Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh has gone missing after the FBI and IRS raided her home, according to Baltimore CBS affiliate WJZ.
Jason Bentley, Pugh’s spokesman, told the Associated Press on Thursday that he has no clue where the Mayor is, while her defense attorney, Steve Silverman, routed calls to voicemail.
According to the report, “Pugh was at her home when the raid began, but has since left the state.”
Federal agents leave City Hall in the investigation into Mayor Catherine Pugh’s business dealings. The mayor’s second floor offices are one of several locations raided on Thursday morning.
Pugh was asked to resign by Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan shortly after the raids.
“Today, agents for the FBI and the IRS executed search warrants at the mayor’s homes and offices,” said Hogan. “Now, more than ever, Baltimore city needs strong and responsible leadership. Mayor Pugh has lost the public trust. She is clearly not fit to lead. For the good of the city, Mayor Pugh must resign.”
Neighbors say they haven’t seen her in weeks. Others were devastated at news of the raid.
This is Michelle Hopkins from Park Heights. She is fed up with the headlines at City Hall and, in her words, devastated by the news of today’s FBI raids. #WJZpic.twitter.com/V1DOJPKj1m
The city is now into the fourth week of Pugh on indefinite leave and silence is surrounding Baltimore’s top offices. Pugh’s aides have gone silent on status updates, declining to comment on her health this week- as questions linger on when, or if, she plans to return to work.
Last Friday her spokesman said she is recovering from pneumonia and plans to return to work.
Meanwhile, dominos continue to fall inside Baltimore City Hall on Tuesday, as acting Mayor Jack Young stayed tight-lipped on his recent decision to place a seventh Pugh staffer on leave of absence. –WJZ
“I’m committed to stabilizing the city and moving forward, and any changes I need to make, I will make them,” said acting Mayor Young.
“I haven’t spoken to her in two and a half weeks. I haven’t heard from her. I have no idea other than what I read in the paper.”
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2UUQIuE Tyler Durden
Following a sharp drop at the open, equities have not only regained all of today’s losses but are once again in record high territory, despite the overnight FX quake which saw the central banks of Japan, Sweden and Turkey all try to hammer their currencies, while the won and yuan both tumbled as the dollar surge, a manifestation of a worldwide dollar shortage according to some, accelerates, while interest rate volatility is once again on the way up.
What is behind this relentless bid in stocks? At the macro level, the answer is two-fold; first, and courtesy of the WSJ, earlier this week speculation spread that Fed the may “pre-emptively” cut rates by the end of the year in order to stimulate core Inflation and “more generically” keep events from abroad from pushing the US into Recession; the second reason is the “better than we feared” earnings from Tech/Growth giants (FB, MSFT, V, PYPL, CMG) which as Nomura’s Charlie McElligott writes have stabilized the recent Growth & Momentum “Slow-flation April Unwind” vs unloved Cyclicals/Value, which had been exploding following the multi-week “repricing of growth higher” phenomenon
On the other hand, and working against the rally, is what we reported on Sunday, namely that last Friday’s Chinese Politburo comments (and ensuing Reuters piece on “RRR cuts to sidelines”) as a hawkish shift away from “broad easing”, and taking some of the “easy money” off the table, especially in China where stocks have suffered their worst weekly drop of the year.
Yet while this mornings’ disastrous earnings fom MMM spooked traders due to the dismal cross-read on global growth in the second half, with UPS also missing wildly, the melt up has return in full force, so we take this opportunity to publish this visual reminder courtesy of Nomura’s Charlie McElligott “why we melted up”… and why we continue to melt up.
EPFR Global Equities and Bond Fund Flows Year-To-Date ($Billions)–$91B “out” of Global Equities, $120B “into” Global Bonds:
Source: EPFR
Equities L/S Hedge Fund Beta to S&P 500—just 1st %ile since 2003:
Source: Nomura
Macro Hedge Fund Beta to S&P 500—just 25th %ile since 2003:
Source: Nomura
Equities L/S Hedge Fund Beta to Nomura Beta Factor—0th %ile since 2003:
Source: Nomura
Leveraged Fund S&P 500 Futures Net $Notional Positioning now -$27.4B Short:
Source: Nomura
Nomura QIS Risk Parity model estimates fresh 2y+ lows in U.S. Equities $Exposure (Across SPX, NDX, Russell): Clearly the 2 year look-back time horizon is capturing more of the ‘2018 “QE to QT” macro regime—which was representative of the narrative that “we have tightened ourselves into a slow-down / recession”
Source: Bloomberg, Nomura QIS
ALL OF WHICH DOES THIS…
Epic Delta %iles as underexposed funds “grab” at upside through upside:
SPX / SPY Consolidated $Delta at 97.4th %Ile since 2013:
Source: Nomura
QQQ $Delta at 100th %ile since since 2013:
Source: Nomura
And in the meantime, Systematic Trend / CTA has violently RE-LEVERAGED into US Equities (from “Max Short” in Dec ‘18 to current “Max Long”), with Notional Exposures at 7 month highs as the already +100% Price Signal continues to see the notional position size continue to grow due to the collapse in trailing realized volatility across the short- to mid- term models:
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2vlOTr8 Tyler Durden
The Washington Post just cast doubt on President Trump’s assertion that Kim Jong Un was unaware of American college student Otto Warmbier’s brutal treatment at the hands of the North Korean state by revealing that the US officials who negotiated for Warmbier’s release were presented with a $2 million bill for his medical care.
In a report that seems suspiciously ill-timed (hitting just hours after Kim wrapped up his first summit meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin), WaPo reported that the North wouldn’t release Warmbier until the negotiators had signed a document promising to pay for his medical care, which they were instructed to sign by President Trump, who had discussed it with former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.
Warmbier’s detention in an exclusive state hospital reserved for foreign patients, the presence of the massive bill, and the quality of care the young man received – which an American doctor begrudgingly admitted was “excellent” – all suggest that Kim likely knew about Warmbier’s case, and had probably been following it closely.
Once it arrived in the US, the bill was forward to the Treasury Department, where it remained unpaid through 2017. It’s unclear whether the administration paid it, though however it was handled, the fact that Trump has now held two summits with Kim suggests that the issue has been settled.
Warmbier’s family speculated that the bill might have been intended as a ransom. The White House refused to comment on the story.
The bill went to the Treasury Department, where it remained unpaid – throughout 2017, the people said. However, it is unclear whether the Trump administration later paid the bill, or whether it came up during preparations for Trump’s two summits with Kim Jong Un.
The White House declined to comment. “We do not comment on hostage negotiations, which is why they have been so successful during this administration,” White House press secretary Sarah Sanders wrote in an email.
Warmbier, who was a 21, fell into a coma for unknown reasons the night he was sentenced to 15 years in prison with hard labor in March 2016.
He was convicted on charges stemming from pulling down a propaganda sign in a Pyongyang hotel in the early hours of Jan. 1, 2016 — an infraction that would be minor in almost any other country, but in North Korea it was considered a “hostile act against the state.”
Fred Warmbier, Otto’s father, said he had never been told about the hospital bill, but said it sounded like a “ransom” for his late son.
In addition to the revelation about the bill, the WaPo story also included some never-before-revealed details about the negotiations that ultimately led to Warmbier’s freedom. According to the paper, the US wasn’t aware of Warmbier’s condition for a full 15 months after he collapsed and sunk into a coma upon being sentenced to 15 years hard labor. It’s believed that Warmbier suffered a ‘cardiovascular event’ – maybe a heart attack. The American doctor who examined him found no evidence of physical trauma, despite the widely held belief that he was tortured by the Kim regime. Once the State Department learned of Warmbier’s condition, it set off a scramble to secure his release, culminating in a visit by the State Department’s point man for North Korea to the hospital where Warmbier was being treated.
The doctor who accompanied him affirmed that Warmbier received “remarkable” care.
Yun and an emergency medicine doctor, Michael Flueckiger, traveled to Pyongyang on a medical evacuation plane. They were taken to the Friendship Hospital in the diplomatic district, a clinic where only foreigners are treated, and found Warmbier lying in a room marked “intensive care unit,” unresponsive and with a feeding tube in his nose.
Flueckiger examined Warmbier and asked the two North Korean doctors, who bore a thick pile of charts, questions about the lab work, scans and X-rays they had done.
Afterward, they went to a meeting room where the talks to free Warmbier began.
“I didn’t realize what a negotiation it was going to be to secure his release,” said Flueckiger, who is medical director of Phoenix Air Group, an aviation company based in Cartersville, Ga., that specializes in medical evacuations.
North Korean officials asked the doctor to write a report about his findings. “It was my impression that if I did not give them a document that I could sign off on, that would cause problems,” Flueckiger said in an interview.
But the American said he did not have to lie in his report. Whatever had happened to put Warmbier into that state, it was “evident” that he had received “really good care” in the hospital, he said. The doctors had done “state-of-the-art resuscitation” to revive Warmbier after he suffered a catastrophic cardiovascular collapse, and it was “remarkable” that he had no bedsores, Flueckiger said.
Reports of the bill set off a backlash against North Korea among groups critical of the regime.
“This is outrageous. They killed a perfectly healthy and happy college student and then had the audacity to expect the U.S. government to pay for his care,” said Greg Scarlatoiu, executive director of the Committee for Human Rights in North Korea.
After being brought back to a Cincinnati hospital, the comatose Warmbier died within six days. Though the exact cause of his injuries has never been determined, North Korea said that he had eaten pork and spinach shortly before his collapse, and theorized that his condition may have been brought on by an allergic reaction to sedatives he was given.
Notably, this isn’t the first time the North has delivered a bill for the medical care of an American hostage. Kenneth Bae, the missionary captured by the Kim regime and held for almost two years, was charged about $300,000 for care related to his diabetes. He didn’t end up paying any of it.
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2UV3Ujd Tyler Durden
Overtime pay jumped 16% in 2018 at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), has sparked concerns the agency is out of control.
Across the MTA, average pay increased by 6% last year, according to the Empire Center for Public Policy. MTA payroll increases cost taxpayers $418 million in 2018, which was $82 million more than the authority expected. As a result, the authority expects to inflate ticket prices and toll fees.
Empire Center’s database at SeeThroughNY reveals the salaries for 80,057 individuals who worked for the MTA last year. Data shows the following payroll trends at the MTA is explosive.
Overtime surged 16%, or $119 million last year. The average pay for all MTA employees employed in 2018 climbed to $84,265 from $79,916 in 2017. A five-year trend in MTA overtime expenses represents an 87%, or a $404 million jump.
The New York Post notes that the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) delays hit a two-decade high last year, the paper points out chief measurement operator Thomas Caputo made $461,646 in overtime in 2018, the most in the agency, after his $164,027 yearly salary.
“Looking into Caputo,” spokesman Shams Tarek told The Post, there were serious discrepancies in how many hours he worked and what exactly was his overtime rate. Caputo was questioned by MTA officials, who said he declined to respond to multiple follow-up questions. In a five hour interview, Caputo could only describe his job as a chief measurement operator — claiming he was “one of only a few people” who can operate an “advanced track-geometry car,” which surveys rails for cracks.
Besides Caputo, there were six other individuals who made almost $400,000 in overtime. Here is the list:
This surprising news comes after the LIRR Sunday raised fare hikes $15 on monthly tickets and $5.75 on weeklies. Some New Yorkers say the out of control overtime is a disgrace.
The Post notes even LIRR employees were offended that some of their colleagues abused overtime.
“This guy is making almost $500,000?! Wow. I don’t even know what a chief measurement operator is; all I know is I want in that,” said one customer-service worker, who wouldn’t give his name. “I’m in the wrong department.”
Tarek explained the increase in paychecks is due to major overhauls of the agency, and claimed it’s cheaper to pay existing employee overtime than hire new ones.
Add Caputo’s overtime plus his yearly salary, and it’s more than 11 times the average American pay.
So rising wages and spiking overtime is a victory for MTA employees, however, it comes at the expense of taxpayers and surging ride fees that will leave the pockets of low-income passengers more empty.
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2XIOThc Tyler Durden
Former vice president and Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden says he asked former former President Obama not to endorse him – as whoever wins should do so on their own merits.
“I asked President Obama not to endorse, and he doesn’t wanna — he should — whoever wins this nomination should win it on their own merits.”
Here’s the video of Biden telling reporters he asked Obama to not endorse him: I asked President Obama not to endorse and he doesn’t want to — whoever wins this nomination should win it on their own merits. pic.twitter.com/9qAmfyuSI4
Obama has notably failed to defend Biden after at least eight women came forward to accuse him of inappropriate touching, which revived decades of controversy over the former VP molesting or creeping out women and children in public.
— Rudy Havenstein, Monetary Policy Pioneer (@RudyHavenstein) April 3, 2019
On the other hand, lawyer Michael Avenatti is now offering his full-throated support of Biden, tweeting that the former VP “offers Dems the very best chance in 2020, especially in key states,” adding “He has the fight, intelligence and fortitude to beat Trump and begin to make America, America again. He has my enthusiastic support.”
Screen shot/Michael Avenatti tweet via the Daily Caller
In March, Avenatti was arrested in Manhattan for allegedly scheming to extort $25 million from sportswear giant Nike. More notable, was that federal fraud charges simultaneously unsealed revealed in a nearly 200-page complaint with allegations of bank fraud. He reportedly embezzled a client’s debts and lied to a bank with faked tax returns.
Meanwhile earlier this month – one day after it was reported that Michael Avenatti was the subject of a federal warrant that resulted in the seizure of his $4.5 million private jet, CNN‘s favorite guest was indicted by a federal grand jury in California on 36 counts – including embezzlement, wire fraud, tax evasion, bankruptcy fraud and bank fraud connected to his alleged theft of tens of millions of dollars from five clients.
He appeared on CNN and MSNBC over 108 times over a 64-day period last year to push anti-Trump narratives – and now he’s supporting Joe Biden.
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2GFNJNH Tyler Durden
Contrasting sharply with February’s disastrous summit in Hanoi, President Vladimir Putin and Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un declared that their three-hour summit meeting on Thursday was a success, and that the two leaders discussed the peace process on the Korean peninsula, along with important bilateral issues.
Speaking with reporters after the summit’s conclusion, Putin praised Kim’s “openness” and said he would convey North Korea’s concerns about the US’s denuclearization demands to the US and China, which are both taking a more active role in the peace process, according to CNN.
“We are all pleased with the outcome of the talks – both I and my colleagues,” Putin said. “Chairman Kim Jong Un is a fairly open person, leading a free discussion on all issues that were on the agenda.”
Asked if Kim would be willing to continue his contact with the US, Putin was noncommital, saying Kim would pursue his “national interests,” but added that “we can’t resolve anything without talks.”
On Friday, Putin will travel to Beijing, where he will meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping and share what was discussed during the talks. Putin insisted the conversation would be “open”, adding that “there are no conspiracies here.”
“Of course, I will speak tomorrow in Beijing with the leadership of the People’s Republic of China, but we will also openly and frankly discuss today’s meeting with the American leadership,” Putin said. “There are no secrets here, Russia’s position is always open, there are no conspiracies.”
Offering a glimpse at how China and Russia’s position on the talks between the US and North Korea, Putin has said that while Kim sincerely wants to denuclearize and Russia also supports denuclearization, the North will require international security guarantees before it surrenders its weapons. These guarantees would need to be offered within a multinational framework.
Meanwhile, Kim praised the summit as a “very meaningful one-on-one exchange,” and Putin added that the North Korean leader had asked him to convey the North’s position to the US.
The only way a workable agreement between the US and North Korea can be achieved would be through international law, Putin said, per the BBC.
“We need to restore the power of international law, to return to a state where international law, not the law of the stronger.”
During a press conference before the beginning of the summit, Kim praised Putin, touted the “traditionally friendly ties” between Russia and North Korea, and declared that he hoped the summit would be a “milestone” in the talks to denuclearize the Korean peninsula, RT reported.
Kim also thanked Putin for “taking time out of his busy schedule” to fly all the way to Vladivostok for the meeting. Kim, who traveled by train, actually covered a shorter distance, since the city is only 129 kilometers (about 80 miles) from Russia’s border with North Korea.
Talks with the US over denuclearization famously collapsed after both sides refused to budge from their diametrically opposed positions. Washington has insisted that the North must give up all of its nuclear weapons and shutter its nuclear facilities before sanctions are removed. Kim, meanwhile, has demanded that the US and UN agree to a schedule of sanctions relief in exchange for gradual progress on denuclearization. Kim had reportedly proposed closing the country’s biggest nuclear facility under international observation in exchange for the US ending all sanctions immediately, a request that, according to Trump, prompted him to walk away from the table.
In recent weeks, Kim has sounded increasingly impatient with the US, saying recently that the US must have a plan to relieve some sanctions by the end of the year, or the North would walk away from the peace talks.
As Putin prepares to debrief Xi on his talks with Kim, Beijng has issued what appears to be a veiled threat through one of its go-to English language mouthpieces, Global Times editor Hu Xijin.
Trust is difficult to be built from scratch between the US and NK. It needs effective help from int’l community where China and Russia can be of help. China, Russia strengthening communication with NK is good to protect current peaceful situation and promote negotiation process. https://t.co/LRScKXC0Rb
In other words, Washington better rethink its insistence on its ‘all-or-nothing’ approach…or else. And one can’t help but wonder if this also has implications for the never-ending trade deal negotiations.
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2W6SLbt Tyler Durden
Remember Spying on Trump was called “Crossfire Hurricane”? Well now it’s renamed to “Crossfire Boomerang”. BOOM. Karma!
From the moment the Special Counsel investigation into Trump-Russia collusion began, we’ve been presented with a portrait of Robert Swan Mueller III as a man of unassailable character, a straight shooter, as impartial as can be. But Mueller was director of the FBI for 12 years (2001-2013), he was the king of the spies.
Does anyone really have the idea that the people who work in US intelligence are the country’s straightest shooters? Not everybody does. For instance, not Mike Pompeo, who bluntly stated: We lied, we cheated, we stole; It’s – it was like – we had entire training courses. It reminds you of the glory of the American experiment.”
So why should we believe Mueller is a man of such unassailable character when he rose to one of the very top ranks in intelligence? It doesn’t make much sense, except of course it’s what politics and media – and intelligence- want us to believe. It may not make sense, but boy, does it work.
And then at some point obviously you have to wonder why Mueller got the Special Counsel job on May 27 2017. Because of that unassailable character, we were told at the time. But if that doesn’t apply to Pompeo, why would it be true of Mueller? And why Mueller while there were strong links to US intelligence that would obviously have to be probed by the counsel (but were not).
That brings us straight to the next question: The main issue, post-report, is not whether Trump tried to stop the Mueller probe. The main issue instead is why it was instigated to begin with. Yes, US intelligence. CIA.
And then there’s yet another question: When did Mueller know there was no collusion? Not just 1 or 2 weeks before presenting his report, that’s for sure.
So when? 6 months ago? A year? Did he ever really think there was collusion? If so, based on what? The almost entrirely discredited Steele dossier? Did he have faith in that? The Mifsud-Papadoloulos-Downer connection ‘engineered’ by CIA asset Stephen Halper? Did he have faith in that? Or was the whole thing goal-seeeked from the start?
It appears very silly to assume that Mueller did not start his job with an agenda, because of the heavy involvement of his former employees and colleagues and his best friend James Comey, whose firing by Trump was one of the main reasons to start the investigation. Sounds like a very hard one to sell, but the media did a great job. Everybody bought into it.
And then the whole thing collapsed. Yes, collapsed. Because this was never about finding the truth, it was always about digging for dirt. On Trump. Think Mueller wasn’t aware of that? I own a bridge….
Mueller was forced to find Trump and his team not guilty on conspiracy or collusion -and obstruction. This is because he would have had to prove this, and couldn’t. But he’s left the accusations against the Russian government and Julian Assange stand. Not because he has evidence for that, but because he doesn’t have to prove them.
Nobody believes a word any Russian says anymore, thanks to the MSM and US intelligence campaign against them. As for Assange, it’s obvious what Robert Mueller has done. He’s completely ignored the one person who could have helped him find the truth -just not the dirt-. and let him rot in hell. Here’s wishing for that same hell to befall Mueller and all of his family.
There is zero chance that Mueller didn’t know his buddy and successor James Comey prevented Assange from talking with the DOJ in 2017. Neither wanted Assange’s evidence to become public, because that would have killed the Russia narrative as well as the WikiLeaks one. And then what?
Let’s make one thing clear. All that proof of Russian hacking and Russian Facebook ads? It doesn’t exist. The entire story is fictional. How do we know? Because the only source that says it is true is US intelligence. And they can not be believed. As Mueller’s investigation once again shows.
Mueller and Barr, like all of Washington -it’s a bipartisan effort-, want the narrative to remain alive that the Russians hacked and meddled in the US elections in favor of Trump, and that Julian Assange was in cahoots with them. None of which Mueller has any evidence for. And Mueller at all have no problem sacrificing Assange and Chelsea Manning while they’re at it.
Assange is not the only expert source who is silenced. The Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity -VIPS- also can’t get their voice heard. People who ran US intelligence for decades are being silenced by those who succeeded them. As if they don’t exist. As if their expertise is worthless.
The evidence they offer simply doesn’t rhyme with the official narrative promoted by their successors and the CIA and FBI. Remember: Mueller only dropped in his report what he would have had to provide evidence for. The rest is still there, but that doesn’t mean it’s true.
One VIPS member is Larry Johnson, “former CIA Intelligence Officer & former State Department Counter-Terrorism Official, (ret.)”. Trump referenced him the other day on Twitter:
“Former CIA analyst Larry Johnson accuses United Kingdom Intelligence of helping Obama Administration Spy on the 2016 Trump Presidential Campaign.” @OANN WOW! It is now just a question of time before the truth comes out, and when it does, it will be a beauty!
And sure enough, the Guardian today described Johnson as a “conservative conspiracy theorist”. This stuff is predictable. But at least we know that while Mueller et al ignore the VIPS, Trump knows at least something about them. A few excerpts of a letter they sent to Trump last week (which he hasn’t seen, undoubtedly):
[..] the Mueller report left unscathed the central-but-unproven allegation that the Russian government hacked into the DNC and Podesta emails, gave them to WikiLeaks to publish, and helped you win the election. The thrust will be the same; namely, even if there is a lack of evidence that you colluded with Russian President Vladimir Putin, you have him to thank for becoming president.
Mueller has accepted that central-but-unproven allegation as gospel truth [..] Following the odd example of his erstwhile colleague, former FBI Director James Comey, Mueller apparently has relied for forensics on a discredited, DNC-hired firm named CrowdStrike, whose credibility is on a par with “pee-tape dossier” compiler Christopher Steele. Like Steele, CrowdStrike was hired and paid by the DNC.
[..] In Barr’s words: “The Special Counsel found that Russian government actors successfully hacked into computers and obtained emails from persons affiliated with the Clinton campaign and Democratic Party organizations, and publicly disseminated those materials through various intermediaries, including WikiLeaks.
Based on these activities, the Special Counsel brought criminal charges against a number of Russian military officers for conspiring to hack into computers in the United States for purposes of influencing the election.” We are eager to see if Mueller’s report contains more persuasive forensic evidence than that which VIPS has already debunked.
“But They Were Indicted! “Circular reasoning is not likely to work for very long, even with a U.S. populace used to being brainwashed by the media. Many Americans had mistakenly assumed that Mueller’s indictment of Russians — whether they be posting on FaceBook or acting like intelligence officers — was proof of guilt. But, as lawyers regularly point out, “one can easily indict a ham sandwich” — easier still these days, if it comes with Russian dressing.
The VIPS mention a few times they can’t get heard. They sent Barr a letter 5 weeks ago, and never got an answer. Here they say: “.. specialists will have a field day, IF — and it is a capital “IF” — by some miracle, word of VIPS’ forensic findings gets into the media this time around.”
The evidence-impoverished, misleadingly labeled “Intelligence Community Assessment” of January 6, 2017 had one saving grace. The authors noted: “The nature of cyberspace makes attribution of cyber operations difficult but not impossible. Every kind of cyber operation — malicious or not — leaves a trail.” Forensic investigators can follow a trail of metadata and other technical properties. VIPS has done that.
If, as we strongly suspect, Mueller is relying for forensics solely on CrowdStrike, the discredited firm hired by the DNC in the spring of 2016, he is acting more in the mold of Inspector Clouseau than the crackerjack investigator he is reputed to be. It simply does not suffice for Mueller’s former colleague James Comey to tell Congress that CrowdStrike is a “high-class entity.” It is nothing of the sort [..] Comey needs to explain why he kept the FBI away from the DNC computers after they were said to have been “hacked.”
And former National Intelligence Director James Clapper needs to explain his claim last November that “the forensic evidence was overwhelming about what the Russians had done.” What forensic evidence? From CrowdStrike? We at VIPS, in contrast, are finding more and more forensic evidence that the DNC emails were leaked, not hacked by the Russians or anyone else — and that “Guccifer 2.0” is an out-and-out fraud. Yes, we can prove that from forensics too.
No Russian hacking. No Guccifer 2.0. But Mueller mentions both a lot.
Again, if Mueller’s incomplete investigation is allowed to assume the status of Holy Writ, most Americans will continue to believe that — whether you colluded the Russians or not — Putin came through for you big time. In short, absent President Putin’s help, you would not be president.
Far too many Americans will still believe this because of the mainstream-media fodder — half-cooked by intelligence leaks — that they have been fed for two and a half years. The media have been playing the central role in the effort of the MICIMATT (the Military-Industrial-Congressional-Intelligence-Media-Academia-Think-Tank) complex to stymie any improvement in relations with Russia.
We in VIPS have repeatedly demonstrated that the core charges of Russian interference in the 2016 election are built on a house of cards. But, despite our record of accuracy on this issue — not to mention our pre-Iraq-war warnings about the fraudulent intelligence served up by our former colleagues — we have gotten no play in mainstream media.
Most of us have chalked up decades in the intelligence business and many have extensive academic and government experience focusing on Russia. We consider the issue of “Russian interference” of overriding significance not only because the allegation is mischievously bogus and easily disproven. More important, it has brought tension with nuclear-armed Russia to the kind of dangerous fever pitch not seen since the Cuban missile crisis in 1962, when the Russian provocation was real — authentic, not synthetic.
[..] We recall that you were apprised of that Memorandum’s key findings because you ordered then-CIA Director Mike Pompeo to talk to William Binney, one of our two former NSA Technical Directors and one of the principal authors of that Memorandum. On October 24, 2017, Pompeo began an hour-long meeting with Binney by explaining the genesis of the odd invitation to CIA Headquarters: “You are here because the president told me that if I really wanted to know about Russian hacking I needed to talk to you.”
[..] Binney, a plain-spoken, widely respected scientist, began by telling Pompeo that his (CIA) people were lying to him about Russian hacking and that he (Binney) could prove it. [..] As we told Attorney General Barr five weeks ago, we consider Mueller’s findings fundamentally flawed on the forensics side and ipso facto incomplete. We also criticized Mueller for failing to interview willing witnesses with direct knowledge, like WikiLeaks’ Julian Assange.
You may be unaware that in March 2017 lawyers for Assange and the Justice Department (acting on behalf of the CIA) reportedly were very close to an agreement under which Assange would agree to discuss “technical evidence ruling out certain parties” in the leak of the DNC emails and agree to redact some classified CIA information, in exchange for limited immunity. According to the investigative reporter John Solomon of The Hill, Sen. Mark Warner, (D-VA) vice chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, learned of the incipient deal and told then-FBI Director Comey, who ordered an abrupt “stand down” and an end to the discussions with Assange.
Why did Comey and Warner put the kibosh on receiving “technical evidence ruling out certain parties” [read Russia]? We won’t insult you with the obvious answer.
Assange is now in prison, to the delight of so many — including Mrs. Clinton who has said Assange must now “answer for what he has done.” But is it too late to follow up somehow on Assange’s offer? Might he or his associates be still willing to provide “technical evidence” showing, at least, who was not the culprit?
VIPS can’t get their voices heard. Everyone ignores them. These are highly experienced veterans of US intelligence, whose successors, and politics, and media, simply act as if they don’t exist. And while it’s curious to see how they go out of their way NOT to create the impression that Mueller makes his “mistakes” on purpose, the gist is just that.
What this adds up to is not just that Mueller has come up with nothing in his $20-30-50 million investigation, but that he has purposely left things in his report that he has no evidence for but also doesn’t have to prove, because those he accuses cannot defend themselves. Note also that Mueller has never indicted Assange, he has only smeared him.
Mueller doesn’t just have nothing, he has less than nothing. What is left of his “findings” once the collusion and obstruction elements are gone, are things that either he himself (his team) or US intelligence has concocted out of thin air. And have you seen even one ‘journalist’ who has questioned these fantasies?
I see only ‘reporters’ more than willing to heap their own fiction on top of the report’s. They’ll grudgingly accept there’s no collusion only to run away with what can still be construed as obstruction, but not a single one questions the Russian hacking or emails or Facebook ads anymore or Assange’s involvement, though Mueller offers zero proof for any of these things. Ditto for Guccifer 2.0.
The GRU (Main Directorate of the General Staff of Russian Armed Forces, formerly the Main Intelligence Directorate) is a very advanced operation. When they hack something they leave no traces. US intelligence is just as capable of leaving GRU “traces” as the GRU itself is of NOT leaving them. The CIA is not smarter than the GRU. That’s what we’re looking at here.
How many Americans do you think there are who think this is the way to conduct investigations ostensibly aimed at truth-finding? You know, if only they knew?!
The only thing perceived as reality in America today is a bunch of fantasies designed to hide the truth. What truth there is, is left to rot in hell. What a place -and time- to live.
Following two strongish coupon auctions, with both the 2Y and 5Y stopping “on the screws” earlier this week, moments ago the Treasury sold $32 billion in 2Y notes in the weakest auction this week. The offering priced at 2.426%, up from the 2.281% in March which was the lowest since 2017, and also a 0.5bps tail to the 2.421% When Issued.
All the internals also priced just below the recent average, with the Bid To Cover sliding from 2.54 to 2.49, below the 6 month average of 2.51. Directs were allocated 19.1%, the lowest since December, and below the 20.1% six auction average. Indirects took down 60.4%, also a drop from last month’s 64.5%, while Dealers were left with 20.6%, the highest allotment since October 2018.
Overall a mediocre auction, and one which printed just as the 10Y yield had risen back near session highs, although it wasn’t so bad as to move the market.
via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2W5Gd41 Tyler Durden
Perhaps out of concern that his former boss might be pushing Robert Lighthizer and Steve Mnuchin to cave on enforcement, technology transfers and market access for the sake of securing a deal with Beijing, former White House Chief strategist Steve Bannon appeared alongside hedge fund manager Kyle Bass, Wall Street’s most visible China bear, to try and explain why Washington needs to stick to its guns and make sure Beijing is held to account for its decades of trade abuses.
Bass, who just the other day distributed his first investor letter in three years warning about a coming blowup in Hong Kong’s balance of payments, argued that the immense pressure for Trump to strike a deal isn’t coming from voters, but from Wall Street and corporate America, who have abetted Beijing in its efforts to maintain the status quo on trade – selling out their country in the process.
Drawing attention to something that few political analysts have been willing to discuss since the US-China trade spat erupted early last year, Bass broke down China’s lobbying strategy, which we highlighted here.
For years, Beijing has sought to curry favor with individual companies and industries by granting them piecemeal concessions, mostly in the form of market access. And since the start of the trade war, Beijing hasn’t been shy about calling in favors, which is why most of the American business and financial community just wants Trump to end the trade war, even if it means settling for a deal that achieves none of Washington’s objectives on ‘structural reform’, kicks the can on enforcement to Trump’s successor, and touts promises for purchases of billions of dollars of agricultural goods instead of meaningful changes.
“All the pressure on Trump to strike a trade deal is coming from Wall Street and corporate America,” Bass argued. “Look who fought CFIUS reform…some of the biggest companies in the US and Wall Street came together to fight it. Steve is right about who’s fighting…it’s corporate America fighting to get Trump to do a deal…and China plays that card and they play it better than anyone else…they open a market to very specific people to court influence.”
At the. beginning of the interview, Bannon warned that Americans are underestimating the threat posed by China, bringing up Huawei, 5G, ‘One Belt, One Road’ and China 2025′. As he repeatedly warned during the 2016 campaign, China represents “the most significant existential threat we have ever faced.”
“Look at what they’re doing…they have a geopolitical strategy to unite theEurasian land mass into one single market then to force the United States out of the Western Pacific then out of the Pacific overall. The radical cadre – this is not the Chinese people – this is about a radical cadre that is taking charge of the Communist Party led by President Xi…they’ve been running an economic war against the industrial democracies for 20 years.”
Questioned about what’s so different about China’s approach to how the US rose to global dominance almost a century ago, Bannon warned about Beijing’s system of “predatory capitalism” and “debt traps.” Meanwhile, corporate America and Wall Street has repeatedly enabled Beijing.
“Corporate America today is the lobbying arm of the Communist Party…and Wall Street is the investor relations arm.”
Both Democrats and Republicans have failed to understand, or willingly ignored, this threat. But for the first time, the US has a president who has been willing to take on the Chinese.
“Now we have a whole of government approach to really confront China on an economic war, this has never happened…the permanent political class and their paymasters on Wall Street have owned the political dialogue.”
Asked by CNBC’s Brian Sullivan if he could really blame corporate America for working with China, citing their fiduciary obligations to shareholder, Bannon insisted that corporations also have a commitment to stakeholders like the American people.
“I’ve worked at Goldman Sachs, and I’ve lived in China…corporate America has a responsibility to its shareholders, but they also have an obligation to their stakeholders – to their employees and their country.”
So, what’s the solution? No more ‘Buicks in China,’ as Sullivan put it?
“What you do is back President Trump,” Bannon said.
Further emphasizing his point that now is not the time for the US to pull punches, Bannon warned that Beijing is keenly aware of the growing wariness in the west of China’s mercantilist economic policy. So Beijing has sought to ‘rebrand’ many of its most controversial policies.
“They don’t call it ‘One Belt, One Road’ anymore…they don’t call it ‘China 2025’. Unless we confront it today, they [China] will be the dominant power in the world.”
After Bannon finished saying his piece, Sullivan shifted his focus to Bass and his warnings about “the Quiet Panic” brewing in Hong Kong. Though his letter hasn’t been widely released, WSJ published a summary.
In his letter, Bass revealed that he planned to take on a long-term bet that Hong Kong’s monetary authority will eventually abandon its peg for the Hong Kong dollar, sparking a sharp devaluation that could lead to huge gains for anybody betting against the currency. Since the peg has held for 36 years, out of the money puts on the Hong Kong dollar are extremely cheap. Though he told CNBC that his bearish case on Hong Kong is about more than the currency.
“My point isn’t narrowly focused on where the currency’s going,” he said. “My point is that if you look at Hong Kong, their banks are 900% of their GDP, their leverage is 900% of their GDP. They’re out of reserves and they’ve spent too much of them defending this peg.”
“The numbers are impossible to argue. The outcome is what’s under debate. If you look at it and develop and objective opinion here on where the imbalances are and it looks like the pressure cooker is about to go off…it might be a year, it might be two years….it might be six months.”
Ultimately, Bass believes “you’re going to see a revaluation of all the Southeast Asian currencies, starting with China and Hong Kong.”
As the interview wrapped up, Sullivan turned back to Biden to ask a few questions on the Washington news du jour.
Asked for his thoughts on Joe Biden’s candidacy, Bannon argued that we have already seen ‘peak Biden’, and that there’s ‘no way’ the former VP would become the nominee. He also warned that Biden has a major vulnerability that hasn’t been much-discussed so far: His cozy relationship with Beijing. Bannon brought up a deal struck by Biden’s son Hunter with a Chinese bank for $1.4 billion, and suggested this might be one of the reasons the Obama administration “looked the other way” as Beijing built up what Bannon once described as immovable aircraft carriers in the South China Sea.
Biden “has no chance to take on Donald Trump. He doesn’t have the stamina, or the smarts.” And for the Democratic candidates more generally, “unless you start talking about China, you won’t be competitive against Trump.” As for the Mueller report, Bannon agreed that there was ‘no collusion and no obstruction’ and that it’s going to be ‘six months of terrible vitriol’ from the Democrats, but that Trump would power through.
This wasn’t the first time Bass and Bannon have appeared together to warn about the dangers posed by China. Find our previous coverage here.
