Month: June 2020

Here We Go Again: Trump Wants New Tariffs on Canadian Aluminum

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Just days before a new trade deal among the United States, Canada, and Mexico is set to take effect, the administration is reportedly considering reimposing tariffs on Canadian aluminum that it had dropped in order to negotiate the deal.

Whether or not the 10 percent tariffs become reality again, the incident seems to demonstrate—once more—that foreign nations have little to gain by negotiating trade deals with America while Donald Trump remains in office. As long as America’s trade policy is being directed by tempestuous protectionists, it will be difficult for any foreign leader to trust that the U.S. is negotiating in good faith.

Restarting an unnecessary and counterproductive trade skirmish with a close ally and key trading partner would also demonstrate that the president has learned nothing from more than two years of failed tariff policies.

“Bringing back these tariffs would be like a bad horror movie,” Neil Herrington, a senior vice president at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, told The New York Times. If they are enacted, Canada will likely retaliate with tariffs on American goods, likely souring any goodwill that might have been generated by the upcoming official launch of the United States–Canada–Mexico Agreement (USMCA).

The Trump administration imposed 10 percent tariffs on nearly all aluminum imports (and 25 percent tariffs on most steel imports) in March 2018 for shallow “national security” reasons. A year later, the White House lifted those tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico after congressional leaders and foreign officials said this would be a necessary first step to reaching the tripartite trade deal that Trump sought to replace the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

Under the terms of the new deal, the United States retains the right to impose tariffs on Canadian aluminum if there is a surge in imports—and that is the justification White House officials appear to be using for this latest tariff threat. As Politico reports, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer told Congress last week that the administration was “looking at” a recent increase in aluminum imports from Canada as “something of genuine concern.”

But genuine concern to whom? The Times reports that the push for new tariffs is coming from exactly two domestic companies: Century Aluminum and Magnitude 7 Metals.

Meanwhile, most of the rest of the aluminum manufacturing sector is opposed to the idea. In a letter sent to the White House on Thursday, the heads of 15 companies and trade associations involved in aluminum manufacturing called for Trump to revoke his threat of additional tariffs.

That supposed surge in imports is overblown too. The Aluminum Association, an industry group, said in a statement that imports from Canada are “largely consistent with historical trends in line with historic norms.”

Just like in 2018, tariffs on aluminum imports stand to harm far more American businesses and consumers than they would help—97 percent of American aluminum jobs are in downstream industries where higher costs on imported metal will cause unnecessary economic pain. As always, Americans will be hit with the cost of the tariffs, which are taxes paid by importers, not by foreign manufacturers.

“The last thing that U.S. manufacturers need is for the government to tax an important input like aluminum while these companies are dealing with unprecedented challenges resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic,” the Coalition of American Metal Manufacturers and Users said in a statement. The group noted that U.S. manufacturers have been paying billions of dollars in tariff-related costs for two years, and that they could have used that money to hire workers or make capital investments.

More tariffs on Canadian aluminum make little sense as economic policy. But what about as a political tactic? There, too, it’s unclear what Trump stands to gain by undermining the launch of the USMCA, one of his administration’s signature accomplishments—or by raising taxes on American businesses during an election year.

And if the Trump administration is going to object every time a new trade deal causes more trade to happen, what incentive do other countries have to negotiate for better terms? The whole episode seems to confirm that Trump values the ability to raise barriers to trade more than he wants to lower them, and it exposes the fundamental flaw in his view of trade as a zero-sum game. When more aluminum is bought and sold across the U.S.-Canada border, both countries become more prosperous.

“Tariffs on Canadian aluminum on the eve of the USMCA commencement make no economic or diplomatic sense,” says Dan Ikenson, director of trade studies for the libertarian Cato Institute, “but that makes the move perfectly Trumpian.”

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A Quarter Of All Personal Income In The US Now Comes From The Government

A Quarter Of All Personal Income In The US Now Comes From The Government

Tyler Durden

Fri, 06/26/2020 – 14:25

Following today’s release of the latest Personal Income and Spending data, Wall Street was predictably focused on the changes in these two key series, which showed a record jump in personal spending (to be expected one month after the savings rate in the US hit a whopping 32% annualized), and a record drop in personal income (as government benefits and stimulus checks slowed substantially).

But while the change in the headline data was indeed notable, what was far more remarkable was less followed data showing just how reliant on the US government the population has become.

We are referring, of course, to Personal Current Transfer payments which are essentially government sourced income such as unemployment and emergency benefits, welfare checks, and so on. In May, this number was $5.3 trillion annualized, following the record $6.4 trillion hit last month when the US government activated the money helicopters to avoid a total collapse of the US economy.

Eve more striking, is that as of May when total Personal Income was just shy of $20 trillion annualized, the government is now responsible for over a quarter of all income.

Putting that number in perspective, in the 1950s and 1960s, transfer payment were around 7%. This number rose in the low teens starting in the mid-1970s (or right after the Nixon Shock ended Bretton-Woods and closed the gold window). The number then jumped again after the financial crisis, spiking to the high teens.

And now, the coronavirus has officially sent this number into the mid-20% range, after hitting a record high 31% in April.

And that’s how creeping banana republic socialism comes at you: first slowly, then fast.

So for all those who claim that the Fed is now (and has been for the past decade) subsidizing the 1%, that’s true, but with every passing month, the government is also funding the daily life of an ever greater portion of America’s poorest social segments.

Who ends up paying for both?

Why the middle class of course, where the dollar debasement on one side, and the insane debt accumulation on the other, mean that millions of Americans content to work 9-5, pay their taxes, and generally keep their mouth shut as others are burning everything down and tearing down statues, are now doomed.

The “good” news? As we reported last November, the US middle class won’t have to suffer this pain for much longer, because while the US has one one of the highest median incomes in the entire world, with only three countries boasting a higher income, it is who gets to collect this money that is the major problem, because as the chart also shows, with just a 50% share of the population in middle-income households, the US is now in the same category as such “banana republics” as Turkey, China and, drumroll, Russia.

What is just as stunning: according to the OECD, more than half of the countries in question have a more vibrant middle class than the US.

So the next time someone abuses the popular phrase  “they hate us for our [fill in the blank]”, perhaps it’s time to counter that “they” may not “hate” us at all, but rather are making fun of what has slowly but surely become the world’s biggest banana republic?

And as we concluded last year, “it has not Russia, nor China, nor any other enemy, foreign or domestic, to blame… except for one: the Federal Reserve Bank of the United States.”

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2Z8n0l0 Tyler Durden

The Secret Is Out: “The Fed Is Busted”

The Secret Is Out: “The Fed Is Busted”

Tyler Durden

Fri, 06/26/2020 – 14:04

Authored by Sven Henrich via NorthmanTrader.com,

First they dismiss you as a conspiracy theorist then they join you. The secret is out, the Fed is busted: Central banks have distorted asset prices far above the economy.

I’ve been harping about the market cap to GDP ratio for a while and even called the Fed’s asset price distortion operation a direct threat to the economy.

Now it appears the IMF agrees:

“This disconnect between markets and the real economy raises the risk of another correction in risk asset prices should investor risk appetite fade, posing a threat to the recovery”

Posing a threat to the recovery. This was precisely my point on CNBC Fast Money last week:

The Fed is the danger. None of what we are seeing here is normal nor healthy as seen in market cap to GDP:

And be clear: Everything is about the Fed. It’s gotten so bad that a broad sense of resignation is making itself felt. Wall Street analysts are reduced to cite nothing but the Fed and further stimulus to justify a buy stocks narrative. Everything is so distorted that the very tenants of capitalism are crumbling.

Tim Seymour acknowledged as much last night: Capitalism is dead:

The very notion of price discovery is reduced to a central bank command order operation. Ever more ready to intervene at an ever more frantic pace, fearful of any downside in markets.

Just take the month of June. Two corrective moves in June and both seeing markets bounce back on what? The Fed coming to the rescue:

I keep asking how desperate they are behind the curtain.

One can’t help but wonder if we are approaching a moment of singularity:

For all the bullish narratives out there nobody can hide from a very self evident fact: Markets peaked on June 8th. It was the same day I asked the Crash 2 question. People mostly think of a crash as a fast event, but that’s not necessarily so. February/March was a crash because it happened so fast. But 2000 was a crash and it took 2 years to play out.

Not everything happens in a day, week or month.

And so I want to highlight some charts that suggest something more sinister may be in play than currently recognized.

Markets did peak on June 8th and the island reversal patterns we discussed in Straight Talk #6 remain in place:

$DJIA:

$NYSE:

$IWM:

All of them peaked on June 8th.

Including $SPX and the $VIX bottomed that day and have broken out since, the pattern busted to the upside:

All except one index who’s new record headlines made these market peaks fade into the background: The almighty Nasdaq managing to hit all time highs on a negative divergence hitting a key trend line before rejecting.

And the market cap concentration of the Nasdaq hiding the most striking fact: Equal weight remains below the December 2018 lows also peaking in June:

Hence I call all this still a bear market.

A bear market that hides in the details hidden beneath and asset prices distorted by the Fed that also can’t hide from this truth:

This market remains about control. It can’t maintain asset price levels this historically disconnected from the economy without artificial intervention expanding. Reduce it by a sliver and asset prices drop.

So far the Fed has succeeded in its mission to save markets from pain commensurate with the crisis unfolding, but it is killing capitalism itself in the process.

Now desperately intervening in one form or another on every down day the Fed soon will run out things to do and buy and market participants having chased nothing but the Fed put have greatly aided and abetted this historic distortion:

I’ve called this a battle for control between fundamental reality on the ground and artificial liquidity injections.

Everything we’re seeing are vertical distortions that are non sustainable:

But worse than vertical they are not changing reality on the ground. They are just masking it.

No bull market without central bank intervention has now been proven beyond a reasonable doubt. The Fed is busted and Wall Street exposed to be nothing but a suckling at the Fed’s liquidity chest.

Rallies still occur when the Fed intervenes. But despite two interventions in June prices now remain below the June 8th peak. The Fed and markets now have to prove they can exceed above these prices or potentially face the point of singularity: No bull market even with central bank intervention. If they can’t, then this bear market will come out of hiding.

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/3eCLmK1 Tyler Durden

$266,325 Lamborghini Totaled 20 Minutes After It Leaves The Showroom

$266,325 Lamborghini Totaled 20 Minutes After It Leaves The Showroom

Tyler Durden

Fri, 06/26/2020 – 13:45

We hope they had insurance.

Because little did the driver of a Lamborghini Huracan Spyder know that just 20 minutes after they would leave the showroom with their supercar, it would be scattered across a highway in West Yorkshire, U.K., totaled and in pieces.

That was the case after the “brand new” car wound up stopped on a highway in West Yorkshire after experiencing mechanical failure. While waiting for assistance and broken down, the car was slammed into from behind by an “innocent motorist” on the same highway, according to CNBC. 

The accident took place on Wednesday and left the Italian-made car in a wrecked heap of metal. Even the West Yorkshire Police Roads Policing Unit had to cringe a bit on Twitter before sharing photographs of the wreck.

“It’s only a car,” they wrote in jest on Twitter, saying the Lamborghini was just “20 minutes old”. They used the hashtag “#CouldHaveCried” in their Tweet. 

According to the BBC, the driver of the van that hit the car was suffering from head injuries, though they were not described as serious. The driver of the Lamborghini has not been identified.

As a result of the accident, portions of the West Yorkshire Highway had to be closed down. 

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/3hZR4bf Tyler Durden

Here We Go Again: Trump Wants New Tariffs on Canadian Aluminum

sfphotosfour111336

Just days before a new trade deal among the United States, Canada, and Mexico is set to take effect, the administration is reportedly considering reimposing tariffs on Canadian aluminum that it had dropped in order to negotiate the deal.

Whether or not the 10 percent tariffs become reality again, the incident seems to demonstrate—once more—that foreign nations have little to gain by negotiating trade deals with America while Donald Trump remains in office. As long as America’s trade policy is being directed by tempestuous protectionists, it will be difficult for any foreign leader to trust that the U.S. is negotiating in good faith.

Restarting an unnecessary and counterproductive trade skirmish with a close ally and key trading partner would also demonstrate that the president has learned nothing from more than two years of failed tariff policies.

“Bringing back these tariffs would be like a bad horror movie,” Neil Herrington, a senior vice president at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, told The New York Times. If they are enacted, Canada will likely retaliate with tariffs on American goods, likely souring any goodwill that might have been generated by the upcoming official launch of the United States–Canada–Mexico Agreement (USMCA).

The Trump administration imposed 10 percent tariffs on nearly all aluminum imports (and 25 percent tariffs on most steel imports) in March 2018 for shallow “national security” reasons. A year later, the White House lifted those tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico after congressional leaders and foreign officials said this would be a necessary first step to reaching the tripartite trade deal that Trump sought to replace the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

Under the terms of the new deal, the United States retains the right to impose tariffs on Canadian aluminum if there is a surge in imports—and that is the justification White House officials appear to be using for this latest tariff threat. As Politico reports, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer told Congress last week that the administration was “looking at” a recent increase in aluminum imports from Canada as “something of genuine concern.”

But genuine concern to whom? The Times reports that the push for new tariffs is coming from exactly two domestic companies: Century Aluminum and Magnitude 7 Metals.

Meanwhile, most of the rest of the aluminum manufacturing sector is opposed to the idea. In a letter sent to the White House on Thursday, the heads of 15 companies and trade associations involved in aluminum manufacturing called for Trump to revoke his threat of additional tariffs.

That supposed surge in imports is overblown too. The Aluminum Association, an industry group, said in a statement that imports from Canada are “largely consistent with historical trends in line with historic norms.”

Just like in 2018, tariffs on aluminum imports stand to harm far more American businesses and consumers than they would help—97 percent of American aluminum jobs are in downstream industries where higher costs on imported metal will cause unnecessary economic pain. As always, Americans will be hit with the cost of the tariffs, which are taxes paid by importers, not by foreign manufacturers.

“The last thing that U.S. manufacturers need is for the government to tax an important input like aluminum while these companies are dealing with unprecedented challenges resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic,” the Coalition of American Metal Manufacturers and Users said in a statement. The group noted that U.S. manufacturers have been paying billions of dollars in tariff-related costs for two years, and that they could have used that money to hire workers or make capital investments.

More tariffs on Canadian aluminum make little sense as economic policy. But what about as a political tactic? There, too, it’s unclear what Trump stands to gain by undermining the launch of the USMCA, one of his administration’s signature accomplishments—or by raising taxes on American businesses during an election year.

And if the Trump administration is going to object every time a new trade deal causes more trade to happen, what incentive do other countries have to negotiate for better terms? The whole episode seems to confirm that Trump values the ability to raise barriers to trade more than he wants to lower them, and it exposes the fundamental flaw in his view of trade as a zero-sum game. When more aluminum is bought and sold across the U.S.-Canada border, both countries become more prosperous.

“Tariffs on Canadian aluminum on the eve of the USMCA commencement make no economic or diplomatic sense,” says Dan Ikenson, director of trade studies for the libertarian Cato Institute, “but that makes the move perfectly Trumpian.”

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This Week in Policing Reform: Utah Outlaws Kneeling on Suspects’ Necks, Memphis P.D. Ends No-Knock Raids

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You might have noticed that there’s a lot of criminal justice news right now. In fact, it can be downright overwhelming to keep track of what’s going on at the local, state, and federal levels. Here’s a quick roundup of some of the most significant policing reforms that passed (or failed) over the last week.

Congress 

  • Last night the Democrat-led House passed the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act by a largely party-line vote. The bill would end qualified immunity—a legal doctrine that shields cops from liability in civil rights lawsuits—establish a national registry for police misconduct, ban police chokeholds and no-knock raids in some circumstances, and limit the transfer of military equipment to state and local police departments. It would also require federal law enforcement officers to wear body cameras and to have dashboard cameras installed in their vehicles. However, Republicans and the White House say ending qualified immunity is a deal-breaker.
  • Senate Republicans’ more modest policing reform bill, the JUSTICE Act, introduced by Sen. Tim Scott (R–S.C.), is dead in the water after Democrats blocked debate on it. Democrats and civil liberties groups oppose the bill, saying it doesn’t go nearly far enough to address systemic problems in American policing. Republicans say the bill strikes a balance between addressing needed reforms and supporting police as an institution.
  • Sen. Mike Braun (R–Ind.), bucking the rest of his party, introduced the Reforming Qualified Immunity Act, which would not end the legal doctrine of qualified immunity, but it would come close.
  • Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) reintroduced the FAIR Act today, which would significantly reform federal civil asset forfeiture.

State-level Package Bills

  • Colorado Gov. Jared Polis signed a sweeping police reform bill into law. The new laws will, among other provisions, require officers to wear body cameras and record police-initiated interactions with the public; create a database of police use-of-force incidents; forbid officers from firing less-than-lethal projectiles at someone’s head, pelvis, or back, and bars cops from firing indiscriminately into crowds; and strip police officers of qualified immunity in civil court if they are sued for violating people’s rights or for failing to intervene when they witness another officer violating a person’s rights.
  • Police reform legislation collapsed in the Minnesota legislature amid a partisan standoff between the Democrat-led House and Republican-led Senate, and lawmakers left the special session with nothing to show for their work. Republican senate majority leader Paul Gazelka told reporters the legislature is “weeks and weeks away from the possibility of doing something with criminal justice reform.”
  • Hopes of police reform also look dim in Georgia, where Democrats have introduced bills that would restrict police use of tear gas, tasers, and choke holds. Georgia House Republicans, meanwhile, passed a bill that would have made police officers a protected class under a new hate crime law. That provision was stripped from the state senate’s version of the legislation.

Use-of-Force

  • Utah Gov. Gary Herbert signed a bill into law on Thursday that makes it a third-degree felony for a police officer to kneel on a suspect’s neck as a method of restraint and a first-degree felony if that action resulted in a person’s death.
  • The Louisiana House unanimously passed a bill to study policing tactics statewide, but not before removing a reference to George Floyd.
  • The Memphis Police Department announced it will no longer execute no-knock search warrants following the March death of Breonna Taylor in botched no-knock SWAT raid. 
  • The Omaha Police Department updated its use-of-force policies to prohibit officers from using their knees to pin someone’s neck to the ground.
  • In New York City, an NYPD officer was arrested for using a banned chokehold, the first cop to be prosecuted under a new law prohibiting chokeholds.

Surveillance

  • The Boston City Council unanimously passed an ordinance banning the city government from using facial recognition technology.
  • Santa Cruz, California, banned the use of predictive policing tools.

Transparency

  • The New York City Council passed the POST Act, which will require the NYPD to disclose all of the surveillance technology that it uses on the public.
  • Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms signed an executive order requiring the police department to identify ways to improve compliance with body camera policies and responsiveness to public records requests for body cam footage, as well as provide a way for the public to submit recordings of police use-of-force incidents for investigations. The order also calls for strengthening the Atlanta Citizen Review Board.

School Policing

As Reason reported yesterday, school districts around the country are considering ending their contracts with local police departments.

  • The San Francisco Unified School District Board of Education unanimously approved a resolution to end its memorandum of understanding with the San Francisco Police Department.
  • The Oakland school board also voted unanimously on Wednesday to eliminate the district’s police department and shift its $2.5 million budget to student support services.
  • The Chicago Board of Education rejected a proposal, supported by teachers unions, to terminate its $33 million contract with the Chicago Police Department. Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot opposed the proposal, but it was still only narrowly defeated by a 4-3 vote.
  • The Los Angeles Unified School District also voted down three separate proposals to address the use of SROs, including one that would have slashed the school police budget by 90 percent, after an 11-hour marathon session.
  • School police officers in Philadelphia will be renamed “school safety officers” and wear new, less severe uniforms when school (hypothetically) resumes in September.

Police Unions

  • A labor coalition in Seattle, Washington, voted to expel the city’s police union.

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This Week in Policing Reform: Utah Outlaws Kneeling on Suspects’ Necks, Memphis P.D. Ends No-Knock Raids

zumaglobalten207019

You might have noticed that there’s a lot of criminal justice news right now. In fact, it can be downright overwhelming to keep track of what’s going on at the local, state, and federal levels. Here’s a quick roundup of some of the most significant policing reforms that passed (or failed) over the last week.

Congress 

  • Last night the Democrat-led House passed the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act by a largely party-line vote. The bill would end qualified immunity—a legal doctrine that shields cops from liability in civil rights lawsuits—establish a national registry for police misconduct, ban police chokeholds and no-knock raids in some circumstances, and limit the transfer of military equipment to state and local police departments. It would also require federal law enforcement officers to wear body cameras and to have dashboard cameras installed in their vehicles. However, Republicans and the White House say ending qualified immunity is a deal-breaker.
  • Senate Republicans’ more modest policing reform bill, the JUSTICE Act, introduced by Sen. Tim Scott (R–S.C.), is dead in the water after Democrats blocked debate on it. Democrats and civil liberties groups oppose the bill, saying it doesn’t go nearly far enough to address systemic problems in American policing. Republicans say the bill strikes a balance between addressing needed reforms and supporting police as an institution.
  • Sen. Mike Braun (R–Ind.), bucking the rest of his party, introduced the Reforming Qualified Immunity Act, which would not end the legal doctrine of qualified immunity, but it would come close.
  • Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) reintroduced the FAIR Act today, which would significantly reform federal civil asset forfeiture.

State-level Package Bills

  • Colorado Gov. Jared Polis signed a sweeping police reform bill into law. The new laws will, among other provisions, require officers to wear body cameras and record police-initiated interactions with the public; create a database of police use-of-force incidents; forbid officers from firing less-than-lethal projectiles at someone’s head, pelvis, or back, and bars cops from firing indiscriminately into crowds; and strip police officers of qualified immunity in civil court if they are sued for violating people’s rights or for failing to intervene when they witness another officer violating a person’s rights.
  • Police reform legislation collapsed in the Minnesota legislature amid a partisan standoff between the Democrat-led House and Republican-led Senate, and lawmakers left the special session with nothing to show for their work. Republican senate majority leader Paul Gazelka told reporters the legislature is “weeks and weeks away from the possibility of doing something with criminal justice reform.”
  • Hopes of police reform also look dim in Georgia, where Democrats have introduced bills that would restrict police use of tear gas, tasers, and choke holds. Georgia House Republicans, meanwhile, passed a bill that would have made police officers a protected class under a new hate crime law. That provision was stripped from the state senate’s version of the legislation.

Use-of-Force

  • Utah Gov. Gary Herbert signed a bill into law on Thursday that makes it a third-degree felony for a police officer to kneel on a suspect’s neck as a method of restraint and a first-degree felony if that action resulted in a person’s death.
  • The Louisiana House unanimously passed a bill to study policing tactics statewide, but not before removing a reference to George Floyd.
  • The Memphis Police Department announced it will no longer execute no-knock search warrants following the March death of Breonna Taylor in botched no-knock SWAT raid. 
  • The Omaha Police Department updated its use-of-force policies to prohibit officers from using their knees to pin someone’s neck to the ground.
  • In New York City, an NYPD officer was arrested for using a banned chokehold, the first cop to be prosecuted under a new law prohibiting chokeholds.

Surveillance

  • The Boston City Council unanimously passed an ordinance banning the city government from using facial recognition technology.
  • Santa Cruz, California, banned the use of predictive policing tools.

Transparency

  • The New York City Council passed the POST Act, which will require the NYPD to disclose all of the surveillance technology that it uses on the public.
  • Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms signed an executive order requiring the police department to identify ways to improve compliance with body camera policies and responsiveness to public records requests for body cam footage, as well as provide a way for the public to submit recordings of police use-of-force incidents for investigations. The order also calls for strengthening the Atlanta Citizen Review Board.

School Policing

As Reason reported yesterday, school districts around the country are considering ending their contracts with local police departments.

  • The San Francisco Unified School District Board of Education unanimously approved a resolution to end its memorandum of understanding with the San Francisco Police Department.
  • The Oakland school board also voted unanimously on Wednesday to eliminate the district’s police department and shift its $2.5 million budget to student support services.
  • The Chicago Board of Education rejected a proposal, supported by teachers unions, to terminate its $33 million contract with the Chicago Police Department. Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot opposed the proposal, but it was still only narrowly defeated by a 4-3 vote.
  • The Los Angeles Unified School District also voted down three separate proposals to address the use of SROs, including one that would have slashed the school police budget by 90 percent, after an 11-hour marathon session.
  • School police officers in Philadelphia will be renamed “school safety officers” and wear new, less severe uniforms when school (hypothetically) resumes in September.

Police Unions

  • A labor coalition in Seattle, Washington, voted to expel the city’s police union.

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Black Lives Matter Network Disavows Local Organizer After Incendiary Comments

Black Lives Matter Network Disavows Local Organizer After Incendiary Comments

Tyler Durden

Fri, 06/26/2020 – 13:25

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times,

The Black Lives Matter Global Network distanced itself from an organizer of a Black Lives Matter group, claiming the chapter isn’t officially part of the network.

“Hawk Newsome has no relation to the Black Lives Matter Global Network,” the network’s managing director Kailee Scales told the Associated Press late Thursday.

Newsome made incendiary remarks during a cable news interview late Wednesday, stating in part:

 “If this country doesn’t give us what we want, then we will burn down this system and replace it.”

President Donald Trump responded earlier Thursday, sharing the quote and adding: “This is Treason, Sedition, Insurrection!”

Trump described Newsome as a Black Lives Matter leader, the same description Fox News used. Newsome made the remarks during an appearance on Fox’s “The Story.”

There’s confusion over Newsome’s exact position. He has been the president of Black Lives Matter Greater New York but was said to no longer be in that position after his remarks were circulated.

The New York group’s website lists him as chairperson and one of its founders.

Nupol Kiazolu, seen in 2018, is now listed as Black Lives Matter Greater New York’s president. (Nicholas Hunt/Getty Images)

Black Lives Matter Greater New York didn’t respond to a request for clarification. An attempt to reach Newsome hasn’t been successful.

Newsome told the Associated Press (AP) that women are in charge of the group now.

Black Lives Matter Greater New York is not an official chapter of Black Lives Matter Global Network. Scales told the AP that only chapters that have agreed to adhere to certain requirements are allowed to join the network.

Newsome challenged the position, saying that the movement isn’t one that anyone can claim ownership of.

“It pains me that at a time like this, black people are not sticking together,” he said. “To say that all people who carry that banner have to be sanctioned is preposterous.”

“To alienate us at a time like this, when the president is targeting us, is not only counterproductive but it’s counterrevolutionary,” he added.

The Black Lives Matter Global Network’s recent focus has been on defunding police departments. The group was founded in 2013 after George Zimmerman, a member of his community neighborhood watch, was acquitted of murder in the killing of Trayvon Martin, a black teenager.

The network’s mission, according to its website, “is to eradicate white supremacy and build local power to intervene in violence inflicted on Black communities by the state and vigilantes.”

Black Lives Matter Greater New York has a list of nine demands, none of which have to do with funding for the police.

The demands include: prosecuting police who falsify information in the course of an investigation, reinstating voting rights to people in jail, and establishing an independent unit to investigate and prosecute all police shootings.

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/3i3iFYZ Tyler Durden

US Blocks Visas For Chinese Officials & Their Families Over Hong Kong Crackdown

US Blocks Visas For Chinese Officials & Their Families Over Hong Kong Crackdown

Tyler Durden

Fri, 06/26/2020 – 13:10

In the fast escalating tit-for-tat Washington blitz on China, the Trump administration Friday announced sanctions on top Chinese Communist officials which bar them and even their family members from entering the United States.

It’s a severe punitive move for Beijing’s recent crackdown on Hong Kong’s autonomy. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in announcing the measure – a major shot across the bow no doubt – as part of “carrying out the President’s orders” further consistent with a congressional law. 

The new visa restriction measures will apply to current and former top Chinese Communist Party officials “who are believed to be responsible for, or complicit in, undermining Hong Kong’s high degree of autonomy.”

Via CNN

“The United States calls on China to honor its commitments and obligations in the Sino-British Joint Declaration – namely that Hong Kong will ‘enjoy a high degree of autonomy’ and that human rights and fundamental freedoms, including the freedoms of expression and peaceful assembly, will be protected by law and respected by governing authorities in Hong Kong,” Pompeo’s statement said.

Congress last year passed the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act, requiring the administration to review whether mainland China was respecting and upholding Hong Kong sovereignty, and if not, impose sanctions. 

Earlier Chinese officials warned of “red lines” if the White House carries through with its promised punitive measures. 

As we reported earlier, the US bill imposing mandatory sanctions on Chinese individuals and entities who “materially contribute to the contravention of China’s obligations” to Hong Kong’s autonomy – and banks that do “significant transactions” with them – was passed unanimously by the Senate on Thursday, with the House of Representatives working on its own version; the final bill gets passed to President Trump, who either signs it or vetoes it – in which case it has a veto-proof majority anyway. This, as Rabobank’s Michael Every wrote, is the constitutional dynamic that has been described several times in the last 12 months for China-focused bills with serious consequences for not just international relations, but international business and finance.

“So far the results have not hit markets: but this bill cuts out the middleman and takes us straight to the biting sanctions”, Every concluded.

But while we await the sanctions to kick in, moments ago we learned once again that China is hardly impressed by the latest developments, and in “quietly delivering a message” to Washington, Chinese leaders have “accused Washington of meddling in areas such as Hong Kong, where China is imposing a sweeping national-security law, and Taiwan.”

According to a report in the journal, during a meeting between Mike Pompeo and China’s top diplomat last week in Hawaii, Yang Jiechi listed these actions as well as China’s “strong dissatisfaction” with a bill President Trump signed last week mandating sanctions against Chinese officials and entities deemed responsible for mass detention of Uighur Muslim in China’s northwestern Xinjiang region.

While Yang reiterated Beijing’s commitment to carrying out the trade deal, he stressed that both sides had to “work together,” said people familiar with the conversations. A Chinese official said that meant “the U.S. side should refrain from going too far with meddling” and that “Red lines shouldn’t be crossed.”

The report then notes that shortly after the meeting concluded, Vice Premier Liu He said that Beijing’s ability to carry out the trade deal required the U.S. to “ease off” pressure on other fronts.

“The two countries should create conditions and atmosphere, and eliminate interference, to jointly implement the Phase One agreement,” Liu said in written remarks to a high-profile financial forum held in Shanghai on June 18.

“You can’t keep asking us to buy your stuff and at the same time keep beating up on us,” said Mei Xinyu, an analyst at a think tank affiliated with China’s Commerce Ministry. “That’s not how it works.”

In short, while Peter Navarro may have fumbled his message earlier this week when he said that the trade deal was off, only to immediately reverse himself when futures plunged and even Trump scrambled to tweet that the deal is still in place, the ball is now in Beijing’s court which – in order to project strength following the just passed sanctions – may decide that it is in Beijing’s best interest to kill the Phase 1 trade deal (especially if that helps get the pro-China Biden elected). And after all, it’s not like China is actually complying with the terms of the deal -as we noted last week, China is currently lagging its import pledges made as part of the “Phase One” deal by some 87%.

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2BH3vbi Tyler Durden

Air Cargo Boom Stalls As Rates Plunge Back To Earth 

Air Cargo Boom Stalls As Rates Plunge Back To Earth 

Tyler Durden

Fri, 06/26/2020 – 13:00

Weekly average air freight prices on major global routes have plunged, signaling the demand-driven boom for personal protective equipment (PPE), which started in late February, has peaked and is now over. 

As Reuters notes, declining Air freight prices could be a significant headwind to “carriers that are scrambling to move cargo to offset weak passenger revenues as they rebuild networks by flying reopened routes with half-empty cabins.” 

Phil Seymour, president of aviation consulting firm IBA, said, “rates are coming down” as the market is “becoming flooded with belly freight capacity.”

Collapsing travel demand and global flight restrictions squeezed carriers at a time PPE demand was surging, leading some airlines to convert passenger jets into temporary cargo aircraft.  

Global Air freight capacity declined 27% in the week starting May 31 compared with a year ago, according to Accenture data. The data showed passenger capacity was slowly rising as flight routes return.

This year, air freight will contribute about 26% of airline industry revenue, up from 12% in 2019. 

David Goldberg, chief executive of DHL Global Forwarding USA, said, “PPE via air freight has drastically slowed down in the last couple of couple weeks, and it’s probably because the second round can afford to go ocean freight.” 

“We’ve seen more rationalization of the air freight rates. They’re still at high levels,” said Goldberg. 

Global air freight (weekly) cargo prices via TAC Index for major routes 

Air freight prices for Hong Kong to Europe and Hong Kong to North America peaked mid-May, and have plunged in the first half of June. 

Air freight prices for Frankfurt to North America remain elevated, while Frankfurt to South East Asia have round-tripped pre-corona prices.

Air freight prices for Shanghai to Europe have quickly faded. 

Air freight prices across the world’s top routes have all faded into June. 

Year to date price performance for top routes is still elevated. 

While soaring demand for air freight was seen around March 20 when world stocks bottomed – and it was at that time the revival narrative of the global economy went into full swing – the slump in air freight prices could suggest the global recovery is starting to fade. 

The air freight industry might be in luck, BMO Capital Markets has recently suggested the second coronavirus wave has arrived, which could result in increased demand for PPE via air cargo. 

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/382kf8O Tyler Durden