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Debt Rattle April 8 2026

Apr 082026
 
 April 8, 2026  Posted by at 9:50 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  73 Responses »


Emil Nolde Half Moon Over The Sea 1945


• Trump Announces a Ceasefire (Sarah Anderson)
• President Trump, Iran Agree To 2-Week Ceasefire (ZH)
• President Trump Threatened Iran, the Democrats Blinked (Tim O’Brien)
• Trump Threatens To ‘Take Out Entire Country Of Iran’ (ZH)
• Defiance Without Leverage: Tehran’s Fatal Miscalculation (David Manney)
• Trump: ‘A Whole Civilization Will Die Tonight’ (Catherine Salgado)
• The New York Times Says We Lost the War (Scott Pinsker)
• German ‘Militaristic Frenzy’ Could End In Tragedy – Zakharova (RT)
• Foldable Apple iPhone Hits Engineering Snags, Raising Risk Of Delays (ZH)
• Here’s How Bad the Midterms Situation for the Democrats Really Is (Margolis)
• Mullin Drops a Bombshell on Sanctuary Cities (Matt Margolis)
• Marc Andreessen Calls AI Job-Loss Fears ‘Fake’, Expects Employment Gains (ZH)

 


 

https://twitter.com/EricLDaugh/status/2041488240062906637?s=20 https://twitter.com/maggiewise111/status/2041472711365403054?s=20

 


 


Trump might claim it is a normal negotiation. Though it’s not for everyone.

Then again, some of the language coming out of Tehran sounds like they studied and imitated Trump. And he knows it.

Then again again, we don’t know who speaks for Iran. Is it a mullah? The IRGC?

To be sure, everyone’s threatening battles they don’t want.

• Trump Announces a Ceasefire (Sarah Anderson)

UPDATE: 8:08 p.m. EST: Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi says Iran will allow safe passage for maritime traffic through the Strait of Hormuz for two weeks, provided there is coordination with Iran’s armed forces.


Original article

Well, it doesn’t look like he’ll be destroying any civilizations on Tuesday night. Donald Trump has announced, via his Truth Social account, that there will be a two-week ceasefire with Iran, subject to “complete, immediate, and safe” opening of the Strait of Hormuz. He said that Iran has proposed a 10-point peace plan — he called the plan significant but “not good enough” on Monday — and he now believes it’s “a workable basis on which to negotiate.” The two-week ceasefire period will allow an agreement to be finalized. He also said that it’s an “honor to have this long-term problem close to resolution.” Here’s his full statement.

“Based on conversations with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Field Marshal Asim Munir, of Pakistan, and wherein they requested that I hold off the destructive force being sent tonight to Iran, and subject to the Islamic Republic of Iran agreeing to the COMPLETE, IMMEDIATE, and SAFE OPENING of the Strait of Hormuz, I agree to suspend the bombing and attack of Iran for a period of two weeks. This will be a double sided CEASEFIRE! The reason for doing so is that we have already met and exceeded all Military objectives, and are very far along with a definitive Agreement concerning Longterm PEACE with Iran, and PEACE in the Middle East. We received a 10 point proposal from Iran, and believe it is a workable basis on which to negotiate. Almost all of the various points of past contention have been agreed to between the United States and Iran, but a two week period will allow the Agreement to be finalized and consummated. On behalf of the United States of America, as President, and also representing the Countries of the Middle East, it is an Honor to have this Longterm problem close to resolution.

Thank you for your attention to this matter! President DONALD J. TRUMP”

This comes after Trump issued a strong warning for Iran earlier on Tuesday, stating, “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will.” He continued: “However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!”

As my colleague Rick Moran reported earlier, “Iran rejected a ceasefire proposal by Pakistan on Monday, which would have included the immediate reopening of the Strait of Hormuz.” Obviously, some last-minute diplomacy has taken place, but whether it will hold remains to be seen.

https://twitter.com/WhiteHouse/status/2041649076500869158

Fox News’ Laura Ingraham says she spoke to Trump just after he announced the ceasefire and claims he is “extremely serious” and “cautiously but seriously optimistic.” He also said the negotiations were incredibly complex and he doesn’t want anything to jeopardize them.

Read more …

“This will be a double sided CEASEFIRE!”

• President Trump, Iran Agree To 2-Week Ceasefire (ZH)

Building on the conversations leaked all day, it appears President Trump has withdrawn his threat to end Iranian civilization as they know it…


“Based on conversations with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Field Marshal Asim Munir, of Pakistan, and wherein they requested that I hold off the destructive force being sent tonight to Iran, and subject to the Islamic Republic of Iran agreeing to the COMPLETE, IMMEDIATE, and SAFE OPENING of the Strait of Hormuz, I agree to suspend the bombing and attack of Iran for a period of two weeks. This will be a double sided CEASEFIRE! The reason for doing so is that we have already met and exceeded all Military objectives, and are very far along with a definitive Agreement concerning Long-term PEACE with Iran, and PEACE in the Middle East.

We received a 10 point proposal from Iran, and believe it is a workable basis on which to negotiate. Almost all of the various points of past contention have been agreed to between the United States and Iran, but a two week period will allow the Agreement to be finalized and consummated.On behalf of the United States of America, as President, and also representing the Countries of the Middle East, it is an Honor to have this Long-term problem close to resolution. Thank you for your attention to this matter! President DONALD J. TRUMP

Additionally, CNN reports that Israel has agree to suspend bombing while talks are ongoing.

Alayna Treene (@alaynatreene) Israel is a part of the two-week ceasefire Trump agreed to just an hour and a half before his deadline, a senior White House official tells CNN. Israel has agreed to also suspend its bombing campaign while negotiations continue, the official said. And the most important variable, Iran, is also on the same page, and accepts Pakistan’s two-week ceasefire proposal with the deal approved by the New Supreme Leaders, according to Iran’s Foreign Minster, Aragchi. More importantly, Iran has said that safe passage via Hormuz “possible” for two weeks.

Talks between the US and Iran will start on Friday, although Iran was quick to note that it will engage in talks with complete distrust.

* * *

The reaction is as you would expect.

Oil plunged (WTI -16%)…

Stocks spiked (S&P Futs +2%)…

Gold ($4800) and Bitcoin ($72500) are soaring.

Treasury yields and the dollar are tumbling. …well it wouldn’t be Tuesday without TACOs.

Last Ditch Peace Effort by Pakistan Prime Minister With just hours until Trump’s self declared deadline wherein he said a “whole civilization will die tonight” – Pakistan’s leader and host of mediation efforts, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, has tried to introduce a last minute olive branch, hoping that the US will avoid its decimation campaign:

“I earnestly request President Trump to extend the deadline for two weeks. Pakistan, in all sincerity, requests the Iranian brothers to open Strait of Hormuz for a corresponding period of two weeks as a goodwill gesture. We also urge all warring parties to observe a ceasefire everywhere for two weeks to allow diplomacy to achieve conclusive termination of war, in the interest of long-term peace and stability in the region.”

Will Trump latch on to this plea and last minute effort of good will? The sides are aware of the proposal:
TEHRAN IS POSITIVELY REVIEWING PAKISTAN’S REQUEST FOR A TWO-WEEK CEASEFIRE: SENIOR IRANIAN OFFICIAL
TRUMP IS AWARE OF PAKISTAN’S PROPOSAL: AXIOS CITING LEAVITT

Diplomatic efforts for peaceful settlement of the ongoing war in the Middle East are progressing steadily, strongly and powerfully with the potential to lead to substantive results in near future. To allow diplomacy to run its course, I earnestly request President Trump to extend… — Shehbaz Sharif (@CMShehbaz) April 7, 2026

In the meantime, some fresh statements via state Tasnim:

“If Trump wants to fall into a hole with his madness, we have prepared a black hole for him from which it will be impossible for him to get out”, Tasnim reports citing an Iranian military source “Have prepared good surprises for Trump’s possible madness; One of them is the addition of Aramco oil facilities, Yanba oil facilities and the Fujairah pipeline to Iran’s goals, and in case of Trump’s crime, Iran will not hesitate to impose heavy costs on America and its partners.” “Trump thinks that with these threats the strait will be opened and the price of oil will go down! He doesn’t know that if he carries out his threat, he will have to wait for the oil price of $200 in the coming days.”

Read more …

Talk about being caught with your pants down your ankles.

• President Trump Threatened Iran, the Democrats Blinked (Tim O’Brien)

By now you’ve seen the reports of the latest threat President Donald Trump made against Iran. My colleague Catherine Salgado detailed: President Donald Trump made a dramatic threat on Tuesday morning as his deadline approaches for the terrorist Iranian regime to surrender or face bigger and more devastating strikes than ever from the United States and Israel. ‘A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again,’ Trump began in explosive style in his April 7 Truth Social post. He had threatened on Easter Sunday to bring such terrible retribution against the terrorist Iranian regime that its tyrants would think they were in hell, and it appears that since talks are unsurprisingly going nowhere, he will execute his threat.


Before that, our colleague Rick Moran covered the president’s description of what would happen to Iran if it continued to rebuff his attempts to negotiate and arrive at a diplomatic solution to the current situation in Iran. ‘We have a plan where every bridge in Iran will be decimated by 12 o’clock tomorrow night. Where every power plant in Iran will be out of business, burning, exploding, and never to be used again. I mean complete demolition by 12 o’clock, and it will happen over a period of four hours if we wanted to,’ Trump said. “We don’t want that to happen. Iran rejected a ceasefire proposal by Pakistan on Monday, which would have included the immediate reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. Instead, they offered a 10-point ceasefire proposal of their own that no one is taking seriously.

It would seem Iran got Trump’s message and has now returned to the bargaining table, agreeing to a two-week ceasefire one day after rejecting it. Our Sarah Anderson has the latest. I’d say that Trump’s tough talk, most likely backed up by the very credible threat real action against what remains of Iranian leadership, worked. Don’t tell that to the Democrats. Before Iran flinched, the Democrats outright panicked. Some of it was fake and by design, but a good bit of it was honest-to-goodness panic. Their scripted, AstroTurfed narrative has gone full 25th Amendment and “war crimes.” Keep in mind tat all of these accusations are about something Trump threatened to do but has not done. Question: Is it a war crime if you just talk about it on social media?

The Democrats always attack Trump and the right for things they imagine but that never happened, but when it comes to things that have happened, if it doesn’t benefit them, they ignore it. Like the time a few weeks ago when the legacy media all but ignored Iran slaughtering some 40,000 actual peaceful protesters. So, when I tell you the left flinched, let’s start with RINO Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska).

After watching what the Iranian regime just did to its own people, she had the gall to put the entire onus on the victims of Iranian oppression to rise up. The gun-less people of Iran. What are they supposed to do to overthrow that regime? Stage a sit-in? Rep. Mike Quigley (D-Ill.) got the memo. His X post is representative of a large number of Democrats in Congress and the Senate, and in the media.

Now that Trump has effectively induced the Iranian regime to talk, will Quigley step up and admit that Trump is speaking the only language the murderous leadership of that country understands? Of course not. Quigley will do what all leftists are doing, which is to notice Trump’s rhetoric and then ignore it or downplay it when it works. Worse, some will try to get away with saying that Iran came back to the bargaining table in spite of Trump’s threats, not because of them, even when the exact opposite is true.

Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) is always good for repeating the left’s focus-grouped messaging, and he delivered here.

He made sure to include both the 25th Amendment and the “war crimes” narratives because Trump said a thing. Meanwhile, speaking of the 25th Amendment, while Khanna wants to use it to get Trump out of office, I guess we’re to believe Khanna couldn’t see President Joe Biden’s mental decline days before that disastrous debate performance with Trump, which helped force him to drop out of the race in 2024.

You can always tell which messages are contrived by who delivers them on the Democrat side. Khanna is one. Others include Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) and Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who by the way, couldn’t pass this opportunity up.

In Congress, Iran could have no better friend that Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.). See if you notice a pattern emerging. Could it be that someone told these Democrats what to say, and that these aren’t things they thought up on their own?

Read more …

In the process:

• Trump Threatens To ‘Take Out Entire Country Of Iran’ (ZH)

US-Israeli strikes have been on a noticeable uptick against Iranian institutions of higher learning over the last days. This has included a large-scale aerial assault on Tehran’s Sharif University, which is often dubbed the “MIT of Iran”. After this attack, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi threatened Iranian retaliation, warning “aggressors will see our might.” He said several other universities have also been struck over the last days. One regional report (Al Jazeera) says that at least 30 Iranian colleges and universities have suffered damage amid the ongoing attacks.


Neither the US nor Israel divulged the reasons behind attacking university campuses. Many of the students at these very campuses were involved in the January protests. The US claims to be “helping” the protesters through the Trump-ordered massive bombing campaign. Shahid Beheshti University in northern Tehran was attacked last Friday. It issued a statement saying: “This hostile act not only targets the security of academics and the country’s scientific environment, but is also a clear attack on reason, research, and freedom of thought.”

Trump Threatens Iran’s Decimation By Midnight Tues If No Deal
Having already spoken to reporters earlier in the day (before, during, and after the Easter Egg party), discussing ceasefire proposals (‘not good enough’) and his desire to ‘take the oil’, President Trump took the lectern in the White House Briefing Room at 1pm ET to discuss the rescue of the downed airmen over the weekend. President Trump centered his remarks on the weekend search-and-rescue operation for downed airmen, highlighting its success while condemning the leak of details surrounding the mission. “Rescue leak is a national security concern,” he said, adding that authorities “will examine media firm that reported rescue leak.” He further declared, “we have to find that leaker, that’s a sick person,” and warning of potential legal action, as he “threatens to jail journalist over leak,” before adding, “The left will love that!”

He then pivoted to a more aggressive stance on Iran, stating, “Iran can be taken out in one night, maybe tomorrow,” and doubling down with, “entire country of Iran could be taken out in one night.” He also at one point said, “we won.” Pete Hegseth then stepped in and reinforced the escalation, stating, “today will be largest volume of strikes on Iran,” and warning, “tomorrow’s strikes on Iran will be more than today.” During the Q&A session, Trump signaled undisclosed strategy, saying, “I have the best plan of all, won’t tell you what it is,” while insisting, “we didn’t do this for regime change.” He described Iran’s leadership shift in stark terms: “new regime is smarter, sharper, less radical.”

Vital infrastructure attacks already in progress… He also addressed the Iranian public directly, stating, “Iranians should rise up, but the consequences are great,” while claiming, “Iranians want us to keep bombing,” and adding, “Iranian people are willing to suffer for freedom.” He also emphasized that “free traffic of oil” in the Hormuz Strait “must in the Iran deal”. He has warned that “every bridge” and power plant will be decimated by midnight tomorrow night if the Iranians don’t accept a ceasefire deal. This followed a report from The Wall Street Journal that the US military is making preparations for potential strikes on energy targets in Iran, according to multiple U.S. officials – as President Trump ratchets up his demand for Tehran to open the Strait of Hormuz – sending oil prices significantly higher…

That military planners are pulling out existing lists of potential targets to provide the president options if he decides to attack energy infrastructure (according to WSJ sources), this should not be new news for traders (but the market is so sensitive), since Trump has ramped up his threats to do just that in recent days, telling The Wall Street Journal on Sunday that he would destroy all of Iran’s power plants if the regime doesn’t agree to reopen the Strait of Hormuz by Tuesday evening.

IRGC Intel Chief Taken Out; Israel Suffers Heavy Casualties The head of the Intelligence Organization of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) was killed in a Monday airstrike, according to confirmation in Iranian media. IRGC-linked Tasnim News Agency reported that the IRGC Public Relations Department confirmed Monday that Major General Majid Khademi was killed earlier in the day during an attack by US and Israeli forces. However, Tasnim did not disclose the location of the strike.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) earlier stated on X that Khademi was one of the IRGC’s most senior commanders with decades of experience. “Khademi worked to advance terrorist attacks worldwide, and was responsible for monitoring Iranian civilians as part of the regime’s suppression of internal protests,” it claimed.RFE/RL reported that Khademi assumed the post last summer after Mohammad Kazemi was killed in Israeli strikes during the 12-day war. Before that, he led the Intelligence Protection Organization of the Ministry of Defense and Armed Forces Logistics. Iran is now vowing to enact vengeance on Israel for his death.

Meanwhile Sunday into Monday saw significant casualties in Israel, after the IRGC claimed in a statement carried by state media that Iranian forces had targeted an oil refinery in Haifa. But instead, it appears that the missile slammed directly into a residential building, killing at least four Israelis. Search and rescue teams have spent some 18 hours pouring through the ruins of the complex, recovering two bodies early Monday after an initial two had been found. The casualties could climb amid ongoing recovery efforts. Another regional source stated that “Over 160 Israelis have been transferred to hospitals over the past 24 hours, Israel’s Health Ministry said on Monday.”

Read more …

“And if they don’t, they’ll have no bridges. They’ll have no power plants. They’ll have no anything.”

• Defiance Without Leverage: Tehran’s Fatal Miscalculation (David Manney)

Iranian leaders rejected a United States proposal for a long ceasefire delivered through Pakistani intermediaries on April 5. Iran communicated its response through Pakistan, signaling that it is unwilling to accept a temporary pause in hostilities. “We won’t merely accept a ceasefire,” Mojtaba Ferdousi Pour, head of Iran’s diplomatic mission in Cairo, said in remarks to the Associated Press. “We only accept an end to the war with guarantees that we won’t be attacked again.” At the White House, Trump said Iran is making a mistake by rejecting the proposal. “They just don’t want to say ‘uncle,’” Trump told reporters. “They don’t want to cry, as the expression goes, ‘uncle,’ but they will. And if they don’t, they’ll have no bridges. They’ll have no power plants. They’ll have no anything.


“I won’t go further because there are other things that are worse than those two.” The offer called for a 45-day pause in fighting and the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most critical energy corridors. Tehran responded with a 10-point counterproposal, demanding a permanent end to hostilities, full security guarantees, sanctions relief, and control over the Strait. Mojaba Ferdousi Pour, head of Iran’s diplomatic mission in Cairo, stated that Iran would accept nothing short of a definitive halt to military action. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi delivered the counter-demands and positioned Tehran as seeking “peace with dignity.”

According to IRNA, Tehran’s proposal includes 10 provisions, such as ending regional conflicts, ensuring safe navigation through the Strait of Hormuz, lifting economic sanctions, and initiating reconstruction efforts. Iranian and Omani officials are working on a framework to manage shipping through the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz, a critical global energy corridor. Tensions escalated further as Israel launched strikes on Iran’s South Pars natural gas field—the world’s largest, shared with Qatar—targeting a major source of the country’s revenue.The attack also killed two senior commanders of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard. Israel described the strike as an effort to weaken Iran’s economic capacity, although it appeared separate from the U.S. ultimatum.

The development raises doubts about the viability of a proposed 45-day cease-fire amid rapidly intensifying hostilities. The framework, however, required the United States and Israel to surrender military leverage already demonstrated on the battlefield. President Donald Trump made his position unmistakable, speaking the day after the rescue of a downed American airman, warning that Iran could be “taken out in one night” if escalation continues. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth stood beside him and confirmed that recent operations inflicted heavy losses on Iranian naval vessels and missile infrastructure.

It’s an obvious strategic imbalance: American forces maintain air dominance, precision strike capability, and maritime superiority in the region. Iranian naval units have already suffered substantial losses. Missile facilities have been degraded; shipping lanes remain vulnerable to further disruption if Tehran continues hostilities. Instead of accepting a pause that would’ve allowed regrouping and diplomatic maneuvering, Iran’s leadership demanded sweeping concessions.

Mojtaba Khamenei was selected by Iran’s Assembly of Experts on March 8 and is the “current” supreme leader of Iran, succeeding his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was directly targeted on February 28, the beginning of Operation Epic Fury.

Mojtaba’s supposed approval or rejection of diplomatic overtures (he may be hooked up to medical machinery) signals that hardliners within Iran’s leadership continue to favor a posture of defiance in the face of U.S. pressure. The supreme leader has the final say on major foreign and security decisions under Iran’s constitutional system, and Mojtaba’s stance suggests Tehran believes firm resistance strengthens internal unity and extracts better terms at the negotiating table.

Read more …

“.. but unfortunately, their regime is satanically stubborn.”

• Trump: ‘A Whole Civilization Will Die Tonight’ (Catherine Salgado)

President Donald Trump made a dramatic threat on Tuesday morning as his deadline approaches for the terrorist Iranian regime to surrender or face bigger and more devastating strikes than ever from the United States and Israel. “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again,” Trump began in explosive style in his April 7 Truth Social post. He had threatened on Easter Sunday to bring such terrible retribution against the terrorist Iranian regime that its tyrants would think they were in hell, and it appears that since talks are unsurprisingly going nowhere, he will execute his threat.


After having issued his formidable warning Tuesday, Trump continued, “I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World.” Referring to the current regime’s lengthy record of tyranny and terror, Trump ended his statement, “47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!”

The message is somewhat cryptic, and it doesn’t clarify whether the regime change is to happen after tonight, or whether Trump thinks it has already begun. Hopefully, it is the former, because we cannot trust a single member of the government that has proudly made “death to America” and “death to Israel” its favorite slogans for half a century. The leader who was the negotiator with America, Mohammad Ghalibaf, is still swearing vengeance. Some members of the government might be willing to agree to terms made by the great Satan, but that does not mean they will live up to those terms. After all, the Islamic concept of taqiyya endorses lies to non-Muslims for the sake of accomplishing Jihad.

Of course, Trump had already issued a more specific and definite threat against Iran’s murderous regime, as my colleague Rick Moran reported earlier. After insisting the “entire country could be taken out in one night, and it might be tomorrow night,” Trump wrote, “We have a plan where every bridge in Iran will be decimated by 12 o’clock tomorrow night.” He expatiated, “Where every power plant in Iran will be out of business, burning, exploding, and never to be used again. I mean complete demolition by 12 o’clock, and it will happen over a period of four hours if we wanted to. We don’t want that to happen.”

Naturally, America wants to leave infrastructure for the much-oppressed Persian people, but unfortunately, their regime is satanically stubborn. As we learned during WWII with a similarly genocidal regime — imperial Japan — sometimes peace comes only after massive devastation and unconditional surrender. The Iranian regime has been attacking Americans directly or through proxies for almost 50 years now. We have long been at war — the murderous mullahs did not leave us that choice. But while we didn’t get to choose when the war began, Americans can choose how the war will end. May Trump eliminate the threat of the Islamic regime once and for all.

Read more …

“The Times regrets the error. Want more?”

• The New York Times Says We Lost the War (Scott Pinsker)

At least it’s colorful: The Gray Lady just gave us the green light to wave the white flag.Running in the April 7 edition of The New York Times: “The Iran War Is Turning Iran Into a Major World Power.” The author, Professor Robert Pape of the University of Chicago, offers the following thesis:

1) Iran will keep control of the Strait of Hormuz for “months or years,” and there’s nothing militarily we can do about it. (Sorry, guys.)
2) The U.S. and Europe are now in decline — and the axis of China, Russia, and Iran is ascending.
3) Iran will emerge as a “new major world power” and the “fourth center of global power” (the other three: America, China, Russia).

But before we pulverize Professor Pape’s preposterously pessimistic proposal, here’s an earlier example of The New York Times’ piercing wisdom, courtesy of author Hans Mahncke:

It’s an X post about a New York Times story from 1903: “Flying Machines Which Do Not Fly.” (And if that story sounds familiar, it’s because beloved PJ Media alum and/or Supreme Leader Editor Paula Bolyard wrote about it in 2024. From Mahncke: “The New York Times did not dismiss the possibility of powered flight at random. There was a very specific reason behind it. At the time, America’s most prominent scientific authority, Smithsonian Secretary Samuel Langley, had been showered with large amounts of taxpayer funding to build an aircraft, the Langley Aerodrome. Despite all the money, institutional backing, and elite prestige, Langley and his team could not get it to fly, culminating in a series of very public failures, the last on December 8, 1903.”

So when the New York Times declared that flight was millions of years away, what it was really saying was that if the most credentialed and well-funded “experts” cannot do it, then it cannot be done. A mere nine days later, the elites’ proclamation of impossibility lay in ruins. Two totally unknown bicycle mechanics from Ohio achieved the first powered flight using improvised parts, a few hundred dollars of their own money, and sheer persistence. From stupid ideas that crash and burn to lame-brained theories that never get off the ground, there’s a long and illustrious history of the Gray Lady getting caught red-handed practicing yellow journalism.

In fact, in honor of Artemis, there’s also this doozy from Jan. 13, 1920, when The New York Times insisted that rockets cannot function in space: That professor [Robert] Goddard, with his ‘chair’ in Clark College and the countenancing of the Smithsonian Institution [from which Goddard held a grant to research rocket flight], does not know the relation of action to reaction, and of the need to have something better than a vacuum against which to react — to say that would be absurd. Of course he only seems to lack the knowledge ladled out daily in high schools. [emphasis added]

It was only AFTER Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins left the surly bonds of earth — on a rocket, by the way — that the Times offered a correction: “Further investigation and experimentation have confirmed the findings of Isaac Newton in the 17th century, and it is now definitely established that a rocket can function in a vacuum as well as in an atmosphere. […] The Times regrets the error. Want more?

Read more …

“Berlin should not forget the lessons of World War II, the Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman has said.“

Russia has not forgotten.

• German ‘Militaristic Frenzy’ Could End In Tragedy – Zakharova (RT)

Germany’s continued military buildup could lead to another tragedy on a global scale, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has warned. Last week, German media reported that male citizens who remain abroad for more than three months without prior approval could face penalties in line with a new requirement under the Military Service Modernization Act. The rule, which came into force on January 1, 2026, obliges German males between the ages of 17 and 45 to obtain permission before leaving the country for an extended period. The Defense Ministry said the measure is intended to maintain a reliable registry of individuals eligible for military service.


In a post on Telegram on Monday, Zakharova noted that previously German men were required to register before going abroad only during a “state of tension” or a “state of defense,” but that the measure has now been expanded to peacetime “as part of Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s strategy of militarizing the country.” Germany recently moved to reintroduce lottery-based conscription as Berlin is looking to increase the number of its active troops from 180,000 to more than 260,000 by 2035. The spokeswoman suggested that “in the heat of militaristic frenzy, Germany has completely forgotten the lessons of history.” “

The last time the German political elite set out to make their country ‘the main military power in Europe,’ it ended in tragedy for all of humanity,” Zakharova said, referring to the Second World War, in which between 60 to 65 million people are estimated to have been killed. Following the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022, Germany launched a massive military buildup, with reported plans of spending more than €500 billion (around $580 billion) on defense by 2029. According to officials in Berlin, the armed forces must be “war-ready” for a potential conflict with Russia by that date. Moscow has repeatedly rejected as “nonsense” claims of it harboring any aggressive plans against the European members of NATO, saying that they are only being made by Western politicians to scare the population and justify increased military spending.

Read more …

Up in the air. Free promotion.

• Foldable Apple iPhone Hits Engineering Snags, Raising Risk Of Delays (ZH)

Hours after Nikkei Asia reported that Apple’s first foldable iPhone could face delays in mass production, Bloomberg pushed back on the report, citing sources who say the foldable iPhone remains on track for a September debut alongside the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max. Apple shares fell as much as 5.1% in the U.S. cash session after the Nikkei report raised concerns about engineering test issues with the new device, potentially delaying mass production.


Initial production could be heavily constrained by the complexity of the foldable phone, but Bloomberg’s sources suggest Apple is still aiming to put it on store shelves within the same launch window as the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max. Bloomberg’s report, countering Nikkei Asia’s earlier story, fits a familiar pattern of information operations, and Apple was likely not thrilled with the stock’s performance after the overnight note. Polymarket odds of the foldable iPhone launching before 2027 stood at around 81% as of early Tuesday afternoon, up from 75% during the overnight hours.

Apple is about 8 years late to the foldable smartphone space, with Samsung’s Galaxy Fold released in October 2018. Now, Tim Cook’s big launch of Apple’s first foldable smartphone could face “delays in its mass production and product shipment schedule,” according to new Nikkei Asia sources deep within the handset supply chain. Supply chain sources told the Japanese business outlet that the complexity of the new foldable iPhone is causing engineering problems during early testing, and these issues could delay mass production and shipments by months.

Some suppliers have already been warned that component production schedules could be pushed back. “It’s true that more issues than expected have emerged during the early test production phase, and additional time will be needed to resolve them and make necessary adjustments. … The current situation could put the mass production timeline at risk,” one of those sources said. The source added, “April will mark a crucial stage of the engineering verification test, and this month through early May is extremely critical.”

Nikkei previously reported that Apple adjusted its iPhone launch strategy for 2026, pushing back production of base model iPhones to early 2027 to prioritize production of premium models, including foldable iPhones. This move is intended to allocate constrained supplies of memory chips and other key components more efficiently. Another person in the handset supply chain said the potential schedule delay has very little to do with memory chips, but rather with “engineering challenges” for Apple’s first foldable iPhone: “Apple and the supply chain are working under a tight timeline, and the current solutions are not enough to completely solve the engineering challenges. More time is needed.”

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They have no-one.

• Here’s How Bad the Midterms Situation for the Democrats Really Is (Margolis)

Conventional wisdom says that Democrats are going to have a good year in the midterms. In fact, Democrats think a six-point lead in the generic congressional ballot is something to feel good about. Maybe they should take a closer look at the numbers before popping the champagne because the truth is that it looks like Democrats are blowing it. And you don’t have to take my word for it either. CNN chief data analyst Harry Enten broke it down on Monday, and the picture for Democrats is a lot less rosy than party leadership would probably like to admit.Yes, they’re ahead — but only barely. Given historical precedent and the current political environment, they should be running away with it. But they’re not.


“This lead is historically low for Democrats at this point with a Republican president,” Enten said. “On average, their lead’s actually slightly less. It’s five points. That’s less than it was back in 2018 when it was eight points and way less than it was during the 2006 cycle when it was 11 points.” Five points. Now, I don’t exactly trust the approval rating polls showing that President Donald Trump at -20 or -30, but still, with numbers like that, Democrats should be crushing the GOP in the general congressional ballot, but they’re not.”You’d make the argument, Democrats should be way ahead, and they’re just only sort of slightly ahead,” Enten pointed out.

It’s not just me saying that. What does this mean in practical terms? Host John Berman noted that five points might be enough to flip the House, which operates on razor-thin margins. But the Senate? That’s a completely different story. Democrats really want to flip the Senate because they think that if they do, they can impeach President Trump next year and convict him.”I think five points is enough to take back the House,” Enten said. “But in the Senate, five points is almost certainly not enough if you apply it to the Senate map.”

The map is brutal for Democrats. Even in a scenario where Republicans hold only states Trump won by more than 10 points, the GOP still comes out ahead 51-49. Democrats would flip North Carolina and Maine, sure, but Ohio, Texas, and Alaska would stay red. Trump won all three by double digits, and Enten pointed to a sobering historical pattern to explain why that matters so much.

“During the Trump era, look at this, flip the Senate seat, midterm and presidential years, states the other party won by ten plus points in the last presidential election, zero, zero, zero times did a party flip those states.” Then there’s the favorability problem, which might be the most damaging data point of all. In 2018, Democrats led Republicans on net favorability by 12 points. In 2006, they led by 18. Today? Republicans are actually ahead by five points on net favorability. Berman tried to soften it slightly, noting that both parties are deeply unpopular with voters right now. Enten wasn’t having it.

“Democrats are even more unpopular than Republicans,” he pointed out. That’s the core of the problem. Democrats are running behind every relevant benchmark from their two big wave election cycles in an environment that should theoretically be handing them a massive structural advantage. A six-point generic ballot lead sounds decent until you realize it’s probably not enough to take the Senate, too. And that puts a huge dent in their plans for the second half of Trump’s term.

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Very clear”

“.. without CBP, there can be no customs clearance. Without customs clearance, you can’t accept international arrivals.”

• Mullin Drops a Bombshell on Sanctuary Cities (Matt Margolis)

Freshly confirmed DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin has wasted no time making his presence felt. Just days into the job, he sat down with Fox News host Bret Baier Monday night and floated an idea so simple and so devastating that it’s a wonder nobody tried it sooner: Pull Customs and Border Protection officers out of international airports in sanctuary cities. Remember, without CBP, there can be no customs clearance. Without customs clearance, you can’t accept international arrivals.


The math isn’t complicated. If Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Boston, Seattle, Denver, Philadelphia, Newark, and New Orleans want to play sanctuary politics, they can explain to thousands of stranded international travelers why their city’s ideological grandstanding just shut down their airport. I love it. I knew Mullin was onto something huge when I watched the interview.”If they are a sanctuary city, should they really be processing customs into their city?” he asked. “Seriously, if they are a sanctuary city and they are receiving international flights, and we’re asking them to partner with us at the airport, but once they walk out of the airport, they’re not going to enforce immigration policy? Maybe we need to have a really hard look at that because we need to focus on cities that want to work with us.”

It’s hard to argue with the logic. These cities actively obstruct federal immigration enforcement, refuse cooperation with ICE, and then expect no consequences?Let’s face it: The time for playing nice has long expired. The DHS shutdown is pushing toward two months, and Democrats show zero interest in negotiating in good faith. They’re demanding absurd reforms for ICE that would effectively kneecap immigration enforcement. And that just isn’t going to happen. Mullin clearly didn’t take the job to play nice with those who’ve declared war on federal immigration law. Democrats were practically giddy when Kristi Noem got fired. They may want to pump the brakes on that celebration because Mullin looks like he’s ready to make her tenure look tame by comparison.

Mullin’s sanctuary city proposal makes perfect sense, and should get Democrats in these cities to reconsider just how far they really want to fight the federal government. Cities that use their local governments as shields against federal immigration law have long operated without real consequences, and Mullin just put consequences on the table. Whether the proposal moves forward depends on how serious the administration is about turning up the pressure. I think they are very serious. But even floating it sends a message: the days of sanctuary cities not suffering consequences for violating federal law are over. Let’s not forget, it was Democrats who created this standoff. They’re the ones who are putting national security at risk over a policy dispute. This is a situation of their own making, and Mullin just handed them the bill.

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He’s someone I would listen to.

• Marc Andreessen Calls AI Job-Loss Fears ‘Fake’, Expects Employment Gains (ZH)

It is not the first time that the venture capital guru has questioned some of the fundamentally dystopian scenarios being proposition in an AI world. In February, we noted that amid an armada of dystopian futurists, projecting linear thoughts into a future of ‘AI uber alles’, Marc Andreessen stands as a beacon of potential utopian light, seeing a future that looks very different and very positive for young and old alike. In a brief few minutes, the co-founder of Netscape and VC firm Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) believes instead that we are living through a unique (and most incredible) time in history with the rise of AI coming right as human civilization needs it… “we’re going to have AI and robots precisely when we actually need them [with populations shrinking] to keep the economy from actually shrinking.”


Simply put, Andreessen says that fears of AI-driven mass job loss are overly simplistic. After decades of unusually slow technological change and low job churn, AI could restore historical productivity levels (exemplified by the period from 1870-1930), sparking opportunity, innovation, and net job growth rather than displacement. Declining populations and reduced immigration will make human labor increasingly valuable. AI’s timing is “miraculous”, Andreessen exclaims, preventing economic shrinkage from depopulation. In even radical scenarios, explosive productivity leads to output gluts, collapsing prices, and massive real-wealth gains – equivalent to “giant raises” for everyone – while making safety-nets more affordable.

Whether incremental or transformative, Andreessen sees the outcome as fundamentally positive economic news. Of course, he does have a lot of skin in this game… Building on that, CoinTelegraph’s Christina Comben reports that Andreessen said artificial intelligence will spark a “massive jobs boom,” dismissing fears of widespread job losses as “all fake” in a Sunday post on X. His optimism contrasts with a March US jobs report showing unemployment holding steady at 4.3%, while the number of people unemployed for 27 weeks or more rose by 322,000 over the past year.

Andreesen shared a Business Insider report showing a sharp rise in tech job openings in 2026, with more than 67,000 software engineering roles, a twofold increase from 2023, and argued that employers had recovered from post-pandemic hiring corrections and the interest rate spike. “The ‘AI job loss’ narratives are all fake,” he wrote. “AI = massive ramp in productivity = massive ramp in demand = massive jobs boom. Watch.” Andreessen is one of Silicon Valley’s most influential investors, a co-founder of Netscape and venture firm Andreessen Horowitz. He is also a major backer of US crypto and AI companies.

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Debt Rattle June 5 2015

Jun 052015
 
 June 5, 2015  Posted by at 9:19 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  4 Responses »


Russell Lee Tracy, California. Gasoline filling station 1942

• In Greek Debt Puzzle, the Game Theorists Have It (NY Times)
• Greece Misses IMF Payment In Warning Shot, Showdown With Europe Escalates (AEP)
• A Speech of Hope for Greece (Yanis Varoufakis)
• EU/IMF Lenders Demand Asset Sales, Pension Cuts In Greek Proposal (Reuters)
• Greece’s IMF Repayment Delay Smacks Of Both Desperation And Defiance (Guardian)
• Greek Finance Ministry: German WWII Debt €280 To €340 Billion (Kathimerini)
• Stay Out Of Harm’s Way – The Casino Is Fixing To Blow (David Stockman)
• The Lawsuit Machine Going After Student Debtors (Bloomberg)
• Bernie Sanders: Let’s Spend $5.5 Billion to Employ 1 Million Young People (BBG)
• Housing Bubble Was Built By JP Morgan, Barclays (MarketWatch)
• The Real Reason Why There Is No Bond Market Liquidity Left (Zero Hedge)
• US Workers Ask: Where’s My Raise? (WSJ)
• Levels Of UK Household Debt At Record High (Independent)
• There’s a Big Decision Looming for Chinese Stocks (Bloomberg)
• We Are The Propagandists: US Turns Truth In Ukraine On Its Head (Salon)
• Kiev Allows Foreign Armed Forces, ‘Potential Carriers Of Nukes’ In Ukraine (RT)
• US Knowingly Conceals Ceasefire Violations By Kiev (RT)
• Global Dairy Costs Drop to 5-Year Low on Record Milk Output (Bloomberg)
• Californians Urged To Rip Out Their Lawns (Guardian)
• The Rewilding Plan That Would Return Britain To Nature (BBC)
• Number of Migrants Trying to Reach Europe via Greece Has Surged by 500% (Vice)

“It would be as if Delaware brought down the United States economy. That would be the fault of the U.S., not Delaware.”

• In Greek Debt Puzzle, the Game Theorists Have It (NY Times)

That Yanis Varoufakis, the rakish Greek finance minister, would meet with senior European officials wearing a leather motorcycle jacket and open-collar shirt would probably have fascinated John F. Nash Jr., the Nobel prize -winning mathematician, game theorist and Princeton professor who was thrown from a taxi and killed last month. Is Mr. Varoufakis really a radical, or simply acting like one to increase Greece’s negotiating leverage — what game theorists mean when they say it can be rational to behave irrationally? Mr. Varoufakis is himself a noted game theorist, co-author of the textbook “Game Theory: a Critical Introduction” and a longtime admirer of Dr. Nash. The two met in Athens in June 2000 after Dr. Nash delivered a lecture on money.

After learning of Dr. Nash’s death, Mr. Varoufakis wrote on Twitter: “Reading your work was inspirational. Meeting you, and spending time together, was an unearned bonus, Farewell John Nash Jr.” The intense and hard-fought negotiations between Greece and its creditors, which have roiled global financial markets for months and appear to be nearing a climax, are the sort of high-stakes game that fascinated Dr. Nash, who won the Nobel in economic science, and lend themselves to the analysis he pioneered. On Thursday, markets were rattled when Greece deferred a payment to the IMF as it continued to seek a new debt deal. “It’s exactly the kind of game that Nash had in mind,” said Sylvia Nasar, author of the definitive Nash biography “A Beautiful Mind,” which was the basis for the Academy Award-winning movie. “There are more than two players. They have common as well as opposing interests. Not making a deal leaves everybody worse off.”

Unfortunately for the financial markets and the future of the European Union, that’s no guarantee that Greece and its creditors will reach a deal that averts the doomsday scenario — a debt default by Greece that could cause it to lose its membership in Europe’s currency union and set off another crisis. I asked Mr. Varoufakis this week how it felt to have the fate of the global economy to a large extent resting on him. “I don’t really feel the weight of the world economy,” he said. “I feel the weight of the Greek people resting on my shoulders. If little Greece, in order to survive, brings down the financial world, it can’t be our fault. It would be as if Delaware brought down the United States economy. That would be the fault of the U.S., not Delaware.”

Virtually everyone agrees that a default by Greece is the least desirable outcome for both Greece and its creditors — among them Germany and France; the European Central Bank; and the I.M.F. Yet one of Dr. Nash’s critical insights is that there may be many possible outcomes — so-called Nash equilibriums — that produce suboptimal results. A Nash equilibrium exists when each side’s strategy is optimal given what they believe to be the others’ strategy. For example, if Germany and other creditors don’t believe Greece’s threat to default, and underestimate the severity of such an outcome, they might see their optimal strategy as remaining firm in their demands for Greek fiscal austerity and structural reforms. If, on the other hand, Germany believes Mr. Varoufakis to be ideologically motivated to reject further austerity, it might well cave to Greek demands for leniency.

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“In a strange way we are all breathing a sigh of relief. We were afraid of a bad deal that would split the party but this is so atrocious it makes life easier. None of us can accept it..”

• Greece Misses IMF Payment In Warning Shot, Showdown With Europe Escalates (AEP)

Greece is to take the drastic step of skipping a €300m payment to the IMF on Friday, invoking an obscure mechanism in abeyance since the 1970s to bundle all debts due in June and pay them at the end of the month. It is the first time that a developed country has ever missed a payment to the IMF since the creation of the Bretton Woods institutions at the end of the Second World War. The news broke after the Athens stock exchange had closed but a bloodbath is feared when the bourse opens on Friday. Yields on two-year Greek bonds spiked 63 basis points to 21.8pc amid mounting fears of a deposit run on Greek banks and the imposition of capital controls as soon as this weekend. The IMF said it had been notified by the Greek authorities that they would pay the entire €1.6bn due this month on June 30, dusting down a procedure last used by Zambia in the 1980s.

The shock move came as leaders of the ruling Syriza movement were locked in a series of emergency meetings to vent their fury over the latest austerity demands by the European creditor powers. Senior figures in the party lined up to denounce the “ultimatum” from Brussels as another wasted moment after four months of acrimonious talks. “It cannot form the basis of an agreement,” said Tassos Koronakis, the party secretary. Alexis Mitropoulos, the deputy speaker of parliament, called it “the most vulgar and murderous plan” that shattered hopes of a deal just as everybody was expecting a breakthrough. Others daubed their war paint and vowed angrily that there would be no “surrender”.

The skipped payment is the clearest sign to date that the crisis is escalating to a dangerous level as Syriza refuses to buckle. It will not be resolved without European statesmanship of a high order, so far lacking. While the authorities sought to play down the Greek decision, it was clearly intended as a warning shot. Syriza had the money at hand. It chose not to pay as a conscious political choice. The Greeks accuse the IMF of violating its own rules by colluding in an EMU-led policy that leaves the country with unsustainable debts. Athens is implicity threatening to escalate the situation all the way to a full default to the IMF, setting off a grave institutional and political crisis within the Fund itself.

Syriza leaders say they are unwilling to burn any more of the country’s dwindling cash reserves to pay creditors until there is a credible offer on the table, insisting that their priority is to pay pensions and salaries and avoid default to their own people. One cabinet minister told The Telegraph that the proposals by creditors seemed designed to bring about a deliberate rupture. “They want to force us into a position where we can’t sign,” he said. “In a strange way we are all breathing a sigh of relief. We were afraid of a bad deal that would split the party but this is so atrocious it makes life easier. None of us can accept it,” he said.

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“..once President Harry Truman’s administration decided to rehabilitate Germany, there was no turning back.”

• A Speech of Hope for Greece (Yanis Varoufakis)

On September 6, 1946 US Secretary of State James F. Byrnes traveled to Stuttgart to deliver his historic “Speech of Hope.” Byrnes’ address marked America’s post-war change of heart vis-à-vis Germany and gave a fallen nation a chance to imagine recovery, growth, and a return to normalcy. Seven decades later, it is my country, Greece, that needs such a chance. Until Byrnes’ “Speech of Hope,” the Allies were committed to converting “…Germany into a country primarily agricultural and pastoral in character.” That was the express intention of the Morgenthau Plan, devised by US Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau Jr. and co-signed by the United States and Britain two years earlier, in September 1944.

Indeed, when the US, the Soviet Union, and the United Kingdom signed the Potsdam Agreement in August 1945, they agreed on the “reduction or destruction of all civilian heavy-industry with war potential” and on “restructuring the German economy toward agriculture and light industry.” By 1946, the Allies had reduced Germany’s steel output to 75% of its pre-war level. Car production plummeted to around 10% of pre-war output. By the end of the decade, 706 industrial plants were destroyed. Byrnes’ speech signaled to the German people a reversal of that punitive de-industrialization drive. Of course, Germany owes its post-war recovery and wealth to its people and their hard work, innovation, and devotion to a united, democratic Europe. But Germans could not have staged their magnificent post-war renaissance without the support signified by the “Speech of Hope.”

Prior to Byrnes’ speech, and for a while afterwards, America’s allies were not keen to restore hope to the defeated Germans. But once President Harry Truman’s administration decided to rehabilitate Germany, there was no turning back. Its rebirth was underway, facilitated by the Marshall Plan, the US-sponsored 1953 debt write-down, and by the infusion of migrant labor from Italy, Yugoslavia, and Greece. Europe could not have united in peace and democracy without that sea change. Someone had to put aside moralistic objections and look dispassionately at a country locked in a set of circumstances that would only reproduce discord and fragmentation across the continent. The US, having emerged from the war as the only creditor country, did precisely that.

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Insane demands that they know will not be accepted: “..increasing value-added tax to 11% (from 6%) for items including drugs and 23% for items including electricity.”

• EU/IMF Lenders Demand Asset Sales, Pension Cuts In Greek Proposal (Reuters)

Greece’s EU/IMF lenders have asked Athens to commit to sell off state assets, enforce pension cuts and press on with labour reforms, two sources familiar with the plan said on Thursday, demands that would cross the Greek government’s “red lines”. If Greece were to accept the plan, lenders would aim to unlock €10.9 billion in unused bank bailout funds that were returned to the European Financial Stability Fund. This would enable Greece to cover its financial needs through July and August, the sources said. Meanwhile, a debate regarding progress of ongoing negotiations with Greece’s lenders would take place in Greek Parliament on Friday at 6 p.m. following a decision by premier Alexis Tsipras, it emerged on Thursday.

In a five-page proposal presented to Tsipras in Brussels on Wednesday, EU/IMF lenders asked Athens to reduce spending on pensions by 1% of gross domestic product and promise not to reverse any legislated reforms, the sources said. They also demanded Athens raise €1.8 billion – or 1% of GDP – by increasing value-added tax to 11% for items including drugs and 23% for items including electricity, the sources told Reuters. They want Greece to scrap a benefit for low income pensioners, called EKAS, to save €800 million by 2016 – a move that if accepted, would force Tsipras to violate his pledge to avoid any new pension cuts. The proposal also calls for a hike in healthcare contributions by Greeks and a cut in the fuel subsidy.

The lenders have also demanded Tsipras not make any unilateral move to restore collective bargaining rights and raise minimum wage level to pre-crisis levels – pledges he made before coming to power in January. The proposal also asks Athens to commit to privatising Grid operator ADMIE, Greece’s major ports in Piraeus and Thessaloniki, the former airport complex of Hellenikon, Greece’s biggest oil refinery Hellenic Petroleum and Greek telecoms operator OTE. Some of the asset sales mentioned – like ADMIE and Hellenikon – have been staunchly opposed by Tsipras’s Syriza party. The proposal does not make any mention of offering debt relief to Athens .

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People have strange views. As soon as the IMF said Greece had the permission to delay, it was clear that they would unless a deal had been made. It doesn’t matter if they announce it at the last moment.

• Greece’s IMF Repayment Delay Smacks Of Both Desperation And Defiance (Guardian)

You could almost hear the gritted teeth through which the IMF issued its terse statement acknowledging that Athens planned to miss Friday’s deadline for making a €300m debt repayment. The Washington-based lender, which was always wary about being dragged into Europe’s debt crisis, didn’t condemn Greece’s actions, let alone suggest that deferring the payment was tantamount to default. It simply restated that in a little-known loophole adopted in the late 1970s, “country members can ask to bundle together multiple principal payments falling due in a calendar month”. But it was clear that the IMF had received little warning of Greece’s plans.

Yanis Varofakis, the country’s pugnacious finance minister, has long argued that the end of June, when the four-month extension to the country’s bailout programme the Syriza government won in February expires, is the real deadline for reaching an agreement. But the lastminute decision to delay the payment, just hours after IMF managing director, Christine Lagarde, said she fully expected it to arrive, smacked of both desperation and defiance. Greece’s stance is likely to infuriate the IMF, which doesn’t want to shoulder the blame for pushing Greece into default, but reportedly believes current plans for tackling its debt burden remain unrealistic.

Even with the rest of the month now apparently available to secure a deal, the distance between Greece and its creditors remains considerable, as leaked negotiating texts from both sides suggested on Thursday. Meanwhile, both the prime minister, Alexis Tsipras, who faces an uphill struggle selling any deal to his party, and Varoufakis, who has been sidelined from the talks but remains finance minister, have continued to make pungent public statements about the sacrifices of the Greek people.

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In parliament. Wonder what the next step will be.

• Greek Finance Ministry: German WWII Debt €280 To €340 Billion (Kathimerini)

Members of a special committee at the Finance Ministry’s General Accounting Office told the parliamentary inquiry into Germany’s unpaid reparations to Greece that Athens is owed between €280 and €340 billion by Berlin. Five officials from the General Accounting Office appeared before the committee, which is chaired by Parliament Speaker Zoe Constantopoulou. The head of the Finance Ministry panel that investigated Germany’s war debt, Panayiotis Karakousis, said that his team found no evidence that Greece had waived its right to claim Second World War reparations. On a visit to Berlin earlier this year, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras told German Chancellor Angela Merkel that her country had a moral duty to settle the matter but he did not refer to any specific figures.

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Absolutely. Thar she blows.

• Stay Out Of Harm’s Way – The Casino Is Fixing To Blow (David Stockman)

Shock waves have been rumbling through the global bond market in the last few days. On April 17 the yield on the 10-year German bund pierced through the 5bps level, but yesterday it tagged 100bps. That amounted to a 20X move in 39 trading days. It also amounted to total annihilation if you were front running Mario Draghi’s bond buying campaign on 95% repo leverage and didn’t hit the sell button fast enough. And there were a lot of sell buttons to hit. The Italian 10-year yield has soared from a low of 1.03% in late March to 2.21% last night, and the yield on the Spanish bond has doubled in a similar manner. Needless to say, this is not by way of a lamentation in behalf of the euro-bond speculators who have had their heads handed to them in recent days.

After harvesting hundreds of billions of windfall gains since Draghi’s mid-2012 “whatever it takes ukase” they were overdue to get slapped around good and hard. Instead, what we have here is just one more striking demonstration that financial markets are utterly broken. The notion of honest price discovery might as well be relegated to the museum of financial history. The exact catalyst for yesterday’s panicked global bond sell-off, apparently, was Draghi’s public confession that although the ECB would stay the course on its $1.3 trillion QE program, it cannot prevent short-run “volatility” in the trading pits.

Why that should be a surprise to anyone is hard to fathom, but it does crystalize the “look ma, no hands” essence of today’s markets. The trading herd goes in the direction enabled by the central banks until a few dare devils finally fall off their bikes, causing an unexpected pile-up and inducing the pack to temporarily reverse direction. Thus, it is not surprising that a few traders got caught flat-footed in recent days. In the case of the insanely over-valued Italian 10 year bond, for instance, the price went straight up (and the yield straight down) for nearly 33 months.

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Creating an even dumber generation.

• The Lawsuit Machine Going After Student Debtors (Bloomberg)

Student loans have eclipsed credit cards to become the second-largest source of outstanding debt in the U.S., after mortgages. Since 2007 the federal student loan balance has more than doubled, to almost $1.2 trillion from $516 billion. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau estimates that students, former students, and their parents owe an additional $150 billion in loans from banks and other private lenders. With defaults climbing, lenders have turned to the courts to collect. Many of their suits are marred by missing documents and procedural errors, say consumer advocates and lawyers defending debtors. “Our office is seeing an uptick in abusive loan debt-collection tactics that leave no room for relief,” wrote Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey.

The paperwork problems echo the “robosigning” scandals that followed the housing bust. Like mortgages, student loans were bundled into packages and sold to investors. “This is robosigning 2.0 with student loans,” says Robyn Smith, a lawyer with the National Consumer Law Center, a nonprofit advocacy group. “You have securitized loans in these large pools; you have the sloppy record keeping,” as in the mortgage crisis.

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“.. it might as well propose taxing churches to pay for sex reassignment surgeries on a moon base.”

• Bernie Sanders: Let’s Spend $5.5 Billion to Employ 1 Million Young People (BBG)

The Employ Young Americans Now Act is the sort of legislation that would have struggled even in a Democratic Congress. In a Capitol controlled by Republicans, it might as well propose taxing churches to pay for sex reassignment surgeries on a moon base. The legislation, introduced by Michigan Representative John Conyers, would create a $5.5 billion fund, $4 billion earmarked for the employment of people between 16 and 24, $1.5 billion for job training grants. There are no pay-fors. It would ask a Congress that is dead-set against “big government” to employ people, with the help of big government.

Yet the bill’s Senate sponsor is Vermont’s Bernie Sanders. That matters quite a lot in June 2015. On Thursday morning, Sanders joined Conyers on a visit to the H.O.P.E. Project in southeast Washington. The presidential candidate toured a small but busy office, located above a strip mall, that had successfully trained 375 people in the IT field, and seen 315 of those people get jobs that paid an average of $42,000—far above the median income locally. Ninety-three% of graduates were African-American, and when Sanders entered a computer room—pausing to greet every student—the only white faces belonged to journalists and staffers. The room was crowded with TV cameras and iPhones, some pointed at four words on the wall: “HARVARD OF THE HOOD.”

“In America now we spend nearly $200 billion on public safety, including $70 billion on correctional facilities each and every year,” said Sanders from the front of the room. “So, let me be very clear: in my view it makes a lot more sense to invest in jobs, in job training, and in education than spending incredible amounts of money on jails and law enforcement.”

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And the rating agencies.

• Housing Bubble Was Built By JP Morgan, Barclays (MarketWatch)

If I had to depend on Wall Street or Washington for an explanation of what ails the U.S. financial economy, I’d probably pick neither one. My choice would be John Griffin, a cowboy boots-wearing University of Texas financial professor, who has been on something of a roll. Six years before Standard & Poor’s agreed to pay $1.4 billion to settle state and federal government lawsuits alleging it inflated credit ratings on securitized mortgage debt, Griffin revealed—with mathematical precision—how S&P degraded its own analytical model to issue puffed-up grades. Seven months before J.P. Morgan Chase agreed to pay $13 billion to resolve state and federal claims that it misled investors on toxic mortgage securities—the largest financial settlement with a single entity in U.S. history—Griffin showed how the bank had originated a disproportionate share of securitized mortgages flawed by undisclosed second liens (among other reporting problems).

Today, Griffin is advancing a new argument: that housing prices were more inflated—and the crash even more violent—in markets where lenders who misreported mortgages held concentrated market shares. He concludes that big banks with bad practices drove the credit bubble, and the misreporting deepened it. “I just want to know the truth,” says Griffin, 45, who grew up playing high school football in Texas and today delivers some of his hardest hits on Wall Street. In his latest forensic work, Griffin and co-author Gonzalo Maturana, an assistant professor of finance at Emory University in Atlanta, combed through 3.1 million mortgages originated between 2002 and the end of 2007. More than one-quarter of these loans subsequently defaulted.

While looking for inconsistencies in appraisal values and owner-occupancy status, the most interesting part of the investigation exposes how some mortgage securities were riddled with undisclosed second liens. These hidden debts reduced the borrowers’ incentive to repay their obligations. Griffin and Maturana found the gaps by comparing bank securities documents to county courthouse records. No fewer than 10.2% of the securitized mortgages in their sample contained an undisclosed second lien. Some lenders, such as Barclays and J.P. Morgan, produced nearly double the overall number of missing debts. This is startling for two reasons: first, loans with an unreported lien were 97% more likely to become seriously delinquent than were correctly reported loans; and second, the same lender originated both liens more than two-thirds of the time.

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Minsky.

• The Real Reason Why There Is No Bond Market Liquidity Left (Zero Hedge)

Back in the summer of 2013, we first commented on what we called “Phantom Markets” – displayed quotes and prices, in not only equities, FX and commodities but increasingly in government bonds, without any underlying liquidity. The problem, which we first addressed in 2012, had gotten so bad, even the all important Treasury Borrowing Advisory Committee to the US Treasury had just sounded an alarm on the topic. Since then we have sat back and watched as our prediction was borne out, as bond market liquidity slowly devolved then sharply and dramatically collapsed recently to a level that is so unprecedented, not even we though possible, leading first to the October 15 bond flash crash and countless “VaR shock” events ever since.

And while we urge those few carbon-based life forms who still trade for a living to catch up on our numerous posts on market “liquidity” and lack thereof, here is a quick and dirty primer on just why there is virtually no bond market left, courtesy of the man who, weeks ahead of the Lehman collapse when nobody had any idea what is going on, laid out precisely what happens in 2008 and onward in his seminal note “Are the Brokers Broken?”, Citigroup’s Matt King. Here is the gist of his recent note on the liquidity paradox which is a must read for everyone who trades anything and certainly bonds, while for the TL/DR crowd here is the 5 word summary: blame central bankers and HFTs.

The more liquidity central banks add, the less there is in markets
• Water, water, everywhere — On many metrics, liquidity across markets seems abundant. Bid-offers are tight, if not always back to pre-crisis levels. Notional traded volumes in credit and rates have reached all-time highs. The rise of e-trading is helping to match buyers and sellers of securities more efficiently than ever before.
• Nor any drop to drink — And yet almost every institutional investor, in almost every market, seems worried about liquidity. Even if it’s here today, they fear it will be gone tomorrow. They say that e-trading contributes much volume, but little depth for those who need to trade in size. The growing frequency of “flash crashes” and “air pockets” – often without obvious cause – adds weight to their fears.
• Yes, street regulation has played a role — The most frequently cited explanation is that increased regulation has driven up the cost of balance sheet and reduced the street’s appetite for risk, and hence ability to act as a warehouser between buyers and sellers.
• But so too have the central banks — And yet this fails to explain why even markets like FX and equities, which do not consume dealers’ balance sheets, have been subject to problems. We argue that in addition to regulations, central banks’ distortion of markets has reduced the heterogeneity of the investor base, forcing them to be the “same way round” over the past four years to a greater extent than ever previously. This creates markets which trend strongly, but are then prone to sudden corrections. It also leaves investors more focused on central banks than ever before – and is liable to make it impossible for the central banks to make a smooth exit.

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Record low productivity.

• US Workers Ask: Where’s My Raise? (WSJ)

The unemployment rate in metropolitan regions across the U.S. is below where it was when the financial crisis blew a hole in the U.S. economy in 2008. Now, many American workers are asking: Where’s my raise? Questions about the slow pace of wage growth aren’t only stumping workers, but also economists and policy makers at the Federal Reserve—with the answers weighing on households and the larger U.S. economy. When U.S. unemployment rates fall, conventional notions of supply and demand predict wages will go up as firms bid for increasingly scarce workers, and there are signs of that, for example, in building trades and restaurants.

“Basic economics hasn’t gone out the window,” Loretta Mester, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, said in an interview. “When employment grows, wages will start to grow.” But a Wall Street Journal analysis of Labor Department data points to persistent constraints on worker pay, even as the economy approaches full employment. The Journal found 33 U.S. metropolitan areas—from the small to the sizable—where unemployment rates and nonfarm payrolls last year returned to prerecession levels. In two-thirds of those cities—including Columbus; Houston; Oklahoma City; Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minn.; and Topeka, Kan.—wage growth trailed the prerecession pace. Among the reasons:

• Companies tapping pools of workers who have disappeared from the U.S. unemployment tallies, creating what economists describe as hidden slack in the economy. Until this invisible labor supply is spent, these men and women, including part-timers, temporary workers and discouraged labor-market dropouts, could hold wages down.

• The blunt force of overseas competition makes companies reluctant to raise pay over fears they will lose sales to cheaper-priced foreign firms.

• Lingering psychological scars of a recession long past. Robert Gordon, an economics professor at Northwestern University, said his research found that wages and inflation were subject to inertia. That means unemployment could drop well below 5.5% for years before wages go up much.

• Meager growth in productivity, which limits the incentive of companies to offer raises.

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What the recovery looks like.

• Levels Of UK Household Debt At Record High (Independent)

Levels of household debt have soared to record highs and a new way of lending aimed at the poor is needed, according to a new released report by the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ). The right wing think tank, founded by Iain Duncan Smith, the work and pensions secretary, warns that household debt has risen by more than £34 billion in less than three years and is £1.47 trillion – the highest ever. Some 8.8 million people are “over-indebted.” And borrowing on credit cards, bank overdrafts, and pay day loans amounts to more than £170 billion – the highest in four years. Fifteen million Britons are going into debt just to cover their bills, says the report – based on research commissioned by JPMorgan Chase Foundation.

It argues that those on low incomes should have financial services and products specifically aimed at their needs. Writing in the preface, Dr Alex Burghart, policy director at the CSJ, says: “Without access to financial services that meet their needs, families are forced to take out expensive loans that they then struggle to pay off.” He argues that while more needs to be done to create jobs and improve pay, “there is also a need for financial services that serve the needs of low-income families.” Dr Burghart adds: “By helping to develop a new marketplace for socially responsible Alternative Financial Institutions (AFIs) we can build a new generation of financial services specifically tailored to meet the needs of low-income families.”

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So the foreigners come in just as the facade topples over?!

• There’s a Big Decision Looming for Chinese Stocks (Bloomberg)

A New York-based company is getting ready to make a call on China that will determine whether billions of dollars flow into the nation’s world-beating stock market. The June 9 decision by MSCI Inc. on the possible inclusion of China’s locally traded shares in the index-provider’s equity benchmarks comes after a year of consultation with banks and funds. MSCI is faced with a situation where it’s getting harder to ignore the Chinese equity market, already the world’s second-largest with a total value of more than $9 trillion. Yet for most international investors, mainland-listed stocks remain out of reach due to limitations on their tradability.

Foreigners own only 5.9% of the yuan-denominated A shares because of regulatory restrictions even as the government moves to open up access to the exchanges in Shanghai and Shenzhen. MSCI, whose emerging-market gauge is tracked by $1.7 trillion of funds, could help change that. “It’s a big deal,” Sebastien Lieblich, Global Head of Index Management Research at MSCI, said by phone from Geneva. China’s market is “relatively untapped,” and an inclusion would suggest it be “elevated to be part of the major radar screen of international institutional investors,” he said. Being added to MSCI’s indexes would mark the integration of China’s locally traded stocks into the world’s financial markets after being largely off limits to foreigners until recently.

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Patrick Smith and truth to power.

• We Are The Propagandists: US Turns Truth In Ukraine On Its Head (Salon)

A couple of weeks ago, this column guardedly suggested that John Kerry’s day-long talks in Sochi with Vladimir Putin and his foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, looked like a break in the clouds on numerous questions, primarily the Ukraine crisis. I saw no evidence that President Obama’s secretary of state had suddenly developed a sensible, post-imperium foreign strategy consonant with a new era. It was force of circumstance. It was the 21st century doing its work. This work will get done, cleanly and peaceably or otherwise. Sochi, an unexpected development, suggested the prospect of cleanliness and peace. But events since suggest that otherwise is more likely to prove the case. It is hard to say because it is hard to see, but our policy cliques may be gradually wading into very deep water in Ukraine.

Ever since the 2001 attacks on New York and Washington, reality itself has come to seem up for grabs. Karl Rove, a diabolically competent political infighter but of no discernible intellectual weight, may have been prescient when he told us to forget our pedestrian notions of reality—real live reality. Empires create their own, he said, and we’re an empire now. The Ukraine crisis reminds us that the pathology is not limited to the peculiar dreamers who made policy during the Bush II administration, whose idea of reality was idealist beyond all logic. It is a late-imperial phenomenon that extends across the board. “Unprecedented” is considered a dangerous word in journalism, but it may describe the Obama administration’s furious efforts to manufacture a Ukraine narrative and our media’s incessant reproduction of all its fallacies.

At this point it is only sensible to turn everything that is said or shown in our media upside down and consider it a second time. Who could want to live in a world this much like Orwell’s or Huxley’s—the one obliterating reality by destroying language, the other by making historical reference a transgression? Language and history: As argued several times in this space, these are the weapons we are not supposed to have. Ukraine now gives us two fearsome examples of what I mean by inverted reason. One, it has been raining reports of Russia’s renewed military presence in eastern Ukraine lately. One puts them down and asks, What does Washington have on the story board now, an escalation of American military involvement? A covert op? Let us watch.

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And we all pretend this is normal.

• Kiev Allows Foreign Armed Forces, ‘Potential Carriers Of Nukes’ In Ukraine (RT)

The Ukrainian parliament has adopted amendments to state law allowing “admission of the armed forces of other states on the territory of Ukraine.” The possible hosting of foreign weapons of mass destruction is also mentioned in the documents. Amendments to Ukrainian law were adopted on Thursday by the Verkhovna Rada, receiving a majority of 240 votes (the required minimum being 226). The bill was submitted to the parliament in May by PM Arseny Yatsenyuk. It focuses on the provision of “international peacekeeping and security” assistance to Ukraine at its request. Peacekeeping missions are to be deployed “on the basis of decision of the UN and/or the EU,” the bill published on the parliament’s official website says.

Previously, the presence of any international military forces on the territory of Ukraine not specifically sanctioned by state law was only possible by adopting a special law initiated by the president. Implementation of the new amendments “will create necessary conditions for deployment on the territory of Ukraine international peacekeeping and security” missions without the need for additional legal authorization, the explanatory note to the draft bill said. The presence of such armed forces in Ukraine “should ensure an early normalization of situation” in Donbass, the note added, saying that they would help “restore law and order and life, constitutional rights and freedoms of citizens” in the Donetsk and Lugansk regions.

In a comparative table, published among the accompanying documents to the bill, “potential carriers of nuclear and other types of weapons of mass destruction are permitted under international agreement with Ukraine for short-term accommodation,” with Kiev providing proper control during the period that such forces were stationed there.

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US MO.

• US Knowingly Conceals Ceasefire Violations By Kiev (RT)

The US and its Western allies are well aware of all the ceasefire violations in eastern Ukraine but, deliberately turn a blind eye to Kiev’s actions, hackers said after obtaining the emails of top Ukrainian official overseeing the truce. The anti-Kiev hacktivist group, CyberBerkut, claims to have hacked the emails of Major-General Andrey Taran, Chief of the Joint Centre for Ceasefire Control and Coordination in Ukraine. The correspondence contained satellite images proving multiple violations of the Minsk peace agreements between Kiev and the rebels by the Ukrainian military, they said. The pictures, dating March, April and May 2015, showed Kiev’s heavy artillery stationed in the immediate vicinity of the borders of the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics.

Ukrainian 100-millimeter field artillery guns, 122-millimeter D-30 and 2S1 Gvozdika howitzers, 152-millimeter Hyacinth-S howitzers and Grad multiple rocket launchers were placed less than 20 kilometers away from the contact line, CyberBerkut said. According to the Minsk ceasefire agreement signed in February, both sides were to pull-out of all heavy weapons and create a security zone from 50 to 140 kilometers, depending on the range of the guns. The hacktivists stressed that Washington knew of the violations by Kiev as the hacked emails came from a staff member of the US Embassy in Ukraine, Tetyana Podobinska-Shtyk.

“[I am] sending you pictures which can become a serious problem for you! Think about how you can explain them, if the [OSCE] monitoring mission obtains them. Consult the team leader and think about a possible action plan, how you can justify them or present them as fake,” Podobinska-Shtyk wrote in a hacked email.

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The end of EU quota slams New Zealand. Which shouldn’t have all those cows to begin with.

• Global Dairy Costs Drop to 5-Year Low on Record Milk Output (Bloomberg)

An abundance of milk from New Zealand to Europe is driving global dairy costs to the lowest in five years. Prices have plunged almost 40% from a record in February 2014 as farmers ramped up production and Chinese demand slowed, according to a United Nations measure of dairy products. Global production of milk, cheese and butter will rise to records this year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. European farmers are increasing output after the government ended production limits in April, while supply from New Zealand, the biggest milk powder exporter, has been better-than-expected during a drought, according to INTL FCStone, a commodities brokerage.

Average prices on New Zealand’s GlobalDairyTrade auction, the global benchmark, fell to $2,412 a metric ton on Tuesday, the lowest since August 2009. “Supply is relatively strong,” John Lancaster, a dairy analyst at FCStone in Dublin, said by phone Thursday. “With the quotas gone, there’s no restriction on farmers.” At the same time, there are signs of weaker demand. China may reduce purchases of whole milk powder this year, while imports of non-fat milk powder will grow at a slower rate than previous years, according to the USDA. China, which uses milk powder in infant formula, has been a driver of global demand in the past. The EU is also exporting less whole milk powder and cheese after Russia banned food imports from the region in retaliation for sanctions related to its policies in Ukraine.

Milk was 20% cheaper in April than a year ago, according to data released last week from the Dutch Federation of Agriculture and Horticulture, known as LTO. The FAO’s gauge of global dairy costs fell to 167.5 points in May, the lowest since October 2009. Milk futures in Chicago have dropped 22% in the past 12 months. Lower prices may pinch farmer profits, leading to less production later this year, Lancaster said. While they’ve benefited from lower feed costs, adverse weather, such as too much or too little rain, would hurt pasture growth and result in less milk production, he said. “If milk prices come down further in Europe, we’d expect to see some kind of a response from production side,” he said. “We could see more culling from herds, depending on how low prices go and potential cash flow issues.”

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What a waste it would be if they don’t seize the opportunity to start growing their own food instead.

• Californians Urged To Rip Out Their Lawns (Guardian)

Would you rather give up your lawn or your shower habit? Can you deal with spray-painting your parched garden green? Can you see the beauty in a front yard filled with cacti and rocks? Low-flushing lavatories and recycled wastewater may not be subject matters you would usually associate with a generally more glamorous and decisively sexier California, but as the reality of drought hits urban areas, these are the questions millions of Californians are having to ask. On 1 April, following the announcement of a fourth year of drought, Governor Jerry Brown issued an executive order demanding a 25% reduction of water usage in urban areas statewide beginning 1 June. That meant that from Monday, around 90% of Californians were faced with reducing their water consumption by a quarter compared to 2013 levels.

In high-consumption areas, water companies have been given targets as high as 36%. Customers have been told they must reconsider their entire way of life. But how to achieve such a feat? Rules have been devised by local water boards, ranging from carrots (discounts on high-efficiency lavatories and washing machines) to sticks (fines for watering your lawn more than twice a week, or for watering the pavement). Residents have taken to drought-shaming one another, reporting water wasters to the authorities or on social media. In places like Sacramento, such finger-pointing has been encouraged – to great effect. But above all else, there is pressure to take things one step further and turn to lawns. More precisely, to the ripping out of them.

In his executive order, Brown called for the replacement of 50m sq ft of lawns with “drought-tolerant landscapes”, a goal to be achieved with the help of local subsidies and partial funding from the state’s water department. “Over 50% of household water usage is outdoors,” said Stephanie Pincetl, a professor and director of the California Center for Sustainable Communities at University of California, Los Angeles.

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Nice Monbiot-supported plan, but what difference will it make?

• The Rewilding Plan That Would Return Britain To Nature (BBC)

Britain once looked very different. In place of sheep-strewn fields and treeless uplands, there were vast natural forests, glades and wild spaces. Within them, wolves, bears and lynx roamed the land. The first Britons lived alongside woolly mammoths, great auks and wild cows called aurochs. All that is now gone. Humans chopped down the trees to make space for farms, and hunted the large animals to extinction, leaving plant-eaters to decimate the country’s flora. Britain is now one of the few countries in the world that doesn’t have top predators. No matter how much we may think England’s green and pleasant countryside is “natural”, it is a pale shadow of what once was – and what could be again. If some conservationists have their way, parts of the UK could be restored to a truly wild state.

This “rewilding” would bring back animals and plants that have been lost, and allow them to roam freely. In these new wild spaces, people could reconnect with animals and plants in a way no park or zoo could ever manage. But it’s also a hugely controversial idea. There are various interpretations of rewilding. The word was coined in 1990 by an American environmentalist named Dave Foreman, who went on to found the Rewilding Institute. Then in 1998, Michael Soulé and Reed Noss set out the core ideas in an article for Wild Earth magazine. The key to rewilding is creating large protected areas in which animals and plants are left to their own devices. The new wildernesses have to be large to support top predators like wolves, which need space and lots of prey.

The top predators are crucial, because they keep down the populations of their prey. These are normally plant-eating animals like deer, which would otherwise run riot and decimate trees and other plant life – and in turn destroy the habitats for many other animals. By keeping plant-eaters in check, top predators allow many more species to flourish. These ripple effects are called “trophic cascades”. Soulé and Noss argued that ecosystems cannot function as they should without top predators or carnivores.

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It’ll take horrible disasters for Brussels to act.

• Number of Migrants Trying to Reach Europe via Greece Has Surged by 500% (Vice)

The number of migrants and refugees crossing the Aegean Sea from Turkey to Greece has increased by 500% since last year, according to European border control agency Frontex. In comparison, the number of migrants attempting the perilous journey across of the Mediterranean to Italy has gone up just 5%, Frontex executive director Fabrice Leggeri said Wednesday. “When you close off a migration route, another one opens up elsewhere,” Thibaut Jaulin, a research fellow at the Center for International Studies and Research (CERI) at Sciences Po in Paris, told VICE News. European authorities have beefed up surveillance along the Libya-Italy migrant route in an effort to prevent the recurring tragedies in the Mediterranean.

In April, naval border monitoring operation Triton saw its budget tripled from €3 million to €9 million a month. The European Council is also considering launching a military operation in Libyan waters to destroy boats used by Libyan people smugglers. The EU is due to vote on the issue on June 22. The move will also need to be approved by Libya or by the UN Security Council. According to Frontex, the “Eastern Mediterranean Route” – described as “the passage used by migrants crossing through Turkey to the European Union via Greece, southern Bulgaria or Cyprus” – is not a new path for migrants. Since 2008, the route has become the second biggest “migratory hot spot” in the EU, and it was Europe’s “second largest area for detections of illegal border-crossings” in 2014.

Leggeri told French daily Les Échos on Wednesday that some 37,000 migrants had arrived on Europe’s shores through Italy since the beginning of 2015, versus 40,000 through Greece.

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