Tuesday, June 30, 2020

Caitlin Johnstone — Rogue Journalist Why The US Empire Works So Hard To Control The International Narrative About Russia


"Patriotism" as pretext, "truth" as falsity, "law" as convenience, "national security" as excuse.

One could substitute "China," Iran" or "Assad" for "Russia" in the post without changing it materially.

Caitlin Johnstone — Rogue Journalist
Why The US Empire Works So Hard To Control The International Narrative About Russia
Caitlin Johnstone

An economist explains the biggest myths about the national deficit — and how we can save the economy — Cody Fenwick


Cody Fenwick interviews Stephanie Kelton about The Deficit Myth.

AlterNet
An economist explains the biggest myths about the national deficit — and how we can save the economy
Cody Fenwick

Exclusive from Gen. Flynn: If We Don't Act, 2% of the People Are About To Control the Other 98%

 
Where some see protest, others see revolution in the works.


The Western Journal
Exclusive from Gen. Flynn: If We Don't Act, 2% of the People Are About To Control the Other 98%
Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn , U. S. Army (retired) served as national security advisor to President Donald Trump.

Saudi Arabia Eyes Total Dominance In Oil And Gas — Julianne Geiger

Abdulaziz added that Saudi Arabia “will be the last and biggest producer of hydrocarbon even then,” referring to 2050.
But is Saudi Arabia’s the world’s leading hydrocarbon producer now? And what is its legitimate prospect for being the largest hydrocarbon producer in 2050?...
Oilprice
Saudi Arabia Eyes Total Dominance In Oil And Gas
Julianne Geiger

It’s official: This was the best quarter for stocks since 1998 — Lee Clifford

“It’s the first time you’ve had back-to-back (quarters) like this since the 1930s,” said Willie Delwiche, investment strategist at Baird. “It’s pretty unprecedented.”
…The quarter’s gains were ignited by promises of massive amounts of aid from the Federal Reserve and Congress. 
Fortune
It’s official: This was the best quarter for stocks since 1998
Lee Clifford

Things you might have missed seeing in US and UK corporate media

Things you might have missed seeing in US and UK corporate media.

(BTW, I am not saying what happened or what didn't happen regarding the allegations. I have no insider track on what the facts may be or not be. I am just saying that the allegations are unsubstantiated and officially controversial. The media is going off on this as if it were established fact when it is far from it. It is a unproven allegation by the president's enemies that is so far without corroboration and moreover it is contested. This appears to be a disinformation campaign driven by intense propaganda when viewed from this angle).
The real bounty hunters in this high-risk game are not Russian operatives allegedly directing militant assassins. Rather, it is domestic political enemies of Donald Trump directing US media outlets to hobble his presidency or chances of re-election.
Sputnik
Deep State bounty hunters' real target is Trump
Finian Cunningham

••••
One can read this most recent flurry of Russia, Russia, Russia paid the Taliban to kill GIs as an attempt to pre-empt the findings into Russiagate’s origins.
Consortium News
Russiagate’s Last Gasp
Ray McGovern, co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, and retired 27-year career CIA whose tasks included preparing and briefing The President’s Daily Brief and leading the Soviet Foreign Policy Branch

••••
Dr. Wilmer Leon is joined by Ray McGovern, who works for Tell the Word, a publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in inner-city Washington, DC. During his 27 years as a CIA analyst, he led the Soviet Foreign Policy Branch and prepared the President’s Daily Brief for US Presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan.

••••
On Monday, Pentagon spokesman Johnathan Hoffman claimed that the US Department of Defense has no facts to recognize the alleged Russian actions as credible.

••••
An assertion made by spooks is as far from evidence as you can possibly get. Really dumb that this needs to be said.
Caitlin Johnstone — Rogue Journalist
Only Idiots Believe The CIA, And Other Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix

This Russia-Afghanistan Story Is Western Propaganda At Its Most Vile
Caitlin Johnstone 

••••

And don't forget

Mint Press News
Every American Should Watch Abby Martin’s New Afghanistan War Documentary

••••

Meanwhile, on the faux "left," fevered imagination based on unidentified (anonymous) sources with no evidence provided for the allegation.

Alternet
‘Owned by Putin’: Trump accused of ‘literal treason’ after bombshell NYT report on Russian assassination unit
David Badash

••••

The reality.
The WSJ points out that it was primarily the NSA's firm dissent that kept the Russian bounties allegation out of the president's daily briefing — which both further confirms the White House's denials of the initial Friday Times reporting, as well as contradicts the NYT "revelation" itself.

"Because of that [NSA dissent], President Trump was never personally briefed on the threat, the White House said, although a key lawmaker said the information apparently was included in written intelligence materials prepared for Mr. Trump," WSJ underscores.
No details were given as to precisely how the NSA differed in its assessment of the Russian bounty allegations. For those keeping score, this marks the third major formal distancing from the substance of the NYT reporting by US intelligence agencies and intel community leadership.
Also recall this isn't the first instance of significant NSA pushback concerning explosive charges aimed at Russia.…
Zero Hedge
Tyler Durden


Oh, and James Clapper is back at it with an ethnic slur.

Observer
James Clapper Tells NBC’s Chuck Todd That Russians Are ‘Genetically Driven’ to Co-opt
Ebony Bowden





CBS News — Fauci warns U.S. could see 100,000 new coronavirus cases per day


This does not bode well for a V-shaped recovery.

CBS News
Fauci warns U.S. could see 100,000 new coronavirus cases per day
Grace Segers

Through Libya, Turkey eyes a Neo-Ottoman Era Dominance — Salman Rafi Sheikh


Backgrounder

History does matter.
With tectonic changes, reflected largely through a massive decline in Saudi influence, taking place within the ‘Muslim world’, a potent struggle for new dominance has already begun.
The symbolic and actual battlefield is Libya, gateway to a big part of the Muslim world in Africa. While a number of countries—Egypt, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Russia, France—are involved directly and indirectly in the ‘Libyan saga’, Turkey’s involvement is not only deeper than all but also the most ambitious one.
Turkey, unlike other countries, is not merely a supporter of a particular regime or a political faction; its presence is rooted in its ambitions to reassert and re-establish Turkey’s Ottoman era dominance and become the leader of the entire ‘Muslim world.’ This leadership has both political and religious dimensions rooted in Turkey’s support for a particular brand of Islam expressed widely through the Muslim Brotherhood....
Erdogan is an Ottoman revanchist.
For Erdogan, Libya and other countries of North Africa are the heritage of his forefathers and the legacy of his country. In a recent speech, he said: “Turkey has a vast historical and civilisational basin. The Mediterranean and North Africa are an important part of that basin. Libya is the legacy of our Ottoman Empire.”...
Catch the term "civilisational." Turkey, Russia, Iran, China, Japan, India (and some others)) are civilizational states. This is becoming a "thing" geopolitically. They see themselves in opposition to Western (European) civilization and its traditions, culture and values, if not in conflict with it owing to the attitude of the West regarding civilizational superiority.

NEO

The Bolton tragedy: How someone with such bad judgment and moral blindness got anywhere near the White House — James North


Inquiring minds would like to know. What was the president thinking of?

Mondoweiss
The Bolton tragedy: How someone with such bad judgment and moral blindness got anywhere near the White House
James North

Who is Adrian Zenz? The Christian Fundamentalist Leading the Global Xinjiang Narrative



Dr Adrian Zenz is said to be a leading researcher into "the Chinese atrocities against the Uighurs". I decided to check him out.

Zenz is a fundamentalist Christian. Whilst religious affiliation does not discredit one, nevertheless the specific nature of his beliefs situate him (even as a German) on the most extreme right of the American evangelical wing bordering on lunacy and outright hysterical. Yet this individual is being used to ferment a global narrative concerning China, with total silence or background information offered on what he actually believes in.

However, this is not all it seems. Zenz is an individual with extremely questionable personal views, even ones which push on legal boundaries in many countries.

... because he is a zealous anti-Communist voice, he is instead presented as an infallible “expert” who ought never to be questioned and his actual views are never given scrutiny or critique.

Zenz states that all “other belief systems” to Christianity are “ultimately inspired by Satan” and that “those who reject faith in Jesus will be sentenced to eternal punishment.

Who is Adrian Zenz? The Christian Fundamentalist Leading the Global Xinjiang Narrative

'Attacking the Very Foundations' of Church-State Separation, SCOTUS Delivers 'Seismic Shock' Ruling on Religious Schools — Andrea Germanos


Liberalism and traditionalism clash in the US and this time, traditionalism wins.

Common Dreams
'Attacking the Very Foundations' of Church-State Separation, SCOTUS Delivers 'Seismic Shock' Ruling on Religious Schools
Andrea Germanos is senior editor and a staff writer

The big issue in the US general seems to be shaping up to who is the more senile.


This is what the US has come to?

Ted Goddard's Political Wire
Trump Moves from ‘Sleepy Joe’ to ‘Senile Joe’

Axios
Biden: Russia bounty issue shows Trump "doesn't seem to be cognitively aware of what's going on"
Hans Nichols

The GOP’s Gen Z Problem and Path Forward — Kristie Eshelman


The US electorate is shifting demographically, ideologically, and attitudinally. Some interesting numbers.

It's looking like the "fourth turning" or "spiritual awakening" is going to be liberal rather than conservative (in US terms).

Niskanen Center
The GOP’s Gen Z Problem and Path Forward
Kristie Eshelman

TASS — Final voter turnout at online voting on constitutional amendments in Russia exceeds 93%


Online voting appears to be effective. It's the future.

TASS

Defend Democracy — UNESCO sent letter to Turkey regarding turning Hagia Sophia into a mosque


Liberalism and traditionalism clash in Turkey.

Defend Democracy Press
UNESCO sent letter to Turkey regarding turning Hagia Sophia into a mosque

Two Views


One side sees totalitarian repression, the other side sees commie sedition.

Here are two representative views of opposing viewpoints that are wisely held in a deeply and bitterly divided US.

View One

Internationalist 360º
Intelligence Leaks Reveal Just How Ready the Police State Is to Crack Down on Dissent
Ranier Shea

View Two

Sic Semper Tyrannis
For BLM and the Antifa Zoo the Union is the real enemy, not the Rebs.
Col. W. Patrick Lang, US Army (ret.)

At the Defense Intelligence Agency, Lang was the Defense Intelligence Officer (DIO) for the Middle East, South Asia and counter-terrorism, and later, the first Director of the Defense Humint Service. At the DIA, he was a member of the Defense Senior Executive Service. He participated in the drafting of National Intelligence Estimates. From 1992 to 1994, all the U.S. military attachés worldwide reported to him. During that period, he also briefed President George H. W. Bush at the White House, as he had during Operation Desert Storm.

He was also the head of intelligence analysis for the Middle East for seven or eight years at that institution. He was the head of all the Middle East and South Asia analysis in DIA for counter-terrorism for seven years. For his service in the DIA, Lang received the Presidential Rank Award of Distinguished Executive. — Wikipedia

also

Waking Times
‘A Spiritual Battle’ – Catholic Archbishop Calls Out Deep State and New World Order in Open Letter to Trump

Chinese coronavirus vaccine approved for military use

China's military has approved a coronavirus vaccine for use within its ranks that has been developed by its research unit and a biotech firm, the company said Monday.

Bangkok Post

Chinese coronavirus vaccine approved for military use

Sputnik — 'Two Guys in a Steam Bath': Media Claims About Trump's Phone Calls With Putin Set Twitter Ablaze

The deep state is upping the attack on the president with the assistance of the media.
Heated discussions have erupted online after a number of insiders familiar with the contents of US President Donald Trump's phone conversations with foreign heads of state offered rather unflattering accounts of how POTUS allegedly conducted himself during those calls, according to a CNN report penned by legendary journalist Carl Bernstein of Watergate fame.
History records that Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein took down President Nixon using information provided by "Deep Throat" who could as well  have been characterized as "Deep State." Woodward and Bernstein later confirmed that Deep Throat had been FBI Associate Director Mark Felt.

I was happy to see Nixon go at the time, and I would not be sorry to see Trump go now, but I am as much concerned with the inordinate power of the Deep State as the intelligence services, senior military, and senior administrative bureaucracy and the use of that power to shape national policy through complicit media.

Sputnik International
'Two Guys in a Steam Bath': Media Claims About Trump's Phone Calls With Putin Set Twitter Ablaze

See also

Zero Hedge
Buried In All The Sensational "Russian Bounty" Headlines: Intel Chiefs Back White House Position
Tyler Durden

TASS
Allegations of Russia offering money to Taliban not confirmed by US intelligence

Making it up as they go along?

Sputnik International
‘Russian bounty’ story shifts: New York Times now claims Afghan CRIMINALS & not Taliban were paid, cites anonymous sources again

Jumping the shark?

The intensity of this is now off the charts.

Zero Hedge
Outrage Erupts After NYT Uses Slain Marine's Photo For "Unsubstantiated" Propaganda
Tyler Durden

SCMP — National security law: Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam demands international respect for the legislation as it is added to city’s Basic Law

During Lam’s video message, she accused foreign governments and politicians who had raised objections to the legislation of double standards.
“All those countries which are pointing their fingers at China have their own national security legislation in place,” she said.
“We can think of no valid reason why China alone should be inhibited from enacting a national security legislation to protect every corner of its territory and all of its nation,” she said.
I think this is right. Having observed the "protests" and "demonstrations" from a distance through the global media, I conclude that the great majority of participants were peaceful. This was reflected in the results of subsequent elections in which the opposition did very well.

A small but significant minority perpetrated violence bordering on a terrorism if not classifiable as terrorism in the interest of subversion of the state. No state would permit this. The problem in Hong Kong is that legislation is not in place to address it at the level it needs to be addressed. The new legislation seeks to remedy that, and so far as I can determine at present, it is within the bounds of internationally accepted standards for a sovereign in defending challenges to its sovereignty.

There is an important distinction to be made in the area of rights and liberties. Human rights and civil liberties include not only individual rights of persons, but the right of the public as a society to protect the security and good order of the collective as a polity.

This is implied in the slogan summarizing liberalism as "liberty, equality, and fraternity." "Liberty" signifies individual rights and liberties. Equality means equality before the law in government under the rule of law rather than the dictates of men and absence of privilege by birth, class, power, wealth, etc. Fraternity signifies solidarity of a people in community as a polity.

This concept is as old as the polis of ancient Greece, to which the West points as the birthplace of democracy. In submitting to the judgement of fellow citizens acting in the capacity of the polis rather than simply as an aggregate of individuals, Socrates accepted the principle of the rule of law as fundamental. Plato makes him quite eloquent about this.

This trifecta of personal liberty, equality of justice, and collective unity in community embodies potentially conflicting interests and individuals versus the polity is one such class of conflicting interests. The US, for example, is now experiencing the results of this conflict of interests coming to a head in terms of rights, liberties, national security, and civil order. People living in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.

SCMP
National security law: Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam demands international respect for the legislation as it is added to city’s Basic Law

See also

Lowering the boom.

Sputnik International
Joshua Wong's Hong Kong Opposition Group Disbands as Foreign Funding Dries Up

Why we need to debunk the 'deficit myth' — Stephanie Kelton


Five minute video.

BBC
Why we need to debunk the 'deficit myth'
Stephanie Kelton | Professor of Public Policy and Economics at Stony Brook University, formerly Democrats' chief economist on the staff of the U.S. Senate Budget Committee, and an economic adviser to the 2016 presidential campaign of Senator Bernie Sanders

Bill Mitchell — Apparently the government has no money but then has plenty

Things are obviously getting desperate out there in financial media commentary land. If one could express written text in graphical terms then there are a number of financial journalists out there that look – like a rabbit caught in the headlights – that is in a state “of paralyzing surprise, fear, or bewilderment.” A good example of this increasingly observed syndrome is an article in The Australian newspaper today (June 30, 2020) by Adam Creighton – Never forget that governments have no money – it is always ours (subscription required). This sort of journalism is becoming an almost daily occurrence as it becomes obvious that capitalism is now on state life support systems and the extremities of government intervention are demonstrating very clearly what Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) economists have been saying – and the only ones that have been saying it – for 25 years or so. I often note that Japan has already pushed the fiscal and monetary policy parameters beyond the limits most countries have explored in peacetime and mainstream economists have systematically predicted various scales of disaster and have always been wrong. Now all countries are at extremes and still no fiscal disaster. But the mainstream mouthpieces – these financial journalists who seem to think the stuff they read in first-year text books from mainstream economics programs are in same way the basis for expertise and knowledge – are in advanced states of dissonance. Drivel follows.
Calling it "drivel" may be too generous. The alternative view is that these screeds are not simply reflexive reactions by the ignorant but rather are intentional attacks on straw men mounted by propagandists for the status quo.

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
Apparently the government has no money but then has plenty
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

Book Review: The Deficit Myth: Modern Monetary Theory and the Birth of the People’s Economy by Stephanie Kelton

Maybe MMT has come just in the nick of time?



In The Deficit Myth: Modern Monetary Theory and the Birth of the People’s Economy, Stephanie Kelton dispels six key myths that have shaped the conventional understanding of deficits as inherently bad, instead arguing that deficits can strengthen economies and lead to faster growth. This book is a triumph, writes Professor Hans G. Despain, shifting normative grounds of government spending away from the false and unproductive idea that deficits are irresponsible and ruinous towards the productive political activity of deciding which spending programmes should be prioritised.

Stephanie Kelton, in her new book The Deficit Myth: Modern Monetary Theory and the Birth of the People’s Economy, demonstrates that concerns about public debt overhang are ill-founded. Kelton argues that government spending properly targeted and government debt need not be problematic. Indeed, she argues that public deficits can be very healthy for an economy.  Kelton contends bigger deficits can strengthen an economy and lead to faster growth.

LSE US Centre

Hamilton Bohannon - Disco Stomp (Sound Remastered)

Hamilton Bohannon is one of the pioneers behind most modern dance music, rock, pop, and techno. He developed the disco beat.

Kraftwerk went to New York after making Autobahn and fell in love with disco music, which influenced their later music.

Hamilton Bohannon - Disco Stomp (Sound Remastered)




An amazing little find I came across the other day, it's been doing my head in ever since.

Kraftwerk: Latin, Cha Cha Cha, Rumba, Reggae, Dub


Señor Coconut - El Baile Aleman (A Latin Tribute to Kraftwerk) (LATIN)



RAY McGOVERN: Russiagate’s Last Gasp

One can read this most recent flurry of Russia, Russia, Russia paid the Taliban to kill GIs as an attempt to pre-empt the findings into Russiagate’s origins.


Behind the Scenes Trump has been making peace moves with Russia, then the Afghanistan story erupts in the New York Times. Ray McGovern isn't falling for it, and neither is Trump.

CIA Disinformation; Casey at Bat

Former CIA Director William Casey said:  “We’ll know when our disinformation program is complete, when everything the American public believes is false.”

Consortium News

RAY McGOVERN: Russiagate’s Last Gasp



Monday, June 29, 2020

Zero Hedge — Wilbur Ross Says US Revokes Hong Kong's Special Status


Bites off nose to spite face. 😧

The West needs favored access to Hong Kong much more than China. That did not used to be case, but the importance of Hong Kong to China has declined dramatically. The result of this will be the gradual decline of Hong Kong as a player and the rise of mainland Chinese trading and financial centers.

More significantly, China has shut the door to easy access by foreign intelligence and political influencers.

In the longer run, rupture from the West will be beneficial to Hong Kong, since most Hong Kongers' problems result from its colonial past that favors the remnant of that past. This is passing into history.

Zero Hedge
Wilbur Ross Says US Revokes Hong Kong's Special Status
Tyler Durden

Bridging China’s past with humanity’s future – Part 2 Straight Bat


2 of 3 parts.

The Vineyard of the Saker
Bridging China’s past with humanity’s future – Part 2
Straight Bat

No Racism in Russia — Anatoly Karlin


Poll results.

Somewhat surprising since there are many ethic minorities and different religions and cultural traditions in the republics of the Russian Federation.

The Unz Review
No Racism in Russia
Anatoly Karlin

‘The God That Failed’: Why the U.S. Cannot Now Re-Impose Its Civilisational Worldview — Alastair Crooke

Liberal core tenets of individual autonomy, freedom, industry, free trade and commerce essentially reflected the triumph of the Protestant worldview in Europe’s 30-years’ civil war. It was not fully even a Christian view, but more a Protestant one.

This narrow, sectarian pillar was able to be projected into a universal project – only so long as it was underpinned by power....


World views are justifications (values-based, normative) rather than explanations (factual, scientific).

Alastair Crooke goes a bit of the rails as the article goes on, in fact, quite a bit.

Strategic Culture Foundation
‘The God That Failed’: Why the U.S. Cannot Now Re-Impose Its Civilisational Worldview
Alastair Crooke | founder and director of the Conflicts Forum, and former British diplomat and senior figure in British intelligence and in European Union diplomacy

Trump Used Looted Venezuelan Public Money to Build Border Wall With Mexico — Ben Norton


Colonialism alive and well.

The Grayzone
Trump used looted Venezuelan public money to build border wall with Mexico
Ben Norton

Sputnik — UN Declares ‘Massive Rise’ in Hunger Spikes as WHO Warns Pandemic ‘Not Close to Being Over’


The pandemic seems to be accelerating — Global R (reproduction value) increasing — rather than stabilizing or declining.
In a Monday news release, the WFP warned that tens of millions of people will most likely go hungry this year due the COVID-19 pandemic. The agency’s estimates show that around 270 million people will face food insecurity before the year ends, which represents an 82% increase from before the pandemic swept across the globe....
Sputnik International
UN Declares ‘Massive Rise’ in Hunger Spikes as WHO Warns Pandemic ‘Not Close to Being Over’

SouthFront — Russia Experimented With “Swarm” Battle Formation Of Su-35 Jets, Led By Su-57 Fighter Jet


Swarm is the future.
He added that similar work is being carried out by the United States of America, in particular for its F35 fighter jets.
In addition, Murakhovsky said, so far neither Russia nor the United States have been able to build such a unified information system for managing all types of troops due to difficulties in creating a single data format for different types and branches of the armed forces.
The operative term is "information system."

SouthFront
Russia Experimented With “Swarm” Battle Formation Of Su-35 Jets, Led By Su-57 Fighter Jet

SouthFront — China Recruits MMA Fighters For Its Border Militia To Counter India


"Don't mess with China."

Actually, hand to hand is step forward rather than back.

SouthFront
China Recruits MMA Fighters For Its Border Militia To Counter India

Understanding R: Why we need more intelligent leaders — Charles Adams


Going viral is similar in progression to compound interest.

R number is the reproductive factor of the virus.

The goal is to get R under 1.0 as soon as possible.

Middle East Eye — Israel orders US-based evangelical channel off air over conversion accusations


Read:  Israel pokes US in eye.

Middle East Eye
Israel orders US-based evangelical channel off air over conversion accusations

China-based TikTok and other apps are banned in India following border conflict — Lydia Dishman

National security concerns are cited for the reason the Indian Ministry is shutting down access to 59 Chinese apps.
TikTok, ShareIt, WeChat, and 56 other Chinese apps have been banned in India over what the government called national security concerns.
Further splintering of the global Internet as globalization reverses gear.
Lydia Dishman

Chinese Oil Majors Could Form A Powerful Buyers Club — Irina Slav

China’s state-owned oil companies—Sinopec, CNOOC, PetroChina, and Sinochem—are discussing an arrangement to buy crude oil together instead of individually, to avoid bidding wars and gain more bargaining power, unnamed sources in the know told Bloomberg.
The group has already secured the support of the central government and its first step as a collective buyer would be to bid on Russian and African oil cargos on the spot market, the Bloomberg sources said.
If the group bidding pans out, it could indeed give the four quite a lot of bargaining power: Bloomberg notes that Sinopec, CNOOC, PetroChina, and Sinochem together import more than 5 million bpd of crude oil, which is more than 20 percent of OPEC’s total daily production. That stood at a little over 24 million bpd as of May....
 The swing buyer cartel.

US Loses Myanmar to China — Joseph Thomas


Winning the battle and losing the war.

NEO
US Loses Myanmar to China
Joseph Thomas

Governments should do everything possible to avoid recessions – yet they don’t — Bill Mitchell

In May 2020, the IMF published a new Working Paper (No 20/73) – Hysteresis and Business Cycles – which provides some insights into what happens during an economic cycle. The IMF are somewhat late to the party as they usually are. We have known about the concept and relevance of hysteresis since the 1980s. In terms of the academic work, I was one of the earliest contributors to the hysteresis literature in the world. I published several articles on the topic in the 1980s that came out of my PhD research as I was searching for solutions to the dominant view in the profession that the Phillips curve constraint prevented full employment from being sustained (the inflation impacts!). The lesson from this literature in part – especially in current times – is that governments should do everything possible to avoid recessions. The hysteresis notion tells us clearly that the future is path dependent. The longer and deeper the recession, the more damaging the consequences and the longer it takes to recover while enduring these elevated levels of misery. Organisations like the IMF have never embraced that sort of reasoning, until now it seems. They certainly didn’t act in this way during the Greek disaster. But, better late than never....
Bill Mitchell – billy blog
Governments should do everything possible to avoid recessions – yet they don’t
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

AFR does hatchet job on Kohler MMT push — David Llewellyn-Smith


Meeting the onslaught.

Macrobusiness
AFR does hatchet job on Kohler MMT push
David Llewellyn-Smith is Chief Strategist at the MB Fund and MB Super. David is the founding publisher and editor of MacroBusiness and was the founding publisher and global economy editor of The Diplomat, the Asia Pacific’s leading geo-politics and economics portal

We Need a Jobs Guarantee Now More Than Ever — Paul Prescod

Review of The Case For a Job Guarantee, by Pavlina Tcherneva (Wiley, 2020).
An idea whose time has come.
The demand for some version of a federal job guarantee is not new in US politics. Tcherneva highlights that the idea was part of the UN Declaration of Human Rights and Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Economic Bill of Rights, as well as a key issue raised during the Civil Rights Movement. Though there were some impressive federal job programs mounted during the New Deal, the author calls the Job Guarantee “the missing piece of the Roosevelt Revolution.”... 
The Humphrey-Hawkins Full Employment Act. signed in to law on October 27, 1978 by President Jimmy Carter and codified as15 USC § 3101, also mandated full employment through US government policy. Effective action on it is overdue.

Jacobin
We Need a Jobs Guarantee Now More Than Ever
Paul Prescod

Your Childhood Neighbourhood Could Affect You on an Epigenetic Level, Says New Study

The research into Learned Helplessness has also shown why some people can fall behind.

Numerous studies have shown that children who grow up in more deprived neighbourhoods tend to have worse physical health as adults compared to those raised in more affluent areas.

Your Childhood Neighbourhood Could Affect You on an Epigenetic Level, Says New Study

Your Environment Could Be Changing Your IQ on a Genetic Level, Study Findsamp

Jonathon Pie - Woke Utopia

When I tweeted that pulling statues down was destroying heritage, I got a lot of backlash for it. I said if I go to Rome I would prefer to see the ancient buildings in all their splendider rather than ruins, despite Rome's brutal history. 

Cancel culture comes full circle as an MP is fired for posting an article from The Independent.


Renegade Inc l Bailing Out or Bankrupting Britain

MMT is coming!

Every time house prices go up the financial press states that the country has become wealthier, but all that has happened is that wealth has been transferred from one section of the public (those that don't own houses) to another (those that do).

The governor of the Bank of England is a public servant. He recently claimed that the UK almost went bankrupt at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic.

But how does a country that issues its own currency go bust? Or are we in danger of propping up sectors that in the medium term just don’t have a future?

Host Ross Ashcroft is joined by the economists and authors Josh Ryan-Collin and Laurie Macfarlane by to discuss if this crisis can be an opportunity to re-shape our economy.`

RT UK is a channel based in London covering British news and politics, protests and interviews with people who make a difference.



The BBC - Why we need to grow the deficit

Could the principles of Modern Monetary Theory show us a way out of the current economic crisis?


The BBC now!

Stephanie Kelton.



Socialism in China - How GOVERNMENT and INFRASTRUCTURE ALLEVIATE POVERTY (NO HAND OUTS)

This guy is Colombian and is a serial entrepreneur who has often enjoyed dangerous sports earning money from them. So, he's not someone you might expect to be a typical CCP supporter.

Anyway, one freedom that China has which much of the world hasn't, is freedom from fear. People are relaxed and friendly in China.

So, is living in dormitories provided by companies in China is really that bad? Well, if you think so then try living as a poor person in the US.

Socialism in China - How GOVERNMENT and INFRASTRUCTURE ALLEVIATE POVERTY (NO HAND OUTS)


Sunday, June 28, 2020

Gower Initiative — ‘What if the Public (really) Understood How Money Works?’ Just think what we could achieve!

After having previously been ignored and disparaged for decades by mainstream economists and politicians, MMT has been making the headlines and finding its way into a growing public conversation.
Two significant publications over the last few weeks are challenging the very basis upon which government policy is determined; ‘does it fit with our political agenda, is it affordable’ and ‘how can it be paid for?’
The Deficit Myth’ by Stephanie Kelton was described by Professor Hans G Despain in a review in the LSE blog as a ‘triumph’ challenging, as he explained, the false idea that ‘deficits are irresponsible and ruinous towards the productive political activity of deciding which spending programmes should be prioritised’.
Hot on its heels came Pavlina Tcherneva’s book ‘The case for A Job Guarantee’ described by James K Galbraith as the ‘next big, common-sense idea for economic reform’. And in the words of Paul Prescod in the Jacobin Mag, the Job Guarantee ‘offers an inspiring vision of what society would look like if we utilized the various talents and skills working people possess’
Both these publications have stirred an already growing interest in that hitherto boring subject of economics, showing that far from being irrelevant to people’s lives it is critical to them in terms of human and planetary well-being....
The Telegraph (UK) aka "Torygraph" has a scathing article denouncing MMT today, and specifically, The Deficit Myth. I won't link to it since it is behind a paywall, but clearly the TPTB have mounted a head-on attack. Expect more to come.

What is China really doing with its digital Yuan? — Chris Faure

China is doing no less than building a new model in FinTech that will make the old model obsolete and in this way they are simply leapfrogging the current financial systems distributing the dollar with fast, lean and modern systems supporting the Financial Silk Road...
Kick ass tech.
Quite rightly the Asiatimes is asking .. Who is actually decoupling from Whom? And I can add, and using modern FinTech to do so with solutions appropriate contextually to our modern world....
So, it is clear that both inside and outside of hard FinTech which this writing is about, the trajectory of recreating systems and simply leaving the US out, is alive and well....
Excellent backgrounder.

The upshot.
The West is 20 years behind this technology, because China decided to leapfrog and not follow the accepted development trajectory and as such has reconfigured the potentials for the entire planet.
It is high time and in the words of Michael Hudson: “So the United States, through the World Bank, has become I think the most dangerous, right-wing, evil organization in modern history — more evil than the IMF. That’s why it’s almost always been run by a Secretary of Defense. It has always been explicitly military. It’s the hard fist of American imperialism.”
The world is leapfrogging, and elegantly zig-zagging around current imperial financial systems, for a true birth of a new post capitalist post industrial order, without going to war for it.
The Vineyard of the Saker
What is China really doing with its digital Yuan?
Chris Faure 

Can corruption be good for growth? — Branko Milanovic

Yuen Yuen Ang, political science professor at University of Michigan, has written an ambitious book. “China’s Gilded Age: The Paradox of Economic Boom and Vast Corruption” is much more than an observer might infer from its title. Its goal is to redefine corruption, reexamine the relationship between corruption and economic growth, and analyze (often empirically) the role of corruption in China’s development during the past 40 years.
Ang begins with two important points: to better understand it, corruption needs to be unbundled into different types because they are likely to have different effects on economic growth. Second, it needs to be weened away from a Western-centric view that, in part because of inability to distinguish between different types of corruption, tends to overlook typical Western corruptions (say, in lobbying or revolving doors between private and public sectors) and present a biased view whereby corruption exists only in less developed economies. That view, Ang argues, leads to a mistaken view that corruption is bad for growth (despite dearth of confirming empirical evidence) and to an idealized view of development characterized by “inclusive institutions” (Acemoglu-Robinson) or “open-access societies” (Douglass North). They are both criticized by Ang.
She proposes a four-type breakdown of corruption. First, petty theft (pay bribe rather than fine); second, speed money: street-level corruption (get a shop license faster); third, grand theft (embezzlement on a large scale—Nigeria’s Abacha); fourth, access money (giving permissions to capitalists to engage in big projects). Only the latter, in Ang’s view, is desirable....
The concluding sentence is most interesting.
Eventually, one hopes, economists will move from their faux-moralizing attitude toward corruption and begin to treat some forms of it as rental income.
Global Inequality
Can corruption be good for growth?
Branko Milanovic | Visiting Presidential Professor at City University of New York Graduate Center and senior scholar at the Stone Center on Socio-economic Inequality, senior scholar at the Luxembourg Income Study (LIS), and formerly lead economist in the World Bank's research department and senior associate at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

Complementary currencies for municipal finance — Steve Randy Waldman

It is an act of criminal malfeasance that the United States’ federal government has not eased the tremendous fiscal pressure on states and municipalities, enabling them to prioritize public health and long-term economic wealth over immediate maintenance of tax revenue. Misgovernance of the United States presently rises to the level of war crime (and that is not just Donald Trump).
A recent article by Rohan Grey, aptly titled Monetary Resilience, highlights one way this national misgovernance might be circumvented. Municipalities could issue complementary currencies:...
Rohan Grey is an MMT lawyer.

What is an MMT lawyer, you ask. A lawyer that understands the institutional aspect of "money," which is as much as legal concept as an economic one, if not more.

A number of legal experts are now interested in MMT and involved in what has become the "MMT project" from an institutional and policy perspective in addition to an economic and financial one.

Lawyers Ellen Brown and Carlos (beowulf) Mucha were instrumental in the platinum coin proposal going viral, for instance.

Interfluidity
Complementary currencies for municipal finance
Steve Randy Waldman

US-China trade deal unravels. What next? — M. K. Bhadrakumar


Note: M. K. Bhadrakumar incorrectly asserts that Mike Pompeo was a sergeant in the US military, whereas Secretary Pompeo graduated first in class from West Point and served as an officer from 1986 to 1991, when he left the military with the rank of captain.

India Punchline
US-China trade deal unravels. What next?
M. K. Bhadrakumar | retired diplomat with the Indian Foreign Service

See also

NEO
US-China Relations: The Picture Remains Extremely Paradoxical
Vladimir Terehov

New Book: The Case For A Job Guarantee — Brian Romanchuk


Excellent short review of Pavlina Tcherneva's new book on the MMT job guarantee.

Bond Economics
New Book: The Case For A Job Guarantee
Brian Romanchuk

Donald Trump Tweet - Afghanistan Attack

Nobody briefed or told me, @VP Pence, or Chief of Staff @MarkMeadows about the so-called attacks on our troops in Afghanistan by Russians, as reported through an “anonymous source” by the Fake News @nytimes. Everybody is denying it & there have not been many attacks on us.....
...Nobody’s been tougher on Russia than the Trump Administration. With Corrupt Joe Biden & Obama, Russia had a field day, taking over important parts of Ukraine - Where’s Hunter? Probably just another phony Times hit job, just like their failed Russia Hoax. Who is their “source”?

Can China become the number one SuperPower without "Freedom"?

An excellent video about China.

Why is there so much anti-Chinese propaganda in the West, because over the last 30 years China has gone from a poor nation to one of the richest, with its people enjoying an ever increasing standard of living, and this worries Western leaders because we might start asking them what went wrong here in the West?

Thatcher and Reagan brought in austerity and told us it would release us from the shackles of government, making our lives better and wealthier.

While we try to keep out Huawei 5G, this guy in this video has his fridge, washing machine, front gate, heating, all connected to the internet. This is standard in China. China is now world leader in many advanced technologies.


In this video, I discuss why I think China's economy will quietly take the first place in the world as a superpower, in spite of the trade war. Because of the supposed lack of "freedom" imposed by the chinese communist party, China's economic collapse is inevitable, according to some westerners - this argument falls on its face when you watch what China Youtubers are putting out day after day. 2020 has challenged the US economy and hegemony, and with Trump, the country is contracting faster and faster. Leadership shown during corresponding riots is a massive contrast - these are moments that defined China.




Saturday, June 27, 2020

Bridging China’s past with humanity’s future – Section 1 — Straight-Bat

This will be presented in 3 sections and in 3 different blog posts
Backgrounder with lots of economic history in addition to social and political history. While the author is a committed socialist, which is a matter of choice based largely on values (normative), the history (positive) seems to me to factual and well-researched. It's a tightly packed summary that covers centuries, so it is a fairly long read, but worthwhile. Increasingly, world history is being made in Eurasia.

The Vineyard of the Saker
Bridging China’s past with humanity’s future – Section 1
Straight-Bat for the Saker Blog
By profession I’m an Engineer and Consultant, but my first love was and is History and Political Science. In retired life, I’m pursuing higher study in Economics.
I’m one of the few decade-old members of The Saker blog-site. Hope that this website will continue to focus on truth and justice in public life and will support the struggle of common people across the world.
An Indian by nationality, I believe in humanity.
See also

Martin Powers lays a lot of the blame on Hegel for the historical phenomenon of Western "exceptionalism" as a cultural "superiority complex." But that credits Hegel with excessive influence in my view.

Many factors were involved in the rise of the concept of Western (white) superiority. Claiming Hegel as instrumental to it is comparable to claiming that Adam Smith was a major factor in the development of capitalism.

On the other hand, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, and to some degree V. I. Lenin, did influence history directly in a major way that is still unfolding. So did the sages and prophets of the various cultural wisdom traditions,

Other people that are known as "philosophers" did exert a strong influence of the development of Western culture and did shape its direction to a degree. But in this role, they are better characterized a "thought leaders" or "public intellectuals."

As someone trained in philosophy and its history, I view philosophy much more broadly than academic philosophy. Reviewing the history of philosophy, most so-called philosophers where just the deep thinker of their time that took the time record their thoughts.

Hegel was one of the few academics that made it to the top of the list. While Hegel's work was a tour de force in Western philosophy, perhaps his greatest weakness was his overemphasis on the West, and Prussia as the epitome of the West in his time.

Viewed in the light of history, different peoples and cultures have had their day. So will "the West." Taking the long view as the world's longest lived civilization, the Chinese realize this.

SCMP
In the US, China-bashing is rooted in myths of Western superiority
Martin Powers

Pepe Escobar — The India-China, Himalayan Puzzle


Backgrounder.

Consortium News
PEPE ESCOBAR: The India-China, Himalayan Puzzle

Moon of Alabama — Evidence Free Press Release Claims 'Russia Did Bad, Trump Did Not Respond' - NYT, WaPo Publish It


Moon of Alabama seems to assume that bad journalism is the cause.

Others assume rather that the media he mentions and similar establishment voices in other countries are complicit in a disinformation/propaganda effort.

See Jorge Marinho, Journalists and Intelligence Services.

Moon of Alabama
Evidence Free Press Release Claims 'Russia Did Bad, Trump Did Not Respond' - NYT, WaPo Publish It

See also

Zero Hedge
BuzzFeed "Reporter" Who Got Zerohedge Banned On Twitter, Fired For Plagiarism
Tyler Durden

Also

Caitlin Johnstone — Rogue Journalist
Mentally Replace Everything Before “U.S. Intelligence Says” With “Blah Blah We’re Probably Lying”

Michael Hudson on Coronavirus and Debt Winners and Losers

Yves here. Michael Hudson discusses the deflationary impact of the coronacrisis and how modern, misguided approaches to unsustainable debt loads are making matters worse.
Remarks given at the 1st ASECU Teleconference ‘Systematic Crises Triggered the Current Pandemic & Progressive Way-Outs,’ May 8, 2020
Naked Capitalism
Michael Hudson on Coronavirus and Debt Winners and Losers
Yves Smith

The Fed is pumping huge amounts of money into the economy: former New York Fed chief



Zero progress here.... ie where it matters..... ZEEEEEEEEEEERRRROOOOOOOOOOO......

So what of the concern that the rapid growth of bank reserves will prove inflationary? This concern is misplaced. The Fed can adjust the interest rate it pays on bank reserves, controlling the cost of credit and influencing whether the reserves are lent out. 

Only when the bank reserves are lent out does the expansionary credit multiplier process start to work. The Fed controls this process because it controls short-term interest rates.

They are making the typical reification error you always see with these people and are believing the accounting abstractions termed “Reserve Assets”  are real and are “lent out”...

Major cognitive errors continue to be made by these people...  unqualified...



Why Amazon is Begging For Regulations - The Twisted Economics of Amazon

I won't be a hipocritic, I have Amazon goods popping through the door two or three times a week. I haven't been well for the last few years, so it's been a godsend for me, and the same for ebay. You have to be careful, though, as sometimes Amazon significantly over charge, so it's best to check around. I bought something for a fraction of the price the other day on eBay. But you can hardly criticise Amazon when it hardly makes a profit - it has to raise money somewhere.


In two short decades, Amazon has grown from a modest online bookstore to an international conglomerate. A conglomerate that seems hellbent on moving into every growing industry out there.

Amazon will only be the second company this channel has ever explored but it is extremely important to understand for a few reasons. most curiously, why amazon is pushing for reform in key areas that wouldn't really be expected...




Friday, June 26, 2020

Why Iran won’t be broken — Pepe Escobar


Status update. Iran is apparently doing pretty well, all things considered.

The Vineyard of the Saker
Why Iran won’t be broken
Pepe Escobar

Why I Voted for "The Russian Amendment" to the Russian Constitution — Anatoly Karlin


Backgrounder by a self-identified "nationalist."

The Unz Review
Why I Voted for "The Russian Amendment" to the Russian Constitution
Anatoly Karlin

See also

While I support the right not to be discriminated against based on age, sexual preference, gender, ethnicity, etc., I think it is overreach for one entity to attempt to impose its values on another, which is a continual bone of contention between liberalism and traditionalism.

The historical dialectic between liberalism and traditionalism is one of the dominant theme of this age. Each society will have to handle it in its own way and at its own pace for the process to be relatively peaceful.

The Vineyard of the Saker
US Ambassador posts a message to the Russian people
The Saker

TASS NATO’s budget is 20 times Russia’s military spending, says envoy

As a result of NATO’s "soaring" military activity an unpredictable military-political situation is unfolding, according to the chief Russian delegate
"Unstable" is probably a better term than "unpredictable."

The difference is that NATO's force is offensive, while Russia's is defensive. It's much less costly in terms of resources to defend rather than attack. Dollar amounts are deceptive. It's "bang for the buck."
"We see the NATO countries’ attempts at gaining military superiority. There is not a hint at restraint in military spending. The alliance’s overall military budget is 20 times Russia’s defense budget," Vorobyov said.
Russia will make it continually more costly for NATO to "dominate." Actually, according to military analyst Andrei Martyanov, NATO already lost dominance some time ago, even disregarding MAD, owing to advanced weaponry.

Sputnik — China Reportedly Warns US That Trade Deal Will Be at Risk if Washington Crosses 'Red Lines'


Anyone taking bets on how long the deal is going to last?

Sputnik International
China Reportedly Warns US That Trade Deal Will Be at Risk if Washington Crosses 'Red Lines'

Henry Wallace, American Visionary — Jeremy Kuzmarov

Over fifty years after his death, Henry A. Wallace, America’s Vice President from 1941-1945 and an independent candidate for president in the 1948 election, continues to evoke strong emotions. On the left, Wallace remains a figure of veneration for his progressive ideals and promotion of world peace, while among conservative and centrist Democrats, he is considered a naïve dupe of communists who underestimated the Soviet “threat.”
John Nichols’ latest book, The Fight For the Soul of the Democratic Party: The Enduring Legacy of Henry Wallace’s AntiFascist, Antiracist Politics(Verso, 2020) offers a convincing case that those on the left were correct: that Wallace was indeed a visionary who was ahead of his time in warning about a right-wing drift in American politics and danger of corporate fascism and whose policy of cooperation with the Russians might have averted the Cold War.
According to Nichols’, Wallace’s removal from the Democratic Party ticket due to back-door machinations at the 1944 Democratic Party convention in Chicago, was a major turning point in American political history. It began the Democratic Party’s trajectory away from the progressive ideals underlying Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal, and towards the embrace of neoliberalism. Nichols in turn believes that the time is ripe for a new generation of Democratic Party leaders to reclaim Wallace’s legacy, and revitalize his political platform, which centered on promoting racial and gender equality and the interests of American working people, and advancing a peaceful foreign policy....
Perhaps the sharpest blow to the US strategically in the past hundred year was the replacement of Henry Wallace with Harry Truman in what would be FDR's last term in office. There is a temptation to view America's "problems" as recent. They began back then and now are coming to a head with nuclear war looming abroad and incipient civil war brewing at home. Neither the Cold War nor the Civil War ever actually ended.
We cannot know for sure if things would have turned out better if Wallace had won the re-nomination and succeeded FDR as President. It is quite possible that there would have been a conservative backlash against Wallace that would have thwarted many of his plans or led to his removal from power. However, there is also the possibility that Wallace could have governed effectively and built a consensus around his ideals and changed America’s political landscape in a more progressive direction....
Nichols also points out that many of today's "progressives" are not traditional progressives in the vein of Henry Wallace or George McGovern, but rather exhibit neoliberal and neoconservative tendencies.

Counterpunch
Henry Wallace, American Visionary
Jeremy Kuzmarov

RT — India Blocks Imports of US Products Made in China Following Deadly Border Clash


India decoupling from China.

RT
India Blocks Imports of US Products Made in China Following Deadly Border Clash

See also

India has long been well-known for its endemic corruption. Now sectarian nationalism is rearing its ugly head in the land of the rishis.

India has neither recovered from the British Raj nor has it yet discovered how to do this As a result it remains in a colonial state with the elite now looking to the American Empire to save it from itself before it implodes.

Counterpunch
Capitalism and the Throttling of Democracy in India
Colin Todhunter

Also

Sputnik International
‘Did China Encroach Our Land?’ India’s Congress Nudges Prime Minister Modi Over Ladakh Conflict

Live Attenuated Vaccines Could Protect against Most Severe COVID-19 Symptoms

Dr. Paul Fidel, Jr., from Louisiana State University Health – School of Dentistry and Professor Mairi Noverr from Tulane University School of Medicine propose the concept that administration of an unrelated live attenuated vaccine, such as the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccine, could serve as a preventive measure against the worst sequelae of COVID-19.

COVID-19 has not had a big impact on children, and the authors hypothesize that one reason children are protected against viral infections that induce sepsis is their more recent and more frequent exposures to live attenuated vaccines that can also induce the trained suppressive MDSCs that limit inflammation and sepsis.

Sci News

Live Attenuated Vaccines Could Protect against Most Severe COVID-19 Symptoms

Don't Blame Modi for 'No Intrusion' Claim, Blame Him for Dramatic Shift in China Policy — Prem Shankar Jha


The Modi government provoked the crisis, and in no small measure, the prime minster himself. Indian nationalists have been only too willing to pile on. This portends to be a huge strategic blunder, although Modi seems to have realized the stakes involved and is now hedging his bet rather than boldly raise the ante.

The Wire (India)
Don't Blame Modi for 'No Intrusion' Claim, Blame Him for Dramatic Shift in China Policy
Prem Shankar Jha

Debunking the myth of ‘helicopter money’ — Yeva Nersisyan and L. Randall Wray


This post is from last April. It is an excellent summary of contemporary issues, so here is again now these issues are coming to the fore owing to the publication of Stephanie Kelton's The Deficit Myth. It shows how most of the critiques aimed at MMT miss the mark since MMT doesn't hold those positions they attribute to it.

Japan Times
Debunking the myth of ‘helicopter money’
Yeva Nersisyan, associate professor of economics at Franklin & Marshall College, and L. Randall Wray is a professor of economics at Bard College and a senior scholar at the Levy Economics Institute
Originally published at Project Syndicate

Stephanie Kelton Cracks Best Seller List — Stony Brook University News

The latest book by Stony Brook’s Stephanie Kelton, The Deficit Myth: Modern Monetary Theory and the Birth of the People’s Economy, has been named to The New York Times best seller list for hardcover nonfiction. A professor of economics and public policy in the College of Arts and Sciences, Dr. Kelton is a leading authority on Modern Monetary Theory, an approach to economics that is drawing great interest worldwide.
Stony Brook University News
Stephanie Kelton Cracks Best Seller List

FACT SHEET: Banking on Surveillance: The Libra Black Paper


Download PDF.

AFR
FACT SHEET: Banking on Surveillance: The Libra Black Paper
Team

The Case for a Job Guarantee by Pavlina R. Tcherneva available in the US today


Available at booksellers in the US today. It was released in Europe previously.

Wiley
The Case for a Job Guarantee
Pavlina R. Tcherneva

Book Review: The Deficit Myth: Modern Monetary Theory and the Birth of the People’s Economy by Stephanie Kelton — Hans G. Despain

In The Deficit Myth: Modern Monetary Theory and the Birth of the People’s Economy, Stephanie Kelton dispels six key myths that have shaped the conventional understanding of deficits as inherently bad, instead arguing that deficits can strengthen economies and lead to faster growth. This book is a triumph, writes Professor Hans G. Despain, shifting normative grounds of government spending away from the false and unproductive idea that deficits are irresponsible and ruinous towards the productive political activity of deciding which spending programmes should be prioritised.
LSE Blog
Book Review: The Deficit Myth: Modern Monetary Theory and the Birth of the People’s Economy by Stephanie Kelton
Hans G. Despain, PhD | Professor of Political Economy at Nichols College

Ikea cute little dog commercial

I loved this when it first came out. I've been looking for it on YouTube for years, and today I found it.


The Pandemic’s Worst-Case Scenario Is Unfolding in Brazil

It's behind a paywall today, but I did manage to read it yesterday. You might get a free view.

'One day in April, he visited the morgue in the capital, Belém. “There were 120 bodies, scattered everywhere. It’s something you’d see in a war.”
Bloomberg

Spain sees infections rise, grim economic forecast

IMF predicts Spain’s economy will shrink by an unprecedented 12.8% this year

As the International Monetary Fund (IMF) published grim expectations for Spain’s economy this year, the country registered an uptick in new COVID-19 infections again on Wednesday.

The Ministry of Health confirmed 334 new COVID-19 infections, up nearly 100 from Tuesday. Two more deaths were also reported, which raised the total number of confirmed fatalities to 28,327.

Besides having one of the highest mortality and infection rates per capita in the world from the infectious disease, the IMF now predicts Spain is set to take one of the world’s biggest financial hits from the coronavirus.

Texas Orders Bars To Close As Hospitals Flooded With Patients Amid Record Surge In COVID-19 Cases: Live Updates

Abbott orders taverns to close

Texas Gov expected to roll back reopening measures after announcing 'pause'

US sees second straight record jump in daily new cases

India cases top 500k after another record jump

Almost all US states seeing biggest jump in cases are located in south, west

Japan reports 100 new cases, biggest spike in weeks

Beijing unwinds more restrictions after latest cluster scare

Zero Edge

Texas Orders Bars To Close As Hospitals Flooded With Patients Amid Record Surge In COVID-19 Cases: Live Updates

Thursday, June 25, 2020

Russia Develops Drone-Disabling Systems To Protect Oil Facilities — Charles Kennedy


Innovation.

Oilprice.com
Russia Develops Drone-Disabling Systems To Protect Oil Facilities
Charles Kennedy

For the first time, the majority of people under 16 in America are nonwhite and Hispanic — Connie Lin


The next generation of US voters that will be replacing the boomers.

Fast Company
For the first time, the majority of people under 16 in America are nonwhite and Hispanic
Connie Lin

Funding deficits with cash, not bonds could help avoid oversized stimulus debt — Felix Salmon

My thought bubble: There's a paradox here. The people who want to print money to avoid adding to the national debt are also the people who say that the size of the national debt doesn't matter. The hope is that monetization would placate the deficit hawks, but that seems unlikely.
Yes, it is only a paradox and not a contradiction. A paradox appears to be a contradiction but it not on analysis.

There are several reasons that some MMT economists favor not necessarily offsetting fiscal deficits with interest-bearing government securities.

In the first place, it is not necessary operationally. Therefore, since public payments are involved, the question arises about public purpose or some others justification based on public interest — instead of being directed toward special interests.

The obvious fact is that the policy of paying interest on public debt favors savers, for two reasons. First, owing to the interest and also owing to default-free risk. Why is paying interest to hold default-free securities not a favor to those that save. Is it in the public purpose to encourage saving?

Those who say that favoring savers is beneficial in that it provides funds for lending are mistaken. Saving doesn't cause investment, but rather investment causes saving, in that saving is the residual of income after consumption. New money is either issued by the currency issuer or results from credit extension by banks that have access to the central bank. No prior saving needed.

There could be public interest in providing default-risk free securities at interest even though it is not necessary operationally. For example, it is argued that this provision of "safe assets" reduces systemic risk. It also plays a role in the operation of the monetary and financial system. For example, debt issuance is used in monetary operations when the central bank is not setting the policy rate directly. Government securities are  also the highest form of collateral.

While Bill Mitchell recommends ending the subsidy to savers as waste, since it is not needed operationally, Warren Mosler recommends limiting securities issuance to the short-term.

On the other hand, some argue, and I assume that Stephanie Kelton is in this group, that although securities issuance is not necessary operationally, there is widespread belief that it is. "Monetizing" as least part of the deficit instead of offsetting it with securities would break that false view.

One more observation is in order here. Paying interest on the debt adds spendable funds to the economy and it is therefore more inflationary than not doing so. Under ordinary circumstances, this might not show up. However, under current thinking, raising the policy rate and thereby increasing  interest rates over the curve, is the preferred tool of monetary policy, in the belief that raising interest rates across the board dampens investment and cools inflationary pressure. But as rates rise, government securities pay higher interest and that adds spendable funds, increasing inflationary pressure.

While there is no operational problem in increasing the government's interest burden, since the interest is paid with issuance, there could be a problem with exacerbating inflation when inflationary pressure is rising owing to monetary policy as currently administered.

Paradox resolved.

Axios
Funding deficits with cash, not bonds could help avoid oversized stimulus debt
Felix Salmon

Deficit Owls — Modern Monetary Theory for Mainstream Economists


Links.

Deficit Owls
Modern Monetary Theory for Mainstream Economists

Unless there is major rent reform we’re going to see a horrible meltdown than the downward — Richard Murphy

...radical thinking is required now or the rental sector is itself going to collapse...
Debt deflation creeping up?

Tax Research UK
Unless there is major rent reform we’re going to see a horrible meltdown than the downward
Richard Murphy | Professor of Practice in International Political Economy at City University, London; Director of Tax Research UK; non-executive director of Cambridge Econometrics, and a member of the Progressive Economy Forum

Harmful State Cuts Loom Without More Federal Aid — Wesley Tharpe

State and local policymakers are waiting as long as they can to impose cuts, partly because they hope that the President and Congress will deliver more aid, and partly so they can get a better sense of the crisis’ magnitude. The economic collapse happened fast and some tax revenue isn’t due yet; most states delayed income tax filing deadlines to at least July 15 (to conform to the federal delay), with others also delaying deadlines for businesses to remit sales tax.
With business closures and layoffs sharply reducing states’ expected income and sales tax revenues, we estimate that state budget shortfalls will total about $615 billion over the current fiscal year (which ends June 30 in most states) and the next two. States must balance their budgets every year, even in recessions, setting the stage for layoffs and punishing cuts to essential services....
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
Harmful State Cuts Loom Without More Federal Aid
Wesley Tharpe, Deputy Director, State Policy Research

Also at CBPP
Some wrongly argue that federal policymakers should “wait and see” before giving states more fiscal aid to help address their huge, recession-driven revenue shortfalls, in part because they haven’t spent all the aid they’ve received so far. States, however, have good reasons not to spend all of that aid just yet. And, in any case, they’ll need far more to address their extraordinary shortfalls and avoid further layoffs and other cuts that would hamper an economic recovery.
Business closures and lost income and jobs — including some 1.5 million furloughs and layoffs of state and local workers — have severely shrunk states’ sales and income tax revenues. All 39 states (plus the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico) that have released new revenue projections are reporting shortfalls, generally very large ones. Nationwide, we estimate, these shortfalls total about $615 billion over the next three fiscal years, not including the added costs of fighting COVID-19.
The federal aid to states thus far includes only about $70 billion to address these revenue losses. That’s far too little to help states avoid layoffs and impose school funding and other cuts that would harm families and communities while making the recession worse and delaying a recovery. States undoubtedly will spend all of that aid and still fall far short of meeting needs....

Good Reasons Why States Haven’t Yet Spent All Coronavirus Relief Funds
Michael Leachman | Vice President for State Fiscal Policy at CBPP

No More Free-Lunch Bailouts — Mariana Mazzucato

With governments spending on a massive scale to save industries and mitigate the economic fallout from COVID-19, they should be positioning their economies for a more sustainable future. Fortunately, far from remaining taboo, using state aid to change private-sector behavior has become common sense.
Managed capitalism for public purpose versus neoliberalism as government favoring capital accumulation and preservation for unlimited growth and expecting "trickle down."

Project Syndicate
No More Free-Lunch Bailouts
Mariana Mazzucato | RM Phillips chair in the Economics of Innovation at SPRU in the University of Sussex

Bill Mitchell – The British government did not approach insolvency in March 2020

Insolvency is a corporate term which refers to a situation where a company is unable to pay contractual liabilities when they become due. From a balance sheet perspective, it means that the assets are valued below the liabilities. The term cannot be applied to a national government that does not issue liabilities in foreign currencies. Such a government can always meet its nominal liabilities irrespective of institutional arrangements it might have put in place to create contingent flows of numbers from one ‘box’ (account) to another ‘box’. Those arrangements do not override the intrinsic capacity of the legislator. So when the British press went crazy the other day reporting comments made by the Bank of England governor that the British government was on the cusp of insolvency, they did the British public a disservice. Donald Trump would have been finally justified in accusing the media of pushing out ‘fake’ news....
Bill Mitchell – billy blog
The British government did not approach insolvency in March 2020
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

Why government deficits don't matter — Alan Kohler interviews Stephanie Kelton

Alan Kohler sits down with Professor Stephanie Kelton, author of the NYT Bestseller 'The Deficit Myth: Modern Monetary Theory and the Birth of the People’s Economy' to take a deep dive into modern monetary theory and why inflation, not deficits themselves, are evidence of overspending, the idea of a job guarantee, plus much more. 
Eureka Report
Why government deficits don't matter
Alan Kohler interviews Stephanie Kelton

Wednesday, June 24, 2020

U.S. records highest single-day total of new coronavirus cases — Catherine Garcia


Doesn't bode well for a V-shaped recovery in the offing.

The Week
U.S. records highest single-day total of new coronavirus cases
Catherine Garcia

Zero Hedge — USA Plunges To 10th Place In World Competitiveness Rankings

For the second consecutive year, the US has been dethroned as the world's most competitive economy, thanks partially to President Trump's trade war. The US now ranks 10th (3rd in 2019), according to the Institute for Management Development's (IMD) new report on the ranking of most competitive world economies.
Trade war.

Zero Hedge — "A Crisis Like No Other": IMF Sees Even Deeper Global Recession, Warns Markets Disconnected From Reality

In the latest revision to the IMF's economic outlook published this morning, the fund warns that the world is facing "a crisis like no other", and now expects global growth to shrink -4.9% in 2020, 1.9% below the April 2020 forecast of -3.0%.
The COVID-19 pandemic has had a more negative impact on activity in the first half of 2020 than anticipated, the IMF said, adding that the recovery is projected to be more gradual than previously forecast. In 2021 global growth is projected at 5.4% down from 5.8%, a number which will also be revised lower, with China's expected 1.0% growth (down from 1.2%) the big wildcard....
Zero Hedge
"A Crisis Like No Other": IMF Sees Even Deeper Global Recession, Warns Markets Disconnected From Reality
Tyler Durden

Zero Hedge — As 3 US Carriers Patrol Western Pacific, Chinese Analysts Warn US-China Stumbling Toward War

No less than two new separate reports in The South China Morning Post are warning of a coming US-China military conflict, saying the prospect is now higher than ever given that amid a rising number of naval incidents, including a recent near-collision incident, communication channels used for deconfliction have fallen silent.
The observation is based in large part on new studies by China's National Institute for South China Sea showing a steep drop-off in intergovernmental communications channels between the two sides....
Zero Hedge
As 3 US Carriers Patrol Western Pacific, Chinese Analysts Warn US-China Stumbling Toward War
Tyler Durden

Also at Zero Hedge

Pentagon Produces List Of 20 Chinese Firms 'Backed By China's Military'

F-35 Stealth Jets "Elephant Walk" In Japan Amid Rising Sino-US Trade Tensions

See also

Politico
Trump national security adviser compares Xi Jinping to Josef Stalin
Daniel Lippman