More than 60 percent of Americans think the Senate should vote on President Donald Trump’s nominee to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy before the November midterm elections, according to a new poll.
An NBC News/SurveyMonkey poll conducted between June 27 and July 1 revealed that 62 percent of respondents think the Senate should either confirm or reject Trump’s pick before the midterms. On the other hand, 33 percent think the Senate should wait until after the elections.
Most Republicans and independents—85 percent and 61 percent, respectively—want the Senate to vote on Trump’s nominee before the midterms. However, 55 percent of Democrats don’t want a vote until after the elections. Republicans currently hold a slim 51–49 majority in the upper chamber of Congress, meaning that by waiting until after the elections, the GOP risks losing control of the Senate.
The poll’s results run counter to the message top Democrats have pushed in recent days—that the Senate should wait until a new Congress is seated before voting on Trump’s nominee. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D–N.Y.) said on the Senate floor last week that Republicans “should follow the rule they set in 2016, not to consider a Supreme Court justice in an election year.” He added that “millions of people are just months away from determining the senators who should vote to confirm or reject the president’s nominee, and their voices deserve to be heard now.”
Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin (D–Ill.) expressed similar sentiments, as did Sens. Kamala Harris (D–Calif.) and Elizabeth Warren (D–Mass.). However, Senate Majority Mitch McConnell (R–Ky.) has indicated he wants to move quickly to vote on Trump’s nominee.
Trump has yet to announce his choice to replace Kennedy, though he said he will do so on July 9. In a tweet early Tuesday morning, he said he interviewed “4 very impressive people yesterday.”
I interviewed 4 very impressive people yesterday. On Monday I will be announcing my decision for Justice of the United States Supreme Court!
Americans are sharply divided along partisan lines regarding what kind of justice they want on the Supreme Court. A majority of Republicans—65 percent—want Trump’s nominee to be conservative, while 63 percent of independents and 53 percent of Democrats think he or she should be moderate.
The NBC News/SurveyMonkey poll also gauged Americans’ opinions on whether or not they want Roe v. Wade, the 1973 case that legalized abortion at the federal level, to be overturned. With the retirement of Kennedy, who, in the landmark 1992 case Planned Parenthood v. Casey, joined the plurality opinion upholding Roe v. Wade, many people are predicting that Roe could be overturned. According to the poll, though, 61 percent of Americans think Trump’s nominee should uphold the 1973 ruling.
Are you stunned by what has become of American culture?
Are you confused as to how every moral principle could be turned on its head so quickly?
Well, it’s not an accident.
You’ve probably heard of “Cultural Marxism,” but do you know what it means?
Marxists, after the tremendous failure of their *economic* ideas, decided to change their angle of attack. There was no way that people could be convinced that Socialism is economically superior to Capitalism.
Socialism produced tyranny and death in the hundreds of millions, while Capitalist nations were bursting with wealth.
So, Marxists shifted to targeting culture instead of the economy.
If Cultural Marxists could *destroy the culture* of Capitalist nations, *then* they would try to use the opportunity to change the governments and economies to their Socialist utopia.
If the people can’t think straight, perhaps then Socialism could be shackled onto them.
Marxists just shifted their targets.
Their original argument of workers being *exploited* by capitalists, didn’t sell. It’s obviously not the case.
So Marxists just shifted their “exploitation” schtick to culture:
– women exploited by men
– gays exploited by heterosexuals
– The old exploited by the young…and vice-versa
– This list goes on and on.
Anything that is true is to be twisted like a pretzel — to the point where people can’t tell what is true anymore.
How do you think they’re doing?
Had enough yet?
Then don’t be afraid to stand up for truth, and speak it!
Otherwise, history can most definitely repeat itself.
And the history of Socialism is as nasty and brutish as it gets. Nothing compares to it in terms of human suffering.
Just in time for American consumers to be “held hostage” by high energy prices as the WTI front-month contract eclipses $75 for the first time in three-and-a-half years, meteorologists are forecasting a heat wave that could drive temperatures on the East Coast into the 100s as Americans prepare for the July 4 holiday.
In anticipation of the high temperatures, the National Weather Service issued a heat advisory affecting the northeast and mid-Atlantic from Virginia to Maine. “Heat advisories and some excessive heat warnings are in effect from central Virginia to eastern Maine. High temperatures in the 90s, combined with high dewpoints, are expected result in heat indices of 95 to 110 degrees for many areas.”
Furthermore, peak temperatures of 105-110 Wednesday afternoon could make even simple activities like walking outside dangerous.
Ooof! Peak heat indices of 105-110 degrees this afternoon make even just walking home from work potentially dangerous. Limit time outdoors if you can and drink water, even if you don’t feel thirsty. pic.twitter.com/gvnBf3TbkW
The heat is so bad in some areas that, according to Fox News, nearly 150 elderly people had to be evacuated from a long-term care facility in Mount Holly, NJ following a mechanical problem that shut down the facility’s air conditioning and power.
Anybody planning to spend time outdoors, in parks or at the beach, should take precautions like staying hydrated and making sure there’s enough water on hand to avoid heatstroke, according to ABC 7.
The New York State Office for the Aging issued a warning to senior citizens to “stay inside” during the heat wave, as hot weather can be particularly dangerous for the elderly.
The heatwave looks like it will break on Wednesday with an afternoon thunderstorm expected in a few areas. But high temperatures are expected to persist until the end of the week.
Mexico’s historic energy reforms are now in focus with a change in administrations on the way.
Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) won a landslide victory in Mexico’s presidential election on Sunday, and appears poised to win majorities in both houses of Congress, granting him sweeping power to remake the country. His party, Morena, also won a large number of governor’s races and AMLO’s former environment minister from when he was mayor of Mexico City followed in his footsteps and won the election for mayor in the capital city.
The Mexican people, fed up with widespread corruption, poverty and violence, have handed AMLO a stronger mandate than any Mexican president in decades.
AMLO has long supported a nationalistic outlook on energy, and spent years criticizing the liberalization of Mexico’s energy reform. He repeatedly said that he would halt future auctions of Mexico’s offshore oil and gas reserves, while also promising to investigate already-awarded contracts for cases of fraud.
AMLO’s election has the oil and gas industry on edge, which fears that a swing to the left imperils its investments in the country. The majorities in Congress for AMLO’s Morena party could also neuter the strongest checks on his power.
However, the energy reforms passed under President Enrique Pena Nieto were codified with constitutional changes, which throws up a very high bar for to clear for any changes, meaning that AMLO, despite his landslide victory, still faces a steep uphill battle to roll back the partial-privatization of the oil and gas sector, if he were to go down that road.
AMLO has also suggested he would curtail or even end crude oil exports, diverting supplies for domestic refining. Mexico’s aging refineries are operating way below capacity, and Mexico has become increasingly dependent on imported fuel from the United States.
(Click to enlarge)
As a result, AMLO wants to spend billions on building a handful of new refineries while upgrading older ones. This strategy, he argues, would cut Mexico’s dependence on foreign fuel and help build up capacity in value-added refined fuel production.
The problem for AMLO, and for Mexico, is that it will carry an enormous price tag, and in any event, Mexico’s crude oil production continues to fall. Output peaked in 2004 at just below 3.5 million barrels per day, falling to just 1.98 mb/d in 2017. By all accounts, without billions of dollars’ worth of investment, output will continue to decline. Indeed, Mexico’s energy minister Pedro Joaquin Coldwell says Mexico will need $640 billion in investment to bring oil production back up to 3 mb/d, a sum so large as to render it somewhat meaningless.
But even more modest sums will be too much for state-owned Pemex, which is stretched because of poor management and very significant debt. As such, Mexico needs international companies to take on the burden of heavy expenditures. With enticing offshore reserves, the oil majors such as Shell, Chevron, ExxonMobil and Eni appear willing to do just that.
However, state control of the nation’s energy reserves is a point of pride for Mexico, dating back to the nationalization of the oil industry in the late 1930s. President Pena Nieto’s privatization was controversial when it passed years ago, and the promised fruits of the overhaul have not been felt by the average person. That gives AMLO leeway to slow-walk permits and suspend future auctions, while working to put Pemex back in control where he can.
AMLO also seems supportive of reinstituting price controls on fuels to blunt the impact of higher oil prices on the public. Pena Nieto removed fuel subsidies in early 2017, which led to a spike in gasoline prices and prompted widespread protest in what became known as the gasolinazo. Expensive fuel is not popular anywhere, and AMLO has signaled his intent to return to price supports, even if it comes at huge public expense.
He had also suggested a national referendum on the energy reform, and ultimately a change in the constitution to wipe out Pena Nieto’s changes. At the same time, he dialed down this rhetoric during the campaign, attempting to reassure investors that their money was safe. Needless to say, there is a lot of uncertainty about what to expect from an AMLO administration.
But his overwhelming victory could embolden him to pursue a more aggressive course of action…whatever that may be.
This Fourth of July, when you watch the fireworks, will you think about the Declaration of Independence?
We should, says John Stossel. After all, the holiday is meant to honor the Declaration. It, and the Constitution it led to, help keep us free.
Compare America to Britain, the country we broke away from. There, they sentenced a man to more than a year in jail for making a Facebook live video outside a courthouse.
Getting locked up for something you write on social media is also common; hundreds get arrested for that in Britain every year.
Fortunately, in America, thanks to the First Amendment, we can say most anything without being jailed
Click here for full text and downloadable versions.
The views expressed in this video are solely those of John Stossel, his independent production company, Stossel Productions, and the people he interviews. The claims and opinions set forth in the video and accompanying text are not necessarily those of Reason.
The California Supreme Court ruled in favor of online review site Yelp.com after a lawyer attempted to use the courts to have a negative review forcefully removed.
As Reasonpreviously reported, personal-injury lawyer Dawn Hassell of the Hassell Law Group accused former client Ava Bird of defaming her law firm on Yelp. Hassell sued Bird in 2013, but Bird did not appear—it is believed that Bird was never served with court papers. The San Francisco County Superior Court ruled in Hassell’s favor by default and awarded her $557,918. The court ordered Bird to remove the reviews and Yelp to “remove all reviews posted by AVA BIRD under user names ‘Birdzeye B.’ and ‘J.D.,'” despite not having definitively confirmed that Bird used the alias “J.D.”
Though Yelp lawyers said they often comply with such orders, they took issue with the nature of the proceedings, as explained by Yelp Deputy General Counsel Aaron Schur in a blog post:
When Yelp appealed, the Court of Appeal doubled down on the lower court’s decision, ruling that Yelp was not a publisher at all, had no right to a hearing in connection with an order to remove reviews, and was not protected by the Communications Decency Act (CDA), the law Congress passed to protect online publishers to shield them them from responsibility for the speech of others. The CDA gives online platforms the right to publish (or not publish) the ideas and opinions of users without the threat of being held liable for that content or forced to remove it. This allows the internet to flourish. The Court of Appeal held that by avoiding suing Yelp directly (to Yelp, a violation of due process) also allowed the plaintiff to sidestep the CDA’s broad immunity.
On Monday, the California Supreme Court ruled 4-3 in favor of Yelp. The justices argued that such orders “could interfere with and undermine the viability of an online platform.” Hassell’s lawyer, Monique Olivier, criticized the ruling, saying that it “stands as an invitation to spread falsehoods on the internet without consequence.”
Several organizations came to Yelp’s defense, including the the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF).
The ACLU filed an amicus brief in 2016, citing, “the danger that the Court of Appeal’s holding posed to online speech.” EFF also filed a brief and argued in 2017 that the two lower courts in the case did not “understand that the First Amendment protects not only authors and speakers, but also those who publish or distribute their words.” EFF also accused both courts of ignoring “the U.S. Supreme Court’s clear holding that issuing an injunction against a non-party is a constitutionally-prohibited violation of due process.”
In the same Yelp blog post citing the CDA, Schur made the following observation about Hassell’s pursuance of Bird:
The Hassell Law Group, which has always been a highly-rated business on Yelp and currently maintains five stars, has spent many years in the court system (and endured the resulting Streisand Effect) in an effort to force Yelp to silence a pair of outlier reviews. As we have observed before, litigation is never a good substitute for customer service and responsiveness, and had the law firm avoided the courtrooms and moved on, it would have saved time and money, and been able to focus more on the cases that truly matter the most—those of its clients.
One of the biggest mysteries to emerge from Tesla’s mad dash scramble over the past week to hit its 5,000 Model 3 production quota in a week, was the question: what is a “factory gated” model and why are so many of the Model 3s produced by Musk not quite “production quality.”
In addressing this question yesterday, Vertical Group’s Gordon Johnson offered this explanation:
TSLA mentioned that it reached 5,031 Model 3 cars of “factory gated” production in the last week of June; while the company said it has used the “factory gated” terminology all along, we were not able to find this term in any SEC filings or public transcripts; however, looking to Linkedin, it seems “factory gated” may mean cars that require further testing and quality inspection upon leaving the factory floor (Exhibit 1) – this would mean these cars are likely not “full production vehicles” in the traditional sense of auto industry terminology;
Exhibit 1: Linkedin Review Suggests “Factory Gated” Produced Cars
May Require Further Inspection/Testing
The implication of the above is that in its rush to produce as many Model 3s as possible, Tesla was slashing quality control corners, and not producing fully QC-compliant units, which while perhaps permissible when producing less sophisticated goods, is clearly controversial to say the least when the product in question is a car that already has a spotty record of crashes and safety.
But while Johnson’s speculation sounds accurate, is that really what happened?
Now, courtesy of Business Insider, it appears that Musk’s quality control transgressions was especially acute: according to the report, which is said to be based on internal Tesla documents, Musk appears to have asked engineers at his Fremont, California factory to remove a standard brake test, called the brake and roll test, from the tasks Model 3 cars must complete in order to move through production, according to internal documents seen by Business Insider.
In order to maximize output and hit the company’s weekly output quota, Musk went all out, eliminating what he considered non-critical “tests” to push out as many cars as possible:
The test was apparently shut down before 3 am on Tuesday, June 26, according to a person familiar with the matter. It’s unclear why this particular test was halted.
And while Musk clearly though the test was redundant, or at least of secondary importance, others disagree, and according to an industry expert, the brake and roll test is a critical part of the car manufacturing process, taking place during its final stages.
The test ensures that the car’s wheels are perfectly aligned, and it also checks the brakes and their function by taking the vehicle’s engine up to a certain RPM and observing how they react on diagnostic machines.
To justify its reporting, BI notes the following screenshot of what the test looks like in the Tesla system.
Source: Business Insider
Here is the report’s explanation of the screengrab above:
The far left column shows what step the car has reached in the manufacturing process and what tasks must be done there. In this step, the car undergoes a brake and roll test.
The two key columns here are the ones labeled “Critical” and “Blocking.” According to an employee at the company, they show that it is apparently no longer necessary for the car to undergo this test before it leaves this step of the manufacturing process.
On the far right are all the descriptions of the tasks that should be performed at this station. However, since the criticality is off and the blocking is off, the car can leave the station whether those tasks are performed or not, the employee said.
It’s not clear how many, if any, cars have left the station without this test being undertaken.
Quoting industry experts, BI then explains just why this test is of such significance in the production process:
Ron Harbour, a consultant at Oliver Wyman and the co-author and founder of “The Harbour Report,” a worldwide guide to manufacturing, told Business Insider that after everything is installed in a car during the manufacturing process, a manufacturer would have to be very lucky if everything on a car was in alignment.
“If you just abandon that [the test] you could potentially have a lot of quality issues with your customers,” he said. “Every plant does that … it’s part of finishing the build of the car.”
Harbour told Business Insider he was unaware of any test that could adequately replace the brake and roll test on a manufacturing line.
When asked about this apparent “corner-cut” Tesla told Business Insider that every car goes through “rigorous quality checks” including brake tests. “To be extremely clear, we drive *every* Model 3 on our test track to verify braking, torque, squeal and rattle. There are no exceptions,” Tesla spokesperson Dave Arnold said in a statement.
However, when pressed on whether or not Musk himself gave the order to remove the brake and roll test, Arnold said: “I don’t have anything further beyond the statement.”
Sounds like a tacit admission, which may come as very bad news for all those Model 3 buyers who are about to receive not only a Model 3 unit that was made not in sterile, high-tech conditions, but may have major drivability and comfort problems.
Business Insider also provided the needed internal color on what factory gating means:
The employee Business Insider spoke with said that the factory gate distinction is important. It means that the company likely reached its goal by finishing cars that had already been through the production line the previous week, but were held back for rework, and readying them for factory gating, the source said.
In other words, of the slightly more than 5,000 cars produced in that last, torrid week, Tesla rushed out production at any cost, even if it meant that countless units had to be QC-tested and checked, at the cost of numerous man hours.
It also means that had Tesla actually followed protocol, it would never have been able to hit its quota and would disappoint the market.
Business Insider’s mole had one more troubling disclosure:
Tesla also announced that it made 28,578 Model 3s in the second quarter. However, BI has viewed internal documents that show that as of June 27 the company had planned to hit 36,020 Model 3s in the second quarter. Tesla declined to comment on this figure.
At that point the carmaker had made under 11,000 cars in the month of June and just under 26,000 cars in the 2nd quarter, putting it on track to fall below its plan of 36,020.
This means that even after building a tent, and slashing QC corners, Tesla was still unable to hit its internal bogey.
Needless to say, all of the above greatly dilutes Musk’s triumphant message that he had managed to hit his production target.
Worse, however, are growing accusations from various prominent Tesla skeptics, that Musk is now openly engaging in the same practices that led to the collapse of Theranos, warning that “this company is sounding more and more like Theranos every passing day. What other safety-related shortcuts are possibly occurring here?”
This company is sounding more and more like Theranos every passing day. What other safety-related shortcuts are possibly occurring here? $TSLAhttps://t.co/0IHICYDbKv
But the biggest problem for Musk is that, just like in the case of Theranos, there now appears to be a very motivated whistleblower within the organization alerting the media about the company’s production flaws and, let’s face it, outright lies.
Unless Musk is able to catch this leaker, or as he called him two weeks ago, saboteur, the Tesla story may have one more similarity with that of Theranos: the ending.
With oil rising to the highest price since November 2014 less than an hour ago, with WTI hitting $75, oil suddenly tumbled on what appeared to be no news, prompting traders to ask if the US had sold even more oil from the SPR.
It turns out the reason is to be found in an article published moments ago by Al Jazeera, according to which the Saudis “have agreed to US demands to pump more oil”, and which quoted the official Saudi Press Agency that Saudi Arabia’s cabinet on Tuesday “endorsed the kindgdom’s readiness to pump more oil to maintain market balance and stability.”
“The kingdom is prepared to utilise its spare production capacity when necessary to deal with any future changes in the levels of supply and demand,” a cabinet statement said, following a meeting chaired by King Salman.
US President Donald Trump on Saturday said Saudi Arabia’s King Salman had agreed to his request to increase oil output “maybe up to” two million barrels. Trump said the agreement was reached after a phone call with the Saudi King about oil production but mentioned no specifics.
Both leaders also discussed “efforts by the oil-producing countries to compensate for any potential shortage in supplies,” SPA reported.
Trump’s claim comes after the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), a grouping of oil-producing states that includes Saudi Arabia, already agreed to ramp up production by a million barrels a day at a meeting earlier this month.
In addition to pressing Saudi Arabia to pump as much as 2mmb/d more to an unprecedented 12mmb/d, an amount many doubt the Saudi can maintain for an extended period of time – think Tesla making Model 3s – the Trump administration has also been pushing countries to cut all imports of Iranian oil from November when the US re-imposes sanctions against Tehran, after Trump withdrew from a 2015 nuclear deal agreed between Iran and six major powers.
If the Saudis are indeed prepared to cave to Trump, it creates an existential threat to OPEC which may see Iran and other members quit immediately, if Riyadh has made a unilateral decision to pump more. Iran’s OPEC governor, Hossein Kazempour Ardebili, accused the United States and Saudi Arabia of trying to push up oil prices and said both countries are acting against the foundation of OPEC.
As this point it is looking increasingly more likely that an emergency OPEC meeting is coming in the not too distant future.
Whether accurate or not, the Al Jazeera report has sent oil sliding, although it may be just the opportunity BTFDers have been waiting for.
Headlines will crow of the fact that US Factory Orders rose 0.4% MoM in May (better than the expectations), rebounding from the 0.4% drop in April (pushing factory order growth up 9.2% YoY – highest since June 2017).
However, what most will miss is that absent defense, new orders dropped 0.1% MoM after falling 0.6% MoM in April.
Which economy is booming America?
Defense Aircraft & Parts were up 21.1% MoM…
But automaker new orders plunged most since Jan 2015…
More than 60 percent of Americans think the Senate should vote on President Donald Trump’s nominee to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy before the November midterm elections, according to a new poll.
The California Supreme Court ruled in favor of online review site Yelp.com after a lawyer attempted to use the courts to have a negative review forcefully removed.
