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Yes... Very special. I'm still holding my oversized position form the early dotcom bust days. It's now a "125 bagger".
All the growth has gone into stockholder equity which is reflected in the share price. The very conservative practice of not issuing shares but achieving real growth has turned a $4 Million market cap into a 1/2 Billion market cap company. Amazing. SLP went public with 4 million shares, split 2/1 twice resulting in 16 million shares and today still has only 17.5 million shares. The best Ivy League business schools should use SLP as an example of how to manage a public company.
Crazy as it seems... I continue to hold my shares. The biggest mistake of my life is that I have my SLP stock in a traditional IRA rather than a Roth. The tax bill is huge... could have all been tax free.
Simulations Plus Reports Third Quarter FY2019 Financial Results
Record quarter as revenues grow 16%, 9MoFY19 revenues up 13%
Board of Directors announces quarterly dividend of $0.06 per share
Simulations Plus, Inc. (SLP), the leading provider of modeling and simulation solutions for the pharmaceutical, biotechnology, chemicals, and consumer goods industries, today reported financial results for its third quarter of fiscal year 2019 (3QFY19) and the first nine months of fiscal year 2019 (9moFY19), the period ended May 31, 2019.
3QFY19 highlights compared with 3QFY18:
Net revenues increased 16.2% to $9.9 million, an increase of $1.4 million over $8.6 million
Gross profit was up 16.6% to $7.6 million, an increase of $1.1 million over $6.5 million
SG&A was $3.1 million, an increase of 18.6% or $483,000 over $2.6 million
Total R&D expenditures were $1,066,000, an increase of $73,000, or 7.4% over $993,000
In 3QFY19, $422,000 was capitalized and $643,000 was expensed
In 3QFY18, $485,000 was capitalized and $508,000 was expensed
Income before taxes increased 13.4% to $3.9 million, an increase of $456,000 over $3.4 million
Net income increased 20.1% to $2.9 million, an increase of $483,000 over $2.4 million
Diluted earnings per share increased 18.8% to $0.16 from $0.13
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/simulations-plus-reports-third-quarter-200500918.html
Stock is up 3.75% for the day plus an additional 6% after hours. I continue to hold a huge position since the dot com lows.... SLP is now a "125 bagger"
Video Of Danish Middle-Schoolers Taught To Chant "Allahu Akbar" Sparks Controversy
A video showing Danish schoolchildren being trained how to perform a Muslim prayer and chant “Allahu Akbar” has stoked controversy.
The clip shows a boy of African descent in Muslim clothing demonstrating the Islamic prayer to a group of mainly ethnically Danish children.
He is then interrupted by a teacher who instructs the kids to say “Allahu Akbar,” after which the entire class kneels in prayer.
The prayer took place at Thyregod School in Velje municipality in southern Jutland in November 2018, reports Sputnik.
People don't like to click on a "blind link". If you would provide just a line or two about the subject matter you will find that there is much more interest.
Good cartoon today... Thanks!
Can Nemo be sold at a high enough price so that after the manufacturing costs are covered a profit is realized? Or do we need to wait for the product improvements to get the cost down so that there is a profit? At this time the market seems to doubt that there will be a profit.
Twitter Is Making You Stupid: Study
Every day roughly 126 million people hop on Twitter to participate in a near-instantaneous flow of information, and it's making users more stupid according to a team of Italian researchers.
While analyzing the impact of Twitter when used to teach literature, economists at the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart in Milan found that it doesn't just fail as an educational aid, it actually reduced standardized test scores between 25% - 40% of a standard deviation.
"It’s quite detrimental," lead author Gian Paolo Barbetta told the Washington Post. "I can’t say whether something is changing in the mind, but I can say that something is definitely changing in the behavior and the performance."
To the best of Barbetta’s knowledge, his study is the largest and most rigorous examination of Twitter’s effect on student achievement, with applications to learning and information retention in other areas of life.
The investigation drew on a sample of roughly 1,500 students attending 70 Italian high schools during the 2016-2017 academic year. Half of the students used Twitter to analyze “The Late Mattia Pascal,” the 1904 novel by Italian Nobel laureate Luigi Pirandello, which satirizes issues of self-knowledge and self-destruction. They posted quotes and their own reflections, commenting on tweets written by their classmates. Teachers weighed in to stimulate the online discussion.
The other half relied on traditional classroom teaching methods. Performance was assessed based on a test measuring understanding, comprehension and memorization of the book.
Using Twitter reduced performance on the test by about 25 to 40 percent of a standard deviation from the average result, as the paper explains. Jeff Hancock, the founding director of the Stanford Social Media Lab, described these as “pretty big effects.” -WaPo
The decline was most noticeable among higher-achieving students, which the paper says bolsters the conclusion that blogs and social media websites actively impair performance instead of simply failing to augment learning.
University of Southern California's Karen North, a professor at the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, said that the study had stark implications when it comes to politics - though the findings are hardly surprising.
"It’s the same problem that we have with the level of political discussion," said North. "People get 280 characters, and it’s not enough. Without the full background, you’re more likely to be led astray ... Remember when we were debating whether people have the attention span to consume 280 characters, instead of just 140?"
The problem according to Barbetta, the lead author, is that people will take shortcuts when they can.
"But a shortcut won’t take you to the destination in this case," he added. "It will take you somewhere different."
And Twitter is the ultimate shortcut.
Barbetta suggested that declining performance among students who had used the social networking site to study the novel was a result of two factors. The first was a mistaken belief on the part of students that they had absorbed the book by circulating tweets about its contents. The second was that time spent on social media simply replaced time spent actually poring over the book.
The study contributes to growing skepticism that human activities — and learning, specifically — can be transferred to cyberspace without a cost. For instance, analysis has found that screen-based reading lends itself to skimming. In a 2016 study, it was discovered that test scores were lower among American undergraduates assigned to classrooms where computers were allowed than among those required to resort to pen and paper.
In the case of Twitter and Italian literature, the initial assumption of the study turned out to be faulty. “We thought we were testing a positive intervention,” Barbetta said. -WaPo
In short, your cane-shaking grandfather was right about these new-fangled ways of communicating.
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-06-02/twitter-making-you-stupid-study
Schlichter: Dear Students, Here's A Plan To Solve Your Debt Problem
So, you’re a barista with a problem – you took out $200K student loans to get that master’s degree from Gumbo State in “LGBTQ2#v& Experiences as Reflected in 17th Century Bolivian Folk Songs” and now you can’t find an uncaffeinated career.
Worse, those fascist monsters who you took money from based on your agreement to pay it back with interest now expect you to pay the money back with interest despite the fact that you really don’t feel like it anymore.
Well, I have a fresh solution to this crisis.
It’s an innovative strategy that totally and permanently resolves this problem in a new and exciting way.
Ready?
Here goes.
How about you pay your own student debt?
That’s it. It’s as elegant as it is simple. You. Pay. Your. Own. Debts.
If you follow this bold, one-step program – the one step is you paying your debts – then you will eventually be debt-free. And best of all, I won’t have to pay any of your debts.
See, a lot of Democrat politicians are promising “free college,” but what they really mean is “free for you.” Someone has to pay, and that someone is me, and I need to level with you.
I am not interested in paying for your college.
Now, some may call me “greedy” or “selfish” for not wishing to work and then have the money I earned taken from me to provide things to you that you want but did not pay for instead of being able to spend it – the “it” being the money I earned – on things that I want. I am okay with that. I would much prefer having people who fundamentally misunderstand the concepts of greed and selfishness call me “greedy” and “selfish” than subsidize their educations, educations that evidently did not include learning about basic concepts like greed and selfishness.
I understand that your priorities for my money may differ from mine, but it being my money, my priorities should take precedence. Here is a short, partial list of things that I prioritize for my money over paying off your student loan debts:
1. A lease on a sweet German sedan
2. A delicious tri-tip sandwich
3. A walk-in humidor
4. Guns and ammo
5. A pedicure for my wife
6. A pedicure for me
7. A pedicure for my fat corgi Bitey
8. Literally anything else but your student loan debt
Now, those who support the idea of taking my money to give it to someone else so that someone else can have things he, she or xe wants rarely put it so bluntly. It’s never, “Well, I want this education but I don’t want to do the things necessary to pay for it. I want you other people to do the things necessary to pay for it.” Instead, it’s always put in some other way that makes them taking our money to spend on things they want appear as a favor to us, the people expected to do the work.
For instance, sometimes they say that us working to give other people free stuff is an “investment.” Again with the not understanding what words means…
Traditionally, with an investment, one gets a return on investment. No one ever explains what my return on investment for Kaden’s Marxist Puppetry degree might be, other than an occasional latte which I would still have to pay for. I prefer that I instead determine how to invest my own money in order to benefit myself, which I do not see as unreasonable since it is my money. Which I earned by working.
This is the beauty of my one-step student loan plan. It puts all this controversy aside. Pay your own student loan off. That’s it. End of discussion. Now get to work.
Note that I am not pointing out how I managed to fund my own education without asking strangers to chip in – actually, without forcing them to chip in, because if you don’t pay your taxes designed to fund “free college” people with guns will come to haul you away. The argument that “I paid for mine so you should pay for you own” is valid, but we need not even reach it. No one should ever be forced to give other people free stuff. It’s my money, and that’s reason enough why you can’t have it.
I certainly understand that academia is a scam and that the government allows lending to people who foolishly undertake debts that they cannot pay. I would stop it all – no government participation in the student loan industry and full bankruptcy dischargeability for student debts. Of course, this would mean many less people taking loans, and therefore fewer college students. No lose to society there. This means many colleges would actually start having to compete for students, and even – gasp – lower prices. Sounds good to me, though they would scream bloody murder – colleges have gotten fat off of loan money and many schools would go under without this pot of suckers’ cash. Oh well.
Sure, academia is a grift, but you did sign on the line that is dotted. You took the money. And I say that you pay it back instead of me.
Now, I have read many tales of woe from people who have taken out huge student loans and have not taken jobs that pay enough to support paying them off. Yes, this is a problem. But it is your problem.
Often, after I suggest my patented student loan debt resolution system – which is, in its entirety, “Pay your own debts” – people who have taken out debts they can’t pay will ask me “Well, how do I do that?”
And my answer is, “I don’t know, because it’s not my problem. It’s your problem. You’re an adult, with at least one degree, so you figure it out.”
See, it’s important to allocate responsibility. It is not my responsibility to provide a solution to your problems. Your problems are your problems. You solve them.
Now, I can provide some helpful suggestions, if you wish to hear them. You won’t like them, because all of them recognize that your problem is your problem, not mine, and all of them require you to do things that you would probably prefer not to do. These suggestions include:
1. Get a better job. You can thank President Trump for the record low unemployment rate. Sure, you might not be able to continue at your dream job because it does not pay enough, but too bad. I’d rather pay for my own dreams.
2. Get a second job. Yeah, that will cut into your free time. Better that than paying your debt off cutting into mine.
3. Spend less on things you enjoy in order to pay off your debt faster. Again, I would prefer you to sacrifice to pay off your debt instead of for me to sacrifice to pay off your debt.
There are probably other ways to pay off your debt, but I am not going to spend my time thinking about them. After all, your student debt is your problem, so you spend time thinking about how to pay it off.
Now, let me once more provide you with my student debt solution.
Here it is again.
Pay your own student debt.
Creating a debtor class of over-educated, under-smart serfs with gender studies degrees is another Cloward-Piven-seque ploy to undermine our society in the pursuit of the socialist Utopia our garbage ruling class seeks to command. Of course, this would be a Utopia built of envy, incompetence and lies. If you want to see the reality of the country they dream of, then check out my action-packed yet super-snarky novels about the United States’ split into red and blue countries, People's Republic, Indian Country andWildfire. Liberals hate my novels. The sissy castaways from the Weekly Standard call them “Appalling.” So, obviously you’ll call them “Awesome.”
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-05-31/schlichter-dear-students-heres-plan-solve-your-debt-problem
It’s been so long ago that I don’t remember if it was Bobwins or hweb that introduced me to SLP on the Raging Bull board. Either way a really big thank you to both for continuing to be first class contributors. They both bring thoughtful and meaningful information and never portray an agenda of their own. SLP has grown from a minuscule market cap of 4 million to almost 1/2 Billion today. And they have done it with almost zero share issuance. That means all the growth has gone to the shareholders. There are so many things going right for this company that it’s hard list them all. I fully expect the growth to continue. The drug discovery industry is screaming for computer solutions to help them find the next big thing and SLP is providing the software tools. The SLP software is so good and so universally known that scientist presenting at professional conferences cite the SLP software as their primary source in their research.
SLP is officially a “ 100 Bagger “.
It’s up 100 fold since the dot com bust of the early 2000’s. I have held a significantly oversized position the entire time. SLP continues to become a larger and larger part of my diversified portfolio.
"THEY DID NOT ADD TO THE FLOAT!!"
That's only a true statement as long as he holds the shares and doesn't sell them. But those shares are part of the outstanding share count. That means that BWMG will have to show bottom line earnings that are 48% higher than prior to issuing these shares in order to get the same PE ratio. They just sold 1/3 of the entire business for $500,000.
Here is a fairly good description of the effect of share dilution:
Note that nowhere is a distinction made between "paper shares" or "retail shares". In fact... those terms don't even exist when talking about share issuance.
https://www.investopedia.com/articles/stocks/11/dangers-of-stock-dilution.asp
Schlichter: How About Some "Adversity Points" For Hardworking Kids Of Hardworking Parents?
The latest tactic for the elite to shaft Normal Americans is the obnoxious “adversity score” that the academifascists who run the SATs plan to introduce as a way to give a fig leaf of objectivity and fairness to their screwing over of your kids in favor of the kids of people they prefer. Do you think there is any chance, and chance at all, that these secret numbers based upon secret factors and kept secret from you will make it more likely for your children to get into one of the elite schools?
Yeah, right.
If only someone had predicted this kind of social credit nightmare…
Now, we know for damn certain that the rock-bottom “adversity scores” of the pampered brats of the elite in politics, Hollywood, the media and the corporate boardrooms won’t hold them back. The elite’s gonna elite. We saw a few particularly dumb rich people get swooped up by the FBI, but for every past-prime starlet about to method act the role of a convict at a minimum security women’s prison, you know there are a hundred smarter, subtler wealthy cheats whose useless Ashleighs and Kadens are currently wandering the halls of Harvard, Yale and the other Skeevy League campuses, literally shaking because someone expressed a dissenting opinion.
No, these “adversity scores” – like every other scam the elite pulls – are a fraud designed to increase the arbitrary power and control of the ruling class. “Adversity scores” are manifestly not designed to cull out those applicants with the least adversity. They are designed to cull out your kids in favor of kids in the political demographics the elite prefers. The schools the admissions racketeers gatekeep are the gateways to the elite, and the likes of our spawn need not apply. The talented kids of middle managers, soldiers or other uncool people who probably go to church and do not even subscribe to the New York Times? Forget it. This is another way for our garbage ruling class to promote “diversity,” by which it means a wide range of people who can be brainwashed into sharing the elite’s liberal elitist views.
“Adversity scores” seek to impose (illegal) racial, political and socio-economic quotas without actually saying so by pretending that this is just a new objective, transparent and fair way to evaluate the “whole person.” But, of course, this is obviously baloney, and that’s why they want to hide the process from examination. Moreover, they appear to be creating these bogus standards by embracing every condescending and cheesy stereotypes of the people this is designed to let them select, like single motherhood, poverty and crime. Congrats, hardworking Normal Americans who happen to be of a racial or ethnic minority! In the collective collectivist mind of our crummy elite, you’ve been pegged as ghetto-dwelling delinquents from broken homes.
That’s who they see you as.
That’s all they will ever see you as.
Oh, and they consider Normal Asian-Americans as especially undiverse. All that hard work and focus and sacrifice and Tiger Momming…sure, Asian-Americans are different from everyone else in their amazing dedication and success, but that’s the wrong kind of diversity, don’t you know? Diversity is only good when it’s aesthetic, or better yet, political. It’s bad when it actually reflects effort and achievement, because those derive from individual effort rather than from useful narratives of collective oppression.
The ruling class wants to make college admissions a political act, and its members hate your politics. How do you think your kid is going to fare under their system?
Let me give you a hint.
Say it with me…
“Would you like to supersize that combo meal?”
But here’s another idea.
It’s kind of radical, so bear with me.
Ready?
How about we use just one criterion for selecting those who will get an opportunity to attend what are allegedly our “best” colleges (that’s not quite true either, but that’s another column)?
Let’s use this thing you might have heard of called “merit.”
You get a bunch of points for…wait for it…academic merit by doing well on a hard test that shows your breadth of knowledge, ability to write, and the skills you have worked to master during high school.
Then you get a few points for things you have actually accomplished. Maybe you trained to be a good football player. Maybe you are a talented painter. Maybe you served your country in war while the rest of the aspiring freshman were back home smoking dope, listening to whoever Drake is, and texting each other about microaggressions.
That’s it.
You get no points, none at all, for where your grandpa immigrated from, or who you pray to, or the type of people you find sexy. These immutable demographic attributes are meaningless anyway. We should focus on – wait, has someone beaten me to this concept by ~50 years? – the content of your character, as demonstrated by how hard you have chosen to prepare for higher education.
Whoa.
Why, even our kids might just have a shot at the academic crown jewels our taxes subsidize in a system like that.
Now, the elite hates this idea.
Hates it.
Why? Because objective standards are rigid and unbending and…difficult to game. The elite hates objective standards – merit – because when they are forced to make decisions based on merit the elitists lose their ability to decide how to divvy up the spoils based on the elite’s own subjective criteria.
That’s why merit is the only way your kid will ever get a crack at these opportunities.
When your kid gets screened under the elite’s “whole person” analysis, he or she will get screened right out.
Active in his church? He probably believes in Jesus and not killing babies. Circular file!
Enjoys hunting? Gun-loving redneck! Dumpster!
Dad’s a truck driver and mom stays home with…wait, four!...kids. Chances are this applicant never even thought to question which bathroom xe should use! Flush!
From Texas, and not even Austin? Republican! Kill this application with fire!
“Adversity scores” are just the latest way for the elite to try to ensure you don’t share in the benefits of a society that we Normal people – who are Normal without regard to race or anything else except their love of country and their inclination to work hard and play by the rules – built, feed, fuel and defend.
But this is our country.
And why should we be second class citizens inside it?
We Normals support the parasitic university system with our tax and tuition money. Like the rest of the institutions in our society, it’s not there for the sole use and amusement of a bunch of liberal blue city jerks.
We count.
We matter.
And we’re not going to be exiled from full participation in a society that would be devouring itself – literally – within 72 hours if we Normals ever chose to say, “Oh, the hell with this,” load our many weapons and walk off the job to wait for the whole sordid mess that is the modern America our garbage elite has ruined to collapse before we come back to restore order and rebuild it.
Time for the GOP to stop being useless and take a stand for Normal Americans. Republicans, explain to the arrogant poohbahs of academia that the party we fund ends if this nonsense begins. Fight for us. And win over Normal Asian-American voters forever.
Here’s the deal, garbage academia…
No merit, no money.
I almost hope they test us.
I really do.
What’s bitterly amusing is that I threw in a concept similar to “adversity points” into my action-packed yet super-snarky novels about the United States’ split into red and blue countries, People's Republic, Indian Country and Wildfire. I actually worried that it seemed so stupid and crazy that no one would believe it, yet here it is, an actual thing. There’s a lot more stuff in them, stuff that keeps coming (horrifyingly) true. Plus, the hacks who sank the garbage scow flagship of Conservative, Inc, TheWeekly Standard, called my books “appalling,” so you’ll totally dig them…
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-05-21/schlichter-how-about-some-adversity-points-hardworking-kids-hardworking-parents
Billionaire Commencement Speaker Shocks Grads With Promise To Pay Off Student Loans
A billionaire philanthropist and technology investor told the graduating class of Morehouse College that he would wipe out the student debt of the entire graduating class, estimated to be around $40 million, according to Time.
Robert F. Smith, this year’s commencement speaker, made the announcement Sunday morning while addressing nearly 400 graduating seniors of the all-male historically black college in Atlanta. Smith is the Founder and CEO of Vista Equity Partners, a private equity firm that invests in software, data, and technology-driven companies. -Time
( This is an all black liberal arts school in Atlanta…. Only 53% of of them graduated. It would be interesting to follow these students in their life and see how many of them are better off because someone else took them out of debt. My guess is that 90% of them will be back in unsustainable debt and crying poverty because they weren't given a fair chance. )
More...
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-05-19/billionaire-commencement-speaker-shocks-grads-promise-pay-student-loans
Who wudda thought ????
DNA tests reveal 30% of suspected fraudulent migrant families were unrelated
Some of the migrant families arrested at the southern border weren't actually families.
In a pilot program, approximately 30% of rapid DNA tests of immigrant adults who were suspected of arriving at the southern border with children who weren't theirs revealed the adults were not related to the children, an official involved in the system's temporary rollout who asked to be anonymous in order to speak freely told the Washington Examiner Friday.
More...
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/defense-national-security/dna-tests-reveal-30-of-suspected-fraudulent-migrant-families-were-unrelated
The Stop Sign has nothing to do with weather or not a company can issue shares. Actually... I would guess that MOST of the "Stop Sign" companies are issuing shares, and it does not require convertible bonds to do so.
Indicates companies that are not able or willing to provide current disclosure to the public markets - either to a regulator, an exchange or OTC Markets Group. This category includes defunct companies that have ceased operations as well as 'dark' companies with questionable management and market disclosure practices. Publicly traded companies that are not willing to provide information to investors should be treated with suspicion and their securities should be considered highly risky.
How to Remove the "Stop Sign"
A company may provide disclosure through a selected U.S. regulatory agency (such as the SEC or a Banking regulator), a qualified foreign stock exchange, or through the Alternative Reporting Standard pursuant to the Pink Basic Disclosure Guidelines.
OTC Markets Group offers products that enable Pink companies to provide more information to investors.
SEC Reporting Companies:
SEC reporting companies should be aware that information published directly to www.otcmarkets.com will not be considered when determining the placement of the stop sign. The determination for reporting companies is based solely on information filed with the SEC's EDGAR system. Delinquent filers either become current in their filings with the SEC or deregister and then follow the steps above for non-SEC reporting companies.
https://www.otcmarkets.com/corporate-services/information-for-pink-companies
So rather than sell debt that's convertible into shares just sell the shares directly...
"Pursuant to a Subscription Agreement effective March 7, 2019 Brownie’s Marine Group, Inc. (the “Company”) issued to Charles Hyatt, an accredited investor, a unit of the securities of the Company, with the unit (the “Unit”) consisting of 50,000,000 shares of common stock"
https://ih.advfn.com/stock-market/USOTC/brownie-039-s-marine-group-BWMG/stock-news/79451355/current-report-filing-8-k
In other words the stop sign is meaningless. It's just a symbol to warn unsuspecting investors.
"That stop sign protects us from convertible debt share printing and dumping"
I don't understand how that keeps convertible debt from being offered.... Could you explain? Thanks.
DMC Global, Inc. (BOOM) provides technology services to energy, industrial and infrastructure businesses around the world. The company operates out of two main businesses: Nobel Clad is a leading global manufacturer of explosion welded clad metal plates; and DynaEnergetics develops and manufactures advanced explosive components and systems for oil and gas wells.
BOOM is one of Navellier's favorites... The earnings estimates indicate significant growth.
I like the current chart pattern. Many times a consolidation pattern breaks to the upside when the financial condition is favorable.
What kind of problems are you having with Schwab ? Tx.
From the Bizarro file !
Schiff: Biden Ukraine Scandal Should Be Off Limits
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA) said on Sunday that Joe Biden's Ukraine corruption scandal should be off limits as the 2020 US election approaches, and that President Trump shouldn't be allowed to investigate - or encourage Ukraine to investigate.
Biden has come under fire for a March, 2016 incident in Kiev in which he threatened to withhold $1 billion in US loan guarantees to Ukraine unless President Petro Poroshenko fired his head prosecutor, General Viktor Shokin, who was leading a wide-ranging corruption investigation into natural gas firm Burisma Holdings. As it so happens, Joe's son Hunter Biden sat on Burisma's board, and waas indirectly paid as much as $50,000 per month.
'I said, ‘You’re not getting the billion.’ I’m going to be leaving here in, I think it was about six hours. I looked at them and said: ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money,’" bragged Biden, recalling the conversation with Poroshenko.
"Well, son of a bitch, he got fired," Biden gloated.
More...
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-05-12/schiff-says-biden-ukraine-scandal-should-be-limits
Jim Jordan Scorches Democrats
Attempting to Hold AG William Barr in Contempt
CA Logic: Raise Gas Taxes, Then Demand An Investigation Into Why Gas Prices Are High
( Yes, they really are this stupid. )
California is home to some of the most power-hungry politicians on Earth. These people actually hiked the gasoline tax, and are now demanding an investigation into why gas prices are higher in California than elsewhere in the United States. It would be sad if it wasn’t so insane.
California Governor Gavin Newson is demanding an investigation into why the state’s gas prices are so high. But as Reason points out, it’s not all that difficult to see what that California politicians are the culprit. In fact, the reason the gas prices are high is that Newsom (and other politicians) raised taxes on gasoline.
As lieutenant governor, Gavin Newsom supported a 2017 bill increasing the state’s gas taxes. When running for governor in 2018, he opposed a ballot initiative that would have repealed that same increase, reported Reason. But like all politicians, Newsom is unwilling to admit that he and his comrades in the California government have caused the problem. So begins the finger-pointing. The governor sent a letter to the California Energy Commission (CEC) on Tuesday demanding that the state agency “investigate” California’s roughly $4.03 per gallon gas prices, which are currently the highest in the country. Those prices are also well above the national average of $2.86 per gallon.
“Independent analysis suggests that an unaccounted-for price differential exists in California’s gas prices and that this price differential may stem in part from inappropriate industry practices,” wrote Newsom in his letter to the CEC.
“These are all important reasons for the Commission to help shed light on what’s going on in our gasoline market.”
California currently imposes the second-highest gas taxes in the country. A state excise tax currently adds $.417 per gallon (almost 42 cents per gallon), and that rate that will increase to $.473 (47 cents per gallon) come July. But that’s not all. On top of that tax, the state imposes a 2.25 percent gasoline sales tax. There’s more. California has also added a low-carbon fuel standard and a cap-and-trade scheme for carbon emissions which together already increase the state’s gas prices by $.24 per gallon above the national average, according to a 2017 state government report.
The worst part is that Newsom isn’t the only problem causer asking for blame to shifted to “inappropriate industry practices” as opposed to their gas tax hikes. In January, 19 state legislators (17 of whom had voted in favor of that 2017 gas tax increase, while the other two had only entered office in 2018) sent a letter to State Attorney General Xavier Becerra, in which they demanded that the state’s Department of Justice (DOJ) investigate the “unexplained gasoline surcharge” that was estimated to cost Californian families $1,700 a year.
Even someone who understands just the basics of economics knows that high levels of taxation and regulation and a lack of competition in the state’s fuel sector are not mutually exclusive explanations to the high gas prices. Government fees and red tape often have the effect of squeezing out marginal producers and retailers (eliminating competition) giving remaining firms greater ability to raise prices. It’s called supply and demand. The demand remains but much of the supply is gone. Once the competition (supply) is gone by way of taxation and regulation, the companies that remain can jack the prices up as high as they want.
California’s government is not doing its residents any favors when it comes to their policies.
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-04-25/ca-logic-raise-gas-taxes-then-demand-investigation-why-gas-prices-are-high
Preferred Pronouns Or Prison
“He.” “She.” “They.”
Have you ever given a moment’s thought to your everyday use of these pronouns?
It has probably never occurred to you that those words could be misused. Or that doing so could cost you your business or your job – or even your freedom...
Shhhh.... Don't tell the liberals.
Electric vehicles emit more CO2 than diesel ones, German study shows
Electric vehicles in Germany account for more CO2 emissions than diesel ones, according to a study by German scientists.
When CO2 emissions linked to the production of batteries and the German energy mix - in which coal still plays an important role - are taken into consideration, electric vehicles emit 11% to 28% more than their diesel counterparts, according to the study, presented on Wednesday at the Ifo Institute in Munich.
Mining and processing the lithium, cobalt and manganese used for batteries consume a great deal of energy. A Tesla Model 3 battery, for example, represents between 11 and 15 tonnes of CO2. Given a lifetime of 10 years and an annual travel distance of 15,000 kilometres, this translates into 73 to 98 grams of CO2 per kilometre, scientists Christoph Buchal, Hans-Dieter Karl and Hans-Werner Sinn noted in their study.
The CO2 given off to produce the electricity that powers such vehicles also needs to be factored in, they say.
When all these factors are considered, each Tesla emits 156 to 180 grams of CO2 per kilometre, which is more than a comparable diesel vehicle produced by the German company Mercedes, for example.
The German researchers therefore take issue with the fact that European officials view electric vehicles as zero-emission ones. They note further that the EU target of 59 grams of CO2 per km by 2030 corresponds to a “technically unrealistic” consumption of 2.2 litres of diesel or 2.6 litres of gas per 100 kms.
These new limits pressure German and other European car manufacturers into switching massively to electric vehicles whereas, the researchers feel, it would have been preferable to opt for methane engines, “whose emissions are one-third less than those of diesel motors.”
Oscar Schneider
The Brussels Times
http://brusselstimes.com/business/technology/15050/electric-vehicles-emit-more-co2-than-diesel-ones,-german-study-shows
‘Bubble Boy’ MBIO Biotech Soars 250 Percent After Cure Announcement
(Bloomberg) -- Shares of the tiny biotechnology company Mustang Bio Inc. more than tripled Thursday, following a scientific breakthrough that cured eight infants suffering from the devastating “Bubble Boy” immune system disorder.
"Mustang Bio is focused mainly on developing novel immunotherapies for cancer and is still working to bring its first product to market. It plans to file for U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval for the gene therapy based mainly on the data in the publication, after it confirms the benefits in a handful of additional children treated with the therapy crafted in its Worcester, Massachusetts, manufacturing facility. The filing could occur by the end of 2021, said Chief Executive Officer Manny Litchman."
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/mustang-bio-soars-485-novel-231626171.html
Dallas County Crooks Rejoice; Democrat DA Won't Prosecute Thefts Under $750
Dallas criminals have just been given a license to steal - up to $750, that is.
Following his November 2018 election win, Dallas County Criminal District Attorney John Creuzot, a Democrat, announced that he will no longer prosecute certain low-level crimes, including thefts of personal items worth less than $750 as long as it isn't for economic gain, according to CBS DFW.
Dallas shop owners are not happy. Andrew Arterburn, owner of One Stop Express in Uptown, said that a shoplifter just stole $120 worth of laundry detergent on Thursday - and is not taking kindly to Creuzot's new approach.
"It’s a slap on the wrist. They go to jail, get a meal, get let go. And they’re not going to be prosecuted at all for it," said Arterburn.
The President of the National Black Police Association, Sgt. Sheldon Smith, said he worries it will lead to more crime.
“It opens the door for some people to think they can commit crimes,” Sgt. Smith said.
Dallas County Sheriff Marian Brown told CBS 11, her office will continue to enforce the laws as mandate by state legislation. -CBS DFW
"I absolutely think it's sending the wrong message," said Dallas Police Association President Mike Mata. "That shop owner is going to take matters into his own hands, or he's going to have to let $600 worth of merchandise walk out of his store, and I don't think he's going to be in business very long."
More...
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-04-15/dallas-county-crooks-rejoice-democrat-da-wont-prosecute-thefts-under-750
Laguna Beach Liberals Triggered By American Flag On Police Cars
Progressives living in the wealthy Southern California enclave of Laguna Beach have become triggered by a recent decision to repaint the city's police cars with the American flag running through lettering on the doors, according to the LA Times.
The design - approved in February - was deemed by some to be "unfit for the artists' community." The ensuing debate has pitted flag supporters against flag opponents, and should make for an interesting City Council meeting Tuesday evening. Officials say the matter is "far more nuanced," according to the Times.
Mayor Pro Tem Steve Dicterow said Monday the council is simply facing “a very narrow decision” about the brightness of the colors, but that the issue has devolved into a broader national conversation about patriotism.
He said he has received hundreds of emails from people around the country, mostly in support of keeping the flag designs on the car. -LA Times
"Clearly, the way it looks on the car is not what anyone expected it to look like," said Dicterow. "I think it’s reasonable that we’re going to look at it again so that whatever we [approve] is exactly what we put on the car."
And despite hundreds of emails supporting the design, Dicterow says that he has received around a dozen emails from concerned residents after the design was approved.
"Some of the words people used was that they felt it was threatening, intimidating, harassing and a symbol of racism."
Local artist Carrie Woodburn, whose parents served in the military, said at a recent council meeting that the design on the squad cars looked "aggressive." By Monday morning, Woodburn said she received over 150 messages via phone, text, voicemail and email who disagreed.
Woodburn says she perceived some of the messages as threats.
"I don’t really care too much about the design, other than what I said — it's bad art," she said, adding: "I’m being attacked for that because the narrative feeds a fire of division, which is what our culture has become."
California attorney Jennifer Welsh Zeiter says she finds the flag design "exceptional" and questions the loyalty of anyone who objects to it.
"They are so filled with hatred toward this ... office of the president of the United States and the current occupant of that office," said Zeiter, adding: "that they cannot see through their current biases to realize that a police vehicle with the American flag is the ultimate American expression."
The nuance
According to City Manager John Pietig, the design originally approved in February was more of a "cloud-like look" vs. the design that now appears on the cars.
On Tuesday, the council will decide whether to continue with the logo or choose an alternative “out of an abundance of caution to address questions that have been raised about the process,” Pietig said two weeks ago.
Nevertheless, the questions about process turned into an online debate about intent. -LA Times
"People are screaming that the American flag on a police car is somehow or another ... hurting people’s feelings who might be immigrants or visitors," said Councilman Peter Blake. "People are actually ridiculous enough to bring up comments about our cop cars having American flags on them."
Laguna Beach Republicans president Emil Monda said that he thought the whole debate over the flag is "bizarre."
"It’s the flag of the United States of America," said Monda. "It’s not a Republican flag, it’s not a Democrat flag. It’s our flag, and we can’t lose that."
Laguna Beach cops, meanwhile, say people love the new design.
"Every time I came to a stop sign, every time I came to a red light, somebody is telling me the car looks great," said Cpl. Ryan Hotchkiss during the March meeting.
"Every one of our members that drives the car loves it, and we look forward to keeping them the way they are."
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-04-16/laguna-beach-liberals-triggered-american-flag-police-cars
A War Has Broken Out In The VIX Complex
Back in January 2018, just weeks ahead of the infamous VIXtermination event on Feb. 5 2018 that wiped out virtually all inverse VIX ETPs in seconds, we predicted that such an event was imminent as a result of a sharp spike in the total outstanding Vega across the entire levered and inverse volatility derivative space, which had reached an all time high. Since then, while the VIX ETP market had been relatively quiet as a result of last year's fireworks which wiped out countless retail investors and other vol sellers, another VIX "event" is coming, and it will be the result of a silent war being waged between retail and institutional investors.
As we noted two weeks ago, JPMorgan's Bram Kaplan recently pointed out that after a year of relative quiet, the net exposure among VIX ETPs recently spiked to their largest net long position in 1.5 years, tilted long by ~$150Mn vega, which is just shy of the record vega exposure hit in early 2018 and which precipitated the VIX ETP implosion. However, unlike 2018, this time the trade is in the other direction as investors piled into long and levered VIX ETPs beginning in February, as soon as the VIX index fell below 16, to as JPM suggests. "position for/speculate on the next volatility spike."
However, when it comes to asset flows in 2019 - which has seen the S&P rise back to all time highs even as equity investors have been pulling money from equity funds week after week - here too the situation is not nearly as simple.
Commenting on the latest VIX flows, Deutsche Bank's Parag Thatte reiterates JPMorgan's point, observing that long VIX ETPs have seen significant inflows totaling $2bn YTD, as retail investors hedge equity gains. This record inflow into VIX ETPs, amounting to $2 billion in notional, is shown on the chart below.
Yet while retail investors, which traditionally prefer ETPs to hedge exposure, have been loading up on crash bets, institutional investors which traditionally prefer the greater liquidity of the futures market, are taking the other side of the volatility trade and as the latest CFTC commitment of traders report shows, the speculative net short position in VIX futures is approaching a record,
If one believes institutions, one look at the chart above confirms that not only is market complacency greater than its was either ahead of the Q4 mini bear market and February 2018 Volmageddon, but it is just shy of a record.
And so the question emerges: who is right - retail investors, who are not only pulling billions from equity funds but have pushed their crash bets to all time highs via VIX ETPs, or institutions, who oddly are on the other end of the spectrum, and not are complacent to an almost record degree, but in their pursuit of yield and carry trades have pushed the net VIX futs short position to unprecedented levels. And while conventional wisdom would say that institutions, i.e., the smart money is always right, for the 9th year in a row, hedge funds and their peers are underperforming the market (with macro funds getting demolished once again).
So who will be right - retail or institutions. Since both positions are at or near record levels, the answer should emerge in the very near future.
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-04-13/war-has-broken-out-vix-complex
Idiot on MSNBC re the Mueller report:
“We must start on impeachment proceedings immediately before we get all the evidence. “
How Countries Fall Into The Welfare Trap
People like the welfare state because they suppose that it comes at no costs and provides many benefits. If people knew how much the present consumption of social benefits entails less prosperity in the future, the population would have a critical attitude towards the welfare state and politicians would have a harder time selling their fraud. Just as a society that ranks security over liberty loses both, a society that attributes a higher value to social benefits than to wealth creation ends up with neither wealth nor benefits.
A short-term perspective is intrinsic to modern democracy. It is run not by the people but by political parties. Such a political system promotes the redistribution of the cake and neglects that the goods must be produced before they can be consumed. Without production, however, there can be no distribution. The illusion is widespread and propagated by the political machinery that production is independent of its distribution so that one could redistribute without weakening production. Yet how the product is distributed affects its future making.
A concept of justice that is only concerned with the social justice of distribution is a contradiction in terms. The justice of distribution of the goods has as its other side the justice regarding the efforts of producing the goods. Justice, rightly understood, has a distributive and a commutative aspect. The disregard of the commutative aspect of justice in favor of the distributive justice is unjust. Such an approach is also irrational since distribution is possible only when there is something to distribute.
Redistribution is unjust and economically irrational when it punishes those who produce. When the redistribution of income and wealth becomes excessive, the active part of the population withdraws from production and parasitism takes over, economic progress will falter und finally disappear. This way, society will impoverish, and the poor are left with less to nothing. In the end, the poor themselves will pay the steepest price of this policy because they will be the hardest hit when growth falls and the misery rise.
It is unethical to strive towards more justice as if it were an absolute good. The cost of imposing equality exceeds its benefits. At first, the negative effects of income equalization on economic growth are not visible. For some time, capital consumption may compensate for weak economic growth. This erosion does not immediately show up in the national income statistics because consumption counts as a part of the national product.
An insidious form of capital consumption takes place through government debt accumulation. A budget deficit means that the overall volume of national savings falls. Fewer savings imply that economic investment potential has become smaller. In the economic statistics, the expenditures? — ?whether they are from the state or from the private side ?—?count equally as a contribution to the national product. Yet while the spending benefits the current receivers of the government expenditures, the lower capital formation will later show up in weaker economic growth and punishes all.
In as much as public debt is an enemy of economic growth, it is also an enemy of wealth creation. The benefits which the government distributes in the short run and that are financed by higher public debt will reduce economic growth and make poverty persistent and more widespread in the long run.
Government debt weakens economic growth and weak economic growth leads to higher government expenditures and thus furthermore to a rising debt burden. Less economic growth ignites more demand for social benefits and more redistribution leads again to even less growth. Numerous countries have fallen into the trap where social expenditures weaken the economy and where this weakness requires more spending, which in turn weakens the economy.
Cycle of Welfare Spending and Economic Stagnation
The expansion of the welfare state leads to a rising public debt, which weakens the economic performance. A weakening economy entails more welfare spending and leads to a further rise of public debt, which, in turn, leads to more welfare spending. A dangerous side effect of this fall into a downward spiral is that the anti-capitalistic attitude in the population increases, since for most citizens, the causal links are difficult to recognize.
This vicious cycle is noticeable in the decline in the rate of productivity growth of the industrialized countries since the 1970s that came along with the expansion of the welfare state and the rise of public debt. The welfare state and government debt are the main causes of the decline in productivity rates. Over the past decades, the rates of the annual increase of productivity of the major industrialized countries have fallen from an average of five percent in the 1960s to around two percent in the 1990s and keep on falling.
The escape from the welfare trap is the challenge of our time. Less productivity growth means less economic growth and less economic growth means lower income. The longer a country remains stuck in the trap, the harder it is to get out. To overcome the vicious cycle, the insight must take hold that an excessive welfare state erodes productivity.
Without productivity gains, there is no increase in real per capita income. The labor productivity of a country determines its income level. The industrialized nations must get out of the whirlpool of welfare spending, public debt, and weak economic growth. Lifting the purchasing power of salaries requires higher productivity. More state control is not the way to higher productivity but less regulation, less intervention, and less redistribution.
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-31/how-countries-fall-welfare-trap
New Study Blames White Americans' Diet For Climate Change
( This is the kind of crap they come up with when they can't find anything else to blame on the white guy. Does it get any stupider than this ??? )
A study has suggested Caucasian Americans’ diet is contributing significantly more to climate change than the diets of other demographic groups in the country. The study, published in the Journal of Industrial Ecology, said white people contributed the most to greenhouse gas emissions, at 680 kg of carbon dioxide equivalent annually, but added that the Black demographic had the highest contribution to land impacts related to food.
The study set out to “fill in the gaps” in research about how various dietary habits affect the environment along the whole supply chain from land resources to water and energy. It focused on three demographic groups - White, non-Hispanic Back, and Latino - since they represent 92.4 percent of the U.S. population and looked into their eating habits to glean some insight into the relation between these habits and what it calls the food-energy-water nexis.
The study’s authors note that the White population, as portion of the U.S. total, was 61.3 percent, with Latinx - a term the authors of the study call intersectional and non-binary to reflect the latest term trends in social sciences - accounting for 17.8 percent and the Black population accounting for 13.3 percent.
In light of these proportions it’s hardly surprising the White population’s diet was a greater contributor to climate change in terms of greenhouse emissions. However, the study also suggested that the White group’s diet was a greater contributor to climate change because of its higher consumption of what the authors call “environmentally intense” food items.
“Results indicate that Whites tend to consume the highest rates of environmentally intense food items, except for the apples food item, when compared to their Black and Latinx counterparts,” the authors wrote.
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-04-01/new-study-blames-white-americans-diet-climate-change
Congestion Pricing Coming To Manhattan
New York State Budget: Congestion Pricing Coming To Manhattan, Sources Tell CBS2
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) – Gov. Andrew Cuomo and leaders of the New York State Legislature say they’ve reached a $175.5 billion state budget agreement.
The deal includes congestion pricing, a controversial plan to charge drivers below 60th Street in Manhattan.
A panel of experts will set the surcharges by the end of 2020, but sources tell CBS2 drivers in cars will pay around $11.50 and truck drivers will pay about $25. Possible discounts for some are still being worked out.
Lawmakers say the money will be spent to fix the MTA.
A statewide ban on most single-use plastic bags is also poised for approval.
The ban would take effect in March 2020 and calls for allowing local governments the option to impose a five-cent fee on paper bags.
Other agreements in the budget include the closure of up to three yet-to-be-determined state prisons, eliminating cash bail for misdemeanor and non-violent felony arrests, a permanent 2 percent cap on local property taxes, and another $1 billion for public education.
“I am proud to announce that together, we got it done,” Cuomo said in a statement.
In an agreement reached earlier last week but not officially announced until Sunday, most single-use plastic bags provided by supermarkets and other stores will be banned statewide starting March 1, 2020. Individual counties will have the option of charging 5 cents for paper bags, with 2 cents going to local governments and 3 cents to the state’s Environmental Protection Fund.
Major issues that didn’t make it into the spending plan include legalization of recreational marijuana. Cuomo and legislative leaders have said the issue was too complex to rush into the budget. Instead, it could be handled in separate legislation worked out over the last three months of the legislative session, scheduled to end June 19.
The Manhattan tolls plan known as congestion pricing will be the first of its kind in the nation. State leaders said a review board will determine the toll amount, exemptions and credits for drivers headed into the borough’s central business district. The billions the tolls are expected to raise will go toward fixing New York City’s ailing mass transit system.
The state budget also includes two other dedicated revenue sources for the subways: a “mansion tax” on Manhattan homes that sell for $25 million or higher, and an internet sales tax levied on retailers who sell merchandise online.
The funding streams for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority includes a reorganization plan and other reforms Cuomo has demanded for the agency that runs the city’s buses, subways and commuter trains.
In addition to eliminating cash bail for some charges, other criminal justice reforms include requiring prosecutors and defense lawyers to share all case information well in advance of trials, and speeding up the time it takes for a case to go to trial.
The budget agreement also establishes a state commission that will come up with a system for public financing of legislative and statewide offices, with up to $100 million in taxpayer funds authorized annually for such a system.
Cuomo and legislative leaders also agreed to legislation that would allow three hours of paid time off for New Yorkers to vote on Election Day and expand voting hours upstate to begin at 6 a.m. instead of noon.
https://newyork.cbslocal.com/2019/03/31/nys-budget-deal-passes-congestion-pricing/
Who In Their Right Mind Would Lend Money To Chicago?
When you see that Italy’s debt is rising, the logical question is, who the hell is dumping good money after bad into such an obviously failed state? The answer is that by lending money to Italy (or Greece, Portugal, Spain, or France) you’re really lending money to Germany, since the latter will have to bail those other countries out shortly.
Keep that in mind as you read this, from yesterday’s Wall Street Journal:
Cash-Strapped Illinois, Chicago Seek Billions From Investors
Illinois and its biggest city kick off hundreds of millions of dollars in borrowings this week, a test of investors’ willingness to lend to stressed governments prone to spending more money than they bring in.
The state launched borrowings with about a $440 million bond deal on Tuesday, followed by a sale topping $700 million by Chicago. Analysts expect what could be billions more especially from the state, as it puts together funds to do everything from paying retirees’ pensions to launching capital projects.
Before buying bonds from the nation’s lowest-rated state and its biggest city, investors have to assess their continuing mismatches between expenses and revenues along with pension burdens, which are slated to eat up a growing share of both budgets in coming years. Municipalities nationwide are grappling with how to pay bondholders while also meeting the rising costs of retirement benefits, but few are as financially strained as the nation’s third-largest city and the state.
Illinois leaders have floated borrowing at least $4.5 billion more through next year, according to its financials. Rather than using most funds to build bridges or improve infrastructure, the Prairie State plans to use many of its bonds to pay off outstanding debts or put money toward pension benefits that have already been earned. For example, a proposed $1.5 billion borrowing tentatively scheduled for June would help pay for a pile of unpaid bills the state still owes. Lawmakers failed to pass a budget for two years under the former governor, worsening this backlog.
Rahm Emanuel’s last bond deal as Chicago’s mayor will be used to pay off previous short-term borrowing alongside projects including sidewalk improvements and traffic signal installation. He considered selling $10 billion of debt to fund pensions, but it will be up to his successor—elected this April—to decide whether to move forward.
Illinois’s rating sits just above junk level. Chicago holds a speculative grade from Moody’s Corp. and investment-grade scores from S&P Global Inc. and other firms. Chicago didn’t hire Moody’s for its latest bond deal.
Despite their precarious finances, the city and state’s leaders have turned to the bond market at what some analysts say is an opportune time. Investors have poured money into municipal bonds in recent weeks, vying for a relatively limited supply of debt, analysts say, and lifting prices while pushing down the yields of even some existing Illinois and Chicago bonds.
That background helps ensure demand for the new bonds, analysts said, in the latest example of how investors’ voracious appetite for debt can help governments find willing lenders despite fiscal stress.
Here’s the key passage that ties Illinois/Chicago back to Italy:
“Despite their precarious finances, the city and state’s leaders have turned to the bond market at what some analysts say is an opportune time. Investors have poured money into municipal bonds in recent weeks, vying for a relatively limited supply of debt, analysts say, and lifting prices while pushing down the yields of even some existing Illinois and Chicago bonds.”
Why would such obviously crappy paper be such an easy sell? Because investors are looking ahead to the next Great Reflation, in which the Fed and other major central banks are forced to unleash a tidal wave of new credit to bail out the bad debts incurred in the previous round of monetary experimentation.
If the express goal is to keep bad debts from blowing up the global financial system, then by definition Illinois/Chicago will be bailed out, since they personify the concept of “bad debt”. So today’s junk munis are tomorrow’s Fed balance sheet assets. Which is another way of saying they’re taxpayers’ responsibility, not Chicago’s.
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-29/who-their-right-mind-would-lend-money-chicago
Illinois' Top Legal Officer Turns His Back On Jesse Smollett Issues
It’s a legal fiasco earning headlines across the world, but the Illinois Attorney General has nothing to say about the growing list of legal questions surrounding dismissal of the case against Jussie Smollett.
Attorney General Kwame Raoul
Jussie Smollett
Kim Foxx, the Cook County State’s Attorney
Michelle Obama’s former chief of staff, Tina Then
Forklift causes whole warehouse to collapse
European Cars Will Soon Slow Down Automatically If You're Speeding
In the next step toward becoming a utopian Brave New World at the hands of suffocating and dehumanizing regulation, all new cars sold in the UK and Europe will soon be fitted with speed-limiting devices, which will automatically stop drivers from exceeding the speed limit, according to the Guardian.
The concept is part of sweeping safety changes being implemented to vehicle safety rules that the EU has provisionally agreed to. Despite the fact that Britain may not be part of the EU when the rules take effect - they're slated to be fully rolled out by 2022 - UK regulators have said they will mirror the safety standards across the Channel. The rules still need to be ratified by the European parliament, which could happen by September.
In addition to speed limiters, other features to be made mandatory in 2022 include automated emergency braking, electronic data recorders and improved visibility. The move is being described as "one of the biggest leaps forward in 50 years" for auto safety and it is estimated that it could save 25,000 lives by 2037.
The speed limiter device, called intelligent speed assistance (ISA), uses GPS and sign recognition to detect speed limits, and will sound a warning and automatically slow a vehicle down if it is exceeding the limit. Drivers will be able to "override" the device by pressing hard on the accelerator, the article says although that act may also quietly notify any nearby police. Some motorist groups have argued that speeding up can sometimes actually be the safer option, such as when a person needs to swiftly pass a vehicle ahead of it.
Antonio Avenoso, executive director of the European Transport Safety Council, told the Guardian: "There have only been a handful of moments in the last 50 years which could be described as big leaps forward for road safety in Europe. The mandatory introduction of the seatbelt was one, and the first EU minimum crash safety standards, agreed in 1998, was another. If last night’s agreement is given the formal green light, it will represent another of those moments, preventing 25,000 deaths within 15 years of coming into force."
Joshua Harris, director of campaigns for road safety charity Brake, said: “These lifesaving measures come at a vital time, with road safety in a concerning period of stagnation with more than 70 people still being killed or seriously injured on British roads every day. The government must commit to adopting these lifesaving regulations, no matter what happens with Brexit.”
We also recently reported that Volvo was implementing new safety systems that would allow their vehicle to determine if a driver was impaired or distracted and then, in the case of a drunk driver, intervene on various levels and also "call the authorities".
We're sure that, especially for automobile aficionados, these limiters and new automated safety systems will bring the joy right back to driving.
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-27/european-cars-will-soon-slow-down-automatically-if-youre-speeding
Pampered Cat Studies Costing Taxpayers
More Than One Million Dollars
Senator Joni Ernst has targeted pampered cats for her latest Squeal Award, which brings to light examples of governmental waste or inefficiencies. She says that a whopping $1.3 million of taxpayer money has been spent on 10 different cat studies with the National Institutes of Health. These concluded that classical music has an impact on the behavior of cats—one of these saying that after playing classical music every day, the animals were less likely to poop outside of their litter box or cough up hairballs. Another spent untold dollars on proving the obvious—that pampered cats were less likely to show signs of sickness or agitation, while those put into unpredictable situations tended to “freak out.” But this seemed to necessitate a follow-up study that proved once the pampering ended, the cats would refuse food, cough up hairballs and/or choose not to use a litterbox. Ernst says that not only are these pointless, the studies don’t comply with the laws requiring disclosure to the taxpayers on federally-funded projects. She is calling for the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to find out why they are not reporting the costs and to work towards ensuring our hard earned dollars are not going to waste on studies like these.
https://www.1380kcim.com/news/2019/pampered-cat-studies-costing-taxpayers-more-than-one-million-dollars/
From the bizarro hole...
JUSSIE SMOLLETT’S LAWYER SAYS HE HASN’T RULED OUT SUING THE CITY OF CHICAGO !
https://dailycaller.com/2019/03/27/jussie-smollett-lawyer-gma/
My building permit
Some have asked what I've been doing in retirement.
Well, I applied for a building permit for a new house.
It was going to be 100 ft tall and 400 ft wide, with 12 gun turrets at various heights,
And windows all over the place and a loud outside entertainment sound system.
It would have parking for 200 cars and I was going to paint it snot green with pink trim.
Then I was gonna hire some idiot to stand on top of it and SCREAM as loud as he could
Three or four times a day.
The City Council told me; Forget it...AIN'T GONNA HAPPEN!
So, I sent in the application again, but this time I called it a "Mosque."
Work starts on Monday. And here is the best part, it's going to be tax exempt!
I love this country.
It's the government that scares me.
Omar Holding Secret Fundraisers With Islamic Groups Tied to Terror
Democratic freshman Rep. Ilhan Omar (D., Minn.) has been holding a series of secret fundraisers with groups that have been tied to the support of terrorism, appearances that have been closed to the press and hidden from public view.
The content of these speeches, given to predominately Muslim audiences, remains unknown, prompting some of Omar's critics to express concern about the type of rhetoric she is using before these paying audiences, particularly in light of the lawmaker's repeated use of anti-Semitic tropes in public.
Read the full article here:
https://freebeacon.com/issues/omar-holding-secret-fundraisers-with-islamic-groups-tied-to-terror/