cashless society, climate sustainability, corporate communism, Covid-19, Great Reset, social credit score
As it turns out, Wall Street isn’t happy with Twitter’s decision to permanently ban President Trump, one of the service’s high-profile users. Analysts are afraid the decision could expose Twitter to more regulation, as Mirabaud analyst Neil Campling said the ban could open Twitter up to more regulation under the next administration now that the platform is clearly making editorial decisions about what type of political content is, and isn’t, appropriate.
Traders are clearly worried, as Twitter shares are down 7% in premarket trade, building on losses from after-hours trading on Friday, as well as Sunday night.
As everyone knows, Twitter was Trump’s preferred channel for “amplifying attacks on his rivals, spreading conspiracies and provoking other nations during his four years in power.
Mahmoud Habbash, an adviser to Palestinian Authority (PA) chairman Mahmoud Abbas on religious and Islamic affairs, said on Wednesday that the “settlers’ calls” for the demolition of the Dome of the Rock mosque on the Temple Mount pose a serious danger.
The statement came after the PA’s official news agency Wafa reported that Jewish organizations that support the construction of a Holy Temple on the Temple Mount have asked the Israeli government to submit a proposal to the Islamic Endowments Department in Jerusalem and the Jordanian government to demolish the Dome of the Rock and to build the Temple in its place.
Habbash said in a statement that the “settlers” who made these calls enjoy broad support from Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. Read More
Less than a week has passed since the Capitol riot, and the Democratic Party, the establishment media, and Big Tech now present it as axiomatic that President Donald Trump incited the mob for the purpose of preventing the electoral vote certification and, presumably, grabbing dictatorial powers.
Republican Senators Pat Toomey and Lisa Murkowski have joined the calls for Trump either to resign or face a second impeachment, and even Ted Cruz has said that Trump’s rhetoric “certainly contributed to the violence that occurred.” But before the lynch mob gets the noose ready and hangs the president from the nearest tree, it would be useful to step back and make sure that he really did what everyone seems to be sure he was guilty of doing: incite the crowd at the Capitol to violence for the purpose of staging a coup.
Trump’s speech that supposedly incited the mob is here. At the end of it, he said:
So we’re going to, we’re going to walk down Pennsylvania Avenue, I love Pennsylvania Avenue, and we’re going to the Capitol and we’re going to try and give… The Democrats are hopeless. They’re never voting for anything, not even one vote. But we’re going to try and give our Republicans, the weak ones, because the strong ones don’t need any of our help, we’re going to try and give them the kind of pride and boldness that they need to take back our country. So let’s walk down Pennsylvania Avenue. I want to thank you all. God bless you and God bless America. Thank you all for being here, this is incredible. Thank you very much. Thank you.
The attentive reader may have noticed that there is nothing there Read More
In December 2017 I wrote a paper titled “What causes asset bubbles” featuring the chart below. A few days later, Bitcoin prices peaked and fell 85% within a year. It seems Bitcoin is back. I believe we are in the midst of another bubble, but this time I am not confident in calling its top. My updated chart and thoughts are below1.
First, let’s not kid ourselves. Bitcoin in its current form is not a viable candidate as a currency replacement. If we measured the US annual inflation in Bitcoin instead of dollars, you’d have seen 275% inflation in 2018, -50% deflation in 2019, -75% deflation in 2020. A healthy society cannot function with that kind of price volatility. The currency must be stable enough that if you get paid on Friday you know what kind of dinner you can buy on Sunday. While it may mature in the future, Bitcoin as it exists is largely a speculative asset. Read More
Iran has announced that it is now enriching uranium to 20%. Joe Biden is about to be sworn in as President of the United States. If those two things don’t terrify you, I don’t know what will.
Natural uranium is useless in the construction of an atomic bomb. In order for the uranium to be useable the concentration of the Uranium-235 isotope, a tiny fraction of what is found in uranium ore, must be dramatically increased. The precise level of enrichment necessary is a state secret, but most open sources use figures somewhere between 80 and 90 percent.
A number of techniques can be used to carry out this enrichment. All follow the same trajectory, however. Most of the time it takes to reach the desired enrichment level and create what is known as highly enriched uranium (HEU) is invested upfront. Just getting to 3.5% enrichment eats up 75% of your time. By the time 20% enrichment is reached, you are 90% of the way through the entire process.
In short, once the Iranians have uranium in hand, which has been enriched to the 20% level, they are virtually done. Read More
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has urged Vice President Mike Pence to use the 25th Amendment to remove President Donald Trump. She threatened to impeach Trump if he did not. Pelosi gave members of Congress a roadmap on two such measures on Sunday.
Why is she so insistent on these desperate attempts to remove Trump, who will leave office in ten days, anyway? While some of Trump’s statements during the Capitol riots were beyond the pale, the president has since condemned the rioters and promised to support a peaceful transition of power.
f Pence and the Cabinet use the 25th Amendment, declaring that Trump is unable to fulfill his duties as president, Trump will have an eight-day period to remain president before he is removed. If the House of Representatives votes to impeach Trump, the Senate would almost certainly not remove Trump before January 20. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) will not reconvene the Senate until January 19, effectively dooming impeachment while Trump is in office.
Both the 25th Amendment and impeachment would also set horrible constitutional precedents.
Democrats appear set to impeach Trump for allegedly inciting the Capitol riots — even though the president never told his supporters to break into the Capitol or engage in violence. ‘
This would set a precedent that Congress could impeach a president if the majority party interprets aggressive rhetoric as incitement to violence. If the Cabinet uses the 25th Amendment, it would set the precedent that a Cabinet could declare a president mentally unfit, removing him or her even if he or she were able to carry out the duties of president.
Even so, Pelosi revealed her plans in a letter to fellow members of Congress on Sunday. She announced that House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-N.Y.) will request unanimous consent to bring up a resolution calling on Pence to activate the 25th Amendment. Without unanimous consent, the House will bring up the resolution on Tuesday. The resolution calls on Pence to respond within 24 hours. If he does not respond, the House will consider impeachment.
In an interview with CBS News’ 60 Minutes correspondent Leslie Stahl, Pelosi explained why Democrats are so desperate to impeach Trump.
“There is a possibility that after all of this, there’s no punishment, no consequence, and he could run again for president,” Stahl said. Read More
With Donald Trump conceding and both Georgia Senate races going to Democrats, it’s time to start thinking about the damage a Joe Biden presidency might do to our economy. Without any restraint from Republicans in Congress, it’s likely some old Obama-era ideas such as carbon taxes and cap and trade may soon be resurrected.
In the Sydney Morning Herald yesterday, Andreas Kluth brought forth the idea of a partnership between the United States and the European Union, essentially forming a new transatlantic “climate club.”
“The geopolitical promise of this idea is to resurrect the notion of the ‘West’ at a time when the U.S. and Europe are drifting apart but still hoping to rejuvenate their alliance after Joe Biden becomes president.
The even bigger goal is to win the struggle against global warming, which both Biden and the E.U. cite as their priority,” Kluth writes. Read More
The surprise cuts by Saudi Arabia following the OPEC+ meeting have provided oil bulls with a major boost, sending Brent above $55.
Friday, January 8th, 2021
Brent topped $55 per barrel at the end of the week, as the pledge from Saudi Arabia to cut deeper has built a solid rally. Other forces are at play as well, including monetary stimulus, the prospects of deeper fiscal stimulus in the U.S., and vaccine optimism. “The past 10 weeks of trading have seen only one weekly decline, which was comparatively small,” said Carsten Fritsch, an analyst at Commerzbank AG. “This is testimony to the strength of the oil market in the last 2 1/2 months.”
Cold winter rallies coal and gas. Thermal coal prices in China are shooting up, and JKM prices for LNG are skyrocketing. Spot prices for liquefied natural gas (LNG) delivery in Asia jumped to a six-year high. A cold winter across the northern hemisphere is contributing to price gains. Javier Blas of Bloomberg notes that at least one LNG spot cargo was sold for $33-$36/MMBtu, which would be a historically high price. Read More
Thursday we posted some details about some of the people who entered the Capitol during the riot on Wednesday. One of those individuals is John Sullivan.
According to the video Sullivan captured of the events, he encouraged protesters to enter the Capitol.
Sullivan said he also intended to “support the Black community” with his attendance, but also feels it was “important to understand” those who were protesting in support of President Donald Trump.
But some of the 40-minute video he posted to his social media sites contradicts his assertion that he and another woman were “only filming” the actions and not participating as he can be heard in the video encouraging people to join them as they push their way through police barricades.
Just after people broke into the building, Sullivan — wearing a gas mask and wielding an iPhone on a stabilizing stick — and a woman who said Wednesday that she was making a documentary on Sullivan, are on the first porch area outside the entrance looking back over the throngs of people around the Capitol.
They can be heard encouraging people to climb the wall, saying, “Come on. Let’s go!” Read More