Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
IT’S GAME OVER FOR THE SAUDIS VS AMERICA ON OIL
Saudi Arabia and the core OPEC states are taking an immense political gamble by letting crude oil prices crash to $66 a barrel, if their aim is to shake out the weakest shale producers in the US. "The resilience of US shale may prove greater than the resilience of OPEC," said Alistair Newton, head of political risk at Nomura. There is no question that the US has entirely changed the global energy landscape and poses an existential threat to OPEC. America has cut its net oil imports by 8.7m bpd since 2006, equal to the combined oil exports of Saudi Arabia and Nigeria. OPEC has misjudged the threat. As late as last year, it was dismissing US shale as a flash in the pan. Abdalla El-Badri, the group's secretary-general, still insists that half of all US shale output is vulnerable below $85. This is bravado. US producers have locked in higher prices through derivatives contracts. Noble Energy and Devon Energy have both hedged over three-quarters of their output for 2015. Further, efficiency is improving and drillers are switching to lower-cost spots, confronting OPEC with a moving target. "The (price) floor is falling and is not nearly as firm as the Saudi view assumes," says Citigroup.
ISIS WANTS ARMAGEDDON – LET’S GIVE IT TO THEM
It's a tyrannical theocracy, crucifixions and decapitations are routine, women are shrouded and intimidated, the grim religious police are all over the place. It's your Islamic State, aka ISIS. How do we know? Basically from defectors, now as during the Cold War the most valuable sources for Western intelligence services. Some of these ex-ISIS followers are free in the West, others are standing trial, as in the case of the 46 Belgians who returned from the IS and are accused of crimes ranging from torture and murder to extortion and terrorism. One of these confessed upon discovering that Belgian authorities had some incriminating telephone intercepts, as when he told his girlfriend: "Today I killed a man. An infidel...his family had collected only thirty thousand euros for him, but the price was seventy thousand. I killed him with a shot in the head. Bang! I wanted to make a video but my camera didn't work right..." Young men are excited by the chance to murder, but when you sign up with ISIS, you have an excellent chance to lose your own life, and this is often an eye-opener for some of the bourgeois European believers. After seeing their comrades drive off in suicide vehicles, they sagely reconsider.
HALF-FULL REPORT 11/28/14
It's so obvious who the HFR Heroes of the Week are that we need to dispense the suspense and laud them right out front. They are the six white men, three white women, two black women, and one black man who comprised the Saint Louis County Grand Jury that refused to indict Police Officer Darren Wilson. We must add to them the St. Louis County prosecutor Bob McCulloch, whose statement announcing the grand jury decision on Monday (11/24) is here. They all knew their lives could be at stake with the murderous anger and multitude of death threats against them, yet they opted for the truth straight in the face of it. That's flat out American heroism. We owe them a grave debt of gratitude... There are good lessons to be learned from this Ferguson Lunacy, and benefits to be gained. Here's the most important... There was another major event that rivaled the Ferguson grand jury decision in importance this week. For background, who is the GOP Congressional Establishment leader you most love to hate?
SWITZERLAND AND THE 6,000 YEAR-OLD GOLD BUBBLE
Five million Swiss voters will decide on Sunday (11/30) whether to force the Swiss National Bank to repatriate all its gold from vaults in Britain and Canada, boost its holdings of bullion to 20% of foreign reserves and then keep the metal forever. The "Save Our Swiss Gold" referendum is a valiant attempt by Switzerland's army of gold bugs -- and the populist Swiss People's party (SVP) - to lead the world back to the halcyon days of the international Gold Standard. It is a primordial scream against a quantitative easing and money creation a l'outrance (at all costs) by the leading central banks. Yet there is a snag. The Swiss National Bank (SNB) is the biggest printer of them all in relative terms, far outstripping the Bank of Japan, let alone the US Federal Reserve or the Bank of England - mere amateurs at this game. At one stage it was mopping up half of the entire sovereign bond issuance of the eurozone each month, a scale of action that the European Central Bank's Mario Draghi can only dream of. You have to smile when you hear Swiss gold enthusiasts complaining that these foreign bonds - bought with electronic fiat francs created out of thin air - are now losing value as the euro slides against the dollar. But then we all suffer from cognitive dissonance.
THE FIRST THANKSGIVING CELEBRATED THE BOUNTY OF CAPITALISM
On Thanksgiving Day, Americans gather with their family and friends to celebrate the blessings that Providence has bestowed on their beloved country. A deep appreciation of these blessings involves understanding that they were earned. It is to understand the awesome truth of how "God helps those who help themselves" applies to the Mayflower Pilgrims and their First Thanksgiving at America's birth. This is an appreciation and understanding of which those on the Left are incapable - for it would mean celebrating the capitalist freedom that made that original Thanksgiving possible. This no liberal, no Democrat, no leftie can do. Thus they must distort history instead. The distortion starts in Kindergarten, with the childish make-believe of your kid's school play portraying the noble Squanto teaching the helpless Pilgrims how to feed themselves. So let's drop the curtain on the distortion and watch the real thing. Here it is. This is what needs to be taught to every schoolchild in America, instead of the garbage they learn now.
THE AYATOLLAH SPITS ON OBAMA
The New York Times headline yesterday (11/24): A Nuclear Deal for US and Iran Slips Away Again. He did it again, as we should have expected. Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei walked us right up to the finish line, spat on Obama, and walked away. Months and months of secret and public talks, letters, back channels, and gestures produced nothing of the sort the president, assorted foreign ministers, pundits, and politicians had been predicting. Instead we are to keep talking, and keep paying the Islamic Republic for the pleasure and privilege. It's not Barack Obama's unique failure; the same thing happened to Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. Both of them came to believe they had a deal with Khamenei, and both of them were rudely disabused of their error when the Iranians walked away. No sensible person doubts Obama's willingness to be generous to the Iranians. Any lingering skepticism should be definitively eliminated by the latest "extension," which reportedly bestows $700 million on Khamenei every month for continuing to talk. You read that right: British Foreign Secretary Phillip Hammond announced that "Iran will receive about $700 million per month in frozen assets." Iranian Assets Unfrozen ran the headline. Khamenei could certainly have had a very good deal if he wanted it. If he didn't take one, it's because he doesn't want it. Why?
HALF-FULL REPORT 11/21/14
I just got back from what you know by now was The Mystery Adventure I couldn't name last September - for I am on the Mullah Regime's blacklist. I was able to secretly scribe Hope for Iran then post it in Istanbul yesterday, and now have to play catch up with what's been going on in the world. Yet again, I can't thank Jack Kelly enough for penning two marvelous HFRs in my absence. Let's start by taking a break to read the best description I've seen of Zero's almost impossibly mendacious demagoguery last night (11/20): Ben Shapiro's Kneel Before Zod. His opening line: "It was historic, both in its scope and its dishonesty: the speech represented a closely-woven and incredible tapestry of falsehood, exposited with a straight face by the greatest liar in modern American history... (It was) like watching a madman describe, with preternaturally perfect sincerity, how the moon was constructed of cheese." The bottom line for me was how much this drama is a truly Reaganesque moment. It's a lesson of history for the GOP -- and wait 'till you see the pictures of how it might happen.
HOPE FOR IRAN
Shiraz, Iran. "Where are you from?" the Iranian man asked me. With a big smile, I happily answered, "America." He responded with a smile of his own. "Ah, America... America Number One!" He hooked his two index fingers together. "American people, Iranian people, good... friends." He unhooked his fingers and waved his hand in a gesture of contempt. "Governments, no good." We both belly-laughed. I and my friends with me repeatedly had the same experience, whether in Tehran, Sari, Mashad, Yazd, Isfahan, Shiraz or Tabriz. We lost count of the people - men and women - who approached us to ask where we were from, and upon being told we were Americans, without exception they would react with surprise, then a beaming smile and say "Welcome." We never once received a negative reaction or a frown. Collectively we've had encounters with hundreds of people over the past twelve days with people all over Iran who spoke some English, some well, some just a few words, and the one thing they wanted us to know was the abyss of difference between them - the people of Iran - and their government. The mullahs who ran their government and preached hate for America did not speak for them. One lady covered in a black hejab tightly grasped the hand of one of the women among us to plead, "Please tell your friends in America that we Iranians are not their enemy." As one shopkeeper in Isfahan's bazaar told us, "What I want is for more Americans to come to Iran, and for all the mullahs to leave." Here's how to do it -- and yes, there are my pictures.
OBAMA IS NOT A MONARCH
The Constitution designs a system of checks and balances for our nation, and executive amnesty for immigrants here illegally unilaterally decreed from the White House would seriously undermine the rule of law. Our founders repeatedly warned about the dangers of unlimited power within the executive branch; Congress should heed those words as the president threatens to grant amnesty to millions of people who have come to our country illegally. To be clear, the dispute over executive amnesty is not between President Obama and Republicans in Congress; it is a dispute between President Obama and the American people. The Democrats suffered historic losses in the midterm elections largely over the prospect of the president's executive amnesty. President Obama was correct: His policies were on the ballot across the nation in 2014. The elections were a referendum on amnesty, and the voters soundly rejected it. There was no ambiguity. Undeterred, President Obama appears to be going forward. It is lawless. It is unconstitutional. He is defiant and angry at the American people. If he acts by executive diktat, President Obama will not be acting as a president, he will be acting as a monarch. Congress, representing the voice of the people, should use every tool available to prevent the president from subverting the rule of law. Here are two of them.
THE IRANIAN DEAL FANTASY
What sort of deal is being concocted between Obama and the Iranian regime? Pundits, experts, reporters, and pols are weighing in on epiphenomena ranging from the number of Iranian centrifuges that will be allowed to how quickly or slowly the remaining sanctions will be lifted. Here in Washington the "inside story" that has been circulating for more than a week is: the deal is all done and it will be announced before the 24th, the nominal deadline for the negotiations on a "permanent" agreement. I've been here since 1977, approaching forty years, and "inside stories" have been wrong...almost always. Say 80-90 percent of the time. That's because the "information" is circulated to advance or sabotage policies or individuals, not to inform. So I don't pay much attention to such stories. Especially when it comes to Iran, there's always a considerable amount that we don't know and aren't going to know, so it's best to be tentative. But we do know some things, and there is an historical record that is pretty consistent, so let's go with that stuff.
WHAT IS OR IS NOT ISLAMIC FOR OBAMA?
In his speech on September 11 announcing that the US would commence limited operations against Islamic State, US President Barack Hussein Obama insisted, "ISIL, [i.e. ISIS or Islamic State] is not Islamic. No religion condones the killing of innocents, and the vast majority of ISIL's victims have been Moslem." To be sure, it is hard to see how any human faith can countenance IS's actions. For the past several months, on a daily basis, new videos appear of IS fighters proudly, openly and wantonly committing crimes against humanity. This week for instance, a video emerged of an IS slave market in Raqqah, Syria, where women and girls are sold as sex slaves to IS fighters. Despite the glaring contradiction between divinity and monstrosity, the fact is that IS justifies every single one of its atrocities with verses from the Koran. IS referred to its sex slave market in Raqqah for instance as the "Booty Market... for what your right hands possess." The phrase "what your right hands possess" is a Koranic verse (4:3) that permits the sexual enslavement of women and girls by Moslem men. By contrast to what he says about IS, throughout his tenure in office, Obama has gone out of his way to mainstream Moslem extremists. This has taken the form of granting senior appointments to people aligned with the Moslem Brotherhood. Further, Obama has befriended radical Islamic leaders who openly support terrorism, including Turkish dictator Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the emir of Qatar, Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani. How are we to explain this seeming anomaly?
THE DAWN OF AMERICA 3.0
It's time for...
THE GREAT DOLLAR BULL RUN HAS STARTED
The US dollar has surged to a four-year high against a basket of currencies and has punched through key technical resistance, marking a crucial turning point for the global financial system. The index - a mix of six major currencies - hit 87.4 on Monday (11/03), rising above the key level of 87. This reflects the plunge in the Japanese yen since the Bank of Japan launched a fresh round of quantitative easing last week. Data from the Chicago Mercantile Exchange show that speculative dollar bets on the derivatives markets have reached a record high, with the most extended positions against the euro, the yen, the Australian dollar, Mexican peso, the Canadian dollar, the Swiss franc, sterling, and the New Zealand dollar, in that order. The Swedish and Norwegian currencies are also coming under heavy pressure. David Bloom, currency chief at HSBC, said a "seismic change" is under way and may lead to a 20% surge in the dollar over a 12-month span. The mega-rally of 1980 to 1985 as the Volcker Fed tightened the screws saw a 90% rise before the leading powers intervened at the Plaza Accord to cap the rise. "We are only at the early stages of a dollar bull run. The current rally is unlike any we have seen before. The greatest danger for markets and forecasters is that they fail to adjust their behavior to fully reflect a very different world," he said.
HALF-FULL REPORT 10/31/14
Boo!
A TREMBLE OF EUROWEENIES
Some of my favorite words in the English language are "collective nouns," the colorful names for groups of animals going back to the 15th century that every kid had to know to go hunting with his dad. Not knowing them was laughable ignorance. We would laugh today if someone said a "herd of fish" instead of a school, or a "flock of cattle," instead of a herd or drove. We know it's a pride of lions, but it's a leap of leopards, a crash of rhinos, a shrewdness of apes, a skulk of foxes. Perhaps you've heard of a murder of crows or an exultation of larks, but it's an unkindness of ravens, an ostentation of peacocks, a bouquet of pheasants, a parliament of owls. Collective nouns were applied to groups of people as well. We still call it a congregation of churchgoers, but it's an impatience of wives, a boast of soldiers, an impertinence of peddlers, an illusion of painters. I love the one for prostitutes: a flourish of strumpets. It's a tremble of cowards. That certainly was the appropriate designation for the French-German Euroweenie portion of participants at the Paris conference I attended earlier this week. It was a conference on Global Security organized by the French Ministry of Defense, the US Department of Defense, and NATO. It had a dual focus: on the threat of Russian aggression in Ukraine, and on cybersecurity. Held in the King's Council Chamber of Les Invalides, among the 40 some attendees were ministers of defense and ambassadors from several countries, high level EU and NATO officials, Pentagon generals, and key executives from major defense and cybersecurity companies. I attended as the geopolitical strategist for one of the conference sponsors. There was no press, and no attribution for anything said was permitted. Given that restriction, here is what happened.
THE LEGEND OF THE LONE WOLF TERRORIST
When I last wrote about this subject (Ledeen's Lair May 2013), they called them "homegrown" terrorists, the phrase of the month a year and a half ago. Back then, such imaginary monsters were bombing marathons; today they are shooting Canadian parliamentarians and security guards, and attacking NYPD guys with their jihadi axes. It doesn't really matter what you call them, because they're figments of the "expert" imagination. The legend-mavens tell us that there are "normal" Americans (this part is very important) who somehow just go bad, and turn into murderous terrorists. There is no foreign input, no alien country or intelligence service, no global conspiracy. The terrorists are homegrown and they are on their own. They are Lone Wolves. It's not so. There are homegrown terrorists like the Unabomber, but these aren't the people we're talking about just now. Unabomber is a nut, but he's a distinctly American nut, and definitely a lone wolf. The so-called lone wolves of recent days-the killer in Canada, the axeman in New York, and, we should add, the Oklahama City decapitator - aren't loners, they're members. They've been inspired by local or online jihadis.
A VIRTUOSO OF MALICIOUS INTENT
Since he assumed office nearly six years ago, US President Barack Hussein Obama has been dogged by allegations of managerial incompetence. Obama, his critics allege, had no managerial experience before he was elected. His lack of such experience, they claim, is reflected in what they see as his incompetent handling of the challenges of the presidency. In everything from dealing with the Congress, to reining in radical ideologues at the IRS, to handling the chaos at the Mexican border, to putting together coordinated strategies for dealing with everything from Ebola to Islamic State (IS), Obama's critics claim that he is out of his league. That he is incompetent. But if Israel's experience with him is any guide, then his critics are the ones who are out to sea. Because at least in his handling of US relations with the Jewish state, Obama has exhibited a mastery of the tools of the executive branch unmatched by most of his predecessors. Obama is a master of mendacity, a virtuoso of malciousness. Consider two recent news stories:
HALF-FULL REPORT 10/24/14
Ten days to go until Election Eve. Is it time to play this? {youtube}QvMQWte5pik{/youtube} Yes, there's still time for things to go sideways, and many races are close enough for the Dems to cheat their way to victory - especially in Colorado. But every time I start to worry about Dem voter fraud this year, I think of Joe Biden. Remember his incredibly obnoxious performance debating Paul Ryan in 2012? It was the single VP candidate debate on national television, with Ryan trying to have a serious discussion about serious issues, and all Biden did was smirk and eye-roll ridicule everything Ryan said. A voice of alarm went off in my brain - which I unfortunately ignored as I couldn't believe it at the time - that Biden was signaling the fix was in. He couldn't take the debate or the entire campaign or voter sentiment seriously because he knew Dem Party operatives had made sure the election would follow Stalin's dictum: "It doesn't matter who votes - what matters is who counts the votes." You won't find SloJo being a smart-ass now - or any other Dem and Enemedia pundit. They are all in a state of gloom and panic living in Sour Grapes City. That alone tells you the Pub margin of victory in many races is too big for Dem cheating to overcome. So maybe we really can sing along with the 1967 Beatles, It's Getting Better All The Time. Let's look at some specifics.
RUSSIA IS DECAYING FASTER THAN THE SOVIET UNION
It took two years for crumbling oil prices to bring the Soviet Union to its knees in the mid-1980s, and another two years of stagnation to break the Bolshevik empire altogether. Russian ex-premier Yegor Gaidar famously dated the moment to September 1985, when Saudi Arabia stopped trying to defend the crude market, cranking up output instead. "The collapse of the USSR should serve as a lesson to those who construct policy based on the assumption that oil prices will remain perpetually high. A seemingly stable superpower disintegrated in only a few short years," he wrote in 2007. Lest we engage in false historicism, it is worth remembering just how strong the USSR still seemed. It knew how to make things. It had an industrial core, with formidable scientists and engineers. Vladimir Putin's Russia is a weaker animal in key respects, a remarkable indictment of his 15-year reign. He presides over a rentier economy, addicted to oil, gas and metals, a textbook case of the Dutch Disease. "Russia is already in a perfect storm," says Lubomir Mitov, Moscow chief for the Institute of International Finance. "Russia is fundamentally crippled. They have outsourced their brains and lost their technology. It looked as if Russia was strong during the oil boom but it was an illusion and now they are in an even worse position than the Soviet Union," he says.
ON THE ROAD TO MANDALAY
CHEAPER OIL IS GOOD NEWS FOR ALL
So ingrained is the bad-news bias of the intelligentsia that the plummeting price of oil has mostly been discussed in terms of its negative effect on the budgets of oil producers, both countries and companies. We are allowed to rejoice only to the extent that we think it is a good thing that the Venezuelan, Russian and Iranian regimes are most at risk, which they are, and which is indeed good news. Yet by far the greater benefit of the oil price fall comes from the impact on consumers. The price of Brent crude oil in Europe has fallen from about $115 a barrel in June to about $86 today (10/22), while crude in the US is at $82. That will make a tank of gas cheaper (though not by as much as it should, because of taxes) but it will also make everything from chairs to chips to chiropractic cheaper too, because the cost of energy is incorporated into the cost of every good and service we buy. The impact of this cost deflation will dwarf any effect of, say, a fall in the price of Exxon shares in your pension plan.
TED’S TOP TEN FOR 2015
By all signs, Americans are preparing to send Washington a clear message in the 2014 elections. The question is, will Washington listen? Republicans - poised to take control of Congress - should set our sights on three big goals to make Americans feel confident in their futures once again: jumpstart the economy, safeguard constitutional liberties, and strengthen our national security. Here are ten critical priorities for the 2015 Congress: First, embrace a big pro-jobs, growth agenda. For six years, the Obama economy has been trapped in stagnation, hurting millions. A Republican Congress should immediately help Americans get more jobs by embracing America's energy renaissance. This means passing legislation to make it easier to build energy infrastructure, such as the Keystone pipeline. But, we need an energy policy that's bigger than Keystone. An effective energy plan would also protect innovative energy technology, such as hydraulic fracturing, from being handcuffed by the federal government. We can also open up land for exploration and ensure that American companies can export liquefied natural gas around the world. And, lastly, stop the EPA from implementing rules that will destroy coal jobs and drive up our electricity bills. Second,
HALF-FULL REPORT 10/17/14
Lots of uplifting news this week, but first a trio of questions. Are you a big fan of Eric Holder? No? Well, how would you like an Eric Holder on steroids? No again? Lastly, why is Sarah Palin answering Yes! to these questions instead? Because that's precisely what she is doing in Louisiana. Zero intends to nominate Tom Perez, a racist fascist far worse than Holder for AG, should the Pubs fail to win the Senate. And that's just for starters. Harry Reid running the Senate for the next two years will allow Zero to run completely amok. Yet Sarah, rather than telling the Louisiana Spoiler - Rob Maness - to stand up like a man for his country and bow out, has doubled down on her support for him. This is ludicrously mistaken and here's why.... Elsewhere, things are looking pretty good. This week has seen an amazing number of October Surprises - all of which have screwed Zero and the Dems. Bad Karma has finally caught up with them. *In Texas, hero-to-baby-killers Wendy Davis drove her gubernatorial campaign straight off a cliff with her wheelchair attack ad on Greg Abbott. After a deluge of disgust, she doubled-down with her ridicule. Abbott was already ahead by 14 points before Wendy's hara-kiri ads. Wendy gives the term "politics of personal destruction" a new meaning. Here are more examples... Yet all of that is merely the tip of the Bad News Iceberg for the Dems this week. Beneath that tip is...
HOW TO PROTECT YOURSELF FROM EBOLA
Americans are living in Panic City over Ebola thanks to the now-lethal incompetence of Obola Obama. He has allowed his fascist political ideology to become homicidally criminal. He refuses to close our southern border from illegal invasion causing epidemics and to bar entry to anyone from Ebola-stricken countries as that would be the failure of his Amnesty goal of millions of new Democrat voters. Hundreds of children in 46 states have been infected with Enterovirus D-68, with seven deaths reported by the CDC as of 10/15. As Jack Kelly notes today (10/16): "There are more than 100 enteroviruses, ranging from the common cold to polio. EV D-68 has been very rare here. (But) EV D-68 is common in Central America, from whence came the flood of illegal immigrant children. The outbreak was first reported in communities to which they were sent. CDC refuses to connect the dots. Why won't it?" Now add the Ebola Panic to this. Ebola is being called Obama's Katrina for good reason. The frightening incompetence of Obama's CDC should terrify anyone actually sentient regarding Obamacare's government seizure of America's entire health care system. Let's take a break from Ebola politics and talk about how to actually protect yourself from it - from Ebola specifically and from any other viral contagion.
COULD THE SICKEST MAN OF EUROPE BE GERMANY?
France may look like the sick of man of Europe, but Germany's woes run deeper, rooted in mercantilist dogma, the glorification of saving for its own sake, and the corrosive psychology of ageing. "Germany considers itself the model for the world, but pride comes before the fall," says Olaf Gersemann, Die Welt's economics chief, in a new book, The Germany Bubble: the Last Hurrah of a Great Economic Nation. (Released last month in a German edition, hopefully an English edition will soon follow.) Mr. Gersemann says the Second Wirtschaftswunder - or economic miracle - from 2005 onwards has "gone to Germany's head". The country has mistaken a confluence of exceptional events for permanent ascendancy. It cannot continue to live off exports of capital goods to China and the BRICS as they hit the buffers, or by stealing a march on southern Europe through wage compression, a zero-sum game. Marcel Fratzscher, head of the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW), makes a parallel critique in his new book, Die Deutschland Illusion, no translation needed. It is the self-deception of a country "resting on its laurels," prisoner of the "household fallacy" that economies are like family budgets, and falsely reassured by the misplaced flattery of foreigners who rarely look under the bonnet at the German engine below.
HOW BITCOIN TECHNOLOGY COULD CREATE A FAR FREER WORLD
Amid the current maelstrom of war, disease and politics, you might have not been paying much attention to bitcoin, the electronic form of money favored by radical libertarians and drug dealers. Yet it is possible that when the history of these days comes to be written, bitcoin's story will loom large. Unnoticed except by the tech-obsessed, the technology behind bitcoin may be slowly giving birth to a brave new world, with eventual implications well beyond money. So argues Bitcoin: The Future of Money?, a new book by Dominic Frisby, a columnist for MoneyWeek magazine published in Britain. Frisby makes the case that it is just possible that bitcoin and its rivals - known as altcoins - and the "blockchain" technology that lies behind them have the potential to spark a radical decentralization of society itself. They could change the way governments finance themselves, make banks redundant and transform the ways companies are run. If he is right, then the founder of bitcoin will take his place alongside the great inventors. So who is he?
HALF-FULL REPORT 10/10/14
Yesterday the New York Times condemned Republicans for conducting a "grim" and "dismal" campaign that blames "Obama and the Democratic Party (who) run a government that is so fundamentally broken it cannot offer its people the most basic protection from harm." The New York Times can't stand it when Republicans tell the truth... On the bright side, there's a wonderfully cheery story in the New York Times on Tuesday (10/07) - cheery for us, doom and gloom for the libtards at the Times: The State-by-State Revival of the Right... No wonder his popularity is in the pits and everyone who loves America hates his guts. Headline from the London Daily Mail on Wednesday (10/08): Obama slams GOP as party of billionaires then attends $32k-a-head fundraiser hosted by billionaire property tycoon named Rich Richman... Now is the time to say J'Accuse! to Chief Justice John Roberts. The suspicion that he was blackmailed (over illegally adopting his children) emerged after switching his vote at the last minute to rationalize the faux-constitutionality of Obamacare (June 2012). This week, that suspicion was confirmed... The Conservative Treehouse really nails this story: Fifth Child Dies to Support President Obama's Illegal Immigration Goals... Is Patrick Howley the HFR Hero of the Week?
LIBERALS NEED TO BE AS AFRAID OF CONSERVATIVES AS THEY ARE OF MOSLEMS
Josey Wales made the issue very clear:
THE TRAGIC AND INDEFENSIBLE SUPREME COURT
The Supreme Court's decision on Monday (10/06) to let rulings by lower court judges stand that redefine marriage is both tragic and indefensible. By refusing to rule if the States can define marriage, the Supreme Court is abdicating its duty to uphold the Constitution. The fact that the Supreme Court Justices, without providing any explanation whatsoever, have permitted lower courts to strike down so many state marriage laws is astonishing. This is judicial activism at its worst. The Constitution entrusts state legislatures, elected by the People, to define marriage consistent with the values and mores of their citizens. Unelected judges should not be imposing their policy preferences to subvert the considered judgments of democratically elected legislatures. The Supreme Court is, de facto, applying an extremely broad interpretation to the 14th Amendment without saying a word - an action that is likely to have far-reaching consequences. It is beyond dispute that when the 14th Amendment was adopted 146 years ago, as a necessary post-Civil War era reform, it was not imagined to also mandate same-sex marriage -- but that is what the Supreme Court is implying. The Court is making the preposterous assumption that the People of the United States somehow silently redefined marriage in 1868 when they ratified the 14th Amendment.
FOUND! SOMEONE MORE NARCISSISTIC THAN OBAMA
They thought it couldn't be done. It was humanly impossible, declared a global consensus of psychologists and psychiatrists, to be more narcissistic than His Ultimate Excellency, the American Messiah Himself, Barack Hussein Obama. It took an Englishwoman - what else? - to prove the experts wrong. She has taken self-love to its ultimate extreme by marrying herself in an "incredibly empowering" ceremony attended by almost 50 of her friends. Grace Gelder married Grace Gelder at an "idyllic farmhouse in rural Devon." Her parents were not present - "mainly for logistical reasons" - but, according to an interview this week (10/04) in the Guardian, they did send "supportive texts throughout the day." Here's the bride/groom tossing her wedding corsage to her admirers:
HIDDEN CHINA III
Last February, we had our adventure to Hidden China II. Like Hidden China I the previous September, it was absolutely extraordinary. Breathtakingly memorable. So much so that Hidden China III is similar to its predecessor - similar, but not the same. It's been upgraded, and includes a visit to the tribal peoples of North Vietnam - the young ladies above are Red Zao - plus a luxury overnight cruise in the World Heritage Site of Vietnam's spectacular Ha Long Bay. In fact, all told we go to six World Heritage Sites. Our primary focus is China's most stunning and fascinating region, Yunnan. It has a multitude of incredibly colorful ethnic cultures who are not Han Chinese and have preserved their traditions. And it has places that will completely blow you away - like Tiger Leaping Gorge, the Luoping Rapeseed Fields, or the thousand year-old Hani Rice Terraces pictured above, clearly one of the great wonders of the world. We go in early March, the best time to see them in 2015, when the crowds from China's National Holiday have vanished and the weather is perfect. Note, however, this is an adventure. We stay in the best hotels and dine in the best restaurants when we can - but that's not always. We're going to places where tourists aren't. And our schedule is demanding so we can see them all in two weeks. Let's get started. And yes, the pictures are real.
HALF-FULL REPORT 10/03/14
THE UMBRELLAS OF HONG KONG EXPOSE CHINA’S CATCH-22
China's Xi Jinping cannot make any serious concessions to Hong Kong's democracy movement. The Umbrella Revolution spreading from the affluent Island to the poorer quarters of Kowloon is an existential threat to the Chinese Communist Party. "If he were to give way, it would set off contagion across the mainland," said George Walden, a veteran British diplomat who survived the Cultural Revolution inside China and later negotiated Hong Kong's future with Deng Xiaoping. "The authorities see this as a matter of life and death, a fuse that can take down their world," said Zhao Chu, a Chinese columnist and star on Weibo - China's Twitter. For China's Communist Party, the Hong Kong drama exposes its Catch-22, the impossible contradiction of its policies. Yet the crisis comes at a treacherous moment for Hong Kong as well. The enclave is up to its neck in China's credit bubble, channeling $1.2 trillion in hard currency loans to Chinese companies. The International Monetary Fund said the "extreme tail event" of a credit shock in China would "entirely wipe out capital in Hong Kong's banking system."
OBOLA OBAMA
It's too soon to answer the question the IBD is asking this morning: "Is Ebola Obama's Katrina?" Yet the Zero Administration's malfeasance makes the question already worth asking. Thomas Eric Duncan is a Liberian citizen with a Liberian passport, living in the capital city of Monrovia. On Monday, Sept. 15, he helped carry (was in physical contact with) a family friend sick with Ebola to her home, who died early the next morning. With him at the time was the lady's brother, who then died of Ebola the day after his sister, Wednesday the 17th. On Friday the 19th, knowing that he had been doubly exposed to Ebola, he left for the United States. It is hard not to conclude that he came here for the medical treatment that he would die without if he remained in Monrovia, and could care less who he infected along the way. Thanks to this, people are freaking out everywhere, especially in Dallas with parents pulling their kids out of schools, as five of their schoolmates were exposed to Duncan after he reached Dallas. The London Daily Mail reports that over 100 people were in contact in Dallas with Duncan, many of whom are now quarantined. So - how does all of this make Zero "Obola Obama"? Try this on. Yesterday (10/01), Josh Earnest, the pathetic dweeb who recently replaced the pathetic dweeb who's name I can't bother to remember as White House Spokesman, announced that the Zero Government has no intention of preventing Ebola carriers from entering the United States. Obola Obama.
ARAB CIVILIZATION HAS COLLAPSED
With his decision to use force against the violent extremists of the Islamic State, President Obama is doing more than to enter a quagmire. He is doing more than play with the fates of two half-broken countries-Iraq and Syria-whose societies were gutted long before the Americans appeared on the horizon. Obama is stepping into the chaos of an entire civilization that has broken down. Arab civilization, such as we knew it, is all but gone. The Arab world today is more violent, unstable, fragmented and driven by extremism-the extremism of the rulers and those in opposition-than at any time since the collapse of the Ottoman Empire a century ago. Every hope of modern Arab history has been betrayed. The promise of political empowerment, the return of politics, the restoration of human dignity heralded by the season of Arab uprisings in their early heydays-all has given way to civil wars, ethnic, sectarian and regional divisions and the reassertion of absolutism, both in its military and atavistic forms. With the dubious exception of the antiquated monarchies and emirates of the Gulf-which for the moment are holding out against the tide of chaos-and possibly Tunisia, there is no recognizable legitimacy left in the Arab world. Is it any surprise that, like the vermin that take over a ruined city, the heirs to this self-destroyed civilization should be the nihilistic thugs of the Islamic State? And that there is no one else who can clean up the vast mess we Arabs have made of our world but the Americans and Western countries?
ERIC HOLDER’S DEMONIZATION OF HONEST ELECTIONS
[TTP has long maintained that voter fraud is a primary means by which Democrats win elections - which accounts for their fanatical opposition to Voter ID laws. Here, Ronald Reagan's Attorney General, together with the former Ohio Secretary of State, explain the fraud of Eric Holder's opposition. ---JW] Attorney General Eric Holder, who announced his resignation last Thursday (9/25), leaves a dismal legacy at the Justice Department. Of all his legal innovations, one was especially pernicious: the demonizing of state attempts to ensure honest elections. As a former U.S. attorney general under President Reagan, and a former Ohio secretary of state, we would like to say something that might strike some as obvious: Those who oppose photo voter-ID laws and other election-integrity reforms are intent on making it easier to commit vote fraud. That conclusion is inescapable, given the well-established evidence that voter-ID laws don't disenfranchise minorities or reduce minority voting, and in many instances enhance it, despite claims to the contrary by Mr. Holder and his allies. As more states adopt such laws, the left has railed against them with increasing fury, ascribing racial animus to people who are trying to safeguard democratic integrity. But there's something even worse than name-calling:
HALF-FULL REPORT 09/26/14
Obviously, the HFR's glass is more than half-full this week with the announcement yesterday (9/25) that the racist scumbag running the Department of Injustice is quitting. The disgusting tearful hypocrisy of his goodbye to Zero aside, this is an event to be savored. Here's a sample of the Congressional goodbyes to the most corrupt, criminal, and law-destroying AG our country has ever had the misfortune to endure... Yet there is more to celebrate than his resignation - it's the timing. There's lots of speculation on why he chose this moment, but the bottom line is he announced it a scant 40 days before the election... Let's squelch the latest nightmare rumor on Holder - that Zero plans to nominate him for the next Supreme Court vacancy. There's as much chance of that as Hillary being able to fly to the moon on her broomstick... We're taking a break here for an important public service announcement. The headlines regarding the Ebola epidemic in West Africa are becoming ever more dire. That of Forbes yesterday (9/25) was: "Ebola - It's Far, Far Worse Than You Thought." TTPers asked our Forum's resident genius, Skye, what could be done. Here is his response. Our suggestion is that you copy and paste it into an email sent to your Congressman, Senator, and any friend who is a health professional. Who knows how many lives you could save by doing so... How many times have you been subjected to flashing website ads blaring about the "coming collapse of the dollar"? Two of the best conservative economic minds put the kibosh on this blather Saturday... On Wednesday (9/24), Zero gave a speech at the UN. The link is to the full text. It was roundly ridiculed and denounced by many conservative pundits. But believe it or not, there was a lot in it that is praiseworthy... We close with a tribute to one of the world's most admirable women...
THE DOUBLE DEATH KNELL OF WARMISM AND DEMOCRAT FASCISM
The Left died last Sunday (9/21). It was a spectacular demise, with 400,000 weirdly costumed moonbats clogging up the streets of downtown Manhattan engaged in a "People's Climate March." What we witnessed was the socio-political equivalent of what biologists call "death fluorescence." They've actually photographed a death wave of bright blue fluorescence propagating through an organism as it dies. Reason TV essentially recorded the same phenomenon in New York on Sunday:
POLITICIANS NEED AN “OTHER PEOPLE’S MONEY ADDICTS ANONYMOUS” PROGRAM
[This speech was delivered by Australian Senator David Leyonhjelm on the floor of the Australian Senate Chamber in Canberra on Tuesday, September 23] My name is David and I am an OPM addict. Actually, that is not true; I am not addicted. I might be one of the very few people in this house who is not, because addiction to OPM is a national crisis and I am surrounded by addicts. I am not talking about the drug opium but something far more terrible. I am talking about an addiction to other people's money. Spending other people's money on other people is what we do here. It is the worst kind of expenditure and it explains why so much public money is wasted. An inevitable characteristic of OPM is that so many grand government plans are destined for failure. Before we can do something about our addiction to OPM, we must first acknowledge our problem. What we need is an OPM Addicts Anonymous. Many government programs are not created because people demand them or because the market was unable to provide the services but because politicians have bought favor with OPM. Politicians are addicted to OPM because they use it to expand their influence, reward political cronies and keep their constituencies dependent on them. The time has come to admit: Politicians pretending to be compassionate, when all they are doing is handing out other people's money, are just thieves masquerading as angels.
ANTI-FRACKING ZEALOTS ARE THE ENEMIES OF HUMANITY
Recent news stories underscore the tremendous benefits brought by America's fracking revolution. * The global economy saves $4.9 billion per day in oil spending because of the shale oil boom. Without it there would be a 3 million barrel per day shortfall and prices would likely be 55% higher: $150/barrel. * Rust Belt cities and industries - from manufacturing, real estate and law to hotels, restaurants and many others - are rebounding because of drilling, fracking and production in nearby shale areas. In Ohio unemployment fell to 5.7% in July from 10.6% four years ago; oil output increased 26% just from the previous quarter, while gas production rose 31% - generating billions in state and local revenues. * The US oil and natural gas boom means jobs and business for almost 30,000 companies within the industry's vast and complex supply chain. Indeed, the petroleum industry accounts for nearly 10 million jobs and almost 8% of all domestic economic activity, including states far from actual drilling activities. * The American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers launched a new website to help veterans and other men and women find high-paying jobs in the booming oilfield, fuel and petrochemical industries. The benefits of fracking are in the trillions, while the alleged risks are exaggerated or even fabricated. So what drives anti-fracking zealots who seem to materialize en masse whenever a new project is announced?