The French are rioting because Macron, who lost his parliamentary majority last summer, decided to ram through his changes to the retirement system without a vote of the National Assembly.
In other words, he thinks he's king.
Friday, March 24, 2023
Thursday, March 23, 2023
Ron DeSantis missteps, tries to weasel out of his characterization of the Russian invasion of Ukraine as a "territorial dispute"
One message for Tucker Carlson viewers, another for "neocons".
But trying to thread that needle is a fool's errand.
Ron DeSantis obviously isn't ready for this yet. No one thinks any part of Ukraine is Russian territory, especially since Russia agreed to the new borders in the 1994 Budapest Memorandum.
DeSantis could elevate himself by pointing out that Ukraine also pledged itself to neutrality in that agreement, and that Ukraine should return to that position instead of seeking EU and NATO membership.
Unfortunately, it appears that DeSantis, and the rest of the field, needs to let Trump become the candidate and lose again in order to cleanse the GOP of Trump once and for all.
DeSantis would be better positioned for 2028 anyway, when the Russia-Ukraine conflict enters its sixth year, at which time he can better Monday morning quarterback the whole thing. He will turn 50 in 2028. He has time. He needs time.
'Well, I think it's been mischaracterized. Obviously, Russia invaded — that was wrong. They invaded Crimea and took that in 2014 — That was wrong,' DeSantis told Piers Morgan in an interview more than a week after his initial comments. ...
'What I'm referring to is where the fighting is going on now which is that eastern border region Donbas, and then Crimea, and you have a situation where Russia has had that. I don't think legitimately but they had,' he said.
More.
Wednesday, March 22, 2023
Soft-on-sex-crime liberal Democrat in Wisconsin could make it to its Supreme Court on April 4
The Kelly commercial isn’t the first to attack Protasiewicz’s sentencing record. Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce, the state’s largest business association, launched an ad campaign highlighting multiple convicted rapists and pedophiles who received light sentences from Protasiewicz.
More.
Worlds in collision: Jeb Bush and Pat Buchanan both go out of their way as 2024 looms to find things to like in Ron DeSantis
Everyone is exhausted by you know who.
Piers Morgan interviews Ron DeSantis
I asked him if he was familiar with the story of Frankenstein, and he said he’d seen the movie.
“And you’re alluding to what?” he smirked, knowing full well what I was alluding to.
“Dr. Frankenstein creates a monster, then loses control of the monster, and then the monster ends up killing him,” I reminded him. “You know the parallel I’m making …”
He chuckled. “Let’s put the country first rather than worry about any personalities or any type of individual … at the end of the day, I’m a vessel for the aspirations of the people I represent. It’s not about me — as Ronald Reagan said, ‘There’s no limit to what you can accomplish if you don’t care who gets the credit.’ ”
“That’s true,” I replied, “but you’re up against somebody who definitely cares who gets the credit, and who’s desperate to want to win back the White House.”
More.
Byron York is crystal clear, as usual
Five things to remember about a 'zombie' Trump indictment
3) The "zombie" timing.
Bragg's indictment, if it comes, is often referred to as a "zombie" case
because federal officials earlier declined to prosecute Trump on these
grounds, and then Bragg himself considered and rejected a prosecution on
the same grounds. Now, with time running out on the statute of
limitations and to charge Trump before the 2024 presidential campaign is
fully underway, Bragg has flip-flopped. The "zombie" case has been
revived and is apparently going full speed ahead.
Tuesday, March 21, 2023
Monday, March 20, 2023
The prediction of the end of humanity ain't happenin', so Greta Thunberg has deleted it
But the internet is forever.
Sunday, March 19, 2023
Never murder a man who is committing suicide -- Woodrow Wilson 1916
He, meteor-like, flames lawless through the void,
Destroying others, by himself destroy'd.
-- Alexander Pope
Saturday, March 18, 2023
US Treasury yields have tanked 14% since March 8 amid bank failure fears
The yield curve aggregate averaged 4.674 on March 8. Now it averages 4.017.
Bills yields fell from an average 5.09 to 4.52 in nine days, 11%, after rising 6.5% in the month 2/8 to 3/8.
Notes yields fell from 4.45 to 3.55, a whopping 20%, after rising over 12% in the month after 2/8.
Bonds yields fell from 4.00 to 3.68, 8%, after rising nearly 6% in the month after 2/8.
It's been extremely difficult to trade the volatility. $TLT is up 5.31% ytd., but $AGG is up just 1.99% ytd. It is a fool's errand to invest in bonds when they behave like stocks.
Meanwhile $SPX is up 2.42% ytd.
This is my opinion, not advice.
Friday, March 17, 2023
Today's toxic assets, if you're a bank, are AAA-rated 30-year fixed rate mortgages from 2020-2021, and 10-year and 20-year US Treasuries of the same vintage
A bank would normally keep AAA assets happily, and hold them to maturity in many instances.
Having to sell them in a rising interest rate environment is where all hell can break loose.
No one wants to buy a UST paying 0.89% when T-bills pay 4.5%, so you have to sell it at a loss to raise cash.
A bank without cash is a failed bank.
Be kind to your banker. He's not having a good week. Even if he didn't pay you interest like he should have since 2008.
Thursday, March 16, 2023
Discount window bailout operations for banks are now officially worse in magnitude than in 2008, though not in scope
We don't have 500 bank failures.
What we do have is Dodd-Frank 2010 limits on deposit insurance not keeping up with 2023 realities.
Unless Congress steps in and helps high depositors, there will be an exodus of high depositor accounts all across the country to money center banks which have too big to fail status and an FDIC put as systemically important enough to backstop.
This would mean many local banks will come under stress and at minimum weaken local economies even if they don't fail.
We do not need the big banks to become any more powerful than they already are.
And we certainly must not weaken local economies.
The reasons in the plumbing don't matter at this point. It's too late for that.
The $250k limit has to change. The authorities at the Fed, Treasury, and FDIC are constrained by that in what it is permissible for them to do.
Call your Senator.
Call your Representative.
Wednesday, March 15, 2023
Moody's missed not only Signature Bank's problems, but Silicon Valley Bank's as well
On Wednesday March 8, Moody’s still had an A3 rating on SVB Financial, owner of the now defunct Silicon Valley Bank, as it was already collapsing for all to see. Four notches into investment grade – a very respectable rating!
More.
Women are twice as likely to be traitors
A 2021 McKinsey study found that women leaders, compared with men at their same level, were about twice as likely to spend substantial time on collaborative efforts that fell outside their formal job.
We need less of that, not more, Heidi.
GOP candidate positions on Ukraine demonstrate nothing but groveling to the anti-war right
And the kernel there is pretending things that are not true, the mark of an unserious country.
Nikki Haley is simply incoherent. She says we have to win this war, but without more financial assistance.
“I don’t think we need to put money in Ukraine,” Haley said last week before an audience in Iowa. ... “This is not a war about Ukraine, this is a war about freedom—and it’s one that we have to win,” Haley said. “If we win this war, this will send a message to China, it will send a message to Iran, it will send a message to North Korea, it will send a message to Russia. If we lose this war… they said Poland and the Baltics are next, and you’re looking at a world war.”
Ron DeSantis pretends Russia never invaded and simply has a territorial dispute with Ukraine.
“While the U.S. has many vital national interests—securing our borders, addressing the crisis of readiness within our military, achieving energy security and independence, and checking the economic, cultural, and military power of the Chinese Communist Party—becoming further entangled in a territorial dispute between Ukraine and Russia is not one of them,” DeSantis told Fox News host Tucker Carlson this week.
And The Daily Beast isn't wrong about Donald Trump's position, who to this day touts the myth that he is some great deal-maker who can untie the Gordian Knot:
Former President Donald Trump has said he would have let Russia “take over” parts of Ukraine if he were still in the White House.
It is also the case that there is plenty of pretending on the other side, that the West wasn't responsible for the Ukrainian revolution of 2014 which ultimately provoked the current conflict.
Statesmen tell hard truths to their people. But none of ours seem capable of telling even the simple ones, including Joe Biden.
Tuesday, March 14, 2023
Inflation remains a big problem in today's Consumer Price Index data
Services inflation is driving inflation now, 7.6% year over year in February. In a primarily service economy that's deeply serious. Wage and salary increases have penetrated deeply into everything, driving up the cost of using the services those people provide.
Electricity inflation is running at 12.9% year over year.
Food inflation is still running at 9.5% year over year.
Overall core inflation in this data is at 5.5% year over year, more than double than under Trump.
The fools at Moody's have just cut their outlook for American banking to negative, but don't take it too seriously
The story is here.
As recently as the end of January, Moody's had rated Signature Bank, the bank which failed spectacularly over the weekend, investment grade.
Moody's completely missed the problems with Signature.
Their sweeping warnings in the wake of this miss should be taken with a truckload of salt. They're just trying to save face.
Monday, March 13, 2023
You remember the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform legislation, right?
Chickens . . . comin' home . . . to roost!
Studies have found the Dodd–Frank Act has improved financial stability . . . lol
Sunday, March 12, 2023
The wizards of smart at Silicon Valley Bank loaded up on mortgage backed securities in the last few years, and when they needed to raise cash recently they had to sell some at a big loss
$1.8 billion.
That sparked the run.
The problems have been known for months by people like Chris Whalen.
This guy below actually tweeted out some particulars in January. This was no surprise.
Except to the federal regulators, who were completely asleep at the switch.
This is what happens when your bond portfolio is full of low-yielding securities. No one wants them when you have to sell them in the new higher interest rate environment. It's not a problem if you will "hold to maturity".
SVB wasn't very smart loading up on this stuff. Apparently they did not even hedge this otherwise foolish over-large position.
Hell, it's probably all California MBS, too. Think the outrageously overpriced homes, refinanced at rock bottom rates, of the very elite who have all their personal and business banking at SVB which is now blowing up. And all the second tier businesses and their employees dependent on them.
It's an inferno devouring their wealth from every side.
And they are screaming like stuck pigs for a bailout.
Friday, March 10, 2023
Stuff that's been in the news since March 6th
Xi Jinpingpong blamed the US for the first time for his domestic failures, according to the Wall Street Journal. He's a commie reactionary with Chinese characteristics. Not a good sign of what's to come.
Some cracker Republican in Florida wants bloggers to register like lobbyists, and Ron DeSantis finally came out against that, thankfully. A little late, though. Newt beat him to it.
Vivek Ramaswamy says CPAC shook him down for $$$$ in exchange for which they'd see to it he did better in the straw poll. There's no report that Matt Schlapp also asked for a reach-around.
LIBOR surpassed 5% for the first time in 15 years on Monday.
Georgia fired up a nuclear power reactor this week. The country now has 93 operating. 67 were never finished after Three Mile Island.
A dog and her pups were rescued alive and well from a basement in Turkey more than a month after the Feb 6 earthquake. The death toll is up to 52k.
Thousands of Iranian schoolgirls are being systematically poisoned in Iran. There was a similar incident in Afghanistan during the first Obama administration. Rag-headed heathen bastards.
South Africa is going the way of Rhodesia.
The UST yield curve aggregate made a new high 4.674% Wednesday v Fed Funds Effective Rate 4.57.
The Obama of Big Oil said peak production from 2019 will never be surpassed.
Pundits who predict inflation won't spiral like the 1970s fail to understand that the price of energy inputs is determinative. Unless energy costs come down big, we're in for it.
Cumulative deaths per million from C-19 in the US are 3,285. In Africa just 181. Follow the science.
The tide is turning on the Wuhan Lab Leak Theory of the origin of C-19 in the press.
Anthony Fauci has authored a paper in CELL which calls for better vaccines than the ones we've got, whether experimental or not. No kidding.
Silicon Valley Bank failed today, the first failure since 2020 when there were four. There was a huge flight to safety. Stocks sold off and longer dated Treasuries rallied 3.45%. The yield curve aggregate plunged 230bp, 3.82%.
Full time employment rose a little in Feb to 49.66% of civilian population. The average last year was 50.1%.
Monday, March 6, 2023
Sunday, March 5, 2023
WaPo ignores that it was Obama's war on coal which impoverished the Ohio River Valley and is now going hungry after the end of COVID-19 food assistance
A mile-long line for free food offers a warning as covid benefits end
In Kentucky, a state that has been hit particularly hard by the collapse of the coal industry, entrenched poverty and hunger have been generational problems that state and federal officials have struggled for decades to address.
More.
Obama's war on coal began immediately after his election.
Some of the power outages in Ohio on today's national map are due to another train derailment, second one in a month there
A third world shit-hole of problems, problems, problems.
Saturday, March 4, 2023
Friday, March 3, 2023
LOL, DC Mayor and President Biden both oppose DC's soft-on-crime bill, progressive Democrats, but I repeat myself, are outraged
The crime bill passed the D.C. City Council unanimously in January. After Washington D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser (D) vetoed it, the city council overrode it 12-1. Among other things, the bill would eliminate most mandatory sentences and lower penalties for a number of violent offenses, including carjackings and robberies. It would also expand the requirement for jury trials in most misdemeanor cases.
More.
Say what you will about Biden or Bowser, these two do not want to become Beetlejuice, who just lost her mayoral re-election bid because 63% of Chicagoans no longer feel safe there.
Sounds more and more like Joe is running, doesn't it?
His Energy Department last week endorsed the possibility of COVID-19 being a lab leak, followed in short order by the FBI saying the same, which the progressives still call a conspiracy theory.
Joe is aligning himself with where the country is on major issues like crime and the pandemic. He's running.
Perverse AP Obama just lies through its teeth about drag with weasel words, laughably calls the weasels self-policing
More.
"typically"
"more common"
"separate"
"avoided"
"generally"
Thursday, March 2, 2023
Wednesday, March 1, 2023
Tuesday, February 28, 2023
Monday, February 27, 2023
Michigan power outage update: Day 5
Over 100k still out in DTE service area in the east, 28k in the Consumers Energy service area in the south.
Pretty shocking multi-day outage, with overnight lows averaging 26F for the last five nights.
Sunday, February 26, 2023
Michigan power outage update
Consumers Energy outages: ~36k still affected (~90k restored overnight).
DTE outages: ~279k still affected (~65k restored overnight).
This evening it will be four days since the power went out for these people.
Saturday, February 25, 2023
California has power outages because it is insane and has weather, Michigan has power outages because it has weather and is insane
127k of the current Michigan outages belong to Consumers Energy, 344k to DTE in the Detroit area.
Peak outages for Consumers Energy were ~237k at one point in this event.
Progress overnight: Just 12k restored for Consumers Energy.
In the last 20 years Michigan ranks 4th overall for total outages, but California remains the big daddy for outages, followed by Texas and New York.
LOL, guy named Purple says somehow we still ended up back together even after slavery drove us into a brutal civil war
Back together at the point of a gun isn't back together, Matt.
Abraham Lincoln made America purple.
More.
Breitbart's John Nolte joins Move On, recommends forgiving Hanoi Jane's treason
They used to hang traitors in the real America.
After 35 years of apologies, isn’t it time to forgive and move on?
More.
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