Headlines

Schumer call on Azar to resign over political meddling in virus response

Pelosi blasts GOP ‘skinny’ deals, doubles down on call for large coronavirus relief deal

Biden visits Florida after court requires ex-felons to payoff fines before voting

Jerry Brown mocks people who want to leave California: ‘Where are you going to go?’

Turkish ship’s return home raises hopes of Greece-Turkey tensions cooling

The Federal Reserve will stay on hold until 2023, according to CNBC survey

President Trump’s says coronavirus vaccine could be approve ‘in a matter of weeks’

Junk Science: Biden climate speech ‘one falsehood after another’

Justice Department watchdog is probing handling of Roger Stone case

Coronavirus live updates: Global deaths rising, Bill Gates calls for equitable distribution of any vaccine

Freudian slip? Kamala talks plans ‘during a Harris administration’

LASD sheriff challenges LeBron James to match reward money in manhunt

STAND UP FOR AMERICA!

Headlines

U.S., Poland sign defense cooperation deal

‘It’s nerve racking’ — Millions of Americans are still furloughed and unsure when they will return to work

Durham hints at more charges to come

Dr. Fauci says he plans to vote in-person for November election

Masks, surgical gowns, testing supplies on FDA shortage list

Sweltering heat is shattering records, triggering power outages across California

NYPD Union endorses Trump

Graham: Clinesmith guilty pleasure would be front-page news if he’d done this to Hillary ... He knows where the bodies are buried


CDC’ chief of staff, deputy chief of staff  jointly depart

US-China trade deal review postponed as China ramps up farm, energy purchases

Former Obama speechwriter mocks notion that Kamala is a moderate

Turkey claims Greece attacked research vessel ... EU urges Turkey to ‘de-escalate’ tensions

STAND UP FOR AMERICA!

Super-Yacht

From daily tiimewaster blog

Saudi prince’s $79 million toy capsizes in Greece...

Headlines

Sanders to press on against Biden after primary losses

Coronavirus live update: Gottleib urges faster US response, WHO declares global pandemic

Top doc: Virus 10 times more lethal than flu ...

Media, Democrats deem Bernie Sanders done: ‘Drop out’

Sessions swats back after Trump endorses his opponent

Goldman says bull market will end soon with stocks down another 15%

White House told federal health agencies to classify meetings ...

U. of Dayton students riot after being told to leave campus

Merkel expects two-thirds of Germans to get coronavirus

Harvey Weinstein sentenced to 23 years in prison for rape, sex assault in case that sparked ‘MeToo’

Vowing to keep border open, Erdogan compares Greeks to Nazis ...

Mexican congressman gunned down in state capital

Headlines

How testing failures allowed coronavirus to sweep the U.S.

Trump names Mark Meadows White House chief of staff, replacing Mick Mulvaney

Cuomo declares state of emergency in NY ...

Biden rakes in $22 million, warns of Bernie Bro’s ‘increasingly negative’ campaign tactics

Cash-flush Biden closes ad gap with Bernie

NBA advises teams to prep contingency plans for games without fans due to coronavirus

China quarantine hotel collapses ...

Greek border in flames as migrants keep trying to break through

Hillary Clinton makes a wisecrack about Melania Trump’s ‘Be Best’ program

Elon Musk says ‘the coronavirus panic is dumb’ as tech peers shift to remote work

As outbreaks multiply, UN declines to declare pandemic ...

Torres rebel over Huawei: as ‘ridiculous’ as Germany working on U.K. radar in 1939

Headlines

Pelosi fiercely defends impeachment inquiry as Trump blows up

Dow plunges more than 500 points as big tech shares lead the decline

What happened to Trump’s boast of 4%, 5% or even 6% economic growth?

Nancy Pelosi: Democrats launched ‘inquiry’ not ‘outright impeachment’

Trump set to hit EU with tariffs on $7.5B of goods after Airbus ruling

Bernie Sanders undergoes procedure for artery blockage, cancels events until further notice

Americans spend more on taxes than food, clothing, health-care — combined!

Poll: Trump re-election support unmoved by impeachment inquiry

Support for impeaching Trump hits new high

At half of US colleges most students go on to earn less than $28,000 a year

Greece struggles to survive as migrant arrivals soar ...

Private payrolls beat expectations with 135:000 jobs in September

Headlines

Judiciary Dems to investigate Trump push to host next year’s G-7 at his Doral resort

Trump says US and China resume trade talks Thursday ‘at a different level’

Comey roasted ... Barr doesn’t prosecute ...

Walmart outsources accounting, office jobs to Indian H-1Bs

Pentagon wants Ukraine military aid to continue

Senators ask Jeff Bezos to crack down on thousands of unsafe products on Amazon

Chinese troop movement into Hong Kong prompts unease ...

New Greek government wants Germany to pay war reparations

U.S. to cut troop strength in Afghanistan to 8,600 under peace deal, Trump says

US intel assessment says mysterious Russian explosion was not from testing nuclear-powered missile

6.3 magnitude quake strikes of Oregon coast ... Thousands of tremors hit northwest ...

Judge ends Epstein case

Headlines.

Trump wants to talk. Iran isn’t interested.

Deutsche Bank will exit global equities business and slash 18,000 jobs in sweeping overhaul

[Epstein] Docs could expose powerful politicians, businessmen ... Developing ...

Cuccinelli: ICE ready to deport approximately 1 million illegal aliens

Opposition party on track for victory in Greece

Powell’s testimony could make or break the stock rally’s

Cortez hits back at Pelosi for knocking far-left politicians ...

Michelle Obama refuses to defend Biden’s praise for segregationists ...

U.K. defends ambassador after disparaging Trump comments leak

U.S. defeats Netherlands to win record 4th Women’s World Cup

Trump reaches high in ABCWashingtonPost poll ...

Newsom: Trump wants to help rebuild after earthquake ...

Headlines

Pelosi asks Trump to reschedule SOTU because of shutdown

Theresa May's government survives no-confidence vote after its crushing Brexit defeat

Feds foil 'jihad' plot on White House ...

White House cheers bipartisan meeting with 'Prolem Solvers' caucus

GOP blocks the Senate's rebuke of Trump over Russia sanctions

Amazon is on a hiring spree in India, even as new restrictions on foreign sellers loom

Border ranchers warn: We're finding prayer rugs out here ...

Victims of illegal immigration storm Nancy Pelosi's office

Greek prime minister wins vote of confidence

US pursuing criminal charges against Huawei for alleged theft of trade secrets: WSJ

ISIS claims suicide attack in Syria ... 4 American soldiers killed ...

Report: Pakistan releases senior Taliban jihadi days after his arrest

Headlines

2020 Dem candidates join anti-ICE stampede

Trump says Saudi King has agreed to increase oil production'maybe up to 2 million barrels'

Record hear Chicago, DC, NYC ...

Report: Trump to demand Rissia exit from Syria at Putin summit

Spain, Greece and Germany seal migrant swap deal

Trump says he will bring up election meddling with Putin

Cut fiber line causes widespread COMCAST outages ...

Report: FBI withholding info on Loretta Lynch and  Clinton investigation

Feds: Decades-old court decision allows family immigration detention

Chinese stocks tumble onto bear market with Shanghai index on track for worst year since 2011

Congressman (Rep. Gohmert)): Rosenstein spying on me ...

Environmental policy created plastic pollution in oceans: says study

The 2% Solution

Yesterday, President Donald Trump chastised the many members of the NATO alliance for not living up to their commitment to spend 2% of their GNP n defense. Of NATO's 28 members only Great Britain, Estonia, Greece, Poland and the United States are meeting or exceeding this commitment. For decades the other 23 countries, including France and Germany, have shirked this commitment without recourse ... relying on the United States to pick up the slack. And when Trump reminded those slackers of their deficiencies, the representative from Luxembourg turned the Macron, the President of France, with a hand-covered snide remark and a snicker ... see: Fox News Video. To me, this is the height of sophomoric haughtiness. Perhaps Trump will find a way to remind this Euro-jerk of America's part in the history of  20th Century Europe.

And I have a prediction ... yes, some of these countries now in default (I'm thinking France and Germany) will find a way of meeting this NATO treaty obligation ... but do it with accounting tricks and not with genuine military buildups. Wait and see.

Headlines

These headlines are real ... they have all been discovered on Internet news sites.

Pakistan high court bans Valentine's Day ...

Mexican migrants signal that they prefer detention over being sent back

La La Land: Streep pledges to stand up to "brownshirts" in new tirade

Monster alligator drags golfer into water ... bashes beast over head with club to survive

Cummings: Flynn should lose security clearance

Greece could replace EU currency with US Dollar ...

Franken: GOP colleagues question Trump's mental health

David Duke endorses Keith Ellison for DNC Chair

Blast kills 10, injures 60 in Pakistan's Lahore

Athens set for first mosque since Ottoman times

Playboy brings back nudes, year after ban ...

Trump takes TWITTER break, and world wonders ...

Soft Tyranny

Governments, it seems, cannot resist the temptation to centralize their power at the expense of their citizen's basic freedoms. Just in the last few years we have seen this grab obviously occur in Egypt, Turkey, Russia, Greece, United States and now in Germany. (And I am sure there are others, less obvious ones.)

I just added Germany to this list because Merkel's clueless administration is now looking to suppress growing popular dissent to the massive immigration of Muslims into the country ... see: Breitbart Article. This is exactly the wrong path to take ... for over time it becomes increasingly narrow and therefore more difficult to perform a U-turn.

Funny how installed governments, once they start to govern against the will of their peoples, suddenly want to suppress dissent ... usually with an iron fist inside a velvet glove. We saw how Morsi in Egypt, once freely elected, greedily grabbing power too rapidly ... only to be ousted by the military. Erdogan in Turkey is trying the same power grab ... only at a slightly more leisurely pace. Ditto, Putin in Russia. And here at home we have seen Obummer disregard our Constitution as he would yesterday's newspaper.

Germany's Chancellor Merkel, after a series of boneheaded statements favoring the acceptance of Muslim "refugees," is beginning to realize that she has created a massive problem not just for her country, but for just about the entire European Union. So she is having a few second thoughts ... see: Hot Air Story ... yet still while suppressing dissent.

And, although Angela Merkel has cultivated a right of center image, I think her basic politics are Euro-weenie liberal and, under stress, her true tyrannical instincts seem to be taking over. If her German voters don't shortly turn against her, they might not get another chance so poignant. I'm sorry to say that I just don't trust her.

Media Head Fakes

The liberal media has forever been trying to mold public opinion with fake and/or partially-true news stories. Witness the picture and narrative of the drowned little Syrian boy that galvanized sympathy for the recent plight of the "refugees" storming Europe. Well as it turns out this boy's father was the paid coyote transporting a boatload of immigrants traveling to Greece. His boat overturned and the boy's mother and sister also perished, but somehow the father survived ... see: New York Post Story. Has this sympathetic narrative been walked back in most of the major news outlets?

Another half-true story meant to drive an agenda is the story about the Muslim boy who brought a "clock" to school in Texas that looked a lot like a home-made bomb. He was arrested but later released ... still to became a cause célèbre for being persecuted as a Muslim for his "scientific" accomplishment. He has even been invited to the White House and Mark Zukerberg of Facebook wants to meet with him. What is the real story? It turns out this kid is the son of a Muslim activist who has agitated many times in the past about the persecution of those of his faith. And they boy himself would never explain why he brought this suspicious device to school ... see: Breitbart News Story. This again sounds very much like a set-up story that fits the liberal (and our president's) agenda so the salient details were broomed under the rug by most media outlets.

It's to the point where I seldom believe anything that I see in the news anymore ... particularly if it seems to support the agenda of the left. Yes, the right might be engaging in such shenanigans ... but I haven't discovered as many egregious examples. Feel free to supply some.

Distractions

- The United States stock market is now in correction territory having fallen more than ten percent with the 500+ point plunge on Friday and a much bigger drop on Monday. A drop of 20+% in the coming days or weeks is not beyond reason and would presage a bear market equivalent to 2008.
- Economies around the world seem to be in trouble ... Russia, Brazil, Venezuela, China, Greece, Canada, and many others are all teetering on panic's edge due to the recent precipitous drop in oil prices ... now hovering just below $40 per barrel. Even Saudi Arabia is rapidly running out of sovereign funds and needs to tap into the world debt markets.
- ISIS, Boko Haram and other radical "religion of peace" groups are raping, enslaving and beheading thousands of Christians throughout the Mideast with almost no response from the Free World.
- Tensions on the Korean Peninsula are escalating to a very dangerous degree with exchanges of artillery fire and propaganda-laden saber-rattling.
- Illegal immigration is surging from third countries into Europe and the United States in unprecedented numbers with very little real resistance from the authorities and few solutions proffered ... other than from Donald Trump.
- Iran is being given the gift of $150 billion dollars to spend on terrorism and a clear path to an atomic weapon by the U.S. Secretary of State, John "Christmas in Cambodia" Kerry and our Imperial President.
- Islamic radical terrorist attacks on civilian and military innocents are almost a daily occurrence throughout the free world.
- The oceans may still be rising and the climate may still be changing despite China's pledge to start reducing its horrendous air pollution by 2030.
- The United States Federal Reserve Bank is on the horns of a dilemma. Either it raises interest rate sometime this Fall or it has almost no tools to deal with a possible new recession.

All these serious problems are but distractions to the leader of the free world whose primary focus is on his golf handicap ... which he is assiduously working on while he vacations unconcerned on Martha's Vineyard. Perhaps this singular focus is a form of denial ... to keep him from fretting about these other distraction.

The Grasshoppers

I know that John Hinderaker is generally my go-to guy at the Powerline blog, but Paul Mirengoff has a very pity entry on the debt debacle in Greece ... see: Greek Farce Explained. In this posting, Paul quotes a lot of the inside skinny about how the Greek poobahs misplayed their hands at the financing negotiations with the rest of the European Economic Community (EEC). Talk about the JV playing against the L.A. Lakers. This arrogant bunch of lefties from Athens carried with them there the grasshopper's attitude that the world owed them a living. They may have learned a very hard lesson ... which I don't think is over yet.

I myself have a few comments on these Mirengoff revelations:

- How can Finland be made to adsorb such of heavy burden of this Greek indebtedness? This posting reveals that this country is being asked to pay out 10% of its annual budget and 2.5% of its GDP to hold Greece's head above water. This can't be fair. If the rest of the EEC ponied up the same relative amounts, I suspect that this would cover Greece's shortfall many times over.

- How can the EEC or the International Monetary Fund (IMF) lend Greece any more money when they know that they are not going to repay what has already been lent? Yes I know that the formation of the Euro has benefited Northern Europe, mainly Germany, greatly ... GNP growth-wise. But nevertheless, if you have to lend someone money to buy your products ... and you know that this debt will never be repaid ... this seems a silly commercial strategy.

- The U.S. generally has assumed an attitude that all this European economic kerfuffle does not affect us. But we forget that we contribute something like 18% to the IMF funding ... so what the IMF loses, we also partly lose.

Isn't rather ironic that present-day Greeks seem to have forgotten Aesop's lesson from "The Grasshopper and the Ant?"

In Spades

The European stock markets are up substantially this morning for two reason: one, the hope for a Greek debt settlement and two, the fact that the Shanghai stock market is up over 10% in the last two days ... both reasons being baloney juice. Whatever the Greek terms, it is clear that the vast majority of its debts will never be repaid and a capitulation by Germany and the EEC will now only encourage other debtor nations (Spain, Portugal, Italy) to swing left and emulate Greece in petulant defiance of their debt obligations.

And insofar as the much bigger issue, China, it is abundantly clear that the current Shanghai stock market is now a state-run artifice. The Beijing government has stepped into this "free market" with both feet ... decreeing that big investors not sell major investments for six months, threatening short sellers with prison, stopping trading on huge numbers of listed stocks, forbidding new IPOs, forcing banks and insurance companies to buy stocks, etc. ... see: The Economist Story. Such government manipulation of prices cannot bode well for the future of this trading venue ... and clearly is no reason for any bullish sentiment in the rest of the world.

Even that perennial bull, Jim Cramer, is chary about these developments and is offering constant veiled warnings about the state of the world's stock markets. I concur ... in spades.

Social Media

For whatever reason I have been somewhat averse to most social media ... in particular Facebook and Twitter. Now it is becoming very apparent that these new media are being used to recruit terrorists around the world, coordinate terrorist attacks and synchronize terrorism planning. In fact it has just been revealed that over 10,000 Twitter tweets are sent out to the world each day by ISIS. And I am quite sure that many of the other social media outlets are being likewise abused by terrorists.

Yes, this is the dark side of these Internet bugaboos ... to be balanced against all the societal good that they perform ... posting 142 pictures of your newborn grandchild, writing a review of your latest family visit to McDonald's, discussing the pros and cons of touring Greece during its financial crisis, lamenting the family pet that you just put down, sexting, rounding up your friends to attend a Bernie Sanders campaign rally, and complaining about how you were treated on your latest airline flight. All very interesting stuff ... and well worth the terrorism downsides that these social-media sites also engender.

So, may I suggest that you invest your last dollar in these social media software companies ... they are bound to make you a fortune ... if you can live to enjoy it.

Broken China

Recently I have pointed out the dragon in the room insofar as financial risk is concerned ... and that is the Shanghai stock market and its dramatic rise and fall ... see: The Next Bubble. Since I wrote this blog entry the stock market there has plunged 27% with no real relief in sight ... see: CNBC Story. The Chinese government seems in fibrillation mode in its frantic efforts to remedy this "bloodbath."

Shanghai Composit Index

There are many who believe that this major stock market correction in China poses a bigger threat to world financial stability than either the Greek or Puerto Rican problems.

I am among them.

Afterward: Not a good idea ... see: NY Times Story.

Rewarding Bad Behavior

When governments reward bad behavior ... they get more bad behavior ... this is the cold hard reality of life. Germany and the European Union are relearning this ages-old lesson as a result of the crisis in Greece where this country had been propped up by it neighbors as it went on a multi-year spree of excessive pensions and tax cheating ... with the natural result of digging itself into a financial hole from which there is no logical outcome except default ... see: Boomberg Story. This same scenerio is being repeated here in the United States as Puerto Rico is also teetering on the brink of bankruptcy ... see: New York Times Story. And let us not forget Detroit.

How is it that we keep forgetting this well-defined lesson? The parameters of fiscal responsibility are so obvious that ignoring them cannot be accidental. Political poltroons have to know that they are laying land mines for their predecessors when they offer multiple freebies to voters in order to get elected ... yet they continue to exhibit this bad behavior ... usually without consequences to themselves. And this is the rub. There is no claw-back for such fiscal irresponsibility ... and there should be. Perhaps, whenever a political entity goes bankrupt, all the previously responsible politicians (and their heirs) who caused this catastrophe should lose all their government-acquired assets, pensions and any other government perks that they still enjoy.

Is this so difficult?

Afterward: And now a prediction from the Ghost of the Christmas Future: Washington Examiner Story.