Tag: news

Academics and Open Letters

In his useful post on the Federalist Society, Josh Blackman notes

My general policy is to not sign any statement I do not write–that applies to letters and briefs. When you put your name on something that someone else wrote, you have limited input. You can’t request changes. There may be things you agree with, things you disagree with, and other things about which you are not certain. But putting your signature on a document requires you to accept everything, in toto.

My views on this have evolved a bit over time, but I find myself closer to Josh’s position than I once was.

As a citizen, I represent myself and my one little vote and voice in the American democracy. In collective actions, whether marching in the street, attending a rally, or signing a petition, my contribution as a citizen is to add numbers to a political effort in which numbers matter. If I sign a petition saying the Firefly should not have been cancelled, all I have to contribute is a number.

As an academic, my contribution is different. If I am asked to sign something that emphasizes my institutional affiliation or professional title, presumably the reason is because my expertise is supposed to matter in that context. But if what I’m offering is expertise, then the only thing I have to offer is my own considered opinion based on my own research and expertise. I’m not just backing a sentiment or contributing to numbers. I’m offering a reasoned argument and a conclusion based on reasoned argument.

I have not gone so far as to say that I will only sign the things I write. It is possible for someone else to write something I agree with, and as with any coauthoring relationship the result might be better if I do not write it all myself. But I have become much more reluctant to sign collective statements.

If I am going to sign on to something, the list of contributors has to be small. When the emphasis is just on gathering names, then the effect can be to water down my own contribution. If I have expertise to contribute to a public issue, it would seem to hurt rather than help the cause for me to join a letter signed by hundreds of others who have no credible claim to expertise on that issue. It is perfectly reasonable for me to be one of thousands of citizens signing a petition, but it makes little sense for me to be one of thousands of professors endorsing a statement.

If I am going to sign on to something, the subject matter has to be in my scholarly wheelhouse. I cannot in good faith add expert support for something about which I am not expert. If I am lending my scholarly credibility to something, I need to have scholarly credibility to lend. Readers are often in no position to judge whether the signers of a given letter all have relevant expertise, and so the burden is on me to not send false signals. There are lots of things I think are right, but I should be able to distinguish in my own mind whether I think something is right because I have a considered scholarly view on it or simply because I have an amateur opinion about it. I should not hold myself out as a scholar while giving my amateur opinion, and generally speaking in both cases I should be willing to explain my reasons and not just state my conclusion.

If I am going to sign on to something, I have to agree with everything in it. A letter or brief might not be exactly how I would have written it myself. There are compromises that must be made in every collective enterprise, but if I am asked to sign on to a thirteen point plan I have to be willing to own all thirteen points. The organizers of such efforts certainly expect the reader to think that everyone signing on to a letter endorses all its major claims. That’s the point of being able to wave around a faculty letter with hundreds of signatures. I would be misleading others if I signed something but had a private list of reservations. If I allow others to represent that I support something that I do not in fact support, then I am fostering a lie and polluting the public square.

If I am asked to sign on to something, I have to think carefully about whether the point is better made through a collective statement or through an elaborated individual argument. There are times when collective statements matter. If a claim is well outside the scholarly mainstream, it is useful for scholars to stand up as a group and say so. If a point is primarily a political one relevant to some collective of which I am a member, then I should stand with the group. But if the point is a contestable claim about which scholars of good faith and competence disagree, then I have a responsibility to not pretend like there is more consensus than there is and to explain why exactly I have reached this particular conclusion on this particular point. I should be trying to persuade and not just impress others with the weight of authority. My default assumption is to think that what I have to add to a public conversation is my considered opinion as a scholar with relevant expertise, and that is usually best conveyed in my own voice.

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Prominent Conservative Legal Scholar Steve Calabresi Calls for Trump’s Impeachment

Impeachment

In a recent New York Times op ed, prominent conservative legal scholar and Federalist Society co-founder Steve Calabresi called for Donald Trump to be impeached and removed from office, due to his recent tweet advocating postponement of the 2020 presidential election:

I have voted Republican in every presidential election since 1980, including voting for Donald Trump in 2016. I wrote op-eds and a law review article protesting what I believe was an unconstitutional investigation by Robert Mueller. I also wrote an op-ed opposing President Trump’s impeachment.

But I am frankly appalled by the president’s recent tweet seeking to postpone the November election. Until recently, I had taken as political hyperbole the Democrats’ assertion that President Trump is a fascist. But this latest tweet is fascistic and is itself grounds for the president’s immediate impeachment again by the House of Representatives and his removal from office by the Senate.

First, I am happy to welcome Steve to the club of conservative and libertarian legal scholars who believe Trump deserves to be impeached and removed from office—a group that already includes several Volokh Conspiracy bloggers, such as Jonathan Adler, David Post, and myself.

I agree with Steve that the Tweet is deeply troubling, and that the president has no authority to postpone the election. The latter is the virtual consensus view of constitutional law specialists. Co-blogger Michael Abramowicz has a good explanation of why.

At the same time, the tweet strikes me as a far less compelling justification for impeachment and removal than numerous previous actions by Trump. The Ukraine scandal (for which Trump was actually impeached, though eventually acquitted by the Senate) involved a serious attempt to usurp Congressional power, and a violation of federal criminal law. Trump’s brutal family separation policy was both illegal, and inflicted severe harm on thousands of innocent children and their families. More recently, Trump’s deployment of DHS forces to Portland and elsewhere is both a violation of constitutional limits on federal power, and undermines civil liberties by using CBP units known for their brutality and disdain for due process, which has predictably resulted in serious violations of constitutional rights.

The Tweet on postponing the election isn’t even Trump’s most reprehensible statement about the 2020 election itself. That dubious distinction goes to his earlier threat to illegally withhold federal funds from states that expand voting by mail. Unlike the postponement Tweet, that one actually threatened action. And the threat was made more credible by this administration’s ongoing pattern of attempting to usurp Congress’ spending power in order to coerce state and local governments into doing the president’s bidding. That  pattern is most evident in the administration’s campaign against sanctuary cities, which has been repeatedly ruled illegal by numerous federal court decisions.

All of these actions are more of a threat to the constitutional order than the postponement tweet. Several have already resulted in grave violations of the Constitution, and severe harm to innocent people. In my view (like that of most constitutional law scholars), impeachment is justified even in some cases where the president has abused his power without violating the law, and perhaps also in cases (like this one) where he has merely implicitly threatened to do so. But case for impeachment is much stronger when the president has in fact violated the Constitution (as in the Ukraine scandal, or has taken actions that inflict serious harm on innocent people (as with the family separation policy), or both (as with family separation and the DHS abuses in Portland).

If the election tweet were an isolated occurrence, I would be inclined to say that it does not justify impeachment, as it does not by itself violate the law, harm innocent people, or pose much of a threat to the constitutional system. But the better way to view it as part of a pattern of abuses of power and subversion of constitutional constraints on the president, which includes the actions listed above, and more besides. Seen in that light, the Tweet adds to the case for impeachment, though in my view there was already more than sufficient justification.

As a practical matter, of course, it is highly unlikely that Trump will be impeached again before the election, and even more unlikely the GOP-controlled Senate will vote to remove him. No law professor—not even one as influential and (deservedly) widely respected as Steve Calabresi is likely to change that political dynamic.

The real significance of Steve’s op ed is not that it will lead to a second Trump impeachment, but that it might influence the views of other conservative lawyers and intellectuals on Trump and his policies. If Trump is defeated in November, there will be a debate on the right about how much of Trump’s legacy should be retained, and how much jettisoned. Those of us who believe this administration’s ultra-expansive approach to executive power should be repudiated can use all the help we can get.

For the moment, of course, Steve Calabresi’s condemnation of the administration is focused on this one particular statement. But perhaps he will come to see that it is part of a broader pattern, that includes many far more troubling usurpations and abuses of power.

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The Return of Sports Is Great. It’s Also Deeply Weird.

upiphotostwo754407

Kyle Schwarber crushes a baseball towards centerfield. The crowd oohs, and the cheers grow louder as a Milwaukee Brewers’ outfielder watches the ball sail over his head. Fans in the bleachers stand to try to snag one of the season’s first home runs.

At least, that’s how it looked and sounded if you watched Sunday’s nationally televised game on FOX—and if you weren’t watching too closely. In the real world, the only cheers came from Schwarber’s Chicago Cub teammates, and no one was scrambling to catch the baseball as it thunked off the empty stands beyond the outfield wall.

Like all professional sporting events right now, the game was played behind closed doors. But viewers at home still got something vaguely akin to the “normal” experience. Simulated cheers and general background crowd noise have been edited into soccer matches by Fox, ESPN, and other networks during the pandemic too. But last weekend’s baseball games marked the debut of Fox’s use of “simulated fans” to make stadiums appear jam-packed even when they’re virtually empty.

In some ways, it’s a cool idea—one that the Miami Marlins probably wish they’d dreamed up years ago. Fox and Major League Baseball borrowed from video games, hired artificial reality programmers, and edited the whole thing together using a more advanced version of the computer that seamlessly draws the yellow line-to-gain on football fields during broadcasts. The Verge has a terrific deep dive into how it all works, if you’re curious.

But does it work? Not really.

Those simulated crowds are an attempt to embrace the idea that the return of pro sports to TV represents a return to normalcy. But the uncanny valley that Fox and MLB have created serves mostly to reinforce just how weird, how abnormal, things are right now. That’s not helped by the fact that the fake fans only show up in certain shots. (Fox programmed four of its camera angles to include them.) Even if the simulation were convincing, TV viewers would be left feeling like they were whipsawing between two different realities.

It’s also not helped by the stories that have surrounded baseball in the week since the Washington Nationals and New York Yankees belatedly opened the season. Within days, 20 of the Marlins’ players had tested positive for COVID-19 and another outbreak popped up in the Philadelphia Phillies’ organization. Both teams (and some of their would-have-been opponents) have been stuck in limbo since Monday. More than a dozen games have already been canceled. It’s still unclear when or if either of the affected teams will be cleared to resume games—or whether those players will be able to hit a major-league fastball after two weeks of being quarantined in hotel rooms.

On Friday, the St. Louis Cardinals canceled their scheduled game due to multiple positive tests. There’s been widespread speculation that the baseball season may have to be abandoned entirely.

Zoom out a little further and the picture gets worse. This week saw the 150,000th recorded American death due to COVID-19. We also got a better sense of the economic destruction that the disease and the response to it have wrought. It’s becoming apparent that most schools are not going to open on time. President Donald Trump is skylarking about delaying the election.

Good luck convincing anyone that things are returning to normal under those circumstances.

But the return of professional sports still matters, even in these somewhat bizarre forms. The National Basketball Association returned to action on Thursday night, and the National Hockey League will join the party this weekend. Both are hoping to finish seasons that were suspended in mid-March, and both have concocted expanded playoff tournaments with the goal of crowning champions by mid-October.

Unlike baseball, those two leagues are playing all their games in one or two locations—the NBA is in Orlando and the NHL is divided between Toronto and Edmonton. Creating “bubbles” means no travel will be necessary, and the leagues hope it will reduce the potential for the pandemic to disrupt seasons again. Whether it works remains to be seen.

Sports in the uncanny valley of fake fans, simulated crowd noise, and quarantine bubbles is better than no sports at all. Certainly, it is better for the players and coaches who can get back to doing what they love to do. And for fans, the explosion of televised sports is a rush of blood to the head. Soccer, golf, and tennis have been back for a few weeks now, but the sudden return of the major North American team sports is especially exciting.

But I could do without the digital mannequins in the bleachers.

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This Year, Summer Television Means Dragging in Shows from Canada, England

coronerCW_1161x653
  • Coroner. The CW. Thursday, August 5, 9 p.m.
  • Hitmen. Available Friday, August 6, on the Peacock streaming service.

Fear not the dog days of August. (At least, on television. War with China and mass starvation are on somebody else’s beat.) TV is turning its multicultural eye to the comparative anthropology of criminal justice systems, and your brain cells will be aflame by the time it’s all over.

Though, I’ll confess, the more interesting thing on The CW’s Canadian import Coroner is dating culture on the great northern tundra. Here, for instance, is the introductory conversation between romantic leads Jenny and Liam: She explains that her husband, who died three months ago of an aneurysm, was a degenerate gambler who defaulted on two mortgages on their home and let his life insurance lapse, throwing the family into hopeless debt.

“So what about you?” she inquires brightly.

“I was in the army, in Afghanistan,” Liam replies. “I killed a bunch of people.”

Lascivious outdoor sex ensues, after which they examine one another’s old bullet-wound scars. You think I’m making this up. I soooo wish.

Coroner, which has already aired for two seasons in Canada, is part of the puzzling summer crop of reruns masquerading as new shows.  It’s the tale of crusading forensic pathologist Jenny (played by Canadian actress Serinda Swan, known mostly for looking a bit like the 1975ish incarnation of Tyne Daly.)

Her city Toronto having apparently already defunded its police department, Jenny has to solve every homicide, but that’s not as weighty a responsibility as it sounds because the criminals, like everybody else in Canada, are pretty nice. (When Jenny asks what one murdered reform-school inmate was in for, a prison social worker earnestly explains: “He was antifa. He was all about the future.”)

Curiously, Canada seems to have a continuing fascination with heroic pathologists. Coroner is at least the fourth show in the country’s TV history about a superstar coroner, going all the way back to Wojeck in 1966, notable mainly because it launched the career of Dean Vernon Wormer, errr, actor John Vernon, source of the immortal disciplinary decree, “No more fun of any kind!”

That’s an apt summation of Coroner, which aside from those bullet wounds on Jenny’s naked back is the very essence of Canadian tepidity. And when you watch TV’s newest British import, in which brains are splattered every few minutes for big laughs, it’s hard to believe these two countries were once part of the same imperial empire.

The Brit show—yes, it already aired there a few months back—is called Hitmen and airs on NBC’s new streaming service Peacock. It stars Mel Giedroyc and Sue Perkins as a pair of crabby, menopausal and quite inept professional killers.

As one chases down a fleeing victim, the other will inevitably be on the phone arguing with a credit card company or an overdemanding client. (“Torture isn’t really our thing. … It’s one thing killing somebody, but popping their tits in a laminator… .”) They often get tricked into hauling the victims to a McDonald’s drive-up window or birthday party or even playing charades with them before snuffing them. The humor is darker than a witch’s heart, most of it consisting of pranks played on people who are about to have their brains blown out.

Surprisingly, this gets old after about the first five minutes. Giedroyc and Perkins used to be the hosts of a Brit cooking-competition show called The Great British Bake Off. They probably should have stuck with that, but maybe experimented with cutting the throats of the contestants who messed up the scones.

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Prominent Conservative Legal Scholar Steve Calabresi Calls for Trump’s Impeachment

Impeachment

In a recent New York Times op ed, prominent conservative legal scholar and Federalist Society co-founder Steve Calabresi called for Donald Trump to be impeached and removed from office, due to his recent tweet advocating postponement of the 2020 presidential election:

I have voted Republican in every presidential election since 1980, including voting for Donald Trump in 2016. I wrote op-eds and a law review article protesting what I believe was an unconstitutional investigation by Robert Mueller. I also wrote an op-ed opposing President Trump’s impeachment.

But I am frankly appalled by the president’s recent tweet seeking to postpone the November election. Until recently, I had taken as political hyperbole the Democrats’ assertion that President Trump is a fascist. But this latest tweet is fascistic and is itself grounds for the president’s immediate impeachment again by the House of Representatives and his removal from office by the Senate.

First, I am happy to welcome Steve to the club of conservative and libertarian legal scholars who believe Trump deserves to be impeached and removed from office—a group that already includes several Volokh Conspiracy bloggers, such as Jonathan Adler, David Post, and myself.

I agree with Steve that the Tweet is deeply troubling, and that the president has no authority to postpone the election. The latter is the virtual consensus view of constitutional law specialists. Co-blogger Michael Abramowicz has a good explanation of why.

At the same time, the tweet strikes me as a far less compelling justification for impeachment and removal than numerous previous actions by Trump. The Ukraine scandal (for which Trump was actually impeached, though eventually acquitted by the Senate) involved a serious attempt to usurp Congressional power, and a violation of federal criminal law. Trump’s brutal family separation policy was both illegal, and inflicted severe harm on thousands of innocent children and their families. More recently, Trump’s deployment of DHS forces to Portland and elsewhere is both a violation of constitutional limits on federal power, and undermines civil liberties by using CBP units known for their brutality and disdain for due process, which has predictably resulted in serious violations of constitutional rights.

The Tweet on postponing the election isn’t even Trump’s most reprehensible statement about the 2020 election itself. That dubious distinction goes to his earlier threat to illegally withhold federal funds from states that expand voting by mail. Unlike the postponement Tweet, that one actually threatened action. And the threat was made more credible by this administration’s ongoing pattern of attempting to usurp Congress’ spending power in order to coerce state and local governments into doing the president’s bidding. That  pattern is most evident in the administration’s campaign against sanctuary cities, which has been repeatedly ruled illegal by numerous federal court decisions.

All of these actions are more of a threat to the constitutional order than the postponement tweet. Several have already resulted in grave violations of the Constitution, and severe harm to innocent people.

If the election tweet were an isolated occurrence, I would be inclined to say that it does not justify impeachment, as it does not by itself violate the law or pose much of a threat to the constitutional system. But the better way to view it as part of a pattern of abuses of power and subversion of constitutional constraints on the president, which includes the actions listed above, and more besides. Seen in that light, the Tweet adds to the case for impeachment, though in my view there was already more than sufficient justification.

As a practical matter, of course, it is highly unlikely that Trump will be impeached again before the election, and even more unlikely the GOP-controlled Senate will vote to remove him. No law professor—not even one as influential and (deservedly) widely respected as Steve Calabresi is likely to change that political dynamic.

The real significance of Steve’s op ed is not that it will lead to a second Trump impeachment, but that it might influence the views of other conservative lawyers and intellectuals on Trump and his policies. If Trump is defeated in November, there will be a debate on the right about how much of Trump’s legacy should be retained, and how much jettisoned. Those of us who believe this administration’s ultra-expansive approach to executive power should be repudiated can use all the help we can get.

For the moment, of course, Steve Calabresi’s condemnation of the administration is focused on this one particular statement. But perhaps he will come to see that it is part of a broader pattern, that includes many far more troubling usurpations and abuses of power.

from Latest – Reason.com https://ift.tt/2XcY7Vi
via IFTTT

The Return of Sports Is Great. It’s Also Deeply Weird.

upiphotostwo754407

Kyle Schwarber crushes a baseball towards centerfield. The crowd oohs, and the cheers grow louder as a Milwaukee Brewers’ outfielder watches the ball sail over his head. Fans in the bleachers stand to try to snag one of the season’s first home runs.

At least, that’s how it looked and sounded if you watched Sunday’s nationally televised game on FOX—and if you weren’t watching too closely. In the real world, the only cheers came from Schwarber’s Chicago Cub teammates, and no one was scrambling to catch the baseball as it thunked off the empty stands beyond the outfield wall.

Like all professional sporting events right now, the game was played behind closed doors. But viewers at home still got something vaguely akin to the “normal” experience. Simulated cheers and general background crowd noise have been edited into soccer matches by Fox, ESPN, and other networks during the pandemic too. But last weekend’s baseball games marked the debut of Fox’s use of “simulated fans” to make stadiums appear jam-packed even when they’re virtually empty.

In some ways, it’s a cool idea—one that the Miami Marlins probably wish they’d dreamed up years ago. Fox and Major League Baseball borrowed from video games, hired artificial reality programmers, and edited the whole thing together using a more advanced version of the computer that seamlessly draws the yellow line-to-gain on football fields during broadcasts. The Verge has a terrific deep dive into how it all works, if you’re curious.

But does it work? Not really.

Those simulated crowds are an attempt to embrace the idea that the return of pro sports to TV represents a return to normalcy. But the uncanny valley that Fox and MLB have created serves mostly to reinforce just how weird, how abnormal, things are right now. That’s not helped by the fact that the fake fans only show up in certain shots. (Fox programmed four of its camera angles to include them.) Even if the simulation were convincing, TV viewers would be left feeling like they were whipsawing between two different realities.

It’s also not helped by the stories that have surrounded baseball in the week since the Washington Nationals and New York Yankees belatedly opened the season. Within days, 20 of the Marlins’ players had tested positive for COVID-19 and another outbreak popped up in the Philadelphia Phillies’ organization. Both teams (and some of their would-have-been opponents) have been stuck in limbo since Monday. More than a dozen games have already been canceled. It’s still unclear when or if either of the affected teams will be cleared to resume games—or whether those players will be able to hit a major-league fastball after two weeks of being quarantined in hotel rooms.

On Friday, the St. Louis Cardinals canceled their scheduled game due to multiple positive tests. There’s been widespread speculation that the baseball season may have to be abandoned entirely.

Zoom out a little further and the picture gets worse. This week saw the 150,000th recorded American death due to COVID-19. We also got a better sense of the economic destruction that the disease and the response to it have wrought. It’s becoming apparent that most schools are not going to open on time. President Donald Trump is skylarking about delaying the election.

Good luck convincing anyone that things are returning to normal under those circumstances.

But the return of professional sports still matters, even in these somewhat bizarre forms. The National Basketball Association returned to action on Thursday night, and the National Hockey League will join the party this weekend. Both are hoping to finish seasons that were suspended in mid-March, and both have concocted expanded playoff tournaments with the goal of crowning champions by mid-October.

Unlike baseball, those two leagues are playing all their games in one or two locations—the NBA is in Orlando and the NHL is divided between Toronto and Edmonton. Creating “bubbles” means no travel will be necessary, and the leagues hope it will reduce the potential for the pandemic to disrupt seasons again. Whether it works remains to be seen.

Sports in the uncanny valley of fake fans, simulated crowd noise, and quarantine bubbles is better than no sports at all. Certainly, it is better for the players and coaches who can get back to doing what they love to do. And for fans, the explosion of televised sports is a rush of blood to the head. Soccer, golf, and tennis have been back for a few weeks now, but the sudden return of the major North American team sports is especially exciting.

But I could do without the digital mannequins in the bleachers.

from Latest – Reason.com https://ift.tt/316K8RR
via IFTTT

This Year, Summer Television Means Dragging in Shows from Canada, England

coronerCW_1161x653
  • Coroner. The CW. Thursday, August 5, 9 p.m.
  • Hitmen. Available Friday, August 6, on the Peacock streaming service.

Fear not the dog days of August. (At least, on television. War with China and mass starvation are on somebody else’s beat.) TV is turning its multicultural eye to the comparative anthropology of criminal justice systems, and your brain cells will be aflame by the time it’s all over.

Though, I’ll confess, the more interesting thing on The CW’s Canadian import Coroner is dating culture on the great northern tundra. Here, for instance, is the introductory conversation between romantic leads Jenny and Liam: She explains that her husband, who died three months ago of an aneurysm, was a degenerate gambler who defaulted on two mortgages on their home and let his life insurance lapse, throwing the family into hopeless debt.

“So what about you?” she inquires brightly.

“I was in the army, in Afghanistan,” Liam replies. “I killed a bunch of people.”

Lascivious outdoor sex ensues, after which they examine one another’s old bullet-wound scars. You think I’m making this up. I soooo wish.

Coroner, which has already aired for two seasons in Canada, is part of the puzzling summer crop of reruns masquerading as new shows.  It’s the tale of crusading forensic pathologist Jenny (played by Canadian actress Serinda Swan, known mostly for looking a bit like the 1975ish incarnation of Tyne Daly.)

Her city Toronto having apparently already defunded its police department, Jenny has to solve every homicide, but that’s not as weighty a responsibility as it sounds because the criminals, like everybody else in Canada, are pretty nice. (When Jenny asks what one murdered reform-school inmate was in for, a prison social worker earnestly explains: “He was antifa. He was all about the future.”)

Curiously, Canada seems to have a continuing fascination with heroic pathologists. Coroner is at least the fourth show in the country’s TV history about a superstar coroner, going all the way back to Wojeck in 1966, notable mainly because it launched the career of Dean Vernon Wormer, errr, actor John Vernon, source of the immortal disciplinary decree, “No more fun of any kind!”

That’s an apt summation of Coroner, which aside from those bullet wounds on Jenny’s naked back is the very essence of Canadian tepidity. And when you watch TV’s newest British import, in which brains are splattered every few minutes for big laughs, it’s hard to believe these two countries were once part of the same imperial empire.

The Brit show—yes, it already aired there a few months back—is called Hitmen and airs on NBC’s new streaming service Peacock. It stars Mel Giedroyc and Sue Perkins as a pair of crabby, menopausal and quite inept professional killers.

As one chases down a fleeing victim, the other will inevitably be on the phone arguing with a credit card company or an overdemanding client. (“Torture isn’t really our thing. … It’s one thing killing somebody, but popping their tits in a laminator… .”) They often get tricked into hauling the victims to a McDonald’s drive-up window or birthday party or even playing charades with them before snuffing them. The humor is darker than a witch’s heart, most of it consisting of pranks played on people who are about to have their brains blown out.

Surprisingly, this gets old after about the first five minutes. Giedroyc and Perkins used to be the hosts of a Brit cooking-competition show called The Great British Bake Off. They probably should have stuck with that, but maybe experimented with cutting the throats of the contestants who messed up the scones.

from Latest – Reason.com https://ift.tt/2PeVSfu
via IFTTT

Apple Being Investigated By “Majority” Of States Over Claims Of Deliberately Slowing Old iPhones

Apple Being Investigated By “Majority” Of States Over Claims Of Deliberately Slowing Old iPhones

Tyler Durden

Fri, 07/31/2020 – 14:25

Just ask Apple: it’s easy to crush earnings expectations – especially if you are forcing droves of iPhone owners to ditch their old phones and buy new ones. 

Right around the time that Apple stock was surging to new highs thanks to a better than expected earnings report and stock split, another story was surfacing: Arizona is leading a multi-state investigation into whether or not Apple is deliberately slowing its old iPhones, and whether such practices would violate deceptive trade laws. 

A probe has been ongoing “since 2018” and investigators are focusing on data that shows “unexpected shutdowns” of old Apple iPhones and the company’s potential slowing down of devices using power management software, according to Reuters. 

Documents obtained last week from a Texas watchdog group showed that the Texas AG was also involved in the investigation. Sources told Reuters that a “majority of U.S. states”, with AGs spanning both parties, are involved and are “teaming up” together in the probe. 

Recall, in 2017, Apple came under fire after Primate Labs revealed that iPhones slowed down as they aged. Apple conceded that reduced power demands led to the slowdowns and that its adjustments were necessary to prevent phones from shutting down due to “unexpected” power spikes. We guess now they only have expected shutdowns.

Apple agreed to pay up to $500 million to settle a related class action lawsuit earlier this year. 

Apple shares are now at record levels after second-quarter results that prompted multiple price-target increases from Wall Street analysts, and reassured that the iPhone-maker’s business was weathering any impact from the pandemic.

Analysts at Goldman Sachs said that they had underestimated how much people were spending to support their working and studying from home, as well as the amount of cash that had been freed up as consumers cut back spending on areas like entertainment and gas. Piper Sandler analysts said they see further strength for Apple’s business, which should benefit from the launch of its new 5G-enabled iPhone, expected later this year.

Keep an eye on your current iPhone to see if it slows down around that time…

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/39LwQ18 Tyler Durden

HEROES vs HEALS: Will Congress Blink?

HEROES vs HEALS: Will Congress Blink?

Tyler Durden

Fri, 07/31/2020 – 14:04

One month ago we warned that, absent a deal to extend the record US fiscal stimulus underwritten during the covid shutdowns, the US economy was “about to fly off a fiscal cliff“, resulting an even bigger hit to US consumption than that seen in Q2, and since it makes up 70% of US GDP, leading to another devastating hit to the economy.

With the official deadline now past and the $600 in weekly expanded unemployment benefits ending today, have we flown off the cliff, or will – as Bank of America writes this morning – Congress blink after all?

HEROES vs. HEALS

As BOfA’s chief economist Michelle Meyer recaps today, the next round of stimulus – considered to be Phase IV – is proving to be harder to get through than the first three. The Democrats have put forward the HEROES bill of $3.4tr while the Republicans have their HEALS bill of $1.1tr. The two bills are summarized in the exhibit below based on work from the Center for Responsible Federal Budget (CRFB). Not only is there a significant difference in the dollar amount but also the intent of the policy.

For what it’s worth, BofA continues to expect that a bill is passed in early August likely coming in above the HEALS act but still significantly short of the HEREOS. The bank’s economists review the various pressure points and assess the impact on the economy.

Can’t we all get along

As BofA summarizes, the main area of agreement is over stimulus checks as both the Reps and Dems are calling for a second round of checks along the same lines of the CARES act – up to $1,200 for individuals and $2,400 for joint filers – though the HEROES act includes $1,200/dependent for up to three, while the HEALS act includes $500 for all dependents. According to CRFB, this provision would amount to $300bn under the Republican proposal and $413bn under the Democratic proposal. The stimulus checks should be able to be rolled out fairly quickly. The CARES Act was signed on March 27 and money started to hit bank accounts on April 15th with about three-quarters of funds being distributed by the end of the month. If the legislation is signed into law in the first half of August, we should start to see the money flow in before the end of the month with the biggest support in early September.

What does this do for the economy? A working paper by the Chicago Fed (Karger E. and Rajan A.) found that 48% of the checks were spent over a 2-week period. The rest was saved or used to pay down debt (frankly, we think this is dead wrong as billions of stimulus funds clearly funneled into brokerage accounts as the Robinhood euphoria has made all too clear). Plugging in this marginal propensity to consumer (MPC) to the $300-413bn range of stimulus funds and assume that about three-quarters will be distributed efficiently, it could boost the level of consumer spending by about 10%, likely showing up most significantly for the September retail sales report.

The stimulus checks create a “hump-like” trajectory for income and savings. We simulate the path for income and spending going forward to capture the impact of the stimulus checks (assuming the Republican proposal for unemployment benefits). You can clearly see:

  1. hump in income;
  2. temporary bounce in savings;
  3. lagged response in consumer spending

No way, no how

There are two main areas of disagreement over the stimulus: unemployment benefits and state & local aid. The CARES Act added an additional $600/week to unemployment insurance (UI) and expanded eligibility to self-employed and gig workers. To put this into perspective, prior to CARES, the average weekly UI was $373/week in 2020 1Q. As such, the “replacement” income from UI spiked higher from an average of 38%.

If the average weekly wage of UI recipients was unchanged, the replacement rate will be just under 100%. More likely, however, is that the average weekly wage of UI recipients has declined given that the recession had a disproportionate effect on hourly and low income workers. Indeed Ganong et al. estimate the current median  replacement rate to be 134%.

The Democrats are calling for this program to be extended through January, while the Republicans are calling for two stages:

1) additional UI declines to $200/week through September;

2) formula imposed where UI goes to 70% of income.

However, state unemployment offices have argued that it will be very challenging to put in place a  formula even with the additional money allocated by the Republican bill to update systems.

We can estimate the impact to income and spending from these proposals. If the current policy continues, spending should remain at current levels. Job creation—and therefore labor income— will slowly reduce the unemployment benefits but it will simply be a substitution of income and therefore spending should continue to be supported. Assuming the current 30 million people on UI (standard program and Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, although the true number is likely somewhat smaller given PUA counts retroactive weeks as a separate claim), the reduction to $200/week would slice about $12bn of personal income/week. BofA estimates the transition to a replacement rate of 70% would then boost the benefit to a little more than $300/week, on average. Therefore, personal income relative to the $600/week benefit would be reduced by about $9bn/week beginning in October. Assuming a MPC of about 70%, this proposal would reduce purchasing power by around $7.5bn/week in August and September, and by $5bn/week beginning in October.

When will we see the impact? It will be a bit confusing because the stimulus check will provide an offset so the hit to consumer spending might not be clear until mid-to-late September. The other consideration is that we should see the number of people on UI decline as jobs return, reducing the shock to the consumer. More immediately BofA is quite concerned about the possibility of a temporary lapse of UI given that the CARES UI program expires on July 31st. There has been some discussion of a stopgap bill to prevent the decline in stimulus, but it doesn’t look like the central case. As such, for the next two weeks, we could see a decline in income of $18bn/week. This could weaken near-term spending — we will carefully monitor the aggregated BAC credit and debit card data to determine the impact. Of course, Congress could theoretically backdate the UI payments to make up for these lost weeks.

State and local stress

The Dems propose nearly $1tr for S&L aid while the Reps allow for greater flexibility to use the $150bn that has been allocated through the CARES Act. These funds could now be used to cover shortfalls in the FY2019 year. There is also a difference in education funding where the Reps allocate $105bn for education with 2/3rd reserved to help schools reopen for in-person education. To receive funding, the schools would need to meet “minimum opening requirements”.

According to data compiled by NCSL (National Conference of State Legislatures) 32 states and DC have all revised down their revenue projections for FY2021from their preCOVID levels, illustrating the breadth of need for some type of state and local aid. Without additional funds, the risk is that S&L governments will continue to cut back on expenditures and employment. We have already seen 1.5mn jobs lost in S&L gov’ts since February

You down with PPP 2.0?

The Reps are calling for a new round of funding for the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) as well as more money for emergency business loans. The Reps PPP 2.0 would leave about $190bn of support for second loans for PPP recipients (which uses about $100bn from PPP 1.0) and change the eligibility to businesses with fewer than 300 employees (vs. the current 500) while requiring that firms demonstrate that their revenue fell by at least 50%. The change in business size would likely be marginal in terms of outreach as 86% of small business jobs are in companies with fewer than 250 employees. They also call for a liability shield to protect businesses from COVID-related lawsuits. The latter is a “red-line” for the Reps but Dems have argued that the liability shield would give large employers the ability to escape damages to their workers. It is difficult to precisely quantify the impact to the economy from this program but presumably it will help to keep small businesses afloat, supporting the labor market and likely resulting in a faster recovery of jobs.

Bottom line: fiscal stimulus has been critical to restoring the health of the economy. As Chart 4 shows, the labor marker only recovered a third of the way back but yet retail spending has made a full recovery.

How can the US solve for this differential? Only stimulus (and lot more of it). What comes next will determine the path forward for the economy. 

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2XcV6Es Tyler Durden

Stocks Are Overvalued On 17 Of 20 Metrics; Growth Is A 6-Sigma Outlier To Value

Stocks Are Overvalued On 17 Of 20 Metrics; Growth Is A 6-Sigma Outlier To Value

Tyler Durden

Fri, 07/31/2020 – 13:50

With the S&P once again near all time highs even as profits are in freefall, pushing the EV/fwd EBITDA multiple to new all time highs…

… now seems a good time to ask the $64 trillion question: just how overvalued is the market?

The answer: according to BofA’s Savita Subramanian, the S&P 500 forward PE expanded in July to 21.8x from 21.5x in June, as returns (+4%) have outpaced estimate revisions (+ 2%). The current multiple is two standard deviations above the historical average of 15.4x (since 1986) – the highest since the Tech Bubble.

Stepping back, BofA finds that stocks are trading above average on all but three of the 20 measures its tracks.

Most notably, the forward PEG is at record highs (2.3x) and the median forward PE (20.7x) is in-line with the prior record of 20.8x. Only on the equity risk premium (i.e., relative to bonds) and on free cash flow (artificially depressed from low capex) does the S&P appear statistically inexpensive. Both of those metrics are due to the Fed’s direct purchases of billions in bonds every single day.

But wait, it gets crazier, because BofA also finds that the “Growth vs. Value” relative price/book value is in the 6-sigma “stratosphere”.

As Subramanian writes, “we have seen increasingly extended relative valuations for Growth and Value stocks, supporting our preference for Value for at least the next few months.” To wit, on some valuation measures, the Russell 1000 Growth index trades at a historical discount to Value index on Price to L/T EPS Growth (PEG), it trades at a premium on other metrics (such as sales or trailing/forward earnings), but nowhere is the distorted valuation more visible than on a Price/Book basis where the relative multiple looks to have gone “vertical”.

In short, value stocks trade at near-record levels of cheapness vs. Momentum (relative forward P/E ~2 standard deviations below average and at lowest levels since Tech Bubble extremes), yet none of this matters as the Fed’s now constant market interventions make growth stocks the consistent winner at the expense of value.

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