Hours after conservative talk radio host Rush Limbaugh announced he has lung cancer, University of California-Riverside Professor Reza Aslan took to Twitter to imply that the world would be a “better place” without Limbaugh in it.
“Ask yourself this simple question: is the world a better or a worse place with Rush Limbaugh in it?” Aslan tweeted.
While his initial tweet came in the form of a question, subsequent tweets from Aslan strongly suggest how he would answer the question.
While claiming that he wasn’t “‘celebrating’ anyone’s diagnosis,” Aslan called Limbaugh a “curse upon this nation, a purveyor of hatred and racism who’s at the very least indirectly responsible for the mass suffering of countless people.”
One user replied to Aslan, stating that he “loathes” Limbaugh, but then asking if they “shouldn’t try to be better than him.”
Aslan responded by asserting that “we are better than him.”
“A monkey eating its own shit is better than him,” Aslan continued. “The fact that a despicable racist evil human being is sick changes nothing about his nature as a despicable, racist, and evil human being.”
Later confronted by the left’s “giddiness” on Twitter about Limbaugh’s diagnosis, Aslan says he “completely reject[s] the idea that one shouldn’t speak ill of bad people when those bad people are ill.”
“And Rush Limbaugh is a bad person,” Aslan concludes.
WTI Holds Losses Below $50 After Bigger-Than-Expected Crude Build
Oil prices plunged to one-year lows, with WTI back below $50 for the first time since Jan 2019 as global demand concerns trumped OPEC+ jawboning that they could do something to stall the decline.
“We’re getting close to the bottom and it’s clear OPEC is not going to sit on their hands,” said Phil Flynn, an analyst at Price Futures Group Inc.
“There’s some dire predictions being priced in right now.“
As Bloomberg reports, the deadly virus has menaced markets by upending trade flows and is estimated to have cut 20% from China’s oil demand as quarantined cities and closed factories cripple industrial activity in the second largest economy in the world. Refineries are curbing operations, while the nation’s top processor is trying to resell millions of barrels of crude it no longer needs.
“How much OPEC decides to cut production will be a deciding factor for price stabilization,” said Bjarne Schieldrop, Oslo-based chief commodities analyst at SEB AB.
But for now, the machines will focus on inventories…
API
Crude +4.18mm (+3mm exp)
Cushing +960k
Gasoline +1.96mm (+1.8mm exp)
Distillates -1.78mm (-200k exp)
After a surprise build in the previous week, analysts expected another sizable build for crude and API reported a bigger than expected 4.,18mm build (and another build for gasoline stocks)…
Source: Bloomberg
Investors will be keenly focused on refinery utilization, says Andrew Lebow, senior partner at Commodity Research Group. “Refiners are beginning maintenance, which is why we can expect to see an inventory build.”
Ahead of the API print, WTI was trading around $49.60 and dipped modestly lower on the data…
But for now the $50 line in the sand is what matters…
“WTI is trying to hold on to that $50 support level,” says Olivier Jakob, analyst at Petromatrix.
“But it’s going to be difficult unless OPEC takes decisive action, otherwise we’ll get to the lows of 2018.”
And finally, we note that the front-end time-spreads for Brent have flipped negative once again…
Behind the app that delayed Iowa’s voting results is a dark money operation funded by anti-Sanders billionaires. Its top donor, Seth Klarman, is a Buttigieg backer who has dumped money into pro-settler Israel lobby groups.
At the time of publication, twelve hours after voting in the Democratic Party’s Iowa caucuses ended, the results have not been announced. The delay in reporting is the result of a failed app developed by a company appropriately named Shadow Inc.
This firm was staffed by Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama campaign veterans and created by a Democratic dark money nonprofit backed by hedge fund billionaires including Seth Klarman. A prolific funder of pro-settler Israel lobby organizations, Klarman has also contributed directly to Pete Buttigieg’s campaign.
The delay in the vote reporting denied a victory speech to Sen. Bernie Sanders, the presumptive winner of the opening contest in the Democratic presidential primary. Though not one exit poll indicated that Buttigieg would have won, the South Bend, Indiana mayor took to Twitter to confidently proclaim himself the victor.
Iowa, you have shocked the nation.
By all indications, we are going on to New Hampshire victorious. #IowaCaucuses
Though a dark money Democratic operation turned out to be the source of the disastrous app, suspicion initially centered on former Hillary Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook and his Russiagate-related elections integrity initiative.
Leveraging Russia hysteria into lucrative election opportunities
While Iowa Democratic Party Chairman Troy Price refused to say who was behind the failed app, he told NPR that he “worked with the national party’s cybersecurity team and Harvard University’s Defending Digital Democracy project…” Price did not offer details on his collaboration with the Harvard group, however.
The New York Times reported that this same outfit had teamed up with Iowa Democrats to run a “drill of worst-case scenarios” and possible foreign threats, but was also vague on details.
Robby Mook, the former campaign manager for Hillary Clinton’s failed 2016 presidential campaign, was the co-founder of Defending Digital Democracy. His initiative arose out of the national freakout over Russian meddling that he and his former boss helped stir when they blamed their loss on Russian interference. Mook’s new outfit pledged to “protect from hackers and propaganda attacks.”
He founded the organization with help from Matt Rhoades, a former campaign manager for Republican Mitt Romney whose public relations company was sued by a Silicon Valley investor after it branded him “an agent of the Russian government” and “a friend of Russian President, Vladimir Putin.” Rhoades’ firm had been contracted by a business rival to destroy the investor’s reputation.
As outrage grew over the delay in Iowa caucus results, Mook publicly denied any role in designing the notorious app.
.@RobbyMook, you may not have built the app, but the @nytimes is reporting that you were involved in stress testing it.
Hours later, journalist Lee Fang reported that a previously unknown tech outfit called Shadow Inc. had contracted with the Iowa Democratic Party to create the failed technology. The firm was comprised of former staffers for Obama, Clinton and the tech industry, and had been paid for services by the Buttigieg campaign.
FEC filings show the Iowa Democratic party and Buttigieg campaign paid Shadow Inc.
An Israel lobby moneyman’s path to Mayor Pete’s wine cave
Shadow Inc. was launched by a major Democratic dark money nonprofit called Acronym, which also gave birth to a $7.7 million Super PAC known as Pacronym.
According to Sludge, Pacronym’s largest donor is Seth Klarman. A billionaire hedge funder, Klarman also happens to be a top donor to Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar.
Though he has attracted some attention for his role in the campaign, Klarman’s prolific funding of the pro-settler Israel lobby and Islamophobic initiatives has gone almost entirely unmentioned.
Seth Klarman is the founder of the Boston-based Baupost Group hedge fund and a longtime donor to corporate Republican candidates. After Donald Trump called for forgiving Puerto Rico’s debt, Klarman – the owner of $911 million of the island’s bonds – flipped and began funding Trump’s opponents.
The billionaire’s crusade against Trump ultimately led him to Mayor Pete’s wine cave.
By the end of 2019, Klarman had donated $5600 to Buttigieg and pumped money into the campaigns of Amy Klobuchar, Cory Booker and Kamala Harris as well.
The billionaire’s support centrist candidates appears to be not only by his own financial interests, but by his deep and abiding ideological commitment to Israel and its expansionist project.
As I reported for Mondoweiss, Klarman has been a top funder for major Israel lobby outfits, including those that support the expansion of illegal settlements and Islamophobic initiatives.
Klarman was the principal funder of The Israel Project, the recently disbanded Israeli government-linked propaganda organization that lobbied against the Iran nuclear deal and backed the Israeli settlement enterprise.
Klarman has heaped hundreds of thousands of dollars on the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) and the American Jewish Committee. And he funded The David Project, which was established to suppress Palestine solidarity organizing on campuses across the US and battled to block the establishment of a Muslim community center in Boston.
Through his support for the Friends of Ir David Inc, Klarman directly involved himself in the Israeli settlement enterprise, assisting the US-based tax exempt arm of the organization that oversaw a wave of Palestinian expulsions in the occupied East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan.
Other pro-Israel groups reaping the benefits of Klarman’s generosity include Birthright Israel, the AIPAC-founded Washington Institute for Near East Policy, and the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD), a neoconservative think tank that helped devise Trump’s “maximum pressure” campaign of economic warfare on Iran.
Klarman is the owner of the Times of Israel, an Israeli media outlet that once published a call for Palestinian genocide. (The op-ed was ultimately removed following public backlash).
In recent weeks, Buttigieg has sought to distinguish himself from Sanders on the issue of Israel-Palestine. During a testy exchange this January with a self-proclaimed Jewish supporter of Palestinian human rights, the South Bend mayor backtracked on a previous pledge to withhold military aid to Israel if it annexed parts of the West Bank.
NEW: The day after Trump unveiled his plan green-lighting Israeli annexation and Netanyahu’s announcement of a cabinet vote on annexation this Tuesday, @PeteButtigieg backtracked on his repeated promise that the “U.S. will not foot the bill for annexation.” #StopFundingOccupationpic.twitter.com/dldyRnI5lo
Battling Bernie with hedge fund money and sexism claims
Like Klarman, Donald Sussman is a hedge funder who has channeled his fortune into Pacronym. He has given $1 million to the Super PAC and was also top donor to Clinton in 2016.
His daughter, Democratic operative Emily Tisch Sussman, declared on MSNBC in September that “if you still support Sanders over Warren, it’s kind of showing your sexism.”
MSNBC pundit says if you support Bernie Sanders over Elizabeth Warren it’s “showing your sexism.” pic.twitter.com/fghFIqOF6C
As Democratic elites like the Sussmans braced for a Bernie Sanders triumph in Iowa, a mysterious piece of technology spun out by a group they supported delayed the vote results, preventing Sanders from delivering a victory speech. And the politician many of them supported, Pete Buttigieg, exploited the moment to declare himself the winner.
In such a strange scenario, the conspiracy theories write themselves.
Baby Yoda A Huge Hit As Disney Reports 26.5 Million Disney+ Subs, Smashing Expectations
Investors were eagerly looking forward to Disney’s results today, not so much for the actual earnings, but to see what Disney’s success was in grabbing streaming TV market share from Netflix and other established streamers such as Amazon for its fledgling Disney+ service, home of the streaming hit The Mandalorian (and baby Yoda). And Disney did not disappoint, reporting a whopping 26.5MM Disney+ subscribers, and smashing consensus expectations of 20.8 million, as the force appears to be very strong with the baby Yoda.
Additionally, Disney also reported that in Q1, it had 6.6 million ESPN+ subscribers, and another 30.4 million Hulu subscribers, as Disney is rapidly emerging as a significant competitor to Netflix, which this quarter reported 61 million domestic and 106 million international subs, however at the expense of $1.7 billion in cash burn in Q4 alone, whereas Disney is a solidly profitable and cash flow positive company.
What is surprising, however, is that despite the massive surge in Disney+ subs, Disney still missed on earnings, even if it beat on the top line, as per the following Q1 results:
Adjusted EPS $1.53 vs. $1.84 y/y, estimate $1.46 (range $1.28 to $1.69)
Media networks operating income $1.63 billion, +25% y/y, estimate $1.61 billion
Direct-to-consumer & international operating loss $693 million, -6.4% q/q, estimate loss $824.3 million
Commenting on the earnings, Disney CEO Bob Iger said “We had a strong first quarter, highlighted by the launch of Disney+, which has exceeded even our greatest expectations.”
And while that may have been enough to boost the stock sharply higher in kneejerk response to the Disney+ number, as algos read the rest of the report and saw the somewhat disappointing bottom line miss, the stock is now red.
Tesla Stock Suddenly Plunges As Much As $100 In Seconds
Having traded as high as $969, a move of almost $200 higher on the day, and hitting a market cap of $175 billion, Tesla stock suddenly collapsed just around 3:50pm, dropping as much as $100 from $960 to $860 in seconds, in what can only be described as the mother of all red candles…
… on a burst in volume, with over 2 million shares hitting the tape in the last few minutes of trading.
Putting that move in context, Tesla lost roughly $20BN in market cap in just that one drop, or as much as the entire market cap as Fiat Chrysler.
Both longs and shorts scrambled to find any news for the move, although despite a vague rumor of a follow-on offering, there was none, even as Tesla dumped back to its cash open levels, before recovering modestly.
And while investors try to find the reason for the furious liquidation, one place that may provide a hint for the stock’s massive ramp higher in the past few days comes from google’s autocomplete function, which now shows the following when googling “Should I Buy…”
Stocks Shrug Off Global Pandemic Fears As Gold ETF Holdings Hit Record High
Despite GOOGL’s demise, the exuberance in TSLA sent Nasdaq back to record highs today, shrugging off any anxiety over global pandemics, trade collapses, and the second-largest economy in the world basically closed.
But while stocks soared, bonds were not buying it…
The IMX is TD Ameritrade’s proprietary, behavior-based index, aggregating Main Street investor positions and activity to measure what investors actually were doing and how they were positioned in the markets.
So it’s rug-pulling time for the big boys…
* * *
Another CNY400 Billion net liquidity injection juiced China stocks…
Source: Bloomberg
European markets uniformly soared today extending Monday;s modest gains…
Source: Bloomberg
And US stocks smashed higher at the open and largely trod water (except Nasdaq which kept pushing to record-er highs)…
Nasdaq broke out to new record highs… as if the coronavirus never happened (we’ve seen this pattern before)…
It did seem like Dow 29k was important for Trump ahead of tonight’s SOTU, but once again it just couldn’t get there…
For the second day in a row, a giant squeeze of the shorts at the open…
Source: Bloomberg
While GOOGL stole the headlines with disappointing earnings, it was TSLA that dominated traders’ minds…
Source: Bloomberg
TSLA’s short-squeeze is beginning to be on par with VW’s infamous move in 2008…
Source: Bloomberg
Source: Bloomberg
Treasury yields surged today…
Source: Bloomberg
30Y Yields spiked off the 2.00% level…
Source: Bloomberg
The dollar held yesterday’s gains back into its tight range…
Source: Bloomberg
Yuan rebounded today after China’s gigantic liquidity injection…
Source: Bloomberg
Cryptos were broadly lower today with the notable outlier of Ripple surging early on…
Source: Bloomberg
Copper was higher today (China liquidity) but PMs and crude were knocked lower…
Source: Bloomberg
Palladium soared today back towards record highs…
Source: Bloomberg
WTI traded down below $50…quite a swing from the Soleimani killing and Iran missile strike highs…
Source: Bloomberg
And while traders show no fear whatsoever piling into the most expensive and most overbought stock market ever, global gold holdings in ETFs has risen to record highs…
Source: Bloomberg
And finally, we note that, just like during The Fed’s Y2K Liquidity splurge, Nasdaq has rebounded right on time…
Source: Bloomberg
It also seems like stocks have come to terms with Bernie getting the nod!!?? Or are they revelling in Iowa’s ‘good start’ at rigging it away from Sanders once again.
Dear liberal white women: Do you enjoy pasta carbonara, getting together with friends, and learning about your complicity in racism? If so, you’re in luck. Professional social justice activists Saira Rao and Regina Jackson are willing to come to your home, eat your food, and interrogate you and your gal pals to the point of tears.
And get this: The cost is a mere $2,500.
Sadly, I’m not making this up. Amazingly, white women are paying. According to a must-be-read-to-be-believed article in The Guardian, Rao and Jackson—who are Indian American and black, respectively—have already attended 15 “Race to Dinner” events in which they demand that attendees confess their racism and admit they are part of the problem.
“If you did this in a conference room, they’d leave,” Rao said. “But wealthy white women have been taught never to leave the dinner table.”
For someone who stylizes herself as an anti-racism activist, Rao engages in constant racial stereotyping. Her Twitter feed reads like satire in the vein of Titania McGrath, a self-aware parody account (at least from what I can recall of it before she blocked me). For Rao, everything and everyone is racist—especially white women, whom she does not like one bit. Some highlights:
To be absolutely clear, the Race to Dinner events do not feature actual racists. They are attended by well-meaning people who have somehow allowed themselves to become convinced that their souls are impure. Consider the testimony of one dinner host:
“I want to hire people of color. Not because I want to be … a white savior. I have explored my need for validation … I’m working through that … Yeah. Um … I’m struggling,” she stutters, before finally giving up.
Another attendee, Morgan Richards, “admits she recently did nothing when someone patronizingly commended her for adopting her two black children, as though she had saved them.” This is very problematic:
“What I went through to be a mother, I didn’t care if they were black,” [Morgan Richards] says, opening a window for Rao to challenge her: “So, you admit it is stooping low to adopt a black child?” And Richards accepts that the undertone of her statement is racist.
One more:
Erika Righter raises her tattooed forearm to her face, in despair of all of the racism she’s witnessed as a social worker, then laments how a white friend always ends phone calls with “Love you long time.”
“And what is your racism, Erika?” Rao interrupts, refusing to let her off the hook. The mood becomes tense. Another woman adds: “I don’t know you, Erika. But you strike me as being really in your head.Everything I’m hearing is from the neck up.”
Righter, a single mother, retreats before defending herself: “I haven’t read all the books. I’m new to this.”
Rao and Jackson have certainly come up with an interesting gimmick for their grift, though there’s nothing novel about trying to convince people they are wicked and sinful—in need of a kind of absolution that only the grifter can provide (for a cost). Indeed, intersectional activism occasionally feels akin to a religion, to the extent that it emphasizes the internal brokenness of human beings and the fallen state of the world.
It’s tempting, then, to observe Rao and Jackson and thus write-off the entire concept of progressive activism on race. But in truth, they are such ridiculous caricatures that probably the most appropriate response is simply to pity the gullible people whom they’ve swindled.
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“Strong Push Of Arctic Air” – Polar Vortex To Strike US Next Week
A polar vortex will strike the US early next week, according to AccuWeather.
AccuWeather Lead Long-Range Meteorologist Paul Pastelok said Central states would be the first to experience a blast of Arctic air, excepted to arrive early next week.
“We are anticipating that a strong push of Arctic air will take place into the US during the second and third week of February in response to displacement or weakening of the polar vortex during the first week of February,” Pastelok said.
He said an area of high pressure above much of the southwestern Atlantic this winter has led to unseasonably warm temperatures for the East Coast to start the year.
“For this reason, we expect the upcoming big discharge of Arctic air to target the interior West and northern Plains initially, where it might be more persistent as February progresses,” Pastelok said.
“While much colder air could work into the Eastern states during the middle to latter parts of February, there is some uncertainty as to how long-lasting and/or severe this may be, depending in part on the persistent area of high pressure over the southwestern Atlantic,” he added.
The last time a polar vortex sent Arctic air into Central states and parts of the Northeast, it was around late November into December.
Data provider Refinitiv estimates that heating degree days (HDDs) for US-Lower 48 for the next two weeks is expected to increase, indicating that it will require more energy, starting next week, to heat homes across the country as the polar vortex sends frigid air into Central states.
An active storm track could setup in the weeks ahead with colder air in the Central states and in some parts of the Northeast.
But-but-but, Punxsutawney Phil didn’t see his shadow on Sunday, declaring that spring is on its way. Well, before spring arrives, there might be one last shot of cold Arctic air…
The annual Groundhog Day event at Gobbler’s Knob in Punxsutawney had ‘Punxsutawney Phil’ declaring that spring will come early after the animal failed to cast a shadow https://t.co/Ld9rU4jJS5pic.twitter.com/jKaULwD2v2
Gordon Chang: “Overwhelmed” Chinese Authorities Are Falsifying Death Toll From Coronavirus
With at least 425 dead (amid an almost nation-wide community lockdown), one outspoken China expert is saying that the number represents a false estimate fabricated by a country notorious for secrecy and censorship.
Gordon Chang, who authored the book “The Coming Collapse of China”, explained on “Tucker Carlson Tonight” last night that “local Chinese authorities have just lost the ability to pick up corpses due to a breakdown in government.”
“So really what we are having right now is, they are completely overwhelmed,” Chang added.
“They are not able to keep accurate statistics. So what we are witnessing is essentially a breakdown in government and keeping accurate statistics is a very minor part of their priorities right now.”
Multiple witnesses and leaked video’s show heavily “overwhelmed” authorities making threats against people “spreading rumors” or showing the chaotic handling of the situation at ground zero.
Chang said that while he understands the preventative measure, he believes the quarantine has “made the problem worse.”
“I can understand why they want to quarantine but remember, the Wuhan mayor said about 5 million people from his city left before the quarantine was imposed,” he said.
“Also right now the quarantine has aggravated a problem and that is [that] people can’t get to hospitals, so they are at home…they are dying.”
“They are infecting other people in their households because they are not, in a sense, quarantined from wives, husbands, brothers, sisters,” he continued.
“The quarantine has made the problem worse. It’s also created panic. That panic has had consequences on, for instance, social cohesion which is absolutely necessary if you want to beat an epidemic.”
“It’s not just Wuhan,” he said. “Many Virologists think that [conditions in] Wuhan will be duplicated in cities like Shanghai, maybe even Beijing. Clearly there is fear everywhere throughout China right now.”
“This is only going to get worse,” Chang concluded, adding the virus will likely not be contained until “April or May.”
Apparently confirming Chang’s warning, The Daily Mail reports a Wuhan medic has said there are more deaths from coronavirus than reported, as patients are dying before they can even be tested for the virus.
Hospital worker Jeisi Luo, not his real name, also made the shocking claim that there are far more cases than official figures suggest, because the waiting list for diagnosis is too long.
Some leftists are blaming “Russian propaganda accounts” for the embarrassing fallout from the Iowa caucus, fulfilling a prediction by President Trump that they would do precisely that.
The results from last night’s caucus were delayed to to a “reporting issue” related to an app called Shadow, the owner of which Tara McGowan is a Mayor Pete Buttigieg supporter and is married to one of his advisers.
Buttigieg declared victory last night despite internal polling showing he had lost to Bernie Sanders.
This prompted the hashtag #MayorCheat to trend on Twitter and that in turn prompted numerous hysterical Buttigieg supporters to claim the hashtag was a creation of Russian-controlled bots.
“When will the Democrats start blaming RUSSIA, RUSSIA, RUSSIA, instead of their own incompetence for the voting disaster that just happened in the Great State of Iowa?” asked President Trump in a tweet.
When will the Democrats start blaming RUSSIA, RUSSIA, RUSSIA, instead of their own incompetence for the voting disaster that just happened in the Great State of Iowa?
Fact is, many on the left were already doing exactly that even before Trump tweeted.
“While I can’t yet prove it, I feel safe in saying that both #BernieWon and #MayorCheat are trending because Russian propaganda accounts are amplifying them,” tweeted David Slack.
“Putin’s goal is to divide us. Instead, let’s stand together, elect Democrats, and sanction his ass out of office,” he added.
Hi.
While I can’t yet prove it, I feel safe in saying that both #BernieWon and #MayorCheat are trending because Russian propaganda accounts are amplifying them.
Putin’s goal is to divide us. Instead, let’s stand together, elect Democrats, and sanction his ass out of office.
“If you are legitimately tweeting the #MayorCheat hashtag then you are either: a) A Russian operative b) A GOP operative or c) A useful idiot playing right into Trump/Russia’s strategy of dividing the Democratic party,” tweeted another user.
If you are legitimately tweeting the #MayorCheat hashtag then you are either:
a) A Russian operative
b) A GOP operative
or
c) A useful idiot playing right into Trump/Russia’s strategy of dividing the Democratic party
Any Democrat is 1000X better than Trump. #IowaCaucas
However, most respondents ridiculed the idea that anyone other than Buttigieg himself was to blame for the hashtag trending.
Some leftists are still so beset by Russia Derangement Syndrome, they think any criticism of their preferred candidate must be some kind of Kremlin-orchestrated conspiracy.
No wonder Trump’s approval rating just hit an all time high.
* * *
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