Month: December 2020

Americans are furious with both Democrats and Republicans right now – particularly after doling out foreign aide and other pork spending for special interest groups over delivering desperately needed help to working-class Americans – which is why now appears to be as good a time as any for President Trump to make a valiant last stand with his “America First” rhetoric. 

As a 16-year-plus trade dispute between the US and EU comes to a head, the US government on Wednesday said it would raise tariffs on certain European Union products, including aircraft components and wines from France and Germany, the latest twist in the battle between Washington and Brussels (just a day after headlines about a trade deal between China and EU).

In a statement, the Office of the USTR said it was adding the new tariffs on aircraft manufacturing parts and certain non-sparkling wines as well as cognacs and other brandies from France and Germany.

The USTR said on Wednesday the EU had unfairly calculated tariffs against the United States allowed by a September World Trade Organization ruling in the ongoing dispute:

“The EU needs to take some measure to compensate for this unfairness.”

Representatives for the European Union and Airbus could not be immediately reached for comment on the USTR action.

To be sure, the new tariffs aren’t exactly a surprise. The Trump Administration has been threatening to ratchet up trade restrictions ever since the WHO ruled that Airbus had benefited from unfair state subsidies last year, when it said the US would be entitled to impose new tariffs on $7.5BN in EU imports.

More recently, the agency ruled that the EU could impose tariffs on $4BN in US imports as part of the dispute. 

Negotiators from the US and several European negotiators have continued talks about ending the long-running dispute over government aid to Airbus, which is politically backed by Britain, France, Germany and Spain.

But with French wine and other popular goods now in the Washington’s sights, Ben Aneff, president of the US Wine Trade Alliance, said the action would cause further hardship for US companies that have already been hurt by President Trump’s protectionist stance. Aneff urged Joe Biden to reverse the decision.

Authored by Jonathan Turley,

President Donald Trump has been criticized by Democrats and Republicans alike for his recent spate of pardons, including corrupt ex-congressmen and the father of Jared Kushner. I was one of those who immediately criticized those pardons as manifestly unjustified and inimical to our legal system. However, none of that makes the comments of senior U.S. District Judge Robert Pratt of the Southern District of Iowa any less troubling. Judge Pratt gave an interview slamming the pardons in a departure from judicial ethics rules barring jurists from engaging in such political commentary.

I have previously criticized Judge Emmet Sullivan for using his courtroom to air grievances against President Trump. Pratt however dispensed with any pretense of judicial function in airing his grievances over the pardons. He told the Associated Press that:

“It’s not surprising that a criminal like Trump pardons other criminals. But apparently to get a pardon, one has to be either a Republican, a convicted child murderer or a turkey.”

Pratt was discussing pardons that included former Ron Paul campaign chairman Jesse Benton and campaign manager John Tate, who were convicted at trial of concealing $73,000 in payments that went to a state senator.  Again, my concern with the comments is not the merits but the messenger.

Pratt was appointed by President Bill Clinton in 1997 and remains an active judge on a reduced docket as a senior status judge. 

As such, he remains subject to the Code of Judicial Ethics.  

State judges have been sanctioned for yielding to such temptations to vent their opposition or criticism to Trump.  Federal judges however have engaged in such public commentary without sanctions.

Pratt’s comments raise serious questions under three of the most basic canons of judicial ethics barring judges from engaging in political activities and positions:

CANON 1
A judge shall uphold and promote the independence, integrity, and impartiality of the judiciary, and shall avoid impropriety and the appearance of impropriety.

CANON 3 
A judge shall conduct the judge’s personal and extrajudicial activities to minimize the risk of conflict with the obligations of judicial office.

CANON 4 
A judge or candidate for judicial office shall not engage in political or campaign activity that is inconsistent with the independence, integrity, or impartiality of the judiciary.

Calling the President of the United States a criminal and denouncing pardons would seem overtly engaging in a political commentary or activity.  It is a troubling dismissal of the long-standing avoidance of such commentary by judges to preserve judicial impartiality.

Making it worse is the fact that Pratt was involved in Sorenson’s case.  He sentenced him to 15 months in prison in 2017 – a surprising departure from the recommended probation of the prosecutors due to Sorenson’s guilty plea and cooperation.  Indeed, Sorenson helped convict Benton, Tate and former Paul deputy campaign manager Dimitri Kesari. His sentencing was troubling for many of us in the defense bar because the recommendation for probation was consistent with past cooperation cases. Pratt’s sentence was not.  Nevertheless, the sentence was within his discretion.

A federal judge has every right to sentence defendants harshly for conduct that they believe warrant added punishment. However, that should be the full extent of their role. They are not grand inquisitors who continue to hound or condemn defendants. They are certainly not appropriate figures to denounce such individuals if they secure commutations or pardons. This is not a personal vendetta and judges should not be seen as wiping up public sentiments against previously sentenced defendants.  Even once a judge leaves the bench, I would argue for continued reticence in making such public comments. However, Pratt has not left the bench. He is still hearing cases while engaging in political commentary.

Much like Judge Sullivan’s use of his final order to condemn former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, this is a gratuitous and injudicious act. Indeed, Pratt is more troubling than Sullivan’s as commentary outside of the courtroom.  Republicans and even Trump associates could well come before Pratt in future cases — facing a jurist who gives public interviews to denounce Trump as a criminal.

Not surprisingly, there has been little beyond praise for Pratt. Call it another example of Trumpunity in our age of rage and hypocrisy. Legal ethicists and experts stretched ethical rules to the breaking point to support actions against Republican lawyers for filing election challenges. Yet, they are again conspicuously silent on these controversy.  Indeed, many Democrats recently denounced public comments by Justice Samuel Alito but have no criticism of Pratt or liberal jurists like the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in far more serious public comments.

What Pratt said publicly was wrong. It undermines not just his credibility but that of his court and his other colleagues.

Russia is using its vaccine program for soft power diplomacy. On Tuesday, Argentina and Belarus became the first two countries to begin coronavirus vaccinations via the Sputnik V vaccine. 

Building on the Sputnik V vaccine’s momentum, Russia is now claiming it has successfully developed the world’s first “antidote” to COVID-19.  

According to RT News, Russia’s Federal Medical and Biological Agency (FMBA) announced this week that an experimental drug to combat the virus is the world’s first direct-acting antiviral antidote if clinical trials are successful. 

FMBA head Veronika Skvortsova has claimed that the experimental antidote is more than 99% effective. 

“This is the first etiotropic drug that directly affects the virus. In fact, this is an antidote for coronavirus infection,” she told Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin on Wednesday, adding that researchers have concluded preclinical studies that already shown the remedy is “completely safe” and “highly efficient.”

Skvortsova told Mishustin that the FMBA is applying for approval to conduct additional testing in the near term. 

“If clinical trials confirm the effectiveness of this drug, it will be the first safe, effective, direct-acting antiviral drug that has no analogs in the world,” she explained.

The Russian Ministry of Health approved the anti-influenza drug Avifavir for reducing patient recovery times back in May. 

If effective, the antidote combined with the Sputnik V vaccine could push Russia ahead in the vaccine race among global superpowers. 

Meanwhile, Pfizer published a statement that said there is “no data” to show that a single dose of Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine will protect from infection after 21 days, according to Axios.

Russia has accused the West of misrepresenting the science behind its Sputnik V vaccine to win market share for its vaccines.

The Cold War space between both countries appears not just to be on the military front but now gravitating towards biotechnology. 

Authored by Michael Snyder via TheMostImportantNews.com,

2020 has been a year that none of us will ever forget.  We experienced the worst global pandemic in 100 years, we witnessed the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression of the 1930s, civil unrest erupted in major cities all over America, and we had one of the wildest presidential elections in our history.  Other than that, it was a pretty quiet year.  For a few moments, let’s take one more look back at the past 12 months. 

The following are 20 numbers from 2020 that are almost too crazy to believe…

#1 When 2020 began, nobody had ever heard of “COVID-19” because that term had not even been invented yet.  But by the end of the year, there had been more than 83 million confirmed cases around the globe and more than 1.8 million deaths.  Here in the United States, there have been more than 20 million confirmed cases so far and more than 350,000 deaths according to the official numbers.  Of course nobody is sure if we can trust the official numbers or not, because just recently a politician in Austria showed that a cup of Coca-Cola can test positive for COVID-19.

#2 All of the masks that we have been wearing and discarding during this pandemic have taken a heavy toll on the environment.  According to one study, more than 1.5 billion (with a “b”) masks will be dumped into the oceans of the world this year alone.

#3 The lockdowns that our politicians instituted to control the spread of COVID-19 resulted in an unemployment shock that was absolutely unprecedented.  Since the beginning of the pandemic, there have been more than 70 million new claims for unemployment benefits.  That means that we have been averaging well over a million new claims per week since the first lockdowns went into effect.  To put that into perspective, the old all-time record for a single week was just 695,000 and that was set all the way back in 1982.  During this pandemic, we have been above that old record every single week, and now unemployment claims are starting to rise higher once again.

#4 Almost four out of every ten Americans do not plan to get a COVID-19 vaccine, but the federal government is going to spend 250 million dollars on an “information campaign” that is designed to convince them otherwise.

#5 The civil unrest that erupted all over America following the death of George Floyd ultimately sparked a crime wave that seems as if it will never end.  According to an analysis of data from 57 big city police departments, the number of murders in those cities is up 36.7 percent compared to last year.  In quite a few of those cities, new all-time records are being established in 2020, and many Americans are anticipating even more violence in 2021.

#6 Recent data from Moody’s Analytics indicates that approximately 12 million U.S. renters are now “at least $5,850 behind in rent and utilities payments”.  Landlords all over the nation are in financial distress because of unpaid rent, and we could potentially see the greatest tsunami of evictions in all of U.S. history if and when all of the rent moratoriums are finally lifted in 2021.

#7 In 2020 we witnessed massively long lines at food banks all across America.  In some cases, people were lining up as early as 2 AM in order to make sure that they would get something before the supplies were gone.  Feeding America runs the largest network of food banks in the entire nation, and they were estimating that approximately one out of every four children in the U.S. would suffer from hunger by the time that 2020 was finally done.

#8 We haven’t seen an economic downturn this severe since the Great Depression of the 1930s, and the middle class has been hit particularly hard.  According to one recent survey, 2020 was a “personal financial disaster” for 55 percent of all Americans.

#9 But 2020 hasn’t been a financial disaster for everyone.  In fact, Forbes recently published an article which celebrated 50 doctors, scientists and healthcare entrepreneurs that become “pandemic billionaires” in 2020.

#10 The U.S. government continues to waste money in some of the most crazy ways imaginable.  I know that I shared this the other day, but I just had to include it in this article as well.  According to U.S. Senator Rand Paul, the federal government has spent 6.9 million dollars to develop a “smart toilet” which uses a very small camera to identify your “analprint”.

#11 One of the reasons why so much crazy spending happens is because our politicians don’t actually read the bills that they pass.  For example, the spending bill that the House of Representatives recently passed was 5,593 pages long, and members of the House were only given a few hours to look it over.  Unsurprisingly, the bill passed the House by a vote of 359 to 53.

#12 When Barack Obama first entered the White House, the U.S. was 10.6 trillion dollars in debt.  Now we are 27.5 trillion dollars in debt, and soon that total will hit the 30 trillion dollar mark.  Needless to say, this is a recipe for national financial suicide.

#13 The decline of the U.S. family continued to accelerate in 2020.  According to a recent Gallup survey, only 29 percent of Americans believe that “it is very important for couples who have children together to be married”.

#14 Americans have continued to get even bigger in 2020 as well.  At this point, 73 percent of the entire U.S. population is either overweight or obese.

#15 The amount of control that the big tech companies have over our lives has gotten more than just a little bit frightening, but most Americans don’t seem to mind.  In fact, one recent survey found that 2 out of every 3 Americans do not care if their smart devices are recording what they say and do at all times.

#16 But if anyone tried to take our smart devices away, then most of us would suddenly become very angry.  Another recent survey found that the average person will spend a total of 44 years looking at digital devices during their lifetimes.

#17 The recent presidential election has deeply divided our nation.  96 percent of Democrats believe that Joe Biden was elected fairly, but only 20 percent of Republicans feel the same way.

#18 Joe Biden only won 16.7 percent of all counties in the United States.  That was a new record low for a winning candidate, beating the previous record low of 22 percent which Barack Obama established in 2012.

#19 But Joe Biden also somehow won the most overall votes in U.S. history by a very wide margin.  He received more than 81 million votes, which was about 12 million more votes than Barack Obama got in 2008 when he set the old record.

#20 On December 14th, the Electoral College voted to make Joe Biden the next president of the United States.  Amazingly, that date is precisely halfway between the “Great American Eclipse” of 2017 and the “Great American Eclipse” of 2024.  If you plot the paths of those two eclipses on a map of the United States, you will see that they combine to form a giant “X” across the heartland of America.

*  *  *

Michael’s new book entitled “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.

The total number of Americans on government unemployment benefits ended 2020 just below 20 million. 2019 ended with just 2 million on jobless claims…

Source: Bloomberg

Initial claims dropped on the week, back below 800k (787k vs 835k exp and 806k prior)..

Source: Bloomberg

Continuing claims continue to slide as Pandemic Emergency Claims rise (and thanks to the latest COVID Relief Bill, will be extended)…

Source: Bloomberg

Let’s hope 2021 gets better…

Bitcoin surged above $29,000 overnight and, despite a quick dump (that we’ve seen at each big figure break), has stabilized there as mainstream interest and trading activity soars.

Source: Bloomberg

And at $539 billion, the largest cryptocurrency surpassed the market cap yesterday of finance giant Berkshire Hathaway, the CEO of which, Warren Buffett, famously likened Bitcoin to “rat poison squared.”

image courtesy of CoinTelegraph

And while crypto may remain “rat poison” to some, CoinTelegraph’s William Suberg notes that bitcoin has posted its highest transaction volume since early 2018 as data points to more and more investors entering the market.

Figures from on-chain analytics resource Digital Assets Data highlights December 2020 as already sparking Bitcoin’s second-largest transaction volumes.

BTC transaction volume eyes record

At a total of $252.37 billion for the remaining 24 hours of December may yet take the tally further still as it rivals December 2017.

Bitcoin transaction volume 1-month chart. Source: Digital Assets Data

Other indicators, such as the size of unprocessed transactions in Bitcoin’s mempool and network transaction fees, also suggest heightened activity overall.

As Cointelegraph additionally reported, wallets containing both large and small balances also continue to increase to unprecedented levels.

Google Trends, meanwhile, has captured the highest levels of search interest in the term “Bitcoin” worldwide since February 2018.

Google search interest in “Bitcoin.” Source: Google Trends

The reason, one which is attracting attention from mainstream sources as well as seasoned crypto traders, lies in the price bull run that is continuing unabated this week.

Ether continues to outperform

Despite its 290% year-to-date returns, however, Bitcoin still pales in comparison to the performance of the largest altcoin Ether (ETH). As Digital Assets Data confirms, ETH/USD has sealed gains of almost 500% since Jan. 1. Versus the March lows, performance is even stronger.

Bitcoin vs. Ether year-to-date returns chart. Source: Digital Assets Data

In a series of tweets on Wednesday, Bobby Ong, creator of price data site Coingecko, gave his predictions for the crypto market in 2021. Among the major tokens, Ether would see a return to higher transaction fees but pass its existing all-time high from 2018.

“ETH will break past its $1,500 ATH mainly driven by DeFi. Gas fees will skyrocket again and highlight scalability issues,” he wrote.

“Most of the year will be spent coordinating on a Layer 2 scalability solution. My bet will be on ZK Rollup gaining traction towards the end of the year.”

For Bitcoin, Ong forecast a price trajectory towards $100,000, alongside the launch of a long-awaited exchange-traded fund and the first central bank adding Bitcoin to its balance sheet.