Protectionist sentiment is running high in the US, with both presidential candidates citing the need to shield workers from the alleged harmful effects of foreign trade. So it is perhaps ironic that the nation that has the most complaints against it for violating trade agreements is…
USA USA USA…
Chart: Goldman Sachs
So USA has almost 4 times more complaints against it for violating agreements that Chynaa.. Protectionist That!
As Goldman's Marina Grushin notes, public opinion seems to stand behind this view, as Pew surveys have found that roughly half of Americans believe trade destroys jobs and lowers wages, compared to only about 20% who think the opposite. Perhaps more surprising, a review of research on trade, jobs, and wage inequality over the last 25 years shows that economists are also increasingly emphasizing the costs that trade can impose on US workers.
Early days: Think tech, not trade
Economic theory predicts that, in aggregate, trade benefits all parties; by importing goods that a trading partner can produce more efficiently, countries increase their consumption and welfare. But economists have also long recognized that trade leads the prices of labor to converge across borders. For developed countries, that pressures less-skilled workers, who find themselves effectively competing with cheaper foreign labor, and who face challenges in transitioning to more competitive parts of the economy.
As trade flourished in the 1970s and 1980s, its effects on labor markets attracted increasing attention. Between 1970 and 1990, goods trade rose from 8% to 15% of US GDP, while the share of manufacturing workers in US employment declined from 25% to 16%. Wage inequality increased, with the “premium” for a college vs. a high school graduate growing from around 45% to 60%. Economists agreed that blue-collar workers were being squeezed; the question was how much of it was due to trade.
For most researchers, the answer at the time was very little. Skill-biased technological change (e.g., the automation of routine tasks) and related productivity gains were generally deemed more important. Robert Lawrence and Matthew Slaughter (1993), for example, concluded from shifts in traded goods prices that trade contributed little to rising wage inequality. Paul Krugman (1994, 1995) similarly assigned trade a “quantitatively minor” role, and estimated that trade with less developed countries accounted for only around 10% of the increase in US wage disparity over the prior 20 years. Effects on employment were also deemed modest. By the estimates of Jeffrey Sachs and Howard Shatz (1994), trade with developing economies between 1978 and 1990 reduced US demand for lower-skilled manufacturing jobs by just 6.2%.
Some researchers did find more substantial effects. Translating the US trade deficit into an effective increase in the supply of less-skilled labor, George Borjas, Richard Freeman, and Lawrence Katz (1992) showed that trade accounted for up to 25% of the widening US wage gap between 1980 and 1985. And Adrian Wood (1994), contending that most studies understated the labor displaced by imports, concluded that trade reduced unskilled manufacturing employment in developed economies by 21.5%, more than three times the Sachs/Shatz estimate. Still, these views were in the minority; among more than 30 studies on wage inequality reviewed by William Cline (1997), most found that the adverse impacts of trade were minimal to modest. In short, the research acknowledged some losses from foreign trade, but emphasized overall gains.
The new view: A bigger role for trade
Between 1990 and 2010, developing economies’ share of world trade roughly doubled, to 38%, driven in large part by EM Asia and China’s 2001 entry into the WTO. In the US, the college wage premium approached 80%, while the trade deficit widened well beyond prior extremes. These shifts prompted economists to revisit the conclusions of the 1990s with new data. Krugman wrote in 2008 that it was “no longer safe” to argue that trade’s impact on inequality in developed economies was insignificant.
Indeed, the work that followed often pointed to greater costs from trade. In an update of Krugman’s 1995 model, Josh Bivens (2013) estimated that trade with less developed countries accounted for one-third of the rise in US wage inequality between 1979 and 2011—and more than 90% of it after 1995. In another example, Michael Elsby, Bart Hobijn, and Aysegul Sahin (2013) found that import exposure could account for 85% of the 3.9pp decline in US workers’ share of national income over the prior 25 years.
Recent research has also highlighted the spillovers from pressure on US manufacturing. In one such study, Avraham Ebenstein and colleagues (2014) found that trade was pushing workers out of generally higher-paying manufacturing jobs and into lower-paying positions in other parts of the economy. Using census data on individual workers across industries, the authors estimated that people who switched occupations due to trade or offshoring saw their real wages fall 12-17% between 1984 and 2002.
China has played an important part in these developments, having increased its share of US imports to 21% in 2015 from only 6% in 1995. MIT’s David Autor and other researchers (2013, 2016) mapped the exposure of 700+ US labor markets to this surge based on initial industry composition, and concluded that workers in more-exposed regions faced lower lifetime earnings, particularly if they were already at the lower end of the pay scale. By Autor’s estimates, Chinese imports cost the US up to 2.4mn jobs between 1999 and 2011, of which nearly 1mn were in manufacturing. Others have found evidence of US jobs effectively “moving” abroad: Ebenstein et al (2012) noted that US job losses have corresponded with Chinese gains in the same sectors. That these shifts occurred even for routine tasks suggests, in their view, that US workers are being displaced by trade rather than technology.
When the facts change, I change my mind
The recent research has not invalidated earlier findings; indeed, the trade landscape has changed considerably since the “first wave” of analysis. More importantly, economists remain proponents of free trade (and, to be sure, some maintain that trade is not an important driver of wage inequality). However, the tone around trade appears to be shifting toward a greater acknowledgment of concentrated losses rather than an affirmation of overall gains. In the words of Harvard University’s Dani Rodrik, “The populist rhetoric on trade may be excessive, but few deny any longer that the underlying grievances are real.”
Janet Yellen’s terrible week signals more about the state of US politics than the US economy … Was Janet Yellen mansplained to by members of Congress who grilled the Federal Reserve chair this week in her semi-annual testimony to the House Financial Services Committee? -Quartz
In this short article, Quartz bemoans how “tough” the treatment was for both Janet Yellen and Hillary this past week.
Yellen appeared before Congress during her semi-annual testimony before the House Financial Services Committee. She came in for harsh questioning regarding Fed political bias and also her inability to reduce risks associated with too-big-too-fail banks.
As for Ms. Clinton, she was attacked by Trump during the first debate via “90 minutes of veiled microaggressions.”
… The interruptions, the remarks about her “temperament,” the questioning of her “stamina,” the criticism of her preparedness—another intelligent woman of great achievement was reprimanded by men of lesser knowledge ….
The article called the approaches of Congress and Trump “coarse” and “sophomoric.”
The only hope is that the “next generation” of American voters will treat officials with the “civility they deserve” regardless of gender and party affiliations.
From our view, the Quartz article is misidentifying victims. The real victims are millions of people at home and abroad.
US citizens are out of work and surviving on food stamps and worse. The economy offers little hope and the “solutions” voiced by Yellen and Clinton and others only promise more of the same: increased economic dysfunction and expanding poverty.
Meanwhile, the US is continually injuring and slaughtering people abroad, including whole families celebrating weddings and women and children lying injured in hospitals that are destroyed around them.
Both Yellen and Clinton have been directly enmeshed in support of a federal government that has been pursuing economic destruction at home and serial warfare abroad. There is plenty of evidence on the ‘Net that the US and its allies helped found ISIS and even Al Qaeda.
The US’s recent wars have destroyed whole countries. In Iraq, depleted uranium caused doctors to warn women not to get pregnant.
Given the ruination of cultures and countries around the world, it seems somewhat ironic that Quartz writers are concerned about “roughness” aimed at Yellen and Clinton via the political process.
Once we were informed that female participation in public life would change things for the better. But Yellen has been an active promoter of the Fed behemoth that has virtually bankrupted the entire US, and probably the world as well. Meanwhile, Clinton is far more warlike than her opponent, Donald Trump. She seems intent on going to war with Iran for instance, if she is elected. And she seems to be welcoming war with Russia, also.
Conclusion: When one examines the power these two women have exercised already, it becomes clear that their actions have been destructive. Quartz should be more concerned with this destructiveness than “coarseness” aimed in their direction.
There’s good news and bad news in the latest Gallup poll on Americans’ desire for a major 3rd Party.
The good news is that at 57%, this is the highest demand we’ve seen
during any recent Presidential election year. The bad news is that we’ve
seen levels this high before. Additionally, this desire for a 3rd Party
doesn’t actually translate into massive third party support when it
comes time to actually voting.
PRINCETON, N.J. — A majority of Americans,
57%, continue to say that a third major U.S. political party is needed,
while 37% disagree, saying the two parties are doing an adequate job of
representing the American people. These views are similar to
what Gallup has measured in each of the last three years. However, they
represent a departure from public opinion in 2008 and 2012 — the last
two presidential election years — when Americans were evenly divided on
the need for a third party.
These results are based on Gallup’s annual Governance poll. The poll was conducted Sept. 7-11, at a time when Americans’ views of the Republican and Democratic parties are near historical lows, and when Americans hold highly negative opinions of
both major-party presidential nominees. In 2008 and 2012, Americans’
favorable ratings of the parties were slightly more positive than today,
but their favorable ratings of the presidential candidates were far
better.
In those years, third-party presidential candidates
received less than 2% of the popular vote for president. This year,
third-party candidates are getting about 10% of the vote combined in
presidential preference polls. Should that level of support hold between
now and Election Day, it would be the strongest performance for
third-party candidates since the 1992 and 1996 campaigns, when Ross
Perot ran for president.
As might be expected, independents have consistently been most
likely among the major political groups to believe a third party is
needed. Currently, 73% of independents, 51% of Republicans and 43% of
Democrats favor the formation of a third party. Republicans’ preference
for a third party today ranks among the highest Gallup has found for a
partisan group, along with a 52% reading among Republicans in 2013 and
50% for Democrats in 2006.
Americans’ usual preference for a third major political
party had subsided in the last two presidential election years, but that
pattern did not repeat itself this year. In 2008 and 2012,
Americans’ general contentment with the major-party nominees may have
led them to believe the parties were doing an adequate job of
representing their views, and thus there was little appetite for a third
party. This was the case in 2012, even as the well-funded “Americans
Elect” movement aimed at providing the infrastructure for a credible
third-party candidate could not field a viable candidate.
The political environment is different this year, with Hillary Clinton’s favorable ratings struggling
to break 40%, while Trump’s have been stuck even lower at around 33%.
Four years ago, Gary Johnson and Jill Stein combined for just over 1% of
the national popular vote as the Libertarian and Green Party
presidential nominees, respectively. This year, with those two
third-party candidates nominated again, their support in pre-election
polls among likely voters is nearly 10%.
With 57% of Americans favoring a third major political
party, but only about one in 10 voters currently saying they will vote
for a third-party candidate, Americans’ appetite for a third party may
not be as great as they say it is. The gap between preference
for a third party and support for third-party candidates in this year’s
election may also reflect the structural challenges third parties face,
Americans’ unfamiliarity with the third-party candidates and possibly Americans’ reluctance to cast their vote for a candidate with little chance of winning.
Here’s the chart of the trend over time. Still no breakout.
For Deutsche Bank, when it rains, it pours, even when everyone tries to come to its rescue.
One day after its stock soared from all time lows, following what so far appears to have been a fabricated report sourced by AFP which relied on Twitter as a source that the DOJ would reduce its RMBS settlement ask with Deutsche Bank from $14 billion to below $6 billion (and which neither the DOJ nor Deutsche Bank have confirmed for obvious reason), moments ago Bloomberg reported that six current and former managers of Deutsche Bank, including Michele Faissola, Michele Foresti and Ivor Dunbar, were charged in Milan for colluding to falsify the accounts of Italy’s third-biggest bank, Monte Paschi (which itself is so insolvent it is currently scrambling to finalize a private sector bailout) and manipulate the market. Two former executives at Nomura Holdings Inc. and five at Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena were also charged.
The news comes in a time of heated relations between Italy and Germany, when the former has been pushing to get German “permission” for a state bailout of its insolvent banks only to be met by stiff resistance by the latter as Merkel and Schauble have demanded a bail-in of private investors instead, even as – ironically – it has been Deutsche Bank’s woeful financial state that has been in the Wall Street spotlight this past week.
In what appears to be another case of “Wells Fargo-esque” scapegoating of junior employees to keep senior execs off the hook, just weeks after Milan prosecutors shelved a probe against Monte Paschi’s former chairman and CEO for alleged market manipulation and false accounting as it “risked undermining investor sentiment”, a judge approved a request by Milan prosecutors to try the bankers on charges involving two separate derivative transactions arranged with Nomura and Deutsche Bank, said a lawyer involved in the case who was in the courtroom Saturday as the decision was announced Bloomberg reports.
Just as importantly, the firms are also named as defendants in the indictment, as the Italian law provides for a direct liability of legal entities for certain crimes committed by their representatives. Which means even more legal charges, fines and settlements are looking likely in DB’s future.
A trial is scheduled for Dec. 15.
As Bloomberg adds, Monte Paschi’s former executives Giuseppe Mussari, Antonio Vigni and Gianluca Baldassarri, and Nomura’s former bankers Sadeq Sayeed and Raffaele Ricci also will face trial for allegedly obstructing regulators after the investigation revealed that the 2009 deal, dubbed Alexandria, was designed to disguise losses from a previous investment.
The basis for the legal action are two deals conducted by Deutsche Bank and Nomura which took place at the height of the financial crisis, meant to mask Monte Paschi’s financial woes. Prosecutors have been reconstructing how Monte Paschi’s former managers misrepresented the lender’s finances in the years through the two deals signed with Deutsche Bank in 2008 and Nomura in 2009. The investigation revealed Monte Paschi arranged the transactions to hide billions in losses that led to false accounting between 2008 and 2012, according to a prosecutors’ statement released Jan. 14, when they completed the investigation.
The fraud first came to light in January 2013, when Bloomberg News reported that Monte Paschi used the transaction with Deutsche Bank, dubbed Santorini, to mask losses from an earlier derivative contract. The world’s oldest bank restated its accounts and has since been forced to tap investors to replenish capital amid a slump in its shares. It’s now attempting to convince investors to buy billions of bad loans before a fresh stock sale.
Zero Hedge previously posted an in depth look of the incestuous relationship between Deutsche Bank and Monte Paschi represented by the”Santorini” deal, which we repost below for those unfamiliar with the nuances of the deal which will likely see renewed media interest in the coming days.
At Deutsche Bank, the job title “risk manager” might be more appropriately characterized as “campaign manager.” That is, Deutsche Bank is no more concerned with the active mitigation of risk than the unscrupulous politician is with actively avoiding extra marital affairs. Like campaign mangers then, risk managers at Deutsche Bank must accept the fact that occasionally (or perhaps quite often) messes will be made and spin campaigns will need to be devised and deployed in order to keep public opinion from turning sour and in order to keep the few regulators who aren’t on the payroll from stirring up any trouble. In short, risk management at the firm seems to be more reactive than proactive and the combination of pliable mathematical models, questionable ethical standards, and a clueless public makes it possible for the firm’s quant spin doctors to disappear vast amounts of risk from the books without anyone getting wise.
Apparently however, even the mainstream media has gotten wise to the act. Recently, CNBC’s John Carney and DealBreaker’s Matt Levine observed that Deutsche Bank was able to report a higher Tier 1 capital ratio in its most recent quarter not by reducing the loans on its books or by increasing its earnings, but by changing the way it calculates its risk weighted assets. In other words, it manipulated its mathematical models to achieve more favorable results.
It is ironic that these commentators should be the ones calling out Deutsche Bank for crimes against mathematics. After all, a little over a month ago, these same two journalists (and many of their peers) trivialized the whistleblower claim filed against Deutsche Bank by a Mr. Eric Ben-Artzi, a PhD mathematician from the most prestigious school of applied mathematics in the country, NYU’s Courant Institute.
In any case, on January 17, Bloomberg reported that “Deutsche Bank designed a derivative for Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena SpA at the height of the financial crisis that obscured losses at the world’s oldest lender before it sought a taxpayer bailout.” The Bloomberg story set-off a wave of investigations which ultimately revealed that the world’s oldest bank made a series of bad derivatives bets that will ultimately cost it three quarters of a billion euros. The Bank of Italy has since approved a 3.9 billion euro taxpayer-sponsored bailout. The story has taken several decisive (albeit hilarious) turns for worst over the past two weeks and the whole thing now reads like a lost chapter of The Da Vinci Code, complete with treacherous characters, scandalous deal-making, and a secret contract locked away “in a concealed safe in a 14th century Tuscan palace.”
As intriguing as all of that is, it is the Deutsche Bank connection which is of particular interest. The firm’s role in helping Monet Paschi conceal losses speaks to the depravity of Deutsche’s corporate culture and to the firm’s willingness to share its expertise in the art of obfuscation with its clients. Here is Bloomberg’s description of what happened:
Monte Paschi was facing a 367 million-euro loss on a… Deutsche Bank derivative linked to its stake in Intesa Sanpaolo SpA (ISP), Italy’s second-biggest bank, according to two documents drafted by executives at the German lender in November and December 2008… Monte Paschi, which originally took the stake in one of Intesa’s predecessor companies more than a decade earlier, had entered into a swap with the German bank in 2002 to raise cash from the holding to bolster capital while retaining exposure to Intesa’s stock-price moves, the documents show.
Intesa shares fell more than 50 percent in the 11 months through November 2008, and the decline would have forced Monte Paschi to post a fair-value loss on the swap at the end of the quarter, threatening the bank’s capital and earnings, the derivatives specialists who examined the documents said.
“Monte Paschi was facing a loss on its equity position and may have needed to find a way around it,” Satyajit Das, a former Citigroup Inc. (C) banker and author of half a dozen books on risk management and derivatives, said after reviewing the files.
This is the first part of what would eventually become a multi-legged trade that spanned the better part of a decade. Although the mainstream media has done a decent job of describing the mechanics of the transaction, I wanted to know the details, so I contacted Bloomberg to see if they would be interested in sharing the 70 some odd pages of documents on which they based their original story. Not surprisingly, they informed me that they are not currently able to share the evidence. While they promised that I would be the first to know if the situation changed, I thought I might take a stab at explaining, in detail, what exactly went on between Deutsche and Monte Paschi in lieu of Bloomberg’s top-secret document stash.
I cannot, of course, be sure that this is entirely accurate without access to primary sources, but this should serve as a decent outline for those interested in learning how the largest bank in the world conspired with the oldest bank in the world to effectively hide hundreds of millions in losses from shareholders.
For our purposes, the story begins on page 310 of Monte Paschi’s 2002 annual report. Under “Acquisitions, Incorporations, and Sales,” the following passage appears:
Sale to Deutsche Bank AG London Branch of a 4.99-percent holding in San Paolo-IMI S.p.A. Along with this sale, the Bank invested EUR 329 million to purchase a 49-percent interest in the newly incorporated Santorini Investment Ltd. Partnership, a Scottish company that is 51- percent owned by Deutsche Bank AG. The aggregate price of the sale was EUR 785.4 million; the difference (EUR 425.3 million) between the sale price and the carrying value (EUR 1,210.7 million) was charged to the revaluation reserve set up in accordance with Law 342/2000. The residual amount was allocated to shareholders’ equity through a bonus share capital increase authorized by a resolution of the extraordinary shareholders’ meeting of 30 November 2002. (emphasis mine)
This is the genesis of the Deutsche Bank deal and while it may sound convoluted, the bank’s motives seem relatively clear in retrospect. First, consider the effect the transaction above had on Monte Paschi’s statement of shareholders’ equity:
First, the bank had to account for the 425 million-euro difference between the carrying value of its stake in San Paolo bank and the amount Deutsche Bank paid for those shares. This was effectively a loss, and as it turned out, Monte Paschi had held what it called an “extraordinary meeting” on November 30 of 2002 to get shareholder approval to use its entire 715 million-euro revaluation reserve (green arrow above) for an increase in the par value of the ordinary and savings shares and to absorb the loss on the sale of the San Paolo stake to Deutsche Bank (this is outlined on page 383 of the 2002 annual report).
Because revaluation reserves didn’t generally count towards Tier 1 capital, the bank was able to absorb the loss on the sale without affecting the area it was really concerned about: core capital. As an added benefit, Monte Paschi was able to use the remainder of the revaluation reserve (the 209 million left over after it absorbed the loss on the sale of the shares) to raise the par value of its own shares, resulting in an increase in its share capital (yellow arrow above). This of course, led to a concurrent increase in the bank’s Tier 1 capital ratio. Effectively then, Monte Paschi turned a 425 million euro loss on the sale of an equity stake into a .2% increase in its Tier 1 capital ratio (there were other components which contributed to the increase, but the point stands). This is likely what Bloomberg was referring to when it said Monte Paschi was seeking “to bolster capital” by using its equity stake in San Paolo.
As noted above, Monte Paschi and Deutsche set up “Santorini Investment Ltd” after the completion of the equity sale. This is where the “equity swap” referenced by Bloomberg comes into play. From what I can tell, this was some derivation of a “total return equity swap.” Here, the deal began with the sale of the San Paolo stake to Deutsche Bank. “Santorini Investment Ltd” (the ”partnership” Deutsche and Monte Paschi set up after the sale) was essentially a special purpose vehicle (SPV) through which the swap was effectuated.
Santorini was majority owned (51%) by Deutsche Bank – Monte Paschi controlled 49%. A portion of the cash from the original sale of the San Paolo stake to Deutsche was effectively used to finance Monte Paschi’s stake in Santorini. Through the SPV, Monte Paschi was able to retain exposure to the share price fluctuations of its San Paolo stake. Typically in such a deal, there is either a floating rate or a fixed rate of interest paid over the life of the swap to the entity to which the shares were sold (in this case Deutsche) based on the notional amount of the shares traded (so 785 million euros here). When the swap matures, the original seller of the shares (Monte Paschi here) will receive the difference between the price of the shares when the swap was originated and the price of the shares at maturity.
Obviously, if the shares rise over time the original seller makes a profit on the swap (minus any interest payments made along the way). Of course the stock could go up or down over the life of the transaction so there is a very real possibility that the original seller of the shares will have to make a payment at maturity in addition to the interest payments made along the way. Note also that if the stock drops over the course of the deal, the original seller may be forced to post collateral to the buyer of the shares. Through Santorini then, Monte Paschi appears to have entered into a total return equity swap with Deutsche Bank referencing the 4.99% stake in San Paolo. Monte Paschi paid Deutsche interest on the deal and was on the hook for margin calls in the event the value of San Paolo’s shares dropped. The following graphic is a simplified diagram of the swap based on an unrelated total return swap diagram originally posted on Sober Look:
It is important to remember that one of the pitfalls of entering into such an agreement is that the seller of the shares may initially have to recognize a capital loss on the sale. By using its revaluation reserve, Monte Paschi was able not only to effectively avoid this for the purposes of core capital, but was in fact able to boost its Tier 1 capital ratio while retaining exposure to the share price movements of the sold San Paolo stake through the swap deal with Deutsche.
The original term of the deal was 3 years but according to Monte Paschi’s 2004 annual report, the swap was extended to 2009:
“…with reference to the investments held in Santorini Investment Limited Partnership, the capital loss, due to the compliance with several accounting principle, is not deemed to be permanent in view of the assets underlying the financial contracts, which anyway increased in value in the last period; moreover, the contract was renewed for further 4 years (new expiry: 31 May 2009) while keeping the advance redemption right.”
On January 1 2007, San Paolo merged with Banka Intesa hence the following passage from the Bloomberg piece:
“Monte Paschi,… originally took the stake in one of Intesa’s predecessor companies… [and] entered into a swap with the [Deutsche] in 2002 to raise cash from [that]…while retaining exposure to Intesa’s stock-price moves.”
It appears then, that Monte Paschi effectively gained exposure to Intesa’s stock by default. Whatever the case, the collapse in the price of Intesa’s shares in 2008 resulted in a 367 million euro impairment to Monte Paschi’s Santorini investment. Desperate, the bank asked Deutsche Bank what could be done. Ultimately, it was determined that Deutsche and Monte Paschi would restructure Santorini and devise a replacement swap that would allow Monte Paschi to hide the losses on its original position.
The replacement swap will be the topic of a follow up piece. For now, consider that Deutsche Bank and Monte Paschi were able, via a stock purchase and a subsequent equity swap, to boost Monte Paschi’s 2002 Tier 1 capital (even though the stock purchase resulted in a nearly half billion euro capital loss for Monte Paschi), while ensuring that Monte Paschi retained exposure to the underlying shares. At the time, it undoubtedly seemed like a good idea – perhaps even a win-win situation. Of course, the near collapse of the worldwide financial system in 2008 would turn the deal into a nightmare for Monte Paschi, but as the Italian bank learned, when Deutsche Bank’s risk management department is involved, “losses” are just an illusion.
In the latest bizarre twist in what has become the most surreal US presidential campaign, Donald Trump had an early start on Friday, when around 3am, the republican nominee tweeted about porn footage that reportedly exists of former Miss Universe Alicia Machado with whom he is engaged in a perplexing media spat (more on that later), drawing fire from Democrat Hillary Clinton.
Did Crooked Hillary help disgusting (check out sex tape and past) Alicia M become a U.S. citizen so she could use her in the debate?
Then, by the end of the day, Trump was facing reports that he himself had appeared briefly in a pornographic video in 2000.
Posted originally on BuzzFeed’s website, in the 13-second clip Trump is seen on a street in New York fully clothed surrounded by young women as he uncorks a bottle of champagne and pours it over the bunny-ear Playboy logo printed on the side of limousine.
“There’s been a lot of talk about sex tapes today,” Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill said. “And in a strange turn of events only one adult film has emerged today and its star is Donald Trump.”
It is unclear if Trump knew at the time he was being filmed for a porn video, Bloomberg writes. As even BuzzFeed admits Trump‘s role in the sex video is virtually non-existent, and centers around him breaking a bottle of champagne on a Playboy-branded limo while several of the playmates are visiting New York City. “Other scenes from the film feature fully nude women posing in sexual positions, dancing naked, touching themselves while naked, touching each other sensually, rubbing honey on themselves, taking a bath, and dressing in costumes.”
In the latest orchestrated media scandal meant to deflect public attention from Hillary and keep the news cycle focused on Trump, during Monday’s debate Hillary cited Machado in Monday’s debate, saying Trump called the Venezuelan “Miss Piggy” after she gained weight. “She has become a U.S. citizen and you can bet she’s going to vote,” Clinton said of the 1996 pageant winner. Having once again taken the bait, since then Trump has defended the way he treated Machado and has sought to discredit her.
“Did Crooked Hillary help disgusting (check out sex tape and past) Alicia M become a U.S. citizen so she could use her in the debate?” Trump said on Twitter early Friday morning.
Trump cited the “sex tape” as evidence of the model’s “disgusting” personality after Machado publicly criticized the GOP nominee for his comments regarding her weight.
As BBG adds, the Republican Party includes a statement in its official party platform about porn: “Its harmful effects, especially on children, has become a public health crisis that is destroying the lives of millions. We encourage states to continue to fight this public menace and pledge our commitment to children’s safety and well-being.”
Just yesterday we wrote about an FBI investigation into potential voter fraud in the critical swing state of Virginia after it was revealed that 19 dead people had recently been re-registered to vote (see “FBI Investigating More Dead People Voting In The Key Swing State Of Virginia“). While the Washington Post caught wind of the investigation, it was not known who was behind the operation…until now.
Meet, Andrew Spieles, a student at James Madison University, and apparently “Lead Organizer” for HarrisonburgVOTES. According to the Daily News-Record, Spieles confessed to re-registering 19 deceased Virginians to vote in the 2016 election cycle.
While this should come as a surprise to precisely 0 people, Spieles just happens to be Democratwho, accorded to a deleted FaceBook post, apparently recently ran for Caucus Chair of the Virginia Young Democrats.
It’s too bad really, sounds like Spieles had all the right “special talents” required to be very successful politician…he just forgot the most important first rule: “Don’t get caught.”
The 19 applications of deceased citizens were submitted by Spieles through an organization called HarrisonburgVOTES. According to the organization’s “About Us” page, HarrisonburgVOTES is a “non-partisan” voter registration organization in Harrisonburg, VA and the surrounding areas.
As the HarrisonburgVOTES webpage points out, the sole goal of the organization is to raise the number of registered voters in Harrisonburg to 25,000…though it’s unclear what percentage of that goal was intended to be filled by dead voters.
The sole goal of HarrisonburgVOTES is to increase the number of registered voters in Harrisonburg and the surrounding areas to increase and encourage civic engagement.
Harrisonburg has the lowest percentage of voting age population (VAP) registered to vote among Virginia localities. Very roughly, about 17,000 people are registered to vote and about 18,000 are voting age and not registered. The goal of HarrisonburgVOTES will be to overcome these issues and raise the number of registered voters to 25,000.
HarrisonburgVOTES was founded by Joseph Fitzgerald who, “shockingly”, is also a prominent democrat in Harrisonburg. Fitzgerald is currently Chairman of the Sixth Congressional District Democratic Committee in Virginia and the former Mayor of Harrisonburg.
Fitzgerald told reporters, of course, that his organization had no knowledge of Spieles’s actions and fired him immediately after his confession.
“He’s smart, and he understands the [political] process,” Fitzgerald told the Daily News-Record of Spieles. “Who the hell knows what his motivations were?”
While we agree it’s difficult to be 100% sure about anyone’s motivations, we would be willing to put money on it having something to do with registering a bunch of dead people and then having them all vote for Hillary in November….just a hunch.
Trigger Warning: The following article includes an abundance of insults and harsh words directed at individuals of both of the male and female sex as well as politically incorrect statements including digs at cross-dressers and people worried about the weather. If you feel “triggered” by any of the statements, please see a psychiatrist.
**** **** *****
Dear Debate-Watchers,
“I guess he is a buffoon after all. Too bad.”
Those words were written by a dear friend and, until the lights went out on the first presidential debate, the most ardent of Trump supporters.
For the debate, a group of us had gathered at the Social Club at La Estancia de Cafayate here in the Argentine outback.
Most of our group were expats who, yearning to be free, have voted with our feet. Therefore, not indicative of broader US demographics.
It’s safe to say the audience was hopeful that Trump would wipe the proverbial floor with Mrs. Clinton. Within a few minutes, however, it became apparent it was not The Donald holding the mop handle.
If proof was ever needed that Hillary is a skilled politician, the debate provided it. She speaks in complete sentences, adroitly dodges sticky questions, and wields the rhetorical knife like a Colombian sicario.
Of course, Hillary had help. It often seemed as if the moderator had sat in on Hillary’s debate preparation, studiously taking notes as her team made helpful suggestions on questions he could use to blindside Trump or topics to be quickly passed over should they arise. Topics such as war-starting and email-server emptying.
But the moderator’s lack of impartiality ultimately didn’t matter, because, to the great detriment of the American Dream, The Donald could hardly string together a single coherent thought. Trump huffed and puffed—and oddly, sniffed—but in the end couldn’t have blown out a paper match.
When he did make an understandable point, as often as not, I disagreed. For instance, it seems like he’s advocating imposing a fresh round of trade tariffs, something that history has proven time and again to be a bucket of cold water over the free flow of goods and services. And he appears to favor using US military muscle to “take the oil” of Middle Eastern countries.
So, here we are.
And by “here,” I mean on the verge of electing the ultimate statist and an unindicted conspirator in too many shady deals to list here.
The Real Problem
As mentioned last week, this month’s edition of Compelling Investments Quantified, released yesterday, leads off with a fairly deep dive into the regulatory morass gunking up the workings of the US and global economies.
To give you the smallest sense of the situation, the graphic below shows the stunning increase in regulation under Obama.
As you can see, the biggest new burden foisted on the economy is an aggressive ramping up of the Environmental Protection Agency, Grand Inquisitors of the Holy Church of Weather Worriers.
While I have long held the attitude that anyone wanting to be a politician is possessed of serious character flaws, I confess to caring about Trump winning the debate and, more to the point, prevailing in the November election.
My reasons were not that he is a man of stellar character with a firm grasp on the issues, but rather because it is clear from his many public actions that he is not a politician in the conventional sense.
Therefore, the Pollyannaish side of me hoped that, upon taking office, he would stop providing water and nutrients to the growing bureaucracy that is literally destroying the US economy, as well as the very idea of America.
And by the latter, I mean a corner of the Earth where private property rights are respected and where everyone has a decent shot at attaining whatever it is they deem to be success.
You know, the America where rugged individuals are considered archetypical.
Instead, the American entrepreneur is forced to struggle through a minefield of politically correct landmines and hundreds of thousands of pages of laws and regulations.
Should he or she succeed financially, the government celebrates such success with progressively punitive taxes.
As a symbol of the New American, I would nominate campus Safe Spaces, such as the one promoted on the sign shown here, from the hallway at Hofstra University where the presidential debate was held.
I will now briefly pause, dear readers, to let out a string of loud and very politically incorrect expletives.
That out of the way, and falling in line with what it means to be an American in this day and age, I must confess to feeling “triggered” by the implications of Trump’s debate pratfall.
After the Debate, the Deluge?
During the debate, Mrs. Clinton made it clear that—rather than reversing the tide of regulation and taxation, prerequisites to getting the US economy off the blocks—she is going to double down.
Starting by ensuring that those individuals whose energetic pursuit of success has resulted in them earning above-average incomes are forced by the state to “pay their fair share.”
We all know how unfair that statement is, given that the top 1% of income earners already pay about half of all income taxes, while the bottom 80% pay just 20% of the total. And a very large percentage of that total pay no taxes at all.
Mrs. Clinton is aware of these facts, but fairness and facts have no role to play in Progressive America. The only thing that counts is how the narrative plays with the rubes.
Will she be worse than Obama in terms of regulations and implementing punitive taxes? Based on her history and stump speeches, the Magic 8 ball points to “YES.”
“…Clinton’s plans are as unambiguously progressive as any from a Democratic nominee in modern history—and almost nobody seems to have noticed.”
Among those plans are free college for the 50% or so of Americans who are already not paying any taxes; subsidies so no one has to pay more than 10% of their income on child care; guaranteed paid family leave; new layers of special treatment for non-whites and non-heterosexuals; new regulations to help unions regain their bargaining power and even, in her own words, to “rewrite the rules” on capitalism.
And so, at the very point in time when the US desperately needs to cut away the bureaucratic Kudzu holding back capitalism, the country is falling into the hands of a socialist sociopath who views the state as a hammer to be unhesitantly used to beat society flat.
In addition to higher taxes for those on the wrong side of the income divide, and more handouts for those on the right side, I think we can correctly anticipate some other consequences of Zer election as La Presidenta, many of which will have implications for investment markets:
Bank bashing. Mrs. Clinton has promised, when elected, to burden the banks with even more regulations. Coming on top of the massive Dodd-Frank bill, the flow of bank funds, which in a healthy economy provides upwards of 90% of total money supply (M4), will continue to remain frozen.
Dastardly deeds done to dirty energy. Oil, gas, nuclear, and in particular coal—are going to come under even greater pressure. Fracking is going to get fracked.
Obamacare is dead, long live Hillarycare. Make no mistake, Hillary and her brain trust will set about “fixing” Obamacare by adding yet more bureaucracy. Universal healthcare was her pet project back in the day. She is plenty peeved Obama pulled off his version of it and so will go to great lengths to make it her own again.
Political correctness on steroids. The morning after she is sworn in, Hillary will get to work pandering to the miscellany of special interest groups to win a second term. With George Soros on her arm and supported at every turn by the not-so-invisible hand of Silicon Valley, she’ll find ways to assure Black Lives Matter in every way they think they should matter. Ditto, the Hispanic populations and every other non-white male demographic, especially Bernie’s Millennials, who will be a far bigger factor in the next election than they are in this one.
An economic circus, but not of the funny sort. The US economy—and most of the world’s largest economies—have suffered extensively at the hands of government bureaucrats who, through ignorance or deliberate malfeasance, have burdened it with regulations to the point of breaking.
However, given that Clinton will have grand plans to make her tenure historically significant for something more than possessing a womb, you can expect a tidal wave of new regulation designed to create a more perfect world.
As the new wave of regulations will threaten to kill the already gagging golden goose, the Clinton administration will need to get very creative to keep the deficits from running amok.
I can’t even begin to guess how, but literally anything that can be imagined is on the table. Wage and price controls, higher estate taxes, big penalties for companies with assets overseas (unless, of course, her hubby is on the board), confiscating foreign-held assets… really, anything is fair game.
Prosperity on hold. Most importantly, instead of turning back toward the light, a Clinton victory ensures that the current economic stagnation and the attendant societal tensions will only worsen. Rig for a long dark night and for the deluge that is all but certain.
While the blame for the precarious situation the US finds itself in could justly be placed at the feet of any number of players, and extends well back in history, at the risk of angering some dear readers, in terms of the here and now, I choose to throw a razzberry in the direction of Donald Trump.
That’s because he arrogantly failed to properly prepare for the debate. As a consequence, he walked into one sucker punch after another and, when smacked, had no snappy retorts prepared to steer the debate back to themes less flattering to his opponent.
By failing to prepare, he let down the millions of people who had allowed themselves to become reengaged in the political process and who dared hope the cultural Marxism overrunning the nation could be slowed.
Of course, there is another possible explanation for Trump’s performance. Maybe he did prepare rigorously for the debate—and according to his campaign co-chair, he did—in which case, could his dismal performance be a sign that, per my friend’s assessment, he actually is a buffoon? Or, as they say in Texas, he’s all hat and no cows.
Regardless, his dismal showing has fully exposed the tender belly of what was left of the American dream, granting a big opening for the progressives to move in for the kill.
Game Over?
Given the debate disaster, is it game over for Trump and, by extension, America?
It’s impossible to say. On the one hand, demoralized as Trump’s supporters may be, the idea of President Hillary is probably enough to get them off their couches come election day.
In fact, much to my surprise, following the debate, Trump’s fundraising efforts soared. And while I have heard from many Trump supporters who share my assessment of his debate performance, every one of them appears to remain committed to their candidate come election day.
However, as far as independents go, I think his performance may have poisoned that well for good.
At the end of the day, it will all come down to turnout. Whereas prior to the debate, Hillary couldn’t get any respect, I don’t think anyone who watched could deny that she appeared more presidential.
Condescending? Arrogant? Slippery? Absolutely.
But at least she was coherent.
I cannot tell you how it pains me to write these words, because I tend toward optimism in my life. Despite having removed our family from ground zero, I had hoped the driving force behind Trump’s near miraculous candidacy—an up-swelling of popular anger at the poor condition the bureaucrats have left the country in—heralded a step back toward the path of sanity for the United States.
Maybe Trump just had a really bad day and will do well enough in what’s left of the campaign season to prevail. And maybe, if elected, he’ll surround himself with smart people and then wander off to the nearest golf course like his predecessor.
At this point, given the choice between the anti-capitalist crook and the big unknown that is Donald Trump, I would still have to pull the lever for Trump and hope for the best.
However, after the dismal debate, the future has just gotten a lot more unpredictable.
The reason why the Trump campaign has been so eager to find transcripts and recordings of the private speeches Hillary Clinton has delivered during her extensive, lucrative speaking career, is because it is there that she reveals that rare glimpse into what she truly thinks, or at least what $250,000 per hour will get her to believe. One such example is a recently hacked recording of Hillary Clinton, where in a private conversation with campaign donors in February, Clinton distanced herself from progressive goals like “free college, free healthcare” and described her place on the political spectrum as spanning from the center-left to the center-right.
The hacked audio provides another peek into the ideological chameleon that Hillary is on a day to day basis. As the Intercept notes, “Clinton has been inconsistent in the past about espousing political labels. She has at times touted herself as stalwart liberal. For instance, she said last July: “I take a backseat to no one when you look at my record in standing up and fighting for progressive values.” But a few months later, she told a group in Ohio: “You know, I get accused of being kind of moderate and center. I plead guilty.”
In one segment of the leaked audio, Hillary focused on her opponent at the time, Bernie Sanders, was pointed to successful programs in Scandinavia which provide universal daycare, family leave, and government sponsored healthcare and college education, as policies that he would seek to adopt. “Progressive” Hillary mocked the compared idea of “free college, free healthcare” to the “extreme” ideas promulgated by the right, which include “populism, nationalism and xenophobia.”
It is important to recognize what’s going on in this election. Everybody who’s ever been in an election that I’m aware of is quite bewildered because there is a strain of, on the one hand, the kind of populist, nationalist, xenophobic, discriminatory kind of approach that we hear too much of from the Republican candidates. And on the other side, there’s just a deep desire to believe that we can have free college, free healthcare, that what we’ve done hasn’t gone far enough, and that we just need to, you know, go as far as, you know, Scandinavia, whatever that means, and half the people don’t know what that means, but it’s something that they deeply feel. So as a friend of mine said the other day, I am occupying from the center-left to the center-right. And I don’t have much company there. Because it is difficult when you’re running to be president, and you understand how hard the job is — I don’t want to overpromise. I don’t want to tell people things that I know we cannot do.
Recording below::
Clinton then went on to explain why she felt so many Democratic voters, many of whom “live in their parents’ basement” were gravitating to Sanders. Ironically, for a presidential candidate that touts the economic recovery the US is going through, she admits these “children of the Great Recession” don’t see much of a future…
Some are new to politics completely. They’re children of the Great Recession. And they are living in their parents’ basement. They feel they got their education and the jobs that are available to them are not at all what they envisioned for themselves. And they don’t see much of a future.
… and with an entire generation unexpectedly finding itself in a dead-end economy, it provides a perfect incubator for what according to Hillary is an army of Bernie supporters: “if you’re feeling like you’re consigned to, you know, being a barista… then the idea that maybe, just maybe, you could be part of a political revolution is pretty appealing.”
I met with a group of young black millennials today and you know one of the young women said, “You know, none of us feel that we have the job that we should have gotten out of college. And we don’t believe the job market is going to give us much of a chance.” So that is a mindset that is really affecting their politics. And so if you’re feeling like you’re consigned to, you know, being a barista, or you know, some other job that doesn’t pay a lot, and doesn’t have some other ladder of opportunity attached to it, then the idea that maybe, just maybe, you could be part of a political revolution is pretty appealing.
One wonders whose fault it is that millions of young people are stuck in dead end jobs, living in their parents basement, while both Obama and Hillary make TV appearances touting the strength of the economic recovery.
But the punchline was what Hillary, who has been scrambling to secure the much-needed Millennial vote in recent weeks, truly thought about about the millions of young people whose vote she is trying to win: a diatribe of mockery, in which she describes the concept of a political revolution as a “false promise” which has attracted all these disillusioned and disheartened young people “living in their parents’ basement.” Does Hillary have anything to offer them? No, but she desperately needs their vote, even if behind the scenes at generously paid private functions, she mocks them in front of all those present.
We should all be really understanding of that and should try to do the best we can not to be, you know, a wet blanket on idealism. We want people to be idealistic. We want them to set big goals… But those of us who understand this, who’ve worked in it know that it’s a false promise. But I don’t think you tell idealistic people, particularly young people that they’ve bought into a false promise.
Especially when you are trying to secure their votes?
Then again, considering the eagerness with which Bernie Sanders has endorsed Wall Street’s favorite candidate, it is quite clear that the real “false promise” here was Sanders’ “revolution” all along. We wonder if in light of this hack, if Bernie Sanders would care to make some statement why he is endosing the candidate who behind closed doors, openly mocks everything that his supporters believe in.
Clinton has been accused numerous times in the past of patronizing young Sanders supporters. On Meet The Press in April, Clinton said she said “I feel sorry sometimes for the young people” who believe Sanders’s claims about her taking money from the fossil fuel industry.
During her remarks, she reiterated her belief that politics is the art of the possible, dismissing the more aspirational approach of Sanders and his supporters. “I want to be very clear about the progress I think we can make,” she said. There was no discussion of her view that the ideology of millions of progressive, young people is a false promise.
And while America’s young voters will be given an opportunity to respond to Hillary in just over 5 weeks time, one wonders what, in a world where Donald Trump’s every word is brutally attacked by the pro-Clinton media. would emerge if even a handful of Hillary’s Wall Street speech transcripts were the finally emerge.
In an email sent to his business partner and Democratic fundraiser Jeffrey Leeds, former Secretary of State Colin Powell wrote of Hillary Clinton, “Everything HRC touches she kind of screws up with hubris.”
Clinton’s tenure as Secretary of State during Barack Obama’s first term was an unmitigated disaster for many nations around the world. Neither the Donald Trump campaign nor the corporate media have adequately described how a number of countries around the world suffered horribly from Mrs. Clinton’s foreign policy decisions.
Millions of people were adversely harmed by Clinton’s misguided policies and her “pay-to-play” operations involving favors in return for donations to the Clinton Foundation and Clinton Global Initiative.
The following is a before and after recap, country by country, of the destabilizing effects of Clinton’s policies as Secretary of State:
Abkhazia
Before Hillary: In 2009, more and more nations began recognizing the independence of this nation that broke away from Georgia and successfully repelled a U.S.-supported Georgian invasion in 2008.
After Hillary: Clinton pressured Vanuatu and Tuvalu to break off diplomatic relations with Abkhazia in 2011. The State Department pressured the governments of India, Germany, and Spain to refuse to recognize the validity of Abkhazian passports and, in violation of the US-UN Treaty, refused to permit Abkhazian diplomats to visit UN headquarters in New York. The Clinton State Department also threatened San Marino, Belarus, Ecuador, Bolivia, Cuba, Somalia, Uzbekistan, and Peru with recriminations if they recognized Abkhazia. Georgia was connected to Clinton through the representation of Georgia in Washington by the Podesta Group, headed by Tony Podesta, the brother of Mrs. Clinton’s close friend and current campaign chairman John Podesta.
Argentina
Before Hillary: Under President Nestor Kirchner and his wife Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, Argentina’s economy improved and the working class and students prospered.
After Hillary: After former president Nestor Kirchner’s sudden death in 2010, the U.S. embassy in Buenos Aires became a nexus for anti-Kirchner activities, including the fomenting of political and labor protests against the government. Meanwhile, Clinton pressed Argentina hard on its debt obligations to the IMF, also crippling the economy.
Bolivia
Before Hillary: Bolivia’s progressive president Evo Morales, the country’s first indigenous Aymara leader, provided government support to the country’s coca farmers and miners. Morales also committed his government to environmental protection. He kept his country out of the Free Trade Area of the Americas and helped start the Peoples’ Trade Agreement with Venezuela and Cuba.
After Hillary: Clinton permitted the U.S. embassy in La Paz to stir up separatist revolts in four mostly European-descent Bolivian provinces, as well as foment labor strikes among miners and other workers in the same model used in Venezuela.
Brazil
Before Hillary: Brazil’s progressive presidents, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and Dilma Rousseff, ushered in a new era for the country, with workers’ and students' rights at the forefront and environmental protection and economic development for the poor major priorities.
After Hillary: Clinton’s authorization of massive electronic spying from the US embassy in Brasilia and consulate general in Rio de Janeiro resulted in a “constitutional coup” against Rousseff and the Workers’ Party government, ushering in a right-wing, CIA-supported corrupt government.
Central African Republic
Before Hillary: Under President Francois Bozize, the CAR remained relatively calm under a peace agreement hammered out under the auspices of Muammar Qaddafi’s Libya.
After Hillary: In 2012, Islamist terrorists of the Seleka movement and supported by Saudi Arabia conducted an uprising, massacring Christians and riving Bozize’s government from power. The CAR became a failed state under Clinton’s State Department.
Ecuador
Before Hillary: Ecuador began sharing its oil wealth with the people and the economy and the plight of the nation’s poor improved.
After Hillary: Clinton authorized a 2010 National Police coup against President Rafael Correa. The economy soon plunged as labor disputes wracked the mining and oil sectors.
Egypt
Before Hillary: Under Hosni Mubarak, Egypt was a stable secular nation that suppressed jihadist politics in the mosques. The jihadist-oriented Muslim Brotherhood was kept at bay.
After Hillary: After Clinton’s 2011 “Arab Spring” and the toppling of Mubarak, Egypt saw Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood elected president. Immediately, the secular country began a process of Islamization with Christian Copts experiencing repression and violence, including massacres. Morsi’s rule resulted in a military coup, thus ending Egypt’s previous moves toward democracy.
Germany
Before Hillary: The nation was a peaceful country where German culture, as well as religious freedom and women’s rights were guaranteed.
After Hillary: Clinton’s “Arab Spring” eventually resulted in a flood of mainly Muslim refugees being welcomed into Germany from the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia. Today, Germany is wracked by Muslim refugee street crime, unsanitary and harmful public health habits of migrants, sexual assaults by migrant men of women and children, increased acts of terrorism, and a diminution of German culture and religious practices.
Greece
Before Hillary: Greece was a nation that saw government safety net social services extended to all in need. It also remained a top tourist destination for northern Europeans.
After Hillary: The 2010 debt crisis emaciated the Greek economy and Clinton remained adamant that Greece comply with draconian economic measures dictated by Germany, the European Union, and the IMF/World Bank. Making matters worse, Clinton’s “Arab Spring” eventually resulted in a flood of mainly Muslim refugees being welcomed into first, the Greek isles, and then mainland Greece, from the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia. Today, Greece, especially the islands of Lesbos, Chios, Samos, Symi, Rhodes, Leros, and Kos, are wracked by Muslim refugee crime, unsanitary public health habits of migrants, sexual assaults by migrant men of women and children, acts of arson and vandalism, and a diminution of Greek culture and religious practices.
Guatemala
Before Hillary: Under President Alvaro Colom, the nation’s first populist progressive president, the poor received access to health, education, and social security.
After Hillary: Clinton authorized the U.S. embassy in Guatemala to work against the 2011 election of president Colom’s wife, Sandra Torres. Colom was succeeded by a right-wing corrupt president who resigned for corruption and then was arrested.
Haiti
Before Hillary: Haiti was prepared in 2011 to re-elect Jean-Bertrand Aristide, forced out of office and into exile in a 2004 CIA coup. The prospects of Artistide’s return to power was a blessing for the slum dwellers of Haiti.
After Hillary: Clinton refused to allow Aristide to return to Haiti from exile in South Africa until it was too late for him to run in the 2011 election. Under a series of U.S.-installed presidents, all approved by Bill and Hillary Clinton, Haiti is a virtual cash cow for the Clintons. The Clinton Foundation diverted for its own use, international aid to Haiti, and the Clintons ensured that their wealthy friends in the hotel, textile, and construction businesses landed lucrative contracts for Haitian projects, none of which have benefited the Haitian poor and many of which resulted in sweat shops and extremely low wage labor practices.
Honduras
Before Hillary: Emergent multi-party democracy with a populist progressive president, Manuel Zelaya. Children received free education, poor children received free school meals, interest rates were reduced, and the poorest families were given free electricity.
After Hillary: Clinton authorized a military coup d’etat against Zelaya in 2009. Clinton family “fix-it” man Lanny Davis became a public relations flack for the military dictatorship. A fascist dictatorship involved in extrajudicial death squad killings of journalists, politicians, and indigenous leaders followed the “constitutional coup” against Zelaya. During 2012, Clinton ordered U.S. embassy in Tegucigalpa to work against the 2013 election of Xiomara Castro de Zelaya as president.
Iraq
Before Hillary: Under Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, Iraq experienced small moves toward an accommodation with the Kurds of the north and Sunnis. Iran acted as a moderating political force in the country that deterred any attempts by Saudi-supported jihadis to disrupt the central government in Baghdad.
After Hillary: Clinton’s Arab Spring resulted in the rise of the Sunni/Wahhabist Islamic State in northern and western Iraq and Iraq’s plunge into failed state status. Shi’as, Kurds, Yazidis, Assyrian Christians, and moderate Sunnis were massacred by the jihadis in northern, western, and central Iraq. The Iraqi cities of Mosul, Kirkuk, and Nineveh fell to ISIL forces with non-Muslims being raped, tortured, and executed and priceless antiquities being destroyed by the marauding jihadists.
Kosovo
Before Hillary: Kosovo, which became independent in 2008, initially granted its Serbian minority in northern Kosovo and Metohija some degree of self-government.
After Hillary: In 2009, Kosovo increasingly became a state ruled by criminal syndicates and terrorists of the former Kosovo Liberation Army. The rights of Serbs were increasingly marginalized and Kosovo became a prime recruiting ground for jihadist guerrillas in Arab countries subjected to Clinton’s “Arab Spring” operations, including Libya and Syria.
Clinton pressured states receiving U.S. aid and other U.S. allies to recognize Kosovo’s independence. These included Pakistan, Palau, Maldives, St. Kitts-Nevis, Dominica, Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Burundi, East Timor, Haiti, Chad, Gambia, Brunei, Ghana, Kuwait, Ivory Coast, Gabon, St. Lucia, Benin, Niger, Guinea, Central African Republic, Andorra, Oman, Guinea-Bissau, Qatar, Tuvalu, Kiribati, Honduras, Somalia, Djibouti, Vanuatu, Swaziland, Mauritania, Malawi, New Zealand, Dominican Republic, Jordan, Bahrain, and Comoros. In the Kosovo capital of Pristina, there is a 10-foot-high statue of Bill Clinton standing over Bill Clinton Boulevard. Not far away is a women’s clothing store called “Hillary.”
Libya
Before Hillary: Under Muammar Qaddafi, post-sanction Libya saw a boom in urban construction and a new major international airport to serve as a hub for Africa. Plans announced for an African dinar, supported by Libyan gold holdings, to serve the needs of Africa. All Libyans received free education and medical care. There was a program for revenue sharing of Libya’s oil wealth with the Libyan people.
After Hillary: Clinton’s 2011 regime change operations against Qaddafi, which saw the Libyan leader sodomized, beaten, and shot in the head by U.S.-supervised jihadist rebels, resulted in Clinton laughing about the incident in the infamous, “We came, we saw, he died” comment. Libya became a failed state where Islamic jihadist terrorists vied for control of the country and Qaddafi’s arm caches were given or sold to jihadist terrorists in Syria, Iraq, Egypt, the pan-Sahel region, and sub-Saharan Africa. After Qaddafi’s ouster, black African guest workers and their families were massacred by jihadist forces.
Malaysia
Before Hillary: Malaysia, before 2009, was a religiously tolerant nation where Buddhists, Christians, and Hindus enjoyed freedom of religion.
After Hillary: In 2009, Najib Razak became prime minister and he began accepting bribes from Saudi Arabia that totaled some $2.6 billion with additional Malaysian public money in Razak’s personal bank accounts plus the Saudi cash totaling some $3.5 billion. Razak began allowing Saudi-influenced clerics to push for sharia law throughout Malaysia and Christians in Sarawak, Sabah, and Penang began experiencing Wahhabist repression. Clinton was silent about Malaysian persecution of non-Muslims. The reason may have been a reported several hundred million donation from Razak’s slush fund into the Clinton Foundation’s coffers.
Palestine
Before Hillary: In 2012, Palestine was granted non-member observer status in the United nations. The 2009 Goldstone Report of the UN found that Israel violated international humanitarian law in its war against Gaza in 2009. Palestine was gaining more support and sympathy internationally and was successfully putting to rest Israeli propaganda disinformation.
After Hillary: Hillary Clinton rejected the Goldstone Report as “one-sided.” Clinton’s unbridled support for expanding Israeli settlements in the West Bank and east Jerusalem and its silence on the dehumanizing Israeli blockade of Gaza, emboldened Israel’s theocratic right-wing government to further encroach on Palestinian territories and cementing into place an apartheid-like series of Palestinian “Bantustans” in the West Bank and an open-air ghetto in Gaza.
Paraguay
Before Hillary: The country under Fernando Lugo began lifting out of poverty the nation’s rural campesinos and urban workers. Paraguay also began a steady move toward democratization after years of military dictatorships.
After Hillary: Clinton’s 2012 “constitutional coup” against Fernando Lugo brought back into power the military-industrial oligarchy with the nation’s campesinos being forced back into poverty and repressive rule.
South Sudan
Before Hillary: Prior to independence in 2011, South Sudan, while rife with intra-tribal feuding, was relatively calm.
After Hillary: After being rushed into independence from Sudan in 2011, South Sudan, a special project of Clinton, George Soros, and actor George Clooney, descended into civil war and chaos. It beat all records in being transformed from a newly-independent state into a failed state.
Syria
Before Hillary: Syria was a multi-cultural and multi-religious secular state championing the concept of pan-Arab socialism and progressive policies advanced by Egypt’s Gamal Abdel Nasser. Syria was not a safe place for jihadism.
After Hillary: After Clinton’s 2011 green light for the “Arab Spring,” Syria became a failed state where the Islamic State gained a firm foothold. Minority Alawites, Christians, Druze, and Kurds were massacred by jihadist groups aided and abetted by NGOs and other interests backed by Clinton.
Thailand
Before Hillary: Thailand’s Red Shirt movement was a powerful force that demanded a return to democracy in Thailand and the restoration of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, ousted in a 2006 military coup, to power.
After Hillary: A Red Shirt protest in 2010 resulted in a bloody crackdown by the Thai military. Clinton remained silent about the Thai army’s killing of protesters and the mass arrests of Red Shirt leaders. U.S. military assistance to the Thai government was continued by Clinton. When Thaskin’s sister, Yingluck Shinawatra, became prime minister in 2011, Clinton began working to undermine her and her government in a manner not unlike Clinton’s subterfuge against Rousseff in Brazil and Cristina Kirchner in Argentina. When it comes to women leaders, Clinton only tolerates conservatives who kow-tow to the United States. The pressure against Yingluck eventually resulted in her ouster in 2014 and her being criminally charged in the same manner that saw Rousseff charged in Brazil.
Tunisia
Before Hillary: Tunisia was one of the most secular nations in the Arab and Islamic world. A top destination for European tourists, the country was more European in its outlook than North African.
After Hillary: After Clinton’s 2011 “Jasmine Revolution,” a textbook themed revolution crafted by Clinton’s friend George Soros, Tunisia descended into Islamist rule and violence. Today, Tunisia is the top country for recruits to the Islamic State.
Turkey
Before Hillary: Turkey was moving steadily closer to European standards on human rights and democracy. Even under the Islamist-oriented Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the country remained committed to pluralism.
After Hillary: Clinton authorized the shipment of Libyan weapons captured from Qaddafi’s arms caches to Turkish middlemen in the employment of Erdogan’s government for transfer to the jihadist rebels in Syria. A complication in this arrangement resulted in the September 11, 2012 jihadist attack on the CIA warehouse facility in Benghazi, which killed U.S. envoy Chris Stevens and other State Department personnel. Turkey’s dalliance with jihadist rebels in Syria was mirrored by increasing Islamization of Turkey. The events of 2011 and 2012 resulted in Turkey today being ruled by an Islamist strongman, Erdogan, with open political opposition being stamped out.
Ukraine
Before Hillary: Ukraine was a stable and neutral country that neither aligned itself with the West and NATO nor with Russia under the presidency of Viktor Yanukovych, elected in 2009 and inaugurated in 2010.
After Hillary: Clinton tried everything possible to ensure the 2009 defeat of Viktor Yanukovych. The State Department and its friends in the George Soros camp provided assistance to Clinton’s favorite candidate Yulia Tymoshenko to defeat Yanokovych. It was this early interference in the 2009 election that ultimately led to the “Euromaidan” themed revolution in 2014 against the government, resulting in civil war, the retrocession of Crimea back to Russia, and secessionist states in eastern Ukraine. Clinton’s policies directly led to a failed state in Europe.
Venezuela
Before Hillary: Under Hugo Chavez, the country provided basic social services to its poorest of citizens. Venezuela also provided discounted gasoline to several Caribbean and Central American countries through the PetroCaribe consortium.
After Hillary: After Clinton allowed the U.S. embassy in Caracas to foment anti-Chavez labor and political protests, the country began to falter economically. After Chavez’s 2012 diagnosis of terminal cancer, the State Department stepped up pressure on Venezuela, crippling the nation’s economy and political system.
Western Sahara
Before Hillary: Recognized by the African Union and several nations around the world as the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR), Western Sahara saw some hope for an evacuation of illegal Moroccan occupation troops from its territory.
After Hillary: In 2010, Moroccan troops began entering Sahrawi refugee camps and attacking residents, even in UN-protected exclusion zones, where Moroccan troops were prohibited from entering. Clinton ensured that UN talks and a proposed popular referendum on the future of Western Sahara were stalled. Clinton pressured a number of states to withdraw their recognition of the SADR, including St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Paraguay, Haiti, Guinea-Bissau, Cape Verde, Malawi, Kenya, Mauritius, Zambia, Panama, and Burundi. The Clinton Foundation received a 2011 donation of $1 million from a Moroccan phosphate company owned by the Moroccan government and which has mining operations in Western Sahara.
Yemen
Before Hillary: Yemen was a largely secular state that was transforming into a federation where the rights of South Yemen and the Zaidi Houthis of north Yemen were being recognized.
After Hillary: Clinton’s “Arab Spring” of 2011 and the fall of Abdullah Saleh from power saw Yemen become a failed state. Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and the Islamic State gained control over several areas of North and South Yemen. The fall of Saleh permitted Saudi Arabia to conduct a genocidal war in the country with Mrs. Clinton’s full support.
They say that history tends to repeat itself and for the China housing market, and its constantly repeating cycle of bubbles, that certainly seems to be the case. It seems like just yesterday that we pointed out the following video of ghost towns springing up all over China with millions of square feet of newly constructed residential living space but not a single resident.
And now, as we’ve pointed out numerous times recently (see posts here and here), China’s home prices are bubbling up all over again. Prices in China’s smaller cities, in particular, are seeing the largest gains as buyers from the larger tier one cities go hunting for “bargains.” In fact, per a recent account from Reuters, home prices in the city of Changsha have risen 30% in two months all while 13.5mm square meters of residential real estate remains unoccupied.
“Prices have risen 2,000 yuan ($299.84) per square meter on average in the past two months. That’s almost a 30 percent rise from July,” said Hu Yi, marketing manager at Central Courtyard, a residential project in Changsha targeting mid- to high-end buyers.
Chen Xiaochuan, marketing manager with local residential property project Xiang-Shore Park said speculators make up about a third of homebuyers in Changsha.
They are mainly from first-tier cities such as Shanghai and Shenzhen, property agents said, but are also from Hefei, where home prices have doubled since the start of the year.
China Index Academy data shows there are 126,945 homes, or 13.46 million square meters, sitting empty in Changsha.
But Changsha isn’t the only city where home prices are bubbling over. Prices in the Zhengdong district have risen two-thirds this year with sales managers in the area caught off guard, “Even we didn’t expect the prices to go up this much.”
“We have already bought an apartment here, and we are looking to buy a second one,” a woman who goes by her last name Wang told Reuters just outside of project’s sales office.
“We see a flux of buyers from people outside of Zhengzhou, especially those from smaller cities in the same province,” Xu said, who apologized for his raspy voice, which he said was due to one too many sales pitches.
And for Zhang Liyang, a sales manager at Greenland Group’s HK.600606 Zhengzhou office, the price surge in the past few months came as a surprise, which meant missed opportunities as she was entitled to employee discount rates.
Of course, as we’ve pointed out numerous times, and confirmed here with data from Deutsche Bank’s China Chief Economist, Zhiwei Zhang, the whole thing is yet another debt-fueled bubble that will inevitably come crashing down again at some point in the not-so-distant future.
Per the chart below, accompanying China’s booming property market is a surge in mortgage loans with LTV’s skyrocketing to 71.2% in recent months, twice the level in 2016H1, 34.8%, which was already much higher than its peak, around 25%, in previous years.
Meanwhile, DB points out the average land auction premium for tier 1 cities rose from around 40% at the beginning of the year to over 90% by August. In tier 2 cities it soared to almost 70% from 25%. Note, these are premia to asking prices not even YoY price changes…seems very reasonable.
And, of course, pricing growth is almost perfectly correlated with credit expansion.
But, just like last time around, its probably nothing…