My weekend routine wraps up with checking in on the Futures markets (free via Bloomberg here) after 6 p.m. to see how the equities are doing. Futures trading shows how markets are reacting to whatever news broke over the weekend. It can provide a snapshot of what Monday morning might look like, or even the rest of the week.

~~~

We are but two weeks into the administration of Trump 2.0. As a new set of policies ramps up, I wanted to share some data points about where we are and what we expect from an administration that presents risks and opportunities. I want to discuss Policy, but before I do, a quick word about Politics especially about mixing it with Investing.

Even something as basic as SENTIMENT is impacted by your priors, tribal affiliation, and flawed cognition. You see what your brain wants/expects you to see, not what is there. See this chart as an example:

Your goal, challenging though it may be, is to avoid letting whatever partisan preferences you may have interfere with your portfolio preferences.  As the chart above shows, partisanship leads to expensive errors,  as an investor is an expensive hobby…

~~~

Let’s jump into the non-partisan fray to see what we can deduce. Note: These bullet points and charts come from my Q1 conference call for clients (week of January 6th) and pre-date the latest news by several weeks.

Economy: For the second time, President Trump inherited a robust economy from his predecessor. Despite economists predicting a recession for the past two years (Wrong!), we have enjoyed a resilient, surprisingly strong economy characterized by full employment, strong wages, and robust spending.

-Full-year GDP is close to 3%;
-Unemployment Rate: 4.1% (full employment);
-Inflation is at a near normal. 2.7% (headline CPI);
-Wages are higher;
-Markets are (were) at record highs.

The U.S. has a ~$28 trillion economy, 4% of the world’s population, >20% of the globe’s GDP, and >55% of the global market cap. Economically speaking, America is already great.

Except for the US, the developed world is doing only OK; Europe has structural problems, and China is doing worse(!). In the U.S., sentiment has been weak for years. But to paraphrase Ralph Waldo Emerson:

“I can’t hear what you’re saying because what you’re doing speaks so loudly.”

From Thanksgiving Day to Cyber Monday, online spending was $41B—that is a monstrous number! Home prices are up, demand for automobiles is robust, and consumer spending on travel, entertainment, and discretionary items is substantial. People may complain about the prices of Eggs, but their actions are pure expansionary boom behavior.

The bottom 50% is undoubtedly struggling: There are not enough starter homes (and they are pricey), credit card rates are very high, and car financing ain’t cheap. While wages are up for everybody, they are much higher for the top half, quartile, and decile.

The bottom line economically is that we rolled into 2025 with a strong, positive economic footprint, with households in good shape, strong wage growth, reasonable saving rates, and corporate profits at record highs.

Footnote: For an incumbent party to lose the White House with this sort of economic data is political malpractice.

~~~

 

Risks & Opportunities from the new 2025 administration

Risks:

1. Tariffs: Smoot-Hartley tariffs were partly blamed for the Great Depression (or at least for worsening it). 25% tariff levels will have a very significant impact on the global economy and the U. S. economy. I don’t know what to make of 20% tariffs on specific countries and 10% tariffs on the rest of the world. My wishful thinking is this is hopefully a negotiating tactic (but who knows?). Yes, there should be some parity/fairness for Tariffs. This is especially true for US Agricultural products (farmers) and oil and natural gas (energy producers).

Tariffs are an inflationary tax ultimately paid by consumers. If we’re putting tariffs on Toyotas from Japan or oil from Canada, it is the consumer that mostly pays them. (Some tariff costs may be absorbed by the goods producers and resellers).

2. Fiscal spending: Despite what 50 years of BS, excess spending has never been a problem during my lifetime. Net interest payments – what we’re paying in interest on our borrowed money – is now larger than our total defense spending. That does catch my attention.

3. Geopolitics: The Trump admnistration is a wild card here. China? Russia? Middle-East? Risk of war and disruption, are all risks to markets.

Everything on the Risks side comes down to interest rates. All of the policies above are likely if implemented fully, to pressure interest rates higher. (Partila implementation less so). Even immigration policies make labor shortages worse (agriculture, construction, restaurants). Deport 3 million people, much less 13 million people, and it is going to be more difficult to find and hire people to work on farms, and in construction. Everything will cost more.

Opportunities:

The opportunities are less nuanced: What will drive markets higher?

1. Tax cuts This is Simple and straightforward: Lower tax rates for Corporate America and especially manufacturing are supportive of higher stock prices.

2. Deregulation will be helpful to specific sectors (Energy, tech, Healthcare). Increased investment in domestic energy production could provide growth opportunities in related sectors. Note: Energy & Materials were among the weaker sectors in 2024

3. Mergers: A defanged FTC will allow more M&A activity, supportive of higher market prices.

4. IPOS and Secondaries tend to do better in that environment, and that is also supportive of higher prices.

5. Stock buybacks will increase (Ditto)

The consistent theme in the opportunities section are simply very market friendly policies…

~~~

What made the Trump 1.0 so challenging is that most observers suffered a failure of imagination as to a full implementation of MAGA policies. There were lots of social policy changes — SCOTUS, Abortion policies, child separation, etc. — but other than the TCHA of 2017 tax cuts, there were fewer radical economic policies implemented.

Trump 2.0 presents very different set of potential outcomes. It is very challenging to guess which will have a bigger impact, as we have no idea as to what will get fully, partially or not at all implemnented.

Strap yourself in, Volatility may begin to move higher…

 

 

 

Previously:
Why Politics and Investing Don’t Mix (February 13, 2011)

Is Partisanship Driving Consumer Sentiment? (August 9, 2022)

Archive: Politics & Investing 

 

See also:
The Trump trade war begins Fine, let’s talk about tariffs (Callie Cox, February 03, 2025)

Tariff Nation: Explaining to your fifth grader why tariffs hurt everyone (Roger Lowenstein, Feb 03, 2025)

Trump Will Take the Stock Market on a Bumpy, if Prosperous, Ride. What to Do Now. Barron’s January 26, 2025

It Was a Very Good Year, Liz Ann Sonders, Kevin Gordon (Schwab, January 6, 2025)

 

 

The post Risks & Opportunities of the New Administration appeared first on The Big Picture.

My back-to-work morning train WFH reads:

• What Inspired Billie Eilish’s Grammy-Nominated Album? Let Her Show You. The singer and songwriter Billie Eilish, 23, has released three full-length albums. Every one has been nominated for album of the year at the Grammy Awards. “I really, really have always had a deep love for albums that feel like albums — that move together and each song goes into each song and there’s the same motifs,” Eilish said in an interview ahead of this year’s ceremony on Sunday. (New York Times)

• After DeepSeek, Tech Stocks Still Win. Here’s How AI Is Getting Reset. DeepSeek could spark a shift from hardware to software, similar to what happened to traditional computing beginning in the 1990s. (Barron’s) see also DeepSeek Arrived. America Freaked. What Happens Now? I asked the WSJ’s smartest minds—and AI—all your deepest questions about the week’s mania. (Wall Street Journal)

• The 10 Hottest Housing Markets for 2025 Means Great News for Sellers in the Midwest, Northeast, and South: Nearly the entire western half of the United States was edged out of a spot on the list. (Architectural Digest)

• Egg prices will be at a record-high for a while: Americans can continue to expect high prices for eggs this year, new estimates show, due to the ongoing avian flu outbreak and inflation. Egg prices are estimated to increase about 20% in 2025, compared to about 2.2% for food prices in general. (CNN)

• Inside the race for Greenland’s mineral wealth: President Donald Trump has said he thinks the US will gain control of Greenland, underlining his persistent claim on the Arctic island, on one occasion pointing to “economic security” as the reason. While the autonomous Danish territory has been quick to say it isn’t for sale, its vast and mostly untapped mineral resources are in great demand. (BBC)

• Your robot chauffeur is on its way. Welcome it. Self-driving cars appear to be safer than those with human drivers. Bring them on. (Washington Post)

• Study: People With A.D.H.D. Are Likely to Die Significantly Earlier Than Their Peers: A large study found that men lost seven years of life expectancy and women lost nine years, compared with counterparts without the disorder. (New York Times)

• 5 Physics Equations Everyone Should Know: Our physics expert picks his top-five equations, plus a scheme to supply US power needs with a bucket of baseballs. Thanks, Einstein! (Wired)

• Tom Green, Former Provocateur, Is Building Something New: A Y2K-era phenomenon most famous for his MTV prank show and surreal brand of comedy, Green pioneered ideas that thrive today. (New York Times)

• The Chiefs’ hidden superpower: They’re great without looking good: The Chiefs are “unselfishly greedy.” The Kansas City Chiefs should have regressed by now, but as they pursue Super Bowl history, their individual sacrifice has made them even scarier. (Washington Post)

Be sure to check out our Masters in Business interview this weekend with Torsten Slok, Partner and Chief Economist at Apollo Global Management. Torsten previously worked at Deutsche Bank for 15 years. For ten of those years, his team was top-ranked by Institutional Investor in fixed income and equities. He has also developed several content platforms at Apollo, including Apollo Academy and the Daily Spark.

 

The US’s Worst Fears of Chinese Hacking Are on Display in Guam

Source: Businessweek

 

Sign up for our reads-only mailing list here.

 

The post 10 Monday AM Reads appeared first on The Big Picture.

The Secret Tariff Code Is Buried In 'Section 2, Item (h)' Of The Executive Order

Authored by 'sundance' via TheConservativeTreehouse.com,

Remember when President Trump established the “External Revenue Service?” … It’s all connected and sequential...

Almost everyone will miss, in part because outcomes appear in a sequence that few care to follow, but buried in the Trump tariff Executive Order {SEE HERE} you will discover something.  As the unofficial Deep State strategist, and the self-appointed misfit explainer of stuff, lol, we will explain:

[Sec 2, SubSection (h)]: Sec. 2. (a) All articles that are products of Canada as defined by the Federal Register notice described in subsection (e) of this section (Federal Register notice), and except for those products described in subsection (b) of this section, shall be, consistent with law, subject to an additional 25 percent ad valorem rate of duty. Such rate of duty shall apply with respect to goods entered for consumption, or withdrawn from warehouse for consumption, on or after 12:01 a.m. eastern time on February 4, 2025, except that goods entered for consumption, or withdrawn from warehouse for consumption, after such time that were loaded onto a vessel at the port of loading or in transit on the final mode of transport prior to entry into the United States before 12:01 a.m. eastern time on February 1, 2025, shall not be subject to such additional duty, only if the importer certifies to CBP as specified in the Federal Register notice.

[…] (h) For avoidance of doubt, duty-free de minimis treatment under 19 U.S.C. 1321 shall not be available for the articles described in subsection (a) and subsection (b) of this section. {link}

So, Canada and Mexico get 25% tariffs, but China only 10%. 

Why? 

The secret is in that subsection “(h)” when it talks about de minimis treatment.

Essentially, what President Trump is doing is levying a much more massive import tax, and possible confiscation impact on the core source of fentanyl (and other illegal) substances.

(Bloomberg) — President Donald Trump’s new trade levies against China, Canada and Mexico include a broadside against e-commerce, with apparent plans to extinguish a long-held tariff exemption for packages worth less than $800.

Trump’s executive orders directing 25% levies on Canada and Mexico — plus a 10% duty on China — specify that the “de minimis” exemption for small packages no longer applies. Under the exemption, products below that dollar amount are able to enter the US without tariffs — a boon for China’s e-commerce retailers who ship often cheaper wares directly to consumers in the US.

The full scope of the de minimis changes — whether they apply just to the new tariffs issued Saturday or to older existing trade levies — was not clear. A White House spokesman did not respond to questions about its reach.

However, trade lawyers said Trump’s language cracking down on the de minimis exemption could apply broadly, even to existing duties against China, Canada and Mexico.

Regardless, the impact of the change threatens to fall most squarely on China, affecting retailers including Alibaba, JD.com Inc., PDD Holdings Inc.’s Temu and fashion-focused Shein. American shoppers and companies imported about $48 billion worth of shipments from the world under that loophole in the first nine months of last year, according to US Customs and Border Protection estimates. (read more)

Approximately a billion packages are estimated to enter the USA under the cover of the de minimis exemption. 

This is where the enforcement mechanism of the “External Revenue Service” combines with the tariff approach and the “state of emergency.”  President Trump imposed the tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, a nearly 50-year law that gives the president sweeping power to impose sanctions after declaring an emergency.

Now the billion packages, mostly from China, Mexico and Canada are going to be subjected to review and interception.

The de minimis loophole comes from back in the 1930s. The idea back then was, say you went on a vacation to Paris, you shouldn’t have to file customs paperwork or pay taxes if you decided to ship some little Eiffel Tower statues to your friends back home.

Congress in 2015 then raised the de minimis threshold from $200 to $800.  However, the e-commerce world exploded, and Chinese companies began using the de minimis loophole to ship cheap goods (ex. Temu and Shein) into the USA direct to consumers without paying any customs duty.

It was reported last year that the U.S. was on track to receive a billion packages through the de minimis loophole that aren’t taxed and don’t have customs slips saying what they are.  Making matters worse, illegal items are slipping through the cracks, including, knockoffs, unsafe items and even chemicals used to make fentanyl.  The worst abuser that exploits this de minimis loophole is, by far, China.

President Trump can require a customs and duty declaration stating what is in every package and subsequently collect tariffs and duties.

Put it all together and President Trump is executing an Emergency Act executive order, plus the imposition of a tariff review, and simultaneous interception of de minimis packages previously unchecked as the enforcement mechanism. 

All executed by the External Revenue Service.

President Trump has got them surrounded, and the scope of it has the media so overwhelmed they cannot quite put it together.

Almost too much winning...

... Almost!

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/02/2025 - 22:10

How Trump's Dismantling Of USAID Marks A Seismic, Historic Shift In America's Role In The World

The most consequential decision and executive order which came within the opening days of President Donald Trump's administration has without doubt been his "reevaluating and realigning US foreign aid" — which sent shockwaves through Washington especially given federal funding has been cut to USAID in a shock blow to the agency. But it is also having a massive ripple effect throughout the world. Some foreign powers will welcome the news, while many allies as well as an assortment of US-backed 'opposition groups' will feel completely abandoned.

This has meant that pro-Western media outlets, NGOs, and 'soft power' organizations are in panic mode. This has basically overnight shutdown a multi-billion dollar regime change apparatus which pushed or often imposed American interests throughout the globe, especially in the very vulnerable Third World, as well as former Soviet satellite regions. The way this works on a practical, on the ground level is detailed in the well-known book Confessions Of An Economic Hit Man. As for Trump's apparent efforts to dismantle the powerful USAID agency, we compiled some of the best current analysis from around the web outlining the huge significance of this move, which is nothing less than a historic reset (and we say a very welcome reset) of Washington's relations with the rest of the world.

Getty Images

We're looking at a seismic shift in the US's relationship with the world, via Arnaud Bertrand:

1) The US is dismantling its foreign interference apparatuses (like USAID )

2) Marco Rubio stating that we're now in a multipolar world with "multi-great powers in different parts of the planet" and that "the postwar global order is not just obsolete; it is now a weapon being used against us."

3) The tariffs on supposed "allies" like Mexico, Canada or the EU: This is the US effectively saying "our attempt at running the world is over, to each his own, we're now just another great power, not the 'indispensable nation'." It looks "dumb" (as the WSJ just wrote) if you are still mentally in the old paradigm but it's always a mistake to think that what the US (or any country) does is dumb.

Hegemony was going to end sooner or later, and now the U.S. is basically choosing to end it on its own terms. It is the post-American world order - brought to you by America itself. Even the tariffs on allies, viewed under this angle, make sense, as it redefines the concept of "allies": they don't want - or maybe rather can't afford - vassals anymore, but rather relationships that evolve based on current interests.

You can either view it as decline - because it does unquestionably look like the end of the American empire - or as avoiding further decline: controlled withdrawal from imperial commitments in order to focus resources on core national interests rather than being forced into an even messier retreat at a later stage. In any case it is the end of an era and, while the Trump administration looks like chaos to many observers, they're probably much more attuned to the changing realities of the world and their own country's predicament than their predecessors.

Acknowledging the existence of a multipolar world and choosing to operate within it rather than trying to maintain an increasingly costly global hegemony couldn't be delayed much further. It looks messy but it is probably better than maintaining the fiction of American primacy until it eventually collapses under its own weight. This is not to say that the U.S. won't continue to wreak havoc on the world, and in fact we might be seeing it become even more aggressive than before. Because when it previously was (badly, and very hypocritically) trying to maintain some semblance of self-proclaimed "rules-based order", it now doesn't even have to pretend it is under any constraint, not even the constraint of playing nice with allies.

BREAKING: USAID security chiefs placed on leave after they refused to turn over classified material to Elon Musk's government-inspection teams, officials say. https://t.co/vqdPmJBs1q

— The Associated Press (@AP) February 2, 2025

It's the end of the U.S. empire, but definitely not the end of the U.S. as a major disruptive force in world affairs. All in all this transformation may mark one of the most significant shifts in international relations since the fall of the Soviet Union. And those most unprepared for it, as is already painfully obvious, are America's vassals caught completely flat-footed by the realization that the patron they've relied on for decades is now treating them as just another set of countries to negotiate with.

* * *

How the Biden administration weaponized USAID, via @DefiyantlyFree

1. Abortion: One of the first things that Joe Biden did after assuming office was to revoke the Mexico City policy, which was supposed to prevent the federal government from using our tax dollars to fund overseas abortions. He did this, even though 73% of Americans strongly oppose using taxpayer funding to support overseas abortion. That includes 59% of people that are actually pro-choice. He resumed funding to the United Nations population fund and dramatically expanded the scope of programs that are authorized to pay for abortion services. Joe Biden tied taxpayer funded abortion services internationally to the United States efforts to advance, gender quality globally and respond to gender based violence and to confront challenges such as HIV aids, tuberculosis and malaria. That means that grants given through ID that go towards malaria or other diseases include paying for abortions on demand in those countries. As a result of these abortion driven objectives in 2022 the US Department of state and USA ID budget was 12% higher than previous years and totaled 70 Billion dollars.

2. Identity Ideology: In 2021 the national gender strategy was implemented for foreign aid and started using an intersectional approach that considers barriers and challenges faced by those who have intersecting in compounding forms of discrimination. That’s a fancy way of saying Marxist victimhood in order of priority. In the Biden administration intersectionality dictated the manner in which US AI ID designed its programs and designed who received its funding.

3.Global DEI: Representatives of the UN who discussed for an aid frequently mentioned the 1619 project and said that slavery is an original sin of America. The Biden administration made accepting and requiring communities of color to adopt to DEI a condition of receiving foreign aide.

4. Global Climate Change: By reentering the Paris climate accords USAID was mobilized into action to fight climate change across the country and force the United States of America to underwrite this climate change overseas. In 2021 USAID announced that it would mobilize $150 billion in public and private climate finance by 2030 with the majority of funding coming from private service actors in collaboration with the United States Taxpayer dollars. There was an integration with the WHO‘s initiative on climate, resilient health systems and sustainable, low carbon health systems and the US national oceanic atmosphere administration. When they say malaria, they mean through climate change hysteria, and green energy policies. For instance, South America needs $26 billion to transform its power system and the United States and Europe under Joe Biden committed to $8.5 billion each to help the country make that transition. That money would be facilitated through USAID.

5. Perpetual need for foreign aid: There is no better example of the insidious relationship between foreign aid and nation building then that of Afghanistan. Even after we pulled out of Afghanistan, USA ID was used to continuously fund the nation.

6. UNRWA and terrorism: The moment President Trump left office and Biden restored to this organization and removed the Houthi rebels in Yemen from a US list of designated terrorists. Removing them from this designation meant that funds flowed to them in foreign aid and were misappropriated to attack and occupy the US Embassy in Sana.

More than 30 Iranian opposition orgs and media outlets have lost funding due to the pause in USAID programs (via Middle East Eye) pic.twitter.com/1p30I94bcD

— Dave DeCamp (@DecampDave) February 2, 2025

7. USAID has been used to fund leftist progressive causes exclusively: If you look at 50 USAID employees chosen at random, which the heritage foundation did 48 of them donated to Democratic candidates and causes, and only two of them donated to Republicans. Following the Floyd riots, 1000 USAID employees demanded the agency make a public statement, affirming Black Lives Matter and accused USAID of structural racism by not designing plans to combat systemic racism, injustice, colonialism, and police brutality, all around the world. The Rockefeller Center, one of the most leftist organizations signed an agreement to be in a strategic partnership with USAID and all of the individual political contributions went to progressive campaigns. The international rescue committee received hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer money to fund its highly partisan causes. The former cochair of this committee was Obama’s treasury secretary.

The Board of Directors has every single one of the founders of the Democratic Party and support progressive policy goals. Another major recipient of foreign aid is CARE international. This is probably one of the most partisan groups who has people like Valerie Jared, Nancy Pelosi, and Hilary Clinton carve out its policy. What once started out as an agency that was about helping to end global poverty in world, and hunger and has become an organization that is solely aligned with radical progressive Democrat agendas. And that is not even touching the vast censorship arm that USAID controls and funds. If anyone is curious about the rabbit hole that exists as it relates to censorship from USAID, I would suggest that you subscribe to Mike Benz on X.

* * *

Nayib Bukele, the President of El Salvador, says more often there's a hidden nefarious agenda...

Most governments don’t want USAID funds flowing into their countries because they understand where much of that money actually ends up. While marketed as support for development, democracy, and human rights, the majority of these funds are funneled into opposition groups, NGOs with political agendas, and destabilizing movements.

At best, maybe 10% of the money reaches real projects that help people in need (there are such cases), but the rest is used to fuel dissent, finance protests, and undermine administrations that refuse to align with the globalist agenda. Cutting this so-called aid isn’t just beneficial for the United States; it’s also a big win for the rest of the world.

USAID, like the National Endowment for Democracy, are well-documented CIA fronts that are designed to manipulate other countries' internal politics for the benefits of DC elites and nobody else in the US.

Both agencies have wrought destruction and can't die soon enough: https://t.co/NoDxJDtht7

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) February 2, 2025

And here's journalist Glenn Greenwald: "USAID, like the National Endowment for Democracy, are well-documented CIA fronts that are designed to manipulate other countries' internal politics for the benefits of DC elites and nobody else in the US. Both agencies have wrought destruction and can't die soon enough."

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/02/2025 - 21:35

Rounding Up The Usual Suspects: Grassley Releases Familiar Name In The Origins Of The Trump Investigation

Authored by Jonathan Turley,

For Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA), the weaponization of the criminal justice system has always followed a certain Casablanca pattern. Like Claude Rains as the venerable Captain Louis Renault, it is simply a matter of “rounding up the usual suspects.”

Grassley released FBI whistleblower records on Thursday showing that an anti-Trump figure, former FBI Assistant Special Agent in Charge Timothy Thibault, previously found to have violated the Hatch Act was a key factor in pushing the election charges brought by former Special Counsel Jack Smith.

Grassley suggested that Thibault violated protocol in opening and advancing the FBI’s initial probe into the 2020 election without sufficient predication. The investigation, called Operation Arctic Frost, was opened on April 13, 2022.

Years later, “Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, [Thibault] walked” into Grassley’s.

Whistleblowers alleged that Thibault’s alleged “partisanship” likely impacted investigations involving President Trump and Hunter Biden.

Thibault was previously named as the agent who effectively scuttled the investigation into Hunter Biden and his laptop.

Fox News reported that a February 14, 2022 email revealed Thibault communicating with a subordinate agent on the foundations for an investigation of Trump.

In another email ten days later to John Crabb, a prosecutor in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia, Thibault states:

“I had a discussion with the case team and we believe there to be predication to include former President of the United States Donald J. Trump as a predicated subject.”

The emails, and others detailed in the report, show Thibault pushing the investigation - in sharp contrast to his role in the Biden investigations.

Grassley and others are citing the evidence as supporting the need to “clean house” at the FBI and root out those who actively participated in the politicization of the criminal justice process.

For those of us familiar with Thibault from the Hunter Biden investigation, his role in the origins of the Smith investigation is deeply concerning.

Whistleblowers previously accused Thibault of “circumventing normal process and procedure to open full field investigations.” 

He was later found by the Inspector General to be violating the Hatch Act, which prohibits federal employees from engaging in certain political activities.

The violations included Thibault retweeting social media posts by the Lincoln Project, a vehemently anti-Trump group.

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/02/2025 - 21:00

Illegal Migrant Protests Ramp Up In US Cities In Response To Trump Deportations

Civil actions from the political left are notoriously seasonal and the winter cold usually keeps fragile progressives indoors.  However, in southern states where temps are warming up we're getting an early glimpse of what larger US cities will probably look like with the arrival of spring.  Illegal migrants and their leftist "allies" are up in arms this week and they're feeling bold - Donald Trump's mass deportation initiatives, which have so far focused on criminal gangs and violent offenders, are unacceptable they say.

     

Protest groups of hundreds and in some cases thousands of people have erupted in San Diego, LA, San Fransisco, Dallas, Atlanta, Phoenix and a handful of other cities.  The events have remained generally peaceful, though in some cases protesters have blocked traffic and attacked vehicles trying to get through.  

CLOSED BORDER: Illegals blocking traffic to protest deportation. Winning hearts and minds? pic.twitter.com/0RLd1ENB0K

— @amuse (@amuse) February 2, 2025

Mass deportations have received wide support, with 66% of US citizens backing the policy in light of the border crisis created by the Biden Administration.  Current projections indicate 16 million to 20 million illegals currently reside in the US, with up to 10 million entering the country in the past four years alone (DHS has admitted that 85% of migrants caught at the border were allowed to enter under amnesty rules during the Biden Administration).  Official government statistics have proven to be faulty, reporting only half the actual number of migrants entering the US at any given time.

NOW: Anti-ICE protesters have shut down both sides of the 101 Freeway in downtown Los Angeles.

After Biden’s record-breaking border crisis, most Americans now support mass deportation—and blocking traffic won’t change that.pic.twitter.com/62cw1FftNy

— KanekoaTheGreat (@KanekoaTheGreat) February 2, 2025

It's hard to imagine many countries outside the US (or Europe) where illegal migrants are so entitled that they're willing demand access by taking to the streets, but here it is.  Imagine if a foreign army marched up to the southern border and then threw a temper tantrum because the US wouldn't let them invade?  This is essentially what's happening now.

A common mantra among protesters is that "no human is illegal on stolen land".  It's actually conquered land, and the conquerors get to make the rules.    

The more diplomatic illegal alien position is that "migrant rights are human rights", but human rights do not give foreigners license to invade another country or break that country's laws.  It's rather convenient to use "human rights" as a social justice shield when the majority of illegals are actively siphoning welfare handouts and other subsidies paid for by legal citizens. 

What about the human rights of native born Americans? 

Another argument from migrants is that "they make America great" by gracing the US with their presence.  But one might notice that at most of these rallies there is hardly an American flag in sight.  In fact, every march is canvassed in the red, white and green of the Mexican flag.  This would suggest that migrants have far more loyalty to Mexico than to the US and that their presence in the states is not part of some "immigrant dream" to assimilate into American culture.

Rather, it is common for illegals to see the US as a cash cow; a place to sneak in, grab as many handouts and as much money as possible and then wire that wealth back to Mexico (or any number of countries) where they plan to retire.  This ongoing international scam has become a kind of institution; certain US businesses and industries get labor for 30% less while migrants get to comfortably feed off system that US taxpayers support.   

The scam is treated as a tradition.  It is so entrenched that illegals are shocked and enraged that it might actually come to an end.  It's a cultural phenomenon that most westerners just don't understand, but in the third world empathy and charity are often seen as signs of weakness.  If you give them an inch they will take a mile because this is how people learn to survive in places where corruption is the cultural norm.     

It's hard to say what could possibly come from these protests other than making it easy for ICE to round up hundreds of migrants at one time.  The notion that illegals have a right to protest at all is absurd, but if they want to serve themselves up on a platter for deportation it's probably not going to bother Tom Homan.

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/02/2025 - 20:25

Some Hospitals Stop Transgender Surgeries On Children After Trump's Order

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times,

Hospitals in Colorado, Virginia, and the nation’s capital said on Jan. 30 they have stopped transgender procedures for minors as they evaluate President Donald Trump’s new executive order.

Denver Health in Colorado has stopped providing transgender surgeries such as breast removal for people under the age of 19, a spokesperson said, in order to comply with the executive order and continue receiving federal funding. It’s not clear whether the hospital will continue providing other transgender procedures and medicine for youth, such as puberty blockers.

In Virginia, VCU Health and Children’s Hospital of Richmond said it has suspended transgender medication and surgical procedures for those under 19 years old.

Children’s National Hospital in Washington said the hospital had “paused prescriptions of puberty blockers and hormone therapy to comply with the directives while we assess the situation further.”

The hospital already did not perform transgender surgeries on minors, according to a spokesperson.

Trump on Tuesday signed an order titled “Protecting Children From Chemical and Surgical Mutilation.”

The order says it is now U.S. policy not to fund, sponsor, promote, assist, or support “the so-called ’transition' of a child from one sex to another.” It says the U.S. government “will rigorously enforce all laws that prohibit or limit these destructive and life-altering procedures.”

The order directs the heads of agencies that provide grants to medical institutions to “immediately take appropriate steps to ensure that institutions receiving Federal research or education grants end the chemical and surgical mutilation of children.”

Other hospitals, including Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, said after the order was signed that its current practices would continue.

“Our team will continue to advocate for access to medically necessary care, grounded in science and compassion for the patient-families we are so privileged to serve,” the hospital said.

The order targets World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) guidance, which describes procedures such as hormone therapy, puberty blockers, and surgeries such as breast removal for children as “gender-affirming care” that “can be effective and helpful for many transgender adolescents.” The order says agencies shall rescind or amend all policies that rely on the association’s guidance.

WPATH said in a statement that restrictions and bans on “access to necessary medical care for transgender youth are harmful to patients and their families.”

The order also directed the U.S. health secretary to take steps to end child sex surgeries, including through Medicare, and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to exclude child sex surgeries from the military-run TRICARE health insurance program.

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/02/2025 - 11:40

Trade Wars Begin: Trump Slaps Tariffs On Canada, Mexico And China; Triggers Immediate Retaliation

Update (10:20pm ET): Just hours after Trump unveiled double-digit tariffs on the three largest US trading partners, Canada and Mexico announced their own plans for retaliatory tariffs on the US.  Outgoing Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said late on Saturday that Canada will respond by placing 25% counter-tariffs on C$155 billion ($107 billion) worth of American-made products, with items including beer, wine, bourbon, fruits, fruit juices, vegetables, clothes, perfume, household appliances, plastic, and lumber subject to tariffs. Hilariously, Canada is going especially hard after alcohol produced in Republican states...

Canadians are targeting American red states pic.twitter.com/cusGfDjemm

— The_Real_Fly (@The_Real_Fly) February 2, 2025

... although at least for now they haven't gone ape with the previously suggested 100% tariffs on Teslas.

Meanwhile, Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum said she also instructed the economy minister to kick off a response plan that includes retaliatory tariffs against the levies.

But since Trump’s orders also included retaliation clauses that would increase US tariffs if the countries respond in kind, that means we are now locked in tit-for-tat escalating prisoner's dilemma, one where it progressively gets worse before it gets much worse. The new measures will be on top of existing trade levies on those countries.

* * *

And just like that, the Trump trade wars have officially (re)started.

As was widely previewed yesterday, President Trump unleashed the first salvo of his latest trade war with tariffs of 25% on Canada and Mexico and 10% on China, the start of a wave of promised trade barrages against both foreign adversaries and allies.

President Trump has officially signed orders implementing 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico and 10% tariffs on China. pic.twitter.com/wU3KjAZFmc

— Martin Walsh (@martinwalsh__) February 1, 2025

Trump signed orders for the tariffs around 5pm ET on Saturday; they will go into effect on Tuesday, at which point they will likely escalate in tit-for-tat fashion until something breaks.

pic.twitter.com/SWZtSm6NMX

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 1, 2025

According to a fact sheet published by the White House, the tariffs are in response to the "extraordinary threat posed by illegal aliens and drugs" such as fentanyl, which constitute a national emergency under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act.

WH fact sheet on the new tariffs pic.twitter.com/Dqq30iWn5x

— Olga Nesterova (@onestpress) February 1, 2025

Perhaps the only difference from what was previously leaked is that energy imports from Canada will be spared from the full 25% levy and will face a 10% tariff. The White House officials said that was intended to minimize upward pressure on gasoline and home-heating oil prices.

The orders also include retaliation clauses that would increase US tariffs if the countries respond in kind. The tariffs issued on Saturday will be on top of existing trade levies on those countries.

White House Officials say there is a high bar for China, Canada, and Mexico to get tariffs removed. They say in President Trumps golden age it’s only legal immigration and no Americans dying of fentanyl. #Tariffs #Mexico #Canada #China

— Edward Lawrence (@EdwardLawrence) February 1, 2025

White House Officials say the Executive Orders signed adding tariffs on Canada, Mexico, and China have a retaliation clause. That means if the country retaliates, then there would be consequences. The Officials say likely increased tariffs. #Tariffs #Canada #Mexico #China

— Edward Lawrence (@EdwardLawrence) February 1, 2025

The order also revoked the so-called de minimis exemption for small parcels and packages, one official said, which will apply tariffs more widely to small shipments and impact e-commerce and online retailing. The US loses a tremendous amount of tariff revenue by using the exemption, one official said.

The three targeted countries are the largest three sources of US imports, accounting for almost half of total volume.

The decision is intended to have sharp economic impacts for the nations targeted; it will likely also impact the US depending on how much of the tariff-related price increases are passed through.

Parts of the US, including the Pacific Northwest and Northeast US, are deeply reliant on electricity or gas flows from Canada. And oil industry advocates have warned against even a 10% increase in the cost of crude inputs into Midwestern refineries that have few near-term options to substitute with US supplies.

For context, over 60% of US crude imports comes from Canada, so a 10% tariff on oil imports will lead to a prompt increase in the price of diesel which is the backbone of the US economy. Depending on the mood of the Fed on any given day, that may be seen as inflationary and lead to rate hikes in the near future.

CHART:

President Trump has chosen to tariff the biggest by far exporter of crude oil into his country… over 4m barrels per day (blue line) of Canadian crude fuel almost exclusively the midwestern refineries…. number 2 is… Mexico… pic.twitter.com/Y6dMLA3erT

— Faisal Islam (@faisalislam) February 1, 2025

Markets have been gripped by uncertainty as they awaited Trump’s decision on the tariffs and there are looming questions about how the levies will impact stocks.

In the 10 days since Trump’s initial tariff threat on his first full day in office, the S&P 500 Index was essentially flat while equity benchmarks in Europe, Canada and Mexico were all higher. The Nasdaq Golden Dragon Index — comprised of companies that do business in China but trade in the US — jumped more than 4%.

According to Bloomberg, automakers such as General Motors Co., Ford Motor Co. and Stellantis NV, which have global supply chains and massive exposure to Mexico and Canada, could see significant swings.

Needless to say, Trump's political opponents such as Jason Furman were quick to conclude that the market will punish what the Democrat economic advisor sees as bad economic and foreign policy.

Less than 2 weeks in and 25% tariffs our close allies + 10% on China.

Plus a (credible) promise that they will go even higher when there is (inevitable) retaliation.

It’s hard to decide if this is worse economic policy or foreign policy.

We’ll see if Trump caves to the market.

— Jason Furman (@jasonfurman) February 1, 2025

Citing sources, Bloomberg writes that officials on the call Saturday justified the tariffs by citing the flow of fentanyl and other illegal drugs across the border, as well as illegal immigration. Sources added that Canada had been officially informed that the tariffs would be implemented on their goods on Tuesday.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is expected to speak on the tariffs after they are implemented on Saturday. Canada is set to impose retaliatory countertariffs, the nation’s natural resources minister said in an interview on Friday.

“We will focus on tariffing American good that actually are sold in significant quantities in Canada, and especially those for which there are readily available alternatives for Canadians,” Jonathan Wilkinson said.

Former Canadian Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, who is among the candidates to succeed Justin Trudeau as prime minister, suggested hitting Trump ally Elon Musk directly by applying a 100% tariff on Tesla cars. That will hardly help de-escalate what is now officially the first trade war of Trump's second (technically third) term.

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/02/2025 - 10:11

Five Takeaways From Trump's Plans To Build An Iron Dome For America

Authored by Andrew Korybko via substack,

Trump signed an Executive Order to build an Iron Dome for America, which aims to defend the homeland “against ballistic, hypersonic, advanced cruise missiles, and other next-generation aerial attacks.”

It’ll also importantly include space-based monitoring and interception systems. Some of the latter will have “non-kinetic capabilities” too, likely referring to directed-energy weapons (DEWs), but it’s unclear whether they’ll be deployed on the ground and/or in space.

Here are five takeaways from this monumental move:

*  *  *

1. Strategic Stability Will Never Look The Same

Bush Jr.’s unilateral withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002 prompted Russia to develop hypersonic technology so as to prevent the US from feeling comfortable enough with its missile defense shield that it one day plots a first strike after thinking that it could intercept Russia’s second one. Trump’s Iron Dome plans mean that there’s no going back to the era of mutual restrictions on missile defense, which was already dubious after what Bush Jr. did, thus worsening the Russian-US security dilemma.

2. The US Just Sped Up The Second Space Race

The second Space Race has already been underway since Trump created the Space Force in 2019, but his latest Executive Order sped it up by compelling Russia and China to further prioritize their space-based defense plans, which will inevitably result in the hyper-militarization of space. There’s no way that those two won’t suit through the deployment of their own defensive systems there that could also disguise offensive weapons just like the US might secretly be plotting to do under this pretext.

3. “Rods From God” Are The Next Superweapon

Whichever country is the first to position itself to carry out kinetic bombardments against others, which refers to dropping space-based projectiles onto their opponent, will obtain dominance. These weapons are popularly known as “rods from God” and are poised to become the next superweapon since they might be impossible to intercept and can promptly strike opponents due to menacingly orbiting above their targets or in close enough proximity to them at all times. This makes them a military game-changer.

4. This Is An Unprecedented Power Play By The US

The preceding points prove that Trump’s Iron Dome plans are an unprecedented power play against Russia and China. The unofficial “rods from God” offensive element raises the chances that the US can destroy their land-based second-strike capability in a first strike while the official missile defense one is meant to neutralize their remaining (submarine-based) capabilities. The combined effect is intended to place them in positions of nuclear blackmail from which concessions can then be perpetually extracted.

5. Space-Based Arms Control Should Be A Priority

Russia and China will work to counteract the US’ aforesaid power play and then unveil their own such systems so as to try to place it in the same position of nuclear blackmail that it wants to place them. This is a dangerous dynamic since one of these three might feel like time is running out before they’re placed in such a position and that they must thus launch a first strike without delay. The only way to reduce this risk is through a space-based arms control pact with credible monitoring and enforcement mechanisms.

*  *  *

Trump’s plans to build an Iron Dome for America are a game-changer in the New Cold War since they’ll take the US’ rivalry with Russia and China to a qualitatively more dangerous level.

The consequent hyper-militarization of space that’ll occur as a result of him wanting to deploy interceptors there, which could disguise offensive arms like “rods from God”, spikes the risk of war by miscalculation.

A space-based arms control pact between them is unlikely anytime soon, but it’s the only way to reduce this risk.

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/02/2025 - 09:20

Lawsuit Alleges FAA Denied 1,000 People Air Traffic Controller Jobs To Meet Diversity Hiring Targets

Just as multiple air travel related tragedies have taken place, it’s been reported that the FAA is fighting a class action lawsuit alleging it denied 1,000 people air traffic controller jobs based on diversity hiring targets, according to the New York Post.

The lawsuit, originally filed in 2015, resurfaced following a fatal midair collision in Washington, DC, that claimed 67 lives—the deadliest U.S. aviation disaster in nearly 25 years. Hours later, a small private plane crashed in Northeast Philadelphia, putting emphasis on the role of air traffic control.

At the time of the blackhawk helicopter incident, staffing levels were reportedly “not normal.” Andrew Brigida, the lead plaintiff in the lawsuit, criticized the FAA’s focus on diversity and inclusion, suggesting it contributed to the likelihood of such an accident.

The New York Post report says that the lawsuit claims the FAA, under the Obama administration, replaced a skill-based hiring system with a “biographical assessment” to increase minority hires.

Andrew Brigida, a white applicant, alleges racial discrimination after being rejected despite scoring 100% on his training exam at Arizona State University’s aviation program in 2013.

The FAA faces growing criticism over its hiring policies, with some, including former President Trump, blaming diversity programs for understaffing and lower air traffic control standards.

Lead plaintiff Andrew Brigida suggested diversity-focused hiring made an aviation accident inevitable. He pointed to the FAA’s preliminary report, which revealed the controller on duty during the fatal plane-helicopter crash was handling two roles due to staffing shortages. The report also noted that Ronald Reagan National Airport had fewer controllers than recommended.

Brigida, now an FAA program manager, hopes Trump will address the staffing crisis if re-elected. Meanwhile, the FAA continues struggling with shortages since 2020’s pandemic layoffs.

The lawsuit, which the FAA and the Department of Transportation are contesting, is set for trial next year. Government lawyers argue that expanding hiring eligibility doesn’t constitute discrimination under Title VII, as it ensures equal access rather than preserving prior advantages.

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/02/2025 - 08:45

Biden Must Explain What The Ukraine War Was For

Authored by Ted Snider via TheAmericanConservative.com,

It is no longer easy to tell what the Ukraine War was for. Very early on, U.S. goals got grafted onto Ukrainian goals, and the hybrid braid became hard to disentangle. “This is a war that is in many ways… bigger than Ukraine,” the State Department announced in the first weeks of the war. But, whatever those goals, few of them remain: There will be no NATO membership for Ukraine, there will be no recovery of all of its territory, and there will be no weakening of Russia.

Former President Joe Biden has a lot of explaining to do, as does Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Zelensky will need to explain to his exhausted nation why choosing the path of war over the path of diplomacy after the Istanbul talks in March and April of 2022 was worth the cost. At that time, what still seemed to be the Ukrainian goals—continued sovereignty and the withdrawal of Russian troops to pre-war boundaries—might have been met. Zelensky must explain why he succumbed to Western pressure to pursue wider ones.

He is going to have to explain why pursuing those wider goals was worth the loss of so much life, limb and land. And, if he is to survive politically and, perhaps, even physically, he is going to have to find someone to blame.

He already fired Valery Zaluzhny, who served as Ukraine’s military commander-in-chief until last year. Now, Ukraine’s security service has arrested two generals and a colonel on the charge of failing to protect Ukrainian territory from Russian advances. 

But blaming the generals won’t be enough to acquit Zelensky. The war went on after Zaluzhny and continued to worsen. And no one will buy the blaming of field commanders. “We were defending a huge swath of the border, we fought to the death in the first hours of the attack,” said soldiers in one brigade after their former commander was arrested. “We were short of people, ammunition and support but we fought, we fought under the leadership of our commander!”

Ukraine no longer has the capacity to field the men nor the weapons to hold off the Russian advance. More land will be lost the longer the war goes on, and more men and weapons are not on their way. “The problem with Ukraine is not that they’re running out of money,” Marco Rubio said at his confirmation hearing for his nomination as secretary of state, “but that they’re running out of Ukrainians.”

Zelensky will need to blame someone higher up than the field commanders. In recent weeks, he’s laid some of that blame on Biden, complaining of insufficient support. “With all due respect to the United States and the administration,” Zelensky said in a podcast interview, “I don’t want the same situation like we had with Biden.”

One day, Zelensky will need to explain to Ukrainians his part in the tragedy. He will have to defend his decision to yield to the West’s pressure not to sign anything with Russia but to “just fight,” as then-British Prime Minister Boris Johnson reportedly put it. As American President Donald Trump said in his first Oval Office interview, "Zelensky... shouldn’t have allowed this to happen either. He’s no angel. Zelensky decided that 'I want to fight.’”

But that does not exonerate the U.S. or mean that Zelensky is unjustified in blaming Biden. Biden, too, is one day going to have to explain what the war in Ukraine was for subsequent to the promising talks in Istanbul. 

The Biden administration repeatedly promised Ukraine whatever they needed for as long as it takes. But that promise evolved into whatever we agree to for as long as convenient. And a clear answer to the question “Whatever they need to do what?” was never provided.

According to Biden National Security Council official Eric Green, U.S. support for Ukraine was never intended to push Russia out of its territory, recover its lost land, and reassert its territorial integrity.

“We were deliberately not talking about the territorial parameters,” Green said in an interview with Time. “The more important objective,” he explained, “was for Ukraine to survive as a sovereign, democratic country free to pursue integration with the West.” 

But reclaiming territory was all that was left for the Ukrainians after the West pressured them to keep fighting rather than abandon aspirations to join NATO. Neutrality for Kiev was “the key point” for Russian negotiators, according to one Ukrainian lawmaker who participated in peace talks. If an agreement had been made, a still-sovereign Ukraine would remain free to pursue economic and cultural—but not military—integration with the West.

Green’s assertion, at first, seems unlikely. The U.S. pushed Ukraine to carry out a counteroffensive in the Donbas and endorsed strikes on military targets in Crimea.

But that was for public consumption. Privately, they knew that Ukraine’s counteroffensive likely couldn’t succeed, that Kiev didn’t have the training or weapons needed to expel Russian forces from the Donbas. And, according to a report from early 2023, they knew it was not “a wise move” to recapture Crimea and were not “actively encouraging Ukraine” to do so.

If Biden was not prepared to give Ukraine whatever it needed to reclaim its territory, and if he was not prepared to offer Ukraine NATO membership, then what was American support for the war all about? Was it really just about weakening Russia or asserting NATO’s unchallenged right to expand wherever it wants, including right up to Russia’s borders? If so, then the people of Ukraine have been cruelly used by America. 

In the first weeks of the war, there was a plausible hope worth exploring that Ukraine might retain much of its territory while avoiding catastrophic bloodshed and destruction of lives. Washington chose a different path, and it is incumbent on Biden to explain why.

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/02/2025 - 08:10

Trump Orders First Airstrikes On Foreign Soil Since Taking Office

In apparent continuity with the GWOT era of the prior two decades, the Trump White House has announced the president ordered a wave of airstrikes on Islamic State cells in Somalia on Saturday, in the very first US strikes abroad since Donald Trump entered his second term.

The Pentagon announced that "multiple" terrorists were killed and that it further assessed no civilians were harmed. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said US Africa Command carried out the strikes as directed by Trump as Commander-in-Chief. Trump on social media hailed that the attacks destroyed the "caves" that ISIS terrorists live in.

"The strikes destroyed the caves they live in, and killed many terrorists without, in any way, harming civilians. Our Military has targeted this ISIS Attack Planner for years, but Biden and his cronies wouldn’t act quickly enough to get the job done. I did!" Trump wrote.

US DOD file image

"The message to ISIS and all others who would attack Americans is that “WE WILL FIND YOU, AND WE WILL KILL YOU!" - he added in caps.

But specifics haven't been offered, such as the identities of those targeted and killed, or the precise location. However the government of Somalia confirmed the operation was done with its approval and coordination.

"Our initial assessment is that multiple operatives were killed in the airstrikes and no civilians were harmed," Defense Secretary Hegseth said. "This action further degrades ISIS’s ability to plot and conduct terrorist attacks threatening U.S. citizens, our partners, and innocent civilians and sends a clear signal that the United States always stands ready to find and eliminate terrorists who threaten the United States and our allies."

The office of Somalia’s president announced that the operation "reinforces the strong security partnership" between the two countries in "combating extremist threats." Somalia "remains resolute in working with its allies to eliminate international terrorism and ensure regional stability," it said on X.

Past presidents have also targeted Somalia with similar such sporadic strikes against Islamist militants. It's part of the dangerous and ongoing post-9/11 trend of ordering acts of war on foreign soil but without any Congressional debate, review, or authorization whatsoever.

Libertarian and former Independent Congressman from Michigan Justin Amash complained about this lack of Congressional input:

Congress hasn’t authorized war in Somalia—even against ISIS. The separation of powers exists to protect both the liberty and safety of Americans. Offensive missile strikes are acts of war and can’t be justified without the express approval of Congress for the specific conflict.

...Presidents can’t declare war. No congressional authorization grants the power to target “terrorists” as a general grouping.

Continuing the decades-old tradition of bombing Somalia https://t.co/6YOG1zw0B9

— Dave DeCamp (@DecampDave) February 1, 2025

But hawks will look to the law enacted just days after 9/11, the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF), as providing legal cover and grounds for the president to do that. It has remained an extremely controversial law and position, granting wide and ambiguous powers to the Executive Branch.

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/02/2025 - 07:35

Avert your eyes! My Sunday morning look at incompetency, corruption and policy failures:

• Did a Private Equity Fire Truck Roll-Up Worsen the L.A. Fires? During the LA fires, dozens of fire trucks sat in the boneyard, waiting for repairs the city couldn’t afford. Why? A private equity roll-up made replacing and repairing those trucks much pricier. (BIG by Matt Stoller)

• Elmo Watch: Elon Musk rose to the top of video game charts. Now he has confessed to cheating. (Sad!) The world’s richest man has admitted to paying to boost his online warriors into global leaderboards, raising questions about his gaming prowess — and his need for digital praise. (Washington Post) see also Bill Gates calls Elon Musk’s embrace of far-right politicians abroad ‘insane shit’: Microsoft co-founder and philanthropist calls fellow tech titan ‘super-smart’ but guilty of ‘overreach’ (The Guardian)

• How to Cover Stupidity (Including Our Own): Writers in Europe are wrestling with a philosophical concept that lies at the heart of much journalism. (Columbia Journalism Review)

• The Players on the Eve of Destruction: The insanity of war has returned to our world. (Noahpinion)

• Americans are watching an inflation bait-and-switch A week into office, Trump has offered zero plans to lower prices. (Washington Post) see also Working Americans Turn to Food Banks as Fed Inflation Battle Drags On: US food banks are facing a wave of need driven by the cost-of-living crunch. (Bloomberg)

• A Spymaster Sheikh Controls a $1.5 Trillion Fortune. He Wants to Use It to Dominate AI: Tahnoun bin Zayed al Nahyan—the UAE’s chess-obsessed, jiujitsu-loving intelligence chief—controls vast sums of sovereign wealth. America’s AI giants are scrambling for a piece of it. (Wired)

• The inside story of Harris’ lost gamble on Joe Rogan, Beyoncé and a late Texas rally: A new book by Jonathan Allen of NBC News and Amie Parnes of The Hill has details about the Harris campaign’s botched attempt to schedule an interview with Joe Rogan. (NBC News)

• Inside a network of AI-generated newsletters targeting “small town America” Good Daily, which operates in 47 states and 355 towns and cities across the U.S., is run by one person. (Nieman Lab)

• It’s a Scam! It’s a Purge! It’s a Scam *and* a Purge: How to think about Trump’s plans for the federal workforce (Paul Krugman) see also Beware the “Deferred Resignation” Offer: A Legally Dubious Proposal for Federal Employees. (Just Security)

• Woody Johnson’s Jets: ‘Madden’ ratings, a lost season and ‘the most dysfunctional place imaginable’ Belichick described the owner’s approach to running the organization as “ready, fire, aim.” Many who have been part of the Jets organization during Johnson’s tenure heard that comment and agreed. Others pointed to the owner’s words on Oct. 15, the day the Jets acquired Adams, when Johnson said, “Thinking is overrated.” (New York Times)

Be sure to check out our Masters in Business interview this weekend with Torsten Slok, Partner and Chief Economist at Apollo Global Management. Torsten previously worked at Deutsche Bank for 15 years. For ten of those years, his team was top-ranked by Institutional Investor in fixed income and equities. He has also developed several content platforms at Apollo, including Apollo Academy and the Daily Spark.

 

How Dry Is Southern California Right Now?

Source: Wired

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Escobar: The Chihuahua Energy Policy - It's A Gas, Gas, Gas

Authored by Pepe Escobar,

Let’s start with the tale of an Empire bragging to the wind.

Mr. Disco Inferno orders OPEC and OPEC+ to lower the price of oil, because, in his mind, that may solve the war in Ukraine – as in forcing Moscow to the table because of dwindling energy revenues.

That in itself summarizes the level of garbage being fed to POTUS by his cornucopia of acronyms passing for intel.

Trump at Davos:

“I’m going to ask Saudi Arabia and OPEC to bring down the cost of oil (…) If the price came down, the Russia-Ukraine war would end immediately. Right now, the price is high enough that that war will continue (…) With oil prices going down, I’ll demand that interest rates drop immediately. And, likewise, they should be dropping all over the world. Interest rates should follow us.”

Quite predictably, OPEC+ – basically run by Saudi Arabia and Russia – said Nyet. Apart from the fact they don’t care much about interest rates, on the energy front they’ll keep doing what they have planned to do, including soon decreasing production, but at acceptable levels.

Standard Chartered, a major player, noted that OPEC has limited power to end the war immediately by reducing the oil price, with OPEC ministers considering this attempt at “strategy” as very inefficient and costly.

So much for imperial diktats.

The Chihuahua Strategic Victory Plan

As highlighted before, the U.S. – via fracking – has enough gas for domestic consumption, but not enough to export en masse to the EU, because of liquification problems. That explains why even buying more American energy for exorbitant prices, the EU de facto remains largely dependent on Russian LNG – and non-U.S. sources – since the sabotage of the Nord Streams, unveiled in detail by Sy Hersh.

Even at full capacity, the Empire of Chaos simply cannot deliver all the gas the EU needs; add to it virtually no investment in both badly needed extra exploration plus the infrastructure necessary to meet increased EU demand.

On the domestic U.S. oil market, things do get positively Kafkaesque. U.S. trucking – a massive service industry – is dependent on imported Russian diesel, which needs to be mixed with Made in America oil in order to be suitable for trucks.

Now cut again to Davos, which came and went barely registering a blip. Toxic EC Medusa von der Leyen told Davos that Europe had “substantially reduced”, and “in record time”, its dependency on Russian fossil fuels.

Nonsense. Europe’s energy reality is bleak. Russian LNG from Novatek is currently priced at around $4.5–$4.7 per MMBtu. That’s more expensive than pipeline gas but still much (italics mine) cheaper than American LNG.

Every industry pro from the Persian Gulf to Antwerp knows that Europe is now importing Russian LNG like it never did before. That’s it – or a dry death. In parallel, Russia will triple its LNG supply capacity by 2035. End result: whatever those “energy commissioners” in Brussels may come up with, Russia will remain essential when it comes to European energy security.

There are no limits – even stratospheric – for Eurocracy stupidity, which corrodes the system like a plague. The Europeans not only have managed to shut off their own gas pipelines but are still “investigating” the Nord Stream de facto terror attack.

End result: they are now importing more (italics mine) Russian gas, but by different means, from third-party suppliers, and paying a fortune.

This is what can be described as the Chihuahua Strategic Victory Plan.

U.S. Treasury sanctions Mr. Disco Inferno

Russia’s LNG exports hit a record high last year, growing by 4% – and delivering 33.6 million tons. The monthly record was 3.25 million tons in December 2024 – 13.7% more than November.

The largest Russian exporter is Yamal LNG: 21.1 million tons, 6% more than in 2023.

Now cut to proverbial American rumble, in the form of Assistant Secretary of State for Energy Resources Geoffrey Pyatt ordering the “full termination” of Russian gas exported to Europe.

To hell with what nations like Hungary, Austria and Slovakia may think – and do need.

Pyatt told the Atlantic Council, “Today we are the largest LNG exporter in the world, and by the end of the Trump administration, we will have doubled what we’re doing today […] The decision has clearly been made in Brussels to get to zero [gas supplies from Russia] by 2027…and the United States strongly supports that goal.”

Oh dear. Do these people even read the basic headlines?

As reported by Politico, the EU is “devouring” Russian gas at unprecedented levels since the start of 2025, importing 837,300 metric tons of LNG just in the first two weeks of the year.

The Ukraine transit deal was shut off for good – at least for now – starting on January 1st. The action now is on the maritime routes.

Enter the U.S. Treasury with a new – what else – sanctions package against Russian oil trade, targeting up to 5.8 million barrels a day shipped by sea.

As it stands, the global oil market is experiencing a surplus of about 0.8 million barrels a day. Oil prices for 2025 should remain at around $71 for a barrel of Brent crude (as it stands, it’s $76.2). Not exactly what Mr. Disco Inferno wants.

So let’s assume these 5.8 million barrels of Russian oil – under stiff sanctions – would vanish from the global market. In this case we would have oil prices skyrocketing to an average of $150 to $160 a barrel. Once again, not what Mr. Disco Inferno wants: he vociferously promised – and keeps promising – a MAGA oil superpower, while lowering oil prices to max $50 a barrel.

According to Russia’s 2025 budget, oil is priced at $65.9 a barrel.

If the U.S. Treasury manages to work its magic and “disappear” with those 5.8 million barrels, Russian revenues would go up to around $88.2 billion, even considering much lower exports.

High oil prices hurt American competitiveness. So somebody should tell Mr. Disco Inferno this U.S. Treasury gambit is actually more negative to Trumpian dreams than to Russia.

Across Eurasia, Russia is sitting pretty, especially with its BRICS partners. Power of Siberia to China is on a roll, and Power of Siberia II should start operating by 2030. A boost on LNG exports to Iran is a done deal – especially after the signing of the strategic partnership earlier this month.

This year a deal will also be signed in Russia to transport LNG to Afghanistan via tanker convoys. Next step will be Pipelineistan: perhaps, finally, the necessary steps to build a variant of TAPI (the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India) pipeline, but with gas coming from Russia.

The biggest customer for Russian LNG, apart from China, is of course BRICS partner India. It’s in the interests of Russia, Iran, Afghanistan and India to have a stabilized Pakistan – not an Islamabad remote-controlled by Washington, as in the current setup – for the final opening of Russian LNG routes to India. That will happen, in time.

As for the European chihuahuas, enjoy your “strategic defeat” fantasies. Keep yapping – and buying Russian LNG.

Tyler Durden Sat, 02/01/2025 - 23:20

Widely Used Chinese-Made Health Monitor Using 'Backdoor' To Send Patient Data To Chinese IP Address

They've hacked everything else in the U.S., so why would we be surprised to find out that patient health data collected by Chinese-made health monitors was being sent, via 'backdoor' to China. 

Now China has access to Janet Yellen's photos (god we hope there's no nudes) and your blood pressure on a random Tuesday. 

The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) warns that Contec CMS8000, a widely used patient monitoring device, contains a backdoor that transmits patient data to a remote IP and downloads executable files, according to BleepingComputer.

Contec, a China-based healthcare tech company, produces various medical devices. CISA was alerted by an external researcher and, after testing the device’s firmware, found unusual network traffic linking to a hard-coded external IP tied to a university, not the company.

CISA discovered a backdoor in Contec CMS8000 firmware, enabling remote execution and full control of patient monitors. The device also secretly transmits patient data to a hard-coded IP upon startup, with no logs to alert administrators.

Though CISA withheld details, BleepingComputer linked the IP to a Chinese university, and the same address appears in other medical devices, including a pregnancy monitor. The FDA confirmed the backdoor also exists in Epsimed MN-120 monitors, rebranded versions of Contec CMS8000.

The BleepingComputer report says:

On analyzing the firmware, CISA found that one of the device's executables, 'monitor,' contains a backdoor that issues a series of Linux commands that enable the device's network adapter (eth0) and then attempts to mount a remote NFS share at the hard-coded IP address belonging to the university.

The NFS share is mounted at /mnt/ and the backdoor recursively copies the files from the /mnt/ folder to the /opt/bin folder.

The backdoor will continue to copy files from /opt/bin to the /opt folder and, when done, unmount the remote NFS share.

"Though the /opt/bin directory is not part of default Linux installations, it is nonetheless a common Linux directory structure," explains CISA's advisory.

CISA warned: "Generally, Linux stores third-party software installations in the /opt directory and thirdparty binaries in the /opt/bin directory. The ability to overwrite files within the /opt/bin directory provides a powerful primitive for remotely taking over the device and remotely altering the device configuration."

"Additionally, the use of symbolic links could provide a primitive to overwrite files anywhere on the device filesystem. When executed, this function offers a formidable primitive allowing for a third-party operating at the hard-coded IP address to potentially take full control of the device remotely."

You can read more of the technicals on the backdoor here. Oh, and go ahead and keep plugging your personal data into Deepseek, we're sure that's just fine. 

Tyler Durden Sat, 02/01/2025 - 22:45

Former Federal Reserve Adviser Arrested For Allegedly Passing US Trade Secrets To China

Authored by Eva Fu via The Epoch Times,

Prosecutors on Jan. 31 arrested a former senior Federal Reserve advisor, accusing him of stealing trade secrets from the agency that could allow China to manipulate the U.S. market.

John Harold Rogers, 63, worked for 11 years as a senior advisor for the international finance division of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, the main governing body for the U.S. central bank.

A federal indictment alleged that Rogers began working with Chinese conspirators since at least 2018. The Chinese handlers worked for the Chinese intelligence and security apparatus and posed as graduate students at a Chinese university, according to the filing.

Rogers, in the collaboration, allegedly solicited trade-secret information that included proprietary economic data sets, China tariff deliberations, and briefing books for specific board governors. He also allegedly solicited internal discussions and forthcoming announcements from the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), a 12-member body consisting of the seven Federal Reserve board of governors, the New York Federal Reserve Bank president, and four of the remaining 11 Reserve Bank presidents that rotate on an annual basis.

Such confidential information is economically valuable, prosecutors noted. By knowing in advance U.S. economic policy, such as federal funds rate changes, China can gain an advantage in selling or buying U.S. bonds and securities in a manner not unlike insider trading, prosecutors said in a Department of Justice (DOJ) statement.

The Federal Reserve’s international finance division is in charge of basic research, policy analysis, and reporting of areas such as foreign economic activity, U.S. trade and capital outflow, and developments in international financial markets and institutions, the agency’s website states.

Rogers is charged with conspiracy to commit economic espionage and with making false statements. A judge ordered Rogers to be held until a detention hearing on Feb. 4, a spokesperson from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Washington told The Epoch Times. The charges carry a total of 20 years in prison on top of up to $5 million in fines.

“Let this indictment serve as a warning to all who seek to betray or exploit the United States: law enforcement will find you and hold you accountable,” said interim U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Edward Martin, who President Donald Trump appointed minutes after taking office on Jan. 20.

FBI assistant director in charge, David Sundberg, said his agency aims to protect U.S. national security interests.

“The Chinese Communist Party has expanded its economic espionage campaign to target U.S. government financial policies and trade secrets in an effort to undermine the U.S. and become the sole superpower,” he said in the DOJ statement.

Ed Martin speaks at an event in Washington on June 13, 2023. Martin is the current U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia. Amanda Andrade-Rhoades/AP Photo

Meetings Under Another Purpose

One of the Chinese handlers, identified in the indictment as co-conspirator 1, presented himself as a graduate student at China’s Shandong University of Finance and Economics who was interested in learning about sensitive U.S. fiscal policy to benefit the eastern Chinese province. He approached Rogers in May 2013 after creating an email that he used almost exclusively with Rogers and a handful of Rogers’s associates, according to the document. When Rogers shared that he was beginning a new project with a Chinese co-author on monetary policy, the co-conspirator allegedly invited Rogers to visit his research institute, offering to cover his airfare and hotel on the trip.

Court documents allege that Rogers took up the offer and visited China twice in 2017, telling the co-conspirator, on his second trip, that he wanted to stay in the same hotel, saying “That place was great!”

The co-conspirator purported to be working on an essay around May 2018 and requested information about the Federal Reserve’s policy measures and timetable, including its responses to China-related issues, the indictment alleges.

Rogers emailed his colleagues for input, including U.S.–China trade issues, Federal Reserve staff’s thinking on exchange rates, and views on the market-clearing price of the Chinese currency, prosecutors said. He boarded a Shanghai-bound flight days after. On May 10, 2018, Rogers emailed one document his colleague sent him to the co-conspirator, the indictment shows.

That September, the two began to discuss their meetings in more veiled terms, according to prosecutors.

At Rogers’s request, they allegedly described those activities as classes so they would appear “legitimate in the eyes of the Fed,” prosecutors noted.

Between then and February 2022, they discussed hosting about a dozen such classes in Chinese hotel rooms, according to message records the investigators intercepted.

Some of these meetings focused on forecasting Federal Reserve policy trends. One of them, initiated in late November 2018, was titled “the trend of U.S. monetary policy in 2019,” according to the indictment. The Chinese co-conspirator, the filing said, asked for an “official fed statement and presentation from current FOMC members.”

The “topic is perfect,” Rogers allegedly responded. He emailed a colleague for the “most straightforward way of accessing” Federal Reserve’s forecast data, as far back as 1994, the prosecutors said.

Rogers allegedly held the said “class” on Dec. 10, 2018, with a man identified as “Jack,” before meeting the Chinese co-conspirator for dinner. On Dec. 20, 2018, a day after a Fed interest rate hike, Rogers allegedly wrote to the co-conspirator alerting him to the change.

The Chinese co-conspirator’s response indicates Rogers had discussed the issue during the earlier meeting.

“Aha, just like what we talked about at dinner,” the co-conspirator wrote, according to the court document.

The pair talked about setting up three more “classes” in Shanghai and Beijing to cover “how the Fed will shrink the balance-sheet in 2019” and the U.S. economic situation in the first half of 2019 in the following months, according to the federal filing.

On June 19, 2019, five days after Rogers flew to Beijing for one of the meetings, the Federal Reserve announced it wouldn’t cut rates but cut the word “patient” in describing the monetary policy outlook, a hint for future actions.

“Same as you predicted!” the co-conspirator allegedly wrote to Rogers.

Rogers allegedly obtained or attempted to access at least six trade secrets for Chinese officials, according to the indictment. Among them were a briefing book dated October 2018 titled “International Economic Topics”; summary and assessment of a European Central Bank announcement dated March 7, 2019, labeled sensitive; a sensitive June 6, 2019 document that contains briefing notes to the Federal Reserve board, and spreadsheets containing proprietary information from the board, according to prosecutors.

The filing alleged that Rogers obtained the board governor’s briefing book, which contained a bold red warning “do not disseminate,” from a colleague by stating it was for his personal use as a “concrete example of ‘information flow.’”

Against his colleague’s request, Rogers allegedly forwarded the document to his personal account, court documents note. Rogers, in October 2018, also allegedly sent internal files on trade policy uncertainty and U.S. investment to the Chinese co-conspirator.

Rogers denied his China ties when the Federal Reserve Board Office of Inspector General investigated in February 2020. Asked in a recorded interview whether he had shared restricted board information with anyone outside of the board, Rogers allegedly responded, “Never.”

He insisted that he had refused money from the Chinese co-conspirator, according to the indictment.

“I set them straight. Don’t put this money in front of me,” he was quoted as saying.

The pair’s connection apparently continued after that, prosecutors say.

In February 2022, the co-conspirator messaged Rogers, inviting him and his wife to Shandong’s Qingdao City for a “class,” the court filing said.

“All related expenses will be covered by us, and we can pay for the class,” the co-conspirator allegedly said.

It’s unclear how or if Rogers responded to the message. But in August 2023, investigators said, Rogers emailed his former colleagues still with the Federal Reserve Board and asked for two internal Excel spreadsheets.

In 2023, Rogers was paid approximately $450,000 as a part-time professor at a Chinese university, according to the DOJ.

Tyler Durden Sat, 02/01/2025 - 22:10

One 21-Year-Old Who Worked A "Mass Scamming Call Center" In Dubai Blows The Whistle

Ever wonder who the sociopaths are you see in Netflix documentaries, catfishing people from the internet using dating apps?

Well, look no further. Australia's News.com.au profiled one such person this week, a young worker inside of a "mass scamming call center". 

The person, named "Beard", said that he "fled war-torn Syria for Dubai" and was desperately looking for work. Thinking he landed an advertising role, he told news.com.au he found himself at a "bizarre office location in the middle of the Dubai desert where those inside tried to confiscate his passport".

He was eventually held captive and forced to scam people for a living, the report says. 

Then he became part of a large-scale “pig butchering” romance scam operation, designed to swindle unsuspecting victims out of their money. News.com.au said this type of fraud devastates thousands of Australians annually.

Beard worked night shifts, 12 hours a day, six days a week, pretending to be a woman named Annie to deceive victims. The scam center housed over 1,000 workers, mostly foreign migrants from Africa and India, all controlled by a Chinese-run syndicate. Workers were confined to the premises, only leaving to buy food from vendors serving the scammers.

Victims, already catfished on dating apps, believed they were chatting with a woman who led a glamorous lifestyle. Beard’s job was to extract financial information and convince them to invest in cryptocurrency.

“It’s not the important information I give them,” he explained. “It’s the important information I got out of them.”

A real woman, half-Turkish, half-Ukrainian, was employed to take brief video calls to reassure victims they weren’t being scammed. “She had a line of people waiting for her to also talk to other victims.”

Beard typically juggled 12 victims at once before handing them over to another team that finalized the scam, the report said.

Despite working inside the operation, Beard never scammed anyone. Instead, he deliberately stalled conversations and warned victims about the risks of crypto investments.

Inspired by YouTube scam-buster Jim Browning, he secretly sent videos and photos from inside the scam center. When he finally decided to leave, he tricked the scammers into letting him go by claiming he needed to return home.

After he left, the scam center eventually shut down.

“The joke is that these scams gave me an incentive to work for them,” he concluded. “Like I had a bed, Wi-Fi, electricity, and water all covered. If someone gets a legal job with worse conditions, they’d be incentivized to go back to the scam centers.”

Tyler Durden Sat, 02/01/2025 - 21:35

Trump's Big-Stick Strategy Will Make America Respected Again

Authored by Connor Vasile via RealClearPolitics.com,

Despite his best efforts at saber-rattling, Colombia’s socialist president Gustavo Petro bent the knee and agreed to take in American deportation flights carrying Colombian nationals, after only a day of receiving tariff threats from President Donald Trump.

While America and Colombia have been long-time partners in coordinating anti-narcotics efforts, newly elected President Trump hit a sore spot this past Sunday after he commenced deportation flights to the South American country. While world leaders reasonably expected Trump to execute his immigration policy the moment he stepped back into the Oval Office, this knee-jerk resistance from Petro only exposes the corrupt and unbalanced relationship the United States has had with Colombia for the past four years under the Biden-Harris administration.

Under Biden, South and Central American countries had a free pass to send their citizens, freed criminals, and other migrants to America’s doorstep without repercussions. For the past four years, the Biden administration wrote a blank check to allow any and all migrants into our nation, without even a background check. This has led to a swelling of migrant gangs such as Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua, which has been busy at work committing violent crime – including murders and rapes – on American soil. Thanks to Biden’s “humanitarian policy,” countries like Venezuela have emptied their prisons and have encouraged migrants to pass through with the promise of attaining the “American dream” in the form of free cell phones, food, and even housing at the expense of the American taxpayer. There’s one issue: Trump is back.

With U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) ramping up deportation efforts of violent illegal aliens, the countries which for so long have benefited from the Democrats’ open-border approach are now forced to address the migrant crisis and take back the citizens they’ve abandoned time and time again. Colombia’s Petro is one of the first to actively resist Trump’s efforts to repatriate Colombian citizens, announcing: “From today on, Colombia is open to the entire world, with open arms.” Petro also tweeted out: “The U.S. cannot treat Colombian migrants as criminals,” and “We are the opposite of the Nazis.”

Trump responded, declaring that an immediate 25% tariff on “all goods” coming into the States from Colombia will be enacted; in one week’s time, the tariff would be raised to 50%. Petro responded in the like, announcing his own 25% tax on American goods, if Trump keeps to his word: “Your blockade does not scare me, because Colombia, besides being the country of beauty, is the heart of the world.”

The Inconvenient Truth: Tariffs Are Effective

Despite Petro’s poetic declarations, it appears he is all bark and no bite; within 24 hours of sparring with President Trump, Petro bent the knee and agreed to take in America’s deportation flights, ensuring that Colombia will, “facilitate the dignified return of the compatriots who were to arrive in the country this morning from deportation flights … [th]is measure responds to the Government's commitment to guarantee decent conditions.”

In fact, Trump’s tariff threat was so effective, Petro quickly agreed to all of Trump’s terms regarding facilitating deportation efforts; so much for being “open to the entire world.”

Petro even offered his own presidential plane to pick up migrants in Honduras in a good faith effort not to disrespect American sovereignty again.

This nimble victory on migration policy isn’t just a nod to how effective Trump’s diplomatic strategy is on the world’s stage. It also highlights a fear establishment politicians and the legacy media have been dreading: Protectionism works.

While the talking heads of CNN, CNBC, NBC and others are quick to fear-monger and forecast the potential price hikes associated with hypothetical tariffs on foreign goods, they conveniently ignore one important aspect of announcing tariffs: leverage.

For the past four years, America has been the world’s laughing-stock. Under Biden, we have experienced war in Ukraine, renewed Chinese efforts to invade Taiwan, the funding of Islamic terrorism in the Middle East, a Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, and blatant spying on American soil. The world has taken American for granted, betting on a weak and ineffective commander in chief to do their bidding and continuously fund their morally questionable policies.

Protectionism Will Be a Diplomatic Strategy, Not an Economic One

With Trump back in the picture, the threat of tariffs shows that America means business after four long years of inept (and absent) leadership. While academics, “classical liberals,” and politicians decry Trump’s use of tariffs as “anti-democratic,” they fail to address tariffs in action. Trump needed only to voice the possibility of tariffs if Colombia did not take back its own citizens. Petro knows better than to spar head-to-head with Trump, as do most other world leaders; the threat of tariffs is sufficient to get countries to step in line. No actual tariffs need to be put in place if American foreign policy is respected. Colombia is the textbook case: Trump rescinded his order after Petro conceded.

In short, tariffs signal to allies and adversaries alike that we are serious about our policies and expect others to pay their fair share. Where have we heard this before?

China seems to already be following suit, having recently agreed to take back illegal immigrants in the wake of potential Trump tariffs.

Protectionism is back, but in a different way: It will be used to remind the world that it should respect America for the billions of taxpayer dollars the federal government disperses every year to subsidize foreign industries. Countries can no longer profit carte blanche off of an American welfare state. If they want fair and free trade relations with the United States, they must do their part to collaborate on important foreign policy matters like the repatriation of their own citizens. They should look to El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele and his success for inspiration.

Play fairly, or pay the price, it’s as simple as that. It’s what’s equitable in the end, anyway.

Tyler Durden Sat, 02/01/2025 - 21:00

Mexico's President Claims She Has 'Plan A, Plan B, Plan C' In Response To Trump Tariffs

Only a few days ago the president of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum, was questioning with some skepticism whether or not Donald Trump would actually follow through on his threats of 25% tariffs on most Mexican-made goods.  "We don't think it's going to happen," Sheinbaum said at her regular morning press conference. "And if it does happen, we also have our plan."

As of the 1st of February it appears that her doubts have been put to rest.  Donald Trump has reiterated that he is going to stick to his tariff plan and that it will not be incremental.  Around 80% of all Mexican exports go to the US, which means that the majority of their manufacturing base will be immediately hit with a drop in US retail demand.  Mexican business leaders say this will trigger a number of bankruptcies and higher unemployment in border cities.  

Sheinbam claims in a recent press conference that she has a 'Plan A, Plan B and Plan C' in the face of high tariffs, but what does she really mean?  What would Mexico's response be, specifically?

First and foremost, Sheinbaum has threatened retaliatory tariffs on US exports to Mexico, her "Plan A".  Around 15% of US exports end up south of the border, however, Mexico is far more export dependent than the US.  Only 10% of the US economy is based on exports while 43% of Mexico's economy relies on exports according to the World Bank.  In other words, tariffs will hurt them a lot more than they'll hurt America.  

Like most establishment media economists, Mexico also argues that the US consumer will have to eat the inflation in prices that comes with tariffs.  This is assuming, though, that there are no alternatives to the Mexican goods being imported.  Car parts, electrical equipment, oil and gas, fruits and vegetables are a few of the biggest markets for Mexican goods.  The US produces close to 90% of the food that Americans purchase and Trump has indicated that energy may be exempt from tariffs.

The Mexican President's Plan B and Plan C are not so clear.  It is likely that Sheinbaum will seek aid from other Latin American governments, either to establish economic agreements to help lessen the pain of US tariffs, or as a means to put pressure on Trump through organized geopolitical sparring.  Most of these countries also have favorable trade imbalances with the US and none of them hold much international weight. 

The real leverage that Mexico has in harming the US is through mass immigration, which siphons hundreds of billions in taxpayer dollars, untold billions in untaxed wages, untold billions in subsidies, hundreds of millions in foreign aid each year that's meant to stop immigration - The list goes on and on.  Then there's the inflation in housing and goods caused by the extra demand of tens-of-millions of illegals, along with the wage depletion caused by foreign workers taking around 30% less pay than the average American worker.

Of course, Mexico has already been allowing illegal immigrants to flood into the US for decades, so it's not much of a threat anymore.

Mexico's response to Trump's tariffs will be to capitulate, the only question is how long will it take them to realize that this is their only option.  Sheinbaum behaves like most leftists/socialists in that she is often sarcastic, petulant and unruly in her rhetoric, but it's all a show.  Once Mexico understands that their prosperity is entirely contingent on US benevolence, they will fold and then act like victims.  

Victims of normal trade restrictions and normal border laws that they have violated for years while feeding parasitically off the US.     

Tyler Durden Sat, 02/01/2025 - 20:25

John Brennan's Protests To President Trump Lifting His Security Clearances Are Absurd

Authored by Fred Fleitz via American Greatness,

Former CIA Director John Brennan is angry that President Trump signed an executive order last week lifting his security clearances.

The president took this action because Brennan was one of 51 former intelligence officers who meddled in the 2020 presidential election by signing a letter they knew falsely claimed a damaging press story about a laptop owned by President Biden’s son Hunter was Russian disinformation.

Brennan indignantly asserted in an MSNBC interview that President Trump’s action was “bizarre” and said he misrepresented the laptop letter, claiming that based on their intelligence experience, the signatories were “deeply suspicious that the Russian government played a significant role in this case.”

Brennan also said he needs to hold security clearances as a former intelligence officer so administration officials can consult with him on national security matters.

Brennan’s objections are absurd and justify the President’s executive order.

Brennan’s claims defending the laptop letter are patently false. The 51 former intelligence officers did not sign the letter as a well-intentioned initiative to warn the American people about a possible Russian attempt to influence the outcome of the 2020 presidential election. They knew this wasn’t true.

We know this because one of the principal organizers of the letter, former acting CIA Director Michael Morell, testified during an investigation by the House Judiciary and Intelligence Committees about the letter’s purpose:

“There were two intents. One intent was to share our concern with the American people that the Russians were playing on this issue, and two, it was to help Vice President Biden.”

The House investigation also found that the letter signers were informed “of the intent of the statement prior to its publication, writing that the statement was meant to insulate Vice President Biden from serious electoral vulnerabilities created by his family’s influence peddling activities.”

This means there can be no doubt the laptop letter was an attempt by the 51 former intelligence officers to misuse their intelligence careers to provide political cover for Biden from damaging information that could have cost him the election.

They knowingly misled the American people to give Biden a talking point to discredit the laptop story during the final presidential debate, held on October 22, 2020.

There can be no doubt John Brennan knew about all of this.

Brennan also made the preposterous argument that he only held security clearances as a former CIA officer so he could be a resource for the U.S. government. He said in an MSNBC interview:

“The only reason I still had a clearance, as I have had for years since leaving government service, was for the benefit of the government. It was to facilitate classified discussions, should the CIA or any agency need to consult with me or other former directors and members of the intelligence community.”

I don’t doubt that the deeply incompetent Biden administration sought counsel on classified national security matters from disgraced former intelligence officers like John Brennan. However, there is zero chance that anyone in the second Trump administration will ever consult someone like Brennan on any issue.

Brennan omitted the real reason he and most other laptop letter signers held security clearances after they left their intelligence jobs—to make money.

High-level security clearances can be very lucrative for former U.S. government employees because they enable them to obtain highly paid contracts and jobs with defense firms and Beltway consulting companies that do business with intelligence and defense agencies. After intelligence officers retire, many retain their security clearances and return to their old offices as highly paid contractors.

Since resigning as CIA director in January 2017, John Brennan has worked for or advised several defense and intelligence contractors.

He served as Chairman of the Intelligence and National Security Alliance (INSA) and CEO of The Analysis Corporation (TAC).

In addition, at least two signers of the Hunter Biden laptop letter, Michael Morell and Jeremy Bash, reportedly have made vast amounts of money working with “special purpose acquisition companies” (SPACs) created to cash in on surging investments by U.S. intelligence agencies in emerging technologies.

Holding a U.S. government security clearance after an intelligence officer resigns is not an entitlement, as John Brennan has implied. It is a privilege that should only be extended when it is in the interest of the U.S. government. Former intelligence officers who use their profession to meddle in elections and mislead the American people undermine our democracy and the U.S. Intelligence Community. They do not deserve the privilege of holding post-employment security clearances.

The Hunter Biden laptop letter scandal also has shed light on the corrupt practice of senior intelligence officers maneuvering to keep their security clearances to enrich themselves after they leave government service and not to promote the security of the United States. The Trump administration must investigate and reform this corrupt practice to ensure that only a limited number of former intelligence officers are permitted to retain their security clearances for urgent national security reasons and on a time-limited basis.

Former CIA Director John Brennan and the other signers of the Hunter Biden laptop letter betrayed their country and their professions by misleading the American people to affect the outcome of the 2020 presidential election. They should not only be stripped of their security clearances but also barred access to all U.S. government national security buildings and facilities.

CIA employees should never again bump into John Brennan in the agency cafeteria.

Tyler Durden Sat, 02/01/2025 - 19:50