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Iran Protest Deaths Reported Ahead Of Monday’s Renewed Sanctions

As we predicted last week, protests have continued across multiple Iranian cities through the weekend fueled by general dissatisfaction over a collapsing economy, runaway inflation, and a sharp hike in prices on imported products, all of which has made life miserable for many Iranian citizens.

However, it is unclear the extent and frequency of the protests as multiple international reports have called the protests, now in their sixth day, “scattered” and sporadic.

With pressures continuing to mount ahead of renewed US sanctions set to snap back into place on Monday — the first wave of which will primarily target automobiles, currency, and gold — there are new unconfirmed reports of deaths after protesters clashed with police. 

A cleric speaks to a crowd of protesters demonstrating in Mashhad, in the Khorasan Razavi province, on August 3rd. Via Nasim News Agency

Demonstrations involving hundreds in each location were reported over the weekend in the nation’s capital, Tehran, and in the cities of Karaj, Shiraz, Mashhad, Isfahan, and Qom — the latter city especially notable given it’s considered by Shia Islam to be the holiest city in Iran. 

US state-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reports that a man was shot and killed on Saturday during a protest in Karaj, west of Tehran, citing Iran’s semi-official Fars. Details remain sparse, but the man was reportedly fired at by an unidentifiable assailant in a passing car. The same report included mention of about 20 protesters in Karaj detained by security forces. 

And on Sunday unverified reports on social media, mostly from opposition activist accounts, say heavy clashes continuing in the cities of Karaj and Qom have resulted in multiple deaths. 

 

However, there are conflicting accounts regarding the actual intensity and momentum of the protests, with activist along with a number of MEK-linked accounts (the controversial Iranian opposition group in exile, “Mujahideen e Khalq”) claiming that deliberate power outages and state blockage of the internet have prevented more footage and images depicting oppression from riot police and security services from reaching the outside world. 

US funded and state-run broadcasters like VOA News and Radio Free Europe have also featured regular reporting of the protests over the past week, especially through Farsi language sources. 

On Monday, the following sanctions will be re-imposed according to a US Treasury Department official statement:

“Sanctions on the purchase or acquisition of US dollar bank notes by the Government of Iran; sanctions on Iran’s trade in gold or precious metals; sanctions on the direct or indirect sale, supply, or transfer to or from Iran of graphite, raw, or semi-finished metals such as aluminum and steel, coal, and software for integrating industrial processes; sanctions on significant transactions related to the purchase or sale of Iranian rials, or the maintenance of significant funds or accounts outside the territory of Iran denominated in the Iranian rial; sanctions on the purchase, subscription to, or facilitation of the issuance of Iranian sovereign debt; sanctions on Iran’s automotive sector.” 

Furthermore, according to the US Treasury, this includes a ban on Iranian-origin carpets and foodstuffs, and notably (and dangerous for civilian air safety) export or re-export commercial airplanes as well as services and parts.

Likely, with the economic noose about to tighten even further on Monday, we could be witnessing just the beginning of more sustained unrest to come as external pressures make the Iranian economy implode. 

And meanwhile at the White House…

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Pro-ISIS Media Outlet Signals Imminent Biological Attack On The West

Authored by Pamela Geller via GellerReport.com,

This too will be ignored by the complicit, sharia-compliant Western press. A biological attack is the intentional release of a pathogen (disease causing agent) or biotoxin (poisonous substance produced by a living organism) against humans, plants, or animals. An attack against people could be used to cause illness, death, fear, societal disruption, and economic damage.

EXCLUSIVE: Pro-ISIS Media Outlet Publishes Posters Calling For Biological Attacks In The West, One Of Which Depicts San Francisco

Over the past week, a pro-Islamic State (ISIS) media group has published a series of posters encouraging biological attacks on Western targets.

Excerpt from the transcript (MEMRI):

PRO-ISIS MEDIA OUTLET CIRCULATES VIDEO CALLING FOR BIOLOGICAL ATTACKS IN THE WEST

This transcript was prepared from the original English subtitles of the video

Narrator: “While the world is watching silently! The European governments are developing satanic chemical attack systems to be brutally tested on the cities and peoples, which refused humiliation and humiliation so the Muslim countries in Africa and Khorsan turned into testing fields of phosphorus bombs and toxic gas. The crusader alliance continues bombing Mosul, Raqqa, Al-Anbar and others… with various types of chemical bombs and incendiary gases. And similar to the enemies of God! We invite you, oh Muwahid [monotheist] who lives between the Mushrikeen [idolaters] that you clean the dust of humiliation and to renew the fatal nightmare in the land of the devil worshipers with a silent destructive weapon. It can not be detected or tracked it can not be escaped or avoided with simple equipment, extract the most harmful viruses and infection bacteria then release them safely by following these simple steps: First, try to find the most severe epidemics to treat.”

On Screen: “Hantavirus, derived from the feces and droppings of rats that carry the plague of the most serious plague at the moment. The Cholera virus is extracted from the patient’s waste. Typhoid bacteria, found in human and animal wastes in general and frequent in the dirty areas.”

Narrator: “Second, spread the bacteria extracted by type as follows.”

On Screen: “Sprinkle the liquid substances or the basics of bacteria with drinking water to take effect automatically. Sprinkle the crushed material on exposed fruit and public foods or scatter them in the air in crowded places – with caution.”

Narrator: “Third, try to be safe and avoid any danger that may affect you during the preparation of harmful substances.”

On Screen: “Work in a room with natural and industrial ventilation. Wear gloves and blouses during work. Put the goggles and goggles – according to chemical process requirements. Do not touch or inhale the materials. Isolating the workplace from the rest of the house. Wash your hands with sterile soap and water after each test.”

Off-Screen Voice: “To our brothers in Aqidah [creed] and Iman [faith] in Europe, America, Russia, Australia, and elsewhere, your brothers in your lands have absolved themselves of blame so leap onto their tracks and take an example from their actions and know that Jannah [paradise] is beneath the shadows of swords.”

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Secret Service Slams “Irresponsible And Inaccurate” Guardian Report On Russian Spy In Moscow Embassy

The US Secret Service has refuted what they claim is an “irresponsible and inaccurate” Thursday report by The Guardian, in which the UK paper claims that a suspected Russian spy had been working “undetected in the heart of the American embassy in Moscow for more than a decade.” 

According to the Secret Service, they provided The Guaridain with “background information clearly refuting unfounded information.” 

The Guardian report reads in part: 

US counter-intelligence investigators discovered a suspected Russian spy had been working undetected in the heart of the American embassy in Moscow for more than a decade, the Guardian has learned.

The Russian national had been hired by the US Secret Service and is understood to have had access to the agency’s intranet and email systems, which gave her a potential window into highly confidential material including the schedules of the president and vice-president.

The woman had been working for the Secret Service for years before she came under suspicion in 2016 during a routine security sweep conducted by two investigators from the US Department of State’s Regional Security Office (RSO). –The Guardian

The paper then claims that the woman was having “regular and unauthorized meetings” with members of Russia’s top security agency, the FSB, and that the RSO sounded the alarm in January, 2017 – which the Secret Service reportedly ignored until letting her go several months later, “possibly to contain any potential embarassment.” 

According to the Guardian, her firing was purposefully concealed by US officials amid the mass removeal of 750 US personnel from its embassy staff of 1,200.  

“The Secret Service is trying to hide the breach by firing [her],” the source said. “The damage was already done but the senior management of the Secret Service did not conduct any internal investigation to assess the damage and to see if [she] recruited any other employees to provide her with more information. –The Guardian

The Secret Service hit back shortly after publication, writing in a statement: 

On Thursday, August 2, 2018, The Guardian published an article by Nick Hopkins entitled, Exclusive: suspected Russian spy found working at US embassy in Moscow. The article is wrought with irresponsible and inaccurate reporting based on the claims of “anonymous” sources. Prior to the Guardian publishing their article, the U.S. Secret Service provided their editor with our official statement as well as background information clearly refuting unfounded information. 

The agency goes on to note that it was the woman’s duty to interface with the Russian government, “including the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), the Russian Ministry of the Interior (MVD), and the Russian Federal Protective Service (FPS) in furtherance of Secret Service interests. 

The Secret Service then cites a factual error based on US protocols: 

In the article, Hopkins and The Guardian claim the “Russian is understood to have had full access to secret data during decade at embassy.” FSNs working under the direction of the U.S. Secret Service have never been provided or placed in a position to obtain, secret or classified information as erroneously reported. -US Secret Service

The agency also asserts that the Guardian‘s claim that they “failed to act on information provided by the U.S. State Department is categorically false,” along with the timing of the woman’s termination aren’t true. 

The U.S. Secret Service Moscow Resident Office closed in August of 2017 due to lack of cooperation from the Russian government – entirely unrelated to the termination of the FSN in question. Reports the Secret Service attempted to minimize or deliberately not disclose the U.S. State Department’s findings are categorically false. -US Secret Service

Lastly, the Secret Service said that any questions of a potential security “breach” of U.S. Secret Service systems, information or reporting ” is unfounded as FSNs work on, and support, only projects with the intent of providing and/or sharing the information with the Russian government in furtherance of Secret Service and USG interests.”

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Paul Craig Roberts: Americans Live In A World Of Lies

Authored by Paul Craig Roberts,

The US government and the presstitutes that serve it continue to lie to us about everything.

On Friday the Bureau of Labor Statistics told us that the unemployment rate was 3.9%. How can this be when the BLS also reports that the labor force participation rate has declined for a decade throughout the length of the alleged economic recovery and there is no upward pressure on wages from full employment. When jobs are plentiful, people enter the labor force to take advantage of the work opportunities. This raises the labor force participation rate. When employment is full – which is what a 3.9% unemployment rate means – wages are bid up as employers compete for scarce labor. Full employment with no wage pressure and no rise in the labor force participation rate is impossible.

The 3.9% unemployment rate is not due to employment. It results from not counting discouraged workers who have ceased to search for jobs because there are no jobs to be had.

If an unemployed person is not actively searching for a job, he is not counted as being in the labor force. The way the unemployment rate is measured makes it a hoax.

The government tells us that there is essentially no inflation despite the fact that prices have been rising strongly – the price of food, the price of home repairs, the price of drugs, the price of almost everything. Two years ago the American Association of Retired People’s Public Policy Institute reported that the average retail drug price has been increasing “at a worrying pace of 10 percent a year, and about 20 drugs have astoundingly had their prices quadruple since just December. Sixty drugs doubled over the same period. Turing Pharmaceuticals, headed by Martin Shkreli, is one of the most pronounced examples of this kind of behavior. The company bought a lifesaving cancer medication only to increase its price from $13.50 to $750 per pill.”

Incomes, of course, have not doubled. In real terms incomes have declined. Moreover, expenditures on medicines are a huge percentage of the budgets of the elderly and those on Medicare. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, the average annual cost of prescription medicines for the elderly accounts for three-fourths of the average Social Security pension and for about half of the median income of peope who receive Medicare benefits.

Real jobs have also declined. The jobs that the financial presstitutes report to be unfilled are not jobs that provide a living. The BLS reported that the number of Americans working multiple jobs rose in July by 453,000, bringing the number of Americans who hold multiple part-time jobs to 8,072,000.

Looking at July’s payroll jobs report again we see the Third World complexion of the US work force. The alleged new jobs are concentrated in lowly paid domestic services: temporary help services, health care and social assistance, waitresses and bartenders.

There is scant sign of a vibrant economy, but high debt is everywhere. Debt is growing faster than the income needed to support it. The US government is on course for another $1 trillion annual budget deficit. The federal, state, and local tax base has been decimated by the global corporatons’ export of high productivity high value-added manufacturing and professional skill jobs. In the name of “free trade” the tax base for Social Security, Medicare, and public pensions has been given away to China and other Asian countries where labor costs are low. The US global corporations make higher profits by shrinking the US tax base. Neoliberal economists defend this absurdity as “free trade” that benefits Americans.

The millions of Americans whose jobs were given away to foreigners know full well that they have not benefited. They know the story told by neoliberal economists and financial presstitutes is a lie.

The lies, of course, go far beyond the economic ones.

Russiagate, which has dominated the print and TV media and NPR since the last presidential campaign is a massive lie that continues day after day. On August 3 the NPR presstitutes, for example, were smacking their lips over the prospect that Paul Manafort was on trial and might give special Russiagate prosecutor Robert Mueller a conviction that could lead to Trump’s removal from the White House. The presstitutes speculated that a convicted Manafort would tell on Trump in exchange for a lighter sentence.

The NPR presstitutes did not reveal that Manafort was not on trial for anything related in any way to Russiagate. Manafort is being tried on income tax evasion charges dating from a decade ago when he was a consultant to Ukrainian politicians. There is no doubt but that these are false charges whose purpose is to coerce Manafort into protecting himself by making false charges against Trump. If Manafort is convicted it will not be on the basis of any evidence. Manafort will be convicted by the presstitute media which will convince jurors that Manafort is “one of those rich who don’t pay taxes.”

That President Trump permits this witch-hunt to continue, a witch-hunt that far oversteps Mueller’s Russiagate mandate for which not a shred of evidence has been found, shows how the presstitutes working hand-in-hand with the military/security complex and DNC have disempowered the President of the United States.

While Americans sit there sucking their thumbs, the coup against the President proceeds before their eyes.

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Saudi Arabia Suspends Diplomatic, Trade Ties With Canada Over “Blatant Interference”

In a world turned upside down by Trump’s unorthodox approach to, well, everything, replete with trade wars and diplomatic scandals, we now have one more, and this one was out of the blue. Late on Sunday, Saudi Arabia unexpectedly unleashed diplomatic hell against Canada when it announced it had suspended diplomatic ties and halted new trade and investment dealings with Canada in a dramatic escalation of a dispute over the kingdom’s arrest of a women’s rights activist.

Saudi Arabia also recalled its ambassador to Ottawa and ordered the Canadian envoy to the capital Riyadh to leave within 24 hours, according to a foreign ministry statement cited by the Saudi Press Agency.

The reason behind Saudi Arabian fury and the collapse in relations appears to have been a recent instance of Canadian virtue signalling: the Saudi foreign ministry cited remarks last week by Canadian foreign minister Chrystia Freeland and the Canadian embassy in Riyadh, criticizing Saudi Arabia’s arrests of women’s rights activists including Samar Badawi. Badawi is a Canadian citizen whose brother Raif Badawi, a blogger who was critical of the Saudi government, was already in jail in the kingdom.

Freeland said in a tweet Aug. 2 that she was “very alarmed to learn that Samar Badawi, Raif Badawi’s sister, has been imprisoned in Saudi Arabia,” and that “Canada stands together with the Badawi family in this difficult time, and we continue to strongly call for the release of both Raif and Samar Badawi.”

Canada’s Foreign Policy echoed the statement on twitter one day later.

According to the Saudi statement, “the kingdom views the Canadian position as an affront to the kingdom that requires a sharp response to prevent any party from attempting to meddle with Saudi sovereignty.”

The statement also noted clear that the arrests “were in line with Saudi laws, and those detained have been provided with due process during investigation and trial.”

The loonie slipped as much as 0.2 percent to 1.3019 per U.S. dollar in early trading, following three straight weeks of gains in Canada’s currency – the longest such winning streak since January.

That said, neither Canada nor Saudi trade will be crippled by the decision: according to Bloomberg, there was a trade flow of $3.23 billion between Saudi Arabia and Canada in 2017, with Saudi Arabia exporting $2.14 billion, or 1%, of its products to the North American nation, and as Bloomberg’s Javier Blas said, “I don’t see how this is going to put much pressure on Ottawa.”

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US GDP Turbocharged After Record Saving Rate Revision: Why That Could Be A Problem

Last week, the US Bureau Economic Analysis unleashed some statistical goalseek magic that would make Beijing thoroughly fabricated economic “data” blush for days: as part of the comprehensive GDP revision carried out every five years by the Commerce Department’s BEA, US economic history was rewritten and in a shocking development, the annual saving rate was revised higher by 1.6% on average since 2010, with the 2017 US savings rate doubling overnight, from 3.4% to 6.7%.

Putting these revisions into context, the last comprehensive revision conducted in July 2015 only produced an upward revision of 0.3% per year. In fact, this revision to the saving rate over the prior 6 months is the largest on record, according to real-time data available from the St. Louis Fed since 1997.

Major revisions to national income (and consequently the saving rate) came from 3 sources of income: proprietors’, dividend and interest income, as well as a tiny increase in employee compensation.

As BofA notes, the BEA incorporated the tabulations of sole proprietorship and partnership tax returns for 2016 which included new research by the IRS showing significant underreporting of income by nonfarm proprietors over time, causing a sizeable upward revision for proprietors’ income starting in 2010. It wasn’t immediately clear if this also meant a sizeable upward revision in tax audits by the IRS.

In addition, newly available IRS income data boosted dividend income in 2016 and 2017 by roughly $113bn and $143bn, respectively, shifting savings from corporations to households while the entire interest income series was revised higher due to changes in the way BEA calculates state and local employers’ contribution to pension plans. Last, the saving rate got an additional boost in 2017 due to the integration of revised employment and wage data from QCEW which added $98bn to wages and salaries.

Unfortunately none of these statistical revisions actually mean anything, because both before and after the BEA revision, some 50% of Americans still don’t have a single dollar in savings, and the only ones affected are those in the top percentiles of US society which means that – you guessed it – the rich get richer again.

And yet, at the statistical level, which is the only one that matters for the Fed, the latest numbers suggest households have been thrifty with their money during the recovery, and with one flick of an excel switch, the secular decline in the US personal savings rate was halted.

There are two implications from this:

  • Moving forward the higher saving rate should be a boon for the consumer BofA’s economists wrote on Friday: in good times it should provide room for the consumer to spend without breaking the bank or levering up and in bad times, it should provide a buffer for the consumer against a negative income or employment shock, helping to extend the business cycle. Even so, BofA did not revise its consumer spending forecast higher significantly post revisions as the bank understands the money was never actually saved, but merely served as a plug in some big picture equation.
  • The other implication is that if the Fed was concerned about hitting an economic ceiling sometime in 2019, as a result of the roughly $500BN in incremental savings “discovered”, the rate hike cycle could be far more aggressive than the market thinks.

And while BofA kept its outlook unchanged, one bank did revise its forecast as a result of the dramatic paper increase in personal savings.

In a Saturday note, Goldman chief economist Jan Hatzius quantified the implications of the higher saving rate for the consumer outlook and wrote that “taken at face value, our model implies that a declining saving rate could deliver a boost of as much as 0.8% to annualized real PCE growth over the next two years.” Even under more conservative assumptions—which Hatzius writes may be warranted given the uncertainty around saving data, Goldman “now expects real consumption growth to slow more gradually than before, from 2.7% over the past year to 2.4% over the next year. “

What does this mean for GDP? Simple: it is revised sharply higher, with Goldman throwing in the towel on its warning of a sharp slowdown in economic growth in 2019 and 2020, and instead now expecting substantially higher growth as we continue drifting ever deeper into the second longest economist cycle in history.

As a result of the consumption and federal spending upgrades, we nudge up our GDP growth forecast by 0.25pp for 2018H2-2019 and lower our unemployment rate path. We still expect 3.3% growth in Q3, but now look for 3.0% in Q4 (vs. 2.5% previously), and 2.0% in 2019 on a Q4/Q4 basis (vs. 1.75%).

We now expect the unemployment rate to decline to 3.5% by end-2018, and to bottom at 3.0% in 2020. We maintain our end-2019 forecast for core PCE inflation of 2.3%.

But while Goldman’s forecasting track record is just as abysmal as, well, any other economist’s, the key implication is what this savings revision means for the Fed’s rate hike timetable: here’s Goldman’s take.

We continue to expect the Fed to hike once-per-quarter until the policy rate reaches 3¼-3½% by end-2019. While the Fed is very focused on containing economic overheating, our standing forecast of quarterly rate hikes already incorporates a significant labor market overshoot. This quarterly pace seems to be largely “locked in” barring a bigger acceleration in core PCE inflation beyond 2.5%, which is a risk but not our baseline forecast. 

Our higher growth and lower unemployment projections therefore moderately reinforce the upside risks to our Fed call.

In other words, the risk to more, and faster, rate hikes is now on the table as a result of a revision in the simple calculation of how much money Americans managed to save, when in reality the vast majority of Americans have just gotten poorer no matter what the BEA’s excel model says, even as “the 10%” have never been richer.

That said, it will be up to Jay Powell to decide if for the first time in 10 years, he will do the right thing, and let the market drop as a result of the Fed’s tightening cycle, wiping out a substantial portion of the 10%’s net worth, when the next recession hits, or if the Fed will immediately proceed with QE4.

For now, however, the only chart worth watching is this: at what interest rate will the Fed finally cause the market to crash.

 

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Putin Appoints Steven Seagal To Strengthen US-Russia Ties

The Russian Foreign Ministry announced on Saturday that Hollywood action star Steven Seagal would be the country’s new representative for Russian-US humanitarian ties, according to Reuters. 

The role was designed to “deepen cultural, art and youth ties” between the two nuclear superpowers. 

The Russian Foreign Ministry likened Seagal’s new role to that of a U.N. goodwill ambassador and said that the actor, who is known for his martial arts prowess, would receive no salary.

“It’s a case of people’s diplomacy intersecting with traditional diplomacy,” the ministry said. –Reuters

US-Russia relations have been under seige since Russian President Vladimir Putin made the executive decision to annex Crimea in 2014 – stoking tensions with the West, which claims the Russian president acted above the law. 

Out for justice, the US and others imposed harsh sanctions against Russia, while the Ukrainian army has found itself on deadly ground facing off with Russian forces throughout the disputed region.

Last year, Seagal was banned from entering Ukraine for five years, after the Ukrainian security service (BSU) deemed him a security threat and placed him on a blacklist. No word if he was marked for death by an attack force, or if they just don’t like a guy who was born to raise hell. We’re sure he would have received the maximum conviction had he set foot in the country, but for now he remains out of reach and hard to kill. 

“Apart from a black belt, I have a black list now,” -Steven Seagal

In 2016, Putin presented Seagal with a Russian passport – while apparently finding something humorous during the ceremony, an exchange which was clearly a big moment for Seagal. 

Seagal – a frequent guest on Russian state TV and a regular visitor to the country for over a decade, was cited by RT as welcoming the appointment: 

“I’ve always had a very strong desire to do all I can to help improve Russian-American relations,” RT cited Seagal as saying. “I have worked tirelessly in this direction for many years unofficially and I am now very grateful for the opportunity to do the same thing officially.”

Seagal’s films are popular with Russian audiences. We can just imagine Putin cozying up to Under Seige with a big vat of popcorn, wondering with the rest of us how Seagal who is more than “just a cook,” didn’t win a single award for his performace:

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Iranian Navy Holds Drills In Persian Gulf After Threats To Block Strait Of Hormuz

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard on Sunday confirmed rumors that they moved up the timing of a large naval drill in the Persian Gulf several days ahead of the Islamic Republic’s planned annual exercises, according to Reuters. State news agency IRNA said the war games were aimed at “confronting possible threats” from enemies.

“This exercise was conducted with the aim of controlling and safeguarding the safety of the international waterway and within the framework of the program of the Guards’ annual military exercises,” Guards spokesman Ramezan Sharif said, according to IRNA.

The U.S. military’s Central Command on Wednesday confirmed it has seen increased Iranian naval activity. The activity extended to the Strait of Hormuz, a strategic waterway for oil shipments the Revolutionary Guards have threatened to block. –Reuters

While Iran didn’t comment on the size of the drill, Haaretz reported on Friday that “more than 100 vessels” would participate, citing a U.S. official. 

The U.S. military’s Central Command on Wednesday confirmed it has seen an increase in Iranian naval activity, including in the Strait of Hormuz, a strategic waterway for oil shipments that Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have threatened to block.

“We are monitoring it closely, and will continue to work with our partners to ensure freedom of navigation and free flow of commerce in international waterways,” said Navy Captain Bill Urban, the chief spokesman at Central Command, which oversees U.S. forces in the Middle East. Central Command did not update its guidance on Thursday.

A third official said the Iranian naval operations did not appear to be affecting commercial maritime activity. –Haaretz

The Strait of Hormuz – a strategically critical passageway linking the Persian Gulf to the Arabian Sea which is crucial to shipping of global energy supplies – has emerged as a focal point in the escalating war of words between presidents Trump and Rouhani, after Iran threatened to block off the Persian Gulf if the US proceeds with fully implementing oil export sanctions on Iran.

As we reported on Wednesday, officials told CNN that while the US sees no immediate signs of hostile intent from Iran, the IRGC show of force has US military intelligence “deeply concerned” for three fundamental reasons according to officials:

  • The exercise comes as rhetoric from the IRGC towards the US has accelerated in recent days.
  • It appears the IRGC is ramping up for a larger exercise this year than similar efforts in the past.
  • The timing is unusual. These types of IRGC exercises typically happen much later in the year.

In the US military’s assessment, the IRGC has assembled a fleet of more than 100 boats, many of them small fast moving vessels. It’s expected Iranian air and ground assets including coastal defensive missile batteries could be involved, while  hundreds of Iranian troops are expected to participate and some regular Iranian forces could be involved as well.

The IRGC exercise comes as the US has only one major warship, the USS The Sullivans inside the Persian Gulf, several officials say. Other US warships are nearby and there are numerous combat aircraft in the region.

The US military has been trying to encourage other nations in the region, especially Saudi Arabia to take a strong line on keeping the Gulf open in the face of rising Iranian rhetoric. They have also expressed concern about keeping open the waterways off Yemen where Iranian backed rebels have attacked oil tankers.

Defense Secretary James Mattis, responding to rising Iranian rhetoric said last Friday, “Iran has threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz. They’ve done that previously in years past. They saw the international community put — dozens of nations of the international community put their naval forces in for exercises to clear the straits.”

And the punchline:

“Clearly, this would be an attack on international shipping, and — and it would have, obviously, an international response to reopen the shipping lanes with whatever that took, because of the world’s economy depends on that energy, those energy supplies flowing out of there.”

And with the public response to any attack on Syria now virtually nil after two consecutive military strikes, if Trump feels he is in urgent need of an international distraction from mounting domestic problems, namely the upcoming conclusion of the Mueller probe which now includes questions about obstruction of justice, Trump may have no choice than to aim for Iran… an outcome Israel would be delighted to assist with.

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Black Chicagoans Blast “Con Man” Mayor Emanuel Amid Record Shooting Spree, Ask Trump For Help

77 people were shot last week in Chicago, 9 fatally, but the rate of shootings has accelerated aggressively today as ‘HeyJackass‘ reports “30 shot in 3 hours is the most shot in the least amount of time we’ve recorded in 5+ years. The previous record was July 4-5, 2016 w/ 29 shot in 6 hours.”

Amid this carnage, ABC7Chicago reports that, police said there was a “trauma lockdown” at Stroger Hospital with only immediate family members of victims are being allowed in the emergency room. A spokeswoman for Stroger Hospital disputes the police account.

“Over the past 24 hours, Stroger’s trauma unit received an unusually high volume of patients. At no time did Stroger go on bypass or ‘lockdown’ its trauma unit,” the spokeswoman said. “We are asking the families of trauma patients to limit visitation at this time to immediate family members only so staff may focus on patient care. “

This comes just days after Superintendent Eddie Johnson visited ABC7 and talked about decreasing crime numbers and overall violence in Chicago.

“I think some of our more challenging, communities, it’s just imperative that police and the community work together to reduce this gun violence,” Superintendent Johnson said. “We just have too many guns on the streets of Chicago.”

But, judging by the protests this week – that will shock the mainstream media narrative out of much of America – Chicagoans (particularly black inner city citizens) are furious at Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s impotence and are asking President Trump for help.

As Fox News reports, demonstrators took to the streets of Chicago this week to call for the resignation of Mayor Rahm Emanuel (D), blasting his administration for failing to curb the city’s gun violence epidemic.

Protesters expressed their outrage over the lack of economic development on the South and West Sides of the city, compared to the North Side, as gang violence continues to plague their neighborhoods.

“Rahm Emanuel is a con man. His whole job is to keep black folks divided,” one man told Fox News’ Gianno Caldwell, who covered the march.

One woman said Thursday that Emanuel “doesn’t care about anybody” except his own neighborhood and his own family, while another woman said Emanuel seems to care more about illegal immigrants in the city.

“African-Americans, we’re citizens, and our ancestors built this country,” she told Caldwell, whose younger brother survived a shooting last year that killed his best friend.

Rev. Ira Acree, one of the organizers of Thursday’s protest, said residents are tired of the “tale of two cities,” where one area is thriving and others are crippled by poverty and gang violence.

And finally, in the most shocking twist in today’s divided nation, it is interesting to see Democratic leaders in Chicago calling for President Trump to involve the National Guard.

State Rep. La Shawn Ford, a Democrat who represents the West Side of Chicago, called on President Trump to help the city.

“Not everyone believes Chicago is a Trump-free zone. If he’s serious about helping the people … I accept his help. We can’t turn any help away,” said Ford, adding that seniors and children need to have safe streets and federal authorities need to help the local police.  

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Ryan Cooper Rages “Ban Share Buybacks…Immediately”

Authored by Ryan Cooper via TheWeek.com,

American corporations are simply raking in profits. Some are so bloated and cash-rich they literally can’t figure out what to do with it all. Apple, for instance, is sitting on nearly a quarter of a trillion dollars — and that’s down a bit from earlier this year. Microsoft and Google, meanwhile, were sitting on “only” $132 billion and $63 billion respectively (as of March this year).

However, American corporations in general are taking those profits and kicking them out to shareholders, mainly in the form of share buybacks. These are when a corporation uses profits, cash, or borrowed money to buy its own stock, thus increasing its price and the wealth of its shareholders. (Big Tech is doing this as well, just not fast enough to draw down their dragon hoards.) As a new joint report from the Roosevelt Institute and the National Employment Law Project by Katy Milani and Irene Tung shows, from 2015 to 2017 corporations spent nearly 60 percent of their net profits on buybacks.

This practice should be banned immediately, as it was before the Reagan administration.

The most immediately objectionable consequence of share buybacks is they come at the expense of wages. Milani and Tung calculate that if buybacks spending had been funneled into wage increases, McDonald’s employees could get a raise of $4,000; those at Starbucks could get $8,000; and those at Lowes, Home Depot, and CVS could get an eye-popping $18,000.

Some economists are skeptical of this reasoning, arguing that wages are set according to labor market conditions. But if you set aside free market dogmatism, it is beyond obvious that this sort of behavior is coming at workers’ expense. Wall Street bloodsuckers are not at all subtle about it, screaming bloody murder and tanking stocks every time a public company proposes paying workers instead of shareholders. Indeed, it provides a highly convincing explanation for something that has been puzzling analysts for months: the situation of wages continuing to stagnate or decline while unemployment is at 4 percent. The answer is that wages are low in large part because the American corporate structure has been rigged in favor of shareholders and executives.

This raises an objection: What about dividends? (These are payments made directly to shareholders, as opposed to buying stock to increase their price.) Wouldn’t banning buybacks just lead to increased dividends?

It might. But buybacks are worse, for three reasons. First, selling shares is generally counted as capital gains, which are usually (though not always) taxed at a much lower rate than dividend payments. Secondly, where dividends are regular occurrences, buybacks happen at erratic intervals, making it easier for huge payments to slip by unnoticed.

More importantly, share buybacks incentivize corporate short-termism and Wall Street predation. Making a quick buck at the expense of the underlying corporate enterprise is easy: simply pressure the company into spending all its money on buybacks — or more than all; Milani and Tung find the restaurant industry spent 136 percent of profits on buybacks from 2015-17, through cash and borrowing — then sell the stock once the price pops up. Money that might have gone into badly-needed investment or debt repayment is now in your pocket, and if the enterprise collapses later, who cares? Not your problem — you’re already on to the next victim.

Dividends, by contrast, are a lot more amenable to the value investor who wants the company to succeed over the long term. In general, banning buybacks will make it somewhat harder for corporations to be turned into a wealth funnel for the top 1 percent.

That said, dividends payments are also out of control — enabled by low top marginal tax rates and special loopholes, plus a powerless working class — and should be wrenched down as well. Banning buybacks should be considered the first step in reining in the outrageous abuse of the American corporate form, not a panacea.

Before about 2005, postwar corporate profits had never reached 9 percent of GDP (save for a couple quarters in the early 1950s). Immediately after the financial crisis, they bounced back up to that level, where they remain to this day.

This is a social crisis for the United States. Having an economy rigged to suck the wealth out of society and place it in the pockets of a tiny, already ultra-wealthy minority is an extremely risky situation for a democratic state. We need big, aggressive moves to club down corporate profits, and start directing that money back into the country as a whole. Banning buybacks is a simple and straightforward way to get started.

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