Nov 132022
 
 November 13, 2022  Posted by at 9:54 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , ,


Salvador Dali The three pines 1919

 

UK and EU To Try To Isolate Russia At G20 Summit (RT)
The New Candidate Countries For BRICS Expansion (SRB)
Surovikin’s Difficult Choice (Big Serge)
Tens of Billions Transferred to Ukraine and Laundered Through FTX (GP)
The FTX-Alameda Nexus (Coppola)
Up To $2 Billion In Client Money Missing In Crypto Giant FTX Collapse (NYP)
First Batch Of Blocked Russian Fertilizers Allowed To Leave EU Port (RT)
Showdown Slow Down (Jim Kunstler)
Crrraaaazy Wally -Street, That Is- (Denninger)
Ports Clogged With Containers As World Trade Stumbles (ZH)
Developing Nations Demand Rich Countries Pay For Climate Change (RT)
US Intel Report Vilifies Key Ally UAE – WaPo (RT)
La Scala Replies To Call To ‘Cancel’ Russian Composers (RT)
Elon Musk In Court Over $56 Billion Tesla Bonus (Telegraaf)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Who will be isolated? The collective west.

UK and EU To Try To Isolate Russia At G20 Summit (RT)

The UK and the EU intend to coordinate their efforts and do “everything possible” to make the Russian delegation feel unwelcome at the upcoming G20 summit in Indonesia’s Bali, a British media outlet has claimed. The Telegraph pointed out, however, that China, and possibly several other key players, is highly unlikely to follow suit. “We try to work with partners in order to show very, very, very firmly what the international community thinks about all these crimes, atrocities, and illegal actions by Russia,” a spokesperson for the EU’s foreign affairs service told the paper. The spokesperson explained that the bloc, together with the UK, will not only shun Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and stage walkouts during addresses by Moscow’s delegation, but also try to convince other nations to do the same.

According to the anonymous official, while the “UK is not keen on coordinating with the EU on foreign policy in general,” the concerted efforts to isolate Russia have proven to be an exception, as London and Brussels “have the same objective.” The report also quoted a French government source as saying that the meeting in Bali will not be “business as usual” and will center on the Ukraine conflict. “There will be a coalition and Russia is isolated,” the official concluded. The article noted, however, that the total isolation of Russia at the event is unlikely, as the country enjoys close relations with China. One unnamed EU official told the paper that Moscow and Beijing are expected to water down any joint statement calling for de-escalation in Ukraine.

The report also suggested that the likes of India, Saudi Arabia and Türkiye, which have not joined Western sanctions against Moscow, could break ranks with the EU and UK this time as well. Relations between Moscow and the West have hit an all-time low in the wake of the Russian military operation in Ukraine. However, Moscow has insisted that any attempts to isolate the country will fail. The key organizations that Russia is part of, such as BRICS, are also expanding. In fact, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa revealed following a meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman last month that Riyadh would like to join BRICS, which currently comprises Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. On top of that, media reports claimed back in July that Türkiye and Egypt might also be interested. Since the start of the year three countries – Iran, Argentina, and Algeria – have officially applied to join BRICS.

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I’d say the list is pretty much endless. Once you have South Africa, Nigeria, Egypt and Senegal, all African countries will want to join. Same in South America, Asia.

The New Candidate Countries For BRICS Expansion (SRB)

The Russian Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov has stated that ‘over a dozen’ countries have formally applied to join the BRICS grouping following the groups decision to allow new members earlier this year. The BRICS currently includes Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. It is not a free trade bloc, but members do coordinate on trade matters and have established a policy bank, the New Development Bank, (NDB) to coordinate infrastructure loans. That was set up in 2014 in order to provide alternative loan mechanisms from the IMF and World Bank structures, which the members had felt had become too US-centric.

The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) was set up by China at about the same time for largely the same reasons and to offer alternative financing than that provided by the IMF and World Banks, which were felt to impose political reform policies designed to assist the United States in return for providing loans. Both the NDB and AIIB banks are Triple A rated and capitalised at US$100 billion. The NDB bank shares are held equally by each of the five members. In total, the BRICS grouping as it currently stands accounts for over 40% of the global population and nearly a quarter of the world’s GDP. The GDP figure is expected to double to 50% of global GDP by 2030. Expanding BRICS will immediately accelerate that process.

Concerning a BRICS expansion, Lavrov stated that Algeria, Argentina, and Iran had all applied, while it is already known that Saudi Arabia, Türkiye, Egypt and Afghanistan are interested, along with Indonesia, which is expected to make a formal application to join at the upcoming G20 summit in Bali. Other likely contenders for membership include Kazakhstan, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Senegal, Thailand and the United Arab Emirates. All had their Finance Ministers present at the BRICS Expansion dialogue meeting held in May. We can examine the basic economic data of the proposed new BRICS members as follows. GDP figures given are nominal, 2022 growth rates are based on the first 9 months of the year from data issued by the respective Central Banks.

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Not fully convinced.

Surovikin’s Difficult Choice (Big Serge)

Here is what I think Surovikin decided about Kherson. Kherson was becoming an inefficient front for Russia because of the logistical strain of supplying forces across the river with limited bridge and road capacity. Russia demonstrated that it was capable of shouldering this sustainment burden (keeping troops supplied all through Ukraine’s summer offensives), but the question becomes 1) to what purpose, and 2) for how long. Ideally, the bridgehead becomes the launching point for offensive action against Nikolayev, but launching an offensive would require strengthening the force grouping in Kherson, which correspondingly raises the logistical burden of projecting force across the river. With a very long front to play with, Kherson is clearly one of the most logistically intensive axes.

My guess is that Surovikin took charge and almost immediately decided he did not want to increase the sustainment burden by trying to push on Nikolayev. Therefore, if an offensive is not going to be launched from the Kherson position, the question becomes – why hold the position at all? Politically, it is important to defend a regional capital, but militarily the position becomes meaningless if one is not going to go on the offensive in the south. Let’s be even more explicit: unless an offensive towards Nikolayev is planned, the Kherson bridgehead is militarily counterproductive. While holding the bridgehead in Kherson, the Dnieper River becomes a negative force multiplier – increasing the sustainment and logistics burden and ever threatening to leave forces cut off if Ukraine succeeds in destroying the bridges or bursting the dam.

Projecting force across the river becomes a heavy burden with no obvious benefit. But by withdrawing to the east bank, the river becomes a positive force multiplier by serving as a defensive barrier. In the broader operational sense, Surovikin seems to be declining battle in the south while preparing in the north and in the Donbas. It is clear that he made this decision shortly after taking command of the operation – he has been hinting at it for weeks, and the speed and cleanliness of the withdrawal suggests that it was well planned , long in advance. Withdrawing across the river increases the combat effectiveness of the army significantly and decreases the logistical burden, freeing resources for other sectors. This fits the overall Russian pattern of making harsh choices about resource allocation, fighting this war under the simple framework of optimizing the loss ratios and building the perfect meatgrinder.

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Money Laundering 101.
1. Foreign aid goes to Ukraine.
2. Ukraine invests in $FTX
3. $FTX donates back to the Democratic Party.

Tens of Billions Transferred to Ukraine and Laundered Through FTX (GP)

We have information that the tens of billions of dollars going to Ukraine were actually laundered back to the US to corrupt Democrats and elites using FTX cryptocurrency. Now the money is gone and FTX is bankrupt. Earlier today we reported that the FTX cryptocurrency appeared to be used in a ponzi scheme involving the Democrats and Ukraine. As reported earlier, the FTX crypto company gave at least $40 million to Democrat candidates and causes in the midterms. Sam Bankman-Fried is Biden’s second biggest donor. In addition to this, Daily Caller lists many of the lawmakers who Sam Bankman Fried was bankrolling who oversaw the institution that was supposed to keep on eye on companies like FTX:

“Sam Bankman-Fried, prolific Democratic donor and ex-CEO of now-bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange FTX, funded the campaigns of members of Congress overseeing the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), one of the key bodies tasked with regulating the crypto industry and the subject of Bankman-Fried’s aggressive lobbying. Bankman-Fried’s FTX is currently under investigation by the CFTC and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) after Bankman-Fried allegedly moved $10 billion in client assets from his crypto exchange to his trading firm Alameda Research, and a liquidity crisis at his exchange which prompted the company to file for bankruptcy. However, prior to the agency’s probe, Bankman-Fried aggressively courted the CFTC – and funded several key lawmakers charged with overseeing the agency, pouring cash into their campaign coffers.”

FTX also happens to be related to Ukraine. The far-left Washington Post reported on March 3 that Ukraine was dealing in crypto. “The Ukrainian government has gathered more than $42 million in cryptocurrency donations since Saturday, plus digital artwork including a limited edition worth roughly $200,000, according to blockchain analytics firm Elliptic. The challenge is how the country cashes in on these assets to fund its war needs.” Then less than a week later FTX made the news for involving itself in Ukraine: “Amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the CEO of FTX, Sam Bankman Fried has come forward to help a crypto donation project. He humbly announced that FTX will be supporting the Ukrainian Ministry of Finance and other communities in collecting crypto donations for the country. The Ukrainian government has received over $60 million in crypto donations from all over the world.”

“FTX’s CEO, Sam Bankman Fried highlighted that the war in Ukraine has been dragging on. The country is in full need of humanitarian help and access to global financial infrastructure. He also called attention to sanctions and crypto during this kind of situation. He indicated that crypto exchanges should enforce sanctions announced by the government seriously. FTX has stressed across all of its regulatory and policy efforts, active coordination and communication with regulators and policymakers is crucial to ensuring that laws and rules achieve their intended outcome, reads a letter by FTXPointing out the urgency to help the nation Sam Bankman announced that the FTX team is honored to support the Ukrainian Ministry of Finance in simplifying the donation process.”

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Create you own token… “Customer assets deposited on the exchange are routinely lent to the hedge fund against collateral consisting of the exchange’s tokens.”

The FTX-Alameda Nexus (Coppola)

The young, dynamic, ambitious owner of a crypto hedge fund – let’s call him “Joe” – sets up a crypto exchange. To start with, this just enables his hedge fund can trade without having to pay margin or exchange fees. But Joe has larger ambitions. He wants to run the biggest and best exchange in the world. And he wants to make money from it. Lots and lots of money. Trillions of dollars, in fact. Now, his hedge fund can make money by taking risky leveraged positions, but it has to raise funds, and that’s not cheap. And his exchange can make money by charging fees on transactions, but although that can be a nice slow steady income, it’s not going to make him the trillions of dollars he wants.

But Joe’s spotted an opportunity. The exchange has lots of customer assets that aren’t earning anything. If he puts those customer assets to work, he can earn far more from his exchange customers. And he’s got an obvious vehicle through which to put them to work. The hedge fund. If he transfers customer assets on the exchange to the hedge fund, it can lend or pledge them at risk to earn megabucks. Of course, there’s a risk that the hedge fund could lose some or all of the customers’ funds. And the exchange promises that customers can have their assets back on demand, which could be a trifle problematic if they are locked up in leveraged positions held by the hedge fund. But this is crypto. There’s an easy solution. The exchange can issue its own token to replace the customer assets transferred to the hedge fund.

The exchange will report customer balances in terms of the assets they have deposited, but what it will actually hold will be its own token. If customers request to withdraw their balances, the exchange will sell its own tokens to obtain the necessary assets – after all, crypto assets, like dollars, are fungible. For this to work, however, the token must reliably hold its value. So the exchange creates more of the tokens than are needed to replace customer balances, and the hedge fund actively buys and sells them on the exchange, thus creating a market in the things and pumping the price. The price rockets, inflating the balance sheets of both the hedge fund and the exchange, and making $billions in unrealised profits for Joe and his investors – of whom there are suddenly a whole lot more, including some exceedingly respectable institutional investors.

It works brilliantly. So, this becomes Joe’s business model. Customer assets deposited on the exchange are routinely lent to the hedge fund against collateral consisting of the exchange’s tokens. There’s a massive and growing mismatch between the asset balances reported to customers on the exchange and the assets the exchange actually holds. But it doesn’t matter, because the token is highly liquid and the value of the tokens pledged as collateral comfortably exceeds the value of the missing customer assets. And the exchange can easily honour all withdrawal requests by trading out its own tokens. Indeed, the tokens are doing so well that even when the hedge fund suffers serious losses in a crypto crash, the exchange is able to bail it out. It’s completely self-sustaining. That is, until the token’s value crashes.

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“SBF and two FTX associates are currently being detained by authorities in the Bahamas, a source tells Cointelegraph..”

Up To $2 Billion In Client Money Missing In Crypto Giant FTX Collapse (NYP)

At least $1 billion of customer funds — and possibly as much as $2 billion — have gone missing in the implosion of the crypto currency exchange FTX, according to reports. FTX’s flamboyant founder, Sam Bankman-Fried, known in the industry as “SBF,” secretly funneled $10 billion of customer funds into his trading company, Alameda Research, sources told two media outlets. Alameda Research is run by Bankman-Fried’s girlfriend, Caroline Ellison. Two senior FTX officials claimed they saw the evidence that the money was missing in copies of financial records Bankman-Fried shared with company executives last week, according to Reuters.


On Friday, Bankman-Fried stepped down from his CEO position as the Bahamas-based FTX filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, after scrambling to shore up an $8 billion liquidity crisis that has left investors unable to claim their funds. A bid to save FTX via a rescue deal with rival exchange Binance didn’t work out, leading to crypto’s highest-profile collapse in recent years. In text messages to Reuters, Bankman-Fried, one of the largest donors to the Democratic Party, said he “disagreed with the characterization” of the $10 billion transfer. “We didn’t secretly transfer,” he said. “We had confusing internal labeling and misread it,” he added, without elaborating. “???” was Bankman-Fried’s response, when asked about the missing cash.

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“In September, he said that Russia was prepared to give these fertilizers to developing nations free of charge.”

So yeah, let’s block it for months…

First Batch Of Blocked Russian Fertilizers Allowed To Leave EU Port (RT)

The first batch of Russian fertilizers, which have been blocked at EU ports amid Ukraine-related sanctions, has been given permission to leave next week, the UN announced on Friday. The cargo amounts to 20,000 tons and is currently stationed in the Dutch port of Rotterdam. It is destined for the African nation of Malawi under the UN World Food Program. “The UN also briefed on recently issued General Licenses and shipments of fertilizer to developing countries’ destinations and its ongoing engagement with private sector and member states. It is anticipated that the first shipment of donated fertilizers will depart for Malawi in the coming week,” the UN said in a statement released after a meeting between senior UN officials and a Russian delegation led by Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Vershinin on Friday.

The meeting centered on Russia’s continued dissatisfaction with UN efforts to lift Western sanctions that pose problems for Russia’s agricultural exports. The organization pledged to assist Russia in the matter back in July as part of a UN-brokered Ukrainian grain deal, which unblocked the export of food and fertilizers from several Black Sea ports. Russia said it may choose not to extend its participation in the deal, which is set to expire on November 19, if the UN does not follow through on its promises regarding Russian exports. On Friday, the Dutch government confirmed that the Russian fertilizer cargo has been given permission to leave the port on the UN’s request. “The decision to release the fertilizer was made on the understanding that the UN would ensure that it is delivered to the agreed location, Malawi, and that the Russian company and sanctioned individual will earn nothing from the transaction,” the Dutch Foreign Affairs Ministry said in a statement.

It did not disclose the name of the Russian company that owns the shipment. Earlier this month, however, TASS news agency reported that Russian fertilizer producer Uralchem-Uralkali was ready to donate 240,000 tons of its fertilizers stuck in EU warehouses for humanitarian purposes, with the first shipment destined for Malawi. Prior to this, Russian President Vladimir Putin stated that a total of 300,000 tons of Russian fertilizers were stuck at EU ports due to Western sanctions. In September, he said that Russia was prepared to give these fertilizers to developing nations free of charge.

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“The opponents of Progressive-Woke-Jacobinism don’t need a circus ringmaster. They need a credible leader, especially one that can manage his or her emotions at least as well as Vladimir Putin does.”

Showdown Slow Down (Jim Kunstler)

The basic Democratic Party election strategy in recent decades has been to turn the voting public into so many millions of proverbial froggies in the pot of water set to slowly rise to boiling so that the froggies don’t notice they’re getting cooked until it’s too late to jump out of the pot. The Democrat’s Lawfare soldiers have slowly and systematically changed the methods of voting and counting the votes, especially to eliminate accountability for the massive scams and screw-ups that have occurred recently. The changes have been accepted as normal. One insidious change was shutting down the small local precinct polling places in churches and schools, where it was easy to get in, get your signature checked, and vote on-site, and where the precinct captains and workers were known and accountable to voters in the neighborhood.

Instead, Lawfare got states to consolidate all the action in huge impersonal voting centers — often sports arenas — where hundreds of election workers churned, and all sorts of frauds went unnoticed in the enormous shuffle of activity. It was also harder to get in and vote at such a giant venue on game day when thousands showed up and long lines formed — which made it easier for interested parties to justify the expansion of mail-in balloting. It’s just possible that Covid-19 was introduced in 2020 to make sure that Election Day in-person voting would look hazardous, with mail-ins becoming the dominant method. It sure helped get rid of Donald Trump.Among the conclusions of the 2005 Commission on Federal Election Reform, co-chaired by (Democratic) former president Carter and (Republican) former Secretary of State James Baker, was that mail-in voting is the easiest way to invite cheating and fraud.

Apparently, no one listened except Lawfare’s Marc Elias, who saw that as a good thing. What we got starting in 2020 and continuing today are the creative refinements of that, as fraudsters apply their zillions of dollars to new ways of stealing elections — as Mark Zuckerberg did in Wisconsin, literally switching out local election officials with Democratic Party activists. Then there are the as-yet-unresolved issues with the Dominion voting machines and their software. Are the machines enabled to hook into the internet? It seems to me that this has been proven. Why is it so hard to admit that these machines are janky and unnecessary? A thousand voices have pointed out that many other nations, France, for instance, use only paper ballots and manage to report the election results the night of.

Arizona is a whole helluva lot smaller than France, and even Florida, which thoroughly reformed its election laws under Governor DeSantis and published the midterm results the same night. Speaking of Mr. DeSantis and Mr. Trump, the ex-President has been verbally laying into the Florida governor so viciously lately that he might have made a fatal error in his quest for electoral redemption. The opponents of Progressive-Woke-Jacobinism don’t need a circus ringmaster. They need a credible leader, especially one that can manage his or her emotions at least as well as Vladimir Putin does.

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“Anyone who thinks The Fed can ignore 32.6% of spending in the economy has rocks in their head..”

Crrraaaazy Wally -Street, That Is- (Denninger)

We call it…. “crazy Ivan” – Hunt for Red October. Except this is November, and the crazy came out of the CPI report. The Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U) rose 0.4 percent in October on a seasonally adjusted basis, the same increase as in September, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Over the last 12 months, the all items index increased 7.7 percent before seasonal adjustment. The index for shelter contributed over half of the monthly all items increase, with the indexes for gasoline and food also increasing. If you were short into this there was no getting away from what went up your backside; a literal 100 handles went into the Spoos within seconds and I’m quite sure if you’d been short you would have been gapped over, so a stop would have gotten you exactly no protection.

The problem in the “better than expected” report is in that bolded line and in fact that’s a high going back all the way through April on a seasonally-adjusted basis. Food away from home also was up at the seasonally-adjusted high, where it has been for the last three months sequentially, so there’s no love there either. Note that the latter is often subject to fairly long supply lines and contracts which delay the impact of movement both ways, and thus that it is lagging is no big shock. Food at bars and restaurants has been up less than food at home over the last 12 months and thus you can expect it to continue hitting the index for quite some time yet. The 900lb Gorilla in the room this month is fuel oil, which is, as many people do not know, #2 diesel.

It was up a stunning 19.8% on the month and stands at 68.5% up from last year this time. Anyone expecting the consumer experience to improve with that record has rocks in their head, never mind those who use it for heating that are about to get a visit from the proctologist this winter. Incidentally if you are one of them and your supplier is screwing you on price go to a truck stop (or any rural fuel place that sells to farmers for off-road use) and bring jerry cans. They sell dyed fuel for use in the refer units. Its the same thing and if its cheaper to buy it there than pay whatever the guy with the truck wants to bring it to the house your decision should be obvious. Piped gas relaxed some, which is good news if you use it, but its still up 20% on the year.

A huge percentage of people use that for heat, so there you go. Oh, and guess what is used to generate electrical power? Uh huh, which is why electricity is up 14.1% on the year. If you remember me talking about “Owner’s Equivalent Rent” and how it falsely stated that there was no inflation while home prices shot the moon you can see the inverse of that right now in the OER number which is up 6.9% on the year. That which held down inflation figures for years is now going to prop them up for years, like it or not. There is no evidence that rents, on the other hand, is relaxing at all. Anyone who thinks The Fed can ignore 32.6% of spending in the economy has rocks in their head; they most-certainly will not, and that’s what shelter comprises. Annualized its up 6.9% so no, we’re not “winning” on inflation.

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“Global trade is moving backwards this year..”

Ports Clogged With Containers As World Trade Stumbles (ZH)

The latest Bloomberg Trade Tracker reveals an ominous outlook for world trade due to soaring interest rates, the war in Ukraine, a slowdown in the US economy, and zero Covid in China. A shortage of containers has entirely reversed into a glut as crashing shipping rates and canceled sails gain momentum during what is supposed to be the busiest shipping period of the year. “The world’s two biggest economies are feeling glum about the export outlook, with both the US and China gauges in contraction in October and the American one in “below-normal” range on the Tracker,” according to Bloomberg. Earlier this week, we explained that economic storm clouds are gathering worldwide as some of the largest shipping companies warn about decelerating global trade.


US shipper FedEx and Danish shipping giant A.P. Moller-Maersk A/S have been vocal about emerging signs of a global slowdown. “Global trade is moving backwards this year,” Maersk’s chief executive officer Soren Skou told Bloomberg Television at the start of November. FedEx CFO Michael Lenz told an audience Tuesday at the Robert W Baird Global Industrial Conference earlier this week that his company parked planes cut costs in response to weak demand for package delivery. The Covid boom for goods has evaporated. Consumers have switched from buying computers and television to spending whatever money they have left on experiences. We predict in May that an inventory glut, i.e., the reverse bullwhip effect, would cool the booming freight market. It’s now peak shipping season — retailers have already canceled overseas orders as freight companies reduce shipping capacity ahead of Black Friday and Christmas.

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Yeah, but we’re broke…

Developing Nations Demand Rich Countries Pay For Climate Change (RT)

Leaders from developing countries have accused wealthy nations and the energy industry of triggering climate change and demanded compensation for the damage it has inflicted on their economies. While oil and gas companies are reaping the benefits, small island states are being devastated by ocean storms caused by rising sea levels, they say. Speaking at the COP27 climate summit in Egypt on Tuesday, Antigua and Barbuda Prime Minister Gaston Browne noted that “oil and gas industry continues to earn almost $3 billion daily in profits,” while “the planet is burning.” “It is about time that these companies are made to pay a global carbon tax on their profits as a source of funding for loss and damage,” Browne added.

Poor nations point at the hypocrisy of their wealthier counterparts, which are the most vocal advocates of slashing emissions while themselves being the biggest polluters following a century of fossil fuel-driven industrialization. Developing countries are now asking how they will be compensated for the floods and droughts attributed to climate change. “I’m not here to ask any of you to love the people of my country with the same passion as I do,” said the prime minister of the Bahamas, Philip Davis. “I’m asking what is it worth to you to have millions of climate refugees to turn into tens of millions, putting pressure on political and economic systems around the world.”

Meanwhile, Senegalese President Macky Sall admitted that his country’s economy is unable to shift away from fossil fuels immediately but said that poorer developing countries in Africa needed increased funding from wealthy nations in order to adapt to the worsening climate. “Let’s be clear, we are in favor of reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. But we Africans cannot accept that our vital interests be ignored,” he said.

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Saudi, Iran, now UAE. No many US friends left.

US Intel Report Vilifies Key Ally UAE – WaPo (RT)

The United Arab Emirates, arguably one of Washington’s most trusted Arab allies, has gamed US foreign policy by meddling in the American political system using both legal and illegal tactics, intelligence officials have reportedly claimed in a classified report. The activities in question spanned multiple US administrations and exploited “vulnerabilities” in the American system, including reliance on political contributions and lax enforcement of laws designed to protect against foreign interference, the Washington Post reported on Saturday. Some of the tactics “resemble espionage,” the newspaper added, citing three unidentified sources who have seen the classified report.

The report illustrates how the US political system is being distorted by foreign money, one Washington lawmaker told the Post, arguing that a “very clear red line needs to be established against the UAE playing in American politics. I’m not convinced we’ve ever raised this with the Emiratis at a high level.” Top US policymakers allegedly received briefings on the classified intelligence report in recent weeks. It’s an unusual advisory for US intelligence agencies to issue because it pertains to a close ally – rather than an adversary, such as Russia, China or Iran – and could be interpreted as delving into domestic politics, said Bruce Riedel, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. Yousef Al Otaiba, the UAE’s ambassador to Washington, defended the oil-rich nation’s outsized influence in the US. “It has been hard-earned and well-deserved,” he told the Post.

“It is the product of decades of close UAE-US cooperation and effective diplomacy. It reflects common interests and shared values.” The UAE has spent more than $154 million on lobbyists since 2016, according to US government records, as well as hundreds of millions of dollars that were donated to American colleges and think tanks. Many of those institutions have produced policy papers with recommendations that are favorable to UAE interests. Those investments have apparently been fruitful, as Washington has approved sales of some of the most advanced US-made weaponry, including MQ-9 Predator drones and F-35 fighter jets, to the UAE. No other Arab nation has been afforded such privileges because US leaders have sought to avoid “diminishing Israel’s qualitative military edge” in the Middle East, the Post said.

Bordering Saudi Arabia to the southwest and Oman to the east, oil-rich UAE is a member of OPEC. Around 2,000 US soldiers and airmen are stationed at Abu Dhabi’s al-Dhafra airbase, and both countries supported Saudi Arabia’s war against the Houthis in Yemen, though the Pentagon ceased supporting “offensive” operations there in 2021, and the UAE withdrew its ground troops in early 2020. In early August, Washington authorized a $2.2 billion sale of 96 Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system missiles, to help Abu Dhabi repel possible ballistic missile threats in the region. However, after OPEC+ members announced their decision to cut oil production last month, multiple US lawmakers accused Washington’s allies of “siding with Russia” and proposed withdrawing troops and missile defense systems from both UAE and Saudi Arabia as a punishment.

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“..discarding the works of Mussorgsky or poet and novelist Alexander Pushkin would be like discarding the works of Shakespeare or Dante..”

La Scala Replies To Call To ‘Cancel’ Russian Composers (RT)

Italy’s famed La Scala theater in Milan has insisted that Russian culture should not be “penalized” because of the military operation against Kiev. It defended its decision to include the works of Russian composers in its newest program after a Ukrainian consul called them instruments of Moscow’s propaganda campaign. According to Italian news agency ANSA, Andrey Kartysh, Ukraine’s consul general in Milan, sent a letter to La Scala CEO Dominique Meyer, as well as Milan Mayor Giuseppe Sala and the head of the Lombardy region, Attilio Fontana, asking to “review” its program for the 2022-2023 season in order to avoid “potential elements of propaganda.” The diplomat cited the “great disappointment and regret” of the Ukrainian community in Italy.

“Culture is being used by the Russian Federation to lend weight to its assertions of greatness and power,” he wrote, arguing that “the pandering to its propaganda can only fuel the image of the regime [in Moscow] and, by extension, its evil ambitions and countless crimes.” La Scala plans to kick off its newest season on December 7 with the opera ‘Boris Godunov’ by 19th-century Russian composer Modest Mussorgsky. The opera is about a Russian tsar who ruled during the Time of Trouble, a period of political upheaval and turbulence in early 17th century Russia. The program also includes ‘The Nutcracker’ ballet, whose score was written by Pyotr Tchaikovsky, and a recital by Russian soprano Anna Netrebko. La Scala Music Director Riccardo Chailly defended the decision to show ‘Boris Godunov’ on stage.

“To remove a masterpiece… is to penalize the culture,” he argued, as quoted by the newspaper Corriere della Sera on Saturday. “Art should not pay for the havoc of what has been happening after February 24,” Chailly said, referring to the date that Russia launched its military operation in the neighboring state. He added that discarding the works of Mussorgsky or poet and novelist Alexander Pushkin would be like discarding the works of Shakespeare or Dante. Chailly noted that the opera house expressed support for Ukraine early on in the conflict and raised €380,000 for Ukrainian refugees in April. Stage director Francesco Micheli, who sits on La Scala’s governing board, called the Ukrainian consul general’s request “reckless,” saying that he “ignores that the opera has no connection with the situation” in his home country. “I think La Scala sees the program as a way to show the unifying value of culture. That is why La Scala should be praised,” Italian Under Secretary of State for Culture Vittorio Sgarbi said.

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Google translation.

Looks like the “thrash metal drummer” is being used by much bigger parties. But Musk made a lot of people a lot of money, and “the proposal has been passed by a large majority by Tesla shareholders.”

Still, lawyers are looking at large fees, so they continue.

@JordanSchachtel:”Elon is blowing things up at Twitter because it is necessary to save the company. The old Twitter was a state-sponsored propaganda operation. Twitter as a private company will not have the privilege of unlimited resources.”

Elon Musk In Court Over $56 Billion Tesla Bonus (Telegraaf)

Elon Musk has to defend a billion-dollar bonus in a US court on Monday that was promised to him a few years ago at Tesla. That bonus could be so high that the Tesla CEO could recoup the entire $44 billion he recently invested in the Twitter acquisition. Musk was promised a package of stock options in 2018 if he could achieve certain goals with Tesla. Since then, Tesla’s stock price has increased more than tenfold and the company was briefly worth more than 1000 billion dollars. According to calculations, Musk could make up to $56 billion. The controversial package allows him to buy 1 percent of Tesla’s shares at a big discount every time certain targets are reached. Richard Tornetta, a small Tesla investor, thought the bonus was excessive and filed a lawsuit as early as 2018. At the time, there was immediately a lot of speculation that the Tesla stock price could rise to great heights.


Tornetta, who is also a thrash metal drummer and runs an audio equipment company, also finds it unfair that Musk was awarded the remuneration of a board that would actually be completely under his control. One of the directors involved was Kimbal Musk, the brother of the richest man in the world. Yet the matter is not so simple. Musk’s lawyers have pointed out that the proposal has been passed by a large majority by Tesla shareholders. Because of the bonus, Musk would have been focused on making Tesla better. And this is said to be the reason why the share price has soared, which is in the interest of all shareholders. The case is being heard in the state of Delaware by the same judge who recently dealt with the case between Twitter and Musk to force the latter to go through with its takeover plan.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

 

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Home Forums Debt Rattle November 13 2022

Viewing 40 posts - 1 through 40 (of 51 total)
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  • #120906

    Salvador Dali The three pines 1919   • UK and EU To Try To Isolate Russia At G20 Summit (RT) • The New Candidate Countries For BRICS Expansion (S
    [See the full post at: Debt Rattle November 13 2022]

    #120908
    teri
    Participant

    Ilargi,
    I posted this comment on the last thread, but I see you have a new article up, so I’ll re-post it here:

    Ilargi, that chart you posted [showing the political donors] is interesting. Not really because of the crypto guy, though, unless one thinks it’s “really bad” to donate to Dems but “not so bad” to donate to Repubs. If this chart is correct, the Republicans got $34,667,000 more than the Democrats from all the top ten donors combined.

    2 of the top ten gave only to Democrats, 5 gave only to Republicans, and 3 others (including Bankman-Fried) spread their donations around. The fact that Bankman-Fried gave more money to the Democrats than to other parties he donated to is meaningless in and of itself. The top 2 Republican donors gave only to Republicans; that is also meaningless. What is consequential is that there is so much mad money (overall) sloshing around the system.

    The top 2 Republican donors are Ken Griffin (owns hedge fund Citadel) and Richard Uihlein (owns ULine shipping and supply company, and is heir to Schlitz brewery). I’m sure the Mercers gave more to the Republicans than anyone else, but they use a dark money fund that allows the donors to keep the recipient’s names and party affiliations secret, so their names aren’t on the chart you show. And yes, it is legal to donate in secret now.

    I think the more interesting aspect of this list is that it shows there are too many people with way too much ‘walking around’ money buying the politicians in this country, and that the Citizen’s United decision was one of the most corrupting decisions in the history of the Supreme Court.

    #120909
    Red
    Participant

    From WAPO “citing three unidentified sources” here we go again.

    Well of course “the war” and “covid” are mentioned instead of the response to them!
    “The latest Bloomberg Trade Tracker reveals an ominous outlook for world trade due to soaring interest rates, the war in Ukraine, a slowdown in the US economy, and zero Covid in China.”

    #120910
    Germ
    Participant

    Just beneath then surface there’s a silent slaughter.

    My tennis partner’s son died “suddenly” last week.
    Totally out of the blue, totally unexpected.

    It’s an ongoing silent, yet sudden, slaughter.

    ” suddenly of ‘natural causes’ “

    Heartbreak as young Gaelic footballer from Northern Ireland’s Co Tyrone dies suddenly

    Heartbreak as popular young actress Emily Chesterton dies suddenly of ‘natural causes’

    #120911
    aspnaz
    Participant

    You’ve reached your quota of meat this month

    Living in Africa, when I was pre-teen, there were poachers but not much was being done as the animal rangers tended to be shot by the poachers if they were caught. By the time I left, each animal had a squad of military plus at least one ranger protecting the animal. It worked to a certain extent, some species were still destroyed by the Chinese belief in rhino horn as a medicine.

    My point is that it is very difficult and very costly to defend animals. One of the reasons is that killing an animal does not result in very severe penalties. We will see new laws, once rationing of meat starts, that classify animal killing as something similar to murder. Without such laws, the elites would have to live without their steaks – not going to happen – as the plebs will have killed and stolen their entire herds. They will think they have it all sorted, but I suspect dogs and cats will go first, then the larger farm animals like pigs and cattle.

    One of the huge difference this time is that people will know where their oppressors are living and what land they own, so it will be fairly easy to find a Bill Gates cattle farm and raid it for food.

    #120912
    Dr. D
    Participant

    Looks like unlike the last Kherson withdrawal where Ukraine rushed in, got cauldroned and annihilated, NATO has not been in a hurry to fill the new Kherson city that Surovikin left them. Too bad. Might be the first time they demonstrated they’ve learned something. But these are probably British Generals by now with Polish troops.

    So they’ve taken the city, but what is that? What is a “City”? The “City” is empty. So do you go shopping? Clubbing? Maybe pick up your day job at the factory? No. The city is the infrastructure that supports the PEOPLE. Even if the people were there, it would be difficult to run it not at a loss while under fire, but possible in a bad sort of way. But with no people at all? No shipping, no building, no fixing. In fact, the infrastructure that is can’t be repaired either because it will be abundantly clear that anything moving within 15 clicks is military and a target. Pre-dialed. So Ukraine has good shelter there but what does that mean in a world of satellites and drones? Not like you can hide.

    The land is worthless without the people. All the people of Kherson are now, or can be, working in factories in the East. That makes them a food and logistics cost, but Russia has the food and the logistics.

    “…can robots and AI really make all the stuff for the elites after they have gotten rid of the people?”

    Well, let’s see: no energy, no shipping, no feedstock, no material and process standardization, no communications, no logistics. Um, probably not. But carry on with your human-hating fantasy. I’ll watch.

    “ UK and EU to Try to Isolate Russia at G20 Summit (RT)”

    If they go with Russia they’ll get their quota of energy, but if they don’t go with the UK and EU then where will they get their monthly quota of beatings? About how Europe is the master race only trying to reform “The Jungle.”

    “ The New Candidate Countries for BRICS Expansion (SRB)”

    I thought the next one was already Angola. And look: no war, no coup! Too busy losing every piece of hardware in the swamps of Ukraine. All-clear. US NATOstan is broke and unable to project power anywhere.

    There’s an easy solution. The exchange can issue its own token to replace the customer assets transferred to the hedge fund.”

    This sets up the classic issue and shows the pure amateur status of Alameda: mismatch between short and long, between liquid and less-liquid assets. Like this: There’s a comic collector named Joe, and he wants SpiderMan #1. The price was $3M, but because he wants it, the price is now $300M. Without Joe, the price drops back to $3M, or even $1.5M. That is, as the old Wall St joke goes: “I’ve bid this up to $1M. Now sell, Mortimer!” “Sell? To who? YOU are the market!”

    Mismatching BTC which can be transferred out of restless crytpo trader’s accounts in minutes, with SpiderMan #1 which will take months to sell, if at all.

    “The price rockets, inflating the balance sheets of both the hedge fund and the exchange, and making $billions in unrealised profits”

    This is accounting fraud. The problem being it’s become standard practice for everyone, headlined by Tesla and Amazon. What are they worth if they wanted to sell, to “realize” those gains? Oh, well, probably far under 1/10th of their listed value. THEN THAT’S NOT THEIR REAL VALUE. As Telsa just found out, $400 to $200, on its way to $40/share, losing $600B in 9 months. Amazon of course lost a TRILLION. …Because like FTX, they were never worth a Trillion to begin with. It’s all accounting fraud. It’s accounting fraud all the way down.

    If I can just value my own comic books, then SquirrelGirl #39 (yes, this is real) I say is worth $1M apiece, all 40 of them. …They’re just really illiquid, and I need to find that elusive buyer who will overpay for an unpopular comic printed only last year. Um, no. That’s accounting fraud. Or as Jon Stewart showed with JonCo valuing Jon’s 1984 Volvo at $1M (in 2011):

    https://money.com/jon-stewart-5-best-money-moments/ (original video is purged to archives) Demonstrating MBS securities sold to the Fed at $1 when worth 0.01. Yes, that’s fraud. No one arrested it then, no one arrested it since then. Everyone has known the whole time. Why arrest it now?

    “Up to $2 Billion in Client Money Missing in Crypto Giant FTX Collapse (NYP)”

    This is as hilariously unlikely as that time in Armstrong’s trial when they said $1B was transferred out of a bank with no record keeping. Hahahaha! Suuuuuurrrrre it did! For all non-literate glue-munchers, if the Crypto left the FTX wallet, it went TO somebody else’s wallet. Which, being crypto, is PUBLIC. That’s what public-ledger means. Sooooo, not like I’m the FBI here, but maybe you should keep an eye on the wallet it was transferred to? Which you have the public address of? And the same with US$ funds? This is not a suitcase of cash. The cash only exists if someone – ON THE LEDGER – knows and can prove that you have it. Because it only exists as a book entry, and US$ and BTC are identical in this. Client money cannot “Go Missing”. What they mean is: “It went to the right people, so we’re not going to look.”

    Fact Check? If it went to Steve Bannon’s and Eric Trump’s personal bank account and Crypto address, you think they could find it? And it wouldn’t be “Missing” then? Yeah, I think so too. What is this bulls—t?

    #120913
    Dr. D
    Participant

    “Tens of Billions Transferred to Ukraine and Laundered Through FTX (GP)”

    Been trying to phrase the narrative I see for FTX, but it’s complicated and wide-reaching.

    We have Ukraine, with billions going there – no limits! – while people all starve at home. Bridges collapse, crime spikes, homeless cities spring up, medieval diseases reappear, unsafe water. But no limits for Ukraine. GOP does nothing. In fact the Squad votes for it, I think there was one Senator, Rand Paul, and 51 Congressmen who showed any opposition at all.

    Money goes to Ukraine, and CBS reports that nobody knows where it’s going. We suggest that, when $50B moves through Europe’s most corrupt, money laundering nation, as reported by the NYTimes for 5 years, that maybe some of it is being laundered? But you don’t launder US money in Ukraine to send to Vanuatu. You launder it to get it back to YOU, the Congressmen and women who arrive with $500k and in 2 years are $10x Millionaires.

    At the same time, there has been non-stop accusations and evidence of election fraud and tampering. Facebook gives millions to critical races, NOT in the political PAC campaigns, but to buy and install their preferred people as the vote counters. No cases come to court. All are dismissed on standing, or timing, zero clarity on evidence. This goes on for years and only increases in 2022.

    At the same time, the Financial system is completely broken but won’t collapse. It’s like a badly-detonated building that’s leaning in on itself. Evergrande was halted, Credit Suisse bailed, losing a trillion in Amazon, half a trillion in Tesla, all collateral for ESG, makes no difference. Prices don’t drop. Why should they? When there are no regulators, companies merely cook books deeper, wider, and broader. If there are bankruptcies, they are merely bailed out, merged, or ignored, slow walked, never reported. BlackRock files and the media doesn’t report it. The judges don’t act on it. So it a real sense, it didn’t happen.

    Rates rise 6x. Shipping stops. Yet it has no effect on housing, retail, or employment numbers. All are gamed and fake for decades.

    The financial collapse never happens, but it HAS to happen, both for reality and sanity to reappear AND for the White Hats to show up so it didn’t happen on their watch, but is (rightfully) blamed on the other guy? It has to happen before. But their baling wire and duct tape is too strong, so good on them, I guess.

    There is no spark.

    So what if.

    What if the Spark that finally reveals the existing worldwide financial collapse doesn’t come normally, from housing or leverage, but from a money laundering a fraud so BIG that the FRAUD ITSELF is what collapses the system? What if that fraud is actually ELECTION fraud, frauds so big it broke not only the United States, the nation, its government – even its army — but the whole world?

    What could anyone say? Are reporters going to ignore the Credit Anstalt that caused the worldwide financial collapse? And when they look into it and find nothing but DNC donors and DNC operatives, the regulators themselves funneling the $50B from Ukraine back to Congress – there’s nothing else IN the books but this – what are they going to say?

    So let me get this straight: We’re broke, you started two nuclear wars, the economy’s wrecked, everyone’s starving, Europe froze, the government collapsed, the market has ceased to trade, there are no jobs because no payroll … And it’s all because YOU WERE RIGGING ELECTIONS?

    Gee, that election rigging must be PRETTY BIG. How big is it? Hey wait: doesn’t this mean that all those things “We voted for” we didn’t REALLY vote for? All those people, that supposed support for things, it wasn’t really support?

    Hold on: I don’t think we even know what the country IS anymore. Who WE are. What we want. What’s popular and unpopular, because it was all a fraud so large, so titanic, so galactic, that it IMPLODED THE ENTIRE WORLD?

    I can’t eat, and my checks don’t clear from work because YOU WERE ELECTION TAMPERING???

    We need a spot-check election just so I can properly assess what is REAL. Who my neighbors are. What a “woman” is. Okay, okay: time out here: Suppose 2022 wasn’t real. Wow. Suppose 2020 wasn’t real either. …They’re all seated. …Passing laws. Um… How do we fix this??? Who is the referee? Who calls a Backsies, a Do-over, so we can find out what American people REALLY want, and REALLY think, without this $50B, planet-imploding market-collapsing, food-halting, election fraud?

    Boom.

    What does that say? Markets halt. I don’t see how they couldn’t, that’s what a “Financial Collapse” is. Second, the only organization capable of calling a time out – and enforcing it – is the U.S. Military. Martial Law. At least here.

    They step in, call a time out, get in NO HURRY, and let people talk, think, digest, plan. Safely. Without “Summer of Love” riots burning all the black businesses. Twitter is open and free speech, not for the election? But somehow after? At some point, a plan is made and elections are held again that people will credit as mostly real, because I really don’t think the military wants to be in charge and run the country. They want to hand it back.

    So you see the cascade here, as the collapse refuses to fail organically for 14, 22 years? Well, The White Hats are all military, Intel, and they have long-scenario planners. And so it if doesn’t happen, the White Hats just have to MAKE it happen. And if so, then how? If you’re forced to, Where is the best possible way for the best possible (bad) outcome?

    All public. All un-avoidable. Impossible to deny or explain away. FTX?

    I guess we’ll see.

    #120914
    Dr. D
    Participant

    Teri: no the point wasn’t that people donate to Democrats. That’s a good thing. And it’s a mark of honest dealing and open discussion to post the whole list, which shows all the equivalent very large GOP donations.

    The point is, George Soros is 80 years old and trading, building his fortune all his life. Like Theil, this takes years, decades.

    But you’re telling me that in two years a 20 year old from MIT has as much money as the 80-year fortune of the top scoundrel and trader?

    C’mon. Surely that beggars belief. If he made the money and wants to donate legally, nobody has a problem with that, although we’ll track for influence peddling, as he donated largely to the Congressmen running the SEC and CFTC.

    But when his donations 13 days after Biden’s campaign, come from his mother running “Mind the Gap” DNC vote-bending organization, and is personally fielding $50B Biden gave to Ukraine, back-laundered through his unregulated Exchange that only appeared yesterday, THAT’S when we want to ask a lot of questions about a 20-year-old suddenly discovering a few billion in the couch cushions.

    …That he gave away as Democratic donations.

    Donate away. That’s not the issue.

    #120915
    Red
    Participant
    #120917
    EoinW
    Participant

    I’d say Big Serge has it right. Holding the west bank in Stalingrad was a mistake. It was a resupply nightmare and so many lives were wasted by hanging onto the city. Stalin never cared about human lives. Something he has in common with the psychopaths who run the West. The encirclement and destruction of the German 6th army would have occurred regardless of which side of the Volga the Russians were on.

    Now there are 300,000 Russian reservists waiting for the ground to freeze. A 1,500 km long front line to choose from. All we know for sure is they won’t be coming through Kherson.

    #120919
    John Day
    Participant

    “Stormy Space Weather” has a pictureof me wiring the needs-no-electricity gas wall-furnace to work without a thermostat. It’s mostly essay. One need not view the two modest and information-packed videos by Ben Davidson. https://www.amazon.com/Weathermans-Guide-Sun-Ben-Davidson/dp/148358898X

    https://drjohnsblog.substack.com/p/stormy-space-weather
    The cold front hit yesterday afternoon, and the cold north wind blew all night​ at 15 to 20 mph. When we got to Yoakum from Austin last night it was warm downstairs in the new house, but kind of cold upstairs, where I had left the windows open. I closed them. This morning it was pleasantly cool downstairs and cooler upstairs, but did not feel cold, as it did outside in the wind. The insulation seems to do a fine job, even in a sustained wind.
    I could barely feel my fingers while picking vegetables in the garden, which had been warm all week. We got lots of small tomatoes, a few medium tomatoes, four good eggplants and lots of kinds of peppers. Along with some fresh basil I picked, some of this became tonight’s spaghetti dinner.

    Since it was finally cold enough to try the heating I put in with the build, I turned the heat pump from AC to heat, and turned it on. It worked fine. Very nice.
    We have small , vented gas wall-heaters upstairs and downstairs, so I squatted down, read the directions and got the pilot lights lit.
    Jenny found the printed directions, so I was able to read about installing a thermostat (“sold separately”) .
    We never bought thermostats, but they are “passive”, “microvolt thermostats”, not requiring batteries or connection to house-wiring. These units are sold to work on gas-only. I looked at the 2 connections for the thermostat wired, which were easy to access with the front open. I touched them both with metal plies at the same time, and the flame came on. Success!
    This is how I remember my grandparent’s wall heater. No thermostat. Turn the little knob to Low, High or Pilot.
    I stripped a couple of pieces of wire, jumpered the connections for the thermostat, and turned the flames to low. They both made plenty of heat on low.
    We are ready for winter in the new house. We turned the furnace on last night in the old house. It is big, central, and makes a big sound when the flame ignites.
    The fan blows impressively. I think it burns a lot of gas, by comparison.
    It is still a work in progress, but we will see how much of our daily living and sleeping we can easily transfer to the new house this winter.

    Space weather is changing, too. Our lovely blue and green planet insulates us from most of that, most of the time, but not completely, and not always.
    We didn’t have space weather yet when I was a kid, but we do now. We didn’t know about much except gravity and forms of radiation in space. There were little tiny particles moving really fast that could damage space capsule shells and windows.
    We did know about big solar flares, like the Carrington Event of September 1-2, 1859, which caused auroral displays and caused telegraph wires to vaporize.
    The sunspot that spewed it was tracked by a hobbyist named Carrington, who got a lordship for it.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrington_Event#:~:text=The%20Carrington%20Event%20was%20the,fires%20in%20multiple%20telegraph%20stations

    These solar flares get tracked by NASA and others these days. We know there is a solar cycle of 11 years. There are electromagnetic excursions as well as ejection of high energy x-rays and gamma rays. The magnetic fields of the earth and the sun are also coupled.
    It looks like the whole of the universe is magnetically coupled, and all of it is in motion, and there are sheets of magnetic waves traveling through the universe, changing the behavior of stars as they cross them, so they can be tracked. Voyager has detected a lot of these electromagnetic fields and waves. Our sun has something like a bow-wave in front of a ship, as it speeds on its way.
    Our solar system is about to be engaged with a big, powerful electromagnetic wave, which seems to be cyclical, like a big, spinning, wavy-disc. Voyager, and watching other stars, reveal this. Earth’s magnetic field has been weakening more rapidly, and its strength has not been reported since 2010, when it was seen to have declined twice as rapidly as predicted. It was down 15% from 1900, and down about 35% from the field strength enjoyed by Jesus of Nazareth. The north pole has accelerated from a walk to a jog towards Siberia in recent years, increasing from 25 miles per year in 2–3, to 50 miles last year.
    There is a lot of uncertainty about polar reversals lately. They might be more frequent and transient than thought, not just every 100,000 to 10 million years. The electromagnetic universe, through which our electromagnetic sun and planet speed may be a determining factor, but it is only beginning to be studied. The current accelerated decay of earth’s magnetic field, coupled with accelerating travel of the magnetic north pole, and the approach of the periodic electromagnetic wave, seen disturbing stars as it overtakes them, suggest that we humans may be in for some bad solar weather soon.
    NASA won’t talk about it. They clammed up after 2015 and have been making data posted earlier harder to find. The European Space Agency is just as tight-lipped.
    The problem is that when the fields weaken X-rays and gamma-rays get through to the earth’s surface, where they are extremely toxic to life forms, such as mammals. A steel roof doesn’t stop gamma rays. Even lead sheet isn’t enough. It needs to be thick lead.
    Four feet of soil or water does a decent job of protecting life forms. Nobody has that, nobody normal, anyway. Driving in a car is no good. Driving at night protects you from solar rays, blocked by earth, but not from cosmic rays, coming from distant parts of our galaxy.

    #120921
    John Day
    Participant

    Other very strange things can happen, like the younger-Dryas period of 13,00 to 11,500 years ago, when the weather changed abruptly from warming, back into sudden glaciation. https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/sites/default/files/2021-11/3%20The%20Younger%20Dryas%20-FINAL%20NOV%20%281%29.pdf
    The Younger Dryas Period corresponds to what looks to be the last time this big electromagnetic spinning disc crossed our solar system. It also looks like large things impacted our planet, likely making clouds of water and dust, which could lead to glaciation. There were anomalies in the magnetic formations in hardening lava. Modern agriculture sprang up after that glaciation age warmed up, but some think it had already been present before that bad 1500 years of cold. There was a genetic bottleneck in our human genome around that time, also. There was a very small human population surviving in India, north Africa and the Mediterranean areas.
    Though NASA won’t talk, Astrophysicist Ben Davidson will. This is a sub 10 minute talk he posted this past week about bad space weather effects we may expect “soon”. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EyPJfa_Cum0&t=2s

    Though we can’t know exactly when, it would probably be this decade or next. Ben talks about our sun going into a recurring micronova event, a cyclic thing for our star, and seemingly linked to the recurring galactic electromagnetic wave disturbance that we now know about.
    Because of how micronovas occur, there is a darkening of the sun, for an undetermined number of days, as solar energy emission decreases, and matter collects at and beyond the surface of the star. A burst of energy explodes this “shell” and releases an intense pulse of gamma and X-rays, which reach the earth in 8 minutes as an intense flash. You should be in a big cave somewhere since our bodies would be sickened or killed at the surface. If it impacts the other side of our planet, you will be spared from the flash. 18 hours after the flash, the hurtling debris field arrives on your side of the planet, so the secure cave is still the place to be. I don’t have one. I’m trying to figure this out. I’ll need to have something actionable when the sun goes dark, right?
    Ben points out how rapidly we are accumulating knowledge of the workings of our universe, that all of the assumptions of not-much happening were based on our just not knowing much, and not looking for very long, or very effectively. We now have sensitive arrays to look at light and other radiation much farther away and are seeing all kinds of “new” things we did not know were happening.

    #120922
    John Day
    Participant

    Here, in 32 minutes, he presents Solar Micronova, The End of an Age, with good animated illustrations. This is the more complete video he talks about. This kind of an event will clearly have lots of human survivors, due to location, good fortune and preparation, but they will be a minority of humanity.
    This video is dense with information, which I am able to digest, having delved into numerous NASA videos in recent years for the background. Try it.

    I’m always in this awkward position of believing in global warming, CO2, methane, other greenhouse-gasses, tipping points of melting polar ice caps and methane clathrates, but not being so worried about those things, compared to other things that would be better candidates to kill most of us. 536 ws purportedly “the worst year to be alive”, likely due to a super-volcano erupting and darkening the sun for a year and a half, ruining crops, making it cold, and bringing out the worst in humans, which is ghastly. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/536

    536 kicked-off the “Late Antiquity Little Ice Age”, which was likely the end of the Anasazi people in Mesa Verde. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_Antique_Little_Ice_Age#:~:text=The%20Late%20Antique%20Little%20Ice,%2C%20539%2F540%20and%20547.

    From around 1300 to 1850 the northern hemisphere had “The Little Ice Age”, with some very cold years, which were probably due to volcanic eruptions causing cooling. This is much better recorded, and includes the Black-Plague years. https://www.britannica.com/science/Little-Ice-Age/Changes-in-large-scale-atmospheric-patterns

    Since 1850, California has had a lot of nice weather, but we find out that was an anomaly. We assume that so much which is pleasant and agreeable in our world is the normal baseline. Who could blame us?
    Being killed by weather is a recurring feature of human existence, and the deadly weather keeps changing for such a very wide variety of reasons, some of which we are just now discovering. Anthropogenic global warming seems to me to be a real thing. I am scientifically trained and educated, and it all seems to be completely as presented by climate scientists. Not looking at all of the other causes of deadly weather seems to be the fatal flaw.
    The largest threat to most people is being killed by other people, which is well documented when weather and crops are bad in history. We have such a vast and intricate food production and distribution system, using 10 calories of fossil fuel for every one calorie eaten, that we are unfathomably vulnerable compared to other periods in history. Most of us would be dead within 3 months if all the electricity went off and stayed off.

    Thank you for considering the context that life is usually far more difficult than we have known it in our own years, and that this best-of-all times is not the baseline. Don’t get sold a scam. Learn basic human living, especially vegetable gardening, walking and bicycling. I’m grateful to have been able to do all of the things, go all of the places, know and help all of the people that I have in my life. Now that I realize that this has been the best of all times, I feel a responsibility to help all of us go forward gracefully, without face-planting from the next curveball that the universe throws our way.
    World War-3 has started. It’s different from the first two, as you have noticed. The cause is about the same. Power elites are in a power struggle as the economy goes through big changes. They all need to get richer, to protect what they already own, and to get rid of some of their rivals and most of us useless-eaters.
    That being said, a lot of them are probably not expecting a micronova event, or even Scotty losing our shields for a few decades.
    Try to outlive them. Keep your head down.

    #120923
    teri
    Participant

    No, Dr D, the point I was making is that putting up a chart showing the names of some donors and who they donated to doesn’t prove any of what you are talking about, although the things you are alleging may all be true as well. The list by itself does not prove anything about anyone on the list, except that they have lots of money and they gave some to political parties.

    #120924
    zerosum
    Participant

    HUNTER WAS AN AMATEUR SCAMMER

    BREAKING EXCLUSIVE: Tens of Billions of US Dollars Were Transferred to Ukraine and then Using FTX Crypto Currency the Funds Were Laundered Back to Democrats in US

    BREAKING EXCLUSIVE: Tens of Billions of US Dollars Were Transferred to Ukraine and then Using FTX Crypto Currency the Funds Were Laundered Back to Democrats in US
    By Joe Hoft
    Published November 12, 2022 at 6:30pm
    2614 Comments

    The Democrats sent tens of billions to Ukraine and then laundered this money back to Democrat pockets and funds in the US. Now the company is bankrupt and the funds are nowhere to be found.

    ————–
    Beyond my pay grade

    • Up To $2 Billion In Client Money Missing In Crypto Giant FTX Collapse (NYP)

    https://nypost.com/2022/11/12/ftx-clients-out-up-to-2-billion-after-crypto-collapse-reports/
    By Dana Kennedy
    November 12, 2022

    On Friday, Bankman-Fried stepped down from his CEO position as the Bahamas-based FTX filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, after scrambling to shore up an $8 billion liquidity crisis that has left investors unable to claim their funds. A bid to save FTX via a rescue deal with rival exchange Binance didn’t work out, leading to crypto’s highest-profile collapse in recent years. In text messages to Reuters, Bankman-Fried, one of the largest donors to the Democratic Party, said he “disagreed with the characterization” of the $10 billion transfer. “We didn’t secretly transfer,” he said. “We had confusing internal labeling and misread it,” he added, without elaborating. “???” was Bankman-Fried’s response, when asked about the missing cash.

    ———

    #120927
    zerosum
    Participant

    Priorities
    It’s easier for Ukraine to get money/supplies, from Canada than for the provincial health ministers to get an increase from Canada.

    #120929
    anticlimactic
    Participant

    COP OUT

    I remember reading reports about previous COPs. The delegates arrive on first class flights or private jets, stay in 5 star hotels, and are driven round in limousines. It is very much ‘do as we say not as we do’. I doubt that any of their meals include insects [unless you include prawns and lobsters as insects!

    #120930
    Noirette
    Participant

    Xavier Moreau, ex-military man, graduate of St-Cyr and the Sorbonne, in the arms biz, in the security biz, political commentator (books – one ‘against’ the F left which I plan to read..) lives in Moscow, seems to be saying, in his last 3 weekly bulletins, that the Ukr. proxy war will only be concluded when the two main protagonists, the USA and Russia, at present Biden and Putin, meet and agree the conditions of the termination, the partition of Ukr., security guarantees, etc.

    XM calls the forces on the ground on the one side (trans) NATOKEEV forces.

    > Many US ‘trainers’ or ‘inspectors’ on the ground in Ukr, for sure, whatever that amounts to, idk, but Polish and Romanian force, soldiers, as well. + 700 French soldiers in Romania waiting for orders…cold and hungry it is said…

    XM states / hints strongly at / my interpretation, that there are, or will be, only two winners in this conflict: the US and Russia.

    The US will ‘win’ by killing off German Industry (> EU industry) and consolidating the dollar, stealing some industry to go back home, etc. Russia wins because it branches out in new trade relations, conduits, commands new respect, etc. In short, the weak + small are crushed while the big + powerful triumph (my words.)

    At present, neither of the two parties will sit down, because both are pursuing their interests with (some? they think?) success.

    USuk (imho short-sightedly) is triumphant after blowing up NordStream, preventing the Vassal Germany from expanding and becoming a partner of Russia — and, Russia finally decides (for the moment) to junk Europe, and prosper via other ties.

    XM. Bulletin 107, in F. https://bit.ly/3UAoYGe

    Calls to ‘cancel’ Lavrov at the G20 meet, not dine with him, talk to him, have pix taken with him – signal that no negotiations can take place. Ex. Guardian.

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/nov/11/leaders-forgo-g20-russia-family-photo

    > see +, first in list at top post

    Yes, so very British, send ppl to Coventry! The main aim is to prevent any stabs at reasonable discussion, negotiation, concessions, etc. The secondary one is reinforcing a long-time trend, divide to confuse, get the public to loathe, shun, ppl who have ‘different opinions’, ‘are conspiracy theorists’, ‘Putin lovers’ etc.

    #120931

    When you’ve used up all your carrots
    And have nothing left but sticks,
    Then your construct falls to pieces
    And the new one’s made of brics.

    #120932
    Antidote
    Participant

    Yo @teri

    He means well. Perhaps given to oversimplification sometimes but why I continue to check back. I remember you inquiring years ago as to what ‘his’(?) qualifications were. Hahahaha!6

    You might like this 5 part essay by Matthew Ehert :
    Logos?

    #120933
    Figmund Sreud
    Participant

    Jimmy Dore on theatre major Justine Trudeau:

    F.S.

    #120934
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    On Solar Micronovae, complete with misleading article titles:

    NO, THERE’S NO SUCH THING AS A SOLAR MICRONOVA

    the wiki on micronovae

    Magnetic polar shifts: yes, those exist. So do micronovae. But “solar micronova” is just bad sci-fi.

    #120935
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    “You might like this 5 part essay by Matthew Ehert :
    Logos?

    Me like.

    #120936
    D Benton Smith
    Participant

    @MyParentsSaidKnow

    Seriously, if you don’t already have a small volume of verse ready for publication then you should get cracking on it.

    #120937
    oldandtired
    Participant

    @teri

    The list by itself does not prove anything about anyone on the list, except that they have lots of money and they gave some to political parties.

    Of course it proves something, teri! That kind of money buys political power. Elections have consequences.

    A wide-open southern border? Millions of aliens flooding into a country? Vaccine mandates?

    Do you really think these people come into political power with a few hundred thousand dollars of net worth, spend a few years in office clipping coupons in their spare time and leave as multimillionaires?

    #120938
    Afewknowthetruth
    Participant

    How come a graph that is deliberately terminated 95 years before the present is labelled ‘YOU ARE HERE’?

    Does the perpetrator of this piece of deceit want to suggest that the present is the year 1927?

    Or does the perpetrator of this deceit want to hide something -such as that data from recent decades shows a very different trend- in order to promote an entirely fake narrative?

    #120939
    Afewknowthetruth
    Participant

    Still on track for very little agriculture and no hydroelectricity in the southwest US in the latter portion of 2023.

    http://graphs.water-data.com/lakemead/

    #120940
    Afewknowthetruth
    Participant

    Some may not know that foreign exchange rates are a rigged casino in which currencies are pushed up and down in order that speculators can cream-off a portion of the changes for themselves.

    John Key was such a currency speculator and made a fortune out of trading the NZ dollar, which was (and probably still is) is the one of the most traded anywhere by speculators because it can be pushed up and down so easily.

    John Key was selected to become prime minister by the global money-lender fascists, to carry out some more wrecking of NZ for short-term profit. His most famous slogan was “A better brighter future.” He never said for whom. Didn’t need to. People are such dumb-arses. And all the so-called elections are rigged anyway.

    With that background we have today’s news:

    ‘The Kiwi dollar will open today at 61.2 USc. For the week it has revalued by +3.1%; over the past month by an impressive +9.5%.’

    https://www.interest.co.nz/business/118436/us-data-mixed-eyes-weakening-labour-markets-chinas-singles-day-results-opaque-india

    #120941
    Afewknowthetruth
    Participant

    ‘Now that I realize that this has been the best of all times’

    For people living in Britain and NZ, the best of times was the period 1955 to 1975. It was a time of rising standard of living, improving services, access to high-quality education and a blossoming of culture.

    If you were living in Vietnam that would have corresponded to the worst of times, of course.

    If Nixon hadn’t closed the gold window, if the US had heeded the lessons of Vietnam…

    #120942
    Michael Reid
    Participant
    #120943
    Veracious Poet
    Participant

    #120944
    Redneck
    Participant

    OLDANDTIRED

    “Russia is LOSING THE WAR.

    You have made your bet. Let us see how this all plays out.”

    Excuse me , I made a bet?

    I said Russia should win , whatever that means , I don’t think they know themselves what winning is. I would say it means beating all of Nato armed forces on the field in Ukraine, that is the actual NATO armies , not the Ukranian proxies , but who knows?

    Again , what I said is that Russia SHOULD have won a long time ago but they don’t have the capability. They still should win , they have to win, Putin’s leadership , his ego and the future of Putin’s new world order depends on it.

    At minimum that means taking ALL the territories in the newly annexed Oblasts and then killing all the remaining nazis throughout Ukraine which would include the Jewish nazis , totally obliterating all and every piece of military equipment in Ukraine , replacing Zelensky with a puppet government which would declare neutrality and divorce itself from NATO and the EU and realign with Russia. If hostilities from the Ukrainian side of the border do not completely stop then that is not winning.

    So………can they do it?

    “like discarding the works of Shakespeare or Dante..”

    They already did that , Shakespeare the anti-semite , remember?

    Russia supports creation of Gates-Rockefeller “Pandemic Fund”
    Moscow reaffirms fealty to WHO at G20 summit, calls for “global sanitary shield”

    See , same old shit , Ivan is on the clotshot train along with Gates and all the other Western scammers. Putin has been jabbed four times and ia absolutely scared stiff on the flu. He has diplomats sitting at the end of tables forty feet away and he has his fully masked cabinet sit about eighty feet away when he meets them in the St. Petersburg imperial palace.

    https://edwardslavsquat.substack.com/p/russia-supports-creation-of-gates?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

    Sam Bankman-Fried,Madoff , Epstein , Weinstein ,Wolfowitz, Allbright, Nuland , Rotstein ,Lansky, Bugsy Siegel, Zelensky and on and on..

    Just another Jewish scammer to put in the basket with all the rest of them starting with Roschild when he scammed the London exchange in 1815 , followed by so many other who have now increased to plague proportions. Ya see why the Germans did what they did ?

    Crypto is and always be a scam. The move into cyber speculation is just the next “innovation’ by the scammers. Bitcoin or any other cyber coin will never be widely used by normal people in every day transactions, it will always be a get rich quick scam , or a go broke quick scam , going broke the most likely scenario as we increasingly see.All the virtue signalling about the blockchain and how it will frees all from fiat etc. is just marketing BS from the scammers , keep buying shitcoins folks, suckers!

    #120945
    Alexander Carpenter
    Participant

    AFAIK: How come a graph that is deliberately terminated 95 years before the present is labelled ‘YOU ARE HERE’?
    Does the perpetrator of this piece of deceit want to suggest that the present is the year 1927?
    Or does the perpetrator of this deceit want to hide something -such as that data from recent decades shows a very different trend- in order to promote an entirely fake narrative?

    The non-idiot AFAIK reveals his idiot hysterics and ignorance about climate change science by asking a frantic and angry rhetorical question about what he characterizes as “deliberate” deception. Even a schoolchild can look into this matter and learn that the proxy data AFAIK is ranting about is presented as 100-year averages because of how the subject material is accumulated, preserved, and measured. And then there is the historical trajectory that matters far more than what is happening right now to outraged “victims” of deceit.
    Simple enough, one would think. However, AFAIK has consistently missed every actual science boat in this domain. There must be some deep emotional wounding for him (or anyone, for that matter) to be so shrill and lost in his own “fake narrative” that he has somehow internalized in obeisance to a standard narrative he seems unable to falsify. That falsification is readily done, and at the simplest levels.

    Here, AFAIK, see if you can wrap your testy mind around this and learn the scientific method (this doc starts out simple, and gets as complicated as the subject matters require):
    https://www.dropbox.com/s/0vrpxs5olpserhx/Do%20You%20%22Believe%22%20in%20Climate%20Change%3F.docx?dl=0

    And since I am willing to forgive AFAIK his follies, please forgive me for all the snark in this doc…

    And for more on the scientific method and its maturing sequellae, try this work-in-progress doc on for size:
    https://www.dropbox.com/s/8vnz3ml5z730mds/Epistemological%20Engineering.docx?dl=0

    #120946
    Susmarie108
    Participant

    @Antidote: “You might like this 5 part essay by Matthew Ehert : Logos?”

    Exceptional reading – all 5 parts. Thank you for linking it. This adds valuable perspective and insight to understanding the insanity of our times.

    It reminds me why we should be advocates for LIFE in daily living. In thought, word, deed. This is the revolutionary act if you want it…the game-changer.

    “…that in order for human beings to be made in the living image of a Creator, we must necessarily have had to be endowed with a quality of free will. The existence of free will gave us the choice to develop or not develop those creative, loving qualities that were innate with us at birth but which robots and animals had no access to. Machines could only do what they were programed to by people and animals could only do what they were programed to by God, but human beings could disobey our nature and become corrupt, materialistic and lose our access to our creative powers…”

    LOVE in the LIGHT.

    #120947
    Afewknowthetruth
    Participant

    Alexander Carpenter

    Well, not only an ad hominem attack but also a link to a fake website that offers nothing.

    And no addressing of the point made, of course. Nor any actual science.

    I guess our collective enemy is getting really desperate now.

    #120948
    Just Some Randomer
    Participant

    “And no addressing of the point made, of course. Nor any actual science”

    I think we all know what ‘The Science’ is worth these days.

    Whose ‘Science’? And who’s paying them for it?

    #120949
    Michael Reid
    Participant

    Russia Donetsk Advance, Promises to Retake Kherson, Ignores US Diplomatic Advances, Talks to Iran

    #120950
    chooch
    Participant

    Noirette,
    Geopolitical forecasting is not one of the puzzles that I wish to tackle. But as I read up on the progress of the conflict in the Ukraine I come across comments related to Germany and its role. I tend to focus on the German ties to the Russian military supply chain and how it might impact things going forward.
    It seems the Euro may be/has become the deutsche mark by another name. Today I came this
    https://twitter.com/AMFChina/status/1591499096229122049?s=20&t=0kL8GDSry-IOGfN5PXe4fw
    Velina Tchakarova pops into the feeds that I frequent, she had this response.


    This seems to be in her area of interest. As of late, She has been posting the following graphic quite often.

    #120951
    Alexander Carpenter
    Participant

    Huh? “Fake website”? No substantive response? No “actual science”? This is sounding more and more neurotic. Get real.

    Ad hominem? Seems pretty compassionate to me: we all have blind spots; to point a significant one out and still recognize astuteness in other areas is not only fair, but a kindness and perhaps even generous.

    So what’s your point, AFAIK? What’s the payoff? What’s it take for you to get real in this highly-structured discipline of science?

    The climate narrative that AFAIK espouses so desperately is the The Science(tm) narrative promulgated by the desperados-in-charge and their captive “experts” and “authorities.” Their “science” is terminally politicized, and falsifiable almost effortlessly (all available online to any kindergartener who bothers).

    The real climate science is difficult, being an engagement with a complex non-linear open system, one that our habitual reductionist linearizing “science” cannot comprehend. To even begin to “grok” nature, one must adopt an evolving complexity-aware paradigm, and then be willing to be humble and earn to live with uncertainty. This requires a certain level of maturity generally not present in people who need to believe and who need to profess conventional beliefs to maintain their social status and personal identity-myths.

    This is a challenge significantly more difficult than most people can engage, and this is still difficult for people who can see through mendacity in other domains less rigorous (in other words, politics has no rigorous “scientific method,” even if we can be systematically skeptical and apply modern-paradigm engineered epistemology).

    #120952
    chooch
    Participant

    Alexander Carpenter,

    Definitely one of the puzzles that I shy away from. Too many initial/boundary conditions. Then if you build a model, how good does the data need to be to benchmark it? And to ultimately validate it, do you have to back test all the way back to the big bang moment?

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