and one in 45 adults have autism, with the condition affecting around 4 percent of boys and 1 percent of girls. The prevalence is up from one in 44 in 2020 and has almost tripled since 2000 when it was one in 150.
“On the spectrum” refers to individuals who share core characteristics of autism while recognizing that each person’s autistic experience is unique, complex, and can change over time.
Thinking about autism as on a linear spectrum can be misleading, as it suggests a person can have “more” or “less” autism, leading to oversimplified labels such as “higher” or “lower functioning.” Instead, autism is better understood as a range of diverse traits, strengths, and challenges that vary for each individual.
Early Signs
The first signs of autism typically appear in early childhood and can be detected through screening in children as young as 12 months old or as old as 24 months. However, the condition may be missed until much later.
Early signs of ASD by age include the following:
- 6 to 12 months: Limited smiling, eye contact, or reciprocal social interactions; diminished babbling or gestures; and reduced response to name
- 9 to 12 months: Repetitive behaviors (e.g., spinning and lining up objects) and unusual play (intense focus on toys’ visual or tactile features)
- 12 to 18 months: Lack of single words, compensatory gestures (e.g., pointing), and pretend play; and limited joint attention (initiating and sharing interests)
- 15 to 24 months: Little to no spontaneous two-word phrases
Signs and Symptoms
The following are common behaviors observed in individuals with ASD. While not all autistic individuals exhibit every behavior, most will show several traits. Some of these behaviors can also occur in people without ASD.
Social interactions:
- Minimal or inconsistent eye contact with others
- Appearing disinterested or inattentive when others are speaking
- Rarely sharing enthusiasm or feelings about objects or activities
- Avoiding physical affection and preferring solitary play, often withdrawing into their own world
- Not responding or taking a long time to respond when called by name
- Limited or delayed speech or loss of previously acquired words
- Struggling with the give-and-take aspect of conversations
- Echoing words or phrases without grasping their meaning
- Having trouble comprehending basic questions or instructions
- Relying on memorized scripted speech instead of using spontaneous language
- Using pronouns incorrectly, such as saying “you” instead of “I” or “me” when referring to themselves
- Talking extensively about specific topics without recognizing others’ disinterest or allowing them to contribute
- Using facial expressions and gestures that are inconsistent with their verbal messages
- Exhibiting an unusual voice quality, such as a sing-song or monotone
- Struggling to grasp others’ perspectives or anticipate their behavior
- Showing little emotional expression and appearing unaware of others’ emotions or exhibiting abnormal expressions of empathy
- Struggling to understand nonverbal cues such as body language or tone of voice
- Not developing close personal relationships, especially outside the family
- Lack of speech, in severe cases
- Taking things very literally, such as not understanding sarcasm or expressions such as “it’s raining cats and dogs”
Restrictive or repetitive behaviors:
- Stimming (self-stimulating behaviors), which involves repetitive body movements or the manipulation of objects. While common among autistic individuals, it is a behavior that nearly everyone exhibits in some form, such as nail biting. For autistic people, stimming can occasionally interfere with daily life or cause harm but often serves as a coping mechanism for managing sensory overload or stressful situations.
- Establishing rigid routines or rituals and becoming upset with even minor changes.
- Experiencing coordination issues or displaying unusual movement patterns, such as clumsiness, toe-walking, or exaggerated body language.
- Displaying severe tantrums or emotional outbursts.
- Fixating on a single topic or activity or maintaining a deep, enduring interest in particular subjects such as numbers or facts.
- Showing limited attention span.
- Picky eating, such as preferring only a few foods or avoiding certain textures.
- Showing heightened or diminished sensitivity to sensory stimuli such as light, sound, clothing, or temperature.
- Developing an intense attachment to specific inanimate objects.
- Having highly specialized and sometimes unusual interests (e.g., intense fascination with vacuum cleaners).
People on the autism spectrum often have notable strengths, such as the ability to learn and retain detailed information, strong visual and auditory learning skills, and excellence in memory, math, science, music, or art. They may also notice subtle details, patterns, smells, or sounds that others may overlook.
Autism Signs in Females
Autism symptoms in women and girls may be different from those in males. According to the DSM-5-TR, autistic females may exhibit:
- Enhanced reciprocal conversation skills
- Improved understanding of verbal and nonverbal communication
- Greater ability to adapt their behavior to different situations
- Less noticeable repetitive behaviors
- More socially accepted special interests (e.g., celebrities)
Research indicates that females are more likely to mask their autism symptoms to fit in than males. They may stay close to peers and move in and out of activities, regardless of engagement status.
Research indicates autism arises from a combination of genetic and environmental factors, as well as abnormal brain development.
Genetics
Genetic factors are believed to contribute 40 percent to 80 percent of autism risk. Over 1,000 genes have been linked to ASD, although many associations remain unconfirmed. Common gene variations may increase ASD risk, but most have a small individual effect, and not everyone with these variations develops ASD.
In about 2 percent to 4 percent of cases, rare gene mutations or chromosomal abnormalities are a direct cause, as with ADNP syndrome, also known as Helsmoortel-Van der Aa syndrome (HVDAS). Some other genes whose rare mutations are associated with autism include ARID1B, ASH1L, CHD2, CHD8, DYRK1A, POGZ, SHANK3, and SYNGAP1. Many ASD-associated genes play roles in brain development or regulate other genes or proteins.
In some children, autism may be linked to a genetic condition such as fragile X syndrome or Down syndrome.
Brain Development
Research suggests that during brain development, individuals with ASD may have an excess of neurons and overgrowth in parts of the brain’s outer layer, the cortex. Additionally, there are irregular areas where the typical structure of the cortex is disrupted. The cortex normally has six layers, formed before birth, each with specialized neurons and connections. These abnormalities are seen in the frontal and temporal lobes, regions involved in emotions, social behavior, and language. These differences are believed to contribute to the social, communication, and cognitive challenges associated with autism.
Other parts of the autistic brain that exhibit abnormalities include the cerebellum and the amygdala. However, it is unclear whether these brain changes spur autism or vice versa.
Environmental Factors
Environmental factors can range from infections and diseases to toxins and maternal health during pregnancy. They include:
- Certain diseases: An ASD subtype called childhood disintegrative disorder is associated with certain diseases, especially if it is late-onset, including subacute sclerosing panencephalitis (a chronic brain infection caused by a measles virus form), tuberous sclerosis (a genetic disorder characterized by benign tumor formation in the brain and other organs), leukodystrophy (a condition involving maldevelopment of the myelin sheath, leading to the disintegration of white matter in the brain), and lipid storage diseases (disorders where excessive fat accumulates in the brain and nervous system, causing toxicity).
- Prenatal infections: Examples include rubella and cytomegalovirus infections.
- Maternal immune conditions: Maternal immune conditions increase autism risk in children. A 2020 study found that maternal asthma was the most frequently reported in mothers of children with ASD. Autistic boys were more likely to have mothers with a history of immune conditions than girls with ASD.
- Prenatal exposure to air pollution: Exposure to PM2.5 (particulate matter that is 2.5 micrometers or smaller in diameter) during the first two trimesters of pregnancy was linked to a higher risk of ASD in children, especially boys.
- Exposure to toxins in the womb: Being exposed to toxins (e.g., heavy metals) or medications (e.g., antidepressants, valproic acid, and thalidomide) while in the womb or in early childhood could raise the risk of autism.
- Lower levels of manganese and zinc.
- Maternal diabetes and obesity: Maternal preexisting Type 2 diabetes, Type 1 diabetes, and gestational diabetes diagnosed by 26 weeks of pregnancy are linked to a higher risk of ASD in children. A 2016 study found that children born to obese women with diabetes are over three times more likely to be diagnosed with autism compared to children of mothers with a healthy weight and no diabetes.
- Birth complications: Preterm birth may increase the risk of ASD, with a higher risk associated with greater levels of prematurity. Challenges during birth resulting in episodes of oxygen deprivation to the baby’s brain can also increase the risk.
- Assisted reproductive technology: A 2017 study suggested that the use of assisted reproductive technology (e.g., in vitro fertilization) may be associated with an increased risk of autism in children.
- Paternal cannabis use: A 2019 study found that a gene linked to autism, DLGAP2, can change in the sperm of men who use cannabis. These changes in the gene’s DNA could be passed down to future children, possibly affecting their autism risk.
Childhood Vaccines
Although authoritative organizations such as the World Health Organization (WHO), the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) assure parents that there is no link between childhood vaccines and autism, some scientists call for further study.
Read more here...
Tyler Durden
Tue, 10/15/2024 - 21:45
Published:10/15/2024 9:02:27 PM
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[145b4449-eb6d-5035-ada8-13d04b3035a3]
'DWTS' Brooks Nader steps out in a sheer dress for girls night with Ellie Goulding
"Dancing with the Stars" contestant Books Nader wore a revealing dress during her girls night out with musician and singer, Ellie Goulding. Nader was seen in a sheer purple dress on Saturday night.
Published:10/14/2024 10:33:08 AM
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[145b4449-eb6d-5035-ada8-13d04b3035a3]
'DWTS' Brooks Nader steps out in a sheer dress for girls night with Ellie Golding
"Dancing with the Stars" contestant Books Nader wore a revealing dress during her girls night out with musician and singer, Ellie Golding. Nader was seen in a sheer purple dress on Saturday night.
Published:10/13/2024 7:06:05 PM
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[Markets]
Globalists Are Taking The Mask Off And That's A Bad Sign...
Globalists Are Taking The Mask Off And That's A Bad Sign...
Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.us,
Remember the last time the globalists took the mask off? It wasn’t that long ago, but some people might have already forgotten how the western world almost lost all individual freedom under the guise of an over-hyped health emergency. When globalists are honest about what they truly want, it usually coincides with an engineered calamity.
In the two years since the failure of the covid pandemic narrative I have argued that globalist organizations are trying to regroup under a new plan. The evidence suggests that these people suffered a shocking revelation after their attempt to implement perpetual medical tyranny. They’ve realized they don’t have as much control over the flow of information and public discourse as they originally assumed.
Even with full-spectrum censorship using algorithms to bury contrary data, even with the full force of the government partnering with social media to silence dissent, even with the threat of economic exile for anyone refusing to take a steady series of mRNA jabs, they still failed. The truth about covid’s minimal Infection Fatality Rate (IFR) still spread, along with data proving the uselessness of the mandates and lockdowns. There was nothing they could do about it.
Their golden ticket to total control was pushing the vaccine passport concept; the alternative media crushed that agenda like a pestilent cockroach. If the passport had been successful we would not be having this conversation now. Everyone would be in fear of having their passport rescinded. Everyone would be afraid to lose their economic access for saying the wrong thing. Everyone would be afraid of being forced into covid camps (which were indeed a real agenda). Or, we would be in the middle of a bloody civil war.
The events of 2020 were meant to initiate the ultimate coup against humanity. The globalists admitted to their plans over and over again. Klaus Schwab and the World Economic Forum proudly declared covid the catalyst for the “Great Reset” and the “Fourth Industrial Revolution.” They asserted that the lockdowns were just the beginning and that the sweeping restriction on our freedoms would be extended to climate change as well.
They thought they had won without firing a shot, but it’s not that easy. Far more people are awake and aware of their motives than they realized, and, at least in America, over 50 million of those people are armed. The lockdowns are now gone, almost no one took the vax boosters, far fewer people took the vaccine than the CDC claims, and the vax passports were defeated. This victory was made possible due to the efforts of alternative media platforms circumventing Big Tech censorship. It’s that simple.
This is why the next event will probably be far worse in scale and consequence, and the globalists are already attempting to rectify their previous mistake of underestimating citizen journalism. They will try to silence us if they can and they are openly admitting to it in recent conferences and mainstream articles. The mask is coming off once more and this suggests to me that something very bad is about to happen.
As I noted in 2023 in my article ‘From Covid To Climate Change: Vehicles For Global Authoritarianism’, the globalists seem to have shifted their more tyrannical efforts away from the pandemic and into the climate discourse. If you really want to know what they are up to these days, you have to watch the climate conferences.
At the end of September there was a host of climate change summits including one held by the WEF in New York called the Sustainable Development Impact Meeting. It was held by the WEF in tandem with the United Nations General Assembly. Not surprisingly, discussion often veered away from climate into “threats to democracy” as well as bitter complaints about the “spread of disinformation.”
John Kerry, former Democratic presidential candidate, former Climate Czar under Joe Biden and a longtime participant in the WEF, said the quiet part out loud at the summit. He argued that the 1st Amendment was a “roadblock” to proper governance and was preventing the elites from controlling public consensus.
His statements are quite blatant.
First of all, consensus is highly overrated and often poisonous. The very basis of science is that it is always up for debate according to the evidence. Once you have forced a “consensus” you have abandoned all due diligence under the scientific method.
This was made obvious during covid, where the “consensus” was exposed as utterly fabricated and most of the claims made by governments and puppet “medical experts” have been proven false. Keep in mind, these were the same people that tried to ban YOU from going to parks and waterboarding at the beach in the name of “flattening the curve.”
I mean, how retarded do you have to be to believe that outdoor activities will lead to viral transmission? That’s not science, that’s hysteria promoted by people claiming to represent science. The same thing goes for the mask mandates, social distancing, the lockdowns, etc. Not one measure they enforced was legitimate.
If we are talking about the concept of man-made climate change, the claim of consensus in science is a lie. The data suggests there is simply no such thing as man-made climate change. There is no evidence of causation between carbon emissions and global warming. No evidence that global warming causes extreme whether. No evidence that our current warming cycle is significant or unique compared to any other warming cycle in history.
In fact, the Washington Post recently and accidentally proved the alternative media’s point on climate change when they tried to map the temperature history of the Earth over 450 million years, only to discover what I have been saying for the longest time – Today’s temps are far lower than they have been through most of the Earth’s history.
But the more important issue here is John Kerry’s assertion that governance requires public information control. Kerry’s fundamental disconnect is his notion that it’s the job of the elites and the government to moderate information for the greater good. No one gave them permission to do this. The government does not exist to create consensus.
The people are in charge, John. As a politician you are just a public servant, nothing more. Your opinions on free speech don’t matter.
Some of the most egregious disinformation is often released to the public by the government and their approved media sources in the name of “saving democracy.” They lie constantly. John Kerry is just angry because now the public has the means to expose him and his cohorts. If a “democracy” requires censorship in order to survive, then it’s not worth saving.
Finally and hypocritically, Kerry suggests that democracy is “too slow” in implementing the changes to society that he views as necessary to create consensus and “unity.” If the 1st Amendment is a “roadblack” to more effective information control and governance, then he and his slimy brethren must intend to remove it. In other words, he believes tyranny would work better because it’s much faster that trying to manipulate the public with propaganda.
He doesn’t explicitly say this, but that’s exactly what he’s inferring.
Besides some of the speeches made by Klaus Schwab at the height of the pandemic, Kerry’s statements might be the most open declaration of globalist authoritarian intent I have ever heard. He’s pulling the mask off and this has me concerned.
His arguments fall in line with a number of articles published in the past couple months from establishment media platforms. The New Yorker just posted an article asking ‘Is It Time To Torch The Constitution?’ The New York Times published a treatise titled ‘The Constitution Is Sacred. Is It Also Dangerous?’ They also wrote an article highlighting the potential positives of despotic governments in countries like Brazil threatening to shut down public access to Elon Musk’s X (Twitter) in order to force the site to censor citizen accounts. These people are on a war path to convince the public that free speech is a threat.
When political elitists and their lackey’s start attacking free speech it’s usually in preparation for a major crisis that they hope to use as a vehicle to eliminate public freedoms. Free speech is the most important liberty because it enables the populace to discern through debate what the truth is and what to do about it.
The globalists thought they had a lock on information during covid and they were wrong. They won’t make the same mistake again. Whatever the next crisis ends up being, they will definitely seek to silence the the alternative media and any rebellious social media platforms before they move forward.
* * *
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Tyler Durden
Thu, 10/10/2024 - 23:25
Published:10/10/2024 11:34:33 PM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post hardcover bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:10/9/2024 7:06:32 AM
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[Gear]
9 Best Prime Day Kindle Deals and Accessories (2024)
Tired of carrying around physical books? Our favorite Kindles are on sale during Prime Day Big Deals, which ends tonight.
Published:10/9/2024 6:04:59 AM
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[Markets]
Russia Tacitly Recognizes China's Self-Proclaimed Status As A "Near-Arctic State"
Russia Tacitly Recognizes China's Self-Proclaimed Status As A "Near-Arctic State"
Authored by Andrew Korybko via Substack,
CNN reported last week that “China’s Coast Guard claims to have entered the Arctic Ocean for the first time as it ramps up security ties with Russia”, though at the time of writing, neither the Russian nor American Coast Guards confirmed their presence in the Arctic. CNN also noted that TASS’ report on this only cited the China Coast Guard’s (CCG) statement on its WeChat page. It’s therefore dubious whether the CCG actually entered the Arctic or just remained in the Bering Sea.
This distinction is important since the perception that Sino-Russo Coast Guard drills were just carried out in the Arctic, no matter how possibly inaccurate as clarified by CNN to its credit, could fuel the West’s efforts to contain Russia along that front. It also adds false credence to the artificially manufactured speculation that Russia is willing to cede sovereignty rights there to China after becoming disproportionately dependent on it over the past two years since the special operation began.
About that, readers should be aware of several relevant pieces of Russian legislation for governing its Arctic maritime territory. A 2017 law banned shipping oil, natural gas, and coal along the Northern Sea Route (NSR) under a foreign flag, while a 2018 one mandates that these ships will also have to be built in Russia. These were complemented by a 2022 law stipulating that all foreign warships must require prior permission to transit the NSR, and only one can do so at a time. These three laws remain on the books.
Their purpose is to ensure that Russia profits as much as is realistically possible from the NSR and can properly protect its sovereignty there. China poses no threat to Russian sovereignty, but allowing its warships to operate unrestricted within Russia’s territorial waters could raise the chances of an incident at sea with its Western Arctic rivals, especially the US. There’s also no reason for them to be there anyhow since Russia is more than capable of ensuring security along this route on its own.
The same can be said for the CCG seeing as how the Arctic is obviously far away from the Chinese coast, but it’s possible in theory that those of its icebreakers that already entered these waters for the first time over the summer could be escorted by the CCG as they lead the way for commercial vessels. If that happens, then this would likely be coordinated with Russia as part of a signal to the West as intuited by what head of the new Maritime Board Nikolai Patrushev hinted at in an interview over the summer.
This could possibly be preceded by formal naval drills in the Arctic Ocean, once again for the same purpose of sending a signal to the West, albeit a misleading one since China isn’t an Arctic naval power and it also has no mutual defense commitments to Russia like such a stunt might make some think. Those aforementioned false perceptions would be deliberately fanned in these scenarios for sending a signal to the West despite the likelihood that it would be exploited to fuel containment along this front.
Russia might conclude that there’s nothing that it can do to stop these developments anyhow so it’s therefore better to play along with these perceptions in order to boost its soft power across the Global South by making these countries think that it and China are jointly countering the West in the Arctic. Even in that case, however, Russia will remain the senior partner in this aspect of its relationship since it’s an actual Arctic state while China claims to only be a so-called “near-Arctic” one.
China’s policy is meant to ensure it a seat at the table in multilateral discussions about that body of water through which it plans to expand trade with Europe via the NSR. This is the natural evolution of its desire to play a greater role in global governance in general and specifically in all emerging frontiers like the Arctic, AI, climate change, etc. The CCG’s drills with their Russian counterparts there, even if they were only in the Bering Sea, reinforces its claim as a “near-Arctic state” due to its adjacency to the Arctic.
Russia tacitly supports this claim as proven by the above, but it remains unclear whether it’s comfortable with China playing a role in Arctic governance, which Russia is reluctant to internationalize since it fears that this could lead to more pressure to curtail the sovereignty rights that it enshrined into law there. All countries want to cut costs on trade so there’s no reason why China wouldn’t want its own natural gas, oil, and coal ships to sail along the NSR instead of having to contract Russia’s for this task.
To avoid any misunderstanding, nothing is being implied about an impending problem in their strategic partnership over this issue since all that’s being put forth is that they have natural differences over this issue, though they’ve thus far been responsibly managed and there’s no reason to expect this to change. Sino-Russo cooperation in the Arctic is indisputably on pace to continue, including in the security dimension, though energy and logistical cooperation are expected to remain the drivers of this trend.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 10/08/2024 - 23:25
Published:10/8/2024 10:39:13 PM
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[Markets]
California Faces Wave Of Lawsuits Over Gender Identity Notification In Schools
California Faces Wave Of Lawsuits Over Gender Identity Notification In Schools
Authored by Brad Jones via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
A mother’s tears of worry and frustration over her 17-year-old daughter’s secret social gender transition at school tell the story of what many parents are facing in California schools.
“I cry every day, not only for my daughter but for the parents that are now contacting me about their kids,” one Los Angeles County mom told The Epoch Times on the condition of anonymity to protect her daughter’s identity.
Under the pseudonym, Lena, she said her daughter, Hannah—also a pseudonym—suffered from gender dysphoria and was secretly socially transitioned at school.
Lena is one of several parents representing nine families that joined a lawsuit filed by the City of Huntington Beach against state officials over a new law that bans parental notification policies, effectively prohibiting school staff from revealing social gender transitions of students to their parents without the child’s consent.
California is the only state to enact such a law.
Unbeknown to her parents, Hannah began secretly identifying as “trans” in 2020, when she was 13, after spending a lot of time on social media platforms.
She was homeschooled until the ninth grade when she attended public high school and is now in her senior year.
In 2021, as Lena was cleaning her daughter’s bedroom, she was shocked to find a sketchbook that contained Hannah’s drawings depicting self-mutilation, suicide ideation, and the bloody aftermath of gender transition surgeries.
“I’m going through her books, and I see very disturbing pictures of her bloody body cut up, saying, ‘I need to come out. I need to pick a name, and I need to tell my parents I’m trans. I want to be on testosterone. I want top surgery,’” Lena said.
She knew something was seriously wrong, and wanted to talk with Hannah but said it took a few weeks to find the right words and broach the sensitive subject.
“I told her what I found and that we love her, and we don’t care what sexual orientation she is as she grows into herself, but she’s not trans,” Lena said.
Lena told her daughter she is female down to her DNA chromosomes and that she and her husband will only call her by her birth name, she said.
After the talk, Hannah agreed to not use the male name—only her birth name—at school, but at the end of the school year when students’ work was showcased online for parents to see, Lena noticed a male name on a biology assignment.
At the start of the academic year, school staff had asked Hannah for her preferred name and pronouns and began socially transitioning her to a male name and identity, Lena said.
According to the complaint, the principal allegedly pulled Hannah aside for a meeting to tell her that school staff were not allowed to tell her parents about the social transition.
As she entered tenth grade in 2022, teachers and administrators continued referring to Hannah by a male name, and Lena was repeatedly denied meetings with the school principal to discuss the situation, so Lena began speaking out at school board meetings. By the end of the school year, the school district agreed to inform Lena if her daughter ever resumed using a male name.
The next year, Hannah again used a masculine name, prompting the principal to arrange a meeting with Lena. Then, after repeated communications from Lena’s attorney and a written statement signed by Hannah agreeing to use her legal name and female pronouns, the school agreed to stop calling Hannah by a male name and pronouns, Lena said.
But Lena said she fears that once California’s Assembly Bill 1955 goes into effect in January, “it will undermine her hard-won contractual rights, her parental rights, and her ability to protect her daughter,” according to the complaint.
“If I had known that they socially transition kids at school behind parents back, I would have never put her in public school,” Lena said. “I will never give up on her or any child. ... She is my child—not the school’s, the state’s, or this country’s.”
Hannah no longer identifies as “trans,” Lena said.
Public Pushback
Assembly Bill (AB) 1955, also known as the Support Academic Futures and Educators for Today’s Youth (SAFETY) Act, which is set to take effect Jan. 1, 2025, bans “parental notification policies,” which have been enacted by more than a dozen California school districts.
Controversy over AB 1955 made national headlines when Elon Musk, whose son identifies as a transgender woman, called the new law “the final straw” when Gov. Gavin Newsom signed the bill into law in mid-July.
Musk vowed to move the headquarters of his companies SpaceX and social media platform X out of state to Texas.
In the Huntington Beach and parents’ case against Newsom, Attorney General Rob Bonta, and State Superintendent of Public Schools Tony Thurmond, Lena is referred to as “1A” and Hannah is called “1C.”
Mayor Gracey Van Der Mark told The Epoch Times the city—which declared itself a “Parents’ Right to Know” city in September—decided to sue the state to assist parents who want to overturn the state law.
“We have no jurisdiction over schools, but we represent everyone in the City of Huntington Beach, including the parents,” Van Der Mark said. “It’s about our parental rights and the state chipping away at [them] and trying to raise our children for us.”
Van Der Mark, elected to the city council in 2022, said defending parental rights is what led her into politics. She said parents have told her their children were exposed to material in schools that forced them to have discussions about sex and gender ideology before they were ready.
Schools are now having these conversations with children at younger and younger ages, she said.
“Whether it’s gender or whether it’s depression, anxiety, it is our right as parents to handle these issues, and that’s been taken from us,” Van Der Mark said.
The state doesn’t have to like the way parents raise their children, but it’s bound by law to respect parental authority, she said.
“To us, it’s about … protecting our children before it’s too late—before they go out and mutilate their bodies,” she said.
Burdening teachers who don’t have counseling or psychiatric credentials with the “huge responsibility” of dealing with issues as serious as gender dysphoria also isn’t fair and puts them in a “bad situation,” Van Der Mark said.
Proponents of AB 1955 said that notifying parents without a child’s consent is a “forced outing,” and puts children who identify as transgender at risk of abuse and suicide.
Van Der Mark questioned the argument.
“Who exactly do you think you’re outing them to?” she asked.
If a boy wants to identify as a girl, changes his name and wears a dress to school, and other children tell their parents who then tell the neighbors, the only ones kept in the dark are the boy’s parents, she said.
“You’re not really outing them to anyone, because everyone is going to know except the parents,” she said.
The legal complaint states that according to the American Psychiatric Association’s (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition, gender dysphoria is a mental health disorder, and as such, parents should be notified.
The new state law sets no age limit on banning parental notification, so “schools cannot notify parents even if preschoolers socially transition,” the complaint states.
The law also prevents schools from disciplining staff who initiate or facilitate social gender transitioning, “which courts have recognized is a type of medical intervention or treatment,” the lawsuit argues.
“A child with gender dysphoria often has other mental health issues. To help their child, parents need to know what is going on,” the complaint states.
“Imagine the outrage if parents were kept in the dark about a child’s epileptic seizures at school and the treatment being provided that child by school employees for that condition.”
State Response
Newsom, Bonta, and Thurmond did not respond to specific requests for comment about the Huntington Beach lawsuit and other related court cases.
“While we are unable to comment on ongoing litigation, Attorney General Bonta is committed to providing his unwavering support to ensure every student has the right to learn and thrive in a school environment that promotes safety, privacy, and inclusivity,” the attorney general’s office stated in an email to the Epoch Times.
Bonta’s office highlighted a January legal alert issued by his office notifying education officials and institutions that “forced outing policies” violate the California Constitution and state laws prohibiting discrimination and safeguarding students’ right to privacy.
“The SAFETY Act,” Bonta said in an emailed statement in July, “reaffirms that forced outing policies and any form of retaliation against teachers, parents, and allies who protect students against such constitutional and statutory harms are a clear violation of state law.”
The attorney general commended the LGBTQ Caucus for prioritizing the bill “to ensure no student is ever forcibly outed against their will, especially when such disclosure could result in serious harm.”
In July, Thurmond also celebrated the signing of AB 1955.
“I am proud to work alongside our legislators who have courageously championed the privacy rights of our most vulnerable students, and whose partnership has helped ensure that this bill made it to the Governor’s desk for signing,” he said in a statement.
Read more here...
Tyler Durden
Tue, 10/08/2024 - 17:00
Published:10/8/2024 4:11:50 PM
|
[Gear]
9 Best Prime Day Kindle Deals and Accessories (2024)
Tired of carrying around physical books? Our favorite Kindles are on sale during Prime Day Big Deals.
Published:10/8/2024 2:56:34 PM
|
[Markets]
Vance Made The Case For Erudition
Vance Made The Case For Erudition
Authored by Jeffrey A. Tucker via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
The day before the Vance/Walz vice presidential debate, I was having lunch with a gentleman with an old-world education, certainly of the highest levels, but just Brooklyn public schools in the old days. He is not a credentialed intellectual in any official sense but it was fascinating to hear him speak about almost anything, even when we disagreed.
He mentioned in passing that he can hardly have a conversation with anyone under 40 these days. This is not because they are stupid or inexperienced. It is because they do not speak properly. They cannot seem to form sentences coherently. They are not adept at normal communication. The language they speak is not anything like standard English and neither is it some charming slang.
The new language is something else, born of purely oral transmission and heavily informed by influencer culture and podcasting. Buzzwords are thrown around everywhere as a replacement for actual language. The vocabulary is small, including the incessant use of “literally,” “so,” “annoying,” and “actually.”
There are repeated words that grate on one’s nerves: “go” instead of said or did, “you know” and “know what I’m saying?” as a random filler, ending most sentences with “right?” plus the worst offender: the incessant deployment of the word “like,” often every 4 or 5 words.
This prattle is embedded in a lyrical formulation that includes three crucial elements: nasal sonorities, raising intonation, followed by an ending vocal fry. Every bit of combination conveys an attitude of “nothing matters,” “I don’t care,” and “to make sure you don’t criticize me, I’m making sure that my words mean as little as possible.”
Yes, I’ve noticed all this, and it is getting worse. English is being replaced by something else entirely. Sitting on a train a few weeks ago, I had people in front, behind, and to the side who were all deploying this strange language. They spoke incessantly the entire trip, and said nothing at all of any meaning.
I simply cannot understand why this is happening. It strikes me as highly dangerous for a culture to lose its language and have it replaced by a series of pidgin utterances that are vague, strange, and largely without content.
What proved so striking about JD Vance’s performance in the debate was the full rejection of this entire way of speaking. Even apart from his content, logic, and command of facts was the erudition itself. That’s what commanded the evening. It caused his points to soar above his opponent and also the hectoring moderators who were reading from scripts.
I hope millions of young people listened in but they should recognize something here. He won the evening not only because of the points he had to make. He won because of the clear way that he made them. Even now, and probably especially now, erudition inspires trust and credibility.
Even as the debate opened, Vance’s opponent punctuated his stream of filler with various sounds of uhhh, which already prepared the listener to disregard the rest.
As Vance took his turn, we got clear English with no filler words or verbal tics at all. His elocution and vocabulary were such a relief! It served as a reminder of they way Americans used to speak before the digital age.
Most times, it is not obvious what distinguishes a compelling answer from one that is not. We tend to think it is about facts or charm or some attitude of joy. It is not. All those evaporate when countered with a clean and meaningful presentation of ideas, with sentences that start and stop with an intuitive cadence and no superfluous extras thrown in to distract.
Here is a secret you will never learn in school and no one will tell you: this kind of erudition is vital and essential to success in absolutely everything. It does not matter your profession or area of specialization. Those who can speak clearly and without fluff will be more successful than those who cannot.
It’s not obvious that the under 40 set that speaks the language we might call “influencer” understands that the habitual gibberish that has replaced English is professionally disastrous for them. Absolutely no one really wants to hear it. It’s awful and once you really take note of the mechanics of this language, the words themselves become sources of grave irritation.
Maybe this is why noise-canceling earbuds have become so popular!
Even now, nothing replaces coherent and cohesive language and vibrant and confident elocution.
At some point in the past, I had somehow picked up the “like” virus. When I realized it was happening, I simply worked on deleting it from my conversations. When I said it, I would give myself a mental pinch. It worked. By day’s end, it was gone. Even now, I do have to concentrate a bit to keep it out of conversation. When you are speaking with someone who deploys it constantly, it can creep into your own language when you do not realize it.
The same strategy can be used for the other problematic tics that festoon contemporary language. Carving them away is like making a sculpture: leave only what matters and then you are in a better position to evaluate the quality of what you are saying. I personally still have a problem with saying “you know” too often, a habit I picked up from a British friend many years ago. It’s a constant struggle to purge it, and when I fail to be conscious of the problem it comes back.
Beyond culling the gibberish, what else can you do?
First, before you speak in answer to any question, simply take a second or two to think about your first word. Make it matter. If you do this, you can stop with the habit of always saying “well” and “so” in front of every sentence (in fact, Vance himself could work on this). Pausing briefly also leaves a bit of space in the audible environment that directs more attention to what you are about to say.
Second, read more. And here I do not mean captions on TikTok videos. I mean actual books. Some of my favorite stylists in American English are H.L. Mencken, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, Garet Garrett, and Albert Jay Nock. You don’t need to be super fussy about this, the Harry Potter books are fantastic for young people and adults too. And try to read them out loud so that you hear new words and expand your vocabulary.
Third, try some exercises. Go to the park or the store or just take a walk, come home, and stand in front of the mirror and describe what you did, what you found, and offer an opinion. Consider videotaping yourself while you are speaking with a conscious effort toward erudition. Watch it back and critique it again.
If you do these three things, you will discover that you can upgrade your language skills in a matter of days. Constant practice will give you a huge advantage over all your peers. Clear speaking is compelling in all times but especially now because it is so rare.
Laura Ingraham said of Vance’s performance that it was the finest she had seen of any political candidate in the 18 years she had covered politics. There are many reasons but the least understood and the most important one is that he speaks plainly, cleanly, coherently, and cohesively. As should we all.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 10/07/2024 - 20:55
Published:10/7/2024 8:29:29 PM
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[7d366ff2-811d-5b57-a373-905ba79316e3]
LAURA INGRAHAM: What I saw in Butler
For anyone who has covered politics over the last 30 years, it is obvious that President Trump is really the only person we have covered who truly deserves a place in the history books.
Published:10/7/2024 4:57:02 PM
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[Markets]
A Historic Short Squeeze In Oil Has Only Begun
A Historic Short Squeeze In Oil Has Only Begun
Last weekend, we warned readers that according to the latest data from Goldman Sachs, a massive short squeeze in energy stocks was on deck.
Specifically we noted that at a time when funds were the most short oil on record, the broader energy space "was the most net sold sector" on the Goldman US Prime book, "driven entirely by short sales, which outpaced long buys (6.4 to 1)."
And here, we said, was "the hint to the next mega squeeze" as the recent short selling in energy was the largest in over 5 years.
What happened next was for the history books, as Brent crude soared the most in almost two years on the back of what was a historic market imbalance with record shorts suddenly starting to run for cover...
... with the Kamala lackeys at Bloomberg going so far as to mock those who actually did the right thing and trade ahead of the inevitable squeeze as "tourists", when in reality the only tourists here are those who expected the ridiculous plunge in oil prices to persist despite Cushing approaching tank bottoms (Bloomberg's message is loud and clear: keep shorting oil unless you want to be branded a "tourist", especially since a spike in oil - and gas - prices may adversely impact its favorite presidential candidate).
Unfortunately for Bloomberg, the squeeze in energy is just getting started, and not just due to fundamentals.
Crude oil soared last week as a result of the rapidly deteriorating situation in the middle east. On Tuesday, spot month WTI and Brent rallied >5% from the lows on the initial headlines from the White House that an Iranian attack was imminent. Goldman's research desk noted on Tuesday that the jump in oil prices reflected a moderate risk premium as actual production disruptions have been limited and spare capacity remains elevated. The energy complex jumped again Thursday on news that the US was considering whether or not to support Israel’s potential retaliatory attacks against Iranian energy infrastructure.
Then, over the weekend, the bank's commodity analysts published a new report (available to pro subs) in which they tried to calculate the impact on the price of oil should Iran oil output be "limited" by Israel, to wit:
- Assuming a 2mb/d 6-month disruption to Iran supply, we estimate that Brent could temporarily rise to a peak of $90 if OPEC rapidly offsets the shortfall, and a 2025 peak in the mid $90s without an OPEC offset.
- Assuming a 1mb/d persistent disruption to Iran supply, reflecting for instance a tightening in sanctions enforcement, we estimate that Brent could reach a peak in the mid $80s if OPEC gradually offsets the shortfall, and a 2025 peak in the mid $90s without an OPEC offset.
But it's not just fundamentals: Goldman's Prime Brokerage wrote in its latest weekly must-read note (also available to pro subs) that "after heightened geopolitical tensions and rising crude oil price, HFs reversed course and net bought US Energy stocks for the first time in 7 weeks, driven almost entirely by short covers."
As a result, the US Energy long/short ratio increased +5% – the largest weekly increase in nearly 5 months – to 1.36, which is in the 69th percentile vs. the past year and 14th percentile vs. the past five years."
That said, the short overhang in energy remains staggering, and hints at a far more brutal unwind once the upward momentum persists for another week, and not only in energy stocks where the short flow on Goldman's Prime Broekrage is just shy of record highs...
... but also in the oil patch, because after oil short interest hit a record two weeks ago as traders turned the most bearish on oil they have ever been, the amount of short covering was virtually non existent, and net managed-money (i.e., hedge fund) exposure across the 4 main oil contracts (Nymex and ICE WTI, Nymex and ICE Brent), is barely above its record lows!
Putting it all together, Goldman Energy specialist Ryan Novak writes that "energy led to the upside on the week after we exited the prior week with aggressive PB selling/short selling that flipped this week, managed money positioning remains short - at all-time lows and tensions across the Middle East escalating with Israel beginning its ground invasion. E&Ps led on the week +7%. All eyes on any incremental news regarding any attack on Iranian energy infrastructure which would pose further upside risk to the commodity and equities."
Bottom line: with record shorts now painfully squeezed as upward momentum has been ignited across the energy sector, and the risk of a flashing red headline that Israel has leveled Kharg Island looming, unwind of what until a week ago was a record short position in oil and energy stocks is just getting started. And that's without Israel even doing anything. Should Israel however take the plunge and either take out Iran's oil infrastructure or, worse, target its nuclear industry, then the coming explosion in oil will make the Volkswagen short squeeze of 2008 seem like quaint amateur hour.
More in the full notes available to pro subscribers here and here.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 10/06/2024 - 22:45
Published:10/6/2024 10:22:03 PM
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[Markets]
Misinformation Doesn't Kill People - People Kill People
Misinformation Doesn't Kill People - People Kill People
Authored by Todd Hayen via off-guardian.org,
This title is intentionally a play on the pro-gun faction’s slogan “Guns Don’t Kill People, People Kill People.” At a certain time before my social awakening, I was appalled by all of the gun violence in the US and elsewhere and therefore believed restricting gun sales and use (through more stringent registration regulations) might be a good idea.
However, I never thought that particular NRA slogan was nonsense as so many of my liberal friends did. It actually rings quite true. Yes, you can still argue (as the leftists do) that if there were not as many guns lying about, people wouldn’t use them to kill other people. To me, that is a rather weak argument.
I have known many gun owners, and I must say as a group they are the most responsible people amongst my friends. The people who use guns to kill others indiscriminately are typically mentally deranged and in need of psychological intervention. So, we either reach out and come up with ways to help these people, or we remove access to guns—for everyone. Which way do you think the agenda believes we should go?
That seems to me equivalent to removing all cars so drunk people don’t have access to them to kill other people with. I know, I know…those who would wish to argue with me would say “Cars have a useful value, guns do not.” It isn’t so much taking away the guns as material objects, it is taking away the right to have them.
Until we remove all government corruption, all crime on the streets, all violent mental pathologies, and have created a utopian, all-safe, society—guns, and owning them, and respectfully learning how to use them safely, have a purpose. When that utopian idyllic society happens, we’ll talk. But I won’t hold my breath.
I digress, sorry.
So, along the same logic lines, how will censoring all speech to weed out the “misinformation” stop crimes like what happened in the UK in early August? The authoritarian position seems to be that “misinformation” is causing much of the “insane” criminal activity in the world today.
First of all, that is quite a stretch. How could anyone establish that as fact? And even if it was a fact (that “misinformation” causes violence) how would one go about removing all of it without removing all free speech? And who would be burdened with the task of differentiating “misinformation” from “real information?”
Aha. Easy to see it now, eh? (Of course, anyone reading this knows this already.)
All this misinformation crap is a ruse to give the agenda the power to shut us all up. Any time they link misinformation with a violent crime they are telling us, erroneously, that if they could just have permission to censor the hate speech, then it would take care of the problem.
I have personally never understood all the hoopla around hate speech being so damaging to society. Sure, it is rude, and sure, it can hurt people’s feelings deeply. And yes, there is a possibility it could incite some lunatic to do horrible things. But do we give up one of our fundamental freedoms due to the few whackos who will get a rise out of “hate speech” and uncontrollably wreak havoc as a result?
I say a resounding “no!” And even if that was the initial intent of censorship—to avoid a lunatic from being inspired—it simply would not work. Best to deal with the lunatic first and not trash free speech just because they think he or she (lunatic) will hear it.
But that isn’t the initial intent. We are told it is, but clearly it isn’t. In fact, I would not be surprised if most of these incidents where misinformation is blamed were intentionally set up so the agenda has something to point at (I have to be careful with this statement, I don’t want to be sued as someone else we know was for saying something similar).
Information is information. Whether it is looney or not (or hateful or not) is up to us individually to determine. We are supposed to have the faculty to do such a discernment, and not require mommy or daddy to come to our rescue and tell the big bad bully to stop hurting our feelings. And again, I am all for living in a society that does not condone hate speech, sexually or racially degrading speech, or speech inappropriate for children (within reason of course, and not by censorship!). But, in my humble opinion, we must do this in such a way that we preserve the First Amendment right to free speech. Plain and simple. There is simply no other way.
What we see going on, however, is not in our best interests. Far from it. The fight against misinformation is not a fight against hate speech, sexually degrading speech, or inappropriate speech for children as they want us to believe it is. The fight by the agenda to remove what that agenda decides is offensive, or dangerous, information is pure and simply a fight against our rights in a free society to freely exchange information.
We have been hoodwinked into thinking this fight is a noble pursuit to silence deranged and mentally ill people, who will take this information to support their heinous attack on innocent others. That is not at all what they are doing. And what they are doing is one of the oldest tricks of manipulation in the books—disguise an action as something else, and then create a false flag to justify it. “See what happened? If only that killer did not have access to that misinformation, this would have never happened.”
So, if we don’t do whatever we can to limit hate speech and the like, then what are we to do? Raise our children with character, teach them how to think, and how to discern good from bad.
Teach them to question what they read, see and hear. Raise them with good and loving hearts so hate has no place to grow within them, nor have influence on them. And what about all of us who are already raised? Teach each other.
Make an example for others to follow. Walk the talk. And make love the most important tenet of your life.
Todd Hayen PhD is a registered psychotherapist practicing in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. He holds a PhD in depth psychotherapy and an MA in Consciousness Studies. He specializes in Jungian, archetypal, psychology. Todd also writes for his own substack, which you can read here
Tyler Durden
Sun, 10/06/2024 - 22:10
Published:10/6/2024 9:48:51 PM
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[Markets]
Fear And Loathing In New Normal Germany
Fear And Loathing In New Normal Germany
Authored by CJ Hopkins via The Consent Factory,
The first rule of New Normal Germany is, you do not compare New Normal Germany to Nazi Germany. If you do that, New Normal Germany will punish you.
It will sic the Federal Criminal Police on you. It will report you to its domestic Intelligence agency. It will ban your books. It will censor your Tweets. It will prosecute you on fabricated “hate-crime” charges.
I know this, because that’s what happened to me. I broke the first rule of New Normal Germany. I compared New Normal Germany to Nazi Germany. I did it with the cover artwork of my book.
Yes, that’s a swastika on the cover. A swastika covered by a medical mask. I tweeted that artwork in 2022. The German authorities prosecuted me for that, and have convicted me for that. So, now I’m a “hate criminal,” and an “anti-Semite,” and a “trivializer of the Holocaust.”
That’s the second rule of New Normal Germany. You never, ever, display a swastika. Displaying a swastika is not “in Ordnung.” Displaying swastikas is totally “verboten.”
Unless you are the Health Minister of New Normal Germany, and you’re comparing your political opponents to the Nazis. Or unless you are a popular German celebrity, and you’re comparing the Russians and their supporters to the Nazis.
Or unless you are a mainstream magazine, and you’re comparing German populists to the Nazis.
In which case, displaying a swastika is fine. And is not “verboten.” And definitely not a “hate crime.”
And that’s the third rule of New Normal Germany. If you agree with the government, obey their orders, and parrot their propaganda, you are not a “hate criminal.” If you are the government, like an actual minister in the government, like the Minister of Health, you’re definitely not a “hate criminal.” And, if you are part of government’s propaganda apparatus, needless to say, you’re also not a “hate criminal.”
However, if you criticize the government, or if you compare the government to Nazi Germany, and if you do that using your book-cover art featuring a swastika behind a Covid mask, then you’re absolutely officially a “hate criminal,” and an “anti-Semite,” and a “trivializer of the Holocaust.”
Here’s how Das Kammergericht, Berlin’s superior or appellate court, explained that in their press release, after they overturned my acquittal in District Court:
“The swastika, one of the main symbols of the banned National Socialist Workers’ Party (NSDAP), is used here exclusively to express criticism of the federal government’s Corona policy; A clear departure from the ideals of National Socialism cannot be seen in the posts in question. The comparison of Corona measures, which are supposed to be embodied by the use of mouth-and-nose coverings, with the Nazi terror regime symbolized by the swastika represents a trivialization of National Socialism and the National Socialist genocide of millions of Jews, but not a criticism of it.”
I remember when the presiding judge read that out in court. I remember it distinctly, because the judge to her right, the bespectacled woman with the short white hair (see the photograph of the courtroom above), was glaring at me with bone-chilling hatred. We got into a staring contest, which she eventually won, because I couldn’t take it for very long. After a minute or so, I started having flashbacks of scenes from The Pianist, Roman Polanski’s film, and of the eyes of medical-mask-wearing Germans when they saw the protest message I wrote on the mask I was forced to wear in grocery stores in order to buy food during the roll-out of the “New Normal” in 2020-2022. That protest message read, “Befehl ist Befehl,” which roughly translates as “orders are orders,” and was the Nazis’ infamous defense at Nuremberg (i.e., “I was just following orders”). If you have never been surrounded by mobs of medical-mask-wearing Germans glaring at you with seething, utterly bone-chilling hatred … well, let me assure you, it is quite an experience. I experienced it, daily, for over two years.
I experienced it again in Das Kammergericht, where my acquittal, back in January, was summarily overturned at the insistence of the Berlin Public Prosecutor. Yes, they can do that in New Normal Germany.
I’m going to spare you the procedural details, and legal arguments, and descriptions of the ham-fisted anti-terror-style security protocols that Das Kammergericht ordered in effect for my trial. If you want to read about that, Aya Velázquez covered it in her recent extensive report, and Dr. Clivia von Dewitz, a German judge and expert on the Nazi-symbol-ban statutes, covered the legal questions in this article before, and this other article after, the trial. I haven’t translated that second article (as I did the first), but here’s an excerpt …
“With this decision, the German judiciary is once again moving away from the principles of a liberal democracy, which thrives on the exchange of conflicting beliefs and opinions as well as criticism of government actions. If Der Spiegel and Stern are permitted to use swastikas on their magazine covers, the same freedom must apply to those who criticize the government. When, as here, the judiciary begins to apply double standards, and condemns obvious criticism of the government via the use Nazi symbols, and conducts a trial under inappropriate ‘anti-terror conditions,’ one has to ask oneself how far the judiciary in Germany has departed from fundamental democratic principles. In response to the court’s ruling that such posts are not covered by freedom of expression or freedom of art, what, if not that, is freedom of expression or freedom of art? An American married to a Jew can hardly be accused of ‘trivializing National Socialism’ or of ‘not expressing an explicit rejection of National Socialism.’”
— Clivia von Dewitz, Berliner Zeitung
Or you can read Eugyppius, another German, writing in English in The Daily Sceptic, or Boris Reitschuster, yet another German, reporting in German, or The Epoch Times, or this excellent piece by Milosz Matuschek, which focuses on the legal arguments.
Or, if you’d prefer to hear from the enormous Goebbelsian keyboard instrument that is the majority of the mainstream German press, and you’re able to read German, you can read all about how seditious and insane I am in Der Tagesspiegel, Die Tageszeitung, and the Legal Tribune Online, a legal journal. For some reason I can’t possibly fathom, Der Spiegel were rather reserved in their coverage. I am sure it had nothing to do with the fact that they had printed that big fat swastika on their cover.
It was rather surprising that the mainstream German press turned up to cover the proceedings, as they had been studiously ignoring the story. Maybe the court’s PR people contacted them, or maybe they just smelled blood in the water.
In any event, the atmosphere in Room 145a of Das Kammergericht was dripping with sanctimonious, fascistic authority. It was clear from the outset that the three-judge panel were there to teach a “Covid denier” a lesson, and remind the German public what happens when you break the rules of New Normal Germany. The judges had clearly already decided to overturn my acquittal, so the rest was just theater, which, apart from my attorney’s lengthy arguments, and my statement to the court, mostly consisted of the judges radiating imperious contempt and seething hostility down at us from the bench like an enormous three-headed Gila monster. The prosecutor had mumbled two or three sentences in a monotone at the outset of the trial. She didn’t bother to attempt to appear to present an actual legal argument, as that would have ruined the fait-accompli mise-en-scène effect they were obviously going for.
I have to give the courtand the prosecution credit for their dramaturgy. The point of staging a public trial like this — which the prosecution demanded, which is unusual at the appellate level — wasn’t to pretend to be carrying out justice. It was a show of force. A demonstration. A public humiliation ritual. And, all things considered, they staged it well.
It’s embarrassing, but, the truth is, they got to me. At some point during the bizarre proceedings, I started experiencing waves of disturbing flashbacks from 2020-2022, when hate-drunk New Normal Germans were chasing down maskless passengers on regional trains like the pod people in Invasion of the Body Snatchers, and goon squads (i.e., the German police) were savagely brutalizing anyone who protested against the “Corona measures,” and government leaders, the state and corporate media, and the vast majority of the German masses were fanatically persecuting “the Unvaccinated” with a fervor not seen since the bad old days.
Those flashbacks looked a little something like this …
… so I was a little disoriented as I left the courthouse.
It has taken a few days, but I’ve mostly recovered. After consultations with my fearless attorney, I’ve decided to submit my case to the Bundesverfassungsgericht, i.e., Germany’s supreme court, because … well, at this point, I kind of have to. If I don’t, the precedent the New Normal German authorities are trying to establish will stand, and the right to freedom-of-expression in Germany will have become nothing but a sick fascist joke.
And, yes, that right is guaranteed in the Grundgesetz (i.e., the German constitution). It isn’t quite the 1st Amendment, but it’s good enough for Germany, and I’m not willing to let it be distorted and made a mockery of by a bunch of fascists, not without a fight.
If you want to help me fight that fight, which is going cost about 12,000 Euros in legal fees, plus whatever expenses I incur along the way, you can contribute to my rebooted “legal defense fund.” If you do, please note the disclaimer at the bottom.
My heartfelt gratitude to everyone who has already contributed! Your engagement and generosity has overwhelmed me once again. I did not want this fight, but now it has to be fought. If it were just about me, it wouldn’t matter that much, but it isn’t just about me, and it matters, greatly. It is a fight that it is being fought throughout the West, not just in Germany and the USA, and the UK, and Ireland, and Australia, but everywhere that people are fighting to defend constitutional rights and democratic principles.
I don’t know whether I will win my fight, but I know we will win the bigger fight. As I said in my statement to the court, totalitarianism, fascism, never wins. Not in the long run. History teaches us that. And it is history that will judge us all in the end.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 10/06/2024 - 10:30
Published:10/6/2024 9:34:37 AM
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[Culture]
Eyewitness to Catastrophe
One year into the war thrust upon Israel in the wake of the Oct. 7 slaughter, several books are now hitting the market. None have been more anticipated than the one by Haaretz journalist Amir Tibon. Tibon, a talented journalist who spent several years in Washington writing for Israel’s newspaper of record, experienced 10/7 in […]
The post Eyewitness to Catastrophe appeared first on .
Published:10/6/2024 6:07:31 AM
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[Markets]
Scientists Identify New Protein That Drives Age-Related Blindness, Uncover Potential Therapy
Scientists Identify New Protein That Drives Age-Related Blindness, Uncover Potential Therapy
Authored by Cara Michelle Miller via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
Researchers have identified a protein that may prevent age-related macular degeneration (AMD), according to a new study published in the Developmental Cell on Oct. 2.
AMD is the leading cause of vision loss among older adults, affecting nearly 20 million Americans. As the population ages, this number is expected to rise significantly. Currently, there are no treatments that can stop AMD’s progression.
“I think we identified something that can target early-stage disease. ... That’s a big deal,” the study’s lead author Ruchira Singh, an associate professor of ophthalmology at the University of Rochester in New York, told The Epoch Times.
The study used human stem cells rather than animal models, which may give a more accurate depiction of what is happening in AMD, according to the researchers.
“Older research methods have been limited in their ability to capture important aspects of either healthy or diseased human cells,” Singh noted.
Researchers Identify the Protein Driving AMD
The researchers extracted human stem cells from healthy people and AMD patients and programmed them into cells lining the retina.
Compared to healthy people, AMD patients’ retinal cells overproduced a type of protein called tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinase 3 (TIMP3), which leads to a buildup of fats and proteins called drusen. Drusen are a marker of early-stage AMD.
In AMD, the macula, the part of the retina responsible for sharp vision, becomes damaged.
In the early stages, yellow deposits of drusen begin to accumulate in the retina. Early AMD symptoms include blurred vision or seeing a black spot in the central field of vision, making everyday activities like reading, driving, and even recognizing faces increasingly difficult.
Dry AMD, which accounts for 90 percent of diagnosed cases, is characterized by the gradual buildup of drusen and slow vision loss. Wet AMD, which is less common and more severe, is linked to the growth of abnormal blood vessels under the retina.
In the study, researchers found that TIMP3 blocked another enzyme called matrix metallopeptidase 2 (MMP2), which acts as the eyes’ cleanup crew, removing harmful substances and keeping the eyes healthy. With less MMP2 activity, drusen accumulates, driving AMD disease.
Boosting MMP2 Prevents AMD
Singh’s team found that by blocking TIMP3, they could increase MMP2 levels, which help regulate inflammation and eye health. When MMP2 levels are low, inflammation increases, leading to more drusen buildup and vision loss.
By boosting MMP2 levels, the researchers were able to reduce drusen accumulation.
Singh’s team has filed provisional patents for enzyme inhibitors that could help treat the disease. Next steps include preclinical studies and determining the best method of delivery, such as oral medication or eye drops. Only after these stages conclude can the therapy be tested and, eventually, made available to patients.
Although the exact cause of AMD is not fully understood, genetic and environmental factors are known to contribute. Having a family history of AMD may increase the risk.
Specific genes, such as ABCA4, have been linked to the condition. However, research is ongoing to determine their role in treatment, according to a review published in Clinical Interventions in Aging.
Older age, smoking, obesity, and cardiovascular disease increase a person’s risk of AMD. Some studies have also linked diets high in saturated fat with an increased likelihood of AMD.
Lifestyle Preventative Tips
AMD progresses at different rates in different people. Up to 3 percent of people with minor drusen accumulation experience vision problems within five years, while about 50 percent with larger drusen develop late-stage AMD and vision loss within the same time frame.
Daily vitamins and nutritional supplements may help slow the progression of intermediate dry AMD.
According to the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO), certain nutrients benefit eye health, including vitamins C and E, zinc, lutein, zeaxanthin, and omega-3 fatty acids. These are linked to a lower risk of developing AMD later in life.
Citrus fruits, dark-green leafy vegetables, whole grains, fatty fish, and nuts are good food choices for supporting eye health.
Additionally, the AAO recommends a low-glycemic-index diet for those with AMD or who are at risk. Glycemic index indicates how quickly foods raise blood sugar, and low-glycemic-index diets tend to be high in nonstarchy vegetables and whole or minimally processed grains and low in processed foods.
Physical activity is also associated with lower odds of early and late AMD. The AAO notes that consistent physical activity, such as walking, cycling, swimming, and even active gardening, can help keep eyes healthy.
Without treatment, dry AMD can progress to wet AMD, which worsens quickly.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 10/04/2024 - 22:35
Published:10/4/2024 10:09:05 PM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post paperback bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:10/4/2024 2:25:27 PM
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[96614345-f2f7-58ab-b19c-268a7182ae78]
My friend Melania Trump is finally telling her story. Let's take a moment to hear her out
In my role as one of Mrs. Trump’s advisers in the White House, I witnessed many of the moments that have since been drastically recast in books, tweets and interviews by ex-staffers.
Published:10/4/2024 2:10:33 PM
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[Quick Takes]
Profs at Elite Colleges Shocked to Learn Students ‘Don’t Know How’ to Read Books
"Daniel Shore, the chair of Georgetown’s English department, told me that his students have trouble staying focused on even a sonnet"
The post Profs at Elite Colleges Shocked to Learn Students ‘Don’t Know How’ to Read Books first appeared on Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion.
Published:10/4/2024 11:58:18 AM
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[Markets]
Doug Casey Exposes The Global Elites' Plan For Feudalism 2.0... And How You Can Resist
Doug Casey Exposes The Global Elites' Plan For Feudalism 2.0... And How You Can Resist
Authored by Doug Casey via InternationalMan.com,
International Man: There’s little doubt the self-anointed elite are hostile to the middle class, which is on its way to extinction thanks to soaring inflation and taxation.
It seems they would like to implement a kinder and gentler version of feudalism.
What is really going on here, and what is the end game?
Doug Casey: The middle class, the bourgeoisie, emerged with the death of feudalism, the inception of the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, and finally, the Industrial Revolution.
“Middle class” has been given a bad connotation in recent times. Leftists want everybody to believe that the bourgeoisie is full of consumerist faults. They’re mocked for being concerned with material well-being and improving their status. The elites feel threatened by them. Unlike the lower class plebs, grunt workers who don’t expect more from life.
Bourgeoisie simply means city dweller. Starting in the late Middle Ages, city dwellers were independent, with their own trades and businesses. Living in towns got them out from under the control of the feudal warrior elites.
Cities became intellectual centers, where the growing wealth of the bourgeoisie—the middle class—gave them the leisure needed to develop science, technology, engineering, literature, and medicine. Universities expanded the idea of education beyond the realm of theology. Commerce and personal freedom attracted the best of the peasants, who rose to the middle class. Cities ended feudalism, a system whereby everyone was born into a class and occupation, and was expected to stay there for life, obligated to pay taxes—protection money—to his “betters”. The rise of the bourgeoisie didn’t suit the ruling classes, who liked dominating society.
Capitalism developed as the bourgeoisie became wealthy. The rest is well-known history, but the point must be made that the creation of the middle class, capitalism, and bourgeois values elevated peasants from poverty and created today’s world.
But, then and now, a certain percentage of the population wants to control everyone else. The types who go to Bilderberg, the World Economic Forum, CFR, and the like see themselves as elite new aristocrats who should dominate the others. Even though most of them came from the middle class, now that they’ve “made it,” they like to pull the ladder up. And if not eliminate, at least neuter or defang the remaining bourgeoisie.
So what’s the end game?
I think it might look something like the movie Rollerball. Keep the plebs entertained while the elite, in the form of a corporate aristocracy, controls society.
International Man: Yuval Harari is a prominent World Economic Forum (WEF) member.
He suggested that the elite should use a universal basic income, drugs, and video games to keep the “useless class” docile and occupied.
What is your take on these comments in the context of Feudalism 2.0?
Doug Casey: A nasty little fellow, Harari is what might be termed a court intellectual for the World Economic Forum. He’s there to provide an intellectual patina for the power members, who are basically the businessmen, politicos, and media personalities. They’re not thinkers or interested in ideas but philistines concerned with money and power. Harari gives them an intellectual framework to justify their actions and plans.
As far as his books are concerned, they amount to a lot of generic truisms, obvious observations, justifications of current trends, and a projection of how the world will evolve. As an author and thinker, he’s knowledgeable and intelligent but grossly overrated. He owes his success to promotion from the new wannabe aristocracy and their hangers on. He illustrates the advantages of being hooked up with power people.
Harari has gone from being just another college professor, living with his husband in Israel, to being an internationally famous multi-millionaire pundit.
He expects the “useless eaters” will be maintained on a subsistence basis until they die out. I’m not sure how much the Covid hysteria, followed by the vaccine, has to do with that. It’s becoming quite clear that Covid itself was an artificially constructed flu variant, mainly affecting the very old, very sick, and very overweight. The vaccine is useless in preventing Covid but has caused significant increases in morbidity and mortality among healthy recipients. Was it a trial run to cleanse the world of useless eaters?
I don’t know. But, based on what people like Stalin, Hitler, Mao, and Pol Pot—among many others—have done in recent years, I don’t think it’s out of the question. No doubt, the new aristocracy wants to cement themselves in place. They certainly don’t like rubbing shoulders with the hoi polloi when they visit Venice, Machu Pichu, and the like.
International Man: How does the WEF’s vision of “you will own nothing and be happy” compare to the previous feudal system of medieval Europe?
Doug Casey: Serfs, unlike slaves, had some rights; they owned tools and huts. But their position in society was fixed, they couldn’t easily move—rather like a medieval version of today’s 15-minute city. They had to recognize their betters, and not say anything challenging—like today’s increasingly draconian limits on free speech.
I expect that the gigantic amount of debt in society today will be the means of turning middle-class Americans into serfs. The lower classes are already welfare recipients who produce very little; they’ll soon be replaced by robots.
The better educated ones are buried under their college debts. But everybody is buried under growing credit card debt, auto debt, mortgage debt, and sometimes even tax debt.
If someone makes a lucky capital gain in the stock market or by selling his house, he might spend that money only to find that the government wants 20%, 30%, or 40% of the gain. So the gain, instead of a blessing, becomes a disaster in disguise.
Many people today are burdened by debt, living paycheck to paycheck. They’re barely getting by, under immense pressure to cover food and rent. They’d probably be quite willing to take a deal offering essentially “three hots and a cot,” a tiny apartment, internet, and some extra money to hang around Starbucks.
International Man: How do you see Feudalism 2.0 developing over the coming months and years?
What can be done to resist this agenda?
Doug Casey: Trends in motion tend to stay in motion until they reach some type of a crisis—when anything can happen. Let’s look at some economic systems, as spelled out by Karl Marx.
In Communism, the Marxist ideal, the State owns both the means of production (factories, farms, and such) as well as consumer goods (houses, cars, and theoretically, even your clothes). Mao’s China is as close as anyone’s come.
Socialism is a way station to Communism. The State owns the means of production, but individuals can still own consumer goods. There are lots of countries with socialist ideals, but no real socialist countries. Cuba probably comes closest.
Fascism is an economic system where both the means of production and consumer goods are privately owned, but they’re both 100% State-controlled. Most of the world’s countries are fascist. The word was coined by Mussolini; he meant it to describe the melding of the State, corporations, and unions.
Few people know that Marx coined the word “capitalism”. It’s a system where everything is both privately owned and privately controlled. There are no purely capitalist countries.
In feudalism, a lord owns everything but grants fiefs to subordinates. An aristocracy is supported by the plebs through taxation. Feudalism is based on the plebs providing service and taxes to the lord in exchange for “protection” from other lords.
Now for some pure speculation on my part.
Most of the world’s governments, including that of the US, are terminally bankrupt. They’ll prove unable to meet their obligations. Meanwhile, the prospect of wars, secessions, and crime is growing. I suspect wealthy corporations and individuals will wind up supplanting most traditional governments.
The result could be called neo-feudalism.
The average person is looking for someone or something to save him, to kiss everything and make it better, when times get tough. With governments bankrupt and dysfunctional, solvent and powerful individuals and corporations could take their place.
Harari and his pals want to see the plebs given a guaranteed annual income, a place to live, and entertainment until the useless eaters fade away. But it won’t be as neat as Harari’s wet dreams imagine. The world will be chaotic. We may be on our way to an idiocracy as well, where the populace is dumbed down so they don’t get dangerous ideas.
No matter how things sort out, I think we’re looking at a chaotic and dangerous situation in the near term.
I don’t see voting as a solution. Notwithstanding the differences between Harris and Trump, it just amounts to choosing the lesser of two evils, which in this case would certainly be Trump. But even if you elected Mises, Hayek, Ron Paul, or Harry Browne, I’m afraid the tide of history would wash them away.
In any event, your vote doesn’t really count. Or perhaps I should say it counts about as much as a grain of sand on a beach with hundreds of millions of grains of sand. And even then, as Stalin said, it’s not who votes that counts. It’s who counts the votes.
What can you do to resist the shape of things to come?
It’s an uphill fight because if you’re liberty-oriented, you’re part of a tiny minority at odds with the views of most of your fellow citizens, who’ve been indoctrinated by years of schooling, media, and entertainment. Collectivist memes are cemented in their minds. And when they talk to their contemporaries, they tend to mutually reinforce their beliefs.
When you’re in a group, it can be dangerous to have different beliefs, in much the same way that it’s dangerous for a chicken in a flock to have a feather out of place. The other chickens will peck it to death. Reigning ideas tend to be brutally enforced.
What can you do about this?
Other than trying to maintain your personal integrity, there’s not much you can do to roll back the tsunami. There wasn’t much that a freedom-loving Russian could do in 1917, a freedom-loving German could do in 1933, or a freedom-loving Cuban could do in 1959. Or a freedom-loving Venezuelan today.
The best you can do is to try to save yourself, your family, and your like-minded friends. Changing society for the better is a long shot. Although I hope Milei in Argentina proves me wrong.
International Man: What do you suggest individuals do to ensure they don’t become modern serfs if Feudalism 2.0 emerges?
Doug Casey: There are two types of freedom: physical and financial.
From a physical point of view, it’s important not to be tied down the way a serf might be. You don’t want all your possessions to be in one place where they’re easily controlled by the powers that be. Don’t act like a plant. Staying rooted in one place is not an optimum survival strategy for a human in tough times.
The powers that be are interested in controlling other people. It’s best to be a moving target, which makes you much harder to hit.
This is a problem for those of us who think that the US is still the land of the free. It’s not. It’s been devolving for decades. My guess is that over the next few years, perhaps starting with this election, the US will evermore closely resemble the other 200 nation-states that cover the face of the globe like a skin disease.
The single most important thing you can do is internationalize and make sure that all your assets aren’t in one bailiwick, under the control of one government.
From a financial point of view, it gives you the freedom to travel and move, especially with the coming FX controls and CBDCs. Use gold and Bitcoin. You should already have a good stash of both. If you don’t, it’s not too late to start accumulating and transferring assets into them.
* * *
The months and years ahead will be politically, economically, and socially volatile. What you do to prepare could mean the difference between suffering crippling losses and coming out ahead. That’s precisely why, legendary investor and NY Times best-selling author Doug Casey just released this urgent report on how to survive and thrive. Click here to download the PDF now.
Tyler Durden
Thu, 10/03/2024 - 17:00
Published:10/3/2024 4:11:25 PM
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[Markets]
Lott: About That New Data On Migrant Crime
Lott: About That New Data On Migrant Crime
Authored by John R. Lott Jr. via RealClearInvestigations,
The new data on all the criminal noncitizens coming into the U.S. is shocking.
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) checks the background of illegal aliens they have in custody. But, the administration’s letter to Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-TX) shows that as of July 21, 2024, ICE let 435,719 convicted criminals and 226,847 people with pending criminal charges in their home countries into the U.S.
Of those cleared by ICE, 13,099 have convictions for homicide, and another 1,845 were facing criminal charges. Some 9,461 have convictions for sex offenses (not including assault or commercialized sex), and 2,659 face pending charges. The convictions include other crimes such as assault (62,231), robbery (10,031), sexual assault (15,811), weapons offenses (13,423), and dangerous drugs (56,533).
About 7.4 million noncitizens are in the “national docket data,” so 662,776 is 9% of the total, and if one extrapolates the numbers to the homicide rate in this country, it strongly indicates that the government is letting migrants into this country who commit murder at a rate 50% higher than the rest of the U.S. population.
And these numbers clearly underestimate the crime rate of these noncitizens. The noncitizens in the “national docket data” turned themselves in to border agents for processing or were caught. Those who don’t turn themselves in are obviously far more likely to have something to hide from those doing the processing, so-called “gotaways,” who are observed illegally entering the U.S. but not caught or turned back.
These figures coincide with other data from the Arizona prison system and show illegal aliens commit crime at much higher rates than Americans or legal immigrants.
Under the Remain-in-Mexico policy, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) did background checks on immigrants’ cases, including contacting the country that the immigrant is from before they are approved to come to the U.S.
ICE agents cannot access the same databases to check on the immigrants, and they didn’t contact the immigrant’s home country. Plus, the massive inflow of immigrants has overwhelmed the system. The Deputy Director for ICE blames the “enormous workload” agents face, so they haven’t been able to do even the limited background checks they are doing. There are so many coming in that the government can’t house these immigrants until their backgrounds are properly checked.
ICE processed these criminals as they entered the country, but it didn’t identify them as criminals, so it released them into the country. Now, they are just walking around freely in the United States, and no one knows where they are.
It took over six months for the Biden administration to finally respond to a congressional request for these numbers. The deputy director for ICE “apologized” for the delay.
As bad as these numbers are, the reality may be even worse. The Biden-Harris administration is cooking the books to make the border crisis not look as bad as it is. For example, in mid-September, retired San Diego Border Patrol Chief Patrol Agent Aaron Heitke testified how the Biden-Harris administration ordered him not to publicize the arrests of illegal border crossers identified as having ties to terrorism.
Democrats quickly pointed out that some of these criminals came in before the Biden administration. But the administration’s letter to Rep. Tony Gonzales, a Texas Republican, didn’t provide a breakdown of how many came through under Biden-Harris. The administration policy, with its limited background checks and overwhelmed agents, has a much higher error rate compared to Trump’s Remain-in-Mexico approach. Background checks are ineffective if officials don’t even contact the immigrant’s home country.
Even if illegal immigrants weren’t committing crimes at higher rates than the general population, the American people have a right to expect those entering this country to be screened in order to prevent more murderers, rapists, drug dealers, and thieves from entering the country. Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have the authority to call for expedited extradition for criminal illegal aliens in the U.S., but they have only moved to make extradition more difficult.
John R. Lott Jr. is a contributor to RealClearInvestigations, focusing on voting and gun rights. His articles have appeared in publications such as the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, New York Post, USA Today, and Chicago Tribune. Lott is an economist who has held research and/or teaching positions at the University of Chicago, Yale University, Stanford, UCLA, Wharton, and Rice.
Tyler Durden
Thu, 10/03/2024 - 10:15
Published:10/3/2024 9:48:05 AM
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[Entertainment]
10 noteworthy books for October
New books this month include fiction from Michael Connelly and Glory Edim’s memoir.
Published:10/2/2024 11:10:01 AM
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[Markets]
Inside Lebanon's Currency Crisis: How Hyperinflation Feels
Inside Lebanon's Currency Crisis: How Hyperinflation Feels
Authored by Dave Birnbaum via BitcoinMagazine.com,
Lebanon is back in the headlines as the conflict in the Middle East intensifies. Before these latest developments, Lebanon had already become a symbol of how quickly a seemingly stable society can descend into chaos.
If you follow major events in the global economy, you’ll probably recall that Lebanon’s recent past serves as a vivid example of what a full-blown currency collapse looks like in a modern, advanced economy. While there are some great books that describe hyperinflation in detached, academic terms, what’s often missing is the human story – what it’s actually like to be a normal, productive person with a family and a bank account, and to live through the collapse of your country’s currency.
For a while now, I’ve known that my friend Tony Yazbeck, co-founder of The Bitcoin Way, had experienced this reality. But it wasn’t until I watched this interview with him that I realized how valuable his story is for everyone to hear. Tony’s story offers a rare, personal glimpse into what it means when your country’s banking system disintegrates, when you lose access to your savings, when food prices rise 10-fold in a few months, and when even basic necessities like medicine and fuel become luxuries.
I asked Tony if he could explain not only why Lebanon collapsed, but also how bitcoin could have been a lifeline in such a dire situation.
Lebanon: A country on the brink
Before its economic collapse, Lebanon was a vibrant, cosmopolitan country, often called the "Paris of the Middle East." Its economy thrived on banking, tourism, and services, positioning it as a bridge between East and West. For Tony, this prosperity wasn’t an illusion—it was his daily life. "My life in Lebanon was extraordinary," he recalls. "I ran three thriving businesses and lived a luxurious lifestyle. Whether it was the latest cars, the best restaurants, or the hottest clubs, Beirut had it all."
Yet beneath the surface, cracks were forming. Lebanon’s banking sector, once a source of pride, was built on unsustainable practices, and the country was drowning in debt. For years, Lebanon’s central bank had pegged the Lebanese pound to the U.S. dollar at an artificially high rate, creating a false sense of stability.
This currency peg required constant inflows of dollars to maintain. When those inflows dried up, the house of cards collapsed.
In 2019, Lebanon’s banks began restricting access to savings, imposing informal capital controls without any legal framework. "Overnight, people lost access to their funds," Tony says. "You couldn’t withdraw your own money, and even if you could, it was in Lebanese pounds that were rapidly losing value."
For those unfamiliar with a currency crisis, the limitation of bank withdrawals is one of the first signs that the system is failing. The government and banks try to delay the inevitable by locking down money in the system. By then, it’s too late.
From thriving businesses to $70 in hand
In early 2020, Lebanon defaulted on its foreign debt, and the value of the Lebanese pound plummeted. Hyperinflation set in, destroying the purchasing power of ordinary people.
Tony watched helplessly as his savings evaporated and his businesses crumbled. "I went from being a successful entrepreneur to having just $70 to my name in what felt like the blink of an eye," he recalls. "I couldn’t pay rent, school fees, or even afford basic groceries."
Hyperinflation took hold with shocking speed. "A loaf of bread that once cost 1,500 LBP shot up to over 30,000 LBP within months," Tony explains. Fuel prices were even worse. "In early 2023, a gallon of gas went from 25,000 LBP to over 500,000 LBP in just a few weeks. It was impossible to keep up with the prices."
The destruction wasn’t limited to material wealth; the psychological toll was immense. Tony describes the anxiety and panic that came with watching his hard-earned success disappear. "For the first time in my life, I didn’t know what to do. I felt completely helpless.”.
A fractured civil society
As Lebanon’s currency collapsed, so did its social fabric. People who once lived comfortable, middle-class lives suddenly found themselves struggling for survival. Basic goods became scarce, and the price of everyday items skyrocketed.
Power dynamics within communities shifted as those who controlled essentials like food and fuel gained disproportionate influence. "There were reports of gangs taking over neighborhoods, controlling access to goods and demanding protection fees," Tony recalls.
Even electricity became a luxury. With the national grid in shambles, most people had to rely on private generators, but the cost of running them was astronomical. "Monthly generator fees jumped from 200,000 LBP to over 4,000,000 LBP," Tony explains. Many families were forced to live without power for long stretches of time.
In response to the crisis, people turned to alternative forms of exchange. Bartering became common, with people trading goods and services directly. "If you couldn’t pay in cash, you might offer plumbing work in exchange for groceries," Tony says. The U.S. dollar, already widely used before the collapse, became the default currency for many transactions. Digital currencies, and especially stable coins like Tether (USDT), also gained traction as people sought ways to preserve value outside the collapsing banking system.
What could have been: Bitcoin as a lifeline
As Tony recounts the collapse, questions loom large: Could this have been prevented? Or at the very least, could individuals have somehow protected themselves better? For Tony, the answer is clear: Yes – with access to bitcoin, many of the worst effects of the crisis might have been avoided.
"If I had known about bitcoin before the crisis, it could have saved me," Tony says without hesitation. "Bitcoin would have given me a way to store value outside the banking system, which completely failed. I wouldn’t have been locked out of my own savings, and I could have preserved my wealth as the Lebanese pound collapsed."
Bitcoin is immune to the kind of capital controls Lebanon’s banks imposed in 2019. No government or bank can freeze your bitcoin or restrict access to it. In a country where the banking system became a trap, bitcoin would have provided a way out.
Even as Lebanon’s currency lost over 90% of its value, bitcoin held its purchasing power globally. "Bitcoin isn’t tied to any government or central bank, so it can’t be manipulated the way the Lebanese pound was," Tony explains. "It’s a hedge against hyperinflation, which would have been critical when prices were doubling and tripling every few months."
Bitcoin’s status as a digital bearer asset would have been equally important. "When cash becomes worthless and banks stop functioning, how do you pay for things? How do you trade?" Tony asks.
In Lebanon, bartering and informal exchanges became necessary for survival. In many situations, bitcoin may have served as a viable alternative to barter, worthless Lebanese pounds, and U.S. dollars that were difficult to obtain.
Lessons for the world
Lebanon’s crisis offers a stark warning to the rest of the world. While many people in developed countries believe that their economies are too stable to collapse in such a way, Tony’s experience should give us pause. "What happened to me could happen anywhere," he warns. "Don’t think you’re immune just because you live in a so-called stable country. The mechanics of fiat currency are the same everywhere."
Tony points to the U.S. as an example of a country that is walking the same dangerous path as Lebanon. "The U.S. national debt now exceeds $35 trillion. Since 1971, when the dollar was taken off the gold standard, the money supply has increased by over 8,000%. That kind of money printing can’t go on forever."
While the U.S. benefits from being the issuer of the world’s reserve currency, that status isn’t guaranteed indefinitely. "All fiat currencies are headed to zero eventually," Tony cautions. "Some will fail sooner than others, but they will all fail. The U.S. dollar might be the last to go, but its turn is coming."
The lessons from Lebanon’s collapse are clear: Protect your wealth before a crisis hits, and don’t assume that your government or banking system will be there to save you when things go south. For Tony, that means turning to bitcoin. "Bitcoin is the only asset that’s truly un-confiscatable," he says. "It’s the only way to escape a broken system."
A new mission to rebuild with bitcoin
In the aftermath of Lebanon’s collapse, Tony has dedicated his life to helping others avoid the same fate. He founded The Bitcoin Way, a bitcoin education and technical services business designed to teach people how to use bitcoin to protect themselves from currency crises. "The crisis forced me to study and understand money," Tony says. "I realized that the fiat system is a scam, designed by thieves to steal and control us. Bitcoin is the solution."
Every day, Tony educates his clients about how to take control of their financial future using bitcoin. "Once you understand how bitcoin works, you see the flaws in traditional fiat systems," Tony explains. "You learn how to manage your assets securely, make transactions independently of banks, and protect your wealth from inflation and economic instability."
The road ahead
Tony believes that the collapse of the Lebanese pound was avoidable, but that would have required structural reforms that never came. "If Lebanon had tackled corruption, maintained transparency, and adjusted the currency peg responsibly, things might have turned out differently," he says.
But given the deep-rooted corruption in Lebanon’s political and financial systems, the collapse was almost inevitable.
As Tony reflects on his experience, he sees parallels between pre-crisis Lebanon and the current state of many developed economies. "We’re seeing the same issues – rising debt, unsustainable monetary policies, and corrupt institutions," he says.
The warning signs are there, but many people ignore them, believing that their country is somehow different.
For those who are paying attention, Tony offers practical advice. "Start educating yourself about bitcoin now, before it’s too late," he urges. "Diversify your assets and don’t rely on fiat currency to preserve your wealth. The mechanics of hyperinflation don’t change just because you live in a wealthy country."
Lebanon’s collapse is not just a cautionary tale for people living in developing economies. It’s a wake-up call for the entire world.
As governments continue to print money at unprecedented rates, the risk of a global currency crisis grows. Bitcoin offers a way out – an inflation-proof alternative that can protect the wealth of individuals when fiat currencies fail.
Tony’s experience is a stark reminder of the fragility of fiat systems and the importance of financial sovereignty. "With bitcoin in your custody, you have the power to protect yourself from corruption, manipulation, and inflation," Tony says.
"You don’t need permission from a bank or a government to manage your own money. And that’s exactly what makes bitcoin the ultimate tool for financial freedom."
Tyler Durden
Tue, 10/01/2024 - 13:05
Published:10/1/2024 12:29:07 PM
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[Markets]
Escobar: Watching The China River Flow
Escobar: Watching The China River Flow
Authored by Pepe Escobar,
Leading website Guancha has published the transcript of a first-class lecture at Renmin University on China-U.S. relations by Martin Jacques, author of When China Rules the World. Jacques is one of the very few Westerner scholars with on the ground experience who actually understands the Chinese psyche and way of life in contrast to the West.
A particularly intriguing section of the lecture concerns research by Danny Quah, the dean of the widely respected Lee Kuan Yew Institute in Singapore. This is the money quote:
“Between 1980 and 2020, Europe’s share of global GDP fell from 26% to 15%. In other words, it fell by 11 percentage points, a very large drop. Although the decline in the United States was smaller, it fell from 21% in the 1980s to less than 16% in 2020. From another perspective, Asia and East Asia are constantly rising. The share in 1980 was 11.5%, and it has risen to 25% in 2020. Among this 25%, China has made the largest contribution, accounting for 18% of the world.”
What this graphically illustrates is the acute swing in the world’s center of economic gravity – no matter the rhetorical tsunamis emanating from the Hegemon. In 1980 the economic center was Atlanticist. Quah though believes that the economic center will reach the Sino-Indian border only by 2050.
When we take China compounded with the 10 members of ASEAN, without even considering South Asia, it’s fair to argue that the economic center will already be in the East by 2030, and will be Sino-Indian before 2040.
Jacques is correct that by then “the ‘Asian Age’ will replace the ‘Western Age’, and since 1750, the world has always been in the Western Age.” On a personal note, after living and working in Asia for most of the past three decades, I qualify our century as “The Eurasian Century”.
And that, in a nutshell, is the reason why the Hegemon/Atlanticist elites are in Deep Panic mode. The free lunch – of exploiting the wealth of the Global South – is coming to an end.
Hong Kong back in the spotlight
China has already designed the masterplan of its development strategy all the way to 2035 and in many aspects all the way to 2049. The current juncture though is extremely tricky.
The People’s Bank of China is taking the necessary master tweaks of the economy very seriously. Earlier this week the PBoC announced cuts to the outstanding mortgage rate and the reserve requirement ratio: that’s the amount of cash commercial banks need to hold as reserves. The PBoC also cut the benchmark policy rate and boosted capital markets.
Then the Politburo, chaired by President Xi Jinping himself, intervened in full force, vowing to protect China’s private enterprises; finally stabilise the always wobbly property sector; and adopt the necessary fiscal expenditures.
That’s the domestic front. On the external front, China is on a roll. The top priority is the slowly but surely internationalization of the yuan. And that’s where the crucial role of Hong Kong comes in – as detailed in a report by Renmin University.
China is already de-dollarizing at nearly breakneck speed. The U.S. dollar’s share of bilateral trade has already fallen from 80% to less than 50%.
China is now trading with the world mostly in yuan – and the petroyuan is not even in full force. Since the start of the SMO by Russia in Ukraine in February 2022, the yuan is the de facto Asian reserve currency for Russia. In parallel, Beijing is accelerating currency swaps all across the spectrum and designating more clearing banks around the world.
Hong Kong is in a class by itself when it comes to state of the art financial institutions. Hence the connection is inevitable for global investors: all sorts of deals are open in China via Hong Kong, with the added bonus of avoiding Hegemon sanctions.
So from now on Hong Kong will be even more of a Holy Grail for all sorts of yuan-denominated transactions. Talk about a magnet for finance tech wizards.
Hong Kong is already the world’s top market for the offshore yuan – processing nearly 80% of all settlements. Three months ago, according to the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA), the Special Administrative Region had $151.7 billion in offshore deposits.
A top HKMA executive not by accident attended the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok earlier this month. With high U.S. interest rates and low PBoC interest rates, offshore yuan bonds will be issued like there’s no tomorrow.
Nuclear destruction or an imperfect evolving new order
From Beijing to Hong Kong, Chinese politico-economic elites are quite comfortable with the fact that for the first time in History, the rise of a great power is not being conditioned by imperialism, war, slavery, looting and all of the above, but under what has been codified since the Little Helmsman Deng Xiaoping’s late 1970s reforms as “peaceful development.”
That is mirrored in several concepts such as win-win; mutual prosperity; equality; “community of shared future for mankind”; and as a master geoeconomic project, the interlocking connectivity corridors across the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).
While China invests in infrastructure development around the world, the Hegemon imposes sanctions, engages in bombing, supports variations of the Forever Wars, finances and weaponizes color revolutions.
Hegemon “strategy” barely qualifying as utter mediocrity ranges from the U.S. government funding a $1.6 billion campaign to smear China to Republicans divided on whether regime change in Beijing is their ultimate goal and the Democrat ambassador in Beijing convinced that Washington’s China policy is not too hawkish.
Then there’s puny functionary and Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell – the man who invented the “pivot to Asia” during the first Obama administration – ordering the Europeans to go hawkish on China and defining Beijing in front of the House Foreign Affairs Committee as “the most significant challenge in our history”.
Very few IQs above room temperature across Asia pay attention to such clowns. In contrast, what is now emerging in informed discussions from South to Southeast Asia is that BRICS progress will not be steady enough if the emphasis remains on consensual decisions.
A daring proposition is emerging that Russia and China – the actual BRICS leaders – should announce at the summit in Kazan next month that they are backing a yuan/ruble/gold alliance: as in if the world needs to choose between NATOstan hegemony or a BRICS alternative, better start with sound (real) money.
Beyond the feasibility of such proposal, there’s a serious critique of Utopia; the Global Majority must be pushed to face the harsh reality it faces – nuclear destruction or an imperfect evolving new order – and make a stand, fast.
Meanwhile, like a river undisturbed while traversing a rocky wilderness, China silently flows away on its path to peaceful primacy.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 09/30/2024 - 22:35
Published:9/30/2024 10:16:17 PM
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[Markets]
Lebowitz Calls For Biden-Harris To "Dissolve The Supreme Court": Turley
Lebowitz Calls For Biden-Harris To "Dissolve The Supreme Court": Turley
Authored by Jonathan Turley via jonathanturley.org,
Author and cultural critic Fran Lebowitz added voice to the unhinged calls on the left for trashing the Supreme Court. As I discussed recently in the Wall Street Journal (and in my book), there is a growing counter-constitutional movement in the United States led by law professors, pundits, and celebrities. Lebowitz amplified those calls in a radical demand to simply get rid of the Court.
Lebowitz called for President Joe Biden to “dissolve the Supreme Court” despite the fact that it would violate the Constitution and remove one of the most critical protections against executive and legislative abuse.
Lebowitz insisted that the Supreme Court is a “disgrace” because, in a reference to Donald Trump, it is “completely his.” To the wild applause of the New York audience, she added: “It’s so disgraceful, this court, that it shouldn’t even be allowed to be called the Supreme Court. It’s an insult to Motown. Basically, it’s a harem. It’s Trump’s harem.”
Her views aligned with others on the left who have attacked the Constitution, the Court, and even rights like free speech as now threats to our democracy.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer previously declared in front of the Supreme Court, “I want to tell you, [Neil] Gorsuch, I want to tell you, [Brett] Kavanaugh, you have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price.”
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) announced that she wants the impeachment of all six of the conservative justices. She was immediately joined by other Democratic members.
Previously, Ocasio-Cortez admitted that she does not understand why we even have a Supreme Court. She asked “How much does the current structure benefit us? And I don’t think it does.”
Other members, such as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), have called for packing the Court with additional members to immediately secure a liberal majority to rule as she desires.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D., RI), has assured voters that Vice President Kamala Harris will support the packing of the Court with a liberal majority.
Despite supporting censorship to combat “disinformation,” many on the left now eagerly spread disinformation about the Court and its rulings. Lebowitz repeated false claims about the Court’s ruling on presidential immunity, stating that the decision makes the president a “king” who “can do whatever you want.”
In reality, the Court followed the same approach that it has taken in prior conflicts between the branches.
As it has in the past, the Court adopted a three-tiered approach to presidential powers based on the source of a presidential action. Chief Justice John Roberts cited Youngstown Sheet and Tube Co. v. Sawyer, in which the court ruled against President Harry Truman’s takeover of steel mills.
In his famous concurrence to Youngstown, Justice Robert Jackson broke down the balance of executive and legislative authority between three types of actions. In the first, a president acts with express or implied authority from Congress. In the second, he acts where Congress is silent (“the zone of twilight” area). In the third, the president acts in defiance of Congress.
In this decision, the court adopted a similar sliding scale. It held that presidents enjoy absolute immunity for actions that fall within their “exclusive sphere of constitutional authority” while they enjoy presumptive immunity for other official acts. They do not enjoy immunity for unofficial or private actions.
None of this matters. Facts do not matter. Many on the left are calling for the trashing of the Constitution based on wildly inaccurate claims.
Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the UC Berkeley law school, is author of “No Democracy Lasts Forever: How the Constitution Threatens the United States,” published last month. In a 2021 Los Angeles Times op-ed, he described conservative justices as “partisan hacks.”
In the New York Times, book critic Jennifer Szalai scoffs at what she calls “Constitution worship.” She writes: “Americans have long assumed that the Constitution could save us; a growing chorus now wonders whether we need to be saved from it.” She frets that by limiting the power of the majority, the Constitution “can end up fostering the widespread cynicism that helps authoritarianism grow.”
In a 2022 New York Times op-ed, “The Constitution Is Broken and Should Not Be Reclaimed,” law professors Ryan D. Doerfler of Harvard and Samuel Moyn of Yale called for liberals to “reclaim America from constitutionalism.”
Lebowitz is also wrong about the voting record of the justices. In reality, the Court continues to rule largely by unanimous, or nearly unanimous decisions. After April, unanimity stood at 46 percent of cases.
Of the 22 6-3 decisions, only half broke along ideological lines. That is the same as the 11 such cases last term.
The average for unanimous decisions has been roughly 43 percent. The rate is back up to 48 percent for the last term. When you add the nearly unanimous opinions, it is the vast majority of cases. Moreover, Sotomayor agreed with Roberts in 71% of cases Kavanaugh and Barrett agreed with Sotomayor roughly 70% of the time.
In critical decisions, conservative justices like Gorsuch and Barrett have joined their liberal colleagues and the Court has repeatedly voted against positions supported by Donald Trump.
Again, none of this matters. Lebowitz and others are falsely telling the public that the Court is dysfunctionally and ideologically divided. Of course, even if you accept the false premise, the problem is not with the liberal justices always voting as a block but the conservatives doing so. The liberals are not robotic, they are simply right.
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University and the author of “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage.”
Tyler Durden
Sun, 09/29/2024 - 22:10
Published:9/29/2024 10:09:31 PM
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[Markets]
Globalists Claim Europe Is "Too White", "Too Western"
Globalists Claim Europe Is "Too White", "Too Western"
Authored by Dmytro “Henry” Aleksandrov via Headline USA,
The globalists recently said the quiet part out loud by admitting in a recently published report that Europe is too “white” and “Western,” urging the continent’s population to change that.
On Sept. 25, 2024, the European Council on Foreign Relations published a report titled Welcome to Barbieland: European Sentiment in the Year of Wars and Elections. In it, senior policy fellow and author Pawel Zerka discussed how Europeans could change Europe to benefit globalists.
Zerka noted that non-white and Muslim people have been misrepresented everywhere, specifically in politics, adding that, as a result of that, they felt “alienated.” The report’s author blamed the “far-right.”
“Far-right parties appeared to be on the rise in almost every member state, usually issuing promises to stop immigration or even planning (as the Alternative for Germany, or AfD, did) to expel large swathes of the population,” he wrote.
According to him, the European Union is “xenophobic” because it is too “white,” “Western” and “boomer,” adding that, to deal with it, people need to diversify the European population, reject the “‘ethnic’ conception of Europeanness” and “fill the ‘civic’ conception of Europeanness with substance.”
The organization also announced the release of the report on Twitter.
This report was just one of the recent examples of anti-white and anti-European hatred. European activists like Eva Vlaardingerbroek have been warning Europeans about the problem.
“Europe has been a predominantly white continent for the entirety of its history. Just because some bureaucrats have decided against the will of the people that we should suddenly be a minority on our own continent, doesn’t mean we should let it happen. Say no to being replaced,” she wrote in one of her Twitter posts.
Headline USA also previously reported on the “Great Replacement” agenda pushed by the United Nations.
Leftists have been pushing these ideas for quite a while, even publishing books to spread their ideas.
Headline USA also wrote about the anti-white racism in South Africa in the form of apartheid for white people. Other people on Twitter, including the platform’s current owner, Elon Musk, wrote about the explicit hatred of white people there.
Conservative journalist Lauren Southern also filmed a documentary on the struggles of white farmers in South Africa.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 09/29/2024 - 09:20
Published:9/29/2024 8:59:03 AM
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[World]
This Clip Encapsulates So Much of What Is Scary About Progressive Democrats
Published:9/27/2024 7:38:28 AM
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[Markets]
US Navy Modernizing To Counter China's Military By 2027
US Navy Modernizing To Counter China's Military By 2027
Authored by Antonio Graceffo via The Epoch Times,
The U.S. Navy has released a document outlining its plans to match and exceed Beijing’s goal of modernizing its military by 2027, aiming to be prepared for a potential conflict with the Chinese regime.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has directed the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to be fully modernized and prepared for war by 2027, coinciding with the PLA’s 100th anniversary. This timeline has raised concerns about a possible invasion of Taiwan, as Chinese leader Xi Jinping focuses on military reforms to ensure the PLA can deter or win a conflict over the island.
The CCP’s strategy goes beyond expanding its navy. It incorporates multi-domain precision warfare, dual-use infrastructure (like airfields and maritime militias), and an expanding nuclear arsenal—and it is supported by the world’s largest shipbuilding capacity.
The U.S. Navy’s 2024 Navigation Plan, led by Adm. Lisa Franchetti, focuses on preparing for a potential conflict with communist China by 2027. Central to this strategy is Project 33, which aims at enhancing the Navy’s long-term advantage and operational readiness. The plan prioritizes modernizing equipment and improving force deployment capabilities, particularly by scaling up the use of robotic and autonomous systems for swift, decisive responses, especially in the Indo-Pacific region.
Project 33 sets two key goals: achieving 80 percent combat readiness for ships, aircraft, and submarines by 2027, and integrating advanced technologies like artificial intelligence and unmanned systems. These initiatives are designed to strengthen the Navy’s ability to respond effectively to emerging threats, specifically focusing on maintaining superiority in the Indo-Pacific.
The U.S. Navy aims to develop three key priorities: long-range fires, non-traditional sea denial, and terminal defense. Long-range fires enable the Navy to strike from a safe distance using advanced missiles and precision-guided weapons, enhancing power projection. Non-traditional sea denial employs methods like cyber warfare, drones, and electromagnetic operations to block adversary access to strategic maritime areas. Terminal defense focuses on protecting naval assets with advanced missile and anti-aircraft systems designed to intercept threats in their final phase.
The U.S. Navy is enhancing its command-and-control capabilities by developing Maritime Operations Centers (MOCs), which are critical for fleet-level warfare. These centers serve as nerve hubs, coordinating naval forces across multi-domain environments, including land, sea, air, space, and cyberspace. MOCs are essential for managing real-time information, directing fleet movements, and overseeing key functions like intelligence, logistics, and communications.
Franchetti stresses the need to mirror China’s military modernization, particularly in integrating technologies like artificial intelligence. To stay competitive in an information-driven battlespace, the Navy is developing MOCs as full-fledged warfighting systems, ensuring they are resilient, adaptable, and ready for decentralized operations. By 2027, the Navy plans to certify MOCs across all fleet headquarters, starting with the Pacific Fleet. These centers will enhance command and control, intelligence, fires, and sustainment functions, boosting decision-making and operational capabilities during crises and conflicts.
The U.S. Navy is closely studying current global conflicts to shape its approach to future sea control. Ukraine’s effective use of missiles, drones, and digital tools against Russian forces has provided key insights for U.S. military strategies, particularly for potential conflicts in the Indo-Pacific. Additionally, the Navy has observed the role drones and ballistic missiles have played in battles against Yemen’s Houthi rebels in the Red Sea, further informing how the Navy prepares for modern warfare. These lessons are crucial for adapting to evolving threats and ensuring readiness in an increasingly complex battlespace.
Unmanned vehicles and weapons systems have played a crucial role in modern warfare, as seen in both Ukraine and the 2020 Armenia–Azerbaijan conflict. Autonomous and remotely operated systems, like drones, have proven highly effective for reconnaissance, precision strikes, and disrupting enemy logistics, all without risking human lives. Recognizing this shift, Franchetti has prioritized integrating unmanned systems, including naval drones and unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs), into U.S. Navy operations.
UUVs are key technologies in modern naval operations. These systems come in two types: autonomous underwater vehicles, which operate independently, and remotely operated vehicles, which an operator controls. Often referred to as naval or underwater drones, UUVs perform tasks like surveillance, mine detection, and environmental monitoring. Franchetti views these robotic systems as the future of warfare, not just for their efficiency but for their ability to free up sailors for other vital tasks. By deploying autonomous systems for missions like surveillance or combat, the Navy can reallocate human personnel to areas where their expertise is most needed, enhancing operational flexibility and overall readiness.
The U.S. Navy’s plan prioritizes integrating robotic and autonomous systems into routine operations by 2027, ensuring their active use by commanders in carrier and expeditionary strike groups. The focus is on improving coordination between manned and unmanned teams, particularly in areas like surveillance, fires, logistics, and deception. This initiative is part of a broader strategy to enhance command, control, and overall operational effectiveness in complex, multi-domain environments.
In addition to preparing for a potential conflict over Taiwan, the Navy’s 2024 Navigation Plan prioritizes maintaining a free and open Indo-Pacific, ensuring critical shipping lanes like the Strait of Malacca and Taiwan Strait remain accessible for global trade.
Meanwhile, China’s anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) strategy aims to limit the ability of the United States and its allies to operate freely in key areas such as the East and South China Seas, particularly the Taiwan Strait. Central to China’s military doctrine, A2/AD seeks to shift the strategic balance by making it difficult for external forces to intervene in what Beijing considers its sphere of influence. Despite this, the U.S. Navy is rapidly modernizing to meet these challenges and is prepared to counter the CCP’s regional dominance efforts.
Tyler Durden
Thu, 09/26/2024 - 23:25
Published:9/26/2024 11:10:13 PM
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[Markets]
The Counter-Constitutional Movement: The Assault On America's Defining Principles
The Counter-Constitutional Movement: The Assault On America's Defining Principles
Authored by Jonathan Turley,
Kamala Harris declared in Tuesday’s debate that a vote for her is a vote “to end the approach that is about attacking the foundations of our democracy ’cause you don’t like the outcome.”
She was alluding to the 2021 Capitol riot, but she and her party are also attacking the foundations of our democracy: the Supreme Court and the freedom of speech.
Several candidates for the 2020 presidential nomination, including Ms. Harris, said they were open to the idea of packing the court by expanding the number of seats.
Mr. Biden opposed the idea, but a week after he exited the 2024 presidential race, he announced a “bold plan” to “reform” the high court. It would pack the court via term limits and also impose a “binding code of conduct,” aimed at conservative justices.
Ms. Harris quickly endorsed the proposal in a statement, citing a “clear crisis of confidence” in the court owing to “decision after decision overturning long-standing precedent.” She might as well have added “because you don’t like the outcome.” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D., R.I.) has already introduced ethics and term-limits legislation and said Ms. Harris’s campaign has told him “that your bills are precisely aligned with what we are talking about.”
The attacks on the court are part of a growing counterconstitutional movement that began in higher education and seems recently to have reached a critical mass in the media and politics.
The past few months have seen an explosion of books and articles laying out a new vision of “democracy” unconstrained by constitutional limits on majority power.
Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the UC Berkeley law school, is author of “No Democracy Lasts Forever: How the Constitution Threatens the United States,” published last month. In a 2021 Los Angeles Times op-ed, he described conservative justices as “partisan hacks.”
In the New York Times, book critic Jennifer Szalai scoffs at what she calls “Constitution worship.” She writes: “Americans have long assumed that the Constitution could save us; a growing chorus now wonders whether we need to be saved from it.” She frets that by limiting the power of the majority, the Constitution “can end up fostering the widespread cynicism that helps authoritarianism grow.”
In a 2022 New York Times op-ed, “The Constitution Is Broken and Should Not Be Reclaimed,” law professors Ryan D. Doerfler of Harvard and Samuel Moyn of Yale called for liberals to “reclaim America from constitutionalism.”
Others have railed against individual rights. In my new book on free speech, I discuss this movement against what many professors deride as “rights talk.” Barbara McQuade of the University of Michigan Law School has called free speech America’s “Achilles’ heel.”
In another Times op-ed, “The First Amendment Is Out of Control,” Columbia law professor Tim Wu, a former Biden White House aide, asserts that free speech “now mostly protects corporate interests” and threatens “essential jobs of the state, such as protecting national security and the safety and privacy of its citizens.”
George Washington University Law’s Mary Ann Franks complains that the First Amendment (and also the Second) is too “aggressively individualistic” and endangers “domestic tranquility” and “general welfare.”
Mainstream Democrats are listening to radical voices. “How much does the current structure benefit us?” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.) said in 2021, explaining her support for a court-packing bill. “I don’t think it does.” Kelley Robinson, president of the Human Rights Campaign, said at the Democratic National Committee’s “LGBTQ+ Kickoff” that “we’ve got to reimagine” democracy “in a way that is more revolutionary than . . . that little piece of paper.” Both AOC and Ms. Robinson later spoke to the convention itself.
The Nation’s Elie Mystal calls the Constitution “trash” and urges the abolition of the U.S. Senate. Rosa Brooks of Georgetown Law School complains that Americans are “slaves” to the Constitution.
Without countermajoritarian protections and institutions, politics would be reduced to raw power. That’s what some have in mind. In an October 2020 interview, Harvard law professor Michael Klarman laid out a plan for Democrats should they win the White House and both congressional chambers. They would enact “democracy-entrenching legislation,” which would ensure that “the Republican Party will never win another election” unless it moved to the left. The problem: “The Supreme Court could strike down everything I just described, and that’s something the Democrats need to fix.”
Trashing the Constitution gives professors and pundits a license to violate norms. The Washington Monthly reports that at a Georgetown conference, Prof. Josh Chafetz suggested that Congress retaliate against conservative justices by refusing to fund law clerks or “cutting off the Supreme Court’s air conditioning budget.” When the audience laughed, Harvard’s Mr. Doerfler snapped back: “It should not be a laugh line. This is a political contest, these are the tools of retaliation available, and they should be completely normalized.”
The cry for radical constitutional change is shortsighted. The constitutional system was designed for bad times, not only good times. It seeks to protect individual rights, minority factions and smaller states from the tyranny of the majority. The result is a system that forces compromise. It doesn’t protect us from political divisions any more than good medical care protects us from cancer. Rather it allows the body politic to survive political afflictions by pushing factions toward negotiation and moderation.
When Benjamin Franklin said the framers had created “a republic, if you can keep it,” he meant that we needed to keep faith in the Constitution. Law professors mistook their own crisis of faith for a constitutional crisis. They have become a sort of priesthood of atheists, keeping their frocks while doffing their faith. The true danger to the American democratic system lies with politicians who would follow their lead and destroy our institutions in pursuit of political advantage.
* * *
Mr. Turley a law professor at George Washington University and author of “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage”
Tyler Durden
Wed, 09/25/2024 - 20:05
Published:9/25/2024 7:18:56 PM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post hardcover bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:9/25/2024 7:11:40 AM
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[Markets]
Artificial Intelligence: Our Days (Probably) Aren't Numbered
Artificial Intelligence: Our Days (Probably) Aren't Numbered
Authored by Art Carden via The American Institute for Economic Research,
Maybe it’s a law of history: every innovation faces opposition. The early nineteenth-century Luddites wrecked textile machinery because it took their jobs. Our innate suspicion extends to trade, too, which is, after all, just another technology for turning one thing into another. Apartheid-era white South Africans opposed efforts to modify the Colour Bar because they feared that African workers would take their jobs and reduce them to “uncivilized” standards of living. Protectionists want to shield their fellow Americans from foreign competition.
Artificial intelligence is the most recent worry and was the big technology story of 2023. Should we curse these intelligent machines? After all, once machines can solve problems, they will take all our jobs and cause mass unemployment. Peggy Noonan sounded the alarm about Artificial Intelligence in the pages of the Wall Street Journal. OpenAI’s executives appeared before Congress to ask (perhaps predictably) for licensing and regulation, and some wonder if the robot apocalypse is finally upon us.
We have heard this story before. It’s still wrong.
The “creative” part of creative destruction is harder to see than the “destruction” part. Of course, I can make life a bit more convenient with new apps and subscription services. But it’s not as dramatic as a plant closure, and there’s no despairing laid off laborer to interview.
But what happens when people innovate and increase others’ productivity? They make some resources redundant and free them up for other, more productive uses. Innovation and institutional change run into distributional problems because some people might be made worse off — absolutely and permanently. Sometimes those who take losses from a changing status quo can veto the change. Government social insurance or trade adjustment assistance, for example, might make it easier for people to swallow the bitter pills of losing their livelihoods. Civil institutions like houses of worship, civic organizations, and other groups help people having hard times. Whether people deserve help might be irrelevant to the political reality. When people put themselves in positions to extract rents, they will do so. In the very long run, weathering periodic injustice might be a small price to pay for big increases in standards of living.
I run the risk of writing my epitaph here, but the threat of artificial intelligence is, most likely, overstated. Learning loss during the COVID-19 pandemic underscored that: online schooling is a poor substitute for in-person schooling. Yes, many meetings could have been emails, but we also feed on contact and conversation. These needs require a lot of human nuances that artificial intelligence is not likely to understand for quite some time.
Releasing labor from areas where machines have taken over has created many new possibilities. Artificial intelligence cannot yet aggregate and deploy knowledge about the particular circumstances of time and place as efficiently and effectively as someone with human intuition. We appreciate aggregations and recommendations, but Facebook’s algorithm doesn’t understand how you do your job quite as well as you do. FA Hayek pointed out a lot of knowledge of “the particular circumstances of time and place” is not properly “scientific.” It is generally of a kind that is difficult (if not impossible) to articulate, much less automate.
The economic historians Joel Mokyr, Chris Vickers, and Nicholas Ziebarth have argued that artificial intelligence might be the world’s best research assistant, but it is unlikely ever to be the world’s best researcher. Every technological change creates a lot of new possibilities. Artificial intelligence — even if not truly “intelligent” — is a monumental achievement of creative cooperation, and it frees up time and energy for even more creative endeavors.
As Frederic Bastiat puts it, “to curse machines is to curse the human mind.” To hate a technology is denigrate the most human undertaking, namely, thinking.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 09/24/2024 - 15:05
Published:9/24/2024 2:41:42 PM
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[Markets]
Serious Progress On The Horizon For Release Of The JFK Files?
Serious Progress On The Horizon For Release Of The JFK Files?
Authored by Mark Adamczyk via American Greatness,
By now, it is pretty widely known that government agencies are still withholding thousands of “protected” files related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. As of 2023, 4,684 assassination records are still “fully or partially” withheld from the public.
All remaining JFK assassination records were supposed to be released in full by 2017. That is the law created by Congress in the 1992 JFK Assassination Records Collection Act (JFK Act).
What happened instead?
President Trump ordered a delay of more than 3 years.
Biden took over the task of declassifying the JFK records and actually made things worse.
Biden placed discretion back in the hands of the very agencies that fight so hard to keep these historical records locked away forever.
Both presidents did not comply with the clear language and intent of the JFK Act.
What is the reason for this?
Our government told us through the Warren Commission that only one individual (Lee Harvey Oswald) killed JFK. A “lone gunman” who had no co-conspirators. We were given that story over 60 years ago, and it was (and is still) sold brilliantly by the mainstream media and in school history books. Interestingly, the JFK Act says that an assassination record can only be withheld if it poses an identifiable harm to a living person, a current military operation, a current intelligence operation, law enforcement, or U.S. foreign relations. So, where’s the connection between the “lone nut” Oswald and a legitimate reason to withhold an assassination record in 2024?
What can stop this ongoing cover-up?
A big step forward was taken in 1992 by Congress with the JFK Act. That law created the Assassination Records and Review Board (ARRB). The ARRB was empowered to declassify all JFK assassination records. And that was in 1992, almost 30 years after the assassination! The ARRB declassified several million assassination records. However, the ARRB had a limited shelf life and closed down in 1998. From 1998 to 2017, Congress did nothing to ensure that the ARRB’s purpose was carried out in full. Every president since Clinton ignored the issue. Trump and Biden simply kicked the can down the road when the JFK Act required full and final disclosure in 2017.
In 2013, ARRB chairman Judge John R. Tunheim expressed his frustration with the CIA. To the Boston Globe, Tunheim said, “There is a body of documents that the CIA is still protecting, which should be released. Relying on inaccurate representations made by the CIA in the mid-1990s, the Review Board decided that records related to a deceased CIA agent named George Joannides were not relevant to the assassination. Subsequent work by researchers, using other records that were released by the board, demonstrates that these records should be made public.”
Tunheim pointed out that the CIA had not told the Warren Commission that George Joannides was the CIA lead for the agency’s links with the anti-Castro group Oswald had a public fight with in mid-1963 (in New Orleans); nor had they told the United States House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA), of which Joannides was the CIA’s liaison. Tunheim said in a separate interview that “it really was an example of treachery… If [the CIA] fooled us on that, they may have fooled us on other things.”
Tunheim’s comments shed credible light on the reason(s) for the continued secrecy. We know that Trump, when president, announced his intent to release all of the JFK records.
We know that Trump got a visit from the CIA at the eleventh hour and instead authorized a delay of more than three years.
We know that Trump has privately told a friend and advisor that he simply “could not” release the remaining JFK records because of what he was shown and told by one or more intelligence agencies.
Could it be that certain intelligence agencies are still protecting an operation involving Oswald that was not explained (or even investigated) by the Warren Commission?
What can we expect now?
Representative Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) has recently initiated legislation to finish the declassification work required by the JFK Act.
If Cohen’s bill is successful, declassification authority would be turned over to an independent civilian review board—in other words, the ARRB 2.0. This should have been done years ago by congressional oversight committees, but it’s a start. Trump has stated (again) that he will release all JFK records if re-elected, and Trump is of course supported by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., in that effort. We do not know what Kamala Harris will do if elected. But at the end of the day, Congress already has the authority in the JFK Act to do this work. The next president simply has to follow the law and only authorize continued postponement for a legitimate reason.
And in all honesty, what reason could there still be for secrecy other than intelligence agencies fighting to cover up their extreme anti-Castro and anti-communist activities from the early 1960s?
Readers should look up “Operation Northwoods,” a Pentagon-CIA “false flag” scheme exposed in 1997, which can be viewed as a blueprint for the attack on JFK in Dallas. Oswald’s journey from New Orleans to Mexico City to Dallas, being portrayed as a “pro-Castro Communist sympathizer” along the way, certainly seems consistent with a Northwoods operation.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 09/20/2024 - 23:25
Published:9/20/2024 10:55:57 PM
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[Markets]
It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad Fake Presidential Race
It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad Fake Presidential Race
Authored by Donald Jefferies,
Don't burn your popcorn...
I’ve been an observer of national politics since I was eleven years old. I cried when they killed Robert F. Kennedy. I was a die hard Democrat. I thought they were the good guys. Then I became an independent, and have grown more radical as I age. I know the process is rigged, and yet I continue to follow it, like a heroin addict.
Donald Trump was recently the victim of yet another assassination attempt. Apparently. The same people who believe the first attempt, in Butler Pennsylvania two months ago, was staged, naturally believe this one was fake, too. And they both might very well have been. After all, everything they do is seemingly scripted. No improvisation allowed. But the response is what really grabs my attention. As I’ve noted, those on the Left who are skeptical of the Trump assassination attempts aren’t skeptical about anything else. They believe in Russian collusion. They think “Climate Change” is a tremendous threat to us all. They accept the transgender lunacy. And despite the vast majority being White themselves, they are fully on board with the anti-White agenda. So they’re certainly predisposed to accept things at face value.
The alleged would-be assassin is supposedly one Ryan Wesley Routh. Another three namer- who could have predicted that? As you can see from the photo above, when Routh was apprehended, his shirt was oddly pulled up, revealing his A-cup man boobs, and his pants were pulled down lewdly, in big hair, rock star fashion. Did he do this himself? I don’t know, maybe that’s the latest fashion trend for potential patsies? It certainly is an attention grabber. Or did law enforcement pull his shirt up, and his pants down? That takes us into more bizarre territory. Perhaps their resistance got weak, and they absolutely had to see if this fifty eight year old had six pack abs. It’s a suppressed homosexuality thing, you wouldn’t understand. However you look at it, I don’t believe we’ve seen another arrest photo like it.
But Ryan Wesley Routh is far more than man boobs and almost exposed crotch. We are told that the FBI and Interpol were “warned” about him. We are told this, after the fact, about most of the accused perpetrators of high profile crimes. We understand how corrupt and incompetent the FBI has always been, so it makes sense that they would ignore “warnings” about any potentially dangerous individual. I suppose Interpol is no better. Maybe they can hire more people, with better lone nut detectors. The brave Secret Service detail was evidently denied the opportunity to stand down at Trump’s own golf course in Palm Beach, Florida. I feel confident they would have been exemplary once again, in not doing their job, if the patsy wearing the makeshift tank top had been able to get close enough to fire at Trump.
Routh is also an author. Just like me, and many others who have never fired shots at any politician. Or pulled our shirts up and pants down so provocatively in public. Routh’s self-published book Ukraine's Unwinnable War: The Fatal Flaw of Democracy, World Abandonment and the Global Citizen-Taiwan, Afghanistan, North Korea and the end of Humanity, is an impassioned plea for World War III. Wow- nobody ever tell me that the subtitles for my books are too wordy. He is documented as a fervent leftist, having formerly supported Bernie Sanders, and having contributed financially many times to ActBlue. He tried to recruit foreign soldiers to help Ukraine defeat Russia. You’d think that, with all this information, it would be obvious that Routh was motivated by the same kind of irrational hatred for Donald Trump that has infected millions of formerly rational Americans with TDS.
But instead of acknowledging this, and perhaps issuing one of their standard lectures to the insane “Woke” Left, the mainstream media, and high profile Democrats themselves, are telling Trump to “tone down” his rhetoric. If you just stop saying “hateful” things, no one will try to assassinate you! What is most remarkable about Routh is the fact that he was inexplicably interviewed by Newsweek in 2022. His only claim to fame was his self-published book, touting the official state controlled media line on Ukraine. People who write self-published books don’t usually get to be interviewed by huge media outlets like that. I have legitimate publishers, and I couldn’t get Newsweek to notice me, even if I walked into their headquarters with a “9/11 Wasn’t an Inside Job” tee shirt pulled up past my nipples. So the FBI not only knew about Routh, but Newsweek thought he was worth an interview, two years ago?
Now I am fully aware that many are dubious about this attempt, just as they are about the incident in Pennsylvania. I am, too. Why would we believe anything that is reported, by a media that is simply regurgitating talking points from “authorities” that lie to us about everything? How did Routh know Trump was going to be at the golf course, the skeptics are asking. Good question. Initially, the New York Post went with a story that claimed two men had fired shots at each other, and it was all totally unrelated to Trump. Well, that sounds plausible. I used to golf regularly, very badly, back in the misty days of America 1.0. I guess I was lucky not to have encountered two men shooting at each other on any of the courses I played. Where else would you hold a gun battle, other than a golf course? Regardless, as in the Steve Scalise shooting, the victim’s motives are never political if he’s a leftist, only if he’s a right-wing extremist.
However real either or both Trump assassination attempts were, the response to them is even more telling. Trump has to be the only politician that survived at attempt on his life, and actually went down in the fake public opinion polls afterwards. You’d imagine that the second attempt would ensure his victory. But I think we can predict that he’ll plunge even further after the failed efforts of Ryan Wesley Routh. I’m sure the Republicuck leaders will leave no stone unturned in finding out the truth here. Sure, they haven’t managed to call a single one of the Secret Service agents who stood down completely in Butler, but these things take time. They’re still searching for photos of Thomas Matthew Crooks taken after he graduated from the eighth grade. That makes sense; few of us have our pictures taken after middle school. It’s all downhill from there.
And their task won’t be made easier by the fact that the Secret Service is unwilling to cooperate in any investigation. Well, to be fair, any real investigation would make the Secret Service look really bad. The Biden administration, Homeland Security, all of them, are urging the Secret Service not to comply with Congress. What is Congress going to do if they don’t? Remember Hunter Biden’s taunting press conference? Maybe if Peter Navarro was one of the Secret Service agents in question. And, in keeping with their appearance of upright honesty, the Secret Service is also rejecting Freedom of Information Act requests about the Butler incident. Nothing evokes innocence better than that. So we’ll never find anything out. If it was real, who was actually behind it? Or if it was staged, as millions believe, why it was staged, and by who? Was Trump in on it? Why stage a shooting, and then stop reporting on it?
Melania Trump, one of the least visible of modern political wives, recently put out a heartfelt video where she talked about the first assassination attempt, and supported the “conspiracy theorists” who feel there is more to it than a loner walking around for thirty minutes carrying a rifle, and then scaling the wall of a building, while witnesses tried in vain to get the attention of law enforcement. If only Crooks would have committed an illegal U-Turn; those cops would have apprehended him before he could U-Turn again. At any rate, Don Lemon, the gay White hater who is married to a White man, played Melania’s emotional video and ridiculed it. Made fun of it like a sixth grade bully. A gay, racist bully. Lemon can freely mock Mrs. Trumpenstein, and millions of Americans believe the Giant Orange Man is orchestrating the whole thing. I think it is all orchestrated, but Trump isn’t doing the orchestrating.
We used to have a saying, back in the smoke-filled 1970s, that bullets, not ballots, shouldn’t effect the outcome of elections. JFK’s death certainly effected the 1964 election, as did RFK’s in 1968. Then there was the George Wallace nonfatal shooting, which ended his campaign in 1972. In 1980, while Reagan was elected, his nonfatal shooting a few months later certainly seems to have impacted the way he governed. But until this year, we hadn’t seen any more bullets changing the outcome of our elections. Lots of character assassination, and false promotion of preferred establishment puppets, but no actual gunfire. As I keep saying, what makes the Trump assassination attempts so extraordinary is how quickly they are forgotten. Tossed down the memory hole. This would apply even if they were staged. They should be the big story of the 2024 presidential race. No investigation, move on to the next act.
The fact that Trump wasn’t asked a single question about the alleged attempt on his life, during the ridiculous debate with Harris, should tell us all we need to know. They don’t want any of these big events looked at honestly, whether they were fake or not. 9/11 or Sandy Hook- don’t ask questions! Why didn’t Trump’s Secret Service do their jobs? Mere incompetence cannot explain that. A volunteer group of elementary school safety patrols would have responded better. So, if you believe it really happened or not, that is what should be investigated first. Like JFK’s Secret Service detail in 1963, who failed to react at all to the sound of gunfire, Trumpenstein’s Secret Service detail failed to notice someone walking around openly brandishing a rifle, and then scaling the side of a building. Even when witnesses alerted them to it. No one is acting like these events were real, even in much of the alt media and the Trump campaign itself.
And while Trump dodges real or fake bullets, Kamala Harris keeps cackling her way to a lead in the fake public opinion polls. Trump’s running mate J.D. Vance continues to be depicted as “weird,” despite never having ingested horse semen, or driven drunk while going nearly 100 mph. Both he and Trump have been blasted by the state controlled media for objecting to Haitian migrants eating cats and dogs. That’s not the “hate” that PETA represents! Vance continues to be haunted by his “childless cat lady” comments. Never have childless women been so proud. They’ve gone beyond the programming and firmly committed themselves to not reproducing. Don’t be fruitful or multiply! Trump hates dogs and cats because he says Haitians are eating them. That’s racist! And he keeps claiming that he’s been shot at. If they frame a Black three-namer patsy for one of these real or fake shootings, that will be racist, too.
While J.D. Vance’s “weirdness” comes primarily from an anecdote invented by his political opponents, about “humping” some sofa pillows, Tim Walz and his wife seem to fit much better into the “weird” category. At a recent Wisconsin rally, Walz gesticulated wildly, in the manner of the immortal Howard Dean, and even lifted his leg at one point. Maybe he was thinking of all those dogs in Ohio who definitely aren’t being eaten by Haitians. Gwen Walz is his perfect soul mate; her wild eyed, sometimes incomprehensible speech is the stuff most political trophy wives never master. She kept saying “bye-bye” for some reason. Gwen notably said, regarding the 2020 BLM riots, that she kept her windows open so she could keep smelling the burning tires. Well, who doesn’t like the scent of a burning tire? Both Walz and his wife were Minnesota public school teachers, so you know where they’re coming from.
A new rumor revolves around Donald Trump having an affair with 31 year old conservative personality Laura Loomer. Loomer has threatened to sue odious “comedian” Bill Maher for insinuating such a thing. Those with TDS accept this without reservations. As I’ve tried to point out to them, this kind of destroys their carefully crafted image of Trump, as a clown with a really, really small penis. Can’t emphasize that enough, because it’s so important to them. And he is 78 years old. Wouldn’t this mean he’s a stud, having an affair with someone young enough to be his granddaughter? I know what you’re saying; Laura Loomer is a worthless apologist for Israel. She’s really ugly; she ought to sue her plastic surgeon. She’s actually a man, Larry Loomer. Whatever, as the young girls say. I hate to see anyone ridiculed for their looks, so this brings out my chivalry. And I can’t stand Maher.
And there is the matter of the anonymous ABC whistleblower, who released an affidavit claiming that he had recordings proving that ABC agreed to “fact check” Donald Trump in advance, as well as not ask certain questions in the debate, as requested by the Harris campaign. Whether she really had an “audio earring” that was feeding her answers, Harris undeniably was given preferential treatment by the laughable moderators. One of them, Linsey Davis, was Harris’s college sorority sister, after all. Girlfriends have to stick together. There have been reports that the ABC whistleblower went on to die in a car crash, reminding us of the precarious shelf life of whistleblowers. This has been debunked, by the state controlled “fact checkers.” Since we don’t know the identity of the whistleblower, how can we know if he’s alive? Trust the Stupid Party in Congress to get to the bottom of it. They always do.
In 1976, I was as excited as a present day illegal immigrant to cast my first vote. I studied all the Democratic Party presidential candidates, and there were plenty of them. Only Senator Fred Harris publicly supported a new investigation into the assassination of JFK, which was of course my primary political issue at that point. Jimmy Carter, the obscure peanut farmer from Georgia, was my least favorite candidate. I noticed how the media chose Carter to focus on, and incessantly promote him as the “front runner” before a single primary vote had been cast. Needless to say, they have used this tactic repeatedly over the years, to marginalize good people like Dennis Kucinich and my friend Cynthia McKinney. While Jimmy’s sister Ruth Carter Stapleton openly questioned the official JFK narrative, the Trilateral Commission’s favorite candidate remained silent on the issue.
So, this is what I’m relegated to now. Analyzing distasteful reactions to what may have been fake assassination attempts. Determining which of the corrupt, incompetent, and insane candidates are the worst in each category. As far back as the 1980s, I was involved in Third Party politics. We obviously didn’t make any inroads, as we don’t have a single viable Third Party today. I fell in love with lots of renegade candidates. Ross Perot. Pat Buchanan. Ralph Nader, Ron Paul. I even had a fling with Lyndon Larouche. Perot got 19 percent of the vote in 1992, and 8 percent in 1996. I don’t think anyone else I liked ever made it over 1 percent. My political candidates are kind of like my sports teams; they never win. So when I voted for Trump in 2016, he became my second winner, alongside Jimmy Carter, for whom I less than enthusiastically cast my first vote as a starry-eyed radical with an ACLU membership card.
As I was writing this, rumors abound that there has been yet another attempt- the third- on Trump’s life. Alex Jones and others are reporting that some attendees who sat behind the stage at a recent Trump rally in Arizona reported experiencing eye pain. Were they collateral damage from a chemical attack directed at Trump? Or were they peddling “wild conspiracy theories,” as one of the few news outlets to report the story called it? A senior Trump campaign advisor released a public statement saying they were “collecting information” about the incident. Can this be real? As real as the other two acknowledged attempts, doubted by millions? Is Trump now just going to be the continuous, designated victim of attempted assassination, yet always surviving? If he really were assassinated, would that be fake, too? Would millions cheer?
I can hear some of you saying; why another piece on this fake presidential race? It’s all rigged, the candidates are selected, not elected. And you are right. It is all scripted. A completely rigged process. I’ve known for a long time that my vote isn’t being honestly counted. But I trudged to the polls, especially when my kids were little, to set a good example of civic duty. I didn’t think they would understand, or should know, how rotten everything was at such tender ages. But I’m still doing it. I’ll probably vote again. I do it for the same reason I still play fantasy football, despite knowing how corrupt and fixed all sports are, and how they discriminate against Whites just like every other part of America 2.0. I’m addicted. If I was a different sort of person, I’d start virtue signaling. It’s not my fault I pay so much attention to your phony bread and circuses- I’m the victim here! You sucked me in a young age, just like the tobacco companies. I quit cigarettes in 1989. I can’t seem to quit politics. Or sports.
I call it the Trumpenstein Project for a reason. I don’t take anything he says seriously. But the side he purports to oppose is unquestionably, indisputably evil. And utterly mad. As always, there is no one to vote for. It is much like betting on the Super Bowl, while knowing that it’s fixed. You still get a thrill out of “your” team winning. There will be no thrills in a Trump victory, should that be the way the script is written. But it will be must see TV, to watch all those deranged leftist “journalists” react. Maybe one or more of them will lose all control, unleashing a stream of ugly profanity, or perhaps they might assault each other. Rachel Maddow vs. Joy Reid. You might see an on air suicide. How could they go on with Orange Man Bad back in the White House? As I’ve noted, that may be the best any of us can expect from this tarnished, prostituted process. It certainly is the best that I can hope for.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 09/20/2024 - 20:05
Published:9/20/2024 7:32:38 PM
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[Markets]
Riley Gaines: Stand With Women
Riley Gaines: Stand With Women
Authored by Riley Gaines via RealClearPolitics,
Are you part of the 70% of American adults who support protecting the integrity and fairness of women’s sports by opposing males competing with and against females? If so, you’ll have a chance to stand with women in less than two months when America goes to the polls to choose the leaders who will make the laws and regulations that ensure women’s sports are only for women.
Let’s face it: Women’s rights are on the line in this election. The attack on our ability to compete fairly and safely in athletic competitions is unlike any we’ve seen since the enactment of Title IX in 1972. That law – which prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in any school or education program that receives federal funds – is largely responsible for the exponential growth of women’s sports over the last 50 years.
That growth in participation is significant: In 1970, just 15% of college athletes were female; today, we make up 44% of college athletes. Female participation in high school sports has exploded over the last five decades, too: During the 1971-72 school year, fewer than 300,000 girls participated in sports – but by 2018-19, that number had increased more than ten-fold to almost 3.5 million girls in competition.
That growth in participation, brought about by the legally mandated equality of the sexes, is now threatened by politicians, too many of whom appear more committed to ideological goals than to biological reality.
Since the start of the Biden-Harris administration, federal bureaucrats have moved aggressively to tilt the playing field. The Biden-Harris administration’s rewrite of Title IX regulations, released April 19 of this year, takes the view that keeping women’s sports all female violates Title IX. That’s just wrong.
I’ve been fighting this kind of thinking at the federal and state level for some time. We’ve made significant progress – 26 states now have laws or regulations on the books protecting women’s sports. And at the federal level, we’ve succeeded in passing legislation through the House, and we’ve forced a vote in the Senate, which allows us to know who’s with us and who’s not. (For the record, on that House vote, every member of Congress who voted for the Protection of Women in Sports Act was a Republican, and every member who voted against it was a Democrat. And in the Senate, every incumbent Democratic senator voted against bringing a women’s sports amendment to the floor for a vote, while every senator who cosponsors the Title IX Congressional Review Act resolution is a Republican.)
We still have a ways to go. After the elections, we’ll have a new president and a new Congress, and we’ll try again to move legislation at the federal level to protect women’s sports and spaces – like domestic violence shelters, rape crisis centers, women’s prisons, and locker rooms, for example. So electing the right leaders in November will be crucial to the success of our efforts next year.
To that end, Independent Women’s Voice has created the Riley Gaines Stand with Women Scorecard, a helpful tool that will draw clear contrasts on the issue. On the one hand will be lawmakers and prospective lawmakers who support fairness, equal opportunity, safety, and privacy in women’s sports and spaces; on the other hand will be those who do not.
The Scorecard is as simple as it sounds – it’s a first-of-its-kind resource that scores every candidate for federal office on whether or not they “Stand with Women,” meaning that they are committed to supporting legislation that preserves female opportunities and private spaces. The Riley Gaines Stand with Women Scorecard, made possible by Independent Women’s Voice, will become an indispensable tool for those of us committed to this vital issue.
Elections are about choices, and campaigns are about contrasts. The choices we make in November will guide the policies enacted and implemented by government at the federal, state, and local level, and will, in many ways, shape the contours of the contests in which our sisters and daughters compete and the safety they feel in their women-only spaces.
This new tool to help identify candidates who are as committed to the cause as we are will help ease the way forward as we fight to maintain equality of the sexes.
We know what a woman is, and what a female is, and we’re committed to standing with women for fairness and equality. We believe our political leaders should know and be committed to those things, too. And now, with Independent Women Voice’s Riley Gaines Stand with Women Scorecard, we’ll know which politicians are worthy of our support – and which are not.
Riley Gaines is an ambassador for Independent Women’s Voice and the host of the OutKick podcast “Gaines for Girls”.
Tyler Durden
Thu, 09/19/2024 - 19:45
Published:9/19/2024 7:35:40 PM
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[Politics]
[Eugene Volokh] "Discard [Library] Books … That Reflect Gender, Family, Ethnic, or Racial Bias"
Professional librarian sources seem split on viewpoint-based book removals: some firmly call for viewpoint neutrality, while others say that books should be evaluated for "biased viewpoints."
Published:9/19/2024 8:03:26 AM
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[autumn]
10 Autumn Reads to Cuddle Up With This Fall
Love it or loathe it, leaf peeping season is better with a big pile of books.
Published:9/18/2024 11:34:21 AM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post paperback bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:9/18/2024 7:12:21 AM
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[Uncategorized]
Naval Academy Affirmative Action Trial Day One in the Books
Attorneys present Opening Statements by both sides, and Plaintiff Students for Fair Admissions commences its case against the Naval Academy
The post Naval Academy Affirmative Action Trial Day One in the Books first appeared on Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion.
Published:9/17/2024 12:19:41 PM
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[Education]
Lack of Opt-Out Option Spurs Maryland Parents to File Suit Against K-5 Gender, Sexuality Indoctrination
DAILY CALLER NEWS FOUNDATION—A group of Christian, Muslim, and Jewish parents in Maryland petitioned the Supreme Court on Thursday to ask it to take up... Read More
The post Lack of Opt-Out Option Spurs Maryland Parents to File Suit Against K-5 Gender, Sexuality Indoctrination appeared first on The Daily Signal.
Published:9/16/2024 11:23:32 PM
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[Markets]
Maryland Parents Urge Supreme Court To Allow Children To Opt-Out Of LGBT Storybooks
Maryland Parents Urge Supreme Court To Allow Children To Opt-Out Of LGBT Storybooks
Authored by Matthew Vadum via The Epoch Times,
Maryland parents have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to restore their right to opt their young children out of having storybooks that promote LGBT lifestyles read to them.
The petition in Mahmoud v. Taylor was filed after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit turned away the parents’ request for an injunction to halt the Montgomery County Board of Education’s policy of promoting the books.
The petition was filed with the Supreme Court on Sept. 12, according to the parents’ attorneys at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, a nonprofit public interest law firm.
The case goes back to November 2022, when the board mandated new “LGBTQ-inclusive” storybooks for elementary school students that promote gender transitions, Pride parades, and same-sex romance between young children.
The board directed employees responsible for choosing the books to use an “LGBTQ+ Lens” and to question whether “cisnormativity,” “stereotypes,” and “power hierarchies” are “reinforced or disrupted,” according to the petition.
Parents were initially told they could opt out on behalf of their children when the storybooks were read, but in March 2023, the board changed its policy. Starting with the 2023–2024 academic year, the opt-out policy would no longer be in effect.
“If parents did not like what was taught to their elementary school kids, their only choice was to send them to private school or to homeschool,” the petition said.
Hundreds of parents, largely Eastern Orthodox Christians and Muslims, attended board meetings, according to the petition, and provided testimony that their religion required that young children not be exposed to instruction on gender and sexuality that was inconsistent with their religion.
“The parents emphasized how impressionable young children are and how they lack independent judgment to process such complex and sensitive issues,” the petition said.
Board members responded by accusing parents of promoting “hate” and likening them to “white supremacists” and “xenophobes,” according to the petition.
The parents filed a lawsuit after the board declined to accommodate them, arguing they enjoyed a constitutional right to keep the opt-out policy in place.
U.S. District Judge Deborah Boardman denied the parents’ request for an injunction to halt the cancellation of the opt-out policy on Aug. 24, 2023.
A divided Fourth Circuit panel upheld the decision on May 15 this year, ruling that the parents had failed to demonstrate that an injunction was justified. The panel added that it took no view as to whether the parents would be able to produce enough evidence later in the proceeding to succeed in their case.
The panel also found there was no evidence that the policy change burdened the parents’ right to free exercise of religion.
Eric Baxter, vice president and senior counsel at the Becket Fund, said the Supreme Court should grant the parents’ appeal.
“Parents shouldn’t have to take a back seat to anyone when it comes to introducing their children to complex and sensitive issues around gender and sexuality,” Baxter said in a statement.
“Nearly every state requires parental consent before high schoolers can attend sex-ed. Parents should have the right to excuse their elementary school children when related instruction is introduced during story hour.”
The Epoch Times reached out to the school board for comment but did not receive a reply by publication time.
It is unclear when the Supreme Court will consider the petition.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 09/16/2024 - 21:45
Published:9/16/2024 9:11:49 PM
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[Markets]
"Congratulations On Becoming The Richest Man In The World," Said JP Morgan To Andrew Carnegie In 1901
"Congratulations On Becoming The Richest Man In The World," Said JP Morgan To Andrew Carnegie In 1901
By Eric Peters, CIO of One River Asset Management
Move On:
“Congratulations on becoming the richest man in the world,” said JP Morgan to Andrew Carnegie in 1901, merging various industrial firms into US Steel. The new firm was capitalized at $1.4bln and became the world’s most valuable company (the US federal budget in 1901 was $517mm for comparison). Carnegie was born in Scotland in 1835. His mom was an impoverished weaver, disrupted by mechanized weaving. She moved Andrew to Pennsylvania. At 13 he went to work in a cotton mill, earning $1.20 for a 12hr day. Morgan paid him $492mm.
Carnegie spent the last 20yrs of his life giving away 90% of his fortune. Beginning in 1880, he built 2,500 libraries in the US, Canada, Britain - feeding hungry young minds. The 1st was in his hometown of Dunfermline, Scotland. By his death in 1919, half the US public libraries had been built by Carnegie. Colonel James Anderson let apprentices and working boys borrow books from his personal library when Carnegie was a kid. “To him I owe a taste for literature which I would not exchange for all the millions that were ever amassed by man.”
US Steel was so dominant that it inspired anti-trust laws. In 1943 it employed 340k workers, supporting the war effort. In 1953 it produced 35.8 million tons of steel, while Europe and Japan struggled to rebuild their productive capacity. But it was slow to innovate and relied on old technology. It now produces 14.5 million tons and is the world’s 27th largest producer. In 1991 it was kicked out of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. Japan’s Nippon Steel is trying to buy US Steel for $14.9bln. Our politicians seem to care. But America moves on.
Whatever it Takes:
Draghi in his argument for a new EU industrial strategy calls for 800bln euros of new annual investment spending. At 4.7% of GDP, it’s double the scale of the Marshall Plan relative to the size of the economy. Imagine that bureaucratic trough. And setting aside the fact that the Germans, who would have to shoulder yet more Italian debt, will never agree to anything remotely close to this, it is worth asking why Europe would turn to a former central banker to draft plans for an economic renaissance? Perhaps they misunderstand their problems.
In the 12yrs since Draghi’s “whatever it takes” speech [here], Europe’s benchmark Euro Stoxx 50 index has rallied +108% ex dividends (+67% in real terms). The S&P 500 is +196% higher (+126% on a real basis). When it comes to producing real prosperity, manipulating money is never the answer. In 2012, EU GDP was $14.6trln and has grown to $18.4trln (2023). US GDP over that period has grown from $16.3trln to $27.4trln. The divergence is utterly staggering. And now, of the globe’s top 25 largest companies, just one is European [here].
Tyler Durden
Sun, 09/15/2024 - 16:20
Published:9/15/2024 3:56:59 PM
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[Markets]
The Coming Shift In World Trade
The Coming Shift In World Trade
Authored by Jeffrey Tucker via The Epoch Times,
In July of 1944, a year and some months before the official end to the Second World War, allied powers gathered at the Bretton Woods Hotel in New Hampshire to hammer out a new economic order that would dominate the world at war’s end.
The meeting alone expressed great confidence in a coming victory. They were not wrong.
As part of the new plan for the world, a new monetary system would take shape. It would be based in gold, with the dollar convertibility guaranteed at 1/35 an ounce. The right to convert would not be available to average people. It was something guaranteed by nation states and central banks alone, at least those allowed to participate.
In the early days of the conference, the New York Times (NYT) editorialized against the scheme. The pen behind the unsigned editorials was the great economist Henry Hazlitt, who would later gain fame for his book “Economics In One Lesson,” which became one of the best-selling economics books of the century. In fact, it still sells well today.
Hazlitt criticized the proposed new monetary system. He said that by making the dollar the world reserve currency, and guaranteeing convertibility into gold only by large trading nations, the new system could not last. This is because there was no mechanism to police nations’ fiscal and monetary policies. The new system would enable endless expansion of money and credit abroad without consequence. The United States would experience, eventually, a devastating gold outflow. At some point in the future, he predicted, the United States would have to suspend convertibility.
This is precisely what happened, not right away but eventually. In 1971, Richard Nixon stopped the system whereby the United States shipped out gold. He did so to save the system, and bring about a new one. The expectation was that gold would fall in price. The opposite happened. Eight years later, the price had reached $850. The people who bet against the monetary elites were the winners.
There is a backstory to Hazlitt’s writing at the NYT. His brilliant editorials against the Bretton Woods system appeared weekly, and were later collected in a book called “From Bretton Woods to World Inflation.” The publisher of the NYT at some point in 1944, just before the system was ratified, came to Hazlitt and said that the paper would change its editorial stance. It would need to favor and not oppose the new system. At that point, Hazlitt realized that his 10-year tenure at the paper was at an end. He packed up, went home, and started working on a new book that became “Economics in One Lesson.” Writing it took not even two weeks.
I’ve been visiting Hazlitt’s writing from this period as a way to understand the present moment. It’s clear that the elites in those days were setting up a new global machinery. In designing such a system—John Maynard Keynes from the UK was the primary influence—there were several moving parts. There was the monetary system as described above. There was to be a transaction clearing system administered by a new World Bank, the remnants of which survive in the Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) today. There was a financing system in the form of the International Monetary Fund. And there was a new trade system called the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which later became the World Trade Organization.
These four moving parts—money, clearing, lending, and trading—were designed to work together as if this entire world economy was a machine to be managed, which is precisely how Keynes thought of it. Hazlitt’s objection was that the system was too clever by half, because it could not account for market and political exigencies. It’s one thing for something to work on paper; it’s something else for it to work in reality.
He saw through the problem that the new system did nothing to discipline governments that were party to the deal. He predicted that all governments would take advantage of the opportunity to exchange in reckless fiscal and monetary policies while free riding against the rich nations that were guaranteeing the system against failure.
He was right about this eventually but, in the meantime, the world economy did take a new direction toward what was later called neoliberalism, a managed system that exalted freedom in international trade and fiscal and monetary liquidity above all else.
Why was the system set up this way? The reason is that an entire generation of what were known as enlightened diplomats had become convinced that depression and war (1930s and 1940s) stemmed from trade protectionism and too many monetary guardrails that prevented states from flooding the system in times of crisis.
In other words, the system of 1944 was established mainly to backwards fix what its architects saw as the main problems of the previous two decades. This is human nature. If you live through a house fire caused by an electrical spark, you are going to be extra careful about the soundness of wiring in the future. If your health has failed you for reasons of a bad diet, you are going to be more careful in the future to eat right. And so on. They were more focused on fixing old problems than anticipating new ones.
Thus did the world of the 1950s and 1960s proceed with these fixes in place. The results were spectacular by any historical standard, especially for the United States. But remember Hazlitt’s prediction that the new system would not provide discipline to states in the matter of fiscal and monetary policy. As it turned out, the leading offender in this regard was the United States, which embarked on the Vietnam War at the same time it blew out its provisions in the welfare state. That led to unsustainable economic tensions.
Meanwhile, the trading system that depended entirely on a gold-based settlement system started to flow only one way, which was out. That system broke down as the welfare-warfare state blew up, and finally Nixon put an end to it. In making that decision, he also made a choice to preserve the low-tariff global trading order over the monetary shackles that had hemmed in some element of monetary discipline.
With all limits now removed, inflation took its toll, exactly as Hazlitt predicted. The United States experienced three successive waves in the 1970s, each worse than the last. That excess was finally stopped with the reign of Paul Volcker at the Fed and the presidency of Ronald Reagan, who had promised to control the fiscal side. And yet: there was a Cold War to win, and the Reagan administration too had to make a choice between a balanced budget and its foreign-policy priorities.
Without marching through the policy errors of the following three decades, let us jump ahead to 2016 during a time when (as could have been predicted) the United States has lost vast amounts of its manufacturing sector to foreign competition due to the very system set up in the Nixon era, not to mention victory in the Cold War which opened up a new swath of the world to productive competition with the United States. The new president Donald Trump swore to end the problem, and how? By blowing up the GATT which had been newly labeled the World Trade Organization.
In other words, Trump took a different tact from Nixon: he sought to patch a trade problem with a very old-fashioned system that had been wholly rejected back in 1944. Again, Hazlitt predicted something exactly like this in his writings, as he explained that nations with undisciplined fiscal and monetary problems, operating in a world without domestic convertibility, are bound to suffer monetary outflows and a deprecation of their production base due to foreign competition.
As a result of Trump’s efforts, which were not reversed by the Biden administration, the system of 1944 now lies in ruins with governments around the world newly experimenting with regional trading systems, tariff policies, and even new systems of settlement that could someday unseat the dollar as the world-reserve currency.
In the meantime, the United States has a major problem. Without dramatic domestic reform, it simply cannot compete on the world stage. This is because the U.S. debt avalanche has assisted in boosting the industrial buildup around the world even as the high-value international dollar makes imports cheap and exports expensive with no settlement system in place. This not only leads to perpetual trade deficits but massively subsidizes imports over domestic goods.
In the last four years of inflation, the U.S. dollar has maintained its strength internationally while decaying domestically. As a result, imports have not suffered nearly as much in inflation as domestic goods, which only entrenches the problem.
(Data: Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED), St. Louis Fed; Chart: Jeffrey A. Tucker)
What we are watching now is the final unraveling of the system of 1944 in all its parts, including the tweak of 1971, which introduces grave dangers to the world of both depression and war. The way out of this predicament is not another cockamamie world order constructed by another globalist economic guru like Keynes.
We need a simple return to fiscal and monetary soundness. Above all else, the United States must get its own house in order, with balanced budgets and sound money, even if that means letting go of its imperial ambitions abroad. That is the best and probably only path to restarting the beautiful ambition of a free-trade world.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 09/14/2024 - 08:10
Published:9/14/2024 7:36:59 AM
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[Markets]
"American Democracy Doesn't Survive": Brown Prof Joins Counter-Constitutional Movement
"American Democracy Doesn't Survive": Brown Prof Joins Counter-Constitutional Movement
Authored by Jonathan Turley,
We have been discussing a slew of books and interviews by academics denouncing the Constitution or individual rights as a threat to democracy. The latest is Brown University Political Science Professor Corey Brettschneider who is warning about the “dangers of the Constitution.”
It is all part of a counter-constitutional movement challenging the very documents that have protected freedoms for centuries. It is hardly a perfect record, but it has served the country and its citizens well.
Brettschneider explained to the Brown Daily Herald that the constitution is not only a danger to us all, but “the traditional checks and balances don’t work, and that impeachment and the Supreme Court have failed to check rogue presidents.”
He warned that “it could be that we’re at the moment where American democracy doesn’t survive.”
The reason appears in large part Trump.
Like many, Brettschneider brushes over the fact that the system has worked as designed, including after the Jan. 6th riot.
Notably, I agree with aspects of the book in highlighting the courageous struggle of dissenters in our history and the criticism of figures like John Adams, who is also criticized in my new book, “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage.”
Moreover, he is correct that abusive presidents have avoided impeachment and the Court has historically failed to protect individual rights. We both criticize those failures, particularly by the Court. Ultimately, however, the Court did embrace more robust views of individual rights and has repeatedly blocked the overreach of presidents.
Brettschneider describes what he calls “constitutional constituencies” in their struggle against such abuses.
“These constitutional constituencies, the citizens readers of the Constitution who played a critical role in defending and furthering our democracy, therefore disrupt a standard story told by constitutional law scholars and political scientists – experts who declare that checks on the president come mainly from Congress or the Supreme Court, or locate the foundation of our democracy with the writers of the Constitution in 1787.”
He adds “If history is any guide, today’s crisis makes this a time ripe for constitutional recovery. In that sense, this book offers hope for current citizens seeking to restore democracy.”
While the book is about historical abuses by presidents and the struggle against them, the book’s pitch pushes all of the anxiety buttons:
“Imagine an American president who imprisoned critics, promoted white supremacy, and sought to undermine the law to commit crimes without consequence.”
(The book addresses five prior presidents and the pitch does not make direct reference to Trump).
I have no objection to those who speak out against Trump or his conduct. That is part of a worthy national debate in this election year. However, more professors and pundits are suggesting that it is not just Trump but our Constitution that is threatening our democracy. While others have called the Constitution “trash” in their books, Brettschneider is a bit more circumspect in his interview and reportedly calls the Constitution a “dangerous document.”
The remarks of Professor Brettschneider is part of a growing library of books and interviews attacking the Constitution. As discussed earlier, law professors have led this effort. For example, in a New York Times column, “The Constitution Is Broken and Should Not Be Reclaimed,” law professors Ryan D. Doerfler of Harvard and Samuel Moyn of Yale called for the Constitution to be “radically altered” to “reclaim America from constitutionalism.”
Other professors have called for amending the First Amendment and have attacked free speech as a danger.
The United States Constitution is the oldest and most successful Constitution in history. It has survived crises that have destroyed other nations. Yet, we are a people who have not experienced true tyranny. We can lose our appreciation for how fortunate we are to have this system and the stability that it has afforded this country.
In challenging constitutional values like the system of checks and balances, these academics are seeking to strip away the very elements that have forced compromise and moderation throughout our history. It is the very genius of James Madison that allowed the most pluralistic nation on Earth to govern as one.
The post-constitutional world that some professors describe is no doubt attractive to many. It promises more immediate gains from raw political power. However, it would endanger all rights by reducing the guardrails that have served us so well for centuries.
* * *
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. He is the author of “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage” (Simon & Schuster).
Tyler Durden
Fri, 09/13/2024 - 19:15
Published:9/13/2024 6:32:33 PM
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[Markets]
Recession Now... Or Stagflation Forever
Recession Now... Or Stagflation Forever
Authored by Michael Pento via PentoPort.com,
The labor market is clearly weakening. But in reality, this is what needs to happen.
Short-term pain is needed to reconcile the great imbalances created by decades of free money. The alternative is intractable inflation that renders the middle class into penury.
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The most recent ADP employment report showed job growth in August was just 99k, far below the projected 140k net new jobs that were supposed to be created. This was the smallest number of net new jobs created in over three and a half years.
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The August Institute for Supply Management (ISM) services index came in as expected at 51.5 vs. 51.4 in the prior month. However, the employment subcomponent dropped to 50.2 from 51.1 in July. This data backs up the figure from the ADP print; the conclusion is that while companies are not yet conducting mass layoffs, they are also not hiring either.
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Initial unemployment claims were 5.1% higher compared to the same week last year.
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U.S.-based employers announced 75,891 cuts in August, a 193% increase from the 25,885 cuts announced one month prior, according to the research firm Challenger Grey and Christmas. But what I found most interesting is that if you exclude the 115,762 job cuts announced in the pandemic year of 2020, last month was the highest August total since 2009, when 76,456 layoffs were recorded. Again, not massive layoffs yet, but moving steadily in the wrong direction.
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US employers announced 79,697 hiring plans so far this year. That is down 41% from the 135,980 plans recorded through August of last year.
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The August Nonfarm Payroll (NFP) Report showed 142k net new jobs created, less than the 161k predicted for the month. The unemployment rate fell to 4.2% from 4.3%. But once again, the downward revisions were significant. The change in total NFP employment for June was revised down by 61,000, from +179,000 to +118,000, and the change for July was revised down by 25,000, from +114,000 to +89,000. With these revisions, employment in June and July combined is 86,000 jobs lower than previously reported. One has to wonder why every single month, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) has to revise its initial report significantly lower. But still, the 142k net new jobs announced for August, which will likely be revised lower, along with the 3-month moving average of just 116k new jobs, were far below the average monthly gain of 202,000 over the prior 12 months.
Recession or not, the truth is there is no chance the economy and earnings growth will live up to Wall Street’s expectations. EPS for the S&P 500 is projected to grow by 15% next year, and the forward multiple on those earnings is 21.0x, while the 10-year average is just 17.9. Current dollar GDP and earnings growth have a very high correlation. In a soft-landing scenario, nominal GDP growth should be around 4% next year (2% inflation target + 2% trend real GDP growth). How is it possible to get 15% earnings growth in a 4% nominal GDP world? You would need a huge corporate tax cut. But instead, tax rates are most likely going up. And even if you get that miraculous 15% EPS growth, the market is already overpriced for that aspirational growth rate.
There is credible evidence that GDP and earnings growth will end up being much lower in 2025, and were not just talking about the potential election chaos and the expiration of the massive Trump tax cuts scheduled for the end of next year. The ABC Presidential Debate lowered the odds of a red sweep, which is necessary to keep the tax cuts in place. Here is a list of conditions that lead us to the conclusion that earnings and growth will be anemic at best.
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The total non-financial debt to GDP is a record 260%. Debt-saturated economies don’t grow quickly, especially when the middle class’s living standards have been torpedoed by inflation.
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Bank lending standards continue to tighten, and loan demand is slowing.
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The Index of Leading Economic Indicators predicts growth of just 1% for Q4.
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The yield curve un-inverted on September 4th for the first time since July 2022. It was the longest inversion in history. This indicator always correctly predicts a recession and/or GDP collapse that begins 3-6 months after normalizing.
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The Real Fed Funds Rate is now more than 200 bps in positive territory and has been elevated for over a year. This has led to trouble in the economy and stock prices in the past.
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The same is true for the shrinking Fed’s balance sheet, which has cut $2 trillion off the base money supply in the past two years.
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As the Sahm rule points out, when the three-month average U.S. unemployment rate rises by 0.5% or more from its 12-month low, a recession is underway. That milestone was triggered in July.
And don’t forget that this tenuous economic construct exists in an environment of record asset bubbles in real estate, equities, and credit.
I must point out Fed Governor Chris Waller’s response to the most recent jobs report, which was less than anticipated but far away from a disaster. After all, the unemployment rate fell, and the average hours worked expanded. He said, “the time has come to lower the target range for the federal funds rate at our meeting.” He also said he is open to a series of rate cuts larger than 25bps if the data weakens further.
Here are some more gems from Governor Waller’s speech given before for the Council on Foreign Relations in New York., “Furthermore, I do not expect this first cut to be the last. With inflation and employment near our longer-run goals and the labor market moderating, it is likely that a series of reductions will be appropriate,”
Waller added, “we will be open-minded about the size and pace of cuts…If the data suggests the need for larger cuts, then I will support that as well.”
Ok, so I’ll give you the real reason why the Fed is starting to panic.
The stock market recently had its worst week in about a year. Therefore, the Fed felt compelled to unleash its plunge protection team. It’s so sad, but the Fed proves over and over again that it is in the business of bailing out asset prices and banks; it only pretends to care about fighting inflation and defending the middle class.
Am I being too harsh on the Fed? Could it be that the FOMC is just concerned about too many people losing their incomes and wants to prevent the pain associated with job losses?
There are two problems with that line of thinking.
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The first is that jobs are not yet being lost. We still have positive net new job creation that is commensurate with labor force growth. So, there is absolutely no need to rush into a rate-cutting cycle; and certainly not one with oversized rate cuts.
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The second and most important is that inflation has already wiped out most Americans' standard of living. Therefore, the aggregate level of prices needs to decline, not just go up more slowly to a level that has destroyed the purchasing power of consumers. Hence, we need to have a recession and some pain in the labor market in the short term to ensure the economy's long-term health. It is much better to have a recession of a small duration than to have inflation become an existential crisis for the country.
Instead, what we have is a Fed that is pouring gasoline on the inflation pyre, whose embers are still glowing white hot. This will intensify the trenchant and pernicious bifurcation between the rich and the poor. And will serve only to destroy the real incomes of those who manage to remain employed while further impoverishing the middle class in the foreseeable future.
* * *
Michael Pento is the President and Founder of Pento Portfolio Strategies, produces the weekly podcast called, “The Mid-week Reality Check” and Author of the book “The Coming Bond Market Collapse.”
Tyler Durden
Fri, 09/13/2024 - 12:45
Published:9/13/2024 12:11:05 PM
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[Markets]
Enabling A "Brutus" To Slay The Elon Musk "Caesar"
Enabling A "Brutus" To Slay The Elon Musk "Caesar"
Submitted by Alastair Crooke
In the Washington Post on Monday, the headlines read: Musk and Durov are facing the revenge of the regulators. Former US Labor Secretary, Robert Reich, in the British Guardian newspaper, published a piece on how to ‘rein-in’ Elon Musk, suggesting that “regulators around the world should threaten Musk with arrest” on lines of that which befell Pavel Durov recently in Paris.
As should be clear to all now, ‘war’ has broken out. There is no need for further pretence about it. Rather, there is evident glee at the prospect of a crackdown on the ‘Far-Right’ and its internet users: i.e. those who spread ‘disinformation’ or mal-information that ‘threatens’ the broad ‘cognitive infrastructure’ (which is to say, what the people think!).
Make no mistake, the Ruling Strata are angry; they are angry that their technical expertise and consensus about ‘just about everything’ is being spurned by the ‘deplorables’. There will be prosecutions, convictions and fines for cyber ‘actors’ who disrupt the digital ‘literacy’, the ‘leaders’ warn.
Professor Frank Furedi observes:
“There is an unholy alliance of western leaders – Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholtz – whose hatred of what they call populism is undisguised. In his recent visits to Berlin and Paris, Starmer constantly referred to the threat posed by populism. During his meeting with Scholz in Berlin on 28 August, Starmer spoke about the importance of defeating “the snake oil of populism and nationalism”.
Furedi explained that as far as Starmer was concerned, populism was a threat to the power of the technocratic élites throughout Europe:
“Speaking in Paris, a day later, Starmer pointed to the far Right as a ‘very real threat’ and again used the term ‘snake oil’ of populism. Starmer has never stopped talking about the ‘snake oil of populism’. These days virtually every political problem is blamed on populism … The coupling of the term snake-oil with populism is constantly used in the propaganda of the technocratic political elite. Indeed, tackling and discrediting snake oil populists is its number one priority”.
So, what is the source of the élite’s anti-populist hysteria? The answer is that the latter know that they have become severed from the values and respect of their own people and that it is only a matter of time before they are seriously challenged, in one form or another.
This reality was very much on view in Germany this last weekend, where the ‘non-Establishment (i.e. non Staatsparteien) parties -- when added together -- secured 60% of the vote in Thüringen and 46% in Saxony. The Staatsparteien (the nominated establishment parties) choose to describe themselves as ‘democratic’, and to label the ‘others’ as ‘populist’ or ‘extremist’. State media even hinted that what counted more were ‘democratic’ votes; and not non-Staatsparteien votes, so the party with the most Staatsparteien votes should form the government in Thüringen.
These have co-operated to exclude AfD (Alternative für Deutschland) and other non-Establishment parties from parliamentary business as far as legally possible -- for instance by keeping them out of key parliamentary committees and the imposition of various forms of social ostracism.
It reminds of the story of the great poet Victor Hugo’s membership rejection -- no less than 22 times -- by the Académie Française. The first time he applied, he received 2 votes (out of 39) from Lamartine and Chateaubriand, the two greatest men of letters of their time. A witty woman of the time commented: “If we weighed the votes, Monsieur Hugo would be elected; but we’re counting them.”
Why war?
Because, after the 2016 US election, the US political backroom élites blamed democracy and populism for producing bad election outcomes. Anti-establishment Trump had actually won in the US; Bolsonaro won too, Farage surged, Modi won again, and Brexit etc., etc.
Elections were soon proclaimed to be out of control, throwing out bizarre ‘winners’. Such unwelcome outcomes threatened the deep-seated structures that both projected and safeguarded long-seated US oligarchic interests around the globe, by subjecting them (oh the horror!) to voter scrutiny.
By 2023, the New York Times was running essays headlined: “Elections Are Bad for Democracy”.
Rod Blagojevich explained in the WSJ, earlier this year, the gist of what it was that had broken with the system:
“We [he and Obama] both grew up in Chicago politics. We understand how it works—with the bosses over the people. Mr. Obama learned the lessons well. And what he just did to Mr. Biden is what political bosses have been doing in Chicago since the 1871 fire: Selections masquerading as elections”.
“While today’s Democratic bosses may look different from the old-time cigar-chomping guy with a pinky ring, they operate the same way: in the shadows of the backroom. Mr. Obama, Nancy Pelosi and the rich donors—the Hollywood and Silicon Valley élites—are the new bosses of today’s Democratic Party. They call the shots. The voters, most of them working people, are there to be lied to, manipulated and controlled”.
“The Democratic National Convention in Chicago next month will provide the perfect backdrop and place [for appointing a] candidate, not the voters’ candidate. Democracy, no. Chicago ward-boss politics, yes”.
The problem was that the revealing of Biden’s dementia had pulled the mask from the system.
The Chicago model is not so very different from how EU democracy works. Millions voted in the recent European parliamentary elections; ‘Non-Staatsparteien’ parties chalked-up major successes. The message sent was clear -- yet nothing changed.
Cultural War
2016 represented the onset of cultural war, as Mike Benz has described in great detail. A complete outsider, Trump had crashed through the System’s guardrails to win the Presidency. Populism and ‘disinformation’ were the cause, it was held. By 2017, NATO was describing ‘disinformation’ as the greatest threat facing western nations.
Movements designated as populist were perceived as not simply hostile to the policies of their opponents, but to élite values too.
To combat this threat, Benz, who until recently was directly involved in the project as a senior State Department official focused on technology issues, explains how the backroom bosses pulled an extraordinary ‘sleight of hand’: ‘Democracy’ they said, was no longer to be defined as a consensus gentium -- i.e. a concerted resolve amongst the governed; but rather, was to be defined as the agreed ‘stance’ formed, not by individuals, but by democracy-supporting institutions.
Once re-defined as ‘an alignment of supporting institutions’, the second ‘twist’ to the democracy re-formulation was added. The Establishment had foreseen a risk that were a direct info-war on populism pursued, they themselves would be portrayed as autocratic and imposing top-down censorship.
The solution to the dilemma of how to pursue the campaign against populism, according to Benz, lay in the genesis of the ‘whole of society’ concept whereby media, influencers, public institutions, NGOs and allied media would be corralled and pressured into joining an apparently organic, bottom-up censorship coalition focussed on the scourge of populism and disinformation.
This approach -- with the government standing at ‘one removed’ from the censorship process -- seemed to offer plausible deniability of direct government involvement; of the authorities acting autocratically.
Billions of dollars were spent in raising up this anti-disinformation eco-system in such a way that it appeared to be a spontaneous emanation out of civil society, and not the Potemkin façade that it was.
Seminars were conducted to train journalists on Homeland Security disinformation best practices and safeguards -- to detect, mitigate, dismiss and distract. Research funds were channelled to some 60 universities to found ‘disinformation laboratories’, Benz reveals.
The key point here is that the ‘whole of society’ framework could facilitate a blending back into the policy mainstream of the long timeframe and largely unspoken (and sometimes secret) bedrock structures of foreign policy -- on which foundation many key élite financial and political interests are leveraged.
An outwardly bland ideological alignment focussed on ‘our democracy’ and ‘our values’ would nonetheless allow for the re-integration of these enduring structures to foreign policy (hostility to Russia; support for Israel; and antipathy towards Iran) to be re-formulated as the appropriate rhetorical slap in the face to the Populists.
The war may escalate; It may not end with a disinformation eco-system. The New York Times in July posted an article arguing how The First Amendment is Out of Control and in August another piece entitled, The Constitution is Sacred. Is it Also Dangerous?
The war, for the moment, is targetted at the ‘unaccountable’ billionaires: Pavel Durov, Elon Musk and his ‘X’ platform. The survival or not of Elon Musk will be crucial to the course of this aspect of the war: The EU’s Digital Service Act was always conceived to serve as ‘Brutus’ to Musk’s ‘Caesar’.
Throughout history, self-regarding and self-enriching élites have become dangerously contemptuous of their peoples. Crackdowns have been the usual first response. The cold reality here is that recent elections in France, Germany, Britain and for the Euro-parliament reveal the deep distrust and dislike of the Establishment:
“The alienation is worldwide, against the postmodern West. Europe will either distance itself from it, or become embroiled in the detestation of the “privileged ci-devant”. The end of the dollar is indeed the analogue of the abolition of feudal rights. It is inevitable, but it will also cost Europeans dearly”.
An eco-system of propaganda does not restore trust. It erodes it.
Tyler Durden
Thu, 09/12/2024 - 06:30
Published:9/12/2024 5:56:27 AM
|
[World]
The debate. Don't ask who won, ask who failed
The first and quite possibly only debate of the 2024 presidential election season between former President Donald Trump and current Vice President Kamala Harris is in the books. At the conclusion of every presidential debate, the one question that everyone asks and the two campaigns try to control the answer to, is, "Who won the debate?"
Published:9/11/2024 8:20:34 PM
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[Markets]
The Dangers Of Money Printing: Thomas Jefferson And The Financial Panic Of 1819
The Dangers Of Money Printing: Thomas Jefferson And The Financial Panic Of 1819
Authored by Mike Maharrey via Money Metals,
To steal a phrase from Thomas Jefferson, the Federal Reserve and the U.S. government have buried us under a "deluge of paper money."
We deal with the consequences of this monetary malfeasance every time we go to the grocery store or the gas station. Our rapidly deprecating money buys less and less every single day.
Central bankers and politicos claim to be fighting this inflationary monster, but the ugly truth is that inflation is by design. The political class is destroying your money as a matter of policy.
This is nothing new. Government people have been ruining our money for their gain since the Republic's earliest days. Sadly, most people don't realize what's happening. They believe price inflation is due to greedy corporations, Putin's price hikes, or voodoo.
As Thomas Jefferson warned, “The evils of this deluge of paper money are not to be removed until our citizens are generally and radically instructed in their cause & consequences.”
Looking at the past can inform us about the present. As the saying goes, history doesn't necessarily repeat. But it often rhymes. With that in mind, the first American boom-bust crisis in the early 19th century is informative.
During this period. Jefferson’s chilling warnings about unchecked fiat, paper money proved prophetic.
In an 1814 letter to Thomas Cooper, Jefferson wrote, “Every thing predicted by the enemies of banks, in the beginning, is now coming to pass. we are to be ruined now by the deluge of bank paper as we were formerly by the old Continental paper.”
Just one year later, a depression gripped the United States kicked off by financial panic. This economic downturn lasted until 1821 and is widely viewed as the first boom-bust period in U.S. history.
It was exactly what Jefferson predicted.
The depression was rooted in an all-too-familiar problem – excessive money printing.
The economic downturn came on the heels of the War of 1812, which officially ended with the signing of the Treaty of Ghent on Feb. 18, 1815. After the war, banknotes began to rapidly depreciate due to the exponential increase in the amount of paper in circulation.
The First Bank of the United States charter ended in 1811 and was not renewed. The Second Bank of the United States (SBUS) wasn’t created until 1816. This led to a proliferation of state-chartered banks.
As economist Murray Rothbard explained in his book, The Panic of 1819, to fund the war, the federal government turned to these state-chartered banks, and they issued large numbers of paper money banknotes far exceeding the amount of gold to back them.
This caused gold to drain from these banks. To keep the money flowing, the U.S. government agreed to a suspension of specie payments from state banks and the situation persisted after the war ended. This allowed banks to make loans with little to no regard for gold reserves to bank them.
It was a formula for disaster.
Jefferson understood this all too well, making his views clear in his letter to Cooper.
“I am an enemy to all banks discounting bills or notes for any thing but coin. but our whole country is so fascinated with this Jack lanthern wealth, that they will not stop short of its total and fatal explosion”
On March 23, 1815, the U.S. entered a period of financial panic. It was followed by several years of mild depression culminating in a sharp economic downturn known as the Panic of 1819.
The panic was exacerbated by financial conditions in Europe in the wake of the Napoleonic wars, but it was fundamentally a domestic problem caused by money printing.
Whenever the money supply rapidly expands, as it did during the war years, it creates all kinds of malinvestments in the economy. The expansion of credit fueled land speculation in the West, that likely would not have happened in a more sound monetary environment. Historian George Dangerfield argued that the entire postwar American economy was “based on a land boom.”
Since the U.S. Treasury accepted payments for land in the form of state-issued bank notes, state-chartered banks helped fund this land boom. The problem was most of them lacked sufficient specie to back their paper.
After it opened for business in 1817, the Second Bank of the United States (SBUS) jumped right in to further expand money and credit.
The SBUS had 18 branches. They were supposed to operate with oversight by the main bank in Philadelphia, but the oversight was lax. Meanwhile, the SBUS was supposed to regulate state banks. This oversight was also lax.
Meanwhile, western branches of the national bank got caught up in the land boom mania and began issuing SBUS banknotes at a dizzying pace. In his book The Awakening of American Nationalism, Dangerfield noted that SBUS banks tried to restock their insufficient gold reserves by redeeming their notes for hard money at eastern and northern SBUS branches.
The result was, as Jefferson called it, “a deluge of bank paper” without sufficient gold backing.
According to Rothbard, by 1818, the Second Bank of the United States had demand liabilities exceeding $22.4 million. Its specie fund stood at a mere $2.4 million – a 10:1 ratio. A 5:1 ratio was considered sustainable.
That year, the SBUS tried to rein in the problem by curtailing loans by its western branches. When state banks began presenting their banknotes for redemption at the Second Bank of the United States, it refused to provide gold specie from its reserves. There was simply too much paper and not enough gold. The state banks did the only thing they could do; they began foreclosing on heavily mortgaged farms and business properties.
This led to widespread bankruptcies, bank failures, a collapse in real estate prices, and spiking unemployment.
It was just what Jefferson predicted.
In an 1819 letter to John Adams, Jefferson lamented that the situation would never change or even improve until people understood the root cause of the economic malaise – paper money.
“The evils of this deluge of paper money are not to be removed until our citizens are generally and radically instructed in their cause & consequences.”
Jefferson went on to pinpoint the root of the problem with paper money, “want of a stable, common measure of value, that now in use being less fixed than the beads & wampum of the Indian.”
Jefferson was responding to a letter penned by Adams discussing Chapter 6 of the 1817 Treatise on Political Economy by Destutt de Tracy. Adams cited a passage calling the printing of paper money more ruinous and a greater theft than empires of old shaving off a little gold from their coins and passing them off as full-weight. In other words, Tracy called it stealing.
“A theft of greater magnitude & still more ruinous is the making of paper. It is greater because in this money there is absolutely no real value. It is more ruinous because by its gradual depreciation during all the time of its existence it produces the effect which would be produced by an infinity of successive deteriorations of the coin.”
Adams put it in even harsher terms, writing to Jefferson:
“That is to say an infinity of successive felonious larcenies. If this is true as I believe it is we Americans are the most thievish people that ever existed, we have been stealing from each other for an hundred & fifty years.” [emphasis added]
How much worse are things today?
We can accurately predict another economic meltdown in the future because, after more than 200 years, the problem of paper money remains. The people still have not become radically instructed as to the cause and consequences of the boom-bust cycle that’s fueled by printing massive amounts of paper (and today, electronic) money.
The government continues to print it at a dizzying pace. Just consider that the Federal Reserve created nearly $9 trillion out of thin air since the 2008 financial crisis through quantitative easing alone. That was on top of the expansion of money and credit due to more than a decade of artificially low interest rates.
Economic principles don’t change with the times. In 1788, Jefferson wrote, “Paper is poverty … it is only the ghost of money, and not money itself.”
It’s still true today.
In other words, Jefferson called it.
His foresight underscores the enduring danger of paper money and government excess, echoing through history’s economic crises.
The Tenth Amendment Center contributed to this report.
Tyler Durden
Wed, 09/11/2024 - 10:45
Published:9/11/2024 9:56:26 AM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post hardcover bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:9/11/2024 7:33:09 AM
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[Science]
Boeing Starliner Returns Home to an Uncertain Future
NASA has three more operational Starliner missions on the books. It hasn't yet decided if it will commit to any more than that.
Published:9/6/2024 5:42:29 PM
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[Politics]
[John Ross] Short Circuit: A Roundup of Recent Federal Court Decisions
Pizza wiretapping, free books, and a search during childbirth.
Published:9/6/2024 3:00:29 PM
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"You Look Like Thomas Crooks, Little Soyboy"
I spent too long in the comments talking about fantasy books I have read or want to read, so I was very happy to see some quick nonsense posted on Hot Air. Note that the soyboy is the first to...
Published:9/5/2024 3:41:20 PM
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[Markets]
On Being A "Threat To Democracy"
On Being A "Threat To Democracy"
Authored by Donald Jeffries via "I Protest",
Merriam-Webster defines “democracy” as: “a: Government by the people especially : rule of the majority, b: a government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections.”
Well, that sounds good. Do we have a rule of the majority? The majority of Americans, after all, about eighty percent of them, are losing in this rigged economy, and living paycheck to paycheck at best. I don’t think they’re “ruling” anything. We all (well, some of us) know that the 10th Amendment to the Constitution clearly states, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” Again, sounds good. But when’s the last time you heard about one of our tyrannical judges ruling in favor of someone invoking the 10th Amendment? Since the Constitution delineates very limited powers to the central government, this should mean that the vast majority of power in this country resides in the States, or the people.
The 10th Amendment isn’t any more popular than the 1st, the 2nd, or the 4th. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have any “hate speech,” or “gun control” laws, or no-knock SWAT team raids on private residences. It’s pretty obvious that the people don’t have any power. There are, of course, distinct differences between democracy and the constitutional republic our Founders established. But today, in the year of our Lord 2024, we don’t appear to have either in America 2.0. Plenty of taxation, but no representation. Lincoln shattered the foundational principle of our War for Independence, the consent of the governed. Millions don’t consent to this tyranny and authoritarianism. It doesn’t matter. We can’t elect better leaders. 96 percent of these horrific incumbents are returned to office every election. It’s just as bad whether that’s because of fraud, or massive stupidity on the part of the voters.
Note in the illustration above that four of the ten hands are Black. Forty percent. Blacks are twelve percent of the U.S. population. Yes, I know that any television viewer would be shocked by that. I think that more than half the actors in commercials now are Black. I don’t need to mention how overrepresented Blacks are in sports and entertainment. So, how does all this excessive interest in our second largest minority group equate with majority rule? Which is what the dictionary says “democracy” is. What does “the people” mean? In our multicultural society, which people are we talking about? There are conflicting interests among these various groups of people. But the interests of White people- who are still clinging to a majority of the population- are ignored. Or belittled. By White elites.
Ballot referendums are a pure form of democracy. The voters decide on a policy, without any representative go-between. In 1994, a very demographically different California approved Proposition 13, which would have prohibited illegal immigrants from obtaining government services. Well, what could be more reasonable than that? The beloved Bill Clinton campaigned strongly against the measure, so you know it was a good one. Under the unconstitutional concept of Judicial Review, which I examine in detail in my book American Memory Hole, Judge Mariana Pfaelzer was able to quash the measure, and thus the will of the people, a month after the proposition was approved. To today’s Left, that was “democracy.” A judge overriding the majority of the people- you know, the ones who run things under a “democracy.” Millions of illegals later, we’re probably more “democratic” than ever.
In 2008, public opinion polls showed that 95 percent or more of Americans were opposed to the banker bailout. So, this being a democracy and all, every national political leader was opposed to the will of the people, and the disastrous bailout was implemented. In the 2020 election, millions of Americans were convinced that there had been massive electoral fraud, and that Joe Biden hadn’t been honestly elected. Was it a majority of the people? Hard to tell, but certainly enough that their voices should have been heard. That’s what would happen in any “democracy.” Instead, untold numbers of protesters were imprisoned, and some are still being denied due process over three years later. Those who appeared in court were subjected to Alice in Wonderland-style kangaroo trials, and given incredibly harsh prison sentences. We are told that these “insurrectionists” were a “threat to democracy.”
We hear that a lot now; about the “threat to democracy.” Donald Trump is a threat. So are all of those who support him. And the “White Supremacists” who secretly rule the land, but are too shy to ever make their presence known, represent the “greatest threat to democracy” of all. According to the lovable hair sniffer Joe Biden, before he was deposed from office in a silent coup. Elon Musk is another “threat.” Just issuing statements in support of free speech was enough. He probably doesn’t really believe in it, but in today’s climate, just saying something against censorship is a “threat to democracy.” Apparently, censorship is one of the cornerstones of democracy. Somebody tell Webster’s to update their definition. They did it for vaccines, after all, during the COVID psyop. Robert Reich and others now want Musk to be arrested. For making comments in support of free speech. That’s a “threat to democracy.”
Disputing the vote is a “threat to democracy.” If you don’t believe it, you may find yourself being prosecuted by the state. The same state that would be responsible for rigging elections, if one can imagine such a thing. Is that any different from the Crown prosecuting someone a few centuries ago, for offenses against the king? “Hate Speech,” the Orwellian term meant to cover Thought Crimes, is also something that violates the precepts of “democracy.” Disinformation, misinformation, conspiracy theories, all of it is a “threat to democracy.” Only FCC approved content is allowed in this democracy, peasant. The state will eagerly censor any unapproved books about Sandy Hook, Pizzagate, 9/11 and the like. But don’t you dare touch a pubic hair between the covers of the all-time classic Gender Queer. The Left considers removing this detailed account of man-boy love from school libraries to be “book burning.”
Prior to the 2022 midterm elections, Joe Biden attempted to frame the choices as either “democracy” or “MAGA Republicans.” Political satirist Tim Young observed, "I'm not saying ‘fascism’ officially had its coming out party in America tonight... I'm just saying Biden condemned his political opponents as a threat to America and democracy set to a blood red background with the military standing behind him." Never before had an American president demonized the opposition to such an extent. Biden was labeling half of America as “extremists.” Perhaps “insurrectionists.” So he was saying that protecting the border- as any nation must to remain sovereign- wasn’t “democracy.” Is private gun ownership part of “democracy?” So what does he and his ilk represent? Empty “Woke” rhetoric? Cancel culture? Abortion on demand?
I would love to hear a “journalist” ask Kamala Harris or Tim Walz for their definition of “democracy.” As we’ve shown, it isn’t the rule of the majority. White people, for example, are still a majority in this country, but anti-White discrimination in business and government hiring is established practice. That’s an odd way to treat the majority. You know, the ones who are in charge under a democracy. Harris, Walz, and every other leading Democrat is on the record as opposing free speech, and supporting censorship. So I guess democracy doesn’t mean free speech. Freedom of association? Nope, you’ll be branded “racist” if you say you aren’t interested in Black guys on a dating site. But you can harass Sarah Huckabee Sanders out of your restaurant. Does democracy respect privacy? Well, not if some cop asks you for your identification and you refuse, as you should under the Bill of Rights.
So what, then, is democracy? It sure isn’t what the dictionary says it is. To US leaders, who champion “our democracy” incessantly, it means sending billions to a comedian turned dictator in Ukraine, who has banned all political opposition and shut down newspapers who criticize him. Our billions are helping to “defend democracy.” Again, I’d really like to hear some Democrat define democracy. When I was a young, ACLU card carrying radical, I thought of the First Amendment when I thought of democracy. I thought of “the people” exerting their will, like Frank Capra taught me in his populist films. I thought of defending the little guy. Helping the poor. Avoiding war. Today’s Democrats defend the powerful. They don’t even notice the poor. And they haven’t opposed a war since Vietnam. To “Woke” Democrats, democracy means censorship, prosecuting your opponents, continuous war, and divisive cultural lunacy.
Benjamin Franklin described democracy as “two wolves and a sheep arguing over what’s for dinner.” In America 2.0 “democracy,” we have a small cartel of powerful wolves, and hundreds of millions of sheep. Despite it being a democracy, the sheep curiously have no power whatsoever. Thomas Jefferson is considered the first American Democrat, although his party called themselves the Democratic-Republicans. No modern Democrat dares to invoke Jefferson’s name, except perhaps to slander him as a “racist.” Jefferson would be a monumental “threat to democracy” in today’s world. So would all the Founders. Except Hamilton, of course. The Declaration of Independence is filled with “threats to democracy.” So is the Constitution, because of the inclusion of the Bill of Rights. Freedom. Liberty. Independence. All of it goes against the “core values” of America 2.0.
The word “democracy” comes from the Greeks, who are credited with establishing the first such form of government. In Greek, it means “peoples power.” Remember, the great Abraham Lincoln talked about of the people, by the people, for the people. Now he was celebrating a “cause” that revolved around stopping people from practicing all that “of, by and for” stuff, with guns and cannons. But the words are beautiful. They’re just classic disinformation. If only the Fact Checkers had been around at Gettysburg. So, the way the Greeks defined it, democracy sounds a lot like populism. Remember John Lennon’s song Power to the People? When’s the last time you heard that one on an oldies station? America is the wonder of the world; a democracy where the people have no power. And if you point that out, you’ll be considered a “threat to democracy.”
To most average people, democracy means freedom. Hey, we live in a democracy. We get to vote! The vote is sacred to defenders of American “democracy.” Go ahead, pick your candidate. You have two choices. Two! Our democracy is full of choices. That’s why “pro choice” is kind of the foundation of our “democracy.” The MAGA people are a “threat to democracy” because they want women to stop having abortions. To a mere community college dropout like me, that would seem to be a good thing. But apparently not. I see all the older women, past menopause, violently confronting pro-life demonstrators. It’s as if they would love to just have an abortion for the sake of it, if they were still biologically able to. That’s a moral disfunction I can’t comprehend. And we wonder why these same angry women embrace the transgender madness? Anything but birth! That would be a “threat to democracy.”
Just searching online, it’s easy to find all the “threats to democracy.” Like “racist,” they are everywhere. Democrats have called “Republicans” in general “threats to democracy,” much as Whites in general have been castigated for their imaginary “privilege.” During the 2022 elections, many Republicans were referred to as a “threat to democracy.” And to think the best the right-wingers in the 1950s could come up with was “commies” or “pinkos.” And elections themselves appear to be a “threat to democracy.” Time magazine warned, in 2021, that “American Democracy Can’t Survive Unless the Far Right Is Marginalized. Here’s How to Do It.” So despite their “rock the vote” lust for this “precious democratic right,” today’s Left actually wants to limit your largely nonexistent “choices” further. They want you to pick between a Democrat and a RINO. Every vote counts! Don’t complain if you didn’t vote. That’s “democracy.”
We also learn that “gender imbalance” is a “threat to democracy.” Presumably, this “threat” will be mitigated if the eminently qualified Kamala Harris attains the presidency. Another “threat to democracy” is the “climate crisis.” There are currently some 2807 climate-related laws and policies all around the world. But there is a call for even more. This obsession with the “climate” meshes perfectly with the insanity of transgenderism and critical race theory. What is meant by the “climate” is unclear. For instance, the damage done to the ecosystem by the Gulf Oil spill seems not to be any kind of “crisis.” Greta Thunberg is as disinterested in that as she is in the environmental disaster in East Palestine, Ohio. Well, at least the poor residents there got some fast food, courtesy of Donald Trump. Trump going there was probably a “threat to democracy.” Buying them fast food definitely was.
Now, before you chide me by saying, don’t you know we live in a constitutional republic, not a democracy? So let’s go to the dictionary again. We learn that a republic is a “form of government in which a state is ruled by representatives of the citizen body. Modern republics are founded on the idea that sovereignty rests with the people.” So that sounds pretty much like a democracy to me. Both stress the power of the people. But if we are a republic, then again 80 percent or more of “the people” appear to have no power, no matter what the dictionary says. So, yes, I know we are supposed to be a republic, but what we have doesn’t look like that, either. How about an oligarchy? Which the dictionary says is “a government in which a small group exercises control, esp. for corrupt and selfish purposes.” Now, that sounds familiar! Is there a better description for our society?
Well, how about plutocracy? A plutocracy is defined as “a form of government or rulership by the rich. It is a form of governance where policies and systems are geared to benefit the wealthy and powerful more than others.” Well, bingo there as well! I think we can combine the small, corrupt group of oligarchs with the plutocratic reality that all our policies are designed to benefit the rich and powerful. So what do we call that? An oligocracy? A plutoarchy? However you look at it, our system of government is much closer to an oligarchy or a plutocracy than a constitutional republic or a democracy. So Thought Criminals like us are not a “threat to democracy.” We’re a threat to oligarchy or plutocracy. “Woke” Hollywood catchphrases are not a substitute for human liberty.
So, in essence, the “democracy” today’s Democrats extol and claim to be defending is not a “democracy” by any definition of the word. The January 6 protesters felt that their votes hadn’t been honestly counted. To our “representatives,” that means they were a “threat to our democracy.” If they’d shown you didn’t count the votes honestly, your “democracy” might be overthrown. The defenders of America 2.0 democracy embrace censorship, and war, the Great Replacement, the transgender lunacy, and multitudes of illegal immigrants. And if those immigrants commit violent crimes, you better not mention it, or you’ll be as “racist” as Donald Trump. Rosa Parks refused to sit in the back of a bus for you. Your vote is precious. The troops died to preserve it. If anyone suggests otherwise, cancel them. Prosecute them. Hum the Black national anthem, click your heels three times and remember, you are defending democracy.
Tyler Durden
Thu, 09/05/2024 - 13:05
Published:9/5/2024 12:26:28 PM
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[37e744f5-fe04-5c7b-8df3-4f9c1b31946a]
Kevin Hart, Reese Witherspoon and other celebrities who have authored popular children's books
Many celebrities can add their published books to their resumes. Athletes, actors and pop stars have all written children's books over the years.
Published:9/5/2024 7:48:53 AM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post paperback bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:9/4/2024 7:14:32 AM
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[Markets]
The Surprising History Of The President's 'Resolute' Desk
The Surprising History Of The President's 'Resolute' Desk
Authored by Walker Larson via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
The president’s desk bears a remarkable pedigree. Its story ties together several disparate historical threads, including a ghost ship, polar exploration, and relations between the United States and the UK. The tale begins with a certain British Admiral, Sir Edward Belch.
A mapmaker in the British Royal Navy described Sir Edward Belcher as “a tyrannical martinet who made every ship he commanded a floating hell.” In 1854, that hell was a cold one, since Belcher and his small flotilla were sailing the frigid seas of the Arctic.
Tyrannical or not, one thing is sure: Belcher was a talented seaman, explorer, and hydrographer (someone who maps bodies of water). In 1852, he'd been assigned an important task. Belcher and his men ventured into the austere, alien waters of the Arctic on a rescue mission, searching for any trace of the lost Franklin Expedition.
The Franklin Expedition, headed by Sir John Franklin, was an 1845 British exploration operation that aimed to find the Northwest Passage through Canada to the Pacific. Franklin’s crew was ordered to record magnetic data as a potential aid to navigation practices. But the treacherous northern sea closed its icy fingers around the men of the expedition and never let them go. The mission proved to be one of the worst disasters in the history of polar exploration.
The two ships of the Franklin expedition—the HMS Erebus and HMS Terror—sailed from Britain in May of 1845, took on supplies in Greenland in July, were spotted in Baffin Bay, Canada, and crossed the Lancaster Sound. They were never heard from again, vanishing into the vast white void.
In the years of searching conducted by the British government after their disappearance, no trace of the ships was found. Only a few artifacts and human remains were recovered. Most of the 129 crew members and officers had simply disappeared. Forensic investigations were conducted on the recovered bodies, revealing that the men suffered from starvation, scurvy, lead poisoning, and, possibly, cannibalism, a narrative supported by the oral accounts of the expedition provided by the Inuit people. It was only in the 2010s that the Erebus and the Terror were at last discovered, wrecked off King William Island.
It was this polar tragedy that brought Sir Edward Belcher and his small fleet of ships, including the HMS Resolute, to the Arctic in 1854. Belcher’s voyage was almost as ill-fated as Franklin’s. Though the Resolute was heavily constructed to withstand the harsh Arctic environment, it became locked in the ice in 1854, along with four more of Belcher’s ships. Belcher made the difficult decision to abandon the ships and begin an overland trek to rendezvous with other vessels that could bring them back to England.
The men left behind their floating piece of home, their security and warmth, and entered the unending whiteness. They marched over the vast expanses of ice, eventually meeting up with their comrades’ ships and returning safely to England. There, Belcher was court-martialed (not for the first time) for abandoning his vessels but acquitted because his orders gave him full discretion. He never received another command.
So there, in the emptiness of the frozen North Sea, where the slowly clenching jaws of ice groaned and echoed through frigid air, the pale winds pined, and the strange lights flickered and played about the sky like ghosts, the abandoned Resolute waited. Belcher and his men had left it in good order, though they knew it would likely be broken up by the ice, in the end. But that was not to be its fate.
Months passed. Summer came, kissing even the hard northern waters with warmth. The ice thawed. Somehow, Resolute broke free. It drifted some 1,200 miles until James Buddington, captain of an American whaling ship, the George Henry, sighted it in 1855, near Baffin Island. An 1856 New York Journal article describes the moment the Americans boarded the ghost ship.
“Finally, stealing over the side, they found everything stowed away in proper order. ... Everything wore the silence of the tomb. Finally reaching the cabin door they broke in and found their way in the darkness to the table ... [a candle] was lit and before the astonished gaze of these men exposed a scene that appeared to be rather one of enchantment than reality. Upon a massive table was a metal teapot, glistening as if new, also a large volume of Scott’s family Bible, together with glasses and decanters filled with choice liquors. Nearby was Captain Kellett’s chair, a piece of massive furniture, over which had been thrown, as if to protect this seat from vulgar occupation, the royal flag of Great Britain.”
Buddington assigned a portion of his crew to the ghost ship, and they sailed it back to the United States. According to maritime law, the ship belonged to those who had found her (Buddington and his crew), and the British government accepted this fact when they were notified of the find. But the U.S. government had a different idea.
At this time, U.S. relations with Great Britain were strained. The War of 1812 was still alive to memory, including the moment when the British burned the U.S. capitol. The two countries continued to dispute the Canadian border. In the discovery of the Resolute, the U.S. government saw an opportunity to make a gesture of goodwill toward their adversaries across the pond. Congress authorized $40,000 to purchase the ship from Buddington and repair it.
The Americans took great care in refurbishing the sturdy old juggernaut, as described in an 1856 New York Times article:
“With such completeness and attention to detail has this work been performed, that not only has everything found on board been preserved, even to the books in the captain’s library, the pictures in his cabin, and a musical-box and organ belonging to other officers, but new British flags have been manufactured in the Navy Yard to take the place of those which had rotted during the long time she was without a living soul on board.”
With great fanfare, the Resolute was sailed back to England and presented as a gift to Queen Victoria, who visited the ship in person. The Brits took the gift to heart, and the queen remembered this gesture from the Americans for many years.
Returning the Favor
When the Resolute was removed from service and broken down in 1879, Queen Victoria ordered some of its timbers to be preserved. The heavy oak lumber, which had weathered so many storms and seen both tragedy and reconciliation, was constructed into a massive, ornate desk, weighing 1,300 pounds. Victoria sent it as a surprise gift to President Rutherford B. Hayes in 1880, returning the favor and expressing gratitude for returning Her Majesty’s Ship, the Resolute, all those years before. Most importantly, the desk became an emblem of the mutual goodwill and alliance between the United States and Great Britain, which has never wavered since.
Most U.S. Presidents used the desk since it was gifted at the end of the 19th century. Between 1951 and 1962, it was used to hold a projector in the broadcast room at the White House until it was rediscovered by First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy. She had it moved back to the Oval Office, where it has formed part of the backdrop for many landmark moments in American presidential history. There are photos of President Kennedy sitting at the desk with John Kennedy Jr. peeking out from beneath it.
The Resolute desk, as it has come to be known, bears within it the marks of struggle, abandonment, miraculous discovery, restoration, and reconciliation. It’s a fitting symbol for the resolute American spirit.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 09/03/2024 - 22:35
Published:9/3/2024 10:05:16 PM
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[Markets]
'Over Ruled': Who Guards The Guardians?
'Over Ruled': Who Guards The Guardians?
Authored by John Maxwell Hamilton via RealClearPolitics,
“Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?” – Who guards the guardians? – is an old question that began as amusing repartee and has bedeviled democratic government from the beginning of its formation.
The phrase originated with the Roman satirical poet Juvenal, who was presented with the idea that wives should be chained to keep them faithful. Fine, the poet replied, but who will guard husbands?
The question for democracy lies at the heart of a new book by Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch, “Over Ruled: The Human Toll of Too Much Law.” Too many laws and regulations administered by unaccountable government officials, he writes, have “swallowed up ordinary people.”
Gorsuch, with help from his former law clerk Janie Nitze, makes his case in a series of parables. They feature individual Americans who have been victimized by government laws that they did not know existed and that should not have been written in the first place. The courts in many stories are too aggressive in adjudicating cases that should have been considered minor infractions, at best.
In one such story, an agent from the U.S. Department of Agriculture informed a young magician, Marty Hahne, that he needed a license for using his rabbit in the act he had just performed at a local library. Hahne subsequently learned he also needed an evacuation plan for the animal in case of a hurricane or some other disaster. This requirement originated in a federal statute, the Animal Welfare Act, which regulates the treatment of dogs, cats, rabbits, and other animals for research, teaching, testing, and exhibition. Congressional lawmakers called on the USDA to apply the law to such venues as “carnivals, circuses, and zoos.” USDA regulators interpreted those exhibitions to include magic shows.
In other stories of misplaced rules and courts run amuck, people’s lives are more than inconvenienced. They are ruined. Gorsuch believes these stories show that a surfeit of laws is sucking the life out of democracy.
“Over Ruled” will be catnip for readers who fear the so-called deep state is out to subvert democracy. It also is convenient for Donald Trump, who, if elected, promises to “drain the swamp” by firing career civil servants and installing his own unelected supporters in their place.
But Gorsuch’s book should be taken seriously, both for its strengths and weaknesses. He certainly makes a valid point that the number of laws and regulations has exploded in recent years. The first federal criminal statute, written when the Republic was established, contained fewer than fifty crimes. Now the total number is, by some counts, 5,000. In the process, Congress has delegated powers to executive department agencies to write administrative laws and rules as well as apprehend suspects and judge them.
Having made the case for the problem, however, Gorsuch does not dig into the complexity of implementing workable solutions. He acknowledges that our society is much more complicated than it was at the nation’s founding, and therefore we need more measures to protect citizens. He does not tell us how we sort the good from the bad or how we regulate the regulators.
Perhaps most damaging to his argument, “Over Ruled” does not provide readers with the context needed to understand the longstanding tension between government by the people and the need for expert mediation on social, economic, and political problems.
Gorsuch, who believes judging involves close adherence to the original intent of the Constitution, takes us back to an earlier era that he characterizes as local people solving local problems. He considers this a good time for “ordinary Americans.” What he fails to say, however, is the Founding Fathers were elitists who doubted that ordinary white, male citizens, not to mention minorities and women, were up to the task of making good government decisions.
Gorsuch liberally quotes James Madison about the evils of too much law. But equally important, Madison and others hoped that elections would put the “best” in office. Only members of the House of Representatives were directly elected. Under the original Constitution, senators were elected by state legislatures. The Electoral College can “elect” a presidential candidate who did not win the popular vote – something that has happened already twice this century.
Thomas Jefferson, among many others, promoted national education schemes to create “a natural aristocracy” – what we would today call civil servants – to manage government. What Jefferson vaguely foresaw has come to pass, whether it is experts monitoring environmental degradation and food purity or ferreting out unfair trade practices.
This reliance on experts – people who have the training to determine facts – has not gone uncontested. It fueled populism in the United States in the late 19th century as well as today. Disaffected citizens feel government is not taking them into account and that the bureaucracy is an untethered fourth branch of government, a phrase Gorsuch used frequently. This mentality has given resonance to Donald Trump’s message that his intuitive common-sense ideas about interest rates are more sound than Federal Reserve System economists who have studied monetary policy all their lives.
Readers who want a fuller exploration of the longstanding social and political tension that arises from depending on experts can turn to “Democracy and Truth” by historian Sophia Rosenfeld. Or readers may choose a new volume by Stephen Breyer. The recently retired justice is an expert on administrative law and helped Sen. Ted Kennedy deregulate the airline industry. His “Reading the Constitution: Why I Chose Pragmatism, Not Textualism” thoughtfully weighs the difficulty of balancing fealty to the Constitution with the needs of modern society.
The willingness to rely on common sense over expertise is not infinitely elastic. Most people prefer to go to trained doctors when they are ill rather than consult someone they pass on the street. Most people like some aspects of government expertise and intervention. They may, for instance, place a high value on fighting animal abuse, which is the motivation behind the well-intentioned (if misused) Animal Welfare Act. Various professions require training and education in order to acquire a license to practice; in addition to adding to their credibility, this restriction reduces competition. One of Gorsuch’s examples of overreaching administrative law concerns an African American woman who was “apprehended” for braiding hair in her salon without having attended cosmetology school.
In regard to preferences, it is worth noting that Justice Gorsuch has some of his own, namely enlarging the power of presidents beyond anything the Founders conceived. Insofar as administrative power is concerned, he and other conservatives believe that the president should have more control over quasi-independent agencies.
A recent Supreme Court decision raises concerns about maintaining the protections that administrative law provides. The court found that it was unconstitutional for the Securities Exchange Commission to levy fines against a financier whom they deemed to have violated antifraud and pro-transparency rules. The court said the SEC had to pursue its case in federal court. This dramatic switch in thinking by the Supreme Court could make it difficult – and in some cases impossible – for agencies to police offenders. As law professor David Cole has noted, “some agencies’ statutes do not authorize them to sue in federal court.” It is worth asking, do we want our already flooded courts to deal with all these issues, when more efficient ways exist to get the job done?
Gorsuch has not written a legal analysis so much as a stump speech. His examples are akin to those used by political leaders to give a human dimension to policies they are promoting. Many of the stories are trivial to the point of being frivolous.
Is it really worthwhile to dwell on a law, long ago passed by Virginia legislators, to outlaw hunting bears with dogs on Sundays? A few reform-minded states have wiped laws like these from the books. At the federal level, Gorsuch notes, President Obama directed agencies to “eliminate rules that don’t make sense.”
These steps are relatively easy. The difficult part Gorsuch leaves untouched. His cases are largely cartoons. They do not demonstrate how to balance the injustice growing out of a law with the legitimate concerns it is trying to address.
The solutions he offers sound like Fourth of July speeches. His call for more civic education, as valuable as that would be (see my RCP column on the subject), emphasizes school-age children spending more time reading the Constitution.
Gorsuch argues that the expansion of laws and regulations undermines the credibility of our legal institutions. “Everyone feels like a criminal,” he told the C-SPAN audience.
The growth in law-making is a problem, but it is questionable that most Americans feel like criminals. How can they feel like criminals if they don’t know about all the laws that exist, as Gorsuch insists is the case?
If the justice is worried that we are moving “from a world in which law is revered into one in which it generates disaffection and feeds distrust,” he could profitably focus on the Supreme Court’s unwillingness to police itself. Feeble ethical standards govern justices’ behavior, which is well known and heavily criticized.
The Supreme Court has enormous power. Justices are appointed, not elected, and may serve until they die. They are given their jobs because of their expertise in nuanced application of the law. For Gorsuch, who belongs to this powerful elite, one might expect a deeper exploration of the trade-offs between too much law and too few protections.
“Who guards the guardians” is a much more profound subject than Justice Gorsuch lets on.
John Maxwell Hamilton is an RCP columnist, a professor at the Manship School of Mass Communication, Louisiana State University, and an award-winning author of eight books, including “Manipulating the Masses: The Origins of Government Propaganda,” which won the Goldsmith Prize.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 09/03/2024 - 21:45
Published:9/3/2024 9:13:07 PM
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[Markets]
Turley: Brazil's $9,000 Fine For Accessing X Puts "Wall Of Censorship" Between Citizens And Unregulated Information
Turley: Brazil's $9,000 Fine For Accessing X Puts "Wall Of Censorship" Between Citizens And Unregulated Information
Authored by Jonathan Turley,
Brazil has not just banned X (formerly Twitter) from the entire country, but citizens will now be fined $9000 a day (more than the average salary in the country) for using VPNs to access the platform. X is the main source of news for Brazilians, who will now be left with government-approved sources or face financial ruin in seeking unfettered information.
The Guardian is reporting that the confiscatory fines are part of a comprehensive crackdown on efforts to get news through X, including ordering all Apple stores to remove X from new phones.
The move puts Brazil with China in the effort to create a wall of censorship between citizens and unregulated information.
For the anti-free speech movement, Brazil is a key testing ground for where the movement is heading next. European censors are arresting CEOs like Pavel Durov while threatening Elon Musk.
However, it is Brazil that foreshadows the brave new world of censorship where entire nations will block access to sites committed to free speech values or unfettered news. If successful, the Brazilian model is likely to be replicated by other countries.
The reason is that censorship is not working. As discussed in my book “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage,” we have never seen the current alliance of government, corporate, academic, and media interest against free speech. Yet, citizens are not buying it.
Despite unrelenting attacks and demonizing media coverage, citizens are still using X and resisting censorship. That was certainly the case in Brazil where citizens preferred X to regulated news sources. The solution is now to threaten citizens with utter ruin if they seek unfettered news.
The question is whether Brazil’s leftist government can get away with this. The conflict began with demands to censor supporters of the conservative former president Jair Bolsonaro. When X refused the sweeping demands for censorship, including the demand to name of a legal representative who could be arrested for refusing to censor users, the courts moved toward this national ban.
The man behind the effort is Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who has aggressively used censorship to combat anything that he or the government deems “fake news” or disinformation. With socialist president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, they are the dream team of the anti-free speech movement.
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison responded to the ban with a posting declaring “Obrigado Brasil!” or “Thanks, Brazil!” Ironically, he did so on X.
Ellison previously praised the virulently anti-free speech group Antifa and promised that it would “strike fear in the heart” of Donald Trump. This was after Antifa had been involved in numerous acts of violence and its website was banned in Germany. It is at its base a movement at war with free speech, defining the right itself as a tool of oppression. That purpose is evident in what is called the “bible” of the Antifa movement: Rutgers Professor Mark Bray’s Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook.
Bray emphasizes the struggle of the movement against free speech: “At the heart of the anti-fascist outlook is a rejection of the classical liberal phrase that says, ‘I disapprove of what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it.’” Bray admits that “most Americans in Antifa have been anarchists or antiauthoritarian communists… From that standpoint, ‘free speech’ as such is merely a bourgeois fantasy unworthy of consideration.”
The question is whether Brazil will become a nightmare for free speech around the world as other nations seek to force citizens to read and hear news from approved, state-monitored sites.
* * *
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. He is the author of “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage” (Simon & Schuster).
Tyler Durden
Tue, 09/03/2024 - 19:15
Published:9/3/2024 6:55:17 PM
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[Markets]
Book Publishers Sue Florida Over Law Banning Sexually Explicit Books From Schools
Book Publishers Sue Florida Over Law Banning Sexually Explicit Books From Schools
Authored by Eric Lendrum via American Greatness,
A coalition of book publishers and individual authors have filed a lawsuit against the state of Florida over its law banning sexually explicit books from school libraries in the state.
As the Daily Caller reports, the lawsuit was filed in the Orlando Federal Court on Thursday by a group of over a dozen publishers and authors, claiming that the bill signed into law in May of 2023 by Governor Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.) is a violation of both the First and 14th Amendments. The law, the plaintiffs claim, “interferes” with their ability to produce and distribute “constitutionally protected” books, insisting that the law is too vague in its description of “sexual conduct.”
Among the publishers involved in the lawsuit are Simon and Schuster, Penguin Random House, MacMillan Publishing Group, and Hachette Book Group.
“Books that are required to be removed under the prohibitions on content that describes sexual conduct or content that is ‘pornographic’ as construed by the State Board are stigmatized, without regard for their value as a whole or their literary, artistic, historical, medical, or educational value as the Supreme Court requires,” the complaint claims.
The plaintiffs demand that the court rule certain parts of the law as unconstitutional, while failing to list any specific examples of books that they believe should be allowed despite the law.
“Educators who are already afraid of official state action or action by vigilante members of the public fear the loss of their credentials and livelihood and even threats to their safety,” the lawsuit adds, without citing any evidence.
The law in question is House Bill 1069, which was first implemented on July 1st, 2023. The law bans all materials that are considered either sexually explicit or outright pornographic. Parents and conservative activists supported such a bill after it was discovered that numerous novels were in public school libraries featuring explicit descriptions of sexual intercourse, particularly between homosexual couples. One such book was a graphic novel with X-rated visual depictions of homosexual sex.
“Over the past year, parents have used their rights to object to pornographic and sexually explicit material they found in school libraries,” said DeSantis in a February statement. “We also know that some people have abused this process in an effort to score cheap political points. Today, I am calling on the Legislature to make necessary adjustments so that we can prevent abuses in the objection process and ensure that districts aren’t overwhelmed by frivolous challenges.”
Tyler Durden
Mon, 09/02/2024 - 22:20
Published:9/2/2024 9:34:00 PM
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[Markets]
"The United States Hates Women": ASU Event Offers Dystopian, Anti-Capitalist Vision Of America
"The United States Hates Women": ASU Event Offers Dystopian, Anti-Capitalist Vision Of America
Authored by Jonathan Turley,
In my new book and prior columns I have described a “radical chic” in academia, faculty who thrill audiences with extremist rhetoric and calls for radical reforms, even revolution. The latest example comes from Arizona State University where professors laid out their dystopian vision of America, a vision that apparently can be avoided by “dismantl[ing] capitalism” and “elect[ing] a female president.”
At the outset, it is important to note two things. First, the program covered by the conservative site College Fix was a small event. Second, these faculty members have every right to espouse these views and it is good for students to have a wide variety of viewpoints on campus.
My objection in the past has not been the presence of far left faculty on campuses but the purging of conservative, moderate, and libertarian faculty.
It is also important to address what are becoming common and extreme arguments on our campuses, including a growing anticapitalist movement.
The event titled “Jenny Irish’s HATCH: A Speculative Future for Reproductive Rights” was held both in person and via Zoom. Jenny Irish, an ASU English professor, was joined by Angela Lober, director of the Academy of Lactation Programs at ASU’s Edson College of Nursing and Health Innovation.
Lober, who runs major programs at the school, offered some of the most extreme viewpoints, including the assertion that “the United States hates women and everything the female body does.”
It was a remarkable claim for a nation that has been a leader in the world in women’s rights for over a century and has long had major female leaders from the Vice President to the Speaker of the House of Representatives to cabinet members.
Not to be outdone, Irish expressed her fear that the United States could see “forced breeding camps” and “cannibalism.” She told the students and faculty that “so much of our reality points toward those futures.” She was less clear on what specifically is pointing to that future other than the Supreme Court’s decision to leave abortion to the states.
Lober was, however, clear about the solution in calling for the audience to help “dismantle capitalism” and “elect a female president.”
The event was co-hosted by ASU Lincoln Center for Applied Ethics, which hosts events that aim to design “a future keyed to human flourishing.”
Putting the hyperbolic rhetoric to the side, the anti-capitalist calls have become ubiquitous on campuses. Socialism has become a rallying cry with polls showing that young people have a more positive view of socialism than capitalism.
There is an interesting dynamic to the push for socialism in the United States. Advocates may have a harder time convincing new migrants and citizens who fled socialist countries like Venezuela.
The draw of a “land of opportunity” has been due to not just our laws but also our economic system. The ability to sustain that growth (or support the existing social welfare systems) depends on a competitive economic system.
The irony is found in comments like those of Fidel Castro who declared that “my idea, as the whole world knows, is that the capitalist system now doesn’t work either for the United States or the world, driving it from crisis to crisis, which are each time more serious.” Cuba was (and continues to be decades later) an utter economic basket case without either liberty or prosperity.
Hugo Chavez made the same claim before driving his country into an economic tailspin.
As a student at the University of Chicago, I was fortunate enough to attend lectures by Milton Friedman and, despite being a liberal, I was convinced that there was a connection between capitalism and individual liberty. There are liberty-enhancing economic systems and those that are liberty-reducing. The freedom of economic choice in a capitalist system has historically reinforced individual liberty in my view.
The ASU event captures a rising call for dismantling an economic system that helped drive industrial innovation and massive wealth creation. It has also left great wealth disparities. We have sought to address poverty with social programs that offer greater opportunity for those who have not been able to escape cycles of poverty. We have much work to be done. However, the anti-capitalist movement often offers few specifics on the alternatives, as at the ASU event.
This is a debate that should be welcomed but not in this type of one-sided, jingoistic presentation. Imagine how much more substantive this panel would have been with an alternative viewpoint. Let’s have a discussion on the merits of capitalism and the record of alternative systems. That would offer educational and not merely emotive benefits to our academic community.
* * *
Jonathan Turley is a Fox News Media contributor and the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. He is the author of “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage” (Simon & Schuster, June 18, 2024).
Tyler Durden
Mon, 09/02/2024 - 15:20
Published:9/2/2024 3:05:46 PM
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[Markets]
Would The Party Of 'Real Freedom' Stand Up?
Would The Party Of 'Real Freedom' Stand Up?
Authored by Matthew J. Brouillette via RealClearPennsylvania,
In his recent speech at the Democratic National Convention, Gov. Josh Shapiro said his party carries the banner of “real freedom.”
On everything from abortion (whose numbers have increased since the Dobbs ruling) to fictitious “book bans” (even though anyone can access and read any of the supposedly banned books), Shapiro claimed “real freedom” is on the ballot this November.
But a look at Democrats’ record of heavy-handed rule shows their claims of “real freedom” are a mirage to distract from their real goal of using government force to make Americans comply with their agenda.
Nowhere is this more apparent than in education. In his speech, Shapiro equated “real freedom” with blocking kids from leaving public schools – no doubt a nod to his party’s platform, which officially opposes educational freedom.
In states across the nation, Democrats fight tooth and nail to trap children – mostly minority children and kids in lower-income households – in failing, union-operated, government-run schools.
As children and families crossing all party lines and spanning every demographic strive to escape the government-imposed, zip-code-driven confines that block equal educational freedom, Democrats continue to believe only the rich deserve access to diverse educational options.
Even as they regale us with the virtues of public education, they send their own children to pricey private schools. Their supposed “freedom” ignores the freedom to choose the best educational environment, regardless of zip code or socioeconomic standing, and instead forces children without means to remain in terrible and even unsafe schools.
The Left raises the ridiculous objection of “taxpayer funding for private education.” But when it comes to higher education, federal student aid embraces no similar discrimination. Furthermore, children are denied even the freedom to cross invisible school district boundaries to attend an alternative but better public school, gutting any claims the Left makes of supporting quality education for all.
Of course, driving Democrats’ anti-educational-freedom agenda are powerful unions that are also behind another of the Left’s false claims of “freedom:” worker freedom.
While President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, Gov. Shapiro, and others wax eloquent on the “freedom to join a union,” they oppose the freedom not to join a union or the freedom to leave a union at will. Indeed, Shapiro has repeatedly pledged that as long as he is in office, Pennsylvania will never become a Right-to-Work state – where workers are free to embrace or abstain from union membership without penalty.
Put simply, Democrats believe worker freedom extends only in one direction: toward unionization. And in the Left’s ideal society, workers aren’t “free” to join a union; they are “forced” to join a union in order to fund the union machine that bankrolls Democrats’ political campaigns. The Left’s freedom in theory is little more than coercion in practice.
Worse, central to the Left’s “freedom” is the desire to force Americans to fund anything they claim is a “freedom.”
The “freedom to earn a living wage” means government-mandated labor costs that force businesses to lay off workers and even shut their doors. “Reproductive freedom” has gone far beyond abortion’s legality and now means forcing taxpayers to fund abortions.
As for “freedom” of speech? Democrats deem it desirable only provided it doesn’t turn into “misinformation” or “disinformation,” which the Left often defines as anything that challenges their narrative. And where falsehoods actually exist, instead of debunking them, the Left seeks to censor them.
In any discussion of “freedom,” we can’t forget – nor should we – that during COVID, Democrats, who claim they’re the party of “freedom,” set up government reporting hotlines to encourage Americans to report lockdown violators to the authorities. Indeed, in Democrat Tim Walz’s Minnesota, violators could be (and were) thrown in jail simply for seeking to maintain their livelihoods amid random shutdown orders that targeted small businesses while allowing major box stores to stay open.
The Left’s “real freedom” looks an awful lot like tyranny.
Without freedom, our representative democracy is, indeed, at risk. But freedom by necessity includes free expression, free association, educational freedom, and economic freedom.
Americans seeking true freedom must look past Democrats’ rhetoric to their actions and recognize that you cannot claim to support the idea of freedom while opposing its substance.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/31/2024 - 17:20
Published:8/31/2024 5:17:50 PM
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[Markets]
Federal Court Upholds Ban On "Let's Go, Brandon" Shirts In High School
Federal Court Upholds Ban On "Let's Go, Brandon" Shirts In High School
Authored by Jonathan Turley via jonathanturley.org,
We previously discussed the case of a student (known as “D.A.”) in Michigan who was ordered to remove his sweater with the popular phrase “Let’s Go, Brandon.” We now have a ruling from U.S. District Judge Paul Maloney in the Western District of Michigan. In D.A. v. Tri County Area Schools. Judge Maloney rejects the free speech claim and rules that school officials can punish a student for wearing a “Let’s Go Brandon” T-shirt. I believe that he is wrong and that the case sets a dangerous precedent.
“Let’s Go Brandon!” has become a familiar political battle cry not just against Biden but also against the bias of the media. It derives from an Oct. 2021 interview with race-car driver Brandon Brown after he won his first NASCAR Xfinity Series race. During the interview, NBC reporter Kelli Stavast’s questions were drowned out by loud-and-clear chants of “F*** Joe Biden.” Stavast quickly and inexplicably declared, “You can hear the chants from the crowd, ‘Let’s go, Brandon!’”
“Let’s Go Brandon!” instantly became a type of “Yankee Doodling” of the political and media establishment.
In this case, an assistant principal (Andrew Buikema) and a teacher (Wendy Bradford) “ordered the boys to remove the sweatshirts” for allegedly breaking the school dress code. In the first such incident, D.A. removed the sweater only to reveal a teeshirt underneath with the same slogan. He was then told to go get a teeshirt from a school official to remove both clothing items.
The school ordered the removal of the clothing as obscene and in violation of the school code. However, other students are allowed to don political apparel supporting other political causes including “gay-pride-themed hoodies.”
The district dress code states the following:
“Students and parents have the right to determine a student’s dress, except when the school administration determines a student’s dress is in conflict with state policy, is a danger to the students’ health and safety, is obscene, is disruptive to the teaching and/or learning environment by calling undue attention to oneself. The dress code may be enforced by any staff member.”
The district reserves the right to bar any clothing “with messages or illustrations that are lewd, indecent, vulgar, or profane, or that advertise any product or service not permitted by law to minors.”
The funny thing about this action is that the slogan is not profane. To the contrary, it substitutes non-profane words for profane words. Nevertheless, “D.A.” was stopped in the hall by Buikema and told that his “Let’s Go Brandon” sweatshirt was equivalent to “the f–word.”
Judge Maloney ruled that:
A school can certainly prohibit students from wearing a shirt displaying the phrase F*** Joe Biden. Plaintiffs concede this conclusion. Plaintiff must make this concession as the Supreme Court said as much in Fraser … (“As cogently expressed by Judge Newman, ‘the First Amendment gives a high school student the classroom right to wear Tinker’s armband, but not Cohen’s jacket [which read {F*** the Draft}].'”) The relevant four-letter word is a swear word and would be considered vulgar and profane. The Sixth Circuit has written that “it has long been held that despite the sanctity of the First Amendment, speech that is vulgar or profane is not entitled to absolute constitutional protection.” …
If schools can prohibit students from wearing apparel that contains profanity, schools can also prohibit students from wearing apparel that can reasonably be interpreted as profane. Removing a few letters from the profane word or replacing letters with symbols would not render the message acceptable in a school setting. School administrators could prohibit a shirt that reads “F#%* Joe Biden.” School officials have restricted student from wearing shirts that use homophones for profane words … [such as] “Somebody Went to HOOVER DAM And All I Got Was This ‘DAM’ Shirt.” … [Defendants] recalled speaking to one student who was wearing a hat that said “Fet’s Luck” … [and asking] a student to change out of a hoodie that displayed the words “Uranus Liquor” because the message was lewd. School officials could likely prohibit students from wearing concert shirts from the music duo LMFAO (Laughing My F***ing A** Off) or apparel displaying “AITA?” (Am I the A**hole?)…. Courts too have recognized how seemingly innocuous phrases may convey profane messages. A county court in San Diego, California referred an attorney to the State Bar when counsel, during a hearing, twice directed the phrase “See You Next Tuesday” toward two female attorneys.
Because Defendants reasonably interpreted the phrase as having a profane meaning, the School District can regulate wearing of Let’s Go Brandon apparel during school without showing interference or disruption at the school….
The court does not explain what will constitute a “reasonable interpretation” of non-profane words as profane. It is not clear if the same result would be reached by an agreement among students as to the hidden meaning of some other common expression akin to the code of “as you wish” in The Princess Bride. Judge Maloney seems to think that, so long as there is a profane meaning for some, there is a right to bar the expression.
Judge Maloney offers a tip of the hat to free speech before eviscerating its protection:
This Court agrees that political expression, the exchange of ideas about the governance of our county, deserves the highest protection under the First Amendment. But Plaintiffs did not engage in speech on public issues. Defendants reasonably interpreted Let’s Go Brandon to F*** Joe Biden, the combination a politician’s name and a swear word—nothing else. Hurling personal insults and uttering vulgarities or their equivalents towards one’s political opponents might have a firm footing in our nation’s traditions, but those specific exchanges can hardly be considered the sort of robust political discourse protected by the First Amendment. As a message, F*** Joe Biden or its equivalent does not seek to engage the listener over matters of public concern in a manner that seeks to expand knowledge and promote understanding.
The court’s narrow view of the content of this speech is, for me, jarring and chilling. The “Let’s Go Brandon” slogan is more than just a substitute for profanity directed at the President (which itself has political content). It is using satire to denounce the press that often acts like a state media. It is commentary on the alliance between the government and the media in shaping what the public sees and hears.
Judge Maloney relied heavily on the Court’s 1986 decision in Bethel School Dist. No. 403 v. Fraser which dealt with a nomination speech of student Matthew Fraser for a friend running for high school vice-president. The speech made juvenile illusions to sex like “I know a man who is firm—he’s firm in his pants, he’s firm in his shirt, his character is firm—but most … of all, his belief in you, the students of Bethel, is firm.”
The Court ruled that “it is a highly appropriate function of a public school education to prohibit the use of vulgar and offensive terms in public discourse.” It added that “schools, as instruments of the state, may determine that the essential lessons of civil, mature conduct cannot be conveyed in a school that tolerates lewd, indecent, or offensive speech and conduct[.].”
The Plaintiffs accepted that the school could prohibit a sweatshirt reading “F**k Joe Biden.” While the Court had found that “F**k the Draft” was protected for adults in Cohen v. California, it ruled that schools are different and stated in Fraser: “As cogently expressed by Judge Newman, ‘the First Amendment gives a high school student the classroom right to wear Tinker’s armband, but not Cohen’s jacket.”) (citing Thomas v. Bd. of Educ., Grandville Cent. Sch. Dist., 607 F.2d 1043, 1057 (2d Cir. 1979)).
However, the Plaintiffs cited other lower court decisions striking a balance in such cases. For example, in B.H. v. Easton Area School Dist. the Third Circuit in a similar case ruled that:
Under Fraser, a school may also categorically restrict speech that—although not plainly lewd, vulgar, or profane—could be interpreted by a reasonable observer as lewd, vulgar, or profane so long as it could not also plausibly be interpreted as commenting on a political or social issue.
This was obviously commenting on a political or social issue, but the court declined to follow the ruling from another circuit on the question.
I disagree with the decision as sweeping too far into the regulation of political speech. Notably, politicians have used the phrase, including members of the House of Representatives despite a rule barring profanity on the floor. On October 21, 2021, Republican congressman Bill Posey concluded his remarks with “Let’s go, Brandon.” It was not declared a violation of the House rules.
In my book “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage,” I criticize what I refer to as “functionalist” interpretations of free speech that have allowed endless trade offs in barring or allowing speech. By protecting speech for its positive function in society, it allows for greater censoring of low-value as opposed to high-value speech.
My view of free speech as a human right is not absolute and I recognize the need for schools to maintain civil discourse. However, the decision by Judge Maloney reflects the slippery slope of functionalism in more narrowly defining the protection of free speech. The default of Judge Maloney is to limit speech even when it is not overtly profane and concerns a major political controversy.
In my view, the school is engaged in unconstitutional speech regulation under a vague and arbitrary standard. The discretionary authority recognized by Judge Maloney sweeps too deeply into protected speech for high school students and offers little clarity on what is permissible political commentary.
Jonathan Turley is a Fox News Media contributor and the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. He is the author of “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage” (Simon & Schuster, June 18, 2024).
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/31/2024 - 12:15
Published:8/31/2024 11:44:05 AM
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[Markets]
Will AI Take Over The World?
Will AI Take Over The World?
Authored by James Rickards via Daily Reckoning,
As you know, artificial intelligence (AI) is all the rage these days. From a market perspective, it’s certainly taken on bubble dynamics.
And I believe leading AI chipmaker Nvidia is about to get hammered, which could trigger a much broader market crash beginning tomorrow afternoon, shortly after 4 p.m.
But from a broader AI perspective, the news is full of stories about how machines with vast computing power and blinding processing speeds, given access to billions of books and documents and the ability to teach themselves, are poised to take over the world.
Is it true? I’ve been studying AI and its potential for years, so I have a deeper understanding of AI than the average talking head.
I’ve actually spent time visiting with the world’s third-fastest non-government supercomputer (the HiPerGator AI computer at the University of Florida) as part of a project to apply generalized superintelligence and AI to national security tasks.
So how advanced is AI getting? How close is it to approaching a rough parity with human intelligence? And what dangers does it pose to humanity?
We Can Just Pull the Plug — for Now at Least
Experimenters now envision machines taking on a life of their own and attacking humans and civilization. But it’s important to remember that if the machine goes berserk, you can just pull the plug.
Apologists for AI capacity claim that pulling the plug won’t work because the AI will anticipate that strategy and “export” itself to another machine in a catch-me-if-you-can scenario where disabling one location won’t stop the code and algorithms from popping up elsewhere and continuing to attack.
Maybe. But there are all kinds of logistical problems with this, including the availability of enough machines with the processing power needed, the fact that alternate machines are likely to be surrounded by firewalls and digital moats and a host of configuration and interoperability issues.
So for now, you can just pull the plug. In fact, there are a number of safeguards being proposed to limit the potential damage of AI while still harnessing its enormous benefits.
This isn’t a technical article, but these safeguards include transparency (so that third parties can identify flaws), oversight, a weakened form of adversarial training (so the machine can solve problems without plotting against us in its spare time), approval-based modification (the machine has to “ask permission” before activating autonomous machine learning), recursive reward modeling (the machine only moves in certain directions where it gets a “pat on the head” from humans) and other similar tools.
Of course, none of these safeguards works if the power behind AI is malignant and actually wants to destroy mankind. This would be like putting atomic weapons in the hands of a desperate Adolf Hitler. We know what would have happened next.
James Bond With AI
The solution in that case would be more political, forensic and defense oriented. Intelligence gathering would play a huge role. Of course, that evolves quickly into a machine-versus-machine intelligence war of collection and deception.
Imagine James Bond with a hyper-computer instead of a Walther PPK. AI’s more immediate threat is less serious, but nonetheless disturbing, especially for investors.
Investors need to be careful about relying on GPT systems for financial advice, despite their enormous processing power. The output is never better than the inputs and the market inputs are littered with bad models, false assumptions, poor forecasting records and biases.
Garbage in, garbage out.
AI is already being programmed with woke ideology, for example. You probably recall Google’s ridiculous Gemini AI-backed image generator that depicted Black Vikings, female popes and other absurd images. You can imagine the dystopian future that a woke superintelligence could create.
A Woke 1984
You’re probably familiar with George Orwell’s classic dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four; (it’s often published as 1984). It was written in 1948; the title comes from reversing the last two digits in 1948.
Orwell created an original vocabulary for his book, much of which is in common, if sardonic, usage today. Terms such as Thought Police, Big Brother, doublethink, Newspeak and memory hole all come from Nineteen Eighty-Four.
Orwell intended it as a warning about how certain countries might evolve in the aftermath of World War II and the beginning of the Cold War. He was certainly concerned about Stalinism, but his warnings applied to Western democracies also.
When the calendar year 1984 came and went, many breathed a sigh of relief that Orwell’s prophecy had not come true. But that sigh of relief was premature. Orwell’s nightmare society is here today in the form of Communist China.
1984 Comes to China
China has most of the apparatus of the totalitarian societies described in Orwell’s book. China is working hard on AI while using facial recognition software and ubiquitous digital surveillance to keep track of its citizens. The internet is censored and monitored. Real-life thought police will arrest you for expressing opinions opposed to the government or its policies.
While China’s worst excesses are not going to happen in the U.S. or what passes for the West these days, the less extreme aspects of China’s surveillance state could.
And while you might not be arrested for expressing unpopular opinions or challenging prevailing dogmas (at least not yet), you could face other sanctions. You could even lose your job and find it nearly impossible to find another. Think cancel culture.
But it’s not just China. Messaging app Telegram founder Pavel Durov was just arrested at an airport in France. It’s very possible the U.S. government had a role in the arrest, along with the EU.
The authorities claim Telegram was promoting child pornography and other heinous acts. But in reality, Durov was arrested because he was not accommodating to Western government requests that he censor certain information and viewpoints. Also, because he wouldn’t provide authorities with information about the producers of that content (Telegram offers producers encryption options).
That’s the real reason Durov was arrested. Is Elon Musk next?
“Show Me the Man and I’ll Show You the Crime”
Here in the U.S., many conservative social media participants have had their acco?unts closed or suspended, not for threats or vulgarity or promoting child pornography, but for criticism of “progressive” views (albeit criticism with some sharp edges).
Meanwhile, those with progressive views can say almost anything on social media, including the implicit endorsement of violence. But nothing happens.
The problem is the trend is moving very quickly in this direction and it’s difficult to stop. And sophisticated surveillance technology to monitor citizens is already in place…
For example, cameras with the latest surveillance technology can spot and match millions of faces in real-time with an accuracy rate of over 99%. They’re touted as anti-terrorism and anti-crime tools, which they certainly are.
But as Stalin’s ruthless secret police chief Lavrentiy Beria said, “Show me the man and I’ll show you the crime.” It’s easy to see that power being abused to target everyday citizens.
(By the way, Beria would ultimately prove his own point, as he was later arrested and executed for treason.)
Circling back to AI, the problem is once the bad actors start populating the literature with misleading information and developer biases infiltrate the code, it’s clear that AI can be an instrument of tyranny.
In all, AI is definitely something to keep an eye on, and we should be asking important questions. But we shouldn’t worry about it taking over the world anytime soon.
We should instead worry about becoming like Communist China.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 08/30/2024 - 06:30
Published:8/30/2024 5:46:55 AM
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[Elections]
‘I Did Fries’: Kamala Harris Claims She Worked at McDonald's, but She Never Mentioned It Until She Ran for President. Did She Really Toil Beneath the Golden Arches?
Harris’s work at McDonald’s, which allegedly took place at a franchise in the California Bay Area the summer after her freshman year in college, is a recent addition to her carefully curated life story. For decades, Harris never mentioned it, not on the campaign trail nor in two books. It’s absent from a job application and résumé she submitted a year after she graduated from college. Third-party biographers did not write about it. Not until Harris ran for president in 2019 and spoke to a labor rally in Las Vegas did she mention the job, telling the crowd that she "was a student when I was working in a McDonald’s."
The post ‘I Did Fries’: Kamala Harris Claims She Worked at McDonald's, but She Never Mentioned It Until She Ran for President. Did She Really Toil Beneath the Golden Arches? appeared first on .
Published:8/29/2024 4:40:05 AM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post hardcover bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:8/28/2024 8:08:18 AM
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[Markets]
New Study Explores How Food Choices Shape Mental Health
New Study Explores How Food Choices Shape Mental Health
Authored by Jennifer Sweenie via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
A study out of the University of Reading has found that a poor-quality diet may be associated with changes in the brain structure that are linked to depression and anxiety. This research provides new insights into the connection between what we eat and our mental well-being.
While the authors did not find a direct association between brain changes and anxiety or depression, they did see an increase in rumination, a common risk factor of the two.
What the Study Found
The study is the first to examine the relationship between diet quality and brain neurochemistry in humans. Thirty adults were divided into two groups based on whether they followed a high- or low-quality diet. Participants in both groups were similar in age, gender, education, income, and caloric and macronutrient intake.
The quality of the diet was defined by adherence to the Mediterranean diet. Participants reported how frequently they ate 130 different food items, their consumption frequency, and food intake habits. Screening questionnaires were administered to assess current depression, anxiety, and rumination levels. Whole brain MRI scans measured prefrontal cortex metabolite concentrations and gray matter volume.
The study found that participants in the low-quality diet group had lower levels of GABA, higher levels of glutamate, and reduced gray matter volume in the brain—markers commonly seen in depression and anxiety. Those in the high-quality diet group had balanced levels of GABA and glutamate and a larger volume of gray matter in the brain.
GABA and glutamate are neurotransmitters. Neurotransmitters are chemical messengers that transmit signals between nerve cells and regulate various processes in the brain and body, such as mood, sleep, and cognition. Gray matter in the brain is involved in memory and emotions.
The researchers noted a trending relationship between increased rumination and decreased frontal gray matter volume. The researchers also observed a correlation between increased glutamate concentrations and increased rumination. Rumination is a major risk factor for anxiety and depression.
A 2019 animal study published in Food & Function showed that a diet high in sugar and saturated fat can decrease the number of parvalbumin interneurons (which contain and release GABA).
Poor-quality diets can also influence glucose and raise blood sugar and insulin levels. Studies show that high blood sugar may raise glutamate levels and subsequently lower the production and release of GABA.
Additionally, high-fat and high-cholesterol diets can also alter cell membranes, which can affect the release of neurotransmitters. A mouse study published in Nutritional Neuroscience in 2019 found that changes to the gut microbiome due to a poor diet are associated with depression-like behaviors. The mice were less social and exhibited a preference for sucrose, or table sugar.
Specifically, a reduction in good bacteria resulting from a diet rich in saturated fats is believed to influence the processes responsible for producing GABA and glutamate.
GABA and glutamate also play a significant role in regulating appetite and food intake. Decreased GABA or elevated glutamate levels may affect inhibitory control and could contribute to unhealthy food choices and overeating.
The Diet and Mental Health Connection
Andreas Michaelides, chief of psychology at Noom, told The Epoch Times in an email, “GABA (Gamma-Aminobutyric Acid) is an inhibitory neurotransmitter, meaning it reduces neuronal excitability and helps calm the brain. When GABA levels are stable and adequate, they help reduce anxious thoughts by calming the brain.”
Michaelides explained that glutamate is an excitatory neurotransmitter that heightens neuronal activity and is involved in learning and memory. Excessive glutamate activity can injure or kill neurons and damage the brain.
“The balance between GABA and glutamate is crucial for healthy brain function,” said Michaelides. “When we have low levels of GABA, we have increased anxiety and depression.”
Concerning glutamate levels, “certain symptoms and conditions, including anxiety, insomnia, and headaches, may indicate excessive glutamate activity,” he said.
How to Optimize Mental Health With Diet
Removing common culprits from your diet that disrupt neurotransmitter balance may support mental health and well-being.
“Certain foods can lower GABA levels or interfere with its natural function. Those foods are processed foods, alcohol and caffeine,” said Michaelides.
“Diets high in processed foods, refined sugars, and excessive protein can increase glutamate levels, these foods either directly contain glutamate or promote its production,” he added.
Processed foods and sugary snacks and beverages are also high in trans fats and refined sugars.
“These foods can cause inflammation and have been linked to higher rates of depression and anxiety. They can disrupt brain function and mood stability,” said Michaelides.
Rapid blood sugar fluctuations may also lead to mood swings and anxiety, with consistent consumption contributing to long-term mood instability.
It’s also best to limit alcohol consumption. Michaelides said, “Alcohol is a depressant that can disrupt neurotransmitter balance, leading to increased anxiety and depression over time.”
Excessive amounts of caffeine are also best avoided, as they can interfere with sleep and exacerbate anxiety.
When it comes to what to include in your diet to support mental health, appropriate protein intake is key.
“To have healthy neurotransmitter production, you must have proper protein intake,” said Michaelides.
When our bodies digest proteins, they are broken down into smaller molecules called amino acids. Amino acids make up neurotransmitters.
“In short, ensuring a varied protein intake supports optimal neurotransmitter function and mental health,” he said.
Sources of high-quality protein from fatty fish such as salmon and mackerel come with an added mental health boost. These high-quality proteins are rich in omega-3 fatty acids, which reduce inflammation and support neurotransmitter production, which is linked to lower risks of depression and improved cognitive function.
Other foods to add to your diet for a mental health boost include leafy green vegetables for their folate content. Michaelides noted that a folate deficiency is associated with a higher risk of depression.
Berries offer a boost in antioxidants and “protect the brain from oxidative stress, a factor linked to mental health disorders,” he added.
Nuts and seeds are excellent sources of magnesium, and sufficient magnesium intake is linked to reduced symptoms of anxiety and depression, he said.
Michaelides also recommends fermented foods such as kimchi and yogurt. “They promote a healthy gut microbiome, which can influence brain chemistry and improve mood,” he said.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 08/26/2024 - 21:45
Published:8/26/2024 9:12:37 PM
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[Markets]
It's Not Right Versus Left; It's Sane Versus Insane...
It's Not Right Versus Left; It's Sane Versus Insane...
Authored by James Howard Kunstler via Kunstler.com,
"RFK, Jr. Murders Whale With Chainsaw!"
“Our society is now a strange hybrid of the Middle Ages, the Third Reich, and Brave New World. We have two classes - lords and peasants; we are in the midst of a very profitable genocide; and it’s all infused with surveillance technology, mind-altering drugs, and wall-to-wall propaganda.”
- Dr. Toby Rogers
The alliance between Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Donald Trump is many things. But first it’s an all-clear signal to a large class of less-than-fully brain-damaged Americans that it’s okay to quit being insane.
As you know, this election is no longer a battle between the political Left and Right. It’s an epic struggle-session between the sane and the insane.
You just witnessed the Democratic Convention nominating an empty pantsuit whose only record as a high government official is failure to protect and defend the nation and to support its constitution. All arranged without any real votes cast. Pretty neat trick, pulled off under the banner of Saving Our Democracy. Please understand that it was the result of hypnotizing so many vulnerable personalities into a mass formation psychosis. They were vulnerable because they are scared stiff by propaganda specifically targeting their deepest archetypal fears — in this case, fear of Daddy, meaning fear of behavioral boundaries, in short, of being civilized.
Thus, the advocacy for Hamas terrorists (Israel = Old Testament = moral boundaries), abortion (no more babies = die-off of cultural line), drag-queens (“mother” = demonic imposter), open border (border = nation’s boundary), the Ukraine War (“Let’s You and Him Fight”), censorship (hatred of fairness), mandates and lockdowns (destroy purposeful, meaningful, productive life), and so on. The propaganda engineered to produce this madness surely comes from our intel blob. They have devoted all the years since the founding of the CIA in 1947 to developing and refining their methods of mindfuckery. They have unleashed it lately at full force because they fear that Mr. Trump will deconstruct their intel blob and possibly prosecute some of its current and former officials for serious crimes such as treason, misprision of felonies, and murder.
The final ingredient in all that is submission of the populace to these programmatic suggestions.
Simply put, they yield to the fears induced in them. Try to enter the mind of a committed Democratic voter. You’ll discover that you are locked out. Sharing of thoughts is impossible because there is no thought in there, only disordered emotion.
Ask a Democrat what they think Donald Trump actually did as president for four years. I guarantee you they will say only one thing: he cancelled abortion.
Which is actually not true. He nominated several Supreme Court Justices who ruled that abortion properly belonged under the jurisdiction of the fifty states. (It was the act of ruling that drove them nuts because rules = boundaries.) Of course, all the single batshit crazy cat-ladies of Boston, New York, Atlanta, Chicago, Minneapolis, Seattle, Portland, Denver, and Los Angeles now raging over the issue are free to abort themselves to their hearts’ content.
So, Kamala Harris emerges from this Cluster-B personality disorder exercise in hypnosis (the convention) as the avatar of . . . “joy” . . . in the absence of any ideas about actually running the government of a country which, for the moment, is run by nobody because the current president (“Joe Biden”) is both mentally unfit and on permanent vacation. None of this is very promising. The raptures of “joy” tend to obscure the idea that there is a future to be concerned about.
Enter Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
He explained his view of the situation and his role in it with unsurpassed clarity last Friday in a powerful and moving speech outlining a decision that must have been very painful for him. As I averred he would do last Friday morning, he denounced the party of his ancestors in unequivocal terms for coming to militate against its own traditional principles — opposing war, fighting for free speech, helping poor working people, and against weaponizing government agencies. He threw his support to Mr. Trump because it’s become obvious that Mr. Trump’s aims and ideas are more in-tune with those forsaken principles of Mr. Kennedy’s father and his uncle, JFK.
And now he’ll campaign on behalf of Mr. Trump, with the expectation that he will play an important, well-defined role in the next Trump administration — in charge of a range of public health issues that he is deeply familiar with from decades of litigation and researching the books about pharmaceutical racketeering actually written by himself.
It’s Monday after the convention. What’s on the candidates’ campaign schedule today. CNNs “Campaign Latest” page says that Mr. Trump will give a speech in Detroit today to the National Guard Association where he is expected to greet the endorsement of former Rep. (and Lt. Col. In the National Guard, Tulsi Gabbard). Kamala Harris has no public appearances scheduled, but CNN reports that she has raised a fabulous $540-million since her launch a few weeks ago. Isn’t that nice? Boolah boolah, lotsa moolah. On Wednesday, Ms. Harris and her veep sidekick, Tim Walz, embark on a bus tour around Georgia. Bus tours will be the signature of their campaign.
Let me tell you what that means: instead of flying expeditiously between campaign stops where they might have to state some positions on public issues, Harris & Walz will eat up many hours on long bus rides from Point-A to Point-B, hiding from the public and the press.
Bobby Kennedy, meanwhile, is cramming as many media appearances as possible into his schedule, submitting to questions about everything, including the latest barrage of accusations about his fully-disclosed personal history.
Fox has had him on several programs, though the other cable news stations are ignoring him, as are The New York Times and the WashPo, except to publish scurrilous stories from his mindfucked siblings and cousins - the latest being that he cut the head off a dead whale on the beach at Cape Cod with a chainsaw.
Readers are supposed to construe that to mean he murdered a whale with a chainsaw.
* * *
Support his blog by visiting Jim’s Patreon Page or Substack
Tyler Durden
Mon, 08/26/2024 - 16:20
Published:8/26/2024 4:00:31 PM
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[Uncategorized]
The crafting of the new Kamala narrative
Even more striking to my mind is Obama's use of metaphors involving narrative, of both movies and books. A sequel. A new chapter. A new story.
The post The crafting of the new Kamala narrative first appeared on Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion.
Published:8/25/2024 2:37:12 PM
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[Markets]
Dems Scramble To Walk Back Harris' Price Control Scheme
Dems Scramble To Walk Back Harris' Price Control Scheme
Democrats are in damage control mode after Kamala Harris' communist price control scheme received a harsh rebuke - including from the Washington Post, which characterized it as "populist gimmicks."
Facing pressure to defend the plan, Democratic lawmakers are downplaying it as a pipe dream that has no chance of passing Congress, Politico reports.
The plan, unveiled as part of Harris' first big economic policy speech, has become a focal talking point for Donald Trump and allies, who continue to frame it as "communist price controls." Meanwhile, food industry officials and some left-of-center economists have warned that price controls could be detrimental, according to the report.
Central to the plan is a call for congress to pass the first-ever federal price gouging ban on food and grocery stores - mirroring legislation reintroduced by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) earlier this year, for which Warren was taken to task by CNBC's Joe Kernen.
Now, six Congressional Democrats and five Democratic aides tell Politico that they've been privately telling critics that the plan isn't viable - and is instead a messaging tactic to to divert blame over inflation from the Biden-Harris administration.
Even many Democrats remain skeptical, or at least uncertain about how Harris would carry out her proposal, if elected. They’re still working on getting details, but many have left that for after the DNC. -Politico
"It’s clear to me these are very general, very lofty goals," said one of the Democratic lawmakers.
"I honestly still don’t know how this would work," said a second Democratic lawmaker.
According to Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, "I think people are reading too much into what has been put out there," adding that the proposal was intended to address the issue in "broad strokes."
Harris has been under pressure to provide more detail on her policy priorities, after four years largely toeing the line set by President Joe Biden and his aides. The rollout of her plan to combat food inflation, however, has sparked concerns among business leaders over which economic advisers are driving her policy decisions. Pieces of her plan, like increasing competition in the meat sector, are straight from the Biden playbook under his former top economic adviser Brian Deese — who is now advising Harris’ campaign. But the broad price gouging language that’s triggered so much backlash signals a more progressive agenda.
That backlash has tempered Harris allies’ initial push to paint the proposal as a bold, progressive idea. Since introducing the price gouging plan, her advisers have sought to soften criticism of the proposal by downplaying its overall impact on the market — and emphasizing that the goal is simply to target a small cohort of potential “bad actors,” rather than generate the kind of sweeping overhaul suggested by the plan’s initial rollout. -Politico
Harris' plan does have its defenders, including Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) and Progressive Caucus Chair Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA).
Top Harris economic adviser Brian Nelson told reporters at the DNC in Chicago that the plan was 'simply' aimed at matching federal standards with so-called price gouging guardrails that already exist in 37 states - something Warren attempted to argue with Kernen.
That said, the existing rules only apply during emergencies such as the COVID pandemic.
"She’s going to work with Congress to ensure that it is directed at bad actors, bad activity," said Nelson. "It’s not meant to set prices or price levels or anything like that. And that is not the way current state laws around price gouging are."
When pressed during a Bloomberg News roundtable to elaborate, Nelson failed to provide any specific examples of price gouging - and deflected by describing Harris as simply trying to outline her own principles on the issue.
"One of the principles is really to make sure that the federal legislation aligns with those state laws," he said.
Meanwhile, the National Grocers Association - an industry group that represents the independent supermarket sector, called Harris' plans "a solution in search of a problem."
"Rather than proposing new legislation far-off in the future," the government should focus on enforcing antitrust laws already on the books, the group said.
"I’m sure it polls well," said one food industry official granted anonymity. "But it’s an obvious effort to deflect blame from her administration on inflation."
Tyler Durden
Sun, 08/25/2024 - 13:25
Published:8/25/2024 12:59:06 PM
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[Markets]
It Hasn't Worked Once, So Why Would A Politician Go All-In On Price Controls Now?
It Hasn't Worked Once, So Why Would A Politician Go All-In On Price Controls Now?
Authored by Mark Jeftovic via TheNationalTelegraph.com,
August 15th was the anniversary of the infamous “Nixon Shock”, when excessive spending and trade deficits had governments on the ropes, as prices climbed relentlessly, inflation soared into the double digits, while economic growth stalled.
In 1971 of that year, Nixon “temporarily” suspended convertibility of the US dollar for gold (still in effect), while simultaneously proclaiming a 90-day freeze on all wages and prices across the United States.
The stagflationary 70’s also saw Trudeau the 1st enact “The Anti-Inflation Act of 1975”, with his infamous “6 and 5” measures (a 6% cap on wage increases with a 5% cap on prices was supposed to put 1% back into the pocket of the peasants).
None of this worked, and as the lumpenpublic were mulched by higher prices and growing government, gold served as a barometer to it all – soaring from $35/oz at the time of the Nixon Shock to $850/oz in 1980 (that all-time high still won’t be exceeded in inflation adjusted terms until gold cracks about $2,580).
It took Paul Volcker to get inflation under control with double-digit interest rates – (when the news came that he had been elevated from President of the New York Fed under Gerald Ford to Chairman by Jimmy Carter, Volcker’s wife burst into tears).
Today, 50 years later with a monetary regime that makes the 70’s look austere, double-digit interest rates are simply not an option – we’ve just seen a 5-sigma event nearly blow up the global monetary system from the BoJ nudging interest rates from the zero bound to 25bps.
With an unprecedented levels of monetary expansion and debt levels somewhere beyond nosebleed elevations, policy-makers and central bankers are trapped.
This is why we’re seeing a resurgence in popular rhetoric around the idea of price controls – everywhere from Jagmeet Singh here in Canada, who blames grocery store CEOs for inflation, to Dem nominee and incumbent Vice President Kamala Harris, channeling him with promises of food price controls as part of her election campaign.
Price Controls Invariably Presage Decline (& Tyranny)
The definitive chronicle of price controls throughout recorded history comes to us by way of Robert L. Schuettinger and Eammon F. Butler’s “Forty Centuries of Wage and Price Controls” – or “How Not to Fight Inflation“.
I could not for the life of me find my hard copy, but during the depths of the Global Financial Crisis, The Mises Institute saw the value in republishing it…
“By special arrangement with the authors, the Mises Institute is thrilled to bring back this popular guide to ridiculous economic policy from the ancient world to modern times. This outstanding history illustrates the utter futility of fighting the market process through legislation. It always uses despotic measures to yield socially catastrophic results.”
It starts as far back as Urakagina of Lagash, a King of Sumeria in around 2350BC who came to power and overturned wage and price controls held in place by an unnamed line of despotic predecessors:
“[he]began his rule by ending the burdens of excessive government regulations over the economy, including controls on wages and prices… An historian of this period tells us that from Urakagina,
‘we have one of the most precious and revealing documents in the history of man and his perennial and unrelenting struggle for freedom from tyranny and oppression.’
This document records a sweeping reform of a whole series of prevalent abuses, most of which could be traced to a ubiquitous and obnoxious bureaucracy …it is in this document that we find the word ‘freedom’ used for the first time in man’s recorded history; the word is ‘amargi’.“
It is somewhat telling to find that the word “freedom” was seemingly coined to describe the end of price controls.
The Code of Hammurabi of ancient Babylon is often cited as one of the earliest legal codes, thought to be the first to enshrine the presumption of innocence, but it also contained detailed tables of price controls on everything from goods to services – like the hiring of a wagon (“forty qa of corn per diem”) to the wages of a field laborer (“eight gur of corn per annum”).
According to Schuettinger and Butler, historical records show that Hammurabi’s price controls dampened trade and economic activity for both Hammurabi and his successors, citing W. F Leemans, who found that:
Prominent and wealthy tamkaru (merchants) were no longer found in Hammurabi’s reign. Moreover, only a few tamkaru are known from Hammurabi’s time and afterwards . . . all . . . evidently minor tradesmen and money-lenders.
Concluding:
“it appears that the very people who were supposed to benefit from the Hammurabi wage and price restrictions were driven out of the market by those and other statutes.”
Finding that:
“There was a remarkable change in the fortunes of the people of Nippur and Isin and the other ancient towns which he ruled, which came in the middle of Rim-Sin’s reign [Hammurbi’s predecessor – whose policies he extended] . The beginning of the economic decline corresponds exactly with a series of “reforms” inaugurated by him.
For the first of many times throughout this piece, I will ask the reader to “hold that thought”.
We can fast forward to ancient Greece where Athens, a city state “perpetually short on grain” sought to control the prices at which it was sold in order to keep them “just”. At one point, under a measure that was supposed to be temporary (sound familiar?), state appointed corn buyers called “Sitonai” were mobilized to set the pricing.
Predictably, the problem got worse, and there were calls to make the measures permanent. One politician, Lysian of Athens wanted to put grain dealers who broke the code to death.
The book is exhaustive in its examinations, covering China, India, the Medieval age, even modern times (Canada and the US in the seventies) – but ancient Rome warrants a deeper look – particularly the road to Emperor Diocletian’s Edict of 301AD.
“Under the tribune Caius Gracchus the Lex Sempronia Frumentaria was adopted which allowed every Roman citizen the right to buy a certain amount of wheat at an official price much lower than the market price.
In 58 B.C. this law was “improved” to allow every citizen free wheat. The result, of course, came as a surprise to the government.
Most of the farmers remaining in the countryside simply left to live in Rome without working.
If that wasn’t enough:
Slaves were freed by their masters so that they, as Roman citizens, could be supported by the state.
(There is a modern day analog here with open borders and the illegal immigration crisis – where we could be looking at mass migrations as being, at least partially, incentivized by governments of weakening economies trying to jettison dependents and potential rebels – offloading them to countries dumb enough to think they’re acting enlightened by taking them on and supporting them).
By 45BC, Julius Caesar found that roughly a third of the citizenry was living on “free food” from the government.
He managed to reduce this number by about half, but it soon rose again; throughout the centuries of the empire Rome was to be perpetually plagued with this problem of artificially low prices for grain, which caused economic dislocations of all sorts.
Succeeding emperors resorted to the ancient version of “Quantitative Easing” – currency debasement:
In order to attempt to deal with their increasing economic problems, the emperors gradually began to devalue the currency. Nero (A.D. 54–68) began with small devaluations and matters became worse under Marcus Aurelius (A.D. 161–80) when the weights of coins were reduced. “These manipulations were the probable cause of a rise in prices,” according to Levy. The Emperor Commodus (A.D.)
By Diocletian’s time in the 4th century it reached truly hyper-inflationary levels when measured in other provincial currencies:
Egypt was the province of the Empire most affected, but her experience was reflected in lesser degrees throughout the Roman world. During the fourth century, the value of the gold solidus changed from 4,000 to 180 million Egyptian drachmai.
Diocletian’s Dilemma
Gresham’s Law states that “bad money drives out the good” – it means that rapidly devaluing or debased currencies are traded for anything other than themselves (which drives prices denominated in that currency up) – while “sound” currencies, like gold, or nowadays Bitcoin are hoarded – or at least more carefully spent.
“[I]n the years before Diocletian, emperors were issuing tin-plated copper coins which were still called by the name ‘denarius.’ Gresham’s Law, of course, became operative; silver and gold coins were naturally hoarded and were no longer found in circulation.”
The result of iterative generations of government mismanagement and currency debasement was the hollowing out of the middle class:
“The middle class was almost obliterated and the proletariat was quickly sinking to the level of serfdom. Intellectually the world had fallen into an apathy from which nothing would rouse it.”
The same thing is happening today, but in Diocletian’s time, he saw what was happening and moved to impose some kind of order, first by issuing a new Denarious, that after centuries of declining silver content, openly contained none:
Via Armstrong Economics
…and then, moving to a system that attempted to replace money entirely (again, hold that thought):
Since money was completely worthless, he devised a system of taxes based on payments in kind. This system had the effect, via the ascripti glebae [tenant serfs], of totally destroying the freedom of the lower classes—they became serfs and were bound to the soil to ensure that the taxes would be forthcoming.
But he had a dilemma:
The principal reason for the official overvaluation of the currency, of course, was to provide the wherewithal to support the large army and massive bureaucracy—the equivalent of modern government.
Diocletian’s choices were to continue to mint the increasingly worthless denarius or to cut “government expenditures” and thereby reduce the requirement for minting them.
In modern terminology, he could either continue to “inflate” or he could begin the process of “deflating” the economy.
Diocletian decided that deflation, reducing the costs of civil and military government, was impossible. On the other hand: To inflate would be equally disastrous in the long run.
Diocletian’s problem is the same one central banks and policy makers face today, all over the world:
Source: IMF
The world is awash in too much debt – with debt-to-GDP more than doubling from 100% to over 256% since the Nixon Shock. With interest rates being artificially suppressed for decades – austerity is off the table, for now — I’ve been writing for years how CBDCs and #Netzero are essentially setting the table for forced austerity.
But we’re not there yet – retail CBDCs are a few years away from being ready but the global financial system is unravelling now (in the meantime, you can get on the waiting list for my CBDC Survival Guide, which is coming out this fall).
How did Diocletian navigate the quagmire?
The Solution: Inflate with Price Controls
As Schuettinger and Butler recount,
It was in this seemingly desperate circumstance that Diocletian determined to continue to inflate, but to do so in a way that would, he thought, prevent the inflation from occurring.
He sought to do this by simultaneously fixing the prices of goods and services and suspending the freedom of people to decide what the official currency was worth.
Contrary to our own political leaders, Diocletian wasn’t stupid (in fact, he may have been the most intelligent Roman Emperor after a long string of weak minded half-wits who were propped up by the military).
He knew that the incentives would be against the productive class working, selling, and entrenpreneuring at a loss and he understood that Incentives Are Everything. In his case:
“if farmers, merchants and craftsmen could not expect to receive what they considered to be a fair price for their goods they would not put them on the market at all, but would await a change in the law (or in the dynasty).”
So Diocletian had to realign people’s incentives:
“From such guilt also he too shall not be considered free, who, having goods necessary for food or usage, shall after this regulation have thought that they might be withdrawn from the market; since the penalty ought to be even heavier for him who causes need than for him who makes use of it contrary to the statutes.”
The penalty was …death.
Same for anyone who purchased goods or services at prices above the prescribed amount (no matter how hungry or desperately you needed something or how scarce that something was).
As draconian as that sounds, it almost looks like more people were killed by deprivation and mob rule than were executed for violating price controls:
There was much blood shed upon very slight and trifling accounts; and the people brought provisions no more to markets, since they could not get a reasonable price for them and this increased the dearth so much, that at last after many had died by it”
The authors go on to cite Roland Kent:
“In other words, the price limits set in the Edict were not observed by the traders, in spite of the death penalty provided in the statute for its violation; would-be purchasers, finding that the prices were above the legal limit, formed mobs and wrecked the offending traders’ establishments, incidentally killing the traders, though the goods were after all of but trifling value; hoarded their goods against the day when the restrictions should be removed, and the resulting scarcity of wares actually offered for sale caused an even greater increase in prices, so that what trading went on was at illegal prices, and therefore performed clandestinely.
Within four years, the law was set aside, and Diocletian abdicated.
Michael Rostovtzeff, another leading Roman historian, remarked:
“Diocletian shared the pernicious belief of the ancient world in the omnipotence of the state, a belief which many modern theorists continue to share with him and with it.”
Here We Are Again
Since the unprecedented monetary stimulus during Covid, we are now beginning to see exactly how trapped we are – with politicians taking victory laps for 2.9% inflation (hedonically adjusted and perpetually revised) – nobody is really remarking that the official targeted inflation rate is in the process of being hiked by half from 2% to 3% target.
The Fed is getting ready to cut interest rates, the Bank of Canada, the Bank of England and the ECB are already cutting and as I told readers in the latest issue of The Bitcoin Capitalist, the Bank of Japan just showed the world that they can’t raise:
On Tuesday, August 6th, the Bank of Japan and the Ministry of Finance held an emergency meeting, and the next day announced “no more rate hikes” until the global financial system could handle it.
Which will be never.
For the first 50 years of the post-Bretton Woods era, since the Nixon Shock, monetary debasement has been mostly under-the-radar and after the stagflationary 70’s, had been largely confined to asset inflation.
This was thanks to a massive bond super-cycle that saw the cost-of-capital come down for 50 years, igniting an asset bubble on the other side of the ledger:
Consumer inflation never really started hitting hard until the aftermath of Covid, and the central banks took to hiking rates to try and get it back under control (my suspicion was always that what they really wanted to do was reload as high as possible so they could cut, once again):
Again, from this month’s TBC (see end of this post for a trial deal):
We’ve been saying since the Fed originally started hiking, that they would do so until something broke.
In March of 2023, something broke – with Silicon Valley Bank and the regional banking crisis; it was quickly papered over with FDIC backstops on all deposits, while the Fed abandoned their balance sheet reductions and quickly reinflated the money supply.
Everything since then has been a theatrical, slow-motion pivot.
Now, after this Bank of Japan miscalculation, something really broke – and the world now sees how the BoJ is trapped, the rest of the central banks are paused or already cutting, right when the global liquidity cycle is starting to turn back up.
Via RBC Global Asset Management
(Also – M2 is also beginning to rise again)
Price Controls Are The ‘Hail Mary’ Play of a Bankrupt System
All the usual tricks which got us this far, money printing, interest rate suppression, ballooning debt have finally run out of runway because they are now resulting in. consumer price inflation.
This is 100% the fault of bad political leadership and central bank policy but that will never be admitted (to be fair, the St. Louis Fed’s Chris Neely authored a piece in 2022 explaining “Why Price Controls Should Stay In the History Books“)
Instead, politicians will resort ad hominem attacks on the productive class, and absurd accusations that it is the fault of investors and entrepreneurs, who must navigate the risks of monetary debasement, for causing it.
Hence, we have Kamala Harris seemingly anchoring her political campaign on “ending price gouging” once she’s in office.
She seems to be channeling Canada’s own champagne socialist, Jagmeet Singh, the Rolex wearing, Versace sporting millionaire who routinely demonizes CEOs – particularly those of grocery store chains, for causing inflation:
Corporate greed in our country has reached a breaking point after decades of Liberal and Conservative governments that have rewritten the rules to favour the ultra-rich.
Now, every bill you pay makes CEOs richer.
It’s wrong.
I’ll change the rules to help you, not CEO profits.
(What’s ironic in both cases, is Harris is promising to do something upon being elected, although she’s the incumbent Vice President since 2020, while Jagmeet Singh is the one person in Canada, who is single-handedly propping the Trudeau government in power with a coalition government that he could end at any time).
The Lure of Technocracy For Price Controls
After one looks at the historical record – 4,000 years of endless failures, in price controls, communism and every permutation of centrally planned economies, there has to be a reason politicians are still reaching for it as a solution to problems they have caused and why a small – but vocal and influential, segment of the public cheerleads this as a net benefit for society.
The secret sauce of “it’s different this time” is technology – particularly Big Tech, big platforms, Total Information Awareness and surveillance. Central planners think it is now technically feasible to run all the calculations and tracking in real time that would enable unrestrained monetary stimulus while keeping a lid on negative externalities like inflation.
Politicians like Kamala Harris and Jagmeet Singh are just farming public sentiment created by their own policy failures, but there are very serious people – mostly unelected technocrats of a particular globalist mindset, who think we have the means, motive and opportunity to create a kind of “fully automated luxury communism”.
One of my go-to clips for illustrating the mindset is J Michael Evans at a WEF meeting talking about coming personal carbon trackers:
I’ll lay out the quote again here:
“We are developing, through technology, an ability for consumers to measure their own carbon footprint. What does that mean? That’s where are they travelling, how are they traveling? What are they eating? What are they consuming on the platform? So, individual – carbon – footprint – tracker. Stay tuned, we don’t have it operational yet, but it’s something we’re working on”.
The stage is set, when politicians tell you they want to be able to control prices, believe them – but what the public must understand is that price controls means spending controls.
The politicians will tell you that it’s all about putting “greedy CEOs” in their place.
What they won’t tell you is that price controls also means is telling you what you can or cannot eat, how you use energy – whether you’ll be permitted to travel, or make any other kind of economic decision or make any kind of value exchange that you used to take for granted.
In a world of price controls, that’s over.
Throughout history, price controls have always brought about serfdom and tyranny because that is the only way to override individual incentives. In today’s highly wired world that would mean total technocratic feudalism.
The most vivid example we have today is Venezuela – where price controls were so effective, the rabble had to break into public zoos to eat the animals.
* * *
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Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/24/2024 - 14:00
Published:8/24/2024 1:26:12 PM
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[Entertainment]
The best new books for kids this fall, recommended by librarians
Discover the top new fall books for kids and teens, recommended by librarians, including titles for all age groups.
Published:8/22/2024 6:24:35 PM
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[]
Walz: We Owe it to America to Discuss Our Policies We Won't Show You
Published:8/22/2024 8:49:46 AM
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[be4d57ba-8354-5a99-9687-312ef9c03df1]
Nicholas Sparks books which doubled as films, 'The Notebook,' 'The Last Song' among most popular
Nicholas Sparks is a famous romance author who has seen much success with his novels. Many of his books, like "Message in a Bottle" and "The Longest Ride," have been made into films.
Published:8/21/2024 8:17:33 AM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post paperback bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:8/21/2024 7:09:36 AM
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[Markets]
Distorting Biden's Foreign Policy Record To Promote Harris' Candidacy
Distorting Biden's Foreign Policy Record To Promote Harris' Candidacy
Authored by Francis P. Sempa via RealClearDefense,
The great James Burnham in The Machiavellians distinguished between the “formal” and “real” meaning of political rhetoric. The formal meaning of such rhetoric, Burnham wrote, helps to disguise the real meaning.
The American foreign policy establishment has begun to spin the foreign policy legacy of President Joe Biden. Writing in Foreign Affairs, Jessica Matthews, Distinguished Fellow and former president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, claims that although “it is too soon to judge the historical significance of Joe Biden’s one-term presidency, it is clear that the past four years have witnessed remarkable achievements in foreign policy.” But this narrative is not just about Biden’s supposed foreign policy legacy. It is also an effort to boost the foreign policy credentials of Vice President Kamala Harris.
According to Matthews, Biden shifted U.S. foreign policy “from an unhealthy reliance on military intervention to the active pursuit of diplomacy backed by strength,” strengthened our alliances, deepened our presence in Asia, promoted multilateralism, and ended the war in Afghanistan. “Biden,” she writes, “has made profound changes in foreign policy--not to accommodate American decline but to reflect the country’s inherent strength.”
Matthews credits Biden with “boldness” in withdrawing from Afghanistan--others would describe it as amateurish and humiliating. She claims that Biden’s response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine “has been both skillful and innovative” and “masterful,” forgetting perhaps that he was the president that failed to deter that invasion. Biden’s “strength” that supposedly backed his diplomacy consisted of diminished relative naval power, a military leadership that prioritizes diversity, equity, and inclusion and efforts to combat climate change, an emboldened Iran in the Middle East, and an even more aggressive China in the western Pacific. It was during Biden’s presidency that Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea grew closer--his administration did nothing to attempt to widen potential cleavages among the so-called “axis of autocracy.”
What Matthews tries to obfuscate is that under Biden, the Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan, Iran-backed Hamas invaded Israel, Russia invaded Ukraine, and China became more aggressive in the western Pacific, threatening both Taiwan and the Philippines. This is not a record of “remarkable achievement.” It almost makes Jimmy Carter look good by comparison.
In Ukraine, instead of using American “diplomacy backed by strength,” Biden has rejected any suggestions for a negotiated ceasefire in favor of support for a Ukrainian “victory.” This is the exact opposite of the kind of “realism” that Matthews claims to support. There is no end in sight to the Ukraine war, and the longer it lasts, the greater the chances of escalation to a wider European, or even global, war.
Matthews is closer to the mark when she characterizes the Biden Middle East policy as a “mix of inattention and wishful thinking,” and that is being generous. Matthews writes that Biden should have been willing to use our leverage to “compel Israel” to wage war the way we--separated from our enemies by oceans--think they--surrounded by enemies--should wage it.
Matthews also criticizes Biden for his Taiwan policy, even though she mysteriously credits him for implementing the “pivot to Asia.” She worries that Biden’s policy has strayed from her preferred policy of “strategic ambiguity.” Matthews apparently still believes that the failed dual policy of engagement/competition can still work with China. Her criticism of Biden here is off the mark. Biden has mostly moved away from the more confrontational policy pursued by the Trump administration during its last two years. The fact that Matthews thinks Biden has been too tough on China with respect to Taiwan reveals more about her worldview than Biden’s. Overall, she writes, “relations with China are steadier than those he inherited.”
Biden gets poor marks for his failure to “advance nuclear arms control and nonproliferation.” Matthews criticizes Biden for providing weapons grade fuel to our ally Australia for its submarines. Meanwhile, China has engaged in what some strategists call a nuclear “strategic break out,” which will result in China’s ability to deploy more than 1,000 nuclear warheads by 2030, and 1,500 such warheads by 2035. And Iran is well on its way to obtaining (if it already hasn’t) nuclear weapons.
But in the end, it is the “remarkable achievements” of the Biden administration that Matthews touts because the real purpose of the article is not to praise Biden’s foreign policy legacy as much as it is to persuade voters to choose a candidate this fall who will “share [Biden’s] worldview.” The choice, she concludes, is between an unmentioned Kamala Harris, who presumably shares Biden’s worldview, and Donald Trump, who will return to a foreign policy of “populism, go-it-alone nationalism, or even isolationism.”
Back to Burnham: Matthews’ formal meaning of her article is to generally applaud the foreign policy record of President Joe Biden, but the real meaning is to persuade voters to vote for Kamala Harris over Donald Trump.
Francis P. Sempa is the author of “Geopolitics: From the Cold War to the 21st Century” and “America’s Global Role.” His work has appeared in Strategic Review, the Diplomat, Joint Force Quarterly, the Claremont Review of Books, the Asian Review of Books, the South China Morning Post, the National Interest, and other publications.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 08/20/2024 - 20:30
Published:8/20/2024 7:55:41 PM
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[Markets]
Judge Napolitano: When Presidents Kill
Judge Napolitano: When Presidents Kill
Authored by Andrew P. Napolitano
Sometime before he withdrew from the presidential race, President Joe Biden secretly reaffirmed his own self-willed and self-created authority to kill persons in other countries, so long as the CIA and its military counterparts have "near certainty" that the target of the homicide is a member of a terrorist organization. That standard was concocted by the George W. Bush administration in 2002.
There is no "near certainty" standard in the law, as the phrase is oxymoronic and defies a rational definition – like "nearly pregnant." Just as one is either pregnant or not, one is either certain or not. There is no "near" there.
Yet, the creation of this standard underscores the lamentable absence of the rule of law in government today. The Biden administration and its three immediate predecessors have all deployed drones to kill persons who were not engaged in acts of violence at the time of their killing, irrespective of the near certainty of their membership in any organizations.
“Terrorist” cannot be a standard for extrajudicial murder because it is subjective. To King George III, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson were terrorists. To the poor folks in Libya and Syria, to the popularly elected governments toppled by CIA-inspired violence in Iran in 1953 and in Ukraine in 2014, to the innocents tortured by the CIA at black sites around the world, the CIA is a terrorist organization.
The presidential use of drones to kill persons overseas began in 2002 with Bush-ordered targeted killings. It continued under President Barack Obama – who even killed Americans overseas. The rules for killing were made up by each president. They were relaxed under President Donald Trump, who gave CIA senior personnel and military commanders the authority to kill without his express approval for each killing. Trump’s folks infamously murdered an Iranian general and his companions on their way to lunch with Iraqi generals to negotiate peace between the two countries.
The Biden administration quietly took back the Trump grants of authority so that today only the president can authorize targeted killing. Yet, there is no moral, constitutional or legal authority for these killings. But presidents of both political parties do it anyway.
The laws of war – a phrase itself that is oxymoronic – which are generally codified in the Geneva Conventions and the United Nations Charter, all of which were spearheaded, written and ratified by the United States, mandate essentially that lawful wars can only be defensive and must be proportional to the threat posed or the harm already caused. Stated differently, treaties to which the U.S. is a signatory restrain the president from killing persons in other countries with which the U.S. is not lawfully at war.
Under the Constitution, treaties sit alongside the Constitution itself as the supreme law of the land. The last four occupants of the White House have ignored this when it comes to secret killings. Each has claimed publicly or secretly that the Authorization for Use of Military Force of 2001, or its cousin, the AUMF of 2002, somehow provide congressional authorizations for presidents to kill whomever they please – and somehow Congress can lawfully authorize these killings.
Yet the AUMF of 2001 purported to authorize Bush to hunt down and kill the folks whom he failed to see coming on 9/11 (those would be his friends, the Saudis), and whom he reasonably found caused 9/11. The AUMF of 2002 authorized Bush to invade Iraq in pursuit of the weapons of mass destruction that he was told by experts inside and outside the CIA Saddam Hussein did not possess. Both AUMFs no longer have a valid purpose today, yet they remain the law.
The Constitution authorizes Congress to declare war against foreign countries, not random killings of persons. Neither of the AUMFs was or is a valid declaration of war, which the Constitution requires as a predicate for all extrajudicial presidential killings. A declaration of war defines the target and sets the end. It is not open-ended as the last four presidents have claimed with respect to these two Bush-era statutes.
If the presidents are right, and the AUMFs authorize them to kill whomever they wish – including Americans – then they are not presidents answerable to the law and the Constitution, but kings who can kill on a whim without transparency or legal consequence.
The whole purpose of confining the war-making power to Congress and the war-waging power to the president was to keep those powers separate. History is littered with examples of tyrants using the powers of the state to kill for no moral purpose. American presidents have given themselves the power to kill. It is the functional equivalent to a loaded gun in a drawer of the president’s desk.
Abraham Lincoln was the first head of state in world history to target civilians militarily and the first to engage in the indiscriminate slaughter of civilians of his own country. Franklin D. Roosevelt slaughtered thousands of innocent helpless German civilians at the end of World War II by carpet-bombing German cities, rather than targeting the German military. Harry Truman slaughtered many thousands of Japanese civilians at Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
All these murders were met with popular approval, as the targets had been demonized by the machinery of government – just like the “terrorists” Bush, Obama, Trump and Biden have killed.
But demonization of human targets and popular approval of their murders cannot turn an immoral act into a moral one. An act is moral when it is consistent with the Natural Law. According to the Declaration of Independence, under the Natural Law, all persons are “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, and among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.” The right to live is the foremost natural right and the great divine gift to all persons – not just Americans.
No person may morally be targeted for death by government for any reason unless it is presently necessary to stop that person from actively killing an innocent. In the cases cited above, the presidential killings were done to terrify political opponents, as the civilian targets were helpless. And the killers were lauded as heroes.
Today, American troops are on the ground in Ukraine showing Ukrainian forces how to use American weapons to kill Russian troops and in Israel showing the IDF how to kill civilians in Gaza. This was done by secret presidential orders that have never been publicly acknowledged. Russian troops and Gazan civilians pose no threat whatsoever to life, liberty or property in America.
Why do American presidents kill? Because they can get away with it.
* * *
Andrew P. Napolitano, a former judge of the Superior Court of New Jersey, is the senior judicial analyst at Fox News Channel. Judge Napolitano has written seven books on the US Constitution. The most recent is Suicide Pact: The Radical Expansion of Presidential Powers and the Lethal Threat to American Liberty. To learn more about Judge Andrew Napolitano, visit https://JudgeNap.com.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 08/18/2024 - 23:20
Published:8/18/2024 10:22:12 PM
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[Markets]
The Super-Wealthy Have A Problem
The Super-Wealthy Have A Problem
Authored by Charles Hugh Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,
The less self-congratulatory camp of the super-wealthy understand the pressure cooker of inequality and unfairness is going to blow unless they relinquish some of their unearned gains generated by Fed policies.
The cultural consensus holds that the super-wealthy always manage to come out ahead in any spot of bother. Due to their grip on the levers of financial and political power, whatever lays waste to the bottom 90% of the populace is either 1) an opportunity to increase their wealth or 2) a minor bump in the road to ever-expanding wealth.
History offers an abundance of examples. A favorite of mine is the guest books of the French chateaus owned by the super-wealthy, which logged visits from the Usual Suspects (political and financial bigshots) until 1940, when the names of Nazi bigshots began filling the ledgers, and then in 1945, the visitor list reverted to the Usual Suspects: a seamless transition from one set of political overlords to the next that the chateau owners rode without difficulty.
But there are counter-examples as well. Consider the family estate of famed architect I.M. Pei in Suzhou, China. I visited the impressive Pei residence, which is now a government-owned property open to the public. The Pei family was wealthy enough to be comfortably in the top tier of Chinese society. Life was good for China's elite, right up to 1949. These elites did not glide though the revolution intact; their wealth was confiscated.
They were replaced with a new elite, who now holds vast troves of wealth secreted away in the West, and just as I.M. Pei attended prestigious American Ivy League universities, so too do the sons and daughters of China's party elites, under assumed names, of course, to allow them a private experience outside the limelight.
So the super-wealthy don't always skate through tumultuous times, emerging richer than ever. We all understand how vast wealth inequality influences the political and social responses to crises. What is less well understood is the role of fairness in the social and political realms: if the inequality is understood to be the result of extremes of unfairness, the public mood darkens considerably, as humans are innately sensitive to unfairness.
The porousness of the border between the wealthy and the poor matters greatly in assessing fairness. If the financial-social membrane between the two classes is relatively porous, enabling the most ambitious and brightest of the poor to enter the ranks of the wealthy (or the ranks of the the top 10% who serve them), then the society maintains a minimum level of fairness that alleviates the pressure to overthrow the regime.
The remedial actions of the state also matter greatly. If the government acts decisively to raise estate taxes, taxes on unearned (i.e. rentier) income and on the higher reaches of earned income, and devotes some minimal attention to the basic needs of the bottom 90%, these policies also alleviate the pressure to overthrow the regime.
The book The Great Leveler: Violence and the History of Inequality from the Stone Age to the Twenty-First Century addresses these dynamics in admirable detail.
In other words, extremes of wealth/power inequality set the stage, but the closing act is decided by our responses to soaring inequality. If the response is PR artifice, i.e. the rich keep getting richer as the suffering of the bottom 90% increases, regime change starts looking like the only solution available.
If, on the other hand, policy makers and the public push back against the dominance of the super-wealthy, then the status quo can avoid fragmentation and dissolution.
The super-wealthy play a key role in this choice of response, and this fragments the elites into warring camps, a dynamic I've addressed many times over the years, including in my chart of some of the overlapping crises that will demand more than duct-tape responses:
The backdrop is the policies that have handed the super-wealthy immense gains in wealth and power via policy-driven asset appreciation and the gradual diminishment of the purchasing power of wages. Over the past 45 years, the value of earnings has declined $149 trillion to the benefit of unearned gains reaped by the already-wealthy:
This chart shows how wealth inequality has risen from the late 1970s, and how it was rocket-boosted by the Federal Reserve's "wealth effect" policies of quantitative easing (QE):
The bottom 80% own a mere fraction of the wealth owned by the top 1% and top 10%
While the wealthy cling to the self-serving narcissistic view that since we're doing fine, everyone's doing fine, the reality is the bottom 80% are awakening to the reality that they're not doing fine, a divide that will only widen as recession tightens its grip on the throats of the bottom 80%:
This is the vision of the "our wealth is rightly all ours" camp of the super-wealthy: the rest of us will own nothing and we'll be gloriously happy. Uh, sure. Since we're so happy, why don't we switch places?
The less self-congratulatory camp of the super-wealthy understand the pressure cooker of inequality and unfairness is going to blow unless they relinquish some of their unearned gains generated by Fed policies. While they naturally intend on keeping the vast majority of their gains, they realize the dividends of limitless greed might just be the overthrow of the regime they control to serve their own interests.
The rest of us play a part, too, of course, and our choice boils down to this: "And you want me to join this?"
The super-wealthy have a problem: if they refuse to release the pressure building in a grossly unfair, rigged system that's enriched them beyond measure, then the pendulum may swing to the other extreme and they'll be visiting their former estates as tourists in a few years.
But if they agree to relinquish some part of their gains, they fear the tides of history may erode their sand castles. Aiya, what a dilemma.
* * *
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Tyler Durden
Sun, 08/18/2024 - 11:40
Published:8/18/2024 10:47:56 AM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post hardcover bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:8/14/2024 7:06:52 AM
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[Markets]
Britain Is Proof: Globalists Plan To Use Migrants As A Mercenary Army Against The West
Britain Is Proof: Globalists Plan To Use Migrants As A Mercenary Army Against The West
Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.us,
Why do western officials insist on gaslighting the public on illegal border crossings?
Why do they attempt to destroy anyone that publicly opposes mass immigration from the third world?
The laws on the books support the public’s majority position on immigration – Come here legally or don’t come here at all.
In Europe, the UK and the US polls show a majority of citizens want reductions in immigration and better border security.
Yet, government officials, who often claim to be “protecting democracy,” brazenly ignore these majority concerns. Why?
For many years now I have offered a specific theory on the true agenda behind open border policies in western countries and I believe this theory answers most of questions surrounding illegal immigration.
The common claim within the Liberty Movement is that this is all part of the “Cloward-Piven Strategy”: A social engineering method which uses large scale relocation of migrants into a society in order to destabilize that nation. The goal is to import people with a incompatible or hostile ideology and, eventually, the target culture will break down and be forced to accept a new system of governance (i.e. from free markets and liberty to communism and slavery).
If western populations are unified in opposing the globalist ideology then the task of deconstruction becomes impossible for them. So, they simply destroy the west from within by introducing millions of people that will NEVER assimilate or unify.
My theory goes beyond the Cloward-Piven explanation, though.
I think there is a deeper and even more sinister purpose to the introduction of third world migrants to the US and Europe.
I summarized my position in my article ‘Cultural Replacement: Why The Immigration Crisis Is Being Deliberately Engineered’ published in January. I noted:
“I have mentioned this in previous articles and I continue to believe that one of the main purposes for the establishment to leave borders open and entice illegals to enter is to create a migrant army; a situation in which millions of illegals will be offered easy citizenship in exchange for service. I also believe that this migrant army will be used against the American public (the real citizenry) to impose martial law measures in the wake of a national disaster…”
In other words, my argument was that migrants from the third-world are not merely being used as unwitting tools for cultural saturation of the west. They’re not being shipped in by the millions to simply live off the fruits of our labor and our ancestors’ labors. I believe they are being brought into the US, the UK and Europe as enforcers for the establishment.
Think about it – They are essentially bought and paid for. They are mercenaries recruited with offers of easy citizenship, government handouts and the opportunity to brutalize the very western (and generally white) populations they despise. And, they are allowed to do this while hiding behind government law enforcement agencies for protection.
With a two tier policing system in place, the migrants can do whatever they want without much fear of repercussions. In Europe there is the added problem of expanding Islamic immigration which is directed by religious doctrine to conquer non-believers. From the Quran:
Quran [9:29] Fight those who do not believe in Allah or in the Last Day and who do not consider unlawful what Allah and His Messenger have made unlawful and who do not adopt the religion of truth from those who were given the Scripture – [fight] until they give the jizyah willingly while they are humbled.
Third world migrants are hired muscle for the political elites. They can terrorize the populace, and if the native population takes action to defend itself the government can step in, call them hateful racists and declare martial law. It’s a win-win. The migrants then help with the enforcement of that martial law as the government doubles down on two-tier policing.
There are those that insist the anti-immigration position is a “false paradigm.” The notion of “false paradigms” has become a plague among liberty movement thinkers that needs to be abandoned. The reality is that we are not just fighting the globalists, we also have to fight the people that wittingly or unwittingly aid the globalists. The elites help instigate conflicts, but many of these divisions already exist without their influence.
For example, third-world cultures are intrinsically violent and authoritarian. The top 20 most violent nations and most oppressive nations in the world are also the same nations sending caravans of migrants our way. Progressives will claim that’s a good thing and that we need to help these people. It’s not a good thing and most of them can’t be helped because they aren’t coming here to be free, they are coming here to take whatever they can take.
The majority of people from these regions will never be able to coexist peacefully within western communities. They don’t understand freedom, they don’t understand diplomacy, they don’t understand compromise. For them, tolerance is not a virtue, it’s a weakness that can be exploited to their advantage. This is a fact proven time and time again as mass migrations accelerates and I think my theory has recently been vindicated by events in the UK.
British citizens have been victimized for over a decade by migrant attacks and organized crime. The two-tier policing system in the UK continues to protect these migrants from retribution while the government hides statistics that show how much violence is being committed by non-citizens.
The British riots last week were a rare moment when patriots finally spoke out on open borders and took to the streets, only to be declared “Nazis” and “racists”. The use of riot police to quell property damage and fighting would be understandable to a point, except that aggressive migrant protests had been ongoing for months with very little police interference. Again, the two-tier policing is obvious.
Then, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer made a statement admonishing patriot protests and defending migrants. No referendum on immigration has been offered. He has not once acknowledged the problem of rising migrant crime and has essentially declared war on patriots.
In July the Labour Party was reportedly in the process of creating of a new “Muslim leadership group” intended to become the primary point of engagement between Keir Starmer’s government and Muslim communities in the UK. A draft document setting out plans for the network describes its core objectives, including “to influence public policy in a way that safeguards and promotes the rights of British Muslims”, and “to influence the media debate around Muslims in Britain”. In other words, propaganda to silence native dissent.
Muslim migrant gangs, calling themselves the “Muslim Defense League” (MDL) saw Starmer’s speech as an invitation to stalk the streets of British towns armed with knives and machetes; moving from street to street attacking white Brits at random.
The migrants made it clear that their purpose was to “assert dominance” over Brits and frighten them into submission. So far UK officials deny that the Muslim gangs exist. The media has refused to cover most of the activities of migrant gangs and has placed all blame on native patriots. One of the only places you can see any video evidence exposing migrant gangs is on Elon Musk’s X (formerly Twitter). Musk as also been attacked by UK officials for “fomenting unrest”, simply because he doesn’t censor the footage.
Meanwhile, Keir Starmer and other government officials have been meeting with Muslim groups to reassure them that the government is on their side. The migrants are now emboldened to do as they please while the Brits face the reality that if they fight back, the government will put them in prison. The migrants are now, in the most basic sense, a mercenary wing of the UK government.
This dynamic is even more undeniable when we look at the move by the UK government to remove Christian-related events from the British military while encouraging Muslim recruiting. Keep in mind, last week the UK government threatened the possibility of the military being used on the British people. Corrupt empires throughout history have preferred using foreign mercenaries to suppress their own citizens. It’s no coincidence that such a large percentage of the people coming from the third-world (around 80%) are military age men.
The post-war British populace has long lived without a relationship to true violence. Sure, they have football riots and brawls, but I’m talking about cold, calculated ethnic warfare designed to subjugate. Alien migrants coming from Africa and the Middle East are intimately familiar with such violence. They know it well and have embraced it totally as a part of their culture.
Not very many Brits are capable of comprehending a knife attack on a children’s dance recital, or the mass stabbing of toddlers playing in a park, or the operation of organized rape gangs that kidnap teens. When you first experience this kind of demonic will, it can be petrifying. I fear the British people are facing something so far outside of their wheelhouse that they may not know how to deal with it. The combination of organized migrant crime and government oppression might browbeat Brits into devastating apathy.
I suspect that the situation in the UK is just a precursor to what we will soon see in the US. Starmer is a die-hard advocate of the World Economic Forum and he is following their program to the letter. The conditions in the UK are what the Davos crowd wants everywhere.
Regardless of the outcome of the US elections in November the illegal immigration crisis will be central to everything we do in the next couple years. If leftists remain in political power then it is likely that we will see a similar attempt at a crackdown on patriots from an arrogant Harris Administration.
I believe Harris will most definitely offer citizenship to every illegal already in the country (many of them in exchange for military service), buying a mercenary force and a progressive voting block at the same time, ending any chance of conservatives ever participating in government again.
In the case of a second Trump Administration the situation changes. The removal of illegal migrants will be the top issue and leftists in the US will try to prevent it. They view the migrants as the key to their kingdom; the way to “destroy capitalism” and bring in woke socialism. Removal of illegals would set them back decades. Leftists will riot rather than lose. It’s a certainty.
The difference is, US patriots are armed (50 million strong with over 400 million guns and hundreds of billions of rounds of ammunition). I’m now receiving a lot of emails these days from UK and European readers who say they are desperate for the same firearms rights we have in the US. They all tell me, “never give up your guns.” Don’t worry, we won’t. We know what’s coming thanks to the events in the UK.
* * *
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Tyler Durden
Tue, 08/13/2024 - 23:25
Published:8/13/2024 11:11:24 PM
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[Markets]
'V For Vendetta' Got It Wrong: Tyranny Comes To Britain Under The Political Left
'V For Vendetta' Got It Wrong: Tyranny Comes To Britain Under The Political Left
There have been plenty of depictions of dystopian future from popular entertainment media over the years, most of them derivatives of books like Brave New World by Aldous Huxley or 1984 by George Orwell with a contemporary spin. Interestingly, Orwell was inspired to write 1984 by a lesser known dystopian tale called 'We', written by Russian author Yevgeny Zamyatin during the darkest years of communism. Orwell argued that Huxley was also inspired by We, but Huxley denied it.
Whenever scientific dictatorship is envisioned by fiction writers the end result is usually very similar to already existing socialist regimes. Soviet doctrine and the ideals of the Third Reich were inspired by Karl Marx; meaning, both regimes were built on far-left philosophies. Progressives today often maliciously associate Nazis with conservative thought, but both Adolph Hitler and Benito Mussolini were avid followers of Marx. As Hitler noted on January 27, 1934, in an interview with Hanns Johst in Frankforter Volksblatt:
“National Socialism derives from each of the two camps the pure idea that characterizes it, national resolution from bourgeois tradition; vital, creative socialism from the teachings of Marxism. Volksgemeinschaft: that means a community of all productive labor, that means the oneness of all vital interests, that means overcoming bourgeois privatism and the unionized, mechanically organized masses, that means unconditionally equating the individual fate and the nation, the individual and the Volk..."
Hitler presented himself as a Christian patriot to win over the German public as they faced economic and moral degradation during the unchecked liberalism of the 1920s, but in private he was not a fan of the religion. Hitler is noted by Albert Speer as saying:
"You see, it's been our misfortune to have the wrong religion. Why didn't we have the religion of the Japanese, who regard sacrifice for the Fatherland as the highest good? The Mohammedan religion [Islam] too would have been more compatible to us than Christianity. Why did it have to be Christianity with its meekness and flabbiness?"
In fact, finding and defining a "conservative" totalitarian regime is almost impossible in modern times. Without the defense of free markets, individual liberty, meritocracy and a healthy respect for constitutional fairness one cannot call himself conservative. The Nazis were no more conservative than Neo-Conservatives are conservative, they are simply leftists that pursue ultimate power using nationalism as a proxy instead of pure globalism.
How the "right wing" was culturally associated with authoritarianism is all thanks to modern Hollywood. The same people that write endless tales of Nazi horror have long ignored the even greater genocides of communism in the Soviet Union, China and elsewhere. And, whenever a modern dictatorship is portrayed in art or film it is usually tied somehow to a conservative (and often Christian) takeover of society.
This brings us to a little film called V For Vendetta released in 2006, and it brings us to the tyranny now accelerating in the UK.
V For Vendetta is based on the graphic novel by the same name written by Alan Moore (picture below), a talented British scribe but also known by many in the comics industry as a leftist and communist. Moore's take on an Orwellian government dominating Britain was decidedly anti-conservative, to no one's surprise.
The film, directed by the Wachowski Brothers (creators of The Matrix and now both claiming to be "trans women" pictured below), took the anti-conservative view from the comic to even greater extremes with an underlying LGBT propaganda message. V depicts a British government gripped by authoritarian Christian zealots bent on rounding up and exterminating gay people (and anyone else they deem unfit). They use an engineered pandemic crisis to frighten the English population and seize power (sound familiar?), establishing a relentless police state run by sexual degenerates that saturates media with disinformation to keep the public docile.
Another film with a similar theme is Children Of Men (release the same year as V for Vendetta), which uses the UK as a backdrop to showcase the steady decline of humanity after a pandemic ends our ability to have children. The authoritarian government in that tale is dominated by white Brits who round up migrants and place them in concentration camps, and of course a migrant woman ends up being the key to solving the question of infertility.
While most people can relate to the struggle against totalitarianism, the intolerable fallacy being perpetuated is that when the jackboots finally march on the western world they will do so in the name of conservative values and religion. Well, the dystopian nightmare has arrived in the UK, and the truth is quite the opposite.
The British public is being culturally diminished through forced mass immigration to which the government offers no redress. UK authorities are far-left in their ideology and promote globalism as the system which Brits must accept without question. And, those same establishment elites have joined with third-world migrants and Islamic militants to terrorize the population into submission.
Today, UK police are out in force threatening to arrest anyone remotely critical of open immigration or UK migrant policies. They have also doubled down on the two-tier policing that caused the patriot protests and riots to begin with. These are not scenes from V For Vendetta, these are scenes from the UK this week:
UK authorities have now made multiples arrests dealing with social media posts and opinions as well as arresting people who were merely spectators at various protests. They are also searching for ways to take down their political opponents, with leftist politicians using MI6 to investigate Nigel Farage for "financial ties" to Tommy Robinson and Russia. It's expected that adjacent leftist governments around the world will be following the UK's example.
Is the far-left really oblivious to their own natural tendencies towards tyranny? Or, is all the media depicting a conservative run dystopia really a form of gaslighting? A means to demonize the very people the elites have long sought to erase from history?
When rebellion against this trend explodes (and it will), many great speeches on liberty similar to those spoken in so many pieces of predictive entertainment will not be spoken by leftists and they won't apply to leftists. Leftists are not the freedom fighters they imagine themselves to be. They are, in fact, the villains of the story.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 08/13/2024 - 04:15
Published:8/13/2024 3:44:36 AM
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Federal Fiscal Burden Consumes 93% Of America's Wealth
Federal Fiscal Burden Consumes 93% Of America's Wealth
Authored by James D. Agresti via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
Based on data from a U.S. Treasury report, the federal government has amassed $142 trillion in debts, liabilities, and unfunded obligations. This staggering figure equals 93 percent of all the wealth Americans have accumulated since the nation’s founding, estimated by the Federal Reserve to be $152 trillion.
Unlike other measures of federal red ink that cover an arbitrary period, extend into the infinite future, or ignore government resources, the figure of $142 trillion applies strictly to Americans who are alive right now and includes the government’s commercial assets. Thus, it quantifies the financial burden that today’s Americans are leaving to their children and future generations.
Complete Versus Incomplete Accounting
Federal law requires the U.S. Treasury to publish an annual report that details the government’s “overall financial position.” In addition to the national debt, the “Financial Report of the United States Government” also includes the government’s explicit and implicit financial commitments, such as:
• federal employee pensions and other retirement benefits like healthcare.
• environmental liabilities like contaminated nuclear sites.
• unfunded obligations for social insurance programs like Medicare.
Such “fiscal exposures,” as explained by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), “represent significant commitments that ultimately have to be addressed.” Thus, GAO stresses that ignoring them can “make it difficult for policymakers and the public to adequately understand the government’s overall performance and true financial condition.”
Yet, that is precisely what the media does. Although the Treasury published the report in February, Google News indicates that no major media outlet has mentioned it. Meanwhile, the same outlets have frequently reported on the national debt and federal budget, which are incomplete measures of the federal government’s fiscal situation.
The commonly cited national debt and federal budget are mainly based on cash accounting, which is the simplistic process of counting money as it flows in or out. Thus, liabilities like pension benefits for federal workers aren’t measured until they are actually paid, which is often decades after they are promised.
In contrast, the Treasury report mainly uses accrual accounting, which measures financial commitments as they are made. This is how the federal government requires large corporations to report their finances. In the words of the Financial Accounting Standards Board, which is tasked by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to create private-sector accounting rules, accrual accounting is the “most relevant and reliable” way to measure the financial health of pension plans.
The same applies to other retirement benefits like healthcare. The accounting rule that governs such benefits explains that “a failure to accrue” implies “that no obligation exists prior to the payment of benefits.” Since an obligation does exist, failing to account for it “impairs the usefulness and integrity” of financial statements.
The Grand Total
A methodical tally of accrual accounting data in the Treasury report shows that the federal government has amassed $142 trillion in debts, liabilities, and unfunded obligations beyond the value of its commercial assets. This reflects the government’s finances at the close of its 2023 fiscal year on Sept. 30, 2023.
The primary components of this burden, which are unpacked below, include:
• $26.3 trillion in publicly held national debt.
• $16.6 trillion in liabilities that are not accounted for in the publicly held debt.
• $104.2 trillion in unfunded social insurance obligations.
These figures tally to $147.1 trillion in debts, liabilities, and unfunded obligations. Offsetting this is $5.4 trillion in commercial assets owned by the federal government, leaving a grand total shortfall of $141.7 trillion.
Numbers in the trillions are hard to conceive, so it’s revealing to place them in context. The figure of $142 trillion amounts to 93 percent of the net wealth Americans have accumulated since the nation’s founding, estimated by the Federal Reserve to be $152 trillion. This includes all of their assets in savings, real estate, corporate stocks, private businesses, and consumer durable goods like automobiles and furniture.
The government’s $142 trillion shortfall also amounts to:
• $430,252 for every person living in the United States.
• $1,098,087 for every household in the United States.
• 2 times annual U.S. economic output (GDP).
• 30 times annual federal revenues.
Publicly Held Debt
The simplest major item quantified by the Treasury report is the publicly held debt, which is $26.3 trillion. This is the money the federal government owes to non-federal entities like individuals, corporations, state governments, and foreign governments.
Publicly held debt is a partial measure of the national debt that excludes $6.9 trillion the federal government owes to federal programs like Social Security and Medicare. The Treasury report also details these intergovernmental debts and consolidates them with the items below.
Liabilities
Pension and other retirement benefits are a large part of compensation packages for government employees. With these generous benefits included, civilian non-postal federal employees receive an average of 17 percent more total compensation than private-sector workers with comparable education and work experience. Postal workers receive even greater premiums ranging from 25 percent to 43 percent.
In 2022, federal, state, and local governments spent $2.3 trillion on employee compensation, costing each household in the nation an average of $17,299.
The Treasury report shows that the federal government currently owes $14.3 trillion in pensions and other benefits to federal employees and veterans that are not accounted for in the publicly held national debt. To pay the present value of these benefits will require an average of $109,005 from every household in the United States.
The Treasury reports other liabilities of the federal government, such as:
• $124 billion in accounts payable.
• $645 billion in environmental and disposal liabilities.
• $99 billion in insurance and guarantee program liabilities.
Altogether, the Treasury records $16.6 trillion in liabilities that are not accounted for in the publicly held debt.
Social Security & Medicare
A similar but far more expensive situation exists with social insurance programs like Social Security and Medicare. This is because—contrary to popular belief—these programs don’t save workers’ taxes for their retirements. Instead, they immediately spend the vast majority of those taxes to pay benefits to current recipients. Thus, they are called “pay-as-you-go” programs.
In stark contrast, the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis explains that “federal law requires private pension plans to operate as funded plans, not as pay-as-you-go plans.” The reasons for this, as explained by the American Academy of Actuaries, are to increase “benefit security” and ensure “intergenerational equity.”
Social Security and Medicare, on the other hand, have levied dramatically increased tax burdens on succeeding generations of Americans, thus creating severe generational inequality. And unless retirement ages are raised or benefits are reduced in some other way, taxes will need to be increased again to keep the programs solvent.
Federal actuaries measure the unfunded obligations of Social Security and Medicare in several different ways, but only one of them approximates accrual accounting. This is called the “closed-group” unfunded obligation, which is the money needed to cover the shortfalls for all current taxpayers and beneficiaries in these programs.
In the words of Harvard Law School professor and federal budget specialist Howell E. Jackson, the closed-group measure “reflects the financial burden or liability being passed on to future generations.” These burdens are $49.8 trillion for Social Security and $53.9 trillion for Medicare. Placing these figures in context:
• Social Security’s unfunded obligations amount to an additional $272,237 from every person who currently pays Social Security payroll taxes.
• Medicare’s unfunded obligations amount to an additional $201,932 from every U.S. resident aged 16 or older.
Those shortfalls are what remain after the federal government has paid back with interest all of the money it has borrowed from Social Security and Medicare.
Social Security and Medicare differ from true pensions because taxpayers don’t have a contractual right to receive these benefits. Nevertheless, paying these benefits is an implied commitment of the federal government, and federal law requires that these programs be included in the Treasury report.
The Treasury report estimates that the combined closed group unfunded obligations of Social Security, Medicare, and some smaller social insurance programs are $104.2 trillion. This figure doesn’t include intergovernmental debt, which is consolidated with other data in the report.
Federal Assets
The Treasury also records the federal government’s commercial assets, such as:
• $922 billion in cash and other monetary assets.
• $1.2 trillion in property, plants, and equipment.
• $1.7 trillion in receivable loans, mainly comprised of student loans.
However, the report doesn’t account for federal stewardship land and heritage assets, such as national parks and the original copy of the Declaration of Independence. While these items have tangible value, the report explains that they “are intended to be preserved as national treasures,” not sold to the highest bidder to cover debts.
In total, the government owned $5.4 trillion in commercial assets at the close of its 2023 fiscal year.
Adding up the federal government’s debts, liabilities, and unfunded obligations and then subtracting the value of its commercial assets yields a fiscal shortfall of $142 trillion.
Root Causes
The first critical step in solving a problem is to understand its root causes. However, scientific surveys show that many voters are misinformed about the root causes of government debt.
A scientific, nationally representative survey commissioned in 2020 by Just Facts found that 25 percent of voters believe the main driver of the rising national debt is military spending. This accords with the reporting of media outlets that frequently blame the debt on military spending.
In reality, military spending has plummeted from 53 percent of all federal expenses in 1960 to 17 percent in 2022:
The same survey found that another 25 percent of voters believe tax cuts were the main driver of debt, in accord with news stories that blame the debt on tax cuts.
In reality, federal revenues have stayed at a roughly level portion of the U.S. economy for the past 80 years:
As shown in the charts above, the primary driver of the national debt is increased spending, particularly on social programs. These programs—which provide healthcare, income security, education, nutrition, housing, and cultural services—have grown from 21 percent of all federal spending in 1960 to 64 percent in 2022.
Yet, only 39 percent of voters correctly identify social spending as the primary cause of rising debt.
Moreover, the vast bulk of the government’s unfunded obligations are due to Social Security and Medicare. Thus, the Congressional Budget Office projects that the main drivers of future debt will be Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, the Children’s Health Insurance Program, Obamacare, and interest on the national debt. Under the weight of these, the publicly held debt is due to soar to unprecedented levels over coming decades.
Harmful Effects
A broad range of academic publications explain that excessive government debt can cause far-reaching negative outcomes, such as lower wages, increased inflation, weak economic growth, higher taxes, reduced government benefits, or combinations of such results.
Likewise, GAO warns that “the costs of federal borrowing will be borne by tomorrow’s workers and taxpayers,” which “may reduce or slow the growth of the living standards of future generations.”
Such effects may have already begun. Although association does not prove causation, the national debt has skyrocketed over recent decades, and with this, the United States has experienced episodes of historically poor growth in gross domestic product (GDP), productivity, and household income. Along with this, rapid inflation has set in, another common consequence of excessive government debt.
While some believe the U.S. government can spend and borrow with abandon because it can print money, one of the most established laws of economics is that there is no such thing as a free lunch. The prolific economist William A. McEachern explains why this is so:
“There is no free lunch because all goods and services involve a cost to someone. The lunch may seem free to you, but it draws scarce resources away from the production of other goods and services, and whoever provides a free lunch often expects something in return. A Russian proverb makes a similar point but with a bit more bite: ‘The only place you find free cheese is in a mousetrap.’”
From Just Facts Daily
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
Mon, 08/12/2024 - 19:15
Published:8/12/2024 6:30:43 PM
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Combatting "False Narratives": D.C. Circuit Refuses To Block Judge Limiting The Speech Of Jan. 6th Defendant
Combatting "False Narratives": D.C. Circuit Refuses To Block Judge Limiting The Speech Of Jan. 6th Defendant
Authored by Jonathan Turley,
We have previously discussed controversial sentences handed down in cases involving rioters on January 6th, including sentencing orders that, in my view, violate First Amendment rights. That included the case of Daniel Goodwyn, who pleaded guilty to a single misdemeanor count of entering and remaining in a restricted building. That crime would ordinarily not involve any jail time for a first offender.
However, Judge Reggie B. Walton of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia decided that he would use the case to regulate what Goodwyn was reading and communicating with a chilling probation order. After the case was sent back by the D.C. Circuit, Walton doubled down on his extraordinary order. Now the D.C. Circuit has refused to hear an emergency appeal.
Judge Walton has attracted controversy and criticism over his public comments about former President Donald Trump and the other issues. He caused a stir in Washington after doing an interview with CNN in which he rebuked former President Donald Trump for his criticism of judges and their family members. Walton previously called Trump a “charlatan,” and said that “I don’t think he cares about democracy, only power.”
Critics charged that Walton’s public statements ran afoul of Canon 3A(6) of the Code of Conduct for United States Judges, which states:
“A judge should not make public comment on the merits of a matter pending or impending in any court.”
Walton then triggered criticism over his handling of the Goodwin case.
The case involved Daniel Goodwyn, 35, of Corinth, Texas, who pleaded guilty on Jan. 31, 2023, to one misdemeanor count of entering and remaining in a restricted building or grounds without lawful authority. That is a relatively minor offense, but Walton imposed a 60-day jail sentence in June 2023 with these ongoing conditions on his online reading and speech.
Walton reportedly noted that Goodwyn spread “disinformation” during a broadcast of “Tucker Carlson Tonight” on March 14, 2023 and ordered that Mr. Goodwyn’s computer be subject to “monitoring and inspection” by a probation agent to check if he spread Jan. 6 disinformation during the term of his supervised release.
After accepting the plea to a single misdemeanor, Walton expressed scorn for Goodwyn appearing “gleeful” on Jan. 6 and his “egging on” other rioters.
He asked his defense counsel “why I should feel that he doesn’t pose a risk to our democracy?”
As a condition for supervised release, DOJ pushed the monitoring conditions and found a judge who seemed eager to impose it.
The order reflects the utter impunity shown by the Justice Department in its pursuit of January 6th defendants. Justice Department official Michael Sherwin proudly declared in a television interview that “our office wanted to ensure that there was shock and awe … it worked because we saw through media posts that people were afraid to come back to D.C. because they’re, like, ‘If we go there, we’re gonna get charged.’ … We wanted to take out those individuals that essentially were thumbing their noses at the public for what they did.”
Sherwin was celebrated for his pledge to use such draconian means to send a message to others in the country. (Sherwin has left the Justice Department and is now a partner at Kobre & Kim).
Walton was rebuked by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia for a surveillance order of Goodwin to detect any spreading of “disinformation” or “misinformation.”
In my new book, “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage,” I discussed concerns over the cases like Goodwyn’s and their implications for free speech. I participated in the coverage on January 6th and criticized President Trump’s speech while he was giving it. I disagreed with the legal claims made to oppose certification. However, the “shock and awe” campaign of the Justice Department, in my view, has trampled on free speech rights in cases that range from Goodwyn to the prosecutions of Trump himself.
Many of us were relieved when appellate judges (Gregory Katsas, Neomi Rao, and Bradley Garcia) rebuked Walton and held that “[t]he district court plainly erred in imposing the computer-monitoring condition without considering whether it was ‘reasonably related’ to the relevant sentencing factors and involved ‘no greater deprivation of liberty than is reasonably necessary’ to achieve the purposes behind the sentencing.”
They sent the case back but, to the surprise of few, Judge Walton proceeded to double down on the monitoring while implausibly declaring “I don’t want to chill anyone’s First Amendment rights.”
For some reason, Walton believes that barring an individual from reviewing and engaging in political speech does not “chill” his First Amendment rights.
Most of us were appalled by the riot and the underlying views of figures like Goodwyn, who is a self-proclaimed member of the Proud Boys. He was rightfully arrested and should be punished for his conduct. The question is not the legitimacy of punishment, but the scope of that punishment.
Prosecutor Brian Brady detailed how the Justice Department has in place a new system using artificial intelligence to monitor the reading and statements of citizens like Goodwyn. The Justice Department brushed aside the free speech concerns since Goodwyn remains under court supervision, even though he pleaded guilty to only a single misdemeanor.
Brady described a virtual AI driven thought program. The justification was that Goodwyn refused to abandon his extreme political views:
“Throughout the pendency of Goodwyn’s case, he has made untruthful statements regarding his conduct and the events of the day, he has used websites and social media to place targets on police officers who defended the Capitol, and he has used these platforms to publish and view extremist media. Imposing the requested [monitoring] conditions would protect the public from further dissemination of misinformation… [and] provide specific deterrence from him committing similar crimes.”
So now federal courts can use a single misdemeanor for unlawful entry in a federal building for less than 40 seconds to “protect the public from … dissemination of misinformation” on the government.
That was all Walton needed to hear. Relying on a record supplied by the Justice Department, Walton said in the hearing that Goodwyn is still engaging “in the same type of rhetoric” that fomented the Jan. 6 violence. He added that he was concerned about Goodwyn spreading “false narratives” when we are “on the heels of another election.”
Walton merely added the DOJ record to his renewed sentencing conditions.
Defense counsel then returned to the D.C. Circuit to seek an emergency stay but Judges Florence Pan and Bradley Garcia denied the motion, holding that “Appellant has not satisfied the stringent requirements for a stay pending appeal” to prevent further “false narratives.”
That drew a pointed dissent from Judge Gregory Katsas who stated:
Daniel Goodwyn pleaded guilty to one count of knowingly entering or remaining in a restricted building or grounds, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1752(a)(1). Goodwyn entered the Capitol and remained inside for a total of 36 seconds. He did not use force to enter, did not assault police officers, and neither took nor damaged any government property. When police instructed Goodwyn to leave the building, he did so.
...
On appeal, this Court vacated the condition … We further instructed the district court, if it wished to impose a new computer- monitoring condition on remand, to “explain its reasoning,” to “develop the record in support of its decision,” and to ensure that the condition complies with section 3583(d) and with the Constitution.
The district court reimposed the same condition on remand. In an oral hearing, the court said that Goodwyn had made statements on social media that “can be, it seems to me, construed as” urging a repeat of January 6, particularly “on the heels of another election.” In its written order, the court elaborated on what it called Goodwyn’s “concerning online activity.” This included posting exhortations to “#StopTheSteal!” and “#FightForTrump,” soliciting donations to fund his travel to Washington, posing for a livestream while inside the Capitol, confirming his presence there by text, and tweeting opinions such as: “They WANT a revolution. They’re proving our point. They don’t represent us. They hate us.” Id. at 3–4. In addressing what the court described as Goodwyn pushing “false narratives” about January 6 after-the-fact, the court, quoting from the government’s brief, led with the fact Goodwyn “sat for an interview with Tucker Carlson on Fox News Channel.” Id. at 4. Finally, in concluding that computer monitoring was reasonably related to Goodwyn’s offense, the court reasoned that monitoring would prevent Goodwyn from raising funds to support potential future crimes and would separate him “from extremist media, rehabilitating him.”
Judge Katsas stated that Goodwyn was likely to prevail on the merits and that his colleagues allowed the denial of First Amendment rights to continue in the interim.
The Walton order reflects the erosion of support for the First Amendment, even on our courts. It is reminiscent of our previous discussion of how courts have criminalized “toxic ideologies” as part of the crackdown on free speech in the United Kingdom.
Here is the D.C. Circuit order: United States v. Goodwyn
Tyler Durden
Sun, 08/11/2024 - 21:00
Published:8/11/2024 8:35:12 PM
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The Ardent Pipe-Dreams Of American Voters
The Ardent Pipe-Dreams Of American Voters
Authored by Edward Curtin via Off-Guardioan.org,
To hell with the truth! As the history of the world proves, the truth has no bearing on anything. It’s irrelevant and immaterial, as the lawyers say. The lie of a pipe dream is what gives life to the whole misbegotten mad lot of us, drunk or sober.”
- Eugene O’Neill, The Iceman Cometh
Voters in the USA live in fantasy and probably always will. No matter how obvious it is that the U.S. is an oligarchy, not a democracy, the ardent pipe dreams of a new face in the White House go to their heads every four years.
It can only be explained by a combination of intellectual ignorance, the acceptance of propaganda, and the embrace of illusions.
An analogy is apropos. In the small town and vicinity where I live, there are about 10 pot shops where pipe dreams are dispensed. As The Platters sang long ago, “when your heart’s on fire, you must realize smoke gets in your eyes.” But few realize it.
Smoke? What smoke?
Quadrennially, this love affair with the presidential candidates burns hot and heavy despite their records, as if they were heart throbs of stage and screen, straight from Broadway or Hollywood deeply concerned for the public’s welfare.
Americans love actors, and the presidential candidates are of course actors, following the directions of the fat cats who produce their shows. As the grand opening of election day approaches, the supine public is aroused to a fanatical frenzy of excitement from its years’-long sleep by a mass media that spews out drivel to deceive. It could be said that what the media propagandists digest, the public eats.
Smoke and mirrors never fail as the electorate’s favorite billionaire-backed candidates – at this point in 2024 Trump and Kamala Harris (but don’t count on it) – spew lie after lie and the mass media faithfully promote the show as if it were an actual contest between good and evil, a grand movie. The acting is terrible, but the audience is so inflamed they can’t tell.
“There are unconscious actors among them and involuntary actors; the genuine are always rare, especially genuine actors,” Friedrich Nietzsche told us long ago, alluding to far more than this crude political masquerade – to life itself – urging us to take a deep look at the games we play and love in our politicians because they confirm our illusions.
In the 2020 election between Joseph Biden and Donald Trump, more than 158 million ballots were cast, a record number that was two-thirds of estimated eligible voters. That was about seven percentage points higher than in 2016 when Trump and Hillary Clinton faced off. Each election was supposed to be the most important in “your lifetime.”
And as everyone knows, the country has gotten more prosperous, healthier and happier, and the world more peaceful, in those eight years of Republican and Democratic rule.
One can expect more of the same smoke this year as the excitement, titillation, and political lies build to a November 4th crescendo. Illusions die hard, or to be more accurate – they do not die.
The Spectacle rolls on.
Although it might sound uppity, unless people read books that explain how the political and economic system is constructed and how it operates, they have no hope of understanding why the presidential elections are musical chairs played to the tune of Yankee Doodle Dandy. Podcasts and talks can be instructive when true, but they don’t stick like words on a page in a book that you have noted and can refer back to.
But the vast majority of people will not read such books because many can’t read or are too lazy or distracted to take the time to switch off digital media and the mainstream corporate press. It is only through slow meditative reading and study of the great analytic books about social structure, propaganda, history, capitalism, and political economy that a person can truly grasp the nature of the power elite’s domination of the US government, the mass media, and the White House.
A soupçon of differences between contestants for the presidency – superficial makeup – is enough to have those caught in the spectacle get worked up into a hot lather of excitement for candidates chosen by the billionaires. It is an aspect of the mania for celebrity culture.
One cannot simply imbibe the daily mass media, listen to talking heads, or read books recommended and promoted by The New York Times or some prize committee such as the Booker or Pulitzer prizes. (see the NYT’s Best Sellers here – as if #5 could be as “best” as #1).
It is no secret that the reading public has been shrinking for years as literacy has waned dramatically. This is not an accident as the internet, cell phones, and the online life have been pushed by the authorities at every level, including throughout the school system. (I am not arguing that the voters saw through the electoral charade in the past because the level of cultural literacy was higher.)
Today, a walk into any local library throughout the country will confirm the sad state of what even those who read books are reading. The new fiction shelves are filled with books with candy-colored sensationalized covers that evoke bodice-ripping books of old now updated to sound more serious by telling stories of orphans on European trains during WW II, mysterious murders, separated twins, equally evil Nazis and Russians on the prowl, childhood trauma, unfaithful men, etc. All seemingly NY Times bestsellers, together with the “non-fiction” books within which you would search a long time on the shelves to find a radical critique of the American political system and its propaganda arms.
This issue of voting and literacy is connected to another key matter. The American public as a whole does not much care to follow foreign policy and military issues. That is an understatement. Once the military draft was ended in January 1973, the public lost interest in who was being killed in America’s wars. Let foreigners be damned was the unspoken assumption. It was a stroke of genius by the military-industrial-political complex, for politics has always been about what’s in it for us, and when the military is voluntary and Americans are dying in smaller numbers, people are indifferent to the killing.
When it comes to politics, the public’s focus is primarily on domestic issues, the economy, health care, taxes, etc., despite the fact that the entire economy is dependent on war and preparations for war and the U.S. has been at war continually for decades. The U.S spends nearly $900 billion dollars annually on “defense” spending; this is more than China, Russia, India, Saudi Arabia, the U.K., Germany, France, South Korea, and Japan combined.
As everyone knows:
The U.S. is defending itself in Syria where its troops illegally occupy the oilfields in the northeast.
It is defending itself helping Israel slaughter Palestinians and supporting an expanded Middle Eastern war.
It is defending itself by attacking Russia via Ukraine and leading the world to nuclear war.
It is defending itself by provoking China in the South China Sea.
It is defending itself all over the world with special forces and military bases everywhere because everyone is out to get us.
It is defending itself always far, far away from its own shores.
Everyone knows that’s how it goes.
But facetiousness aside, the voting public either doesn’t know or doesn’t care that the U.S.A. is a warfare state; it’s as simple as that. Without waging wars, the U.S. economy, as presently constituted, would collapse. It is an economy based on fantasy and fake money with a national debt over 35 trillion dollars that will never be repaid. That’s another illusion. But I am speaking of pipe dreams, am I not? And whether they choose to be aware of it or not, the vast majority of Americans support this killing machine by their indifference and ignorance of its ramifications throughout the society and more importantly, its effects in death and destruction on the rest of the world. But that’s how it goes as their focus is on the masked faces that face each other on the stage of the masquerade ball every four years.
This charade is comical but accepted by so many, and as the Halloween season in a presidential election year in the USA approaches, it becomes most clear. It’s always a trick until four years elapses and the next poisoned candy treat is offered.
Get to the polls. Your life depends on it!
But there is a big price to be paid – a lesson always too late for the learning – for going to the masquerade ball. Yet when smoke gets in your eyes…ah, such an exciting time it is!
“Do you not know there comes a midnight hour when everyone has to throw off his mask?” warned Søren Kierkegaard.
“Do you believe that life will always let itself be mocked?
Do you think you can slip away a little before midnight in order to avoid this?
Or are you not terrified by it?”
Tyler Durden
Sun, 08/11/2024 - 18:40
Published:8/11/2024 6:05:08 PM
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[Markets]
Central Bank Gold Buying Through First Half Of 2024 Sets Record
Central Bank Gold Buying Through First Half Of 2024 Sets Record
Authored by Mike Maharrey via Money Metals,
Despite central bank gold buying slowing moderately in the second quarter, it set a record through the first half of 2024.
Central banks globally added a net 483 tons of gold through the first six months of the year, 5 percent above the record of 460 tons in H1 2023.
In the second quarter, central bank gold demand totaled 183 tons, according to the latest data compiled by the World Gold Council. That was up 6 percent year-on-year, but about 39 percent lower than the Q1 buying pace.
With gold at or near record price levels in most currencies, it’s unsurprising that central bank buying slowed in the second quarter.
China primarily drove the Q2 slowdown in central bank demand. The People’s Bank of China reported no additions to its gold reserves in May or June and only officially added 2 tons in April.
Prior to the pause in May, China had increased its gold holding for 18 straight months.
Many analysts believed the Chinese paused officially adding gold to their reserves in an effort to push gold prices lower.
When the Chinese reported no changes to their official reserves in May, it precipitated a panicked gold selloff. Despite the kneejerk reaction, it seems unlikely that the Chinese are finished adding gold to their reserves. There is also some speculation that China is adding a significant amount of gold to its reserves off the books.
Even with the pause, China still added nearly 30 tons of gold to its reserves through the first half of 2024.
Turkey was the biggest buyer through the first half of the year, adding 45 tons to its gold hoard. The bulk of its buying was in Q1, with the pace slowing to 15 tons in the second quarter.
The Turkish central bank has bought gold for 12 straight months after liquidating 160 tons of gold in the spring of 2023.
India ranks as the second-biggest gold buyer through the first half of the year. The Reserve Bank of India has added gold to its reserves every month this year totaling 37 tons.
In 2022, the Indian central bank added 33 tons of gold to its reserves followed by a 16-ton increase last year.
The Reserve Bank of India has been buying gold since 2017. Over that period, the RBI has increased its gold holding by over 260 tons.
An Indian economist told the Times of India that the push to accumulate gold was based on both political and economic reasons. He said that the "reliability" of the U.S. dollar has "diminished." He noted the "noticeable decline" in the confidence in U.S. dollar assets.
Another economist told the Times, “It makes a lot of sense (to invest in gold), given the increased volatility in the FX market, elevated interest rates in the U.S., and, of course, also as the central banks in each economy would like to diversify the asset classes in which they are parking their reserves.”
India recently transported 100 tons of its gold from the UK back into India.
Poland was the biggest gold buyer in the second quarter, increasing its holding by 19 tons. The country currently holds about 13 percent of its reserves in gold. At a news conference in early June, National Bank of Poland Governor Adam Glapinski reiterated his plan to increase gold’s share of total reserves to 20 percent.
Poland was the second-biggest gold buyer in 2023. The Polish central bank bought 130 tons of gold last year, increasing its holdings by 57 percent, to 359 tons.
In 2021, Glapinski announced a plan to expand the country’s gold reserves by 100 tons. The central bank reached that goal in September of '23 and kept buying.
When he announced the plan to expand its gold reserves, Glapinski said holding gold was a matter of financial security and stability.
"Gold will retain its value even when someone cuts off the power to the global financial system, destroying traditional assets based on electronic accounting records. Of course, we do not assume that this will happen. But as the saying goes – forewarned is always insured.
And the central bank is required to be prepared for even the most unfavorable circumstances. That is why we see a special place for gold in our foreign exchange management process."
Other notable buyers in the second quarter included:
- Uzbekistan – 7 tons
- Czech Republic – 6 tons
- Qatar – 4 tons
- Singapore – 4 tons
- Russia – 3 tons
- Iraq – 3 tons
- Jordan – 1 ton
- Kyrgyz Republic – 1 ton
Notably, Singapore had been a consistent buyer this year before selling 12 tons of gold in June.
Uzbekistan has also been a frequent seller this year, turning back to buying in May. It is not uncommon for banks that buy from domestic production – such as Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan – to switch between buying and selling.
The Philippines has been the biggest seller through the first half of the year, decreasing its gold reserves by about 25 tons. Thailand was another notable seller, decreasing its holdings by just under 10 tons.
Despite the modest colling of central bank gold demand in Q2, there is no indication that they are souring on the yellow metal. According to the most recent World Gold Council survey, 29 percent of central banks plan to add more gold to their reserves in the next 12 months. The WGC said it was the highest level since the survey began in 2018.
Only 3 percent said they had plans to decrease gold reserves.
Earlier this year, the World Gold Council said the continuation of gold buying supports its expectation that "2024 will be another solid year of central bank gold demand."
"Last year central banks placed great emphasis on gold’s value in crisis response, diversification attributes, and store-of-value credentials. A few months into 2024 the world seems no less uncertain meaning those reasons for owning gold are as relevant as ever."
Last year, central bank gold buying fell just 45 tons short of 2022’s multi-decade record.
According to the World Gold Council, central banks net gold purchases totaled 1,037 tons in 2023. It was the second straight year central banks added more than 1,000 tons to their total reserves.
Central bank gold buying in 2023 built on the prior record year. Total central bank gold buying in 2022 came in at 1,136 tons. It was the highest level of net purchases on record dating back to 1950, including since the suspension of dollar convertibility into gold in 1971.
China was the biggest buyer in 2023.
Analysts at ANZ Bank recently said they expect central bank gold buying to remain hot for at least the next six years.
According to these analysts, "Depleted trust in the U.S. fixed-income assets and the rise of non-reserve currencies are other themes that could support central bank gold buying."
Tyler Durden
Sat, 08/10/2024 - 11:40
Published:8/10/2024 11:04:00 AM
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[Entertainment]
These 3 audiobooks highlight the importance of getting accents right
In 3 new audiobooks, voice actors try to transport listeners to the British Isles in books by Elizabeth O’Connor, Lisa Jewell and Carys Davies.
Published:8/10/2024 8:23:33 AM
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[Markets]
There's Just One Problem: AI Isn't Intelligent, And That's A Systemic Risk
There's Just One Problem: AI Isn't Intelligent, And That's A Systemic Risk
Authored by Charles Hugh Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,
Mimicry of intelligence isn't intelligence, and so while AI mimicry is a powerful tool, it isn't intelligent.
The mythology of Technology has a special altar for AI, artificial intelligence, which is reverently worshiped as the source of astonishing cost reductions (as human labor is replaced by AI) and the limitless expansion of consumption and profits. AI is the blissful perfection of technology's natural advance to ever greater powers.
The consensus holds that the advance of AI will lead to a utopia of essentially limitless control of Nature and a cornucopia of leisure and abundance.
If we pull aside the mythology's curtain, we find that AI mimics human intelligence, and this mimicry is so enthralling that we take it as evidence of actual intelligence. But mimicry of intelligence isn't intelligence, and so while AI mimicry is a powerful tool, it isn't intelligent.
The current iterations of Generative AI--large language models (LLMs) and machine learning--mimic our natural language ability by processing millions of examples of human writing and speech and extracting what algorithms select as the best answers to queries.
These AI programs have no understanding of the context or the meaning of the subject; they mine human knowledge to distill an answer. This is potentially useful but not intelligence.
The AI programs have limited capacity to discern truth from falsehood, hence their propensity to hallucinate fictions as facts. They are incapable of discerning the difference between statistical variations and fatal errors, and layering on precautionary measures adds additional complexity that becomes another point of failure.
As for machine learning, AI can project plausible solutions to computationally demanding problems such as how proteins fold, but this brute-force computational black-box is opaque and therefore of limited value: the program doesn't actually understand protein folding in the way humans understand it, and we don't understand how the program arrived at its solution.
Since AI doesn't actually understand the context, it is limited to the options embedded in its programming and algorithms. We discern these limits in AI-based apps and bots, which have no awareness of the actual problem. For example, our Internet connection is down due to a corrupted system update, but because this possibility wasn't included in the app's universe of problems to solve, the AI app/bot dutifully reports the system is functioning perfectly even though it is broken. (This is an example from real life.)
In essence, every layer of this mining / mimicry creates additional points of failure: the inability to identify the difference between fact and fiction or between allowable error rates and fatal errors, the added complexity of precautionary measures and the black-box opacity all generate risks of normal accidents cascading into systems failure.
There is also the systemic risk generated by relying on black-box AI to operate systems to the point that humans lose the capacity to modify or rebuild the systems. This over-reliance on AI programs creates the risk of cascading failure not just of digital systems but the real-world infrastructure that now depends on digital systems.
There is an even more pernicious result of depending on AI for solutions. Just as the addictive nature of mobile phones, social media and Internet content has disrupted our ability to concentrate, focus and learn difficult material--a devastating decline in learning for children and teens--AI offers up a cornucopia of snackable factoids, snippets of coding, computer-generated TV commercials, articles and entire books that no longer require us to have any deep knowledge of subjects and processes. Lacking this understanding, we're no longer equipped to pursue skeptical inquiry or create content or coding from scratch.
Indeed, the arduous process of acquiring this knowledge now seems needless: the AI bot can do it all, quickly, cheaply and accurately. This creates two problems: 1) when black-box AI programs fail, we no longer know enough to diagnose and fix the failure, or do the work ourselves, and 2) we have lost the ability to understand that in many cases, there is no answer or solution that is the last word: the "answer" demands interpretation of facts, events, processes and knowledge bases are that inherently ambiguous.
We no longer recognize that the AI answer to a query is not a fact per se, it's an interpretation of reality that's presented as a fact, and the AI solution is only one of many pathways, each of which has intrinsic tradeoffs that generate unforeseeable costs and consequences down the road.
To discern the difference between an interpretation and a supposed fact requires a sea of knowledge that is both wide and deep, and in losing the drive and capacity to learn difficult material, we've lost the capacity to even recognize what we've lost: those with little real knowledge lack the foundation needed to understand AI's answer in the proper context.
The net result is we become less capable and less knowledgeable, blind to the risks created by our loss of competency while the AI programs introduce systemic risks we cannot foresee or forestall. AI degrades the quality of every product and system, for mimicry does not generate definitive answers, solutions and insights, it only generates an illusion of definitive answers, solutions and insights which we foolishly confuse with actual intelligence.
While the neofeudal corporate-state cheers the profits to be reaped by culling human labor on a mass scale, the mining / mimicry of human knowledge has limits. Relying on the AI programs to eliminate all fatal errors is itself a fatal error, and so humans must remain in the decision loop (the OODA loop of observe, orient, decide, act).
Once AI programs engage in life-safety or healthcare processes, every entity connected to the AI program is exposed to open-ended (joint and several) liability should injurious or fatal errors occur.
If we boil off the mythology and hyperbole, we're left with another neofeudal structure: the wealthy will be served by humans, and the rest of us will be stuck with low-quality, error-prone AI service with no recourse.
The expectation of AI promoters is that Generative AI will reap trillions of dollars in profits from cost savings and new products / services. This story doesn't map the real world, in which every AI software tool is easily copied / distributed and so it will be impossible to protect any scarcity value, which is the essential dynamic in maintaining the pricing power needed to reap outsized profits.
There is little value in software tools that everyone possesses unless a monopoly restricts distribution, and little value in the content auto-generated by these tools: the millions of AI-generated songs, films, press releases, essays, research papers, etc. will overwhelm any potential audience, reducing the value of all AI-generated content to zero.
The promoters claim the mass culling of jobs will magically be offset by entire new industries created by AI, echoing the transition from farm labor to factory jobs. But the AI dragon will eat its own tail, for it creates few jobs or profits that can be taxed to pay people for not working (Universal Basic Income).
Perhaps the most consequential limit to AI is that it will do nothing to reverse humanity's most pressing problems. It can't clean up the Great Pacific Trash Gyre, or limit the 450 million tons of mostly unrecycled plastic spewed every year, or reverse climate change, or clean low-Earth orbits of the thousands of high-velocity bits of dangerous detritus, or remake the highly profitable waste is growth Landfill Economy into a sustainable global system, or eliminate all the sources of what I term Anti-Progress. It will simply add new sources of systemic risk, waste and neofeudal exploitation.
* * *
Become a $3/month patron of my work via patreon.com.
Subscribe to my Substack for free
Tyler Durden
Fri, 08/09/2024 - 17:00
Published:8/9/2024 4:42:00 PM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post paperback bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:8/7/2024 7:33:34 AM
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[Culture]
Books Sold Here
The bookshop is the pool-hall for nerds. For those of us who look upon books as near-sacred objects and the places where they are sold as temples of sorts, bookshops are places of pleasure, education, and camaraderie, and as such are indispensable to the good life.
The post Books Sold Here appeared first on .
Published:8/4/2024 8:39:16 AM
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[Markets]
The Great Unwinding: Is There Any Way To Come Out Ahead?
The Great Unwinding: Is There Any Way To Come Out Ahead?
Authored by Charles Hugh Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,
History suggests being wary of the "strong buys" at $45 when the eventual bottom is $4.
In response to my chart-fest post The Rollercoaster Ride Ahead: 15 Years of Extreme Distortions Will Be Unwound, readers asked: OK, so what can I do in response? That's the right question, for passively awaiting the wave to wash over us and then scrambling for higher ground is a high-risk strategy.
Let's start with three stipulations: 1) this is not investment advice; everything here is an observation based on history or my personal experiences after previous bubbles have popped; 2) there are no easy answers--none, and 3) my last three books can be viewed as a trilogy describing macro and individual responses to the Great Unwinding. I'll post links to the free chapters at the end of this post. The point being that I've pondered this question for many years.
Do I have all the answers? No. Nobody does. All we can assemble is a coherent response based on the lessons of history and system dynamics: what's fragile, risky and undependable and what's lower risk and more resilient.
Since no response is easy, we're talking about degrees of difficulty and what's within reach for each of us. We all have limits of experience, location, skills, capital, networks and so on. Therefore there is no "one size fits all" template that's going to work for everyone. The whole point of my book on Self-Reliance is that we each have to plan our own responses; we can't just follow somebody else's plan.
There's a great divide between what Americans want / expect and what's realistic. The average American feels they need to earn over $180,000 to live comfortably, survey shows The survey also found that only 6% of US adults make $186,000 or more, while the median family income is between $51,500 and $86,000. In other words, everyone feels they'd be OK if they joined the top 6%, meanwhile those households earning $180,000 are feeling that they need to earn $300,000 to be comfortable.
If you and your spouse / partner can skim off $300,000 or more annually, go for it. In terms of risk management, it might be prudent to assume one of you loses your job at some point, so figuring out how to live on $100,000 now rather than later makes sense.
Many readers report that they've already fashioned a low-cost, resilient lifestyle, generally by living in a lower cost rural locale with cheaper housing, paying off debt, doing their own repairs and maintenance on homes and vehicles, growing some of their own food and finding like-minded people in the community to share/work with.
Living Well on Less Than $30,000 a Year--One American Family's Story.
Establishing a low-cost lifestyle demands sacrifices, many of which are "impossible" or out of reach in the current zeitgeist: the jobs and excitement are in cities and suburbs that are unaffordable: Starter Homes Cost At Least $1 Million In 117 California Cities.
Learning how to repair, maintain, grow, cook, bake and build also takes time, effort and sacrifice. The transition from consumer to producer is not easy.
It's been a long time since Americans experienced a "real recession": the last "real recession" was in 1981-82, over 40 years ago. Since then, recessions have been brief due to unprecedented bailouts and stimulus. The returns on bailouts and stimulus have diminished, and expecting the same tricks to work like magic again is, well, magical thinking. Things have changed, and as I've outlined, it may be less like 2000 or 2009 and more like 1973: nine years of turmoil and inflation that refuses to return to zero.
The biblical seven abundant years, seven lean years comes to mind. Humans predictably respond to abundance by gleefully squandering what's plentiful in the good times, and then frugally hoarding whatever is left when the lean times kick in. Frugality is common-sense: waste nothing, need less, get serious about your Plan B and Plan C.
Readers ask: are there safe havens for my capital? There are certainly many claims made about safe havens, and I can only speak from my experience of bubbles popping over the past 50 years. The current bubble is unique in being an Everything Bubble, in which traditional safe-haven asset classes have already been front-run by the smart money.
In my experience, every asset goes down when massive credit-asset bubbles pop as the "good" assets get sold to cover margin calls as "bad" assets plummet and debts have to be serviced / paid down. That's the downside of a financial system that is completely dependent on debt and leverage for its survival: the asset valuations can collapse but the debts remain and can only be cleared by bankruptcy / liquidation / insolvency.
Assets drop to levels that are considered "impossible" at the top of the bubble. This is the mindset of bubbles: the current valuations are entirely rational, and history says they'll only move higher over time. This is how stocks that fell from $60 to $45 got recommended as a "strong buy" and then eventually bottomed at $4. Skyscrapers were sold for the value of their elevators in the Great Depression.
Earning 4% on cash looks pretty good when others playing "catch the falling knife" have lost 40% of their capital. Patience tends to pay off as bubbles pop and furious counter-rallies tempt bottom-fishers and buy-the-dippers. If history is any guide, bubbles take a few years to completely deflate, as the speculative frenzy takes a long time to dissipate as gamblers' capital and desire to bet are whittled away.
The cliche is cash is king in asset-bubble deflations, and there's a reason for this. Cash may lose some purchasing power due to inflation, but it's earning some income to offset inflation. Every other asset that soared in the bubble is exposed to the selling that comes from having to pay down debt, unwind leverage and get out now before I lose even more money.
The risks of patiently waiting for the bubble to completely deflate are low compared to the risks of trying to rotate in and out of deflating assets ahead of the bots and smart money, who are masters of juicing manic counter-rallies to suck in the impatient and speculators who are overly anxious to "buy the dip."
Note that Wall Street never recommends frugally piling up cash for a few years, as that generates no income for Wall Street, which thrives off the herd busily churning away capital chasing the latest hot rotation into bat guano futures, cobalt mines in Lower Slobovia, the Hydrogen economy, AI-powered robot pets, and so on. Maybe fortunes will be minted, maybe not, but staying out of the casino and waiting for the bottom, when everyone has given up, is never going to be touted by anyone in the casino.
Recall that it doesn't matter what the "market" deems as the "fair price" for productive real-world assets. If my house is "worth" $1,000 or $1 million, it still provides shelter. If a homestead produces 1,000 pounds of nutritious food a year, it doesn't matter whether the "market value" of the land is $1,000 or $1 million. That only matters if we're speculating or leveraging debt. If we're only interested in the use value, then the "market" gyrations are of zero interest.
What's the "real value" of anything? That depends. My wife just bought a pair of almost-new Merrell brand shoes that retail for $100 for $2 at a thrift store. For somebody, the shoes were worth $100. Now they're worth a few dollars.
Keep in mind health is the only real wealth. Once health is lost, even $100 million can't restore it.
Everyone's a genius in a bubble, but over time, few survive even five years of volatility. It may look easy to have caught the highs and lows of the 1970s, but few managed to do so.
History suggests being wary of the "strong buys" at $45 when the eventual bottom is $4. This is of course "impossible." Everyone thought that in 2000 and 2008, too, and it's the dominant mindset once again.
The opportunities lie ahead--far ahead. There is much to be said for this simple strategy: get lean, get frugal, pay off debt, save cash, get your Plans B and C in order, learn as much as you can to increase what you can do in the real world for yourself and your household, lower your exposure to non-linear disruptions and systemic risks beyond your control, turn a deaf ear to the touts and stay out of the casino.
* * *
Become a $3/month patron of my work via patreon.com.
Subscribe to my Substack for free
Tyler Durden
Thu, 08/01/2024 - 09:07
Published:8/1/2024 8:53:30 AM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post hardcover bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:7/31/2024 7:43:36 AM
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[Markets]
German Publisher Stops All Printing Of JD Vance's Book Hillbilly Elegy
German Publisher Stops All Printing Of JD Vance's Book Hillbilly Elegy
Authored by Jonathan Turley,
JD Vance is a marked man. After accepting the nomination for vice president, Vance has been the subject of endless media attacks. Recently, Vice President Kamala Harris even questioned his “loyalty” to the country despite his serving as a Marine in the Iraq War. Yet, one of the most chilling attacks came from Germany where the publishing house Ullstein Buchverlage has stopped printing the sold-out German translation of Hillbilly Elegy, his 2016 autobiography.
As we have discussed previously in this country, it is the modern left’s equivalent of book burning. After all, why burn books when you can simply prevent their being printed under blacklisting campaigns?
In this country, we have seen the left successfully force book bans for writers and even justices who espouse opposing viewpoints. We have seen actual calls for book burning recently (here and here).
Ullstein is facing a high demand for Vance’s best-selling book Hillbilly Elegy, but has refused to print more copies due to his political viewpoints (unrelated to the book).
First published in 2016 and made into a movie in 2020, the book returned to the top position on The New York Times‘ bestseller list after Trump chose Vance as his running mate.
HarperCollins is rushing to print more books to meet the demand.
Some in the United States are already balking at the selling of any book by Vance. Seven Stories Press wrote, “Seven Stories Press is extremely thrilled to have never published JD Vance.”
Ullstein published the German translation of Hillbilly Elegy in 2017 and held the rights to reprints.
The company cited Vance’s allegiance with Trump and his politics as the reason in a statement to German media:
“At the time of its publication, the book made a valuable contribution to understanding the drifting apart of US society…In the meantime, he is officially acting alongside him and advocating an aggressively demagogic, exclusionary policy.”
German author Gerd Buurmann posted a mocking response that we should be happy that Ullstein had just thrown Vance’s book out of its catalogue and not into the fire – a reference to the notorious Nazi book burnings of the 1930s.
Other Germans have raised the same objections and referenced the painful history of book bans and burnings in Germany under the Nazis.
German readers want to read the book, which Ullstein acknowledged is one of the most influential works of this generation. However, because the company disagrees with his political viewpoints, it moved to block others from reading the book.
We have seen similar campaigns leading to the banning or burning of books by figures like JK Rowling because of her opposition to some transgender policies. The left now protests any programs on Rowling’s work and opposes the selling of her enormously popular Harry Potter series or even video games based on the series. When authors have defended her right to be published, they have also been subjected to cancel campaigns.
Yet, Ullstein’s decision is particularly chilling as a publishing house. Again, we have seen editors at publishing houses sign petitions to bar books by conservative figures like Justice Amy Coney Barrett from being published.
In 1933, thousands of books by Jewish and leftist writers were burned throughout Germany. Publishing houses further banned the printing of these books. The books were announced as corrupting the minds of German citizens. Many books were banned or burned on the basis of the authors being Jewish or known socialists or anarchists.
Now the left has developed a taste for censorship and blacklisting. Editors and publishing houses are blacklisting those with conservative or libertarian views as forms of dangerous viewpoints or disinformation.
Ullstein will, of course, not stop people from reading the work of JD Vance. While it may make it more difficult for Germans to find copies, ideas like water have a way of finding their way out. Blacklisting and censorship have not succeeded in killing a single idea. What it does is reveal the true character and values of those who want to prevent others from hearing opposing viewpoints.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/28/2024 - 12:50
Published:7/28/2024 11:53:11 AM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post paperback bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:7/24/2024 8:06:13 AM
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[Markets]
CJ Hopkins: The People's Court Of New Normal Germany
CJ Hopkins: The People's Court Of New Normal Germany
Authored by CJ Hopkins via The Consent Factory,
Just when I thought things could not possibly get more shockingly totalitarian in New Normal Germany, where I’m being prosecuted in criminal court (for the second time) for tweeting, the German authorities have gone and surprised me again.
No, they haven’t established an actual Nazi-style People’s Court (pictured below) yet, and, of course, there is absolutely no similarity between the current German justice system, which is totally fair and democratic and a paragon of impartial justice and the rule of law, and The People’s Court of Berlin during the Nazi era, nor is there any similarity between Nazi Germany and New Normal Germany (i.e., modern-day Germany), and I would never, ever, suggest that there was, as that would be intellectually lazy, and tasteless, and completely inaccurate, and illegal, and … well, let me fill you in on the latest.
The Berlin Superior Court has set a date for my next thoughtcrime trial.
As regular readers will probably recall, my first thoughtcrime trial in January ended with my acquittal. So, the German authorities are putting me on trial again. Yes, they can do that in Germany. But, wait, that’s not the best part.
The best part is, at my new thoughtcrime trial - this time in Berlin Superior Court - full-scale Anti-Terrorism Security protocols will be effect in the courtroom. Everyone will be subjected to TSA-style scanning and screening, and will have to surrender all their personal possessions and hats and coats and head coverings to the Security Staff, and completely empty their pockets of all items, before entering the courtroom. No computers, phones, smart-watches, or any other potential recording devices will be allowed in the courtroom. Pencils and sheets of paper will purportedly be provided to members of the press by Security Staff. Members of the press and public will be limited to 35, and, after they have successfully passed their “security screening,” they will be cordoned off in the last five rows of the gallery in the very back of the courtroom, “for security reasons,” and monitored by the armed Security Staff.
For the benefit of any new readers unfamiliar with me and my case, I am not a terrorist. I’m an award-winning American playwright, novelist, and political satirist. I have lived here in Berlin for 20 years. The German authorities have been investigating and prosecuting me since August 2022. My case has been covered in The Atlantic, Racket News, Neue Zürcher Zeitung, Multipolar, and many other outlets, so I won’t reiterate every little detail again here. Basically, I am being prosecuted for “spreading pro-Nazi propaganda” because I criticized the Covid mask mandates and tweeted the cover artwork of one of my books, The Rise of The New Normal Reich.
Here’s the cover artwork of that book. The other two images are the recent covers of Der Spiegel and Stern, two well-known mainstream German magazines, which are not being prosecuted for “spreading pro-Nazi propaganda.”
As anyone (even the German authorities) can see, the Spiegel cover artwork uses exactly the same concept as the cover artwork of my book. The only difference is, the Spiegel swastika is covered by the German flag, whereas the swastika on my book is covered by a medical mask.
Both artworks are obviously intended as warnings of the rise of a new form of totalitarianism. Der Spiegel was warning about the Alternativ für Deutschland party (AfD) — as was Stern with its swastika floating in a champagne glass. I was warning about what I dubbed “The New Normal Reich,” the new nascent form of totalitarianism that emerged during 2020-2023, which is still very much on the rise, and which is thoroughly documented and analyzed in my book (which book was banned by Amazon in Germany at the same time the German authorities launched a criminal investigation of me and instructed Twitter to censor my Tweets, which Twitter did).
The pretext the Court is citing for ordering these Anti-Terrorism Security protocols at my trial is ridiculous, and infuriating. The Court claims that the courtroom in which my trial is to take place is occasionally used for a certain “high-security” trial. Therefore, according to the Court, my trial must also be subjected to Anti-Terrorism Security protocols. Seriously, the Court sent my attorney a fax setting forth this “explanation,” which is, of course, a load of horseshit. The Berlin Superior Court is a huge building containing multiple courtrooms, one or two which are probably not subject to such Anti-Terrorism Security protocols when “high-security” trials are not taking place within them.
No, the imposition of these Anti-Terrorism Security protocols is clearly a cynical ploy intended (a) to suppress coverage of the trial, (b) to discourage the press and public from attending, and (c) to intimidate and harass me and my legal counsel, and any members of the press and public who nevertheless attend the trial in spite of the “security procedures” they will be subjected to.
This cynical tactic — which is not an official press blackout, because journalists can still attend and attempt to scribble notes on their knees with the pencils and sheets of paper provided by the Security Staff — comes as no real surprise. As I mentioned above, my case and my first trial got a fair amount of attention from the international press, enough to put the Court on notice that my prosecution was being watched. So, it’s no mystery why the German authorities would want to discourage any reporting on my “do-over” trial in Superior Court.
Also, the gallery was filled to capacity at my original trial in January, where I delivered a rather unusual closing Statement to the Court, which was then published and disseminated widely in Germany. So, again, it is no real mystery why the Superior Court wants to discourage members of the public from attending this new trial by threatening to subject them to these humiliating “security” protocols, and why it has limited the gallery size to only 35 seats.
I assume the German authorities — and by “authorities” I mean the Berlin District Prosecutor’s office, the Berlin Superior Court (Der Kammergericht), and whatever other authorities are intent on punishing me, and making an example of me, for daring to criticize the government’s edicts during 2020-2022, i.e., suspension of the constitutional rights, mask mandates, segregation, the banning of protests, etc. — I assume these authorities are particularly motivated to prevent the press from covering this second trial in Superior Court, because, from what I understand of the German legal system, they are going to “do” me (i.e., convict me) this time.
The way the German legal system works, if they want to do you, is (1) you are acquitted in the lower Criminal Court, (2) the District Prosecutor appeals the verdict to the Superior Court, (3) the Superior Court overturns your acquittal, and (4) the prosecution goes back to the original Criminal Court, which stages a new trial, at which you will be found guilty, because, once the Superior Court has overruled your acquittal, the Criminal Court will convict you based on the Superior Court’s ruling. At which point you will appeal. And on and on and on it will go, until you are broke, or until you give up fighting because you are just so fucking exhausted.
I’m not making this up. This is how The People’s Court of New Normal Germany (i.e., the post-Covid German justice system, which, again, bears no resemblance whatsoever to The People’s Court of Berlin in Nazi Germany, or to the courts in the Soviet Union during the Stalin era, or any other totalitarian “justice” system) … this is how it works in New Normal Germany if you are a critic of the authorities and refuse to meekly accept whatever punishment they want to summarily dish out for whatever they deem to be your thoughtcrimes.
But, hey, at least they’re not going to take me out and put me up against a wall and shoot me, like they did with political criminals in Nazi Germany, and the USSR, so I suppose I should be grateful. I’ll have to work on that.
If you think my case is an aberration, it isn’t. There are many, many other people — critics of the government’s “Covid measures” during 2020-2023 — who are being persecuted and made examples of. Most of these people do not have the financial resources to pay lawyers to fight these prosecutions, so they plead guilty to the charges and pay the fines, which are typically much less than what they would face in attorney’s fees. Being somewhat of a public figure, I thought it was my responsibility not to do that. I’m extremely grateful to everyone who has donated to my legal defense fund, which is how I have been able to cover my legal expenses. There’s enough left in that fund to cover this next trial in Superior Court, so I’m OK for now, financially. I mention that because people are already asking how they can send me money.
What people can do, if they want to do something helpful, is make as much noise as possible about what is happening, not just in Germany, but all throughout the West. Because what is happening is, well, what I tried to capture and analyze in my book. The Powers That Be are going totalitarian on us. They are gradually, and not so gradually, phasing out the so-called “liberal” or “democratic” rights and principles that it was necessary to placate the Western masses with during the Cold War era, which it is no longer necessary to do beyond a certain superficial point.
I have published three books of essays documenting this transition to a new global-capitalist form of totalitarianism, so I’m not going to go on and on about it here. But that’s what all the censorship is about. That’s what all the manufactured hysteria, fomented hatred, fanaticism, the permanent state of “emergency” and “crisis,” the “culture wars,” the cults of personality, the bombardment of our minds with absolutely meaningless nonsense, the naked displays of force, the blatant instrumentalization of the justice system to punish political dissidents, not just here in Germany, but throughout the “democratic” West … that is what all this is about.
I’ll keep my readers posted on the details of my upcoming trial in Berlin Superior Court. My attorney is objecting to these “security protocols,” of course. We’ll see how that goes. In the meantime, instead of sending me money this time, maybe try to step back from all the mass hysteria and hatred that we are being inundated with and see the big picture. It isn’t pretty.
Help spread the word about the new totalitarianism, about the phasing-out of our democratic rights. I don’t care which “side” of whatever you are on — Trump, Biden, Palestine, Israel, the culture wars, the cancel campaigns, Covid, Elon Musk, Russia, whatever — and neither do The Powers That Be. Take a step back and try to see the bigger picture … the forest, instead of just the trees. And then make as much noise about it as you can.
We are heading somewhere very ugly … somewhere most of us can’t imagine. Some of us will get there first, but all of us will be there, together, eventually. My story is just one example of what it will be like there, in that ugly place. It isn’t really a story about Germany. It is a story about the end of the myth of democracy, and the rule of law, and all that good stuff. As Frank Zappa once so eloquently explained …
“The illusion of freedom will continue as long as it’s profitable to continue the illusion. At the point where the illusion becomes too expensive to maintain, they will just take down the scenery, they will pull back the curtains, they will move the tables and chairs out of the way and you will see the brick wall at the back of the theater.”
It’s something to behold, that brick wall is, especially up close and personal. You’ll see when you get here. I’ll save you a seat.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 07/23/2024 - 03:30
Published:7/23/2024 3:12:13 AM
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[Markets]
True Purpose Of NATO Remains USA Hegemony
True Purpose Of NATO Remains USA Hegemony
Authored by Yves Engler via Counterpunch.org,
NATO’s new focus on China harkens back to the belligerent alliance’s early days.
At the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s 75th anniversary summit in Washington, DC, last week China was a big part of the agenda. The NATO summit’s final declaration mentioned the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) 14 times. It noted that “the PRC continues to pose systemic challenges to Euro-Atlantic security” and China’s “stated ambitions and coercive policies continue to challenge our interests, security and values.”
The leaders of NATO “partner” nations Japan, South Korea, New Zealand and Australia attended the summit. They collectively met NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg to map out strategy for the Asia Pacific region. NATO announced four new joint projects with countries that are important to Washington’s bid to establish an anti-China military bloc. In response, Beijing accused NATO of “inciting bloc confrontation and hyping up regional tensions”.
Unsurprisingly, NATO frames its focus on China as defensive. “The PRC has become a decisive enabler of Russia’s war against Ukraine”, claimed the summit’s final communique. According to this storyline, Chinese relations with Russia threaten NATO. But this is exaggerated. China has taken a cautious approach to Russia’s war largely complying with (illegal) US sanctions and refusing to sell arms (though its companies sell some dual use products to Russian firms). Conversely, North Korea and Iran are selling Russia arms while NATO countries are donating large amounts of weapons to Ukraine.
Comparing Chinese ties to India’s highlights NATO’s exaggeration. India is buying more oil and weapons from Russia than China and when NATO began its meeting Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was in Moscow to meet President Vladimir Putin.
In 2022, NATO released a strategic concept listing China for the first-time. It labeled Beijing a challenge to the alliance’s “interests, security and values” and at the time Stoltenberg declared, “China is substantially building up its military forces, including nuclear weapons, bullying its neighbours, threatening Taiwan ….”
This is all part of the US empire’s bid to contain China’s rise. Washington has become obsessed with an emerging “peer competitor” that may eventually rival its power.
While it seems strange that an alliance to defend the ‘north Atlantic’ should target a faraway Asian state, NATO is neither defensive nor only about the north Atlantic. The alliance’s recent wars in Afghanistan and Libya demonstrate that it’s a tool to enable US-led global domination.
That’s been clear for 75 years.
As part of the Parliamentary debate over NATO’s founding Canada’s external affairs minister Lester Pearson said:
“There is no better way of ensuring the security of the Pacific Ocean at this particular moment than by working out, between the great democratic powers, a security arrangement the effects of which will be felt all over the world, including the Pacific area.”
Two years later he said:
“The defence of the Middle East is vital to the successful defence of Europe and north Atlantic area.”
In 1953 Pearson went even further:
“There is now only a relatively small [5000 kilometre] geographical gap between southeast Asia and the area covered by the North Atlantic treaty, which goes to the eastern boundaries of Turkey.”
Pearson believed that the newly created ‘defensive’ alliance justified sending 27,000 Canadian troops to Korea. In a history of the 1950-53 US-led Korean war David Bercuson writes that Canada’s external minister “agreed with [President] Truman, [Secretary of State] Dean Acheson, and other American leaders that the Korean conflict was NATO’s first true test, even if it was taking place half a world away.”
The Korean War was partly a reaction to Mao’s 1949 communist/nationalist revolution in China. After US forces approached its border, China intervened. The war left around three million dead.
In reality, NATO was established to bring a decolonizing world under the US geopolitical umbrella. This remains true 75 years later as the alliance continues to advance US hegemony.
Tyler Durden
Tue, 07/23/2024 - 02:00
Published:7/23/2024 1:26:48 AM
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[Markets]
Engineering A Crisis: How Political Theater Helps Keep The Deep State Stay In Power
Engineering A Crisis: How Political Theater Helps Keep The Deep State Stay In Power
Authored by John & Nisha Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,
“The two ‘sides’ of mainstream politics are not fighting against one another, they’re only fighting against you. Their only job is to keep you clapping along with the two-handed puppet show as they rob you blind and tighten your chains while your gaze is fixed on the performance.”
- Caitlin Johnstone
A failed assassination attempt on a presidential candidate. An incumbent president withdrawing his re-election bid at the 11th hour. A politicized judiciary that fails to hold the powers-that-be accountable to the rule of law. A world at war. A nation in turmoil.
This is what controlled chaos looks like.
This year’s election-year referendum on which corporate puppet should occupy the White House has quickly become a lesson in how the Deep State engineers a crisis to keep itself in power.
Don’t get so caught up in the performance that you lose sight of what’s real.
This endless series of diversions, distractions and political drama is the oldest con game in the books, the magician’s sleight of hand that keeps you focused on the shell game in front of you while your wallet is being picked clean by ruffians in your midst.
It’s the Reichstag Fire all over again.
It was February 1933, a month before national elections in Germany, and the Nazis weren’t expected to win. So they engineered a way to win: they began by infiltrating the police and granting police powers to their allies; then Hitler brought in stormtroopers to act as auxiliary police; by the time an arsonist (who claimed to be working for the Communists in the hopes of starting an armed revolt) set fire to the Reichstag, the German parliamentary building, the people were eager for a return to law and order.
That was all it took: Hitler used the attempted “coup” as an excuse to declare martial law and seize absolute power in Germany, establishing himself as a dictator with the support of the German people.
Fast forward to the present day, and what do we have? A discontented citizenry, a disconnected government, and a Deep State that wants to stay in power at all costs.
So what happens? Trump has a near miss, Biden bows out, and politics becomes exciting to the masses again.
It works the same in every age.
This is how the police state will win, no matter which candidate gets elected to the White House.
You know who will lose? Every last one of us.
After all, politics today is not about Republicans and Democrats.
Nor is it about abortion, healthcare, higher taxes, immigration, or any of the other buzzwords that have become campaign slogans for individuals who have mastered the art of telling Americans exactly what they want to hear.
Politics today is about one thing and one thing only: maintaining the status quo between the Controllers (the politicians, the bureaucrats, and the corporate elite) and the Controlled (the taxpayers).
Indeed, it really doesn’t matter what you call them—the 1%, the elite, the controllers, the masterminds, the shadow government, the police state, the surveillance state, the military industrial complex—so long as you understand that no matter which party occupies the White House in 2025, the unelected bureaucracy that actually calls the shots will continue to do so.
In other words, no matter who wins this next presidential election, you can rest assured that the new boss will be the same as the old boss, and we—the permanent underclass in America—will continue to be forced to march in lockstep with the police state in all matters, public and private.
Consider the following a much-needed reality check, an antidote if you will, against an overdose of overhyped campaign announcements, lofty electoral promises and meaningless patriotic sentiments that land us right back in the same prison cell.
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FACT: According to a scientific study by Princeton researchers, the United States of America is not the democracy that it purports to be, but rather an oligarchy, in which “economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy.”
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FACT: Despite the fact that the number of violent crimes in the country is down substantially, the lowest rate in sixty years, the number of Americans being jailed for nonviolent crimes such as driving with a suspended license continues to skyrocket.
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FACT: Thanks to an overabundance of 4,500-plus federal crimes and 400,000-plus rules and regulations, it is estimated that the average American actually commits three felonies a day without knowing it. In fact, according to law professor John Baker, “There is no one in the United States over the age of 18 who cannot be indicted for some federal crime. That is not an exaggeration.”
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FACT: Despite the fact that we have 38 million Americans living at or below the poverty line, 13 million children living in households without adequate access to food, and 1.2 million veterans relying on food stamps, enormous sums of taxpayer money continue to be doled out on wasteful programs that do little to improve the plight of those in need.
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FACT: Since 2001 Americans have spent $93 million every hour for the total cost of the nation’s so-called war on terror.
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FACT: It is estimated that 5 million children in the United States have had at least one parent in prison, whether it be a local jail or a state or federal penitentiary, due to a wide range of factors ranging from overcriminalization and surprise raids at family homes to roadside traffic stops.
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FACT: According to a Gallup poll, Americans place greater faith in the military and the police than in any of the three branches of government.
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FACT: At least 400 to 500 innocent people are killed by police officers every year. Indeed, Americans are now eight times more likely to die in a police confrontation than they are to be killed by a terrorist. Americans are 110 times more likely to die of foodborne illness than in a terrorist attack. Police officers are more likely to be struck by lightning than be made financially liable for their wrongdoing.
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FACT: On an average day in America, over 100 Americans have their homes raided by SWAT teams. Most of those SWAT team raids are for a mere warrant service. There has been a notable buildup in recent years of heavily armed SWAT teams within non-security-related federal agencies such as the Department of Agriculture, the Railroad Retirement Board, the Tennessee Valley Authority, the Office of Personnel Management, the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the Education Department.
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FACT: For all intents and purposes, we now have a fourth branch of government: the surveillance state. This fourth branch came into being without any electoral mandate or constitutional referendum, and yet it possesses superpowers, above and beyond those of any other government agency save the military. It is all-knowing, all-seeing and all-powerful. It operates beyond the reach of the president, Congress and the courts, and it marches in lockstep with the corporate elite who really call the shots in Washington, DC. The government’s “technotyranny” surveillance apparatus has become so entrenched and entangled with its police state apparatus that it’s hard to know anymore where law enforcement ends and surveillance begins. They have become one and the same entity. The police state has passed the baton to the surveillance state.
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FACT: Everything we do will eventually be connected to the Internet. By 2030 it is estimated there will be 100 trillion sensor devices connecting human electronic devices (cell phones, laptops, etc.) to the Internet. Much, if not all, of our electronic devices will be connected to Google, which openly works with government intelligence agencies. Virtually everything we do now—no matter how innocent—is being collected by the spying American police state.
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FACT: Americans know virtually nothing about their history or how their government works. In fact, according to a study by the National Constitution Center, 41 percent of Americans “are not aware that there are three branches of government, and 62 percent couldn’t name them; 33 percent couldn’t even name one.”
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FACT: Only six out of every one hundred Americans know that they actually have a constitutional right to hold the government accountable for wrongdoing, as guaranteed by the right to petition clause of the First Amendment.
Perhaps the most troubling fact of all is this: we have handed over control of our government and our lives to faceless bureaucrats who view us as little more than cattle to be bred, branded, butchered and sold for profit.
As I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, if there is to be any hope of restoring our freedoms and reclaiming control over our government, it will rest not with the politicians but with the people themselves.
One thing is for sure: the reassurance ritual of voting is not going to advance freedom one iota.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 07/22/2024 - 23:40
Published:7/22/2024 10:45:01 PM
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[Markets]
Understanding Lab Tests For Optimal Health
Understanding Lab Tests For Optimal Health
Authored by Emma Tekstra via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
Study Challenges 'Bad Cholesterol' Label For LDL
Annual Lab Tests Are a Good Idea
Maybe you already submit to blood tests as part of your annual check-up with your doctor. If you’re generally healthy they may advise everything “looks normal” whether or not you have been complaining of various symptoms.
If you’re managing a chronic condition perhaps your doctor requests more regular testing and monitors your numbers to adjust medication accordingly. Or maybe you’ve been avoiding the doctor and haven’t had any lab work done in a while.
Blood tests are one of the least invasive and cost-effective tests you can get to be proactive about managing your health. Testing centers are typically easy to find and make an appointment with. In fifteen minutes you can be in and out, having had a few vials of blood drawn in a usually pleasant setting, and be on your way. Results are often available online a week or so later.
According to the Cleveland Clinic, “blood tests are an essential tool healthcare providers use to monitor your overall health or diagnose medical conditions.” But you don’t need to be under a doctor’s care to obtain blood tests. Consumer-focused companies like Grassroots Labs or Function Health can put you firmly in the driver’s seat.
Limitations of Normal Ranges
The trick though is in understanding the context of all those numbers and how your results compare to the cited “normal range.” Only then can you begin to glean relevant insights to optimize your health.
For starters, even if you test 100 different biomarkers in your blood, it is barely scratching the surface of what is going on inside your infinitely complex body that is constantly working to keep you in balance and functioning well.
A blood test generally measures a moment in time and may be influenced by what you ate the day before, how much you exercised, if you had an argument with your spouse, or how well you slept the previous night. You are an individual. There is no such thing as a perfect score for any element being tested.
An article published in the journal Heliyon last year discusses the pros and cons of biomarkers which include tests of other bodily fluids and cells such as hair—useful to test for heavy metals—and stool—useful to assess your microbiome—and sound an alert to certain cancers and other conditions. One of the clear disadvantages cited of biomarker monitoring is the difficulty of establishing what is “normal.”
The reference values or normal ranges listed on your test results are typically lab-specific and are based on the test results of a subset of the population studied. The range then covers the results for 95 percent of this sample population who are deemed to be healthy. The lowest 2.5 percent and the highest 2.5 percent are considered outliers, with the rest considered normal.
The lab may adjust its range by demographics such as males/females and age groups, but this vastly oversimplifies all the elements that affect any individual biomarker for a given human.
Typical Tests Your Doctor May Order
The biggest use of blood tests is to assist your doctor in making diagnosis and treatment decisions. The pharmaceutical industry relies on biomarker testing to prove its drug is doing what it claims to do better than a placebo.
Most drugs are evaluated by their effect on a biomarker rather than their impact on actual health. But as long as we understand the context and limitations of the tests, we can use them to our advantage helping to inform our priority interventions.
The most common tests your doctor is likely to order include:
- Metabolic markers—to understand your kidney and liver function, blood sugar level, proteins, and electrolyte balance including your hydration status.
- Complete blood count—looks at your red and white blood cells and platelets which can indicate an infection, anemia, or blood clotting issues.
- Lipids—will include your LDL (low-density lipoprotein) and HDL (high-density lipoprotein) cholesterol, and your triglycerides (a type of fat stored in your liver).
- Thyroid function—especially for women, specifically your TSH (thyroid-specific hormone) levels indicating potential hypo- or hyperthyroidism which can affect many aspects of your health including infertility.
- Hemoglobin A1C—especially for those who have a high basic glucose level or who are overweight. It measures the percentage of your blood cells that are saturated with glucose and provides a better measure of your average glucose level over the last 2—3 months.
- PSA (prostate-specific antigen)—men only. Can indicate problems with the prostate, including cancer, but other factors can also affect PSA levels.
Without going into the details of each test and the shortcomings of its quoted normal range, it is important to do your own research and consider additional testing if:
- You are outside of normal ranges and your doctor is proposing pharmaceutical treatment to address it.
- You are inside of normal ranges but are suffering from “unexplained” symptoms.
Examples of other blood tests that can provide additional context and guidance are:
- Inflammatory markers—C-reactive protein (hs-CRP, the high-sensitivity version) can be used as a general measure of inflammation and risk for cardiovascular disease and depression. Homocysteine is an amino acid that needs certain B vitamins to break down—elevated levels can indicate impaired ability to detox and make neurotransmitters.
- Thyroid detail—beyond the basic TSH score, more accurate tests can measure additional elements such as free T4, total T3, free T3, and reverse T3 to get a better picture of how your thyroid is performing.
- Full hormone panel—such as the DUTCH testing service, which stands for dried urine test for comprehensive hormones—which tests over 24 hours to get a more accurate picture.
- Cancer detection—such as the Galleri test that has been validated to detect early signals of over 50 types of cancer.
- Pathogen antibodies—including Lyme disease and mold using specialty tests such as those offered by Realtime Laboratories and IGeneX.
- Essential nutrients—like vitamin D, iron/ferritin, B12, folate (B9), magnesium, and omega-3s.
These more advanced tests may not be covered by your insurance plan but are often an excellent investment to better understand your health issues and how to tackle them. This is especially true if the aim is to avoid pharmaceuticals so often designed to address a biomarker rather than improve overall health.
Essential nutrient testing in particular can often provide the missing link to explain mystery symptoms or unusual “scores” in other blood tests.
Understanding Nutrient RDAs
In our modern world of over-scheduling, ultra-processed food, insidious technology, and other toxin exposures, so much of what ails us is due to an underlying nutrient deficiency. There are simply inadequate nutrients going into our body to run all the many complex systems that rely on them.
If we’re taking any pharmaceuticals the risk of deficiencies is higher as many pharmaceuticals are known to leach nutrients out of the body.
It is therefore recommended to include nutrient-level testing in your annual blood work. But make sure you apply a similar level of caution in their interpretation and your response for three main reasons:
1. The “normal” ranges quoted for nutrient tests are usually far too low given the vast majority of the U.S. population is deficient, and therefore any sample taken to set the ranges. A deficiency in certain nutrients may not immediately present with symptoms so the sample population may be considered healthy subjects but in fact, their nutrient levels are not optimal.
For example, most labs will quote a normal range for vitamin D blood levels of 30–150 nanograms per milliliter (ng/ml). A well-informed doctor may push you to be over 50 ng/ml and supplement up to that level. However, research now suggests over 75 ng/ml is optimal.
2. It is important to understand that blood levels are not always a good indication of absorption or availability to your cells. Magnesium for example is stored in your bones and tissues with only a small amount circulating in the blood. Absorption of one nutrient can also affect another, with low magnesium levels potentially responsible for low potassium or calcium levels as well, emphasizing the need to look at all test results holistically.
3. Another factor to understand when responding to nutrient test results is the recommended daily allowance (RDA) suggestions—more often now quoted in the United States as daily value (DV) requirements for individual nutrients.
It’s worth noting a bit of the history about how RDAs were developed decades ago before we understood the interaction of different nutrients and how factors like the health of our microbiome, age, weight, and lifestyle greatly affect our personal nutrient needs.
The focus was to prevent the occurrence of specific diseases like scurvy, beri beri, pellagra, and rickets (respectively long-term deficiencies in vitamin C, B1, B3 (niacin), and vitamin D for calcium absorption). They weren’t (and still aren’t) focused on optimal health.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration took over the ownership of DV levels to help consumers determine the level of various nutrients in a standard serving of food compared to their approximate requirement for it. You are likely to find the percentage of DV now quoted on supplement bottles. However, your personal needs may be far higher.
In Conclusion
It can seem a bit overwhelming to synthesize the pros and cons of lab testing plus make an informed decision on what tests to undertake and how to interpret the results. As with all aspects of your health, it is a very individual decision and warrants taking the time to research some details rather than ceding responsibility to the professional in a white coat. Standardized guidelines are never a substitute for an informed holistic assessment.
8 Key Tips
- Annual blood tests are a good idea—despite their drawbacks analyzing your blood can provide important insights.
- You don’t need to go through a doctor—several direct-to-consumer options are now available without a doctor’s requisition order.
- Non-standard tests may be helpful particularly if symptomatic—consider additional testing for better insight although be aware your insurance plan may not cover them.
- Reference ranges are not always useful—individual physiology is important as well as taking a holistic view of all tests and their levels over time.
- Focus on symptoms not just numbers—context is key. The numbers are just a set of data points. Energy levels, digestion, mental health, and pain for example are important indicators.
- Absorption and interaction of different nutrients may not line up with test numbers—monitor symptoms for indication of deficiency and take a holistic view.
- A whole food diet is optimal to address nutrient deficiencies and other concerning test results—make food your first line of defense opting for nutrient density over convenience.
- If supplementation is required select quality brands—nutrient combinations from whole foods (not synthetically made) and a formulation that optimizes absorption is critical.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 07/22/2024 - 04:15
Published:7/22/2024 3:46:20 AM
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[Markets]
Anti-Free Speech Laws Hit New Heights In Italy: Reporter Fined For "Body Shaming' PM Meloni
Anti-Free Speech Laws Hit New Heights In Italy: Reporter Fined For "Body Shaming' PM Meloni
Authored by Jonathan Turley,
I have long been critical of the erosion of free speech in Italy and other Western European countries, including the use of criminal libel laws against critics of the police or government. This week a Milan court has ordered a journalist to pay Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni damages of 5,000 euros ($5,465) for making fun of her in a social media post. Giulia Cortese was also given a suspended fine of 1,200 euros for a joke on X. It is the latest absurd example of the expanding crackdown on free speech.
In my new book, “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage,” I discuss how this anti-free speech wave from Europe has finally reached our shores. The rapid loss of free speech in countries like Italy, France, Germany, and Great Britain should be a wake up call for all Americans to protect this “indispensable right.”
There are many in the United States, including Hillary Clinton, who want to replicate the anti-free speech laws in the United States.
This is a prototypical example of how vague laws are being used to crackdown on everyone from journalists to politicians to even comedians.
Cortese posted a comment on Twitter in Oct. 2021 about Meloni’s height.
She objected to the government’s attack on “freedom of expression and journalistic dissent.”
Cortese published a mocked-up photo of Meloni with a picture of the late fascist leader Benito Mussolini in the background. As she clashed with the Prime Minister, she then later added:
“you don’t scare me, Giorgia Meloni. After all, you’re only 1.2 metres (4 feet) tall. I can’t even see you.”
Notably, Meloni supported the legal action despite the fact that she is part of a party long in the minority and threatened by such laws. She also successfully sued best-selling author Roberto Saviano after he insulted her on television in 2021 over her position on illegal immigration.
This is the slippery slope that our own country could soon find itself on if many politicians and pundits have their way.
Just recently, the New York Times published another anti-speech diatribe titled “The First Amendment is Out of Control.”
It is, of course, no easy task to convince a free people to give up a core part of identity and liberty. You have to make them afraid. Very afraid.
Anti-free speech books have been heralded in the media. University of Michigan Law Professor and MSNBC legal analyst Barbara McQuade has written how dangerous free speech is for the nation. Her book, “Attack from Within,” describes how free speech is what she calls the “Achilles Heel” of America.
There is even a movement afoot to rewrite the First Amendment through an amendment. George Washington University Law School Professor Mary Anne Franks believes that the First Amendment is “aggressively individualistic” and needs to be rewritten to “redo” the work of the Framers. She wants the language change to balance your right to speak against the interests of “equity.”
Meloni’s use of these laws to silence critics is disgraceful. At the same time, the media has been largely supportive of these laws in targeting others with dissenting political and religious views. The Cortese case shows how many in journalism and academia remain silent on the rights of others until they are themselves threatened by the growing intolerance for opposing views.
As the anti-free speech movement literally reaches new heights in countries like Italy, Americans should take note. This remains an existential fight over a right that defines us all. That is the long and short of it.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 07/22/2024 - 03:30
Published:7/22/2024 2:58:07 AM
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[Culture]
Dire Strait
While the Republican and Democratic parties plunge into painful realignments, China is making its own moves internationally. Taiwan has become a major flashpoint of the U.S.-China rivalry, and two books on the topic reveal not only some of the key arguments taking place in the United States about Taiwan, but also why this realignment is happening.
The post Dire Strait appeared first on .
Published:7/21/2024 5:11:36 AM
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[Markets]
Carnegie Mellon University Prof Says Trump Assassination Attempt Was "Staged" Like "Stupid Tubi Movie Set"
Carnegie Mellon University Prof Says Trump Assassination Attempt Was "Staged" Like "Stupid Tubi Movie Set"
By Emma Arns of CampusReform
A professor at Carnegie Mellon University took to social media after the assassination attempt of former President Donald Trump and suggested that the shooting was “staged,” suggesting that the shooter was part of a “stupid show.”
Uju Anya, an associate professor of second language acquisition at Carnegie Mellon University, made the comments just hours after the attempted assassination.
“People dying doesn’t make the attack any less staged. Someone who thought the attack was real could’ve killed others trying to prevent harm. Also, someone could’ve shot the shooter to hide the plot,” associate professor of second language acquisition, Uju Anya, tweeted.
“Politicians kill all the time and kill many more people to steal power,” she added. “And people died behind this farce. Actual people’s lives gone for them to stage this stupid show.”
Anya currently teaches and conducts research primarily “examining race, gender, sexual, and social class identities in new language learning through the experiences of African American students,” according to her website.
“It was staged. Like a stupid Tubi movie set in the Bronx with palm trees in the background,” she added.
“They lie, and people die. That’s exactly what they do. That’s the record. Whatever ‘attack’ on him they set up to stoke his followers’ fears and sentiments, threat and persecution has now cost lives,” Anya said.
When an X user commented “someone is dead,” Anya responded, “a dead person can’t reveal the setup.”
Trump was grazed by a bullet Saturday at his Pennsylvania rally. The gunman was taken down by Trump’s Secret Service team, and Corey Comperatore, an attendee, was killed.
Anya considers herself an “antiracist” a “feminist” and an ally of the LGBT+ community, as referenced in her X account biography.
She is also the author of two books, “Racialized identities in second language learning” and “Racial equity on college campuses”.
Campus Reform has reached out to Anya and Carnegie Mellon University for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 07/20/2024 - 19:50
Published:7/20/2024 6:52:58 PM
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[Markets]
Leftists Prove They Are Zealots In The Wake Of Trump Shooting
Leftists Prove They Are Zealots In The Wake Of Trump Shooting
The response by a large portion of the political left to the attempted assassination of Donald Trump has revealed a disturbing ideological madness - A dedication to lies and delusions that goes deep into the realm of zealotry. It's something that thousands of commentators have warned about over the years. The general public has long denied the claim as being "reactionary" and many thought conservatives were exaggerating. Recent events prove otherwise.
What else would you expect from the same group of people that can't define what a woman is? The same people that think sexualized drag performances and graphically sexual picture books are a good idea for young children in public schools? The same people that engaged in years of violent rioting because of the death of a hardcore criminal and fentanyl addict who happened to be black? The same people that supported medical authoritarianism and mass censorship during the covid pandemic? The same people that claimed "stagflation was transitory"? The people that bought into the Russiagate hoax, refused to believe that Hunter Biden's laptop was real and denied Joe Biden's steep cognitive decline?
This zealotry continues to be exposed through their response to the attempted assassination of Donal Trump. The narrative in the media is that now is the time for "cool heads" and calm, yet, at the same time they are working diligently to peddle the conspiracy that the plot was staged by Trump himself.
The envy from Joy Reid is transparent - The leftists are furious about that iconic photo and they wish they could diminish it somehow. They aren't honest enough to say "Hey, I don't like Trump's policies, but that moment was ballsy."
She seems to be asserting that Trump trusted a sniper enough to barely miss his face so that he could get a great photo. This would mean that the plan was for Trump to fake an ear injury with hundreds of people and cameras around him, and that the shooter would have to fire close enough to his head to make it believable, hitting three bystanders and killing one of them in the process. And of course, most of Trump's Secret Service security team and local police would have to be in on the plot, not to mention the photographer.
Keep in mind, there's no evidence to support any of this and the leftists suggesting the conspiracy are the same people who argued that conservatives should "follow the science" during the pandemic lockdowns. When it comes to leftists and Trump, reason goes completely out the window and their true insanity shines through. Those that aren't entertaining conspiracies about the shooting are simply enraged that the shooter missed.
Why are these people like this? One could assume they've always been this way - Zealots with a pure hatred for anyone that contradicts their ideology and Trump happens to be a convenient magnet for their animosity. Then again, it's more likely that they have been radicalized by the very media that's calling for conservatives to "calm down" after the attack, not to mention the Biden Administration. Remember this speech painting MAGA Republicans as monsters ready to tear down "democracy"?
When leftists are referred to as "useful idiots" it's important to understand what that means. It means that they are willing to say anything and do anything to further a cause which, in the end, doesn't even benefit them. It means they have ascended to a dangerous level of incompetence; a world in which reason and logic have no meaning and everything they do to win is emotionally justified.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 07/19/2024 - 21:35
Published:7/19/2024 8:54:53 PM
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[Entertainment]
Need a break from the news? 5 feel-good books offer refuge.
Find solace in books like “A Good Life,” “Big in Sweden,” “Experienced,” “Joe Nuthin’s Guide to Life” and “Pets and the City.”
Published:7/19/2024 7:30:50 AM
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[Markets]
A Time Of Shame And Sorrow: When It Comes To Political Violence, We All Lose
A Time Of Shame And Sorrow: When It Comes To Political Violence, We All Lose
Authored by John & Nisha Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,
“Whenever any American's life is taken by another American unnecessarily—whether it is done in the name of the law or in the defiance of law, by one man or a gang, in cold blood or in passion, in an attack of violence or in response to violence—whenever we tear at the fabric of life which another man has painfully and clumsily woven for himself and his children, the whole nation is degraded.”
- Robert F. Kennedy on the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. (1968)
There’s a subtext to this assassination attempt on former President Trump that must not be ignored, and it is simply this: America is being pushed to the brink of a national nervous breakdown.
More than 50 years after John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr., and Robert F. Kennedy were assassinated, America has become a ticking time bomb of political violence in words and deeds.
Magnified by an echo chamber of nasty tweets and government-sanctioned brutality, our politically polarizing culture of callousness, cruelty, meanness, ignorance, incivility, hatred, intolerance, indecency and injustice have only served to ratchet up the tension.
Consumed with back-biting, partisan politics, sniping, toxic hate, meanness and materialism, a culture of meanness has come to characterize many aspects of the nation’s governmental and social policies. “Meanness today is a state of mind,” writes professor Nicolaus Mills in his book The Triumph of Meanness, “the product of a culture of spite and cruelty that has had an enormous impact on us.”
This casual cruelty is made possible by a growing polarization within the populace that emphasizes what divides us—race, religion, economic status, sexuality, ancestry, politics, etc.—rather than what unites us: we are all Americans, and in a larger, more global sense, we are all human.
This is what writer Anna Quindlen refers to as “the politics of exclusion, what might be thought of as the cult of otherness… It divides the country as surely as the Mason-Dixon line once did. And it makes for mean-spirited and punitive politics and social policy.”
This is more than meanness, however.
We are imploding on multiple fronts, all at once.
This is what happens when ego, greed and power are allowed to take precedence over liberty, equality and justice.
This is the psychopathic mindset adopted by the architects of the Deep State, and it applies equally whether you’re talking about Democrats or Republicans.
Beware, because this kind of psychopathology can spread like a virus among the populace.
As an academic study into pathocracy concluded, “[T]yranny does not flourish because perpetuators are helpless and ignorant of their actions. It flourishes because they actively identify with those who promote vicious acts as virtuous.”
People don’t simply line up and salute. It is through one’s own personal identification with a given leader, party or social order that they become agents of good or evil. To this end, “we the people” have become “we the police state.”
By failing to actively take a stand for good, we become agents of evil. It’s not the person in charge who is solely to blame for the carnage. It’s the populace that looks away from the injustice, that empowers the totalitarian regime, that welcomes the building blocks of tyranny.
This realization hit me full-force a few years ago. I had stopped into a bookstore and was struck by all of the books on Hitler, everywhere I turned. Yet had there been no Hitler, there still would have been a Nazi regime. There still would have been gas chambers and concentration camps and a Holocaust.
Hitler wasn’t the architect of the Holocaust. He was merely the figurehead. Same goes for the American police state: had there been no Trump or Obama or Bush, there still would have been a police state. There still would have been police shootings and private prisons and endless wars and government pathocracy.
Why? Because “we the people” have paved the way for this tyranny to prevail.
By turning Hitler into a super-villain who singlehandedly terrorized the world—not so different from how Trump is often depicted—historians have given Hitler’s accomplices (the German government, the citizens that opted for security and order over liberty, the religious institutions that failed to speak out against evil, the individuals who followed orders even when it meant a death sentence for their fellow citizens) a free pass.
This is how tyranny rises and freedom falls.
None of us who remain silent and impassive in the face of evil, racism, extreme materialism, meanness, intolerance, cruelty, injustice and ignorance get a free pass.
Those among us who follow figureheads without question, who turn a blind eye to injustice and turn their backs on need, who march in lockstep with tyrants and bigots, who allow politics to trump principle, who give in to meanness and greed, and who fail to be outraged by the many wrongs being perpetrated in our midst, it is these individuals who must shoulder the blame when the darkness wins.
“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that,” Martin Luther King Jr. sermonized.
The darkness is winning.
It’s not just on the world stage we must worry about the darkness winning.
The darkness is winning in our communities. It’s winning in our homes, our neighborhoods, our churches and synagogues, and our government bodies. It’s winning in the hearts of men and women the world over who are embracing hatred over love. It’s winning in every new generation that is being raised to care only for themselves, without any sense of moral or civic duty to stand for freedom.
John F. Kennedy, killed by an assassin’s bullet five years before King would be similarly executed, spoke of a torch that had been “passed to a new generation of Americans—born in this century, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage—and unwilling to witness or permit the slow undoing of those human rights to which this nation has always been committed, and to which we are committed today at home and around the world.”
Once again, a torch is being passed to a new generation, but this torch is setting the world on fire, burning down the foundations put in place by our ancestors, and igniting all of the ugliest sentiments in our hearts.
This fire is not liberating; it is destroying.
We are teaching our children all the wrong things: we are teaching them to hate, teaching them to worship false idols (materialism, celebrity, technology, politics), teaching them to prize vain pursuits and superficial ideals over kindness, goodness and depth.
We are on the wrong side of the revolution.
“If we are to get on to the right side of the world revolution,” advised King, “we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin the shift from a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society.“
Freedom demands responsibility.
Freedom demands that we stop thinking as Democrats and Republicans and start thinking like human beings, or at the very least, Americans.
JFK was killed in 1963 for daring to challenge the Deep State.
King was killed in 1968 for daring to challenge the military industrial complex.
Robert F. Kennedy offered these remarks to a polarized nation in the wake of King’s assassination:
“In this difficult day, in this difficult time for the United States, it is perhaps well to ask what kind of a nation we are and what direction we want to move in. [Y]ou can be filled with bitterness, with hatred, and a desire for revenge. We can move in that direction as a country, in great polarization…filled with hatred toward one another. Or we can make an effort … to understand and to comprehend, and to replace that violence, that stain of bloodshed that has spread across our land, with an effort to understand with compassion and love… What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence or lawlessness; but love and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or they be black.”
Two months later, RFK was also killed by an assassin’s bullet.
Fifty-plus years later, we’re still being terrorized by assassins’ bullets, but what these madmen are really trying to kill is that dream of a world in which all Americans “would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
We haven’t dared to dream that dream in such a long time.
But imagine…
Imagine what this country would be like if Americans put aside their differences and dared to stand up—united—for freedom.
Imagine what this country would be like if Americans put aside their differences and dared to speak out—with one voice—against injustice.
Imagine what this country would be like if Americans put aside their differences and dared to push back—with the full force of our collective numbers—against government corruption and despotism.
As I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, tyranny wouldn’t stand a chance.
Tyler Durden
Wed, 07/17/2024 - 23:40
Published:7/17/2024 11:16:11 PM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post hardcover bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:7/17/2024 7:04:35 AM
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[Entertainment]
Olympic Moments That Ring True as Among the Most Memorable in History
These Olympic moments deserve their own podium.
Because even if they didn’t all include a medal, they still secured their place in the history books.
Often, these moments featured celebratory...
Published:7/13/2024 3:14:54 AM
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[Entertainment]
Pregnant Lea Michele Reunites With Scream Queens Costar Emma Roberts
The Chanels are back in action.
It was one for the books as Lea Michele gave a glimpse into her Hamptons reunion with Scream Queens costar Emma Roberts.
The Glee alum posted a slew of photo...
Published:7/12/2024 8:02:23 PM
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[In Education]
Pentagon Schools Encouraged Students To Be Left-Wing Activists, Pushed DEI On Kids And Teachers, Docs Show
by Robert Schmad at CDN -
Teachers at Pentagon schools promoted materials that train students to be social justice activists and pushed diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) on teachers, according to a new Open The Books report shared exclusively with the Daily Caller News Foundation. Department of Defense Education Activity (DODEA) schools, which serve children of …
Click to read the rest HERE-> Pentagon Schools Encouraged Students To Be Left-Wing Activists, Pushed DEI On Kids And Teachers, Docs Show first posted at Conservative Daily News
Published:7/11/2024 6:55:54 PM
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[Markets]
Anarchy In The UK
Anarchy In The UK
Authored by Joakim Book via The Mises Institute,
Anarchism [an·ar·chism] n.
1. “a political theory holding all forms of governmental authority to be unnecessary and undesirable and advocating a society based on voluntary cooperation and free association of individuals and groups” Merriam Webster
The venerable British magazine The Economist has us worried in their May 11 issue titled “The New Economic Order.” Contemplating what seems to be the collapse of the global, liberal order—Francis Fukuyama’s End of History story, more or less—the leader article argues that “a worrying number of triggers could set off a descent into anarchy, where might is right and war is once again the resort of great powers.”
Later in the piece we’re told that once the precious conditions of the last three decades break, “it is unlikely to be replaced by new rules. Instead, world affairs will descend into their natural state of anarchy that favors banditry and violence.”
Adding to the unhelpful pile is Oxford English Dictionary, giving us a wholly misleading entry for anarchy:
“political or social disorder resulting from the absence or disregard of government or the rule of law.”
Granted, this is how most people think about anarchy. Upon mentioning this frightful word, most react in horror. Yes, communist types from the tweed-wearing intellectual to the stone-hurling Antifa member embrace the term for themselves in their literal banditry and violence.
But anarchy only means “disorder” to the mind that can’t fathom anything but top-down dirigisme. Altogether foreign is a universe of emergent order, of “the products of human action but not human design” in the famous phrase that harks back to Adam Ferguson (Adam Smith’s contemporary during the Scottish Enlightenment). Instead, it’s a state of affairs of rules, not rulers. The etymological origin is a?a???a, where an means “without” and a???a “rulers.” Anarchy isn’t disaster, destruction, or war but rules without rulers.
We’re sometimes told that nation-states are acting with respect to one another in a state of anarchy, since nothing—no world government or court—binds them, and a plethora of ever-passing democratically rulers merely play an infinitely lived game of mutual interaction. The equivalence is false, since nation-states aren’t natural entities, but contrived aggregations of mafiosos that extract maximum value from their (tax) hostages via the use of violence.
It was roughly a decade ago that the social purpose of “property rights” clicked for me, and it was directly in connection with a world of an-archy—rules without rulers.
I hadn’t thought much about the concept or its role in economic affairs, but picturing the frontier setting in Terry Anderson’s and P.J. Hill’s The Not So Wild Wild West made it obvious. We humans establish property rights, not in some pen-wielding constitutional setting or faraway legal process involving bribing (sorry, “lobbying”) and political horse-trading, but by literally fencing land when the (transaction) cost of the process makes sense given the scarcity of land. And land only becomes scarce when humans have conflicting uses for the exact same plot of land.
Until then, a hyperabundant resource (well, “resource…”) like land—more than you can fence or cultivate or put livestock on even if you wanted to—becomes like a non-resource like oxygen: All possible and practical demands for it won’t make more than a negligible dent in its availability.
In the excellent book The Company of Strangers: A Natural History of Economic Life, economics professor Paul Seabright gets to the same point using property rights over water:
“Property rights are, above all, rules that determine how water may be used, and water use is a social institution whose rules we collectively invent.” But, he adds crucially, “Rules are worth making only if we can afford the expense of enforcing them,” which explains the classic difference in riparian vs prior appropriation rights between eastern and western United States.
In his slam-dunk Bitcoin: Everything Divided by 21 Million, Swedish author Knut Svanholm hits on exactly that very Austrian point:
“Economics only applies to scarce goods. Things in abundance are free because their supply greatly exceeds the demand. The air you breathe is an example of such goods.”
Similarly, the core thesis of Anderson and Hill’s work is positively blasphemous to most statists and the average man on the street alike, misunderstanding the state of anarchy in which the rules themselves evolve:
The West during this time is often perceived as a place of great chaos, with little respect for property or life. Our research indicates that this was not the case; property rights were protected, and civil order prevailed. Private agencies provided the necessary basis for an orderly society in which property was protected and conflicts were resolved.
Hobbes was off; there is no need for an overbearing Leviathan threating all of us with violence. Rousseau’s general will is nonsense. Left to their own devices, humans—aided by social institutions—are pretty nice.
Plenty of our everyday interactions are anarchical, too, merely mundane instances of repeat games in the pursuit of common wellbeing. Svanholm clearly realizes that Bitcoin is anarchism; it’s rules without rulers, and your option is to obey them or exit. Nobody “runs it,” and there’s no management to replace or CEO to jail. Still, it functions.
For freedom to prevail, we instead choose to submit ourselves to good rules, not dismantling every last hard and difficult obstacle standing in our way to an imagined utopia. In a forthcoming book about the Christian faith and Bitcoin, Jordan Bush, executive director at educational foundation Thank God for Bitcoin, gives an allegory about a fish in pursuit of ultimate freedom:
“I’m going to free myself from the confines of the water and live on land.” He swims as fast as he can, leaps out of the water, and comes to rest on the riverbank only to find that he fundamentally misunderstood the nature of freedom. Freedom isn’t found in the pursuit of the absolute absence of restrictions. It’s found by submitting oneself completely to the right restrictions—the ones that correspond to one’s nature.
Broadly speaking, faith groups are pretty anarchical: They join together in commune or various religious institutions, but your faith is with God—not the leaders of those man-made organizations; you leave, or re-create them, when they break apart. Most friendships, too, are anarchic: You cooperate and do together what both parties voluntarily agree to. Contrary to Bitcoin, the rules of which are crystal clear, friendships are hazy and often undefined. They can be negotiated, expanded, or reduced; nobody but the parties to the interaction governs it (no Friendship Tsar at the Office for Friendly Relations)—and you leave, i.e., dissolve the friendship, when it no longer functions.
In none of these anarchic domains do we find “might is right” or the destruction of property that the word traditionally invokes. Anarchy doesn’t mean anything goes, the purview of the postmodern left—or might is right, the ever-lasting claim of the extreme right.
It may well be the case that the on-going regime shifts in the global world order will take place through destruction and conflict—but it won’t be because of anarchy.
Anarchy is rules without rulers. The Economist overlooked that first, crucial part.
Tyler Durden
Thu, 07/11/2024 - 05:00
Published:7/11/2024 4:21:36 AM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post paperback bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:7/10/2024 7:13:06 AM
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[Culture]
Everyone Is Trying to Make This TikTok Go Viral—and It Never Will
The app’s algorithm is so powerful that ordinary TikTok users can’t get their favorite videos into the record books. Homegrown viral campaigns like the egg that took over Instagram are a thing of the past.
Published:7/10/2024 6:08:07 AM
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[Uncategorized]
Town Admits First Amendment Violation After Firing Librarian Who Endorsed Conservative Candidates Opposed to ‘Inappropriate’ Children’s Books
The library and town admitted 'regret' for violating the librarian's 'constitutional rights.'
The post Town Admits First Amendment Violation After Firing Librarian Who Endorsed Conservative Candidates Opposed to ‘Inappropriate’ Children’s Books first appeared on Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion.
Published:7/9/2024 7:45:53 AM
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[Markets]
How Do Americans Prepare For Retirement?
How Do Americans Prepare For Retirement?
While the U.S. has no mandatory retirement age and forcing older workers to retire is, in fact, illegal according to the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, the OECD's Pensions at a Glance report suggests an effective labor market exit age of 65.2 for men and 65.3 for women in the United States in 2022.
One possible reason for the U.S. ranking 13th out of 39 OECD countries regarding the highest retirement age is pensions without additional private savings not being sufficient to sustain an adequate standard of living.
When choosing how to best save up for old age, there is a clear generational divide in the country.
Statista's Florian Zandt highlights a Consumer Insight survey from 2022 which shows that, on average, a savings book or deposit is still the most suitable method for many respondents, ranking particularly high among Baby Boomers (28 percent) and Gen Z (22 percent).
The former group also heavily relies on overnight deposits, with 29 percent of survey participants investing in these specific types of deposits lasting from one day to the next.
You will find more infographics at Statista
Interestingly, real estate ranks highest in the age cluster of survey respondents aged 18 to 29. 24 percent of said respondents see it as best suited for retirement savings, even though median house sale prices increased by almost 30 percent between the first quarters of 2020 and 2024.
Another popular retirement scheme in this group is company pension plans. The only cluster of respondents with a popularity share below 20 percent consisted of those born between 1965 and 1979.
Trust in government pensions is low across the board, trailed only by investing in commodities like precious metals. As with savings books and company pensions, the former is seen as especially suitable by both the youngest and the oldest participants in the survey.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/07/2024 - 16:55
Published:7/7/2024 4:28:02 PM
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[]
Daily Tech News 7 July 2024
Top Story Merle Myers did not kill himself: A former Boeing inspector says parts marked for scrap ended up being built into planes. (CNN)Meyers, a 30-year veteran of Boeing, described to CNN what he says was an elaborate off-the-books practice...
Published:7/7/2024 3:15:46 AM
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[Markets]
Inside The Chinese Money-Laundering Network Fueling America's Fentanyl Crisis
Inside The Chinese Money-Laundering Network Fueling America's Fentanyl Crisis
It's worth noting that 100,000 Americans die in drug-related deaths per year, the vast majority from pills cooked with fentanyl, an opioid analog 50 times more potent than heroin. Every six months, the US drug death catastrophe eclipses the Vietnam War.
Fueling the fentanyl epidemic across the US are Chinese money launderers helping international drug traffickers, like Mexican cartels. Capital flight from China is not a new phenomenon, but in recent years, the scale of these transfers, washed through the drug trade, has become very alarming.
Paul Murphy from the Financial Times has provided the most straightforward explanation yet of the new Chinese money laundering network fueling America's fentanyl crisis:
First, understand that Chinese nationals are barred from transferring more than $50,000 out of China each year. And yet, as you are surely aware, there are many many Chinese nationals living very comfortable lives in the west, as students perhaps, or tourists, or simply not working.
Now understand that Mexican drug cartels are harvesting untold billions of dollars, in cash, selling drugs in North America — and that the pill of the moment is fentanyl, which kills about 70,000 people a year in the US.
The chemicals to make fentanyl come from China. These are shipped to Mexico by otherwise legit Chinese chemical manufacturers.
In Mexico, the cartels turn the chemicals into pills and smuggle these north across the border, where they are sold for cash — dollar bills that then need to be cleaned.
Murphy continued:
Meanwhile, in New York for instance, there will be a Chinese student attending an educational establishment, where the fees will be circa $66,000 a year, books and extras another $10,000, food and lodging costs of maybe $5,000 a month, or a lot more.
The $50,000 Chinese transfer cap doesn't cover these things, so she will go on WeChat and broadcast a message to her network of friends saying: "I need dollars in New York to meet my outgoings. Can anyone help?"
In due course, someone associated with what is a very efficient Chinese underground banking system will get in touch and tell the student to meet a courier at a preordained time and place, typically a park in Brooklyn. There, the student will be handed a bundle of cash.
Back in China, the parents of the student will then be asked to transfer the same amount of money (plus commission) to an account that will eventually make its way to the chemical company that produced the precursor ingredients for fentanyl, settling the outstanding bill for the Mexican drug cartel.
Murphy explained, "Drug addicts in the US are facilitating the Western education of Chinese youth, as well as helping to fund the lifestyles of other Chinese nations living outside China."
He provided a flow chart showing how the complex laundering system works.
In a separate report last week, FT's Joe Miller and James Kynge published an in-depth analysis of the Chinese-Mexican laundering network in a report titled "The new money laundering network fuelling the fentanyl crisis."
The report sheds light on the less understood part of the money laundering operation — the demand for dollars from wealthy Chinese individuals. While capital flight from China is not new, the methods have become increasingly creative, involving chemical companies that, in turn, have fueled America's opioid epidemic.
"The levels of capital flight in the past three years have been quite alarming," one senior Chinese official told FT, adding, "Some wealthy private entrepreneurs are losing confidence in China's future. They feel unsafe, so they find ways to get their money out."
Brad Setser, a former US Treasury official and an expert on global capital flows at the Council on Foreign Relations, estimated that capital flight from China is running at an annualized rate of about $516 billion as of 1Q24. This figure was even higher in the 3Q22, reaching almost $738 billion.
"The whole system of drug trafficking is being sustained by a network of clandestine [Chinese] money brokers," said Giovanni Melillo, the chief prosecutor for Italy's National Anti-Mafia and Terrorism Directorate. His office has been coordinating laundering probes across Italy this past year.
Previous cases of money laundering in the US involving Chinese nationals have raised serious questions about how much Beijing knows about these dark laundering networks. For instance, a recent Wall Street Journal report revealed that Chinese crime groups and drug traffickers used the Toronto-Dominion Bank to launder money from US fentanyl sales.
In mid-April, the House Select Committee on China revealed that the Chinese Communist Party used tax rebates to subsidize the manufacturing and exporting of fentanyl chemicals to overseas customers.
The biggest mystery here is why the Biden administration hasn't taken a tougher stance on China while America's fentanyl epidemic kills as many citizens each year as two Vietnam Wars.
Tyler Durden
Wed, 07/03/2024 - 22:50
Published:7/3/2024 11:38:35 PM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post hardcover bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:7/3/2024 7:09:32 AM
|
[9e366c9c-8b15-5dbc-b08f-cd6badbc5c74]
10 movies based on best-selling books
Many movies develop a story already established in a popular book. "Harry Potter," "The Hunger Games" and "The Godfather" were best-selling books before they were movies.
Published:7/2/2024 3:40:22 PM
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[Markets]
Customized B Vitamin Therapy Could Help Parkinson’s Patients, New Study Suggests
Customized B Vitamin Therapy Could Help Parkinson’s Patients, New Study Suggests
Authored by George Citroner via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
A team of Japanese scientists has uncovered an unexpected link between the gut and the brain. The discovery may offer fresh insights into managing a condition that affects 9 million people worldwide.
Deficiency of 2 B Vitamins Linked to Parkinson’s
The study, published in npj Parkinson’s Disease, suggests that vitamin B deficiency may contribute to Parkinson’s development by compromising the intestinal barrier, which typically prevents toxins from entering the bloodstream. Toxins in the bloodstream may lead to neuroinflammation, which is inflammation in the nervous system often associated with neurodegenerative diseases and other neurological conditions.
Researchers used shotgun sequencing to analyze stool samples, allowing them to identify changes in the microbial community and genetic makeup. The study found fewer genes in Parkinson’s patients’ gut bacteria responsible for making vitamins B2 (riboflavin) and B7 (biotin). Both have anti-inflammatory properties and may help counteract the neuroinflammation associated with Parkinson’s disease.
This suggests that B vitamin supplementation could potentially relieve Parkinson’s symptoms and even slow disease progression, Hiroshi Nishiwaki, the lead study author, said in a press release.
Previous research has already shown that high doses of riboflavin contribute to the recovery of some motor functions in Parkinson’s patients. While there’s no specific research on biotin supplementation for Parkinson’s, one study found that high doses of biotin improved symptoms in patients with multiple sclerosis, another neurological disorder.
Customized for Individual Microbiomes
The findings also suggest that vitamin therapy could potentially be customized based on each patient’s unique microbiome profile to delay the onset of Parkinson’s-associated symptoms.
“We could perform gut microbiota analysis on patients or conduct fecal metabolite analysis,” Mr. Nishiwaki said in the press release.“ We could identify individuals with specific deficiencies and administer oral riboflavin and biotin supplements to those with decreased levels, potentially creating an effective treatment,” he added.
The study demonstrates the importance of the gut microbiome in the progression and initiation of Parkinson’s disease, a theory first hypothesized more than 20 years ago, Dr. Raminder Parihar, the director of neuromodulation at the Montefiore Neurological Surgery Movement Disorders Center who was not affiliated with the study, told The Epoch Times.
“This provides another avenue that should be further explored on using supplementation of riboflavin and biotin to slow the progression of Parkinson’s disease and potentially prevent the development of motor symptoms in Parkinson’s disease,” Dr. Parihar added.
Other Vitamins That Could Help
While no vitamins or nutrients can cure Parkinson’s disease, several may help alleviate symptoms or reduce risk. They include:
Dr. Parihar noted that some vitamins may interfere with levodopa, a drug commonly prescribed to Parkinson’s patients. Iron, for example, can affect the absorption of levodopa if taken simultaneously. He recommends taking iron supplements an hour after levodopa to allow for proper absorption.
Consult a health care professional before starting any supplements, as they may interact with medications or have side effects. While these vitamins and nutrients show potential benefits, they should not replace standard medical treatment for Parkinson’s disease.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 06/29/2024 - 08:10
Published:6/29/2024 7:43:03 AM
|
[Markets]
You Keep Using The Term 'Authoritarian'...
You Keep Using The Term 'Authoritarian'...
Authored by Jeffrey Tucker via The Brownstone Institute,
You know the term “authoritarian.” You think you know what it means.
An authoritarian dad, boss, or government says: my way or the highway. They are forever barking orders and see compliance as the answer to all human problems. There is no room for uncertainty, adaptation to time and place, or negotiation. It’s ruling by personal dictate while tolerating no dissent.
To be authoritarian is to be inhumane, to rule with arbitrary and capricious imposition. It can also mean to be ruled impersonally by a machine regardless of the cost.
Sounds like a conventional government bureaucracy, right? Indeed. Think of the Department of Motor Vehicles. Think of the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Energy which are right now issuing edicts that will end in the ability of your washing machine to clean your clothes and your car to go the distance.
They have been doing this to us for many decades, with or without the permission of Congress or the president. The agencies have become literally out of control in the sense that no one can control them.
Any society managed by a large and intrusive bureaucratic machinery is necessarily authoritarian. A government that is not authoritarian is necessarily limited in size, scope, and range of power.
Let’s say you have a political leader who has routinely called for less in the way of authoritarian rule by bureaucracies. He intends to use whatever power he has to curb the autonomous rule by administrative bureaucracies and subject them more to the wishes of the people, who should ideally be in charge of the regime under which they live.
Such a leader would not be called an authoritarian. He would be called the opposite, an emancipator who is trying to dismantle authoritarian structures.
If all of the above makes sense to you, try to make sense of this news story in the New York Times. It’s about the growing efforts on the part of many activists to resist a second term of Donald Trump.
In passing, the story says: “If Mr. Trump returns to power, he is openly planning to impose radical changes — many with authoritarian overtones” including “making it easier to fire civil servants.”
The story quickly adds that he intends to replace the fired employees with “loyalists.” Maybe. But consider the alternative. The president is supposed to be ostensibly in charge of 2 million plus bureaucrats that are employed by 400-plus agencies in the executive branch — but they don’t actually have to carry out the policies of the elected president. They can in fact completely ignore him.
How is this compatible with either democracy or freedom? It is not. There is nothing in the Constitution about a vast army of bureaucrats who rule behind the scenes that is in no way reachable or manageable by elected representatives.
The attempt to pull back, rein in, and otherwise do something about this problem is not authoritarian. It is the opposite. Even if “loyalists” replaced the fired employees, that would be an improvement over a system of government in which the people truly have no control at all.
Two years into Trump’s first term, the administration came to figure out that this was a problem. The administration intended some dramatic turns in policy in a number of areas. All they experienced was dogged resistance from people who believed they and not the elected president were in charge. Over the next two years, they undertook many efforts to at least solve this problem: namely, the president should be in charge of the government that falls under his jurisdiction.
This only makes sense. Imagine you are the CEO of a company. You discover that the main divisions that actually run the company care nothing about what you say and cannot be fired even if you demand it, and yet you are personally held responsible for everything these divisions do. What are you going to do?
It is not “authoritarian” to unseat or otherwise attempt to gain control over that for which you are held responsible, professionally or politically. That is truly all that the Trump people are suggesting. This is nothing other than a Constitutional system: we are supposed to have a government by and for the people. That means that the people elect the administrator of the executive branch. At a minimum, the winner of the election needs to be able to have some influence over what the agencies in the executive branch do.
And for suggesting this and trying to make it happen, Trump is called an authoritarian. Prepare yourself: this will be said millions of times between now and November and following. Can the mainstream media just flat-out change the meaning of a term like this? They can but there is also every reason to push back and not let it happen.
Language is a human construct. The more vibrant and fast-moving society is, the more the language changes. That can be a wonderful thing. In fact, one of my favorite books to read in off-hours is H.L. Mencken’s The American Language, written by this genius when he was otherwise censored for his views in wartime.
It’s a marvelous chronicling of the evolution of American usage, published in 1919, but oddly pertinent even today, applicable to the dwindling number of people who can still form coherent sentences.
When it comes to vocabulary, there are two schools of thought broadly speaking: prescriptivist and descriptivist. The prescriptivist view is that words have embedded meanings that you can trace from other languages and should be used as intended. The descriptivist approach sees language as more a living experience, a tool of utility to make communication possible, in which case anything goes.
As Americans, we mostly accept the descriptivist outlook but this can go too far. Words cannot mean literally anything, much less the opposite. But this is exactly what is happening. It’s the same with the word “democracy,” which is supposed to mean the people’s choice, not whatever elites dish out to us. If Trump is the choice, so be it. That is the unfolding of democracy.
If we want the president to be the CEO of the executive branch of government — and that’s a pretty good description of what the US Constitution establishes — then the administration ought to have that managerial authority. If you don’t like it, take it up with the Founders.
Again, any society managed by a large and intrusive bureaucratic machinery is necessarily authoritarian. A government that is not authoritarian is necessarily limited in size, scope, and range of power.
Any one president who takes action to curb the power and reach of arbitrary authority is not an authoritarian, but rather one who seeks to give authority back to the people. Such a man would be an emancipator, even if everyone said otherwise.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 06/28/2024 - 19:15
Published:6/28/2024 6:42:57 PM
|
[Markets]
Futures Jump After Biden's Disastrous Debate, Core PCE Looms
Futures Jump After Biden's Disastrous Debate, Core PCE Looms
Futures are higher led by small caps with tech stocks also mostly higher, as markets start pricing in a Trump presidency following what even Bloomberg admitted was a "disastrous" debate performance by Biden which is making Democrats panic. As of 7:45am ET, S&P and Nasdaq 100 futures rose 0.4%, suggesting this week’s rally on Wall Street is set to continue, with both indexes on course for a third quarter of gains amid expectations that signs of more bad economic growth will give the Fed more room to ease policy this year. That said, not even a looming core PCE which will likely show continued easing in prices (May PCE est 0.0% MoM, down from 0.3%, 2.6% YoY, down from 2.7%) is having an impact on bond yields which are notably higher this morning as is the USD as markets take a long, hard look at what inflation will look like under Trump's tariff-ridden regime (spoiler alert: higher). Commodities are mixed: oil and precious metals are higher; base metals are lower. Today's macro focus will be the May PCE release to access the Goldilocks narrative. Survey expects a 0.1% MoM print vs. 0.2% prior; on YoY basis, survey sees the number dropping to 2.6% survey vs. 2.8% prior).
In premarket trading, Nike shares tumbled 15% after the sneaker maker’s Q1 sales outlook missed Wall Street expectations. Following the print, UBS downgraded its recommendation on the stock to neutral, saying the fundamental trends were much worse than analysts had realized. Morgan Stanley also moved to the sidelines, seeing the catalyst for their prior overweight thesis on the stock as “out of view." Megacap tech are mostly outperforming: NVDA +65bp, AMZN +40bp, AAPL +54bp, GOOG/L +48bp. Here are some other notable premarket movers:
- Infinera shares soar 17% after Nokia agreed to buy the maker of digital optical telecommunications equipment for $2.3 billion.
- Trump Media & Technology Group shares jump 7.9% following Thursday’s presidential debate between President Joe Biden and Donald Trump, with the latter coming away looking stronger.
The elephant in the room, of course, was last night catastrophic debate by Joe Biden who ended his presidential campaign in less than 2 hours because as Bloomberg notes, "Biden failed to ameliorate concern about his age in the presidential debate, offering remarks in a hoarse voice and often misspeaking and meandering. A thousand-yard stare on the split screen didn’t help. Donald Trump won the debate, according to 67% of watchers polled by a CNN flash poll. Democrats expressed alarm about Biden’s candidacy, but the president told reporters he intends to stay on the ticket."
And now that the debate is in the history books, traders are scrambling to evaluate what the Trump presidency will look like; conveniently we just published a great primer yesterday.
Attention now turns to the week's final event, the Fed's preferred inflation print, the core PCE. “The fundamental question behind the PCE print is whether there will be at least one rate cut this year,” said Mabrouk Chetouane, head of global market strategy at Natixis Global Asset Management. "If it goes in a way the consensus and the Fed aren’t anticipating, then it will be problematic for equity and bond markets alike."
European stocks pared an early gain, weighed down by a decline in France’s equity benchmark ahead of the weekend’s parliamentary election. Investors pulled the most money out of European equity funds in almost four months in the week through Wednesday, according to a Bank of America Corp. note citing EPFR Global data. France’s CAC 40 index dropped 0.5% to a five-month low, and the nation’s bonds underperformed, with the 10-year yield rising to the highest since November. The main concern for investors is that the new French government will drive the country deeper into debt. “We retain a cautious stance on French financial assets due to the high event risks and the slim chances of meaningful fiscal consolidation, regardless of the election result,” Bank J Safra Sarasin strategists led by Karsten Junius said in a note. L’Oreal SA fell after the French beauty-products maker said it expects slower growth in the overall beauty market this year. Puma SE and JD Sports Fashion Plc declined, tracking Nike’s slump. Nokia Oyj shares rose as much as 4.4% after the Finnish mobile-phone company agreed to buy US-listed optical transmission equipment maker Infinera. Here are the other notable European movers:
- Nokia shares rise as much as 4.6% after the Finnish company agrees to buy US-listed optical transmission equipment maker Infinera for $2.3 billion.
- Saab shares rise as much as 5.1% as the defense firm is to join Sweden’s main stock benchmark on July 1, following Nasdaq’s semi-annual changes.
- Keywords Studios shares gain as much as 6.5% to £23.20 after the video game services company said it’s likely to accept an updated offer from EQT Group of £24.50 per share in cash.
- Tyman shares rise as much as 4.6% after the UK construction firm and Quanex agreed on a revised proposal to increase the cash value received by Tyman shareholders through a special interim dividend of 15 pence/share.
- PKO Bank shares gain as much as 1.3% to a record high after shareholders of Poland’s biggest lender approve mgmt’s plan to pay 2.59 zloty/share as dividend from 2023 profit.
- Ercros shares climb as much as 13% to €3.93 after Esseco Industrial launched a voluntary, competing public tender offer for the shares in the industrial company.
- L’Oreal shares fall as much as 3.7%, declining for a second day after CEO Nicolas Hieronimus flagged slower growth for the beauty market this year as China weakness weighs on sales.
- Adidas shares hold steady in the face of Nike’s sales warning, with Warburg analysts citing a pre-close call held late Thursday by the German sportswear maker.
- Teamviewer shares fall as much as 8.2% on Friday. The firm detected an irregularity in the company’s internal corporate IT environment on June 26, according to a statement on Thursday.
- JD Sports shares slide as much as 6.6% after Nike issued a full-year outlook that missed expectations. Sports apparel retailer peer Puma falls as much as 3.4%.
- Air France-KLM shares drop as much as 7%, hitting a record low, after Barclays downgraded the stock to equal-weight from overweight, citing political instability in France.
- Safestore shares falls as much as 4.8% as Morgan Stanley downgrades the UK storage firm to equal-weight, citing cost pressures and delays to development plans.
Earlier, Asian equities rose, on track for a weekly gain, as the lack of hawkish comments in the US presidential debate offered some respite for Chinese stocks, with traders turning their focus to a key inflation data due Friday. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index gained as much as 0.6%, poised to post its first weekly advance in three. Japan’s Topix index reached its highest level since 1990 due to a rally in financial firms courtesy of the latest plunge in th eyen, while tech heavy-markets such as Taiwan and South Korea also advanced. Hong Kong stock benchmarks recouped early losses and edged away from technical correction territory as traders assessed the debate between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump.
In FX, the dollar hovered near an eight-month high, on track for a sixth weekly gain. The greenback initially rose as markets assessed Trump was the victor in the debate. It’s a foretaste of how markets might react to a second Trump presidency, and suggests the US currency could be a major beneficiary. Meanwhile, South Africa’s rand soared 1.5% on renewed optimism the country’s two largest parties are moving closer to a power-sharing deal.
“Markets likely extrapolated today’s debate outcome to the actual election outcome in November,” said Carol Kong, a strategist at Commonwealth Bank of Australia in Sydney. “Trump’s policies are likely to add to inflationary pressures and escalate trade tensions, thereby supporting US interest rates and the safe-haven US dollar.”
In rates, Treasuries retreated, paring gains from the prior session, when lackluster US economic data reinforced speculation the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates this year to prevent a bigger slowdown in the economy. Economists expect the Fed’s preferred inflation gauge, the core PCE Price Index, slowed to an annualized rate 2.6% last month from 2.8%. That would be the lowest reading since March 2021, though it remains above the central bank’s goal for 2% inflation. French bonds also drop, underperforming their German counterparts and widening the 10-year yield spread by 2bps to around 84bps. French, Spanish and Italian EU harmonized CPI rose inline with estimates and prompted little reaction.
In commodities, oil prices advance, with WTI rising 1% to trade near $82.60 a barrel. Spot gold is steady around $2,328/oz.
Looking at today's calendar, the US economic data slate includes May personal income/spending, PCE price index (8:30am), June MNI Chicago PMI (9:45am), University of Michigan sentiment (10am) and Kansas City Fed services activity (11am). Fed speakers scheduled for the session include Daly (8:40am, 12:40pm) and Bowman (12pm
Market Snapshot
- S&P 500 futures up 0.3% to 5,561.00
- STOXX Europe 600 up 0.2% to 513.47
- MXAP up 0.3% to 180.38
- MXAPJ up 0.3% to 566.34
- Nikkei up 0.6% to 39,583.08
- Topix up 0.6% to 2,809.63
- Hang Seng Index little changed at 17,718.61
- Shanghai Composite up 0.7% to 2,967.40
- Sensex up 0.2% to 79,373.31
- Australia S&P/ASX 200 up 0.1% to 7,767.47
- Kospi up 0.5% to 2,797.82
- German 10Y yield little changed at 2.45%
- Euro little changed at $1.0694
- Brent Futures up 0.7% to $86.97/bbl
- Gold spot up 0.1% to $2,329.85
- US Dollar Index up 0.12% to 106.03
Top Overnight News
- The IMF has urged the US to “urgently” address its mounting fiscal burden, as it took aim at the tax plans of both presidential candidates just hours before their first electoral debate. FT
- Japan’s economic data has a (slightly) hawkish bias, with higher industrial production for May (+2.8% M/M vs. the Street +2%) and a slightly firmer core Tokyo CPI for June (+1.8% vs. the Street +1.7%). RTRS
- Apple’s China iPhone shipments rose 40% in May, off the previous month’s pace of growth despite steep discounts. BBG
- NKE down 15% pre mkt reported a miss on FQ4 sales and provided very weak guidance for F25. WSJ
- Argentina’s Congress approved President Javier Milei’s signature pro-business reforms in a final 147 to 107 vote. Lawmakers also approved the return of income taxes, reversing the Senate’s bid to undo the measure and giving the government breathing room to reach its fiscal targets. BBG
- France heads to the polls for its first round of voting on Sunday with Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally party continuing to widen its lead. President Emmanuel Macron’s group trails in third place. BBG
- European inflation expectations ticked down according to the latest ECB survey, including over the next 12 months (from 2.9% to 2.8%) and 36 months (from 2.4% to 2.3%). ECB
- Iran has expanded its most sensitive nuclear production site in recent weeks. And for the first time, some leaders are dropping their insistence that the nuclear program is for peaceful purposes. NYT
- The US, Israel and Ukraine are in talks to supply Kyiv with up to eight Patriot air defense systems, dramatically improving its ability to counter Russian air strikes. FT
US Presidential Debate
- US President Biden said during the first presidential debate that the US economy was falling when Trump came out of the presidency and that the Trump economy rewarded the rich and raised the deficit, while he said that Trump exaggerates and lies about border security in which everything he says is a lie.
- Former President Trump said they had the greatest economy in the history of the US under his administration and had the greatest economy in the world but Biden did something disastrous by encouraging illegal immigrants, while he added that immigrants from everywhere flock to the US because of Biden and are killing US citizens. Trump also said he achieved a lot in the field of economics and that inflation is currently killing the US which became a third-world country under the Biden administration, as well as noted that tariffs will reduce deficits and check countries like China. Furthermore, Trump said there was no terror under his administration and that the world is blowing up under Biden, while he added Iran was broke and Hamas would never attack Israel under his administration, as well as claimed that he would have the war between Russia and Ukraine settled before he takes office.
- CNN poll showed about 67% of debate followers saw Trump as the winner; 81% of registered voters who watched the debate said it had no effect on their choice for President, 5% said the debate made them change their mind on whom to vote for.
- Following the debate, Politico reports that some Democrats were so concerned by Biden's performance that they are discussing replacing him on the ticket; however, the likes of Governor Newsom said that kind of talk is “unhelpful” and “unnecessary”. Additionally, advisors acknowledged that not much is possible unless Biden steps aside.
A more detailed look at global markets courtesy of Newsquawk
APAC stocks were mostly higher heading to month-, quarter-, and half-year end following the positive bias stateside but with gains capped as participants digest a slew of data and await the Fed's preferred inflation gauge. ASX 200 was led higher by tech strength but with upside limited by weakness in miners and materials. Nikkei 225 benefitted from recent currency weakness, while there was also a slew of data releases including mostly firmer-than-expected Tokyo inflation and a return to growth in Industrial Production. Hang Seng and Shanghai Comp. were positive in tandem with the gains in regional peers with catalysts light although there were comments from President Xi who reaffirmed the China opening up message.
Top Asian News
- Chinese President Xi said China will never leave the road of peaceful development and they will continue to expand the system which will become increasingly market-oriented. Xi added that China continues to expand opening up and its door will never close, while it is willing to discuss FTAs with additional developing countries.
- Japan's Finance Ministry announced they are to replace its top currency diplomat Kanda with Atsushi Mimura and replace Vice Minister of Finance Chatani with Hirotsugu Shinkawa although the changes were said to be part of a normal personnel rotation, according to Nikkei and Bloomberg.
- Japanese Finance Minister Suzuki said he won't comment on forex levels and it is important for currencies to move in a stable manner reflecting fundamentals. Suzuki reiterated he is closely watching FX moves with a high sense of urgency and is deeply concerned about excessive, one-sided moves on forex and repeated that rapid FX moves are undesirable.
- Geely Auto (0175 HK) Q1 2024 (CNY): revenue 52.315bln vs. prev. 33.506bln, profit attributable 1.561bln vs. prev. 714mln; Q1 sales volumes +49% Y/Y.
- PBoC says it is to step up the implementation of monetary policies already in place; will keep liquidity reasonably ample. Will guide a reasonable growth of credit.Will keep CNY basically stable. Will keep prices at a reasonable level. Will resolutely prevent overshooting risks. To firmly correct pro-cyclical behavior and prevent the formation and reinforcement of one-sided expectations. Deepen supply-side reform. Remarks which saw USD/CNH drop from 7.2985 to a test of 7.2900, a figure which held. Since, the move has pared marginally back to around 7.2930.
European bourses, Stoxx 600 (+0.3%) are mostly firmer, taking positive leads from a strong APAC session; price action in Europe has been choppy thus far. European sectors are mixed; Energy takes the spot, benefiting from the gains in the underlying crude complex. Consumer Products & Services is the clear laggard, with the likes of Puma (-2.5%) hit following poor Nike results. US Equity Futures (ES +0.2%, NQ +0.4%, RTY +0.6%) are entirely in the green, ahead of US PCE. Nike (-12%) has sunk in the pre-market after it reported a beat on EPS, a miss on Revenue, noted that quarterly sales will fall 10% and warned on weakness in China.
Top European News
- EU leaders agree on the top EU jobs with von der Leyen given a second term as European Commission President, while Portugal's Antonio Costa is to be the new chairman of EU summits and Estonia's Kaja Kallas is to be EU's top diplomat. It was separately reported that French President Macron named Thierry Breton as the French EU commissioner.
FX
- DXY is currently just shy of the 106 mark within a 105.87-106.13 range. Some desks attribute overnight strength in the USD to Trump outperforming Biden in the first tv debate. However, it is likely that ongoing upside in USD/JPY also played a role.
- USD/JPY has printed another multi-decade high at 161.27 with jawboning from Japanese officials and personnel adjustments unable to stop the rot for the currency. Officials in Japan will be hoping for a soft outturn for US PCE data today after Tokyo CPI picked up on a headline and core basis overnight. Currently flat on the session and holds around 160.70.
- EUR/USD is slightly softer and back on a 1.06 handle but within yesterday's 1.0676-1.0726 range. Asides from the fallout from the US PCE data, attention is increasingly turning towards the weekend risk associated with the French election.
- GBP is flat vs. the USD as the final release of Q1 UK GDP unable to instigate much in the way of price action. For now, Cable is tucked within yesterday's 1.2612-70 range.
- Antipodeans are both falling victim to the broadly firmer USD. AUD/USD a touch softer but largely in consolidation mode having not strayed from a 0.66 handle since June 17th.
- PBoC set USD/CNY mid-point at 7.1268 vs exp. 7.2727 (prev. 7.1270).
Fixed Income
- USTs came under pressure in APAC hours as the US election debate got underway. A debate which saw Biden perform particularly poorly with the odds of a Trump presidency lifting. Currently trading around 110-05 ahead of US PCE.
- Bunds were initially lower in tandem with broader weakness in Treasuries, and was fairly unreactive to French/Spanish inflation metrics thereafter. Currently lower by around 16 ticks and trading within Thursday's 131.68-132.19 bounds.
- OATs underperform ahead of Sunday's legislative first round election which has caused the OAT-Bund yield spread to widen to above 84bps.
- Gilt price action has been following peers, within initial underperformance on the back of the upwardly revised UK Q1 GDP figures.
Commodities
- Crude continues to climb. Upside which is a continuation of Thursday's marked gains for the complex, which began without clear or fresh fundamental catalysts. Brent higher by just under USD 1/bbl, and sitting above USD 86/bbl.
- Spot gold is flat, in what has been a rangebound and quiet session for the complex awaiting impetus from US PCE. XAU currently sits just under USD 2330/oz, with its 50 DMA at USD 2337/oz.
- Base metals are entirely in the green benefitting from the broadly positive risk tone, though with gains capped as participants await US PCE.
Geopolitics: Middle East
- "US Pentagon is moving military assets near Israel and Lebanon to be ready to evacuate Americans", via Walla's Elster citing NBC.
- US is to release part of suspended bomb shipment to Israel with the US and Israel discussing the release of a 500-pound bomb shipment to Israel, while the Biden administration is also reviewing another part of the shipment which includes 1,800 and 2,000-pound bombs, according to Axios.
- US official said the Pentagon is moving US military assets close to Israel and Lebanon as it prepares to evacuate Americans in Israel and Lebanon if the fighting intensifies, according to NBC.
Geopolitics: Other
- US Deputy Secretary of State Campbell raised serious concerns regarding China’s destabilising actions in the South Sea in a call with China's Executive Vice Foreign Minister Ma Zhaoxu.
US Event Calendar
- 08:30: May PCE Price Index MoM, est. 0%, prior 0.3%
- May PCE Price Index YoY, est. 2.6%, prior 2.7%
- May Core PCE Price Index MoM, est. 0.1%, prior 0.2%
- May Core PCE Price Index YoY, est. 2.6%, prior 2.8%
- 08:30: May Personal Income, est. 0.4%, prior 0.3%
- May Personal Spending, est. 0.3%, prior 0.2%
- May Real Personal Spending, est. 0.3%, prior -0.1%
- 09:45: June MNI Chicago PMI, est. 40.0, prior 35.4
- 10:00: June U. of Mich. Sentiment, est. 66.0, prior 65.6
- June U. of Mich. Current Conditions, est. 64.0, prior 62.5
- June U. of Mich. Expectations, est. 68.0, prior 67.6
- June U. of Mich. 1 Yr Inflation, est. 3.2%, prior 3.3%
- June U. of Mich. 5-10 Yr Inflation, est. 3.1%, prior 3.1%
- 11:00: June Kansas City Fed Services Activ, prior 11
Central Bank Speakers
- 06:00: Fed’s Barkin Gives Keynote Speech
- 08:40: Fed’s Daly on CNBC
- 12:00: Fed’s Bowman Speaks in Moderated Q&A
- 12:40: Fed’s Daly Speaks on AI, Workforce
DB's Jim Reid concludes the overnight wrap
We go to press this morning just after the first US presidential debate of the election between Joe Biden and Donald Trump. The general consensus among pundits is that Trump had the better performance, and a CNN flash poll of registered voters watching the debate found viewers thought Trump won by a 67%-33% margin. There are just two debates scheduled in this campaign, with the second on September 10, ahead of the election on November 5. Going into the debate, the national polls were neck-and-neck, and Trump only had a 0.2pt lead in FiveThirtyEight’s polling average, so it’ll be interesting to see if the debate affects that.
Staying on politics, it’s going to be an important weekend for markets ahead, as the first round of the French legislative election is taking place on Sunday. Clearly we won’t know the full results until the second round on July 7, but it will offer a better sense of the likely outcomes in terms of who can reach a majority, if anyone. As it stands, the latest Ifop poll yesterday showed Marine Le Pen’s National Rally on 36%, ahead of the left-wing alliance on 29%, and President Macron’s centrist group on 21%. In terms of seats projected in the National Assembly, that poll suggests the National Rally and its allies would end up with 220-260 seats, falling short of the 289 necessary for a majority. Alongside that, the left-wing alliance would get 180-210 seats, and President Macron’s group would be on 75-110. As a reminder, my team published a two-part guide to the French elections running through the situation and the implications for Europe (links here and here).
Ahead of Sunday’s first round vote, French assets have continued to lose ground, with the 10yr Franco-German spread closing above the 80bp mark for the first time since 2012. And in absolute terms, the 10yr French OAT was up +3.8bps to 3.26%, which is its highest level since November. That came as Germany’s finance minister Lindner said that “A strong intervention by the ECB would raise some economic and constitutional questions”. Equities also fell back, with the CAC 40 down -1.03%, meaning it’s now less than 0.4% above its low point a couple of weeks ago.
The French election is likely to be the main focus by Monday, but before we get to that, today will bring several important inflation numbers. In particular, we’ve got the US PCE inflation report for May, which is the measure that the Fed officially target, and hence is closely followed in markets. Our US economists think that core PCE should increase by +0.17%, based on the CPI and PPI data that we’ve already got. In turn, that would cut the year-on-year rate to 2.63%, the lowest in over three years. So that would be very promising news from the Fed’s perspective, but it’s clear they remain cautious given the inflation spike we had back in Q1 of this year. Indeed, that was echoed by Atlanta Fed President Bostic, who said that “It’s going to be a much longer experience and that’s why I’m preaching patience”.
US Treasuries rallied ahead of that release, as we got another batch of underwhelming data, which is increasingly becoming a theme of late. For instance, the continuing jobless claims rose to 1.839m in the week ending June 15 (vs. 1.828m expected), which is their highest level since November 2021. Alongside that, the weekly initial jobless claims over the week ending June 22 came in at 233k (vs. 235k expected). That was a bit lower than last week, but it still pushed the 4-week moving average up to 236k, which is the highest it’s been since September. That adds to several metrics suggesting that the labour market could be weakening, not least given the unemployment rate was up to 4.0% in the May jobs report. So evidence of loosening in the labour market even if there are enough one-offs in the data to give it a pass for the moment. Staying with the weaker data theme, core capital goods orders for May disappointed, falling -0.6% (vs. +0.1% expected), while a gauge of pending home sales fell to its lowest level since the start of the series in 2001. The Atlanta Fed’s GDPNow estimate for Q2 was cut to an annualised rate of +2.7% yesterday, having been at +3.0% previously. This is still decent but US data is increasingly surprising on the downside, so economic momentum still seems to be rolling over a bit, albeit from high levels.
That backdrop cemented investors’ conviction that the Fed would cut rates by the end of the year, with the amount of cuts priced in by the December meeting up +2.0bps to 45bps. In turn, that meant 10yr Treasury yields fell -4.3bps to 4.29%, and the 2yr yield was also down -3.5bps to 4.71%. Over in Europe, yields were steadier for the most part, with the 10yr bund yield down just -0.3bps. However, the consistent theme was wider spreads, with yields on French OATs (+3.8bps) and Italian BTPs (+3.3bps) both seeing larger moves.
For equities, there was a similar divergence on either side of the Atlantic. In the US, that saw the S&P 500 (+0.09%) close just shy of its all-time high, with the Magnificent 7 (+0.41%) closing at a new record. Nvidia (-1.91%) underperformed again, weighed down after underwhelming projections from chipmaker Micron (-7.12%) the previous evening. Elsewhere, the small cap Russell 2000 rose +1.00%, moving back into the green for 2024 with a +0.56% YTD advance (vs. a +14.95% gain for the S&P 500). Meanwhile in Europe, the STOXX 600 (-0.43%) lost ground for a third consecutive session, with more pronounced losses among southern European countries, including the FTSE MIB (-1.06%) and the IBEX 35 (-0.72%).
Overnight in Asia, the Japanese Yen has continued to weaken, and is currently trading at 161.07 per US Dollar, which would be its highest closing level since 1986. In the meantime, equities have continued to advance, with gains for the Nikkei (+0.76%), the CSI 300 (+0.64%), the Shanghai Comp (+0.98%), the Hang Seng (+0.56%) and the KOSPI (+0.26%). In addition, the TOPIX (+0.72%) is currently on course to close at its highest level since 1990. Looking forward, US equity futures are also pointing higher, with those on the S&P 500 up +0.23%.
In other political news, Ursula von der Leyen was nominated by EU leaders for a second term as President of the European Commission. That was part of an agreement that saw former Portuguese PM Antonio Costa chosen as President of the European Council, and Estonia’s PM Kaja Kallas as the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. However, Von der Leyen will still need to win a majority of votes in the new European Parliament, which is held by secret ballot, and in 2019 she only exceeded that by nine votes. The High Representative also needs agreement from the President-elect of the European Commission, and later on the entire Commission as a whole (including the President, High Representative and other commissioners) face a vote of consent in the European Parliament.
Finally we also saw the third estimate of US Q1 GDP just as we hit the end of Q2 for markets today. This release had a few revisions. On the bright side, the Q1 reading was revised up a tenth, and now shows growth at an annualised +1.4%. However, both headline and core PCE were revised up a tenth as well, with core PCE inflation now seen at an annualised +3.7% in Q1.
To the day ahead now, and data releases from the US PCE inflation reading for May, the Canadian GDP report for April, the flash CPI releases for June from France and Italy, along with German unemployment for June. From central banks, we’ll hear from the Fed’s Barkin, Bowman and Daly, along with the ECB’s Villeroy.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 06/28/2024 - 08:03
Published:6/28/2024 7:32:18 AM
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[World]
Another 80 Pro-Palestinian Protesters Have the Chargers Against Them Dropped
Published:6/27/2024 2:49:03 PM
|
[fiction]
10 Must-Read Books to Check Out While You Wait for Sally Rooney’s New Novel
Rooney's 'Intermezzo' comes out in September; lose yourself in these books while you wait.
Published:6/26/2024 2:09:21 PM
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[Entertainment]
Washington Post paperback bestsellers
A snapshot of popular books.
Published:6/26/2024 7:09:00 AM
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[Uncategorized]
Historic Heatwave
“we live in an unscientific age in which almost all the buffeting of communications and television-words, books, and so on-are unscientific. As a result, there is a considerable amount of intellectual tyranny in the name of science.” Richard Feynman
Published:6/23/2024 11:37:21 PM
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[Markets]
"This Is Going To Be Far Worse Than The Great Depression..."
"This Is Going To Be Far Worse Than The Great Depression..."
Via Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com,
Financial writer and precious metals broker Bill Holter has been documenting all the unpayable debt that has been building up in the financial system like cancer.
The latest black hole of default is coming from a big bank in Japan. Norinchukin Bank is selling $63 billion in Treasuries and other sovereign bonds to stay afloat. Then there is recent news announced by the FDIC that 63 US banks (the names are being kept secret) have more than $500 billion in losses, and let’s not forget about the trillions in losses sitting on the books of European banks ready to suck the world into a black debt hole. This is just a few of many on a long list of destabilizing problems that can tank the entire over-indebted financial system.
Holter warns, “The list is so long..."
"it could be a banking problem. It could be a derivatives problem. It could be a derivatives problem in the stock market, the bond market and you could see a failure to deliver in silver. Some type of warfare could crash the system. You could see warfare in Ukraine, Israel or Tiawan.
The system is so unstable, at this point, it could be anything that could bring it down.
Unpayable debt is not just a US problem. This is all over the world. Central banks are having to issue huge amounts of debt because we are in the exponential decay phase. We are exactly where Richard Russell said we would be 20 years ago. It’s inflate or die, and the only way to inflate is to create more money supply.”
Add to that the $10 trillion in debt the US Government has to roll over by the end of the year. Meanwhile, the US government piles on $1 trillion in new debt every 100 days. What could go wrong?
Holter said the last time he was on USAW that there was a little less than a 50% chance we would even have an election. Now, he predicts it is more likely there will be no 2024 Presidential Election. Holter says:
“There is no way the system, as it is now, survives. It’s mathematically impossible. So, if it is mathematically impossible, are they going to blow smoke . . . up until the day it blows up? Or are they going to do something to blow it up and then say our programs and policies were working except for XYZ this or whatever.
They have to kick the table over. They cannot allow the table to fall over on its own because then there is going to be finger pointing. To avoid the finger pointing, they have got to kick the table over.”
Holter also thinks gold is going to exponential numbers to back all the debt the USA has.
If you go with the 8,030 tons of gold the government claims is in Fort Knox, you will need a dollar price of gold at “$125,000 per ounce for 100% gold backing of the dollar.”
Holter also says, “The dollar is being pushed out of the global financial system..."
"Demand for dollars is shrinking at a time when borrowing demand is rising.” This is a going to be a disaster for America and anyone holding dollars in the future.
In closing, Holter says, “The financial collapse that is coming will be worse than anything we have ever experienced..."
"This is going to be far worse than the Great Depression simply because society itself is far worse. . . . Back in the Great Depression, you had neighbors helping neighbors. Today you will have neighbors picking on other neighbors like vultures.”
There is much more in the 51-minute interview.
Join Greg Hunter as he goes One-on-One with financial writer and precious metals expert Bill Holter for 6.22.24.
* * *
To Donate to USAWatchdog.com Click Here
Bill Holter’s website just keep getting more and more viewers, and it’s still free. It’s called BillHolter.com.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 06/23/2024 - 19:50
Published:6/23/2024 7:17:45 PM
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[Markets]
Biden Admin Asked Amazon To Hide Vaccine-Critical Books During Pandemic
Biden Admin Asked Amazon To Hide Vaccine-Critical Books During Pandemic
Authored by Steve Watson via modernity.news,
The Biden Administration pressured Amazon to hide books for sale on its platform that were critical of vaccines during the pandemic, it has been revealed.
The findings were presented by the House Judiciary Committee and Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government in documents that show Amazon reduced the visibility of titles that the government deemed overly critical of big pharma shots.
The documents show that some books were simply generally critical of vaccines, with several written by medical professionals. Some were even just reviews of scientific studies.
The Federal government compiled a “Do Not Promote” list, to which more than 40 titles were added.
In a series of X posts, Judiciary Committee Chair Rep. Jim Jordan explained how internal emails from Amazon contain employees revealed that “the impetus for this request is criticism from the Biden Administration.”
They even targeted a children’s book that they deemed to be too friendly toward the unvaccinated.
“Don’t let the Biden Admin tell you that their censorship campaign was about concerns of misinformation going viral on social media,” Jordan wrote.
He further urged “They were going after BOOKS too. This is–and always has been–about suppressing difavored views, not purported challenges of new technologies.”
There is a deep irony attached to this story in that the Biden Administration has repeatedly accused Republicans of trying to ‘ban’ books nationwide.
While in almost all of these cases, the likes of Florida governor Ron DeSantis were expressing opposition to school libraries carrying sexually explicit books aimed at children, it turns out the Biden Administration was actively working to censor books for adults.
Your support is crucial in helping us defeat mass censorship. Please consider donating via Locals or check out our unique merch. Follow us on X @ModernityNews.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 06/23/2024 - 17:30
Published:6/23/2024 5:16:45 PM
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[Markets]
Von Greyerz: As Dominoes Fall, Gold Will Stand Stronger Than Ever
Von Greyerz: As Dominoes Fall, Gold Will Stand Stronger Than Ever
Authored by Egon von Greyerz via VonGreyerz.gold,
At the end of a monetary era a number of dominoes will keep falling, initially gradually and then suddenly as Hemingway explained when asked how you go bankrupt.
Some of the important dominoes the world will see falling are: Political, Geopolitical, Currency, Debt and Investment Assets.
The consequences will be unthinkable – Social Unrest, War, Hyperinflation, Deflationary Implosion of Assets, Debt Defaults and much more.
But when things settle down, there will also be offsetting forces such as the emergence of powerful BRICS nations often backed by commodities.
Gold will play a major role during this process. Both central banks, sovereign wealth funds and investors will turn to gold as the most stable part of a crumbling system. This will lead to a fundamental revaluation of gold. As more gold cannot be produced, increased demand can only be satisfied by higher prices.
The likely result will be a revaluation of gold by multiples.
FALL OF THE LEADERSHIP DOMINO
Inept leaders and lack of statesmen are the typical prerequisites for these periods and thus one of the falling dominoes.
I have always argued that a country gets the leaders it deserves.
As we get to the end of one of the worst periods in history, both financially and morally, weak leadership exists in most major Western economies.
So, let’s look at the motley crew of world leaders and their unpopularity.
Political leaders will not only be thrown out at elections but also before their period is finished.
The recent European election is a typical example of a failed system. Most ruling parties are being rejected and in many cases parties on the right gain popularity.
Just look at the picture above from the recent G7 meeting in Italy. With the exception of Italy’s Meloni, the remaining G7 leaders have disapproval ratings of 57% to 72%.
With elections in the UK & France this year, the ruling parties are guaranteed to lose. The French Presidential election is not until 2027 so Macron could be a lame duck for 3 more years. The French people are unlikely to accept that and might force him out before then.
Whoever is elected in France, the powerful trade unions are likely to bring the country to a halt.
UK’s Sunak is one of Britain’s most ineffective leaders in history. But the new Labour Prime Minister, Kier Starmer was not even seen to stand a chance 2-3 years ago. He will not be voted in, but Sunak will be voted out by the people. Next will be a very dark period in UK history with high taxes, high debt, poor leadership and political instability and hard times.
The US situation today is even worse, with a president who seems incapable of taking any decisions. Instead, the US is led by an unelected and unaccountable group of neocons who tell the president what to say and what to do. But even that is difficult for Biden to execute. Just his recent appearance in Italy at the G7 meeting confirms that.
He can obviously not be blamed for being senile. But he should no longer have the ultimate power.
The US election is likely to be a disaster. Looking at the poor health of Biden, it is unlikely that he will stand for re-election in November. Kamala Harris will clearly not stand for election. It would not be surprising to see Hillary Clinton ushered in as the Democratic candidate. Although Trump is loved by around half of the people, he is hated by the other half and thus a very divisive choice. And a rerun of the Clinton – Trump election could easily lead to trouble or insurgence in the US whoever wins.
Germany’s Scholz’ coalition might not make it to the 2025 election due to its unpopularity and the decline of the German economy.
In summary, the political stage will be a total mess in coming years and lack of strong leadership will not only bring political unrest but also social unrest.
FALL OF THE CURRENCY & DEBT DOMINOES
The currency domino has been falling ever since Nixon closed the gold window in 1971.
With high spending and deficits on top of Debt to GDP above 100% in many nations, the West in particular is facing a very dark period with galloping debt growth and collapsing currencies.
This will lead to debt defaults, bank defaults, more printing, higher interest rates and still higher deficits.
All currencies will accelerate their debasement process.
In such a scenario, there will be no winner. It is possible that the dollar due to demand will be slightly stronger than other Western currencies at least for a period.
But a temporary relative strength of the dollar should be totally ignored. There is no prize for coming 2nd or 3rd to the bottom. All currencies will lose dramatically in real terms which means against gold.
We must remember that we are now in the final collapse of the current monetary system. Since 1971 all currencies have lost 97-99% in real terms which means GOLD!
The final 1-3% fall (100% from now) will take place in the next 3-8 years. So, yet another currency system will be laid to rest.
This one lasted since 1913 so a bit over a century. Its demise was predestined the day it was born. It was only a matter of time. As always in history, the consequences will be much more far reaching than just the death of Money.
Debt and currency collapses happen hand in hand. They are partners in crime and are the inevitable consequence of sustained government deficit spending.
After a period of unlimited currency printing, the financial system will fail partly or totally.
Political and social unrest also follows, possibly civil war.
Governments under economic pressure normally start a war or escalate an existing one to divert the attention from domestic problems. A war is also a good excuse for printing more money.
FALL OF THE ASSET DOMINO
Initially there will be high inflation, possibly hyperinflation and high interest rates. Thereafter as the system implodes, inflated asset prices in stocks, bonds, property etc will crash by 50-100% in real terms.
Most sovereign bonds (if they are printed) will serve best as wallpaper.
I rate the chances of this chain of events taking place as very high, especially in the West.
Financial, economic, political and social collapses of this kind are nothing new as they have happened throughout history, albeit not on a scale of this magnitude.
FALL OF THE NUCLEAR WAR DOMINO
Will we have a nuclear war?
We obviously don’t need to worry about this option since if we have a global nuclear war, there will be very few, if any, people left on earth.
As the world potentially moves as close to a nuclear war as it can without starting one, we must ask ourselves, WHO IS RUNNING THE WORLD?
Well, no one individual of course. But the US leadership is probably the main contender when it comes to dictating, at their whim, to any country in the world.
This can be starting wars in a country which is no threat to the US. It can be controlling the global financial system through the dollar or regulating the banking system via edicts like FATCA requiring the world to report any dollar transaction to the US authorities. It can also involve coups in countries which the US leadership finds unacceptable or even eliminating enemies.
It can be sanctions or freezing of assets against countries whose actions the US leadership disapprove. The list is endless.
What is interesting is that the US people never has a say in any of these decisions. All the actions above and many more are taken by the US president and his advisors with zero accountability to the people.
None of that would be possible in for example Switzerland where people power rules through direct democracy.
What the world should ask itself is: How does it solve the extremely serious situation the world is in?
I am not talking about the Ukrainian war which, as Trump has indicated, could be stopped within a few days if the US stopped sending weapons and money to Ukraine.
Putin recently made it clear that what Russia wants is to keep the Russian speaking areas of Eastern Ukraine and no NATO membership for Ukraine. But no one is interested in exploring this.
Instead, there has just been a peace conference in Switzerland where neither Russia nor China was present. Such a conference is a total waste of time and money.
Without two of the mightiest military and economic powers on earth, one of which (Russia) is directly involved in the war, this conference will achieve absolutely nothing.
This is just posing for the cameras with a bland meaningless statement at the end.
So instead of these useless conferences, the leaders of China, Russia and the USA should get together to end the Ukraine war and then tackle the real problems facing the world like poverty, famine, crime, drugs, debt etc, etc.
Imagine what the combined brain power and resources of these countries could achieve assisted by many more nations.
But sadly, that is a dream that is unlikely to be realised.
Much easier to print money and start a war rather than to find REAL and sustainable solutions to the major global problems that the world is facing.
So, world leaders have a choice – pick up the phone and talk to your fellow leaders or start a war.
What sane leader would choose nuclear war before a small loss of ego and peace?
WEALTH PRESERVATION FOR FINANCIAL SURVIVAL
So, what can investors do to protect themselves?
Some DONT’S are obvious, like:
Don’t keep most of your wealth in a fragile banking system whether in cash or in securities –
With many banks likely to default, it might take too long before your assets are released, if ever!
Bail ins or forced investments are likely in government securities at low interest rates and for extended periods like 10 years or more.
Don’t hold sovereign bonds –
Many governments will default.
Don’t bet on inflation reducing your debt –
High interest rates or indexation of loans might make it impossible to repay borrowings.
Don’t forget that stocks have been inflated by massive credit expansion which will end.
The list of don’ts in the biggest global debt and asset bubble in history and is of course endless.
So, some DOs could be more useful –
Do hold a lot of physical gold and some physical silver in safe jurisdictions like Switzerland and possibly Singapore outside the banking systems –
Precious metals must be held in very safe non-bank vaults, in your name with direct access to the metals.
To minimise confiscation or freezing of your metals, best to keep them outside your country of residence.
Hold a meaningful amount of physical gold and silver –
Most of our clients who are HNW wealth preservation investors have more than 20% of their investment assets in gold and with a smaller percentage in silver due to its volatility.
Gold is up 9-10x in this century in most currencies, still.
THE REAL MOVE IN GOLD AND SILVER HASN’T STARTED YET
The move away from the dollar as the global trading currency is likely to accelerate over the next few years.
BRICS countries are whenever possible settling bilateral trading in their local currencies with gold as the ultimate settlement money. This will be a gradual move away from the dollar. At some point the move will accelerate as the need for trading via another nation’s currency will be seem superfluous, especially since final settlement can be in gold.
As I have made clear many times, the US confiscation of Russian assets will lead to central banks no longer holding dollar reserves but instead gold will be the only acceptable reserve asset.
The move by Central Banks to gold as a reserve asset will lead to a fundamental revaluation of gold over the next few years to a price which will be multiples of the current price.
The major increase in demand can only be satisfied by higher prices and not by more gold since the world cannot produce more than the current 3,000 tonnes p.a.
In my 55-year working life I have experienced 2 major bull markets in Gold.
The first one was from 1971 to 1980 with gold up 25X from $35 to $850.
The second one started in 2001 at $250 and has only started a move which will reach multiples of the current price.
But my 55 years of gold history is just over 1% of the long-term bull market in gold.
Since the emergence of the fiat money system, the gold bull market is sadly more a reflection of governments’ mismanagement of the economy leading to ever growing deficits and debts. In such a system, the price of gold mainly reflects the chronic debasement of paper money.
Governments and central banks are gold’s best friend.
They have without fail always destroyed the value of fiat money, by debasing the currency through deficit spending and debt creation.
For example, in the Roman Empire around 180 to 280 AD the Denarius Silver coin went from almost 100% silver content to 0%, replacing the silver with cheaper metals.
This obviously leads to the question, why should anyone hold fiat or paper money?
Well, in a sound economy with no deficits, virtually no inflation and a balanced government budget, holding cash that yields an interest return is absolutely fine.
But the world has not experienced such Shangri-La times since 1971 when Nixon closed the gold window.
Still, even at $2,320 today, gold in relation to money supply is as cheap as in 1970 when it was $35 or in 2000 when the gold price was $300.
WEALTH PRESERVATION AND LIFE’S PRIORITIES
With the falling of the dominoes outlined above, most people in the world will experience a lot more hardship than currently.
For anyone with savings, whether it is $100 or $100 million, wealth preservation should be a top priority. Gold and some silver in physical form safely stored outside the banking system should be an absolute priority.
As we encounter difficult times, helping family and friends is more important than anything else. This will be extremely important in order to deal with the trials which we will all encounter.
And please don’t forget that in addition to family and friends, some of the best things in life are free such as nature, books, music and hobbies.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 06/22/2024 - 11:40
Published:6/22/2024 10:53:24 AM
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[Pride Month]
10 Queer Books by Queer Authors to Read Before Pride Month Ends
What these books have in common is that they share stories of bravery, love and community.
Published:6/21/2024 2:19:12 PM
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[Markets]
Price Discovery Equals Short Sales
Price Discovery Equals Short Sales
Authored by Douglas French via The Mises Institute,
Price discovery in commercial real estate, which had been frozen while sellers insisted on prices from the good ol’ ZIRP days, is starting to thaw. Real estate giant Related Companies has unloaded the property at 321 W. 44th St., New York City, for less than $50 million, reports Bloomberg.
Not only is that a 67 percent discount from the nearly $153 million that Related Fund Management paid for it in 2018, but also, the lenders, including Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, agreed to a “short sale.” For those who have forgotten 2008 or were too young, a “short sale” is when the lender agrees to a property sale for less than the outstanding amount on the mortgage. The owner loses everything, and the lender takes a large loss. In this case, the repayment to the lenders was more than cut in half as the property’s mortgage exceeded $100 million.
Another recent office building sale had Blackstone and its lender agreeing to sell 1740 Broadway for $186 million. Blackstone Inc. bought the building in 2014 for $605 million.
Pacific Investment Management Company (Pimco) expects more regional bank failures due to a “very high” concentration of troubled commercial real estate (CRE) loans on their books, Bloomberg reports.
John Murray, the head of Pimco’s global private commercial real estate team, told Bloomberg’s Laura Benitez that “the real wave of distress is just starting” for lenders to everything from malls to offices.
Ms. Benitez writes, “Contrary to some market expectations, larger banks have been disposing of some of their higher quality assets first to avoid deeper losses, according to Murray.”
That means banks are selling their best assets because they can receive prices at least equal to what they are carrying in loans on their balance sheets. There is no other reason to sell good loans but to generate liquidity.
“As stressed loans grow due to maturities, however, we expect that banks will start selling these more challenged loans to reduce their troubled loan exposures,” Mr. Murray said. Banks will take losses when these loans are unloaded, impairing capital and in some cases leading to bank failures.
Ms. Benitez writes, “The turmoil has been particularly felt among regional banks, which boosted their CRE exposure that in many cases is now worth only a fraction of their value at their peak.”
Not only are banks carrying a collective half a trillion dollars in unrealized losses on securities portfolios, but also, as Ms. Benitez explains, bank commercial real estate loan books are underwater as well.
“The combination of rising rates plus recessionary pressures creates real challenges for commercial real estate, from both a capital markets and fundamentals perspective,” Mr. Murray said.
Real challenges for the banks holding the paper as well.
Tyler Durden
Thu, 06/20/2024 - 18:20
Published:6/20/2024 5:31:59 PM
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[Democrats]
Democratic Dark Money Machine Quietly Adds Another Mystery Group to Its Ranks
It has no website, no employees, and its books are in the care of a powerful green consulting firm with close ties to the White House. It has also flooded Democratic groups with more than $35 million in untraceable cash since 2020, all while evading public detection—until now.
The post Democratic Dark Money Machine Quietly Adds Another Mystery Group to Its Ranks appeared first on Washington Free Beacon.
Published:6/20/2024 4:37:59 AM
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[Markets]
'Manufacturing Obituaries': Media Falsely Reports Noam Chomsky's Death
'Manufacturing Obituaries': Media Falsely Reports Noam Chomsky's Death
Authored by Brett Wilkins via Common Dreams,
Some popular media outlets and international political figures came under fire Tuesday for falsely reporting the death of U.S. academic and social critic Noam Chomsky, who is fighting to recover in Brazil after suffering a massive stroke last year.
"Chomsky did not die. I just spoke to Valéria, his wife," said Brazilian journalist Cauê Seigner Ameni. "He is well," Valéria Chomsky confirmed to ABC's Chris Looft. Beneficência Portuguesa de São Paulo, a hospital in Brazil's largest city, said in a statement that Chomsky was discharged on Tuesday to continue his treatment at home, according to The Associated Press.
The New Statesman ran—and subsequently deleted—a Chomsky obituary Tuesday following rumors of the 95-year-old's passing. Other outlets including Jacobin kept or tweaked Chomsky obits, with telltale signs like the word "obituary" in their URLs belying their inaccuracy.
Commentators from across the political spectrum also posted reaction—from mournful on the progressive left to gleeful among liberals and right-wingers—to false reports of Chomsky's death.
"Shameful and sad that Valéria Chomsky had to deny news of Noam Chomsky's death over the phone here in Brazil, because a bunch of places decided to publish pre-written obituaries and posts at the first online rumor," Brazilian academic Sabrina Fernandes said on social media.
"Since no outlet that reported the death decided to post an errata, it only got worse," she added, condemning "the online scoop and attention industry... waiting... like vultures."
Responding to numerous reports of Chomsky's death in the Latin American corporate media, Mexico City-based Rutgers School of Communications professor Andrew Kennis—whose book Digital Age Resistance contains a foreword co-authored by Chomsky—told Common Dreams that "it is both a fitting and cruel irony that the fundamentally flawed, trillion-dollar-valued, conglomerate-owned, mainstream news media system has once again erred in its ways."
"No, Noam is not dead. Instead, he's struggling to recover with the unflagging dedication of his partner, who transported him the first chance Noam's health permitted her to do so to receive top-rate medical care in Brazil," Kennis added.
Some observers worked the title of one of Chomsky's more than 100 books—Manufacturing Consent, which he wrote with Edward Herman—into their commentary on the false reports.
"Chomsky is NOT dead. If Chomsky was dead, he would be turning in his grave to see how quickly rumors spread and how social media functions," said Croatian philosopher and Chomsky collaborator Srecko Horvat. "He might as well still call it: 'manufacturing obituaries'."
Tyler Durden
Wed, 06/19/2024 - 18:25
Published:6/19/2024 5:45:39 PM
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[Fantasy]
10 of the Best Cozy Fantasy and Science Fiction Reads That Will Help You Escape the World
Cozy books feel like a warm hug, but that doesn’t mean their authors avoid tough topics.
Published:6/15/2024 8:08:15 AM
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[Markets]
Key Events This Week: Fed, CPI and PPI
Key Events This Week: Fed, CPI and PPI
With the (ridiculously manipulated propaganda) jobs report now in the history books, this week the whole financial world will be focused on Wednesday with two big events occurring: the latest FOMC and CPI (with PPI to follow on day later). Below, DB's Jim Reid previews the first two below but other events this week include NY Fed 1-yr inflation expectations today, UK employment data, US small business optimism and a 10yr UST auction tomorrow, China CPI and Japanese PPI on Wednesday, waking up to a mid-life crisis on Thursday alongside US PPI and a 30yr UST auction, with the BoJ decision and the US UoM consumer sentiment on Friday.
Before we delve deeper, it is fascinating to see the negative reaction of French bond markets this morning after the surprise news last night that Macron has called for snap legislative elections which will take place in two rounds on June 30th and July 7th. This is after his party trailed with 15% in the European Parliamentary (EP) elections with Le Pen's National Rally (RN) winning 32%. Although this was broadly in line with expectations, Macron is likely hoping to win back some momentum and hope a notable part of the EP results were a protest vote and also encourage other centrist parties to help rally round to limit the charge of Le Pen. His other hope would be that if RN have a bigger part in government, their appeal may diminish before the next Presidential elections in 2027. So a big gamble.
In terms of the wider EP elections the main takeaway is that even with the uncomfortable results in France and Germany, the centrist majority is holding as the far-right didn’t outperform expectations in aggregate. As the results have started to materialise the Euro is -0.44% lower as I type, at 1.0753 against the dollar, its weakest level in nearly a month.
Moving forward, Reid previews the main events of the week in more detail now. According to the DB strategist, it's not very often you have a US CPI released on the same day as a FOMC meeting and the former will certainly factor into the latest Fed Summary of Economic Projections (SEP). On Friday, a few US houses who were expecting summer Fed cuts pushed back their projections after the strong payroll number and this release will also influence the tone of the meeting. DB economists believe the new SEP forecasts are likely to revise core PCE inflation higher this year (2.8%), and move the median dot from three rate cuts to two with a desire for optionality for September perhaps the only thing preventing this moving nearer to DB's long standing expectation of a cut only arriving in December. The DB econ team also expects the 2025 median dot to move up by 25bps as well and the long-run dot to 2.75% (with risks it moves even higher).
Powell's press conference will no doubt offer nuances around any changes and will have the ability to put a dovish or hawkish spin on them. At this stage optionality will likely be preferred with little specific guidance.
May's CPI release hours earlier will cast a long shadow over the meeting. The DB Econ team expects headline CPI (+0.12% forecast vs. +0.31% previously) to come in softer than core (+0.27% vs. +0.29%), helped by declining gas prices last month. This would reduce the core YoY rate by a tenth to 3.5%, with the headline remaining steady at 3.4% (in-line with consensus). Under these forecasts the three-month annualized core rate would fall three-tenths to 3.8%, while the six-month annualized rate would remain at 4.0%. Obviously as ever rents will get a lot of attention to see if they are falling as the models suggest they should be and then for PPI on Thursday, the components that feed directly into core PCE (namely health care services, domestic airfares, and portfolio management) will be the main thing to watch.
For the Fed to cut rates in September (unlikely in our eyes), or earlier (only in an imminent crisis), inflation must fall sharply, or employment needs to weaken considerably. For the latter, Friday's payroll suggested that this will be tough to see in the data quickly enough. May's headline (+272k) and private (+229k) payroll gains were well above the +180k and +165k expected respectively with a 0.4% gain in average hourly earnings a tenth higher than expected. The diffusion index (63.4) was the highest level since January 2023 which shows that job growth has broadened out after narrow gains for a lot of the last year.
The other two big events of the week are the Chinese inflation and the BoJ. For the former, current median estimates on Bloomberg suggest the CPI may improve to +0.4% YoY in May from +0.3% in April, with the PPI also coming in higher relative to the previous reading (-1.5% vs -2.5% in April). For the latter, economists expect the target short-term interest rate to remain unchanged but highlights that the focus will be on guidance for JGB purchases. They also see changes including a reduction of the central bank's purchases from the current 6tn yen per month to 5tn yen.
Courtesy of DB, here is a day-by-day calendar of events
Monday June 10
- Data : US May NY Fed 1-yr inflation expectations, Japan May bank lending, Economy Watchers survey, April BoP current account balance, BoP trade balance, Italy April industrial production, Sweden April GDP, Norway and Denmark May CPI
- Central banks : ECB's Holzmann speaks
- Auctions : US 3-yr Notes ($58bn)
Tuesday June 11
- Data : US May NFIB small business optimism, UK April average weekly earnings, unemployment rate, May jobless claims change, Japan May M2, M3, machine tool orders, Canada April building permits
- Central banks : ECB's Villeroy, Rehn, Holzmann and Lane speak
- Earnings : Oracle, GameStop
- Auctions : US 10-yr Notes (reopening, $39bn)
Wednesday June 12
- Data : US May CPI, monthly budget statement, China May CPI, PPI, UK April monthly GDP, Japan May PPI, Germany April current account balance
- Central banks : Fed's decision, ECB's Guindos speaks
- Earnings : Broadcom
Thursday June 13
- Data : US May PPI, initial jobless claims, UK May RICS house price balance, Germany May wholesale price index, Italy Q1 unemployment rate, Eurozone April industrial production
- Central banks : Fed's Williams interviews US Treasury Secretary Yellen
- Earnings : Adobe, Wise
- Auctions : US 30-yr Bond (reopening, $22bn)
Friday June 14
- Data : US June University of Michigan survey, May import and export price indices, Japan April Tertiary industry index, capacity utilisation, Italy April trade balance, general government debt, Eurozone April trade balance, Canada April manufacturing sales, Sweden May CPI
- Central banks : BoJ decision, Fed's Goolsbee speaks, ECB's Lagarde, Lane and Vasle speak, BoE's inflation attitudes survey
Finally, focusing on just the US, Goldman notes that the key economic data releases this week are the CPI report on Wednesday and the PPI report on Thursday. The June FOMC meeting is on Wednesday. The post-meeting statement will be released at 2:00 PM ET, followed by Chair Powell’s press conference at 2:30 PM.
Monday, June 10
- 11:00 AM New York Fed 1-year inflation expectations, May (last 3.26%)
Tuesday, June 11
- 06:00 AM NFIB small business optimism, May (consensus 89.6, last 89.7)
Wednesday, June 12
- 08:30 AM CPI (mom), May (GS +0.11%, consensus +0.1%, last +0.3%); Core CPI (mom), May (GS +0.25%, consensus +0.3%, last +0.3%); CPI (yoy), May (GS +3.36%, consensus +3.4%, last +3.4%); Core CPI (yoy), May (GS +3.50%, consensus +3.5%, last +3.6%): We estimate a 0.25% increase in May core CPI (mom sa), the softest sequential pace since October. Our forecast reflects a 3% pullback in airfares and price weakness across consumer products, as indicated by Adobe online price data and consistent with Target’s announced price cuts. We also forecast a deceleration in car insurance rates (+1.0% vs. +1.8% in April) based on online price data. We assume another decline in new car prices (-0.3%) but a 1.1% rebound in the used car measure. We estimate stable inflation in the housing measures (primary rent +0.35%; OER +0.42%). We estimate a 0.11% rise in headline CPI, reflecting lower energy (-1.4%) and unchanged food prices. Our forecast composition is consistent with a 19bp increase in core PCE in May (mom sa).
- 02:00 PM FOMC statement, June 11-12 meeting: As discussed in our FOMC preview, we continue to expect the first rate cut in September, by which point we expect to have seen five straight months of better inflation news. After September, we expect quarterly rate cuts to a terminal rate of 3.25-3.5%. This implies a second cut in December for a total of two cuts in 2024, four more in 2025, and two more in 2026. At the June meeting, we expect the median forecast of 2024 Q4/Q4 core PCE inflation to rise 0.2pp to 2.8%. The GDP growth and unemployment rate projections should be little changed. We do not expect any significant changes to the FOMC statement or Chair Powell’s message. We expect the median forecast in the dot plot to show two cuts in 2024 (vs. three in March) to 4.875%, four cuts in 2025 (vs. three in March) to 3.875%, and three cuts in 2026 (unchanged) to 3.125%.
Thursday, June 13
- 08:30 AM Initial jobless claims, week ended June 8 (GS 225k, consensus 220k, last 229k): Continuing jobless claims, week ended June 1 (last 1,792k)
- 08:30 AM PPI final demand, May (GS +0.1%, consensus +0.1%, last +0.5%); PPI ex-food and energy, May (GS +0.3%, consensus +0.3%, last +0.5%); PPI ex-food, energy, and trade, May (GS +0.3%, last +0.4%)
- 12:00 PM New York Fed President Williams (FOMC voter) speaks: New York Fed President John Williams will moderate a discussion with Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen at an event hosted by the Economic Club of New York. A Q&A is expected. On May 30, Williams said, “I see the current stance of monetary policy as being well positioned to continue the progress we’ve made toward achieving our objectives… Looking at the broader context, the behavior of the economy over the past year provides ample evidence that monetary policy is restrictive in a way that helps us achieve our goals.” He added, “I expect overall PCE inflation to moderate to about 2½ percent this year, before moving closer to 2 percent next year… Overall, I see some of the recent inflation readings as representing mostly a reversal of the unusually low readings of the second half of last year, rather than a break in the overall downward direction of inflation.”
Friday, June 14
- 08:30 AM Import price index, May (consensus +0.1%, last +0.9%): Export price index, May (consensus +0.1%, last +0.5%)
- 10:00 AM University of Michigan consumer sentiment, June preliminary (GS 72.7, consensus 73.0, last 69.1): University of Michigan 5-10-year inflation expectations, June preliminary (GS 3.0%, consensus 3.0%, last 3.0%)
- 02:00 PM Chicago Fed President Goolsbee (FOMC non-voter) speaks: Chicago Fed President Austan Goolsbee will speak in a fireside chat at the Iowa Farm Bureau Economic Summit. A Q&A is expected. On May 10, Goolsbee said, “There isn’t at this time much evidence, in my view, that inflation is stalling out at 3%...we hit this bump [in Q1] and now I think we wait…I still don’t accept that we’re stuck at the last mile and that’s going to be the hardest. That’s one of the things we’re trying to determine – are we hung up at a higher level of inflation, which is what the last two and a half months say, or is that just a bump, which is what the previous seven months say?” He added, “If r-star is increasing, and maybe it is, why [is it increasing]?...My objection with the arguments that maybe r-star is changing is none of those empirical data contributions that would raise r-star have changed in the last six months.”
- 07:00 PM Fed Governor Cook speaks: Fed Governor Lisa Cook will give remarks on lessons from the American Economic Association Summer Program. Speech text is expected but a Q&A is not.
Source: DB, Goldman, BofA
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/10/2024 - 09:40
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The Military-Industrial Complex Is Killing Us All
The Military-Industrial Complex Is Killing Us All
Authored by David Vine -Therisa (ISA) Arriola via CounterPunch.org,
We need to talk about what bombs do in war. Bombs shred flesh. Bombs shatter bones. Bombs dismember. Bombs cause brains, lungs, and other organs to shake so violently they bleed, rupture, and cease functioning. Bombs injure. Bombs kill. Bombs destroy.
Bombs also make people rich.
When a bomb explodes, someone profits. And when someone profits, bombs claim more unseen victims. Every dollar spent on a bomb is a dollar not spent saving a life from a preventable death, a dollar not spent curing cancer, a dollar not spent educating children. That’s why, so long ago, retired five-star general and President Dwight D. Eisenhower rightly called spending on bombs and all things military a “theft.”
The perpetrator of that theft is perhaps the world’s most overlooked destructive force. It looms unnoticed behind so many major problems in the United States and the world today. Eisenhower famously warned Americans about it in his 1961 farewell address, calling it for the first time “the military-industrial complex,” or the MIC.
Start with the fact that, thanks to the MIC’s ability to hijack the federal budget, total annual military spending is far larger than most people realize: around $1,500,000,000,000 ($1.5 trillion). Contrary to what the MIC scares us into believing, that incomprehensibly large figure is monstrously out of proportion to the few military threats facing the United States. One-and-a-half trillion dollars is about double what Congress spends annually on all non-military purposes combined.
Calling this massive transfer of wealth a “theft” is no exaggeration, since it’s taken from pressing needs like ending hunger and homelessness, offering free college and pre-K, providing universal health care, and building a green energy infrastructure to save ourselves from climate change. Virtually every major problem touched by federal resources could be ameliorated or solved with fractions of the cash claimed by the MIC. The money is there.
The bulk of our taxpayer dollars are seized by a relatively small group of corporate war profiteers led by the five biggest companies profiting off the war industry: Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon (RTX), Boeing, and General Dynamics. As those companies have profited, the MIC has sowed incomprehensible destruction globally, keeping the United States locked in endless wars that, since 2001, have killed an estimated 4.5 million people, injured tens of millions more, and displaced at least 38 million, according to Brown University’s Costs of War Project.
The MIC’s hidden domination of our lives must end, which means we must dismantle it. That may sound totally unrealistic, even fantastical. It is not. And by the way, we’re talking about dismantling the MIC, not the military itself. (Most members of the military are, in fact, among that the MIC’s victims.)
While profit has long been part of war, the MIC is a relatively new, post-World War II phenomenon that formed thanks to a series of choices made over time. Like other processes, like other choices, they can be reversed and the MIC can be dismantled.
The question, of course, is how?
The Emergence of a Monster
To face what it would take to dismantle the MIC, it’s first necessary to understand how it was born and what it looks like today. Given its startling size and intricacy, we and a team of colleagues created a series of graphics to help visualize the MIC and the harm it inflicts, which we’re sharing publicly for the first time.
The MIC was born after World War II from, as Eisenhower explained, the “conjunction of an immense military establishment” — the Pentagon, the armed forces, intelligence agencies, and others — “and a large arms industry.” Those two forces, the military and the industrial, united with Congress to form an unholy “Iron Triangle” or what some scholars believe Eisenhower initially and more accurately called the military-industrial–congressional complex. To this day those three have remained the heart of the MIC, locked in a self-perpetuating cycle of legalized corruption (that also features all too many illegalities).
The basic system works like this: First, Congress takes exorbitant sums of money from us taxpayers every year and gives it to the Pentagon. Second, the Pentagon, at Congress’s direction, turns huge chunks of that money over to weapons makers and other corporations via all too lucrative contracts, gifting them tens of billions of dollars in profits. Third, those contractors then use a portion of the profits to lobby Congress for yet more Pentagon contracts, which Congress is generally thrilled to provide, perpetuating a seemingly endless cycle.
But the MIC is more complicated and insidious than that. In what’s effectively a system of legalized bribery, campaign donations regularly help boost Pentagon budgets and ensure the awarding of yet more lucrative contracts, often benefiting a small number of contractors in a congressional district or state. Such contractors make their case with the help of a virtual army of more than 900 Washington-based lobbyists. Many of them are former Pentagon officials, or former members of Congress or congressional staffers, hired through a “revolving door” that takes advantage of their ability to lobby former colleagues. Such contractors also donate to think tanks and university centers willing to support increased Pentagon spending, weapons programs, and a hyper-militarized foreign policy. Ads are another way to push weapons programs on elected officials.
Such weapons makers also spread their manufacturing among as many Congressional districts as possible, allowing senators and representatives to claim credit for jobs created. MIC jobs, in turn, often create cycles of dependency in low-income communities that have few other economic drivers, effectively buying the support of locals.
For their part, contractors regularly engage in legalized price gouging, overcharging taxpayers for all manner of weapons and equipment. In other cases, contractor fraud literally steals taxpayer money. The Pentagon is the only government agency that has never passed an audit — meaning it literally can’t keep track of its money and assets — yet it still receives more from Congress than every other government agency combined.
As a system, the MIC ensures that Pentagon spending and military policy are driven by contractors’ search for ever-higher profits and the reelection desires of members of Congress, not by any assessment of how to best defend the country. The resulting military is unsurprisingly shoddy, especially given the money spent. Americans should pray it never actually has to defend the United States.
No other industry — not even Big Pharma or Big Oil — can match the power of the MIC in shaping national policy and dominating spending. Military spending is, in fact, now larger (adjusting for inflation) than at the height of the wars in Vietnam, Afghanistan, or Iraq, or, in fact, at any time since World War II, despite the absence of a threat remotely justifying such spending. Many now realize that the primary beneficiary of more than 22 years of endless U.S. wars in this century has been the industrial part of the MIC, which has made hundreds of billions of dollars since 2001. “Who Won in Afghanistan? Private Contractors” was the Wall Street Journal‘s all too apt headline in 2021.
Endless Wars, Endless Death, Endless Destruction
“Afghanistan” in that headline could have been replaced by Korea, Vietnam, or Iraq, among other seemingly endless U.S. wars since World War II. That the MIC has profited off them is no coincidence. It has helped drive the country into conflicts in countries ranging from Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos, to El Salvador, Guatemala, Panama, and Grenada, to Afghanistan, Libya, Somalia, and so many others.
Deaths and injuries from such wars have reached the tens of millions. The number of estimated deaths from the post-9/11 wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Syria, and Yemen is eerily similar to that from the wars in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia: 4.5 million.
The numbers are so large that they can become numbing. The Irish poet Pádraig Ó Tuama helps us remember to focus on:
one life
one life
one life
one life
one life
because each time
is the first time
that that life
has been taken.
The Environmental Toll
The MIC’s damage extends to often irreparable environmental harm, involving the poisoning of ecosystems, devastating biodiversity loss, and the U.S. military’s carbon footprint, which is larger than that of any other organization on earth. At war or in daily training, the MIC has literally fueled global heating and climate change through the burning of fuels to run bases, operate vehicles, and produce weaponry.
The MIC’s human and environmental costs are particularly invisible outside the continental United States. In U.S. territories and other political “grey zones,” investments in military infrastructure and technologies rely in part on the second-class citizenship of Indigenous communities, often dependent on the military for their livelihoods.
Endless Wars at Home
As the MIC has fueled wars abroad, so it has fueled militarization domestically. Why, for example, have domestic police forces become so militarized? At least part of the answer: since 1990, Congress has allowed the Pentagon to transfer its “excess” weaponry and equipment (including tanks and drones) to local law enforcement agencies. These transfers conveniently allow the Pentagon and its contractors to ask Congress for replacement purchases, further fueling the MIC.
Seeking new profits from new markets, contractors have also increasingly hawked their military products directly to SWAT teams and other police forces, border patrol outfits, and prison systems. Politicians and corporations have poured billions of dollars into border militarization and mass incarceration, helping fuel the rise of the lucrative “border-industrial complex” and “prison-industrial complex,” respectively. Domestic militarization has disproportionately harmed Black, Latino, and Indigenous communities.
An Existential Threat
Some will defend the military-industrial complex by insisting that we need its jobs; some by claiming it’s keeping Ukrainians alive and protecting the rest of Europe from Vladimir Putin’s Russia; some by warning about China. Each of those arguments is an example of the degree to which the MIC’s power relies on systematically manufacturing fear, threats, and crises that help enrich arms merchants and others in the MIC by driving ever more military spending and war (despite a nearly unbroken record of catastrophic failure when it comes to nearly every U.S. conflict since World War II).
The argument that current levels of military spending must be maintained for “the jobs” should be laughable. No military should be a jobs program. While the country needs job programs, military spending has proven to be a poor job creator or an engine of economic growth. Research shows it creates far fewer jobs than comparable investments in health care, education, or infrastructure.
U.S. weaponry has aided Ukrainian self-defense, though the weapons manufacturers are anything but altruists. If they truly cared about Ukrainians, they would have forgone any profits, leaving more money for humanitarian aid to that country. Instead, they’ve used that war, as they have Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza and growing tensions in the Pacific, to cynically inflate their profits and stock prices dramatically.
Discard the fearmongering and it should be clear that the Russian military has demonstrated its weakness, its inability to decisively conquer territory near its own borders, let alone march into Europe. In fact, both the Russian and Chinese militaries pose no conventional military threat to the United States. The Russian military’s annual budget is one-tenth or less than the size of the U.S. one. China’s military budget is one-third to one-half its size. The disparities are far larger if you combine the U.S. military budget with those of its NATO and Asian allies.
Despite this, members of the MIC are increasingly encouraging direct confrontations with Russia and China, aided by Putin’s war and China’s own provocations. In the “Indo-Pacific” (as the military calls it), the MIC is continuing to cash in as the Pentagon builds up bases and forces surrounding China in Australia, Guam, the Federated States of Micronesia, Japan, the Marshall Islands, the Northern Mariana Islands, Palau, Papua New Guinea, and the Philippines.
Such steps and a similar buildup in Europe are only encouraging China and Russia to strengthen their own militaries. (Just imagine how American politicians would respond if China or Russia were to build a single military base anywhere close to this country’s borders.) While all of this is increasingly profitable for the MIC, it is heightening the risk of a military clash that could spiral into a potentially species-ending nuclear war between the United States and China, Russia, or both.
The Urgency of Dismantling
The urgency of dismantling the military-industrial complex should be clear. The future of the species and planet depends on it.
The most obvious way to weaken the MIC would be to starve it of its lifeblood, our tax dollars. Few noticed that, after leaving office, former Trump-era Pentagon chief Christopher Miller called for cutting the Pentagon’s budget in half. Yes, in half.
Even a 30% cut — as happened all too briefly after the Cold War ended in 1991 — would free hundreds of billions of dollars annually. Imagine how such sums could build safer, healthier, more secure lives in this country, including a just economic transition for any military personnel and contractors losing jobs. And mind you, that military budget would still be significantly larger than China’s, or Russia’s, Iran’s, and North Korea’s combined.
Of course, even thinking about cutting the Pentagon budget is difficult because the MIC has captured both political parties, virtually guaranteeing ever-rising military spending. Which brings us back to the puzzle of how to dismantle the MIC as a system.
In short, we’re working on the answers. With the diverse group of experts who helped produce this article’s graphics, we’re exploring, among other ideas, divestment campaigns and lawsuits; banning war profiteering; regulating or nationalizing weapons manufacturers; and converting parts of the military into an unarmed disaster relief, public health, and infrastructure force.
Though all too many of us will continue to believe that dismantling the MIC is unrealistic, given the threats facing us, it’s time to think as boldly as possible about how to roll back its power, resist the invented notion that war is inevitable, and build the world we want to see. Just as past movements reduced the power of Big Tobacco and the railroad barons, just as some are now taking on Big Pharma, Big Tech, and the prison-industrial complex, so we must take on the MIC to build a world focused on making human lives rich (in every sense) rather than one focused on bombs and other weaponry that brings wealth to a select few who benefit from death.
This piece first appeared in TomDispatch.
David Vine, a TomDispatch regular and professor of anthropology at American University, is the author most recently of The United States of War: A Global History of America’s Endless Conflicts, from Columbus to the Islamic State. He is also the author of Base Nation: How U.S. Military Bases Abroad Harm America and the World, part of the American Empire Project. Theresa (Isa) Arriola is an assistant professor in the department of sociology and anthropology at Concordia University. She chairs Our Common Wealth 670 (OCW 670) on Saipan, a community advocacy group dedicated to research, education, and awareness about military planning in the Mariana Islands. She was born and raised on Saipan and is an Indigenous Chamorro woman. Her research interests center around militarism, indigeneity, sovereignty, and Oceania.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 06/07/2024 - 23:05
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ECB Cuts Rates For The First Time Since 2019, Does Not "Pre-Commit To A Particular Rate Path"
ECB Cuts Rates For The First Time Since 2019, Does Not "Pre-Commit To A Particular Rate Path"
And so, the second G7 central bank to launch an easing cycle in the past 24 hours (the BOC was the first) is in the history books.
Moments ago the ECB confirmed that, as widely previewed and expected, it cut rates by 25bps as follows:
- ECB Cuts Deposit Facility Rate by 25bps to 3.75%; Est. 3.75%
- ECB Cuts Main Refinancing Rate by 25bps to 4.25%; Est. 4.25%
- ECB Cuts Marginal Lending Facility Rate by 25bps to 4.50%; Est. 4.50%
Commenting in its statement on the first ECB rate cut since 2019, the central bank said that "based on an updated assessment of the inflation outlook, the dynamics of underlying inflation and the strength of monetary policy transmission, it is now appropriate to moderate the degree of monetary policy restriction after nine months of holding rates steady. Since the Governing Council meeting in September 2023, inflation has fallen by more than 2.5 percentage points and the inflation outlook has improved markedly. Underlying inflation has also eased, reinforcing the signs that price pressures have weakened, and inflation expectations have declined at all horizons. Monetary policy has kept financing conditions restrictive. By dampening demand and keeping inflation expectations well anchored, this has made a major contribution to bringing inflation back down."
At the same time, despite the progress over recent quarters, the ECB noted that "domestic price pressures remain strong as wage growth is elevated, and inflation is likely to stay above target well into next year. The latest Eurosystem staff projections for both headline and core inflation have been revised up for 2024 and 2025 compared with the March projections. Staff now see headline inflation averaging 2.5% in 2024, 2.2% in 2025 and 1.9% in 2026. For inflation excluding energy and food, staff project an average of 2.8% in 2024, 2.2% in 2025 and 2.0% in 2026. Economic growth is expected to pick up to 0.9% in 2024, 1.4% in 2025 and 1.6% in 2026."
Translation: goodbye 2% inflation target.
Finally, in conclusion for those expecting guidance about more rate cuts, this is how the ECB previewed its next actions:
The Governing Council is determined to ensure that inflation returns to its 2% medium-term target in a timely manner. It will keep policy rates sufficiently restrictive for as long as necessary to achieve this aim. The Governing Council will continue to follow a data-dependent and meeting-by-meeting approach to determining the appropriate level and duration of restriction. In particular, its interest rate decisions will be based on its assessment of the inflation outlook in light of the incoming economic and financial data, the dynamics of underlying inflation and the strength of monetary policy transmission. The Governing Council is not pre-committing to a particular rate path.
Also of note, here are the ECB’s new economic projections:
- ECB Sees 2025 Inflation at 2.2%; Prior Forecast 2%
- ECB Sees 2026 Inflation at 1.9%; Prior Forecast 1.9%
Yes, the ECB raised its 2025 inflation target as it cuts rates.
Bottom line: no surprises, with the ECB cutting rates as expected, and remaining murky on the future, but the take home message is clear: any 2% inflation target the central bank may have had is dead.
The market reaction was generally as expected, with the lack of dovish guidance lifting the EURUSD from 1.0863 to 1.09 over the course of 10-minutes.
At the same time, Bund Sep'24 fell from 131.14 to 130.93 before then extending to a trough of 130.82 around eight minutes later. BTP-Bund yield spread has widened modestly from around 129bp to just over 130bp.
Equities also came under pressure: the Dax Jun'24 fell from 18739 to 18711 and then slipping further to 18686 10-minutes later
Summarizing the decision, Newsquawk writes that overall, the decision was largely as expected with the ECB cutting by 25bp and not committing to any rate path with decision ahead to be data-dependent and meeting-by-meeting. The details from the statement (see below) err on the hawkish side and as such, thus far. the ECB can be described as a hawkish-cut with data-dependence taking centre stage.
Within the statement the ECB acknowledged that the outlook for inflation has improved markedly, however despite recent progress ‘ domestic price pressures remain strong as wage growth is elevated, and inflation is likely to stay above target well into next year.' Furthermore, the ECB continues to pledge to keep policy “sufficiently restrictive for as long as necessary to attain the 2% goal. On that. HICP forecasts were lifted for 2024 and 2025 on the headline and both by more than expected, with the core views also raised as well. Furthermore, the 2026 GDP view was maintained defying some calls for a moderation.
Tyler Durden
Thu, 06/06/2024 - 08:27
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WTAF?! Jonathan Turley DECIMATES DOJ's Legal Claim About Why They Can Withhold Biden/Hur Tapes (Thread)
Published:6/2/2024 8:07:14 AM
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[Entertainment]
Show Off Your Pride with These 20 LGBTQ+ Reads
Who says you have to go outside to celebrate Pride?
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Published:6/2/2024 6:01:30 AM
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[Markets]
1 In 9 Children In The US Diagnosed With ADHD, COVID-19 A Potential Factor
1 In 9 Children In The US Diagnosed With ADHD, COVID-19 A Potential Factor
Authored by Amie Dahnke via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
Childhood attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is becoming increasingly common, with a new study revealing that one in nine American kids have been diagnosed with the condition—equating to 7.1 million children.
Many more children in the U.S. have been diagnosed with ADHD recently. In 2022, there were 1 million more cases compared to 2016, potentially fueled by the COVID-19 pandemic’s effect on children’s mental health and virtual schooling putting symptoms on display.
Pandemic Stressors May Have Fueled Rise in ADHD
The research article, published in the Journal of Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychology, provided insight into how the COVID-19 pandemic potentially influenced ADHD diagnoses. The higher prevalence could reflect “a generally increasing awareness of and pursuit of care for ADHD and/or a reflection of poor mental health among children during the COVID-19 pandemic,” the researchers wrote.
Previous studies have shown that the COVID-19 pandemic wreaked havoc on the mental and social well-being of young people, who experienced stressors such as illness and death in the family and community, changes in parents’ work habits, disruptions in school life, decreased social interaction, and increased fear and uncertainty. A 2022 study found that these pandemic-related stressors “can increase symptoms of inattention, impulsivity, and hyperactivity.”
The COVID-19 pandemic likely helped encourage an increase in diagnoses, as previously unobserved ADHD symptoms were front and center in households when children attended school virtually, according to the new study.
Conversely, during the pandemic, schools faced greater challenges in providing support for those students, “may have led more parents to seek diagnoses to ensure access to support for their child,” the research team wrote.
What It Takes for a Child to Be Diagnosed
ADHD is one of the most common developmental conditions affecting children in the U.S. In the three-year span before the COVID-19 pandemic, nearly one in 10 children had received a diagnosis. To be diagnosed with the condition, a child must exhibit at least six symptoms of either inattention or hyperactivity-impulsivity for at least six months.
The symptoms must be severe enough to be “maladaptive and inconsistent with developmental level” or negatively impact social, academic, and occupational activities, according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.
Common symptoms of inattention include difficulty maintaining attention during tasks or play, not following instructions, often losing items required for an activity or task (like a pencil for homework), or being forgetful in daily activities.
Examples of hyperactivity include fidgeting with hands or feet, leaving one’s seat in the classroom or situations where they’re expected to remain seated, or having difficulty playing quietly. Examples of impulsivity include difficulty waiting for their turn or often interrupting others.
ADHD Gender Gap Narrows
In the U.S., more boys than girls have typically been diagnosed with ADHD, but new data shows that the gap between the two sexes is narrowing. Before 2022, the boy-to-girl diagnosis ratio was 2:1, while in 2022, it dropped slightly to 1.8:1, according to the study.
Among children aged 3 to 17 with ADHD, 41.9 percent had mild cases, 45.3 percent moderate, and 12.8 percent severe. Certain factors were linked to more severe ADHD: being aged 6-11 (vs. adolescents), living in households with lower education or income levels, and having a co-occurring mental/behavioral/developmental disorder.
More white American children are diagnosed with ADHD than minority children, though the research team noted that “with increased awareness, such gaps in diagnoses have been narrowing or closing.”
Children with public health insurance had the highest prevalence levels, as did children whose caregivers’ highest level of education was high school.
ADHD in children was most common in the Northeast, Midwest, and South, compared to children living in the West.
The report notes that the prevalence of ADHD in children is higher in the United States than in other countries. The reason “may be the result of variation in availability of clinicians trained to diagnose and manage ADHD, state and local policies, and regional differences in demographic characteristics,” the research team wrote. Future research could determine the differences between clinical guidelines and practices across countries.
Tyler Durden
Sat, 06/01/2024 - 23:20
Published:6/2/2024 12:30:45 AM
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