Tag: news

Authored by Kelli Ballard via LibertyNation.com,

Throughout history, there have been conflicts and wars, and the attitude about the engagements – and its warriors – change depending on the public opinion at the time. Consider the medieval era where being a knight was romanticized. They were considered chivalrous with a code that expected them to be pure in both thought and deed. When the brave knights returned after a battle, they were honored and celebrated. Great feasts were given in their name and the ladies swooned and threw lace, ribbons, and other personal effects to show their support – and hopefully catch a legendary hero husband in the process.

World Wars I and II soldiers were treated with respect and given a place of honor. American citizens payed tribute to them for their sacrifices.

But now, let’s flash forward to the Vietnam War and the veterans who suffered not only from wartime injuries (both physical and mental), but also from hostility and disrespect from the very citizens they put their lives on the line to protect.

Ashamed To Be An American Soldier

Whether being drafted into service or signing up on their own, young men, boys, and women, did their duty and served their nation. They went into unfamiliar and hostile territory to fight against the enemy; some being injured or even losing their lives. They witnessed atrocities, saw their platoon brethren die, and dreamed of the day when they could return home, to their loved ones.

However, when that day came, instead of open, welcoming arms, many veterans were met with anger, people spitting on them, calling them “baby killers.” Far from being worshipped as heroes, as their former soldiers were, Vietnam veterans were harassed and made to feel ashamed for their patriotic service.

What had happened to American citizens that once revered the warriors who protected them? Why had they suddenly become so antagonistic against their own soldiers? Aside from the baby killers accusations, there could be several other reasons. For the first time, Americans were losing a war, and fear took hold. But as Bob Feist, an Army veteran and retired Navy pilot wrote in his opinion piece “Disrespect for Vietnam vets is fact, not fiction” for the Star Tribune:

“We need to remember that it was the South Vietnamese government that lost their war, not the much-maligned American soldier. American service members did not suffer defeat, even though most of us felt defeated. Policy and politics out of Washington had failed, not the military.”

Adding to that, the war had left the nation hurting financially and there just weren’t enough funds to help the injured veterans. War always has an emotional and psychological impact, and returning home to be insulted, spit on, and mistreated did not help matters. As Feist said, “Spitting stories, while true, aren’t the point. But denial of what we suffered dishonors us again.”

Peter Langenus commanded the Delta Company, 3rd Battalion/7th Infantry, 199th Light Infantry Brigade from 1969-70. Some of the missions he led his men on lasted for 30 days or more. He said:

“without shaving, bathing or changing clothing. None of that prepared me for the reception at home upon our return.”

Thankfully, the American people have once again changed their attitudes towards their defenders and the soldier is again celebrated for his or her services.

Honored And Revered: Today’s American Soldier

It took another 20 years after the Vietnam War for Americans to return to respecting their warriors. The first step in the healing process began in 1982 with the dedication of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. After the Gulf War (1990-91), people began waving flags and celebrating soldiers. Langenus, who had suffered as a Vietnam veteran, and also a veteran of Desert Storm, couldn’t believe the change around.

“The Vietnam veterans, we couldn’t believe it. We could not understand getting letters from school kids. You couldn’t believe that people were cheering you.”

The biggest factor in the change in American attitudes towards veterans most definitely has to be after 9/11; a direct attack on American soil. Since then, citizens wear flag pins and go around saying “thank you for your service.” On Veterans Day, restaurants give military personnel free meals. Parades have returned to welcome home soldiers. The American soldier is no longer dishonored and is now revered.

Steven A. Wowwk is a disabled Vietnam Veteran who served in the Army’s First Cavalry Division. He is happy to see returning soldiers treated with respect, but:

“Deeds need to be done in addition to words. I appreciate the respect of ‘thank you’ because that was something I never received when I came home. It’s better than nothing. It’s better than them walking away and not even recognizing you. But what are you doing in addition to saying ‘thank you’?

Veterans Day started out as Armistice Day, to commemorate the end of World War I. In 1954, Dwight D. Eisenhower officially changed the name to Veterans Day to honor all veterans from all conflicts. This year, while remembering and honoring today’s heroes, let’s not forget those who fought and died for our country, and who were treated with such disrespect when returning to American soil.

Interesting Facts

• 2 million living veterans served during at least one war since 2018.

• 9% of veterans are women.

• Seven million veterans served during the Vietnam War.

• Three million veterans have served in support of the War on Terrorism.

• Of the 16 million Americans who served during World War II, just under 500,000 were still alive as of 2018.

• Two million veterans served during the Korean War.

• As of 2017, Alaska, Maine, and Montana had the highest percentage of Veterans.

• In 2018, Connecticut was home to the highest percentage of World War II veterans at 7.1%.

It’s an eyewitness account that’s almost too horrible to believe.

During an interview with ABC’s “Good Morning America”, 13-year-old Devin Langford recounts his six-hour trek to seek help after the brutal assault by cartel gunmen on a convoy of three vans carrying members of his family. Nine people were killed during the assault, including Devin’s mother, Dawna Langford, and his younger brothers, Trevor, 11, and Rogan, 2. And several of Devin’s siblings, including his baby brother, Brixon, who was shot in the chest, and his sister, Kylie, who was shot in the foot.

Devin’s family, members of a Mormon sect known as the LaBaron family, relocated to northern Mexico in the 1940s, partly to preserve their practice of polygamy, which was becoming widely shamed in the US, and had been outlawed by the mainstream Church of Latter Day Saints. As it expanded over the decades, the community always managed to coexist peacefully with the locals and, increasingly, the drug cartels who battled for control of extremely lucrative trafficking routes.

Devin Langford

But last week, while reportedly traveling to a wedding in a neighboring state, three mothers and six children were brutally murdered after being ambushed by heavily armed cartel gunmen. Devin said the attackers had what he described as “long guns”. While traveling from the town of Bavispe in Sonora state to Galeana in Chihuahua state, the convoy encountered the gunmen some time between 9:30 am and 1 pm local time, according to the Mexican authorities, who haven’t offered any updates about the identities of any suspects.

Devin said that the shooting seemed to start almost out of nowhere.

“They just started hitting [the] car first, like with a bunch, a bunch of bullets. Just start shooting rapidly at us,” he said. “The car didn’t work. So she was just trying right there, starting the car as much as she could, but I’m pretty sure they shot something so the car wouldn’t even start.”

There’s been speculation that the attack was a case of mistaken identity, but members of the family suspect that it was intended as a message from the cartels, and many have decided to relocate back to the US (most members of the community have dual citizenship).

At one point during the journey, Devin had to leave his siblings in a secluded area while he continued on alone. Eventually, he found help, and the reports about his family’s brutal murder blew up into an international news story. In a tweet, President Trump offered Mexico whatever aid it deems necessary to finally defeat the cartels.

“We walked a little while until we couldn’t carry them no more. And so we put them in the bushes so they wouldn’t get hit or nothing. So I started walking,” Devin said. “Every one of them were bleeding really bad. So I was trying to get in a rush to get there.”

Of course, if history is any guide, the more firepower the Mexican and American governments bring to bear against the cartel, the harder the cartels will push back, causing violence to explode. Hence, AMLO’s plan to abandon the drug war.

For the entirety of his 14-mile trek to safety, Devin feared that more cartel gunmen might be around the corner, ready to shoot him and his siblings.

As he made the trek for help, he said he wondered “if there was anybody else out there trying to shoot me or following me” and he thought about “my mom and my two brothers that died.”

After the shooting stopped, Devin said the gunmen rounded up the survivors and made them all lie down on the floor of the cars, before driving off.

Since the attack, Devin said he’s been struggling with feelings of guilt, despite his father’s insistence that his actions were nothing short of heroic.

Devin said he doesn’t feel like a hero, but his father said there’s no doubt in his mind that his son saved lives.

“Every one of my children that survived that are living miracles,” Langford said. “How many bullet holes were fired into that vehicle … at that horrific scene and how many children were involved. It’s amazing. It’s amazing. It’s beyond amazing that they survived.”

“To be honest with you, my boy’s a hero simply because he gave his life for his brothers and sisters,” he added.

Watch a clip from the interview with Devin below:

Authored by Martin Enlund, Andreas Steno Larsen and Joachim Bernhardsen via Nordea,

Everybody seems to believe the Fed is essentially running QE4, while no one dares to be short risk in to the potential signing of a Phase-1 deal. The next monthly purchase pace update is out on Thursday, which could prove to be an eye-opener.

Almost everybody seems to believe that what the Fed is currently doing is identical to a large and substantial QE program, with many market participants extrapolating the initial purchase pace of 60bn/month to last at least until April, possibly even until the end of June 2020. This – ceteris paribus – implies a cumulative growth of bank reserves (or excess liquidity, if you will) of 390bn-510bn (this is wrong in our view, since things can’t be held equal…). Anyhow, everybody probably knows by now that when the Fed does QE, everything just turns perfect – which is indeed reflective in price-action across global markets over the past month or so.

Chart 1: Fed QE usually makes everything alright

However, when the Fed announced its intention to buy bills T-back in October, it started with “with the period from mid-October to mid-November”. Now, a month has almost passed, and a new schedule for the Fed’s POMOs will be released on Thursday November 14: “the Desk [NY Fed] will announce the planned purchase amount and release a tentative schedule of operations for the monthly period”.

Table 2: New POMO schedule due next week – so far there is no pattern for the dollar

It may be too early to expect it already for the 14th, but it’s not completely unthinkable that the Fed will cut its planned purchase pace at some point. For instance, the US Treasury will add plenty of liquidity to the system over the next month, the Effective Fed Funds Rate has dropped towards the IOER rate (meaning easing money market strains), while interest in the Fed’s TOMOs has been range-bound. If the Fed does cut its bill purchase pace, then the extrapolators will need to reassess their calculations, threatening the QE narrative.

Chart 2: USD liquidity momentum will be turning against the greenback

USD liquidity momentum empirically has led the way for the DXY in recent years but has done so with a two to three-month lead. So even if the liquidity momentum has started to turn against the USD, it should be too early to bet on that undermining the greenback yet. What’s more, this time the Fed has basically decided that liquidity will stop shrinking, while in QE1, QE2 and QE3 it decided to sustainably boost liquidity. 

…

How many days in a row can the market reprice optimistically on positive trade remarks? That’s a question to ponder when looking back on the past few weeks. With Trump’s China advisor saying recent good news “may represent wishful thinking on the Chinese side”, Reuters reporting on “fierce internal opposition” and Trump not on board, it may be that the market will be in for a disappointment at some point. That said, Trump may not want to rock the boat during the Christmas shopping season and Black Friday isn’t due until November 29, maybe the market can remain upbeat for a while yet. The hopetimism on trade wrongfooted our AUD/NZD short (stopped out @ 1.0835)

We wouldn’t rule out that an actual signing of a Phase-1 deal could prove to be a yuuge buy the rumour, sell the fact type of event. Currently it is our impression that no one (not even HFs) dares to be short risk before the Phase-1 hype fades.

Geopolitically we remain in the pessimistic camp.

Retail rents in Manhattan have fallen again, this time before the holiday season, an ominous sign that consumer health is deteriorating. Maybe retail spending this holiday season will be somewhat disappointing; after all, President Trump was seen on Twitter on Monday asking his 66.5 million followers to spend more of their money as the stock market rose to new highs. Any time the government asks its citizens to spend money, it usually means trouble ahead. 

Average asking rents across Upper Fifth Avenue, especially between 42nd and 49th streets, saw one of the steepest drops in retail rents in Q3, falling 25% YoY, reported Bloomberg, citing a new report from Jones Lang LaSalle Inc. 

As shown below, Lower Fifth, Broadway, Madison Avenue, SoHo, and Herald Square retail rents over the same period were in free fall. This is a reflection of the weakening consumer base ahead of the holiday season. There were several outliers, Upper Fifth and Times Square retail rents over the same period marginally declined. Meanwhile, the Meatpacking district saw rents jump 7.3% in Q3 YoY. 

Across Manhattan’s retail industry, average rents plunged, on average, 8% in Q3 YoY. 

Patrick Smith, vice chairman at JLL’s retail brokerage, said declining rents in some of NYC’s most popular shopping districts indicate declining consumer traffic.

A random walk down Manhattan and you’ll find, nowadays, streets overwhelmed with vacant retail shops, as landlords begging for tenants slam rents lower.   

Bleecker Street in Greenwich Village, once filled with a lively shopping district, is now littered with vacant stores. 

The Real Deal has said Manhattan’s Upper East Side is “facing a retail vacancy epidemic.”

Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer has said more than 188 vacant shops can be found along Broadway. 

Douglas Elliman, a real estate brokerage, has said 20% of Manhattan retail is likely vacant, up 7% since 2016. 

Manhattan’s retail rents and retail vacancy problems could be a sign that the broader economy is faltering. If so, this would be terrible news for the consumer, which powers 70% of GDP. This could all mean a recession is ahead.

Authored by Sven Henrich via NorthmanTrader.com,

Reports of the demise of the Megaphone may be greatly exaggerated.

Last week $SPX exceeded the upper trend line of the Megaphone pattern and calls of the pattern’s death have been plentiful since then. But is the pattern truly invalidated?

Since the summer I’ve state clearly: For bulls to convince they need to break above the trend line, then successfully retest the trend line and then they can move onto the melt-up move if that’s what they want to do.

Well, price has clearly moved about the trend line:

Now you can blame/credit central bank intervention all you want, but reality is price moved above it. But does this confirm the breakout?

From my perch the answer is no as no retest has taken place yet, and without such a successful retest risk remains that the breakout will prove to be false.

And let me throw in another wrinkle here that’s quite eye opening: If you look at the market through a larger lens, i.e. the entire market, then the megaphone trend line has not been exceeded nor even quite tagged yet.

Here’s the $VTI the overall market ETF:

The Fed’s liquidity interventions since September and October may have sparked an aggressive, steep rally to exceed the July highs by 2% (so far), but according to the larger market the megaphone pattern is still quite alive and reports of its demise may be greatly exaggerated.

And it is right here in this moment in time that $VIX short positioning has taken on record proportions, exceeding even the previous record short right at the January 2018 highs right before holders of the doomed $XIV product got massacred as $VIX exploded higher:

The ghosts of $XIV….. https://t.co/a8yPNi2XJn

— Sven Henrich (@NorthmanTrader) November 11, 2019

Shorting the $VIX has been a regular occurrence during all rallies to new highs, even this July as $SPX reached 3028, and then came the $VIX rip that was also advertised by the charts in advance.

The pattern repeats the same volatility compression to extremes as $SPX pursues a tight channel structure, then a positive divergence forms on $VIX, people getting bullish and then rug pull. I submit the construct in the charts is very similar now compared to July:

As I outlined in Melt-up: “In my view the $VIX has a coming appointment with the 17 level. The nature of that appointment may well decide everything”.

The firepower that is being built in short $VIX positions may certainly suggest that a real risk off $VIX spike could also easily exceed these levels.

With many participants celebrating the demise of the megaphone pattern they are doing so with $VTI not yet having exceeded the upper trend line and record short $VIX positioning in place. Perhaps it is not the megaphone that will experience megadeath, perhaps it will be complacent positioning.

It’s too early to tell and the jury remains out, but the charts clearly highlight coming volatility risk.

*  *  *

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ICE isn’t invading Queens, but if you spent too much time on Twitter over the past couple of days, you could be forgiven for thinking otherwise.

According to Gothamist, an ICE-branded military grade armored vehicle was used in an operation last week in the borough where a man suspected of smuggling and illegally selling weapons was taken into custody.

The armored personnel carrier was first spotted Wednesday morning on Forest Avenue near Norman Street in the Queens neighborhood of Ridgewood. Meanwhile, agents wearing ICE jackets were seen standing around the vehicle, while a gunner remained in position.

Local “activists” (Twitter blue-checkmarks) compared the vehicle’s presence in the neighborhood to “an occupying force.”

ICE is literally rolling through Queens in armored personnel carriers like an occupying force. https://t.co/2mFB5LBSx9

— Aaron Leaf (@aaronleaf) November 7, 2019

What they didn’t explain is that the branch of ICE wasn’t there to arrest illegal migrants. Instead, the Homeland Security Investigations unit – or HSI – was on the ground to serve a criminal arrest warrant stemming from a federal investigation into a firearms-related suspect. According to the mayor’s office, the individual in question was found to have bee hoarding “about 50 guns, including a machine gun, gun parts and ammunition.”

While still technically part of ICE, HSI isn’t involved in detaining individuals with a suspect immigration status.

Just the mere presence of the armored vehicle, which, again, was only there because agents presumably feared being fired upon by heavy weaponry while serving their warrant, was enough to incite terror in the neighborhood.

The Ridgewood Tenants Union, a left-wing organization dedicated to protecting the rights of the “marginalized”, accused ICE of inspiring terror.

“People feel terrorized,” said Raquel Namuche, an organizer with the Ridgewood Tenants Union. “This happened right across from a youth program for children as young as four-years-old and there seemed to be no safety protocols in place. For people to leave their homes early in the morning and see a tank out on the street is just wild.”

But the vehicle wasn’t a tank: it’s technically called a BearCat, the tactical vehicle is commonly used by the military and in some law enforcement capacities. HSI’s Special Response Team in New York has one of those vehicles, just like the SWAT team does.

Regardless, a councilman representing the neighborhood bashed ICE over the use of the “tank”.

Councilmember Antonio Reynoso also expressed frustration about the incident, pointing to constant fear in immigrant neighborhoods about the potential for raids and deportations. “I do not understand what necessitated ICE’s use of a tank other than the simple desire to instill fear amongst our community members,” he said in a statement to Gothamist. “At this time, we must ensure that residents are connected to resources like the Immigrant Defense Project so that they are equipped to know their rights against ICE.”

Even when it’s performing basic law-enforcement duties like arresting dangerous criminals, urban progressives have made clear that the agency is evil, illegitimate and should be abolished.