Crooked Bough News Round-up

— On Kamala's "Inspiring" Backstory & The Big Lie About "Unity"

 

at 7/26/24 5:50pm

On Kamala's "Inspiring" Backstory & The Big Lie About "Unity" Authored by James Hickman via SchiffSovereign.com, The year was 1994. Former NFL superstar OJ Simpson has just fled from police in the infamous low speed chase in his white Ford Bronco. Pulp Fiction was playing in the cinemas. And 29 year old Kamala Harris began dating one of the most powerful politicians in the State of California— Willie Brown. Brown had been in politics for decades at that point and has risen to become the Speaker of California State Assembly, then Mayor of San Francisco. (And despite having spent his entire adult life in politics, Brown somehow managed to amass a collection of $6,000 suits and expensive sports cars.) Willie Brown was also at 60 years of age back in 1994 (he’s 90 now), three decades older than his girlfriend Kamala. Obviously she was in it for love. I’m sure that’s the case. But it just so happened that, barely a few months into their steamy relationship, Speaker Willie Brown appointed Kamala to multiple, senior-level positions in the state, including a seat on the California Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board and the Medical Assistance Commission. I’m also sure that Brown appointed his girlfriend due entirely to her competence, and absolutely no other reason whatsoever. These appointments, along with Sugar Daddy’s public support and endorsement, were integral in Harris’s later campaign to become San Francisco District Attorney, then Attorney General of California in 2010. Willie Brown also endorsed her for Senate when she declared her candidacy in 2016, and was instrumental in securing her top endorsements, including from Joe Biden and Barack Obama. Again, all of this success was clearly due exclusively to Kamala’s tremendous competence and nothing more. Now, a lot of people have been remarking lately that Kamala is a DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) hire. But that’s completely unfair. Talk about a low blow. I mean, Kamala’s critics have completely missed the point that this woman— who claims to embody female empowerment— got her start by having sex with a powerful California politician 30 years her senior. So let’s give credit where credit is due: she slept her way to the top well before she became a DEI hire. In fact it wasn’t until she was picked to be Joe Biden’s running mate that she started benefiting from the DEI obsession. Curiously, it is now considered racist to even bring this up. CNN has decided that calling Vice President Kamala Harris a “DEI Candidate” is a “pseudonym for the N-word” and “racist dog whistle”. That’s absurd. Joe Biden’s entire presidency has been about promoting DEI candidates, and he admitted this himself recently when he said: “To me the values of Diversity, Equality, Inclusion are literally— and that’s not kidding— the core strengths of America. That’s why I’m proud to have the most diverse administration in history that taps into the full talents of our country. It starts at the top with the Vice President.” Biden also made it perfectly clear in 2020 that he wanted to select a woman of color as his running mate. So why exactly is it controversial to assert that Kamala was a DEI hire? Is it also controversial that the sky is blue, or that Michael Jordan was an exceptional basketball player? But these people in charge have a way of acting offended about even the most basic and obvious truths. It’s quite a talent. Speaking of talent, Kamala has none. Whenever she opens her mouth, she is as incompressible as Joe Biden yet without the excuse of age and dementia. Like this gem: “So I think it’s very important… for us, at every moment in time, and certainly this one, to see the moment in time in which we exist and are present, and to be able to contextualize it, to understand where we exist in the history and in the moment as it relates not only to the past, but the future.” This is also the person that was put in charge of the border security, which has been a total disaster. But in her televised explanation, she justified having not been to the border by saying she hadn’t been to Europe either. Wow, really racking up those foreign policy credentials! And on the topic of foreign policy, check out this inspiring quote as Kamala showcased her encyclopedic understanding of European affairs: “Ukraine is a country in Europe. It exists next to another country called Russia. Russia is a bigger country. Russia is a powerful country. Russia decided to invade a smaller country called Ukraine, so, basically, that’s wrong.” Note that this wasn’t an interview on Nickelodeon or some event with elementary school kids. This was an actual response in a real interview about the war in Ukraine. One of my favorite Kamala stories, though, is when she visited Puerto Rico earlier this year. Protesters were in the streets of San Juan, singing in Spanish. Kamala merrily clapped along, until an aide quietly whispered that the song was protesting her visit as a representation of the federal government’s “colonization” of Puerto Rico. Her track record as a prosecutor is also far from impressive. As the Attorney General of California, she prosecuted and incarcerated cannabis users. But in 2019, asked if she herself had ever smoked weed, she cackled and said, “I have. And I inhaled.” In 2014, Kamala’s office argued to keep non-violent inmates (including from minor drug convictions) locked up so that the state would have free prison labor to fight wildfires. But Kamala would prefer that her Black Lives Matters voters forget about all that. The Big Lie they are now force-feeding us is that the party of democracy is energized and united around Kamala Harris. Personally I think they are terrified and desperate. Deep down they know this woman is an incompetent buffoon. And more importantly, they are still incredibly fractured. Just look what the radical left has been doing this very week. Their Marxist foot soldiers have been busy burning American flags, defacing public monuments, and hoisting Hamas flags, while chanting “Allahu Akbar!” in the streets. Curiously most of them are white atheist 20-somethings from upper-middle class upbringings. And some of the Left’s most prominent politicians boycotted a speech given by the Prime Minister of Israel— one of America’s strongest allies during its time of war. This continues to look like a group that is completely out of touch, but insists that they have everything under control… which is pretty much par for the course given the last few years under Biden. Having said all that, it would be foolish to think they won’t pull out all the stops— continue to create all the propaganda, tell whatever lie, manufacture whatever hoax, and suppress whatever truth is necessary to win. Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 19:50

— 22 Year Old Arrested For Allegedly Stealing Seattle Fire Truck

 

at 7/26/24 5:25pm

22 Year Old Arrested For Allegedly Stealing Seattle Fire Truck A 22-year-old man was arrested this week after allegedly stealing a Seattle Fire Department truck, according to KOMO.  On Wednesday morning, the man rode a scooter to the truck, entered it, activated the lights and sirens, and attempted to drive away around 3:30 a.m. on the 9200 block of Second Avenue Southwest. The suspect couldn't deactivate the parking brake and only managed to drive around the corner before exiting the vehicle, the report said.  A witness reported seeing a man on a scooter ride up to a fire engine, get on, and drive away with its lights and sirens on, additional reporting said.  Police then arrived, confirmed with Seattle Fire Department employees that a fire engine had been stolen. "The firetruck involved was from South Park-based Engine 26, as noted by the SFD incident log," the West Seattle Blog reported. The man was arrested and booked into King County Jail for motor vehicle theft. According to police, the truck was returned to the Seattle Fire Department. Hoodline reported that this incident is the suspect's ninth arrest in nine months. Previous arrests led to short stints in custody, except for his most recent one from June 20 to July 1 for two stolen-vehicle cases, with hearings set for early August. Despite frequent arrests, he has no past felony convictions. Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 19:25

— In Defense Of Standardized Testing

 

at 7/26/24 5:00pm

In Defense Of Standardized Testing Authored by John Hilton-O'Brien via The Epoch Times, There’s been a lot of noise about getting rid of standardized exams. Supposedly, minorities are at a disadvantage with them. Consequently, the argument runs, doing away with standardized exams will allow more minorities to enter into prestigious career paths, enhancing “social justice.” If you look more closely at the history of standardized exams, however, this isn’t true.  Instead, getting rid of standardized exams serves the interests of an elite class—and will permanently lock minorities and entire classes of people out of social advancement. Standardized tests have already been eliminated in a number of places. Oregon, Wisconsin, and New Hampshire no longer have bar exams. The University of California no longer uses Standardized Admission Tests as part of its entrance requirement, just like SUNY and an association of Ivy League universities. And in Canada, many provinces are decreasing the use of standardized tests. But here’s the problem. Without the tests, how do we decide who gets admitted to university? (Unless, as in the movie “Idiocracy,” we get rid of them.) How do we decide who becomes a lawyer or a doctor? The most famous example of a standardized exam is the Public Service Commission Test used to vet applications for government civil service. If we do away with those, how do we decide who is qualified to become a public servant? Civil service examinations have been around for thousands of years. Imperial China used the examinations to allow young men from any social class or background to enter the imperial bureaucracy. Before that, and during dynasties where the exams were not used, entry into the patrician or bureaucratic class had been restricted by birth. Of course, entry still wasn’t easy. In imperial China, even more than today, you wouldn’t have the resources to study for the difficult standard exams unless you had access to money. Then, as now, money was a good indicator of success. But the point is that money wasn’t the only indicator. In fact, the imperial system came to run the exams as a double blind, going so far as to have exam responses copied out by another person, to ensure that nobody received favourable grading because a grader recognized their calligraphy. The China’s worst times are instructive for us, too. When the Mongol Yuan dynasty took over, they did away with the exams. When they returned them, only 25 percent of the exam seats were allotted to the majority Han Chinese ethnicity. How did they decide which Han wrote the exams? Letters of reference, of course, from existing bureaucrats or their Mongol overlords. Without open standardized exams, in other words, advancement was based on who you knew. That’s becoming true in the West today—complete with attempts at Yuan-style race-based admissions. As anybody who has ever applied to an elite university knows, reference letters are already important. If you’re entering a profession like medicine or law, a good reference letter can mean the difference between getting that coveted residency and not. Reference letters already reinforce pedigree—what university or prep school you attended. Even admissions specialists who hate reference letters admit they make a difference—and expensive prep schools write much better reference letters. In the absence of standardized tests and grading, reference letters will become even more important. And how are those rated? By who wrote them. The letter from an elite prep school is noticed as a letter from an elite school, regardless of content, and that tells the admissions expert what she or he needs to know. Who decides who becomes a lawyer? The partners in the law firms. And how will they choose their candidates? In the absence of a standardized bar exam, admission will depend on who the partners know. The same is true for doctors. If we wind up doing away with the public service admission tests, worse will follow.  Imagine a government whose civil service is hired based on who they know. The West has been here before—but not since the days of the absolute monarchs. So, who benefits from ending standardized tests? We suspect it is not the students. There is a sort of feedback loop inside the education industry, when the same people designing the curriculum are the ones testing for it. Internal tests such as “performance-based assessment” check only to see if the students can do what the teacher told them to do.  They don’t check to see if it will help the student in the environment that they are going to. In other words, little Suzy may consistently get top marks for her “holistic” language arts classes—but when she graduates, outsiders find that she can’t read or write. Externally administered standardized tests are the best way to make sure that the education system helps anyone aside from the teachers’ unions. You know who isn’t interested in dropping standardized test scores? Minorities who aren’t part of the “favoured” few. Part of the reason that elite U.S. universities are dropping standardized exams is that the U.S. Supreme Court told them that they couldn’t have race-based admission courses that left Asian-American students out in the cold. Dropping standardized tests allows universities to engage in discrimination without legal pushback. The racial policies of the Yuan and Qin dynasties live again in the Ivy League. Today, the abandonment of standardized testing is done specifically to disadvantage poor whites, as well as Asian students. The official reason given is that institutions—which claim to be guided by the highest ideals—can favour African American and Hispanic students in the United States, and (hopefully) First Nations in Canada. In the name of social justice, of course. But without standardized tests, admission decisions are arbitrary. Tomorrow, African-Americans, Hispanics, and First Nations may find that not all of them are favoured. Instead, favour will go to particular African American families, particular Hispanic families, and particular First Nations families. Skin tone doesn’t tell us the real story here. The simple truth of North American society is that we are developing a class system.  Those trying to get rid of standardized testing tell us outright that their motive is to decide who joins their social class of educated functionaries. They are trying to restrict entry. They are trying to become a self-selecting aristocracy. The only mechanism that ensures everyone with academic ability can have access to universities, professions, and civil service is standardized exams. We abandon them at our peril. Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 19:00

— Manhattan DA Argues Trump Case Not Affected By Supreme Court Immunity Ruling

 

at 7/26/24 4:40pm

Manhattan DA Argues Trump Case Not Affected By Supreme Court Immunity Ruling Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg has argued in a new court filing that former President Trump's criminal case and guilty verdict are not affected by the Supreme Court's recent ruling on presidential immunity. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg (L) steps away after speaking to the media after a jury found former President Donald Trump guilty of falsifying business records in New York City on May 30, 2024. (Seth Wenig/AP Photo) "That decision has no bearing on this prosecution and would not support vacatur of the jury’s unanimous verdict (let alone dismissal of the indictment) even if its reasoning did apply here," reads a July 24 brief from Bragg's team. Earlier this month the Supreme Court ruled in a separate case that presidents enjoy absolute immunity for core constitutional conduct, presumptive immunity for official acts, but no immunity for unofficial acts - which Bragg has seized on in his response to a Trump filing asking New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan to toss Trump's indictment, arguing that communications between Trump and his aides have been used as evidence before the grand jury which indicted Trump and a jury which returned a guilty verdict. According to Bragg's team, all of the criminal charges in Trump's 'hush money' case "stem from the defendant's 'unofficial acts' - conduct for which 'there is no immunity.'" As the Epoch Times notes further, the affected evidence is only a “sliver” if the “mountains of testimony and documentary proof that the jury considered,” therefore not warranting dismissal. Timing of Objections Prosecutors had relied on testimony of White House Communications Director Hope Hicks and Oval Office Director of Operations Madeleine Westerhout to establish that President Trump had signed Trump Organization checks at the White House. Defense attorneys had raised presidential immunity objections to Ms. Hicks’s testimony, and Justice Merchan had overruled the objections. The defense had also objected during Ms. Westerhout’s testimony, but not specifically citing presidential immunity. Prosecutors had also shown several social media posts made by President Trump during his time in office, some directly addressing allegations after his former attorney Michael Cohen was charged for financial crimes. Defense attorneys had objected to the admission of these quotes, but not on the basis of presidential immunity. Prosecutors argue defendants failed to preserve a record of objections based on immunity for official acts, and this “precludes this Court from considering any claim to vacate his conviction.” Prior to the trial, attorneys for President Trump did file a presidential immunity motion. Justice Merchan had dismissed the motion, ruling that defense attorneys could make individual objections against the admission of specific evidence during the trial and that he did not believe the motion was filed in good faith. The judge had faulted defendants for not raising presidential immunity earlier, including during an attempt to remove the case to federal court. Prosecutors now argue that the defense “waived reliance on presidential immunity as a defense” when they tried to remove the case to federal court. They cited a separate, civil case against former President Trump in which a federal judge had ruled that presidential immunity was a waivable defense. However, the U.S. Supreme Court majority opinion held presidential immunity to be necessary to the core principle of separation of powers. Charges Former President Trump was charged with 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree, and prosecutors argued that even excluding the contested evidence, the grand jury evidence establishes these charges. The 34 records are 11 checks to Mr. Cohen and their corresponding invoices and vouchers, including one repeated record after the initial one was lost. Prosecutors argue that the grand jury record establishes that these are business records, that they contain false entries, that former President Trump caused or made the entries, and that he “acted with intent to defraud.” “Even excluding all of the evidence defendant belatedly identifies as immune, the grand jury record is easily sufficient to support the indictment,” the brief reads. Justice Merchan has scheduled former President Trump’s sentencing in the case to Sept. 18. The judge is expected to issue a ruling on the presidential immunity arguments by then. Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 18:40

— Lies...

 

at 7/26/24 4:20pm

Lies... Authored by W.J.Astore via BracingViews.com, They’re Everywhere in America Soon after Joe Biden took office as president in 2021, I remember hearing that his VP, Kamala Harris, was put in charge of immigration, informally known as the “border czar.” Yesterday, the House passed a resolution condemning Harris for her handling of the border crisis. Yet I’ve also been hearing from Democrats and the media that Harris never was the border czar, even as there’s plenty of video evidence of networks like ABC, CBS, and NBC referring to her using that term. Denying that Harris was the border czar is a fairly small lie immersed in much larger sea of lies, and of course it’s a bipartisan effort. Donald Trump exaggerates and lies just to stay in shape. Democrats love to attack Trump for lying even as they lie themselves. Truly, it’s hard to run a government and a country when lies confuse every issue. Another lie being told about Kamala Harris is that her candidacy is the result of democracy in action. She’s the people’s choice! Except almost nobody voted for her as a presidential candidate. She’s been elevated and selected by the DNC and the donor class. She is a packaged product of the so-called elites within the party, the very opposite of a candidate chosen by the people. And yet I’m told this packaged product is going to “save democracy” from Trump, who was actually selected as a candidate in a more democratic process. Of course, there are far bigger and more serious lies than whether Harris was the border czar or whether she’s the people’s choice as the savior of democracy. U.S. troops’ deadliest enemies, I’d argue, are most often the lies told by the U.S. government, abetted and amplified by senior officers in the military. Think here of Iraq and Afghanistan, or go back further to Vietnam. Daniel Ellsberg, truth-teller about the Vietnam War and so many other things Knowing (or sensing/feeling) you killed for lies, or knowing your friends died for lies, is surely a contributing cause to a rash of suicides in the U.S. military today. The sacrifices and horrors of war may be eased by a “just” war, like World War II, but they are aggravated by unjust wars.  And they are further aggravated when you try to get help through the VA only to be turned away or stonewalled. All this is prologue to a note I received from a regular reader of Bracing Views about lies in America. I’ve decided to retain the profanity because it’s more than appropriate: I don’t know about you, but I find it quite amazing that, despite decades of bold-faced lying about US wars, all of it proven and even reported in the NYT and other mainstream media, the narrative of the each subsequent war is always accepted as true, until it too is exposed as being nothing but lies. Let’s look at the recent record: 1) Vietnam–exposed as nothing but lies by the Pentagon Papers. 2) Iraq–exposed as lies when the infamous WMD were never found and there was nothing found to back up the claim of links to Al Qaeda. 3) Afghanistan–exposed as pure fiction as revealed by the Washington Post “Afghanistan Papers” which said that “senior U.S. officials failed to tell the truth about the war in Afghanistan throughout the 18-year campaign, making rosy pronouncements they knew to be false and hiding unmistakable evidence the war had become unwinnable.” Add to the above list the fact that the Mueller report investigating the Russiagate hoax came up with nothing, ZERO. Currently, there are a couple of new false narratives duly reported by the mainstream media and, for the most part, swallowed by most people. First is the false narrative about the US war in Ukraine, that NATO expansion has nothing to do with it but rather was caused by naked Russian aggression and Putin’s plans to re-create the Soviet Union and take over the rest of Eastern Europe. Second, the false narrative that Israel is just defending itself against Palestinian terrorism rather than committing grotesque war crimes, completely ignoring the fact that the Israelis have been keeping the Palestinians under illegal occupation for over 50 years, since June 1967.  Lie after lie after lie after lie. And yet none of it matters. It is all sent down the memory hole as if it never happened. And then it is on to the next war, when the official narrative spewed out by the DC blob will once again be swallowed hook, line and sinker. It appears to be never ending. No matter how much lying is exposed, it simply does not matter. I think it is pretty fucking amazing. What will it take to get people to come out of their coma and realize what the fuck is going on? And keep in mind…..it has nothing to do with party affiliation. The lying is endemic, it’s in the DNA of the National Security State. Presidents come and go, but the lying for war-making never stops. And no one is ever held accountable either.  It’s pretty fucking impressive, when you think about it. Keep this is in mind……one would think that, after this abhorrent track record, the appropriate response would be to assume that the narrative justifying the new war of the moment was not true and nothing but more of the same lying. But that NEVER happens. NEVER. How is that possible? Is it just a serious form of denial? Is it due to mental illness? Is it just some perverted form of patriotism? In what other realm is it possible to lie non-stop and never be held accountable? Even worse, to continue to have credibility despite a track record of pathological lying?  A friend of mine pointed out that, in the old USSR, people knew that the official news on their TV every night was nothing but lies.  So, this begs the question: Which system is more pernicious and has more effectively brainwashed its people? The one where people are controlled but they are aware that they are being fed nothing but lies, or the one that is constantly lied to but the people still believe they are being told the truth? To those keen insights, I made this reply: Our [American] system of lying is better! We have state/corporate media too, it’s just more subtle and advertised as “free.” We have our own “Pravda” except it rarely tells the truth, unless that “truth” is in the interests of the powerful. To which our BV keen reader replied: Exactly. But to suggest that we have our own version of “Pravda,” only worse because it has the cover of supposedly being “free,” is tantamount to treason, you realize. This is the reason why Julian Assange/Wikileaks was such a threat…for actually challenging the right of the National Security State to lie non-stop about its war making and never be exposed for its lying or held accountable. Of course, that is exactly why Assange was locked away in prison for so long and tortured, not because he was spreading lies but because he was revealing truths. And we can’t have that in America! Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 18:20

— Arizona State Senator Claims "Political Persecution" After Ticketed Doing 71 MPH In A 35 MPH Zone

 

at 7/26/24 4:00pm

Arizona State Senator Claims "Political Persecution" After Ticketed Doing 71 MPH In A 35 MPH Zone After being caught driving 71 in a 35 mph zone, Arizona State Senator Justine Wadsack is claiming she is the victim of "political persecution".  As a result, she's refusing the sign the citation, according to reports from Jalopnik, citing the Tucson Sentinel.  According to the report, in Arizona, driving 20 mph or more over the speed limit is a Class 3 misdemeanor. The penalties include up to 30 days in jail, up to a year of probation, a $500 fine, and three points on your license. And in further proof our politicians get too much leeway, the incident occurred in March, but Wadsack wasn't ticketed due to her legislative immunity. Legislators can be charged after the session ends, which this year was on June 15. At that point, when the Tucson PD tried to have her sign the citation, and officer said she “immediately became defensive and argued that she was in fact not speeding." The officer continued: "I explained that there was probable cause to issue her a citation for criminal speeding and that she could present her arguments to the judge; however, she refused to meet to sign the citation and said she would not accept it." She was “also was upset that she was being cited several months after the fact and I explained that was due to the legislative session was ongoing at the time of the traffic stop (thus legislative immunity to be issued a ticket on March 15) however it did not prevent her from receiving a ticket once the legislative session adjourned.”  Then, she demanded to speak with the manager with the chief of police and claimed “political persecution”.  City attorney Mike Rankin commented: “Citing someone - Ms. Wadsack or anyone else - for putting other people in danger by driving at speeds more than 20 miles per hour above the posted speed limit within city limits is not ‘persecution.’ It is prosecution.” When asked why she was driving more than twice the speed limit, Wadsack claimed she was rushing home because her 2015 Tesla Model S had a low battery. This excuse is illogical, as electric vehicles are less efficient at high speeds. Even if she had a more plausible reason, like needing a restroom, she was still caught driving 36 mph over the limit. This behavior is reckless and dangerous, the report said, especially near the University of Arizona, where pedestrians are common. Additionally, Wadsack's claimed residence raises questions. She and her husband own a home outside the district she represents. She listed an apartment in the district when running for office but now allegedly lives in a different apartment. When stopped, she was about 10 blocks from her house, 17 miles from one apartment, and 19 miles from the other.  Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 18:00

— US Maternal Mortality Rates Remain the Highest Among High-Income Countries: Research

 

at 7/26/24 3:40pm

US Maternal Mortality Rates Remain the Highest Among High-Income Countries: Research Authored by George Citroner via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours), The United States continues to lead developed nations in maternal deaths, with some experts calling the recent rise unprecedented despite spending trillions on health care. Mental health issues, racial disparities, and a shortage of specialized care providers all contribute to this “crisis,” according to a report by the Commonwealth Fund, an independent research foundation that focuses on health care issues. (Sopotnicki/Shutterstock) A Shortage of Health Care Professionals The recent analysis showed that the United States had a maternal mortality rate of 22 deaths per 100,000 live births in 2022, significantly higher than other high-income countries—often more than doubling or even tripling their figures, according to the report. Half of the countries in the analysis reported fewer than five maternal deaths per 100,000 live births. The increase is “stunning and unprecedented,” Dr. James Thorp, an obstetrician-gynecologist at the Sisters of St. Mary’s Health System in Saint Louis, Missouri, told The Epoch Times, referring to an increase in maternal deaths over the past few years. “And it really went ... kind of unrecognized, kind of just slipped under the door, so to speak,” he noted. Maternal mortality is defined as the death of a woman while pregnant or within 42 days of pregnancy’s end from any cause related to or aggravated by pregnancy or its management, excluding accidental or incidental causes. About 75 percent of maternal deaths worldwide are caused by severe bleeding, infections, high blood pressure during pregnancy, complications from delivery, and unsafe abortion, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). In the United States, most maternal deaths occur during the postpartum period—especially the late postpartum period between 43 and 365 days after birth, as per the Commonwealth Fund’s research. This is a critical time when women face increased risks of severe bleeding, high blood pressure, and infection. The analysis highlights a shortage of maternal care providers in the United States, with just 16 midwives and obstetricians per 1,000 live births. Comprehensive postpartum support, including home visits from midwives and nurses, is vital to address maternal and mental health concerns and assess social health drivers, the authors wrote. The findings support those of a 2020 study published in The Lancet Global Health, which suggested that integrating midwives into health care delivery could provide 80 percent of essential maternal care, potentially reducing maternal deaths by 22 percent, neonatal deaths by almost 23 percent, and stillbirths by 14 percent. Many Factors Contribute to the Increase Several complex factors contribute to the high maternal mortality rates in the United States. These include an aging demographic, the ongoing obesity epidemic, and associated health problems. Research shows that more people are having children later in life or are becoming pregnant with chronic conditions such as obesity or cardiovascular disease. These factors increase the risk of complications during pregnancy and childbirth. The rising rate of cesarean sections may also play a role, as this procedure has been linked to increased mortality risks for both the mother (from blood clots or complications of anesthesia) and the child. A report by the U.S. Centers for Control and Prevention (CDC), published in September 2022, found that mental health conditions were the most common underlying cause of pregnancy-related deaths where a cause was identified. These conditions, including death by suicide and overdose or poisoning linked to substance use disorders, contributed to 23 percent of fatalities, surpassing infection (9 percent), hemorrhage (14 percent), and cardiac conditions (13 percent). There is also a disparity in health care outcomes relative to spending, according to Dr. Thorp. The United States has higher maternal death rates than India despite spending far more on health care. While the United States spends about $14,000 per person annually, India spends only $21 per person. Yet India, with four times the U.S. population, has “a better grade than we do,” Dr. Thorp said. Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 17:40

— 51 Days Later, Two Boeing Starliner Astronauts Still Stranded On International Space Station

 

at 7/26/24 3:20pm

51 Days Later, Two Boeing Starliner Astronauts Still Stranded On International Space Station There is still no return date for astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams, who remain stranded on the International Space Station due to thruster failures and a helium leak in their Boeing Starliner spacecraft, according to Space.com. On Thursday, NASA's commercial crew program manager Steve Stich told reporters, "We don't have a major announcement today relative to a return date," adding, "We're making great progress, but we're just not quite ready to do that." Stich said mission managers have yet to formulate a return date for Starliner. However, he emphasized that the ultimate goal is to bring Wilmore and Williams back to Earth on the spacecraft. A test-fire of Starliner's 28-thruster reaction control system will be conducted on Saturday or Sunday. The results could determine how the space agency and Boeing should move forward and if the spacecraft is deemed usable or unusable for the return mission.  "We're going to fire all those thrusters to a number of pulses, just to make sure before we undock, that whole system performs the way we expected and the way it did last time we checked it."  "We'll also get a chance to look at the helium system. It's been six weeks since we last checked that helium system; that was on June 15. So we'll pressurize manifold by manifold, and then hot-fire the thrusters, and then we'll get a chance to look at the helium leak rates and verify that the system is stable," Stich told reporters.  Fifty-one days ago, on June 5, Starliner's inaugural crewed flight blasted off from Florida's Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. The low Earth orbit mission was scheduled for only a week. NASA has rated Starliner for 90 days in space. Starliner is one of two private spacecraft that ferry astronauts from Earth to the ISS, along with SpaceX's Crew Dragon. Boeing has lagged behind Crew Dragon and Cargo Dragon for years. Starliner has faced years of challenges.  It's day 51 of what was originally planned as Starliner's 8-day mission. NASA engineers are addressing over 30 issues related to thrusters and helium leaks, with return date to be announced next week. The crew is safe as there are various options for their return. ??? pic.twitter.com/oA8a84HzMI — Berry Straw (@ddnnddc) July 25, 2024 Stich admitted that one of the rescue plans under review would be using SpaceX's Dragon capsule to return the astronauts to Earth.  Imagine that headline: 'Elon Musk's SpaceX Rescues Boeing Astronauts From ISS'...   Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 17:20

— Rate Of Shoplifting Spikes Across US

 

at 7/26/24 3:00pm

Rate Of Shoplifting Spikes Across US Authored by Eric Lundrum via American Greatness, The rate of shoplifting saw a noticeable increase in the first half of 2024, even as the rates of other crimes fell to levels not seen since before the pandemic. According to the Daily Caller, a study by the Council of Criminal Justice (CCJ) determined that shoplifting rose by 24% in 23 different cities across the country, compared to the first half of 2023. That rate is also about 10% higher than the first half of 2019. Meanwhile, the rates of homicide and robbery fell to lower than the levels seen in 2019. “Shoplifting is a theft by someone other than an employee of the victim of an item displayed for sale,” the study clarifies. “After a notable decline in the first few months of the COVID-19 pandemic … shoplifting dropped 15% from 2019 to 2020 and declined another 10% in 2021,” the report reads. “Shoplifting increased 12% across the sample cities from 2022 to 2023, but by the end of 2023, the shoplifting rate was 10% lower than in 2019.” Several of the most prominent cities to see shoplifting increases include Boston, which saw its 11.9% rate of shoplifting in May of 2020 surge to 42.4% in June of 2024, and Chicago, which previously had a rate of 14.8% in May of 2020 but skyrocketed to 41.4% in June of 2024. Meanwhile, the first half of 2024 saw approximately 2% fewer homicides and 15% fewer robberies than the first half of 2019. “The average homicide rate for the entire sample was 2% lower in the first half of 2024 than in the same period in 2019,” the study notes. “The overall decline was driven by large drops in cities with traditionally high homicide rates, including Baltimore, Philadelphia, and St. Louis. Two-thirds of the sample cities (19 out of 29) actually had homicide rates that were higher in the first half of 2024 than in 2019.” The spike in crime in the United States, particularly shoplifting, began in 2020 amidst the nationwide COVID lockdowns and simultaneous race riots that destroyed hundreds of businesses, caused billions in damage, and killed over two dozen civilians. Looting was a frequent occurrence in cities struck by racial violence, which was overwhelmingly carried out by black nationalist groups like Black Lives Matter and the far-left anarcho-communist terrorist organization Antifa. Subsequent progressive efforts to curb the power of the police, including several cities outright defunding their police departments, led to the sustained and even increased rates of shoplifting and other crimes. Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 17:00

— WTF Is Going On With The Fed's Reporting Of US Bank Deposits

 

at 7/26/24 2:43pm

WTF Is Going On With The Fed's Reporting Of US Bank Deposits The last two weeks have seen US bank total deposits rise by $33BN (on a seasonally-adjusted basis)... Source: Bloomberg But.. on a non-seasonally-adjusted basis, total US bank deposits have fallen $40BN... Source: Bloomberg Which makes us ask again - what exactly is a 'seasonally-adjusted bank deposit'? But we will move on from that farce. Excluding foreign deposits, the picture gets even more malarkey-ful - a $9BN unadjusted deposit outflow is magically morphed into a $27BN inflow by The Fed's fuckery. The unadjusted outflow was all from large banks while the adjusted deposits showed strong inflows into both large and small banks (+$19BN and +$8BN respectively).   Source: Bloomberg That's $31BN of (unadjusted) deposit outflows magically morphed into $62BN of deposit inflows in the last two weeks... Doe it even matter anymore? Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 16:43

— Saving Our Democracy...

 

at 7/26/24 2:20pm

Saving Our Democracy... Authored by James Howard Kunstler via Kunstler.com, “Being insane is the new normal.” - Aimee Terese on “X” However it happened this week, “Joe Biden” passed the blowtorch to a new generation and got himself gone from the political battlefield. Delegates to the coming Democratic National Convention (August 19) were duly notified of the selected replacement, Veep Kamala Harris, and ordered to line up behind her. Not a peep of disagreement was heard among them. Amazing that no one had a different idea. Thus, is democracy saved. The curious details around this event remain shrouded in mystery. Reporters for The New York Times and the WashPo could not be bothered to inquire, and their readers are not inclined to ask how all this came to be. It just is. In a culture with no sense of consequence, things just happen or un-happen. It is your duty to recognize that the wind now blows from another direction and bend with it. One thing was obvious: the long-running prank of pretending that President “Joe Biden” is sound-of-mind fell apart after his mortifying appearance on the debate stage June 27th. Apparently, every last captain and foot-soldier in the Democratic Party ranks was taken completely by surprise to see their champion flicker out in real time, like a forty-watt bulb that has done years of duty on the front porch and suddenly leaves you in the dark. Three weeks followed with “Joe Biden” boldly campaigning as if nothing had happened. (Perhaps his mind did not register that things had changed.) And then there was the weird tweet on “X” Sunday afternoon when the whole country was outside waterskiing, grilling weiners, carjacking, and yelling at ballparks, and the deed was done. Someone, possibly even “Joe Biden” himself, wrote a letter pasted into the tweet that declared he was bowing out of the race. The White House staff didn’t even know until it was up-and-posted. Rumor had it that Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama read the riot act to “JB”, who was refusing to follow the script. There were plenty of carrots-and-sticks to finally lever his obdurate ass into motion: not least must have involved any pending legal outcome of the family’s influence-peddling operations, whispers of new whistleblower accusations about offshore bank accounts, perhaps with sweeteners in the deal as to how much schwag the clan could still hold onto in the end. Then, the valedictory speech on Wednesday, sort of a proof-of-life exhibition, to verify that Sunday’s janky tweet to the nation was for real. You heard a Homeric recitation of “JB’s” signal achievements in office, every one of them demonstrably false. He did not keep our country out of war, or grow the economy, or keep inflation down, or beat Big Pharma, or build anything, or defend personal freedoms, or “make it clear there is no place, no place in America for political violence or any violence ever.” (In fact, the very next day, Thursday, pro-Hamas mobs attacked US Park police and vandalized federal property at Washington’s Union Station, and on Friday all charges were dropped against them — while scores of J6 Capitol trespassers rotted for years in the DC jail.) What “Joe Biden” actually accomplished in office was the near-total wrecking of the USA. He torpedoed the authority and legitimacy of just about every federal agency, turned the Department of Justice into a Gestapo, seeded the federal court benches with Woke lunatics, allowed an invasion of perhaps 20-million border-jumpers (including many thousands of professional terrorists), coerced injections of an ineffective and injurious vaccine into millions of citizens afraid of losing their livelihoods, promoted gross medical experiments on sexually troubled children, invited drag queens and mentally-ill degenerates to cavort in the White House, spent borrowed money at a rate that propelled the national debt past the event horizon into a black hole, made the seeking of incompetence the number one priority of the Pentagon, provoked a war in Ukraine that now teeters on the hazard of a nuclear exchange, and allowed the CIA to complete its takeover of the US government. “Joe Biden” will go down in history as the worst of all 46 US presidents. And, of course, in the rush of cascading events the past several weeks came the attempted assassination of the Democratic Party’s nemesis, Mr. Trump, an operation festooned with loose threads, suspicious agency failures, and intimations of Deep State blob engineering. You’ll have to stand by on any of that resolving soon. But many Democrats expressed disappointment that Mr. Trump was not killed, since that would be saving our democracy. Also not quite resolved is the case of who the Democratic Party truly intends to run for president this year as the days dwindle down to Nov. 5. The current delirium over Kamala Harris is like a relief rally in the financial markets when a crisis has been averted — or, at least, stalled. You have reason to doubt that the Democratic Party’s leadership crisis has actually been averted. Despite sedulous efforts to wipe her record, too many Americans know Kamala Harris as a hee-hawing ninny with a predilection for hapless Marxist fantasies. I’m not persuaded that she is at all comfortable in her sudden role as the party’s avatar. She is rumored to hit the bottle in moments of stress. The Party of Chaos will supposedly run a “virtual roll call” of delegates August 1st in order to meet the requirements to get on the ballot in several states. But then comes the actual convention with live bodies in murmuration on the floor of the arena, and in the back rooms and hallways, and there are more than three weeks between now and then for Kamala Harris to remind the world what a cackling lightweight she is. A lot can happen between now and then. *  *  * Support his blog by visiting Jim’s Patreon Page or Substack   Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 16:20

— Two Trillion & Counting... The Mega-Cap Meltdown Continues

 

at 7/26/24 2:00pm

Two Trillion & Counting... The Mega-Cap Meltdown Continues Since peaking on July 10th, the market cap of the Magnificent 7 stocks has dropped a mind-numbering $2 trillion... Source: Bloomberg As another week goes by (the third in a row) with Small Caps (+3%) dramatically outperforming Nasdaq (-3%). The Dow ended the week green but S&P red (but closed above its 50DMA)... That has crashed Nasdaq back into 'normal' range with the Russell for the last year... Source: Bloomberg And the biggest three week underperformance of Nasdaq vs Small Caps since the very peak of the DotCom bubble... Source: Bloomberg Treasuries have been broadly bid the last two days, with the long-end lagging (but managing to get back to unchanged on the week today) as the short-end yields tumbled... Source: Bloomberg This drove the yield curve (2s30s) to disinvert most sine July 2022... Source: Bloomberg Rate-cut expectations rose modestly on the week (focused fully in 2024 as 2025 remained flat)... Source: Bloomberg The dollar drifted very modestly higher in a very noisy trading Source: Bloomberg Gold ended the week slightly lower, bouncing back today... Source: Bloomberg Crypto markets were mixed this week with Bitcoin bouncing back strongly today, back up to $68,000... Source: Bloomberg ...but ETH seeing 'sell the news' relative pressure since the ETFs launched... Source: Bloomberg Oil prices ended the week lower, chopping around back in a tight technical range it has found comfortable for months... Source: Bloomberg Finally, it's different this time... it's bigger.... Source: Bloomberg ...and remember, next week is the busiest of the summer -  massive macro events (JOLTs, BOJ, Euro CPI, US ECI, FOMC, BOE, NFP), coupled with massive earnings announcements (40% of SPX market cap next week). Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 16:00

— Navy To Expunge Records For SEALs, Sailors Who Refused COVID Vaccines

 

at 7/26/24 1:35pm

Navy To Expunge Records For SEALs, Sailors Who Refused COVID Vaccines Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times, The U.S. Navy has agreed to correct the records of SEALs and sailors who declined to receive COVID-19 vaccines due to their religious beliefs, under a settlement approved by a federal court on July 24. “Defendants agree to re-review the personnel records of all class members to ensure that the U.S. Navy has permanently removed records indicating administrative separation processing or proceedings, formal counseling, and non-judicial punishment actions taken against the class members solely on the basis of non-compliance with the COVID-19 vaccine mandate and adverse information related to non-compliance with the COVID-19 vaccine mandate,” the settlement agreement states. The review must be finished within nine months, according to the agreement. The Navy has also agreed to review the records of class members discharged over refusal to receive a COVID-19 shot. Officials “will remove any indication from that service member’s records that he or she was discharged for misconduct” and make sure the discharged members are listed as eligible for enlistment. The expungement of records must be completed within one year according to the agreement. All Navy members who filed a religious request for an exemption from the Navy’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate and were actively serving as of March 28, 2022, are covered by the settlement. That includes people who rescinded their accommodation requests in order to leave the military. Some 4,339 individuals are affected by the settlement, according to court documents. “This has been a long and difficult journey, but the Navy SEALs never gave up,” Danielle Runyan, senior counsel at the First Liberty Institute, said in a statement. “We are thrilled that those members of the Navy who were guided by their conscience and steadfast in their faith will not be penalized in their Navy careers.” The Navy declined to comment on the settlement. The lawsuit, filed in 2021 by the institute on behalf of Navy personnel, prompted the court system in 2022 to block the COVID-19 vaccine mandate for members seeking religious accommodation. In 2023, the Department of Defense rescinded the mandate for all military branches, including the Navy, per a bill approved by Congress and signed by President Joe Biden. The settlement features the Navy committing to posting a statement on its website saying in part that the branch “supports diverse expressive activities, to include religious expression, and recognizes that through inclusion we are a better military and stronger nation for it.” The statement will say accommodating religious beliefs is “a pillar of the Navy’s commitment to treating all sailors with dignity and respect.” The Navy has also agreed to list information advising members of their rights to request religious accommodations, create a training presentation for Navy supervisors and commanders, and pay $1.5 million in attorneys’ fees. Individuals who believe they are part of the class to which the agreement applies can visit First Liberty Institute’s website for the settlement. More than 16,000 military members filed religious accommodation requests as of January 2023. Many of the requests were denied. If members received a denial but still refused to receive a COVID-19 vaccine, they were often booted from the force. Branches discharged 7,705 members for not complying with the COVID-19 vaccine mandate. The Navy discharged 1,566 members. When the Navy discharged members, it gave them reentry codes that made them ineligible for reenlistment. The Army and Air Force violated their own rules in handling exemption requests in a timely manner, the Pentagon’s inspector general said earlier this year, while the Marines and Navy generally met their timeline requirements. The Navy, though, was among the branches that the watchdog found used incorrect codes for members who were granted exemptions. Officials attributed the incorrect codes to clerical errors. Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 15:35

— Racism And Sexism: The Campaign Theme Of The Harris-Whoever Ticket

 

at 7/26/24 12:55pm

Racism And Sexism: The Campaign Theme Of The Harris-Whoever Ticket Authored by Richard Truesdell and Keith Lehmann via American Greatness, Is Kamala Harris the quintessential DEI hire? It’s a legitimate question, given that Joe Biden made it clear during his 2020 election-year campaign that he would only consider a black woman for his VP slot. As president, he also claimed that the choice of Supreme Court Justice replacement for Stephen Breyer would be limited to a black woman. Not even the most qualified black woman, just someone possessing dark skin and lady parts. Biden could have simply told the country that he was going to choose the most qualified person for either position. Instead, he said that his choice was going to be based primarily on skin color and gender. What has this wrought? Let us tell you, it has positioned the capabilities of otherwise well-qualified people into the corner of racial and sex bias, regardless of intentions. Of course, maybe that was the intention all along. You cannot convince anyone with even moderate powers of observation that this is not happening. Joe Biden and now Kamala Harris, along with their Democrat power operators, place intrinsic qualities such as skin color, gender, and sexual preference over meritocracy in assigning important roles in government cabinet positions, committee assignments, and security operations. We have seen the result, and it isn’t pretty. A former and potential future president was less than an inch away from having his brains blown out of his skull on live television. In a testimony before the House of Representatives on Monday, the head of the Secret Service, Kimberly Cheatle, with the expressed responsibility of protecting presidential contenders from harm during a campaign, claims that she tried her best but admitted the task was just too much. That implies just about everything toxic about DEI. She has subsequently resigned, much to the relief of everyone. Let’s explore DEI, which is diversity, equity, and inclusion. Diversity, when implemented by force, is the purposeful dilution of staffing that makes a company or government consider immutable qualities that have nothing to do with capability. At woke companies and government agencies, this so-called diversity has nothing to do with the job at hand. Diversity is heralded as a “strength.” Well, our military has failed miserably for over thirty years using this attribute, losing Afghanistan, losing in Ukraine, and for the last three years, losing on our southern border. We are witnessing a clear and rapid deterioration of our infrastructure, from our airline transportation to our local policing, all due to racial and gender quotas. Next is equity. This is a term previously understood as ownership, as in “home equity.” An asset you actually own, such as a bond or stock certificate. This term has been essentially co-opted to now mean “equal outcome.” This is an obtuse implication that equates “fairness” with “justice.” It is another divisive tool in the radical arsenal that is intended to confuse, obfuscate, and hide the real objective here, which is to install fringe ideas and intentions that are alien to a majority of the population. Then we have inclusion. But what is so-called inclusion? It means nothing more than the exclusion of straight, white, Judeo-Christian males. They are today’s most abused, discriminated against, slandered, vilified, and demonized demographic. Brought upon by fad beliefs, promoted by Democrats and almost the entire mainstream media, any failure in society is put upon the feet of men who happen to be white and hold traditional Judeo-Christian values. This is a toxic brew of envy and hatred toward fellow Americans that has taken hold in deeply progressive circles on the left, mostly among affluent single white women but has been touted by the legacy media as yet another club to wield against traditional meritocracy. A DEI hire will always be stained with the notion that they “Didn’t Earn It” among fellow workers, regardless of their true capabilities. This was hammered home last year when recently appointed Harvard President Claudine Gay was called to testify on anti-Semitism on college and university campuses. In a performance that previewed Cheatle’s testimony 10 months later, Gay issued a weak apology, which was roundly criticized in most quarters. Yet it was not enough to stop calls for her to step down. Even though 700 of Harvard’s 2,452 faculty members signed a letter opposing calls for Gay to be removed as university president, she resigned. And soon after she stepped down, it was revealed that she plagiarized her academic work, causing a review by the Harvard Corporation. Even after her resignation, Harvard said the review found “a few instances of inadequate citation” and “duplicative language without appropriate attribution” in her work, but “no violation of Harvard’s standards for research misconduct.” If a Harvard student turned in a master’s thesis or doctoral dissertation using the criteria used to whitewash Gay’s scholarship, he or she would likely fail. This is the true cost of DEI. Kamala Harris represents DEI at its worst. We have gotten to the point where merit has been sacrificed on the altar of DEI. It places race and sex in place of merit and it costs America every day. We have to look no further than the current Democrat front-runner for the presidency, Kamala Harris, whose early career advancements were facilitated through sordid affairs and race-based, gender-based favoritism. We are already seeing on outlets like MSNBC and CNN that whenever Harris’ relationship with powerful California Democrat Willie Brown at the start of her political career is brought up, or that she was having an affair with a married man almost 30 years her senior, you’ll be branded as racist for doing so. (Remember, these are the same outlets that have had no issue with using these similar smears when describing Donald Trump’s sex life, especially during his recent hush money charade trial in New York.) And we would be remiss not to mention her relationship with TV talk show host Montel Williams back in 2001. There’s a term for this; it’s called slut-shaming. Indulge in it at your peril of being branded a sexist. On Wednesday, Saagar Engetti discussed the topic of slut-shaming on his Breaking Points podcast and walked on eggshells as he did. (While you’re watching, watch Krystal Ball gaslighting her Democrat audience and followers. It’s hysterical.) To get an idea of how Harris’ past relationships have been scrubbed, just take a look at her Wikipedia page. There, under personal life prior to her 2014 marriage to First Gentleman Doug Emhoff, you will find just this: “In the 1990s, Harris dated Speaker of the California Assembly Willie Brown. In 2001, Harris had a brief dating relationship with talk show host Montel Williams.“ That’s it. So if you need any proof of the inherent leftist bias of Wikipedia and its profiles, look no further. Then there’s the rampant and rank hypocrisy of her stand on drug use as California’s Attorney General. She had no problem imposing lengthy jail terms on pot users, including many young black men, as she tried to show her “tough on crime” stance. Later, we find her laughing and boasting about her own use of “recreational drugs” on this cringey exchange on the Charlamagne tha God podcast. The Trump campaign should run this clip in heavy rotation in the fall. Moving on to her term as vice president, there are her failures as the Border Czar. Facilitated by the mainstream media, she’s walking that back, saying that she was only fostering diplomatic relationships with Central American countries like Guatemala to get at the root causes of the immigration crisis. How stupid do they think we are? That none of us have access to the internet and that we don’t know how to use Google? That Biden didn’t appoint her in 2021 as the Border Czar? On Wednesday, as the President of the Senate and the presumptive Democrat nominee for president, she should have been seated behind Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during his recent address to Congress. Instead, due to a “scheduling conflict,” she spoke at a five-day conference at a previously scheduled event in Indiana, at the historically Black Zeta Phi Beta Sorority Grand Boule conference in Indianapolis. This was a clear slap at Netanyahu and Israel, the only true democracy in the Middle East. But Harris wasn’t the only cowardly Democrat to boycott Netanyahu’s speech. Others included Senate president pro tempore, Washington Senator Patty Murray, who was called to replace Harris. She declined. Other Democrats declined before retiring. Maryland Senator Ben Cardin, an Orthodox Jew who is retiring, stepped up. The whole process reeks of barely concealed anti-Semitism. (It should be noted that almost half of Democrat senators did not attend the speech—another slap at our most important Middle Eastern ally.) Harris is a great example of how Democrats now choose their candidates and, more importantly, their leaders. Because DEI is so ingrained in Democrat ideology and policy, their entire world is influenced by a person’s immutable characteristics that cannot be changed, which is now the mantra of Democrats. Harris’s failure as Biden’s Border Czar is now being magically erased, Soviet-style, by Democrats and its handmaidens in the mainstream media. It is a case of media gaslighting that will be studied by media and political analysts in the years to come. By the way, have you noticed how hysterical the Democrats and media get when anyone refers to Harris as a DEI hire? How they claim it’s racist and sexist to make such a statement? Why is this the case? It’s because it’s true. It is racist and sexist. No, not pointing it out, but the simple fact that Harris was chosen only on the basis of her skin color and being a woman. Anyone can see this, but we’re expected to normalize this racism and sexism because it’s “the good kind.” Another case of media gaslighting. Racist and sexist gaslighting is what we can expect from Democrats and the media in the next 100 days leading up to November 5. Everything previously thrown at Trump has failed. They will stop at nothing to prop up this DEI hire to drag her into the White House next January, just like they did with Biden in 2020. The whole world is watching with stunning disbelief at how far this incumbent Democrat administration and their enablers in the legacy media will go to foist their loser ideas on the public. It is up to American patriots to make sure they fail miserably. Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 14:55

— Fair Share? Yellen Says US Opposed To Global Wealth Tax On Ultra-Rich

 

at 7/26/24 12:15pm

Fair Share? Yellen Says US Opposed To Global Wealth Tax On Ultra-Rich Authored by Tom Ozimek via The Epoch Times, A proposal for a worldwide tax on the assets of the ultra-wealthy that’s being pushed by some countries within the G20 does not have the support of the Biden administration, according to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen. Ms. Yellen told reporters at a July 25 press conference during the G20 finance ministers meeting in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, that the United States thinks that a global agreement on taxing ultra-high-net-worth individuals is neither practical nor a particularly good idea. “Tax policy is very difficult to coordinate globally,” Ms. Yellen said. “We don’t see a need or really think it’s desirable to try to negotiate a global agreement on that.” The new global tax on billionaires was proposed by the European Union Tax Observatory last year, and last month, the Brazilian G20 presidency asked its researchers to lay out their proposal in more detail. French economist Gabriel Zucman, an architect of the proposal, has posited that individuals with more than $1 billion in net worth should be required to pay a minimum annual tax amounting to 2 percent of their wealth, according to a baseline version of what he calls an “ultra-high-net-worth tax.” The reason the minimum is expressed as a fraction of wealth rather than income is that wealth is far more difficult to manipulate, according to the proposal. Mr. Zucman estimates in his report to the G20 that the minimum tax on billionaires equal to 2 percent of their wealth would raise between $200 billion and $250 billion per year from about 3,000 individuals. If the tax is extended to individuals worth more than $100 million, that would generate an additional $100 billion to $140 billion a year. Participating countries would coordinate their efforts at a global level to collect the tax through various domestic instruments, including by a tax on the broad notion of income, as well as a wealth tax. Now is a good time to implement such a tax, according to the French economist, because bank secrecy laws have been curtailed over the past 15 years through increased global information exchange. A key obstacle to successful implementation is gaps in information exchange, which Mr. Zucman says could be overcome by enhanced surveillance to identify the beneficial owners of assets. The global ultra-high-net-worth tax proposal is a way to make progressive taxation more effective, according to Mr. Zucman, who argues that contemporary tax systems fail to effectively tax the wealthiest individuals and so undermine tax progressivity and all its purported benefits. “A progressive tax system strengthens social cohesion and trust in governments to work for the common good,” Mr. Zucman writes in the executive summary of his G20 report. “It is critical to fund the public goods and services—such as education, health care, public infrastructure—that are engines of economic growth, as well as the investments needed to address the climate crisis.” Ms. Yellen, in her remarks in Rio de Janeiro, threw cold water on the global ultra-high-net-worth tax, but not on progressive taxation. “We think that all countries should make sure that their taxation systems are fair and progressive,” Ms. Yellen said. The Treasury Secretary added that the Biden administration is “strongly supportive of progressive taxation, and making sure that very wealthy high income individuals pay their fair share.” She highlighted policies proposed by President Joe Biden, such as a billionaires’ tax, which she described as “a very worthwhile initiative.” President Biden has put forward a proposal for a billionaire’s tax that would set a minimum 25 percent tax for the nation’s billionaires, generating an estimated $500 billion in revenue over a decade. Critics of a billionaire’s tax have argued it would face significant legal hurdles, including constitutional challenges on grounds of it potentially being recognized as a type of direct tax that is not permitted under the U.S. Constitution. Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 14:15

— Bidenomics Failure Worsens As Credit Card Delinquency Rate Hits 12-Year High  

 

at 7/26/24 11:55am

Bidenomics Failure Worsens As Credit Card Delinquency Rate Hits 12-Year High   Whatever happened to the 'Bidenomics' propaganda pushed by the White House and amplified by leftist corporate media outlets? Well, that narrative quickly imploded, just like the narrative that President Biden is the 'sharpest person in the room.'  A majority of Americans are livid with Bidenomics. They have been financially crushed by elevated inflation and high interest rates as the national debt uncontrollably soars by $1 trillion every 100 days. The economic pain is very real and has sent households into a downward spiral. Now, credit card debt delinquencies are soaring, reaching the highest level since 2012.  The Democratic Party's propaganda machine in corporate media has spent this entire week attempting to convince the American people that Vice President Kamala Harris should be the next president of the US. From 'saving to democracy' to 'young blood' - the radical left has tried to spin all sorts of narratives this week, even rewriting the history of Harris' past to skewing polls (see: here & here & here). The problem with Democrats propping up the former 'Border Czar' is that it won't affect the dire situation for tens of millions of voters who find themselves in financial turmoil because of failed Bidenomics. Many folks are suffering and have trouble paying shelter costs, and don't get the American people started about food inflation at the supermarket - it's a sour topic.  The damage to the working poor and middle class has already been realized. By the way, the pain is creeping towards high-income classes...  On Thursday, Goldman analyst Natasha de la Grense told clients, "Not a great start to earnings season in Consumer, with very few positive surprises so far. Both high-end consumption and the low-income consumer are weak."  With that in mind, cracks in the consumer sector are widening significantly. New data from the Philadelphia Federal Reserve reveals that the share of past-due credit card balances in the first quarter reached the highest level since records began in 2012.  Here's more from the report:  All measures of balance-based credit card delinquency rates posted their highest levels in the nearly 12-year history of the series in the first quarter. Meanwhile, the total number of credit card accounts 30, 60, and 90 days past due declined for the first time in a year, following typical seasonal trends. Figure 1 plots the share of credit card balances and accounts 60 or more days delinquent, highlighting the divergence in trends across the two measures of card delinquencies this quarter. Although the share of accounts falling behind on payments was smaller, account holders who are behind have larger balances left unpaid. Utilization and average account balances declined this quarter across all percentile cuts, in a typical seasonal reduction following holiday spending. Furthermore, the report noted total number of credit cards fell in the quarter, consistent with seasonal trends. However, total revolving balances reached a record $628.6 billion. Revolved balances account for about 71% of total outstanding balances, the highest level since 2021.  The report also noted that "account holders who are behind have larger balances left unpaid." Even with inflation cooling and rate traders pricing in the first 25bps interest rate cut in September, the lag effect will be months before consumers see any direct relief.  Greg McBride, chief financial analyst at Bankrate, told NBC News, "Interest rates are not going to fall fast enough to bail you out of a bad situation." Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 13:55

— President Biden Claims The US Isn't At War As He Bombs Yemen

 

at 7/26/24 11:35am

President Biden Claims The US Isn't At War As He Bombs Yemen Authored by Dave DeCamp via AntiWar.com, On Wednesday night, President Biden falsely claimed in an address to the nation that the US was not at war. "I’m the first president in this century to report to the American people that the United States is not at war anywhere in the world," the president said. About a half hour before Biden delivered his address, US Central Command announced that it launched new strikes targeting the Houthis in Yemen. Since January, the US has carried out hundreds of strikes in Yemen as part of a new war that has not been authorized by Congress. US Navy Image US naval commanders have described the fight against the Houthis in the Red Sea as the largest naval battle the US has been engaged in since World War II. Back in April, US military officials said the munitions used in the Red Sea and other bombings Biden ordered in Iraq and Syria since October 7 had cost the US about $1 billion. The US has also been involved in combat operations against ISIS remnants in Iraq and Syria. Earlier this month, CENTCOM said it had been involved in 196 partnered operations in both countries in the first half of 2024. US troops deployed in Syria are not welcomed by the government, making it an illegal military occupation. At the end of 2023 and the beginning of this year, the US was fighting Shia militias based in Iraq that began targeting US bases in response to the US support for the Israeli onslaught in Gaza. In January, three US troops were killed in a drone attack on Tower 22, a secretive base in Jordan near the Syrian border. The US launched multiple rounds of airstrikes against the Shia militias, which are part of Iraq’s security forces. The bombings enraged the Iraqi government, which asked the US to withdraw, and now the two sides are negotiating the future of the US presence. The US has also bombed Somalia multiple times this year to support the Mogadishu-based government against al-Shabaab. The US also launched an airstrike that it said targeted ISIS in Somalia back in May. There is this weird facet of American psychology that we don't see airstrikes or special ops raids as being "war." https://t.co/QMU9rJzQiz — Jack Murphy (@JackMurphyRGR) July 25, 2024 Besides the direct combat, the US is also providing vast amounts of military aid and intelligence support for Ukraine’s war with Russia and Israel’s genocidal campaign in Gaza. President Biden has brought the US and Russia closer to a direct war than at any time in history and has continued to enable a mass slaughter of Palestinians. Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 13:35

— Boeing, Money Printing, & The Military-Industrial Complex

 

at 7/26/24 10:55am

Boeing, Money Printing, & The Military-Industrial Complex Via SchiffGold.com, Boeing’s commercial jets struggle, but its military machines thrive, all fueled by endless fiat money... Not-so-mysteriously, none of the problems now associated with Boeing passenger planes seem to be affecting the weapons of annihilation they produce for the Military-Industrial Complex’s borderless global war machine, which is fueled by infinite fiat money. Myriad problems with Boeing passenger jets have put the company into the news just about every day for months, but the company makes much more than just planes for commercial passenger airlines. Boeing is also a major aerospace contractor that produces fighter jets, attack helicopters, predator drones, missiles, and even the president’s airplane, Air Force One.  To be fair, Boeing’s record as of late beyond commercial jets is far from perfect — its Starliner, a crewed craft designed to bring astronauts to the ISS, was plagued with issues on the way to the space station that are now being investigated by its astronauts. And Boeing’s main rival in the space industry, SpaceX, has had its own problems with similar craft. But when was the last time you heard about an Apache helicopter breaking down on its way to deliver a payload of highly-combustible “democracy” to a country unfortunate enough to be on the ever-expanding list of nation-states roped into unnecessary wars waged by the US or one of its global proxies? Somehow, the systemic quality control issues at Boeing appear much more likely to get a handful of hapless air travelers injured than to cause problems with a military operation that has the “righteous” cause of protecting the petrodollar hegemon. The printing of fiat money fuels both phenomena in different ways. Boeing’s corner-cutting and quality control issues are just one symptom of living in a fiat money system. As the dollar is debased, the incentive and ability to create solid, long-lasting products is degraded in kind. Manufacturing costs rocket upward as supplies, materials, logistics, storage, maintenance, insurance, wage demands, and every other production factor all increase, leading to a degradation in quality across the process as the irresistible temptation intensifies to prioritize minimizing costs over producing reliable, well-made, quality goods such as safe airplanes.  US M2 Money Supply (Billions) When individuals and corporations realize that the money is worth less than it was a year ago, and in a year will be worth even less still, these cost-cutting measures become standardized matters of policy. Inflation expectations incentivize speed of production and cost-cutting over high-quality projects that take more time and money to make, but that will last much longer. When central bankers turn on the printer and degrade the value of each dollar in circulation, they essentially steal not just money, but time, as any ability to meaningfully save for the future is diminished and short-term profits and speculation are rewarded over quality. The lifetime of hours you spend at work — time that could be spent with your family, on building a business, on creating great art, and on being a producer of lasting and valuable things — is shrunken so that bankers, politicians, and war profiteers can become richer. Inflation is the most insidious and destructive tax. pic.twitter.com/L8rDxOxAMR — Fight With Memes (@fightwithmemes) July 15, 2024 And it happens regardless of “which side” is in office. This is how fiat money contributes to the degradation in the quality of goods, such as airplanes, and sends the long hours that we spend working to earn that money — whether you work at Boeing or somewhere else — into a slow-motion black hole torn open by the thievery of money printing. When bankers can create infinite amounts of the currency out of thin air, it means that long-term projects, entrepreneurship, and literally everything else that requires a lower time preference are disincentivized in favor of spending, speculating, and cutting corners anywhere possible.  But when it comes to maintaining the Welfare-Warfare state, the ability to print infinite money is essential. Without it, the war machine consistently supported by both Democrats and Republicans would cease to exist. Dollars would be limited, there would be a practical cap on spending that would impose fiscal discipline because the currency would be pegged to something — like gold — of intrinsic value and real scarcity. That means that all of Boeing’s fighter jets, drones, military helicopters, and ballistic missiles would have to be financed through direct taxation, which Americans would never accept. It also means that Boeing would be far more incentivized to produce passenger jets that don’t fall apart on the runway. But unlike a direct tax, stealing value (and time) by printing money takes longer to notice as it slowly drives the dollar’s value down toward zero. In a system with loose money, inflation goes up and down at different rates during different periods, but if you zoom out, you can always rely on costs going up.  Until it passes the event horizon of hyperinflationary collapse, the debasement doesn’t happen all at once. The US dollar uses its unique world reserve currency status, enforced by the threat of violence, to delay this process and export dollar inflation to other countries. But this is how the proverbial frog is boiled. When it gets bad enough that common Americans do finally start to notice, presidents and other politicians blame “price gouging” and “corporate greed.” This would be a more honest assessment if the accusations of greed were turned inward: Onto the bankers who enjoy the privilege of being first in line at the money printer, onto shamelessly corrupt Federal Reserve officials who take advantage of knowing exactly which economic levers are about to be pulled, onto the senators who make millions with suspiciously-serendipitous stock trades and pass bills written by lobbyists at the same corporations that funded their campaigns, and onto the presidents who encourage the Fed to print, print, and print some more so that the economy can be made to appear robust during their term in office. Until central banking is fundamentally changed (or the Fed abolished entirely) with a hard money standard, expect more of the same. Until, of course, the dollar is finally printed into oblivion and a monetary reset forces the empire’s hand. When that day comes, it will be disastrous, and the regime will try to blame everyone and everything except itself as it presents an even more centralized, bigger government and bigger banking “solution.”  But it will also be an opportunity to replace the current system with something better. However, it will be up to the people to look past the propaganda to recognize the issue, and demand hard money — lest we surrender another hundred-plus precious years of stolen time to the bankers and their political cronies. Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 12:55

— Seller On Amazon Sold Merch Reading "The Only Good Trump Is A Dead One"

 

at 7/26/24 10:35am

Seller On Amazon Sold Merch Reading "The Only Good Trump Is A Dead One" "Why are you allowing a shirt to be sold that seems to encourage lunatics to attempt to kill members of the Trump family?" commentator and filmmaker Robby Starbuck asked Amazon & founder Jeff Bezos on X, referring to Amazon allowing a seller earlier this week to offer merchandise with the slogan "The Only Good Trump Is A Dead One." Hey @Amazon @JeffBezos, Why are you allowing a shirt to be sold that seems to encourage lunatics to attempt to kill members of the Trump family? @DonaldJTrumpJr @LaraLeaTrump @EricTrump pic.twitter.com/8EBPFpGPo0 — Robby Starbuck (@robbystarbuck) July 25, 2024 Starbuck said, "Just searched and @Amazon has hoodies too!"  Just searched and @Amazon has hoodies too! pic.twitter.com/IgjXgnbKVk — Robby Starbuck (@robbystarbuck) July 25, 2024 Starbuck's post garnered nearly 800k reads by Friday morning. He said the anti-Trump merch was removed from the Amazon online store on Thursday evening.  This is messed up — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 26, 2024 Elon Musk chimed in, "This is messed up."  They’ve been removed now. — Robby Starbuck (@robbystarbuck) July 25, 2024 After a FOX Business investigation into the anti-Trump shirts on Thursday afternoon, Amazon told the media outlet that the shirts were removed "due to non-compliance with our guidelines." "Amazon does not allow products that promote, incite or glorify hatred, violence, racial, sexual or religious intolerance or promote organizations with such views," Amazon stated on its website. Here's what X users are saying about anti-Trump gear on Amazon: The side of tolerance is actually insane ? Say it ain’t so! pic.twitter.com/8EKqOfE0lJ — One Bad Dude (@OneBadDude_) July 26, 2024 We've located where the crazy deranged rhetoric is coming from (not the right) — ░SourPatchLyds░ (@sourpatchlyds) July 26, 2024 It's going to cost Amazon ... — Brian Basson (@BassonBrain) July 26, 2024 Sigh, Amazon. Who vets these products internally?  Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 12:35

— Sorry Liz; Cash - Not Crypto - Still Top Funding-Choice For Terrorists

 

at 7/26/24 10:15am

Sorry Liz; Cash - Not Crypto - Still Top Funding-Choice For Terrorists Authored by Arijit Sarkar via CoinTelegraph.com, Singapore’s internal investigation into nationwide terrorism threats has revealed a significant reliance on cash transfers for fundraising. In contrast, the adoption of cryptocurrency among terrorist organizations remains low. The Singapore terrorism threat assessment report 2024, released July 25, highlighted an elevated terrorism threat to the nation owing to global instability. The report was issued by the Internal Security Department of the Ministry of Home Affairs. Bypassing regulations with cash The Singapore government noted an increase in the use of cryptocurrencies to raise funds for terrorist activities by various Islamist terrorist groups. However, the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) continues to receive most of its funding through cash transfers. “Although there is increasing use of cryptocurrencies, the predominant means for financial transactions by ISIS and its affiliates remain cash couriers and informal value transfer systems (hawala).” Wire transfers through financial institutions, money service businesses and cash couriers remain the top choice for terrorist organizations to raise capital. While Singapore reported no indication of an imminent attack, the primary threat driver continues to be online self-radicalization driven by supporters of the terrorist group Hamas. Crypto donations in terror financing The report also noted that, in February, a Philippines-based pro-ISIS media group ran a fundraising campaign in support of the “mujahideen (fighters)” and shared posters soliciting cryptocurrency donations. The agency reminded citizens that funding terrorism is a crime. Since 2015, 13 individuals have been convicted for terror financing, which includes three Singaporeans and 10 foreigners. Singapore’s ongoing effort to curb terror financing through regulation The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) recently increased the risk level for crypto exchange platforms or digital payment token service providers from medium-low to medium-high as part of an update to the country’s laws on Countering the Financing of Terrorism. Key findings of the Money Laundering National Risk Assessment in the Anti-Money Laundering landscape. Source: MAS The change aims to prevent terrorist organizations from exploiting Singapore’s economic openness as an international financial, business and transport hub for terrorist financing purposes. [ZH: These findings run in direct contrast to Senator Elizabeth Warren's constant diatribes against crypto.] As Decrypt's Stephen Graves notes, her intense scrutiny of crypto mining in the U.S. comes as she faces headwinds in her campaign to impose tighter restrictions on crypto in the U.S. Just this week, Sen. Roger Marshall (R-KS) pulled his support for Warren's Digital Asset Anti-Money Laundering Act of 2023. His withdrawal was especially notable because he co-sponsored the bill. Crypto firms have stepped up their efforts to unseat Warren, who has linked the digital asset class to crimes including child sexual exploitation, terrorist financing and the fentanyl trade. Ripple Labs has donated $1 million to help defeat prominent crypto critic Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) this November.  A company spokesperson confirmed to Decrypt on Tuesday that it made the payment to the Commonwealth Unity Fund, a super PAC set up to support the campaign of one of Warren’s Republican challengers, crypto attorney John Deaton.  The spokesperson declined, however, to comment on whether Ripple plans to spend additional funds on the race. They also did not clarify how the company’s... This month, Ripple Labs donated $1 million to the Commonwealth Unity Fund, a a super PAC set up to support the campaign of one of Warren’s Republican challengers, crypto attorney John Deaton. In February, it was revealed that pro-crypto super PAC Fairshake, which has raised hundreds of millions of dollars from crypto firms, poured $10 million into attack ads directed at prominent Warren ally Katie Porter, a Democratic congresswoman currently in a four-way race for California’s open U.S. Senate seat. Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 12:15

— Netanyahu Angry After Meeting With Vice President Harris

 

at 7/26/24 9:55am

Netanyahu Angry After Meeting With Vice President Harris Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was angered by Vice President Kamala Harris' on-camera statement following their Thursday meeting, and he now says the words threaten to sabotage any potential peace deal with Hamas. Diplomats speaking with Axios said Netanyahu's criticism stems from Harris speaking as if a ceasefire and hostage exchange would mark the final end of the war in Gaza, whereas Israel's position has all along been that counter-Hamas operations could resume even if a hostage deal is reached. Via AFP Following the Harris-Netanyahu meeting which lasted about 40 minutes, the Vice President said "It is time for this war to end in a way where Israel is secure, all the hostages are released, the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza ends and the Palestinian people can exercise their right to freedom, dignity and self determination." She added: "And as I just told Prime Minister Netanyahu it is time to get this deal done. Let's get the deal done. So we can get a ceasefire to end the war. Let's bring the hostages home. And let's provide much needed relief to the Palestinian people." Israeli officials told Axios that the Biden meeting was much more constructive than the one with Harris, but that they were "caught off guard" by Harris' follow-up statement:   The Israeli officials said Netanyahu and his team were caught off guard by Harris' on-camera statement and taken aback by its tone, which they said sounded much more critical than Biden's. "Harris' statement after the meeting was much more critical than what she told Netanyahu in the meeting," one Israeli official claimed. According to more, "The Israeli official also said Netanyahu was unhappy with the fact that Harris criticized Israel publicly for the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and for killing civilians, especially at the current timing amid the hostage deal negotiations." But an aide to the vice president said he has no idea what the Israeli side is talking about and emphasized the private meeting between Harris and Netanyahu was "serious and collegial."  BREAKING: VP Harris speaks after meeting with Israeli PM Netanyahu Harris calling for an immediate cease-fire deal to free the hostages. The VP saying she “will not be silent" about the suffering in Gaza, the "devastating" loss of life and the "dire" humanitarian crisis. pic.twitter.com/Fe5QPoOuFh — MSNBC (@MSNBC) July 25, 2024 So for now, it appears Netanyahu is ready to blame lack of progress in a ceasefire on VP Harris, and the current chaos of American politics after Biden bowed out of the presidential race. Israeli officials have tried to push a narrative that says a truce deal is impossible if there is any daylight in messaging between Washington and Tel Aviv. But what Israel wants is a perpetual 'blank check' from the US taxpayer (akin to Ukraine's Zelensky), and makes a lot of noise and complains bitterly in any instance where US leadership is not 100% on board, or issues some degree of criticism of Israeli military action. Tyler Durden Fri, 07/26/2024 - 11:55

As of 7/26/24 7:16pm. Last new 7/26/24 6:15pm.