Month: August 2023

Authored by Lee Fang via RealClear Wire,

Throughout the United States, it takes three times as many hours of training to become a nail technician, a barber, or a plumber as it does to become a police officer. 

Finland, Australia, Denmark, and Germany – countries with far less crime and a fraction of American gun violence – spend dramatically more to prepare officers before sending them off into the streets. Finland, for instance, provides police cadets with 5,500 hours of training, nearly 14 times the minimum 408 training hours required by the state police board in Georgia. 

Highly trained law enforcement officers, studies consistently show, are better at handling mental health emergencies and defusing violent confrontations, are less likely to engage in racial bias, and are more equipped to build community bonds necessary for good police work.

Poorly trained officers, in contrast, are more likely to use force and rely on their firearms, a tendency that has led to lost lives and scandals. Georgia’s police officers are among the least trained in the country. 

The evidence suggests a focus on police training can also mend deep wounds from years of officer misconduct. Newark, N.J., under a court order because of rampant police abuses, has decided to adopt yearly seminars for police officers, including training that emphasizes mental health programs for traumatized police officers. Although the reforms cost over $7.5 million, they began paying dividends almost immediately. In 2020, Newark had zero police shootings. Crime rates that year went down. 

Municipalities have recently turned to the Integrating Communications, Assessment and Tactics standard of police training. The ICAT approach, focused on communication tools to calm volatile situations, is credited with lowering use-of-force incidents by nearly one-third, reducing injuries to officers and civilians. As part of a reform agenda, city leaders in Atlanta announced a police academy focused on adopting the most modern de-escalation tactics, including the ICAT method. 

Despite the clear need for more and better police training, opposition to the planned Atlanta Public Safety Training Center – derisively dubbed “Cop City” – is now among the most popular protest causes of self-styled radicals. Viral social media posts have claimed that the academy is focused on advancing “white supremacy” and that it is designed for “militarization” tactics. Some claim, ominously, that Israeli special forces will be brought to the training center to teach the Atlanta Police Department to terrorize minority groups. 

The conspiratorial allegations have frustrated local officials, who say that planning meetings, which have been open to the public, made it clear that the academy is doing nothing of the sort. Instead, it will feature modern facilities to train police, firefighters, and other emergency responders in professional best practices.

Protest organizers carefully ignore any of the publicly debated training curriculum and have instead made the center into a target for an abstract smorgasbord of left-wing causes. In one recent podcast from a local organizer and several national left-wing influencers, activists called the “Cop City” protest an attempt to “link intensive policing, undemocratic land use processes with the issue of climate change,” and “a global struggle against fascism” to “disrupt the machinery of capitalism.” 

Such rhetoric has made meaningful discussion nearly impossible. In June, as the Atlanta city council debated the future of the training center, demonstrators from as far as Los Angeles mobbed the hearing. Outside the government chamber, protesters chanted, “If you build it, we will burn it.” 

The slogans were far from an idle threat. Demonstrators have thrown fireworks and incendiary devices at law enforcement and set fires at the proposed police academy site in the forest. 

“Atlanta has an opportunity to create the prototype of what real training should look like, a model for the rest of the country,” said Rev. Timothy McDonald III, senior pastor of First Iconium Baptist Church in Atlanta. But he added that the role of anarchists has prevented substantive debate about the proposed center.

“Antifa, they don’t want any kind of training, they don’t want any police. No policing is no answer. We got to have police and you got to have trained police,” said McDonald. 

McDonald runs a community center designed to reduce gun violence and serves as a board member of People for the American Way. He’s one of many local progressives frustrated by the escalating violence and opposition to the training center. 

“Training is everything. You don’t go to the doctor unless the doctor is trained,” said McDonald, who has advised police reform efforts around the country. 

But such arguments are lost on radicals singularly dedicated to destroying anything with “police” in the name. 

Leftists from around the world have come to Atlanta to protest the training center. During violent confrontations with law enforcement earlier this year, only two of the 23 arrested at the site were from Georgia. The rest were from as far as Canada and France. Last year, at another protest over the proposed Atlanta police academy, every single arrested demonstrator was from outside the state. Construction crews have been attacked and local legislators followed to their homes in a bid to intimidate them. 

In January, the dangerous protest tactics led to deadly violence. During an attempt to clear an encampment of protesters at the proposed training center site, an armed protester and Georgia state troopers exchanged gunfire. The activist, 26-year-old Manuel Esteban Paez Teran, graduated in 2021 from Florida State University with a degree in environmental science. Known as “Tortuguita” (Little Turtle), he had moved from Tallahassee to join the protesters. Georgia investigators say that on Jan. 18, Teran refused to clear the area and fired a shot that injured a state trooper. In response, law enforcement returned fire and killed him. 

The death of Teran at the “Cop City” site, one local Atlanta columnist worried, would likely only fuel even more of an “activist Lollapalooza” environment, attracting a festival-like atmosphere of roving leftists seeking the latest, most fashionable outrage, further polarizing the issue. Online leftists have incorporated the slogan, “Trees give life, police take it. Viva, viva, Tortuguita!” 

And indeed, the protest has gone global. “Stop Cop City” signs can be spotted in Paris, Brooklyn and San Francisco, while the movement has spread. The official activist coalition includes three groups from Santa Cruz, Calif. Anarchists are now targeting a new program proposed this year by liberal New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy that trains police to work alongside mental health professionals. That program, one local anarchist group claims, shows that the “white power establishment wants to build cop city everywhere.” 

The anti-police training movement is well-funded and receives glowing, uncritical coverage in many prestige media outlets. James “Fergie” Chambers, the anarchist heir to a billionaire media fortune, recently promised $600,000 for the anti-training center campaign. Another liberal foundation called Solidaire, funded by Facebook billionaire Mark Zuckerberg among other wealthy California donors, is offering tips to activists on how to derail the police training center. 

Why is better police training now the focus of progressive left ire? Not long ago, President Barack Obama convened a commission on police reform, addressing the inadequate training of officers as the top priority. 

The episode highlights the divergent views around policing that formed in the aftermath of the Black Lives Matter movement. Many saw the moment as an opportunity for substantive reform, such as requirements for body cameras, enhanced training, and legal accountability. Others, especially upper-class activists, have used the movement as fuel for theatric protest violence with no tangible goals and no serious concern for public safety. 

The “Stop Cop City” momentum has shifted the norms of the criminal justice movement. In 2015, the NAACP, for instance, strongly backed Obama’s calls for greater investments in police training and de-escalation tactics, calling such reforms “absolutely critical” in testimony before Congress. Those days appear to be long gone. In June, Gary Spencer of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund described the proposed Atlanta training center as a project for “perpetuating militarized policing that will endanger the lives of our residents, our visitors, and put the Black people and Brown people in Atlanta at a heightened risk of police violence.” 

Atlanta in particular began the process of creating this academy as part of a series of reforms to reduce police brutality while addressing crime. In the aftermath of 2020, following violent protests after the police killing of Rayshard Brooks – a young man who grabbed an officer’s taser, leading to a violent confrontation and the police officer killing him – then-Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms faced a crisis. 

Bottoms promised better training of officers and greater police oversight, but she also faced a crime wave and low morale among officers. Homicide in her city was up by 58% while over 200 police officers had either resigned or retired in the wake of the Brooks riots. Bottoms needed to navigate calls for criminal justice reform from the protest movement the year prior while responding to rising crime. 

In April 2021, the mayor announced the creation of the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center, a new complex to be built on an 85-acre plot of land owned by the city. The idea married the problems into one solution. Bottoms said the facility would help overhaul the force to recruit new officers and train them with modern policing techniques, focused on tactics to avoid officer-involved shootings. 

The new academy would train officers, emergency medical staff, and firefighters with input from community leaders and civil rights experts. Both Atlanta firefighters and police currently train at decrepit old buildings, and the unions representing both workforces have long called for new facilities. 

“People say we need to abolish police or defund the police, well I don’t know how you do that, unless somebody is going to abolish crime,” said Bottoms at a press conference defending the center. “What I’ve said repeatedly over the last year is that holding the men and women who serve us in a public safety capacity accountable is not mutually exclusive from supporting them.” 
 
The mayoral proposal for reform made clear that every Atlanta police officer will receive ICAT de-escalation training.

The notion that the training center is a stalking horse for white supremacy strains credulity. Bottoms and her successor, Andre Dickens, are black, as are the majority of city council members backing the project.  

If anything, the “Stop Cop City” movement has rippled with identity-based rage. Atlanta City Councilman Michael Julian Bond, the son of the civil rights icon Julian Bond and an outspoken proponent of the training center, has said that his office has been deluged with death threats and racist messages from protesters. “There’s been gratuitous use of the ‘N-word’ against me,” Bond told reporters earlier this summer. “They wish I was dead like my father.” 

But the proposal instantly faced opposition from leftist groups who saw the investment in a new training center as a bitter rebuke of the “defund the police” movement. 

Before the first city council hearing, demonstrators swarmed the home of Atlanta Councilwoman Joyce Sheperd, gathering on her lawn and porch to bang pans and chant. There was no interest in discussing the proposal. “No cop city,” the protesters yelled. 

Not long after, environmentalists joined the protests, claiming the forest for the proposed site is a habitat worthy of special protection. Encampments sprouted on the proposed site, and activists began funneling Molotov cocktails and weapons, preparing for clashes with law enforcement and construction workers. 

The city has in turn promised plans to build one of the largest public city parks on the 300-acre site, and will plant 100 hardwood trees for every tree removed to build the 85-acre training center. The academy shooting range will be indoors, muffled from noise. Atlanta has passed special additions to the training center plan, forbidding the use of helicopters and explosives, and requiring special training for police on protecting speech rights. 

But no attempted engagement has pacified the movement. The opposition has only intensified, with activists viewing the center as an existential threat. 

“This project is based upon genocide,” implored one activist at the most recent city council meeting. A man covered in tattoos claimed that he had dedicated his life to “fighting fascism,” and was anguished that the U.S. had gone from “putting bullets in Nazi’s heads” to now “reward[ing] them with pay raises and playgrounds,” a reference to the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center. “If this facility is built, queer trans people, black people, indigenous people are going to be killed,” claimed another activist at the hearing. 

Despite such talk, ordinary Atlanta residents remain supportive of the project. A poll conducted earlier this year at the direction of Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens, found 61% of residents in favor of moving forward with the center. The council hearing in June on the project ended with a 10-4 vote in favor. 

If activists cannot stop the training center with violence or extreme rhetoric, they’re also proposing a ballot measure to cancel the training center. Last week, a judge approved a petition extending the time for activists to collect signatures to move the process forward. 

During the July Fourth weekend, protesters said they torched construction equipment again, and reportedly set fire to Atlanta Police Department motorcycles as a threat against city plans to continue moving forward with the safety training center. 

The ongoing dispute has left many in Atlanta baffled by the conspiratorial rhetoric and violent activism, which now threatens the future of the academy. 

“I know crowds can get excited when emotions are high, but there hasn’t been the right kind of dialogue,” said Rev. Gerald Durley, an Atlanta activist and longtime community leader. 

Durley, who has participated in the planning for the training center, noted that he’s been on the front lines challenging police tactics and fighting for more effective oversight. 

“Police, certainly in America, need more training, not just on police investigations but on de-escalation and crowd control,” said Durley. “When you come down to the actual facts and figures, this training center would be something good.” 

The demonstrators, he said, had lost sight of how to fix ongoing problems with policing. 

“It’s hard for me to condemn a pitbull,” added Durley, “if I haven’t trained that pitbull on what to do.” 

Lee Fang is an independent journalist based in San Francisco. He writes an investigative newsletter on Substack via www.leefang.com.

After dropping to the lowest level since Dec 2020 (when it was negative 268K), in July the rate of payroll growth is expected to slow further, with measures of wage growth also seen cooling further. Consensus expects payrolls to slow to 200K from 209K, while hourly earnings rise 4.2% vs a year ago, down from 4.4% last month.

That said, analyst whisper numbers and gauges of the US labor market strength are supportive of a stronger reading: as Newsquawk notes, ADP’s gauge of payrolls surprised to the upside once again, though many analysts dismiss the data series as an unreliable forecaster for the NFP data; weekly claims data has trended lower relative to the June survey week; PMI surveys allude to healthy labor market conditions, and consumers have confidence in the outlook for the labor market. And tracking estimates are also above what the consensus predicts. Looking forward, payroll additions are expected to ease further, but Fedwatchers still suggest that a print in July that is in line with the consensus would still likely keep the prospect of another FOMC rate rise in play.

EXPECTATIONS:

• NFPs: Analysts expect 200k nonfarm payrolls to be added to the US economy in July, slightly below the 209k added in June.
• Unemployment rate: The jobless rate is expected to remain unchanged at 3.6% (note: the FOMC’s latest projections anticipate the jobless rate will rise to 4.1% by the end of this year, before ticking up to 4.5% next year).
• Average Hourly Earnings: Consensus expects a cooling to 4.2% Y/Y from 4.4%, with the monthly print expected at +0.3% M/M (down from +0.4%);
• Average Weekly Hours: expected to remain at 34.4hrs. According to whispers, the bias could be to the upside; traders cite a Bloomberg report which was tracking payrolls growth at 364k this month, and sees the jobless rate falling to 3.5%. That would certainly be viewed as a very hawkish development and would send yields sharply higher still.

ADP DATA: ADP’s data surprised to the upside, once again, reporting 324k private payrolls were added in July, blitzing
through the consensus view of 189k (the range of forecasts 140-300k); the prior data for June was revised lower to 455k
from an initially stated 497k (which in turn was more than double the NFP print of 209K so it’s rather safe to ignore ADP). The wages metrics also cooled sharply again, taking the annual rate for Job Stayers to 6.2% Y/Y (from 6.4%), and for Job Changers to 10.2% from 11.2%. For obvious reasons, analysts continue to be critical of the ADP’s ability to forecast the BLS payrolls data. Pantheon Macroeconomics, a very vocal critic, said that “since its relaunch with new methodology last August, ADP has been both unforecastable and deeply unreliable as an indicator of the official first estimate of private payrolls each month,” adding that the data “has no implications for our July forecast.” Of course, it very well could be that ADP is right and it is the BLS “data” that is massaged for political purposes.

WEEKLY CLAIMS: Weekly initial and continuing jobless claims data has eased in the July survey week relative to the June survey window; initial jobless claims were at 228k vs 265k (with the moving average at 238k vs 265k), while continuing claims was 1.69mln vs 1.73mln (with the average moving lower to 1.72mln from 1.76mln).

BUSINESS SURVEYS: S&P Global’s PMI Data is mixed in its outlook for the labor market; its flash release for July said firms expanded workforce numbers, though the rate of job creation was only marginal, however, and the weakest since January. “Some manufacturing companies noted that the solid rise in payrolls was due to greater ease of hiring, with some also mentioning an improvement in employee retention and improved confidence in the outlook,” it said, “in contrast, services firms reported the slowest rise in employment for six months in July, continuing to highlight challenges retaining and attracting staff due to rising wage costs.”

CONSUMER CONFIDENCE: The Conference Board reported that Consumer Confidence improved in July, with assessments of the present situation rising on brighter views of employment conditions, where the spread between consumers saying jobs are ‘plentiful’ versus ‘hard to get’ widened further. “This likely reflects upbeat feelings about a labor market that continues to outperform,” CB said. Additionally, consumers’ assessment about the short-term labor market outlook was also more favourable, with slightly more consumers expecting more jobs to be available, while slightly fewer anticipate less jobs.

JOLTs: It is also worth noting that the JOLTs data for June (which is one month delayed vs the July jobs data from the BLS due tomorrow) reported job openings of 9.582mln, beneath the expected 9.61mln, and 9.824mln prior. Wells Fargo said that “since the Fed began tightening policy in March 2022, job openings have fallen 20% while the unemployment rate has trended sideways,” adding that “this marks an encouraging step towards inflation subsiding without a recession, but with price growth still elevated and a pullback in demand for workers ongoing, a “soft landing” remains far from assured.” The number of new hires and quit both also slumped, signaling a sharp slowdown in the labor market.

ARGUING FOR A STRONGER-THAN-EXPECTED REPORT

• Big Data. Alternative measures of employment growth indicate strong job gains in nJuly, with a median pace of +360k across the four indicators tracked.

• Arrival of summer student workforce. When the labor market is tight, payroll ngrowth tends to remain strong in July, with average payroll gains 15k above the full-year average (see Exhibit 2). We believe this reflects the interaction between labor availability and the spring hiring season: seasonal labor market slack peaks at the start of the year, troughs in early May, then rebounds in June and July with the arrival of the student summer workforce.

• Job availability. JOLTS job openings were roughly unchanged month-over-month (at 9.6mn) and in line with consensus expectations in June, and online measures have similarly flattened out over the past few months (Exhibit 3). While labor demand has fallen meaningfully from last year’s peak, it remains elevated by 1.0-2.5mn relative to 2019 and represents a positive factor for job growth. The Conference Board labor differential—the difference between the percent of respondents saying jobs are plentiful and those saying jobs are hard to get—increased by 4.4pt to 37.2 in July.

ARGUING FOR A WEAKER-THAN-EXPECTED REPORT

• Employer surveys. The employment components of business surveys improved on net but remained at weak levels in July. The employment component of Goldman’s manufacturing survey tracker edged up to 49.6 and the employment component of our services survey tracker increased to 51.4.

NEUTRAL FACTORS:

• Layoffs. Announced layoffs reported by Challenger, Gray & Christmas declined sharply in July (-36.8% to 24k, SA by GS), compared to 45k on average in the second half of 2022. While initial jobless claims fell to an average of 238k in the July payroll month (vs. 251k in June), the recent string of declines likely benefited from favorable seasonal comparisons. The JOLTS layoff rate was unchanged at 1.0% in June.

VARIANT TAKE:  In its preview, Goldman – which has been chronically bullish ahead of payroll reports and mostly on the wrong side of consensus – estimates an above-consensus 250k payrolls in July as “job growth tends to remain strong in July when the labor market is tight—reflecting strong hiring of youth summer workers—and three of the alternative measures of employment growth we track indicate a strong pace of job growth.” The bank is also more optimistic than consensus, estimating that the unemployment rate edged down by 0.1% to 3.5% (vs. consensus of 3.6%) reflecting a rise in household employment and unchanged labor force participation at 62.6%. The bank is in line with consensus regarding wages and estimates a 0.3% increase in average hourly earnings that lowers the year-on-year rate to 4.2% “reflecting waning upward wage pressures and positive calendar effects (consensus also 0.3% / 4.2%).”

POLICY IMPLICATIONS: SGH Macro’s Fedwatcher Tim Duy suggests that if the data is in line with market expectations, and in the context of a GDP growth rate running above 2%, it keeps the prospect of a FOMC rate hike on the table at the October and/or November meetings, and adds that anything below 200k will give the Fed scope to continue to pause on rate changes. Duy says that July’s data could be elevated due to seasonal effects, but payroll growth of around 300k or more over the next two reports would probably be consistent with unemployment below 3.5% by the time of the September meeting. “That combined with a Q3 growth outlook of more than 2% would probably put a September rate hike into play,” SGH writes, “that’s arguably an extreme situation (or maybe not if the economy is rebounding from the “recession” of the 4Q21 and 1Q22 and the Fed’s series of rate hikes?), and the Fed would hate it.”

The bottom line is that if the whisper numbers based on the “big data” forecasts – or the monthly ADP report – are remotely accurate, and payrolls reverse the recent decline, odds of another rate hike will spike, which in a time of soaring deficits and $1 trillion in debt issuance this quarter will send the 10Y to fresh 2023 highs, fast approaching 4.50%.

Extended preview research available to pro subscribers

Authored by Masooma Haq via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

An agriculture land acquisition company that is reported to have bought up land on three sides of a major U.S. Air Force base in California is now suing the farmers who sold them the land.

Flannery Associates LLC spent nearly $800 million to buy the land surrounding Travis Air Force Base, then filed a $510 million lawsuit in May against the farmers.

Rep. John Garamendi (D-Calif.) told NewsNation the suit is likely a tactic to financially destroy the farmers.

Mr. Garamendi said some of the families he has spoken to did not want to sell to Flannery, but the company made them offers for huge amounts. Flannery’s lawsuit accuses the farmers of conspiring to inflate the price of the farms.

“It’s a suit designed to force the farmers to lawyer up, spend tens of thousands of dollars on lawyering, and maybe at the end of the day, bankrupt themselves,” Mr. Garamendi said. “In fact, that has happened to at least one family that I know of and I’ve heard rumors that another family simply said we can’t afford the lawyers.”

Intimidation Suspected

According to The Wall Street Journal, the U.S. Air Force’s Foreign Investment Risk Review Office has not been able to determine who is funding the purchases, even after an 18-month investigation into the purchase of the 140 properties around the Air Force base.

Based on property records, the land covers California’s Solano County from the Sacramento River to Fairfield, including land directly bordering three sides of the Air Force base, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Sarah Donnelly is a member of the city council for Rio Vista, California, which borders the land purchased by Flannery. She said she is highly suspicious of Flannery’s motives.

“The Flannery group is an unknown entity,” Ms. Donnelly told The Epoch Times in an emailed statement. “Based on the fact that they are suing our farmers, their intentions are suspect.“

“I can only assume they are suing as a form of intimidation,” she added.

ABC7 reported the company began purchasing the land in 2018, and accelerated purchases in 2022 and 2023.

Flannery, represented by Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, claims lost profits from land it did not buy and from overcharges for properties it did purchase.

“If the conspirators had acted independently, they could have each individually negotiated a sale with Flannery and made tens of millions of dollars in profits,” Flannery’s attorneys said in the complaint. “But the conspirators wanted to make hundreds of millions.”

National Security Concerns

The suit against the California farmers comes at a time when U.S. lawmakers have been growing increasingly alarmed about farmland purchases by U.S. adversaries, such as China and Iran.

Congress is imposing more guards against foreign adversary purchases of land near sensitive sites.

U.S. Reps. Mike Thompson (R-Calif.) and Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.) introduced legislation on July 12 to strengthen and expand protections around national security sites, critical infrastructure, and farmland.

“Protecting national security and food security go hand in hand in our region—which is why it is vital to know who owns land around national security sites,” Mr. Thompson said in a statement.

Public records of Solano County, where Travis Air Force Base is located, can trace Flannery Associates LLC back to Feb. 9, 2018. Roughly 52,000 acres with 314 land purchases are directly connected with this mysterious company.

“The land purchases go up to the fence of Travis Air Force Base, the home of the largest wing of the Air Force’s Air Mobility Command,” Thompson’s office said in the statement.

When asked if he had spying concerns, Mr. Garamendi, who represents the area where Travis Air Force Base sits, told ABC7 he had “every reason in the world” to suspect there is spying going on.

“This land is adjacent to a critical national security platform, Travis Air Force Base; therefore [it’s] an area where spy operations or any other nefarious activity could take place,” he said. “That could detrimentally impact the ability of Travis Air Force Base to operate in a moment of national emergency.”

In addition, U.S. senators recently approved a measure in the National Defense Authorization Act that would prohibit China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia from purchasing U.S. farmland and would screen American investment in high-tech ventures on foreign adversary soil.

The provision passed in a vote of 91–7.

Lear Zhou and Reuters contributed to this report.

On Wednesday, Beijing lifted flood warnings following the heaviest rainfall the Chinese capital has experienced in over 140 years, resulting from the remnants of Typhoon Doksuri. The torrential rain was a relief after the region endured months of extreme weather conditions, including record-breaking heatwaves and severe droughts. 

The torrential rain was a relief after the region endured months of extreme weather conditions, including record-breaking heatwaves and severe droughts. 

🇨🇳 Floods test China’s disaster-response systems as emergency level raised

Full Story → https://t.co/fHdpxa6mdO

China’s capital Beijing experienced rain with an unusual intensity this past week, that breached many local meteorological records.

WATCH 👇 pic.twitter.com/9Rvq7pap86

— PiQ (@PriapusIQ) August 3, 2023

Clips of #Floods in #China and Why a Single Rainfall Can Be So Devastating?
(You must watch to the end! And turn on CC)#CCP #Chinanews #Beijing #Xijinping pic.twitter.com/p2e1ibXVBS

— Inconvenient Truths by Jennifer Zeng 曾錚真言 (@jenniferzeng97) August 2, 2023

The #flood in western #Beijing seen on the high-speed train. There are many #mountainous areas in #Mentougou District in the west of Beijing, and heavy rains have brought huge floods. Beijing #Daxing #Airport is downstream of it.#CHINA #FLOOD #HEAVYRAINS #HEAVYFLOOD pic.twitter.com/On1aoJIGOQ

— Nitesh rathore (@niteshr813) August 2, 2023

Massive flood due to heavy rainfall cases cars drown in Zhuozhou of #Hebei, China.#flooding #flooding #BeijingFlood #storm #TyphoonDoksuri #typhoon #pagbaha #rain#China pic.twitter.com/SHixvbJ8m7

— Anil Kumar Verma (@AnilKumarVerma_) August 3, 2023

Across flood control zones in Hebei, the South China Morning Post reported more than 850,000 people have been evacuated. 

A senior Hebei water official told CCTV that floodwaters would subside in about a month. Damage assessments are currently underway.

The Guardian cites forecasters who expect more typhoon activity to hit China this year. 

Typhoon Khanun, the sixth typhoon of this year, is hitting Northern Taiwan on Thursday, shutting businesses and schools while airlines canceled flights. Taiwan’s stock and foreign exchange markets were also closed due to weather-related issues. 

For much of the Northern Hemisphere summer, China has been baking in record-breaking heatwaves. The rainfall is a welcoming sign. 

Authored by Devin Hartman via RealClear Wire,

Electric transmission can be rather complex, but done right it boils down to two simple benefits: lower costs and fewer blackouts. Currently, bad regulation results in expensive transmission that fails to address growing reliability threats. 

As debt limit negotiations revealed, conservatives are hesitant to welcome electric transmission expansion. It is hard to blame them. Media headlines frame transmission development as synonymous with progressives’ agenda. Ballooning transmission expenses have led to consumers demanding reform. Crucially, proper transmission reform strikes right at the core of the conservative energy message – lower costs and greater reliability – by efficiently expanding the grid. 

The problem surrounding transmission is deeply flawed regulation that rewards massive overspending on inefficient projects and deters efficient development. Of the $20-$25 billion spent annually on transmission, over 90% is subject to neither competitive bidding nor a cost-benefit test. Most projects are advanced by local monopoly utilities and rubber-stamped by regulators, and captive customers bear the costs. Republican Commissioner Mark Christie of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has taken the lead to work with states to fix this. 

Meanwhile, FERC has a pending rulemaking to fix regional transmission. Consumers and free market groups paint a clear reform path. FERC needs to strengthen regional planning for economic projects, which are determined by cost-benefit tests and put out for competitive bid, while eliminating exemptions for inefficient monopoly projects.  

Regional and local transmission problems can be fixed by regulatory leaders. But they are less equipped to handle the gaping hole in transmission policy: interregional transmission. Fortunately, conservatives like Neil Chatterjee, who served as President Trump’s FERC chairman, offer great insight. 

While FERC tries to fix the regional transmission framework, no such framework even exists for interregional transmission. The result is that hardly any interregional transmission has been developed, despite huge cost and reliability advantages compared to small projects. Since the majority of grid reliability events stem from severe weather events, the ability of one region in emergency conditions to import power from a neighbor’s surplus is vital to keep the lights on. Winter Storms Uri and Elliott made this clear. Reliability authorities expect threats to worsen amid “insufficient transmission for large power transfers.” 

Conservatives have expressed interest in two approaches to interregional transmission reform. The first is to build transmission like natural gas pipelines. The underappreciated catalyst of the gas revolution last decade was the institution of nationwide competitive reforms. In this model, competitive gas producers and consumers voluntarily contracted for pipeline service with competitive pipeline developers. This signals where, when and how much pipeline expansion is economical. The resulting infrastructure fueled the great energy story of the 2010s. 

About one-third of states instituted similar competitive reforms in the electric industry. The downstream segment – competitive retail energy providers – seek reforms to enable them to obtain the benefits of voluntarily contracting for interregional transmission. Competitive transmission developers want similar reforms, such as monetizing the reliability benefit of firm power imports in competitive electricity markets. Such reforms should be prioritized, but they will only work in the minority of the country that embraced electricity competition. 

Most of the country clings to vertically-integrated monopoly utilities. Their profits are determined by the amount of capital they spend, which creates a perverse incentive to manage costs. To think monopoly utilities would be willing to pursue low-cost transmission development is a fool’s errand. Instead, they have a pattern of torpedoing cost-efficient large-scale transmission to justify building more expensive local transmission and power plants. For example, Entergy recently undercut a $100 million transmission project to justify a new billion dollar power plant. Mandatory transmission planning requirements are the only option to foster least-cost transmission development in monopoly jurisdictions.

Transmission planning requirements come in different shapes and sizes. Some can be excessive and inefficient, others necessary and prudent. One concept has emerged to establish a floor for prudent transmission investment: minimum interregional transfer requirements. This entered debt limit negotiations in the form of the BIG WIRES Act, which is a thoughtful approach by Democrats seeking bipartisanship. However, it proposes a uniform requirement across all regions.

Conservative thought leaders have been resistant to the idea of Congress imposing an arbitrary requirement on interregional transfer. Their instincts serve them well. Grid economics and reliability conditions vary by region. Some conservatives skeptical of a uniform requirement find a tailored approach more appealing, where transfer levels are determined by region-specific reliability conditions and benefit-cost analysis.

Such an approach would deliver “no regrets” transmission development. Not only are such projects vital to bolster grid reliability, but they often reduce more costs than they create. For example, an interregional transmission line during Winter Storm Uri would have paid for itself in four days. 

The status quo is not cutting it. Costs are rising and reliability conditions are worsening. Enabling voluntary capital to flow is the best option, where it is feasible. For the rest, “no regrets” transmission solutions are now a matter of energy security, not political convenience.

Devin Hartman is the policy director for the R Street Institute’s energy and environmental program. 

The Pentagon is pursuing strategic ways to prevent further seizures of international vessels by Iran’s military, particularly in and near the vital Strait of Hormuz and Persian Gulf region. There’s been a series of tit-for-tat tanker seizures of late between Tehran and Washington, as the US attempts crude oil sanctions enforcement against Iran.

And now the US is mulling more drastic action, with The Associated Press reporting Thursday, “The U.S. military is considering putting armed personnel on commercial ships traveling through the Strait of Hormuz, in what would be an unheard of action aimed at stopping Iran from seizing and harassing civilian vessels,” per four American officials cited in the report. Some reports now suggest Marines are already being trained for the proposed program.

The ongoing ‘tanker wars’ began in the summer of 2019, and has more recently seen headlines such as the following: Quiet US Seizure Of Iranian Crude Prompted Iran’s Capture Of Houston-Destined Tanker.

No details have as of yet been revealed of the potential plan to place US military personnel aboard tankers entering ‘hot zones’ where Iranian naval patrols are known to frequent, but it comes following Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announcing that additional Marines have been sent to the Gulf region.

Austin said in late July that the USS Bataan amphibious readiness group and the 26th Marine Expeditional Unit have been deployed, which consists of about 2,500 Marines, to provide “even greater flexibility and maritime capability in the region.”

The amphibious readiness group consists of the Bataan warship and two others, the USS Mesa Verde and the USS Carter Hall. The group had already left Norfolk, Virginia earlier in July. 

Weeks ago the Pentagon sent the USS Thomas Hudner and additional F-35 and F-16 fighter jets to the region, to assist A-10 attack aircraft, as tankers have come under increasing threat – including an incident in which one was fired upon. 

“One official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the military had already been training some Marines in the Middle East to be on the vessels.”https://t.co/3mH9aPGMaq

— Jason Brodsky (@JasonMBrodsky) August 3, 2023

Interestingly, these additional measures against Tehran come in tandem with the US sending more advanced combat jets to the region in response to aggressive behavior from Russian aircraft over the skies of Syria. There’s also growing concerns that pro-Iranian elements will attack more US outposts in northeast Syria.

Authored by Edward Ring via American Greatness,

“Hate and fear might as well be the GOP’s motto. And while there was a time when a liberal like me saying that would be accurately labeled hyperbolic, that time has passed. Show me what, aside from hate and fear, the modern Republican Party is all about.”

 – Columnist Rex Huppke, writing for USA Today, July 16, 2023

Huppke’s comment is something we hear all the time. The campaign to dehumanize MAGA Republicans as hatemongers and fearmongers is a staple of the liberal media, is the playbook for Democrat politicians all the way up to President Biden, and is supported by almost the entire academic community. This dehumanization campaign isn’t restricted to Democrats. Establishment Republicans either equivocate, or explicitly join Democrats in demonizing MAGA Republicans.

If Huppke’s self-described hyperbole typifies how housebroken establishment pundits attack MAGA Republicans, a more intellectual approach to sowing hatred and fear of MAGA Republicans is exemplified in the writings of an influential political commentator, Heather Cox Richardson, who earns an estimated $1.0 million per year from her Substack subscribers. When writing about alleged “messages of anti-inclusion and hate” proffered by the grassroots group Moms for Liberty, Richardson quoted Chris Rufo to make her point about a supposed “attack on democracy” coming from the American Right:

“Radical right activists like Rufo believe they must capture the central institutions of the U.S. and get rid of the tenets of democracy—individual rights, academic freedom, free markets, separation of church and state, equality before the law—in order to save the country.”

In an extensive body of work, Richardson’s consistent theme is that Republicans are dangerous extremists, relying on misinformation to spread hate and fear. While her tone is objective and she carefully avoids the appearance of hyperbole, her message is consistently biased. Richardson is not objective, or she would blend empathy with her criticism of right-of-center groups such as Moms for Liberty. Instead, Richardson is an active participant in a process of polarization, not mutual understanding.

What Richardson misses, perhaps willfully, is that the “central institutions” of the U.S. have already been “captured” by left-wing extremists, who use them as a platform to spread the most potently seductive blend of hatemongering and fearmongering in the history of propaganda. Equally significant, and also ignored by Richardson, is that America’s most powerful corporations and wealthiest individuals have, with rare exceptions, determined that embracing the leftist narrative offers them a path to more profit and more power.

How Democrats Sow Hatred and Fear

On a host of critical issues the pervasive reach of this narrative of fear and hate is omnipresent. The strategy is obvious: saturate the population with fear, then tacitly urge them to hate anyone who is allegedly responsible, and, crucially, hate anyone who attempts to diminish or deny the threat posed by whoever or whatever is so allegedly fearsome. The “climate emergency” is a perfect example.

When it comes to spreading fear, catastrophic floods, rising seas, deadly heat and raging fires are images that tap something primal in humans. All of these threats are now conveyed to the American public, nonstop, by every establishment institution. A normal heatwave is now “historic,” despite evidence to the contrary, and television screens show temperature maps smothered in red, as if the world was on fire. A powerful storm is now called a “bomb cyclone,” and whatever damage or death may result is blamed on “human caused climate change.” To cope, laws and regulations are demanded, and passed, that convey unprecedented new powers to government bureaucracies and politically connected corporations.

With the fear comes hate. Anyone questioning the climate crisis narrative is a right-wing extremist. The use of the word “denier” to describe a climate skeptic is a particularly effective choice, since it triggers associations with the commonly used term “holocaust denier,” used to describe anyone repugnant enough to deny the Nazi genocide against Europe’s Jews during the Second World War. In a classic and typical strategy of inversion, as well, climate skeptics are accused of being funded by fossil fuel companies. And this accusation sticks, despite the obvious fact that if supplies of the most indispensable fuel on earth are constrained, fossil fuel companies make more profit.

The militancy and fanaticism of climate alarmists is well documented and growing. But it isn’t love for the planet, much less people, that motivates them. It is obsessive anxiety, nurtured by fearmongers on the corporate, Democratic Left, who have captured America’s institutions and stoke that anxiety with every new storm and every hot day. And with existential anxiety comes hatred for anyone who would get in the way of whatever radical solutions might ease that anxiety.

Fearmongering from Democrats is everywhere. The “war on women.” “Systemic racism.” The “genocide against black men by police.” “Turning back the clock” on rights of women and minorities. And, of course the latest, the campaign to “erase” transsexuals.

The False Premises of Democratic Fearmongering

None of these claims have any solid basis in facts. Women have more rights in America than they ever have, anywhere in the world, today as well as throughout history. Systemic racism in its modern incarnation favors virtually anyone belonging to a “protected status group,” which in practice means anyone who is not a heterosexual white male.

The number of blacks killed each year at the hands of police is vanishingly small. Between 2015 and 2021, a total of 135 unarmed blacks were killed by police, an average of 19 per year. With more than 23 million black males living in the U.S., the chances of an unarmed black man in America dying at the hands of police in any given year is less than one in a million. In most of these cases there is an explanation for what happened, while some of these killings are clearly inexcusable and horribly wrong. But with over 1 million sworn police officers in the United States, some abuses are a statistical inevitability. That doesn’t justify them, but it is not evidence of an “epidemic of violence against black men,” much less “genocide.”

This doesn’t stop the Democratic hate machine. If you question the black genocide narrative, you are a racist. If you are a racist, you deserve to be hated.

As for “turning back the clock,” there is a gaping difference, completely ignored by Democrats, between trying to restore common sense, fairness, and sanity to America’s culture and American institutions, and going back to the 1950s, much less the 1850s. Moms for Liberty can be forgiven if they want to keep books written at the third grade level that offer graphic instructions on how to perform oral and anal sex, out of the libraries of elementary schools. Similarly, activists like Chris Rufo have a point when they suggest it might be a tragic mistake for America’s medical and psychiatric establishment to endorse hormone blockers and genitalia altering surgery on minors.

These people are not “haters.” They are fighting madness, curated by an establishment that has traded sanity and standards for a manipulated, collectively psychotic, fearful, hateful, and very useful Democrat mob.

Democrats (and RINOs) Are Corporate Puppets

The truth about climate, identity, and healthy morality doesn’t matter to Democrat leaders, and if all you care about is acquiring, keeping, and growing political and economic power, why should it? Fearmongering and hatemongering is the hard currency of Democrats. It is being used to purchase and transform a nation. Pundits like Rex Huppke traffic in this currency because it’s an easy schtick. It also pleases the corporations and oligarchs that pay Huppke. These special interests recognize how coopting the rhetoric of leftist fear and hate diffuses what until recently was a virulent leftist aversion to corporate power and private wealth. At the same time, they recognize how the green agenda and equity agenda will enable them to acquire still more power.

The biggest lie in American politics is that Democrats and RINOs care about the American people, especially the underdog or “disadvantaged.” They do not. Democrats have become a party controlled by transnational elites, multinational corporations, international banks, and supranational institutions. Worse, much worse, is the flawed, misanthropic agenda of this coalition: turning America into a technology driven police state, using environmentalism and “equity” as justification to level down and subdue the American people. And the psychological weapon to advance this agenda is to foment fear and hatred against whoever might expose the lie.

Partisan academics like Heather Cox Richardson hide the propagandistic essence of their work by adopting an intellectual tone, and selectively omitting relevant facts. But they, too, are feeding the fear and hate machine that defines corporate Leftism in America today. If Richardson, or Huppke, and all the other thousands of hacks who have climbed the greasy pole of leftist influencing truly cared about fighting hate and fear, they would look in the mirror. They might recognize that corruption and hate, sadly, can be found everywhere. Starting from that novel premise, from time to time they might honestly examine what merit and moral worth might be found in MAGA Republican populism, and what nihilistic madness might be found in their own backyards.

That would constitute balance. That would be a step towards reconciliation and unity. It might lead to a new political consensus that demands freedom be more than an illusion, and rejects a national policy of managed decline.

Late Wednesday, the Korean Exchange warned investors about speculative trading in superconductor-related stocks following claims of a technological breakthrough that could revolutionize the energy industry.

On Thursday, small-cap stocks such as Duksung Co. and Sunam Co. surged as much as their 30% daily limits for their third consecutive session. Sunam has jumped 220% in the last eight sessions, while Duksung has increased 165%. Mobiis Co. and Shinsung Delta Tech Co. have risen by 125% and 107%, respectively. 

Because of the volatility, the exchange told investors to be careful before investing in Duksung, Sunam, Mobiis, and Shinsung Delta Tech. It issued the lowest of a three-level warning system on the companies, stopping short of trading halts. 

“The bourse hands down such designations when there’s a probability of speculative bets and unfair trades so that investors may exercise caution before investment,” Bloomberg noted, adding, “The exchange operator can escalate warning levels before mandating a one-day trading suspension.”

On July 22, South Korean researchers published a paper on a new superconductor technology that utilizes a lead-based material called “LK-99” — the world’s first superconductor able to conduct electricity at room temperature and ambient pressure. Typically, superconductivity has only been achieved at sub-zero temperatures, limiting its use in the real economy to only a few commercial applications, such as hospital MRI scanners. The claim of the breakthrough might suggest superconductivity could revolutionize the energy industry.

“Investors should be cautious on increased volatility in these superconductor theme stocks as their substance is not clear,” said Han Ji-young, an analyst at Kiwoom Securities Co.

“The name of the metal is LK-99. It is a cutting edge ambient pressure room temperature super conductor. It has both huge military and civilian applications. And that’s not even the best part, John, you can make it in your oven at home.” pic.twitter.com/ZHEWqlLESS

— The Klendathu Writoooooooooor (@KlendathuCap) August 2, 2023

Authored by Victor Davis Hanson via American Greatness,

Two sets of laws now operate in an increasingly unrecognizable America…

Consider the matter of unlawfully removing and storing classified papers.

Donald Trump may go to prison for removing contested White House files to his home.

So far Joe Biden seems exempt from just such legal jeopardy.

But as a senator and Vice President with no right, as does a president, to declassify files, Biden removed and, as a private citizen kept for years classified files in unsecure locations.

Biden’s team strangely revealed the unlawful removals after years of silence.

It did so because the Biden administration found itself in the untenable position of prosecuting the former president for “crimes” that the current president committed as well—albeit far earlier and longer.

Impeachable phone calls?

Donald Trump was impeached by a Democratic House for delaying foreign aid until the Ukrainian government guaranteed that Hunter Biden and his family were no longer engaged in corrupt influence peddling in Kyiv.

In addition, the Left charged that Trump was targeting Joe Biden, his possible 2020 rival.

Yet Biden, with impunity, bragged that he had fired a Ukrainian prosecutor looking into his own son’s schemes by promising to cancel outright American foreign aid.

And the Biden administration’s Justice Department is now targeting Trump, currently the frontrunning challenger to Biden in 2024.

Election denialism?

Trump was indicted by Special Counsel Jack Smith, in part for supposedly conspiratorially “unlawfully discounting legitimate votes.”

Will Smith then also indict Stacey Abrams? For years Abrams falsely claimed that she was the real governor of Georgia. She toured the country in hopes of “discounting” the state vote count.

Or maybe Smith was referring to the conspiracist and former president Jimmy Carter.

He alleged that Trump in 2016 “lost the election, and he was put into office because the Russians interfered on his behalf.”

Will Smith charge Hillary Clinton?

She serially libeled Trump as an “illegitimate” president.

Clinton hatched the Russian collusion hoax, and bragged she joined the “Resistance” to continue her attacks on an elected president.

Or maybe Smith meant the Hollywood crowd.

Lots of actors cut commercials after the 2016 election—begging viewers to pressure the electors to ignore their constitutional duties to honor their states’ popular vote and instead swing their ballots to Hillary Clinton?

Was not that “insurrectionary?”

Or was Smith thinking of January 2005?

Then 32 Democratic House members and Sen. Barbara Boxer tried to nullify the legally certified vote in Ohio—to thereby elect the loser John Kerry.

How about destroying evidence?

Trump was also indicted for allegedly attempting to erase video material from his own cameras in his own house.

Yet Hillary Clinton with impunity eliminated subpoenaed communication devices and thousands of emails.

Violations of security? Trump was indicted for supposedly loosely talking about classified material to visitors at his home.

So will prosecutor Smith’s indictments also extend to Hillary Clinton?

She sent classified documents illegally over her unsecure private server.

FBI Director James Comey memorialized a confidential president conversation.

Then he deliberately leaked what properly was a classified document to the media. It was all part of Comey’s Machiavellian gambit to prompt the appointment of a favorable special prosecutor.

What about subversion of the electoral process?

Donald Trump was indicted for supposedly undermining the election of 2020 by questioning the integrity of the balloting.

In 2016, Hillary Clinton’s campaign illegally hired two foreign nationals Christopher Steele and Igor Danchenko to compile falsehoods about her opponent Trump.

Clinton hid her payments behind three paywalls.

Her team, along with the FBI, helped leak the counterfeit dossier to the media and high officials to undermine her opponent—and thus subvert the election itself.

Lying and perjury?

Two Trump aides and Trump himself are indicted for supposedly stonewalling federal investigators by claiming either amnesia or ignorance.

That tact is exactly what James Comey did 245 times while under oath before Congress.

What do former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, former Director of the CIA John Brennan, and former interim FBI Director Andrew McCabe all have in common?

All three admitted they flagrantly lied either under oath to Congress or to federal investigators.

The three were never indicted for their false and perjurious testimonies.

We have now serially devolved from the 2016 election “Russian collusion” hoax, to the 2020 election “Russian disinformation” laptop hoax, and down to the 2024 election weaponized indictments.

Out of pathological hatred or fear of Donald Trump, the Left has crafted one set of laws for themselves, and another for all other Americans.

They smugly believe their own moral superiority grants them such a right to apply laws unequally—or to ignore them altogether.

To retain power at all cost, and to destroy a political rival, leftwing Democrats are systematically dismantling the constitutional foundations of the United States as we once knew them.

The Oakland branch of the NAACP says that thanks to the city’s “failed” leadership and the movement to defund the police, crime is rampant and “everyone’s in danger.” In a blistering op-ed, the NAACP slams the city – including DA Pamela Price, for public safety spiraling out of control, Golden Gate Media reports.

“Oakland residents are sick and tired of our intolerable public safety crisis that overwhelmingly impacts minority communities. Murders, shootings, violent armed robberies, home invasions, car break-ins, sideshows, and highway shootouts have become a pervasive fixture of life in Oakland. We call on all elected leaders to unite and declare a state of emergency and bring together massive resources to address our public safety crisis,” reads the letter.

The @NAACPOAKLAND just release a statement regarding Oakland’s escalating violence.
Please read and share far and wide. pic.twitter.com/sxaIEpl13c

— Seneca Scott (@SenecaSpeaks21) July 28, 2023

“Failed leadership, including the movement to defund the police, our District Attorney’s unwillingness to charge and prosecute people who murder and commit life threatening serious crimes, and the proliferation of anti-police rhetoric have created a heyday for Oakland criminals,” reads the op-ed by Cynthia Adams, President of the Oakland Branch of the NAACP, and Bishop Bob Jackson of the Acts Full Gospel Church. 

“We urge African Americans to speak out and demand improved public safety,” it continues. “We also encourage Oakland’s White, Asian, and Latino communities to speak out against crime and stop allowing themselves to be shamed into silence. There is nothing compassionate or progressive about allowing criminal behavior to fester and rob Oakland residents of their basic rights to public safety. It is not racist or unkind to want to be safe from crime. No one should live in fear in our city.”

In March of 2021, The Guardian noted that Oakland saw a horrific spike in crime after the city pushed forward with defunding their police department.

Following the reduction in police presence, the city experienced a 314% increase in homicides vs. the same time in 2020, and a 113% increase in firearms assaults.

In Oakland, Defund OPD, a five-year-old campaign housed within the Anti-Police Terror Project (APTP), is a leading voice in the city’s efforts to reduce police spending and invest in areas such as housing, unarmed mental health responses and violence prevention programs.

The campaign began in 2015, a year that the APTP co-founder Cat Brooks refers to as a “bloody” one. The city’s police department killed 11 people and the following year was embroiled in scandal after officers sexually exploited and trafficked a teenager. Since their defunding effort launched, APTP has kept sustained pressure on city officials to cut the department’s budget by at least half. -The Guardian

And now, residents are starring in their own version of Escape from Oakland.