November 6: Daily Contrarian Reads

The Synchronized Global Growth Meme—It’s Not All That

It became a staple of mainstream analysis because it was easy and non-specific. And in many ways it has become so again, in 2017 perhaps even to that much more of an impressive (sounding) degree. This time around not only is “global growth” supposedly picking up, it is doing so in synchronized fashion. Being applied to Japan again and more so China, it’s the first time in seven or perhaps ten years, apparently, that this has happened – therefore we are meant to be very impressed by it even if it still remains undefined.

The Great College Loan Swindle

Americans don’t understand the student-loan crisis because they’ve been trained to view the issue in terms of a series of separate, unrelated problems. They will read in one place that as of the summer of 2017, a record 8.5 million Americans are in default on their student debt, with about $1.3 trillion in loans still outstanding…….But the separateness of these stories clouds the unifying issue underneath: The education industry as a whole is a con. In fact, since the mortgage business blew up in 2008, education and student debt is probably our reigning unexposed nation-wide scam.

Red Ponzi Cracking—- Why The Chinese Government Bond Yields Are Soaring

Catching sight of a chain reaction in China’s markets is rare. Carrying out a postmortem of a recent selloff in China’s $9 trillion bond market shows how it is becoming harder for Beijing to untangle its increasingly intertwined financial system.

Tales From The Swamp-O-Rama

What America might want to know right now is: how come Hillary Clinton doesn’t have any legal problems? Why aren’t DOJ investigators examining the financial records of the Clinton Foundation? You would think somebody would want to find out how over $120 million of Russian “charitable donations” ended up on its ledgers around the time that Secretary of State HRC approved the Uranium One deal — compared to which, Bill Clinton’s $500,000 payment from a Russian bank for giving a speech around the same time just looks like walking-around money.

Here They Go Again—–Synthetic CDOs May Reach $100 Billion This Year Or 5X 2015

The comeback in complex credit derivatives blamed for exacerbating the global financial crisis is picking up pace. That’s according to new research this week from Citigroup Inc., one of the biggest arrangers of so-called synthetic collateralized debt obligations. Sales of the products may jump to as much as $100 billion this year from about $20 billion in 2015, Citigroup analysts wrote in an Oct. 31 report.

Malls and their Hapless Investors Keep Getting Crushed

……But late Thursday, mall investors got another unneeded wake-up call.CBL Properties, a mall REIT with 119 mostly retail-oriented properties, reported earnings, and shares plunged 26% on Friday, to $5.92. They’d already been dropping for years because the brick-and-mortar retail meltdown is structural, and not new, and will not turn around before it’s finished melting down. Shares of CBL are down 50% year-to-date and 75% from May 2013.

 The New French Foreign Legion In Africa—–Washington Style

US troops have now stepped into the boots of ‘La Legion.’  Almost unnoticed, US Special Forces – our version of the Legion – have been slipping into Africa, the newest and most exciting market for the Pentagon. Creation of the new US Africa Command in 2007, with headquarters in Germany, was discreet but it signaled active US military and geopolitical interest in resource-rich Africa, a key target of Chinese interest.  No one in Washington seems to know how many US troops operate in Africa, but it’s at least 12,000 not counting mercenary contractors and CIA units.  There was consternation in Congress when these facts emerged last week.

Trick or Treat: One Year Later, Is Trump a Blessing or a Curse to the Deep State?

Here’s the question I pose to you: has Donald Trump been a blessing or a curse to the architects of the American police state? One thing is for sure: a year into his presidency, Trump hasn’t done much to improve the lot of the American people. The predators of the police state are still wreaking havoc on our freedoms, our communities, and our lives. The government still doesn’t listen to the citizenry, it still refuses to abide by the Constitution, which is our rule of law, and it still treats the citizenry as a source of funding and little else.

The Cunningness of the CIA’s JFK Assassination Cover-Up

Whatever else might be said about the assassination of President Kennedy, one thing is for sure: The cover-up of this particular U.S. regime-change operation was one of the most ingenious and cunning plots ever designed. This shouldn’t surprise anyone, given that practically from its inception in 1947 the CIA was specializing in the arts of assassination, regime change, and cover-up.

The War On Terror Has Cost $250 Million A Day For 16 Years

American taxpayers have spent $1.46 trillion on wars abroad since September 11, 2001. The Department of Defense periodically releases a “cost of war” report. The newly released version, obtained by the Federation of American Scientists Secrecy News blog, covers the time from the September 11th terrorist attacks through mid-2017.