Team cracks code to cheap, small carbon nanotubes Phys.org (CL).
Legend of Loch Ness Monster will be tested with DNA samples AP
Rice, staple food of billions, could become less nutritious because of climate change South China Morning Post
US Hurricane Clustering: A New Reality? Bank Underground
M&A frenzy stokes fear of market nearing top of cycle FT
OCC gives banks green light to compete with payday lenders The American Banker
Fannie-Freddie Overhaul Plan Is Dead for Now, Senators Say Bloomberg
Deutsche Bank plans thousands of investment banking job cuts FT
Is US Manufacturing Fundamentally Strong? Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis
How Africa’s Elites Hide Billions Offshore International Consortium of Investigative Journalists
Syraqistan
Iran’s Khamenei Likens U.S. to Cat in ‘Tom and Jerry’ Bloomberg
Netanyahu Needs Conflict to Survive Foreign Policy
Propaganda 101: How To Defend A Massacre Current Affairs (CL). Worth noting that United States elites identify with Israel far more than any similarities between the two could possibly warrant, so it’s not unreasonable to imagine these techniques being repurposed, cynically or delusionally, for domestic consumption.
Drumpf’s Complicity In Israel’s Brutal Attacks On Palestinians Is Yet Another Example Of The GOP Taking Credit For Obama’s Hard Work ResistanceHole
China?
Why China’s Payment Apps Give U.S. Bankers Nightmares Bloomberg
China’s foreign minister decries disinvitation from US military exercise South China Morning Post
Mekong River nations face the hidden costs of China’s dams Nikkei Asian Review
Brexit
How Britain’s departure from the EU stretches to mid-2020s FT
UK ups ante in Brexit satellite clash with Brussels Politico
After Windrush, will the rights of the Irish in Brexit Britain really be safe? The New Statesman (KW). “The government doesn’t seem to realise that new legislation will be needed.” No doubt.
Jeremy Corbyn: The next Labour government will abolish the House of Lords Politics
New Cold War
Flight MH17 shot down by Russian military-sourced missile, investigators conclude Independent
* * * Framing the Trump Campaign as Lackeys of Russia by Publius Tacitus Sic Semper Tyrannis. One narrative of many from the Hall of Mirrors, but Colonel Lang is neither a fool nor a patsy….
The Real Origination Story of the Trump-Russia Investigation Andrew McCarthy, National Review. And another…
A Thinking Person’s Guide to the Stefan Halper Conspiracy Theory emptywheel. And another….
Bowing to pressure, White House to host bipartisan briefing on Russia investigation The Hill
Jared Kushner Gets Security Clearance, Ending Swirl of Questions Over Delay NYT. “Mark S. Zaid, a veteran Washington lawyer who handles security clearances, said it was highly unlikely that the special counsel would uncover evidence of improper foreign entanglements and not flag it for security officials.”
* * * Exclusive: Yulia Skripal – Attempted assassination turned my world upside down Reuters. Worth reading carefully. Skripal: “I also think fondly of those who helped us on the street on the day of the attack.” Who were not, IIRC, wearing moon suits?
Yulia Skripal and the Salisbury WUT Craig Murray
CIA chief hints agency is working to change Venezuelan government Independent. No way!
The Moon is still strategic The Interpreter
Trump Transition
Pentagon Is Speeding Up Arms Exports to Saudi Arabia, Other Allies Defense One
Judge Rules Trump Twitter Feed A Public Forum, President Can Mute, But Not Block, Users Above the Law
Realignment and Legitimacy
The Conversations We Need to Have Slate. “Conversation.” We seem to be having a centrist eruption.
Centrists Are the Most Hostile to Democracy, Not Extremists (charts) NYT (FluffytheObeseCat).
The Left and Right Share a Common Enemy: Capitalists Who Corrupt Capitalism Evonnomics
America’s Version of Capitalism Is Incompatible With Democracy New York Magazine (UserFriendly).
Old Populism and the New Ideas of Michał Kalecki American Affairs
Some Preliminary Questions For MMT Steve Keen, Econintersect
Democrats in Disarray
Reuters poll shows Republicans leading generic ballot for first time The Hill (original)
#Resistance leaders warn: Patience is thin with Dems who help Trump McClatchy. A little late for that…
Which Democrats Work For Wall Street? Just Look At The Voting Records Down with Tyranny
Health Care
Democrats join Koch group to revamp veterans programs McClatchy (the VA Mission Act). Sanders to vote no. Even the Washington Monthly gets it: “The objective of the VA Mission Act is clear: further privatization of key services inside the Department of Veterans’ Affairs.”
New policy requires on-field players, personnel to stand for anthem ESPN
Class Warfare
Is Capital or Labor Winning at Your Favorite Company? Introducing the Marx Ratio The Upshot (UserFriendly). Clever (?) branding, but I’m dubious. Capital isn’t winning massively at Amazon? Really?
A lab director sets out fixes for the scientific ecosystem Nature
After Evergreen The Stranger
Anarchism: The Jesus Way Hello Gregory (UserFriendly). UserFriendly: “Written by that fired Palo Alto preacher. He’s a smart cookie, for a preacher.”
Antidote du jour (via):
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
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New frontiers in flake-o-nomics:
This is the kind of feckless posturing that passes for policy in a dying empire. The absurd diversionary tactic of labeling imported tires, axles and alternators as a national security issue requires notifying the Secretary of Defense of the dire threat.
Herbert Hoover Trump ain’t gonna win re-election by painting America as a helpless giant laid low by weaponized car parts, even as its cost-plus, no-bid defense [sic] industry systematically destroys value. Flake-o-nomics don’t pay.
It is an odd world we live in. The military drops so many bombs they are running out of them, and in danger of not being able to make moar, or enough to satisfy demand.
Kind of like having all the guns in the world but no bullets. Perhaps the F35 can be retrofitted with a bayonet mounted on the nose for $100 billion.
In lieu of dropping bombs, has the pentagon considered boulders?
They’re cheap, tend to put the hurt on whatever they hit, just slap some fins & guidance control on em’, and you’re good to go.
That’s why the Air Force Space Command is slavering to get the “High Frontier” under their control. Cut out the middlebeing. Drop little asteroids on defenseless terran surface installations from orbit. The energy delivered can be “Catastrophic.” Almost, dare we say it, “Extinctual.”
I’ve heard it claimed that iRock is a weapon of mass destruction.
And the Beat will go on til morale awesomely improves.
Beats scissors. And is here to stay!
And it’s paleo!
Yeah, well, about that 100 billion. The only way to get the F35bay deployed in any reasonable time frame is if we’re allowed to design, manufacture, assemble, test, and deploy in parallel. Otherwise, it will probably cost more (although we haven’t quite figured out just how much more, hence we’ll need a cost-plus arrangement just in case).
They are already installing a bayonet to go on the front of the F-35. Unfortunately, the software to use it will not be ready until 2025.
And yet I saw (but did not click on) a link somewhere saying that the Pentagon is speeding up the sales of arms to foreign nations. The dissonance, it burns.
Even soybeans are strategic.
‘Must grow more.’
They plan ahead, years and decades ahead, taking one step at a time. Perhaps a tiny step like trading soy beans not in dollars.
another (the real reason?) reason for growing more soy…(and corn)
http://time.com/3840073/gmo-food-charts/
because they own this part of the genome
http://www.moonofalabama.org/2018/05/hostage-video-of-yulia-skripal-released.html#more
more from the moon
The British government accusations against Russia have no sound basis. Its chemical weapon laboratory in Porton Down, a few miles from Salisbury, surely has made Novichok agents. These are simple compounds anyone with knowledge of organic chemistry and access to a decent laboratory can create. Dave Collum is professor for organic chemistry at Cornell University. He had criticized the British claim that only Russia could have produced the agent that allegedly hurt the Skripals. He put his thesis to a test. Only one of his 15 students did not manage the task
Thank God the Russians do not have all the smart chemists.
I keep wondering if the Skripal’s actually had picked up some form of botulism or ciguatera as they had been out to eat at a restaurant.
that is one speculation i’ve seen, at moa. the isolation the skripals are kept in is very odd.
I’ve been a fan of David Columm for a long time. He is a very interesting and relatively rational human being. His Year In Review column/essay published every year at PeakProsperity is always a pleasure to read, very similar to Grant William’s Things That Make You Go Hmmm… except covering much broader categories.
I’m sure this little experiment will show up in his 2018 Year In Review with some good detail. Can’t wait to read it along with his pithy commentary that goes along with it.
Pangolins: like dinosaurs among us.
Not for long among us, if the believers in traditional Chinese “medicine” have their way.
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/worlds-wanted-animal-baby-pangolin-best-friend/16240/
Here’s what I’ve never understood about traditional Chinese ‘medicine’. The Chinese seem to pirate and sell cheap knock offs of just about everything, so why is it that they must use authentic animal parts? If they sold talc as powdered rhino horn, how many people would really know the difference?
Last night PBS had an hour-long Nature program on pangolins. They are the most trafficked animal in the world. Unfortunately, they are slaughtered for their scales (used in Chinese medicine despite the fact that they are comprised of only keratin, the same protein that makes up fingernails) and flesh. They are nearing extinction in many areas.
https://www.pbs.org/video/the-worlds-most-wanted-animal-evunge/
a variant on the rape of the earth by capitalism, in this case driven by chinese medicine.
Today’s antidote is a great photo.
Whenever I hear of yet another species facing extinction, I’m horrified.
How completely stupid the human race can be, never thinking nor caring about the future, or consequences.
The full episode is very good. I had never even heard of these animals before today. Man’s Inhumanity to Earth… actually Man’s “Humanity” to Earth.
At least some in Africa, China and Viet Nam are trying to do something to stop it. Hopefully it’s not too late.
Occupied Australia:
Australia getting too friendly with Asians? The world’s self-designated policeman can’t tolerate that. So “we” have to militarize the place with some yankee occupation troops, garrisoned out of sight and out of mind from cosmopolitan Sydney and Melbourne where well-to-do feathers might be ruffled.
Thanks, Obama!
As the Mekong River nations would say, so close to our hegemon, so far from Guanyin, the Bodhisattva of compassion.
And 99 year leases are commonplace these days.
I’ll have you know that we are not Occupied Australia!. It is more a case of our political leaders, on both sides, are selling Australia out as hard as possible to the US and it is having an effect on them. Just tonight I heard a politician call another politician a ‘patriot’. To Australians, this has a really weird, creepy sound to it and you hardly hear much of this word. In fact, if you called another person that, you would probably get some strange looks from anybody within earshot.
Looking at map of our region, I seriously doubt that those bases are really about China. I think that it is more of a matter over over-watching countries like the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, etc. Being so close, it would be easier to send quiet missions and patrols to these countries. Australia may have to accept US air bases here as our own Air Force is going to be seriously handicapped for the next coupla decades. Why do you ask? Because they are going to be equipped with F-35s whereas our neighbours are starting to buy Russian fighters – and they actually work!
‘Thank you for your service!’
Rev Kev: You gotta look at the BIGGER map — the one showing all the Imperial “deployments.” http://www.visualcapitalist.com/u-s-military-personnel-deployments-country/ , and I am sure there are even better maps, like that Strava “heat map” excoriated for “revealing” those covert sneaky unacknowledged “bases” and “lily pads” where Really Tough Special Forces guys and gals go fitbitting around the perimeters…http://www.businessinsider.com/secret-us-military-bases-world-strava-heat-map-operational-security-compromised-fitness-trackers-2018-1
Those bases in Oz are just part of the “natural development” of what used to be called “encirclement” and is now better thought of as “englobement,” or “full spectrum dominance.” http://www.littlerock.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/357767/uniquely-usaf-global-battlespace/ If one could work out a map, a “geovisualilzation,” of the ability of the Empire (on paper at least) to “reach out and touch” those items on the Grand Game’s target list, from all those “installations” and “bases” and “lily pads,” https://portside.org/2018-04-14/us-military-expansion-africa-one-lily-pad-time, a set of circles that describe the tactical and strategic ranges of all those expensive weapons systems (which so often fall far short of the MIC corporate hype), and the various layers of “power projection” through corruption/finance and “regime change” and “trade domination” and so forth, one might get a better picture of what the, what shall we call it, hive mind of the Empire is contemplating. The thought processes (sic) and institutional and careerist and profit-taking drivers are all in place. And like the Evil Aliens in that silly movie, “Independence Day,” it looks a little like there’s an “embedded clock signal” in the Global Networkcentric Interoperable Battlespace system, counting down willy-nilly to that moment when all the Giant Black Interstellar Extraction Ships are in place and ready to open fire…
Not, of course, that there is any certainty that the Grand Plan of Owning and Extracting Everything Just For The Titillation and Benefit Of The Very Few, https://www.globalpolicy.org/component/content/article/153/26325.html [yaas, no doubt just a bunch of tin foil hattery, mmmhmmm) might actually eventuate… There may be a Will Smith and Jeff Goldblum to interracially and intersectionally figure out how to inject the fatal malware viruses into the Alien Internet…
I do like the lede in this article about the “lily pad” activities:
The US Military Expansion in Africa, One “Lily Pad” at a Time
Using the “lily pad” strategy of “temporary” troop deployments, the US now has an “imperial-scale” military presence in Africa. With troops in more than 15 countries the US expansion has become self-justifying. The US must now stay in Africa to protect the interests of the US military there. https://portside.org/2018-04-14/us-military-expansion-africa-one-lily-pad-time
“We invaded your sovereign nation, killed some folks, you dared to shoot back and actually killed some of our Sacred Troops! Now we have perforce to ramp up, lock and load, and put you Wogs in your place!” Same justification for so much of the Imperial englobement. What a wonderful load of self-licking coconut ice cream cones…
Lilypads… When I was in the Army we used to call ourselves human trip wires when we were assigned to places like Panmunjom, otherwise known as “The Truce Village”, or Tegucigalpa.
“China is by far Australia’s biggest trading partner.”
It’s not necessarily a good thing – it’s like saying America is Mexico’s biggest trading partner…so far from God.
The latest MH17 nonsense report would appear to be a final attempt to sabotage the Russian World Cup finals due to start in a couple of weeks. The MSM are already reporting letters from victims’ families bemoaning the fact.
Did they trace the serial number on the missile? :)
I love how the main faker said in the article declaring the debate was finished “we still have alot of work to do”.
Talk about telegraphing. Um, by “work”, did he mean “work to actually prove what we’re asserting?”
Timing is everything and I’m sure there will be more propaganda stories.
Perhaps the US should withdraw from the World Cup.
Oh wait. Never mind.
Not to worry. The US men aren’t that good at soccer. They’ll be gone long before the finals.
That was what they said about the US ice hockey team in 1980.
(Plays “the Stars and Stripes Forever,” hand over heart…)
I think they got lucky, which had happened from time to time, like the USSR basketball team in 1972.
Or, more recently, my beloved Michigan Wolverines.
The men’s basketball team had a great run through this year’s NCAA tournament. I didn’t expect to see them playing for the championship. Which proved that Villanova deserved to win the title. They are that good.
For what it’s worth, Russia may be hosting the Cup but even they will admit that they don’t have a great soccer team. They may exit soon too.
Already are gone. Hence the change in managers. The only reason we get there usually is because we qualify out of concacaf, one of the weaker regions. Failing to qualify should have been a near-impossibility.
They’re already gone before the first round even starts. They got booted in the qualifiers by that powerhouse of Trinidad & Tobago.
“What happened in China was not an even playing field,” Al Kelly, Visa’s chief executive officer, said at an investor conference in March. “What I hope happens around the rest of the world as they migrate is that at least it’s an even playing field.”
Says the head of the largest western payments oligopoly.
How completely unsurprising that the Chinese have figured out the only real “disruption” to payments processing; bypassing the bank and interchange legacy systems / processes to get as close to peer to peer as possible. The irony here is that the Chinese will happily retrofit their systems to adapt to the western processes to play the long game of taking consumers.
“China’s foreign minister decries disinvitation from US military exercise”
So I guess that someone in Washington decided that it was better having China on the outside of the tent p*ssing in.
The gradual intensification of soft yellow rain into becoming a typhoon??
The Kalecki and Keen articles are rolling through my head like a taiji ball vortexing down a hill. I’ll need to reread a time or two, but what popped from the depths of intuition when I looked for a conclusion came From Mexico:
It’s MMT for me,
and austerity for thee
Warren Moslers’s free book
http://moslereconomics.com/wp-content/powerpoints/7DIF.pdf
is a surprisingly enjoyable read (or I may just be sad) and covers the trade deficit stuff.
I read ‘Econned’, Keen’s ‘Debunking Econ’, Wray’s ‘Understanding Modern Money’ and the above over a period of just a few weeks. I am still on the recovery path – it has been close to 8 years now.
Looks like a good debate though (the Keen piece). Pleased to see them in dialogue. Sometimes I too wish Bill Mitchel might be a little less caustic – though it is often deserved.
The interview was unintelligible. Too bad. Keen seemed to be banging his head against a wall of fungibility. I shut it off but sounded like Mosler was the most logical. And I thought the BIS handled those global settlements – which implies that surplus countries eventually pay domestically by having a stronger currency and must rebalance domestically with more spending to stimulate the economy again… and all MMT is advocating is to simply spend that money into the economy as sovereign, debt-free money. I assume that Keen’s MCT is Modern Capitalist Theory. Which is hopeful given his description that his new model incorporates both money and energy into an ecology of capitalism. This must be where he travelled from analyzing debt in capitalist economies – that debt is energy transmogrified into money, or something. I’m confused. Nevermind.
Subprime on the government’s dime:
Getting Rich on Government-Backed Mortgages [Bloomberg]
Time to start pre-production on 99 Homes, Part Two – The Trumpening.
“About 9 percent of FHA loans are 30 days or more past due, below the high of 14 percent in 2009. But on average, borrowers are spending 43 percent of their income on debt payments, the highest level in at least two decades,” says the article.
Meanwhile, Bloomberg reports today that with Senators Corker and Warner having given up on a proposed bill, “the two quasi-governmental companies at the center of the U.S. mortgage market [Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac] will have spent more than a decade under federal control without an end in sight.”
Like the National Helium Reserve which fuels our strategic fleet of military dirigibles, Fannie and Freddie may soldier on for a century as wards of a Congress that couldn’t manage a lemonade stand, much less the dynamic hedging of a mortgage portfolio with constantly shifting maturity and convexity.
The take-home lesson is that the next housing crack-up is being engineered right in front of our eyes, as the final lot of unqualified
victimsbuyers is saddled with homes they can’t afford. Time for Time to drop the other shoe:I sold my Fannie Mae stock for around $59 a share in 2007, and presently it’s worth a princely $1.52, and that’s after the housing bubble not only came back, but surpassed previous highs in the aughts.
So riddle me this batman, why is Mae worth about 97% less now?
I’d ask the opposite. Why was it “worth” $59 USD back then?
The hangover hadn’t happened yet and the party was still raging, and it wasn’t common knowledge about all the NINJA & Liar Loans that had propped up the housing bubble, many of which were underwritten by Fannie & Freddie.
Yeah, and I’ll just mention that some centrist radicals hereabouts scowl mightily at me when I denigrate the “Confidence Fairy.” It seems I’ve crossed some ‘inclusionary’ line.
Your use of ‘hangover’ suggests that the ‘players’ in those markets back then were inebriated in some sense, or lack thereof. Otherwise, I’d just hate to think that there were cynics running the casino back in ’07.
Dividends. They stopped paying them to prop up AHA.
Somebody had 8 years to try to the housing market , why not call it the Obamaning?
OCC gives banks green light to compete with payday lenders The American Banker
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Some years ago we were walking down the main drag in Hurricane, Utah (pronounced ‘hurry-kin’ by the locals) and there was a payday lender with a clipping from a SLC newspaper on the front window that had them @ the lowest rates in the state @ 312% apr, versus 946% being the highest.
They were proud of being the least usurious shylock in the beehive, ha!
“Flight MH17 shot down by Russian military-sourced missile, investigators conclude”
In other news, investigations found that it was the Spanish that sunk the USS Maine in Havana Harbour and the Vietnamese did in fact attack US warships in the Gulf of Tonkin.
I almost perished aboard KAL 007, nearly 35 years ago.
I was on a KAL flight from LA to Anchorage to Seoul the next day, as luck would have it.
The only thing that happened was that i’ve never seen so many help yourself to a snappy cocktail beverage carts in the aisles of an airplane before or since. Everybody was acutely aware of what went down, and KAL must’ve decided on drinks, to calm our nerves.
Nothing untoward occurred obviously, as i’m here to tell the tale.
I knew of someone on that KAL flight.
I had to fly US Airways out of Pgh the day after 427. Was so sad in the airport. Understandably, the employees really couldn’t even make eye contact.
I remember that flight well. I was stationed on the border at that time and had a few friends with relatives on that flight including my Korean Language teacher’s brother-in-law as well as a Korean pilot friend who was on that run the previous year. He was a wreck for awhile after that. She wasn’t in good shape either.
It was pretty devastating at the time. The entire country was on lock-down for three or four days. Seoul at the time was the 7th largest city in the world and I had never seen a city that large in complete darkness at night. I mean complete, no lights on anywhere, no auto traffic, no street lights, nothing. Very eerie.
Our rifles were our only bed partners for a week.
The South has a much more obvious and important reason for reunification than most here can even imagine.
Also, Iraq did in fact take babies out of incubators in Kuwait before the first Gulf war, and did have yellowcake and other WMD in 2003 before the next Gulf war.
“Casus belli?” Because we’re the United States of America, home of the CIA and the biggest baddest Military Industrial Complex. Make America Go To War Again (MAGTWA)
What’s so implausible about some Russia-backed militants making a mistake? Still not a reason for the U.S. to back Ukraine…
One of the reasons there’s a debate is that the same make of missile was in use by Ukraine’s military. However, my take has always been that much of the blame lies with those who directed a civilian plane to fly over a warzone with an active air-bombing campaign.
And maybe that is why the Ukrainians have made the recordings of the air traffic controllers over their airspace on that day unavailable. Less awkward this way in case they were deliberately ignoring the internationally circulated cautions about commercial overflights in that area in order to specifically direct commercial air flights across the area of potential peril. Gotta get the fish in the barrel first, and then…
Now that the Supremes have shot down labor, the concept of Labor Day seems outdated.
We need a snappy new moniker for the end of summer…
Any proposals?
Here’s a few suggestions:
Proletariat day
Plebian day
Serf’s day
Pay day (the one day a year where you get paid the equivalent value that you bring the company)
Everyday American’s day
Nonunion day
Right-To-Work Day
I’m confused. Will we be kneeling to our new overlords or not? I hear you can get fired for that. Maybe we will have to bow like the Nipponese.
Not just bowing or deep bowing, but prostrating.
A big sticking point for the first British diplomatic mission (McCartney Embassy) to China was about the nine prostrations before the emperor.
Close, Wukchumni: Right-To-Labor Day
Wait, wait – why not just call it “Capitalism Day”?!
And have all the brilliant entrepreneurs take a well-deserved day off.
National Razor Day.
Laird’s Demise Day ?
Paidfamilyleavehahahayoumustbejoking Day.
Associate Day
Team Member Day
Account Executive Day
Return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Lg4gGk53iY
Oh. I was really expecting a Loan Arranger joke. /godblessclaytonmoore
‘Elites Day’. Be proclaimed that on this hallowed day all onderlings will happily serve their overlords with even greater displays of devotion and exertion to further ‘The Cause’.
Then it should be :
“Bend over and grab your ankles” Day
Same As Every Other Day.
Or how about ‘Labor Day’ with those mothers delivering on the appointed date, getting an unlimited supply of free diapers?
Very Zen.
Thus the saying in Chado, “Everyday is a good day.”
No one (day) is more special than others.
Mandatory Arbitration Day
Just Die Already Day
Anthropomorphically speaking, the little tomatoes in the garden know they will soon be eaten alive by some yoga practicing vegetarian, (not an easy, peaceful way to go for sure), but they hold on strong.
That ought to inspire us.
How about bring back Saturnalia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturnalia) from Romans days again though that was held around December. The Romans turned into party animals and you would have things like masters serving slaves, gambling everywhere and rampant overeating and drunkenness became the rule. It would be great!
so…friday.
Assets Day.
Human Capital Day
I’m sure we’ll think of lots more.
Re the Keen article, Keen may be confounding prescription and description. I don’t recall Mitchell recommending trade deficits as a policy goal. Mitchell may be taking it for granted that to run a trade deficit you have to have a counterparty, and counterparties have ideas of their own. If trade deficit policy has only worked for the U.S. (as seems likely), it has worked brilliantly. How many millions of iPhones has the U.S. obtained, in exchange for only a number, typed up in a Federal Reserve, or maybe a Bank for International Settlements, computer? It’s only lately that the wheels have started to loosen, and we get questions like how many soy beans you have to have to swap for an iPhone.
The emphasis I’ve seen in MMT is on development and growth issues. We’ve seen third-world countries starve their populace in order to grow cash crops for export. Mitchell just finished a series on Timor-Lese, now facing policy choices that may lead down that road, or others.
I think Keen is better off connecting trade deficits explicitly to the global reserve currency status.
And being its sole issuer means you have no need to peg your money to another monetary sovereign’s.
These two statements are simply descriptions of what is. There is no recommending nor any need of it.
I have a hard time finding fault with Keen’s argument. It’s the same reason why the IMF and World Banks insistence that every country try to run a trade surplus is bonkers.
And no, for the record, our trade deficit has not worked out that well for the US. We may have lots of iPhones, but we’ve also lost a lot of jobs. Most of us would rather have the jobs, thank you very much.
I think the key bit is MMT replacing NAIRU with a JG where taxation is used for upper or lower bound deflation – inflation vs natural [tm] anything. Ideological friction unfortunately is a mill stone here.
CAD is a hot button topic I find for those with more sound or hard money leanings [Keen did say “debt-free”], can’t even get past the Reserve Currency dynamic with some or any of the histrionics around it, not to mention the propensity for surpluses baking in the next recession – Rubinomics post wages and productivity diverging [demand] and government savings. Yet distribution [PK] is only via political pork starving broad investments thingy and then when the market does one of its “animal spirit” fueled party’s in lieu of…..
Still, when I quire on what is a reasonable time frame for CAD dynamics to work itself out I never get a reasonable response.
I guess I’ll still agree with PK on EMH where the the market is dynamic and rarely if ever in equilibrium; markets might be above or below equilibrium level at any given time.
Yet none of this money business [crankery] sorts out a cornucopia of other economic laws and theories which are baked into the misleadership class and unwashed collective thoughts.
In other thoughts why do people spend a packet on an RE referb and to save a few bucks decide not to repaint areas or walls – press panel ceilings ad hoc in the planing stage… only to cave at the last moment. It costs more in the end and really messes with the dead line.
Ummm… homo economicus – ????? – aesthetic force majeure – ????
Which is more important to most people: their job, or the price of cheap plastic widgets?
I think its a bit more complicated.
Without getting into CT its been argued with data that CBs were fighting a non existent inflation bogeyman due to previous monetarist leanings which then went neo – new Keynesian or quasi monetarist. In addition the increasing dominance that equity played in everything from executive remuneration to offsetting income for the middle class, unwashed wage earners, and pensioners.
As far as your question goes I would proffer people would like access to basics which knowlage and resources currently have to offer whilst attempting to deal with all the foible this mortal journey has to offer.
It’s a terrible idea making people stand for the anthem. Rather than a patriotic display of love for nation and its principles, it’s reduced to merely a display of coercion and power imbalance.
You’re definitely NOT free to sit or kneel for the national anthem!
I read somewhere how this caper of having the players come out for the national anthem was only introduced a coupla years ago and before that, they waited in the locker rooms. Don’t know how true this is.
Yes, that’s true.
https://sports.vice.com/en_us/article/yp89dj/stephen-a-smith-points-out-nfls-paid-patriotism-problem
https://thinkprogress.org/nfl-dod-national-anthem-6f682cebc7cd/
Sadly this what we have become
I’m OK with it, it being not more demanding than the requirement that we must use Federal Reserve paper with ‘IN GOD WE TRUST’ on it.
Ok with it, but not necessarily loving it..
And are kids still standing and putting their right hand over the heart while reciting the pledge of allegiance every morning at school, as if they’re all potential traitors and saboteurs. Any day might stick the lord’s prayer back in the routine.
I think they do that in the army. You get up in the morning, raise the flag and salute to it.
Speaking of which, as being a solider is a job, does OSHA inspect battlefields for dangerous working conditions?
Maybe add “Hail Caesar! We who are about to die salute you!” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ave_Imperator%2C_morituri_te_salutant
And then circulate some credentialed bureaucrats among them to have them fill out and sign Truman Loyalty Oaths: President Harry S. Truman signed United States Executive Order 9835, sometimes known as the “Loyalty Order”, on March 21, 1947.[1] The order established the first general loyalty program in the United States, designed to root out communist influence in the U.S. federal government. Truman aimed to rally public opinion behind his Cold War policies with investigations conducted under its authority. He also hoped to quiet right-wing critics who accused Democrats of being soft on communism. At the same time, he advised the Loyalty Review Board to limit the role of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to avoid a witch hunt.[2] The program investigated over 3 million government employees, just over 300 of whom were dismissed as security risks.[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_9835
What is profoundly stupid is believing that the only way to “demonstrate” against [fill in the blank] is to insult the people who, by watching television, pay you millions per year.
But on the other hand, it shows how few avenues are available to enable protest in these United States.
Few, in or inside the United States.
More, I understand, if one becomes an ex-pat.
Works for me…I scream at people all day long on the internet hoping to affect a change!
Becoming an ex-pat can be in and of self a protesting act.
some of us must instead drop out in place
https://wulfzendik.wordpress.com/drop-out/
And yes, I thought he was a lunatic when I met him, some 25 years ago(so was I,lol), but it’s hard to argue with his diagnosis, today.
There are lots of ways to protest. You can do it, unmplested, and probably without need of permit, on many street corners, as i just watched in nyc.
Ah, if you want a national bully pulpit for your protest, that’s different. Are you being handsomely paid for your time as you protest? At a higher rate than min, even higher than 15/hr? In this case it might be reasonable that your employer prefers you not offend many of the millions that are paying so handsomely, one way or another, for your time.
I’ve been protesting silently for decades now, by not watching TV.
And I think about protesting violence in small ways, like not profiting from violent sports games personally.
I like ‘protesting violence.’ It is so ambiguous.
The concussions can make one feel woozy or things ambiguous.
The players are protesting that black people often can’t even merely exist unmolested by police on street corners. Only those responsible or complicit in that molestation need feel offended.
Can’t agree with your logic here. The employers in this case are deliberately politicizing a sporting event by playing the anthem and requiring players to engage in a compulsory demonstration of blind loyalty which may conflict with their personal beliefs.
If the owners want to avoid political statements at their events how about not playing the anthem and discontinuing those paid-for advertisements for “saluting the troops”?
The Yankees (I know, different sport) used to have cops prevent fans from leaving their seats to go to the rest rooms or concessions stands while they gratuitously played the jingoistic, theocratic anthem “God Bless America” during the 7th inning stretch. They were forced to stop that practice (harassing the fans not playing GBA).
Oh right.
He doesn’t have enough money to pay for an ad in WaPo or the NYT.
He cannot write (or hire someone to write) a Letter to the Editor and, most likely, no editor would publish a letter from an NFL star.
To repeat myself, he elected a course of action that was stupid.
Did you ever consider that what the players are protesting is being forced to stand for the anthem or the playing of the anthem at all – that is, forced politicization of a sporting event along with a compulsory display of blind loyalty that is in conflict with their personal views?
What about Olympic sporting events?
Not simiply a matter of some one person who just won an event, but glorifying the nation, playing the anthem, and raising the flag?
Ask Tommie Smith or John Carlos about that one.
But not too many followed up, after Mexico City.
I have not watched the Olympics since, I think, 1990, or maybe even earlier.
In contrast, more people than eve watched the last one, I assume.
Still, I recommend boycotting that, and not buying stuff online requiring shipping. Instead, buy local.
Also, don’t watch TV, and avoid chain stores. Go to places where you can actually talk to the entire ownership and management.
And avoid going to NFL games and watch a little as possible, if you must.
aye! and growing a bunch of tasty vittles and giving half of it away is a revolutionary act, as well.
One cucumber at a time.
and, it occurred to me, while i was chasing the geese and thinking about today’s NC threads: why do people still bank at…say…wells fargo or BOA?
I had a BOA checking account a long time ago…then a bounced paycheck made a bunch of my checks bounce and it took me homelessness, 3 years and a record as a “thief” to get out from under it.BOA was less than helpful.
Now I only bank at the local one, where I know the president and the owner…and where they live,lol.
Both of them also know that everyone knows them and where they live…which I think is a sort of preventative measure to skulduggery.They know that their houses would burn.
reckon this is as it should be.
so why do people continue to do business with such known criminals?
Also, avoid buying those expensive jerseys.
No one cares about Letters to the Editor anymore. Whereas doing something on TV, that will get noticed. Oh, I’m sorry, a bunch of the braindead audience were ‘insulted’ by it? Tough freaking luck. They might have to engage their brains for once.
American football is already intrinsically a political and propaganda affair, and has been for a long time. The hypocrisy of complaining about a player using it as a platform for political protesting when the USAF regularly performs flyovers of games is breathtaking.
if you mean the players, they aren’t insulting me, they are supporting something i believe in, and they are using the same platform the nfl/military partnership used to sell the propaganda.
I think if a player knees to protest, say, the bank bailout, I would probably say, ‘Good. Thanks.’
Though, afterwards, I might ask myself, the millions protested as well, but they still bailed them out. And I might ask, ‘Should we move from protesting to something else?’
we can multitask.
Except we don’t.
Mass protests are not everyday occurrences. A lot of people are angry still about the bank bailout, but few gather to protest.
Most are doing something else regarding that.
And we are made busy with other crises, like, Global Warming for example.
Which is to say, that
1. You protest, once or a few times.
2. You raise awareness
3. You move on to implement action plan
If you just
1. protest
and
2. protest
and
3. more protest, and nothing else, people will ask, why? Is this virtue signalling? Or protest for the sake of protest?
I believe with kneeing, we should be ready to move past just protesting. The issue has been made known.
people still sat at, and got arrested, for using facilities restricted to whites only, even after the issue became known. there were still demonstrations for civil rights, even after the issue became known, witness the march on washington. and people worked on overturning those laws, simultaneously, so, multitasking.
Don’t assume all, or even most, of the people who follow the NFL are “insulted” by the players’ protests.
I am a frequent commenter on a website for a popular NFL team. By far the majority of the fans on that site support the players right to protest, and a large percentage disagree with the entire premise of playing the national anthem before every game in the first place, much less requiring the players to stand for it. As noted below, it is relatively recent development that players are even on the field during the anthem. Commenters have also suggested a cessation of flyovers. Not everyone believes it is appropriate to turn a sporting event into a propaganda opportunity.
In September, 2001, following several national tragedies, football and baseball games were cancelled or suspended.
Sports and national security can be linked in a non-intuitively direct way like that.
Then we have the ceremonial first pitch. In the Wikipedia page, there is a list of the presidents throwing out the first ceremonial pitch of a game.
World champions are often invited to the White House…that’s another one to think over.
they’re being linked in a monetary way, and the players are effectively leveraging that to get their message to a lot of people.
They are linked to money.
For example, there is a lot of money in the World Cup. Players wrap themselves with flags. And when a country wins, the whole nation (maybe not everyone) goes wild, as if the event is of great national significance. The little people pour out unto streets waving their flags and singing their national anthem.
For the players, they will get a lot of money too.
A few days later, they will parade publicly, and all the politicians will come out, surrounded by flags, and more patriotic songs, and they will make speeches about the nation, its greatness, etc.
That’s the best time to make a statement, take a knee.
the players have already had some effect, and can continue to. i think they should continue to draw attention to the issue, and perhaps more issues, because they are uniquely well situated to do so.
I believe they were raising an important (police brutality, especially against African Americans).
But it seems they got distracted. And we are now, here, talking about paid patriotism/propaganda (which is an important issue as well), and freedom of speech.
So, there is the stay on focus issue (multitask).
And with freedom of speech or protest, you get a permit to march down a street. But it’s harder to get permit to do that for 30 days, or 1 year straight. So, that you were able to knee for one or 10 games would negate to a degree the freedom of speech issue. The larger problem is that the effectiveness of saying (silently – that is another problem) the same over and over again. You can have the same message, but you do well to keep the listeners’ attention by varying your delivery or words.
The fist raising in 1972 is a good example. You do it once, and the impact is more powerful. People will always remember that. You do it all the time, it risks of becoming commercialized or monetized.
Beyond that, you have to have action plans. I see more good things done off the field, after the initial kneeing. You have players given money. There are a lot of rich players, and sadly, money talks. There is an article on today’s links about the value of teaching minority teens to code. That’s one action with concrete material benefits. With the awareness raised, they can add to the money they have with additional donations.
That’s where they or we should be at…Instead, I think towards the end of the last NFL season, it became a ‘because you want us to stop, we will not stop’ kind of test of will to see who would triumph, because freedom of speech, and nothing about the original message.
What would happen if black-sympathetic players stood with their backs to wherever the team-owners were sitting? What would happen if black-sympathetic players raised a black power fist while standing? What would happen if black-sympathetic players did both at once?
And of course concerned team-members or even entire teams could stay in the locker-room or wherever till the antheming was all done.
I think that this made a better and more direct point-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1968_Olympics_Black_Power_salute
About the nanotubes research:
I know research is costly but it still irks me a little about the need to lock things up in patents for a long time to recover the costs. If I were to guess then the research would not have been done if relying solely on private funding. And if I were to make a second guess then my second guess is that the ones making the discovery aren’t going to be the ones making the most money out of their discovery. Interesting to see how a society values different activities, if we were to approximate the valie with who gets the money then it might seem that society values some unexpected people/behaviour.
The general rule of thumb in the inventing game is that the people who underwrite the commercial production of a new invention get the lions share of the profits.
Another aspect of invention is that often, the really useful ways for a discovery to be used are not at all obvious at the beginning. Later tinkerers make add on discoveries and run with them.
True. And the difference between the public and private sector is:
-an employee in the private sector will not get much, if any, benefits from a patent. IP generated while in employment is owned by the employer
-an employee at a university (at least partially) funded by the government can apparently take the generated IP into private ownership. Possibly the university gets part-ownership.
I’m not sure if government funded research should be given away for free but if the government through taxes (or through the Magic Money Tree MMT) funded the research then there is at least an argument that the government should retain control of the IP.
Who cares about the Precautionary Principle, when there’s Vast Profits To Be Made? “Carbon nanotubes dangerous to the environment,” http://thefutureofthings.com/4077-carbon-nanotubes-dangerous-to-the-environment/
And of course it seems that nanotubes can be as carcinogenic as several types of asbestos fibers. http://earthsky.org/human-world/when-nanotubes-are-dangerous
But hey, never let any of us stand in the way of The Next Big Thing…https://www.technologyreview.com/s/406893/facing-the-dangers-of-nanotech/
Re: the Reuters poll indicating that the R’s have a slight lead in the generic polling.
Considering the trend in this type of polling over the last 6 months, and the lack of a D response, I have to say that we are very near the same kind of situation we were in the primaries of the last election cycle. In that the D’s are squandering their lead and ignoring a situation which could burn their fingers.
I expect that they will continue down the path they are on and come midnight election day there will be a lot of tears and hand-wringing going on about how the voters did them wrong again.
They will be crocodile tears so long as they accomplished the primary goal of keeping progressives from power. Only blue dogs need apply to dccc for assistance… donors don’t give a rats ass who wins if the choice is blue dog or rep. Following such contests all dem losers will cry all the way to their bank.
from the Anarchism Jesus Way blog post:
1. This is unbelievable;
2. so I looked it up;
3. it turns out it is not exactly true but the degree of exaggeration may be both innocent and harmless;
the news report: Vandals target 12 Stone Church locations, causing nearly $10K in damages (Fox 5 Atlanta)
According to Fox news the broken windows were on the street not on a Starbucks franchise inside the church. The news doesn’t mention Starbucks at all, although I don’t have any problem believing that an Atlanta church has a Starbucks franchise inside so I did not check that detail. 12 stone is the name of the church and the number of locations was two, not twelve.
Anybody know the actual facts regarding the Starbucks angle? I cannot imagine the satanists on top the Starbucks management chain are eager to have their brand connected with a church even if it is in Atlanta and they pull 400K a year in sales.
https://12stone.com/questions/#toggle-id-1
Apparently the church operates a cafe that serves Starbucks products.
Good find there HL. I wonder if they know the Starbucks logo has female nipples this close -><- to being bared, save for the temporary vagaries of the ocean current when the mermaid was posing for the illustrator?
Sounds kinda like the Sparrows of King’s Landing having a go …
Diplomacy:
Yet another example of how the two Koreas likely could reach an understanding, but for the third-party yankee occupiers who won’t leave and won’t get out of the way.
Flake-o-summits don’t pay.
A bullshitter in a China shop
He’s the Bizarro-Obama. Obama would go into negotiations with his final offer, then bargain down from there. Trump and Bolton won’t start negotiating until all their demands are conceded in advance.
Trump, Bolton and now Pence shooting off his mouth. Aren’t Vice Presidents only supposed to go to funerals? Seems NK did the unforgivable in Trump’s book by criticizing Pence’s statements. Surely Trump’s first and biggest mistake was in picking Pence for VP. Even before being elected he thereby surrendered to the Blob.
Rumors abound that the monied interests who own the GOP are gearing up to replace Trump with Pence in ’20, now that Trump has played his part and kept everyone distracted while the federal government suffers a silent plutocratic coup. Let us not forget that Pence is and always has been a creature of the Kochtopus, and given the contrast between his style and Trump’s it’s not farfetched to consider he was put on the ticket for just that reason.
After four years of Trump, what sensible Republican voter wouldn’t be more than happy to give their vote to the handsome, polite Mr. Pence in a primary?
And if Sanders gets the DemParty nomination, what sensible Clintonite voter wouldn’t be more than happy to give their vote to the handsome, polite Mr. Pence in the general election in order to avoid voting for the Head Bernie Bro in Chief?
Too bad he’s not more obsessed with winning a Nobel Peace award.
The ‘what’s in it for Trump’ analyses are still good, I think. We are getting to know what he likes or doesn’t crave all that much.
Yes the two Korea make peace happen with Russia and China standing behind them to make it happen. Then maybe South Korea will ask Amerika to remove all troops and Navy from their country then rent space to both China and Russia.
That exploding sound we hear is boltons head;-)
Oh well, another Dear Jong letter.
Gee whiz. What a stunning surprise.
The United States does not want the Koreas to reach an understanding.
Bolton’s reference to Libya and its fate was entirely intentional.
When I saw what Trump wrote this morning I let out an audible moan.
Most of the time he talks he reminds me of a spoiled, schoolyard bully, full of bluster & pompous.
After this latest from him, I can’t get the image out of my head of a bully with a super-soaker confronting a boy with a water pistol while in a lyrical voice taunting “My gun’s bigger than youuur gun.”
Aarghhh…
Really? It seemed way weirder than that to me. He acts like NK cancelled the summit, not him? WTF? It’s like one of those unexpected love letters that guys, and it’s always guys given this particular idiom, write to a woman who never even was under the impression she was in a relationship.
I felt a wonderful dialogue was building up between you and me, and ultimately, it is only that dialogue that matters. Some day, I look very much forward to meeting you. In the meantime, I want to thank you for the release of the hostages who are now home with their families. That was a beautiful gesture and was very much appreciated.
If you change your mind having to do with this most important summit, please do not hesitate to call me or write.
I’m no poker player, but is this another bluff, by acting weird?
Is there a self-help book called “How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Embrace Brinkmanship?”
Anyone who has ever had a close relationship with a narcissist, especially a malignant narcissist, has no problem at all with that apparent confusion. The cardinal rule of narcissism is that it is always the other guy’s fault.
Could you imagine WW3 starting, on account of Mike Pence being insulted?
Wait just a minute there. When you insult Pence, you are insulting G-d!. It says so right in the RNC Book of Prayer.
So, when President Pence assists with laying the Cornerstone for the Third Temple in Jerusalem, don’t you expect anything less than the fulfillment of Scriptures, lots of them, from all over the place.
Well, the propaganda has already started.
U S ambassador and picture of third temple, Haaretz: https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/u-s-ambassador-to-israel-pictured-with-image-of-jerusalem-third-temple-replacing-muslim-mosques-1.6112357
Lawrence Lessig Evonomics article is good and commonsensical. What he is getting at is that corruption is the central problem of our capitalist paradise. The excellent BBC In Our Time podcast recently did a show on Tocqueville and talked about Tocqueville’s puzzlement over a country devoted both to democracy–which according to classical thought requires a spirit of “virtue” or honesty and civic mindedness–while at the same time being completely devoted to the pursuit of money.
Not much has changed, and current culture doesn’t even pay lip service to virtue. Rather, telling lies and working the system to your advantage is viewed as a sign of one’s cleverness. Some might even call it The Art of the Deal. In this age of irony honesty is seen as quite corny.
Lessig gives an analysis but not much of a prescription about how campaign finance and other corrupt institutions can be reformed. In fact this may not be a job for social theorists since what needs to change is not so much the system as ourselves. It could be time for corny ideas about honesty and unselfishness to make a comeback. Liars to the Gulag.
“Is US Manufacturing Fundamentally Strong?”
I really do not know about this article. I was reading an article on RT at https://www.rt.com/usa/427593-pentagon-report-munitions-bombs/ about the problems that the Pentagon is having with the industrial base supplying weapons to the military. In fact, there is now a high reliance on imports of weapons parts from overseas countries like China. As an illustration of other problems, weapons like the Sidewinder and AMRAAM air-to-air missiles may not be able to be manufactured before long due to chemicals that will soon be no longer produced. These are not temporary problems but are structural problems in how weapons manufacturing is done in the US. My point is that if this is the case of an industry of vital concern to US national security, then how true would it be for the rest of the manufacturing base? I reckon that this would be more of a worry than stopping foreign produced cars into the US on national security grounds.
True rare earth round magnets are now made only China and Russia. They are used in the guidance systems. The plant that made them in Amerika was sold and shipped out of the country over a weekend to China during big dogs potus days.
The Rome of manufacturing was not dismantled in one day.
Trump might be the first to confront it, but it will only to be harder in the future.
The FDA lists dozens of drugs as “currently in shortage”:
By contrast, the US is totally saturated with vehicles. It got along for five years (1941-1946) with zero domestic auto production and no imports, as all auto plants were converted to weapons manufacturing.
Invoking “national security” as an all-purpose carte blanche for evading WTO obligations will sink the global system into Trump-style autocratic discretionary chaos.
According to BofAML’s Michael Hartnett, “South Korean export growth, a notoriously good global cyclical indicator, has turned negative for the first time since 2016.” Here’s his chart with visual proof:
As the Orange Charlatan pursues his bogus “auto parts are the health of the state” protectionist aggression, he’s setting up the global recession in 2020 which will make Herbert Hoover Trump a reviled one-termer.
You say that like it’s a bad thing. Even we sometime Trump defenders are giving up.
They should all be reviled, not given monumental buildings in Chicago parks.
Coming soon to Chicago, on priceless city parkland, successfully preserved for kids from political grifters for more than 100 years — until, that is, the community organizer won the pre-Nobel.
The BOAT ! Barack Obama Adoration Temple, thanks to John Kass.
No library therein, by the way. Too messy for a proper temple.
Tinfoil Hatt types think that this is a trial run for the Third Temple in Jerusalem.
Just when we think we’ve gone as far down as it is possible to go.
The site renderins appear as some kind ersatz Star Trek set to me ..
From the FDA list:
The world’s greatest health care system. JF[amilyblog]C.
If that’s the sterile irrigation water made by Baxter, I’m going to take a wild guess that’s from a location in Puerto Rico.
Concentrating production (of anything) in one place (or country) is best avoided.
The first thing the bad guys (those Russians, for example) do will be to seize it.
Bernie really going after Bezos
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VRdyZgD3GI
Saw that yesterday….it brightened my day….
I saw it too. Bezos’ comments about putting his moolah-moolah into space travel were a classic example of cluelessness.
Fantastic work by Sanders’ staff on that one.
It’s a kid of pre-emptive strike against the “but, but, those billionaires invest in lots of wonderful, innovative products, we NEED them to do this” argument.
That argument just got buried.
F-ing spaceships!!!!
FDR never fantasized about space travel.
I think Kennedy was the one who wanted to go to the Moon. From Wikipedia:
Is it a case of us Luddites opposing progress now – the ‘progress of all people?’
“not because they are easy, but because they are hard; because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one we intend to win”
It is striking rhetoric. Whenever I recall that speech, I think ‘any politician who goaded us to action like that today would get lynched.’
Then I think, ‘Oh wait…’
“We’re going to Mars!!!”
(We don’t have politicians like that, but billionaires are our new heroes.)
Dubya Bush announced a mission to Mars, which was remembered for maybe four minutes…
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2018/05/23/town_hall_question_to_pelosi_if_trump_colluded_with_russians_why_hasnt_there_been_any_proof_after_a_year.html
Anyone up for watching Nancy Pelosi lie like a rug??????
Make sure to watch to the end where she suggested your vote might get “distorted by a foreign power”.
Wow, that’s breathtaking in its awfulness!!! That’s the fakest of fakenews I’ve seen….well, maybe this week…
Anyone up for watching Nancy Pelosi lie like a rug??????
Reminded me of the old joke:
How can you tell Nancy Pelosi is lying?
Her lips are moving.
I’m surprised the NC links did not include the Repubs call for a new special counsel.
So Donald gets elected; he says pursuing the Clinton crimes “is not a priority”; the Obama DOJ concocts Russia-Gate; and after two years of considerable patience, grudging cooperation, tweetstorms, and forlorn hopes that the DOJ can actually act in a non-partisan manner, Team R finally says “you want to go there? That’s how you want to play it?” OK here goes:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XR97EgcihlU
The list of crimes sounded pretty comprehensive to me, they even got Uranium 1 in there, the Clinton “Foundation”, and of course the Top Secret memos on the homebrew servers in Chappaqua. I noticed the use of the term “obstruction of justice” and “destruction of evidence”. That’s 30 years. Only thing I could see missing was 1 MDB in Malaysia, you know, where the nation’s leader received a transfer of $689 million dollars to his personal account as a “gift”.
The Foreign Policy article on Netanyahu is spot on and it worries me a lot too having seen this kind of thing in Russia when Putin reacted to growing opposition in 2011-2014 by becoming much more assertive (or aggressive if you want) abroad. And it was a tremendously successful pivot for him, his support has grown and stayed high
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2018/05/23/former_cia_officer_john_kiriakau_john_brennan_and_robert_mueller_set_out_to_ruin_people.html
Tucker Carlson crushing it again….John Kiriakou interview…
Shocking details about Brennan
Thank you, JGL.
It’s a pity that Fox is no longer aired in the UK cable and satellite, so one has to watch online.
It’s amazing that Carlson is one of the rare journalists on MSM.
Agreed, good interview, but I had to laff (sic) when Carlson transitioned to his next story with, “(paraphrasing) Democrats intend to impeach the President should they win back control of the House next year.” Uh, yeah, sure, THAT’LL happen.
“Germany’s largest bank to cut over 7000 jobs.” Are they finally going straight?
https://sg.news.yahoo.com/deutsche-bank-slash-over-7-000-jobs-major-064256295.html?guccounter=1
Thank you, Tom.
My employer’s AGM was certainly eventful as per https://www.theguardian.com/business/live/2018/may/24/deutsche-bank-slash-7000-jobs-city-markets-ftse-sterling-business-live. It was getting tasty, literally and metaphorically. If only the food at work was as good.
With regard to your question, is that rhetorical? I hope RB Houghton chimes in as he had some witty analysis of banks on the Torygraph business blog just before the paper went behind a paywall.
Thank you, Troy, even.
Wish i knew what to think about Marcy Wheeler. She was great at live-blogging the Scooter Libby trial but it seems like she has changed during and since the 2016 elections.
I don’t have the time to go through her analysis, though I did read part of the article. The comments section is harsh of anyone who questions Marcy’s research and understanding. After listening to George Webb (and I don’t know truly who the heck he is) it seems like there is a lot more information out there than the press is covering. Who do you believe these days?
I hear you. Much as I love Marcy and the wheelers I can hardly read them anymore. If one doesn’t follow her daily it’s likely one will no longer be able to see the ocean for the algae. That said, Publius Tacitus at Sic Semper (and comments of course) is my go-to guy with limited time on these matters.
I don’t think it’s necessary to believe anybody or form an opinion about matters like this. I’ve never understood why people are pressured to have an opinion about everything. It’s not going to change the outcome of the presidential election. Nor will it dictate the course or policies of the Trump administration anyway. I must admit that my opinion isn’t heavily influenced by other people on this subject.
Before I knew about the Steele dossier I already had British intelligence pegged as a primary culprit behind the undermining of Trump’s presidency. The question was always who was going to potentially lose the most from a Trump administration. With all his talk of America First and NATO being obsolete combined with Brexit I reach my conclusion and recent developments have only served to reinforced it,
Publius Tacitus makes a pretty good case that he readily admits is circumstantial at best. That said, I like this take for no other reason then the fact it provides ammunition to taunt the FBI with. It’s popular among their lot to label leftists as “useful idiots”, but who’s being manipulated by a foreign intelligence agency? Somebody needs to teach the G-men a lesson along the lines of…
Nations don’t have friends. They have interests.
I thought Publius’ case was, at best, vaporous. There’s a certain plausibility, as you note, but one picture does not a case make.
I imagine that we’ll find out more that’ll bring some clarity as time goes on. We’re living through a particular moment where the American state is heavily divided and busy fighting against itself. Want an example? It’s just like CIA-backed Arab/Turkomen Islamist/Jihadist rebels fighting Pentagon-backed Arab tribal and Kurdish socialists in Syria.
The various narratives offered by journalists like Greenwald and Marcy are little more than professional sniping, That doesn’t mean they aren’t acting in good conscience.
I’d also like to point out that the recent Post on (redacted for the lulz) involved his enthusiasm for privately meeting with foreign students and teachers while he was working at Cambridge. Which doesn’t sound like something a talent scout or recruiter would do… right?
‘I already had British intelligence pegged as a primary culprit behind the undermining of Trump’s presidency’
Haven’t thought about it but the three countries mentioned with Russiagate -the US, the UK and Australia – are all members of the Five Eyes. I wonder if Canada and New Zealand will put in a special appearance before it is all finished?
Neither Canada or New Zealand are suffering from a geopolitical crisis which would motivate such a desperate and opportunistic undertaking. The NSA, and presumably the other SIGINT agencies in the Five Eyes, has been reluctant to give their public endorsement of this cluster—-.
I don’t really think that anybody in the US intelligence community has the brains and backbone to initiate something like this either. Clapper and/or Brennan were probably convinced that something was going on that worth investigating. I don’t believe in the cupidity of McCabe with all his private talk of an insurance policy though.
That sounds like Publius’ confirmation bias and/or institutional loyalties at work.
Don’t know about NZ, but Canada is not really a powerhouse, spy-wise, and in any case our PM, Mr Trudeau the Younger, could not possibly be more accommodating. Not in the sense of being America/GB’s poodle, heavens no! Poodles are smart and known for doing things their own way, ‘master’ be family blogged. Our Justin is more like a Labrador puppy.
Of interest since this is a topic around here.
https://arstechnica.com/cars/2018/05/emergency-brakes-were-disabled-by-ubers-self-driving-software-ntsb-says/
Perhaps Uber should have stolen more of Google/Waymo’s tech (alleged by Waymo).
Rumblings of another UK general election.
That’s what I admire most about the British system of government. They can ditch their government at any time. It’s rare but it can happen.
Its hard to see it happening – who wants an election? The Brexiters know May is under their control so its not in their interest – ‘moderate’ Tories fear letting in Corbyn, while Corbyn probably knows the timing isn’t right. From what I’ve seen of the polling, another election would probably just end up with a fairly similar Parliament, although likely with the DUP weakened.
If I were a sensible Tory, I would be falling over myself to stick Jeremy Corbyn or indeed, anyone else, with this monstrous Brexit baby.
Saritha Prabhu writes at The Federalist:
“I’m A Democrat, And The Left’s Russia Gaslighting Scares Me More Than Trump Does”
See my pelosi link above for a particularly egregious example of her gaslighting.
I’m a leftist and the Democrats’ Russia mania appalls me, but the Federalist is an extremely right wing outlet, and, as constantly pointed out in the twitterverse, doesn’t reveal its funding.
A Son Speaks Out by Moses Farrow
http://mosesfarrow.blogspot.com/2018/05/a-son-speaks-out-by-moses-farrow.html
This is tragic and painful to read but absolutely credible and worth your time. I had no idea that three of the Farrow children committed suicide: Tam in 2000, Patrick in 2009, and Thaddeus in 2016.
He’s spoken of this before but not in such detail. All who would defend Mia should read.
There’s a lot of accusing going on these days and not as much proof. Morgan Freeman is the latest #me too target. But the freely circulated and believed accusations against Allen are particularly bad. He is casually accused of a major and quite heinous felony.
yeah i was kind of creeped out by his relationship with his adopted daughter (i’m still not sure how i feel about that, but there’s nothing illegal about it; families are weird) and i was initially inclined to believe there was a fire there, with so much smoke, but this is looking more and more like a frame to me now.
From the article by Moses:
“Even people who doubt Dylan’s claims of assault, often cling to Woody’s relationship with Soon-Yi as justification for their skepticism about him. The public attacks on Soon-Yi by complete strangers still stagger me, as does the general misinformation that so many people consider fact. She is not Woody’s daughter (adopted, step, or otherwise), nor is she developmentally challenged. (She got a master’s degree in special education from Columbia University!) And the claim that they started dating while she was underage is totally false.”
i never saw the allegations about being challenged, but it was widely reported she was his stepdaughter (and iraqi wmd’s were widely reported, too, i just didn’t routinely expect the msm to get routine facts wrong en masse at the time i read them). this article is changing my conceptions about the case, and i’m not clinging to anything; as a longtime allen fan, i didn’t want to believe the allegations in the first place.
apparently she was 21 when they began the affair, during allen’s marriage to soon yi’s mother, mia farrow, and that ended his marriage.
2 things are clear about Woody Allen from his movies (really all I know about him):
1st, that he is obsessed with moral boundaries and those who step over them. Granted, this is a fundamental source of drama, but he’s made it his own. For a tangential example, there is “Bullets Over Broadway,” clearly written to make people laugh when someone gets murdered. As indeed they do.
2nd, that he is also obsessed with dangerously young women – which Mia Farrow was not, when he was involved with her. The movie with Mariel Hemingway is an outstanding example.
His affair with Soon Yi combines them: she was much younger, dangerously so; and he stepped right on a moral line, without quite falling over. It could be one of his movies. Oddly enough, apparently they’ve made something of an ideal couple. Go figure.
For a further irony, Mia Farrow’s first marriage was quite similar.
Woody Allen and Mia Farrow were never married and they didn’t live together.
you’re right, never married, never lived together. it was an unusual relationship, committed, but very definite boundaries.
Even that is unclear. Mia has insinuated more than once that Ronan/Sachel may not be Woody’s biological son. She has a history of boundary issues herself (Previn) So who knows.
The really disturbing part to me is the tragic deaths of three of her children.
yes, i had never heard that before, as i had not heard moses’ story.
Thank you for that – I was only vaguely aware of the abuse allegation, but although it is only based on his screen presence I have always had a difficulty in seeing Allen as a predator of any sort, whereas Farrow has always struck me as being someone on a very short fuse.
:<
(though I am on a low carb diet…avoiding as much as possible rice, pasta, bread, soba, ramen, etc).
Eating brown rice, instead of white rice, can remedy that a bit.
Here’s my note to Steve Keen re his article:
Steve, I think both sides in your trade-deficit article about MMT miss the important point that the Trade Balance is NOT the overall payments balance.
The U.S. deficit for over 50 years has been mainly military in character. The private sector was just exactly in balance in the 1950s, 60s, etc. Foreign aid generated a surplus (of debt repayments, as the “aid” took the form of loans). Military spending was what pumped dollars into the world economy.
Increasingly, countries need US dollars to pay their foreign loans, which are dollar-denominated. This drains their economies (think of German reparations after WW I, and Inter-Ally debts).
U.S. payments deficits pump dollars INTO the world economy. Other countries save their currencies from appreciating by recycling them to the US. And the ONLY thing that China and other dollar recipients can do is to buy US Treasury securities. (The US won’t let them buy US companies or many kinds of exports.) So the US has to issue Treasury securities to provide a vehicle for foreign governments to hold – and to hold down their own currency exchange rates.
Michael
Didn’t know this. Thanks for your posts, always informative.
Wonder if it remains true this century.
“Framing the Trump Campaign as Lackeys of Russia by Publius Tacitus Sic Semper Tyrannis.”
While I love the idea that Mifsud was a British intelligence plant, I see no actual evidence for it. All he’s got is one photograph of Mifsud standing next to an actual British spy at an international academy, published in an article that has since been mysteriously taken down. In fact, the sudden disappearances, of Mifsud and of information, are the best evidence he’s got. Otherwise, I see nothing.
Hurricane statistics are a lot like stock market statistics. There are relatively few secular cycles so the statistics are still quite rough. For example, there are only a handful of examples of major bull and bear markets in the US markets because it generally takes 20-30 years for an entire cycle to run its course. Similarly, by the time you look at climate impacts like El Nino and La Nina, there are only a few cycles of those since 1950 when there started to be good data on hurricanes. The best analogy to Sandy is probably the Long Island Express of 1938. Similarly, Irma is like the Keys hurricanes of the 1930s. Galveston was obliterated @ 1900 by a hurricane that nobody knew was coming until the wall of water showed up.
However, the biggest variable in insurance damages isn’t the hurricane statistics, but instead the massive coastal development putting lots of expensive properties in harm’s way. Swamps were essentially designed to be hit by hurricanes but filling them with expensive real estate creates an insurance industry disaster. That was the lesson of Andrew – the insurance industry was caught totally unprepared as their claims histories vastly underestimated the insurance hit of all of the recent construction. https://www.iii.org/sites/default/files/paper_HurricaneAndrew_final.pdf
So in this day and age, property damage from hurricanes is essentially a voluntary activity except for where there are essential services (e.g. commercial fishing) where you have to be located by the water.
About Sergei Skripal, ” who betrayed dozens of agents to Britain’s MI6 foreign spy service, ”
Isn’t that “dozens” of logical suspects, independently of any government involvement? Were any of those betrayed agents in Britain at the time?
o “Team cracks code to cheap, small carbon nanotubes | Phys.org” — As cool and potentially useful as the tech is, I fear that widespread use of such highly electrically active (in terms of making electrons do funny, interesting, useful but potentially also harmful things) nano-materials may well lead to a pollution nightmare as they, like certain persistent chemicals, pervade all aspects of the global environment and food chain.
o “Legend of Loch Ness Monster will be tested with DNA samples | AP” — Great, but good luck getting a cheek swab!
o “Flight MH17 shot down by Russian military-sourced missile, investigators conclude ” Independent” — As with Reuters’ “U.S. fighter jets intercept Russian bombers in international airspace off Alaska” which I fwded to Yves last week, interesting to see these kinds of “this is news?” (or in this case, “they’re still trying to peddle this conclusion-fixed-around-prescribed-narrative BS?”) headlines. If one didn’t know better, one might almost surmise that the digital-ink-stained wretches in the western MSM have a mandated weekly quota of ‘Scary Russians!’ propaganda to fill.
o “CIA chief hints agency is working to change Venezuelan government | Independent” — It’s an interesting exercise to see how many nations can plausibly be interchanged with ‘Venezuela’ in the headline. And of course in the wake of the 2016 election the list also includes the U.S.! Our dear CIA, as ever working hard to keep the world safe not for, but from, democracy. Iran ’53 is only one of many entries in the agency’s regime-change-scalps collection.
o “The Conversations We Need to Have Slate. “Conversation.” We seem to be having a centrist eruption.” — Would that “conversation” be about the need for “healing”, perchance?
o “New policy requires on-field players, personnel to stand for anthem | ESPN” — Seeing as how the NFL has worked so dilgently to turn itself into the Pentagon’s sports-based military propaganda arm, I actually find the new requirement rather fitting. Why should the servicemembers marching in military parades and such be alone in having their first amendment rights curtailed?
If the players have to stand for the national anthem like good soldiers, shouldn’t the actual soldiers have to play football?
Only the top soldier, the commander-in-chief gets to carry the (nuclear) football.
The rest will just block for him.
Subject: Quis custodiet ipsos custodies?
US troops dropping acid while they guard the Minutemen:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/security-troops-on-us-nuclear-missile-base-took-lsd/ar-AAxJoPD?ocid=spartandhp
And their officers, meanwhile, are cheating on their competency tests that determine their fitness to hold, and turn, the keys to the Gates of Hell:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/01/30/nuclear-test-scandal-air-force-missiles/5056115/
Lucidity in the Sky with Daimons .. indeed !
“Is Capital or Labor Winning at Your Favorite Company? Introducing the Marx Ratio The Upshot (UserFriendly). Clever (?) branding, but I’m dubious. Capital isn’t winning massively at Amazon? Really?”
Well, it’s a nation of plantation overseers, I keep saying. Some of the articles we’ve seen on Amazon corporate, anyway, seem to suggest that the people hired there say they want to work constantly, think work-life balance is a fiction, are keen on competitive pressures, etc. Crying at work might be unfortunate, but ends justify means.
A Marxist might call this false consciousness. Sort of the same problem with democracy. Most of us, Marxist or otherwise, want to impose our own definitions of democracy upon the political body rather than accepting the simple “will of the people” as democracy. But in a democracy if people think they’re free, then they are.