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Afghan Teen Wasn’t Gay Enough to Get Asylum in Austria: Report

An 18-year-old Afghan native seeking asylum in Austria may have had his application denied because he didn’t act gay enough.

The unnamed teenager, who’s been living in Austria since 2016, first applied for asylum on the basis of his Hazara heritage, according to Deutsche Welle (DW). The Hazara minority is persecuted in Afghanistan.

Later, he said he couldn’t go back to his home country because he’s gay. Homosexuality is against the law in Afghanistan and many other Muslim-majority countries.

“Of course it’s difficult to tell people that you’re gay, when you live in asylum accommodation centers where you still have to hide your sexuality. He was a teenager—they need time and a trustful environment,” LGBT rights activist Marty Huber tells The Washington Post. Huber works for Queer Base, a human rights organization that’s representing the Afghan teen.

But the teenager’s asylum application was rejected by an Austrian official who didn’t think he acted gay enough. “The way you walk, act or dress does not show even in the slightest that you could be homosexual,” the official wrote in his assessment, according to AFP.

The official also based his assessment on the fact that the teen had gotten into several fights and appeared to be something of a loner. “You appear to be capable of a level of aggression which would not be expected among homosexuals. You didn’t have lots of friends.…Aren’t homosexuals usually more sociable?” the official said.

There’s more. AFP reports:

The official rejected the statement that the Afghan teenager had kissed straight men, saying he would have been beaten if he had done so, the Falter reported.

He had said he became aware of his sexuality when he was 12 years old, but the official found that was “rather early” and so not likely, particularly in a society such as Afghanistan “where there is no public sexual stimulation through fashion and advertisement”.

Austria’s Interior Ministry wouldn’t confirm the details of the case to the Post. But it noted that “using a few sentences out of” the 120,000 asylum decisions the government has made in the last two years “does not reflect reality.”

“Asylum-seekers must substantiate their reasons for fleeing,” the ministry said in a statement to DW. “There are no concrete rules of proof, but the authorities must show if and why a claim was found to have been substantiated.”

The teen is appealing his asylum rejection.

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Pompeo Forms “Iran Action Group” To Coordinate All Iran Strategy, Reports Directly To White House

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced on Thursday that the United States has formed an “Iran Action Group” within the State Department to guide Washington’s post-nuclear deal policy. The group will coordinate all activity and policy related to Iran, including inter-agency initiatives after President Trump withdrew the US from the 2015 nuclear deal in May. 

Pompeo told reporters the action group would be “directing, reviewing and coordinating all aspects of the State Department’s Iran-related activity.”

It is to be headed by current State Department director of policy planning Brian Hook, who will in turn report directly to Pompeo. Hook has been a lead negotiator attempting to pressure European allies to significantly alter prior commitments related to the international deal. 

“Our hope is that one day soon we can reach an agreement with Iran but we must see major changes in the regime both inside and outside of its borders,” said Pompeo, and added, “The Iranian people and the world are demanding that Iran finally act like a normal nation.”

Echoing prior statements which suggest the administration could be exploring ways to foster regime change, Pompeo said the State Dept. is committed to a “whole of government effort to change the Iranian regime behavior.”

Hook also addressed the briefing, saying he’ll be guiding an “elite teams” of foreign affairs officials to implement a “new strategy” which “addresses all manifestation of the Iranian threat and the new Iran Action Group will be focused on implementing that strategy.”

The group, Hooker said, will “play a critical role in leading our efforts within the Department and executing the president’s Iran strategy.”

This will chiefly include attempting to ensure European and other allies conform to the White House’s re-imposed sanctions to stop what it has called Iran’s “malign activities” in the Middle East.

This will involve ratcheting up pressure to curb European imports of Iranian oil, especially as a November 4th deadline approaches in which sanctions will be reimposed on those still still dealing with Iran. 

Since Trump’s pullout of the JCPOA, the US has demanded a complete renegotiation based on new terms while accusing Tehran of still seeking nuclear weapons, something which the European Union has balked at, refusing to comply.

But the new “Iran Action Group” is sure to also continue previously revealed plans for regime destabilization, including a US-sponsored 24/7 Farsi-language channel to combat Tehran’s “fake news” in order to push back one what Pompeo earlier in the summer described as “the long-ignored voice of the Iranian people”.

And in early July it was revealed that a high level joint US-Israeli “working group” had already been meeting for months which involved top White House and State Department officials, including National Security Advisor John Bolton, which reportedly held informal strategy sessions discussing scenarios of pursuing regime change in Iran.

Axios reported at the time: “Israel and the United States formed a joint working group a few months ago that is focused on internal efforts to encourage protests within Iran and pressure the country’s government.”

Pompeo’s new initiative appears to be a formalization of plans connected with the joint working group, worrisome for the fact that both Bolton and the Israelis have long advocated for the US to wage preemptive war on Iran. 

On Monday, Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei declared that Iran would never enter direct alks with the Trump White House, stating in a tweet, “THERE WILL BE NO WAR, NOR WILL WE NEGOTIATE WITH THE U.S.”.

With Iran’s economy plummeting, and with Washington formalizing inter-agency cooperation for further action targeting Tehran, it appears the two sides could be headed toward an Iraq-style collision course — whether this takes place months from now, or years.

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Matt Taibbi Warns Censorship Does Not End Well

Two weeks ago, Matt Taibbi warned in Rolling Stone that social networks are too big and broken to properly function, and any “fixes” will only create more problems.

Since then, amid more permanent and temporary bans and ‘timeouts’, things have got worse and Taibbi is back to warn America that censorship does not end well…

Excerpted from Rolling Stone,

How America learned to stop worrying and put Mark Zuckerberg in charge of everything…

Last week, we saw another flurry of censorship news. Facebook apparently suspended VenezuelaAnalysis.com, a site critical of U.S. policy toward Venezuela. (It was reinstated Thursday.) Twitter suspended a pair of libertarians, including @DanielLMcAdams of the Ron Paul Institute and @ScottHortonShow of Antiwar.com, for using the word “bitch” (directed toward a man) in a silly political argument. They, too, were later re-instated.

More significantly: Google’s former head of free expression issues in Asia, Lokman Tsui, blasted the tech giant’s plan to develop a search engine that would help the Chinese government censor content.

…

Few Americans heard these stories, because the big “censorship” news last week surrounded the widely hated Alex Jones. After surviving halting actions by Facebook and YouTube the week before, the screeching InfoWars lunatic was hit decisively, removed from Apple, Facebook, Google and Spotify.

…

Collectively, all these stories represent a revolutionary moment in media. Jones is an incidental player in a much larger narrative.

Both the Jones situation and the Facebook-Atlantic Council deletions seem an effort to fulfill a request made last year by the Senate Judiciary Committee. Last October, Facebook, Google and Twitter were asked by Hawaii Senator Mazie Hizono to draw up a “mission statement” to “prevent the foment of discord.”

…

After Trump’s shocking win in 2016, everyone turned to Facebook and Google to fix “fake news.” But nobody had a coherent definition of what constitutes it.

Many on the left lamented the Wikileaks releases of Democratic Party emails, but those documents were real news, and the complaint there was more about the motives of sources, and editorial emphasis, rather than accuracy.

When Google announced it was tightening its algorithm to push “more authoritative content” last April, it defined “fake news” as “…blatantly misleading, low quality, offensive or downright false information.”

…

It isn’t clear, but within short order, a whole range of alternative sites (from Alternet to Truthdig to the World Socialist Website) started complaining about significant drops in traffic, apparently thanks to changed search processes.

…

Now that we’ve opened the door for ordinary users, politicians, ex-security-state creeps, foreign governments and companies like Raytheon to influence the removal of content, the future is obvious: an endless merry-go-round of political tattling, in which each tribe will push for bans of political enemies.

…

The most ominous development involves countries asking for direct cleansing of opposition movements, a la China’s search engine, or Tel Aviv’s demands that Facebook and Google delete pages belonging to Palestinian activists. (This happened: Israel’s justice minister said last year that Facebook granted 95 percent of such requests.)

…

Americans are not freaking out about this because most of us have lost the ability to distinguish between general principles and political outcomes. So long as the “right” people are being zapped, no one cares.

But we should care. Censorship is one of modern man’s great temptations. Giving in to it hasn’t provided many happy stories.

Read the full detailed story here…

 

 

 

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Mass-Casualty Incident: Dozens Overdose On Synthetic Marijuana In New Haven

The Office of Emergency Management in New Haven, Connecticut, has reported a mass casualty incident involving at least 71 people who have overdosed from synthetic marijuana with 52 of them near a Connecticut city park, authorities said late Wednesday.

A majority of the overdoses were located in the vicinity of the New Haven Green, a park near Yale University, throughout the day Wednesday, according to officials.

An official told CBS News that 25 overdoses occurred within a three-hour span and that some overdoses were “in multiples of 4-6 at a time.” All of those overdoses were in the area of the New Haven Green, said Rick Fontana, the city’s director of emergency operations.

At the height of the mass casualty incident, emergency medical services resources, such as personnel and equipment, were overwhelmed by the number of victims stretching across the 16-acre park. No deaths were reported but officials said two people suffered life-threatening symptoms.

The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) quickly revealed that the drug was K2, a synthetic cannabinoid, that induces a marijuana-like effect when smoked. The DEA also said there were no additives in the K2.

CBS affiliate WFSB-TV reported that the Department of Public Health delivered 50 doses of Narcan, to replenish the supply after first responders went through an entire stockpile the night before in New Haven. The local broadcaster adds that three arrests have been made.

Fontana told CBS that the city’s 911 dispatch started receiving calls just after 8 a.m. about possible overdoses at the park. First responders found multiple individuals suffering from “a multitude of signs and symptoms ranging from vomiting, hallucinating, high blood pressure, shallow breathing, semi-conscious and unconscious states.”

“Two individuals had life-threatening symptoms, and the others had non-life-threatening symptoms,” he said.

Paramedics were forced to permanently station themselves at Connecticut’s New Haven Green on Wednesday as the number of people falling unconscious or vomiting increased following a mass K2 overdose (Sorce/ Daily Mail) 

At the height of the situation, emergency crews were sprinting across the 16-acre park from victim to victim as the number of those falling unconscious or vomiting increased (Sorce/ Daily Mail) 

Those who were treated were suffering from a range of symptoms, including vomiting, hallucinations, high blood pressure and shallow breath (Sorce/ Daily Mail) 

Police believe the person responsible for the overdoses may have been given out free samples of the K2 drug  (Sorce/ Daily Mail) 

At one point, officials estimate that four to six people were dropping from overdoses at the same time and 25 of the overdoses happened within a three-hour stretch (Sorce/ Daily Mail) 

A total of 71 people were rushed to various hospitals suffering from apparent overdoses. Another five people refused medical treatment (Sorce/ Daily Mail) 

Officials said the patients were “all different ages” and that Narcan was administered to some.

NBC Connecticut Reporter records the moment when first responders arrived to find one man overdosing on the drug.

Here is another incident that was captured on social media.

WTNH News 8 reports from the scene to find a massive police and emergency crew presence.

Large police presence continued into the overnight.

Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy released a statement Wednesday evening highlight the “very real and serious threat that illicit street drugs pose to the health of individuals”:

“The substance behind these overdoses is highly dangerous and must be avoided. The state Department of Public Health and the Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services have been assisting New Haven officials throughout the day. I have spoken with Mayor Harp and assured her that the state remains committed and ready to assist their response efforts wherever needed.”

New Haven, Connecticut, Mayor Toni Harp’s statement said:

“Today New Haven was on the front lines of a coast-to-coast struggle to combat the public health menace of illicit distribution and use of what appear to be tainted street drugs … I’m extremely grateful for the timely and effective work of first responders who helped revive, transport, and save these victims. I’m also grateful to the state Department of Public Health for its quick response to our request for additional doses of Narcan, the antidote administered to several of those afflicted.”

Maybe America has a drug problem? 

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Peter Schiff: “We Are Seeing A Lot Of Warning Signs” Of A Financial Crisis

Authored by Mac Slavo via SHTFplan.com,

Just like the financial crisis of 2008 which investor Peter Schiff accurately predicted, there are warning signs again that are being ignored.  “We are seeing a lot of warning signs people should be worried about, but again they’re dismissing them, much the way they did 10 years ago,” Shiff said.

Schiff is known for his “doom and gloom” market predictions, yet he’s been spot on in the past.  And our current debt-based system is unsustainable to the point that a severe global economic crisis is imminent – we just don’t know when the global bubble will burst. Once again, Schiff is trying to warn people, because the signs are there, but who’s listening?

“We’re seeing a lot of warning signs people should be worried about, but again they’re dismissing them, much the way they did 10 years ago. You know, we’re getting close to the 10-year anniversary of the 2008 financial crisis. Remember, the whole thing started in August of 2008. Here we are August 2018, 10 years later. I think we’re heading for an even bigger crisis and the same people are even more clueless.”

 –Peter Schiff

A big problem that could compound the next financial crisis is one Schiff continues to point out: Americans are flat broke.

“Real wages, despite the 2.7% increase, real wages are actually down during that year. In fact, this is the biggest drop in real wages in six years. Now to hear Donald Trump talk, or anybody else talk, real wages are soaring, right? Everybody is getting a raise. They’re not. Inflation – consumer prices are rising faster than wages,” Schiff said in his recent podcast on the subject of the state of the economy.

Wages have been stagnant especially in the face of inflation. Rising interest rates will also harm those already living paycheck to paycheck.  There are a lot of people buying stuff on credit. In fact, the entire economy is built on working-class debt and a system which transfers wealth to the elites from the workers. 

Schiff is hard on Donald Trump too, and rightfully so.  Lower taxes are always a good thing, the lower the better, in fact.  But Republicans refused to cut any government spending while instead, increasing it to the point of running massive deficits, making them worse than Democrats when it comes to being fiscally conservative. The cold truth is that a back-up plan is needed, and most Americans don’t have that.  Many would be in some serious trouble during a financial downturn, and the country is most definitely headed that way. -SHTFPlan

As Peter put it, America is the real Turkey…

“All the people who are willing to skewer Turkey because it’s doing exactly what the United States is doing yet they don’t recognize the same problems that are building in the US.”

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Pennsylvania Lawmakers Want to Lift the Statute of Limitations Amid the Catholic Priest Sex Abuse Report

|||Tupungato/Dreamstime.comAfter a report found that 301 Catholic priests, clergy, and lay teachers in Pennsylvania sexually abused over 1,000 children, several in the state government hope to both lift and expand the statute of limitations for child sex crimes.

The disturbing report, which is 884 pages long, found that systemic sexual abuse occurred over in six Pennsylvania dioceses over the span of at least 70 years. The report also established a pattern that revealed Bishops and others in church leadership were aware of the sexual abuse and chose to act in a way that often protected the predators from repercussions. In several instances, Bishops dissuaded victims from reporting abuse and actively worked to prevent meaningful investigation into the allegations.

Among its many revelations, the report exposed the way some used Pennsylvania’s statute of limitations on reporting child sex abuse to their advantage. Many of the victims are now too old to see their abusers prosecuted. The current statute of limitations lets victims of child sexual abuse sue their abusers, and those complicit, in civil court until the age of 30. PennLive reports that a bill sponsored by Senate President Pro Tempore Joe Scarnati (R) would raise the age to 50. Additionally, the bill, Senate Bill 261, would completely eliminate the statute of limitations for any future criminal prosecutions for child sex abuse.

As reported, Scarnati’s bill was unanimously approved in the Senate, but has been stalled in the House since February 2017.

Supporters of the expanded window hope to see Scarnati’s bill joined with a “real deal” amendment proposed by Rep. Mark Rozzi (D), who himself is a victim of clergy abuse. PennLive also reports that Rozzi’s amendment would give victims an additional two years to pursue civil action. Rozzi has since argued that it can take victims a long time to come to terms with the abuse they suffered, often times after the window is closed.

Scarnati’s bill is expected to come up for a vote in the fall. Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro, who presented the report to the public, urged state lawmakers to pass the bill.

Victims in other states are looking for similar actions. WVUE reports that an older Louisiana man brought allegations against a former deacon in the Archdiocese of New Orleans. Louisiana faces similar issues with its statute of limitations on child sex abuse.

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SEC Is Probing If Musk Tweeted About Tesla Deal To “Crush The Shorts”

With every passing day, it is becoming increasingly likely that Musk’s “funding secured” tweet could end up beinn the costliest in history, and could potentially land him, or others, in prison.

Last week, before it was confirmed that the SEC had opened a probe into Tesla, by sending the company a subpoena inquiring into Musk’s actions, we wrote that “the biggest risk for Musk is if regulators find that he made a statement only intending to goose his company’s share price, or as he likes to put it, “crush the shorts.” Under US securities law, companies and corporate officers can (and will) be held liable for making misstatements or omitting information that shareholders need to make informed investment decisions.”

It now appears that the SEC is also wondering the same thing, because the WSJ reports that the SEC is now investigating whether Musk “intentionally misled investors when he tweeted about the proposal in a bid to hurt short sellers by driving up Tesla’s stock price.“

The line of inquiry comes as the regulator is pressing Tesla directors for details on how much information Musk shared with them before he tweeted last week about a potential deal to take the company private, the WSJ reports citing a person familiar with the matter.

And, as has been extensively discussed here in the past week, establishing what the board knew and when is key to the SEC’s probe because if Musk didn’t show the board a relatively firm deal with potential investors, it could indicate that the conversations weren’t as far along as he suggested when he tweeted that he had “funding secured” for a deal.

It would also confirm that Musk’s only intention was to, indeed, “crush the shorts”, however by manipulating public perception about what was already decided.

And since we already know that Musk did not have a firm deal in place, and funding was certainly not “secured”, it is up to the SEC to demonstrate that there are no individuals who are “too eccentric to prosecute” for the simple reason that anyone who intentionally misleads shareholders – even Elon Musk – can be charged with fraud under U.S. securities laws.

On the other hands, if Musk can show he had a basis to make the statement—such as advanced talks with the Saudi fund or a promise from them to fund the deal—regulators would be less likely to allege that his statement was misleading or false.

Then again if Musk elaborate on that statement, he already would have, which is why TSLA is now trading below where it was when the Saudis announced their 5% stake.

Meanwhile, Musk’s alleged fraudulent tweet has already made the Urban Dictionary.

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Trump’s Ridiculous Military Parade Is Already Three Times Over Budget

The absurd military parade that literally only one person wants to see happen this November will cost an estimated $92 million—more than three times what the White House initially said would be highest possible price tag for the event.

When President Donald Trump first pitched the idea of having the American military flex its way down Pennsylvania Avenue—after he returned from watching a Bastille Day celebration in Paris last year—his budget-makers said the whole thing could be done for no more than $30 million and possibly as little as $10 million. But like all defense spending, the budget for Trump’s parade has ballooned to several times the initial projections, the Associated Press reports, citing an anonymous Pentagon official.

About $50 million of the parade’s cost will cover the Pentagon’s equipment, personnel, and other support, the AP source said. The rest will be used for security—because, yeah, you apparently have to spend $40 million to protect a parade of the world’s most powerful, expensive, and well-equipped military from being attacked by terrorists during a six-block walk. Asymmetric warfare is a bitch, ain’t it?

The AP also notes that the budget for the November 10 parade is not yet final and needs approval from Defense Secretary Jim Mattis. In other words, the costs could still increase.

Even if the parade were going to cost nothing, it wouldn’t be worth having. Marching a bunch of tanks through the capital city is something that should only happen in military dictatorships, dystopian movies, and France. This isn’t something that stable, democratic countries should do, and it’s certainly not something that American taxpayers should have to fund.

If this parade has to happen, it should be a celebration of the men and women who have fought so bravely during America’s almost 17 year long War on Terror—and it should coincide with the ending of those largely unauthorized conflicts, as Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.) has suggested.

Short of that, it should not happen. Polls show that a vast majority of American military personnel are opposed to the idea of having such a parade. Presumably, the America they volunteered to risk their lives for isn’t the type of place where this sort of thing happens. Others have pointed out the disgrace of holding the parade on the eve of Veteran’s Day—a day that, ever since it was called Armistice Day, has been meant as somber remembrance of the horrors that war has inflicted, not as a celebration of the terrible tools used to kill, wound, and maim human beings.

Sure, $92 million is a drop in the bucket of federal spending—heck, it’s barely more than 1 percent of the Pentagon’s budget—but America is going to face trillion-dollar annual deficits over the next few years, and you can’t start saving money until you stop wasting it on frivolous displays of militarism that accomplish nothing except tickling the president’s jollies.

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George Gilder Is Excited about Life After Google and You Should Be Too: Podcast

Google’s dominance in so many aspects of our digital lives is “creating a walled garden that’s basically controlled by two nerds in Silicon Valley,” says George Gilder, the author who more than anyone else predicted today’s imperfect online utopia in books such as Life After Television: The Coming Transformation of Media and American Life and Telecosm: How Infinite Bandwidth Will Revolutionize Our World.

Of course it’s not just Google (which owns YouTube), Gilder says in a Reason Podcast recorded at FreedomFest, the annual gathering of libertarian held every year in Las Vegas. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, and a host of other online ecosystems are working to keep us all within their own specific spaces, the better to sell to us and capture economic and demographic value from users. “This model of creating economic success on the Internet by homogenizing a walled garden doesn’t replicate,” argues Gilder, who says that if Apple or whomever can have their own proprietary space that keeps people tethered to one service on the Internet, then so too will China, Iran, and despotic regimes. “In the end, the internet breaks into fragile fiefdoms and falls apart.”

Long a prophet of transparency, mobility, and cryptocurrency, Gilder says that disruption is coming and, as with earlier shifts from mainframe to personal computers, it will be upon us long before the solons of Silicon Valley know what hit them.

In a wide-ranging conversation, I also ask Gilder how his techno-optimism about the liberating effects of cyberspace and technological innovation square with his old preoccupations in books such as Sexual Suicide and Men and Marriage about preserving traditional gender roles. “I do think reproduction is a vital human function, and if we botch that, we aren’t going to have any future. I really do think maintaining the sexual constitution, as I called it in Sexual Suicide, is important for procreation and having new generations.” Even in a world filled every sort of sex robot imaginable, he says, won’t be able to reprogram that.

Subscribe, rate, and review our podcast at iTunes. Listen at SoundCloud below:

Audio production by Ian Keyser.

Photo credit: Jim Epstein, Reason

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Dow Soars Most In 4 Months Because China Agrees To Talk On Trade (Again)

R.I.P.

Overnight saw the world was saved by a headline…

CHINA VICE COMMERCE MINISTER TO VISIT U.S. FOR TRADE TALKS

US equity futures show the excitement the algos felt from that headline… The Nasdaq was unable to recover its losses from yesterday while The Dow and S&P did but late weakness across the big tech names went the S&P back into the red from Tuesday’s close. Nasdaq erased most of its post-Trade-Talks gains, The Dow soared 1.5%…

 

The Dow surged all the way up to last Tuesday’s close… this was The Dow’s best day since early April.

The big driver of The Dow’s 400 point rally was not WMT as everyone suspected given its huge move (WMT +60pts) – the big winners were all trade-related (BA +100, CAT, & AAPL). On the cash index side today, Nasdaq was the laggard and The Dow the biggest winner…

 

The Dow bounce extended its move off the 50DMA…

 

Nasdaq and Small Caps remain red on the week…

 

A tale of two retailers today…

 

FANG Stocks continued to slump back near 10% correction levels… led by a 3% tumble in Facebook

 

Here’s the odd thing though – US Stocks soared on the trade-talks headline… but China stocks ended the day notably weaker…

 

Oh and by the way, both US and Chinese is utterly sucking recently…

 

While stocks soared, Treasury yields barely moved, managing around a 1bps rise on the day (the long-end unchanged)…

The yield curve dipped very modestly flatter on the day.

 

Notably, Emerging-market sovereign dollar-denominated debt is trading at a wider premium than speculative-grade U.S. companies – a notable break from historic norms – underscoring economic and political stresses around the world, while America Inc. powers ahead…

 

The Dollar ended the day marginally unchanged, after dipping to unchanged on the week before rallying this afternoon after Mnuchin’s comments about new sanctions for Turkey…

 

The Turkish Lira ended higher but was spooked by Mnuchin’s threats…

 

While everything seemed awesome if you just looked at US equities, some EM currencies continued to collapse.

South African Rand was worst…

And the Indian Rupee hit a new record low…

 

Of course the biggest news was the Yuan’s surge… on the back of headlines some Chinese officials will take a late summer vacation to Washington…

 

This was the biggest surge in offshore yuan since Jan 2017… the last time CNH neared 7.00!!

 

Which is coincidentally the same level that seems important to Turkey – look at the rebound after the Lira and Yuan hit parity…

 

Cryptos rallied broadly on this down-dollar day, but only Bitcoin remains green on the week…

 

Commodities all managed gains on the day but remain ugly on the week…

 

Today’s US stock market behavior was ‘odd’ in word, as Gluskin Sheff’s David Rosenberg notes…

The Dollar and Bonds ended practically unchanged and The Dow soared…

And finally, just in case you were wondering what sparked all this global weakness…

We’re gonna need to turn that spigot back on!!!

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