Tag: finance

The Fed downgraded its assessment of the US economy through its Beige Book surveys from “modest to moderate” growth, characterizing the economy as growing only “slight to moderate.”

In the last Beige Book, eight of 12 districts said growth was “modest to moderate,” while Wednesday’s report said 10 saw it as “slight-to-moderate” and two reported “flat economic conditions.”

“About half of the districts noted that the government shutdown had led to slower economic activity in some sectors,” according to the report released Wednesday in Washington.

Additionally, based on anecdotal information collected by the 12 regional Fed banks through Feb. 25, The fed noted that consumer spending was also held back by harsh winter weather and higher costs of credit.

Quantifying the shift, it appears “Tariff” talk has reduced but “slowness” has surged…

Critically, the word “strong” appeared 37 times, compared to 58x in the January 16 version and 83x in the October 24, 2018 version. Meanwhile, incidence of the root word “weak-” rose to 34, up from 13x seven weeks ago and 19x in the October version.

Bloomberg summarizes the following key anecdotes from this week’s Fed’s Beige Book:

Boston: A semiconductor manufacturer facing big declines in demand from China put a hiring freeze in place, but they were reluctant to institute layoffs since it takes three to six months to train new workers.

New York: Broadway theaters continued to report strong year-over-year gains in revenues and especially attendance, which was up nearly 20 percent from a year earlier in both January and early February.

Philadelphia: Philadelphia hotels were challenged compared with last year; the Eagles’ 2019 playoff run included no home games, then the government shutdown closed several national park attractions, reducing tourism activity in the city.

Cleveland: One auto retailer noted that sales of new vehicles had decreased slightly because of higher prices, while the demand for used vehicles increased.

Richmond: The Washington, D.C., area saw a sharp drop in visitors during the shutdown

Atlanta: New discoveries in the Gulf of Mexico contributed to increased activity in offshore exploration and production.

Chicago: Numerous contacts attributed slower sales to the harsh winter weather that occurred over the reporting period.

St. Louis: Louisville contacts in higher education noted that enrollments are down as the employee-friendly labor market has led potential students to enter the workforce instead of pursuing a college degree.

Minneapolis: A district contact noted that RV sales saw a slowdown in the second half of 2018 and that he anticipated “2019 being down again” by roughly 5 percent due to higher interest rates and higher unit costs.

Kansas City: Regional energy firms expected the expansion of LNG pipeline capacity later this year to help accommodate increased production.

Dallas: Consumer lending ticked up, which one contact attributed to loan requests from workers affected by the recent government shutdown.

San Francisco: A steel manufacturer in Oregon noted strong activity in the industry due to lower competition from abroad arising from trade policy actions.

The bottom line is that the report is likely to support the decision by many Fed officials to pledge patience on future interest-rate hikes amid a healthy, but slightly slowing, economic expansion.

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2tVdv9w Tyler Durden

A second federal judge has struck down a decision by the Trump administration to add a question about citizenship to the 2020 US Census, ruling that it threatens “the very foundation of our democratic system.” 

US District Judge Richard Seeborg of the Northern District of California found the citizenship question unconstitutional in defiance of the Enumeration Clause – also known as the Census Clause.

Notably, unlike Judge Furman’s ruling in New York, Judge Seeborg found the citizenship question unconstitutional in defiance of the Enumeration Clause.

It’s a far more sweeping victory for the challengers.

— Adam Klasfeld (@KlasfeldReports) March 6, 2019

Judge finds citizenship question violates Enumeration Clause–a question that appeared on census in past. “The constitutionality of a particular governmental action may depend on the larger social context in which that action occurs” (citing Grutter) https://t.co/5RhVMpXi11 pic.twitter.com/bilzugK96I

— Josh Blackman (@JoshMBlackman) March 6, 2019

Because it was ruled unconstitutional, Wednesday’s ruling is far more legally significant than a January decision by a New York federal judge to strike down the citizenship, ruling that Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross violated the Administrative Procedure Act while deciding to add the question to the survey. 

The Supreme Court is scheduled to hold a hearing about the New York ruling on April 23. 

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Second judge calls Trump’s decision to add citizenship question to census illegal; US Supreme Court to decide issue .

— Zeke Miller (@ZekeJMiller) March 6, 2019

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2XGdYu2 Tyler Durden

Careful not to discredit their cause in the eyes of a wary international community, US officials and opposition leader Juan Guaido have continued to imply that a military intervention to remove Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro remains an option as the strongman has proven surprisingly resilient in the face of an internationally backed challenge to his rule.

However, many may not realize just how close the situation came to an all-out military conflict late last month, when a skirmish over a US-funded humanitarian aid convoy left at least two Venezuelans dead. As the fighting raged along the Venezuela-Colombia border, a group of 200 exiled soldiers were readying their weapons and preparing to forcefully overpower the Venezuelan national guardsmen and “escort” the caravan of supplies across the border.

According to Bloomberg, which reported the aborted coup attempt on Tuesday, the group backed down at the last minute after Colombian officials – who promised to maintain some semblance of peace during the demonstrations – caught wind of their plan, which had been organized by retired General Cliver Alcala, and quickly shut it down.

But now that Guaido is back in Caracas, with the support of 50 nations who recognize him as the legitimate ruler of Venezuela, the situation along the border is looking increasingly parlous. And as BBG pointed out, as the situation drags on, the calls for a military intervention will only grow louder.

Led by retired General Cliver Alcala, who has been living in Colombia, they were going to drive back the Venezuelan national guardsmen blocking the aid on the other side. The plan was stopped by the Colombian government, which learned of it late and feared violent clashes at a highly public event it promised would be peaceful.

Almost no provisions got in that day and hopes that military commanders would abandon Maduro have so far been dashed. Even though Guaido is back in Caracas, recognized by 50 nations as the legitimate leader of Venezuela, the impromptu taking up of arms shows that the push to remove Maduro – hailed by the U.S. as inevitable – is growing increasingly chaotic and risky.

As the standoff drags on, the urge to seek some sort of military solution will only increase. Guaido himself hinted at such an idea in the immediate aftermath of the failed aid mission. His comments got a cool official reception in Washington, Bogota and Brasilia but Senator Marco Rubio, who has helped shape U.S. policy on Venezuela, seemed to cheer them on. President Donald Trump has said all options remain on the table.

Bloomberg based its reporting on interviews with Latin American and US officials. Alcala also acknowledged the plan. Unfortunately for the retired general, while a few dozen Venezuelan national guardsmen defected during the border clashes – which many believed were staged to curry sympathy for Guaido and ratchet up pressure on Maduro – the Socialist leader still commands the loyalty of both the Venezuelan military and government-aligned militias/death squads.

This article is based on interviews with U.S. and Latin American officials and Venezuelan exiles, some of whom asked not to be identified speaking about confidential matters. Alcalá, the retired general, did acknowledge the plan to escort the aid across the border and said he understands why the Colombians wanted to avoid trouble. A Colombian government spokesman didn’t respond to a request for comment.

But in a rare nugget of honesty, reportedly conveyed to BBG by a Latin American official, the US officials charged with managing the crisis – US, Sen. Marco Rubio, National Security Adviser John Bolton and special envoy Elliott Abrams – are just waiting for Maduro to give them a reason to intervene. The plan, as it stands, is to ratchet up economic and political pressure on his regime until Maduro makes a move that would “warrant more aggressive action” (with Guadio back in Caracas, it’s not difficult to imagine what that might be). European and Latin American diplomats have expressed concerns with this approach, because – surprise, surprise – “trust of Trump is low.”

To try and curry favor for an intervention from Venezuela’s neighbors, the US is warning that the country’s refugee crisis, already one of the worst in Latin American history, could accelerate if Maduro remains in power, sending another 1.5 million refugees into Colombia and Brazil, which are already struggling with their own economic troubles.

Should the US opt for an invasion, the prospects of a swift resolution are low: For context, Venezuela is twice the size of Iraq, and it has its own army and militias.

Which means it’s only a matter of time before the conflict in Venezuela blossoms into yet another one of the US’s “forever wars.”

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2IVCbsY Tyler Durden

Celebrity chef Mario Batali, amidst a chorus of sexual harassment and assault allegations, has given up his stake in all of his restaurants, according to the New York Times. The chef’s ongoing 20 year partnership with the Bastianich family of restaurateurs was “formally dissolved” this week, more than a year after sexual harassment and assault allegations surfaced. The “Batali & Bastianich Hospitality Group” is no more. 

According to Tanya Bastianich Manuali, who will head up the new company taking the place of Batali’s former partnership, Batali “will no longer profit from the restaurants in any way, shape or form.” Bastianich Manuali and her brother bought out Batali’s shares for undisclosed terms. The new company will head up the group’s 16 restaurants under a new management and financial structure. 

Batali said on Wednesday: “I have reached an agreement with Joe and no longer have any stake in the restaurants we built together. I wish him the best of luck in the future.” Batali declined requests for further comment from the New York Times. 

Batali is also selling his stake in Eataly, a chain of luxury Italian supermarkets, that he was an investor in. Chris Giglio said on behalf of Eataly: “Eataly is in the process of acquiring Mr. Batali’s minority interest in Eataly USA.”

During its heyday, the “Batali & Bastianich Hospitality Group” was made up of dozens of restaurants and food businesses located not just in the US, but also in Singapore, Italy and Hong Kong. Restaurants like Babbo and Del Posto were responsible for helping lift Batali to his celebrity status. Investments from California chef Nancy Silverton and Lidia Bastianich, Mr. Bastianich’s mother, helped give the operation even more gravitas as it grew. 

Silverton and Bastianich will be partners in the new company, along with Mr. Bastianich and Mrs. Bastianich Manuali.

Late in 2017, allegations of sexual misconduct against Batali first surfaced, causing him to step away from daily operations at his restaurants. Four women accused the chef of touching them inappropriately in a “pattern of behavior that appeared to span at least two decades”. Three women worked for Batali and the fourth worked in the industry. 

Mr. Bastianich said Tuesday: “While I never saw or heard of Mario groping an employee, I heard him say inappropriate things to our employees. Though I criticized him for it from time to time, I should have done more. I neglected my responsibilities as I turned my attention away from the restaurants. People were hurt, and for this I am deeply sorry.”

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2HjegB7 Tyler Durden

Submitted by Michael Every of RaboBank

Coincidence and subsidence

Only three trade war updates today worth mentioning, all of which should leave markets brimming with optimism. First, it has been reported that China has hacked 27 US universities to try to steal maritime defence technologies. Second, Zhang Shan, China’s Commerce Minister, has described the negotiations in Washington as “very difficult and very hard…There are significant differences between the two countries systems, culture, and development stages.” Third, US Secretary of State Pompeo stated Trump will walk away, just as he did from North Korea, if the proposed US-China trade deal is not “perfect”.

For optimists, the good news from China’s “twin sessions” so far is a promise to purchase more US goods, a line on intellectual property protections, and moves towards some form of new foreign-investment law. For pessimists there is the retreat back into massive off-book fiscal stimulus and a statement banks will have to increase lending to private enterprises 30% y/y this year. There is no way loans to SOEs, which make up 75% of new lending, are going to drop. Hence the 25% that does go to POEs rising 30% is going to mean an 8% increase in total lending even before we get any boost to SOE loans to allow them to roll their debts over. That smells like a mid-teens percentage-point increase in bank lending. Is that going to move the growth dial? Yes – but not as much as before because China is in a rapidly-decaying orbit. This investment-led strategy has failed in other countries before, and it will fail again.

More specifically, where is the bank capital for this new lending surge to come from? From perpetual bonds the PBOC is buying from banks! What is the ratio of FX reserves to M2 going to do as this happens alongside the huge new pledged purchases of US goods? Plunge. And with lower borrowing rates too, that will mean a much weaker Chinese currency unless institutional money starts to flow in and keep flowing in. Can one join the dots to the allegations MSCI was leaned on by China to encourage exactly that development, or is it just a lucky coincidence?

Is it also a lucky coincidence that the Fed are now so committed to a pause they didn’t see coming as recently as December, despite unemployment continuing to tumble and the ISM services survey hitting a level of over 59, much stronger than expected? We’ve just heard Rosengren talk about economic risks needing to clear up if rates are to move at all this year, and Kashkari noting “slack” in a labour market the FOMC argued was tight for ages, and that he was “going to do my part not to screw it up and raise rates unnecessarily.” It’s nice for a layman to understand Fed-speak for once – and the “two sessions” are saying similar things within different systems and culture.

Down in the Lucky Country, it also can’t be a coincidence that Q4 GDP was so much weaker than the RBA had expected it to be just a few months ago. Aussie growth was up 0.2% q/q and 2.3% y/y, the latter vs. 2.6% expected, far below the permanently sunny heights of 3% the RBA expects Australia to stick to because some economist’s Excel model somewhere says so. Q1 is going to be worse, in all likelihood. Nonetheless, the Reserve Bank have just stated at their March meeting once again that they live in hope of all being well, and CPI, wages, and growth magically picking up again. Today Governor Lowe spoke on the housing market, and asked: “An obvious question to ask is what are the underlying, or structural, drivers of the large run-up in housing prices and the subsequent decline? There isn’t a single answer to this question. Rather, it is a combination of factors.” Before reading any further, I was thinking “Yes, the RBA and APRA.”

However, it would appear that the RBA is still unable or unwilling to join the dots that it is responsible for this mess. Instead, it is still selling the bogeyman that “…the origins of the current correction in prices do not lie in interest rates and unemployment. Rather, they largely lie in the inflexibility of the supply side of the housing market in response to large shifts in population growth.” Has the Aussie population suddenly started to plummet? Is that why house prices in Sydney and Melbourne are going off a cliff? I thought it had been firmly established that it was due to banks lending 10 times salary for new mortgages in the view prices could only go up, and they’re now being forced to lend more responsibly?

Lowe then comes to his triumphant conclusion: “Taking these various considerations into account, the adjustment in our housing market is manageable for the overall economy. It is unlikely to derail our economic expansion. It will also have some positive side-effects by making housing more affordable for many people.” If Lowe is right, he is a hero. If this is his “Sub-prime is contained” moment then rate cuts, QE, and a collapsing AUD will follow. And Lowe will move on to give after-dinner speeches for $250,000. The Lucky Country indeed (for some).

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2HhGQmA Tyler Durden

One can’t say they didn’t warn you:

• On December 23, with the S&P points away from a bear market, Steve Mnuchin called the Plunge Protection Team, i.e. President’s Working Group on capital markets, with one clear message – stop the plunge.
• On December 25, Trump pulled an Obama, and told Americans to buy stocks: “We have companies, the greatest in the world, and they’re doing really well,” the president told reporters at the White House on Christmas Day. “They have record kinds of numbers. So I think it’s a tremendous opportunity to buy. Really a great opportunity to buy.” (Pension funds heard him loud and clear, unleashing the biggest stock buying spree in history the very next day).
• On January 4, just two weeks after Fed Chair Powell hiked rates by 25bps and said the Fed’s balance sheet was on “autopilot”, and tightening would continue, the former Carlyle lawyer, sitting between Bernanke and Yellen capitulated, and for the first time said that the Fed would be patient, effectively ending the Fed’s rate hike posture.

What has transpired since then is nothing short of breathtaking, with the S&P rebounding from the mid-2,300 to 2,800 (and on same days rising above it), in what Goldman dubbed “one of the sharpest rallies in history.” Indeed, as shown below, the rolling 67-day price return of the S&P is the 3rd fastest rally this century, perhaps ever. In other words, there are bear market rallies and then there are bear market rallies, and what we have just experienced was, according to Goldman, “the sharpest rally since the global financial crisis recovery, and sharp valuation re-rating alongside negative earnings revisions” one which was accompanied by the fastest decline in the VIX on record.

Alas, with the S&P now clearly unable to breach 2,800 and stay comfortably above this “quad resistance” level, the rally appears to be over, and as Goldman wrote over the weekend, “there is now a material disconnect between Fed pricing and the S&P 500… as not only are markets pricing no hikes in the next 12 months, but they are pricing a cut in the next 2 years.”

Updating this take, overnight Goldman’s Ian Wright doubles down on the bank’s bearishness and notes that “the macro backdrop of growth moving down but inflation moving up is far from consistent with a sustained low vol regime, and vol of vol remains high, and so higher volatility will likely return before too long.”

Therefore, Goldman thinks periodic corrections are more likely than a sustained bear market (as part of a “skinny and flat” range), and US skew has returned, and as a result the world’s most influential FDIC-backed hedge fund think that it is time to start hedging for the coming mean reversion lower.

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2UoVMmG Tyler Durden

What was that again about the border emergency being a “made up” crisis?

According to federal data, more immigrant families – mostly from Central America – have been apprehended at the border since the beginning of the fiscal year than during any full-year period in recent memory.

Here’s more from the Wall Street Journal:

From the start of the federal fiscal year in October through February, the Border Patrol arrested 136,150 people traveling as families for crossing the border illegally, according to data released Tuesday. The prior record for a 12-month period was 107,212, during the fiscal year that ended last September.

As WSJ explains, the acceleration in apprehensions is “the latest illustration of how many parents and children are seeking asylum in the U.S., primarily to escape violence, poverty and hunger in Central America.” In other words, the rise in apprehensions isn’t so much a factor of increased enforcement as it is a rise in the number of migrants heading toward the border.

The surge didn’t happen all at once – rather, the number of migrants has been climbing since 2015, when fewer than 40,000 migrants were apprehended at the border.  Since US Customs and Border Protection began counting family units in 2013, there have been 2.6 million apprehensions along the US’s southern border.

And if the number of migrant families trying to cross into the US continues to accelerate at the current pace, the total number could double or triple the prior year’s record by the end of the 2019 fiscal year in September.

One government official said there pace shows no sign of slowing down, as violence in Central America remains an endemic issue.

Maureen Meyer, Mexico and migrant rights director for the Washington Office on Latin America, a human-rights advocacy group in Washington, said there is no sign that the pace is slowing.

“Nothing in the Northern Triangle countries has changed,” Ms. Meyer said, referring to Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala.

Government officials said trying to estimate how many people will cross the border illegally in the coming months isn’t possible.

“Immigration patterns are determined by so many different things,” said Ramiro Cordero, a Border Patrol spokesman in El Paso, Texas.

“They fluctuate so much that you can’t predict it.”

Aside from families, the number of unaccompanied minors has also been climbing. Through February, about 26,900 have been caught at the border this fiscal year, compared with 50,036 for all of the prior fiscal year.

Meanwhile, the number of border arrests has fallen as the profile of migrants shifts away from single men seeking work toward families who surrender at the border after declaring asylum.

The overall number of arrests at the border was roughly 267,900 between October and February, compared with 136,209 over the same period a year earlier. That figure has in recent years been hovering near lows not seen since the 1970s, as fewer single adults come to the US in search of work, deterred by stepped-up enforcement and an improved Mexican economy.

The volume of families, most of whom voluntarily turn themselves in to law enforcement to seek asylum, has at times overwhelmed government facilities. Some families spend days in cinder-block cells with no beds or showers while waiting to be processed by immigration officials.

As WSJ notes, migrants are increasingly traveling in groups of more than 100 – or, as Trump would call them, “caravans.”

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2IUv7wQ Tyler Durden

So far, simmering tensions between the US and Chinese Navy in the South China Sea haven’t had much of an impact on trade-deal talks. But that doesn’t mean investors should just ignore the US’s increasingly provocative “freedom of navigation” operations in the contested region that is also a vital chokepoint for one third of global trade.

As Trump reportedly pressures his negotiators to walk away with a deal, the US air force has for the first time since just before Thanksgiving risked a confrontation with Beijing by flying two B-52 bomber on a mission that brought them within close proximity to the Chinese mainland.

The “training mission” brought the bombers close to disputed airspace over the South and East China Seas, according to RT. The mission was part of the US Pacific Command’s “Continuous Bomber Presence Missions”, which are designed to act as a means of deterrence against Beijing, which hasn’t shied away from flexing its growing military presence in the Pacific.

Two US Air Force B-52H Stratofortress long-range bombers, based in Guam, participated in “routine training missions” on Monday by flying through the disputed airspaces over the South and East China Seas. As one bomber “conducted training in the vicinity of the South China Sea,” the other practiced off the coast of Japan in “coordination with the US Navy and alongside our Japanese air force,” US Pacific Air Forces said in a statement.

The provocation is particularly notable because of Beijing’s increasingly belligerent rhetoric toward Taiwan, which President Xi pledged earlier this year would soon be “reunited” with the mainland, eliciting cries from Taiwan’s leader that the Taiwanese people would never accept this.

The bombers reportedly took off from Anderson Air Force Base in Guam.

Back in October, a Chinese warship nearly collided with a US destroyer in the South China Sea, provoking condemnations from both sides. Of course, these ongoing provocations apparently don’t matter to global markets…until they do.

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2XIeQOB Tyler Durden

This week the House Judiciary Committee chaired by Jerry Nadler (D-NY) fired off 81 document requests to various individuals and organizations in a quest to uncover crimes committed by the Trump, his 2016 campaign, or members of the current administration. 

Ths long list of recipients includes Julian Assange, the NRA, Michael Flynn, Steve Bannon, George Papadopoulos, and Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg – while Nadler’s inquisition is expected to focus on 3 broad areas of interest: allegations of obstruction of justice, public corruption and other abuses of power.

Nadler, meanwhile, has unequivocally stated that he thinks President Trump obstructed justice – telling ABC‘s George Stephanopoulos on Sunday: “It’s very clear that the President obstructed justice.”

To that end, the Wall Street Journal Editorial Board has some bad news for Nadler; 

Nothing Nadler cites is actually illegal…

***

Via the Wall Street Journal Editorial Board

Nadler’s ‘Obstruction’ Quest

The examples he cites as crimes are legal presidential actions.

Well, we’re off on the march to impeachment, as we predicted last year even as Democrats said it wasn’t on their minds. With Chairman Jerry Nadler’s subpoena swarm from House Judiciary this week, and his assertions that President Trump obstructed justice, the articles of impeachment are apparently awaiting only the collection of the readily available details to fill in the blanks.

“Do you think the President obstructed justice?” asked ABC’s George Stephanopoulos on Sunday.

“Yes, I do,” replied Mr. Nadler. “It’s very clear that the President obstructed justice. It’s very clear—1,100 times he referred to the Mueller investigation as a witch hunt, he tried to—he fired—he tried to protect [Michael] Flynn from being investigated by the FBI. He fired [FBI director Jim] Comey in order to stop the Russian thing, as he told NBC News.”

Credit Mr. Nadler for candor that Democrats didn’t display when they campaigned last year. Then they talked only about holding the President “accountable.” Now they claim they already have enough to impeach Mr. Trump, though as Mr. Nadler admitted Sunday, “you have to persuade enough of the opposition party voters, Trump voters . . . that you’re not just trying to steal the last—to reverse the results of the last election.”

That may be harder than he imagines, and not only because of Mr. Nadler’s Freudian slip there of “steal.” Based on the public evidence so far, Mr. Trump hasn’t obstructed justice in any of the examples Mr. Nadler cited. Mr. Nadler wants to turn the President’s exercise of his normal constitutional powers into impeachable offenses.

The case against Mr. Nadler’s obstruction theory has been made in these pages by former Attorney General Michael Mukasey and appellate lawyer and our contributor David Rivkin. Attorney General William Barr also made the case in his 2018 memo to the Justice Department when he was still in private life.

A President can obstruct justice while in office but only if he is committing a per se illegal offense. That is, if he suborns perjury or destroys evidence, or commits “any act deliberately impairing the integrity or availability of evidence,” as Mr. Barr put it. Presidents Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton committed such acts in Mr. Barr’s view, but Mr. Trump has not as far as we can see.

On the other hand, a President cannot obstruct justice when he takes actions that are consistent with his Article II powers under the Constitution. That includes in particular firing inferior executive-branch officers such as Mr. Comey. Such acts may be politically stupid, but they aren’t obstruction.

Mr. Trump’s motive in firing Mr. Comey doesn’t matter. If a President commits a legal act but can be accused of a crime because of his motive, then any presidential action can be called into question based on an accusation of motive. This would open a Pandora’s box that would leave any political officer vulnerable to charges of obstruction. That would include an Attorney General who declined to prosecute someone whom Members of Congress wanted him to indict. Congress could essentially rule the executive branch.

Mr. Trump’s comments to Mr. Comey about Mr. Flynn also aren’t obstruction for similar reasons. The President is the chief law enforcement officer and can advise on cases as he wants. Such meddling is unwise and politically dumb, but it isn’t obstruction.

“On their face, the President’s comments to Comey about Flynn seem unobjectionable,” Mr. Barr wrote in his 2018 memo.

“He made the accurate observation that Flynn’s call with the Russian Ambassador was perfectly proper and made the point that Flynn, who had now suffered public humiliation from losing his job, was a good man. Based on this, he expressed the ‘hope’ that Comey could ‘see his way clear’ to let the matter go. The formulation that Comey ‘see his way clear,’ explicitly leaves the decision to Comey. Most normal subordinates would not have found these comments obstructive.”

In any event, nothing was obstructed. Robert Mueller was appointed to investigate what Mr. Nadler calls “the Russian thing,” and Mr. Flynn was prosecuted. As for Mr. Nadler’s attempt to criminalize Mr. Trump’s charges of a “witch hunt,” try selling that to the public.

***

Perhaps Mr. Mueller will report new facts that are damning. But it’s notable that Mr. Nadler and other Democrats are now saying they will expand their probes beyond Mr. Mueller’s ambit. They seem to be expecting a factual and political disappointment.

Democrats seem hell-bent on impeaching Mr. Trump, and most of the media will be cheering them on. We’ll wait to see all of the facts they assemble. But the legal bar should be high, the crimes real, and the Constitution protected if they want to “steal,” er, reverse, an election.

Appeared in the March 6, 2019, print edition.

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2EFrMfw Tyler Durden

As sporadic skirmishes across the heavily militarized line of control, which separates Indian-controlled Kashmir from Pakistani Kashmir, have continued this week with casualties reported on both sides, an information war has been raging between the nuclear armed powers over just what happened during last Tuesday and Wednesday’s events which saw an Indian MiG-21 shot down by Pakistani fighters after an intense dogfight, precipitating a crisis over the captured pilot, later handed back to India. 

The whole pretense behind the bold Indian incursion into Pakistani airspace was to bomb terror training camps belonging to Jaish-e-Mohammad, a response to the group’s Feb. 14 suicide bombing of a bus carrying Indian paramilitary police reserve officers, which killed 40.

India had vowed a swift and fierce response while denouncing Pakistan seeming tolerance of the terror group on its soil. But now Reuters is questioning India’s narrative after examining new high-resolution satellite images of the site near Balakot in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of northeast Pakistan: 

High-resolution satellite images reviewed by Reuters show that a religious school run by Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) in northeastern Pakistan appears to be still standing days after India claimed its warplanes had hit the Islamist group’s training camp on the site and killed a large number of militants.

The images, produced by San Francisco-based private satellite operator Planet Labs Inc, show that nearly a week after the Indian airstrikes, there’s little to no damage on the Jaish-e-Mohammad terror camp that the Indian Air Force claimed to have successfully taken out. 

Indian military sources had indicated that a total of 12 Indian Mirage 2000 multirole fighter jets carrying 1,000 kg (2,200 lbs) of bombs had successfully carried out the attack.

Reuters continues:

Until now, no high-resolution satellite images were publicly available. But the images from Planet Labs, which show details as small as 72 cm (28 inches), offer a clearer look at the structures the Indian government said it attacked.

The image is virtually unchanged from an April 2018 satellite photo of the facility. There are no discernible holes in the roofs of buildings, no signs of scorching, blown-out walls, displaced trees around the madrasa or other signs of an aerial attack.

The new report based on the images flatly contradicts the official version of events repeated by both the Indian armed forces and Prime Minister Narendra Modi — namely that all intended targets and the madrasa site were taken out — and Reuters speculates that either the bombing raid missed the targets altogether or was fabricated as part of a politically convenient narrative. 

Satellite images reviewed by @Reuters cast doubt on India airstrike claims https://t.co/LgMQuys3x6 via @ReutersTV pic.twitter.com/m2i9ADiyd2

— Reuters Top News (@Reuters) March 6, 2019

Did last week’s events which resulted in a full-blown armed stand-off and dangerous war of words originate from Modi’s desire to appear tough under pressure in response to the Feb. 14 police bus bombing? As Reuters points out, “India must hold a general election by May, and pollsters say Modi and his Hindu nationalist party stand to benefit from his aggressive response…”.

Or perhaps once Modi committed to risking war with Pakistan in launching the aerial assault, it was realized that any failure to hit the intended target would be too politically embarrassing, considering the extremely high risk of the endeavor.

According to Reuters:

The images cast further doubt on statements made over the last eight days by the Indian government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi that the raids, early on Feb. 26, had hit all the intended targets at the madrasa site near Jaba village and the town of Balakot in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

“The high-resolution images don’t show any evidence of bomb damage,” one East Asian affairs and satellite imagery expert cited in the report concluded.

The new findings appear to lend credence to Pakistan’s version of events. From the start Pakistan’s military claimed the Indian jets had merely dropped their bombs an a largely empty hillside amidst sustained Pakistani defense measures. 

Major General Asif Ghafoor, spokesman for the Pakistani military, said, “There has been no damage to any infrastructure or human life as a result of Indian incursion.” He added further of a ground investigation of the site: “This has been vindicated by both domestic and international media after visiting the site.”

But Indian officials had claimed its jets had taken out as many as 300 terrorists at the site. Should India’s version of events ultimately be debunked in international press, it would likely seal Modi’s fate in the upcoming election, and could go down as among the most infamous false flags in the history of the Indian-Pakistan conflict. 

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2TiMmwu Tyler Durden