Jan 132020
 
 January 13, 2020  Posted by at 11:17 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,


G.G. Bain Three-ton electric sign blown into Broadway, New York. 1912

 

‘I’m Spending All My Money To Get Rid Of Trump’: Michael Bloomberg (R.)
What If @realDonaldTrump Is Brilliant? (Papachelas)
Warren, Sanders Campaigns Spar In Rare Show Of Discord (R.)
How Bad Can The Climate Crisis Get If Trump Wins Again? (G.)
Avoid UK Recession By Kickstarting Green Economy, Says Thinktank (G.)
China Is Really Worried About Unemployment, Social Unrest (CNN)
Ford’s China Vehicle Sales Drop 26% In Third Straight Year Of Decline (R.)
Downing of PS-752 Already Being Used To Smear MH-17 Skeptics (OffG)
Bolivia Exiled Ex-President Morales Calls On Radio For Armed Militias (R.)
Somebody Snuck A Potato Into CES 2020 (F.)

 

 

All of the money, none of the prospects. Will he be the first to spend a full billion? Don’t change your station.

‘I’m Spending All My Money To Get Rid Of Trump’: Michael Bloomberg (R.)

U.S. presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg told Reuters he is ready to spend much of his vast fortune to oust Republican President Donald Trump from the White House in 2020, rejecting criticism from rivals for the Democratic nomination that the billionaire is trying to buy the U.S. election. Ranked by Forbes as the eighth-richest American, Bloomberg has flooded U.S. airwaves and social media feeds with messages that he stands the best chance to beat Trump, spending more on campaign ads since he launched his campaign in November than his main Democratic rivals have over the last year.

“Number one priority is to get rid of Donald Trump. I’m spending all my money to get rid of Trump,” Bloomberg told Reuters aboard his campaign bus on Saturday, during a nearly 300-mile (483-km) drive across Texas, one of the 14 states that will vote on Super Tuesday on March 3. “Do you want me to spend more or less? End of story.” U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren, one of the leading Democratic presidential contenders who has vowed to get money out of politics, blasted Bloomberg when he launched his campaign with a $37-million TV advertising blitz, accusing the former New York City mayor of trying to buy American democracy. “These are just political things they say, hoping they catch on and they don’t like me doing it, because it competes with them, not because it’s bad policy,” Bloomberg said.


After entering the race late and missing the first six Democratic debates, Bloomberg generally sits fifth in national public opinion polls behind Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders, Warren and Pete Buttigieg. But not just the two liberal standard-bearers of Warren and Sanders, all of the four are too liberal to beat Trump, Bloomberg said. “One of the reasons I’m reasonably confident I could beat Trump is I would be acceptable to the moderate Republicans you have to have,” said Bloomberg, a former Republican who made his fortune selling financial information to Wall Street firms. “Whether you like it or not, you can’t win the election unless you get moderate Republicans to cross the line. The others are much too liberal for them and they would certainly vote for Donald Trump.”

Read more …

No, I don’t think Trump is brilliant, thank you. Just funny to see this coming from Greece.

What If @realDonaldTrump Is Brilliant? (Papachelas)

History is often written by those who don’t follow the rules or, rather, by those who ostentatiously throw them onto the trash heap of history. Donald Trump is one of those people, whether we like it or not. In an era where political correctness and slick public relations are the norm in politics and beyond, Trump came along with his own unique style and turned everything on its head. This started during his candidacy for president. A one-time close associate of his described how his team tried to convince him to start using prepared speeches, reading from a teleprompter. He didn’t like the idea at all but he agreed to give it a go.

When the moment came for his first public speech, he started reading from the teleprompter, darting looks to his left and right, clearly uncomfortable with the whole process. At one point, his patience at an end, he petulantly threw down the screen and blamed his awkwardness on his team, declaring that he preferred making speeches without teleprompters. His associates were aghast for a few minutes. But after seeing the rave reception of the move by Trump’s supporters, they realized that his instinct and political brilliance was probably beyond them.

He pulled it off in domestic politics; could he also do it in foreign policy? All the relevant literature, handbooks and collected wisdom of experts far and near suggest that such a feat is impossible. What is essentially a negotiating tactic from the Manhattan real estate world cannot work in the forum of international politics. The art of pushing someone to the end of their tether and then making a deal at the last minute would be rejected as unenforceable. But that’s exactly what Trump is testing now. The assassination of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani in Iraq by American forces was a very extreme act which all Trump’s predecessors had avoided, as had even successive Israeli governments. Trump did it.

And by doing so he simultaneously sent a clear message to the Middle East that the USA is no longer dependent on its oil and natural gas reserves. Iran responded in a relatively reasonable fashion. In a few weeks, it will become clear whether those who believe that Iran will hit back harder – albeit under or over the radar – are right, or whether a new balance of power will finally emerge that puts it “in its place” and possibly leads to a new deal. That’s when a lot of so-called experts will be banging their heads against the wall.

Read more …

Prepare for 11 months of this, getting uglier as we go along.

Warren, Sanders Campaigns Spar In Rare Show Of Discord (R.)

A rare sign of discord emerged on Sunday between progressive Democratic presidential contenders Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders over a report that Sanders’ campaign volunteers had called her a candidate of the elite in conversations with voters. “I was disappointed to hear that Bernie is sending his volunteers out to trash me,” Warren told reporters after a campaign event in Marshalltown, Iowa, which will hold the nation’s first nominating contest on Feb. 3. “I hope Bernie reconsiders and turns his campaign in a different direction.” Warren and Sanders, who are friends, fellow U.S. senators and their party’s progressive standard-bearers, agreed early in the nominating contest to an informal non-aggression pact and have largely avoided criticizing each other.


Politico reported late on Saturday that Sanders’ campaign had distributed talking points for volunteers on what to say to voters who are thinking of supporting his main rivals – former Vice President Joe Biden, Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, and Warren. The guidance suggested that volunteers argue Warren was supported by “highly-educated, more affluent people who are going to show up and vote Democratic no matter what,” rather than motivating people who do not normally vote, Politico reported. Sanders said on Sunday he did not approve the negative talking points about other candidates. “We have over 500 people on our campaign. People do certain things. I’m sure that on Elizabeth’s campaign people do certain things as well,” Sanders told reporters after a rally in Iowa.

Read more …

Blaming Trump for a process that has taken centuries to develop is as silly as it is lazy. There is no government anywhere that is willing to commit anything other than lip service to this.

How Bad Can The Climate Crisis Get If Trump Wins Again? (G.)

Climate pollution in the US is up under Donald Trump and threatens to undermine international efforts to stall the crisis, especially if he wins re-election this year and secures a second term in the White House. While US climate emissions fell 2.1% in 2019, they rose significantly in 2018, according to estimates from the economic analysis firm Rhodium Group. On net, emissions are slightly higher than in the beginning of 2017, when Trump’s administration began enacting dozens of environment rollbacks aimed at helping the oil and gas industry. Trump is still working to further weaken bedrock standards. This week he proposed to allow major projects like pipelines and highways to bypass reviews of how they will contribute to global warming.

The draft rule is unlikely to become final before the November election, but it is yet another reason industries weighing climate choices might delay significant action. “What they have done is created confusion within the business community and the environmental world as to what are going to be the standards,” said Christine Todd Whitman, who led the Environmental Protection Agency under the Republican president George W Bush. “Essentially every regulation the agency promulgates gets a lawsuit that goes with it, almost inevitably … that’s the only good thing you can say about it.” Whitman called the approach “mindless” and said “whoever is a bigger donor gets to tell them what the environmental policy should be, it seems”.

In the absence of any federal climate action, states, cities and businesses have pledged their own efforts, seeking to encourage other big emitters like China and India to continue to slow their growing climate pollution. Andrew Light, a climate negotiator for President Barack Obama’s state department, said the world is taking note of those efforts, but if Trump is re-elected “you are going to see a lot of people who are worried anew about what the US can do.” Americans choosing Trump would send the signal that they don’t care about the climate, Light said.

America’s Pledge, a project to quantify ongoing US emissions reductions, estimates that non-federal actors – like states and cities – could cut climate pollution 37% below 2005 levels by 2030. A Democrat in the White House could increase that to 49% with what Light described as modest, politically achievable policy changes. Experts are increasingly calling for the US to halve its emissions by 2030 and neutralize them by 2050.

Read more …

Next up: $50 trillion. You’re being had.

Avoid UK Recession By Kickstarting Green Economy, Says Thinktank (G.)

The government fightback against the next recession should include pumping as much as £50bn into green projects, in a move that would help reboot the economy and tackle the climate emergency, according to a left-leaning thinktank. Against a backdrop of concern among economists that Britain is ill-equipped to combat another downturn on the scale of the 2008 financial crisis, the New Economics Foundation thinktank said a green plan to beat a future slump was required. In the event of a recession, it said the government should spend at least 2% of GDP, or around £30bn, to decarbonise the economy, by investing in renewable energy projects, planting trees, transport infrastructure, electric vehicles, and retrofitting homes with new insulation.

For a larger economic shock, as much as 3% of GDP, or around £50bn, could be spent. Leading economists including former US Treasury secretary Larry Summers and the former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund, Olivier Blanchard, have called on governments around the globe to prepare for future economic shocks with readily available blueprints to raise government spending. It comes as central banks, including the Bank of England, have limited capacity to provide support because interest rates remain close to the lowest levels on record more than a decade after the financial crisis. Mark Carney, the Bank’s governor, has hinted that Threadneedle Street could cut rates soon, while warning that it is running out of ways to combat recessions.


The foundation said that raising investment in green infrastructure was required regardless of whether Britain was facing a recession or not. However, it said that a plan for fighting a future downturn should have decarbonisation at its core. [..] It said that spending around £10.5bn on a mass insulation programme for homes – equivalent to only a third of the coalition government’s tax cuts between 2010 and 2013 – would have enabled residential emissions to fall by around 30% by 2018.

Read more …

Why would CNN run a piece like this, at this point in time?

China Is Really Worried About Unemployment, Social Unrest (CNN)

The Chinese government wants to do whatever it can to protect the economy in 2020. It’s got an enormous task ahead of it. Beijing has made clear that the world’s second largest economy cannot spiral into a slump and risk mass layoffs as it tangles with rising debt, cooling domestic demand and an ongoing trade war with the United States. That’s particularly important this year because it marks the conclusion of the government’s 13th Five-Year Plan, during which it promised to establish a “moderately prosperous society” and end poverty. Senior members of the Communist Party’s Politburo — the seven most powerful men in China — said last week that all efforts must be taken to achieve those goals in 2020.

In recent weeks, the government has bombarded the economy with a wave of stimulus measures, from tariff reductions that could help soothe the pain from rising prices, to rate cuts that could fuel more bank lending. Authorities are also amping up the language they’re using to describe the situation. China’s State Council last month called on local governments to “go to all lengths” to prevent massive job losses this year — what it characterized as the country’s top policy priority. The chief administrative office even warned that the country could face “massive unexpected incidents” if unemployment balloons — a euphemism in China widely understood to refer to social unrest and riots, and one that is rare in public government documents.

In recent years, the government has said it has to create 11 million new jobs annually to keep employment on track. While China’s official unemployment data has barely budged over the last several years, hovering between 4% and 5%, Beijing’s messaging suggests that it is unusually worried about the slowing economy and the challenges that the year could bring. “Beijing is much more worried about social unrest than about ballooning local debt, which at one point seemed to be a priority, ” said David Zweig, director of Transnational China Consulting Limited and a professor emeritus at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. Huge protests, after all, have for months consumed Hong Kong, which local officials said last November would sink into its first annual recession in a decade.

The protests have focused on calls for greater democracy, but economic factors such as the soaring cost of housing and an increasingly competitive labor market have been fueling a growing sense of dissatisfaction, particularly among the city’s young people. Social unrest might be the “black swan” risk facing the country, Zweig added, using a phrase that Chinese President Xi Jinping himself uttered last year to describe an improbable but chaotic event. “2020 is going to be very difficult, and mass unemployment may be the most feared problem,” said Frank Ching, a China political commentator and adjunct associate professor at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. “It’s not just an economic issue — it could develop into a political one. “

Read more …

And 15% for GM. Who’s taking over? Reuters doesn’t say.

Ford’s China Vehicle Sales Drop 26% In Third Straight Year Of Decline (R.)

Ford Motor Co’s China vehicle sales fell for a third consecutive year, by 26.1%, as it battles a prolonged overall sales decline in its second-biggest market that has hit demand for its mass-market Ford brand and sports utility vehicles. The U.S. automaker delivered 146,473 vehicles in China in the fourth quarter, down 14.7% year-on-year, Ford said in a statement. In total, it sold 567,854 vehicles over 2019. Ford has been trying to revive sales in China after its business began slumping in late 2017. Sales sank 37% in 2018, after a 6% decline in 2017. Anning Chen, president and chief executive of Ford Greater China, said that while 2019 was a “challenging” year for the automaker, it saw its market share in the high-to-premium segment stabilize and its sales decline in the value segment start to narrow in the second-half of the year.


“The pressure from the external environment and downward trend of the industry volume will continue in 2020, and we will put more efforts into strengthening our product lineup with more customer-centric products and customer experiences to mitigate the external pressure and improve dealers’ profitability.” The automaker plans to launch more than 30 new models in China over the next three years of which over a third will be electric vehicles. It has also said it would localize management teams by hiring more Chinese staff and aimed to improve relationships with joint venture partners. [..] Its larger U.S. rival General Motors last week said its sales in China fell 15% from a year earlier to 3.09 million vehicles in 2019, its second year of decline.

Read more …

Waiting for the Belingcat “analysis”.

Downing of PS-752 Already Being Used To Smear MH-17 Skeptics (OffG)

Many have noted that Iran’s honorable decision to take responsibility for the catastrophe is in sharp contrast with Washington’s response in 1988 when the U.S. Navy shot down Iran Air Flight 655 scheduled from Tehran to Dubai over the Strait of Hormuz in the Persian Gulf, killing all 290 occupants, after failing to cover it up. Just a month later, Vice President George H.W. Bush would notoriously state he would “never apologize for the United States of America. Ever. I don’t care what the facts are.” Although he was not directly referring to the incident, one can only imagine what the reaction would be if Iranian President Hassan Rouhani were to say the same weeks after shooting down the Ukrainian plane, let alone an American one.

Predictably, Tehran’s transparency has gone mostly unappreciated while the Trump administration is already trying to use the disaster to further demonize Iran. Oddly enough, Ukrainian International Airlines is partly owned by the infamous Ukrainian-Israeli oligarch, politician and energy tycoon Igor Kolomoisky, who was notably one of the biggest financiers of the anti-Russian, pro-EU coup d’etat which overthrew the democratically elected government of Viktor Yanukovych in 2014. Kolomoisky is also a principal backer of current Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky whose dubious phone call with Trump resulted in the 45th U.S. president’s impeachment last month.

In another astounding coincidence, Kolomoisky’s Privat Group is believed to control Burisma Holdings, the Cypress-based company whose executive board 2020 presidential candidate Joe Biden’s son Hunter was appointed to following the Maidan junta. The former Vice President admitted that he bribed Ukraine into firing its top prosecutor who was looking into his son’s corruption by threatening to withhold $1 billion in loan guarantees. Kolomoisky, AKA “the Chameleon”, is one of the wealthiest people in the ex-Soviet country and was formerly appointed as governor of an administrative region bordering Donbass in eastern Ukraine following the 2014 putsch.

He has also funded a battalion of volunteer neo-Nazi mercenaries fighting alongside the Ukrainian army in the War in Donbass against Russian-speaking separatists which the military aid temporarily withheld by the Trump administration that was disputably contingent upon an investigation of Biden and his son goes to. In 2014, another infamous plane shootdown made international headlines when Malaysian Airlines Flight 17 (MH17) scheduled from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur was shot down over the breakaway Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) in eastern Ukraine, killing all 298 passengers and crew.

Read more …

Can Evo make a come-back?

Bolivia Exiled Ex-President Morales Calls On Radio For Armed Militias (R.)

Bolivia’s exiled former president Evo Morales on Sunday defended a call he made for the formation of armed groups, a recording of which was leaked on public radio. Speaking exclusively to Reuters on Sunday night in Argentina where he is in exile, the defiant former president confirmed his was the voice in a recording played on Bolivian radio calling for creation of armed militias “as in Venezuela”. He said people have a right to defend themselves if the new government was attacking them. He said he had not meant armed with guns and was referring to citizen defense groups that had always loosely existed. “In Bolivia, if the armed forces are shooting the people, killing the people, the people have the right to organize their security,” he said in the interview with Reuters.


“We´re not talking arms, more like slingshots,” he said. “In some times (these groups) were called militias, in other times they were called union security or union police and in some places it is called communal guard. It is not new.” In the recording released by radio station Kawsachun Coca Tropico, Morales said he and his supporters had been “too trusting” ahead of last year´s presidential election, and should have had a “Plan B.” “If between now and in a little while… I were to return (to Bolivia) or someone else goes back, we must organize as in Venezuela armed militias of the people,” Morales said in the recording. “We were too trusting. The blunder: we did not have a ‘Plan B’.”

Read more …

Is all innovation positive? Given how it’s promoted, one might think so. But that’s just because of the money involved.

Somebody Snuck A Potato Into CES 2020 (F.)

I almost walked right by it. But then I realized the object the young man was holding up, apparently thrilling the small crowd gathered around his tiny CES 2020 booth, was a potato. The vegetable in question looked like an ordinary, chunky Idaho spud, although protruding out of one side was some kind of antenna, a black plastic appendage bent upward. Close to the potato’s surface, the exterior of the antenna became a thin, blade-like electrode that pierced the skin, clearly doing… something. The man was regaling the crowd with his incredible smart product, which he said was finally unlocking the awesome decision-making power of the potato. The antenna, which he called the NeuraSpud, tapped into the potato’s “artificial intelligence.”

Once you connected your smartphone over Bluetooth to the device and launched the accompanying app, you could ask the potato anything — with your voice, no less — and it would spout an answer on the screen, the digital-vegetable equivalent of a Magic Eight Ball. If the smart potato sounds like a big, stupid stunt, that’s because it is. The man behind the idea, Nicholas Baldeck from France, told me he brought his admittedly ridiculous “invention” to CES to make a point about the torrent of smart gadgets at the show, many of which don’t really solve problems at all. “This product has way more chance of success than 60% of the startups here,” Baldeck says. “I am skeptical of this idea of ‘connected everything.’


Now it looks like innovation is about putting a chip into any object. I’m not sure the word ‘smart’ makes more sense before the word toothbrush than the word potato.” Baldeck went to a lot of trouble to make his point. His booth cost $1,000, and he spent about $4,000 in travel, equipment and marketing. Plus the electrode-driven antenna he brought really works, he says — though “works” in this context is somewhat fungible, since what the electrode is “reading” from the juices inside the potato to create the answers is probably just random junk. He also had to buy a bunch of potatoes.

Read more …

 

 

 

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Home Forums Debt Rattle January 13 2020

Viewing 17 posts - 1 through 17 (of 17 total)
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  • #52668

    G.G. Bain Three-ton electric sign blown into Broadway, New York. 1912   • ‘I’m Spending All My Money To Get Rid Of Trump’: Michael Bloomberg (R.)
    [See the full post at: Debt Rattle January 13 2020]

    #52669
    Dr. D
    Participant

    “What will it take for the Federal Reserve to withdraw from its daily liquidity operations in this $2.2 trillion market for repurchase agreements (repos)?
    All I am prepared to say publicly is that the solution is beyond the powers of all the central banks combined. The solution is not attainable without political concessions, which politically are just off the table. This is going to require a major reform that is unlikely to take place and will not even be recognized until the crisis erupts on a much larger scale.” –Armstrong

    Could the Fed Ever Exit the Repo Market?

    “I’m Spending All My Money to Get Rid of Trump’: Michael Bloomberg (R.)”

    And another pedophile trying to get rid of him: a registered offender tried to get access to Marine One and is now in custody. Is that 16 probable assassination attempts now?

    his Democratic rivals are ‘too liberal’ to beat Donald Trump.”

    True, however, he will never be accepted by the party left. Worse, AOC has started open war with the DNC, saying either Biden or her has to go. I just read Biden is in 4th, which isn’t any poll I’ve seen. However, it is possible Bernie is in 1st, with Pelosi passing impeachment exactly then, which pull Bernie off the road and out of the primary. …And we worry about the Russians rigging the elections and undermining democracy. Why bother? We do it all for them. All they have to do to destroy us is watch. P.S. she is also trying to pass ONE impeachment, and not the other, although there was only ONE, and one vote, so she can shop the Supreme Court and find a crime to impeach for since they still don’t have one. Dunno what to say. Sure! Why not? Makes as much sense as anything. In #Oppositeland, we start with the conviction and work our way backward to the crime.

    What If @realDonaldTrump Is Brilliant? (Papachelas)”

    He’s not brilliant but he’s not dumb either. Like everybody else “he” is a team. But by saying he’s dumb they are making it so, SO easy to control things and steer them around. Case in point: “he petulantly threw down the screen and blamed his awkwardness on his team” Or you could equally say: they are a bunch of canned dumba—es and he was totally right, as was immediately proven…IN THE NEXT SENTENCE. So what’s with the framing? For the love of Christmas, is there any article where the facts they themselves report don’t disprove their own headline anymore?

    A rare sign of discord

    Speaking of: uh, what? The entire Democratic field does nothing all day but attack each other. Bernie may not be foremost, but it sure ain’t rare. And does Warren, fraudulently pulling identity theft on Bernie’s platform while taking millions from Wall Street not count as a bit discordant to his campaign? They’re imposters, and the Progressive wing generally knows it.

    How Bad Can The Climate Crisis Get If Trump Wins Again? (G.)”

    So odd since I’ve been reading about this since 1990, 26 years before Trump. But: “The Guardian”, so you can be sure not a single synapse went off. “199 Years Synapse Free!” How bad will it get? Well the U.S. has reduced CO2 the most including under Trump, more than any other nation — although honestly the U.S. and E.U. are falling in parallel, we’re just larger. Sounds awful! How can we survive the continual decline of CO2 under Trump? He must be stopped so we can sign that Paris Accord and get China and India to get those CO2 levels up again! Besides, these lilly-white pollyannas only export their savage pollution and human rights violations to China, so they can live in smug sanctimony. The CO2 is the same, whether it’s China or Detroit, but in Detroit we’d be giving odious Americans jobs, and that cannot be tolerated.

    Just consider it #OppositeLand, where everything that’s said, done, or implied, is the opposite of reality. Whenever they say something (i.e. Buy stocks) do the opposite.

    seeking to encourage other big emitters like China and India to continue to slow

    Working gangbusters, as China has opened 130 new coal plants. But in #Oppositeland, #Failing is the new #Winning, so…

    could increase that to 49% with what Light described as modest, politically achievable policy changes.”

    Hahahaha. He thinks we can cut fossil fuels 50% in 10 years! Not without killing half the people, silly. …But of course, that is the plan. You’re literate: read their white papers. Not like it’s a secret or anything.

    ” Avoid UK Recession By Kickstarting Green” investment in all my billionaire friend’s front corporations that will make us ever richer, and push income disparity further off the charts!

    (P.S., It’s also a scam, like Tesla, we’re not going to reduce anything but your wallet, most probably while killing you in a fiery wreck.) That’s because real green and CO2 decline would drop GDP, make us POORER, and REDUCE income disparity. “readily available blueprints to raise government spending” You know, like that. Where I get the money, and the taxpayer – 25% of which are on welfare and 50% of which don’t have $400 — get the bill. The billionaire friends and Senators, MPs get the profits! #Winning!

    “spiral into a slump and risk mass layoffs as it tangles with rising debt, cooling domestic demand and an ongoing trade war…”

    You mean the trade war that wasn’t working, didn’t do anything, and wasn’t pressuring China? That trade war, CNN? Your reporters need to coordinate your stories a little; they’d never hold up in court.

    And 15% for GM. Who’s taking over? Reuters doesn’t say.”

    That’s because Reuters, like the others, is not a news agency. No surprise though: even the dumbest people told them China would steal everything, take it, start their own companies, and kick the U.S. out. By golly were all us dumb people right and all you schmarty-peoples wrong? Again? 35 years in a row? Who’d a thunk. Hey, does that make you dumber than the dumbest fat American that you hate and make fun of? A: Yes. Far, far dumber. So dumb you’d have to go to Yale to believe such dumbness.

    the U.S. Navy shot down Iran Air Flight 655 scheduled from Tehran

    Nice. While true, they, the media, seem to be the Iranian Revolutionary Force imbedded in the West to attack our own government and people. We attacked them, they attacked us, they shot down a plane, we shot down a plane, maybe we should knock it off and stop shooting down planes? Is it not good that they, while starting with required denials, seem to be opening up and working to honesty? Is that bad? And that’s against the body of the article focusing on deceptions. Some people like it, some people don’t. Some vilified Iran, some the U.S. Some want war, some are against war. So the media just manufactures what they want and say that “it’s true”, which technically it is. But you’re describing your echo chamber, the inside of your own ego, not reality.

    ““Bolivia Exiled Ex-President Morales Calls on Radio for Armed Militias (R.)”
    if the armed forces are shooting the people, killing the people, the people have the right to organize their security”

    Sounds like they need a 2A. Otherwise, if the government misbehaves, the people have no options but death. In one view, the people are a collective that exist for the government, and in the other, the government was created out of, and exists for, the individual people. One causes mass-death, the other mass-prosperity. Choose wisely.

    #52670
    Dr. D
    Participant

    In a surprise to exactly no one: “Facebook Glitch Reveals Greta Thunburg’s Father Posting As Teenage Climate Activist” …and UN’s Climate Change organization, Adarsh Prathap. “Greta claims to have written all the content posted by her father and Prathap.”

    Another environmentalist, another lie.

    I mean aside from Columbia openly having lectures saying they planned and staged the whole thing with signed buy-in from scores of media outlets who promised to invent coverage and salt otherwise ordinary stories with unrelated AGW stuff, with the Green handler behind her in every photo.

    Guys, you are not helping the cause here. You’ve probably done more to harm it than anything I can think of, even Obama (pipeline, drilling, ANWR) and George Bush (near-permanent environmental death in two different Gulfs). And we haven’t even started with the real backlash such as we now see in Chappelle, Gervais, and political correctness. The world is actually IN trouble: there are actual things wrong. Is it too much to ask to focus on that and NOT lie about it, about totally normal or unrelated things? Nope. And it mirrors TDS: Step 1: lie about everything you don’t need to, don’t have to, and harms yourself. Step 2: never tell the truth even when it helps your cause. Is it any wonder people think you’re crazy, even extreme? Meantime guys like Elon Musk are burning nations of diesel with Caterpillars leveling mountains, then lighting all the lithium on fire so he can charge his cars with diesel and coal, while Monsanto forces Europe to eat Roundup in every meal.

    Can we start somewhere normal, like encouraging people to have honeybees, then stopping the poisons that kill us both? A: No. There’s no profit and concentration of power in that. Only in Greta and the worldwide Carbon Tax. Otherwise, you think they’d post her? No way. If she’s on line, there’s a profit or a lie somewhere. If there weren’t, they’d shut her out like everybody else.

    #52671
    sumac.carol
    Participant

    Dr. D re your comments on yesterday’s article on bees: you are incorrect when you stated that there are no native bees in North America. There are in fact over 4000 varieties of native bees in North America. They do an amazing job of pollinating plants – far more efficient than non-native honey bees.
    https://duckduckgo.com/?q=native+bee+species+north+america&ia=web

    #52672
    sumac.carol
    Participant

    Dr. D another point on your comment on the honey bee die-off: if honey bees only live as you say for 2 months and in your opinion the die-off is therefore a non-issue, why do you think honey bee keepers are sounding an alarm? Your comment on their short lives in the context of their die-off is a bit like saying humans in the vastness of time are not that important in the grand scheme of things so we should not worry about letting a few billion die. Is that what you really mean?

    #52673
    zerosum
    Participant

    Every blog urges you to Read more …
    • ‘I’m Spending All My Money To Get Rid Of Trump’: Michael Bloomberg (R.)
    LIAR!
    The money came from our pockets.

    • Downing of PS-752 Already Being Used To Smear MH-17 Skeptics (OffG)
    There is a lot of other new hidden in these articles. Go look at the sources
    Read more …

    Iran’s accidental downing of a Ukrainian plane is already being used to smear MH-17 skeptics


    by Max Parry — January 12, 2020
    ie. In another astounding coincidence, Kolomoisky’s Privat Group is believed to control Burisma Holdings, the Cypress-based company whose executive board 2020 presidential candidate Joe Biden’s son Hunter was appointed to following the Maidan junta. The former Vice President admitted that he bribed Ukraine into firing its top prosecutor who was looking into his son’s corruption by threatening to withhold $1 billion in loan guarantees.
    Predictably, Tehran’s transparency has gone mostly unappreciated while the Trump administration is already trying to use the disaster to further demonize Iran.

    I found lots and lots of other interesting news.
    OPINIONS????
    IF THE HAT FITS!!!!

    Bee news

    California’s Almond Harvest Is a Bee Thief’s Dream


    Oct 08, 2018
    California’s Almond Harvest Is a Bee Thief’s Dream
    —-
    ADMITTING THE TRUTH

    Iran admitted to killing civilians. They are having to endure the demonstrations.

    USA does not admit to making “COLLATERAL DAMAGES”.
    Anyone showing proof, Yep, (like Assange), (you can name 2 more), are not called whistleblowers, but rather called spies and…. and ….. well you have heard just as many horror stories as me.

    When have you hear Israel admit to making a mistake?
    https://www.israelnews.net/news/263686369/trump-deals-israel-another-huge-favour-in-assassinating-soleimani
    Trump deals Israel another huge favour in assassinating Soleimani
    By Jay Jackson, Israel News.Net
    12 Jan 2020

    How about being put in jail for 18 years and getting re-educated without a trial?
    (Geee! Did you think that I was referring/talking about China?)
    NOOOOO!

    Activists Demand U.S. Close Guantánamo and End 18 Years of Torture


    Jessica Corbett
    Jan 12, 2020

    Human rights advocates marked the 18th anniversary of the opening of the U.S. military prison at the Guantánamo Bay Naval Station in Cuba with a rally outside the White House on Saturday to “demand an end to years of torture and human rights violations” and call for the detention camp’s immediate closure.
    In January 2018, President Donald Trump signed an executive order to keep the prison open. The move, which revoked an order from Trump’s predecessor that called for the prison to be closed, outraged human rights defenders. With the demonstration Saturday, activists criticized not only Trump’s decisions related to the prison but also those of former Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush.
    “Three United States presidents have overseen Guantánamo during its shameful 18-year existence, yet it continues to remain open as people who have never been granted a trial are still detained and as they age and face the prospect of spending the rest of their lives in the prison, dying far away from the families and loved ones they have not seen in years,” Daphne Eviatar of Amnesty International USA said in a statement.
    “It is well past time that Guantánamo close once and for all, and all the men who have long ago been cleared for release are transferred to countries that have agreed to accept them,” added Eviatar, director of the Security With Human Rights program.

    Organizers of the “Justice Now: Close Guantánamo and End Torture” rally included Amnesty International USA, Witness Against Torture, Defending Rights & Dissent, Center for Constitutional Rights, CAIR, September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, the World Can’t Wait, CodePink, National Religious Campaign Against Torture, Close Guantanamo, Tsuru for Solidarity, and Justice for Muslims Collective.
    “Guantánamo currently holds 40 individuals: all Muslim men, many of whom were tortured in the camp,” Amnesty’s statement said. “Several detainees are experiencing health problems as a result of years of detention and instances of torture and other ill-treatment. Some remain detained despite having been cleared for transfer for years. This includes Toffiq al-Bihani, who has been imprisoned for eight years without trial.”

    Participants in Saturday’s demonstration carried signs which declared “Close Guantánamo now!” and “Investigate and prosecute U.S. torture!” Other signs shared the stories of individuals detained at the prison. Some of the activists wore orange jumpsuits and black hoods.

    Along with the rally outside the White House Saturday afternoon, organizers held a funeral procession, which ended at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C. The activists carried nine coffins for nine detainees who have died at the prison.

    Organizers of the action aimed to call “attention to the brutality of the prison, including indefinite detention, and for an end to any and all uses of torture,” they explained on Facebook. “We cannot let Guantánamo disappear from the public consciousness.”
    ———
    ZH has a lot more “articles” to read

    #52675
    Maxwell Quest
    Participant

    “If she’s [Greta] on line, there’s a profit or a lie somewhere. If there weren’t, they’d shut her out like everybody else.”

    Ding! Ding! Ding! When, oh when are people going to figure this out? Cute little Greta currently has the media spotlight because she is serving a useful purpose for very powerful people. When she is no longer needed, they will cast her aside.

    #52676
    zerosum
    Participant

    flight path of all planes 08 jan 2020
    https://teakdoor.com/images/imported/2020/01/226.jpg

    #52677
    zerosum
    Participant

    Route still flying
    https://www.flightradar24.com/data/flights/ps752

    Flight history for Ukraine Int. Airlines flight PS752

    #52681
    restless94111
    Participant

    I am not clear here. What climate crisis? There is no climate crisis, obviously. And why would you feature anything coming from the Guardian, after your enormous, constant attacks on the Guardian? So the evil they propagate against Assange is evil and wrong, but their equally evil nonsense about fake climate change is ok with you? Come on, man. What are you doing? Why? Wake up.

    #52682
    John Day
    Participant

    http://www.johndayblog.com/2020/01/people-get-hurt.html
    Over the weekend we heard, from Iran, that Iran shot down a civilian flight, taking off from Tehran, shortly after the Iranian military responded to US assassination of of General Suleimani, on a diplomatic peace mission to Baghdad, as requested by President Trump.
    It took a few days, but Iran admitted to it.
    Missile defenses were on hair trigger for US retaliation, and People Got Hurt.
    Flashing back…
    On July 3, 1988, in the late days of the Iran-Iraq war, the USS Vincennes mistakenly shot down Iran Air Flight 655 over Iranian waters and killed 290 people.
    In the days immediately following the incident, US President Ronald Reagan issued a written diplomatic note to the Iranian government, expressing deep regret.[15] However, the United States continued to insist that Vincennes was acting in self-defense in international waters.
    ​ ​In 1996, the governments of the United States and Iran reached a settlement at the International Court of Justice which included the statement “…the United States recognized the aerial incident of 3 July 1988 as a terrible human tragedy and expressed deep regret over the loss of lives caused by the incident…”[16] As part of the settlement, even though the U.S. government did not admit legal liability or formally apologize to Iran, it still agreed to pay US$61.8 million on an ex gratia basis in compensation to the families of the Iranian victims.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655

    Yet another video of Democratic primary front runner Joe Biden passionately defending the 2003 Iraq invasion and occupation has resurfaced and is going viral. In it he even sings George W. Bush’s praises at a moment which came a mere few months after the now infamous “Mission Accomplished” stunt aboard the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln.
    This comes in a campaign where he’s lied repeatedly about his leading role in pushing the war authorization through the Senate five months before the March 2003 invasion, seeking to distance himself and methodically conceal the facts now that public opinion has long shifted. It also has resurfaced at a moment John Kerry is currently making the rounds on major networks defending Biden against Bernie Sanders’ criticism of Biden’s clear pro-war record.
    At a crucial moment Biden’s speech, delivered at the Hawkish DC Brookings Institution in July 2003 actually slammed anti-war Democrats and simultaneously upheld Bush and his disastrous war as “bold and popular” and promised further support to the neocon administration.
    https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/should-be-disqualifying-biden-more-damning-footage-resurfaces-bidens-record

    Evidence portrays the plot to assassinate General Suleimani originating with John Bolton, then National Security Advisor, and being canned by Trump as being excessive to the shoot down of a drone last June. “No American was killed”. That became to loaded plan, awaiting a trigger, and a means to execute.
    For the past 18 months, officials said, there had been discussions about whether to target General Suleimani. Figuring that it would be too difficult to hit him in Iran, officials contemplated going after him during one of his frequent visits to Syria or Iraq and focused on developing agents in seven different entities to report on his movements — the Syrian Army, the Quds Force in Damascus, Hezbollah in Damascus, the Damascus and Baghdad airports and the Kataib Hezbollah and Popular Mobilization forces in Iraq…
    ​ ​Defense Secretary Mark Esper presented a series of response options to the president two weeks ago, including killing Soleimani. Esper presented the pros and cons of such an operation but made it clear that he was in favor of taking out Soleimani, officials said.
    ​ ​Trump signed off and it further developed from there.
    https://www.moonofalabama.org/2020/01/the-long-planned-us-assassinations-in-iraq-will-increase-the-political-chaos.html#more

    In what states is it legal to “smoke Biden” these days?
    “He Needs To Stop”: Democrats Freaking Out After Sanders Says Trump Will Smoke Biden
    ​ ​According to those complaining, the 78-year-old Sanders will make it harder for Democrats to unify around a nominee after months of taking flack from their own side of the aisle – despite the fact that a Friday poll has him in the lead, and that his no-holds-barred approach may earn him the nomination.
    ​ ​”He needs to stop,” said one Democratic strategist who is unaffiliated with any candidates. “It’s not helpful and it actually hurts the party. It’s like he didn’t learn his lesson the last time. It’s incredibly short-sighted and terrible.”
    https://www.zerohedge.com/political/he-needs-stop-democrats-freaking-out-after-sanders-says-trump-will-smoke-biden

    Other than being made a lesson to scare everybody else again, it’s a really good deal.
    Let’s give it a try!
    Is Iraq About To Become A Chinese Client State?
    https://oilprice.com/Geopolitics/Middle-East/Is-Iraq-About-To-Become-A-Chinese-Client-State.html

    #52683
    V. Arnold
    Participant

    Dr. D re your comments on yesterday’s article on bees: you are incorrect when you stated that there are no native bees in North America. There are in fact over 4000 varieties of native bees in North America. They do an amazing job of pollinating plants – far more efficient than non-native honey bees.
    sumac.carol

    Thanks for that. I knew Dr. D was wrong, but too lazy to get the facts.
    Keep on keeping on…

    #52684
    zerosum
    Participant

    @ John Day
    Let’s do a fact check
    I don’t know anything. Here is what I read. Did you see it?
    It seems very likely that Israel would be very interested in assassinating the general.
    https://www.israelnews.net/news/263686369/trump-deals-israel-another-huge-favour-in-assassinating-soleimani

    NBC News reported on Saturday Israelis intelligence through the Mossad had assisted in tracking Soleimani so was actually a participant in the slaying.

    https://www.nbcnews.com/news/mideast/airport-informants-overhead-drones-how-u-s-killed-soleimani-n1113726
    Jan. 10, 2020, 12:48 PM PST
    By Ken Dilanian and Courtney Kube

    Armed with a tip from informants at the airport in the Syrian capital of Damascus, the CIA knew exactly when a jet carrying Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani took off en route to Baghdad. Intelligence from Israel helped confirm the details.

    #52685
    zerosum
    Participant
    #52686
    zerosum
    Participant

    for computer experts

    https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/here-comes-wikigate-2-nyt-claims-russian-hackers-successfully-breached-burisma

    Color us skeptical, alt-right, conspiracy-wonk, Putin-puppets; but the transparency and timing of tonight’s “bombshell” report from The New York Times of an ‘alleged’ hacking by ‘allegedly’ Russian hackers of Burisma – the Ukrainian energy firm that VP Biden’s crack-smoking, energy-ignorant son was paid $50,000 per month as a board member – reeks so strongly of foundational narrative-building for something “embarrassing” that is coming, it is stunning just how dumb the deep state must think the American public really is. Actually, maybe not all that stunning.

    #52694
    John Day
    Participant

    @Zerosum.

    Yep. That’s who “democracy” is owned by. I saw all that, too.

    #52695
    Dr. D
    Participant

    I’m only literate. I only know what I read. Very first DuckGo hit “Most people don’t realize that there were no honey bees in America until the white settlers brought hives from Europe” in 1622.

    There are native species, but they’re not “bees” as people commonly refer to them, not HONEYbees of any sort – although this search showed me there WAS a Mayan honeybee that exists only at the equator. What bees did we have? Bumble, sweat, mason, hoverbees, wasps, many others, almost all solitary. But the article seemed to say that the honeybee was a scourge to the environment and the native, existing bees. Maybe. Doubt it – they’re a different niche, life cycle, and approach, so expect you’ll find they ADD diversity and are complimentary. I thought they wanted diversity? Want to do a study? But the point was, without honeybees, you don’t have apples, pears, almonds… And you must therefore would only have maize, grasses, etc. Squash is pollinated by both, but CAN be pollinated by non-honeybees – and going the other way, that’s frustrating when environmentalists, journalists – again lacking 30 minutes on Wikipedia – say NO crops would exist without honeybees = we all gonna die. No, once there were no bees, so clearly beans, squash, etc. are native crops who had no trouble pollinating. Others crops would have trouble, but we humans would then pollinate them. Things would change, but the world wouldn’t end. Nevertheless, since they’re doing work for nothing, don’t harm them.

    Lifespan? The reporter alarmingly said, “More bees die every year in the US than all other fish and animals raised for slaughter combined.” True but wtf? More bacteria die in an hour in Pittsburgh toilets than that. So? Also we don’t ‘slaughter’ bees and hang their little carcasses in meat shops. More bees die because they’re smaller and there are more of them. More ants die than bees, and they aren’t either ‘slaughtered’ or intentionally killed either. Is this the world’s largest non sequitur? Knowing that, no one intentionally kills a hive, the bees therefore DIE OF OLD AGE. Now we’re arguing that they die slightly sooner than if they had better conditions: how much better, how much sooner? No one knows, this disingenuine reporter most of all. But they aren’t ‘slaughtered’, basically ever. It’s just the garbage assembly of essentially meaningless emotion-words meant to yank you around. If they can’t think straight, I can’t credit their article on matters I can’t cross-check. What is its purpose then? It’s only meant to say: humans are bad. Hate and death and fear and despair. Okay, okay, I’M SORRY. You got me. I’m SORRY I took care of bees for 10,000 years. I’m SORRY I gave them a whole new continent. I’m SORRY we gave them ever-more nutritious plants and are breeding a whole new almond for them. I’m SORRY I fought off their predators. I’m sorry I built them 2.68 million homes and I’m sorry we’re taking them to a doctor to fix both mites and colony collapse now. If it makes everyone feel better they can live in a hollow tree and be as rare like the wolverine, but maybe we should let the bees vote on it for themselves? Hey, how do you feel about living in a virgin pine forest with no human clearings or crops around, and live in a hollow tree in -20f weather all winter? Better or worse than now? You’ll be free bees with all the Liberty and self-determination due to your kind.

    Then to my next question, which is: are we humans any less murdered, less free, or less abused than they? Hardly. Probably worse, our peoples are too different to say. But that IS in fact part of the point of their (natural) deaths. We naturally die too, yes, and we too are not important in the big scheme either. Nature rolls on and on, one day without us. So if 550M people died in the last 10 years, but it’s almost all from natural causes, then…what? So bees are slaughtered…of natural causes by old age?

    That doesn’t make the die-off not an issue, but we’ve learned a lot of things here: one, food and pollination will go on adequately, despite alarmist reporters. Since that’s the case, and bees are okay, being 2.8M hives this year, up by 200,000, what’s the article for? To terrify you unnecessarily and unscientifically. To jerk on your heart strings while removing you from logic. And I think this is bad reporting. So next, mites have long existed, but not as hard-hitting until now. Why? CCD didn’t exist, or wasn’t large enough to be known before 2006. Why? Now there’s a reporter’s question. Monsanto and others have been savaged on the weakening of bees caused by exposure to glyphosate and neonicotinoids, as well as a very specific termite poison that causes…ta da…CCD in termites, the bees’ closest relative: it makes them lose their way back home. Comments on this in Guardian article? No. Companies, brands, lawsuits? Nope. “Pesticides” mentioned generically. Monsanto could have written this article themselves, it’s so helpful to them. Generic “transform the way large-scale agriculture is carried out.” I mean, all things can generally be improved, so yes? How though? “these enormous orchards can’t function without bees.” No then? I’m lost: what do you want from me? So change things without changing them? Typical do-gooder: “Whaaah, it’s not perfect!” “Okay, any suggestions that won’t kill everyone on earth?” “Nope: you figure it out, you do the hard work, while I complain about how YOU SUCK on the internets and sip my GMO soy glyphosate Starbucks with a straw.” Thanks, very helpful.

    What I see from wild hives – and nothing in this article, thanks – is that backyard bees in wild fields away from modern crops are under noticeable pressure that would otherwise be remarkable, particularly mites. However, not at alarmist levels. At the same time, bees in agri-business – saying GMOs, pesticides, glyphosate – are under another whole level of trouble. Then bees which travel on trucks are worst of all. Why? Bet the pesticides ARE hurting them, and the more “modern” the field, the worse, while they also travel to areas in the South with the new termite poisons: no termites live up North. However, even after all this, it’s violently denied by the companies (of course: ‘safe as water’), but also no clean evidence from beekeepers generally who almost certainly could know for sure by now. That’s confusing: is there no evidence or are they saving $100B fine by doctoring the evidence? But again, why 2006?

    Although I can’t run in circles pulling my hair — because as you say, pollination will be fine and we’re not going to die – I DO care about the bee thing specifically. Mainly because it can put pressure on these guys – chemical conglomerates, not so much farmers – to STOP KILLING EVERYTHING, to save the bees, and thus themselves and their own yields. But that’s because they DON’T care about every fish, frog, and Christopher Robin wading in Pooh sticks and are joyful to poison every living things right out to sea, while paying exorbitant profits to monopolies and proven serial murderers for the privilege. This could get a wedge in we otherwise might not.

    But with Guardian articles fact-free, written muddily (like native vs imported bees), and wandering around alarmed and fearful of everything human = bad, we’re not going to stop pesticides at all, are we? And therefore waste all our time, let Monsanto go, kep poisons rolling, and do nothing for the bees either. That’s what I’m really up to here.

    But if you like bees, then why not help them yourself? Get a hive, grow plants, stop spraying. It’ll do more than hot air on the internet. Suggest borage or buckwheat. Very easy. If you prefer wild, mason bee huts are available on the internets.

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