"Japan Mixed The Batter, The Fed Will Bake The Cake..."

Via SchiffGold.com,

Americans are already struggling to feed their families and pay their bills, but having predicted every US recession since 1960, the steepening bond yield curve is speaking loud and clear that an “official” downturn is nearly inevitable. With bond prices on the rise as the Fed looks increasingly likely to cut rates in September, the yields are going down and the inverted curve is finally leveling out after an epic two-year inversion. 

And with stocks now crashing around the world, global uncertainty is rocketing upward in a “Black Monday” event, especially as dizzyingly volatile Japan struggles to contain its post-ZIRP doom loop. In other words, the storm may be arriving in earnest.

The yield curve represents the difference in interest rates between long and short-term bonds, and every time it steepens after becoming inverted, a recession soon follows. It’s become a popular indicator because of its surgical accuracy, and because it tends to flash clear and reliable predictions before other datasets can do the same.

10-Year Treasury Constant Maturity Minus 2-Year Treasury Constant Maturity

Source: Bloomberg

Even the Federal Reserve admits that thus far, the yield curve crystal ball has never failed. While there are some different yield spreads that one could observe between bonds of varying maturities, recessions tend to hit when the curve flattens and the Fed cuts interest rates - precisely the current scenario.

Unemployment numbers and equity prices are important as well, and last week, data showed that unemployment has gone up, triggering the “Sahm Rule” - a formula which has predicted the majority of recessions since it was devised in the 1950s by Federal Reserve alumnus Claudia Sahm.

As a general statement, unemployment has been trending upward again since 2022, in the fallout of the COVID-19 spike.

Source

For Sahm’s part, she recently published a substack post downplaying the significance of her indicator in the context of the current market, but as indicated by the yield curve and other trends, it’s far from the only warning sign.

Stock markets also flashed a sea of red last week, with Japanese stocks now tumbling further in the worst day since 1987 and the global sell-off, especially in risk assets, is intensifying. The stock market is not the economy, and as for the jobs reports, those numbers can’t be trusted — but if anything, the real employment data is even worse than indicated by official claims.

And if history is any indication, the inverted yield curve tells no lies even as government and Federal Reserve data seek to paint as rosy a picture as possible to reassure markets and continually justify the academic expertise and professional necessity of central bankers.

So does that mean we’re in for a “hard landing,” or a soft and gentle recession? 

It isn’t just up to the Fed — chaos in Japan and beyond is fueling global economic chaos, forcing the Fed’s hand. The epic supply of liquidity injected into the system in the past several years has helped fuel a post-COVID asset rally, stunting the effects of the Fed’s rate hikes. But it also means that lowering interest rates now, and causing the money supply to increase even more, is increasingly likely to cause inflation to run utterly amok when consumer prices are already cripplingly-high.

However, a rate cut is all but assured now that a global sell-off is triggering panic. There’s likely to be panic either way, so the Fed might as well intervene with an emergency rate cut (or two) to try to save the system — which will, at best, kick the can down the road, and at worst, fuel further madness that ripples through the quivering world economy like a shockwave. 

The Japanese implosion gives the Fed no choice but to cut, and cut hard — Japan mixed the batter, the Fed will bake the cake, and the people of the world will now have it stuffed down their throats.

Tyler Durden Sat, 08/10/2024 - 08:10

Ukraine Demands Mexico Arrest Putin At Presidential Inauguration 

Ukraine has issued a formal request for Mexico to arrest Russian President Vladimir Putin if he travels to Mexican soil for the inauguration of the country's new president Claudia Sheinbaum.

The request comes after on Tuesday it was widely reported that the Mexican embassy in Moscow confirmed that Putin has been issued an invitation to attend the swearing in events. 

"The Russian President will decide whether he will participate in the ceremony himself or appoint another high-ranking official to do so on his behalf," the embassy was quoted in Reuters as saying.

The invitation went out despite the Hague-based International Criminal Court (ICC) having issued an arrest warrant against Putin in 2023. Interestingly, Mexico is a signatory to the Rome Statute, which requires member states to enforce the rulings of the ICC.

To be expected, Ukraine is livid, with the Embassy of Ukraine in Mexico emphasizing that Putin is a "war criminal" and that Mexico must pursue his arrest. The embassy issued a fresh statement calling Putin and the whole spectacle of the invitation "shameful":

"This shameful crime will be one of the many reasons why Putin, along with the rest of the Russian military-political leadership, will one day have to stand trial for launching a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, sanctioning shelling, shooting, torture, rape and robbery of the Ukrainian people. And for now, we believe that the Mexican government will in any case fulfill the international arrest warrant by handing it over to the UN judicial body in The Hague."

However, Mexico's foreign ministry has defended its actions by telling Reuters that "the government had sent diplomatic notes to all nations with which it had relations, as well as international organizations of which it is a member, inviting them to Sheinbaum's inauguration."

The inauguration of President-elect Sheinbaum will take place on October 1, and the Russian Embassy in Mexico has confirmed that it had received the invitation. Upon Sheinbaum's victory in the June 2nd election, President Putin congratulated her and said he looks forward to more years to come of positive and cooperative relations between Moscow and Mexico City.

It didn't take long for Mexico to respond to the Embassy of Ukraine:

Outgoing Mexican president, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, told reporters at a press conference on Thursday that the country would not arrest Putin if he did visit, adding: "We can’t do that. It’s not up to us."

While it is unlikely that Putin will travel to Mexico given everything that's happening related to the Ukraine war, he's likely to make Western officials sweat a bit by not announcing his intentions until just before the event.

Tyler Durden Sat, 08/10/2024 - 07:35

UK's Night Of The Ghost Fascism

Authored by Charlotte Gill via The Critic,

Did you know that the UK defeated fascism on Wednesday? Blink and you might have missed it, but newspapers were swift to record The Battle of Britain, August 7, 2024 — history ready to be clipped and filed away, handed to the grandkids one day. 

“Night anti-hate marchers faced down the thugs”, ran The Daily Mail’s front page, The Times’ equivalent reading “Thousands take to street to confront far right”. Lisa Nandy, the Culture Secretary, took to X to proclaim:

“The history of our town is working class people who have driven the far right out of town over and over again for 100 years. Our community sent that message again last night.”

But where was this “far right”? The existential threat that had been so valiantly “driven out” by groups such as “Grannies Against Fascism” and the legions of millennial hipsters that had gathered in Walthamstow? 

Earlier that day the borough’s MP Stella Creasy delivered a video message on X. Sporting large shades — perhaps hiding weary eyes; the sort Churchill might have had ahead of D-Day — she updated locals on “how to get home safely tonight”. In spite of the hazardous conditions, probably not dissimilar to those experienced by Londoners during the Blitz, Walthamstow’s warriors later braved the outdoors to show fascism what for. 

Their fortitude was all the more commendable given the endless stream of TV broadcasts about tens of far right units deployed to different parts of the UK. ITV’s Paul Brand spoke of 6,000 police officers “on standby”, while shops boarded up their windows. Taking to X, one brave soldier, by the name of “Paddy Tofu”, wrote “The last time I actively stood against the fash was in my 20s”. He confessed that, now in his 50s, he felt less confident in his combat skills. “Still going tho”, he ended. That’s the spirit! As Vera Lynn put it,  “we’ll meet again”!

But as Paddy Tofu stood on the frontlines, shoulder to shoulder with his courageous comrades, the Far Right appeared to have gone mysteriously AWOL — and with it, reality too. To anyone with fully-functioning eyesight, there were, at most, handfuls of unsavoury souls dotted around the country. Some of the Far Right — “four or five”, reported Pink News — reared their fascistic heads in Brighton. Photos of them being confronted by “anti-fascists” didn’t exactly look like the Allies (hypothetically) storming into Hitler’s bunker. The Far Right Four (or five?) gave the impression that one or other of them might say “Tommy Robinson tells it as it is!” after a few pints and own a Princess Diana mug. But was this “the Far Right” aka members of a growing and vast network of fascists? Going on headlines alone, you might believe Wednesday saw the thwarting of the “Brighton Anschluss”.

These days I do tend to wonder how many modern “anti-fascists”, some sporting balaclavas (the surefire sign of being on the right side of history), know about World War II and other periods they invoke. We are warned more about history than ever before — yet almost always with the effect of minimising it. The meaning of words — fascism, Nazi, far right — have been totally rewritten.

At the helm of this revisionism is the Establishment — the media and a Government that lied and continues to lie to Brits about how big the far right threat is. The Labour Party is quite prepared to conflate teenage boys smashing the window of Greggs (as happened in some of the riots) with the few extreme ideological right-wing nutters Britain has, should it help boost “far right” numbers.

Exaggerations around the size of the far right are hardly new. In 2023, a report commissioned by the Conservative government warned that Prevent (the UK’s counter terrorism service) “has a double standard when dealing with the Extreme Right-Wing and Islamism. Prevent takes an extensive approach to the Extreme Right-Wing, capturing a variety of influences that, at times, has been so broad it has included mildly controversial or provocative forms of mainstream, right-wing leaning commentary that have no meaningful connection to terrorism or radicalisation”, whereas it has increased the threshold for Islamist extremism. It’s noteworthy that, in 2021, referrals for Extreme Right-Wing ideology were higher than Islamist referrals (25 per cent and 22 per cent, respectively), even though Islamist extremism is still the UK’s largest threat — by far.

Often it feels as if the diversity paradigm has been embedded into counter-terror strategy; as though, in trying to seem inclusive and determined to combat “Islamophobia”, the authorities, media and politicians “overcompensate” by exaggerating Far Right numbers (“LOOK HOW MUCH WE CALL OUT THEM TOO!”).

But where was the Far Right yesterday, and in general? Does this neo-Nazi collective have a name or lair? A “Far Right Caliphate”? Could members be deradicalised from whatever it is they’ve been programmed into? These are the questions that won’t be asked, never mind answered, by the Establishment, desperate to have its “big, bad wolf”, even though lack of one should surely be a cause for celebration.

The Establishment’s hyping up of “the far right” is not only a type of “misinformation”, but dangerous on multiple fronts — not least as a pretext for mission creep, whereby anyone guilty of mildly conservative sentiment could be next in line for Starmer, who needs to prove a “Far Right” collective, soaring in size. 

Inaccuracy also affects how counter-terrorism resources are allocated, leading to blindspots in what people the security services decide to monitor. It could mean an intelligence agent was taken off a research project about, say, the extremist Islamic militia Ansar al- Sharia, to study men who follow Tommy Robinson on X. 

I mention this militia specifically because, in 2012, Khairi Saadallah, a Libyan asylum seeker who “was trained to fight and fought (for a period of at least 8 months), as a member of the now-proscribed group, went on to murder three men who’d met in a Reading park (2020). The swift manner in which he executed his victims, indicative of the fact he had been trained to kill, was commented upon in sentencing remarks.

Saadallah was referred to Prevent four times and known by intelligence services, but never deported back to “unsafe” Libya. Cases like his are surely most pressing for the political class to consider. But Starmer is preoccupied creating 500 new prison spaces for rioters.

In any normal era, politicians and the media would admit that Wednesday was the product of hype — understandably among normal people, who had witnessed the riots over the weekend, but with suspicious credulity among our political and media classes. Yet in any normal era news outlets/ MPs wouldn’t have been so misleading about the scale of the Far Right in the first place. Thugs, however violent, racist and mad, are not the same thing as the fascistic collective they spoke of — as though its size and strategy were parallel to Daesh’s.

Instead, a new narrative was spun about Wednesday. It was a victory for the anti-fascists, said a media apparently modelling itself on North Korean broadcasting. Nothing was said about a “fake list” of rioters nor HOPE not Hate’s Nick Lowles spreading unfounded rumours of an acid attack on a Muslim woman. Meanwhile the country has been locking up “the far right” while releasing people convicted of crimes up to and including manslaughter.

A real confrontation with authoritarians may be sooner than we think.

Tyler Durden Sat, 08/10/2024 - 07:00

Climate Fear-Mongering Fail: Great Barrier Reef Sees Third Record Year Of Coral Growth

Authored by Chris Morrison via DailySceptic.org,

Massive increases in coral across the Australian Great Barrier Reef (GBR) have been reported for 2023-24 making it the third record year in a row of heavy growth. Across almost all parts of the 1,500 mile long reef, from the warmer northern waters to the cooler conditions in the south, coral is now at its highest level since detailed observations began. The inconvenient news has been ignored in mainstream media which, curiously, have focused on a non-story in Nature that claimed “climate change” poses an “existential threat” to the GBR.

“The science tells us that the GBR is in danger – and we should be guided by the science,” Professor Helen McGregor from the University of Wollongong told Victoria Gill of BBC News. 

The existential threat is “now realised” reported the Guardian.

Travelling back from the reality inhabited by the Guardian, it can be reported that last year’s gains were eye-catchingly large. On the Northern GBR, hard coral cover leapt from 35.8% to 39.5%, in the central area it rose from 30.7% to 34%, while in the south it went from 34% to 39.1%. The report is the result of monitoring of hard coral cover reefs from August 2023 to June 2024 by the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS). The percentage of hard coral cover is a standard measurement of reef conditions used by scientists and is said to provide a simple and robust measure of reef health. Similar reports have been published by the AIMS over the last 38 years.

For the first two years of record coral growth, the narrative-driven mainstream media ignored the recovery story. But this year, the suspicious might contend, something had to be done to blunt the sensational news of the stonking rises. Help has come in the form of a paper just published in Nature which uses proxy temperature measurements and climate models to suggest temperatures around the vast reef area are the highest recorded in 400 years. This time period is the blink of an ecological eye-lid given that coral has been around for hundreds of millions of years during periods when temperatures and atmospheric carbon dioxide have been markedly different. Nevertheless, this is said to pose an existential threat despite it being known that sub-tropical corals thrive between 24°C-32°C, and in fact seem to grow faster in warmer waters.

Natural bleaching, when the coral expels algae and turns white, can occur with temporary local temperature changes, but evidence from many years of scientific observation suggests the corals often and quickly recover. Long term changes in water temperature – tiny compared to coral’s optimum conditions – pose no threat, but alarmists concentrate on the bleaching events to warn of possible ecological collapse. The Guardian noted a recent fifth mass bleaching in eight years across the reef, driven, it claimed, by “global heating”. So far, its readers are in the dark as to how this squares with the recent record growth.

A decade of mass bleaching, relentlessly catastrophised in the interests of Net Zero by activists in the media, academia and politics, does not appear to have done much harm to the recent growth in the Northern GBR.

Or the central area.

Or even in the south where the water temperatures are slightly cooler.

To read the latest AIMS report is to read the best possible spin on the story that the reef is heading for disaster. And, of course, it is all down to the unproven changes in climate that are said to be caused by human activity. It is claimed this will cause more frequent and long-lasting marine ‘heatwaves’, a product no doubt of a climate model. It is generally suggested that these heatwaves and mass bleaching were rare prior to the 1990s, although how anyone can know this is a mystery. Detailed GBR observations and temperature recordings barely stretch back a few decades.

As is often the case with publicly-funded operations, the political message is never far from the surface. Thus we learn that “enabling coral reefs to survive these stressful conditions requires a combination of a reduction in global greenhouse emissions to stabilise temperatures… and the development of interventions to help reefs adapt to and recover from the effects of climate change”. No doubt this last proposal requires large amounts of money from the taxpayer to cover the costs of such worthy work.

Not everyone goes along with the coral fear-mongering. The distinguished scientist Dr. Peter Ridd has studied the GBR for 40 years and notes that coral numbers have “exploded” in recent years. He says that all 3,000 reefs in the world’s largest system have excellent coral. “Not a single reef or even a single species of reef life has been lost since British settlement,” he reports. The impact of bleaching is “routinely exaggerated by the media and some scientific organisations”. In his view, the public is being deceived about the reef. “How this occurred is a serious issue for the reef-science community which has embraced emotion, ideology and raw self-interest to maintain funding,” he observes.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 23:25

What Effect Will Voter ID Laws Have In The 2024 Election?

Since the last presidential election in the United States, four states have implemented strict photo ID laws at the polls, bringing the count of places with these types of laws to 10. Additionally, three more states have made their ID laws stricter and in one state, such a change was blocked by courts.

Around 29 million Americans of voting age live in states where voter ID laws were tightened, while the number of those living under strict photo ID requirements rose from fewer than 30 million to more than 50 million. Research by the University of Maryland shows that as of the fall of 2023, almost 50 million Americans or around 20 percent of adults citizens were estimated to not have a valid driver's license or at least not one with their current name or address on it, among them 23 million Democrats, 15.7 million Republicans and 10.5 million Independents.

As Statista's Katharina Buchholz details below, combining these numbers means that around 10 million voting-age adults could be negatively affected by photo ID laws in November 2024. 

You will find more infographics at Statista

Other research, however, shows that party mobilization and outreach have successfully compensated for these negative effects on voter turnout in the past.

Voter ID laws, specifically those strictly requiring photo ID, are a contentious topic. 

While proponents say that bringing official and easy-to-verify identification on election day should be a no-brainer, the lack of a uniform national ID system in the U.S. means that some people do not have a photo ID. This most often affects poor and otherwise marginalized people as well as people of color, which has led to the topic of voter ID having become a partisan one in the country.

Most states that currently have strict photo ID law for voting are in the Southern United States or the Midwest. New laws were passed in the last four years in Nebraska, Arkansas, North Carolina and Ohio, while they have existed for longer in Georgia, Mississippi and Tennessee, among other. A bigger group of states requests photo ID at the polls, but voters without it can use a workaround, for example signing a sworn affidavit or other document or have their signature matched by a clerk. Even states with strict photo ID laws mostly allow voting a provisional ballot and bringing in ID by a specific deadline as well as some exception in case voters have specific impairments, objections on religious grounds or others.

In Texas and South Carolina, this line between exception and workaround has been increasingly blurred, showing the tug-of-war that surrounds U.S. voter ID laws. Voters in both states who do not have photo ID can fill out a reasonable impediment declaration. While this sounds like voters will need to prove that they qualify for an exception, the cause can be any "obstacle you find reasonable", the South Carolina Election Commission informs. In Texas, the situation is similar.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 23:00

Fauci's "DNA Of Caring"

Authored by Randall Block via The Brownstone Institute,

Dr. Anthony Fauci often claims a “DNA of caring” yet his actions reveal a stark contrast. Avoiding direct patient care, Dr. Fauci focused on populations—effecting a mindset aligned with abstract compassion for humanity that nonetheless neglects individual rights. His so-called ‘DNA of caring’ has most recently doubly stranded those subjected to it: first, by amplifying fear about Covid-19 while burying mitigating data; second, by pushing a vaccine in a draconian, methodical, and threatening manner, taking away liberty and jobs to an extreme never seen before in the history of mankind. 

Additionally, by fast-tracking and strong-arming an mRNA vaccine-platform technology heretofore devoid of Phase II or III safety studies, Dr. Fauci prioritized hypothetical scientific advancement over actual current health, medical knowledge, and personal liberties—effectively double-crossing both the public’s trust and violating his own integrity: contradicting medically foundational principles he had spent his career enunciating—perhaps influenced by pharmaceutical interests.

Introduction: From Public Health to Panic: The Motivations Behind Dr. Fauci’s Pandemic Pivot

In early 2020, Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of NIAID, initially approached the coronavirus with standard public health strategies. By late February, Dr. Fauci had become the deciding influencer for the New York Times’ Donald McNeil’s decision to go “up to eleven,” announcing: “To Take On the Coronavirus, Go Medieval on It.” This article heightened panic in New York City, soon to be America’s pandemic landfall—and marked a shift from a century of public health’s more measured responses BACKWARDS to draconian measures. Remember: “lockdowns” emanate literally from 1970s prisons.

Several theories potentially explain this pivot. One suggests Fauci’s involvement with NIAID grants to the Wuhan lab pushed him to deflect accountability. Another points to political motivations, aiming to undermine an adversary, Donald Trump—by destabilizing the economy, and influencing the election through lockdown-necessitated mail-in ballots.

A deeper, but not necessarily mutually exclusive motive may lie in Fauci’s support for mRNA vaccine technology. Previously, mRNA treatments had only reached Phase I trials. The pandemic allowed for emergency-use authorization, fast-tracking this experimental platform and breaking regulatory barriers—likely saving a decade by creating a precedent for future mRNA treatments. He did this knowing systemic vaccines may not be appropriate for respiratory illnesses, and having observed close hand China’s failure to create an effective Coronavirus vaccine in the 2000s after SARS.

And this wasn’t the first time: his persistence in pushing for mRNA technology was evident during the previous decade’s Zika Microcephaly pandemic response. Even as Zika had fizzled to zero (microcephaly-) cases, Fauci persisted in pushing for Zika (DNA-and mRNA-) vaccines. He dangled ~$100 million in front of Brazil in 2018, but it refused—whereupon he pivoted in the 2020s to Johns Hopkins to inject and infect women with Zika to test the vaccine. This is a man who will not let a public health emergency go to waste—even if it involves aggrandizing it.

Despite his self-assessment as having a “DNA of caring,” Fauci’s actions suggest a focus more on institutional goals and the advancement of mRNA technology than on the people themselves—via corporatism: merging governmental authority with big business interests. Treating populations with a one-size-fits-all approach, stripping away individual rights, and using people as means to societal ends evokes an antidemocratic utilitarianism.

A Self-Professed “DNA of Caring”

A Google search for “Dr. Anthony Fauci’s promotion of the mRNA vaccine” performed today (helpfully for the otherwise beleaguered Dr. Fauci) funnels towards his On Call: A Doctor’s Journey in Public Service book tour—including this ironic and self-titled fluff piece: ‘I had that DNA of caring for people‘ sweetly afforded by PBS’ uncritical, team player Geoff Bennett. 

Nearly comically—this June 2024 video, intending to polish his legacy, inadvertently highlights his dictatorial tendencies, tin ear, and inability to learn from mistakes. Despite his mea culpa about failing to listen to stakeholders during the 1980s’ HIV/AIDS crisis and promising to have learned from that experience, merely a few sentences later Fauci lashes out at his contemporary Covid-19 critics. 

The irony here is stark. Fauci admits that he and his institutions were domineering and unheeding of criticism during the HIV/AIDS crisis—whereupon he retroactively wishes he had given those activists input into the process that had so directly affected them. 

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Understandably, but unacceptably, the scientific community and the regulatory community just said, “We know best for you. We’re the scientists. We’re the ones with the experience.” And they kept saying, “No, no, no. We really want a seat at the table.” When we didn’t listen, then they started becoming theatrical, iconoclastic, disruptive, and confrontative. As John Lewis used to say, ‘there’s trouble and there’s good trouble.’ They were making ‘good trouble’ in the field of health in wanting to have a seat at the table. One of the best things I think I have done in my career was to put aside the theatrics (note: an admission against interest) and listen to what they were saying, because what they were saying made absolutely perfect sense. And I remember saying to myself that, if I were in their shoes, I’d be doing exactly what they were doing.

GEOFF BENNETT: When you describe that (HIV/AIDS) experience as “enlightening,” how did it inform your approach moving forward to confront other epidemics?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Yes. Yes, listen to the patients. Listen. And don’t think that everything comes from the top down. Listen to the community. Listen to what they’re experiencing. And you’re going to make a much better and more appropriate response to whatever the disease challenge is. That was a lesson that was very well-learned from the activists.

Volte-face and thin-skinned (a possible alternate title for his book), he shows no such sympathy for those who opposed his Covid-19 rabbit-out-of-a-hat absurdities, dismissing them outright:

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: I think it’s important to say, because it’s the truth, that if ever there was a time when you didn’t want to have a public health crisis was at a time of profound divisiveness within our country, where you were having people making decisions about health based on political ideology. That is the worst possible circumstance.

It would have been really nice if we had a uniform message: “Masks work. Use them.” “Vaccines are good and save lives.” Let’s do it.

“No, hydroxychloroquine not only doesn’t work, but, in fact, it could harm you.” (ignoring risk/benefit ratio; “right to try,” FDA-approval, and track record—and that this is true for any treatment, cf. vaccines). 

This dismissive attitude toward dissenting voices is ironic given Fauci’s complete 180 on his own views. He refuses to engage with anyone who challenges him, yet seems blissfully unaware he’s contradicting his past self. And there is this gem uncovered by the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic from Dr. Fauci, Summer 2021—so different from his supposed HIV-lesson-learned to “Listen to the community. Listen to what they’re experiencing”—speaking more like a mob boss:

“I have to say that I don’t see a big solution, other than some sort of mandatory vaccination. I know federal officials don’t like to use that term. Once (administrators) feel empowered and protected legally, (they’ll) say, ‘you want to come to this college buddy, you’re going to get vaccinated.’ Yeah, big corporations are going to say ‘you want to work for us, you get vaccinated.’ And it’s been proven that when you make it difficult for people in their lives, they lose their ideological bullshit and they get vaccinated.”

Dr. Fauci’s actual “DNA of caring” is caring about pharmaceutical mRNA.

Fauci 1.0 Vs. Fauci 2.0

Somewhere around February 2020, there seems to have been a ‘software update’ of Dr. Fauci’s mindset, and not for the better. Generally speaking, people only turn to questionable behavior when faced with a greater agenda, threat to self, or conversion. Here’s a by-no-means complete table of Fauci Covid-era “flip-flops:”

This transformation was likely triggered by the realization of his agency NIAID’s and/or his own embarrassingly damaging complicity in the gain-of-function genesis of the “Wuhan flu” SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus threat. He aimed for self-preservation, politically maneuvering against Donald Trump to compromise him, while also greasing the skids for the mRNA vaccine. 

This necessitated performing life support for the “emergency” in the “Emergency Use Authorization/ EUA” by quashing any interim medications, aggrandizing the threat of SARS-CoV-2—when he knew, from the Diamond Princess data, that it was not that severe (zero deaths, 25 days after exposure)—and backtracking from his comments that respiratory illnesses were not best approached by vaccines; that natural immunity was preferable to vaccine immunity, and that flu shots needed to be timely for the upcoming variant. Despite his previously calling the coronavirus threat “minuscule,” Fauci’s actions followed a pattern of (mis)using the crisis to bequeath a Big Science/Big Pharma (-regulatory-capture cycle untested mRNA treatments. 

Covid-19 Pandemic: Overreach and Ignoring Early Data

During the Covid-19 pandemic, Fauci’s approach starkly contradicted the lessons he claimed to have learned from the HIV/AIDS crisis. He enforced top-down measures that often lacked scientific backing. For instance, he admitted in a January 2024 Congressional hearing (belatedly released in June) that he did not know the scientific basis for the six-foot social distancing rule and could not substantiate masking requirements for children. 

“Collectively, the four pillars of the “Covidian Cult” were lockdowns, masks, social distancing and mRNA vaccines. Dr Fauci was one of the most powerful advocates of all of these things, and he became the public face of each demand. But here we have one of the architects, without too much pushing, admitting that two of those four pillars were never set in any scientific foundation at all. Now what this admission does is utterly destroy the entire Covidian argument. Because the argument was that we should “Follow the Science.” The argument was that technocratic experts had decided the course of action to follow, and that we had no right to question that course because they were the experts and we were simply, “Tracy from Facebook.” Daniel Jupp “Fauci’s Evidence: It just sort of appeared. You know, from nowhere.”

Fauci’s stance on vaccination mandates was equally inconsistent. In 2004, he advised against flu vaccines for those who had already contracted the flu. Yet during the Covid-19 pandemic, he supported mandatory vaccinations regardless of prior infection, ignoring the virus’ evolving nature. Vaccines were administered for an outdated strain, akin to giving expired flu shots, which are typically removed from circulation once the virus mutates significantly. This inconsistency highlighted his failure to adapt his policies to the realities of the virus’ mutations.

Fauci 1.0 had said, “You seek and learn…from an experiment“ (2005). The floating coronavirus-incubation/quarantine experiment, a.k.a. Diamond Princess was an incredible serendipity for the world—if not its 3,711 captives. Trying to enlist that number of people for an unknown viral threat would’ve required a pre-payout of ~$10 billion (and could not have included this random selection of individuals)—yet, the world was the beneficiary of this experiment in a timely fashion, February 2020 for “free” (although the passengers and crew might disagree with that term).

Instead of focusing on the obvious good news results: zero fatalities after three weeks’ exposure; essentially none of the children or young adults feeling much ill or even noticing infection—Fauci 2.0 sided with Chinese propaganda and extreme measures, contributing to widespread panic and economic devastation. Fauci 2.0 ignored the possibility of Chinese guile, either blithely or willfully—but in either case to our nation’s discredit, discomfort, disunion, and disinformation.

The Gates Foundation’s mRNA Finesse; Zika Emergency

In 2017, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation pledged $100 million to Moderna to develop an mRNA-platform vaccine for Zika. This investment was made despite the fact that Zika, a relatively harmless dengue variant, was not (by that time) persistently linked to the microcephaly cases it was blamed for. The Zika-microcephaly phenomenon just petered out even in the initial “pandemic” panic crisis year of 2016. This rush to develop an mRNA vaccine for a non-crisis reflects a broader trend of aggrandizing potential threats to justify rapid and untested vaccine development.

My book, Overturning Zika: The Pandemic That Never Was, points out the complete absence of any Zika-related microcephaly increase in any year, including the incipient 2015 year. Once Zika tests were developed and Brazil adopted the WHO standard for statistical microcephaly determination, the link between Zika and microcephaly was never substantiated—and effectively disappeared. “Zika-Microcephaly” had always and only been “science” by press release, political pressure, and professorial self-aggrandizement.

Dr. Fauci never stopped pushing for Zika vaccines long after it was clear there was no recurrence of Zika-related microcephaly in Latin America. In 2018, he attempted to initiate a human challenge trial (HCT) in Brazil, but the authorities refused, not wanting to introduce the Zika virus into the population through experimentation.

HCTs had fallen out of favor due to the negative outcomes of the Guatemala and Tuskegee experiments. In 2017, the NIH’s ethics panel determined that Zika did not warrant human challenge trials, but Dr. Fauci pushed for them regardless, ignoring prevailing public health wisdom. 

Why was he jonesing for a putative Zika vaccine? Fauci was a proponent of synthetic vaccinology and mRNA platforms. Conveniently ignoring Zika-Microcephaly’s fizzle, he continued over-generously funding Moderna (whose very name is a portmanteau of “modified RNA”).

When Zika’s shoddy underlying science and non-recurrence failed to sustain the necessary “emergency” for mRNA technology, an unrepentant and unpunished Fauci aggrandized Covid-19 to achieve the same goals. Had he been reprimanded for violating the NIH ethics panel’s decision, he might not have been so rash and brash in exaggerating Covid-19. It appears Fauci pursued his “fix” of stealthily introducing mRNA technology to the public and mainstreaming it through vaccines, despite the ethical breaches and potential risks involved.

mRNA Vaccines: From Never Done to Pandemic Panacea

The foundation for mRNA-vaccine technology was laid years before the pandemic. Here’s an excellent history (behind paywall) of the endeavor, beginning with Robert F. Malone’s late-1980s conceptualization—although (reminiscent of Breaking Bad’s Gray Matter Technologies: Walter White says, “It was my hard work. My research. And you and Elliott made millions off it.”) all of the financial-windfall beneficiaries currently in the field are happy to orphan whistleblower Malone who said the coronavirus “should never have been politicized.” Legacy media is happy to help discredit him: effectively always, his name is accompanied by the term, “spreading misinformation.”

The Obama Administration invested heavily in mRNA research through DARPA (via the mysterious network, “JASON”) and BARDA. By the end of the Obama era, mRNA vaccines were being tested in both animals and humans – but never beyond Phase 1. 

The Covid-19 pandemic fast-tracked the push for mRNA vaccines under Operation Warp Speed, prioritizing them over traditional vaccines like Johnson & Johnson’s adenovirus vector vaccine. Concerns about side effects, such as myocarditis in young males, were brushed aside in the rush to advance mRNA technology. This urgency overshadowed the critical need for proper safety trials, effectively using the public as guinea pigs in a massive, premature experiment.

Now, with the ice broken, a flood of new mRNA vaccines is in the pipeline for diseases like cytomegalovirus (CMV), influenza, and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). Researchers are even exploring mRNA vaccines for avian flu, hepatitis C, HIV, and more. This rapid adoption bypasses decades of proven safety from traditional vaccine platforms, raising ethical concerns about using the global population for untested innovations.

Even if mRNA vaccines prove beneficial in the long run, we deserve better than to be test subjects in this grand experiment—without getting a share of the proceeds. It’s like “My parents went to Vegas and all I got was this lousy T-shirt,” but with much higher stakes.

Profit over Safety

The profit motive may be king. Much as the ‘minor issues’ of people’s freedoms and safety (I’m joking) were completely ignored to help speed the development of mRNA vaccines, being politically favored has its benefits. Every accommodation is made for electric vehicles or climate change initiatives. One wonders, given that everyone turned a blind eye to safety and is still doing so regarding Covid’s mRNA vaccine(s), whether these newer possibilities—which are not emergencies per se—will go through proper multiphase studies over the proper length of time to check for long-term side effects. 

Studies for “long-term effects” ipso facto need a “long-term” study: eight or 10 years may not even be enough. Other vaccines have been out for decades and there are still questions circulating given that they are being given more frequently and with multiple other vaccines in combination throughout the course of tender childhood. 

Pre-NCVIA (1986 federal liability waiver for vaccine manufacturers), kids got a handful of vaccines, now we are up to 72 separate inoculations recommended through adolescence. With whispers of avian flu and other potential “emergencies,” we have to be careful that these aren’t just efforts to fan the flames and bypass safety studies once again.

The silver lining, the promise we are given is that mRNA technology may help cancer treatment, food- and environmental- allergies, genetic diseases, heart disease, stroke, heart failure, and neurodevelopmental disorders. While these advancements are promising, it is essential to balance innovation with rigorous safety protocols; to balance self-interested Big Science/Big Pharma claims with the normal skepticism, given the track record.

Lockdowns: Misguided Anachronism 

Fauci’s advocacy for lockdowns was another significant departure from standard public health practices. Historically, “lockdown” was a term used exclusively in prison settings. Before Covid-19, general population lockdowns were virtually unheard of, except in extreme cases like a tuberculosis outbreak in a South African prison and limited restrictions during the Ebola outbreak in Sierra Leone. Implementing such measures for Covid-19 ignored the relatively benign nature of the virus for most of the population. The lockdowns caused widespread economic disruption, halted education, and inflicted severe mental health consequences.

Donald McNeil of the New York Times famously espoused a “go medieval” approach to the virus, but only after the endorsement specifically of Dr. Fauci. McNeil’s article, “To Take On The Coronavirus, Go Medieval on It,” drummed up enormous fear and overreaction. In August 2020, McNeil revealed that his consultation with Dr. Fauci was pivotal in shaping the article.

Donald McNeil wrote: 

“There are two ways to fight epidemics: the medieval and the modern. The modern way is to surrender to the power of the pathogens: Acknowledge that they are unstoppable and try to soften the blow with 20th-century inventions, including new vaccines, antibiotics, hospital ventilators and thermal cameras searching for people with fevers. The medieval way, inherited from the era of the Black Death, is brutal: Close the borders, quarantine the ships, pen terrified citizens up inside their poisoned cities.” 

Mr. McNeil, writer and rhetorician (and decidedly not a scientist) is merely channeling this Fauci 2.0 bureaucrat/autocrat whose decidedly medieval methods fall into stark contrast with (erstwhile) modern public health’s. Fauci 2.0 essentially settled the issue for McNeil, who readily adopted this extreme stance.

Ironically, those advocating for a more modern public health approach, like the (genuine) experts behind the Great Barrington Declaration, were shut down. Fauci’s supposed “DNA of caring” seems to only extend to himself, his views, and his control over the narrative. His actions during Covid-19 show that he learned nothing from his self-professed enlightenment during the HIV/AIDS crisis.

He ignored and dismissed any criticism, especially from those on or above his level. Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, MD, PhD, (economics), for example, is arguably more qualified than Fauci, more of a political than medical ace. This is evident in his absurdly anachronistic “medieval” approach to the pandemic; his inability to tolerate dissent; his failure to listen to those who challenge him—in fact his censoring them, codifying a policy of “Shut Up!” to skeptics of his overreaching policies. 

Even Fauci 1.0 was not a great medical doctor. In the 1980s, during the HIV/AIDS crisis, Fauci speculated that close household contact, without sexual interaction or needle sharing, could lead to AIDS transmission. This glib and unfounded claim led to widespread fear and misinformation. As a result, AIDS patients (it is posited) were often abandoned by their families due to the fear of casual transmission.

His stubborn focus on producing a vaccine rather than therapeutics was of particular frustration to activists and other scientists. Ironically, this emphasis on vaccines over therapeutics repeated in 2020 and 2021 with the push for mRNA vaccines, despite the availability of other potential treatments. 

The government, under Fauci’s influence, went out of its way to insult and ridicule FDA-approved, off-label usage, rational treatment alternatives, such as hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) and Nobel-Prize generating ivermectin (which was FALSELY derided as mere horse medication). Many drugs used in humans are also used in animals. This dismissal and ridicule were strategic, aimed at maintaining the narrative that only a vaccine could solve the crisis, thus justifying the emergency use authorization (EUA) for the mRNA vaccines. Absent an emergency, they would not have been able to circumvent the necessary safety measures. This strategy was not only misleading but potentially criminal, as it prioritized the adoption of untested vaccines over exploring all possible treatment avenues.

Unprecedented Excess Deaths

The implications of these decisions have been far-reaching and devastating. According to researchers from Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, there have been more than three million excess deaths since 2020, with the trend continuing despite (or because of) the rollout of vaccines and containment measures. In BMJ Public Health, the authors stated, 

“excess mortality has remained high in the Western World for three consecutive years, despite the implementation of COVID-19 containment measures and COVID-19 vaccines. This is unprecedented and raises serious concerns. During the pandemic, politicians and the media emphasized daily that every COVID-19 death mattered and every life deserved protection through containment measures and COVID-19 vaccines. In the aftermath of the pandemic, the same morale should apply.”

This is the tragic outcome of Fauci’s policies. The world was promised salvation, but instead, we have worse economies, more top-down nondemocratic management, halted education, and disrupted lives. Children couldn’t see people’s faces, and the societal impacts have been profound.

We Were Betrayed by Falsehoods

Dr. Anthony Fauci’s actions during the Covid-19 pandemic mirrored the very failings he claimed to have learned from the HIV/AIDS crisis. His inability to adapt, combined with a penchant for authoritarian measures, has left a legacy of distrust and division. Fauci’s enforcement of arbitrary measures, disregard for scientific data, and contribution to economic and social disruption have caused untold harm. His tenure stands as a stark reminder of the dangers of unchecked authority.

Fauci’s role in the Covid-19 response has shown a disregard for American values of liberty and openness. His actions have inflicted deep scars on the nation, from economic devastation to the erosion of public trust. The world deserves better from its public health leaders, and Fauci’s tenure stands as a cautionary tale of what happens when power goes unchecked. The suffering caused by his decisions is a legacy not of public health triumph but of public health failure and manipulation.

As H.L. Mencken famously said, “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.” Unelected Dr. Fauci’s prison-styled lockdowns and tyrannical, unproven, mRNA-over-vaccinating within an overall disdainful, peremptory medical misgovernance made sure of that.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 22:35

Visualizing 45 Years Of Growth In US Real Wages, By Income Group

Since 1979, the top income earners in America have seen their real wages grow at more than double the rate of every other income group.

Given this rapid rise, income inequality in the U.S. exceeds nearly every other rich nation, driven by several complex factors. Among these, tax policy, technological change, and economic downturns have widened this gap. Diminishing bargaining power across workers has also contributed to wage disparities.

This graphic, via Visual Capitalist's Dorothy Neufeld, shows the growth in real wages over time across income groups, based on data from the Economic Policy Institute.

Stark Differences in Real Wages Over Time

Below, we show the cumulative growth in real wages between 1979 and 2023 by wage group:

As we can see, the lowest paid workers in America have seen their real wages increase just 17% over the period—averaging a dismal 0.4% annual growth rate.

If we take out the pandemic-era’s period of strong wage growth for low-wage workers, this figure drops to 0.1% between 1979 and 2019. By contrast, real wages boomed at an annualized rate of 2.9% over the pandemic, outpacing wage growth in the previous 40 years combined.

A similar trend of slow wage growth can be seen across all other income groups apart from the highest income earners. This has contributed to the middle-class—those falling between the lowest and highest income quintiles—to shrink from 61% of the population in 1971 to 51% in 2023.

At the same time, the share of lower-income households grew by 27% in 1971 to 30% in 2023, while the share of upper-income households rose from 11% to 19% over the period.

Wage Growth During the Pandemic

As we can see in the table below, high labor demand during the pandemic led to significant wage increases, particularly for lower-income groups:

What is notable about these wage gains is that they outpaced inflation, which totaled nearly 20% over this period.

Today, a strong labor market is continuing to push real wages above inflation as price pressures have eased, but this growth has slowed considerably since pandemic peaks. In June 2024, year-over-year real wage growth was 0.8% on average, compared to 7.7% in April 2020.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 22:10

US Ambassador Boycotts Nagasaki A-Bomb Ceremony Because Israel Not Invited

Authored by Dave DeCamp via AntiWar.com,

US Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel boycotted Friday’s memorial service in Nagasaki commemorating the 79th anniversary of the US dropping a nuclear bomb on the city because Israel was not invited to attend.

Emanuel said the ceremony had become "politicized" by the decision not to invite Israel, but Russia and Belarus will also be excluded for the third year in a row, a move supported by the US.

Envoys from the US, the UK, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, and the European Union sent a letter to Nagasaki last month saying it would "become difficult for us to have high-level participation" if Israel wasn’t invited. The envoys said the decision would equate Israel with Russia and Belarus.

Lanterns placed in Hypocenter Park in Nagasaki on the eve of the 79th anniversary of the US atomic bombing of the southwestern Japan city. via Kyodo

Nagasaki Mayor Shiro Suzuki stuck to his decision not to invite Israel despite the pressure. He said it was due to concerns that Israeli attendance could lead to demonstrators disrupting the ceremony. "I will continue to persevere and ask for understanding of the decision as often as necessary," Suzuki said.

Suzuki said he made the decision "not for political reasons" but to ensure "a smooth ceremony in a peaceful and solemn environment."

Israel’s ambassador to Japan was invited to Hiroshima’s ceremony on Tuesday, which was attended by Emanuel and other Western ambassadors. The ambassadors of the UK, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, and the EU are expected to boycott the Nagasaki ceremony along with Emanuel, and the Western nations will send lower-level representatives instead.

Israeli officials have pointed to the US and allied bombings of Japan and Germany during World War II to justify the mass slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza. President Biden said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pointed to the US atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which killed over 200,000 Japanese civilians, in conversations they had about Gaza.

Let me get it straight... Israel, which did not exist as a country then, wasn't invited. So the US... which actually dropped the bomb.. is angry. https://t.co/muhnmPU8Di

— Brad Hoff (@BradRHoff) August 8, 2024

"It was pointed out to me that — by Bibi (Netanyahu) — that ‘Well, you carpet-bombed Germany. You dropped the atom bomb. A lot of civilians died,'" Biden said in December 2023.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 21:45

Panama Hits 'VIP' Chinese Migrant-Smuggling Route Through Notorious Darien Gap

In the latest indication that new President Jose Raul Mulino may be serious about his campaign pledge to end the country's role as a major funnel of masses of illegal immigrants bound for the United States, Panamanian border police on Wednesday arrested 15 people linked to an illicit "VIP" migrant-smuggling operation that caters to Chinese clients, AFP reports. The detainees -- who face 15 to 20 years in prison -- are all Panamanian, but are accused of working for Colombian gangs. 

While the Pan-American Highway stretches some 19,000 miles through South, Central and North America, there's a 66-mile gap that starts just inside Colombia and stretches into Panama. That means migrants have to make a harrowing journey on foot through a mountainous and marshy region called the Darien Gap. They not only have to survive dangerous natural conditions, but also criminal gangs known to rape, murder, kidnap and rob them.

Not the VIP version: Most migrants traverse the Darien Gap on foot, braving days of heat, rain, mud, dehydration, water crossings, disease, thieves and rapists (John Moore/Getty Images via Council on Foreign Relations)

The VIP service targeted this week promised a faster, easier and safer passage into Panama -- but at a higher price. Migrants pay about $500 for a standard escort through the gap, but fees for this expedited trip range from $2,600 to $8,000, local prosecutor Emeldo Marquez told AFP. Given the price, most customers who can afford the first class experience are Chinese. 

The VIP trip is shortened in a variety of ways, starting with boat service that bypasses a portion of the jungle trip by departing the Colombian coast from Capurgana or Necocli and dropping migrants in Carreto or Caledonia, Panama. Smugglers then whisk them through the remaining wilderness using canoes, horses and ATVs. That helps cut the average VIP jungle jaunt down to just two days, instead of upwards of eight days or more for everyone else. 

A detainee is guarded by a Panamanian National Border Service member near Santa Fe in Panama's Darien province (Abraham Teran via Associated Press)

About a half-million migrants made the Darien Gap trek in 2023, and about 200,000 so far this year. They come from many countries, but most of the recent migrants are Venezuelan. While still a small percentage, Chinese traffic has soared, with more than 55,000 Chinese crossing the Mexican border since 2023. 

On the campaign trail, President Jose Raul Mulino emphasized his intent to end Panama's role as a critical link in a path that funnels northbound migrants into Central America. He reiterated that intention in his inaugural address, saying, "I will not allow Panama to be a path open to thousands of people who illegally enter our country supported by an entire international organization related to drug trafficking and human trafficking."

Earlier this summer, Panama started installing concertina-wire fences inside the Darien Gap. “The patrol at the national border service has begun to block the majority of border passages," said Frank Abrego, Panama's minister of public security during a June 28 visit to the area.  

On July 1 -- the same day that Mulino was sworn into office, Panama announced it had signed an agreement with the United States with a goal of cutting the flow of migrants through the isthmus. Under the deal, the US government has committed to covering Panama's expenses for deporting people who enter Panama illegally, and to help with "equipment, transportation and logistics." 

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 21:20

Democratic California State Lawmaker Switches To Republican Party

Authored by Caden Pearson via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

A California state lawmaker announced on Thursday that she’s switching affiliation to the Republican Party in a bid to save the state from heading in the wrong direction under a Democratic supermajority.

State Sen. Marie Alvarado-Gil (D-Jackson) at the Capitol in Sacramento, Calif., on July 10, 2023. (Rich Pedroncelli/AP Photo)

State Sen. Marie Alvarado-Gil, who represents the state’s fourth Senate district, said she joined the Senate Republican Caucus and party after deep reflection and to help “in their fight to fix California.”

“I was elected to serve the public, not a political ideology,” Alvarado-Gil said in a statement. “The status quo under a supermajority Democratic rule in the legislature is simply not working for this state.”

Democratic state Senate President Pro Tem Mike McGuire said her decision would be disappointing for voters who elected her in 2022.

“They trusted her to represent them, and she’s betrayed that trust,” he said in a statement.

However, Alvarado-Gil, who represents a largely conservative-leaning rural district in northeast Central Valley, said the decision was “right for the constituents that voted me into office” and about putting them first.

California has a Democrat supermajority in both the Assembly and the Senate. After Alvarado-Gil’s defection, which gives Republicans nine votes in the 40-member Senate, Democrats will retain their veto-proof majority.

Despite Democrats having more power and ability in the state Legislature, Alvarado-Gil said that since she’s been elected, she’s had a front-row seat to watching the Democratic supermajority push California in what she characterized as a wrong direction.

Republicans’ nine votes still leaves them well under the majority they need to control the chamber. Democrats hold supermajorities in both the Assembly and Senate at the Capitol.

Alvarado-Gil is known for working with Republicans and has split from Democrats to vote on issues where she feels politics is being put over public safety.

State Senate Minority Leader Brian W. Jones, in a statement welcoming Alvarado-Gil to the GOP, said it takes courage for a lawmaker to stand up to the supermajority the way she has.

“Her record on tackling crime, protecting communities from sexually violent predators, and prioritizing her constituents speaks for itself,” said Jones, who has recently worked with Alvarado-Gil on a number of key Republican measures.

Alvarado-Gil, who is in her first term, has broken with Democrats on a number of bills, including gun legislation, caps on oil industry profits, and restrictions on homeless encampments over the last year. She was one of three state Democratic senators to co-author legislation led by Jones to restrict homeless encampments.

She said on Thursday that she will continue to aggressively advocate for fiscal responsibility, public safety, supporting veterans, tackling the homelessness crisis, and lowering living costs.

Alvarado-Gil has supported legislation addressing crime, fentanyl, human trafficking, child sex trafficking, sexual assault, and relocating sexually violent predators to rural communities.

“I look forward to collaborating with my Republican colleagues on their plan to Fix California and continuing to lead with a pragmatic approach on issues affecting my district and this great state,” she said.

California Republican Party Chairwoman Jessica Millan Patterson said, “Senator Alvarado-Gil has represented her community as an independent, fiscally-conservative voice in Sacramento, and we are honored to have her represent them going forward as a member of the Republican Party.”

Alvarado-Gil beat out a progressive Democrat by more than five points in the 2022 election. Registered Republican voters in her district have increased since 2022 to nearly 39 percent to Democrats’ 34 percent in 2024.

It’s uncommon for a member of a majority party to switch affiliation, according to California State Library legislative historian Alex Vassar.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 20:55

Breast Or Bottle? China Is The Global Market For Infant Formula

In a press release published ahead of World Breastfeeding Week (August 1 to 7), the World Health Organization (WHO) reports that:

“Over the past twelve years the number of infants under 6 months who are exclusively breastfed increased by more than 10 percent globally. Now, almost half (48 percent) of infants worldwide benefit from this excellent start in life”.

But this progress needs to be put into perspective if we take into account sales of breast milk substitutes, which have more than doubled worldwide over the last twenty years. Additionally, while countless studies have found the benefits of breastfeeding, others have claimed that when you eliminate selection bias, i.e. richer women being more likely to breastfeed, the positive effects almost disappear as larger socioeconomic factors overlay the still substantial benefits that breast milk does have.

Breastfeeding is sure to provide all the nutrients and energy needed for the growth and development of newborns and provides immune protection and other benefits through bioactive ingredients that formula doesn't have.

In developing countries, water safety is another factor that makes breast milk the superior option, while of course, the small chance of formula itself being contaminated also remains a risk.

However, the product is still marketed aggressively around the world, using with exaggerated claims to its benefits - something that has been criticized widely together with the baby milk industry's high spending on lobbying.

The WHO recommends exclusive breastfeeding until the age of 6 months and continued breastfeeding (with appropriate complementary feeding) until 2 years or more. However, apart from the response to marketing, not exclusively breastfeeding can have many reasons, including the mother working, personal reference, division of labor considerations and physical issues breastfeeding.

As Statista's Katharina Buchholz shows in the chart below, based on UNICEF data, the regions where breastfeeding is most prevalent are South Asia and Eastern and Southern Africa, where around 60 percent of infants aged 0 to 5 months are exclusively breastfed.

You will find more infographics at Statista

Conversely, breastfeeding rates up to 6 months are lowest in North America (26 percent) and Eastern Europe and Central Asia (36 percent). For Western Europe, this data is not available due to the lack of a standardized collection method and incomplete national data, but breastfeeding rates are generally low across Europe.

However, despite the high rate of breastfeeding in Asia, China is the biggest market worldwide for baby milk and infant formula.

In 2024, Statista Market Insights estimates that sales will reach almost $17 billion in the country. The second biggest market, the United States, is far behind at just $6.2 billion. However, per-capita spending was higher in the U.S. and actually lowest in China out of the top 5 biggest markets. Numbers by UNICEF show that the use of formula is more widespread in more developed countries and has also become typical in China's burgeoning middle class, while it hasn't caught on everywhere in the nation - explaining the lower per-capita spending.

You will find more infographics at Statista

Like in other nations, families in China are subject to aggressive baby formula marketing and urban Chinese women were found to have the highest exposure to respective advertising messages in a recent survey.

Due to its high price, the global market for baby formula is large at almost $54 billion.

The above survey also names Vietnam as a country saturated with such marketing. It was identified as the fifth biggest formula market by Statista, while another Asian nation, Indonesia, came in rank 3. Out of the top 5, Vietnam exhibited the highest estimated per-capita spending on infant formula given that estimates say only 17 percent of babies there are exclusively breastfed for the first six months of their lives.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 20:30

Abbott Orders Texas Hospitals To Report Health Care Costs For Illegal Immigrants

Authored by Aldgra Fredly via The Epoch Times,

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott issued an executive order on Aug. 8 requiring that hospitals collect data on patients living illegally in the United States and report the costs of medical services provided to them.

In a statement, Abbott said he aims to collect data on illegal immigrants who use public hospitals so that Texas can seek reimbursement from the federal government for their medical expenses.

“Texas will hold the Biden-Harris Administration accountable for the consequences of their open border policies, and we will fight to ensure that they pay back Texas for their costly and dangerous policies,” the Republican governor stated.

Under the executive order, Texas hospitals are required to collect data on inpatient discharges and emergency visits by illegal immigrants, as well as the costs of medical services provided to them, starting on Nov. 1.

Hospitals will need to report the information to the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC) by March 1, 2025, and continue reporting data on a quarterly basis.

The executive order also requires that hospitals inform patients that, under federal law, their responses to questions about their immigrant status will not affect patient care.

It stated that HHSC will need to report annually to the governor, the lieutenant governor, and the House speaker on the preceding year’s costs for medical care provided to illegal immigrants starting Jan. 1, 2026.

Abbott said that people in Texas should not have to “shoulder the burden” of financially supporting medical care for illegal immigrants.

The Epoch Times has reached out to the White House for comment.

The Texas Hospital Association (THA), representing over 85 percent of the state’s acute-care hospitals and health care systems, said that it is reviewing Abbott’s executive order “as quickly as possible.”

“Right now, hospitals don’t ask about patient immigration status as a condition of treatment,” THA said in a statement.

“Hospitals are required by law to provide life-saving treatment to anyone, regardless of ability to pay or status.”

More than 1,000 illegal immigrants wait in line to be processed by U.S. Border Patrol agents after crossing the Rio Grande from Mexico in Eagle Pass, Texas, on Dec. 18, 2023. (John Moore/Getty Images)

Texas has seen a 74 percent decrease in illegal border crossings since the launch of the state’s border security mission, dubbed Operation Lone Star, in March 2021, the governor’s office stated on June 14.

As part of the initiative, state authorities have deployed floating border barriers, installed wire fencing, and used the Texas National Guard to stem the flow of illegal immigrants.

According to the statement, the multi-agency effort has led to over 513,700 illegal immigrant apprehensions and more than 44,000 criminal arrests, with more than 38,600 felony charges so far.

The Texas governor criticized President Joe Biden’s recent executive actions, announced by the White House in June, stating that they “will do little to stem the flow of illegal immigration into the country.”

“As long as the Biden Administration refuses to provide any type of enforcement, any type of blockage, of people crossing illegally, all that this new Biden policy is going to do is to actually attract and invite even more people to cross the border illegally,” Abbott said in the statement.

According to a White House fact sheet published on June 4, the executive orders will bar illegal immigrants from receiving asylum when border officials deem illegal border crossings are at “high levels.”

“This ban will remain in place until the number of people trying to enter illegally is reduced to a level that our system can effectively manage,” Biden said at a news conference on June 4.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection recorded more than 1.44 million encounters with people trying to enter the United States nationwide as of June 2024.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 17:40

Putin Said To Be Stunned By Ukraine's Shock Attacks On Kursk & Lipetsk

In addition to the ongoing Ukrainian cross-border offensive in Russia's Kursk region, Russia has been hit hard by a "massive attack" of drones Thursday and Friday, Lipetsk's regional governor has said Friday.

The chief target appears to have been a nearby airfield. "The enemy is hitting civilians in Kursk and Belgorod," Gov. Igor Artamonov wrote on Telegram. "Today [it] massively attacked our region with drones. We will not be frightened, we will not give in, but we are not going to risk the lives of our people either."

The Ukrainian National News agency has claimed that some 700 guided bombs were destroyed in the strike on Lipetsk airfield. Russia's defense ministry subsequently said it intercepted at least 75 "aircraft-type" drones in the southern region, and others were sent over Crimea and the Black Sea. The Skhemy investigative project of US state-funded Radio Liberty has circulated the following before and after satellite images of the airfield...

Thousands of civilians were already evacuated in Kursk, which has seen intense battles over the past four days of what appears an outright Ukrainian invasion attempt; and on Friday at least hundreds have been evacuated in western Lipetsk. Several villages have been emptied out amid a state of emergency.

New reporting by a source which claims to have an insider's view on the Kremlin’s halls of power says President Putin and his top officials were caught off guard and stunned by these developments:

Ukraine’s surprise incursion into Russia's Kursk and Lipetsk border regions has stunned the Russian military and come as a “slap in the face” to President Vladimir Putin personally, four Russian officials told Politika.Kozlov. 

The ongoing offensive, which Russia has failed to repel for three days, has exposed Russia’s territorial defense shortcomings and undermined Putin’s propaganda coup as the rescuer of an FSB hitman and failed Russian spies in last week’s prisoner swap with the West. 

“The chief [Putin] was in a poor mood… He probably hasn't been seen like this since our [Russian army] was forced to retreat from Kherson in the fall of 2022,” said an official involved in preparing Kremlin events involving Putin.

The official, along with Politika.Kozlov’s other sources, spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the topic.

Putin’s appearance and facial expressions during his public appearances on Wednesday and Thursday indicated that he was “dissatisfied” and “annoyed” with the situation, several Russian officials who have known Putin personally for years told Politika.Kozlov.

This also comes as images and videos widely circulate which point to serious Russian troop losses in these cross-border attacks on Kursk and Lipetsk.

Russian military surrenders at the Sudzha checkpoint.

Ukraine forces have also filmed themselves in possession of Gazprom natural gas facility in Sudzha...

⚡Ukrainian media outlets publish video showing Ukrainian soldiers saying they control Gazprom facility in Sudzha in Russia's Kursk region pic.twitter.com/YhGEbmJ5oB

— War Monitor (@WarMonitors) August 9, 2024

Pro-Russian military bloggers have acknowledged the authenticity of many of these videos, and the troop losses which they reveal:

A video that surfaced online appears to show bodies on burnt-out Russian military trucks in the country’s southwestern Kursk region, the latest sign that Ukraine’s cross-border assault is probing more deeply and inflicting significant damage on Moscow’s troops.

In the daytime video – shared by Russian military bloggers and independent outlets, and geolocated by CNN – about a dozen trucks are seen on the side of a road in the village of Oktyabrskoye, about 8 kilometers (5 miles) east of the town of Rylsk, appearing to contain dozens of dead bodies.

...The video, which a Russian military blogger says shows the aftermath of a Ukrainian strike Thursday night, comes three days after Kyiv shifted tactics with a surprise incursion into Russian territory.

Despite these attempts of Ukrainian forces to capture territory inside Russia being essentially a suicide mission, Kiev is spiking the proverbial football and is seizing the moment to lobby for even more muscular Western military support.

Watch Putin's face while Gerasimov speaks

'Ukrainian forces lost 54 armored vehicles and 7 tanks in the Kursk attack.' pic.twitter.com/s5nvxjRgRo

— OSINTNic (@OSINTNic) August 7, 2024

Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Zelensky, claimed that most of Ukraine's Western allies "quietly approve" of the cross-border action.

Podolyak has praised the West's reaction to the surprise assault as being "absolutely calm, balanced, objective, and based on an understanding of the spirit of international law and the principles of defensive warfare." He added: "Now, a significant part of the global community considers [Russia] a legitimate target for any operations and types of weapons."

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 17:20

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.

*  *  *

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Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 17:00

Investors Flooded Into Money-Market Funds & Bank Deposits As Markets Crashed

Money-market fund assets rose to a fresh record ($6.19TN) as a global selloff in risk assets earlier in the week sent investors flying into cash. About $52.7BN flowed into US money-market funds in the week through Aug. 7, the largest weekly inflows since the period ended April 3 (Tax-Day prep)...

Source: Bloomberg

Also of note this week, demand for a rarely used Federal Reserve facility rose to the highest level in almost a month on Thursday as counterparties tested its accessibility.

Counterparties tapped the Fed’s Standing Repo Facility, or SRF - where eligible banks can borrow reserves in exchange for Treasury and agency debt - for $101 million on Thursday, the most since July 11.

There’s been at least one pop in usage every month since February, which suggests banks are testing their systems, though with minuscule amounts for a facility that at its peak attracted $153 billion in March 2020

Source: Bloomberg

Reserves are closing in on the $3 trillion level Federal Reserve Board member Christopher Waller has touched upon as the lowest comfortable level of reserves, i.e. the level that funding problems could manifest.

The RRP represents a sort of buffer on top of the current level of reserves, as (principally) money market funds can draw down it, adding to reserves in the process.

Source: Bloomberg

As all of that was happening, and yen carry trades unwound, US bank deposits soared on both a seasonally-adjusted (+$90BN) and non-seasonally-adjusted (+$189BN) basis.

That surge pushes SA deposits back above pre-SVB levels for the first time...

Source: Bloomberg

The NSA rise is the largest since May 2023 and the SA rise in deposits is the largest since the end of April 2024.

Excluding foreign flows, US domestic deposits spiked dramatically: +$77BN SA (large banks +$75BN, small banks +$2BN)..., +$179BN NSA (large banks +$149BN, small banks +$30BN)...

Source: Bloomberg

On the other side of the ledge, loan volumes soared by their most since the start of the year with large bank loan volumes rising $16.8BN and small bank loan volumes up $2.7BN...

Source: Bloomberg

Finally, we note that as reserves fade, US equity market capitalization has begun to catch down to that long-tight-correlation...

Source: Bloomberg

The question is - how long will The Fed allow this to drop before juicing reserves once again?

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 16:40

Harris/Walz Are "Levitating In Fake Polls On Gusts Of Idiot Wind"

Authored by James Howard Kunstler via Kunstler.com,

"Who Elected YOU Boss of This Outfit?”

“There’s some perversion that’s happened in our country in the last several years.”

- Candidate Kamala Harris

You might well wonder: how does the Democratic Party rank and file sustain such fervor for the wrecking crew of Harris & Walz conjured up with zero input from the Party’s demos? Just plopped onstage as by the old MGM studio heads casting a pair of iffy contract players in a “B” movie musical called Our Pronouns Are Cash and Carry.

So far, Harris and Walz levitate in fake polls on gusts of idiot wind from the Party’s unofficial public relations team of the The New York Times / MSNBC / CNN / NPR media matrix. But it’s already obvious that Veep Kamala Harris’ brain is just a laugh generator triggered by anything that sounds like an idea from the material world: the economy? Hee-haw. . . Ukraine? Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha. . . The border? Tee-hee. . . Transitioning minor children?  Yuk-yuk-yukity-yuk. . . The Middle East? Cackle cackle. . . .

You are well aware, I’m sure, that the veep has yet to be exposed to a single unscripted interchange with anyone outside her promotional circle. It’s been kind of neat trick to behold, like watching a barking terrier walk around the stage on its hind legs — but after a while the audience might be thinking, What else can you show me?

You must not suppose this liminal moment in history between the defenestration of “Joe Biden” and the apparent selection of Harris &  Walz is anything but a transient psychotic episode in American politics. The tell is that nobody in the Dem fold is inquiring as to how it happened, and especially who is behind it. Has the Dem Party become just Speaker emeritus Nancy Pelosi’s personal mafia? It appears that she was the one who delivered the black spot to “JB.” Do Chuck Schumer and Hakim Jefferies even matter in that supposed hierarchy, or is Mrs. Pelosi sole proprietor of the org now?

There must be a few unfettered souls among the Dem delegates who detect that, without the smoke and mirrors of the media matrix, Harris & Walz can’t possibly make the case for getting elected honestly. And the odds of successfully rigging another national election seem to be on-the-fade, too, with such obvious pranks as registering 371 illegal aliens (non-citizens) to vote using an address that turns out to be a Walmart parking lot. Yesterday, Governor Glen Youngkin of Virginia signed an excutive order requiring paper ballots and voter ID along with other new regs. Is a trend underway among the states to clean up their acts?

The so far railroaded national Dem delegates have ten more days to watch the Harris / Walz tag-team get vivisected on “X”, which, like it or not, has become the sole open conduit for news and commentary in a nation ruled by a psychopathocracy. You can say that because the policies they promote are obviously inimical to our country’s well being — open borders, harrassment, arrest and censorship of political opponents, the pointless Ukraine war, sexual mutilation of children, mass digital surveillance, medical quakery, and a policy of lying about absolutely all of it. Many still recognize insanity when they see it in action. These matters are not defensible and, deep down, they must know it, and maybe enough of the delegates will decide to do something about it — like revolt against the candidates foisted on them.

One possible result, of course, is that such a revolt will rip the party to shreds. You can easily imagine chaos in the streets of Chicago among the disaffected delegates and the Antifa shock troops called forth to punish them. Chaos for its own sake is highly valued by so-called “progressives” looking to progressively destroy the entire armature of civilized life in order to create out of the ashes a nirvana of sadomasochistic persecution and punishment — their Hieronymus Bosch Wokester utopia.

I’m guessing that there will be untoward discoveries about, and mortifying blunders galore by, Harris & Walz these ten days ahead, and they will go into the Chicago convention like two pitiful creatures marked for sacrifice. Gawd knows what will emerge from the turbulence that ensues — but I’m still dogged by the feeling that the only plausible outcome is a giant flying reptile with a face like Hillary’s swooping into the arena on her great, flapping, leathery wings crying, Caw caw caw, I own you all now, you miserable cat ladies, incels, nose-rings, and sundry victims of hateful offense! Follow me once more into the glorious rapture of defeat! And it shall be done!

*  *  *

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Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 16:20

Stocks Erase 'Black Monday' Losses As Vol Tumbles; Bond Yields & Black Gold Surge

If you took the week off and are just now looking at your book, you could be forgiven for being confused and unimpressed... S&P unchanged, rate-cut expectations notably lower, TSY yields up 15bps, and oil surging.

Source: Bloomberg

Summarizing this crazy week in stocks.

• S&P 500 - Last Friday's close: 5,346.56

• S&P 500 - This Friday's close: 5,344.16

What you missed was a 6% collapse in stocks (and 20bps plunge in TSY yields) on Monday as yen-carry-unwinds wreaked havoc in risk markets with VIX exploding to crisis highs, before vol-sellers piled back in...

Source: Bloomberg

As Goldman's Tony Pasquariello highlighted this morning, the wedge of market enthusiasm that opened up the summer has narrowed considerably...

Additionally, if you wondered just how correlated global positioning cross-asset was, we found out real quick this week, as the Yen Carry trade dominated all and every asset-class...

Source: Bloomberg

As we mentioned above, the big picture for stocks on the week was 'meh' with S&P and Nasdaq back up to unchanged. The Dow a small laggard and Small Caps down for the second week in a row (but obviously well off its lows)...Yes, that is a 6%-ish plunge in Nasdaq and Small Caps on Monday that was erased by the end of the week.

Energy and Tech were among the outperforming sectors (even after Tech's collapse on Monday) while Materials were the laggard...

Source: Bloomberg

'Most Shorted' stocks were squeezed back into the green on the week after Monday's collapse but remain well down from pre-payrolls...

Source: Bloomberg

Mag7 Stocks rebounded dramatically off the 8%-plus pukefest at the cash open on Monday, but ended the week in the red still...

Source: Bloomberg

Goldman's trading desk noted that the floor better to buy today though overall activity light in notional terms (volumes -10% vs the trailing 20 days) and top of book (liquidity) continues to be weak compared to average.

• LOs very quiet with small buy skew across Hcare and macro products, vs selling tech.

• HFs selling Tech, Industrials, and Cons Discretionary, vs buying Energy + Macro Products.

Treasury yields were up on the week (with the short-end underperforming - 2Y +18bps, 30Y +12bps on the week), but including Friday's post-payrolls plunge, yields are still down with the short-end outperforming...

Source: Bloomberg

Rate cut expectations tumbled from the initial surge on Monday withe most of the swing in pricing concentrated in 2024...

Source: Bloomberg

The yield curve (2s10s) briefly disinverted on Monday, but was flatter (more inverted) by the end of the week...

Source: Bloomberg

The dollar ended lower on the week as yen strengthened after BoJ folded...

Source: Bloomberg

Gold rebounded yesterday and today, back above $2400 but ended marginally lower on the week...

Source: Bloomberg

Oil prices had a big week, with WTI ripping back from 6-month lows around $72 to $77 by the end of the week (making it back to pre-payrolls levels)...

Source: Bloomberg

Bitcoin also had a wild week only to end approximately unchanged.  Having puked from $62k to $50k, it rebounded all the way back to $62k overnight (before finding support at $60k)...

Source: Bloomberg

Finally, amid the carnage of the last week, money market fund total assets soared to a new record high...

Source: Bloomberg

A huge $53BN inflow (the most since April - Tax Day) suggests 'real money' market participants are perhaps more than a little nervous as HFs, vol-sellers, and algos lift the market on thin volumes.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 16:00

CBP Agents Snag Record $48 Million In Meth Hidden Inside Lettuce Shipment At Southern Border

By Caleb Revill of FreightWaves

U.S. Customs and Border Protection announced several large drug busts this week after field operatives seized a record-breaking 3,400 pounds of methamphetamine on the Southern border and 266 pounds of cocaine on the Northern border – all on the same day.

According to a CBP news release, field operatives seized the methamphetamine – valued at $48 million – from a tractor trailer at the Pharr International Bridge cargo facility on the Texas-Mexico border on Aug. 1. The release states that this seizure is the largest ever in the port of entry’s history.

CBP officers assigned to the facility encountered a tractor trailer entering from Mexico and selected it for inspection. After using nonintrusive inspection equipment and physically inspecting the shipment, officers found 1,488 packages of alleged methamphetamine concealed in the shipment of lettuce.

Customs and Border Protection officers found 1,488 packages of alleged methamphetamine in a shipment of lettuce from Mexico, as well as 100 bricks of cocaine hidden on an outbound tractor trailer to Canada on Aug. 1. (Photo: CBP and Jim Allen/FreightWaves

Officers seized the narcotics and vehicle. Homeland Security Investigations special agents have initiated a criminal investigation, according to the release.

“Our CBP officers remain vigilant and intercepted this massive methamphetamine load, preventing it from reaching American streets,” said Carlos Rodriguez, port director of the Hidalgo/Pharr/Anzalduas Port of Entry, in the release.

The same day, CBP officers at the Blue Water Bridge port of entry near Port Huron, Michigan,  seized 266 pounds of cocaine from a tractor trailer leaving the U.S. for Canada. According to another news release from CBP, an X-ray scan of the trailer and subsequent physical inspection conducted by officers and a K-9 team revealed 100 bricks of suspected narcotics concealed behind a fake wall in the trailer.

The illicit drugs were confirmed to be cocaine through later testing, and they were seized along with the truck and trailer. The driver, a Canadian citizen, will face local prosecution in St. Clair County, according to the release. The case remains under investigation by Homeland Security Investigations.

“We will continue to use all tools at our disposal to disrupt the flow of dangerous drugs into our communities,” said Port Director Jeffrey Wilson. “This seizure showcases the effectiveness of our layered approach to border enforcement, which is further enhanced by the assistance of our regional law enforcement partners.”

The release states that this discovery comes on the heels of one of the largest inbound fentanyl seizures on the Northern border within the past five years in Detroit. Nearly 6 pounds of fentanyl pills were seized by CBP officers from inbound international mail during that incident on June 2.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 15:45

Virginia Mandates Paper Ballots, Tracking, And Proof Of Residency For 2024 Election

Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin (R) on Wednesday signed an executive order to implement various security measures ahead of the November election - including the use of paper ballots, tracking possession of ballots during early voting, matching the number of ballots casts with then number of voters who have checked in, and the number of ballots sent to voters.

The order also requires absentee ballots to be requested before being mailed to voters, in addition to rejecting ballots mailed back unless the voter provides the last four digits of their Social Security number and birth year.

The state notably uses paper ballot counting machines that aren't connected to the internet and are tested before elections.

Meanwhile, Youngkin also ordered the state to update its voter rolls - including adding or removing people based on whether they are allowed to vote in the state, removing those unable to prove residency, removing the names of dead voters, and ensuring illegals cannot cast a ballot.

According to Virginia AG Jason Miyares, 6,303 illegals have been removed from the state's voter rolls during Youngkin's tenure, and almost 80,000 deceased voters have been removed.

As the Epoch Times notes further, Youngkin instructed the Department of Motor Vehicles to “expedite the interagency data sharing with the Department of Elections of noncitizens by generating a daily file of all noncitizens transactions, including addresses and document numbers.”

The Department of Elections compares a list of noncitizens with a list of those registered to vote. Those who are on both lists get removed from voter rolls. If someone is erroneously removed, he or she has 14 days to prove eligibility to cast a ballot.

Additionally, Virginia has cameras monitoring drop box locations 24/7.

Moreover, according to the executive order, the Department of Elections is to inform voters about prohibited activities including, but not limited to, electoral intimidation, illegally disclosing or using Social Security numbers, unlawful registrations and votes, and tampering with or stealing voting items.

There have been almost two dozen cases of election fraud cases in Virginia since 2007, according to the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank in Washington.

Election Integrity

In a statement, Youngkin said that the issue of election integrity isn’t partisan and that elections should be held fairly.

“This isn’t a Democrat or Republican issue, it’s an American and Virginian issue,” he said. “Every legal vote deserves to be counted without being watered down by illegal votes or inaccurate machines. In Virginia, we don’t play games and our model for election security is working.”

While Youngkin and the GOP flipped the gubernatorial mansion and the House of Delegates in November 2021, Democrats have controlled both houses of the state Legislature since earlier this year.

Polling has showed that former President Donald Trump is competitive in the Old Dominion State. More recent polls, after President Joe Biden dropped out and Vice President Kamala Harris received the nomination, have shown a tighter race.

The last time a GOP presidential candidate won Virginia was in 2004, when President George W. Bush won reelection.

In addition to the presidential race, other major races in Virginia in November include the Senate race between incumbent Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) and Republican Hung Cao and key House races in the state’s Second, Seventh, and 10th congressional districts.

The next Virginia gubernatorial election will be held in November 2025. Youngkin is ineligible to run for a second consecutive term in accordance with the state’s constitution. Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-Va.), who isn’t running for reelection, is seen as the early front-runner for the governor’s mansion.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 15:05

Recession-Risk Reality-Check

Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk.com,

Greg Ip says the conditions for recession are not in place. I disagree. And I show where and how he went wrong.

The chart itself explains where Ip went wrong. See if you can figure it out.

“This Doesn’t Look Like Recession” Says Greg Ip

Please consider This Doesn’t Look Like Recession. Here’s How One Could Happen.

Unemployment is rising, stocks are falling and bond yields are well below short-term interest rates. These are all telltale signs of recession.

But a closer look suggests that while recession risk has risen, the U.S. isn’t in one now. The distinction is crucial because it means it isn’t too late to head off a downturn. It all depends on the Fed, and on the unpredictable moods of investors, consumers and employers.

The increase in unemployment to date, according to a rule-of-thumb popularized by the economist Claudia Sahm, in the past has only occurred during recessions.

To decide if it’s raining, it’s better to stand outside than count umbrellas. Similarly, to determine whether recession has begun, better to look at the indicators the NBER uses than the Sahm rule. Three—payroll employment, industrial production and real (inflation-adjusted) incomes, minus government transfers—were all shrinking in the four months up to and including the month the Sahm rule was triggered, in 1990, 2001 and 2008. In all three, a recession had begun several months earlier.

In the four months through July, payrolls were growing, and in the three months through June, so were real incomes and industrial production. If a recession had already begun, it would be a very unusual one. (Sahm said last week she didn’t think a recession is imminent).

Background on the McKelvey (Sahm) Rule

Edward McKelvey, a senior economist at Goldman Sachs, created the indicator.

Take the current value of the 3-month unemployment rate average, subtract the 12-month low, and if the difference is 0.30 percentage point or more, then a recession has started.

Claudia Sahm, a former Federal Reserve and White House Economist, modified the indicator from 0.3 to 0.5.

Please consider The Sahm Rule: Step by Step written December 7, 2023 by Claudia Sahm.

I created the Sahm rule, and it’s on me to communicate it well. I try. If you have any questions, please add them to the comments.

Sahm claims to have invented the rule. However, credit should go to Edward McKelvey, at Goldman Sachs.

The Lag Effect

Sahm modified the McKelvey rule to eliminate false positive. But that was at the expense of being far less timely.

In the 2008 recession, the Sahm rule triggered three months late. In the 1973 recession, Sahm triggered 7 months late.

Ip’s Huge Mistake

Ip’s huge mistake is comparing conditions in place when the rule triggers instead of conditions when the recession began.

Ip shows 4-month sum pf payrolls as negative, when in fact, they were positive.

Change in Nonfarm Payrolls Oct 2007-Jan 2008

• Oct: +72,000

• Nov: +116,000

• Dec: +105,000

• Jan: +1,000 Recession Start

Every month was positive, including the start of the recession.

Change In Nonfarm Payrolls Using Sahm Trigger

• Jan: +1,000

• Feb: -71,000

• Mar: -70,000

• Apr: -219,000 Sahm Trigger (was this remotely useful?)

The Sahm rule did not trigger until three months into the recession when payrolls were -219,000.

And look at December 2007. Despite a report of +105,000. It was clear recession was unavoidable.

Bernanke did not see recession until April, when it obvious to the world.

Industrial Production Index Oct 2007-Jan 2008

• Oct: 101.6

• Nov: 102.2

• Dec: 102.3

• Jan: 102.1

Industrial production peaked one month before recession started.

Look at Ip’s chart for Industrial Production and note how negative (and wrong) that it is. September Industrial Production was 101.9.

The average of the four months at the start of recession is (101.6 + 102.2 + 102.3 + 102.1) = 102.1 That’s up from 101.9 not hugely down as Ip shows.

Now let’s take a look at things from the perspective of the Sahm indicator.

Industrial Production Using Sahm Trigger

• Jan: 102.1

• Feb: 101.8

• Mar: 101.4

• Apr: 100.7 Sahm Trigger (was this remotely useful?)

“Real-Time” Nonsense

Sahm labels “her” indicator as “real-time”.

With lags as long as 7 month and never leading in the history of the data to 1948, there is nothing “real-time” about it.

Ip enhances the mistakes by taking a lagging indicator then applying those conditions to other indicators with varying lags.

QCEW and Business Employment Dynamics (BED)

Greg Ip also ignores or is unaware of enormous discrepancies between the monthly nonfarm payroll reports, also called Current Employment Statistics (CES) and the QCEW reports.

BED is a large subset of the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages QCEW which covers 11.6 million businesses

The nonfarm payroll reports are based off surveys of under 700,000 businesses. QCEW is based off 11.6 million businesses.

Expect the BLS to Revise Job Growth Down by 730,000 in 2023

On July 26, 2024, I commented Expect the BLS to Revise Job Growth Down by 730,000 in 2023, More This Year

Bloomberg’s chief economist, Anna Wong, arrived at a -730,000 overstatement in nonfarm payrolls. Using the same data, I calculated (in advance of her number), -779,000.

By her estimate, the BLS jobs overstated nonfarm payrolls by 81,111 jobs every month for 9 months. Click on link for more details.

Yet, here we are, putting faith in nonfarm payroll numbers that are not only lagging, but outright nonsense.

My July 8 Recession Call

July 8: Weak Data Says a Recession Has Already Started, Let’s Now Discuss When

I’ve seen enough. A recession has started. Let’s discuss starting with a very good indicator that has few false positives and no false negatives.

Since then ….

ADP Change in Employment

Data from ADP, chart by Mish

Unemployment Rate

August 2: Unemployment Rate Jumps, Jobs Rise Only 114,000 with More Negative Revisions

August 2, 2024: The McKelvey (Sahm) Unemployment Rate Recession Rule Just Triggered

A recession indicator based off rising unemployment triggered in July. Claudia Sahm, a former Fed economist, takes credit for an indicator she did not invent. Let’s discuss.

Key Points

• Due to the lagging nature of the Sahm rule, recession is highly likely to already be underway when it triggers.

• Applying her rules to other indicators is a serious mistake.

• I like a trigger of 0.4, halfway between the original McKelvey idea and Sahm’s revised rule.

• Click on above link for details.

Also, please take a look at my July 31 post Small Business Employment Growth Is Now Negative (and What It Means)

ADP data shows year-over-year payroll growth is negative 88,000 for small corporations sized 20-49!

Payroll trends are negative in all but very large corporations (Given Intel’s 15,000 Mass Layoff and tech woes in general, how long will that last?)

Recession is underway.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/09/2024 - 14:45