What the H*ll is WRONG with our criminal justice system??? .. Yes, I know that's a three hour discussion.. but.. Have you read about these three guys in Florida went fishing and ended up being murdered? They were shot dead on a normal fishing trip. When I first saw the headline a few days back I passed on it for the Rant because it seemed a little questionable. Like maybe the boys were up to no good. Nope. Turns out that wasn't the case.
Polk County Sheriff, Grady Judd has arrested three people in connection with the murders and, get this, the ringleader has 230 FELONIES on his record. TWO HUNDRED AND THIRTY... "He's a thug, he's a criminal. He is pure evil in the flesh" Sheriff Judd said. The guy has been charged with three counts of first-degree murder, tampering with evidence, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon and possession of ammunition by a convicted felon. His girlfriend and brother are also charged in he murders. How the H*LL is this man on the streets? Reporters asked the Sheriff that very question and he said, "I have no idea".
Who is the judge or parole officer that let him out?? THAT is a guy/girl that deserves to be exposed !!! This guy has been committing violent crime since he was 12 !! WHO let him out????
"I stand with you !!" --- BOOOOOOO!!! RESIGN !!! .. Portland Mayor, Ted Wheeler, "joined" the protests in Portland, Oregon last night and demanded the Federal forces leave. Wheeler was roundly booed and had stuff thrown at him by the protestors. When the crowd refused to disperse he was tear gassed along with the rest of them. Unlike ANY of the rioters/protestors, Wheeler had a security team around him that scuffled with protestors. Federal forces are legally only allowed if requested by state officials. However, these Federal police are there protecting Federal buildings and landmarks that are being set on fire or destroyed by rioters.
A new tactic of the radical left rioters is to dress a bunch of people up in yellow shirts that say, "MOM" on them in black magic marker. These "moms" stand in a line between police and rioters to "protect" them from police. (You get it right? Now, the police aren't forcing back thugs and rioters, they are forcing back "MOMS") .. If you read an article in the Loser Media about this take a close look at the "Moms". The group in Oregon was about half biological males "identifying" as mothers..
Where's Bad Bad Leroy Brown when you need him??? SOMEONE has to get the South Side of Chicago under control. In addition to all the shootings and murders they are now experiencing a rash of car jackings...by ARMED 10-YEAR OLDS !!! A group of boys 10-15 years old have been jacking cars and point guns in people's faces. Where are the parents????
A day after The State Department ordered the closing of the Chinese Consulate in Houston the attention turns to San Francisco. Fugitive Chinese scientist Juan Tang is hiding in the San Francisco Chinese consulate. She worked at the University of California, Davis. She is wanted by Federal officials because she lied on her visa application saying she was a civilian when she is in the Chinese Military. The US claims she was stealing secrets during research with other scientists. Tang claims she is NOT in the military and the photos of her in China in military uniforms are real but she did not know they were military uniforms. (Oh Geez.. LIE BETTER, GIRL !!!) ..
COVID Update: The spikes in Texas and Florida are subsiding (at least for now) but California is discussing a second "lock down" as they overtake NY with the most cases at 409,000. Again, I do NOT want to downplay the severity of the situation. But, make sure you read the Loser Media reports and so called "quotes". They like using terms like "overwhelmed" to scare you.. . But look carefully, the statements with overwhelmed are like this: "If the trajectory of new cases continues our ICUs will be overwhelmed" in Texas.. and things like "nearly overwhelmed" from Rancho Mirage California.... Well.. The "If" in Texas didn't happen. They leveled off .. and if you "nearly" win the lottery because you have 4 of 5 numbers .. is that "overwhelming" ?? or is that just "whelming" ??
The doctors and hospitals are getting WAY better at treating patients and sending them home quicker. Does this surge in Covid cases stretch hospital resources? YUP.. Does it delay treatment of some other sick people? Yup. Would it be better if it never existed? Yup. Should we live every day of our lives in a state of constant panic over it? NO!!! .. Wear a mask. Wash your hands. Don't sneeze on old people .. Now, go LIVE ...
In Da Swamp: President Trump has vowed to send Federal law enforcement to several large cities to stop the bloodshed. His legal power is limited in this situation. Federal law enforcement can protect Federal buildings and enforce Federal law but cannot "aid" local police or enforce local or state law unless requested.
Of course, the Mayors of the cities with the violence and crime epidemics do not want the Federal forces and are calling this a political stunt. It might be political, but NYC has seen a 24% increase in murders and a 220% increase in shootings, Chicago's mess is documented in the Rant regularly (including the wonderful new carjacking teenagers) and Portland has had riots nightly for two months. Why is the Loser Press not covering the regular citizens? The ones that can't leave their homes because they are afraid? The VICTIMS of the shootings and murders? .. and...
SPORTS:
MLB: The LA Dodgers are about to sign Mookie Betts to a 13 year $380 Million contract. I've seen him play. He is great. He is talented. But, these long term deals are almost ALWAYS a mistake for the club...
Astros Pitching Coach, Brent Storm, went out to have a meeting on the mound with his pitcher. Storm put his hand over his mouth as he spoke so that the other team could not lip read... but... he was wearing a MASK already. AHAHHAH... Old habits die hard...Of course, social media was kind to him over this minor faux pax... Yeah.. Sure..
GOLF: Round One of the 3M Open from Blaine, MN today .. and the Euros are in action with the British Masters hosted by Lee Westwood.
CELEBRIDIOTS:
I gotta tell you.. I know he is a little off the rails because he is bipolar .. But.. Kanye West is CRACKING ME UP !!! ..He keeps putting out tweets and then erasing them .. He said he's been trying to divorce his wife, Skank #2, for a while.. then deleted it.. Then he called his mother-in-law "Kris Jong Un" AHAHHAHAH..
Sara Sampaiao is showing off her new bikini sending out photos from "Beautiful Arizona" .. HERE.. ..SARA !!!!! We're agreed to isolate until there was a vaccine !!! You're supposed to be in the basement or the pool. What were you thinking getting on a plane !!! .. and gimme my hat back !!!!
She won't be rocking the orange jumpsuit but Bar Rafaeli ..HERE...was convicted in Israel of tax evasion. While Bar made big money as a model around the world she did not pay taxes in her home country of Israel. They didn't like that .. She got no jail time but will have to pay her back taxes and a $730,000 fine and do 9 months of community service.. I don't mind the conviction. I like the bad girls.. But, You're still my second favorite Israeli. Gal Gadot .. HERE ...is #1 !!!
From Seekingalpha.com
Tesla is up another 5.3% to $1,677 in premarket trade after posting its fourth consecutive quarter of profit, opening the door for the company's inclusion in the S&P 500. Adjusted for one-time items, Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) earned $2.18 a share, swinging from an adjusted loss of $1.12 a share a year ago, while sales fell 5% to $6.04B. On the earnings call, Elon Musk announced that Tesla will build its next "massive" factory near Austin, Texas, which will produce the Cybertruck, a pickup truck and the Tesla Semi, as well as the Model 3 and Y for the East Coast. He also talked up the development of the autonomous driving program, promising more developments by the end of 2020.
Despite fiscal Q4 results that were largely positive, shares of Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) fell as much as 3% in AH trading on Wednesday. The software giant easily beat analyst estimates, reporting a net profit of $11.2B and revenue that rose 13% to $38B. Traders may have been looking for more. The company's cloud computing operation saw sales growth under 50% for the first time, while transactional license purchasing continued to slow and subsidiary LinkedIn was negatively impacted by the weak job market.
Traders are barely digesting the high-profile results from Tesla (TSLA) and Microsoft (MSFT) before the next round of earnings make headlines. Dow and S&P 500 futures are ahead by 0.4%, while the Nasdaq advanced 0.9%, ahead of figures from Twitter (NYSE:TWTR), AT&T (NYSE:T) and Intel (NASDAQ:INTC), as well as American (NASDAQ:AAL) and Southwest Airlines (NYSE:LUV). Weekly jobless claims are also on the radar. Another 1.3M American workers are expected to have filed for first-time benefits during the week ended July 18, bringing that total to 52.58M since coronavirus lockdowns began in mid-March.
Senate Republicans have "reached a fundamental agreement" with White House negotiators Steven Mnuchin and Mark Meadows on how to move forward with the next coronavirus relief bill. What's in the proposal? Another round of direct stimulus payments, $16B for coronavirus testing, $105B for K-12 education, colleges and universities, though there was no agreement on a payroll tax cut. The plan, set to be unveiled today, will serve as a starting point for negotiations with Democrats, who have passed a $3.4T bill in the House. Lawmakers are also racing to reach a deal on the $600 weekly supplement to unemployment benefits that's due to expire on July 31.
With the coronavirus pandemic weighing heavily on Europe's economy, the EU is now arguing that softer rules on the finance industry are needed to help the recovery. The bloc is planning to loosen a key plank of MiFID II that forces investors to pay banks and brokerages for research separately from their trading fees. The proposal also trims investor protection rules like record keeping and disclosure requirements primarily focused on professional investors. Over in the U.S., the SEC has proposed raising the Form 13F reporting threshold and voted to regulate proxy advisers more closely, while a new U.S. derivatives rule is set to complete Dodd-Frank.
Warren Buffett scooped up 34M shares of Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) over the last few days - at an average price of about $24 - taking his stake in the banking giant to over 11% (from about 7.4%). Big discount? The Oracle spent the $816M after BAC shares plunged nearly 32% since the beginning of the year. Buffett has been criticized in recent weeks over failing to deploy Berkshire Hathaway's (BRK.A, BRK.B) enormous cash hoard, which climbed to $137B in Q1. BAC +1.6% premarket.
There was big news from India overnight as Amazon Pay (NASDAQ:AMZN) partnered with private firm Acko General Insurance to offer car and motorcycle insurance. It's the e-commerce giant's first market for the service, where it will compete with local rivals including Paytm and Policybazaar. Amazon is moving fast to become a full-fledged financial services platform, with Amazon Pay supporting a range of payments services, including the popular UPI, and debit and credit cards. Meanwhile, India's Flipkart (FPKT) announced it would acquire parent Walmart's (NYSE:WMT) local cash-and-carry business, attempting to strengthen its wholesale offering to compete better with Amazon.
The hackers who took over prominent accounts on Twitter (TWTR) last week were able to access direct messages. "We believe that for up to 36 of the 130 targeted accounts, the attackers accessed the DM inbox, including 1 elected official in the Netherlands," the company said in its latest update. While many of the high-profile hacked accounts tweeted a scam asking for bitcoin, an analysis of transactions showed that the scheme only collected $121,000. Direct messages, however, could be used or publicized by hackers at a later point in the future. Go deeper: The cyber attack will likely be discussed this morning as Twitter reports earnings.
What else is happening...
U.S. may label Switzerland a currency manipulator.
Pfizer (NYSE:PFE), BioNTech (NASDAQ:BNTX) ink vaccine deal with U.S. government.
Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) defends its 30% App Store fee from antitrust scrutiny.
Wednesday's Key Earnings
Chipotle (NYSE:CMG) -1.3% AH reporting comparable sales decline of 9.8%. Kinder Morgan (NYSE:KMI) -3.1% AH as demand drop hit pipeline volumes. Las Vegas Sands (NYSE:LVS) -0.6% AH posting a 51% plunge in Q2 revenue. Microsoft (MSFT) -2.5% AH on decelerating cloud sales growth. Spirit Airlines (NYSE:SAVE) +2.3% following mixed results. Tesla (TSLA) +6.2% AH after fourth straight quarter of profitability.
Today's Markets
In Asia, Japan closed. Hong Kong +0.8%. China -0.2%. India +0.7%. In Europe, at midday, London +0.6%. Paris +0.4%. Frankfurt +0.5%. Futures at 6:20, Dow +0.4%. S&P +0.4%. Nasdaq +0.9%. Crude +0.1% to $4194. Gold +0.8% to $1880.20. . Ten-year Treasury Yield flat at 0.59%
Today's Economic Calendar
8:30 Initial Jobless Claims 10:00 Leading Indicators 10:30 EIA Natural Gas Inventory 11:00 Kansas City Fed Mfg Survey 4:30 PM Money Supply 4:30 PM Fed Balance Sheet
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.
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