Tag: news

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, the Trump administration has relied on a powerful tool originally developed by Palantir, the data-mining firm created by Trump ally Peter Thiel, for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

According to the Daily Beast, however, officials working with Joe Biden’s transition team have recommended getting rid of the newly minted system after warning that it’s not accurate, according to an anonymously sourced report in the Daily Beast.

Palantir’s technology allows officials to track hospitals’ supplies, case count, and testing – a platform which Vice President Mike Pence has touted as ‘revolutionary’ – giving the government the ability to assess what hospitals need in real time. Detailed information allows the government to track any personal protective equipment (PPE) shortages, ICU bed availability, admissions, drugs and other medical supplies, along with testing capacity.

Three anonymous officials who work with the HHS Protect system, however, tell the Daily Beast that the system is unreliable ‘and lacks the ability to update critical information the federal government needs to better assist communities across the country.’

Officials at the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and HHS have suggested in materials shared with the Biden transition and in briefings with transition officials that the new administration scrap HHS Protect and revert back to the prior CDC data collection system known as the National Healthcare Safety Network’s COVID-19 module, according to three individuals familiar with those conversations. HHS and the CDC did not respond to a request for comment.

“The system had problems from the very beginning. It never functioned in the way we thought it was going to,” said one official who works with the data. “We should be doing more with the data that’s out there. But the system doesn’t allow us to do that because it isn’t accurate.” –Daily Beast

One of the main problems with the new system is that it bypasses standard communications channels which used to exist between the CDC and local health departments – instead, requiring hospitals to begin entering information manually through TeleTracking, a private contractor which helped develop the HHS Protect system. Unfortunately, some hospitals did a poor job of updating information, and there is no local oversight bodies to ensure the process was adhered to, according to officials.

One recent report in Science said that the HHS Protect data differed from health departments by up to 20%.

In July, the congressional Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus – the government’s main oversight body for handling the pandemic, launched an investigation into the discrepancies, sending a letter to HHS Secretary Alex Azar and CDC Director Robert Redfield which demanded that the Trump administration reverse course and run data through the CDC. According to a Democratic aide, that effort is ongoing.

If the recommendations are accepted, the change in data collection would come at a time when Biden is already in the midst of mapping out other drastic changes to how the federal government responds to COVID-19.

The president-elect has already said he would significantly speed up the vaccine distribution by widening the recommendations for who should get the shot and when. And on Thursday Biden released his $1.9 million COVID-19 plan, which calls for direct payments of $1,400 to most Americans, $350 billion in state and local aid, $50 billion toward COVID-19 testing and an additional $20 billion for a national vaccine program with state and local governments. –Daily Beast

Surely none of this has anything to do with Peter Thiel.

Authored by James Rickards via The Daily Reckoning,

The U.S. economy lost 140,000 jobs in December. Only about 55% of the jobs lost in March and April have returned. That’s a significant number.

Americans and others around the world who make their living as bus drivers, bartenders, waiters, hair stylists and boutique store clerks, among thousands of other jobs, make up 50% of all jobs and 45% of U.S. gross domestic product.

This is the part of the economy affected by the lockdowns. They are being destroyed.

When the pandemic passes, and we are able to look back on the experience without fear or political bias, it will be clear that the lockdowns were one of the greatest economic blunders in history. Lockdowns do not stop the spread of the virus, but they do destroy the economy. This is not merely a matter of opinion or conjecture.

The pandemic has now lasted long enough that we have solid comparative data from all 50 U.S. states and many countries around the world. This data covers states and countries that tried extreme lockdowns, moderate lockdowns or completely voluntary methods that involved no mandatory lockdown at all.

The empirical results show that the experience of all of these jurisdictions was about the same and that lockdowns have not “contributed in any meaningful way” to saving lives. In fact, there is other evidence that shows lockdowns killed more people than they saved due to suicides, drug abuse, alcohol abuse, domestic violence and depression.

This study on the ineffectiveness of lockdowns was produced by Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, a Professor of Medicine at Stanford University, and his collaborators. One TV anchor who interviewed Dr. Bhattacharya said, “California has the strictest lockdowns in the country and cases there are absolutely exploding. What am I supposed to take from the usefulness of lockdowns?”

The fact is that lockdowns do not stop the spread of the virus, but they are very good at destroying the economy. I covered this all in my new book, The New Great Depression.

People are social beings and do not like lockdowns. No matter what the rules are, people will find their way around them. And, with or without strict compliance, the virus goes where it wants.

I’ve been to the White House on official business numerous times. It’s hard to think of a more locked-down place. It has multiple security perimeters, multiple entrances before one can reach the Oval Office, and numerous security guards.

Still, the President and First Lady contracted the COVID-19 virus last October, most likely in the White House itself. As I said, the virus goes where it wants. If lockdowns don’t work, why do public health officials and government officials keep insisting on them? There are two reasons.

The first is that academic epidemiologists are just as out of touch with everyday Americans as any other elite group. They sit in their labs and ivory tower offices and have had no difficulty working from home and avoiding routine exposure that other Americans face.

They have not lost their jobs or seen their businesses destroyed. It’s easy to order a lockdown when you’re not the one whose job or business is ruined. The other reason is that politicians have to be seen doing something, even if they don’t know what they’re doing.

Everyone agrees that washing hands, social distancing and masks in crowded venues make sense. But, that’s not enough for the politicians. They want to appear to be “saving the population” even if they’re just destroying the economy.

If you think the lockdowns have been an economic disaster (I do), then get ready for something worse…

Two of the top public health advisors in the new Biden administration are Ezekiel Emanuel of the Center for American Progress and Michael Osterholm of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota.

Both Emmanuel and Osterholm have long histories of calling for lockdowns during pandemics. In June Ezekiel said, “You have to actually have people at home, close nonessential businesses, stop bars, stop indoor dining, have everyone wearing face masks. These are the things we need to do. … You need to do it nationwide.”

The evidence is clear that lockdowns don’t work. Biden’s health advisors are calling for them anyway.

Only an out of touch elite could support shutting down the economy and not realize you would destroy that economy and the jobs that go with it.

Meanwhile, the pandemic is giving the government justification to clamp down on civil liberties.

For example, Dr. Fauci is now promoting the idea that certain institutions may require individuals to get one of the new vaccines at the state level (though he isn’t sure the federal government will mandate vaccination).

Here’s how it could work: When you get the vaccine, you will receive some kind of certification that could be a QR code on your mobile phone or registration in a central government controlled database. If you want to fly, rent a car, send your children to school or do other everyday activities, you will be required to produce your vaccine registration credentials.

This method is similar to the “social credit” system used in Communist China to enforce compliance with Communist Party definitions of good behavior. Fauci also envisions “COVID-19 passports” that would be required before certain types of travel were allowed.

What Fauci does not mention is that the vaccines are still experimental. They have been approved by the FDA, but this was done on an emergency basis and some acute allergic reactions and even deaths have been reported among those who have received the vaccines.

Also, most Americans may not realize that the COVID-19 vaccines are not traditional vaccines that introduce one mild disease in order to build antibodies to a more deadly disease. Instead, these new vaccines work through genetically modified RNA sequences.

It’s not clear what the long-term effects of such genetic modification might be. But many elites and government bureaucrats seem perfectly fine with using unsuspecting Americans as guinea pigs. Would you like to be one?

New restrictions are one more reason why a new recession is upon us and why any economic recovery will be slow and weak.

Neither monetary nor fiscal policy will effectively stimulate the economy.

Monetary policy is not stimulus because the new money is going to the banks and the banks simply deposit it with the Fed as excess reserves on which they receive interest. If the money is not being loaned by banks and spent by consumers, it isn’t generating economic activity.

Fiscal policy isn’t stimulus because the U.S. debt-to-GDP ratio is now over 130% and rising quickly. Extensive research shows that at debt-to-GDP ratios above 90%, the multiplier on new debt is less than one. This means we’re in a debt trap (in addition to a liquidity trap caused by the Fed).

We cannot print our way out of a liquidity trap. We cannot spend our way out of a debt trap. The Fed and Congress may try to stimulate the economy, but they will fail.

They’ll only dig the country a deeper hole to climb out of.

Though some 30 million coronavirus vaccine doses have been distributed throughout the United States, there’s already a backlog in terms of administering the shots to the public, with just over 11 million of these making it into people’s arms as of Thursday, according to numbers cited in Reuters.

This has prompted questions over whether various state eligibility rules, which require identify checks, should be strictly enforced or if for the sake of speed and ease of getting the shots out faster, sites like pharmacies should forgo ID checks and rely on an honor system and common sense (i.e.: it’s easier to know who’s elderly and thus part of more vulnerable crowd of first recipients).

Currently, 22 states have set age guidelines to prioritize who should receive the shot, with more expected to follow. But increasingly locations are choosing not to follow the state guidelines at a moment US Health Secretary Alex Azar is urging states to speed up inoculation of the elderly and those with chronic health conditions.

It’s expected that teachers and other “essential” workers will be next, which will present further identification challenges. As it currently stands, many pharmacies are going by the age given when online appointments are set up, but not checking on site.

“We are not planning to ask for ID to receive a COVID-19 vaccination,” a CVS Health spokesman said, as cited in Reuters. “These vaccinations will be appointment-only in our stores and patients will have already gone through an eligibility screening when they register for an appointment on our website, through our app or via a 1-800 number.”

Kroger too, which has a pharmacies giving the shot, announced that “State and local guidelines vary across the 40 public health jurisdictions we serve, but in most cases, identification will not be required to receive the vaccine.”

Whether or not this leaves open the likelihood that many could jump in line earlier, the end result from health authorities’ perspective is that more would be inoculated regardless, and faster.

By Clarissa Hawes of FreightWaves,

A truck driver remains hospitalized more than a week after he was shot multiple times by two Missouri State Highway Patrol (MSHP) troopers.

Investigators claim Tayland Rahim, 27, of Gladstone, Missouri, drove to the agency’s local headquarters with an assault-style rifle and fired several rounds around 9:40 p.m. on Jan. 4 in the Troop A parking lot in Lee’s Summit. Sgt. Andy Bell, a spokesman for the Highway Patrol, said Rahim was shot after he disobeyed troopers’ commands to drop his weapon.

“The suspect started shooting randomly and into the ground in the parking lot, and that’s what prompted the two troopers to exit the building and the third trooper, who was in the parking lot, to warn and advise the radio dispatch personnel to seek shelter,” Bell told FreightWaves.

Bell said investigators are unsure of the truck driver’s motive since they have been unable to interview Rahim, who is listed in stable condition at a Kansas City-area hospital.

“He obviously wasn’t there to ask for directions,” Bell said.

Court documents show that Rahim’s only interaction with Missouri law enforcement was in October 2019, when he was ticketed by a Troop A officer in its Commercial Vehicle Enforcement Division at a weigh station for being 2,360 pounds overweight. The ticket, a misdemeanor, cost Rahim $135. 

At the time, Rahim was driving a 2020 International tractor for Swift Transportation, a unit of Knight-Swift Transportation Holdings Inc. according to court filings.

David Berry, vice president of Swift Transportation, told FreightWaves that Rahim quit Swift in September of 2020.

Attempted Ambush

Sgt. Bill Lowe, a spokesman for the Highway Patrol, called the shooting at Troop A headquarters an attempted “ambush” — the first of its kind in Missouri.

“I will say coming to the troop headquarters is a little different because this has never happened in the history of the Highway Patrol,” Lowe said in a recent press conference. “He was set to do some harm, set to do something bad.”

Prosecutors have not filed charges in the case since investigators haven’t been able to interview Rahim, Bell said.

“We will continue to analyze any and all evidence and if and when he is released, he will be immediately put under a 24-hour investigative hold, which allows us to submit the evidence we have to a judge for an arrest warrant,” Bell told FreightWaves.

Investigators seized a cell phone, a rifle magazine with 30 rounds and two live rounds from a black Ford F-150 pickup truck that was registered to one of Rahim’s relatives, according to a search warrant. 

Investigators also searched a house in Gladstone where Rahim lived and found three guns and ammunition, Bell said.

“This person drove to our facility, exited his vehicle with a multi-round rifle and pulled the trigger multiple times,” Bell told FreightWaves. “We just don’t know the motive at this point.”

The unprecedented frenzy to sell stock now when markets remains elevated at all time highs on the back of helicopter money, went into overdrive today when online dating app Bumble – which “differentiates” itself from the hundreds of other dating sites because women “make the first move” – filed to go public today.

The Texas-based company listed in its Friday S-1 filing an offering size of $100 million, which however is a placeholder amount that will change before the actual numbers are finalized. According to Bloomberg, Bumble, which was started in 2014, will seek a valuation of $6 billion to $8 billion in the listing, and with the company expect to float between 5% and 10% of its common stock, we anticipate the final offering will be around $500 million.

The company, which plans to list its shares on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol BMBL, is using Goldman and Citigroup as lead managers on the offering. What is surprising is that Bumble has decided to pick a conventional route to court investors – a syndicate-led initial public offering – instead of taking advantage of the recent SPAC euphoria and reverse-merging with some already public shell.

The company, whose key investment highlight is that virtually everyone now meets online..

… disclosed that it had 2.4 million paying users as of Sept 2020, and the following financial results for the period from January 29, 2020 to September 30, 2020

• Total Revenue of $376.6 million
• Bumble App Revenue of $231.5 million
• Badoo App and Other Revenue of $145.1 million
• Net loss of $(84.1) million, respectively, with a net loss margin of 22.3%
• Adjusted EBITDA of $98.9 million, representing Adjusted EBITDA Margin of 26.3%.
• Net cash provided by operating activities of $1.0 million
• Free Cash Flow of $(4.7) million

Surely all that is worth “at least” $8 billion.