top of page

Read this First 07/10/2020

SPLIT DECISION !!! The Supreme Court told Congress to go pack sand because their quest for Trumps financial records were political and had no legal merit. But, they decided that the NY Attorney General CAN pursue his case while Trump is still President. Although this is considered a "win" for Democrats its not likely the tax returns are made public prior to the November election.

I don't think this is any big deal for Trump because he will explain it away like he always does. I don't like the fact that a sitting President should have to deal with lawsuits or trials for things that aren't that serious. Misstating stuff on Tax documents leads to fines and penalties, not Prison. (Unless you don't pay. THEN they jail you). If there are murder or rape or some other major felony charges, then maybe. But, what happens now? If Biden wins can a Republican DA charge him and his son for Fraud in China and Ukraine and take up Biden's time defending that instead of running the Country? .. Go ahead and put your case together but they should have to wait until he is out of office to formally charge and indict a President for minor things... Just one man's opinion..

Another ruling as considered surprising and far reaching. The court sided with a Native American defendant saying that a VAST part of Oklahoma is still officially part of the "Creek Indian Nation" for crimes committed by Native Americans. The case involves the "MCA" (Major Crimes Act of 1885) and the ruling means that only the FEDERAL Government can prosecute crimes by Native Americans on the land. The dissent argued that the decision ignores the fact that the land does NOT actually belong to the Creek Indian Nation and that it could cause hundred of other state and local convictions to be thrown out.. Justice Roberts argued that it is "well settled precedent" that when Oklahoma became a State in 1907 their Statehood and Constitution should prevail. Congress will have to act in order to clarify the rules but for now, the MCA holds....

Hong Kong has re-imposed many restrictions after a spike in COVID-19 cases. Schools have been shut after 38 new cases of the virus were reported Friday. Compare that to 10,000 new cases Tuesday in TEXAS. But, you know, EVERYTHING is bigger in Texas ..

YOU'RE RACIST .. no YOU'RE RACIST !!! No No No... YOU are Racist. Am I confusing you? Well, Oregon politician Jonathon Lopez released a racist letter he received while running for County Commissioner and was OUTRAGED. Lopez railed against the racists in the area that didn't want any of "us Mexicans" in public office. There is ONE kinda BIG problem. Investigators found out that Lopez sent the letter to himself. OOPS !!! Sad part is that it didn't even work. He lost .. Sadder part is that he should be prosecuted.. but won't, I'm sure..

While we are on ridiculous stories about racism coming out of the Pacific Northwest...Let's go back to Seattle.. this story is REALLY hard to believe.. But, I assure you.. it is being well documented out there in Social Media land.... White Employees at the Seattle Capital (you know, the one where they had the CHAZ country) were summoned to a meeting.

The two and a half hour meeting called “Training on Internalized Racial Superiority for White People.” looked to force white people to "Undo their whiteness" and be "held accountable by people of color". Handouts included papers with bullet points, "racism may not be my fault, but it's my problem" and told white employees they are expected to give up "comfort and physical safety" and "the certainty of your job" and give up "accepting jobs or promotions"

They defined, “Internalized Racial Superiority,” as perfectionism, individualism, imposition, arrogance, paternalism, silence, intellectualization, control, violence, comfort, appropriation, cognitive dissonance, objectivity and “anti-blackness.”.. Uhh.. WOW..

Federal Prosecutors had better get to Seattle quickly. This "meeting" or attempted indoctrination is certainly a crime. Attempting to force certain employees to do things and discriminate them "on the basis of their race or sex" is WAYYYYY outta bounds. Just ask Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg about it. "On the Basis of Sex" is the name of her movie ..

In NYC: I am going to say it again. GET OUT while you can.. Retirement requests at the NYPD had to be temporarily halted after a 400% increase this week. Say this out loud with me: FOUR.... HUNDRED .. PERCENT !!!! .. The Mayor is an idiot, the Police are despondent and getting de-funded, and crime and murders are spiking. This is NOT "Progress" this is insanity ... and while that is happening...

Over on 5th Avenue Mayor deblasidiot helped paint the Black Lives Matter letters on 5th Avenue in front of Trump Tower. The obvious swipe at President Trump drew a response from Trump that "deblasidiot hates cops and is defunding them and wasting money on defacing a prominent NYC street....". Moron deblasidiot retorted that "black people built this street and were never fairly compensated" ummmm.. Uhhh.. I know you are too stupid to read, Mayor .. but maybe buy history book and have someone read it to you. ... IRISH immigrants predominantly, "BUILT" the roads, tunnels, buildings and bridges of NYC in the 1800's and 1900's.... Go look it up, Moron. Should the ancestors of those IRISH people send you a bill, Mayor??

In Da Swamp: VP Joe Biden announced his "economic" plan yesterday and it looks.. well.. A LOT like Trumps plan. The main differences are that he would RAISE corporate taxes and...so he says.. force the "wealthy to pay their fair share" Ummm Yah.. Well Joe, you have no clue how the tax code works so I'm not sure how you're gonna do that.. (and obviously you have no plan because you don't say what you're gonna do. Another fake campaign pledge to get Bernie Voters on board). .. Pushing for more American jobs and manufacturing jobs should help him in swing states like PA and Michigan.. but..there is ONE big problem with what happened...

Joe read the script and refused to answer any questions from reporters. His "handlers" are trying to keep the gaffe count down. They are planning a virtual convention and trying to avoid debates with Trump.

In you live in the Northeast you may be meeting "Fay" this weekend. Tropical Storm Fay looks like it's gonna dump rain with potential flooding from NY to Maine. So, stock up on water, toilet paper, food, and.. Tito's ...

SPORTS: GOLF: Colin Morikawa leads after one round of the Workday Charity Classic at Muirfield in Ohio. Course looks great. Still kinda odd with no fans .. also.. Tiger Woods committed to playing next week at the Memorial. Not a surprise .. but should be good for ratings..

NHL: The NJ Devils hire veteran coach, Lindy Ruff as their head coach. Ruff had great success in Buffalo and was most recently an assistant with the NY Rangers..

NBA: Players said goodbye to Wives and Girlfriends and entered, "The Bubble" at Disney World. If their team does well, a player will be "stuck" with his team in their "bubble" hotel in Disney for 35 days up to 3 months!! I wonder why they didn't let the wives and girlfriends take tests and stay with them? I know that might seem like it doubles the chance of an infection but if they are all in the same place, same hotel, same arenas, same food etc, wouldn't that be OK?

Did you guys see that? Three actual SPORTS stories.. are Sports REALLY coming back? or is this a tease? They play for a few weeks then go back in lockdown???

CELEBRIDIOTS:

"GLEE" star Naya Rivera drown in a California lake while swimming with her 4 year old. Her son said to authorities that they went swimming and she never came back to the boat.. Officially, she is still "missing" but they looked all day and found nothing..

In one of the more arrogant, indecent and just plain WRONG moves I have seen in a while, the Band "Lady Antebellum" is now SUING the singer, "Lady A". Antebellum wanted to "GET WOKE" so they dropped the Civil War reference "Antebellum" and want to be called, "Lady A". The REAL Lady A is Anita White and has been performing for over a decade using that name. But these pompous-azz-smug jerk-faces have decided they will TAKE her name because she refused to "cut a deal" with them. Actually, she wanted $10 Million. Which is a bit much... another route?? ...

How about PICK ANOTHER NAME!!!??? .. How about Lady ARROGANT and you can be LA .. then sue Los Angeles.. or maybe Arrogant Antebellum and be "AA" and sue a bunch of alcoholics. .. I for one will be turning off the radio if their music ever comes on..

Federal Agents have take Jizz Maxwells clothes and sheets to "make sure" she doesn't use them to hang herself. She will now wear paper clothes until her arraignment. She has to be MISERABLE... which I'm sure is what they want.. she's more likely to "talk" and cut a deal..

and.. the WINNER of the voting for "Which ex involved in psycho Johnny Depp's trial is hottest/craziest" is .... drum roll ..... Vanessa Paradis !!! Congrats, Vanessa!!! Take a victory lap !!! ..HERE .... Oh.. no.. Wait ... that's Lily Rose .. her 21 year old smoke show daughter. Congrats on that, too Vanessa.... but HERE is Vanessa..

From Seekingalpha.com

The tech-heavy Nasdaq on Thursday closed at a new all-time high led by gains from Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) and Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN), while the Dow and S&P 500 closed lower on disappointing earnings from Walgreens (NASDAQ:WBA). While U.S. stock index futures are all inching lower premarket, the same pattern is being seen as the Dow and S&P 500 lead losses at 0.5% and the Nasdaq behind at 0.2%. "The cyclical story is on hold for now," Allianz Global Investors' Mona Mahajan declared, as money flows back into stay-at-home plays. "It's not dead forever," she added. "There are a few things that could reignite it," like evidence virus cases have peaked, a vaccine or a resolution to the November presidential election.

"While the oil market has undoubtedly made progress... the large, and in some countries, an accelerating number of COVID-19 cases is a disturbing reminder that the pandemic is not under control and is casting a shadow over the outlook," the IEA wrote in its closely watched monthly report. While global oil demand in the first half of 2020 plunged by 10.75M barrels a day, down roughly 11% Y/Y, the agency forecast oil demand would be down by 5.1M bpd in the second half. This means global oil demand this year will average 92.1M barrels per day, down by 7.9M bpd versus 2019, a slightly smaller decline than forecast in the last report.

Investors are also set to get a glimpse of the coming earnings season as Carnival (NYSE:CCL) reports Q2 results this morning against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic. Like many of its peers, the company has already borrowed heavily and raised money to stay afloat as most of its voyages were canceled due to coronavirus restrictions. The world's largest cruise operator will also likely discuss the future and its plans to sail again as COVID-19 cases spike. Yesterday, AIDA Cruises, Germany's leading cruise line and a part of Carnival, announced that three of its ships will restart sailing in August.

Following an increase in COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations in various parts of the country, Starbucks (NASDAQ:SBUX) is requiring customers to wear facial coverings at all company-owned locations from July 15. The coffee chain joins a long list of companies that require masks, including Costco (NASDAQ:COST) and major airlines. Earlier this week, the Retail Industry Leaders Association asked governors to require consumers not affected by a medical condition to wear masks when shopping or in public spaces.

Tyson Foods (NYSE:TSN), the biggest U.S. meat company by sales, currently relies on about 122K workers to churn out about 20% of chicken, beef and pork produced in the U.S. That's changing after the coronavirus pandemic showed supply chain vulnerabilities. The company is now pushing further into robotics, developing an automated deboning system destined to handle some of the roughly 39M chickens it processes each week. At Pilgrim's Pride (NASDAQ:PPC), the second largest U.S. chicken processor, deboning machines now trail humans by only 1% to 1.5% in terms of meat yield per chicken.

The U.S. is expected to announce actions today against France over its digital services tax, but will suspend them while France defers the collections from U.S. technology firms. The steps are tied to a U.S. Section 301 probe into the foreign tax, which Washington says discriminates against U.S. tech giants like Google (GOOG, GOOGL), Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Facebook (NASDAQ:FB). The Trump administration also plans to finalize regulations this week that will bar the U.S. government from buying goods or services from any company that uses products from five Chinese firms, including Huawei, Hikvision, Dahua (OTCPK:DHUA), Hytera and ZTE Corp. (OTCPK:ZTCOY).

On June 26, Amazon (AMZN) announced a $1.3B deal to acquire startup Zoox, which is set on designing a fully autonomous vehicle from scratch rather than retrofitting existing cars. The problem? Amazon needs to keep talent on board to make the deal worth it. It's planning at least $100M in stock awards to retain Zoox's 900+ employees, and can walk away from the deal if large numbers of them turn down the offers. The Information already reported last week that two senior Zoox engineers, James Philbin and Marc Wimmershoff, joined rival Alphabet's (GOOG, GOOGL) self-driving unit Waymo, and Reuters revealed that GM's (NYSE:GM) Cruise stepped in to offer $1.05B for Zoox after the latter signed an exclusive agreement to negotiate with Amazon. Go deeper: Flash back to the infamous case of Anthony Levandowski.

Tenino, a town of fewer than 2,000 people in Washington state, has begun printing its own wooden currency to help residents and businesses through the coronavirus crisis. There's some history here: In 1931, civic leaders printed local wooden banknotes to restore consumer confidence after the town's bank failed during the Great Depression. Current Tenino residents, who have documented loss of income due to the pandemic, are eligible for up to $300 a month, while nearly all businesses in the town are accepting the local $25 bills (which can be redeemed at city hall). "A federal program dumps money from the top and these blue-chip companies steal it all," said Mayor Wayne Fournier. "If we do it from the ground up, there's no stealing. It's a direct ballast to Main Street."

What else is happening...

TikTok (BDNCE) is no longer available in Hong Kong.

Sony (NYSE:SNE) invests $250M in 'Fortnite' maker Epic Games.

United Airlines (NASDAQ:UAL), pilots union reach tentative agreements.

Reports suggest Coinbase (COIN) is headed for stock market listing.

Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) poised to electrify S&P 500 - Reuters.

Thursday's Key Earnings

Today's Markets

In Asia, Japan -1.1%. Hong Kong -1.8%. China -2%. India -0.4%. In Europe, at midday, London +0.3%. Paris +0.1%. Frankfurt +0.1%. Futures at 6:20, Dow -0.5%. S&P -0.5%. Nasdaq -0.2%. Crude -2.4% to $38.69. Gold +0.5% to $1812.90. Ten-year Treasury Yield -2 bps to 0.57%

Today's Economic Calendar


Regards,

Roger “Raj” Searing rajsearing@gmail.com "Raj Searing™”, "Read this First™", "@rajsearing™", "TheRantRoom™" and “TheRantroom.com™” are Trademarks of RRRAJ, LLC. All Rights Reserved-2003.

DISCLAIMER:

This RANT is intended SOLELY as Commentary, Satire and/or Social Criticism and is for ENTERTAINMENT. Content in this RANT is based on PUBLICLY AVAILABLE INFORMATION and is purely the OPINION of the writer. It is NOT intended to be relied on as fact. Sometimes I get drunk and make stuff up. Some of this information is garnered from well respected news sources and some is not. As Raj puts it: "If you cannot tell that most of this Rant is just my opinion then you are too stupid to be reading it!!!!

Stop before you hurt yourself! "

The Rant is inspired by how I feel that day, what I ate for dinner the night before, who is pissing me off, what I find entertaining, and information I sometimes get from: Bloomberg,1010WINS, Foxnews.com, CNN.com, ABCNews.com, CNBC.com and another dozen random news ".coms", The NY Post, The Asbury Park Press, The Drudge Report, The Daily Mirror, The Independent, The Standard, MSN, AOL, The Daily Beast, Breitbart, Wall Street Journal, Barstool Sports, Bleacher Report, CNBC, Various Analysts at brokerage firms, SeekingAlpha, Twitter, Instagram, PopSugar, Harpers, Washington Times, al Jazeera, The Washington Post, The Financial Times, Reuters, Maxim, RT News, Eonline,Vanity Fair, Politico, The Sun, The Daily Mail, The Guardian, Pravda, Forbes, Money, GQ, Men’s Health, YahooNews.com TMZ, ESPN.go.com, Golf Digest, and the Victoria Secret Catalogue.


This email is for entertainment only. We disclaim any and all responsibility for damages of any kind arising out of use, reference to, or reliance on any of this information that we already told you is worthless. If it gets forwarded out we have no control over where it ends up and are not responsible for the content of any site it may end up on. We try to remain free of viruses and all other diseases that can hurt computers but we do not warranty that…especially if someone forwards it to you. Action figures are sold separately and batteries are not included. If you choose to share this information with people that have no sense of humor you are advised to stand back at least 6 feet. If you receive this rant stapled to other papers do not put in the microwave. Please drink responsibly.




18 views
bottom of page