San Francisco based Federal Judge, William Orrick, issued a preliminary injunction today blocking any attempt by the Trump administration to withhold funding from “sanctuary cities” that do not cooperate with U.S. immigration officials.
Judge Orrick said president Trump has no authority to attach new conditions to federal spending.
(Via AP) […] U.S. District Judge William Orrick issued the preliminary injunction in two lawsuits — one brought by the city of San Francisco, the other by Santa Clara County — against an executive order targeting communities that protect immigrants from deportation. The injunction will stay in place while the lawsuits work their way through court. (read more)
Judge Orrick is a campaign bundler to former President Obama for over $200,000, and is married to a pro-abortion activist. You might remember Judge Orrick from 2015 when he blocked the release of videos made by the Center for Medical Progress, the group that unveiled Planned Parenthood’s participation in the sale of organs harvested from aborted children.
Having spent over 30 years deep in the weeds on the actuarial side of trade and economics, I can guarantee you there’s a generational need to completely reset all frames of reference when it comes to imports, exports, and U.S. trade principles in general.
It is no longer worthwhile even beginning a conversation around the arcane concept of “free trade”, especially when discussing commodities and agricultural trade. The “free market” was structurally disassembled years ago when multinational corporations began using the business end of agriculture to create investment and global profit via Wall Street.
The BIG AGRICULTURE legislative lobbying groups are funded -much like the U.S. CoC- with multinational corporations and multinational investment banks. Agricultural prices, formerly referenced on basic supply and demand principles have been bastardized through global purchases, and contracts therein, of U.S. farm products.
Simple question to understand the dynamic: “If there is such a U.S. glut of raw milk, then why has the 10-year price of milk skyrocketed”? Within the answer to that question you realize the product is not domestic. It is controlled by multinationals, exported under controlled contract, and the domestic price (you pay) driven by global trade not domestic production/consumption (supply and demand).
The inverse (import pricing) is also true. We’ve been getting screwed by the multinational interests of global trade for decades. This is NOT ‘free trade’. The BIG CLUB owns the process (inputs and outcomes) and manipulates the market in their interests, not yours. There simply is no “free market”.
[TRANSCRIPT] – 3:14 P.M. EDT – THE PRESIDENT: Busy day. They had a very busy day — had a good day. We’re doing well, very well. Things are turning around. I know they’re turning around for you folks, so I just want to welcome you very much to the White House — special place — America’s farmers and ranchers.
I especially want to congratulate Secretary — now I can say, Secretary Sonny Perdue, who was just sworn in as the Secretary of Agriculture — (applause) — sworn in by Justice Thomas. And it was a beautiful ceremony, and we’re going to celebrate a little bit later, and that’s great. We’re very happy. And you had a good vote too.
One of President Trump’s greatest strengths is his keen instincts for developing relationships as a strategic tools toward accomplishing consequential objectives. To wit, President Trump invites the entire U.N. Security Council delegation to lunch at the White House.
Now, most of us, myself included, do not think highly of the United Nations as an entity that has ever accomplished anything of worth – beyond pushing an incessant drum-beat of left-wing globalism and ridiculous pie-in-the-sky pontificating.
However, that said, the historic invitation to lunch is quite smartly full-throated use of regional political proximity. President Trump inviting the U.N Security Council ambassadors to the White House is something Vladimir Putin, or any other leader of consequence, cannot recreate. The Ambassadors themselves acted more like a group of valedictorian school kids on an outing to where the really important people live.
Important leverage is created through personality, nuance, outline of expectations, proximity and exposure to real power. This is far beyond the mere wordy pontificating power of the attendee’s familiarity, this is structurally deploying leverage of consequence to change paradigms.
[TRANSCRIPT] 11:50 A.M. EDT – THE PRESIDENT: This is a very, very important and powerful group of people, and it’s really wonderful to have you with us. And I have to say, welcome to the White House. It’s a privilege to have all of the ambassadors and their spouses.
You know, they were going to leave out the spouses, and I said, you must bring your spouses. (Laughter.) You know, I heard there were a lot of very angry spouses — (laughter) — and this is their first time to the White House. So it’s a great honor to those of you that brought your wife or spouse.
(Via Reuters) The United States on Monday blacklisted 271 employees of a Syrian government agency it said was responsible for developing chemical weapons, weeks after a poison gas attack killed scores of people in a rebel-held province in Syria.
The U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned 271 employees of Syria’s Scientific Studies and Research Center (SSRC), an agency that Washington says develops chemical weapons for the government of Bashar al-Assad, the Treasury said in a statement.
Some of the people blacklisted had worked on Syria’s chemical weapons program for more than five years, the Treasury Department said. The sanction orders U.S. banks to freeze the assets of any employees named, and bans American companies from conducting business with them.
A newly empowered Chris Wallace takes the big government Fox Media position and begins arguing with OMB Director Mick Mulvaney. Interested observers will note Wallace defends the U.S. CoC lobbying position around the budget, health care, the border wall, the imminent risk of government shutdown, Trump’s “first 100 days”, necessary tax cuts, cuts to environmental protection etc.
It can be frustrating to watch because Chris Wallace is arguing the exact positions of Tom Donohue, the U.S. CoC and the K-Street swamp’s corporatist lobbyists.
In advance of a generically created media 100 day way-point to judge the presidency, ABC/Washington Post deliver a poll today (full pdf below) to begin framing the week long narrative.
The direction taken by political narratives is mostly due to a loose coalition of like-minded ideologues within politics and media. People who run in the same circles, attend the same cocktail parties and gather at the same conventions and group meetings. The current ‘anti-Trump administration’ approach is no different from prior 2016 election assemblies.
Tomorrow in Chicago, former President Obama is anticipated to rally the ideological resistance to current President Trump. Enhancing the weekly set-up is a poll from ABC and the Washington Post constructed to cast a negative light upon Trump. It’s the same formula used in the 2016 election assemblies.
It becomes exhausting, and really quite futile, to dig through the poll construct. Yes, the pollsters over sample anti-Trump groups, and yes they under sample those methodological groups who would be more favorable in their opinion of Trump’s efforts. The transparency of the intention is evident within the data they assemble, and even more so within the way ABC/WaPo specifically highlights the data and focuses the attention of the consuming reader or reviewer. (more…)
All eyes are on the French Presidential Election (Round #1) being held today. There are multiple candidates but only the top two go to round #2. Most predictions have Marine Le Pen and Emmanuel Macron as the top two candidates.
UPDATE: 5:30pm EDT Surprising most of the liberal punditry, and contradicting most of the earlier exit polls, Marine Le Pen has won the first round over her closest rival Emmanuel Macron (link):
Francios Fillon conceded and endorsed the political establishment favorite Macron. Melenchon has refused to endorse anyone. As expected the national runoff will be:
Marine Le Pen -vs- Emmanuel Macron
Similar to Hillary Clinton, Macron will carry the endorsement of the professional political class and all of the left-wing French media. Similar to Donald Trump, Marine Le Pen will be running as an outsider against the entire political apparatus and the media machine.
There is a massive psy-ops and social media propaganda campaign currently being pushed by the Venezuelan government in order to cover for their violent responses toward the average citizen in the country. Liberal/Hollywood media are lax in covering the crisis because Venezuela represents a failure of their previously heralded socialist state.
What is continuing to happen in Venezuela is heartbreaking. Today Venezuela’s opposition march in silence honor a dozen people killed during protests demanding that the government of President Nicolas Maduro hold delayed elections and address a growing economic crisis. Watch:
Twelve people have been killed in a renewed wave of demonstrations this month in incidents primarily involving security forces or armed civilians. Another eight were electrocuted in a looting incident that took place following a protest as people search for food.
President Trump visited the Treasury Department today so sign one executive order and two presidential memorandums.
The executive order requires Treasury to identify and lessen burdens from tax regulations issued in 2016. The two memorandum focus on examining and possibly revisiting two areas of the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform law in an effort to remove the regulatory and compliance burdens on smaller banks.
When Dodd-Frank was instituted it was sold to the electorate as a bill to stop banks from becoming too big to fail, there were 12 massive banks under that definition. The goal was to create more national banks. Since passage those ‘too big to fail banks‘ have become even bigger. Twelve banks, are now five even bigger banks. Go figure.
[Transcript] 2:55 P.M. EDT THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much, Steve. Great honor, I must say. It’s a great pleasure to be at the United States Treasury Department and to meet so many dedicated public servants.
I went through that beautiful hallway where those incredible paintings of past secretaries, and it was really very interesting. I want to read every one, I want to learn about every one of them, but we have one that I hope will go down as one of the greats. I think Hamilton is tough to beat, but maybe you can do that too. We’ll take it, right? But thank you very much.
San Francisco based Federal Judge, William Orrick, issued a preliminary injunction today blocking any attempt by the Trump administration to withhold funding from “sanctuary cities” that do not cooperate with U.S. immigration officials.
