Oct 202019
 
 October 20, 2019  Posted by at 9:45 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , , ,  20 Responses »


Rembrandt van Rijn The three trees 1643

 

Hillary Clinton Bails On DC Event That Tulsi Gabbard Is Attending (NYP)
Dems Introduce Legislation To Block G7 Summit At Trump’s Doral Resort (Fox)
Trump Ditches Plan To Host G7 At Doral Resort: ‘Irrational Hostility’ (G.)
Trump Campaign Mocks Outrage Over Mulvaney Comments With T-Shirts (ZH)
UK PM Sends Unsigned Request For Brexit Delay (BBC)
Brexit Delay And Election Better Than Johnson’s Deal – Farage (R.)
Parliament Tethers Britain to a Failing Experiment (OffG)
“European Values” Is Slang For “European Power” (OffG)
Libor Rigging Inquiry Shut Down By Serious Fraud Office (BBC)
Boeing Board To Meet In Texas As Scrutiny Intensifies (R.)
The Not-Com Bubble Is Popping (Atl.)
Iraq Cleric Sadr Urges Supporters To Continue Anti-Government Protests (Rudaw)
10 Australia MPs Join Forces To Bring Home Julian Assange (DT.au)

 

 

NOTE: none of the people in the clip below have denied beating their wives.

Hillary Clinton Bails On DC Event That Tulsi Gabbard Is Attending (NYP)

It looks like the “Queen of Warmongers” blinked. A face-to-face confrontation between Hillary Clinton and Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard set for next Friday was averted when Clinton backed out of the Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit in Washington, DC. Clinton aides cited a scheduling conflict when she announced her withdrawal from a speaking slot at the annual event. One insider told Slate that Clinton dropped out to protest the inclusion of former Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielson on the schedule. But Gabbard is on the bill, too — and Clinton’s pull-out came just hours after the former Secretary of State on Friday accused the Hawaii Democrat of being the “favorite of the Russians” on a podcast.


“I think they’ve got their eye on somebody who is currently in the Democratic primary and are grooming her to be the third-party candidate,” Clinton said. Gabbard fired back with a venomous tweet. “Thank you @HillaryClinton,” she posted. “You, the queen of warmongers, embodiment of corruption, and personification of the rot that has sickened the Democratic Party for so long, have finally come out from behind the curtain.” Gabbard continued the retort during an appearance on Tucker Carlson Tonight: “The reason why she’s doing this is because ultimately she knows she can’t control me. I stand against everything that she represents.”

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And these people have no idea when they’re being uber trolled. They use their political clout to spend taxpayer money on hot air.

Dems Introduce Legislation To Block G7 Summit At Trump’s Doral Resort (Fox)

A trio of House Democrats introduced legislation Friday to block President Trump from hosting next year’s G7 summit at one of his Florida resorts. Reps. Lois Frankel from Florida, Bennie Thompson from Mississippi and Steve Cohen from Tennessee proposed the Trump’s Heist Undermines the G-7 (THUG) Act. A companion bill sponsored by Sens. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., and Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., will be introduced in the Senate, according to lawmakers. The House bill would prohibit funding for the three-day summit at Trump National Doral Golf Club in June. It would also require Trump to submit to Congress documents related to the decision to host the summit at Doral, lawmakers said.


“[Trump] is unashamed of his corruption,” Frankel said in a press release. “He is abusing the office of the presidency and violating law by directing millions of dollars of American and foreign money to his family enterprises by holding an important meeting of world leaders at his Doral resort.” Acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney made the announcement on Thursday that next year’s G7 meeting will be held at Doral June 10-12. Mulvaney said the decision will save taxpayers millions because the resort will provide its services at cost. Democratic lawmakers claimed Friday that past G7 summits have cost “upwards of $40 million.”

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Meanwhile, the press and the Democrats have provided Trump with first of all a big laugh, plus an enormous amount of free advertizing for his resort. And they’re all righteous about it, they celebrate it as a major victory. Here’s the Guardian: “Donald Trump has been forced into a humiliating climbdown”.. Good god. Ditch the blinders.

Trump Ditches Plan To Host G7 At Doral Resort: ‘Irrational Hostility’ (G.)

Donald Trump has been forced into a humiliating climbdown over plans to host the G7 meeting at his own luxury resort following a political outcry. The US president announced in a Saturday night tweet that he had reversed his decision and would seek an alternative venue to host world leaders next June. The move represented a rare admission of defeat by Trump, who typically digs in and fights to defend every controversial statement and policy. Even in his concession, the president complained bitterly that he thought he was “doing something very good for our country” by choosing the Trump National Doral, near Miami, to host G7 leaders.

“It is big, grand, on hundreds of acres, next to Miami international airport, has tremendous ballrooms & meeting rooms, and each delegation would have … its own 50 to 70 unit building,” he tweeted. Trump added that he had announced he would do it at no profit and at no cost to the US but, he claimed, both the media and Democrats had reacted unreasonably. “… Therefore, based on both media & Democrat crazed and irrational hostility, we will no longer consider Trump National Doral, Miami, as the host site for the G-7 in 2020,” the president continued. “We will begin the search for another site, including the possibility of Camp David, immediately. Thank you!”

The choice of the Trump National Doral was widely condemned as the most egregious example yet of the president abusing his position to enrich himself and his business. The resort was in need of a boost: in May the Washington Post reported that Doral’s operating income had fallen 69% since 2015. Trump’s u-turn was welcomed by ethics watchdogs. Noah Bookbinder, executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, said: “President Trump’s decision to award the G7 Conference to his own property was outrageous, corrupt and a constitutional violation. “It was stunningly corrupt even for a stunningly corrupt administration. His reversal of that decision is a bow to reality, but does not change how astonishing it was that a president ever thought this was appropriate, or that it was something he could get away with.”

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And of course the trolling continues, certainly after the success of the Doral narrative.

Trump Campaign Mocks Outrage Over Mulvaney Comments With T-Shirts (ZH)

The Trump campaign’s latest trolling (after selling plastic straws and “Where’s Hunter?” T-shirts) comes after acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney told reporters last week that there’s “going to be political influence in foreign policy,” suggesting that the media “get over it.” In response, the Trump campaign turned Mulvaney’s comment into yet another T-shirt, as the rest of the media foused on his seeming admission that there was a quid pro quo with Ukraine. “Did he also mention to me in past the corruption related to the DNC server? Absolutely,” Mulvaney told reporters. “No question about that. But that’s it, and that’s why we held up the money.”


This was quickly seized on by White House reporters, who said Mulvaney described a quid pro quo for holding up security assistance to Ukraine unless the country’s alleged involvement with the DNC server was investigated. Mulvaney, later retracted his statement – saying “Let me be clear, there was absolutely no quid pro quo between Ukrainian military aid and any investigation into the 2016 election. The president never told me to withhold any money until the Ukrainians did anything related to the server.”

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Is there anybody left who knows where things stand? This move feels convoluted. 1 million protesters yesterday in London.

UK PM Sends Unsigned Request For Brexit Delay (BBC)

Boris Johnson has sent a request to the EU for a delay to Brexit – but without his signature. The request was accompanied by a second letter, signed by Mr Johnson, which says he believes that a delay would be a mistake. The PM was required by law to ask the EU for an extension to the 31 October deadline after losing a Commons vote. EU Council President Donald Tusk tweeted that he had received the extension request. He added he would now consult EU leaders “on how to react”. Hours after losing a crunch vote in a historic Saturday session in the House of Commons, the prime minister ordered a senior diplomat to send an unsigned photocopy of the request for a delay, which was forced on him by MPs last month.


The second letter from Mr Johnson – signed off this time – makes clear he personally believes a delay would be a mistake. It says the government will press on with efforts to pass the revised Brexit deal agreed with EU leaders last week into law, and that he is confident of doing so by 31 October. A cover note from Sir Tim Barrow, the UK’s representative in Brussels, explained the first letter complied with the law as agreed by Parliament. The prime minister previously said he would “rather be dead in a ditch” than ask the EU to delay Brexit. BBC Political Editor Laura Kuenssberg described the decision to send three documents as “controversial”, predicting “there will be a fight about whether Boris Johnson is trying to circumvent the court”. She added: “This is heading straight for the court, and it may very quickly end up in the Supreme Court.

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Farage thinks he can win bigly in the elction.

Brexit Delay And Election Better Than Johnson’s Deal – Farage (R.)

Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage said on Sunday a short delay to Brexit in order to hold a national election would be better than accepting Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s deal. “I want to leave on the 31 of October, but I’ll warn everybody that if this treaty goes through nothing will have changed at all, and I think far better to have a short delay and a general election where we might solve this,” Farage told Sky News, adding that Johnson’s deal was “rotten” and “not Brexit”.

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I like this from OffGuardian. We need alternative views. Part is on Britain…

Parliament Tethers Britain to a Failing Experiment (OffG)

Brexit isn’t going to happen. Left or Right – Lexit or Rexit – it’s over. It’s time to make peace with that idea. Penned in by the absurd Benn Act, No Deal is off the table, which means Britain will be forced to either remain or accept a deal that’s Remain by another name. The Letwin Ammendment and Johnson’s unsigned extension request are just morbid theatre. Unneccasary nails in a well-sealed coffin. It’s all very Weekend at Bernies’ – A lame cast of characters, puppeteering Brexit’s corpse to keep up a tired joke that was never funny to begin with. Parliament has become an absurd pantomime, where a clown Prime Minister – his majority willfully destroyed – sets up straw men that the “opposition” bayonet with increasingly maniacal glee.

No thought is given to policy or consequences, only increasing the tally of Boris Johnson’s parliamentary defeats. Labour, and the bedraggled, hysterical remainers in the Lib Dems/TIG/Green Party, have become nothing but contrarians – automatically gain-saying anything tabled by the government for the simple joy of humiliating the nation’s Court Jester in Chief. Corbyn has been so successfully gaslighted by his remain-heavy PLP he doesn’t even realise he’s betraying his life-long principles, his mentor Tony Benn, and entire swaths of the Labour’s Northern heartlands, who all voted to leave. When a general election does come, it will mean nothing.

Labour will likely be destroyed as working-class voters either flock to the Brexit Party or simply collapse into the apathy of the voiceless, and stay home. If Labour scrapes together enough voters from Remain country in Scotland and London to claw their way to a small majority, well their socialist manifesto will be crippled by the EU’s austerity policy and restrictions on nationalisation. In either event, Corbyn will be replaced by a New Labour non-entity of little renown and less worth. The papers will declare socialism dead (again), and maybe clap Corbyn on the shoulder for doing “well, considering” and “changing the conversation”.

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…and Kit Knightly unloads on the EU as well.. (2nd part of same article)

“European Values” Is Slang For “European Power” (OffG)

France is miserable, sick of austerity. Sick of spending cuts and falling standards and neo-liberal economics promising a trickle-down that never seems to come. In Paris – and many other French cities – the Yellow Vests are nearing their fiftieth straight week of protests, and don’t seem to be slowing down (Hopefully they plan something nice for their first birthday). People have lost eyes, hands, even lives. The Hong Kong protests – so long front-page news in the UK – have been a picnic in comparison. In Hungary, an elected President is held hostage by the bureaucracy of the EU. Whatever you think of Orban, he was democratically elected to enact the political promises he made during his campaign.

That Brussels can sanction him, and threaten to remove Hungary’s voting rights, is perverse. Anti-democracy in the name of democracy. They say it’s about “protecting European values”, but is it? That’s pretty hard to believe, considering the situation elsewhere in Europe… Spain will join France in the flames soon. They already sent thirteen politicians to prison for sedition. Take a moment to consider that – actual “sedition”. This comes after sending in riot police to break up a peaceful referendum. Spanish police beat voters, arrested protesters and destroyed ballot boxes. Madrid has faced no punishment, or even criticism, for this. They – unlike Orban – have escaped any sanction or censure.

Police attack Catalonian independence protests on the streets of Barcelona…and Brussels’ silence is deafening. (Imagine Russia had just jailed 13 opposition politicians for sedition. Imagine Maduro was blinding protestors with rubber bullets. The difference in coverage and attitude would be breathtaking.) What is the difference between Budapest and Paris? Or Moscow and Madrid? Well, Orban is anti-EU (as are the Gilets Jaunes). The governments of France and Spain are Pro EU, with a ferocity that fully justifies the capital P. Follow a pro-EU agenda of austerity, uncontrolled immigration and globalisation and you can blind as many protesters as you want. The harder you look, the more it seems “European values” is slang for “European power”.

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Just a rumor: “The decision comes because of evidence that implicates the Bank of England”

Libor Rigging Inquiry Shut Down By Serious Fraud Office (BBC)

An investigation into the rigging of Libor, the benchmark interest rate that tracks the cost of borrowing cash, has been unexpectedly closed. The decision comes despite evidence that implicates the Bank of England. It means no one will now be prosecuted in the UK for so-called “low-balling”, where banks understate interest rates they pay to borrow cash. The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) said its decision followed a detailed review of the evidence. Thirteen traders and money brokers were prosecuted over four years by the SFO in connection with rigging Libor.


Six have been prosecuted by the US Department of Justice (DoJ). A further 11 traders have been prosecuting for manipulating Euribor, the eurozone equivalent of Libor. The SFO said aspects of its Euribor investigation remain open. In a statement, the SFO said: “Following a thorough investigation and a detailed review of the available evidence, there will be no further charges brought in this case. This decision was taken in line with the test in the Code for Crown Prosecutors.” The code states that the evidence must support a realistic prospect of conviction and must be in the public interest.

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The people who demanded the cost cuts that led to the drama now get together to fire a few 1000 employees. They should first fire themselves.

Boeing Board To Meet In Texas As Scrutiny Intensifies (R.)

Boeing Co’s board of directors and top executives from its airplanes division and supply chain were due to meet on Sunday in San Antonio, Texas, two days after the U.S. planemaker was plunged into a fresh crisis over its banned 737 MAX jet. The meeting comes as pressure mounts on the world’s largest planemaker not only from investigations into the 737 MAX following two deadly crashes, but also from the financial burden caused by the jet’s safety ban and continued high production. Several industry sources said there was speculation inside the company of significant job cuts as Boeing, unable to deliver 737 MAX planes to customers, continues to drain cash.


And although Boeing has so far told suppliers it expects to maintain a production rate of 42 single-aisles monthly with plans to increase to a record level next near, rates may have to come down if regulators further delay the MAX’s return to service, the people said. The schedule for the board’s face-to-face meetings was set for Sunday and Monday in San Antonio, one of the people said, two days before Boeing reports earnings on Oct. 23. The week after, Boeing Chief Executive Officer Dennis Muilenburg – who was stripped of his job as board chairman eight days ago – is due to testify before U.S. Congress about the plane’s development.

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WeWork is not a mass mania?

The Not-Com Bubble Is Popping (Atl.)

It is easy to look at today’s crop of sinking IPOs—like Uber, Lyft, and Peloton—or scuttled public offerings, like WeWork, and see an eerie resemblance to the dot-com bubble that popped in 2000. Both then and now, consumer-tech companies spent lavishly on advertising and struggled to find a path to profit. Both then and now, companies that bragged about their ability to change the world admitted suddenly that they were running out of money. Both then and now, the valuations of once-heralded tech enterprises were halved in a matter of weeks. Both then and now, there was a widespread sense of euphoria curdling into soberness, washed down with the realization that thousands of workers in once-promising firms were poised to lose their jobs.

But if you look closer, today’s correction isn’t much like the dot-com bubble at all. In fact, it might be more accurate to say that what’s happening today is the very opposite of the dot-com bubble. Let’s first understand what exactly that bubble was: a mania of stock speculation, in which ordinary investors—from taxi drivers to Laundromat owners to shoe-shiners—bid up the price of internet-related companies for no good reason other than “because, internet.” Companies realized that they could boost their stock price by simply adding the prefix e- (as in “e-Bay”) or the suffix com (as in Amazon.com) to their corporate names to entice, and arguably fool, nonprofessionals. “Americans could hardly run an errand without picking up a stock tip,” The New York Times reported in its postmortem.

[..] When the web browser Netscape went public on August 9, 1995—the day many cite as the beginning of the dot-com bubble—its stock skyrocketed from $28 to $75 in a matter of hours, even though the company wasn’t profitable. In today’s market, the opposite is happening: Unicorns with no positive earnings are getting slaughtered at the gates. WeWork’s valuation fell more than 80 percent pre-IPO when investors balked at its mounting losses. Peloton, Lyft, and Uber have also struggled to persuade public markets to grade them on a curve; all saw their stock prices fall on the day of the public offering. Institutions and retail investors are refusing to fork over to unicorns the valuations that private investors were expecting—particularly Softbank, a major backer of Uber, Lyft, and WeWork. This isn’t a picture of mass mania. It’s a picture of public sobriety, where the masses are diagnosing an acute fever in private markets.

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My list of mass protests yesterday included Chili, Ecuador, Lebanon, Barcelona, France, London, Puerto Rico, Hong Kong. Today we can add Iraq.

Iraq Cleric Sadr Urges Supporters To Continue Anti-Government Protests (Rudaw)

Firebrand Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr has called on Iraqis to resume the nationwide protests against corruption, unemployment, and the lack of public services. Several of Iraq’s central and southern cities, including the capital Baghdad, were rocked by violent protests in early October, which left at least 108 dead and more than 6,000 injured. In a long statement published on his Facebook page late on Saturday, Sadr called on his supporters and the public to return to the streets on Friday, October 25 to resume the protests.


Sadr is head of the Sayirun alliance, the largest bloc in the Iraqi parliament. He is also head of the Saraya al-Salam militia, which is part of Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) umbrella, also known as Hashd al-Shaabi in Arabic. “The government leaders and politicians are in a state of fear because of you, they are completely unable to fix anything within this country,” Sadr’s statement read. “Therefore, I ask everyone to start the revolution which will clean Iraq from corrupters and fools.” Sadr has withdrawn his backing for the government of Adil Abdul-Mahdi in the wake of the protests and called for fresh elections. He accused Iraq’s top politicians of being under the influence of foreign powers – particularly arch rivals Iran and the United States.

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Is something positive happening? I’m not holding my breath for Australia to stand up to the US.

10 Australia MPs Join Forces To Bring Home Julian Assange (DT.au)

A group of 10 MPs from across the political spectrum have joined forces to form a Parliamentary Working Group focused on bringing home Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. LNP member George Christensen and independent Andrew Wilkie have agreed to be co-chairs and have put forward the proposed group for approval from the President of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives. It is understood the group includes Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce, members of the Labor Party and the cross bench. Mr Wilkie told News Corp Australia he hopes the group will raise the profile of Assange’s case and educate the public.

He believes people who may have been wary of Assange because of the rape allegations levelled against him will change their view when they know what is happening. He said Assange has not been charged with rape and the attempts to extradite him to the US have nothing to do with those allegations. Assange, 48, faces 18 counts in the US including conspiring to hack government computers and violating an espionage law. Australian Barrister Greg Barnes, who is acting as an Adviser to the Assange campaign said: “People are quite naive and misunderstand what is going on.” “If the United States get their way, he will probably be tried in secret, in a kangaroo court and given life in jail.”

The formation of the group comes ahead of Assange’s scheduled court appearance in London on Monday and calls for the Federal Government to intervene on Assange’s behalf. Assange is being detained in one of Britain’s toughest prisons Belmarsh and his legal team have warned his health is deteriorating. A full extradition hearing is not expected to go ahead until February. Mr Barnes said it is the first time that the US has sought to use its laws to prosecute a person who did not commit an act in a US jurisdiction or have any links to the US. “It is a dangerous step and it means that any journalist or person who publishes material deemed to be classified under US espionage laws could be prosecuted irrespective of having any link to the US.”

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