The first answer appeared on page D4:
"Fed’s support for corporate debt has been a Wall Street bonanza" by Paula Seligson and Lisa Lee Bloomberg News, July 13, 2020
The Federal Reserve’s extraordinary effort to keep credit flowing to companies during the COVID-19 pandemic is also shunting money to banks’ bottom lines.
Fees for underwriting blue-chip US company bonds in the first half of the year essentially doubled to more than $7 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg, after the Fed set up an unprecedented series of programs to support corporate debt markets and slashed interest rates. US companies have rushed to borrow, selling more than $1 trillion of high-grade notes in just a few months, and some of the proceeds have trickled down to banks.
That boon underscores how the biggest banks’ roles as financial intermediaries can translate to billions of dollars of profits after borrowing floodgates open. When the firms start releasing their second-quarter earnings on Tuesday, they’re broadly expected to post their worst results since the financial crisis as they set aside more money for bad loans. Gains from bond underwriting — and the resulting debt trading — are one of the few bright spots.
That fee income might be enough to turn quarterly net losses into profit for some banks, said Gerard Cassidy, an equity research analyst at RBC Capital Markets.
“The Fed’s unprecedented actions in monetary policy since the start of COVID-19 have benefited banks very well,” Cassidy said.
You have been HAD by COVID, Americans!
The U$UAL $U$PECTS benefit again!
The Fed’s efforts can only help banks so much. Debt underwriting typically accounts for only around 5 percent to 10 percent of the total money banks like JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Citigroup Inc. make from fees, which in turn is about half their revenue, said Jesse Rosenthal, an analyst at CreditSights Inc., and the benefits may be relatively short lived if the pace of borrowing slows down, as many strategists expect in the second half of the year.
Oh, the poor banks as the $tinking greed is walked back by Bloomberg!
The central bank’s efforts have helped banks in myriad ways. The Fed is buying bonds in the open market and if necessary directly from companies, which has helped slash yields on investment-grade corporate bonds to the lowest level on record. That’s spurring companies to borrow, which is lifting underwriting fees for both investment-grade and high-yield debt. When companies sell bonds, investors often sell older securities from the corporation and buy newer ones, so trading revenue rises too.
On top of that, the Federal Reserve offered financing to banks that make loans under the Small Business Administration’s Paycheck Protection Program, making it easier for banks to earn fees from that program. Many didn’t even tap the Fed’s facility, because they’ve been flooded with customer deposits. Loans under that program are US guaranteed, meaning the banks don’t have any risk of borrowers defaulting.
But it was all done for you, citizen!
“The PPP program has been a windfall for the banks at taxpayers’ expense, even if some are donating the fees to worthy causes,” said Anat Admati, a professor at Stanford University Graduate School of Business.
Time for an elbow bump as TAXPAYER MONEY is funneled to BLM!
WAKE UP, America!!!
The Fed is also taking steps including buying short-term corporate bonds known as commercial paper directly from companies, and as of last week, its Main Street Lending Program, aimed at small and midsized businesses, was fully up and running. The Fed will buy 95 percent of each loan made under the up-to-$600 billion program, which could generate around $5.5 billion of fees for banks if there’s full uptake, according to a Bloomberg analysis.
The printing pre$$es must be smoking by now.
The biggest gains to banks have come from underwriting so many bonds. In addition to US investment-grade bonds, dollar high-yield note sales have jumped too, with underwriting fees there rising about 50 percent to $1.96 billion in the first half of 2020, according to Bloomberg data.
These gains from underwriting are not just happening in the United States. Central banks globally have been opening the money spigots to try to jump start the economy during the pandemic, spurring companies worldwide to borrow.
(Blog editor shakes head at the disingenuousness of the pre$$ and journali$ts. This is crap, cock-$ucking reporting. Must be the hedge fund ownership)
A wide range of companies that had put off borrowing earlier this year when markets were tumultuous ended up selling bonds in the second quarter. T-Mobile US Inc. sold $19 billion of investment-grade bonds in April to help finance its acquisition of Sprint Corp. United Airlines Holdings Inc. sold nearly $4 billion of notes in June to help keep itself afloat.
The increase in capital markets fees speaks to the strength of diversification at the banks, which have set aside more money to cover expected losses on loans, said Robert Smalley, a credit desk analyst at UBS Group AG.
“Debt underwriting fees really help counterbalance some of that,” he said, “but overall net income for the banks, like we saw in the first quarter, will be down materially year-over-year.”
For example, JPMorgan Chase, which posts results on Tuesday, posted about a $140 million increase in debt underwriting fees to $1.1 billion in the first quarter. That activity spurred record trading results and helped offset $820 million of markdowns on bridge loans.
June was the busiest month ever for junk bond sales. Investment-grade borrowers surpassed all of 2019 volume by mid-June.
That is what the Fed is buying!
“It has been an incredibly intense four months because we were trying to bring so many companies to market,” said Richard Zogheb, Global Head of Debt Capital Markets at Citigroup Inc. “I have a wife and a little guy here and they thought, ‘This is going to be great, we’re going to see you so much more,’ and frankly they’ve probably seen me less.”
Related: Another local biotech gets ready to make a public debut
Watertown's Pandion Therapeutics plans to raise $94m in its IPO, more than originally anticipated.
Workdays typically lasted at least 12 hours and he rarely left his home office except to get something to drink or to use the bathroom, he added.
Am I supposed to feel sympathy for the a$$hole?
I mean, he has a job!
Companies have borrowed in the bond market to raise money to help tide them over during the crisis, and to refinance debt, including money they borrowed on revolving lines of credit. Many decided to refinance existing bonds early, while they could and while rates for some borrowers were relatively cheap, rather than wait for the second half of 2020 and or even 2021.
Must be nice to play with numbers and make one$elf rich.
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I'm waiting for the Democratic audit and hearings with bated breath, and right below that article was this piece:
"Millions have lost health insurance in pandemic-driven recession" by Sheryl Gay Stolberg New York Times, July 13, 2020
WASHINGTON — The coronavirus pandemic stripped an estimated 5.4 million American workers of their health insurance between February and May, a stretch in which more adults became uninsured because of job losses than have ever lost coverage in a single year, according to a new analysis.
Maybe the Fed can help!
The study, to be announced Tuesday by the nonpartisan consumer advocacy group Families USA, found that the estimated increase in uninsured workers from February to May was nearly 40 percent higher than the highest previous increase, which occurred during the recession of 2008 and 2009, when 3.9 million adults lost insurance.
“We knew these numbers would be big,” said Stan Dorn, who directs the group’s National Center for Coverage Innovation and wrote the study. “This is the worst economic downturn since World War II. It dwarfs the Great Recession. So it’s not surprising that we would also see the worst increase in the uninsured.”
Families USA is one of a number of groups trying to estimate the number of people who have lost insurance during the pandemic; definitive data will not become available until mid- to late 2021, when the federal government publishes health insurance estimates for 2020. The analyses vary, but all reach the same grim conclusion: More people lack insurance than ever before.
They aren't seeing you anyway, so no big lo$$.
The nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation has estimated that 27 million Americans have lost coverage in the pandemic; that study took into account family members of the insured. Another analysis, published Monday by the Urban Institute and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, projected that by the end of 2020, 10.1 million people will no longer have employer-sponsored health insurance or coverage that was tied to a job they lost because of the pandemic, and those losing coverage could face staggering costs if they are struck by COVID-19, which has sent the seriously ill to hospital intensive care units for weeks, sometimes months.
The job was taken from them by government staffed by authoritarian, tin-pot governors.
The studies come in the thick of the campaign season, when health care — and in particular the future of the Affordable Care Act, popularly known as Obamacare — will be a major issue. Democrats and their presumptive presidential nominee, Joe Biden, want to expand the law. President Trump has asked the Supreme Court to overturn it.
Of course!
Another political piece of agenda-pushing in my pre$$!
What else is new?
Four of every five people who have lost employer-provided health insurance during the coronavirus pandemic are eligible for free coverage through expanded Medicaid programs or government-subsidized private insurance through the Obama-era health law, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, but experts say that insuring the recently unemployed is a difficult challenge. Many people cannot afford premiums for coverage through either the health care law or the program known as COBRA, for the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act. Others might not know they are eligible for Medicaid.
Who will be paying for it?
The White House and Congress have done little to help. The Trump administration has imposed sharp cuts on the funding for outreach programs that assist people in signing up for coverage under the health law, and while House Democrats have passed legislation intended to help people to keep their health insurance, the bill is stuck in the Republican-controlled Senate.
Yeah, it's always Trump or the Republicans fault in my pre$$.
“Helping people keep their insurance through a public health crisis surprisingly has not gotten much attention,” said Larry Levitt, executive vice president for health policy at the Kaiser Family Foundation. “This is the first recession in which the ACA is there as a safety net, but it’s an imperfect safety net.”
WTF is he talking about?
I was told not less than three weeks ago that the U.S. $afety net was $tronger than ever and we are all getting rich!
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Right next to both articles was this:
"Wall Street got a painful reminder that the coronavirus pandemic isn’t going away, and a big early gain for stocks suddenly flipped to losses after California showed how it’s still scarring the economy. The S&P 500 fell 0.9 percent, with all the losses accumulating in the last hour of trading, after California said it will extend closures of bars and indoor dining across the state, among other restrictions. It’s one of many states across the US West and South where coronavirus counts are accelerating and threatening the budding recovery that just got underway for the economy. The announcement from California, which accounts for nearly 15 percent of the country’s economy, combined with an escalation by the White House in its tensions with China to knock the market down from its earlier gain of 1.6 percent. Technology stocks took the hardest hits, highlighted by Microsoft’s swing from an early gain of 1 percent to a loss of 3.1 percent. It’s a sharp step back for tech-oriented giants, which have been cruising higher through the pandemic on bets that they can keep growing almost regardless of the economy. “There’s an increasing sense that the recovery from the virus related shutdown is going to be more drawn out, more uneven than maybe the market was looking for,” said Willie Delwiche, investment strategist at Baird. The volatility struck markets just as earnings reporting season gets underway. Several of the country’s biggest banks are slated to report their results Tuesday, including JPMorgan Chase, and the expectations are almost universally dreadful across the S&P 500. Investors are expecting banks, which traditionally kick off each earnings season every three months, to say they’ve had to set aside billions of dollars to cover loans potentially going bad due to the pandemic-caused recession, for example.
Well, we all know about the big banks now!
For energy stocks, whose earnings reports get going later in July, Wall Street expects profits to have disappeared completely. It’s not surprising given how prices in one corner of the US oil market momentarily dipped below zero during the quarter as demand disappeared. Investors have largely seemed willing to give a pass for such terrible results in the latest quarter and maybe even for a couple more. Instead, investors are focusing on a hopeful return to profit growth in 2021 and beyond. That’s helped the S&P 500 climb back to within 7 percent of its record set in February. The hope is that the economy and declines in corporate profits bottomed out in the spring and will continue to improve. The job market, retail sales and other measures of the economy have already begun showing some budding improvement. Of course, all the optimism is colliding with fears that the recovery could be short-lived due to the jumping coronavirus counts in California and other global hot spots. Monday’s sudden dive for markets after California’s announcement was reminiscent of similar recent market reactions after Florida and other Sun Belt locations have announced rising numbers of known infections and deaths. If states continue to bring back restrictions on their economies to slow the resurgence, it could choke off the fragile economic improvements just as they got underway. “The most important thing is COVID-19 data,” said Darrell Cronk, chief investment officer of Wells Fargo Wealth and Investment Management. Such concerns have helped the price of gold recently rally to its highest level since September 2011. Also adding to nervousness in the market was the White House’s decision to reject nearly all Chinese maritime claims in the South China Sea. The world’s largest economies have been sparring over everything from the coronavirus pandemic to human rights....."
What $hit-slop "journali$m," and it is nice to know that the governor of California can crash the market if he wishes.
Related:
Huawei sales soar in face of restrictions
Looks like the world is choosing sides:
"Months of growing animosity between Beijing and Washington escalated again Monday, when China slapped sanctions on four US officials, including three Republican members of Congress, and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declared most of China’s maritime claims in the South China Sea ‘‘completely unlawful.’’ ‘‘The world will not allow Beijing to treat the South China Sea as its maritime empire,’’ Pompeo said in a statement, accusing China of a ‘‘campaign of bullying’’ to control contested offshore resources other countries in the region also lay claim to. Pompeo in effect upended previous US policy that maritime disputes between China and other countries in the region should be resolved through United Nations-backed arbitration. His declaration places the United States on the side of China’s smaller neighbors — Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Vietnam. All of them reject China’s claims of sovereignty in the waters around islands in the South China Sea. Ever since a contentious meeting in Hawaii last month with China’s foreign policy chief, Yang Jiechi, Pompeo has repeatedly said the United States will watch Beijing’s actions to determine whether the ruling Chinese Communist Party wants to tone down the temperature on the heated rhetoric emanating from both capitals. China and Iran have been forging new ties as the two countries have become the biggest targets of the Trump administration......"
You can see the war shaping up as China allegedly copies the U.S. model.
"For the second time this year, Hong Kong Disneyland Park is closing temporarily following the city’s decision to ban public gatherings of more than four people because of the coronavirus pandemic, Disney officials said Monday. Disney officials posted on the resort’s website that the Hong Kong park was closing Wednesday until further notice. The resort’s hotels will remain open with adjusted levels of service, Disney officials said. Hong Kong’s leader, Carrie Lam, announced new coronavirus-related restrictions Monday and urged the private sector to put in place work-from-home arrangements for employees. Since July 6, Hong Kong has reported 250 new cases, with Monday’s tally of 52 being the highest since March."
I'd say you could come to Disney Land in California, but.....
"The Los Angeles and San Diego school districts, the two largest in California with a combined K-12 student population of about 720,000, announced Monday they won’t bring students back to classrooms next month because of rising coronavirus hospitalizations and infection rates. School leaders said there is too much uncertainty surrounding the safety of students and staff to try to return pupils to classrooms right away so they will continue the distance learning that was employed for the final months of the spring semester. Los Angeles and San Diego are the latest in a growing number of California school districts choosing to start the new term with digital learning amid strong concerns from teachers unions and as local leaders push Governor Gavin Newsom’s administration for clearer guidelines on what classroom learning should look like. Newsom, a Democrat, applauded Los Angeles and San Diego but stressed that each district has unique needs. The governor has extended the closure of bars and indoor dining statewide and has ordered gyms, churches, and hair salons closed in most places as coronavirus cases keep rising in the nation’s most populated state. On July 1, Newsom ordered many counties to close bars and indoor operations at restaurants, wineries, zoos, and family entertainment centers like bowling alleys and miniature golf. On Monday, he extended that order statewide and closed additional parts of the world’s fifth-largest economy, including indoor malls and offices for noncritical industries. California confirmed 8,358 new coronavirus cases on Sunday. Hospitalizations have increased 28 percent over the past two weeks."
That's puzzling because he is fine with race rioters protesting in the streets.
Flipping back the other way:
"Universal Health Services Inc., the largest US owner of psychiatric hospitals and clinics, has agreed to pay more than $127 million to resolve allegations that it improperly billed government insurance programs in Massachusetts and states around the country, Attorney General Maura Healey said in a statement Monday....."
That's what is known as a kickback, while her grandstanding makes the top of the B-section.
PepsiCo’s bottom line boosted by at-home snacking
They had a stronger-than-expected spring as homebound consumers looking for comfort stocked up on snack foods as their waist lines expand!
Strike at Bath Iron Works enters fourth week with no talks planned
I hope they don't go bankrupt.
At-home workers drinking less coffee
Dunkin' have to resort to layoffs.
‘Tiger King’ tops ‘The Lion King’
Based on how Netflix Inc. and Walt Disney Co. are trading, Wall Street is more into “Tiger King” than “The Lion King,” while all the talk is Moderna.
Thankfully, ‘‘big government deficits are the only thing keeping the US economy on life support and anti-deficit rhetoric threatens to pull the plug,’’ said Nathan Tankus, research director of the Modern Money Network. ‘‘The alternative is mass defaults, evictions, and bankruptcies which will devastate the United States.’’ The big increase in the deficit is largely due to an accounting change related to the Paycheck Protection Program. Some budget experts believe US spending will have to be cut after the economy improves....."
That's good news to a couple in Kentucky:
"Workers are pushed to the brink as they continue to wait for delayed unemployment payments" by Eli Rosenberg Washington Post, July 13, 2020
Alexis Herdez has been filing for unemployment every week since April, shortly after she was laid off on her first day of work at a bridal clothing store, but more than two months later, the 23-year-old in Lexington, Ky., has yet to receive any payment.
She and her husband have been struggling to pay rent and make their monthly car payment.
The automated phone system for the state’s unemployment system takes her to a queue for a callback that has yet to come. Visits to state offices have been fruitless. While Herdez was finally able to get an appointment with someone at the unemployment agency to look at her case, it’s not until August, she said.
The pandemic’s toll on workers who have been furloughed or laid off like Herdez is measured in numbers that splash across headlines: 1.4 million new weekly unemployment claims and 18 million people are already receiving continuous unemployment insurance. Tens of thousands of workers at Levi’s, Wells Fargo, and United Airlines learned this past week they could be furloughed or laid off in coming months, sending those workers to seek jobless benefits as well.
Four months into the worst recession since the Great Depression, tens of thousands of workers like Herdez across the country have filed for jobless claims but have yet to receive payments. Many are now in dire financial straits.
Should have become a banker or CEO of a going corporate concern.
The issue has spilled back into public view in recent weeks, as thousands of frustrated workers awaiting payments have camped out, sometimes overnight, in front of unemployment offices in states like Oklahoma, Alabama, and Kentucky.
Really?
I gue$$ there are protests, and then there are protests, huh?
If only they got the coverage that Floyd did.
Must be all white claimants.
The ongoing delays are the result of a confluence of crises, experts say.
A flood of new jobless applications — about 50 million — has overwhelmed state unemployment offices over the past four months. The agencies themselves are hampered by years of neglect. They rely on reduced staffs and badly outdated technology after years of budget cuts, often at the behest of business groups and Republican legislatures. Issues with fraud and user confusion over the new rules and filing process have further bogged down the process, but cases like Herdez show what happens when workers simply run out of money and the social safety net malfunctions with defaulted payments and trips to food banks.
Tired of the f**ing excuses yet?
In more desperate situations, workers become homeless.....
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It's the same in Mass, but the BG only reports it sporadically because it doesn't want to make state look bad.
Time to bag up this section with a splash of hope for the future.
{@@##$$%%^^&&}
"Ghislaine Maxwell tried ‘to flee’ when FBI showed up to arrest her in N.H., prosecutors say" by Travis Andersen Globe Staff, July 13, 2020
A panicked Ghislaine Maxwell, the socialite charged with helping Jeffrey Epstein sexually abuse underage girls in the 1990s, tried to flee to another room inside her stately New Hampshire home on July 2 when she looked out the window and saw FBI agents coming to arrest her, prosecutors said Monday.
The dramatic recounting of the arrest came in a legal filing prosecutors submitted Monday in US District Court for the Southern District in Manhattan, where Maxwell, 58, is slated for arraignment Tuesday on six felony counts including conspiracy to entice minors to travel to engage in illegal sex acts and perjury.
In the filing, prosecutors said FBI agents who arrived at Maxwell’s home in Bradford, N.H., discovered the property was barred by a locked gate. Agents breached the gate, the document said, and noticed a person later determined to be a private security guard on the property.
As they approached the front door, the filing said, agents announced themselves and directed Maxwell to open the door.
“Through a window, the agents saw the defendant ignore the direction to open the door and, instead, try to flee to another room in the house, quickly shutting a door behind her,” the filing said. “Agents were ultimately forced to breach the door in order to enter the house to arrest the defendant, who was found in an interior room in the house.”
Agents also spotted an electronic device that looked suspicious, according to the filing, which said “they also noticed a cell phone wrapped in tin foil on top of a desk, a seemingly misguided effort to evade detection, not by the press or public, which of course would have no ability to trace her phone or intercept her communications, but by law enforcement.”
Prosecutors made their submission Monday in response to a filing last week from Maxwell’s lawyers, who are requesting that she be freed on a $5 million bond with conditions while the case is pending.
Maxwell, who is being held at Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, on Friday waived her presence at Tuesday’s proceedings, which will be held remotely and which will also include her bail hearing.
Her lawyers didn’t immediately respond to e-mails seeking comment Monday but have said in court papers that Maxwell “vigorously denies the charges, intends to fight them, and is entitled to the presumption of innocence.”
Not anymore.
The guard present at the residence during Maxwell’s arrest told agents she hadn’t left the premises during his time working there, and that he was sent to make purchases for the property with the credit card, according to the filing.
He didn't do his job!
Noting that Maxwell has vast wealth and citizenship in France, which doesn’t extradite citizens to the US under French law, prosecutors reiterated their contention that she’s a flight risk and should be detained pending trial. Maxwell is also a citizen of the US and the United Kingdom, records show.
Prosecutors say Maxwell and Epstein groomed girls for participation in sexually abusive behavior by building a rapport with them through shopping trips, taking them to the movies, and spending time with them. As the ties strengthened, Maxwell would introduce sexualized behavior, ultimately leading to Epstein abusing the girls, sometimes with Maxwell’s participation or presence, prosecutors allege.
Authorities allege that girls were sexually assaulted in Epstein’s Manhattan residence, in his home in Palm Beach, Fla., and at a sprawling ranch in New Mexico. The indictment alleges Maxwell played a role “in the sexual abuse and exploitation of multiple minor girls by Jeffrey Epstein,” specifically three girls who were allegedly abused in the 1990s.
Epstein, a wealthy financier who counted US presidents, British royalty, and stars of academia among his friends, died last summer in federal custody while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. His death has been ruled a suicide.
Maxwell has repeatedly denied wrongdoing and called some of the claims against her “absolute rubbish.”
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At least she had on a mask, unlike the white nationalist they also arrested.
Time to start counting the mail-in ballots (the controversy is “no controversy at all.”):
"It's great to be identified early as the establishment-backed candidate and to benefit from millions of dollars in donations. It's not so great for the opponents. Activist Betsy Sweet and attorney Bre Kidman have watched money pour into front-runner Sara Gideon's campaign for U.S. Senate in Maine, with cash piling up to the point that she's now raised the most of any political candidate in the state's history. Gideon's claims that she wants to get money out of politics ring hollow to them. “We're not holding elections. We're holding auctions,” said Sweet. “Everyday Mainers are not the highest bidders.” Maine Democrats will decide Tuesday between Gideon, Maine's House speaker and a candidate who's amassed $23 million in contributions, and two candidates who've had to claw and scrap to get attention in a world consumed by a pandemic. The winner will take on Sen. Susan Collins in the fall....."
Unless you are one particular candidate:
"Senator Elizabeth Warren on Monday denounced President Trump’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic, calling for the federal government to increase testing and provide more resources to states. After her opening remarks, Warren began taking questions from the audience. Asked what Congress can do to help residents during the pandemic, Warren emphasized the importance of protecting voting rights by increasing support for polling staff and making voting by mail available to all. "The pandemic is layered on top of another problem, and that is for years now the Republican party has taken as its mission to do what it can to suppress voters, and that means particularly suppressing voting in communities of color," she said. A man named Levi, from East Boston, asked how Warren planned to address racial discrimination in housing, law enforcement, and other areas. Warren said reform should begin with changes to the criminal justice system and should extend to other measures, like canceling student loan debt, and mobilizing more resources to communities of color. “The way I see this, racism for generations has shaped crucial aspects of our economic and political system, so just being race-neutral is not going to do the work that we need to get done,” she said. Warren described climate change as a crisis that also offers an opportunity. “It’s an opportunity to create good, union, American jobs in clean and renewable energy. It’s an opportunity to create jobs in infrastructure and manufacturing, and to directly confront the racial and economic inequality that has been embedded in our fossil fuel economy.” Warren said public officials must make sure schools have the resources to adopt new safety measures against the virus and criticized Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos for leveraging the pandemic to pull money out of public education. “I’ve just had it,” she said....."
Yeah, #METOO!
She has become a disgusting party hack and megaphone, and finished her talk by outlining her plans to safeguard access to abortions!
Time to ride her out on a rail:
Hundreds of drivers for the MBTA’s Ride service are on strike
That will be hurting disabled students the most, leaving them alone and confused (does that comfort you?) as they wait for an Uber.
Calling for accountability, Campbell proposes police oversight board
It's not like they are the Minneapolis police, but the heat is on as the debate continues between the President and the General over the COVID-19 vaccine, and why is Charlie Baker afraid of the State Police?
{@@##$$%%^^&&}
Arizona reports record in patients using ventilators
Deaths to come.
Texas GOP convention may go online after court losses
The fact that they rose to his defense tells you all you need to know about them.
"Activists against police brutality expressed outrage and demanded accountability Monday after video emerged over the weekend of an officer placing his knee on a man’s head and neck area outside a Pennsylvania hospital. Hundreds of people marched in downtown Allentown on Monday night, calling for the officer to be fired and police funds to be reallocated to education, mental health and other social services. The videotaped incident occurred nearly seven weeks after a white Minneapolis police officer pressed his knee into the neck of Floyd, a Black man, for nearly eight minutes. Floyd’s death in police custody sparked global protests over police brutality and racial injustice. The brief bystander video, shot from a passing vehicle and posted on social media, shows Allentown officers restraining the man on the ground outside the emergency room of the Sacred Heart Campus of St. Luke’s Hospital....."
What timing!
Apparently, the man had begun to yell and spit at officers and hospital staff, and was “noncompliant which required officers to restrain” him. He was treated at the hospital and released(?), and community advocates said they were trying to identify the man in the video to offer support.
WTF?
The entire world is being turned upside down!
"The U.S. Marshals Service is investigating after a protester was hospitalized in critical condition over the weekend after being hit in the head by a less-lethal round fired by a federal law enforcement officer, authorities said Monday. The incident was widely condemned in Portland, which has seen violent protests every night following the death in May of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Recent protests have focused almost entirely on federal property, and particularly the courthouse....."
The courthouse is covered with graffiti:
Federal officers pull a protester into the Federal Courthouse as protesters gather in downtown Portland, Ore.
What a shithole, and if certain cho$en people have their way:
What a shithole, and if certain cho$en people have their way:
"The Open Society Foundations, the philanthropic group founded by the business magnate George Soros, announced on Monday that it was investing $220 million in efforts to achieve racial equality in America, a huge financial undertaking that will support several Black-led racial justice groups for years to come. The initiative, which comes amid national protests for racial equality and calls for police reform ignited by the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, will immediately reshape the landscape of Black political and civil rights organizations, and signals the extent to which race and identity have become the explicit focal point of American politics in recent years, with no sign of receding. Mr. Soros, who has at times faced smears and anti-Semitism over his role as a liberal megadonor, is also positioning his foundation near the forefront of the protest movement. Of the $220 million, the foundation will invest $150 million in five-year grants for selected groups, including progressive and emerging organizations like the Black Voters Matter Fund and Repairers of the Breach, a group founded by the Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II of the Poor People’s Campaign. The money will also support more established Black civil rights organizations like the Equal Justice Initiative, which was founded by the civil rights lawyer Bryan Stevenson and depicted in the 2019 movie “Just Mercy.” The Open Society Foundations will invest an additional $70 million in local grants supporting changes to policing and criminal justice. This money will also be used to pay for opportunities for civic engagement and to organize internships and political training for young people. Patrick Gaspard, the president of the Open Society Foundations, said in an interview that the group believed the investment was about harnessing the momentum toward racial justice, but also giving organizations room to think long-term. Now, he said, is “the moment we’ve been investing in for the last 25 years.”
$ure LOOKS LIKE a CONSPIRACY to me, and "between the local grants and the millions for Black-led organizations, however, Mr. Soros and his foundation have helped answer the question of whether the social justice groups that have dominated the current moment are here to stay," -- thus the tearing down of our society will continue!
"An independent panel of national legal experts will review the conviction of an African American man sentenced as a teenager to life in prison for the murder of a little girl struck by a stray bullet, Northwestern University's Center on Wrongful Convictions and the New York-based Innocence Project announced Monday. Myon Burrell, 34, has spent nearly two decades behind bars. His case captured widespread interest, first at the time of his 2002 arrest, and again this year after Sen. Amy Klobuchar touted it during her run for the U.S. presidency. She used it as an example of how — when top prosecutor in Hennepin County — she helped find justice for the African American community outraged by gun violence and the senseless death of Tyesha Edwards, an 11-year-old Black girl killed while doing homework at her dining-room table. After the Associated Press and APM Reports highlighted flaws in the investigation that pointed to a possible wrongful conviction, Klobuchar called for a review, saying justice was not only about punishing the guilty but protecting the innocent. She and the Hennepin County Attorney's Office expressed support Monday for the new panel, which hopes to release its findings by the year's end. The death of George Floyd has put a spotlight on Minnesota and its long history of racial injustice....."
So let a baby-killer out of jail!
Also see:
$ure LOOKS LIKE a CONSPIRACY to me, and "between the local grants and the millions for Black-led organizations, however, Mr. Soros and his foundation have helped answer the question of whether the social justice groups that have dominated the current moment are here to stay," -- thus the tearing down of our society will continue!
"An independent panel of national legal experts will review the conviction of an African American man sentenced as a teenager to life in prison for the murder of a little girl struck by a stray bullet, Northwestern University's Center on Wrongful Convictions and the New York-based Innocence Project announced Monday. Myon Burrell, 34, has spent nearly two decades behind bars. His case captured widespread interest, first at the time of his 2002 arrest, and again this year after Sen. Amy Klobuchar touted it during her run for the U.S. presidency. She used it as an example of how — when top prosecutor in Hennepin County — she helped find justice for the African American community outraged by gun violence and the senseless death of Tyesha Edwards, an 11-year-old Black girl killed while doing homework at her dining-room table. After the Associated Press and APM Reports highlighted flaws in the investigation that pointed to a possible wrongful conviction, Klobuchar called for a review, saying justice was not only about punishing the guilty but protecting the innocent. She and the Hennepin County Attorney's Office expressed support Monday for the new panel, which hopes to release its findings by the year's end. The death of George Floyd has put a spotlight on Minnesota and its long history of racial injustice....."
So let a baby-killer out of jail!
Also see:
Former Mueller prosecutor writing on investigation
Deep State creature Andrew Weissmann’s book “Where Law Ends: Inside the Mueller Investigation” will be published Sept. 29.
Deep State creature Andrew Weissmann’s book “Where Law Ends: Inside the Mueller Investigation” will be published Sept. 29.
Judge seeking more details on clemency for Stone
It's US District Judge Amy Berman Jackson, a Clinton-appointed skank.
It's US District Judge Amy Berman Jackson, a Clinton-appointed skank.
GOP reelection operation hires 1,500 field staffers
Still won't be enough, as the campaign is on fire:
Still won't be enough, as the campaign is on fire:
"A fire suppression system was inoperable when a blaze erupted aboard the USS Bonhomme Richard in San Diego, so sailors fought the blaze with water, a top Navy official said Monday. Rear Admiral Philip Sobeck said the Halon gas system had been turned off because it was being worked on while the amphibious assault ship was undergoing maintenance work. The fire erupted Sunday morning and continues to burn. It broke out in a lower cargo area where cardboard and drywall supplies were stored and firefighters initially fought it with water until they had to withdraw, Sobeck said....."
Firefighting vessels poured sea water on the amphibious assault ship USS Bonhomme Richard at Naval Base San Diego on Sunday (CHRISTINA ROSS/US NAVY/AFP via Getty Images/AFP via Getty Images)
Looks like Pearl Harbor:
"Officials organizing events to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II in Hawaii say the coronavirus has not derailed the plans. Planners expect to follow though with the schedule of Victory over Japan Day, or V-J Day, events Aug. 29 through Sept. 2 as uncertainty remains about COVID-19 health restrictions, The Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported. The theme of the events is “Salute Their Service, Honor Their Hope,’’ and the schedule includes several warplane flyovers and a ceremony on or next to the battleship Missouri, on which the United States accepted Japan’s unconditional surrender Sept. 2, 1945. Tony Vericella, executive director of the 75th World War II Commemoration Committee in Hawaii, said that as of last week more than 30 World War II veterans from outside Hawaii and their family members had committed to attending the events in Oahu. Vericella said the participation of veterans and others from the US mainland relies on the state lifting a 14-day self-quarantine for out-of-state travelers, which would be replaced with a mandate for visitors to undergo COVID-19 screening tests prior to arriving. The Honolulu City Council last week urged Hawaii’s governor to consider delaying the plan until the rate of new coronavirus cases on the US mainland and in Hawaii drops significantly."
Related:
"An outbreak of coronavirus cases on US military bases in Okinawa, Japan, has alarmed the island’s local population, which at times has been at odds with the Americans stationed there and has otherwise been successful in limiting COVID-19. The US Marine Corps, which has about 20,000 troops stationed on the island, reported 94 confirmed cases to the prefectural government and said it had instituted strict measures in all 33 installations in the region. Denny Tamaki, the governor of Okinawa, said he was shocked by the number of infections and said it was “extremely regrettable” that so many cases had emerged among US troops and affiliated personnel in less than a week. Excluding the American cases, Okinawa has recorded just 148 infections since February. Tamaki added that he had “strong doubts” about the prevention measures reported by the United States. The US military in South Korea also announced Monday that 11 troops had tested positive upon arrival from the United States. The US military has struggled with outbreaks among its troops, with a major cluster of infections in March on the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt. The Japanese military, by contrast, has reported just 14 cases among its defense forces, all of whom are thought to have contracted the virus in their communities rather than while deployed. The cases in Okinawa are a new strain on relations between the military and the local government, where the presence of US bases, dating to the end of World War II, has been an ongoing source of friction. Citizens have long complained of noise, crime, and aircraft accidents, and have repeatedly questioned why nearly half of the 55,000 US troops in Japan — which include personnel from all of the military branches — are stationed on Okinawa."
How are we going to fight a war with sick sailors?
Should have executed those war criminals:
"Judge blocks federal executions hours before first was scheduled to occur" by Michael Balsamo Associated Press, July 13, 2020
Looks like Pearl Harbor:
"Officials organizing events to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II in Hawaii say the coronavirus has not derailed the plans. Planners expect to follow though with the schedule of Victory over Japan Day, or V-J Day, events Aug. 29 through Sept. 2 as uncertainty remains about COVID-19 health restrictions, The Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported. The theme of the events is “Salute Their Service, Honor Their Hope,’’ and the schedule includes several warplane flyovers and a ceremony on or next to the battleship Missouri, on which the United States accepted Japan’s unconditional surrender Sept. 2, 1945. Tony Vericella, executive director of the 75th World War II Commemoration Committee in Hawaii, said that as of last week more than 30 World War II veterans from outside Hawaii and their family members had committed to attending the events in Oahu. Vericella said the participation of veterans and others from the US mainland relies on the state lifting a 14-day self-quarantine for out-of-state travelers, which would be replaced with a mandate for visitors to undergo COVID-19 screening tests prior to arriving. The Honolulu City Council last week urged Hawaii’s governor to consider delaying the plan until the rate of new coronavirus cases on the US mainland and in Hawaii drops significantly."
Related:
"An outbreak of coronavirus cases on US military bases in Okinawa, Japan, has alarmed the island’s local population, which at times has been at odds with the Americans stationed there and has otherwise been successful in limiting COVID-19. The US Marine Corps, which has about 20,000 troops stationed on the island, reported 94 confirmed cases to the prefectural government and said it had instituted strict measures in all 33 installations in the region. Denny Tamaki, the governor of Okinawa, said he was shocked by the number of infections and said it was “extremely regrettable” that so many cases had emerged among US troops and affiliated personnel in less than a week. Excluding the American cases, Okinawa has recorded just 148 infections since February. Tamaki added that he had “strong doubts” about the prevention measures reported by the United States. The US military in South Korea also announced Monday that 11 troops had tested positive upon arrival from the United States. The US military has struggled with outbreaks among its troops, with a major cluster of infections in March on the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt. The Japanese military, by contrast, has reported just 14 cases among its defense forces, all of whom are thought to have contracted the virus in their communities rather than while deployed. The cases in Okinawa are a new strain on relations between the military and the local government, where the presence of US bases, dating to the end of World War II, has been an ongoing source of friction. Citizens have long complained of noise, crime, and aircraft accidents, and have repeatedly questioned why nearly half of the 55,000 US troops in Japan — which include personnel from all of the military branches — are stationed on Okinawa."
How are we going to fight a war with sick sailors?
Should have executed those war criminals:
"Judge blocks federal executions hours before first was scheduled to occur" by Michael Balsamo Associated Press, July 13, 2020
TERRE HAUTE, Ind. — A US district judge on Monday ordered a new delay in federal executions, hours before the first lethal injection was scheduled to be carried out at a federal prison in Indiana. The Trump administration immediately appealed to a higher court, asking that the executions move forward.
US District Judge Tanya Chutkan said there are still legal issues to resolve and that “the public is not served by short-circuiting legitimate judicial process.’’ The executions, pushed by the administration, would be the first carried out at the federal level since 2003.
This may surprise you, but I am opposed to the death penalty.
This blog is pro-life in all cases. The wars based ons lies kill enough.
As for war criminals like Bush, et al, there is a nice cell awaiting them at Gitmo.
Chutkan said the inmates have presented evidence showing that the government’s plan to use only pentobarbital to carry out the executions “poses an unconstitutionally significant risk of serious pain.”
Chutkan said the inmates produced evidence that, in other executions, prisoners who were given pentobarbital suffered ”flash pulmonary edema,” which she said interferes with breathing and produces sensations of drowning and strangulation.
The inmates have identified alternatives, including the use of an opioid or antianxiety drug at the start of the procedure or a different method altogether, a firing squad, Chutkan said.....
Whatever they want. now get on with it!
--more--"
Related:
Federal judge voids Georgia ‘heartbeat’ abortion restriction
Of course, women can get all the abortion pills they want, and think of the juxtaposition there: one judge blocks an execution while another allows the murder of innocent babies.
{@@##$$%%^^&&}
I wonder what they would have named the kid in the hope he/she was not ignored, and discredited while Trump keeps focus elsewhere:
"‘Never seen anything like this:’ State lawmakers face multiple crises and a time crunch" by Matt Stout Globe Staff, July 13, 2020
It’s so common on Beacon Hill in even numbered years, it’s nearly tradition: the last-minute rush by lawmakers to pass a raft of lingering bills before formal lawmaking ends July 31, but this year, the simultaneous health, economic, and racial justice crises have made the late-session crush like no other.
See: Putting Together a State Budget
Nice to $ee $ome things are $till normal.
The Massachusetts Legislature has yet to pass an annual budget for the current fiscal year, one of its primary constitutional responsibilities. A sweeping economic development bill is burbling in the background. Legislation raising more than $600 million in new taxes for transportation appears dead, but a $17 billion bill to borrow money for it is not, and a recently emerging item on the agenda — to tighten accountability of police — has broad support on Beacon Hill, but a final bill remains tied up in the legislative process.
Absent a vote extending the formal session, state legislators have just 18 days to plow through this unprecedented to-do list, and more.
“In my 30 years, I’ve never seen anything like this,” said state Representative Ronald Mariano, the House’s majority leader. “The problem is— we don’t have any money.”
Let's go through the "intellectual exercise" anyway, kids.
Lawmakers are tinkering with a $1 billion-plus COVID spending bill, a version of which ping-ponged back Monday from the House to the Senate. High-profile priorities, such as housing and health care, may also veer dramatically from the more sweeping plans lawmakers envisioned months before the pandemic landed, should they emerge at all.
Legislative leaders have had private discussions about whether, and how, they can give themselves more time to pass it all, a rare consideration even for a body known to regularly suspend its own rules. That could include extending the legislative session past July 31 or threading a special session into the political calendar, when lawmakers face reelection this fall, and in a sign of the pile of work still ahead, the House and Senate are not engaged in any conference committees, the six-person negotiation sessions that help broker the final versions of complicated legislation.
Both chambers appear to be keen on passing an economic development bill. Mariano said a provision legalizing and taxing sports betting would also “probably” be included in the House’s package, potentially giving oxygen to an issue that’s long stalled.
Many of the legislative discussions come down to money. Nearly two weeks into the fiscal year, the state is leaning on a temporary $5.25 billion budget to keep state government functioning, and legislative leaders say they remain handcuffed by two considerations, among many. They face unpredictable tax revenues as the state eases through Baker’s reopening plan amid the COVID-19 pandemic and questions of whether Congress will pass a bill seeding state and local governments with more funds. Without the latter, officials warn, deep cuts could be used to offset a potential multibillion dollar state budget gap.
Meanwhile, lawmakers are scrambling to pass a bill targeting policing in Massachusetts, spurred in recent weeks by the demonstrations against police brutality following the death of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis.
Honestly, we have way more important concerns at the moment, especially since they never went near the State Police $candal!
The Senate moved toward passing a version of the legislation on Monday, and Governor Charlie Baker has filed legislation to create a system for licensing police officers and stripping them of their certification for misconduct.
The House, too, has committed to passing a bill, but DeLeo said Monday it won’t come before the House holds a public hearing, perhaps as early as this week.
The truncated, and complicated, discussion around increasing accountability on police has already hit snags. Before it began in earnest Monday, debate in the Senate was delayed on three successive days by Republican Senator Ryan C. Fattman, who used parliamentary tactics to table the bill while criticizing what he said was its rushed passage.
Focus quickly turned to the provision aimed at qualified immunity, the legal doctrine that bars government officials, including police officers, from being held personally responsible for monetary damages in civil lawsuits. The original version of the Senate bill sought to curtail it by setting a higher bar: An officer’s action would only get immunity if “no reasonable defendant could have reason to believe that such conduct would violate the law.”
Police unions have railed against the measure, while Representative Ayanna Pressley and Senator Elizabeth Warren took the rare step of weighing in on state policy, publicly urging senators in recent days to pass it.
It quickly created a linear debate: How much should legislators try to tackle as the clock dwindles?
Representative Russell E. Holmes, a Mattapan Democrat and former chairman of the Black and Latino Legislative Caucus, said, “We can’t tackle 400 years of systemic racism and white supremacy in four weeks. That’s not possible.”
Then how did he win office and what was he doing in government?
--more--"
That was the Globe's top lesson today, and once again, Trump caved.
I hoped you learned something, reader.
